BOOK IV.

THE COUNTERCHASE.

NIGHT THE TWENTY-FIRST.

THE YELLOW DOG.

About two months later--to be accurate, it was seven weeks and two

days--my flat in Jermyn Street was honoured with a totally unexpected

call by Constantia Denistoun. Constantia has a way of committing

improprieties with all the _aplomb_ of innocence. She just walked

upstairs and walked into the room where Jephson and I were packing

gun-cases.

"Hallo!" said she. "You seem to be in a mess here."

"Please sit down," said I, removing a sporting rifle and bundle of

cotton-waste from the best arm-chair.

"What is the matter?" she asked, arching her brows as she surveyed

the general disorder.

"We're packing," said I.

"It may surprise you to hear it," said she, taking the seat, "but so

I had guessed. What is it? Preparing for the pheasants, or for

Quarter Day?"

"Neither," I answered. "I'm going to South America, that's all.

. . . That will do for the present, Jephson. You may get Miss

Denistoun a cup of tea."

"Sudden?" she asked, when Jephson had withdrawn.

"Well," I admitted, "I booked my passage only two days ago, but I've

had the notion in my mind for some time."

"Alligators, is it? or climbing, this time? Or just general

exploring?"

"You may call it exploring, though I may have a shy at the Andes on

the way. These fits come upon me at intervals, Constantia, as you

know, ever since you determined to be unkind."

"Don't be absurd, Roddy," she commanded, tracing out a pattern of the

carpet with the point of her sunshade. The tracing took some time.

At length she desisted, and looked up, resting her arms on her knees.

"Roddy, I'm engaged to be married."

A bowl stood on the table, full of late tea-roses sent up from

Warwickshire. . . . As the blow fell I turned about, and slowly

selected the best bloom.

"I hope," said I, "the fortunate man, whoever he is, doesn't object

to your calling around on us poor bachelors and breaking the news.

However, Jimmy Collingwood is up, with his wife, and will be coming

around from his hotel in a few minutes. He'll do for a chaperon.

Meanwhile"--I held out the rose--"I wish you all happiness from the

bottom of my heart. . . . When is it to be?--and shall I be in time

with an alligator for a wedding present?"

"Now that's rather prettily offered," said Constantia, half-extending

her hand to take the flower, her eyes shining with just the trace of

tears. "But you and I are a pair of humbugs, Roddy. To begin with

_you_--I don't believe there are any such things as alligators on

that island."

"What island?" I stammered, and my fingers gave a small, involuntary

jerk at the rose's stem as hers closed upon it.

"The island about which you wrote that queer short note to--to Dr.

Foe--two days ago, asking if he could supply you as nearly as

possible with its bearings."

"Are you telling me--?" I began.

She nodded, searching my face. "Yes, your old friend is the man; and

that's where _I_ come in as a humbug. The reason of this call is

that I want to know why you two, who used to be devoted, are no

longer friends."

"Good Lord!" I exclaimed, not loudly, but more or less to myself.

"You must forgive my lighting a cigar, Constantia. . . . My mind

works slowly." While lighting it I made a miserable attempt to fob

her off and gain time. "When an old friend cuts in and carries

off--"

"That's nonsense," she interrupted sharply; "and you know it; and you

ought to know that I know it."

"Well, then," I protested rather feebly, hating to hurt her,

"you must allow that his behaviour to that man Farrell was a bit

beyond the limit. Of course, if you can forgive it--well, I don't

know. It's odious to me to be talking like this about the man to

whom you're attached--the man I used to worship. And for me, who

still would lose a hand, cheerfully, now as ever, to spare you pain!

. . . My dear girl, let's talk of something else."

"No, we will not," said Constantia firmly. "I came to talk about

this, and I will. . . . Of course I know it was wrong of Jack to

pursue Mr. Farrell as he did. You remember my telling you I was

worried, that day we talked about him after my return from the

States? At that time I imagined he was allowing himself for a bribe

to be friends again with this man, and it distressed me; because--

well, women have their code, you know, as well as men, and--and I may

confess to you now that, even at that time, I had begun to take an

interest--"

"I see," said I dully, resting my arm along the chimney-piece and

staring down into the grate, where Jephson had lit a small fire: for

the day, though bright, was chilly.

"You assured me, you remember, that Jack was above any such meanness;

and so far you relieved me, for I saw you were telling the truth.

But," she continued, "I saw also that it wasn't the whole truth: that

you were hiding something. So I went away puzzled. Afterwards, I

got the truth out of Jimmy Collingwood."

"Well?" I prompted her, as she paused.

"Well, it was shocking of Jack, I admit. But, after all, this

Mr. Farrell had ruined his life, and--of course I don't quite

understand men and their code--but isn't it a trifle uncharitable of

you, Roddy, not to allow that the shock may have unhinged his mind

for a time? . . . No, I'm playing the humbug in _my_ turn, and I'll

own up. It was wicked, if you will: but it was great in its way, and

determined . . . and women, you know, always fall slaves to that sort

of thing. It was straightforward, too: Jimmy said Jack had given his

man fair warning. Jimmy--but you know that boy's way--gave me the

impression that he didn't condemn Jack's craze as unsportsmanlike:

merely for being, as he put it, a thought bloodthirstier than any

line of sport he himself felt any inclination to follow. 'But I'm no

judge, Con,' he added--I remember his words--'for the simple reason

that I never had a career to be ruined.' . . . Well, for the rest,

Jack says he came straight to you as soon as he set foot back in

England, and told you the whole story.--That's so, I guess?"

Constantia, in her agitation, relapsed into her mother's idiom.

I nodded, bending my head still lower over the high chimney-shelf,

still staring down into the fire.

"Then you _know_," she said; "and I _do_ call it rather dull of you,

Roddy--not to say insensate--and unlike you, anyway. . . . When, at

the end, he turned and behaved so finely, nursing this man through

his last illness. . . ."

I tell you, it was lucky that I still kept my face turned sideways,

still staring down on the fire. . . . It took me like a mental

nausea, and all my thought for the moment was to hold steady under

it. I felt my fingers gripping hard on the ledge and holding to it,

as the waves went over my poor brain. Through the surge of them

confusedly I heard her voice pleading: and yet her voice was calm,

well under control. It must have been the waves in my own head that

broke her speech into short sentences.

"You were his friend . . . his best friend . . . mine, too, Roddy.

You took it so well, just now . . . I _do_ want--"

What in the world could I say? How lift and turn my face to her?

How answer? . . . And yet within a second or two I must lift my face

and make some answer. Her voice was already trailing off

plaintively. I heard her catch her breath--

And then--thank God--I heard a brisk, happy footstep in the outer

passage, and Jimmy burst into the room with his accustomed whoop.

"Ahoy, within! How goes it with Gulliver?" He broke off, staring,

and let out another joyous whoop, upon which chimed the merry rattle

of tea-things, as Jephson followed close on his heels with a tray.

"Eh? No--but it is! In the words of the Bard, What ho, Constantia!"

He threw his bright top-hat across the room, hooked his umbrella over

his left arm, and ran forward with both hands held out. "Oh, Con!

this is good! Give me a kiss, with Otty's leave--a real good nursery

kiss!"

"There!" agreed Constantia. "And now sit down and be a good boy.

Where's Lettice?"

"Shopping in Knightsbridge: and the nurse walking the infant up and

down, more or less parallel, just inside the Park, that he may watch

the wheels go round. . . . I broke away. Shouldn't be surprised if

Lettice taxi'd around here presently. I hinted at tea, and she knows

where to find me. . . . Oh, by George, yes! Lettice always knows

where I am, somehow. Meanwhile, here's your good staid chaperon."

He dropped into a chair. "Otty, you're looking serious. What were

you talking about, you two?"

"Well, it's like this," said I, after a glance at her; "Constantia's

going to be married--to Jack Foe."

He had started up at my first words, to congratulate her. As I

dropped out the last three, with admirable presence of mind--"When in

doubt, apply cake," said he hoarsely, cramming a large piece into his

mouth to stifle his emotion.

"I am not in doubt," said Constantia serenely; "and I suppose that is

why you help yourself as first aid, before offering me some bread and

butter, while Roddy lets me pour the tea. Thank you," she added, as

he whipped about with an apology. "Don't speak with your mouth full:

it's rude. . . . And now listen to me. Roddy, here, is off for South

America, he tells me. Two days ago he wrote to Jack, asking for the

latitude and longitude, as near as might be, of a certain island.

Jack showed me the letter. . . . You know about this?" she asked

Jimmy, shooting out the question of a sudden.

I interrupted it. "Jimmy knows about it," said I. "No one else."

She looked at us calmly, taking stock of us. "Very well," she said;

"and Jack has told me the whole story too, of course. I didn't know

till this moment that Jimmy knew: but I'm so glad he does, for it

makes us all four-square. Now, when first Jack got your letter,

Roddy, He was for sending the information in six words on a post

card, as being all that was due to an old friend that had so

misjudged him. But I persuaded him, and--"

The outer door slammed upon the word, and a brisk footstep sounded in

the passage. I recognised it at once. So did Constantia.

"--And here he is!" exclaimed Constantia, without rising, "--come, as

it happens, to have it out with the pair of you. . . . Hallo, Jack!"

I am bound to say that my first look at Jack Foe gave me a start, as

he too started at sight of Jimmy, whose presence, of course, he had

not expected. He was pale in comparison with the tan of two months

back: but at every other point he was wonderfully set up and

improved. It was Constantia's doing, belike: but he had become again

in appearance the Jack Foe of old times--a trifle more seamed in the

face but with a straightness and uprightness of carriage that

rejuvenated him. His clothes, too, were of the old cut, modestly

distinguished.

"Collingwood too?" said he, nodding easily. "That's better than I

looked for. . . . You have told them?" he asked Constantia with a

frank look of understanding. Then his eyes wandered, naturally, over

the disorder in the room.

"Roddy is packing," said Constantia.

"For South America," said I.

"And after that? Yes, you needn't tell," he went on with an ease

which I could only admire. "It's the island, of course--I had your

note and was going to answer it, but Miss Denistoun--Constantia--

insisted that I should call round and tell you. The latitude is--"

"One moment," interrupted Jimmy. "You let the door slam behind you,

Professor: and your dog is protesting."

