Solitary woman as she was, the villagers, like all people who live in very small, mentally restricted country places, would have idly gossiped away her reputation had she received her lover into her house alone.

So she passed a very dismal time all by herself; and closing up the house early, took little Charlie in her arms and went to bed, where, much to her own abashment, she cried herself to sleep.
Meanwhile, David himself, for whom she fretted, had arrived in Exeter.
The journey had fatigued him considerably, though he had been able to get fairly good food and a glass of wine at one of the junctions where he had changed _en route_.

On leaving the Exeter railway station, he made his way towards the Cathedral, and happening to chance on a very small and unpretending "Temperance Hotel" in a side street, where a placard intimating that "Good Accommodation for Travellers" might be had within, he entered and asked for a bedroom.

He obtained it at once, for his appearance was by no means against him, being that of a respectable old working man who was prepared to pay his way in a humble, but perfectly honest fashion.

As soon as he had secured his room, which was a curious little three-cornered apartment, partially obscured by the shadows of the many buttresses of the Cathedral, his next care was to go out into the High Street and provide himself with a good stock of writing materials.