A FEW CHAPTERS BY THE EDITOR
I.
THE PLEASANT STRANGER.
It was in July of that same year that the Rev. Alexander Burnett was
abashed to find himself inadvertently conspicuous. He had very
heartily permitted himself to be photographed in the centre of a small
group of lads from his parish who had heard their country's call and
were home in their khaki for a last leave-taking. Moreover, the
excellence of the photograph and the undeniably close resemblance of
his own portrait to the reflection he surveyed each morning when
shaving, had decidedly pleased him. But the appearance of this group,
first as an illustration in a local paper and then in one that enjoyed
a very wide circulation indeed, embarrassed him not a little. For he
was a modest, publicity-avoiding man, and also he felt he ought to have
been in khaki too.
Not that Mr Burnett had anything really to reproach himself with, for
he was in the forties, some years above military age. But he was a
widower without a family, who had already spent fifteen years in a
sparsely inhabited parish in the south-east of Scotland not very far
from the Border; and ever since he lost his wife had been uneasy in
mind and a little morbid, and anxious for change of scene and fresh
experiences. He was to get them, and little though he dreamt it, that
group was their beginning. Indeed, it would have taken as cunning a
brain to scent danger in the trifling incidents with which his strange
adventure began as it took to arrange them. And Mr Burnett was not at
all cunning, being a simple, quiet man. In appearance he was rather
tall, with a clean-shaven, thoughtful face, and hair beginning to turn
grey.
A few days later a newspaper arrived by post. He had received several
already from well-meaning friends, each with that group in it, and he
sighed as he opened this one. It was quite a different paper, however,
with no illustrations, but with a certain page indicated in blue
pencil, and a blue pencil mark in the margin of that page. What his
attention was called to was simply the announcement that the Rev. Mr
Maxwell, minister of the parish of Myredale, had been appointed to
another charge, and that there was now a vacancy there.
Mr Burnett looked at the wrapper, but his name and address had been
typewritten and gave him no clue. He wondered who had sent him the
paper, and then his thoughts naturally turned to the vacant parish. He
knew that it lay in a certain group of northern islands, which we may
call here the Windy Isles, and he presumed that the stipend would not
be great. Still, it was probably a better living than his own small
parish, and as for its remoteness, well, he liked quiet, out-of-the-way
places, and it would certainly be a complete change of scene. He let
the matter lie in the back of his mind, and there it would very likely
have remained but for a curious circumstance on the following Sunday.
His little parish church was seldom visited by strangers, and when by
any chance one did appear, the minister was very quickly conscious of
the fact. He always took stock of his congregation during the first
psalm, and on this Sabbath his experienced eye had noted a stranger
before the end of the opening verse. A pleasant-looking gentleman in
spectacles he appeared to be, and of a most exemplary and devout habit
of mind. In fact, he hardly once seemed to take his spectacled gaze
off the minister's face during the whole service; and Mr Burnett
believed in giving his congregation good measure.
It was a fine day, and when service was over the minister walked back
to his manse at a very leisurely pace, enjoying the sunshine after a
week of showery weather. The road he followed crossed the river, and
as he approached the bridge he saw the same stranger leaning over the
parapet, smoking a cigar, and gazing at the brown stream. Near him at
the side of the road was drawn up a large dark-green touring car, which
apparently the gentleman had driven himself, for there was no sign of a
chauffeur.
"Good day, sir!" said the stranger affably, as the minister came up to
him. "Lovely weather!"
Mr Burnett, nothing loath to hear a fresh voice, stopped and smiled and
agreed that the day was fine. He saw now that the stranger was a
middle-sized man with a full fair moustache, jovial eyes behind his
gold-rimmed spectacles, and a rosy healthy colour; while his manner was
friendliness itself. The minister felt pleasantly impressed with him
at once.
"Any trout in this stream?" inquired the stranger.
Mr Burnett answered that it was famed as a fishing river, at which the
stranger seemed vastly interested and pleased, and put several
questions regarding the baskets that were caught. Then he grew a
little more serious and said--
"I hope you will pardon me, sir, for thanking you for a very excellent
sermon. As I happened to be motoring past just as church was going in
I thought I'd look in too. But I assure you I had no suspicion I
should hear so good a discourse. I appreciated it highly."
Though a modest man, Mr Burnett granted the stranger's pardon very
readily. Indeed, he became more favourably impressed with him than
ever.
"I am very pleased to hear you say so," he replied, "for in an
out-of-the-way place like this one is apt to get very rusty."
"I don't agree with you at all, sir," said the stranger energetically,
"if you'll pardon my saying so. In my experience--which is pretty
wide, I may add--the best thinking is done in out-of-the-way places. I
don't say the showiest, mind you, but the _best_!"
Again the minister pardoned him without difficulty.
"Of course, one needs a change now and then, I admit," continued the
stranger. "But, my dear sir, whatever you do, don't go and bury
yourself in a crowd!"
This struck Mr Burnett as a novel and very interesting way of putting
the matter. He forgot all about the dinner awaiting him at the manse,
and when the stranger offered him a very promising-looking cigar, he
accepted it with pleasure, and leaned over the parapet beside him.
There, with his eyes on the running water, he listened and talked for
some time.
The stranger began to talk about the various charming out-of-the-way
places in Scotland. It seemed he was a perfervid admirer of everything
Scottish, and had motored or tramped all over the country from Berwick
to the Pentland Firth. In fact, he had even crossed the waters, for he
presently burst forth into a eulogy of the Windy Islands.
"The most delightful spot, sir, I have ever visited!" he said
enthusiastically. "There is a peacefulness and charm, and at the same
time something stimulating in the air I simply can't describe. In body
and mind I felt a new man after a week there!"
The minister was so clearly struck by this, and his interest so roused,
that the stranger pursued the topic and added a number of enticing
details.
"By the way," he exclaimed presently, "do you happen to know a
fellow-clergyman there called Maxwell? His parish is--let me see--Ah,
Myredale, that's the name."
This struck Mr Burnett as quite extraordinary.
"I don't know him personally," he began.
"A very sensible fellow," continued the stranger impetuously. "He told
me his parish was as like heaven as anything on this mortal earth!"
"He has just left it," said Mr Burnett.
The stranger seemed surprised and interested.
"What a chance for some one!" he exclaimed.
Mr Burnett gazed thoughtfully through the smoke of his cigar into the
brown water of the river below him.
"I have had thoughts of making a change myself," he said slowly. "But
of course they might not select me even if I applied for Myredale."
"In the Scottish Church the custom is to go to the vacant parish to
preach a trial sermon, isn't it?" inquired the stranger.
The minister nodded. "A system I disapprove of, I may say," said he.