"My dog?" Foe turned about, as Jimmy stepped to the passage. "What

are you talking about, Collingwood? I don't own such a thing."

"I'll be damned if there isn't one snuffling at that outer door,"

said Jimmy, and went quickly out into the passage. I heard the lock

click back and, upon the noise, a scuffle and gallop of a four-footed

beast: and, with that, a great yellow dog burst in at the doorway of

the room, took a leap forward, crouched, and slowly stiffened itself

up with its legs, its back hunched and bristling. There it stood,

letting out its voice in a growl that sounded almost like a groan of

satisfied desire.

"Great Scott!" exclaimed Jimmy, following. "If this isn't your

Billy, Professor, come to life!"

And I, too, cast a quick glance over my shoulder at Foe--against whom

the hound evidently stiffened, as a pointer at its game. Foe, white

as a sheet, was leaning back, his shoulders propped against the edge

of the mantelshelf.

"He is not my dog," he gasped out. "Take him away: he's dangerous!"

"Looks so, anyway," said Jimmy calmly. "Well, if he's not your dog,

here's his owner to claim him."--And into the room, staring around on

us, walked Farrell.

For the moment I stared at him as at a total stranger. It was only

when, almost ignoring the rest of us, he took a step forward,

pointing a finger at one man--it was only when I turned about and saw

Foe's face--that the truth broke on me--and then, at first, as a wild

surmise, and no more. Even when I wheeled about again and stared at

the man, full belief came slowly: for this Farrell was thin, wiry,

gaunt; sun-tanned, with sunken eyes and a slight stoop; wearing the

clothes of a gentleman and, when at length he spoke, using the accent

of a gentleman. . . . But this came later.

For some seconds he said nothing: he stood and pointed. I glanced at

Constantia, preparing to spring between her and I knew not what.

Constantia, leaning forward a little in her chair, with lips slightly

parted, had, after the first glance, no eyes for the intruder, whom

(I feel sure) she had not yet recognised. Her eyes were fixed on

Jack, at whom the finger pointed: and her hand slid along the arm of

her chair and gripped it, helping her to rise and spring to his side.

Jimmy's face I did not see. He had come to a halt in the doorway.

"_You hound!_"

"Roddy! Catch him--oh, help!"

It was Constantia's call ringing through the room. I sprang about

just in time to give support as Jack fell into our interlacing arms,

and to take the most of his weight as we lowered him flat on the

hearth-rug in a dead faint.

"Call off your damned dog, sir, whoever you are!" shouted Jimmy,

running forward to help us. "We'll talk to you in a moment."

I heard Farrell call "Rover! Rover!" and the dog must have come to

heel instantly. For as I knelt, occupied in loosing Jack's collar,

of a sudden a complete hush fell on the room. Jimmy had run for the

water-bottle. "Don't ring--don't fetch Jephson!" I had commanded.

"Get water from my bedroom." When I looked up to take the bottle,

Farrell still stood implacable before the doorway.

Constantia also looked up. "Who is this gentleman?" she demanded.

"My name is Farrell," answered the figure by the doorway.

"Miss Denistoun may remember a fellow-passenger of some years ago, on

the _Emania_."

I heard the catch of her breath as she knelt by me, staring at him.

I heard Jimmy's muttered "My God!" My arm was reaching to catch

Constantia if she should drop backward.

But she pulled herself together with a long sob--I felt it shuddering

through her, so close she knelt by me. Again silence fell on the

room. Jimmy had fetched my bath-sponge along with the bottle.

I poured water upon it and bathed Jack's temples, watching his

eyelids. After a while they fluttered a little. I felt over his

heart. "He is coming round," I announced: "but we'll let him lie

here for a little, before lifting him on to the couch.

"One question first," commanded Constantia. "Answer me, you two.

. . . Is this--is this thing true, Roddy? _Did he leave-this

man--on the island?_"

For the moment I could put up no better delay--as neither could

Jimmy--than to call "hush!" and pretend to listen to Jack's faintly

recovering heart-beat. But Farrell heard, and answered,--

"It's true, Miss Denistoun. . . . I had no notion to find him here;

still less to find you and distress you. I came to Sir Roderick.

But the dog here was wiser. _He_ knew the scent on the stairs, and

raced in ahead. . . . I am sorry to say it, Miss Denistoun: but that

blackguard yonder took ship and left me solitary,--to die, for aught

he knew. Let him come-to, and then we'll talk."

Constantia rose. Slowly she picked up her gloves and sunshade.

"No, we will not talk," she said, after a pause. "That talk is for

you four men. I--I have no wish to see him recover."

As she said it, she very slowly detached from her breast-knot the

rose which had carried my felicitation, and laid it on the table:

and, with that, she walked out, Farrell drawing aside to make way for

her.

NIGHT THE TWENTY-SECOND.

THE SECOND MAN ESCAPES.

Now that exit of Constantia's, I must tell you, had an instant and

very remarkable effect upon Farrell, though she swept by him without

perceiving it.

A moment before he had stood barring the doorway, his legs planted

wide, his eyes fierce, his chest panting as he waited for his enemy

to come back to life, his mouth working and twisting with impatience

to let forth its flood of denunciation.

As Constantia walked to the door he not only drew back a foot to let

her pass. He drew his whole body back, bowed for all the world like

any shop-walker letting out a customer, even thrust out a hand, as by

remembered instinct and as if to pull open an imaginary swing-door

for a departing customer of rank. In short, for a moment the man

reverted to his past--to Farrell of the Tottenham Court Road. . . .

Nor was this all. As she went by him he slewed about to follow her

with his eyes, kicking aside the dog that hampered him, crouching

against his legs: and still his gaze followed her, to the outer door.

Not until she had closed the outer door behind her did he face about

on the room again; and still it was as if all the wind had been

shaken, of a sudden, out of his sails. His next words, moreover--

strange as they were--would have stablished his identity with Farrell

even had any doubt lingered in us.

"Funny thing," said he, addressing us vaguely, "how like blood tells,

even down to a look in the eyes. I was husband to a woman once,

thousands of miles from here and foreign of race: but she came of

kings, though far away back, and Miss Denistoun, Sir Roderick, she

reminded me, just then--"

"Look here, Mr. Farrell," I broke in; "with your leave we won't

discuss Miss Denistoun, here or anywhere--as, with your leave, we'll

cut all further conversation until Dr. Foe is fit for it, which at

this moment he pretty obviously is not. It may help your silence if

I tell you that the lady who has just left is, or was, engaged to

marry him."

"_Christ! . . . And she knows?_" He stared, less at us than at the

four walls about him.

"She does not," said I: "or did not, until a few minutes ago."

"But _you_ knew!"--Wrath again filled Farrell's sails. "_You_ knew--

and you allowed it. . . . And you call yourselves gentlemen, I

suppose!"

"If you take that tone with either of us for an instant longer,"

I answered, after a pause, "you shall be thrown out of that door, and

your dog shall follow through the window. If you prefer to stand

quite still and hold your tongue--will you?--why, then, you are

welcome to the information that I only heard of this engagement less

than an hour ago, and Mr. Collingwood less than ten minutes before

you entered."

"But you knew _that other thing_," Farrell insisted.

"Yes, I knew," said I: "and for the simple reason that Dr. Foe told

it all to me. And Mr. Collingwood knows, for I told it to him.

We two have kept the secret."

"And," sneered Farrell, "you still keep being his friends!"

"No," I answered; "as a matter of fact, we do not. But you have

taken that tone again with me in spite of my warning, and I shall now

throw you downstairs. . . . You are an ill-used man, I believe,

though not by me: and for that reason, if you come back--say at ten

to-morrow morning--and apologise, you will find me sympathetic.

But just now I am going to throw you out."

"You may if you can," retorted Farrell, eyeing my advance warily.

"I've spoilt this marrying, I guess: and that's the first long chalk

crossed off a long tally."

I was about to grip with him when Jimmy called sharply that there

were to be no blows--Foe wanted to speak.

Foe had recovered under the brandy and lay over on his side, facing

us, panting a little from the dose--of which Jimmy had been liberal.

"Have it out, Roddy," he gasped, "here and now. I'm strong enough to

get it over, and--and he can't tell you any worse than you both know,

of my free telling--and I don't want to trouble either of you again.

Let him have it out," implored Foe, between his sharp intakes of

breath.

"I am glad you excepted _me_," burst out Farrell. "You'll trouble

_me_ again fast enough: or, rather, I'll trouble _you_--to the end of

your dirty life. Are you shamming sick, there, you Foe?"

"You know that he is not," said Jimmy, holding back my arm.

"Tell your story, and clear."

"My story?" echoed Farrell in a bewildered way. "What's my story

more than what you know, it seems? What's my story more than that,

after sharing hell for days in an open boat, and solitude on that

awful island, this man left me--choosing when I was sick and sorry:

left me to hell and solitude together--left me to it, cold-blooded,

when I was too weak to crawl--left me, in his cursed grudge, when he

could have saved two as easy as one? Has he told you that,

gentlemen?"

"He told me quite faithfully," said I. "We--Mr. Collingwood and I--

both know it."

"Ay," Farrell retorted, "but neither you nor your Mr. Collingwood,

when you say that, understands a bit what it means . . ." He broke

off, searching for some words to convey the remembered agony to our

brains that had no capacity (he felt) even to imagine it.

"No," came a dull voice from the couch--startling us, dull though it

was. "Only you and I, Farrell, understand what it means. Tell them

just the facts, as I told the facts, and no more. Tell them, and me,

how you escaped."

"By the same ship as you did, if you wish to know--the _I'll Away_

schooner, Captain Jefferson Hales. And I'll tell you something even

more surprising.--Your ill-luck started the very hour you left me and

Rover to die like two dogs together. When you stepped aboard the

_I'll Away_, you stepped aboard as a lost missionary. You had your

own bad reasons for not wanting to tell too much: and Hales had his

own very good reasons for not putting too many questions. To start

with, he didn't like missionaries as a class, _or_ their

conversation: and I gather that his crew likewise didn't take much

truck in them; neither in the species nor in you as a specimen: least

of all in you as a specimen. I'm sorry for it, too, in a way:

because, at first, I pictured them asking you to put up a prayer, and

pictured your face and feelings as you knelt down to oblige.

