"I can't do any more down here, it's growing dusk.

I must go back and meet the manager." The girl walked along at his side as he turned towards the village.
"I suppose you are one of Mr.Oliver's company ?" she observed presently.
"You must all be much concerned." "They're all greatly concerned," answered Copplestone.

"But I don't belong to the company.

No--I came to Norcaster this morning to meet Mr.
Oliver--he's going--I hope I oughtn't to say was going!--to produce a play of mine next month, and he wanted to talk about the rehearsals.
Everything, of course, was at a standstill when I reached Norcaster at one o 'clock, so I came with Stafford, the business manager, to see what we could do about tracking Mr.Oliver.And I'm afraid, I'm very much afraid--" He paused, as a gate, set in the thick hedge of a garden at this point of the village, suddenly opened to let out a man, who at sight of the girl stopped, hesitated, and then waited for her approach.

He was a tall, well-built man of apparently thirty years, dressed in a rough tweed knickerbocker suit, but the dusk had now so much increased that Copplestone could only gather an impression of ordinary good-lookingness from the face that was turned inquiringly on his companion.