"I quite agree with you," said the stranger sympathetically. "Still,
so long as that is the system, why not try your luck? Mind you, I talk
as one who knows the place, and knows Mr Maxwell and his opinion of it.
You'll have an enviable visit, whatever happens."
"It is a very long way," said Mr Burnett.
"Don't they pay your expenses!"
"Yes," admitted the minister. "But then I understand that those
islands are very difficult for a stranger to enter at present. The
naval authorities are extremely strict."
The stranger laughed jovially.
"My dear sir," he cried, "can you imagine even the British Navy
standing between a Scotch congregation and its sermon! You are the one
kind of stranger who will be admitted. All you have to do is to get a
passport--and there you are!"
"Are they difficult to get?"
The stranger laughed again.
"I know nothing about that kind of thing," said he. "I'm a Lancashire
lad, and the buzz of machinery is my game; but I can safely say this:
that _you_ will have no difficulty in getting a passport."
Mr Burnett again gazed at the water in silence.
Then he looked up and said with a serious face--
"I must really tell you, sir, of a very remarkable coincidence. Only a
few days ago some unknown friend sent me a copy of a newspaper with a
notice of this very vacancy marked in it!"
The Lancashire lad looked almost thunder-struck by this extraordinary
disclosure.
"Well, I'm hanged!" he cried--adding hurriedly, "if you'll forgive my
strong language, sir."
"It seems to me to be providential," said Mr Burnett in a low and very
serious voice.
With equal solemnity the stranger declared that though not an unusually
good man himself, this solution had already struck him forcibly.
At this point the minister became conscious of the distant ringing of a
bell, and recognised with a start the strident note of his own dinner
bell swung with a vigorous arm somewhere in the road ahead. He shook
hands cordially with the stranger, thanked him for the very interesting
talk he had enjoyed, and hurried off towards his over-cooked roast.
The stranger remained for a few moments still leaning against the
parapet. His jovial face had been wreathed in smiles throughout the
whole conversation; he still smiled now, but with rather a different
expression.
II.
THE CHAUFFEUR.
Mr Burnett was somewhat slow in coming to decisions, but once he had
taken an idea to do a thing he generally carried it out. In the course
of a week or ten days he had presented himself as a candidate for the
vacant church of Myredale, and made arrangements for appearing in the
pulpit there on a certain Sunday in August. He was to arrive in the
islands on the Thursday, spend the week-end in the empty manse, preach
on Sunday, and return on Monday or Tuesday. His old friend Mr Drummond
in Edinburgh, hearing of the plan, invited him to break his journey at
his house, arriving on Tuesday afternoon, and going on by the North
train on Wednesday night. Accordingly, he arranged to have a trap at
the manse on Tuesday afternoon, drive to Berwick and catch the Scotch
express, getting into Edinburgh at 6.15.
He was a reticent man, and in any case had few neighbours to gossip
with, so that as far as he himself knew, the Drummonds alone had been
informed of all these details. But he had in the manse a very valuable
domestic, who added to her more ordinary virtues a passion for
conversation.
On the Saturday afternoon before he was due to start, he was returning
from a walk, when he caught a glimpse of a man's figure disappearing
into a small pine wood at the back of his house, and when his
invaluable Mary brought him in his tea, he inquired who her visitor had
been.
"Oh, sic a nice young felly!" said Mary enthusiastically. "He's been a
soger, wounded at Mons he was, and walking to Berwick to look for a
job."
Though simple, the minister was not without some sad experience of
human nature, particularly the nature of wounded heroes, tramping the
country for jobs.
"I hope you didn't give him any money," said he.
"He never askit for money!" cried Mary. "Oh, he was not that kind at
a'! A maist civil young chap he was, and maist interested to hear
where you were gaun, and sic like."
The minister shook his head.
"You told him when I was leaving, and all about it, I suppose?"
"There was nae secret, was there?" demanded Mary.
Mr Burnett looked at her seriously.
"As like as not," said he; "he just wished to know when the man of the
house would be away. Mind and keep the doors locked, Mary, and if he
comes back, don't let him into the kitchen whatever cock-and-bull story
he tells."
He knew that Mary was a sensible enough woman, and having given her
this warning, he forgot the whole incident--till later.
Tuesday was fine and warm, a perfect day on which to start a journey,
and about mid-day Mr Burnett was packing a couple of bags with a sense
of pleasant anticipation, when a telegram arrived. This was exactly
how it ran:--
"My friend Taylor motoring to Edinburgh to-day. Will pick you and
luggage up at Manse about six, and bring you to my house. Don't
trouble reply, assume this suits, shall be out till late. DRUMMOND."
"There's no answer," said Mr Burnett with a smile.
He was delighted with this change in his programme, and at once
countermanded his trap, and ordered Mary to set about making scones and
a currant cake for tea.
"This Mr Taylor will surely be wanting his tea before he starts," said
he, "though it's likely he won't want to waste too much time over it,
or it will be dark long before we get to Edinburgh. So have everything
ready, Mary, but just the infusing of the tea."
Then with an easy mind, feeling that there was no hurry now, he sat
down to his early dinner. As he dined he studied the telegram more
carefully, and it was then that one or two slight peculiarities struck
him. They seemed to him very trifling, but they set him wondering and
smiling a little to himself.
He knew most of the Drummonds' friends, and yet never before had he
heard of an affluent motor-driving Mr Taylor among them. Still, there
was nothing surprising about that, for one may make a new friend any
day, and one's old friends never hear of him for long enough.
The really unusual features about this telegram were its length and
clearness and the elaborate injunctions against troubling to answer it.
Robert Drummond was an excellent and Christian man, but he had never
been remarkable for profuse expenditure. In fact, he guarded his
bawbees very carefully indeed, and among other judicious precautions he
never sent telegrams if he could help it, and when fate forced his
hand, kept very rigorously within the twelve-word limit. His telegrams
in consequence were celebrated more for their conciseness than their
clarity. Yet here he was sending a telegram thirty-four words long,
apart from the address and signature, and spending halfpenny after
halfpenny with reckless profusion to make every detail explicit!
Particularly curious were the three clauses all devoted to saving Mr
Burnett the trouble of replying. Never before had Mr Drummond shown
such extraordinary consideration for a friend's purse, and it is a
discouraging feature of human nature that even the worthy Mr Burnett
felt more puzzled than touched by his generous thoughtfulness.
"Robert Drummond never wrote out that wire himself," he concluded. "He
must just have told some one what he wanted to say, and they must have
written it themselves. Well, we'll hope they paid for it too, or
Robert will be terrible annoyed."
The afternoon wore on, and as six o'clock drew near, the minister began
to look out for Mr Taylor and his car. But six o'clock passed, and
quarter-past six, and still there was no sign of him. The minister
began to grow a little worried lest they should have to do most of the
journey in the dark, for he was an inexperienced motorist, and such a
long drive by night seemed to him a formidable and risky undertaking.