Well, that was one of the pretty fancies that ought to come true but

don't manage to, in this world. As for the next, there's no saying.

You passed yourself for a missionary, and if Satan has humour enough

to accept you on that ticket, a pretty figure you'll make, putting up

false prayers in hell. . . . Anyhow, you didn't make friends on board

that schooner--eh?"

"I did not," Foe answered listlessly.

"You weren't over comfortable with that crowd when you changed me for

it?"

"I was not, if that's any comfort to you."

Farrell grinned. "Of course it's a comfort to me. They sent you to

Coventry more or less; and I'll tell you the reason, if you don't

know it. There was a whisper going round the ship forward. . . .

One of the hands--it being a clear day--had heard a dog barking from

the shore. Another fancied that he had. Then a third called to mind

having heard somewhere--he couldn't remember the public, or even the

port--that when old Buck Vliet marooned his missionary he'd left a

dog with him in compassion. . . . I should tell you two gentlemen

that the yarn about Vliet and how he caught a missionary by mistake,

and how he'd short-circuited him somewhere in a holy terror, was a

kind of legend all along the coast and around the Eastern islands.

I dare say it crossed to the Atlantic in time: for again it was the

kind of story that starts by being funny and gets funnier as each man

chooses to improve on it. . . . All I can say is, that if the body

you and I, Foe, looked down upon, that afternoon, belonged to Vliet's

missionary, I don't want to hear any more fun about it. . . . So you

see, gentlemen, this God-forsaken lot, down in the _I'll Away's_

fo'c'sle, patched it up amongst them that this man, in his hurry, had

deserted his dog. Now, as I shall tell you, if they had reasoned,

they'd have known that the dog wouldn't starve, anyway. But they

didn't reason. They were a God-forsaken lot--mostly broken men,

pliers about the islands--and it just went against their instinct

that anyone should forsake so much as a dog. If they'd known you had

forsaken a man, you Foe, they'd have tarred and burnt you.

"--Captain Hales, as it happened, hadn't caught the barking or any

faint echo of it: the reason being that he was hard of hearing,

although in the rest of his senses sharper than all his crew rolled

together, and in wits or at a bargain a match for any trader between

Chile and Palmerston. Also I have heard it rumoured that he had run

a bit wild in his youth, found himself within the law or outside of

it (I forget which), and come down to the South Pacific for the

good of his health. But that was many years ago. He was now a

middle-aged man, and had learnt enough about these waters to call you

a fool if you suggested by way of flattery that what he didn't know

about them wasn't worth knowing.

"--Something, at any rate, in his past had turned him into a silent,

brooding man, seldom coming out of his thoughts until it came to a

bargain, when he woke up like a giant from sleep. His deafness

helped to fasten this silent habit deeper upon him. Also he was

touchy about his deafness: didn't like at any time to be reminded of

it; and was apt to fly into a sudden rage if anyone brought up a

reminder, even by a chance hint. And that, belike, was the main

reason why he alone on board--barring yourself, Foe--never heard tell

of this barking which he had missed to hear with his own ears.

"--And now for one thing more, Foe--and it'll make you squirm by and

by! Like most deaf men he was a bit suspicious: and looking at you

sideways as you came on board--what with one thing and another, not

liking missionaries as a line in trade, and, in particular,

mistrusting the cut of _your_ jib, he thought things over a bit and

altered his helm.

"--I'll explain. You see, you not only came aboard looking what you

are, but you came aboard fairly slimed over, in addition, with all

that had ever been told or guessed against Buck Vliet's missionary.

The stories didn't agree about his sect: but they agreed that Vliet,

though a ruffian, hadn't marooned the man just for fun--that he must

have been a hard case somehow. The stories might vary concerning

Vliet's reasons: but they agreed that the man hadn't come to it by

sheer over-prayerfulness: and the conclusion was--reasonable or

unreasonable--that you, Foe, must have been a bad potato somehow, or

at best a severe trial, if so hardened a stomach as Vliet's hadn't

been able to keep you down. Worse; he guessed you for a spy.

"--Here, Sir Roderick and Mr. Collingwood, I must tell you that Vliet

and Hales, as masters in this knock-about off-island trade, had grown

to be rival kings in their way, and Hales in his brooding fashion as

jealous as fire. From all I've heard, Vliet hadn't the ambition to

be properly jealous: all _he_ objected to was his business being cut.

"--Vliet was an old man--a regular hoary sinner, who kept his trade

secrets by a very simple method. He stocked his crews entirely with

lads of his own begetting. White, black, he didn't care how many

wives he carried to sea, or how much of a family wash he carried in

the shrouds on a fine day. He ran his trade on secrecy and close

family limitations. He had no range. His joy was to have a corner

unknown to a soul else in the world. Fat, lazy, wicked, and sly--

that was Vliet. He belonged to the old school.

"--Now, for years, Hales--of the new school, and challenger--had been

chasing after a rumour that chased after Vliet from port to port--a

rumour that Vliet drew on an uncharted island, in those latitudes,

known only to himself and to so much of his progeny as the old

Solomon didn't mistrust enough to lose overboard. . . . Well, the

belief at Valparaiso is that old Buck Vliet, with his schooner--on

which he grudged a penny for repairs--had found an ocean grave at

last, somewhere. The guess is that he overdid the _Two Brothers_ in

the end, being careless of warnings, with a top-hamper of wives.

There is also a legend--likely invented to account for the name of

his schooner--that he left all his money to a twin brother in

business in Salt Lake City, and that the brother and his brother's

wives had fitted out a new schooner to hunt for the island's

whereabouts.

"--Listen, you Foe! While I was lying sick, and you neglecting the

look-out, Hales made our island, and anchored in the bay. While I

was lying sick, and you neglecting the look-out, Hales made our

island, that had been his dream for years; landed there, or on the

far side, took its bearings to a hair, of course, and went ashore

with a party to prospect. What do you say to that?"

"I say," answered Foe, still languidly, shifting his head a little on

the cushion, "that I always told you we were on the wrong side of the

island, and that you would never listen."

"They landed, anyway," pursued Farrell; "and for a whole day, after

watering, they explored. They never got over the crest that looked

down on our camp."

"And if they had they would never have seen us," said Foe, responding

like a man in a dream. "You had chosen the site too cleverly; the

fern-brake would have hidden us, anyway. Let that pass."

"But there was the bonfire and the look-out, both unattended."

"Oh, if we're to start re-arguing arguments that kept us tired for

about three years," answered Foe, "you built the bonfire on the wrong

slope, as I always told you. And I'd cut down your flagstaff."

"We won't quarrel about _that_, since here we are," Farrell retorted

with a savage grin. "So I'll drop it and get on with the story.

And the next thing to be mentioned in the story, Foe, is that for a

clever man, you're about the biggest fool alive. You have no end of

knowledge in you, which I admired on the island. The way you found

all kinds of plants and things and turned them to account, and

explained to me how traders and practical chemists could make

fortunes out of them--why, it was wonderful. But it wasn't so

wonderful to me as that, with all this knowledge, you'd never turned

it to account, so to speak, when, with a third of it, at your age,

I'd have been a millionaire. And the ways and manners of a gentleman

you had, too; which I could easier set about copying--as I did.

It won't bring you much comfort to know that, half the time, I was

sucking education out of you, grinning inwardly and thinking,

'Now, my fine hater, the more you're taking the superior line with me

the more I'm your pupil all the time; the more you're giving me what

I'll find priceless, one of these days, if ever we get back upon

London pavements.' In the blindness of your hatred you never guessed

that Peter Farrell, all through life, might have had a long way with

him--a way of looking ahead--and all to better himself. You never

guessed _that_, all the time, I was letting you teach me.

"--But in practical matters--in all that counts first with a business

man--I saw pretty early that you were little better than a fool.

Yet I couldn't have believed you or any man such a fool as you showed

yourself on the _I'll Away_: and even you couldn't have missed

sensing it but for one thing--_you couldn't dare return to the

island_.

"--A place so rich as that, unknown, uncharted!--reeking with copra,

not to mention other wealth--fairly asking to be sold and turned over

to a government, to a syndicate, to develop it! Man! you and Hales

had a million safe between you when you boarded the schooner; and I

can see Hales's mind at work when he spotted your boat and sized up

the share he was losing by your turning up. The marvel to me is, he

didn't turn you a blind eye. But Hales is a humane man. He did time

in his youth, but he's not the sort that you are, Foe--the sort that

could leave a man to die solitary and forsaken. Belike, too, the

prize was so great in his grasp that he didn't care how much, in

reason, might run through his fingers.

"--Listen! When you sighted him, he had made a careful offing of the

southern reefs, and had hauled up close to his wind. Where do you

suppose he was bound? He was fetching up to beat back to Valparaiso.

Being Yankee born and not a stocking-banker like old Buck Vliet, he

was all for Valparaiso with an island to sell to the Chilian

Government, and a concession and a syndicate fair in view. This

cargo of beads, cheap guns, sham jewellery, canned meats, and rum,

that he had aboard for the islands, would keep: the rum would even be

improved by a little Christian delay. But, if he sank it all, all

was nothing to the secret he carried.

"--And then you hove on his view, for partner: and he took you in.

. . . I hope you'll remember him gratefully after this, Foe.

He chose to sight you--and he hadn't heard the dog. If he had, it

wasn't in him to guess that you had left any better than a dog

behind.

"--Then you fairly flummoxed him. Missionary though you were, he'd

accepted you as prospective shareholder. It wasn't for him to guess

that you dared not go back.

"--He's told me that, accepting you, for a day and a half he held on

his course, close-hauled. Is that so? But he was suspicious, as

deaf men are. He took a notion that you--you, keeping mum as a cat,

having to pass for somebody else and avoid questions--were just lying

low, meaning to slip cable at Valparaiso and hurry in with a prior

claim. I am sorry to say it, Foe: but altogether you did not create

good impression on board the _I'll Away_. To the crew you were an

object of dark suspicion. To the skipper you were either a close

knave, meaning to trick him, or an incredible idiot. After a while,

and almost against hope, he determined to try you for an idiot.

