44 KINGSCLERE 



city, agreed among themselves that a trial must 

 inevitably take place before the Derby, and they 

 had vowed to each other that, let it occur when it 

 might, they would be there to see. Sir Joseph 

 Hawley, who himself naturally objected to being 

 touted, arranged with Porter to be on the ground 

 early in the morning, but not to previously approach 

 Kingsclere by the accustomed route. Overton on 

 the one side of the Downs, and Newbury on the 

 other, were incessantly watched, while Kingsclere 

 itself, with, of course, Park House, was kept under 

 sleepless surveillance. The plan agreed upon was for 

 the Baronet to avoid alighting, as usual, at Overton, 

 but to go on to Whitchurch, where it was hoped 

 and believed he would not be recognised. Guess 

 the Baronet's horror when, on giving up his ticket 

 at the latter station, he was accosted with, ' Can I 

 have the honour of taking you, Sir Joseph ?' The 

 applicant for a fare was the proprietor of a pony- 

 trap, who had formerly been postboy at the inn at 

 Stockbridge. Making the best of it, Sir Joseph 

 hired the vehicle, and inasmuch as he was the only 

 passenger for Whitchurch by that particular train, 

 and the old postboy was merely plying for hire, all 

 went, so far, well. Sir Joseph was driven part of the 

 way on to the Downs, and then he dismissed his 

 charioteer. 



And now, as the novelist would say, we must 

 shift the scene to Kingsclere. At that time there was 

 an old tollhouse standing on the Overton Road — 

 the ramshackle edifice was but recently razed to the 