At last at half-past six the thrum of a car was heard, and a few
minutes later a long, raking, dark-green touring car dashed up to the
door of the modest manse. The minister hurried out to welcome his
guest, and then stopped dead short in sheer astonishment. Mr Taylor
was none other than the Lancashire lad.
On his part, Mr Taylor seemed almost equally surprised.
"Well, I'm blowed!" he cried jovially. "If this isn't the most
extraordinary coincidence! When I got Robert Drummond's note, and
noticed the part of the country you lived in, I wondered if you could
possibly be the same minister I'd met; but it really seemed too good to
be true! Delighted to meet you again!"
He laughed loud and cheerfully, and wrung the minister's hand like an
old friend. Mr Burnett, though less demonstrative, felt heartily
pleased, and led his guest cordially into the manse parlour.
"You'll have some tea before you start, I hope?" he inquired.
"Ra-ther!" cried Mr Taylor. "I've a Lancashire appetite for tea! Ha,
ha, ha!"
"Well, I'll have it in at once," said the minister, ringing the bell,
"for I suppose we ought not to postpone our start too long."
"No hurry at all, my dear fellow," said Mr Taylor, throwing himself
into the easiest chair the minister possessed. "I mean to have a jolly
good tuck in before I start!"
At that moment Mr Burnett remembered that this time he had seen a
chauffeur in the car. He went hospitably out of the room and turned
towards the front door. But hardly had he turned in that direction
when he heard Mr Taylor call out--
"Hallo! Where are you going?"
And the next moment he was after the minister and had him by the arm
just as they reached the open front door. Mr Burnett ever afterwards
remembered the curious impression produced on him by the note in Mr
Taylor's voice, and that hurried grip of the arm. Suspicion, alarm, a
note of anger, all seemed to be blended.
"I--I was only going to ask your driver to come and have a cup of tea
in the kitchen," stammered the embarrassed minister.
"My dear sir, he doesn't want any; I've asked him already!" said Mr
Taylor. "I assure you honestly I have!"
Mr Burnett suffered himself to be led back wondering greatly. He had
caught a glimpse of the chauffeur, a clean-shaven, well-turned-out man,
sitting back in his seat with his cap far over his eyes, and even in
that hurried glance at part of his face he had been struck with
something curiously familiar about the man; though whether he had seen
him before, or, if not, who he reminded him of, he was quite unable to
say. And then there was Mr Taylor's extraordinary change of manner the
very moment he started to see the chauffeur. He could make nothing of
it at all, but for some little time afterwards he had a vague sense of
disquiet.
Mr Taylor, on his part, had recovered his cheerfulness as quickly as he
had lost it.
"Forgive me, my dear Mr Burnett," he said earnestly, yet always with
the rich jolly note in his voice. "I must have seemed a perfect
maniac. The truth is, between ourselves, I had a terrible suspicion
you were going to offer my good James whisky!"
"Oh," said the minister. "Is he then--er--an abstainer?"
Mr Taylor laughed pleasantly.
"I wish he were! A wee drappie is his one failing; ha, ha! I never
allow my chauffeur to touch a drop while I'm on the road, Mr
Burnett--never, sir!"
Mr Burnett was slow to suspect ill of any one, but he was just as slow
in getting rid of a suspicion. With all his simplicity, he could not
but think that Mr Taylor jumped extraordinarily quickly to conclusions
and got excited on smaller provocation than any one he had ever met.
Over his first cup of tea he sat very silent.
In the meantime the sociable Mary had been suffering from a sense of
disappointment. Surely the beautiful liveried figure in the car would
require his tea and eggs like his master? For a little she sat
awaiting his arrival in the kitchen, with her cap neatly arranged, and
an expectant smile. But gradually disappointment deepened. She
considered the matter judicially. Clearly, she decided, Mr Burnett had
forgotten the tradition of hospitality associated with that and every
other manse. And then she decided that her own duty was plain.
She went out of the back door and round the house. There stood the
car, with the resplendent figure leaning back in his seat, his cap
still over his eyes, and his face now resting on his hand, so that she
could barely see more than the tip of his nose. He heard nothing of
her approach till she was fairly at his side, and in her high and
penetrating voice cried--
"Will ye not be for a cup of tea and an egg to it, eh?"
The chauffeur started, and Mary started too. She had seen his face for
an instant, though he covered it quickly, but apparently quite
naturally, with his hand.
"No, thanks," he said brusquely, and turned away his eyes.
Mary went back to the kitchen divided between annoyance at the rebuff
and wonder. The liveried figure might have been the twin-brother of
the minister.
III.
ON THE CLIFF.
Gradually Mr Burnett recovered his composure. His guest was so genial
and friendly and appreciative of the scones and the currant cake that
he began to upbraid himself for churlishness in allowing anything like
a suspicion of this pleasant gentleman to linger in his mind. There
remained a persistent little shadow which he could not quite drive
away, but he conscientiously tried his best. As for Mr Taylor, there
never was a jollier and yet a more thoughtful companion. He seemed to
think of every mortal thing that the minister could possibly need for
his journey.
"Got your passport?" he inquired.
"Yes," said the minister. "I am carrying it in my breast-pocket. It
ought to be safe there."
"The safest place possible!" said Mr Taylor cordially. "It's all in
order, I presume, eh?"
Mr Burnett took the passport out of his pocket and showed it to him.
His guest closely examined the minister's photograph which was
attached, went through all the particulars carefully, and pronounced
everything in order, as far as an ignorant outsider like himself could
judge.
"Of course," he said, "I'm a business man, Mr Burnett, and I can tell
when a thing looks businesslike, though I know no more about what the
authorities require and why they ask for all these particulars than you
do. It's all red tape, I suppose."
As a further precaution he recommended his host to slip a few letters
and a receipted bill or two into his pocket-book, so that he would have
a ready means of establishing his identity if any difficulty arose. Mr
Burnett was somewhat surprised, but accepted his guest's word for it,
as a shrewd Lancashire lad, that these little tips were well worth
taking.
By this time the evening was falling, and at length Mr Taylor declared
himself ready for the road. He had drunk four cups of tea, and hurried
over none of them. For a moment Mr Burnett half wondered if he had any
reason for delaying their start, but immediately reproached himself for
harbouring such a thought. Indeed, why should he think so? There
seemed nothing whatever to be gained by delay, with the dusk falling so
fast and a long road ahead.
The minister's rug and umbrella and two leather bags were put into the
car, he and Mr Taylor got aboard, and off they went at last. Mr
Burnett had another glance at the chauffeur, and again was haunted by
an odd sense of familiarity; but once they had started, the view of his
back in the gathering dusk suggested nothing more explicit.
