And after a few minutes Clodagh followed her example, though she was no longer sleepy. But something--a vague feeling of slight shyness--made her do so, for she was conscious of her opposite neighbour's scrutiny. Now and then from the depths of the quaint black bonnet she caught the gleam of dark bright eyes, and the sensation caused her cheeks to grow pink again. "Who and what can she be?" the girl said to herself. "She certainly looks like a peasant, but her voice--her expressions--her dignity belie it," and thus puzzling over the anomaly, Clodagh after all fell asleep. Now I must mention what may seem strange and most improbable. You will remember the description given to the young traveller only an hour or two before the coach stopped at the turnpike, of the old lady in the neighbourhood, concerning whom such curious and even uncanny things were said? Yes--well, this is the strange fact. Though Clodagh was at once impressed in an unusual way by the personality of their fellow-traveller, and perplexed to explain her inconsistencies, never once during the day's journey did it occur to her to put "two and two together"; to guess, as no doubt you, children, who are reading this little old story, will already have done, that here in person was the mysterious lady of the landlady's legend--the being who, if not actually of fairy race herself, still had much in common with the "good people," and doubtless dealings with them. But so it happened with Clodagh, and afterwards--not a long-delayed afterwards either, as you will hear--she felt quite unable to explain her own forgetfulness, or "stupidity" as she called it. In the meantime what occurred was this. She slept and Paulina slept on uninterruptedly till the coach drew up at Oddingstowe. And when it did so, and the clatter over the cobble-stones of the old inn's courtyard aroused them, lo and behold, they were alone! The strange new-comer had disappeared. The whole episode might have been a dream, only that rarely, if ever, do any two people dream the same and at the same time. Paulina stared. "She's gone," she exclaimed. "Yes," said her cousin, feeling very much inclined to add, "You needn't have been so rude to her." "I never felt or heard the coach stop to let her get out," added the elder girl. "Nor did I," said Clodagh, "only----" "Only what?" "Nothing. I was dreaming, I suppose. But I have a misty recollection of hearing some one say, almost in a whisper, 'Good-bye for the present, my dear. We shall meet again.'" "I hope not," said Paulina, with a slight shudder. "Clodagh, you don't think possibly she's a witch?" Clodagh's spirit of mischief inclined her to frighten her cousin a little, but she refrained.