He ordered his helm up, and watched you. You did not protest.

He put his helm farther and farther up, and headed for the

Marquesas. Still you offered no objection. So he landed you--on

Nukuheva, if I remember. And from Nukuheva, somehow, I guess, you

got a slant out of your missionary labours to Sydney or else 'twas

back to Valparaiso--I haven't tracked it: but from one or other you

picked up some sort of a passage home. Anyway, lost men as the

_I'll Away's_ crew might be, they were glad enough, having traded you

for nothing, to up-sail and lose you out of their sight. . . . And

this man I find you two gentlemen treating as your friend, whom the

scum of the earth (as you would call them) abhorred! And you _know_,

whilst those poor men only guessed!"

"Stay a moment, Farrell," interposed Jimmy. "Sorry to interrupt

. . . but will you kindly take a look around this room.

Not entirely a neat apartment, eh? A few odd cases and cabin trunks

lying around? . . . You and Sir Roderick were almost at blows just

now. But if you're curious to know the reason of all this mess, it

is that, when you paid us this timely call, he was packing to search

for you."

"So?" Farrell drew back, regarding me, and the upper lids of his

eyes went up till they were almost hidden by his brows. "So?" he

said slowly. "But why?"

"Put it at a whim," I said sharply, "and get on with your tale.

. . . If you interrupt again, Jimmy, I'll strangle you, or attempt

to. You may have observed that I'm ready to fight anybody, this

afternoon."

Farrell looked at me earnestly. "I see what you would be driving at,

sir," said he, becoming the humble tradesman again. "And I admire.

But, by God, sir!" he broke out, "it won't do! It shan't do! No man

is going to shoulder that man's sin, to rob me of him!"

"Get down from that horse," said I. "You can mount him again, if you

choose, later on; but, first, finish the story."

"All very well," said Farrell, "to put it in that dictatorial way,

when you've taken the heart out of a man. . . . Well, Hales headed

back for Valparaiso, scarce believing his luck. There he interviewed

the ministry, got a provisional concession, and started out for the

island again, to make good--and found another inhabitant alive and

kicking.

"--He behaved just as well as before, and better--for I was frank

with him and knowledgeable. He couldn't understand missionaries,

real or sham: but he understood a square deal, and didn't charge

interest on bowels of mercy. His only grumble was, 'I'll put you on

your honour. Tell me, please, there's no more of you hereabouts.

It's a long passage to and fro: and if you're a man, you'll see that

I'm almost as crowded as you are lonesome. Don't start me beating

_all_ this brush for skunks!'

"--He sailed me back to Valparaiso, after we had spent three days

prospecting the property together. At Lima I left him to fight out

details with the Minister of the Interior--who, for some mysterious

reason, turned out to be the person charged with trafficking for an

islet three hundred miles from any interior--while I trained north

and, crossing the Isthmus, sailed north for New York. The only man

I knew in the whole Western Hemisphere was a friend of mine there,

Renton by name, and I made for Renton, to raise capital.

"--I found that he could walk into Wall Street, and, arm-in-arm with

me, raise the money easily. Moreover I found that he had stored some

twelve thousand dollars for me as my share of an investment I'd

helped him to in Costa Rica. Some day, gentlemen, I'll tell you of

this little episode, if you care to hear about it. It was a deal in

a queer sort of mahogany he had asked me to inspect.

"--But to return to the island, and wind up. Hales found me there,

alive and hearty, Foe. For why? Because I had found a purpose in

me--to wait and, when time came, to hunt you to the ends of the

earth. It's _my_ turn now. You've taught me, and I'll improve on

your teaching. You've bought a practice, I've learnt; and now I

learn that you've fixed up to marry this Miss Denistoun.

"--Don't I know why? . . . Didn't I see that look in her eyes as she

walked past me, just now?

"--Yes. . . . Santa's look. . . . No secrets between you and me.

But, by God, you shan't! I'll save her from _that_. Sooner than she

shall be wife of yours, I'll marry her myself!"

"Mr. Farrell," said I, "you have learnt much and learnt it sorely:

but you haven't learnt enough. Pick up your hat, take your dog with

you, and walk out."

"That's right enough," said he; "and I'm going. I'm only half a

gentleman yet, and my feelings get the better of me in the wrong way.

But you'll never rob me of that fellow, and so I promise you two, and

him. . . . Come along, Rover!"

NIGHT THE TWENTY-THIRD.

COUNTERCHASE.

I went to the South Pacific, after all.

Farrell called on me, next day, and before I could countermand my

passage. He came, as he said, to offer me his deep apologies.

"I grant you, Sir Roderick, that I behaved ill to you and Mr.

Collingwood, and specially to Miss Denistoun. I had no business to

drag her into the talk. . . . But I'm only a learner in the ways

gentlemen behave. It doesn't come to me by nature, as it comes to

luckier ones, whose parents and grandparents have bred it into the

bone. You may put it that I've hair on my hoof and have to shave it

carefully. What taking trouble can do I can make it do, and don't

count the time wasted. But it's the unexpected that catches out a

man like me. . . . You see, I came up thinking to find you alone: and

I was so keen to see you, I paid no attention to the dog, queerly as

he was behaving. I thought, maybe, he'd smelt a cat. There weren't

any cats on the island, or aboard the _I'll Away_, or the cars, or

the _Oceanic_. . . . And then I burst in after the hound, as soon as

I realised that he meant mischief of some sort; and, of a sudden,

there was Foe face to face with me, and you others treating him

friendly as friendly. Was it any wonder that, coming on him like

that and after hunting him more than half the world across, I let

myself go?"

"Well, first of all," I answered coldly, "you may disabuse your mind

of any notion that Mr. Collingwood and I were chatting with Doctor

Foe in the way you suspect. As a matter of fact, after you left, we

told him what we were trying to avoid telling him in Miss Denistoun's

presence at the moment when you broke in--that, through his treatment

of you, he had forfeited our friendship."

"Had he come to hear that?" asked Farrell,--"if it's a fair

question."

"It's a perfectly fair question," said I, "and the answer is that he

had not. He had come to give me in person some information for which

I had written to him. . . . Can you guess? It was the precise

latitude and longitude of your island. . . . And now, question for

question. You hadn't tracked him here, for you have just said that

your finding him in this room took you fairly by surprise."

"Almost knocked me over," Farrell agreed.

"Then what had been your purpose in calling on me?" I asked,

"--if that, too, is a fair question."

"Well, I'll admit I was calling, in part, to get his address or

discover his whereabouts. But that wasn't my only reason. My real

reason and foremost--But before I tell it, Sir Roderick, will you

answer me yet another question? Was it true, what Mr. Collingwood

said?--that you were actually packing to search for me?"

"Mr. Collingwood," I answered, somewhat embarrassed, "certainly would

not have said it if it hadn't been true."

"Well, it fairly beat me," said Farrell, staring. "And it beats me

again, now you confirm it. Searching for _me_?--Why? You couldn't

have guessed there was money in it."

"It may sound strange to you, sir," said I pretty icily; "but I took

that fancy into my head neither for your _beaux yeux_ nor for profit.

Moreover, if you don't understand without my help, I'll be shot if I

can provide you with an explanation that won't strike you as wildly

foolish. . . . However, if you must know, the thought of a

fellow-creature marooned on that island, and of the bare chance that

he might yet be alive to be rescued, had been preying on my mind ever

since I heard Foe's tale, and parted with his friendship on account

of it. Also it may appear extravagant, but through that old

friendship I felt a sort of personal responsibility, as if Jack had

left his trespass in my keeping. . . . But why discuss all this?

You're back, safe and sound, and the trip is off. When Jephson has

finished unpacking, he'll step over to Cockspur Street and pay

forfeit for the two berths."

"_Two_ berths?"

"Jephson was going with me. I fancy he looked forward to the

adventure, and is a trifle disappointed this morning."

Farrell nodded to show that he understood. Yet he seemed to be

considering something else, and kept his eyes fixed on me in a queer

way.

"Sir Roderick," he said, after a pause, "your arrangements are all

made for this voyage?"

"Oh, yes," said I. "Your turning up like this is quite a small

nuisance in its way. I'd arranged with my lawyers, arranged with my

bankers, let my flat here furnished from the first of next month

(_that's_ the worst), taken out letters and passport, made my will,

stored my few bits of spare plate. Last week I spent down in

Warwickshire, clewing up the loose tackle, holding heart-to-heart

conversations with Collingwood and my steward. Collingwood's my

neighbour down there, you know, and will help to look after things."

Farrell considered all this, slowly. "Excuse me, Sir Roderick," said

he, "but is there no chance of your going back to your intention and

re-packing?"

"Why on earth should I?" was my very natural question.

"Why, it's like this, sir," said Farrell, "--and now I'll come to the

real reason that brought me yesterday. My real reason was a matter

of business. . . . You may remember my telling you that, in New York,

I'd consulted Renton, an old friend of mine, about raising the

capital to take over and develop Santa Santissima, as we've agreed to

call the island; and that Renton had no difficulty to raise the

money. What I didn't tell you--not thinking it wise before company--

was that from the first I'd stipulated--with Hales as well as with

Renton--that half the shares should be held in Great Britain.

Hales didn't care, as he put it, where in thunder the money came

from, so long as it was good. Renton--as being British-born, though

naturalised--made no objection and only one condition, that the

syndicate should be a small one. If I could get half the capital

raised quietly in England by one or two persons, why, so much the

better. He could raise the other half without calling on Wall Street

or starting so much as an echo. . . . Now, I don't mind telling you,

Sir Roderick, that I had you in mind all the while. That island is a

gold mine: the copra alone there represents whole fortunes running to

waste: and even if old Buck Vliet still sails the waters--which I

doubt, for the _Two Brothers_ hasn't been spoken or sighted within

these four years, and he wasn't provisioned for whaling--still, the

concession papers are made out in Hales's name and mine, and the

duplicate documents stored. . . . All I can say is, that I'm ready to

put my own little pile upon it, to the last guinea. And I thought of

you from the first; you having done me a good turn more than once, or

tried to. Yes, sir: but the best of all would be your going out and

making sure for yourself. You, that was preparing to go that

distance to find a lost man--I say, sir, it would be heavenly, if you

went and found a fortune instead. I've arranged a cable to Hales,

and the _I'll Away_ will be waiting for you at Valparaiso. But in

case he should miss--which he won't--here are papers for you:

bearings of the island, sketch-map, copy of bond of agreement with

him, copy of agreement with Renton. All these I was bringing to put

into your hand yesterday. But, my God! Sir Roderick, now that I've

heard what I've heard--that you were preparing to search the South

Pacific for me, and for no worse reason than that a poor devil was

cast away there, I'd ask you on my knees to sleep in the berth you've

booked and travel to better purpose."

