The thought rushed across his brain, as he watched her: “She’s never had her chance in life! She was made for large transactions and stirring events!” Letting his gaze wander over the groups about them, Wolf caught sight of Mr. Urquhart’s figure in the distance; and he decided that, since sooner or later he would have to greet the man, the best thing he could do was to get it over as soon as possible, so as to be prepared to face his Blacksod friends free of responsibility.

Leaving his companions to themselves, therefore, with a nod at his mother, he plunged into the heart of that motley scene. The day obviously was the culmination of the Wessex Fair. The large expanse of meadow-land lying between the castle-ruins and the railway was encircled by booths, stalls, roundabouts, fortune-tellers’ tents, toy circuses⁠—all the entertainments, in fact, which the annual horde of migratory peddlers of amusement offered, according to age-old tradition, to their rustic clients.