CHAPTER XXITX
BACK TO GASTON CAREW

O they marched back out of the palace gates, down to

the landing-place, the last red sunlight gleaming on

the basinets of the tall halberdiers who marched on either
side.

Nick looked out toward London, where the river lay
like a serpent, bristling with masts; and beyond the river
and the town to the forests of Epping and Hainault; and
beyond the forests to the hills, where the waning day still
lingered in a mist of frosty blue. At their back, midway
of the Queen’s park, stood up the old square tower Mire-
fleur, and on its top one yellow light like the flame of a
gigantic candle. The day seemed builded of memories
strange and untrue.

A belated gull flapped by them heavily, and the red sun
wentdown. England was growing lonely. <A great barge
laden with straw came out of the dusk, and was gone
without a sound, its ghostly sail drawing in a wind that
the wherry sat too low to feel. Nick held his breath as
the barge went by: it was unreal, fantastical.

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