This was
annoying, yet it was not really upsetting; there was a train available in
half an hour, and, unless things went very cross, he could be back,
possibly by five o'clock, certainly by eight. He gave the plan to Calton
to take to the house, but it was not worth while to remove the clue.
All went as he had hoped. He spent a rather exciting evening in the
library, for he lighted tonight upon a cupboard where some of the rarer
books were kept. When he went up to bed he was glad to find that the
servant had remembered to leave his curtains undrawn and his windows
open. He put down his light, and went to the window which commanded a
view of the garden and the park. It was a brilliant moonlight night. In a
few weeks' time the sonorous winds of autumn would break up all this
calm. But now the distant woods were in a deep stillness; the slopes of
the lawns were shining with dew; the colours of some of the flowers could
almost be guessed. The light of the moon just caught the cornice of the
temple and the curve of its leaden dome, and Humphreys had to own that,
so seen, these conceits of a past age have a real beauty.
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