Presently they passed a corner, and the minister looked round uneasily.
"What road are you taking?" he asked.
"We're going to join the coast road from Berwick," said Mr Taylor.
"Isn't that rather roundabout?"
Mr Taylor laughed jovially.
"My good James has his own ideas," said he. "As a matter of fact, I
fancy he knows the coast road and isn't sure of the other. However, we
needn't worry about that. With a car like this the difference in time
will be a flea-bite!"
He had provided the minister with another excellent cigar, and smoking
in comfort behind a glass wind-screen, with the dim country slipping by
and the first pale star faintly shining overhead, the pair fell into
easy discourse. Mr Taylor was a remarkably sympathetic talker, the
minister found. He kept the conversation entirely on his companion's
affairs, putting innumerable questions as to his habits and way of
life, and indeed his whole history, and exhibiting a flattering
interest in his answers. Mr Burnett said to himself at last, with a
smile, that this inquiring gentleman would soon know as much about him
as he knew himself.
Once or twice the minister wondered how fast they were really going.
They did not seem to him to be achieving any very extraordinary speed,
but possibly that was only because the big car ran so easily. In fact,
when he once questioned his companion, Mr Taylor assured him that
actually was the explanation. It was thus pretty dark when they struck
the coast road, and it grew ever darker as they ran northward through a
bare, treeless country, with the cliff edge never far away and the
North Sea glimmering beyond.
They had reached an absolutely lonely stretch of road that hugged the
shore closely when the car suddenly stopped.
"Hallo!" exclaimed Mr Taylor, "what's up?"
The chauffeur half-turned round and said in a low voice--
"Did you see that light, sir?"
"Which light?"
The chauffeur pointed to the dark stretch of turf between them and the
edge of the cliffs.
"Just there, sir. I saw it flash for a second. I got a glimpse of
some one moving too, sir."
Mr Taylor became intensely excited.
"A spy signalling!" he exclaimed.
"Looks like it, sir," said the chauffeur.
Mr Taylor turned to the minister with an eager, resolute air.
"Our duty's clear, Mr Burnett," said he. "As loyal subjects of King
George--God bless him!--we've got to have a look into this!"
With that he jumped out and stood by the open door, evidently expecting
the minister to follow. For a moment Mr Burnett hesitated. A vague
sense that all was not well suddenly affected him. "Do not go!"
something seemed to say to him. And yet as a man and a loyal subject
how could he possibly decline to assist in an effort to foil the King's
enemies? Reluctantly he descended from the car, and once he was on the
road, Mr Taylor gave him no time for further debate.
"Come on!" he whispered eagerly; and then turning to the chauffeur,
"come along too, James!"
Close by there was a gate in the fence, and they all three went through
this and quietly crossed the short stretch of grass between the road
and the cliffs, Mr Taylor and the minister walking in front and the
chauffeur following close at their heels. Now that the car was silent,
they could hear the soft lapping of the water at the cliff foot, but
that and the fall of their feet on the short crisp turf were the only
sounds.
Mr Burnett peered hard into the darkness, but he could see absolutely
nothing. All at once he realised that they were getting very close to
the brink, and that if there were any one in front they would certainly
be silhouetted against the sky. There could not possibly be any use in
going further; why then did they continue to advance? At that a clear
and terrifying instinct of danger seized him. He turned round sharply,
and uttered one loud ringing cry.
He was looking straight into the chauffeur's face, and it seemed as
though he were looking into his own, distorted by murderous intention.
Above it the man's hand was already raised. It descended, and the
minister fell on the turf with a gasp. He knew no more of that night's
adventure.
IV.
MR DRUMMOND'S VISITOR.
Upon a secluded road in the quiet suburb of Trinity stood the residence
of Mr Robert Drummond. It was a neat unpretentious little villa graced
by a number of trees and a clinging Virginia creeper, and Mr Drummond
was a neat unpretentious little gentleman, graced by a number of
virtues, and a devoted Mrs Drummond. From the upper windows of his
house you could catch a glimpse of the castled and templed hills of
Edinburgh on the one side, and the shining Forth and green coasts of
Fife on the other. The Forth, in fact, was close at hand, and of late
Mr Drummond had been greatly entertained by observing many interesting
movements upon its waters.
He had looked forward to exhibiting and expounding these features to
his friend Mr Burnett, and felt considerably disappointed when upon the
morning of the day when the minister should have come, a telegram
arrived instead. It ran--
"Unavoidably prevented from coming to stay with you. Shall explain
later. Many regrets. Don't trouble reply. Leaving home immediately.
"BURNETT."
As Mr Drummond studied this telegram he began to feel not only
disappointed but a trifle critical.
"Alec Burnett must have come into a fortune!" he said to himself. "Six
words--the whole of threepence--wasted in telling me not to reply! As
if I'd be spending my money on anything so foolish. I never saw such
extravagance!"
On the following morning Mr Drummond was as usual up betimes. He had
retired a year or two before from a responsible position in an
insurance office, but he still retained his active business habits, and
by eight o'clock every morning of the summer was out and busy in his
garden. It still wanted ten minutes to eight, and he was just
buttoning up his waistcoat when he heard the front-door bell ring. A
minute or two later the maid announced that Mr Topham was desirous of
seeing Mr Drummond immediately.
"Mr Topham?" he asked.
"He's a Navy Officer, sir," said the maid.
Vaguely perturbed, Mr Drummond hurried downstairs, and found in his
study a purposeful-looking young man, with the two zigzag stripes on
his sleeve of a lieutenant in the Royal Naval Reserve.
"Mr Drummond?" he inquired.
"The same," said Mr Drummond, firmly yet cautiously.
"You expected a visit from a Mr Burnett yesterday, I believe?"
"I had been expecting him till I got his wire."
"His wire!" exclaimed Lieutenant Topham. "Did he telegraph to you?"
"Yes: he said he couldn't come."
"May I see that telegram?"
Caution had always been Mr Drummond's most valuable asset.
"Is it important?" he inquired.
"Extremely," said the lieutenant a trifle brusquely.
Mr Drummond went to his desk and handed him the telegram. He could see
Topham's eyebrows rise as he read it.
"Thank you," he said when he had finished. "May I keep it?"
Without waiting for permission, he put it in his pocket, and with a
grave air said--
"I am afraid I have rather serious news to give you about Mr Burnett."
"Dear me!" cried Mr Drummond. "It's not mental trouble, I hope? That
was a queer wire he sent me!"
"He didn't send you that wire," said Lieutenant Topham.
"What!" exclaimed Mr Drummond. "Really--you don't say so? Then who
did?"
"That's what we've got to find out."
The lieutenant glanced at the door, and added--
"I think we had better come a little farther away from the door."
They moved to the farther end of the room and sat down.