It has occurred to me since--and more than once or twice--that

although the man and his offer were honest, he had a secondary

purpose all this while: to get me out of the way lest I should

embarrass his pursuit of Foe and his other scheme of which I am to

tell.

But, on the whole reckoning, I incline to think the man was perfectly

sincere, and even eager to do me this kindness; which--as things

turned out--was really an extravagant one, on the monetary

calculation.

At any rate, after studying his face for a while, I called Jephson

out from my bedroom and told him that I had changed my mind: we would

sail, after all, and he might start re-packing at once. Jephson

fairly beamed.

"But there's one thing I'd like to say," put in Farrell, while it was

obvious that this order overwhelmed him with joy. "I want to have it

clear between us that, joyful as I am at your acceptance, and

grateful as I am for your seeing things in this light, it doesn't in

any way compromise my dealing with Foe."

"If you take my advice," said I, "you'll drop Foe, and all this silly

business of hatred. He has tried it on you, and up to a certain

point it answered. You played him--I'll grant you, unknowingly--a

perfectly damnable trick. Don't smear your soul with any flattering

unction, Mr. Farrell. You wrecked his life; and, in return, he set

himself to wreck yours. Up to that point I can understand, though it

all seems to me infernally silly. But in his monomania he went just

that step too far, and has exchanged thereby the upper hand.

You have the cards now: yet I warn you against playing them. For, as

sure as I sit here, I warn you that in the act of destroying him you

will destroy yourself. I look back on his miserable pursuit, and I

prophesy the end of yours."

"Well, it has taken me through fires of hell," said he; "but I

wouldn't have missed it. I'm the man now, and he's the coward."

"Quite so," said I. "Then be thankful and drop it. Do you want to

retrieve his soul as he has found yours?"

Farrell mused over this for a while. "I can't explain it to you," he

said. "I can't explain it to myself. But that man and I simply

can't give one another up. As I woke it in him, so he wakes in me

something that I can't be without, having once known it. It seems to

be a necessary part of myself."

"There are a great many 'Can'ts' in that confession--for a strong

man," was my comment; "and a trifle too much 'myself' for a man who

has found himself. But you remember that meeting at the Baths, when

you and Jack Foe first made acquaintance? Of course you do.

Well, there was a little man seated in the hall, fronting you, and he

read the explanation and gave it to me later, as he helped me on with

my coat. I made no account of it at the time: but he said that he'd

seen another man looking out of your eyes, for a moment, and it gave

him a scunner."

Again Farrell pondered. "I dare say he was right, too," he said

thoughtfully. "When two men are made for one another, I guess their

souls--if that's not too good a word--must exchange flesh and

clothing now and then, so that for the moment there's a puzzle to

separate t'other from which. . . . Has Foe told you about _her_--

about Santa?"

"He has," said I.

"Yet he can't have told you all: for he doesn't know it all--about

Renton, for instance, and how I did that bolt from him to Costa Rica,

and from Costa Rica to San Ramon. You must hear all about that, if

you will: because, when you've inspected the island for yourself,

your next business will be with Renton, and I want you to understand

the man you will be dealing with."

Thereupon he told me: and that is how I was able, the other night, to

relate what happened in Costa Rica and at San Ramon.

One of these days, when you're fairly rested, you shall have a full,

dull, true, and particular account of the voyage upon which I

started, next day, with Jephson, as per schedule: with a detailed

description of Santa Island, or Santa Santissima (to give it its full

name). But this story isn't about me: it concerns Foe and Farrell:

and therefore it's enough to say here, that I reached Valparaiso and

found Captain Jeff Hales waiting for me with his schooner fresh from

dock, and fleet: that he and I took to one another in the inside of

ten minutes; that our voyage, first and last, went like a yachting

cruise; that we made the island and spent something more than two

months on it, prospecting, mapping, choosing the sites for our

factories that were to be, even planning a light tramway to cart

their produce down to the grand north-eastern bay which (as Foe had

warned me) proved to be the only anchorage. But Santa's cross was

there, standing yet on the small beach where the castaways had

landed, and no doubt it stands yet. No storm ever seriously troubles

the water within that lovely protected hollow.

Returning to Valparaiso, I travelled north by steamer, by rail, by

steamer and rail again, to New York, hunted up Renton, and found that

my luck held; that I was dealing with a man as honest as Hales and

keen as either of us. With half a dozen cable messages, to and from

Farrell in London, we had everything fixed, and our company as good

as a going concern, when the Chilian Government interposed a long,

vexatious delay which, at one point, appeared to hint at an intention

to repudiate the bargain.

Back I travelled; this time with Renton in company, and Renton mad as

fire. It all turned out to be a bungle by some clerk that had taken

to drink and forgetfulness; but it cost us a month or two before the

Government of Senor Orrego, having no case, decided to do us justice

without troubling the Courts. Renton and I returned in triumph

through the grilling heats of July, and reached New York to find the

papers announcing this war for a certainty: whereupon, without

unpacking, I pelted for home.

From Southampton I made for London, and had two short interviews with

Farrell amid the rush of rejoining the H.A.C., collecting kit, and

the rest of it. Our talk was entirely about business, and was

conducted at the National Liberal Club--the hostelry to which I had

addressed all my letters and cables. I gathered that he used it

almost as a permanent residence, having sold or given up his house at

Wimbledon. He said nothing of Foe, and I forbore to ask questions.

From the H.A.C., in the general catch-as-catch-can of those early

weeks of the war, I found myself on one and the same day pushed into

a temporary Commission in the R.F.A., commanded down to Warwickshire

to recruit for it; and met at my lodge-gate with a telegram ordering

me off to Preston to collect a draft there and report its delivery at

Aldershot. Funny sort of home-coming for a man returning after two

years' absence! But there it was. I had just time by smart driving

to catch the next down train at our local station: so, without even a

glimpse of the ancestral roof, I put the dog-cart about and posted

back.

For the next week or so, as Jimmy put it of his own very similar

experience (he had joined up in the Special Reserve as a gunner three

years before the war), I didn't spend a night out of my train.

Then came a morning--I had rolled up with my latest draft, from

Berwick at 4.30 a.m.--when the Colonel sent for me to come to the

orderly-room some ten minutes before he opened business, and then and

there asked me if it was to my liking to come out to France with the

division then moving, on the ammunition column of his brigade.

I walked back to the R.F.A. mess, picked up a newspaper in the

ante-room, and dropped into a chair. My heart was beating like a

girl's at her first ball. "France"--"France"--the very "r" in that

glorious word kept beating in my ears with the roll of a side-drum.

I gripped the _Times_, steadied myself down to master the short

little paragraph on which my eyes had been fixed, unseeing, for a

couple of minutes, and found myself staring at this announcement:

"A marriage has been arranged, and will shortly take place,

between Peter Farrell, Esq., of 15a The Albany, and Constantia,

only daughter of the late George Wellesley Denistoun, Esq.,

J.P., D.L., of Framnel in the West Riding of Yorkshire, and of

Mrs. Denistoun of 105 Upper Brook Street, W."

NIGHT THE TWENTY-FOURTH.

CONSTANTIA.

The drumming in my ears died suddenly out to silence, and then

started afresh more violently than ever, and more sharply, for the

long pinging of an electric bell shrilled through it. The pinging

ceased sharply: the drumming continued; and I looked up to see the

mess sergeant standing over me, at attention.

"Telephone call for you, sir."

I went to the instrument like a man in a dream. Something suddenly

gone wrong with Sally's healthy first-born? Jimmy starting for

France and ringing me up for farewell? Farrell--damn Farrell!--to

talk business? Jephson, with word that he had achieved the urgent

desire of his heart and been passed as a gunner, to join me, _quo fas

et gloria ducunt_? These four only, to my knowledge, had my probable

address.

"Hallo?" I called.

"Hallo!" came the answer sharp and prompt, in a woman's voice which I

recognised at once for Constantia's. "Is that you, Roddy?"

"Yes--Roddy, all right," I spoke back, mastering my voice.

"Have you seen--?" Her voice trailed off.

"D'you mean the announcement? Yes, two minutes ago. Is it

congratulations you're ringing up in this hurry?"

"Roddy, dear, don't be a beast!" the voice implored. "I'm in a

horrible hole, and I think only you can help me. Is it possible for

you to get leave, and come? Mamma asks me to say that there's a room

here, and--and we want you!"

"As it happens," returned I, "there'll be no trouble about getting

leave. We're to start--report says--at the end of the week, and I

must be sent up to collect a few service odds-and-ends. As for

sleeping, I'll ring up Jephson, and if he's already conscripted, I

can doss at the Club. All that is easy. But tell me, what is the

matter?"

"Oh! I can't here." Constantia's voice thrilled on the wire.

"It's pretty awful. I never gave him leave--_never_!"

"You're getting pretty incoherent," said I. "We'll have it out when

we meet. Dinner? . . . No, I shall pick up a meal on the train.

. . . Mustn't expect me before 8.30; I have to put a draft through

and see them off. Odd jobs, besides. . . . These are strenuous

times."

"Roddy, you're an angel!"

"Not a bit," said I; "and I warn you not to expect me in that

capacity. You'll observe that I haven't congratulated you yet."

I put this in rather savagely.

"You're also rather a brute," answered the voice. "But you'll come?"

"Please God," said I.

"Thank God!" answered she; and I hung up the receiver.

Well, in my jubilation I had forgotten to ask for leave to run

up and get kit. But leave was no sooner asked for than given.

