“Say I ran into you-a little way back.”

He said, “All right.”

Her whispered “Thank you” reached him, and then a clear and charming voice, “Oh, here’s someone! Perhaps he knows where we are! Do ask him!”

The fog became permeated with an aroma of whisky. The voice that had rolled out its demand for two thousand pounds now enquired in a genial manner,

“And where would ye be wanting to be?” There seemed to be at least three r’s in the “where.” Ione had turned. She was still holding the arm which she had pinched. There was a sharp pain in her ankle. She said just a little breathlessly,

“I’m afraid I am quite lost. I don’t know if you can help us at all.”

There was the sound of a laugh.

“If ye had asked me that same thing just about ten minutes ago, I’d have told ye, but I’m beginning to think that I might have been mistaken. It’s a bad fog that would baffle me, but I’ll admit that I’m not just so sure of my surroundings as I’d like to be. I have an idea where I went wrong, but I’m far from saying I could find my way back to it. No, no-it’s ‘Keep right on to the end of the road, keep right on to the end-’ ” He passed easily into song, but pulled up before the end of the verse. “Ye take my meaning? If ye keep right on ye’ll aye get somewhere. If ye stay where ye are ye might just as well be dead and buried, and a grand saving of trouble to all concerned.”

The voice which belonged to the arm that Ione was holding said quietly,

“I can tell you where we are, for what it is worth. Not very much, I’m afraid, because I can’t see the slightest chance of getting anywhere else until the fog lifts.” Ione pinched again hard.

“Oh, why didn’t you say so before?”