"Mr Burnett has been knocked on the head and then nearly drowned," said
the lieutenant.
Mr Drummond cried aloud in horror. Topham made a warning gesture.
"This is not to be talked about at present," he said in a guarded
voice. "The facts simply are that I'm in command of a patrol-boat, and
last night we were off the Berwickshire coast when we found your friend
in the water with a bad wound in his head and a piece of cord tied
round his feet."
"You mean some one had tried to murder him?" cried Mr Drummond.
"It looked rather like it," said Topham drily.
"And him a minister too!" gasped Mr Drummond.
"So we found later."
"But you'd surely tell that from his clothes!"
"He had no clothes when we found him."
"No clothes on! Then do you mean----"
"We took him straight back to the base," continued the lieutenant
quickly, "and finally he came round and was able to talk a little.
Then we learned his name and heard of you, and Captain Blacklock asked
me to run up and let you know he was safe, and also get you to check
one or two of his statements. Mr Burnett is naturally a little
light-headed at present."
Mr Drummond was a persistent gentleman.
"But do you mean you found him with no clothes on right out at sea?"
"No; close under the cliffs."
"Did you see him fall into the water?"
"We heard a cry, and picked him up shortly afterwards," said the
lieutenant, rather evasively, Mr Drummond thought.
"However, the main thing is that he will recover all right. You can
rest assured he is being well looked after."
"I'd like to know more about this," said Mr Drummond with an air of
determination.
"So would we," said Topham drily, "and I'd just like to ask you one or
two questions, if I may. Mr Burnett was on his way to the Windy
Islands, I believe?"
"He was. He had got all his papers and everything ready to start
to-night."
"You feel sure of that?"
"He wrote and told me so himself."
Lieutenant Topham nodded in silence. Then he inquired--
"Do you know a Mr Taylor?"
"Taylor? I know a John Taylor----"
"Who comes from Lancashire and keeps a motor-car?"
"No," said Mr Drummond. "I don't know that one. Why?"
"Then you didn't send a long telegram to Mr Burnett yesterday telling
him that Mr Taylor would call for him in his motor-car and drive him to
your house?"
"Certainly not!" cried Mr Drummond indignantly. "I never sent a long
telegram to any one in my life. I tell you I don't know anything about
this Mr Taylor or his motor-car. If Mr Burnett told you that, he's
light-headed indeed!"
"Those are merely the questions Captain Blacklock asked me to put,"
said the lieutenant soothingly.
"Is he the officer in command of the base?" demanded Mr Drummond a
little fiercely.
"No," said Topham briefly; "Commander Blacklock is an officer on
special service at present."
"Commander!" exclaimed Mr Drummond with a menacing sniff. "But you
just called him Captain."
"Commanders get the courtesy title of Captain," explained the
lieutenant, rising as he spoke. "Thank you very much, Mr Drummond.
There's only one thing more I'd like to say----"
"Ay, but there are several things I'd like to say!" said Mr Drummond
very firmly. "I want to know what's the meaning of this outrage to my
friend. What's your theory?"
Before the war Lieutenant Topham had been an officer in a passenger
liner, but he had already acquired in great perfection the real Navy
mask.
"It seems rather mysterious," he replied--in a most unsuitably light
and indifferent tone, Mr Drummond considered.
"But surely you have _some_ ideas!"
The Lieutenant shook his head.
"We'll probably get to the bottom of it sooner or later."
"A good deal later than sooner, I'm afraid," said Mr Drummond severely.
"You've informed the police, I presume."
"The affair is not in my hands, Mr Drummond."
"Then whose hands is it in?"
"I have not been consulted on that point."
Ever since the war broke out Mr Drummond's views concerning the Navy
had been in a state of painful flux. Sometimes he felt a genuine pride
as a taxpayer in having provided himself with such an efficient and
heroic service; at other times he sadly suspected that his money had
been wasted, and used to urge upon all his acquaintance the strong
opinion that the Navy should really "do something"--and be quick about
it too!
Lieutenant Topham depressed him greatly. There seemed such an
extraordinary lack of intelligent interest about the fellow. How
differently Nelson would have replied!
"Well, there's one thing I absolutely insist upon getting at the bottom
of," he said resolutely. "I am accused of sending a long telegram to
Mr Burnett about a Mr Taylor. Now I want to know the meaning of that!"
Lieutenant Topham smiled, but his smile, instead of soothing, merely
provoked the indignant householder.
"Neither you nor Mr Burnett are accused of sending telegrams. We only
know that you received them."
"Then who sent them, I'd like to know?"
"That, no doubt, will appear in time. I must get back now, Mr
Drummond; but I must first ask you not to mention a word to any one of
this--in the meantime anyhow."
The householder looked considerably taken aback. He had anticipated
making a very pleasant sensation among his friends.
"I--er--of course shall use great discretion----" he began.
Lieutenant Topham shook his head.
"I am directed to ask you to tell _nobody_."
"Of course Mrs Drummond----"
"Not even Mrs Drummond."
"But this is really very high-handed, sir! Mr Burnett is a very old
friend of mine----"
The Lieutenant came a step nearer to him, and said very earnestly and
persuasively--
"You have an opportunity, Mr Drummond, of doing a service to your
country by keeping absolute silence. We can trust you to do that for
England, surely?"
"For Great Britain," corrected Mr Drummond, who was a member of a
society for propagating bagpipe music and of another for commemorating
Bannockburn,--"well, yes, if you put it like that--Oh, certainly,
certainly. Yes, you can trust me, Mr Topham. But--er--what am I to
say to Mrs Drummond about your visit?"
"Say that I was sent to ask you to keep your lights obscured,"
suggested the lieutenant with a smile.
"Capital!" said the householder. "I've warned her several times about
the pantry window. That will kill two birds with one stone!"
"Good morning, sir. Thank you very much," said the lieutenant.
Mr Drummond was left in a very divided state of mind regarding the
Navy's competence, Mr Burnett's sanity, and his own judgment.
V.
ON THE MAIL BOAT.
A procession came down the long slope at the head of the bay. Each
vehicle but one rumbled behind a pair of leisurely horses. That one, a
car with a passenger and his luggage, hooted from tail to head of the
procession, and vanished in the dust towards the pier. The sea
stretched like a sheet of brilliant glass right out across the bay and
the firth beyond to the great blue island hills, calm as far as the eye
could search it; on the green treeless shores, with their dusty roads
and their dykes of flagstones set on edge, there was scarcely enough
breeze to stir the grasses. "We shall have a fine crossing," said the
passengers in the coaches to one another.
They bent round the corner of the bay and passed the little row of
houses, pressed close beneath the high grassy bank, and rumbled on to
the pier. The sentries and the naval guard eyed the passengers with
professional suspicion as they gathered in a cue to show their
passports, and then gradually straggled towards the mail boat. But
there was one passenger who was particularly eyed; though if all the
glances toward her were prompted by suspicion, it was well concealed.
