She bustled out with the remark that she couldn’t trust that durned old fool to look at the clock, and continued the conversation through the open door.

“Reckon you’ll be making for Folkestone. ’Tis a tidy walk.”

“No. I’m staying at Rye. I’ve come out to have a walk over the marshes.”

She loomed out a bulky figure framed in the doorway. “Then you baint lookin’ for work? You be a visitor? A gentleman?”

“I’m what they call a naturalist. I want to have a look at the plants and birds and things round about. I thought of walking across towards Dungeness.”

She cocked her hands on her hips. “I know what a naturalist is,” she said nodding wisely. “You pick slimy things out of the dicks and keep ’em in little bottles. We’ve had gentlemen out here before like that. Lor-a-mussy, John, them eggs will be as hard as bricks.”