The great scoops in the flank of the hill forced them to follow a circular route which lengthened their road. The hut seemed to stand always equally far ahead, and never to draw any nearer; nor had they much hope of finding either Clare or Lovel within it. Mr. Warrener, now that he had gained a few hours of experience, was beginning to share Calladine’s hopelessness; before they started, it had seemed comparatively simple an undertaking to go out and search and shout for Clare over the Downs. Now, although he called her name tentatively on approaching the hut, the quilted silence swallowed up the small echo of his voice. Yet it was a bell-like name to call, “Clare! Clare!” Calladine let Mr. Warrener go forward and peer into the hut, and he felt a sudden tenderness for the old man. “If,” he said to himself, “Clare should never return to me, Mr. Warrener and I must keep house together,” but the idea of Clare not returning gave him a pang which eclipsed the amenities of the prospect with Mr. Warrener, leading a scholar’s life, and he was ashamed of the glimpse that had opened out on to a life so congenial, so secure. Mr. Warrener turned in the doorway and beckoned. “They have been here,” he said. Calladine drew near and looked. Yes, they had been there. The hut was poor, a shepherd’s shelter, with a rough table arranged on a couple of boxes, and a thick pallet of bracken on the floor; warm enough, no doubt, and even snug, with the paraffin lamp burning and the door closed against the cold. Mr. Warrener and Calladine looked in silence. A horn mug stood on the table, beside a loaf of bread; two sugar-boxes served as stools. A couple of blankets were thrown over the bracken; a bag stuffed with bracken did for a pillow. There was nothing else. “My God,” said Calladine, staring at the pallet, “they lay there last night,--they lay there!” He looked round the pitiful cabin, and a groan was forced from him. “He brought her here!” he said, “and I who gave her everything she could desire,--comfort, even beauty, refinement....” He sat down and buried his face, and touched perhaps the bitterest moment he had yet gone through. “How much she must have loved him,” he said, raising a suddenly haggard face to Mr. Warrener. Mr. Warrener was deeply perturbed and distressed. Such things were altogether beyond his experience and understanding. “Hush,--don’t take it so much to heart,” he said, confused, but meaning to be kind, and he touched Calladine on the shoulder with a gesture singularly awkward. “Now let us think what is to be done. Shall we remain here, and trust to their return at nightfall? It is true that we could not, all four of us, spend the night in this hut, but probably Lovel knows the way,--he can take us all home safely.” “You seem to have a curious confidence in the fellow,” growled Calladine. Mr. Warrener blinked in his mild fashion.