She was a girl of anything from twenty-two to twenty-five, lithe,
dressed to a miracle, dark-haired, and more than merely pretty. Her
dark eyebrows nearly meeting, her bright and singularly intelligent
eyes, her firm mouth and resolute chin, the mixture of thoughtfulness
in her expression and decision in her movements, were not the usual
ingredients of prettiness. Yet her features were so fine and her
complexion so clear, and there was so much charm as well as thought in
her expression, that the whole effect of her was delightful.
Undoubtedly she was beautiful.
She was clearly travelling alone, and evidently a stranger to those
parts. No one on the pier or steamer touched a hat or greeted her, and
from her quick looks of interest it was plain that everything was fresh
to her. The string of passengers was blocked for a moment on the
narrow deck, and just where she paused stood a tall man who had come
aboard a minute or two before. He took his eyes discreetly off her
face, and they fell upon her bag. There on the label he could plainly
read, "Miss Eileen Holland." Then she passed on, and the tall man kept
looking after her.
Having piled her lighter luggage on a seat in a very brisk and
business-like fashion, Miss Holland strolled across the deck and leaned
with her back against the railings and her hands in the pockets of her
loose tweed coat, studying with a shrewd glance her fellow-passengers.
They included a number of soldiers in khaki, on leave apparently;
several nondescript and uninteresting people, mostly female; and the
tall man. At him she glanced several times. He was very obviously a
clergyman of some sort, in the conventional black felt hat and a long
dark overcoat; and yet though his face was not at all unclerical, it
seemed to her that he was not exactly the usual type. Then she saw his
eyes turn on her again, and she gazed for some minutes at the pier just
above their heads.
The cable was cast off and the little steamer backed through the foam
of her own wake, and wheeling, set forth for the Isles. For a while
Miss Holland watched the green semicircle slowly receding astern and
the shining waters opening ahead, and then turned to a more practical
matter. Other passengers were eyeing the laden deck-seat.
"I'm afraid my things are in your way," she said, and crossing the deck
took up a bag and looked round where to put it.
The clergyman was beside her in a stride.
"Allow me. I'll stow it away for you," he said.
He spoke with a smile, but with an air of complete decision and quiet
command, and with a murmur of thanks she yielded the bag almost
automatically. As he moved off with it, it struck her that here was a
clergyman apparently accustomed to very prompt obedience from his flock.
They had been standing just aft of the deck-house, and with the bag in
his hand he passed by this to where a pile of lighter luggage had been
arranged on the deck. As he went he looked at the bag curiously, and
then before putting it down he glanced over his shoulder. The lady was
not in sight, and very swiftly but keenly he studied it more closely.
It was a suit-case made of an unusual brown, light material. Turning
one end up quickly he read on a little plate this assurance by the
makers, "Garantirt echt Vulcanfibre." And then slowly, and apparently
rather thoughtfully, he strolled back.
"You'll find it among the other luggage, just beyond the deck-house,"
he said, and then with an air of sudden thought added, "Perhaps I ought
to have put it with your other things, wherever they are."
"I have practically nothing else," said she, "except a trunk in the
hold."
"You are travelling very light," he remarked. "That wasn't a very
substantial suit-case."
For a moment she seemed to be a little doubtful whether to consider him
a somewhat forward stranger. Then she said with a frank smile--
"No; it was made in Germany."
As she spoke he glanced at her with a curious sudden intensity, that
might have been an ordinary trick of manner.
"Oh," he said with a smile. "Before the war, I presume?"
"Yes," she answered briefly, and looked round her as though wondering
whether she should move.
But the clergyman seemed oblivious to the hint.
"Do you know Germany well?" he asked.
"Yes," she said. "Do you?"
He nodded.
"Yes, pretty well--as it was before the war, of course. I had some
good friends there at one time."
"So had I," she said.
"All in the past tense now," said he.
"I suppose so," she answered; "yet I sometimes find it hard to believe
that they are all as poisoned against England and as ignorant and
callous as people think. I can't picture some of my friends like that!"
She seemed to have got over her first touch of resentment. There was
certainly an air of good-breeding and even of distinction about the
man, and after all, his extreme assurance sat very naturally on him.
It had an unpremeditated matter-of-course quality that made it
difficult to remain offended.
"It is hard to picture a good many things," he said thoughtfully.
"Were you long in Germany?"
She told him two years, and then questioned him in return; but he
seemed to have a gift for conveying exceedingly little information with
an air of remarkable finality--as though he had given a complete report
and there was an end of it. On the other hand, he had an equal gift
for putting questions in a way that made it impossible not to answer
without churlishness. For his manner never lacked courtesy, and he
showed a flattering interest in each word of her replies. She felt
that she had never met a man who had put her more on her mettle and
made her instinctively wish more to show herself to advantage.
Yet she seemed fully capable of holding her own, for after half an
hour's conversation it would have been remarkably difficult to essay a
biographical sketch of Miss Eileen Holland. She had spent a number of
years abroad, and confessed to being a fair linguist; she was going to
the Islands "to stay with some people"; and she had previously done "a
little" war work--so little, apparently, that she had been advised to
seek a change of air, as her companion observed with a smile.
"Anyhow, I have not done enough," she said with a sudden intensity of
suppressed feeling in her voice.
The keen-faced clergyman glanced at her quickly, but said nothing. A
minute or two later he announced that he had some correspondence to
look over, and thereupon he left her with the same air of decision
instantly acted on with which he had first addressed her. He passed
through the door of the deck-house, and she got a glimpse of his head
going down the companion. Her face remained quite composed, but in her
eyes there seemed to be the trace of a suggestion that she was unused
to see gentlemen quit her side quite so promptly.
A few minutes later she went down herself to the ladies' cabin. Coming
out, the foot of the companion was immediately opposite, and beyond
stretched the saloon. At the far end of this sat the clergyman, and at
the sight of him Miss Holland paused for a moment at the foot of the
ladder and looked at him with a face that seemed to show both a little
amusement and a little wonder. He sat quite by himself, with a bundle
of papers on the table at his elbow. One of these was in his hand, and
he was reading it with an air of extraordinary concentration. He had
carelessly pushed back his black felt hat, and what arrested her was
the odd impression this produced. With his hat thus rakishly tilted,
all traces of his clerical profession seemed mysteriously to have
vanished. The white dog-collar was there all right, but unaided it
seemed singularly incapable of making him into a conventional minister.
