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Browning’s an old friend of mine, we go to the same art school. And as Dr. Browning had been staying in London, we thought we’d all cycle up here together. It’s been gorgeous,” added Felix regretfully, reflecting that henceforth a distance of four miles would separate him from that delightful enigma, Isabel. Miss Donne,” he added, “is staying with the Brownings for a week or so. She’s an art student friend of Nora’s.”
    â€œAnd the vanished cyclist, as Rampson calls him?”
    â€œOh, he’s my cousin Charles,” said Felix in a worried tone. “But I’ve only known him three days. He came back from Canada about six weeks ago. You see, my Uncle Evan died three months ago, and Charles inherited Rhyllan, and naturally came back to live there. I wrote to him when we started from London, inviting him to hire a bike and join us at Worcester. I thought it’d be a good opportunity of getting friendly with him.”
    â€œAnd was it?” asked Christmas with a smile.
    â€œOh, yes,” answered Felix without enthusiasm. He looked with a worried frown out of the window into the darkness. “I do wish he’d turn up. I suppose you think I’m an awful idiot to get nervy about an able-bodied fellow older than myself, just because he doesn’t keep to the time-table. But it really is rather mysterious, because he doesn’t know anybody in the neighbourhood, and doesn’t know his way about yet, and he’s just one of those slap-dash sort of people that do come to grief. I think I’ll ring up Rhyllan as soon as we’ve finished dinner, and see if he’s taken it into his head to go straight home.”
    â€œAn excellent idea,” agreed his new-found friend. “Meanwhile, let’s forget him and attend to this excellent mutton. We’ve had mutton for dinner every night for the last week, pretty nearly. And very nice, too.
    â€˜The mountain sheep were sweeter,
But the valley sheep were fatter,
And so we thought it meeter
To bear away the latter.’
    The mint sauce, please, Sydenham.”
    â€œâ€˜Meat,’” objected Mr. Rampson, “is not an adjective. I suppose you mean more meaty.”
    Christmas looked at him pityingly.
    â€œâ€˜Meet,’ my dear Sydenham, is a word much used by writers of verse to signify seemly, proper or expedient.”
    â€œVerse,” said Rampson indifferently. “That accounts for it. I don’t read verse.”
    â€œDon’t boast of your lack of culture, cousin.”
    â€œYou,” returned his cousin with composure, “can quote a line or two of verse about these mountains and valleys. But can you tell me what their geological formation is? Can you even tell me what mineral they produce? No.”
    â€œYes. I notice that most of the houses in this part of the world are roofed with slate of a peculiarly charming appearance. I imagine, therefore, that these hills produce slate as well as mutton.”
    â€œTalking of slate,” said Felix, “we had tea this afternoon at a small inn with the quaint sign of The Tram, called apparently after the tram-lines that used to run to a quarry nearby.”
    â€œI noticed it,” replied Christmas, “at the top of Rodland Hill, and a very nice little brick-and-timber building it is. The name puzzled me for a moment, but I managed to make the right deduction. Is the quarry still in use? We might go over and see them blasting, or whatever they do to slate. It would improve Sydenham’s mind.”
    Felix smiled.
    â€œNo, I understand from the girl at the inn that the quarry hasn’t been used since she dunno when. So I don’t imagine that there’s much to see, except some rusty truck-lines and the usual mass of brambles and fern.”
    â€œThere’s always something a little ghostly and depressing, I think, about a disused quarry,” murmured John Christmas pensively.