have a look at them mixed up in this odd and mysterious business of
life. Some apprehension of the odd affair that it was was characteristic
of Mark Sabre's habit of mind, increasingly with the years,--with
Mabel.


II

Penny Green--"picturesque, quaint if ever a place was", in garrulous Mr.
Hapgood's words--lies in a shallow depression, in shape like a narrow
meat dish. It runs east and west, and slightly tilted from north to
south. To the north the land slopes pleasantly upward in pasture and
orchards, and here was the site of the Penny Green Garden Home
Development Scheme. Beyond the site, a considerable area, stands
Northrepps, the seat of Lord Tybar. Lord Tybar sold the Development site
to the developers, and, as he signed the deed of conveyance, remarked in
his airy way, "Ah, nothing like exercise, gentlemen. That's made every
one of my ancestors turn in his grave." The developers tittered
respectfully as befits men who have landed a good thing.

Westward of Penny Green is Chovensbury; behind Tidborough the sun rises.

Viewed from the high eminence of Northrepps, Penny Green gave rather the
impression of having slipped, like a sliding dish, down the slope and
come to rest, slightly tilted, where its impetus had ceased. It was
certainly at rest: it had a restful air; and it had certainly slipped
out of the busier trafficking of its surrounding world, the main road
from Chovensbury to Tidborough, coming from greater cities even than
these and proceeding to greater, ran far above it, beyond Northrepps.
The main road rather slighted than acknowledged Penny Green by the