After infinite trouble, Hamer got Lanty on the telephone towards one o’clock on that Saturday afternoon. The agent was deep in deeds in some Witham lawyer’s office, and excessively annoyed at being snatched from them. Hamer, at the other end, sounded anxious, and started badly. Did Lancaster know it was raining? Lancaster was safely under cover and furiously occupied, and did not care a toss what it was doing outside. Why should Mr. Shaw care--if he did care? It seemed he did. He recounted Brack’s conversation of the day before--at least, as much of it as Lanty would deign to receive--and found himself cut off before the end of it. After five minutes’ patient waiting, the agent’s voice came back to him, slightly breathless. “I say, I beg your pardon! Saw a chap out of the window that I mightn’t catch again for a month of Sundays, so I just sprinted. I’m always pressed on Saturday, so you must overlook it. By the way, it’s raining more than a bit, as you say, and I’d no umbrella. But I give you my word it’s not the Day of Judgment or anything of that sort! You don’t know our weather, yet; we’ve had such a fine year. As for Brack, didn’t he strike you as being a little off his chump? I’m rather anxious about him.... Why, no! Hotpot it for all you’re worth! They’ll turn up, you’ll see. There’s nobody minding rain in this district except Brack. Right! Thanks very much. I’ll come over by the Lane. How is Wigmore, this morning? ... That’s good. By the way, Harriet turned in to the Board to-day for the first time. Great doings, I hear! Put the Chairman right on a matter of some cubic feet, and trotted out a point of law that cleared up that supply difficulty like magic, and left them all gaping. All the old hands are saying it’s like old times and John Knewstubb over again. Harriet will shake them up before she’s through!” Hamer, still worried, observed that there was a wind, and Lancaster groaned. “My dear sir, it can’t always be summer! We’d do badly if we didn’t get a wind now and then. It’s to be expected, you know. Time o’ year. March.” _March!_ The fatefully-returning word smote on his ear like a blast. He hung up the receiver and stood, thinking. CHAPTER XXIII COME--THE GREEN GATES OF VISION:--V. THE OUTER DARK It was dark when Brack got in, pitch-dark and blowing the very roof off the world. He found his housekeeper slumbering peacefully in the kitchen, with a bottle of gin peeping coyly from under the table. He shook her into some measure of wakefulness, but coherence was beyond her. Ay, Lup Whinnerah had called, sure enough, and kept her yammering in a draught fit to blow the flesh off her old bones. “Message? What-like message? Nay, now, master, ye said nowt o’ t’ sort! T’ lad didn’t bide long or say much neyther, barrin’ he’d happen look in later. Ay, he’d a manbody o’ sorts wi’ him, but I don’t mind who. It was ower black.”