Miss Holland went up on deck rather thoughtfully. The little mail boat
was now far out in the midst of a waste of waters. The ill-omened
tideway was on its best behaviour; but even so, there was a constant
gentle roll as the oily swell swung in from the Atlantic. Ahead, on
the starboard bow, loomed the vast island precipices; astern the long
Scottish coast faded into haze. One other vessel alone was to be
seen--a long, low, black ship with a single spike of a mast and several
squat funnels behind it. An eccentric vessel this seemed; for she
first meandered towards the mail boat and then meandered away again,
with no visible business on the waters.
The girl moved along the deck till she came to the place where her
suit-case had been stowed. Close beside it were two leather kit-bags,
and as she paused there it was on these that her eyes fell. She looked
at them, in fact, very attentively. On each were the initials "A.B.",
and on their labels the legend, "The Rev. Alex. Burnett." She came a
step nearer and studied them still more closely. A few old
luggage-labels were still affixed, and one at least of these bore the
word "Berwick." Miss Holland seemed curiously interested by her
observations.
A little later the clergyman reappeared, and approached her like an old
acquaintance. By this time they were running close under the cliffs,
and they gazed together up to the dizzy heights a thousand feet above
their heads, where dots of sea-birds circled hardly to be distinguished
by the eye, and then down to the green swell and bursting foam at the
foot of that stupendous wall. In the afternoon sun it glowed like a
wall of copper. For a few minutes both were instinctively silent.
There was nothing to be said of such a spectacle.
Then Miss Holland suddenly asked--
"Do you live near the sea?"
"Not very," he answered with his air of finality.
But this time she persisted.
"What is your part of the country?"
"Berwickshire," he said briefly.
"Do you happen to know a minister there--a Mr Burnett?" she inquired.
"That is my own name," he said quietly.
"Mr Alexander Burnett?"
He nodded.
"That is very funny," she said. "There must be two of you. I happen
to have stayed in those parts and met the other."
There seemed to be no expression at all in his eyes as they met hers;
nor did hers reveal anything. Then he looked round them quietly.
There were several passengers not far away.
"It would be rather pleasant in the bows," he suggested. "Shall we
move along there for a little?"
He made the proposal very courteously, and yet it sounded almost as
much a command as a suggestion, and he began to move even as he spoke.
She started too, and exchanging a casual sentence as they went, they
made their way forward till they stood together in the very prow with
the bow wave beneath their feet, and the air beating cold upon their
faces,--a striking solitary couple.
"I'm wondering if yon's a married meenister!" said one of their
fellow-passengers--a facetious gentleman.
"It's no' his wife, anyhow!" grinned his friend.
A little later the wit wondered again.
"I'm wondering how long thae two are gaun tae stand there!" he said
this time.
The cliffs fell and a green sound opened. The mail boat turned into
the sound, opening inland prospects all the while. A snug bay followed
the sound, with a little grey-gabled town clinging to the very wash of
the tide, and a host of little vessels in the midst. Into the bay
pounded the mail boat and up towards the town, and only then did the
gallant minister and his fair acquaintance stroll back from the bows.
The wag and his friend looked at them curiously, but they had to admit
that such a prolonged flirtation had seldom left fewer visible traces.
They might have been brother and sister, they both looked so
indifferent.
The gangway shot aboard, and with a brief hand-shake the pair parted.
A few minutes later Miss Holland was being greeted by an elderly
gentleman in a heavy ulster, whilst the minister was following a porter
towards a small waggonette.
VI.
THE VANISHING GOVERNESS.
The house of Breck was a mansion of tolerable antiquity as mansions
went in the islands, and several curious stories had already had time
to encrust it, like lichen on an aged wall. But none of them were
stranger than the quite up-to-date and literally true story of the
vanishing governess.
Richard Craigie, Esq., of Breck, the popular, and more or less
respected, laird of the mansion and estate, was a stout grey-bearded
gentleman, with a twinkling blue eye, and one of the easiest-going
dispositions probably in Europe. His wife, the respected, and more or
less popular, mistress of the mansion, was lean and short, and very
energetic. Their sons were employed at present like everybody else's
sons, and do not concern this narrative. But their two daughters, aged
fifteen and fourteen, were at home, and do concern it materially.
It was only towards the end of July that Mrs Craigie thought of having
a governess for the two girls during the summer holidays. With a
letter in her hand, she bustled into Mr Craigie's smoking-room, and
announced that her friend Mrs Armitage, in Kensington, knew a lady who
knew a charming and well-educated girl--
"And who does she know?" interrupted her husband.
"Nobody," said Mrs Craigie. "She is the girl."
"Oh!" said the laird. "Now I thought that she would surely know
another girl who knows a woman, who knows a man----"
"Richard!" said his wife. "Kindly listen to me!"
It had been her fate to marry a confirmed domestic humourist, but she
bore her burden stoically. She told him now simply and firmly that the
girl in question required a holiday, and that she proposed to give her
one, and in return extract some teaching and supervision for their
daughters.
"Have it your own way, my dear. Have it your own way," said he. "It
was economy yesterday. It's a governess to-day. Have you forced the
safe?"
"Which safe?" demanded the unsuspecting lady.
"At the bank. I've no more money of my own, I can tell you. However,
send for your governess--get a couple of them as you're at it!"
The humourist was clearly so pleased with his jest that no further
debate was to be apprehended, and his wife went out to write the
letter. Mr Craigie lit his sixteenth pipe since breakfast and chewed
the cud of his wit very happily.
A fortnight later he returned one evening in the car, bringing Miss
Eileen Holland, with her trunk and her brown suit-case.
"My hat, Selina!" said he to his wife, as soon as the girls had led
Miss Holland out of hearing, "that's the kind of governess for me! You
don't mind my telling her to call me Dick, do you? It slipped out when
she was squeezing my hand."
"I don't mind you're being undignified," replied Mrs Craigie in a
chilly voice, "but I do wish you wouldn't be vulgar."
As Mr Craigie's chief joys in life were entertaining his daughters and
getting a rise out of his wife, and as he also had a very genuine
admiration for a pretty face, he was in the seventh heaven of
happiness, and remained there for the next three days. Pipe in mouth,
he invaded the schoolroom constantly and unseasonably, and reduced his
daughters to a state of incoherent giggling by retailing to Miss
Holland various ingenious schemes for their corporal punishment, airing
humorous fragments of a language he called French, and questioning
their instructor on suppositious romantic episodes in her career. He
thought Miss Holland hardly laughed as much as she ought; still, she
was a fine girl.
At table he kept his wife continually scandalised by his jocularities;
such as hoarsely whispering, "I've lost my half of the sixpence, Miss
Holland," or repeating, with a thoughtful air, "Under the apple-tree
when the moon rises--I must try and not forget the hour!" Miss Holland
was even less responsive to these sallies, but he enjoyed them
enormously himself, and still maintained she was a fine girl.
