"Have you been in the house all the time?" demanded Mr. Bennett.
"Yes, sir."
"Didn't you hear me shouting?"
"I did fancy I heard something, sir."
"Then why the devil didn't you come to me?"
"I supposed it to be the owls, sir, a bird very frequent in this locality. They make a sort of harsh, hooting howl, sir. I have sometimes wondered," said Webster, pursuing a not uninteresting train of thought, "whether that might be the reason of the name."
Before Mr. Bennett could join him in the region of speculation into which he had penetrated, there was a grinding of brakes on the gravel outside, and the wettest motor car in England drew up at the front door.
From Windles to Southampton is a distance of about twenty miles; and the rain had started to fall when the car, an open one lacking ev
