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It was a lovely day.  And we were glad of it, for at two o’clock my Cousin Madrigal was to be married from the old house where she was born, and in the old church In which she was baptized.  A special train was being run from London, but Monk’s Honour lay four miles from the nearest station, and it was doubtful if the supply of cars and carriages would prove equal to the demand.  Therefore we had decided to go down by road.  With my uncle’s land marched the well-timbered acres of Hillingdon, where the Tanyons lived, and they had very kindly invited us to luncheon, so that we should not descend untimely upon a simmering household.  In their keeping we proposed to leave Nobby and the car.  The house was only five minutes’ walk from the church and as many again from Madrigal’s home, so that once we had reached the village we should need no conveyance until the time came for us to return to Town.

For a wonder we were all on time, and it was barely eleven o’clock when Jonah let in the clutch and the Rolls began to move.  Daphne sat in front, and Jill between Berry and me on the back seat.  The girls wore dust-cloaks to save their finery, and two large bandboxes concealed their respective hats.  Berry, Jonah and I wore light overcoats above our morning-dress, and three tall hats, ironed to perfection, each in his stiff white hat-box, jostled one another on the mat at our feet.  A smaller box by their side contained three blooming gardenias.

Once clear of London Jonah gave the Rolls her head, and we were soon floating through the midst of blowing cherry orchards and fragrant hop gardens, which of the great sun were quick with radiance.

The deeper we plunged into the countryside, the richer this became.  Here was a treasure of woodland, and there a wealth of pasture:  grey lichened walls hoarded a precious park, keeping the timid deer in generous custody:  a silver stream stole between smiling hayfields, crept shadowed and cool under the dusty road and, beyond, braided a spreading cloth of golden buttercups, that glowed with a soft brilliancy, such as no handicraft on earth could coax from the hard heart of costly metal.

Presently we left the main road to sail up a curling hill, and over and down past a fair steading into a friendly valley, where the cattle stood drowsy under the shelter of giant chestnut trees, and luxuriant hawthorns in full blossom filled all the neighbouring air with timely sweetness.  At the bidding of an aged finger-post Jonah turned to the left, and a moment later the car was scudding up a leafy lane, high-banked, narrow, and soon so screened and arched with foliage that in a little we were being swept through a veritable tunnel, seemingly driven through the living green.  More than once the lane changed direction, but the tunnel held:  the ground was rising, but we sailed on, the steady purr of the engine swelling into a low snarl as we swung to right and left between the cool green walls....