Mrs Craigie's opinion of her new acquisition was only freely expressed
afterwards, and then she declared that clever though Miss Holland
undoubtedly was, and superior though she seemed, she had always
suspected that something was a little wrong somewhere. She and Mr
Craigie had used considerable influence and persuasion to obtain a
passport for her, and why should they have been called upon to do this
(by a lady whom Mrs Armitage admitted she had only met twice), simply
to give a change of air to a healthy-looking girl? There was something
behind _that_. Besides, Miss Holland was just a trifle too
good-looking. That type always had a history.
"My wife was plain Mrs Craigie before the thing happened," observed her
husband with a twinkle, "but, dash it, she's been Mrs Solomon ever
since!"
It was on the fourth morning of Miss Holland's visit that the telegram
came for her. Mr Craigie himself brought it into the schoolroom and
delivered it with much facetious mystery. He noticed that it seemed to
contain a message of some importance, and that she failed to laugh at
all when he offered waggishly to put "him" up for the night. But she
simply put it in her pocket and volunteered no explanation. He went
away feeling that he had wasted a happy quip.
After lunch Mrs Craigie and the girls were going out in the car, and
Miss Holland was to have accompanied them. It was then that she made
her only reference to the telegram. She had got a wire, she said, and
had a long letter to write, and so begged to be excused. Accordingly
the car went off without her.
Not five minutes later Mr Craigie was smoking a pipe and trying to
summon up energy to go for a stroll, when Miss Holland entered the
smoking-room. He noticed that she had never looked so smiling and
charming.
"Oh, Mr Craigie," she said, "I want you to help me. I'm preparing a
little surprise!"
"For the girls?"
"For all of you!"
The laird loved a practical jest, and scented happiness at once.
"I'm your man!" said he. "What can I do for you?"
"I'll come down again in half an hour," said she. "And then I want you
to help me to carry something."
She gave him a swift bewitching smile that left him entirely helpless,
and hurried from the room.
Mr Craigie looked at the clock and decided that he would get his stroll
into the half-hour, so he took his stick and sauntered down the drive.
On one side of this drive was a line of huddled wind-bent trees, and at
the end was a gate opening on the highroad, with the sea close at hand.
Just as he got to the gate a stranger appeared upon the road, walking
very slowly, and up to that moment concealed by the trees. He was a
clergyman, tall, clean-shaved, and with what the laird afterwards
described as a "hawky kind of look."
There was no haughtiness whatever about the laird of Breck. He
accosted every one he met, and always in the friendliest way.
"A fine day!" said he heartily. "Grand weather for the crops, if we
could just get a wee bit more of rain soon."
The clergyman stopped.
"Yes, sir," said he, "it is fine weather."
His manner was polite, but not very hearty, the laird thought.
However, he was not easily damped, and proceeded to contribute several
more observations, chiefly regarding the weather prospects, and tending
to become rapidly humorous. And then he remembered his appointment in
the smoking-room.
"Well," said he, "good day to you! I must be moving, I'm afraid."
"Good day," said the stranger courteously, and moved off promptly as he
spoke.
"I wonder who will that minister be?" said Mr Craigie to himself as he
strolled back. "It's funny I never saw the man before. And I wonder,
too, where he was going?"
And then it occurred to him as an odd circumstance that the minister
had started to go back again, not to continue as he had been walking.
"That's a funny thing," he thought.
He had hardly got back to his smoking-room when Miss Holland appeared,
dressed to go out, in hat and tweed coat, and dragging, of all things,
her brown suit-case. It seemed to be heavily laden.
She smiled at him confidentially, as one fellow-conspirator at another.
"Do you mind giving me a hand with this?" said she.
"Hullo!" cried the laird. "What's this--an elopement? Can you not
wait till I pack my things too? The minister's in no hurry. I've just
been speaking to him."
It struck him that Miss Holland took his jest rather seriously.
"The minister?" said she in rather an odd voice. "You've spoken to
him?"
"He was only asking if I had got the licence," winked Mr Craigie.
The curious look passed from her face, and she laughed as pleasantly as
he could wish.
"I'll take the bag myself," said the laird. "Oh, it's no weight for
me. I used to be rather a dab at throwing the hammer in my day. But
where am I to take it?"
"I'll show you," said she.
So out they set, Mr Craigie carrying the suit-case, and Miss Holland in
the most delightful humour beside him. He felt he could have carried
it for a very long way. She led him through the garden and out into a
side lane between the wall and a hedge.
"Just put it down here," she said. "And now I want you to come back
for something else, if you don't mind."
"Mind?" said the laird gallantly. "Not me! But I'm wondering what you
are driving at."
She only smiled, but from her merry eye he felt sure that some very
brilliant jest was afoot, and he joked away pleasantly as they returned
to the house.
"Now," she said, "do you mind waiting in the smoking-room for ten
minutes or so?"
She went out, and Mr Craigie waited, mystified but happy. He waited
for ten minutes; he waited for twenty, he waited for half an hour, and
still there was no sign of the fascinating Miss Holland. And then he
sent a servant to look for her. Her report gave Mr Craigie the
strongest sensation that had stirred that good-natured humourist for
many a day. Miss Holland was not in her room, and no more, apparently,
were her belongings. The toilette table was stripped, the wardrobe was
empty; in fact, the only sign of her was her trunk, strapped and locked.
Moving with exceptional velocity, Mr Craigie made straight for the lane
beyond the garden. The brown suit-case had disappeared.
"Well, I'm jiggered!" murmured the baffled humourist.
Very slowly and soberly he returned to the house, lit a fresh pipe, and
steadied his nerves with a glass of grog. When Mrs Craigie returned,
she found him sufficiently revived to jest again, though in a minor key.
"To think of the girl having the impudence to make me carry her luggage
out of the house for her!" said he. "Gad, but it was a clever dodge to
get clear with no one suspecting her! Well, anyhow, my reputation is
safe again at last, Selina."
"Your reputation!" replied Mrs Craigie in a withering voice. "For
what? Not for common-sense anyhow!"
"You're flustered, my dear," said the laird easily. "It's a habit
women get into terrible easy. You should learn a lesson from Miss
Eileen Holland. Dashed if I ever met a cooler hand in my life!"
"And what do you mean to do about it?" demanded his wife.
"Do?" asked Mr Craigie, mildly surprised. "Well, we might leave the
pantry window open at night, so that she can get in again if she's
wanting to; or----"
"It's your duty to inform the authorities, Richard!"
"Duty?" repeated the laird, still more surprised. "Fancy me starting
to do my duty at my time of life!"
"Anyhow," cried Mrs Craigie, "we've still got her trunk!"
"Ah," said Mr Craigie, happily at last, "so we have! Well, that's all
right then."
And with a benign expression the philosopher contentedly lit another
pipe.