Joan Gaunt and Lizzie Straker, like the hardy veterans that they were, lay down under the trees to snatch an hour or two’s sleep, but Eve felt wakeful and in a mood for thought. The night’s adventure had left her with an impression of paltriness, and she kept picturing the black shell of the burnt house standing pathetically in the midst of its neglected garden. She remembered Lawrence Kentucky’s chuckle, a peculiarly offensive and sneering chuckle. Was that the sort of man who could be called a pioneer of progress, or a knight of Arthur’s Court? It struck her as pathetic that these women should have christened him Galahad. It just betrayed how little they knew about men. She looked up at the tall trees and was instantly reminded of the fir woods at Fernhill. A quiver of emotion swept through her. It had been just such a dawn as this when she had fled from Orchards Corner. She realised that she was wiser, broader, less sentimental now, and that Canterton had not been the passionate visionary that she had thought him. Lizzie Straker woke up and shouted “Breakfast!” The gentlewoman of Horsham had fitted them out royally. They had a tea kettle to boil over a fire of dead wood, a big bottle of water, ham sandwiches, buttered scones, and a tin of Swiss milk. Even a tin opener had been included. That breakfast under Crooksbury Hill reminded Eve of Lynette’s fairy picnics in the Wilderness. The larches would be all covered with green tassels. She wished she was with Lynette in the Wilderness. Breakfast over, Joan Gaunt brought out her itinerary. “Where do we go next? I’ve forgotten.” Lizzie Straker licked a finger that had managed to get itself smeared with Swiss milk. “Let’s see. Something beginning with B, wasn’t it?” “Yes—Basingford.” The pupils of Eve’s eyes dilated. They were going to Basingford! * * * * * CHAPTER XXXIX LYNETTE They found themselves at the “Black Boar” at Basingford, sitting round a green table under a may tree in the garden. The “Black Boar” was an ancient hostelry, all white plaster, black beams, and brown tiles, its sign swinging on a great carved bracket, its parlour full of pewter and brass. It had the pleasant smell of a farmhouse rather than the sour odour of an inn. Everything was clean, the brick-floored passages, the chintz curtains at the windows, the oak stairs, the white coverlets on the solid mahogany beds. A big grandfather clock tick-tocked in the main passage. The garden at the back ended in a bowling-green that was remarkably well kept, its mown sward catching the yellow evening light through the branches of ancient elms.