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 clearly, now, and Mr. and Mrs. Crick having directed their own gig to be sent for them, to leave the carriage to the young couple, she observed the build and character of that conveyance for the first time. Sitting in silence she regarded it long.

‘I fancy you seem oppressed, Tessy,’ said Clare.

‘Yes,’ she answered, putting her hand to her brow. ‘I tremble at many things. It is all so serious, Angel. Among other things I seem to have seen this carriage before, to be very well acquainted with it. It is very odd—I must have seen it in a dream.’

‘Oh—you have heard the legend of the D’Urberville Coach—that well-known superstition of this county about your family when they were very popular here; and this lumbering old thing reminds you of it.’

‘I have never heard of it to my knowledge,’ said she. ‘What is the legend—may I know it?’

‘Well—I would rather not tell it in detail just now. A certain D’Urberville of the sixteenth or seventeenth century committed a dreadful crime in his family coach; and since that time members