Perhaps you are
not aware that the family--her father, at any rate--is at variance
with me as much as with you.
'I didn't know it.'
'And that I cannot rush into the house as an old friend any more
than you can. Certainly I have the privileges of a distant
relationship, whatever they may be.'
Knight let down the window, and looked ahead. 'There are a great
many people at the station,' he said. 'They seem all to be on the
look-out for us.'
When the train stopped, the half-estranged friends could perceive
by the lamplight that the assemblage of idlers enclosed as a
kernel a group of men in black cloaks. A side gate in the
platform railing was open, and outside this stood a dark vehicle,
which they could not at first characterize. Then Knight saw on
its upper part forms against the sky like cedars by night, and
knew the vehicle to be a hearse. Few people were at the carriage
doors to meet the passengers--the majority had congregated at this
upper end. Knight and Stephen alighted, and turned for a moment
in the same direction.
The sombre van, which had accompanied them all day from London,
now began to reveal that their destination was also its own. It
had been drawn up exactly opposite the open gate. The bystanders
all fell back, forming a clear lane from the gateway to the van,
and the men in cloaks entered the latter conveyance.
'They are labourers, I fancy,' said Stephen.
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