There was no escape now. Dale had to blurt out the fatal word: "Hereford!" "Are you sure?" "Yes, my lord. I'm goin' there with his lordship's portmanteaux." The head of the Fitzroy clan turned to Simmonds again. "Will you drive me to Gloucester?" he asked. "No, my lord. I'm under contract to remain in Bristol five days." "Very well. Stop in Bristol, and be d----d to you. Is there any reason why you should not take me to pick up my son's belongings? Then Dale and I can go to Hereford by train. Viscount Medenham is devilish particular about his linen. If I stick to his shirts I shall meet him sometime to-day, I suppose." Simmonds sought Dale's counsel by an underlook, but that hapless sportsman could offer no suggestion, so the other made the best of a bad business. "I'll do that, of course, my lord," he said with alacrity. "Just grab his lordship's dressing-case from that porter and shove it inside," he went on, eying Dale fiercely, well knowing that the whole collapse arose from a cause but too easily traced. "No, no," broke in the Earl, whose magisterial experiences had taught him the wisdom of keeping witnesses apart, "Dale comes with me. I want to sift this business thoroughly. Put the case in front. We can pile the other luggage on top of it. Now, Dale, jump inside. Your friend knows where to go, I expect." Thus did two bizarre elements intrude themselves into the natural order of things on that fine morning in the West of England. The very shortness of the road between Bristol and Bath apparently offered an insuperable obstacle to the passage of Simmonds's car along it, and some unknown "chap," whose "nevvy" had married the sister of a Beckhampton housemaid, became the predominating factor in a situation that affected the fortunes of several notable people. For his part, Lord Fairholme gave no further thought to Marigny. It did not even occur to him it might be advisable to call again at the College Green Hotel, since Medenham had slept elsewhere, and Hereford was now the goal. Certainly, the Frenchman's good fairy might have pushed her good offices to excess by permitting him to see, careering about Bristol with a pair of chauffeurs, the man whom he believed to be then on the way to London. But fairies are unreliable creatures, apt to be off with a hop, skip, and a jump, and, in any case, Marigny was writing explicit instructions to Devar, though he would have been far more profitably employed in lounging outside the hotel. So everybody was dissatisfied, more or less, the quaking Dale more, perhaps, than any, and the person who had absolutely no shadow of care on his soul was Medenham himself, at that moment guiding the Mercury along the splendid highway that connects Bristol with Gloucester--taking the run leisurely, too, lest Cynthia should miss one fleeting glimpse of the ever-changing beauties of the Severn estuary.