From Victoria that evening I taxi'd straight to Jermyn Street, where

I found Jephson, warned by telegram, elate at the prospect of

soldiering. I was able, after a talk with my Colonel, to inform him

that he had also a prospect of coming along as my servant, and this

lifted him to the seventh heaven. Then I went out, picked up a

dinner at Arthur's, and walked on to Upper Brook Street.

In those days London had not started to shroud its lamps. One stood

a few paces short of the porch of Number 105; and as I turned into

Brook Street I saw a man come hastily down the steps, and enter a

taxi anchored there. The butler followed and closed the door upon

him. The night had begun to drizzle, and there was a sough of

sou'westerly wind in the air. I turned up the collar of my service

overcoat and, as the taxi passed, walked pretty briskly forward and

intercepted Mrs. Denistoun's butler, who, after a stare at the

retreating vehicle, had reascended the steps and was about to close

the door. Recognising me by the light of the porch lamp, he opened

the door wide, and full upon the figure of Constantia, standing in

the hallway. She gave a little gasp and came to me, holding out her

hand.

"You were always as good as your word, Roddy. Come into the library.

Where are you sleeping, by the way?"

"In my flat," said I. "Jephson will not be called up for a day or

two. He has a fire lit, and will sit up for me."

"He may have to sit up late," replied Constantia. "Mamma will be

down presently. . . . There has been something of a scene, and she is

upset. You saw Mr. Farrell go away, just now? You must have passed

him, almost at the door."

"I did," said I, "though I don't know if he recognised me.

Child, what is the matter?"

"Child?" echoed Constantia. "It does me good to be called that, for

that's exactly how I am feeling. . . . He had no right--no right--"

and there she broke off.

"Do you mean," said I, "that he put that announcement in the _Times_

having no _right_ to do it?"

"I dare say," moaned Constantia, waving her arms feebly,

pathetically, "he understood more than I meant him to."

"Let us be practical, please," said I, becoming extremely stern.

"Have you, or have you not, engaged yourself to marry Farrell?"

"Certainly I have not," she answered with vivacity. "He asked me,

and I--well, I played for time."

I couldn't repress a small groan at this: or, rather, it was half a

groan and half a sigh of relief. "Has he spoken to your mother?"

"No."

"Does your mother know about it?"

"Yes. I told her."

"Does she approve of this announcement in the papers? Has she

sanctioned it?"

"Of course she does not--of course she has not. . . . Roddy, sit down

and don't ask so many questions all of a heap. Sit down and light

your pipe, and pass me a cigarette. Furnilove will bring in some

whisky for you by and by."

"Thank you, Constantia; but I don't feel like staying. I've always

maintained--oh, damnation!" I broke off.

"What have you always maintained, Roddy? Sit down and tell it.

Are you not here because I sent for you? And didn't I send for you

because I am in trouble? We are in a tangle, I tell you, and I'm

asking you, on my knees, to untwist it. So light your pipe and,

before we begin, tell me--What is it you have always maintained?"

"I have always maintained," I answered slowly, even more stern than

before, "that no woman can be safely trusted to know a cad from a

gentleman. If the cad can flourish a trifle of worldly success in

front of her, or if he's a mere adventurer and flashes himself on her

boldly enough, _or_, if she has persuaded herself to pity him, she's

just fascinated, and you can't trust her judgment ten yards.

There! . . . I've burnt my boats."

Constantia sat for some while pondering this, breathing out the smoke

of her cigarette, gazing into the fire under the shade of a

handscreen.

"I'll tell you another thing, Roddy," she said at length; "and it's

as true and truer. No woman thinks worse of a man for burning his

boats. . . . But it isn't quite worldly success to be wrecked and

left desolate on an island three hundred miles from anywhere.

It all started (as you hinted) with my pitying him and admiring his

strength of will after the awful experience he had tholed."

"He left you just now? I saw him drive away, and his infernal dog

with him."

"Yes: there had been a pretty bad scene. I was furious, and Mamma

was so much upset that I doubt if she'll be fit to talk to-night.

But it's a blessed relief to her, now that she knows you are anchored

here for a while, to protect us, and that, at the worst, we can ring

up Jermyn Street."

"Why," I exclaimed, "what the devil is there to protect you from?"

"Jack--Mr. Foe, that is--has been watching this house for days.

He haunts the pavement opposite, all the hours he is off duty.

Mamma is sure that he means evil, and I wish I was sure that he

didn't. He has gone under, Roddy. It is awful to look out, as

Furnilove draws the blinds, and see that figure there stationed,

reproaching us--yet for what harm that we have done him? He is even

ragged. . . . I should not be surprised to hear he was starving.

Yet what can we do?"

"Tell me his address," said I.

She hesitated. "Why should you suppose that I know his address?" she

asked, shading her face.

But I took her up bluntly. "I am sorry," I said, "to be discharging

apophthegms upon you to-night: but you must hear just one other.

Every woman follows and traces a man who has once laid his heart on

her altar. I am sorry, Con, to call up an instance from so far back

in the past: but you knew where to 'phone even for me, this morning.

. . . So own up, child, and tell me, where is Foe?"

"I believe," she answered after a while, the handscreen hiding her

face, "he has found work in one of these emergency hospitals they are

putting up. . . . It's at a place called Casterville Gardens, down by

Gravesend. When first he started watching this house, he was in

rags; but for the last fortnight he has worn khaki, and it improves

his appearance wonderfully. . . . Besides, when a man is in the army,

you have the comfort to know that, at least, he isn't starving."

"Was it so bad as that?" I asked. "Well, and now about Farrell?"

"Ah!" said she, "when you saw him get into that taxi, I had dismissed

him. He was going--or said he was going--straight to Printing House

Square to get that abominable paragraph contradicted. I told him

that he was to return to-night and bring me his assurance that it was

contradicted--either that, or never to enter this house again. . . .

And now, Roddy, as he may be late--as I would only be content with

his seeing the Editor in person--and as editors, I understand, come

down late to their work--suppose you mix yourself a whisky-and-soda:

for here is Furnilove with the glasses. . . . Furnilove! keep the

latch up for an hour or so, and the door on the chain. Mr. Farrell

may be calling late with a particular message. Do not admit him

beyond the hall, but come and report to me here. Sir Roderick will

receive him in the hall and take the message."

"Yes, miss," said the obedient Furnilove.

"That is all." Constantia pondered.--"Except that you may tell the

housemaid not to worry about the room for Sir Roderick. He will not

sleep here, after all. And you may send Henriette up with word to

Mamma that all is right and Sir Roderick stays only to receive Mr.

Farrell's message. He will probably be going at once on receipt of

it, and then you can lock up. The others can go to bed when they

choose."

"Very good, miss," said Furnilove, and withdrew.

"And now," said Constantia, "since he is late, keep me amused.

Tell me all about the island."

So I told her this and that of my voyaging; and the time drew on

until the clock on the mantelpiece chimed a half-hour. It was

one-thirty.

"The dickens!" said I, pulling out my own watch and consulting it.

"Farrell is a long time at Printing House Square. In my belief, Con,

he won't be returning."

Just at that moment the front door bell pealed loudly.

We stood up together. We heard Furnilove padding towards the door,

and we both moved out into the passage as he slid up the latch and

unhooked the chain. Constantia, in her eagerness, had pressed a

little ahead of me.

A man rushed in, disregarding Furnilove, shouldering him aside--a

man in a furred overcoat. Expecting Farrell, for the moment I

mistook him for Farrell. Even when above the fur collar I caught the

sight of common khaki, for another moment I took him for Farrell.

But he ran for Constantia, stretching out his arms as if to embrace

her; and as he stretched them, under the hall light, I saw that one

of his hands was bleeding.

I had enough presence of mind to spring in front of her and ward him

off. It was Foe.

"It's all right," he gasped, staring at me. "No need to make a fuss.

. . . I have killed him." And with that, still staring at me

horribly, he sank slowly and collapsed in a huddle at my feet, raving

out incoherent words.

Furnilove behaved admirably. Having assured himself that Miss

Constantia was safe, and that I had the intruder under control, he

went smartly to the telephone. . . . Amid Foe's ravings I heard him

ringing up the exchange and, after a pause, summoning the doctor.

"We had better have the spare room prepared again, after all," said

Constantia. "We can't turn him out, in this state. . . . And there's

a dressing-room, Roddy, next door, if you can put up with it. . . .

But what has happened, God knows."

"God knows," said I. "But he's a lunatic, unless I'm mistaken.

We'll hear what the doctor says. . . . But he shan't sleep here,

to trouble you. . . . Furnilove, whistle up and have a taxi

ready. . . ."

"Oh, what is he saying?" moaned Constantia as the body on the floor

still twisted as if burrowing to hide itself, now muttering and again

shouting in a voice that reverberated along the passage, "Kill him!

Damn that dog!--kill him!"

I knelt on the body and held it still. It was the body of my best

friend, and I knelt on it, almost throttling him.

"One can't ring up a lunatic asylum, at this hour of the morning,"

I found myself gasping. "He's for my flat, to-night, if your doctor

will take charge of him with me." And with that I looked up and

caught sight of Constantia's mother at the head of the staircase.

"It's all right, Mrs. Denistoun," said I, glancing up. "It's my

friend, Jack Foe--my friend that was. With the doctor's leave I'll

get him back presently to Jermyn Street, where Jephson and I will

look after him for the night. . . . Jephson used to worship him, and

will wait on him as a slave."

And with that--as it seemed amid the blasts of Furnilove's whistle in

the porchway and the _toot-toot_ of a taxi, answering it--a quiet man

stood above my shoulder. It was the doctor: and Furnilove had been

so explicit on the 'phone that the doctor--whose name I learnt

afterwards to be Tredgold--almost by magic whipped out a small bottle

from his pocket.

"Water," said he, after a look at the patient, "and a tumbler,

quick!"

Furnilove dashed into the library and returned with both.

"Bromide," said Dr. Tredgold. "Let him take it down and then hold

his head steady for a few minutes. . . . Right! . . . Now the

question is, where to bestow him? I can't answer for him when the

dose wears off: but it's no case to leave with two ladies."

"There's a taxi, doctor," said I, "if we can get him into it. I have

a flat in Jermyn Street, and a trustworthy manservant. I suggest

that he'll do there for the night."

