Next day he sailed on an Empress liner, and on the evening after he
reached England left the train at a lonely station in the North. It
was not yet dark, and for a moment or two he stood on the platform
looking about. There had been rain, and the air had a damp freshness
that was unusual in Canada. In the east and north the sky was covered
with leaden cloud, against which rounded hilltops were faintly marked.
Rugged moors rolled in long slopes towards the west, where the horizon
was flushed with vivid saffron and delicate green. Up the middle of
the foreground ran a deep valley, with blue shadow in its bottom and
touches of orange light on its heathy sides. There were few trees,
although a line of black firs ran boldly to the crest of a neighboring
rise, and stone dykes were more common than the ragged hedges. Foster
saw no plowed land, and nothing except heather seemed to grow on the
peaty soil, which looked black as jet where the railway cutting pierced
it. Indeed, he thought the landscape as savage and desolate as any he
had seen in Canada, but as he did not like tame country this had a
certain charm.

While he looked about a man came up. He was elderly and dressed with
extreme neatness in old-fashioned dark clothes, but he had the
unmistakable look of a gentleman's servant. Though there was a small
car in the road, he was obviously not a professional chauffeur.

"You'll be Mr. Foster, sir, for the Garth?" he said.

Foster said he was and the man resumed: "Mr. Featherstone sent the car
and his apologies. He had to attend the court, being a magistrate, and
hoped you would excuse his not coming."

Then he picked up Foster's portmanteau and called a porter, who was