"_Kind!_ I should think he was. Well, well!" And Dale stood nodding his head dolefully. Then he went away slowly and sadly, and he kept on nodding his head in the same doleful manner long after the door was shut--just on the chance that the servants might look out of the hail windows and see it before he vanished round the corner. He could think now, as well as he had ever done. It was of prime importance that no outsiders should ever learn that Everard Barradine had injured him. This guided him henceforth. It settled the course of his life there and then. He must return to Mavis; he must by his demeanor cover the intrigue--or so act that if people came to know of it, they would suppose either that he was ignorant of his shame or that he was a complaisant husband, taking advantage of the situation and pocketing all gifts from his wife's protector. No motive for the crime. That was his guide-post. In the night he got rid of the canvas suit and slouch hat. Next day he went home to Rodchurch Post Office, and, speaking to Mavis of Mr. Barradine's death, uttered that terrific blasphemy. "_It is the finger of God._" XXXI He acted his part well, and everything worked out easily--more easily than one could have dared to hope for. Not a soul was thinking about him. He had to assert himself, thrust himself forward, before people in the village would so much as notice that he had come back among them again. The inquest, as he gathered, was going to be a matter of form: it seemed doubtful if the authorities would even make an examination of the ground over there. All was to be as nice as nice for him. Yet he was afraid. Fear possed him--this sneaking, torturing, emasculating passion that he had never known hitherto was now always with him. He lay alone in the camp-bedstead sweating and funking. The events of the day made him seem safe, but he felt that he would not be really safe for ages and ages. Throughout the night he was going over the list of his idiotic mistakes, upbraiding himself, cursing himself for a hundred acts of brainless folly. The plan had been sound enough: it was the accomplishment of the plan that had been so damnably rotten. Why had he changed his addresses in that preposterous fashion? Instead of providing himself with useful materials for an alibi, he had just made a lot of inexplicable movements. Then the pawning of the watch--in a false name. How could he ever explain _that_? Anybody short of money may put his ticker up the spout, but no one has the right to assume an alias. And the buying of the clothes and hat. Instead of bargaining, as innocent people do, however small the price demanded, he just dabbed down the money. He must have appeared to be in the devil's own hurry to get the things and cut off with them. The two men at that shop must have noticed his peculiarities as a customer. They would be able to pick him out in the biggest crowd that ever assembled in a magistrate's court.