"Right," said Dr. Tredgold again; "and the sooner the better.

I'll come with you, when I've bound up this wound on his hand.

It's a nasty one. . . . It looks to me--Yes, and it is, too!"

"What is it?" I asked.

"A dog-bite."

"So _that_ was what he killed!" thought I, and aloud I said, "Thank

God!"

"Eh?" said the doctor. "A dog-bite's a queer thing to thank God

for."

"It might have been worse," I answered.

"H'm: well it's bad enough," Dr. Tredgold replied, busy with his

bandaging.

NIGHT THE TWENTY-FIFTH.

THE PAYING OF THE SCORE.

Next evening, my leave being up, I returned to Aldershot.

Dr. Tredgold had called around early, and after overhauling his

patient and dressing the hand, had assured me there was no cause for

anxiety. The fever had gone down, and this allowed us to tackle the

main mischief, which was malnutrition. In short, Jack was starving.

"Your man makes an excellent nurse," said the doctor. "I'll tell him

to go slow at first, with beef-tea and milk, and to-morrow he can

start the works up with a dose of champagne. But I'll drop in

to-morrow, to make sure. The wound?--Oh, it's a dog-bite, safe

enough, and a rather badly lacerated one. But we cauterised it in

time last night, and it shows no 'anger,' as the saying is. Has he

told you how he came by it?"

"No," said I. "He has been lying in this lethargy ever since you

left him. He wakes up and takes his medicine from Jephson, and then

drops back into a doze. I thought it best not to worry him."

"Quite right, too. . . . And I'll not ask questions, either, beyond

putting it that he's a friend of yours, gone under, and you're

playing the Samaritan. . . . Well, you can go back to duty, and

Jephson and I will see this through. It's queer, too. . . . I seem

to have seen his face somewhere. . . . But what's queerer is that he

isn't dead. He must have had some practice at fasting, poor fellow.

I should say that his stomach hadn't known food for a week."

I duly 'phoned the doctor's report to Constantia. To Jephson my last

words were, "Write daily. When Dr. Foe can sit out, dress him in any

old suit, shirt, and underwear. I don't see myself out of this khaki

for a long time ahead. He will be fit again long before Monday week,

when you're to join up: and when he is able to walk, there's an

envelope for him in the top right-hand drawer of my writing-table."

Jephson wrote twice to report that Dr. Foe was "going on favourably,"

and on the third day, that he had even dressed himself and taken a

walk. He had been away four hours and more--"which caused me much

anxiety," added Jephson.

But on the fourth day, on the eve of our starting for Rouen, I got

the following letter, in Jack's own handwriting:

"My dear Roddy,--I shall use the old name, since it is the last

time I shall address you; and you, starting for France, will

have no time to reach me and say that it is forbidden.

"I have killed Farrell. It was a stupid and a sorry ending.

At the last it was even quite brutal--bestially different from

anything I had imagined--and I had imagined many ways--while I

had control of the show.

"I have gone through madness. That again was part of the

bestiality I had not reckoned with. . . . And unless I take

steps I shall soon be back in worse bestiality, worse madness.

But I am taking steps. . . . And in the meantime, when you read

this you are to be sure that it is written by a man perfectly

sane.

"It is nothing that I have killed Farrell. I could have killed

him, as he could have killed me, at any time. I still think

that, while the pursuit lay with me, my methods were the more

delicate, and that I should never have goaded him to strike as

he goaded me.

"But I will grant that his methods were effective enough: and

along one line I should have allowed them to be original, if I

didn't know that he had picked up the hint of it on the _I'll

Away_. It was _rumour_ that had cursed me there, and he started

to work upon rumour. I had put up a plate in Harley Street, as

you know, upon the dregs of my capital. This meant a certain

bluff upon credit. If my reputation lasted me out six months,

all would be well. He divined this and struck at it. To do him

justice, I suppose that if he had walked up brutally to the

Medical Association and given them his story, I should have been

struck off the Register. He worked more subtly than that.

Indefinable reports started up, spread and followed me. Out of

the skies a net of suspicion descended between me and my quite

reputable past. For no reason given, my fellow-practitioners

began to shun me.

"I had a bad case, and no money to carry it through. I have

heard, Roddy, that he let you into the secret of the island and

that you are like to prosper on it: and I wish you well. But I,

who brought him to it, lingering him to land--I, but for whose

treasured flask he would never have lived to see Santa Island--

could set up no claim on any of that wealth.

"I had deserved this. It was all quite right, and I make no

complaint. But I had to throw up Harley Street, and for two

years I steadily sank. In the end I came to know worse hunger

than I was prepared for. Though you won't have me at any price,

I think you would pity if I told you of some of the holes to

which I have crept to sleep.

"I suppose--and now I think of it, I might have borrowed some

comfort from the thought--I suppose that all the while, being

rich, Farrell had hired eyes to watch me. It is certain that he

ran across me--always at night, and always in evening dress.

Once, on the Embankment, as I was coiling on a bench, he came

down from the Savoy and along, bringing his dog for a walk.

The dog scented me and growled; but I lay out stiff, pretending

to sleep.

"Even when it came to a Salvation Army shelter, we were disturbed

by a company of the benevolent; Farrell one of them, in a furred

coat with an astrachan collar. He saw me stretched there with

closed eyes, and said that one half of the world never knows how

the other half lives.

"It was going like that with me when the War broke out.

Then--broken, beaten, and in rags--I put all pride in my pocket,

walked across the bridge to Silversmiths' College, rang in on

Travers, and demanded a job.

"Travers was shocked. . . . I could see also that he was

suspicious. Rumour had been at him, too. Finding him less than

frank, I turned more than proud: and, his back being up and his

conscience uneasy, he did what I could have pardoned in a weaker

man; lost his temper, to excuse himself in his own eyes for

treating me unjustly. He had scarcely spoken six words before I

detected the slime of Farrell's trail. The man had managed to

sow rumours, somehow, within the gates of Silversmiths' College,

of all places!--rumours that had nothing to do with the island,

but suggested that, after all (there being no smoke without

fire), there _had_ been dubious and uncleanly experiments in the

laboratory during my professorship. I believe that this, when I

came to think it over, started my recovery: yes, my recovery.

For it showed me that Farrell was deteriorating, and, renewing a

little of my old contempt for the man, raised me by so much

above the abject fear of him into which I had sunk. From that

moment hope was renewed in me, and I nursed it. So long as he

worked on the truth he had me at his mercy: playing with

falsehood in this fashion, he was vulnerable, might come to be

mortally vulnerable if I watched and waited, and then I should

regain the lost mastery, dearer to me than life.

"For the moment, however, Travers claimed all the scorn I carried

inside me for use. He hinted that the College had suffered by

the scandal of the riot: which no doubt was true to some extent,

but not true enough to hide a lie or to cover a meditated

betrayal. He said that he had always looked a little askance on

my researches, and particularly upon my demonstrations; that

they were doubtless astonishing, but had lain, to his taste, a

little too near the border-line of quackery,--Yes, Roddy, he

said the word, and it did not choke him. On the whole and

speaking as a friend (yes, he used that word, too), he must

express a hope that I would not press to renew my connection

with the Silversmiths' College. It would pain

him inexpressibly, remembering old times, to be forced to give

me a direct refusal. . . . But was there anything else he could

do for me?

"That, Roddy, was the valley of the shadow of my death, and I had

no rod or staff to comfort me.

"I did not answer him in words. I gave him a look, and walked

out.

"My purpose had been to apply for temporary work, to relieve some

younger teacher who wished to enlist for medical work at the

front. Had you been in London, Roddy, I'd have pocketed shame

and come to you, and borrowed the price of a suit of clothes;

inside of which--and may be with your support--I might have

walked up boldly for a commission in the R.A.M.C.--for there was

nothing definite against me: only I was ruined, and my old

credentials, set against my present squalor, were so

comparatively splendid as to raise instant suspicion of drink

and disgrace. But it was part of my just punishment that, when

I most needed help, you should be far abroad searching for the

very island on which I had shipwrecked all.

"Finally I found work as a dresser in one of those temporary

hospitals which sprang up everywhere in such hurry as the

streams of wounded began to pour back from France. Ours was

pitched in a derelict pleasure-ground on the right bank of

Thames some way below Greenwich. . . . I don't suppose you ever

visited Casterville Gardens: as neither had I until I entered

them to do stretcher-drill, tend moaning men, and carry bloody

slops in the overgrown alleys that wound among its tawdry,

abandoned glories. It had a half-rotted pier of its own, upon

which, in Victorian days, the penny steam-boats had discharged

many thousands of crowds of pleasure-seekers. The gardens

occupied the semicircle of an old quarry, on which the

decorative landscape gardener had fallen to work with gusto,

planting it with conifers and stucco statues in winding walks

that landed you straight from the sightless wisdom of Socrates

and Milton, or the equally sightless allurement of Venus,

shielding her breasts, upon a skittle-alley, a bandstand, a

dancing-saloon, or a bar at which stood, for contrast, another

Venus, not eyeless, dispensing beer. The conifers, flourishing

there, have grown to magnificent height. The effect of rain

upon the statues has not been so happy, and I have set my pail

down to pick a snail off the saddle-nose of Socrates and

meditate and wonder what he would have thought of it all.

"The dancing-saloon--still advertising itself as 'Baronial

Hall'--had been converted into a main ward, holding forty beds.

It was there that Farrell found me at work, that night. He had

interviewed the Adjutant--as we called the harassed secretary

who, brayed daily between the upper and nether millstones of

official instructions and 'voluntary effort,' never left his

desk nor dared to wander abroad for fresh air--the gardens

having been specially laid out to trick the absent-minded and

induce them to lose their way. Farrell had simply told the

Adjutant that he wished to see me on urgent personal business.

The Adjutant could not hesitate before a presence that might, in

its dress-clothes and sable-lined overcoat, have stood among the

statues outside for personified Opulence.

"'Very good,' said he. 'Oh, yes, certainly. I will send for the

man. . . . Your business is private, you say? . . . I am very

sorry: we are all at sixes and sevens here, with every office

crowded. But there's an empty saloon--one of those absurdities

with which the management in old days sought to tickle the

public taste. They are going to turn it into a ward in a couple

of days, and that's why we have left it unoccupied. If that

will do, and you'll come with me, we'll see if the electric

light functions. I believe the fitters were at work there this

afternoon.'"

