“You know her?”

“No—­o,” said the young man, hesitating.  “But I somehow fancy as I may have seen her before.”

“Where?”

“Why, in Canada.  I was living on a farm, not far from Winnipeg”—­he named the place.  Delane suddenly dropped his pipe, and stooped to pick it up.

“All right,” he said, “go on.”

“And there was a man—­a sort of gentleman—­his name was Delane—­on another farm about ten miles from where I was working.  People talked of him no end—­he was a precious bad lot!  I never saw him that I know of—­but I saw his wife twice.  They say he was a brute to her.  And she was awfully handsome.  You couldn’t forget her when you’d once come across her.  And when I saw Miss Henderson drivin’ one of the wagons in the Millsborough Harvest Festival, a fortnight ago, I could have sworn it was Mrs. Delane.  But, of course, it was my mistake.”

“Where did you see Mrs. Delane?”

“Once at her own place.  I was delivering some poultry food that Delane had bought of my employer—­and once at a place belongin’ to a man called Tanner.”

“Tanner?”

“Tanner.  He was somethin’ the same sort as Delane.  We’ve a lot of them in Canada—­remittance men, we call them—­men as can’t get on in the old country—­and their relations pay ’em to go—­and pay ’em to keep away.  But Tanner was a nice sort of fellow—­quite different from Delane.  He painted pictures.  I remember his showin’ some o’ them in Winnipeg.  But he was always down on his luck.  He couldn’t make any money, and he couldn’t keep it.”

“You saw Miss Henderson there?”

Dempsey gave a guffaw.

“Oh, Lor, no!  I don’t say that.  Why, I’d get into trouble—­shouldn’t I?  But I saw Mrs. Delane.  I was driving past Tanner’s place, with two horses, and a heavy load, November two years ago—­just before we passed our Military Service Act, and I joined up.  And an awful storm came on—­a regular blizzard.  Before I got to Tanner’s I was nearly wore out, an’ the horses, too.  So I stopped to ask for a hot drink or somethin’.  You couldn’t see the horses’ heads for the snow.  And Tanner brought me out some hot coffee—­I’m a teetotaller, you see—­an’ a woman stood at the door, and handed it to him.  She was holdin’ a lamp, so I saw her quite plain.  And I knew her at once, though she was only there a minute.  It was Mrs. Roger Delane.”

He stopped to light a cigarette.  No sound came from his companion.  All round them spread the great common, with its old thorns, its clumps of fir, its hollows and girdling woods, faintly lit by a ghostly moonlight that was just beginning to penetrate the misty November dusk.  The cheerful light of Dempsey’s cigarette shone a moment in the gloom.  Delane was conscious of an excitement which it took all his will to master.  But he spoke carelessly.

“And what was Mrs. Delane doing there?”

Dempsey chuckled.

“How should I know?  Tanner used to have a sister staying with him sometimes.  Perhaps she and Mrs. Delane were friends.  But I saw that woman quite plain.  It was Mrs. Delane—­that I’ll swear.  And Miss Henderson is as like her as two peas.  It might have been her sister.  Miss Henderson’s very uncommon-looking.  You don’t often see that complexion and that hair.  And she has lived in Canada.”