The news contained in Robin's letter promised, at any rate, to end all likelihood of any further meeting. Even if, later on, the unknown Englishman should return to Montricheux, it would only be to find her gone. She derived a certain feeling of relief from this thought. There was something disquieting about the man. He made you like and dislike him almost in the same breath. On the whole, Ann felt she would be glad to be in England, freed from the rather disturbing uncertainty as to whether they might or might not meet again. People so often came back to Montricheux. She folded up Robin's letter, and, slinging her basket of flowers over her arm, returned to the house, somewhat troubled in mind as to how she should break the news of her impending departure to Lady Susan. The difficulty solved itself, however, more easily than she had anticipated. "At Silverquay!" exclaimed Lady Susan, when Ann had explained matters. "Now, how charming! I do think Fate is a good-natured old thing sometimes. I shall lose you and yet still keep you, Ann. You'll be living quite near me." Ann looked up in surprise. "But you don't live at Silverquay!" she said. "Almost next door, though. My home, White Windows, is in the neighbouring parish--Heronsfoot--about five miles away, three if you cut across the fields." "Then of course you know this Mr. Coventry?" "No, I've never met him. I knew Rackham Coventry, from whom your man inherited, and I've heard him speak of his cousin Eliot. They were on very bad terms with each other, so that Eliot never came near the place in poor old Rack's time, and, as your brother tells you, he was abroad when the property fell in to him. Heronsmere is a lovely old house, by the way." "I wonder Mr. Coventry never came back until now," said Ann. "He must take very little interest in the place." "He's lived abroad for years, I believe. I remember Rack's telling me he had been crossed in love, and he cut himself adrift from England afterwards. I think the girl threw him over because in those days he wasn't rich enough. She must feel rather a fool now, if she knows how things have fallen out. The Heronsmere rent-roll is enormous." "It rather serves her right, doesn't it?" commented Ann, with a feeling that for once poetic justice had been meted out. Lady Susan smiled. "Yes. Though I always feel a bit sorry for people who get their deserts. You never realise how heavy the bill is going to be when you're running it up." She fell silent a moment, then went on: "The pity of it is that I suppose Eliot Coventry will never marry now, and so Heronsmere will ultimately go to a very distant branch of the family. He tried to get himself killed out of the way during the war, I heard. I knew a man in the same regiment, and he told me Eliot didn't seem to know what the word fear meant--'Mad Coventry,' they called him. He took the most amazing risks, and came through without a scratch."