"That, as Farrell told me ten minutes later, was how it happened.

For me, when answering the message that a stranger had called to

see me on urgent business, I walked as directed, across the

matted moonlit lawn to this building which I had never visited

before--and when, pushing the door wide, I saw Farrell standing

under the electric lamps, with his dog beside him--I fell back a

pace and half-turned to run for it.

"For he was alone, yet not alone: a hundred Farrells stood there.

No, a battalion, and all of them Farrells! And a battalion of

dogs!

"I stepped back from the ledge of the threshold. Above the

doorway an inscription in faded gilt letters shone out against

the moon--'VERSAILLES GALLERY OF MIRRORS. ADMISSION 3D.'

"Then I understood. This absurd and ghastly apartment was lined,

all around its walls, with mirrors, in panels separated only by

thin gilt edgings. Dust lay thick on the floor; cobwebs hung

from the ceiling in festoons; there was not a stick of furniture

in the place. But a battalion of Farrells stood in it, and

there entered to it, and stood, under the new electric fittings,

a battalion of Foes.

"Farrell's aspect was grave. His eyebrows went up at the choke

of half-insane laughter with which I greeted him. 'Foe, my

man,' said he, eyeing my khaki. 'So you have come to this, have

you?'

"He said it pompously, with a fine air of patronage, and I

stifled a second laugh, hugging it inside my ribs: for now I

felt that the time would not be long--that, at long last, he

would pass me over the cards. 'We both seem to have come to

this, don't we?' I answered with a shrug and a glance around.

"'I have run down here,' he went on, still betrayed back to his

old Tottenham Court Road manner, 'because I have an announcement

to make to you. . . . Have you read your _Times_ to-day?'

"He was priceless. Oh, he was falling to me--falling to me like

a ripe peach! He held out a scrap of paper.

"'Do I look like a man that takes in the _Times_?' I purred '--at

twopence a day, and the price likely to go up, they tell

me. . . . But I can guess your news, for I've watched the house.

. . . You've come all this way to tell me that you're going to

marry Constantia Denistoun. . . . Well?'

"'You have been watching the house?' asked he, staring, as it

took him aback.

"'Of course I have. . . . And she didn't tell you? . . . Gad! If

she didn't tell you, she isn't yours yet, and I've a doubt if

she's ever like to be. Did she give you leave to put in that

announcement?'

"Farrell cleared his throat. Before he could answer I had

chipped in--'No, you liar! I hate men who clear their throats

before speaking. It was an old trick of yours, of which I

believed myself to have cured you at some pains. . . . So you

have played over ardent, and there has been a row, and you have

come down here to take it out of _me_. . . . Man, you thought

you would: but I have you beaten at last; for I see you--as she

will see you--dissolving back into the cad you always were.'

"'I am going to marry her,' Farrell persisted. 'Let that eat

into your soul.'

"'It has eaten,' said I, 'these weeks ago, just as far as ever it

will get; and that's as far as a rat can gnaw into a

marlinespike. . . . Come out of this into fresh air,' said I

with another look round on our images repeated in the mirrors.

'There are too many Farrells and Foes here. When I ran the

game, at Versailles that afternoon, it had a certain dignity.

. . . But, you! . . . Your primal curse, Farrell, reasserts

itself at length. I have done my best with you, but you

reproduce it in tawdriness. Out of the Tottenham Court Road you

came: and back to your vomit you go.'

"'I am going to marry Miss Denistoun,' he repeated dully.

'I felt sure it would interest you to know.' He was losing grip.

"'Oh, yes,' said I. 'Whistle your dog, and let's get out of this

for a walk by the river. . . . There's too many of us in this

room, and we're all too cheap. . . . Damn it! I believe I could

forgive you for anything but for lowering our hate to _this_!'"

"We went out past the sentry, and walked down by the sullen

river's edge, the dog padding behind us.

"'You have been provocative,' said Farrell, after a while,

checking himself by an afterthought in the act of clearing his

throat. 'Considering our relative positions, I am rather

surprised at your daring to take this line. . . . But you used a

word just now. It was 'forgive.' I came not only to say that I

am going to marry Miss Denistoun, but to propose that henceforth

the account is closed between us. You must tell yourself that I

have won; and, having won, I bear no further malice. I would

even make some reparation on the shrine of my affection for Miss

Denistoun. She would esteem it, I feel sure, as a tribute.

. . . Dear me, how fast we are walking! . . . You'll excuse me

if I stop and take off this coat. . . . In the old days, as a

working-man, more than half my time I walked without a coat, and

an overcoat to this day always sets up a perspiration. . . .

Well now, shall we shake hands at the end of it all and cry

quits? . . . Say the word, and I'll go one better. They've

formed the syndicate for that island of ours. What do you say

to a thousand shares, and to coming in on the Board?'

"He was on the river side of me, quite close to the brink. I had

been playing for some minutes with the knife in my pocket; and

as I leapt on him and drove it in over the breast, he fell

straight backwards. All the end of Farrell was a gasp, a sharp

cry, and a splash.

"And both cry and splash were drowned instantly by the raging

yelp of the dog as he sprang for me. I fisted him off by his

throat and he fastened his teeth in my right hand, tearing the

flesh down as I slipped the knife into my left hand. Then with

my left I jabbed sideways under his ribs, and his bite relaxed,

and he dropped.

"The embankment was steep. I ran down a little way and came to a

disused landing-stage--four or five planks on rotting piles.

Kneeling there, I lowered my bleeding hand, to bathe it.

. . . As I knelt the body of Farrell came floating down-stream

and was borne in towards me by the eddy. It lodged against the

piles, chest uppermost, its white, wide-open eyes turned up to

the moon.

"--And I stared on it, Roddy, crouching there. _And I swear to

God it was not Farrell's face but my own that I stared into_.

"Yes . . . for I stared and stared at it--there, plain, looking

up far beyond me, sightless--until a swirl of the tide washed it

clear; and, as it passed out into darkness, it seemed to be

sinking slowly, slowly.

"I dragged myself away and ran back to the dead dog. Farrell's

overcoat lay close beside it, and his hat--which had fallen

short of the edge of the embankment as he pitched backwards.

"I picked up the coat, put it on, and felt in its pockets.

They were empty, but for a railway ticket. I picked up the hat,

and smiled to find that it fitted me. Lastly I stopped, lifted

the dog's corpse and flung it over to follow its master.

All accounts thus closed, I stepped out for the station and

caught the last train for Charing Cross.

"You know the rest.

"I borrowed your clothes, yesterday, and went down to the

inquest. They admitted me to see the body, on my pretence that

I had missed a relative and might be able to identify it.

Farrell had gone back to his old features; death had made up its

mind to hide the secret after all. . . . I am afraid that,

having overtaxed my strength, I broke down on the revulsion, and

may have given myself away.

"But it doesn't matter. That dog has done for me. Your Dr.

Tredgold is a good fellow and has nursed me very prettily back

from starvation. But I happen, as you know, to have studied

canine virus with some attention, and I have an objection to

rivalling some effects of it that I have witnessed. Before you

receive this, I shall be dead. I shall not trouble your

hospitable roof, and I am sorry to trouble Jephson. But the

searchers may find my body in Bushey Park.

"So long!--and, on the whole, so best. . . . I find, having lost

Farrell, that _I cannot do without him_.

"You have been endlessly good to me. Remember me as I was once

on a time, and so I shall always be--Yours,"

"Jack."

That is the end of the tale [concluded Otway], except for this--

Twelve months later, being on leave and wanting to clear up the

mystery of the newspaper report, I took a train down to C--, past

Gravesend, made inquiries of the police, and finally hunted up the

juryman who had shown so much emotion at the inquest. I found a

little whiskered grocer, weighing out margarine in a shed that was

half shop, half canteen. All I extracted from him was this--

"Yes, to be sure, sir, I remember it perfectly. I only wish I

didn't: for I dream of it at night: and, being a widower, I can't

confide the trouble. The fact is, I must suffer from nerves and--

what do they call 'em, sir?--hallucinations--yes, that's the word.

But I was fresh from inspecting the body, and when that person broke

in, wearing a face like the corpse's twin-brother, well, it knocked

me clean out. Of course, it must have been a hallucination; none of

the others saw the least resemblance--as they've told me since.

But at the moment, I'd have wagered my life. . . ."

EPILOGUE.

"Yes, that is the story," said Otway, sorting back the documents into

his dispatch-case.

"Is it quite all the story, sir?" asked Polkinghorne, breaking the

silence that followed its close.

Otway frowned, re-sorted the last three or four papers, laid them in

the case and closed it with a couple of snaps.

"That's all," he answered, "that exists for publication. That is,

unless you want a moral. I can give you _that_, all right: and if

you have any use for it you may apply it to this blasted War.

As I see it, the more you beat Fritz by becoming like him, the more

he has won. You may ride through his gates under an Arch of Triumph;

but if he or his ghost sits on your saddle-bow, what's the use?

You have demeaned yourself to him; you cannot shake him off, for his

claws hook in you, and through the farther gate of Judgment you ride

on, inseparables condemned.

"--And, oh, by the by! I am taking my leave next Wednesday.

Sammy has been nosing suspiciously, these five days, around a

wine-case which on the 22nd he shall have the honour of opening.

It contains, if our friend the Transport Officer hasn't been

beforehand with you, some Pommery 1900; with which you are to do your

best. For it turns out that, with luck, I am to be married on that

day. No flowers, by special request."

Otway re-opened the dispatch-case and again made sure of his last two

exhibits, which he had not exhibited. The first was a note, folded

three-corner-wise, which ran:

"Dear Roddy--Your last word to me was that you had no patience

with people so clever that they lacked sense to come out of the

rain. Well, I am willing to learn that silly skill, if you

remain willing to teach me.--Yours,"

"CONSTANTIA."

The second of these exhibits, not exhibited, was a creased envelope

containing the shredded petals of a rose.

THE END.

End of Project Gutenberg's Foe-Farrell, by Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch