Project Gutenberg's The Mystery of the Green Ray, by William Le Queux
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Title: The Mystery of the Green Ray
Author: William Le Queux
Release Date: September 16, 2008 [EBook #26637]
Language: English
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THE MYSTERY OF THE
GREEN RAY
BY
WILLIAM LE QUEUX
AUTHOR OF "THE UNNAMED"
SECOND EDITION
HODDER AND STOUGHTON
LONDON NEW YORK TORONTO
MCMXV
CONTENTS
PAGE
CHAPTER I.
BESIDE STILL WATERS 1
CHAPTER II.
THE MAN GOING NORTH 17
CHAPTER III.
MAINLY ABOUT MYRA 31
CHAPTER IV.
THE BLACK BLOW 50
CHAPTER V.
IS MORE MYSTERIOUS 63
CHAPTER VI.
CONTAINS A FURTHER ENIGMA 78
CHAPTER VII.
THE CHEMIST'S ROCK 91
CHAPTER VIII.
MISTS OF UNCERTAINTY 102
CHAPTER IX.
THE MYSTERY OF SHOLTO 116
CHAPTER X.
THE SECRET OF THE ROCK 126
CHAPTER XI.
HOW THE UNEXPECTED HAPPENED 133
CHAPTER XII.
WHO IS HILDERMAN? 149
CHAPTER XIII.
THE RED-HAIRED MAN 167
CHAPTER XIV.
A FURTHER MYSTERY 178
CHAPTER XV.
CONCERNS AN ILLUSTRATED PAPER 188
CHAPTER XVI.
DISCLOSES CERTAIN FACTS 202
CHAPTER XVII.
SOME GRAVE FEARS 220
CHAPTER XVIII.
THE TRUTH REVEALED 235
THE MYSTERY OF THE GREEN RAY
CHAPTER I.
BESIDE STILL WATERS.
The youth in the multi-coloured blazer laughed.
"You'd have to come and be a nurse," he suggested.
"Oh, I'd go as a drummer-boy. I'd look fine in uniform, wouldn't I?"
the waitress simpered in return.
Dennis Burnham swallowed his liqueur in one savage gulp, pushed back
his chair, and rose from the table.
"Silly young ass," he said, in a voice loud enough for the object of
his wrath to hear. "Let's get outside."
The four of us rose, paid our bill, and went out, leaving the youth
and his flippant companions to themselves. For it was Bank Holiday,
August the third, 1914, and I think, though it was the shortest and
most uneventful of all our river "annuals," it is the one which we are
least likely to forget. On the Saturday Dennis, Jack Curtis, Tommy
Evans and myself had started from Richmond on our yearly trip up the
river. Even as we sat in the two punts playing bridge, moored at our
first camping-place below Kingston Weir, disquieting rumours reached
us in the form of excited questions from the occupants of passing
craft. And now, as we rose from the dinner-table at the Magpie,
Sunbury, two days later, it seemed that war was inevitable.
"What I can't understand," growled Dennis, as we stepped into one of
the punts and paddled idly across to the lock, "is how any young idiot
can treat the whole thing as a terrific joke. If we go to war with
Germany--and it seems we must--it's going to be----Good Heavens! who
knows what it's going to be!"
"Meaning," said Tom, who never allowed any thought to remain
half-expressed, "meaning that we are not prepared, and they are. We
have to step straight into the ring untrained to meet an opponent who
has been getting ready night and day for the Lord knows how many
years."
"Still, you know," said Jack, who invariably found the bright spot in
everything, "we never did any good as a nation until we were pushed."
"We shall be pushed this time," I replied; "and if we do go to war, we
shall all be wanted."
"And wanted at once," Tom added.
"Which brings me to the point which most concerns us," said Dennis,
with a serious face. "What are _we_ going to do?"
"It seems to me," I replied, "that there is only one thing we can do.
If the Government declare war, it is in your cause and mine; and who
is to fight our battles but you and me?"
"That's it, old man, exactly," said Dennis. "We must appear in person,
as you lawyers would say. I'm afraid there's not the slightest
hope of peace being maintained now; and, indeed, in view of the
circumstances, I should prefer to say there is not the slightest fear
of it. We can't honourably keep out, so let us hope we shall step in
at once."
Jack's muttered "hear hear" spoke for us all, and there was silence
for a minute or two. My thoughts were very far away from the peaceful
valley of the Thames; they had flown, in fact, to a still more
peaceful glen in the Western Highlands--but of that anon. I fancy the
others, too, were thinking of something far removed from the ghastly
horror of war. Jack was sitting with an open cigarette-case in his
hand, gazing wistfully at the bank to which we had moored the boat.
There was a "little girl" in the question. Poor chap; I knew exactly
what he was thinking; he had my sympathy! The silence became
uncomfortable, and it was Jack who broke it.
"Give me a match, Tommy," he exclaimed suddenly, "and don't talk so
much." Tom, who had not spoken a word for several minutes, produced
the matches from a capacious pocket, and we all laughed rather
immoderately at the feeble sally.
"As to talking," said Tom, when our natural equanimity had been
restored, "you all seem to be leaving me to say what we all know has
to be said. And that is, what is the next item on the programme?"
"I think we had certainly better decide----" Dennis began.
"You old humbug!" exclaimed Tom. "You know perfectly well that we've
all decided what we are going to do. It is merely the question of
putting it in words. In some way or other we intend to regard the case
of Rex _v._ Wilhelm as one in which we personally are concerned. Am I
right?"
"Scored a possible," said Jack, who had quite recovered his spirits.
"In which case," Tom continued, "we don't expect to be of much
assistance to our King and country if we go gallivanting up to
Wallingford, as originally intended. The question, therefore, remains,
shall we go back by train--if we can find the station here--or shall
we punt back to Richmond?"
"I don't think we need worry about that," said Dennis. "I vote we go
back by river; it will be more convenient in every way, and we can
leave the boats at Messums. If things are not so black as we think
they are we can step on board again with a light heart, or four light
hearts, if you prefer it, and start again. What do you say, Ron?"
"I should prefer to paddle back," I replied. "It would be a pity to
break up our party immediately. I don't want to be sentimental, or
anything of that sort, but you chaps will agree that we have had some
very jolly times together in the past, and if we are all going to take
out our naturalisation papers in the Atkins family, it is just
possible that we--well, we may not be all together again next year."
"And you, Jack?" asked Dennis.
"Oh, down stream for me," said young Curtis, with what was obviously
an effort at his usual light-hearted manner. "Think of all the beer
we've got left." But the laugh with which he accompanied his remark
was not calculated to deceive any of us, and I am afraid my clumsy
speech had set him thinking again. So we went "ashore," and had a
nightcap at the Magpie, where the flippant youth was announcing to an
admiring circle that if he had half a dozen pals to go with him he
wouldn't mind joining the army himself! Having scoured the village
in an unavailing attempt to round up half a pound of butter, we put
off down stream, and spent the night in the beautiful backwater. No
one suggested cards after supper, and we lay long into the night
discussing, as thousands of other people all over the country were
probably discussing, conscription, espionage, martial law, the
possibilities of invasion, and the probable duration of the war. I
doubt very much if we should have gone to sleep at all had we been
able to foresee the events which the future, in its various ways, held
in store for each of us. But, as it was, we plunged wholeheartedly
into what Tommy Evans described as "Life's new interest." We
positively thrilled at the prospect of army life.
"Think of it," said Jack enthusiastically, "open air all the time.
Nothing to worry about, no work to do, only manual labour. Why, it's
going to be one long holiday. Hang it! I've laid drain-pipes on a
farm--for fun!"
It was past one o'clock when we got out supper. And our appetites lost
nothing by the prospect of hardships which we treated rather lightly,
since we entirely failed to appreciate their seriousness. Jack's
visions of storming ramparts at the point of the bayonet merely added
flavour to his amazing collation of cold beef, ham, brawn, cold fowl,
and peaches and cream, with which he insisted on winding-up at nearly
two in the morning. He would have shouted with laughter had you
told him that in less than three weeks he would be dashing through
the enemy's lines with despatches on a red-hot motor-cycle. And
Tommy--poor old Tommy--well, I fancy he would have been just as
cheerful, dear old chap, had he known the fate that was in store. For
to him was to fall the lot which, of all others, everyone--rich and
poor alike--understands. There is no need for me to repeat the story.
Even in the rush of a war which has already brought forward some
thousands of heroes, the reader will remember the glorious exploit
of Corporal Thomas Evans, in which he won the D.C.M., and also,
unfortunately, gave his life for his country. It is sufficient to say
that three men in particular will ever cherish his memory as that of a
loyal friend, a cheery comrade, a clean, honest, straightforward
Englishman through and through.
As for Dennis and myself--but I am coming to that.
Having finished our early morning supper, we turned in for a few
hours' sleep, Jack and Tommy in one boat, Dennis and I in the other.
But before we did so we stood up, as well as we could under our canvas
roof, and drank "The King"; and I fancy that in the mind of each of us
there was more than one other name silently coupled with that toast.
Then, for the first time in my memory of our intimacy together, we
solemnly shook hands before turning in. But, try as I would, I
couldn't sleep. For a long time I lay there, in the beautiful silence
of the night, my thoughts far away, sleep farther away still.
Presently I grovelled for my tobacco-pouch.
"Restless, Ron?" Dennis asked, himself evidently quite wide awake.
"Can't sleep at all," I answered. "But don't let me disturb you."
"You're not disturbing me, old man. I can't sleep either. Let's light
the lamp and smoke."
Accordingly we fished out our pipes and relighted the acetylene lamp,
which hung from the middle hoop. Jack turned over in his sleep.
"Put out the light, old fellow. Not a cab'net meeting, y'know," he
murmured drowsily. And by way of compromise I pulled the primitive
draught curtain between the two boats, and as I sat up to do so I
noticed with a start that Dennis wore a worried look I had never seen
before. I lay back, got my pipe going, and waited for him to speak.
"I wonder," he said presently, through the clouds of smoke that hung
imprisoned beneath our shallow roof--"I wonder if there would have
been any war if the Germans smoked Jamavana?"
"What's worrying you, Den?" I asked, ignoring his question.
"Worrying me? Why, nothing. I've got nothing to worry about. What
about you, though? I don't want to butt in on your private affairs,
but you've a lot more to be worried about than I have."
"I? Oh, nonsense, Dennis," I protested.
"None of that with me, Ron. You know what I mean. There's no point in
either of us concealing things. This war is going to make a big
difference to you and Myra McLeod. Now, tell me all about it. What do
you mean to do, and everything?"
"There isn't much to tell you. You know all about it. We're not
engaged. Old General McLeod objects to our engagement on account of my
position. Of course, he's quite right. He's very nice about it, and
he's always kindness itself to me. You know, of course, that he and my
father were brother officers? Myra and I have been chums since she was
four. We love each other, and she would be content to wait, but, in
the meantime--well, you know my position. I can only describe it in
the well-worn phrases, 'briefless barrister' and 'impecunious junior.'
There's a great deal of truth in the weak old joke, Dennis, about the
many that are called and the few that are briefed. Of course the
General is right. He says that I ought to leave Myra absolutely alone,
and neither write to her nor see her, and give her a chance to meet
someone else, and all that--someone who could keep her among her own
set. But I tried that once for three months; I didn't answer her
letters, or write to her, and I worried myself to death very nearly
about it. But at the end of the three months she came up to town to
see what it was all about. Gad, how glad I was to see her!"
"I bet you were," said Dennis, sympathetically. "But what d'you mean
by telling me you'd got nothing to worry about? Now that you're just
getting things going nicely, and look like doing really well, along
comes this wretched war, and you join the army, and such practice as
you have goes to the devil. It's rotten luck, Ronnie, rotten luck."
"It is a bit," I admitted with a sigh. My little bit of hard-earned
success had meant a lot to me.
"Still," said Dennis, "you've got a thundering lot to be thankful for
too. To begin with, she'll wait for you, and then, if necessary, marry
on twopence-halfpenny a year, and make you comfortable on it too. As
far as her father is concerned, she's very devoted to him, and would
never do anything to annoy him if she could possibly help it, as I
easily spotted the night we dined with them at the Carlton. But she's
made up her mind to be Mrs. Ronald Ewart sooner or later; that I
_will_ swear!"
"I'm very glad to hear you say so," I answered, "but the thing that
worries me, of course, is the question as to whether I have any right
to let this go on. If war is declared----"
"Which it will be," said Dennis.
"Well, then, my practice goes to the devil, as you say. How long after
the war is it going to be before I could marry one of Myra's maids,
let alone Myra? And, supposing, of course, that I use the return half
of my ticket, so to speak, and come back safe and sound, my own
prospects will be infinitely worse than they were before the war. The
law, after all, is a luxury, and no one will have a great deal of
money for luxuries by the time we have finished with it and wiped
Germany off the map. Besides, if there's no money about, there's
nothing to go to law over. So there you are, or, rather, there I am."
"What do you intend to do, then?" my friend asked.
"I shall go up to Scotland to-morrow night--well, of course, it's
to-night, I should say--and see her--and--and----"
"Yes--well, and----"
"Oh, and tell her that it must be all--all over. I shall say that the
war will make all the difference, that I must join the army, and that
she must consider herself free to marry someone else, and that, as in
any case I might never come back, I think it's the best thing for us
both that she should consider herself free, and--er--and--and consider
herself free," I ended weakly.
"Just like that?" asked Dennis, with a twinkle in his eye.
"I shall try and put it fairly formally to her," I said, "because, of
course, I must appear to be sincere about it. I must try and think out
some way of making her imagine I want it broken off for reasons of my
own."
Dennis laughed softly.
"You delicious, egotistical idiot," he said. "You don't really imagine
that you could persuade anyone you met for the first time even that
you're not in love. By all means do what you think is right, Ron. I
wouldn't dissuade you for the world. Tell her that she is free. Tell
her why you are setting her free, and I'll be willing to wager my
little all that you two ridiculous young people will find yourselves
tied tighter together than ever. By all means do your best to be a
good little boy, Ronald, and do what you conceive to be your duty."
"You needn't pull my leg about it," I said, though somewhat
half-heartedly.
"I'm not pulling your leg, as you put it," Dennie answered, in a more
serious tone. "If ever I saw honesty and truth and love and loyalty
looking out of a girl's eyes, that girl is Myra McLeod."
"Thank you for that, Den," I answered simply. There was little
sentiment between us. Thank heaven, there was something more.
"And so you see, you lucky dog, you'll go out to the front, and come
back loaded with honours and blushes, and marry the girl of your
dreams, and live happy ever after." And Dennis sighed.
"Why the sigh?" I asked. "Oh, come now," I added, suddenly
remembering. "Fair exchange, you know. You haven't told me what was
worrying you."
"My dear old fellow, don't be ridiculous, there's nothing worrying
me."
I pressed him to no purpose. He refused to admit that he had a care in
the world, and so we fell to talking of matters connected with the
routine of army life, how long we should be before we got to the
front, the sport we four should have in our rest time behind the
trenches, our determination to stick together at all costs, etc.
Suddenly Dennis sat bolt upright.
"Gad!" he cried savagely, "if you beggars weren't going, I could stick
it. But you three leaving me behind, it's----"
"Leaving you behind?" I echoed in astonishment. "But why, old man?
Aren't you coming too?"
"I hope so," said Dennis bitterly; "I hope so with all my heart, and I
shall have a jolly good shot at it. But I know what it will be, worse
luck."
"But why, Dennis?" I asked again. "I don't understand."
"Of course you don't," he replied, "but you've got your own troubles,
and there's no point in worrying about me, in any case."
I begged him to tell me; I pleaded our old friendship, and the fact
that I had taken him into my confidence in the various vicissitudes of
my own love affair. It struck me at the time that it was I who should
have been indebted to him for his patient sympathy and help; and here
he was, poor old fellow, with a real, live trouble of his own,
refusing to bother me with it.
"So you've just got to own up, old man," I finished.
"Oh, it's really nothing," said Dennis miserably. "I'm a crock, that's
all. A useless hulk of unnecessary lumber."
"How, my dear chap?" I asked incredulously. Here was Dennis Burnham,
who had put up a record for the mile in our school days, and lifted
the public school's middle-weight pot, a champion swimmer, a massive
young man of six-foot-two in his socks, calling himself a crock.
"You remember that summer we did the cruise from Southampton to
Stranraer?"
"Heavens! yes," I exclaimed, "and we capsized the cutter in the
Solway, and you were laid up in a farmhouse at Whithorn with rheumatic
fever. Am I ever likely to forget it?"
"I'm not, anyway," said Dennis, ruefully. "That rheumatic fever left
me with a weak heart. I strained it rowing up at Oxford, you remember,
and that fever business put the last touches on it for all practical
purposes."
"Are you sure, old man?" I asked. It seemed impossible that a great
big chap like Dennis, the picture of health, should have anything
seriously wrong with him.
"I'm dead sure, Ron; I wish I weren't. Not that it matters much, of
course; but just now, when one has a chance to do something decent for
one's Motherland and justify one's existence, it hits a bit hard."
"Is it serious?" I asked--"really serious?"
"Sufficient to bar me from joining you chaps, though I'll see if I can
sneak past the doctor. You remember about three weeks ago we were to
have played a foursome out at Hendon, and I didn't turn up? I said
afterwards that I had been called out of town, and had quite forgotten
to wire."
"Which was extremely unlike you," I interposed; "but go on."
"Well, as a matter of fact, I was on my way. I was a bit late, and
when I got outside Golders Green Tube Station I ran for a 'bus. The
rest of the day I spent in the Cottage Hospital. No, I didn't faint.
The valve struck, and I simply lay on the pavement a crumpled mass of
semi-conscious humanity till they carted me off on the ambulance. It's
the fourth time it's happened."
"Of course you had good advice?" I asked anxiously.
"Heavens! yes," he exclaimed; "any amount of the best. And they all
say the same thing--rest, be careful, no sudden excitement, no strain,
and I may live for ever--a creaking door."
"My dear old Den," I said, for I was deeply touched. "Why didn't you
tell me?"
"Plenty of worries of your own, old man," he answered, more
cheerfully; "and, besides, it would have spoiled everything. You
fellows would have been nursing me behind my back, to use an Irishism,
and trying to prevent my noticing it. You know as well as I do that if
you had known I should have been a skeleton at the feast."
"You must promise me two things," I said presently. "One is that you
won't try to join the army; there is sure to be a rush of recruits in
the next few days, and the doctors will be flurried, and may skip
through their work roughshod. The other is that you will take care of
yourself, run no risks, and do nothing rash while we are away."
The first he refused. He said he must do what he could to get through,
if only to satisfy his conscience; but he made me the second promise,
and solemnly gave me his word that he would do nothing that would put
him in any danger. Then at last, at his suggestion, we turned in; he
insisted that I had an all-night journey in front of me. And so
eventually I fell asleep, saddened by the knowledge of my friend's
trouble, but somewhat relieved that I had extracted from him a promise
to take care of himself.
Little did I dream that he would break his promise to save one who was
dearer to me than life itself, or that I should owe all my present and
future happiness to poor old Dennis's inability to join the army.
Truly, as events were to prove, "he did his bit."
CHAPTER II.
THE MAN GOING NORTH.
We "made" Richmond about half-past eleven, and completed the necessary
arrangements for the housing of the boats and the disposal of our
superfluous fodder, as Jack called it, for by this time we had all
made up our minds that the war was inevitable.
The bustle of mobilisation had already taken possession of the
streets, and as we stepped out of Charing Cross Station we stumbled
into a crowd of English Bluejackets and Tommies and French reservists
in Villiers Street. We parted for the afternoon, each to attend to his
private affairs, and arranged to meet again at the Grand Hotel Grill
Room for an early dinner, as I had to catch the 7.55 from King's
Cross.
I dashed out to Hampstead to my flat, and packed the necessary wearing
apparel, taking care to include my fly-book and my favourite
split-cane trout rod in my kit. I should only be in Scotland for a
couple of days, but I knew that I should be fishing with Myra at least
one of them, and no borrowed rod is a patch on one's own tried
favourite. I snatched an half-hour or so to write to the few relatives
I have and tell them that I was joining the army after a hurried visit
to Scotland to say good-bye to Myra. And then I got my kit to Dennis's
rooms in Panton Street, Haymarket, just in time to have a chat with
him before we joined the others at the Grand Hotel. I found him
hopefully getting things ready for a long absence, sorting out
unanswered letters, putting away papers, etc. On the table was an open
copy of a stores catalogue. He had been trying to find suitable
presents for his two small step-sisters. Dennis invariably thought of
himself last of all, and then usually at someone else's request.
"Well, old man," I asked, "how do you feel about it now?"
"Rotten, Ronnie," he replied, with a rueful smile. "I've been on the
'phone to my silly doctor chap, and he shouted with laughter at me.
Still, I shall have a jolly good shot at it as soon as the thing is
definite."
"I only pray to heaven," I said seriously, "that no slipshod fool of a
doctor lets you through."
"They won't let me in, old chap; no such luck. It's a ghastly outlook.
What on earth am I to do with myself while the war lasts?"
"My dear chap," I exclaimed, "it won't be as bad as all that. There
will be thousands of men who won't go to the war. I shan't be
surprised if you see very little difference about town even when the
war's in full swing. You can't go, although you want to, and it's
jolly bad luck, old man. Don't think I don't understand, but, believe
me, you won't be the only man left in London by a million or two."
"I know," he said penitently, "I'm grousing and worrying you. Sorry!
But I can see you setting out for the Temple in the morning and
leaving your house on fire. It wouldn't make it easier simply because
you knew you weren't able to do anything to put out the fire. In fact,
it would make it a jolly lot worse. Still, we'll cut that and change
the subject. When you get back from Invermalluch give me a look up. I
expect I shall be here. And, of course, give my kindest regards to
Miss McLeod--oh, and the General," he added, as an afterthought.
"I will, indeed," I promised readily, "and I'll wire you the train I'm
coming back by. I should like you to meet it, and we can spend the few
remaining days I have together. If you don't get past the doctor I
should like you to keep your eye on one or two things for me while I'm
away."
"Of course, anything you like. The more the merrier," he answered
readily; and the poor fellow brightened visibly at the thought of
being able to do something for a pal.
We taxied round the corner with my kit, and joined the others at the
grill room. They were both in the highest of spirits, Jack, of course,
in particular. He had been told that his intimate knowledge of motors
and motor-cycles would be of great advantage to him, and he had been
advised on all hands to join as a despatch-rider. In imagination he
already saw himself up to the most weird pranks on his machine, many
of which, much to the gratification of his friends, and just as much
to his own astonishment, were proved later to have a solid foundation
in fact. Over dinner we discussed the question of applying for
commissions.
"Oh, dash it, no," said Jack; "I'm going to Berlin on the old
snorter."
"Commissions are off--quite out of the question," Tommy agreed with
emphasis. "To begin with, it means waiting, which is absurd; and in
the second place I object to any attempt to travel first-class. It's
silly and snobbish, to put the kindest construction on it. If I've got
to join this excursion I'm willing to go where they like to put me,
and if necessary I'll hang on behind."
I record this remark because it was the last that I ever heard poor
Tommy Evans make in this connection; and I think the reader will agree
it was just what one would have expected of him.
We said good-bye after dinner. They all wanted to come to the station
to see me off, but I was anxious to be alone with Dennis.
The others in any case had plenty to do, and I could scarcely let them
sacrifice their "last few hours of liberty" to come and see me off. I
rather expected that the excitement of the war would have prevented a
lot of people travelling, but the reverse was the case. There seemed
to be more people than ever on the platform, and I could not get a
corner seat even in the Fort William coach. I bundled my things into
a carriage and took up as much room as I could, and then Dennis and I
strolled about the platform until the train was due to start.
"Strange mixtures of humanity you see on a railway platform," Dennis
remarked presently.
"Very," I agreed. "I daresay there are some very curious professions
represented here."
"This chap, for instance," said Dennis, indicating a youth in a tweed
jacket and flannel trousers. "He might be anything from an M.P.'s
private secretary to an artist's model, for all we know. I should say
he's a journalist; he knows his way through a crowd as only
journalists do."
"A typical Yorkshire cattle-dealer in his Sunday best," I suggested,
as we passed another passenger. And so we went the length of the
platform making rough guesses as to the professions of my fellow
travellers. Suddenly I noticed a tall man, wearing a tweed cap and a
long covert-coat, his hands in his pockets, a stumpy cigar stuck in
the corner of his mouth. His hair was gray, and his face bore signs of
a tough struggle in early youth. His complexion was of that curious
gray-yellow one sees frequently in America and occasionally in
Denmark--something quite distinct from the bronze-gray of many
colonials. I nudged Dennis.
"What did you make of that?" I asked him after we had passed.
"I should be much more interested to know what 'that' made of us," he
replied.
"Nothing, I should think," I answered carelessly. "Why, the man's eyes
were nearly closed, he was half asleep. I bet he hasn't taken the
slightest notice of anyone for the past ten minutes. You could commit
a murder under his nose and he wouldn't see it."
"I think not," said Dennis quietly. "I fancy that if you took out a
cigarette-case as you passed him he would be able to tell you
afterwards how many cigarettes you had left in the case, what brand
they were, and what the monogram on the front was. If you've any
murders to commit, Ronnie, I should be careful to see that our
American friend is some thousands of miles away."
"Good heavens, you old sleuth!" I exclaimed in astonishment. "I never
saw a more innocent-looking man in my life."
"I hate innocent people," said Dennis emphatically; "they are usually
dangerous, and seldom half as innocent as they look."
"But what makes you think this man is only pretending to look like a
dreaming, unobservant idiot, and why do you call him American so
definitely?"
"He may or may not be American; but we have to give him a name for
purposes of classification," Dennis explained. "In any case his
overcoat was made in the States; the cut of the lapels is quite
unmistakable. I knew an American who tried everywhere to get a coat
cut like that over here, and failed. As to his being observant, you
seem to have overlooked one important fact. There the man stands,
apparently half asleep. Occasionally he displays a certain amount of
life--tucks his papers more tightly under his arms, and so on. Now,
the man who has been dreaming on a station platform and is obviously
going by the train would wake up to look at the clock, or glance round
to see how many are travelling, and generally take an interest in the
bustle of the station. But this man doesn't. Why? Because he only
wakes up when his interest wanders, and that is only when he has seen
all he wants to see for the moment. When we pass him the second time
he will probably appear to be more awake, unless there is someone else
passing him in the other direction, simply because he has seen us and
sized us up and dismissed us as of no interest; or, more likely,
stowed us away in his capacious memory, and, having no further use for
us, he forgets to appear disinterested."
"Good Lord, Dennis!" I exclaimed, "I'd no idea you ever noticed things
so keenly. What do you think he is--a detective?"
"Either that or a criminal. They are the same type of mind. One is
positive and the other negative, that's all. We'll turn back and test
him as we pass him. Talk golf, or fishing, or something."
So we commenced a half-hearted conversation on trout flies, and as we
approached "the American" I was explaining the deadly nature of the
Red Palmer after a spate and the advisability of including Greenwell's
Glory on the same cast. Unfortunately, as we passed our man there were
three other people coming towards us, and he was gazing over the top
of the carriage with the same dreaming look that had, according to
Dennis, deceived me before. But we were hardly abreast of him when his
stick shot up in front of us. His arm never moved at all; it was done
with a quick jerk of the wrist.
"You've dropped a paper, sir," he said to Dennis, to my utter
astonishment, for I had seen no paper dropped. Dennis turned quickly,
and picked up a letter which was lying on the platform behind him.
"I'm very much obliged, sir; thank you," said Dennis, as he put the
letter in his pocket.
"I never saw you drop that," I exclaimed when we were safely out of
earshot. "Did you?"
"There you are," my friend cried triumphantly. "You were walking
beside me and you didn't spot it, and he was some distance away and he
did; and you say he was half asleep."
"I say, Den," I exclaimed, laughing, "d'you think it's going to be
safe to travel on this train? I wonder where he's going?"
Then we dismissed the man from our minds. The train was going in six
minutes, and I joined the crowd round the rug and pillow barrow, and
prepared to make myself comfortable. Leaving everything to the last
minute, as most travellers do, we had a hurried stirrup-cup in view of
the fact that I was about to "gang awa'," and as the train glided out
of the station Dennis turned to wire for my breakfast-basket at
Crianlarich. The one thing that it is important to do when travelling
on the West Highland Railway I had forgotten! We had not passed
Potter's Bar before I decided that it would be impossible to sleep, so
I ferreted out the attendant and bribed him to put me into a
first-class carriage. Better still, he showed me into a sleeper. I was
dog-tired, and in ten minutes fell fast asleep. I awoke for a moment
or two as the train snorted into a station and drew up. I dozed again
for some time, and then the door of my sleeper opened and who should
look in but "the American."
"Say, I beg your pardon," he exclaimed apologetically. "My mistake."
"Not at all," I replied. "Where are we now?" For the train was still
standing.
"Edinburgh," he answered. "Just leaving. Sorry to disturb you."
I again assured him that there was no harm done, and he turned and
left me, the tassels of his Jaeger dressing-gown trailing after him.
Then I fell asleep again, and woke up as we left Whistlefield. I had
finished my wretched ablutions--for an early morning wash on a train
is always a wretched business--as we reached Crianlarich. I was not
long in claiming my breakfast; and when the passengers in the
refreshment-room had finished their coffee--which seems to be the time
when the train is due to leave, and not _vice-versâ_, as might be
expected--the guard was standing on the platform, flag in hand, on the
point of blowing his whistle. Suddenly the head of the American shot
out of the window of his carriage--no other expression describes it.
"Say, conductor," he exclaimed angrily, "where's my breakfast?"
Surely Dennis had been right about the nationality.
"What name might it be, sir?" asked the guard.
"Hilderman--J. G. Hilderman. Ordered by telegraph."
"I'll see, sir," said the guard, dashing into the refreshment-room. It
did not seem to matter when the train started; but, after a further
heated argument, in which the official refused to wait while a couple
of eggs were being fried, Mr. Hilderman was supplied with a pot of
coffee, some cold ham, and dried toast, and we recommenced our belated
journey. I reached Fort William and changed on to the Mallaig train,
as did Mr. Hilderman, on whom, after the breakfast episode, I had
begun to look with an affectionate and admiring regard. The man who
can keep a train waiting in Great Britain while the guard gets him his
breakfast must be very human after all. Most of the way on the
beautiful journey through Lochaber I leaned with my head out of the
window, drinking in the gorgeous air and admiring the luxurious
scenery of the mountain side. But, in view of the hilly nature of the
track and the quality of the coal employed, it is always a dangerous
adventure on the West Highland Railway, and presently I found myself
with a big cinder in my eye. I was trying to remove the cause of my
discomfort, and at the same time swearing softly, I am afraid, when
Hilderman came up.
"I guess I'm just the man you're looking for," he said. "Show me."
In less time than it takes to tell the offending cinder was removed,
and I was amazed at the delicacy and certainty of his touch. I thanked
him profusely, and indeed I was really grateful to him. Naturally
enough, we fell into conversation--the easy, broad conversation of two
men who have never seen each other before and expect never to see each
other again, but are quite willing to be friends in the meantime.
"Terrible news, this," he said presently, pulling a copy of the
_Glasgow Herald_ from his pocket. "I suppose you got it at Fort
William?"
"No," I said. "I didn't leave the train. I wasn't thinking of
newspapers. What is it?"
"A state of war exists between Great Britain and Germany as from
twelve o'clock last night."
"Ah!" said I. "It has come, then." And I was surprised that I had
forgotten all about the war, which was actually the cause of my
presence there. I noticed with some curiosity that Hilderman looked
out of the window with a strangely tense air, his lips firmly pressed
together, his eyes wide open and staring. He was certainly awake now.
But in a moment he turned to me with a charming smile.
"You know, I'm an American," he said. "But this hits me--hits me hard.
There's a calm and peaceful, friendly hospitality about this island of
yours that I like--like a lot. My own country reminds me too much of
my own struggles for existence. For nearly forty years I fought for
breath in America, and, but that I like now and again to run over and
have a look round, you can keep the place as far as I'm concerned.
I've been about here now for a good many years--not just this part,
for this is nearly new to me, but about the country--and I feel that
this is my quarrel, and I should like to have a hand in it."
"Perhaps America may join in yet," I suggested.
"Not she," he cried, with a laugh. "America! Not on your life. Why,
she's afraid of civil war. She don't know which of her own citizens
are her friends and which ain't. She's tied hand and foot. She can't
even turn round long enough to whip Mexico. Don't you ever expect
America to join in anything except family prayer, my boy. That's safe.
You know where you are, and it don't matter if you don't agree about
the wording of a psalm. If an American was told off to shoot a German,
he'd ten to one turn round and say: 'Here, hold on a minute; that's my
uncle!'"
"You think all the Germans in the States prefer their fatherland to
their adopted country, or are they most of them spies?"
"Spies?" said Hilderman, "I don't believe in spies. It stands to
reason there can't be much spying done in any country. Over here, for
instance, for every German policeman in this country--for that's all a
spy can be--there are about a thousand British policemen. What chance
has the spy? You don't seriously believe in them, do you?" he added,
smiling, as he offered me a Corona cigar.
"I don't know," I said doubtfully. I didn't want to argue with my good
Samaritan. "There is no doubt a certain amount of spying done; but, of
course, our policemen are hardly trained to cope with it. I daresay
the whole business is very greatly exaggerated."
"You bet it is, my boy," he replied emphatically. "Going far?" he
asked, suddenly changing the subject.
"North of Loch Hourn," I answered.
"Oh!" said Hilderman, with renewed interest. "Glenelg?"
"I take the boat to Glenelg and then drive back," I explained. I was
in a mood to tell him just where I was going, and why, and all about
myself; but I recollected, with an effort, that I was talking to a
total stranger.
"Drive back?" he repeated after me, with a sudden return to his dreamy
manner. Then, just as suddenly, he woke up again. "Where are we now?"
he asked.
"Passing over Morar bridge," I explained.
"Dear me--yes, of course!" he exclaimed, with a glance out of the
window. "Well, I must pack up my wraps. Good-bye, Mr. Ewart; I'm so
glad to have met you. Your country's at war, and you look to me a very
likely young man to do your best. Well, good-bye and good luck. I only
wish I could join you."
"I wish you could," I replied heartily. "I shall certainly do my best.
And many thanks for your kind assistance."
And so we parted, and returned to our respective compartments to put
our things together; for our journey--the rail part of it, at any
rate--was nearly over. And it was not until long afterwards that I
realised that he had called me by my name, and I had never told him
what it was.
CHAPTER III.
MAINLY ABOUT MYRA.
The train slowed down into Mallaig station. I thrilled with
anticipation, for now I had only the journey on the boat, and Myra
would be waiting for me at Glenelg. The train had hardly stopped when
I seized my bag and jumped out on to the platform. The next instant I
was nearly knocked back into the carriage again. A magnificent Great
Dane had jumped at me with a deep bark of flattering welcome, and
planted his paws on my shoulders.
"Sholto, my dear old man!" I cried in excitement, dropping my bag and
looking round expectantly. It was Myra's dog, and there, sure enough,
was a beautiful vision of brown eyes and brown-gold hair, in a
heather-coloured Burberry costume, running down the platform to meet
me.
"Well--darling?" I said, as I met her half-way.
"Well?" she whispered, as she took my hand, and I looked into the
depths of those wonderful eyes. Truly I was a lucky dog. The world was
a most excellent place, full of delightful people; and even if I were
an impecunious young barrister I was richer than Croesus in the
possession of those beautiful brown eyes, which looked on all the
world with the gentle affection of a tender and indulgent sister, but
which looked on me with----Oh! hang it all!--a fellow can't write
about these sort of things when they affect him personally. Besides,
they belong to me--thank God!
"I got your telegram, dear," said Myra, as we strolled out of the
station behind the porter who had appropriated my bag. Sholto brought
up the rear. He had too great an opinion of his own position to be
jealous of me--or at any rate he was too dignified to show it--and he
had always admitted me into the inner circle of his friendship in a
manner that was very charming, if not a little condescending.
"Did you, darling?" I said, in reply to Myra's remark.
"Yes; it was delivered first thing this morning, and father was very
pleased about it."
"Really!" I exclaimed. "I _am_ glad. I was afraid he might be rather
annoyed."
"I was a little bit surprised myself," she confessed, "though I'm sure
I don't know why I should be. Dad's a perfect dear--he always was and
he always will be. But he has been very determined about our
engagement. When I told him you'd wired you were coming he was
tremendously pleased. He kept on saying, 'I'm glad; that's good news,
little woman, very good news. 'Pon my soul I'm doocid glad!' He said
you were a splendid fellow--I can't think what made him imagine
that--but he said it several times, so I suppose he had some reason
for it. I was frightfully pleased. I like you to be a splendid fellow,
Ron!"
I was very glad to hear that the old General was really pleased to
hear of my visit. I had intended to stay at the Glenelg Hotel, as I
could hardly invite myself to Invermalluch Lodge, even though I had
known the old man all my life. Accordingly I took it as a definite
sign that his opposition was wearing down when Myra told me I was
expected at the house.
"And he said," she continued, "that he never heard such ridiculous
nonsense as your saying you were coming to the hotel, and that if you
preferred a common inn to the house that had been good enough for him
and his fathers before him, you could stop away altogether. So there!"
"Good--that's great!" I said enthusiastically. "But did you come over
by the boat from Glenelg, or what?"
"No, dear; I came in the motor-boat, so we don't need to hang about
the pier here. We can either go straight home or wait a bit, whichever
you like. I wanted to meet you, and I thought you'd rather come back
with me in the motor-boat than jolt about in the stuffy old _Sheila_."
"Rather, dear; I should say I would," said I--and a lot more besides,
which has nothing to do with the story. Suddenly Myra's motherly
instinct awoke.
"Have you had breakfast?" she asked.
"Yes, dear--at Crianlarich. The only decent meal to be got on a
railway in this country is a Crianlarich breakfast."
"Well, in that case you're ready for lunch. It's gone twelve. I could
do with something myself, incidentally, and I want to talk to you
before we start for home. Let's have lunch here."
I readily agreed, and after calling Sholto, who was being conducted on
a tour of inspection by the parson's dog, we strolled up the hill to
the hotel. As we entered the long dining-room we came upon Hilderman,
seated at one of the tables with his back to us.
"Yes," he was saying to the waiter, "I have been spending the week-end
on the Clyde in a yacht. I joined the train at Ardlui this morning,
and I can tell you----"
I didn't wait to hear any more. Rather by instinct than as a result of
any definite train of thought, I led Myra quickly behind a Japanese
screen to a small table by a side window. After all, it was no
business of mine if Hilderman wished to say he had joined the train at
Ardlui. He probably had his own reasons. Possibly Dennis was right,
and the man was a detective. But I had seen him at King's Cross and
again at Edinburgh before we reached Ardlui, so I thought it might
embarrass him if I walked in on the top of his assertion that he had
just come from the Clyde. However, Myra was with me, which was much
more important, and I dismissed Hilderman and his little fib from my
mind.
"Ronnie," said Myra, in the middle of lunch, "you haven't said
anything about the war."
"No, dear," I answered clumsily. "It----" It was an astonishingly
difficult thing to say when it came to saying it.
"And yet that was what you came to see me about?"
"Yes, darling. You see, I----"
"I know, dear. You've come to tell me that you're going to enlist. I'm
glad, Ronnie, very glad--and very, very proud."
Myra turned away and looked out of the window.
"I hate people who talk a lot about their duty," I said; "but it
obviously is my duty, and I know that's what you would want me to do."
"Of course, dear, I wouldn't have you do anything else." And she
turned and smiled at me, though there were tears in her dear eyes.
"And I shall try to be brave, very brave, Ronnie. I'm getting a big
girl now," she added pluckily, attempting a little laugh. And though,
of course, we afterwards discussed the regiment I was to join, and how
the uniform would suit me, and how you kept your buttons clean, and a
thousand other things, that was the last that was said about it from
that point of view. There are some people who never need to say
certain things--or at any rate there are some things that never need
be said between certain people.
After lunch we strolled round the "fish-table," a sort of subsidiary
pier on which the fish are auctioned, and listened to the excited
conversations of the fish-curers, gutters, and fishermen. It was a
veritable babel--the mournful intonation of the East Coast, the broad
guttural of the Broomielaw, mingled with the shrill Gaelic scream of
the Highlands, and the occasional twang of the cockney tourist. Having
retrieved Sholto, who was inspecting some fish which had been laid out
to dry in the middle of the village street, and packed him safely in
the bows, we set out to sea, Myra at the engine, while I took the
tiller. As we glided out of the harbour I turned round, impelled by
some unknown instinct. The parson's dog was standing at the head of
the main pier, seeing us safely off the premises, and beside him was
the tall figure of my friend J. G. Hilderman. As I looked up at him I
wondered if he recognised me; but it was evident he did, for he raised
his cap and waved to me. I returned the compliment as well as I could,
for just then Myra turned and implored me not to run into the
lighthouse.
"Someone you know?" she asked, as I righted our course.
"Only a chap I met on the train," I explained.
"It looks like the tenant of Glasnabinnie, but I couldn't be certain.
I've never met him, and I've only seen him once."
"Glasnabinnie!" I exclaimed, with a new interest. "Really! Why, that's
quite close to you, surely?"
"Just the other side of the loch, directly opposite us. A good swimmer
could swim across, but a motor would take days to go round. So we're
really a long way off, and unless he turns up at some local function
we're not likely to meet him. He's said to be an American millionaire;
but then every American in these parts is supposed to have at least
one million of money."
"Do you know anything about him--what he does, or did?" I asked.
"Absolutely nothing," she replied, "except, of course, the silly
rumours that one always hears about strangers. He took Glasnabinnie in
May--in fact, the last week of April, I believe. That rather surprised
us, because it was very early for summer visitors. But he showed his
good sense in doing so, as the country was looking gorgeous--Sgriol,
na Ciche, and the Cuchulins under snow. I've heard (Angus McGeochan,
one of our crofters, told me) he was an inventor, and had made a few
odd millions out of a machine for sticking labels on canned meat. That
and the fact that he is a very keen amateur photographer is the
complete history of Mr. Hilderman so far as I know it. Anyway, he has
a gorgeous view, hasn't he? It's nearly as good as ours."
"He has indeed," I agreed readily. "But I don't think Hilderman can be
very wealthy; no fishing goes with Glasnabinnie, there's no yacht
anchorage, and there's no road to motor on. How does he get about?"
"He's got a beautiful Wolseley launch," said Myra jealously, "a
perfect beauty. He calls her the _Baltimore II._ She was lying
alongside the _Hermione_ at Mallaig when we left. Oh! look up the
loch, Ron! Isn't it a wonderful view?"
And so the magnificent purple-gray summit of Sgor na Ciche, at the
head of Loch Nevis, claimed our attention--(that and other matters of
a personal nature)--and J. G. Hilderman went completely from our
minds. Myra was a real Highlander of the West. She lived for its
mountains and lochs, its rivers and burns, its magnificent coast and
its fascinating animal life. She knew every little creek and inlet,
every rock and shallow, every reef and current from Fort William to
the Gair Loch. I have even heard it said that when she was twelve she
could draw an accurate outline of Benbecula and North Uist, a feat
that would be a great deal beyond the vast majority of grown-ups
living on those islands themselves. As we turned to cross the head of
Loch Hourn, Myra pointed out Glasnabinnie, nestling like a lump of
grey lichen at the foot of the Croulin Burn. Anchored off the point
was a small steam yacht, either a converted drifter or built on
drifter lines.
"Our friend has visitors," said Myra, "and he's not there to receive
them. How very rude! That yacht is often there. She only makes about
eight knots as a rule, although she gives you the impression she could
do more. You see, she's been built for strength and comfort more than
for looks. She calls at Glasnabinnie in the afternoons sometimes, and
is there after dark, and sails off before six." (Myra was always out
of doors before six in the morning, whatever the weather.) "From which
I gather," she continued, "that the owner lives some distance away and
sleeps on board. She can't be continuously cruising, or she would make
a longer stay sometimes."
"You seem to know the ways of yacht-owners, dear," I said. "Hullo!
what is that hut on the cliff above the falls? That's new, surely."
"Oh! that beastly thing," said Myra in disgust. "That's his, too. A
smoking-room and study, I believe. He had it built there because he
has an uninterrupted view that sweeps the sea."
"Why 'beastly thing'?" I asked. "It's too far away to worry you,
though it isn't exactly pretty, and I know you hate to see anything in
the shape of a new building going up."
"Oh! it annoys me," she answered airily, "and somehow it gets on
daddy's nerves. You see, it has a funny sort of window which goes all
round the top of the hut. This is evidently divided into several small
windows, because they swing about in the wind, and when the sun shines
on them they catch the eye even at our distance. And, as I say, they
get on daddy's nerves, which have not been too good the last week or
two."
"Never mind," I consoled her; "he'll be all right when his friends
come up for the Twelfth. I think the doctors are wrong to say that he
should never have a lot of people hanging round him, because there can
surely be no harm in letting him see a few friends. I certainly think
he's right to make an exception for the grouse."
"Grouse!" sniffed Myra. "They come for the Twelfth because they like
to be seen travelling north on the eleventh! And I have to entertain
them. And some of the ones who come for the first time tell me they
suppose I know all the pretty walks round about! And in any case," she
finished, in high indignation, "can you imagine _me_ entertaining
anybody?"
"Yes, my dear, I can," I replied; and the "argument" kept us busy
till we reached Invermalluch. The old General came down to the
landing-stage to meet us, and was much more honestly pleased to see
me than I had ever known him before.
"Ah! Ronald, my boy!" he exclaimed heartily. "'Pon my soul, I'm glad
to see you. It's true, I suppose? You've heard the news?"
The question amused me, because it was so typical of the old fellow.
Here had I come from London, where the Cabinet was sitting night and
day, to a spot miles from the railway terminus, to be asked if I had
heard the news!
"You mean the war, of course?" I replied.
"Yes; it's come, my boy, at last. Come to find me on the shelf! Ah,
well! It had to come sooner or later, and now we're not ready. Ah,
well, we must all do what we can. Begad, I'm glad to see you, my boy,
thundering glad. It's a bit lonely here sometimes for the little
woman, you know; but she never complains." (In point of fact, she even
contrived to laugh, and take her father's arm affectionately in
her's.) "And besides, there are many things I want to have a talk with
you about, Ronald--many things. By the way, had lunch?"
"We lunched at Mallaig, thank you, sir," I explained.
"Well, well, Myra will see you get all you want--won't you, girlie?"
he said.
"I say, Ronnie," Myra asked, as we reached the house, "are you very
tired after your journey, or shall we have a cup of tea and then take
our rods for an hour or so?"
I stoutly declared I was not the least tired--as who could have been
in the circumstances?--and I should enjoy an hour's fishing with Myra
immensely. So I ran upstairs and had a bath, and changed, and came
down to find the General waiting for me. Myra had disappeared into the
kitchen regions to give first-aid to a bare-legged crofter laddie who
had cut his foot on a broken bottle.
"Well, my boy," said the old man, "you've come to tell us something.
What is it?"
"Oh!" I replied, as lightly as I could, "it is simply that we are in
for a row with Germany, and I've got a part in the play, so to speak.
I'm enlisting."
"Good boy," he chuckled, "good boy! Applying for a commission, I
suppose--man of your class and education, and all that--eh?"
"Oh, heavens, no!" I laughed. "I shall just walk on with the crowd, to
continue the simile."
"Glad to hear it, my boy--I am, indeed. 'Pon my soul, you're a good
lad, you know--quite a good lad. Your father would have been proud of
you. He was a splendid fellow--a thundering splendid fellow. We always
used to say, 'You can always trust Ewart to do the straight, clean
thing; he's a gentleman.' I hope your comrades will say the same of
you, my boy."
"By the way, sir," I added, "I also intended to tell you that in the
circumstances I--I----Well, I mean to say that I shan't--shan't
expect Myra to consider herself under--under any obligations to me."
However difficult it was for me to say it, I had been quite certain
that the old General would think it was the right thing to say, and
would be genuinely grateful to me for saying it off my own bat without
any prompting from him. So I was quite unprepared for the outburst
that followed.
"You silly young fellow!" he cried. "'Pon my soul, you are a silly
young chap, you know. D'you mean to tell me you came here intending
to tell my little girl to forget all about you just when you are
going off to fight for your country, and may never come back? You mean
to run away and leave her alone with an old crock of a father? You
know, Ewart, you--you make me angry at times."
"I'm very sorry, sir," I apologised, though I had no recollection of
having made him angry before.
"Oh! I know," he said, in a calmer tone. "Felt it was your duty, and
all that--eh? I know. But, you see, it's not your duty at all. No.
Now, there are one or two things I want to tell you that you don't
know, and I'll tell you one of 'em now and the rest later. The first
thing--in absolute confidence, of course--is that----"
But at this point Myra walked in, and the General broke off into an
incoherent mutter. He was a poor diplomatist.
"Ah! secrets? Naughty!" she exclaimed laughingly. "Are you ready,
Ronnie?"
"He's quite ready, my dear," said the old man graciously. "I've said
all I want to say to him for the time being. Run along with girlie,
Ewart. You don't want to mess about with an old crock."
"Daddy," said Myra reproachfully, "you're not to call yourself names."
"All right, then; I won't," he laughed. "You young people will excuse
me, I'm sure. I should like to join you; but I have a lot of letters
to write, and I daresay you'd rather be by yourselves. Eh?--you young
dog!"
It was a polite fiction between father and daughter that when the old
fellow felt too unwell to join her or his guests he "had a lot of
letters to write." And occasionally, when he was in the mood to
overtax his strength, she would never refer to it directly, but often
she would remark, "You know you'll miss the post, daddy." And they
both understood. So we set out by ourselves, and I naturally preferred
to be alone with Myra, much as I liked her father. We went out on to
the verandah, and while I unpacked my kit Myra rewound her line, which
had been drying on the pegs overnight.
"Are you content with small mercies, Ron?" she asked, "or do you agree
that it is better to try for a salmon than catch a trout?"
"It certainly isn't better to-day, anyway," I answered. "I want to be
near you, darling. I don't want the distance of the pools between us.
We might walk up to the Dead Man's Pool, and then fish up stream; and
later fish the loch from the boat. That would bring us back in nice
time for dinner."
"Oh! splendid!" she cried; and we fished out our fly-books. Her's was
a big book of tattered pig-skin, which reclined at the bottom of the
capacious "poacher's pocket" in her jacket. The fly-book was an old
favourite--she wouldn't have parted with it for worlds. Having
followed her advice, and changed the Orange I had tied for the "bob"
to a Peacock Zulu, which I borrowed from her, we set out.
"Just above the Dead Man's Pool you get a beautiful view of
Hilderman's hideous hut," Myra declared as we walked along. I may
explain here that "Dead Man's Pool" is an English translation of the
Gaelic name, which I dare not inflict on the reader.
"See?" she cried, as we climbed the rock looking down on the gorgeous
salmon pool, with its cool, inviting depths and its subtle promise of
sport. "Oh! Ronnie, isn't it wonderful?" she cried. "Almost every day
of my life I have admired this view, and I love it more and more every
time I see it. I sometimes think I'd rather give up my life than the
simple power to gaze at the mountains and the sea."
"Why, look!" I exclaimed. "Is that the window you meant?"
"Yes," Myra replied, with an air of annoyance, "that's it. You can see
that light when the sun shines on it, which is nearly all day, and it
keeps on reminding us that we have a neighbour, although the loch is
between us. Besides, for some extraordinary reason it gets on father's
nerves. Poor old daddy!"
It may seem strange to the reader that anyone should take notice of
the sun's reflection on a window two and a quarter miles away; but it
must be remembered that all her life Myra had been accustomed to the
undisputed possession of an unbroken view.
"Anyhow," she added, as she turned away, "we came here to fish. One of
us must cross the stream here and fish that side. We can't cross
higher up, there's too much water, and there's no point in getting
wet. I'll go, and you fish this side; and when we reach the loch we'll
get into the boat. See, Sholto's across already."
And she tripped lightly from boulder to boulder across the top of the
fall which steams into the Dead Man's Pool, while I stood and admired
her agile sureness of foot as one admires the graceful movements of a
beautiful young roe. Sholto was pawing about in a tiny backwater, and
trying to swallow the bubbles he made, until he saw his beloved
mistress was intent on the serious business of fishing, and then he
climbed lazily to the top of a rock, where he could keep a watchful
eye on her, and sprawled himself out in the sun. I have fished better
water than the Malluch river, certainly, and killed bigger fish in
other lochs than the beautiful mountain tarn above Invermalluch Lodge;
but I have never had a more enjoyable day's sport than the least
satisfying of my many days there.
There was a delightful informality about the sport at the Lodge. One
fished in all weathers because one wanted to fish, and varied one's
methods and destination according to the day. There was no sign of
that hideous custom of doing the thing "properly" that the members of
a stockbroker's house-party seem to enjoy--no drawing lots for reaches
or pools overnight, no roping-in a gillie to add to the chance of
sending a basket "south." When there was a superfluity of fish the
crofters and tenants were supplied first, and then anything that was
left over was sent to friends in London and elsewhere. At the end of
the day's sport we went home happy and pleased with ourselves, not in
the least depressed if we had drawn a blank, to jolly and delightful
meals, without any formality at all. And if we were wet, there was a
great drying-room off the kitchen premises where our clothes were
dried by a housemaid who really understood the business. As for our
tackle, we dried our own lines and pegged them under the verandah, and
rewound them again in the morning, made up our own casts, and
generally did everything for ourselves without a retinue of
attendants. And thereby we enjoyed ourselves hugely.
Angus and Sandy, the two handy-men of the place, would carry the
lunch-basket or pull the boats on the loch or stand by with the gaff
or net--and what experts they are!--but the rest we did for ourselves.
By the time I had got a pipe on and wetted my line, Myra was some
fifty yards or so up stream making for a spot where she suspected
something. She has the unerring instinct of the inveterate poacher! I
cast idly once or twice, content to revel in the delight of holding a
rod in my hand once more, intoxicated with the air and the scenery and
the sunshine (What a good thing the fish in the west "like it
bright!"), and after a few minutes a sudden jerk on my line brought me
back to earth. I missed him, but he thrilled me to the serious
business of the thing, and I fished on, intent on every cast.
I suppose I must have fished for about twenty minutes, but of that I
have never been able to say definitely. It may possibly have been
more. I only know that as I was picking my way over some boulders to
enable me to cast more accurately for a big one I had risen, I heard
Myra give a sharp, short cry. I turned anxiously and called to her.
I could not distinguish her at first among the great gray rocks in the
river. Surely she could not have fallen in. Even had she done so, I
hardly think she would have called out. She was extraordinarily sure
on her feet, and, in any case, she was an expert swimmer. What could
it be? Immediately following her cry came Sholto's deep bay, and then
I saw her. She was standing on a tall, white, lozenge-shaped rock,
that looked almost as if it had been carefully shaped in concrete. She
was kneeling, and her arm was across her face. With a cry I dashed
into the river, and floundered across, sometimes almost up to my neck,
and ran stumbling to her in a blind agony of fear. Even as I ran her
rod was carried past me, and disappeared over the fall below.
"Myra, my darling," I cried as I reached her, and took her in my arms,
"what is it, dearest? For God's sake tell me--what is it?"
"Oh, Ronnie, dear," she said, "I don't know, darling. I don't
understand." Her voice broke as she lifted her beautiful face to me. I
looked into those wonderful eyes, and they gazed back at me with a
dull, meaningless stare. She stretched out her arm to grasp my hand,
and her own hand clutched aimlessly on my collar.
In a flash I realised the hideous truth.
Myra was blind!
CHAPTER IV.
THE BLACK BLOW.
"Oh, Ronnie, darling," Myra asked, in a pitiful voice that went to my
heart. "What can it mean? I--I--I can't see--anything at all."
"It's the sun, darling; it will be all right in a minute or two.
There, lie in my arms, dear, and close your poor eyes. It will be all
right soon, dearest."
I tried to comfort her, to assure her that it was just the glare on
the water, that she would be able to see again in a moment, but I felt
the pitiful inadequacy of my empty words, and it seemed that the light
had gone out of my life. I pray that I may never again witness such a
harrowing sight as that of Myra, leaning her beautiful head on my
shoulder, suddenly stricken blind, doing her best to pacify her dog,
who was heart-broken in the instinctive knowledge of a new, swift
grief which he could not understand.
I must ask the reader to spare me from describing in detail the
terrible agony of the next few days, when the hideous tragedy of
Myra's blindness overcame us all in its naked freshness. I cannot
bring myself to speak of it even yet. I would at any time give my life
to save Myra's sight, her most priceless possession. I make this as a
simple statement of fact, and in no spirit of romantic arrogance, and
I think I would rather die than live again the gnawing agony of those
days.
I took Myra in my arms, and carried her back to the house. Poor child;
she realised almost immediately that I was as dumbfounded as she was
herself at the terrible blow which had befallen her, and that I had no
faith in my empty assurances that it would soon be all right again,
and she would be able to see as well as ever in an hour or two, at
most. So she at once began to comfort me! I marvelled at her bravery,
but she made me more miserable than ever. I felt that she might have a
sort of premonition that she would never see again. As we crossed the
stream above the fall I saw again the reflected light from Hilderman's
window, and a pang shot through me as I remembered her words on that
very spot--that she would rather die than be unable to see her beloved
mountains.
I clutched her in my arms, and held her closer to me in dumb despair.
"Am I very heavy, Ron, dear?" she asked presently. "If you give me
your hand, dear, I could walk. I think I could even manage without it;
but, of course, I should prefer to have your hand at any time." She
gave a natural little laugh, which almost deceived me, and again I
marvelled at her pluck. I had known Myra since she was four, and I
might have expected that she would meet her tragic misfortune with a
smile.
"You're as light as a feather, dearest," I protested, "and, as far as
that goes, I'd rather carry you at any time."
"I'm glad you were here when it happened, dear," she whispered.
"Tell me, darling, how did it happen?" I asked. "I mean, what did it
seem like? Did things gradually grow duller and duller, or what?"
"No," she answered; "that was the extraordinary part of it. Quite
suddenly I saw everything green for a second, and then everything went
out in a green flash. It was a wonderful, liquid green, like the sea
over a sand-bank. It was just a long flash, very quick and sharp, and
then I found I could see nothing at all. Everything is black now, the
black of an intense green. I thought I'd been struck by lightning.
Wasn't it silly of me?"
"My poor, brave little woman," I murmured. "Tell me, where were you
then?"
"Just where you found me, on the Chemist's Rock. I call it the
Chemist's Rock because it's shaped like a cough-lozenge. I was casting
from there; it makes a beautiful fishing-table. I looked up, and
then--well, then it happened."
"We're just coming to the house," said Myra suddenly. "We're just
going to turn on to the stable-path."
"Darling!" I cried, nearly dropping her in my excitement; "you can see
already?"
"Oh, Ronnie, I'm so sorry," she said penitently. "I only knew by
the smell of the peat stacks." I could not restrain a groan of
disappointment, and Myra stroked my face, and murmured again, "I'm
sorry, dearest."
"Will you please put me down now?" she asked. "If daddy saw you
carrying me to the house he'd have a fit, and the servants would go
into hysterics." So I put her tenderly on her feet, and she took my
arm, and we walked slowly to the house. She could see nothing, not
even in the hazy confusion of the nearly blind; yet she walked to the
house with as firm a step and as natural an air as if she had nothing
whatever the matter with her.
"You had better leave dad to me, Ron," she suggested. "We understand
each other, and I can explain to him. You would find it difficult, and
it would be painful for you both. Just tell him that I'm not feeling
very well, and he'll come straight to me. Don't tell him I want to see
him. Give me your arm to my den, dear."
I led her to her "den," a little room opening on to the verandah.
There was a writing-table in the window covered with correspondence
in neat little piles, for Myra was on all the charity committees in
the county, and the rest of the room was given up to a profusion of
fishing tackle, shooting gear, and books. Sholto followed us, every
now and then rubbing his great head against her skirt. I left her
there, and turned into the hall, where I met the General. He had
heard us return.
"You're back early, my boy," he remarked.
"Yes," I said, taking out my cigarette-case to give myself an air of
assurance which was utterly unknown to me. "Myra is not feeling very
well. She's resting for a bit."
"Not well?" he exclaimed, in surprise. "Very unusual, very unusual
indeed." And he turned straight into Myra's room without waiting for
an answer to his quiet tap on the door. With a heavy heart I went
upstairs to the old schoolroom, now given over to Mary McNiven, Myra's
old nurse.
"Master Ronald! I _am_ glad," she cried, when I accepted her
invitation to "come in." Mary had boxed my ears many times in my
boyhood, and the fact that we were old friends made it difficult for
me to tell her my terrible news. I broke it as gently as I could, and
warned her not to alarm the servants, and very soon she wiped away her
tears and went downstairs to see what she could do. I went out into
the fresh air for a moment to pull myself together, marvelling at the
unreasoning cruelty of fate. I turned into the hall, and met the
General coming out of Myra's room. He was talking to Mary and one of
the housemaids.
"These things often occur," he was explaining in a very matter-of-fact
voice. "They are unusual, though not unheard-of, and very distressing
at the time. But I am confident that Miss Myra will be quite herself
again in a day or two. Meanwhile, she had better go to bed and rest,
and take care of herself while Angus fetches Doctor Whitehouse. No
doubt he will give her some lotion to wash her eyes with, and it will
be only a day or two before we see Miss Myra about again as usual. You
must see that she has no light near her, and that she rests her eyes
in every possible way. There is nothing whatever for you girls to get
anxious or frightened about. I have seen this sort of thing before,
though usually in the East."
The old man dismissed the maids, and went into the drawing-room, while
I spent a few moments with Myra. I was delighted to see the General
taking it so well, as I had even been afraid of his total collapse, so
I took what comfort I could from his ready assurance that he was quite
accustomed to that sort of thing. But when, some twenty minutes later,
I went to look for him in the drawing-room, and found him prostrate on
the sofa, his head buried in his arms, I realised whence Myra had
derived her pluck. He looked up as he heard the door open, and tears
were streaming down his rugged old face.
"Never mind me, Ronald," he said brokenly. "Never mind me. I shall be
all right in a minute. I--I didn't expect this, but I shall be all
right in a minute." I closed the door softly and left him alone.
I found Angus had harnessed the pony, and was just about to start for
Glenelg to fetch Doctor Whitehouse. So I told him to tell the General
that I should be better able to explain to the doctor what had
happened, and, glad of the diversion, I drove in for him myself. But
when he arrived he made a long and searching examination, patted
Myra's head, and told her the nerve had been strained by the glare on
the water, and rest was all that was needed; and, as soon as he got
outside her door, he sighed and shook his head. In the library he made
no bones about it, and her father and I were both grateful to him.
"It's not a bit of use my saying I know when I don't," the doctor
declared emphatically. "I'm puzzled--indeed, I'm absolutely beaten.
This is a thing I've not only never come across before, but I've never
even read about it. This green flash, the suddenness of it, the
absence of pain--she says she feels perfectly well. She could see
wonderfully well up to the second it happened; no warning headaches,
and nothing whatever to account for it. I have known a sudden shock to
the system produce instantaneous blindness, such as a man in a very
heated state diving into ice-cold water. But in this case there is
nothing to go by. I can only do her harm by pretending to know what I
don't know, and you know as much as I do. She must see a specialist,
and the sooner the better. I would recommend Sir Gaire Olvery; that
would mean taking her up to London. Mr. Herbert Garnesk is the second
greatest oculist in the country; but undoubtedly Sir Gaire is first.
Meanwhile I will give her a little nerve tonic; it will do her no
harm, and will give her reason to think that we know how to treat her,
so that it may do her good. She must wear the shade I brought her, and
take care her eyes are never exposed to the light."
"The fact that you yourself can make nothing of it is for us or
against us?" asked the General, in an anxious voice.
He was looking haggard and tired out.
"In what way?" queried the doctor.
"I mean that if she had--er--totally lost her--the use of her
eyes--for all time, could you be certain of that or not? Or can
you give us any reason to hope that the very fact of your not
understanding the nature of the case points to her getting over it?"
"Ah," said the doctor, "I'm not going to be so unfair to you as to say
that. I will say emphatically that she has not absolutely hopelessly
lost her sight. The nerves are not dead. This green veil may be
lifted, possibly, as suddenly as it fell; but I am talking to men, and
I want you to understand that I can give no idea as to when that may
be. I pray that it may be soon--very soon."
"I'm glad you're so straightforward about it, Whitehouse," said the
old man, as he sank into a chair. "I don't need to be buoyed up by any
false hopes. You can understand that it is a very terrible blow to Mr.
Ewart and myself."
"I can indeed," said the doctor solemnly. "I brought her into the
world, you know. It is a tragic shock to me. I'll get back now, if
you'll excuse me. I have a very serious case in the village, but I'll
be over first thing in the morning, and I'll bring you a small bottle
of something with me. You'll need it with this anxiety."
"Nonsense, Whitehouse," declared the General stoutly. "I'm perfectly
all right. There's nothing at all the matter with me. I don't need any
of your begad slush."
"Now, my dear friend," said the medical man cunningly, "it's my
business to look ahead. In the next few days you'll be too anxious to
eat, so I'm going to bring you something that will simply stimulate
your appetite and make you want to eat. It's not good for any man to
go without his meals, especially when that man's getting on for
sixty."
"Thank ye, my dear fellow," said the old man, more graciously.
"I'm sorry to be such a boor, but I thought you meant some begad
tonic." The General was getting on for seventy; to be exact, he was
sixty-nine--he married at forty-six--and when the medicine came he
took it, "because, after all, it was begad decent of Whitehouse to
have thought of it."
I spent a miserable night. I went to bed early, and lay awake till
daybreak. The hideous nightmare of the green ray kept me awake for
many nights to come. The General agreed with me that we must waste no
time, and it was arranged that we should take Myra up to London the
next day.
"You know, Ronald," said the old man to me as we sat together after
the mockery that would otherwise have been an excellent dinner, "I
was particularly glad to see you to-day. I've been very worried
about--well, about myself lately. I had an extraordinary experience
the other day which I should never dare to relate to anyone whom I
could not absolutely rely on to believe me. I've been fidgeting for
the last month or two, and that window that you say you saw to-day has
got very much on my nerves. I've been imagining that it's a heliograph
from an enemy encampment. Simply nerves, of course; but nerves ought
not to account for extraordinary optical delusions or hallucinations."
"Hallucinations?" I asked anxiously. "What sort of hallucinations?"
"I hardly like to tell you, my boy," he answered, nervously twirling
his liqueur glass in his fingers. "You see, you're young, and
I'm--well, to tell you the truth, I'm getting old, and when you get
old you get nerves, and they can be terrible things, nerves." I looked
up at the haggard face, drawn into deep furrows with the new trouble
that had fallen on the old man, and I was shocked and startled to see
a look of absolute fear in his eyes. I leaned forward, and laid my
hand on his wrist.
"Tell me," I suggested, as gently as I could. He brightened at once,
and patted my arm affectionately.
"I couldn't tell the little woman," he muttered. "She--she'd have been
frightened, and she might have thought I was going mad. I couldn't
bear that. I hadn't the courage to tell Whitehouse either; but you're
a good chap, Ronald, and you're very fond of my girlie, and your
father and I were pals, as you boys would say. I daresay it was only
a sort of waking dream, or----" He broke off and stared at the
table-cloth. I took the glass from his hand, and filled it with
liqueur brandy, and put it beside him. He sipped it thoughtfully.
Suddenly he turned to me, and brought his hand down on the table with
a bang.
"I swear I'm not mad, Ronald!" he cried fiercely. "There must be some
explanation of it. I know I'm sane."
"What was it exactly?" I asked quietly. "Nothing on God's earth will
persuade me that you are mad, sir."
"Thank you, my boy. I'll tell you what happened to me. You won't be
able to explain it, but you shall hear just what it was. You may think
it's silly of me to get nervous of what sounds like an absurdity, but
you see it happened where--where to-day's tragedy happened."
"What Myra calls the Chemist's Rock?" I asked, by this time intensely
interested.
"At the Chemist's Rock," he replied. "It was a lovely afternoon, just
such an afternoon as to-day. I had been going to fish with girlie, but
I was a little tired, and--er--I had some letters to write, so I said
I would meet her later in the afternoon. It was agreed we should meet
at the Chemist's Rock at half-past four. I left the house about a
quarter-past, and strolled down the river to the Fank Pool, crossed
the stream in the boat that lies there, and walked up the opposite
bank past Dead Man's Pool towards the Chemist's Rock. I mention all
this to show you that I was feeling well enough to enjoy a stroll, and
a very rocky stroll at that, because, if I hadn't been feeling
perfectly fit, I should have gone up the back way past the stable, the
way you came back this afternoon. So you see, I was undoubtedly quite
well, my boy. However, to get on with the tale. As soon as I came in
sight of our meeting-place I looked up to see if girlie had got there
before me. She was not there. I looked further up stream, and saw
Sholto come tearing down over the rocks. I knew that he had seen me,
and that she was following him. I naturally strolled on to go to the
rock--I say I went----" He broke off, and passed his hands across his
eyes.
"Yes," I said softly; "you went to the rock, and Myra met you----"
"No," he said; "I didn't. I didn't go to the rock."
"But I don't understand," I said, as he remained silent for some
moments. The old man leaned forward, and laid a trembling,
fever-scorched hand on mine.
"Ronald," he said, in a voice that shook with genuine horror, and sent
a cold shiver down my spine, "I did not go to the rock. _The rock came
to me._"
CHAPTER V
IS MORE MYSTERIOUS.
I sat and stared at the old man in astonishment. Obviously he was
fully convinced that he was giving me an accurate account of what
had happened, and equally obviously he was perfectly sane.
"That is all," he said presently. "The rock came to me."
"Good heavens!" I exclaimed, suddenly brought to my senses by the
sound of his voice. "What an extraordinary thing!"
"For a moment I thought I was mad, and sometimes, when I have thought
over it since--and the Lord knows how many times I've done that--I've
come to the conclusion that I must have fallen asleep. But even now
the fear haunts me that my mind may be going."
"You mustn't imagine anything like that, General," I advised
seriously. "Whatever you do, don't encourage any doubts of your own
sanity. There must be some explanation of this, although I can't for
the moment imagine what it can possibly be. It is a remarkable thing,
and I fancy you will find, when we do know the explanation, that
anyone else standing where you were at that time would have seen
exactly the same thing. The rock stands out of the water; it is just
above a deep pool, and probably it was a sort of mirage effect, and
not by any means a figment of your brain."
To my surprise the old man leaned back in his chair and burst out
laughing.
"Of course," he exclaimed. "I never thought of that--a sort of mirage.
Well, I'm begad thankful you suggested that, Ronald. I've no doubt
that it was something of the sort. What a begad old fool I am. Let us
pray that our poor little girl's trouble," he added solemnly, "will
have some equally simple solution."
The General was so relieved that I had given him, at any rate, some
sort of reason to believe that his brain was not yet going, that he
began to declare that he was convinced Myra would be better in a day
or two. So we arranged that I should take her up to London the next
day, and leave her in charge of her aunt, Lady Ruslit, and then, as
soon as we had heard Sir Gaire's verdict, I was to bring her back
again. General McLeod had been anxious at first to come with us, but I
pointed out that he would be of more use to Myra if he stayed behind,
and kept an eye on her interests in the neighbourhood. I promised to
wire him the result of the interview with Olvery as soon as I knew it.
And just about a quarter to ten we went to bed.
"Ronald," said the old man, as we shook hands outside my door,
"there's just one thing I wasn't frank with you about in the matter of
the Chemist's Rock. I am anxious to believe that it's a point of no
particular importance. You know the rock is a sort of sandstone, not
grey like the rest, but nearly white?"
"Yes," I answered, wondering what could be coming next.
"Well," said the old man, "that day when I saw it appearing to come
towards me it was not white, but green."
"No," I said at last, when we had spent another twenty minutes
discussing this new aspect in my room. "It's beyond me. I can't see
how the two events can be connected, and yet they are so unusual that
one would think they must be. I certainly think it is a point to put
in detail before Olvery."
"On the whole, I quite agree with you," said the General. "I am rather
afraid he may take us for a pack of lunatics, and refuse to be
bothered with the case."
"I'm sure he won't do that," I asserted confidently. "And he may have
some medical knowledge that will just shake the puzzle into place, and
explain the whole mystery to us. It seems to me a most remarkable
thing that these two strange affairs should have happened in exactly
the same place. That it is some strange freak of nature I have no
doubt, but I am absolutely at a loss to think what it can be."
It can hardly be wondered at that, as I have said before, sleep and I
were strangers that night, and I was glad enough when the time came
for me to get up.
Myra came down after breakfast, wonderfully brave and bright, but
there was no sign whatever of her sight returning to her. The
leave-taking was a wretched business, and I cannot dwell on it. Sandy
started early to sail to Mallaig with the luggage, and we followed in
the motor-boat, Angus at the engine, old Mary McNiven in the bows,
while I took the tiller, and Myra lay on a pile of cushions at my
feet, her head resting on my knee, her arm round Sholto's neck; for
she had wanted the dog to see her off at the station. The old General
managed to keep up a cheery manner as he said good-bye at the
landing-stage, but he was looking so care-worn and haggard that I was
glad that he had been persuaded not to come up to London with us. He
was certainly not in a fit state for the fatigues of a long journey.
As we passed Glasnabinnie the _Baltimore_ slid out from the side of
the shed that stood on the edge of the miniature harbour which Nature
had thoughtfully bestowed on the place.
"I can hear a motor-boat," said Myra, suddenly sitting up.
"Yes," I replied. "It's Hilderman's."
"Is she ahead of us?" she asked.
I looked round, and saw that the _Baltimore_ was putting out to round
the point.
"No, she's about level," I answered. "She's evidently making for
Mallaig. We are, if anything, a little ahead, but they will soon pass
us, I should think."
"Oh, Ron," cried Myra, with childish excitement, "don't let them beat
us. Angus, put some life into her. We _must_ make the harbour first."
Angus did his best, and I set her course as near in shore as I dared
on that treacherous coast. The _Baltimore_ glided out to sea with the
easy grace of a powerful and beautiful animal, and as we passed the
jagged promontory she was coming up about thirty yards behind us.
"Challenge him, Ron," Myra exclaimed; "you've met him."
I turned, and saw Hilderman and two other men in the boat, one a
friend apparently, and the other the mechanic. I stood up and waved to
him.
"We'll race you to Mallaig," I shouted.
"It's a bet," he agreed readily, at the top of his voice, waving back.
It was a ding-dong business across the mouth of Nevis, and the
_Baltimore_ was leading, if anything, but we had not far to go, and
our opponents had taken a course a good deal farther out to sea than
we were. Coming up by the lighthouse, however, the _Baltimore_ drew in
at a magnificent pace, and swept in to pass inside the lighthouse
rock. Hilderman, who was quite distinct at the short distance, stood
up in the stern of the _Baltimore_, and looked at us. We were making
good time, but we had no chance of outdistancing his powerful boat.
But, as he looked at us, and was evidently about to shout some
triumphant greeting, I saw him catch sight of Myra, lying at my feet,
her face hidden in the shade over her eyes. Suddenly, without the
slightest warning, he swung the tiller, and, turning out again, took
the long course round the lighthouse, and we slid alongside the
fish-table a good minute ahead of him. Myra was delighted; she had no
suspicion that we had virtually lost the race, and the trifling
excitement gave her a real pleasure. Angus, I could see, was puzzled,
but I signed to him to say nothing. My heart warmed to Hilderman; he
had seen that Myra was not well, and, divining that it would give her
some pleasure to win the race, he had tactfully given way to us. I was
really grateful to him for his kindly thought, and determined to thank
him as soon as I could. We had nearly half an hour to wait for the
mid-day train, and, after seeing Myra and Mary safely ensconced in the
Marine Hotel, I went out with Sholto to get the tickets, telegraph to
Dennis, and express my gratitude to Hilderman. But when I stepped out
of the hotel he was standing in the road waiting for me.
"Good morning, Mr. Ewart," he said, coming forward to offer me his
hand. "Is there anything the matter with Miss McLeod?"
"She's not very well," I replied. "She has something the matter with
her eyes. It was very good of you to let us win our little race. Every
little pleasure that we can give Miss McLeod just at this time is of
great value to us."
"Eyes?" said Hilderman, thoughtfully, with the same dreamy expression
that Dennis had pointed out at King's Cross. "What sort of thing is
it? I know something about eyes."
"I'm afraid I can tell you nothing," I replied. "She has suddenly lost
her sight in the most amazing and terrible manner. We are just taking
her up to London to see a specialist."
"Had she any pain?" he asked, "or any dizziness or fainting, or
anything like that?"
"No," I said; "there is absolutely nothing to go by. It is a most
extraordinary affair, and a very terrible blow to us all."
"It must be," he said gently, "very, very terrible. I have heard so
much about Miss McLeod that I even feel it myself. I am deeply grieved
to hear this, deeply grieved." He spoke very sympathetically, and I
felt that it was very kind of him to take such a friendly interest in
his unknown neighbour.
"I think you'd better join me in a brandy and soda, Mr. Ewart," he
said, laying a hand on my arm. "I don't suppose you know it, but you
look ten years older than you did yesterday."
Yesterday! Good heavens! Had all this happened in a day? I was
certainly feeling far from myself, and I accepted his invitation
readily enough. We turned into the refreshment-room outside the
station, and I had a stiff whisky and soda, realising how far away
from London I was when the man gave me the whisky in one glass and
the soda in another.
"Tell me," said Hilderman, "if it is not very rude of me to ask, or
too painful for you to speak about, what was Miss McLeod doing when
this happened? Reading, or what?" I gave him a rough outline of the
circumstances, but, in view of what the General had told me the night
before, I said nothing about the mystery of the green ray. We wanted
to retain our reputation for sanity as long as we could, and no
outsider who did not know the General personally would believe that
his astonishing experience was anything other than the strange
creation of a nerve-wrought brain.
"And that was all?" he asked thoughtfully.
"Yes, that was all," I replied.
"I suppose you haven't decided what specialist you will take her
to when you get her to London?" he queried. I was about to reply when
I heard Sholto in a heated argument with some other dog, and I bolted
out, with a hurried excuse, to bring him in. As I returned, with my
hand on his collar, the harbour-master greeted me, and told me
we might have some difficulty in reaching London, as the train
service was likely to be disorganised owing to the transport of troops
and munitions. When I rejoined Hilderman I was full of this new
development. It would be both awkward and unpleasant to be turned out
of the train before we reached London; and every moment's delay might
mean injury to my poor Myra.
"I don't think you need worry at all, Mr. Ewart," my new friend
assured me. "The trains will run all right. They may alter the
services where they have too many trains, but here they are not likely
to do so. Thank heaven, I shall not be travelling again for some time.
I hate it, although I have to run about a good deal. I have a few
modest investments that take up a considerable portion of my time. I
figure on one or two boards, you know."
I thanked him for his kindly interest, and left him. I wired to Dennis
not to meet the train, but to be prepared to put me up the following
night. Then I got the tickets, and took Myra to the train. Hilderman
was seeing his friend off; a short, somewhat stout man, with flaxen
hair, and small blue eyes peering through a pair of large spectacles.
He bowed to us as we passed, and I was struck by the kindly sympathy
with which both he and his companion glanced at Myra. Evidently they
both realised what a terrible blow to her the loss of her sight must
be. I will admit that, when it came to the time for the train to
start, my heart nearly failed me altogether. The sight of the
beautiful blind girl saying good-bye to her dog was one which I hope I
may never see again. As the train steamed out into the cutting Sholto
was left whining on the platform, and it was as much as Angus could do
to hold him back. Poor Sholto; he was a faithful beast, and they were
taking his beloved mistress away from him. Myra sat back in the
carriage, and furtively wiped away a tear from her poor sightless
eyes.
"Poor old fellow," she said, with a brave smile. "If they can't do
anything for me in London he will have to lead me about. It'll keep
him out of mischief."
"Don't say that, darling!" I groaned.
"Poor old Ron," she said tenderly. "I believe it's worse for you than
it is for me. And now that Mary has left us for a bit I want to say
something to you, dear, while I can. You mustn't think I don't
understand what this will mean to you, dear. I want you to know,
darling, that I hope always to be your very great friend, but I don't
expect you to marry a blind girl."
I shall certainly not tell the reader what I said in reply to that
generous and noble statement.
"Besides, dear," I concluded eventually, "you will soon be able to see
again." And so I tried to assure her, till presently Mary returned.
And then we made her comfortable, and I read to her in the darkened
carriage until at last my poor darling fell into a gentle sleep.
But twenty-six hours later, when I had seen Myra safely back to her
aunt's house from Harley Street, I staggered up the stairs to Dennis's
rooms in Panton Street a broken man.
Dennis opened the door to me himself.
"Ronald!" he cried, "what has happened?"
"Hello, old man," I said weakly; "I'm very, very tired."
My friend took my arm and led me into his sitting-room, and pressed me
gently on the sofa. Then he brought me a stiff brandy and soda, and
sat beside me in silence for a few minutes.
"Feel better, old boy?" he asked presently.
"Yes, thanks, Den," I answered. "I'm sorry to be such a nuisance."
"Tell me," he said, "when you feel well enough." But I lay, and closed
my eyes, for I was dog-tired, and could not bring myself to speak even
to Dennis of the specialist's terrible verdict. And soon Nature
asserted herself, and I fell into a deep sleep, which was the best
thing I could have done. When I awoke I was lying in bed, in total
darkness, in Dennis's extra room. I sat up, and called out in my
surprise, for I had been many miles away in my slumbers, and my first
hope was that the whole adventure had been a hideous nightmare. But
Dennis, hearing my shout, walked in to see if I wanted anything.
"Now, how do you feel?" he asked, as he sat on the side of the bed.
"Did you carry me in here and put me to bed?" I asked idly.
"You certainly didn't look like walking, and I thought you'd be more
comfortable in here," he laughed.
"Great Scott, man!" I cried, suddenly remembering his heart trouble,
"you shouldn't have done that, Dennis. You promised me you'd take no
risks."
"Heavens! that was nothing," he declared emphatically. "You're as
light as a feather. There was no risk in that."
Indeed, as events were to prove, it was only the first of many, but
being ignorant of that at the time, I contented myself with pointing
out that very few feathers turned the scale at twelve-stone-three.
"Now look here, old son," said Dennis, in an authoritative voice. "You
mustn't imagine I'm dealing with your trouble, whatever it is (for you
_are_ in trouble, Ronald), in a matter-of-fact and unsympathetic way.
But what you've got to do now is to get up, have a tub, slip into a
dressing-gown, and have a quiet little dinner with me here. It's just
gone eight, so you ought to be ready for it."
He disappeared to turn on the bath-water, and then, when he met me in
the passage making for the bathroom, he handed me a glass.
"Drink this, old chap," he said.
"What is it?" I asked suspiciously. "I don't want any fancy
pick-me-ups. They only make you worse afterwards."
"That was prescribed by Doctor Common Sense," he answered lightly.
"It's peach bitters!"
After my tub I was able to tackle my dinner, with the knowledge that I
was badly in need of something to eat, a feeling which surprised me
very much. Throughout the meal Dennis told me of the enlistment of
Jack and poor Tommy Evans, and we discussed their prospects and the
chances of my seeing them before they disappeared into the crowded
ranks of Kitchener's Army. Dennis himself had been ruthlessly refused.
He spoke of trying his luck again until they accepted him, but I knew,
from what he told me of the doctor's remarks, that he had no earthly
chance of being passed. He seemed to have entirely mastered his regret
at his inability to serve his country in the ranks, but I understood
at once that he was merely putting his own troubles in the background
in face of my own. The meal over, we "got behind" two of Dennis's
excellent cigars, and made ourselves comfortable.
"Now then, old man," said my friend, "a complete and precise account
of what has happened to you since you left King's Cross two days ago."
"It has all been so extraordinary and terrible," I said, "that I
hardly know where to begin."
"I saw you last at the station," he said, laying a hand on my knee.
"Begin from there." So I began at the beginning, and told him just
what had happened, exactly as I have told the reader.
Dennis was deeply moved.
"And then you saw Olvery?" he asked. "What did he say?"
I got up, paced the room. What had Olvery said? Should I ever forget
those blistering words to the day of my death?
"Come, old boy," said Dennis kindly. "You must remember that Olvery is
merely a man. He is only one of the many floundering about among the
mysteries of Nature, trying to throw light upon darkness. You mustn't
imagine that his view is necessarily correct, from whichever point he
looked at the case."
"Thank you for that," I said. "I am afraid I forgot that he might
possibly be mistaken. He says he knows nothing of this case at all; he
can make nothing of it; it is quite beyond him. He is certain that no
such similar case has been brought to the knowledge of optical
science. His view is that there is the remotest possibility that this
green veil may lift, but he says he is sure that if there were any
scientific reason for saying that her sight will be restored he would
be able to detect it."
"I prefer your Dr. Whitehouse to this man any day," said Dennis
emphatically. "He took just the opposite view. This man Olvery, like
so many specialists, is evidently a dogmatic egotist."
"I'm very glad you can give us even that hope. But the eyes are such a
delicate instrument. It is difficult to see how the sight can be
recovered when once it has gone. Of course, Olvery is going to do
what he can. He has suggested certain treatment, and massage, and so
forth, and he has no objection to her going back home again. Myra, of
course, is tremendously anxious for me to take her back to her father.
She is worrying about him already; and, fortunately, Olvery knows
Whitehouse, and has the highest opinion of him."
"Go back as soon as you can, old chap," Dennis advised. "Wire me if
there is anything I can do for you at this end. I'll make some
inquiries, and see if I can find out anything about any similar cases,
and so on. But you take the girl back home if she wants to go."
While we were still talking, Dennis's man, Cooper, entered.
"Telegram for Mr. Ewart, sir," he said.
I took the yellow envelope and opened it carelessly.
"What is it?" cried Dennis, springing to his feet as he saw my face.
"Read it," I said faintly, as I handed it to him. Dennis read the
message aloud:
"Come back at once. I can't stand this. Sholto is blind.--McLEOD."
CHAPTER VI.
CONTAINS A FURTHER ENIGMA.
Back again at King's Cross. I seemed to have been travelling on the
line all my life. Myra turned to Dennis to say good-bye.
"I hope," she said bravely, "that when we meet again, Mr. Burnham, I
shall be able to tell you that I can see you looking well."
"I do hope so, indeed, Miss McLeod," said Dennis fervently, with a
quick glance at me. He was lost in admiration at the quiet calm with
which my poor darling took her terrible affliction.
"Good-bye, old chap," my friend said to me cheerily. "I hope to hear
in a day or two that Miss McLeod is quite well again. And," he added
in a whisper, "wire me if I can be of the slightest use."
I readily agreed, and I was beginning, even at that early stage, to be
very thankful that my friend was free to help me in case of need.
When at last we reached Invermalluch Lodge again I sat for an hour in
the library with the old General, telling him in detail the result of
the specialist's examination, but I took care to put Dennis's point of
view to him at the outset. I was glad I had done so, for he seized on
the faint hope it offered, and clung to it in despair.
"What is your own impression of Olvery?" he asked.
"I fancy his knighthood has got into his head," I replied. "He gave me
the impression that he was quite certain he knew everything there was
to be known, and that the mere fact of his not being sure about the
return of her sight made him positive that it must be complete and
absolute blindness. Of course he hedged and left himself a loophole in
the event of her recovery, but I could have told him just as much as
he told me."
"You say you took it on yourself to take Myra out of his hands
altogether. Why?"
"When I received your wire, I rang him up at once, and asked him to
see me immediately," I replied. "Eventually he agreed, and I took a
taxi to his place, and told him about Sholto. He gave his opinion
without any consideration whatever. He said: 'The merest coincidence,
Mr. Ewart--the merest coincidence--and you may even find that the dog
has not actually lost his sight at all.' So naturally I thanked him,
gave him his fee, and came away. I propose now that you should try and
get this man--Garnish, is it----?"
"Garnesk," interposed the General, consulting a note Dr. Whitehouse
had left--"Herbert Garnesk."
"Well, I want you to try and get him sufficiently interested to come
here--and stop here--until he has come to some decision, no matter
what it is."
"A thundering good idea, Ronald," agreed the old man. "But we can't
tell him this extraordinary story in writing."
"I'll go and find him, and fetch him back with me, if I have to hold a
gun to his head."
Accordingly I dashed off to Mallaig again, and caught the evening
train to Glasgow. I spent an unhappy night at the Central Station
Hotel--though it was certainly not the fault of the hotel--and looked
up Mr. Garnesk as early in the morning as I dared disturb a celebrated
consultant oculist. I took a fancy to the man at once. He was
young--in the early 'forties--very alert-looking, and exceedingly
businesslike. His prematurely grey hair gave an added air of
importance to the clever eye and clean-cut features, and he had a
charm of manner which would have made his fortune had he been almost
ignorant of the rudiments of his calling.
"So that's the complete story of Miss McLeod and her dog Sholto," he
mused, when I had finished speaking. For a brief second I thought he
was about to laugh at the apparent absurdity of the yarn, but before I
had time to answer he spoke again.
"Miss McLeod and her dog are apparently blind, and Mr. Ewart is a
bundle of nerves--and this is very excellent brandy, Mr. Ewart. Allow
me."
I accepted the proffered glass with a laugh, in spite of myself.
"What do you think of it?" I asked.
He sat on the edge of the table and swung his leg, wrapt in thought
for a moment.
"I'm very glad to say I don't know what to think of it," he replied
presently.
"Why glad?" I asked anxiously.
"Because, my dear sir, this is so remarkable that if I thought I could
see a solution I should probably be making a mistake. This is
something I am learning about for the first time; and, frankly, it
interests me intensely."
Suddenly he sat down abruptly, with a muttered "Now, then," and began
to catechise me in a most extraordinarily searching manner, firing off
question after question with the rapidity of a maxim gun.
I shall not detain the reader with details of this catechism. His
inquiries ranged from the system on which the house was lighted and
the number of hours Myra averaged per week on the sea to the make of
the engine in her motor-boat. His last question was: "Does anybody
drink the river water?"
"Windows that flash in the sun seem to me to be confusing the issue,"
he said at last. "Windows must always reflect light in a certain
direction at a certain time, and though they may be irritating they
could not possibly produce even temporary blindness. Still, we won't
forget them, Mr. Ewart, though we had better put them aside for a
moment. Now, how soon can you bring Miss McLeod to see me?"
"We had hoped," I ventured to suggest, "that you would be able to run
up and see her, and have a look at the ground. You could then examine
the dog as well."
"I'll be perfectly candid with you, Mr. Ewart," he replied. "I was
just going to start on a short holiday. I was going to Switzerland;
but the war has knocked that on the head, so I am just running up to
Perthshire for a week's fishing. I need a holiday very badly, more
especially as I have undertaken some Government work in connection
with the war. Fortunately, I am a bachelor, and I will willingly give
up a couple of days to Miss McLeod."
"Why not combine business with pleasure?" I suggested. "There's good
fishing at Invermalluch, gorgeous scenery, a golf-course a mile or two
away, and you can do just as you please on the General's estate. He'll
be delighted."
"Are you sure?" he asked. "Well, anyway, I can go to the Glenelg Hotel
and fish up Glenmore. Now, Mr. Ewart, we will catch the afternoon
train, the earliest there is--though I suppose there's only one."
"I can't tell you how grateful I am, Mr. Garnesk," I said. "It may
mean a very great deal to us that you are so anxious to see Miss
McLeod."
"I am not anxious to see Miss McLeod," he answered, cryptically. "I'm
anxious to see the dog."
I left him, to telegraph to the General that I was arriving that night
bringing the specialist with me; and I need hardly say that I left the
telegraph office with a comparatively light heart. The journey to
Mallaig was one of the most interesting afternoons I have spent.
Garnesk was consulting oculist to all the big chemical, machine, naval
and other manufacturers in the great industrial centre on the Clyde,
and he kept me enthralled with his accounts of the sudden attacks of
various eye diseases which were occasionally the fate of the workers.
The effects of chemicals, the indigenous generation of gases in the
furnace-rooms, and so on, had afforded him ample scope for experiment;
and, fortunately for us all, he was delighted to have found new ground
for enlarging his experience. The mixture of professional anecdote and
piscatorial prophecy with which he entertained me, now and then
rushing across the carriage to get a glimpse of a salmon-pool in some
river over which we happened to be passing, gave me an amusing insight
into the character of one whom I have since learned to regard as a
very brilliant and charming man. When we arrived at the landing-stage
at the Lodge, the General greeted him with undisguised joy.
"Begad! Mr. Garnesk," he blurted, "I'm thundering glad to see you,
sir. It's good of you to come, sir--extremely good."
"That remains to be seen, General," said Garnesk, solemnly--"whether
my visit will do any good. I hope so, with all my heart."
"Amen to that!" said the old man, pathetically, with a heavy sigh.
"How is Miss McLeod?" asked the scientist.
"Her eyes are no better," the General replied. "She cannot see at all.
Otherwise she is in perfect health. She says she feels as well as ever
she did. I can't understand it," he finished helplessly.
A suit-case, a bag of golf-clubs, and a square deal box completed
Garnesk's outfit.
"Steady with that--here, let me take it?" he cried, as Angus was
lifting the last item ashore. "Business and pleasure," he continued,
raising the box in his arms and indicating his clubs and fishing-rods
with a jerk of the head. "I've one or two things here that may help me
in my work, and as they are very delicate instruments I would rather
carry them myself."
As we approached the house the sound of the piano greeted us in the
distance; and soon we could distinguish the strains of that most
beautiful and understanding of all burial marches, Grieg's "Aase's
Tod."
"My daughter can even welcome us with a tune," said the old man
proudly. To him all music came under the category of "tunes," with the
sole exception of "God Save the King," which was a national
institution.
Garnesk stopped and stood on the path, the deal box clasped carefully
in his arms, his head on one side, listening.
"We have the right sort of patient to deal with, anyway," he remarked,
with a sigh of relief. But to me the melancholy insistence of the
exquisite harmonies was fraught with ill-omen, and I could not
restrain the shudder of an unaccountable fear as we resumed our walk.
Later on, when I found an opportunity to ask her why she had chosen
that particular music, I was only partially relieved by her ingenuous
answer:
"Oh! just because I love it, Ronnie," she said, "and there are no
difficult intervals to play with your eyes shut. I thought it was
rather clever of me to think of it. I shall soon be able to play more
tricky things. It will cure me of looking at the notes when I can see
again."
Myra and the young specialist were introduced; and, though he chatted
gaily with her, and touched on innumerable subjects, he never once
alluded to her misfortune. Though the General was evidently anxious
that Garnesk should make his examination as soon as possible,
hospitality forced him to suggest dinner first, and I was surprised at
the alacrity with which the visitor concurred, knowing, as I did, his
intense interest in the case. But, after a few conventional remarks to
the General and Myra, I was about to show him to his room when he
seized my arm excitedly.
"Quick!" he whispered. "Where's the dog?"
I led him to a room above the coach-house where poor Sholto was a
pitiful prisoner. Garnesk deposited his precious packing-case on the
floor, and called the dog to him. Sholto sprang forward in a moment,
recognising the tone of friendship in the voice, and planted his paws
on my companion's chest. For twenty minutes the examination lasted.
One strange test after another was applied to the poor animal; but he
was very good about it, and seemed to understand that we were trying
to help him.
"I should hate to have to kill that dog, but it may be necessary
before long," said the specialist. "But why didn't you tell Miss
McLeod her dog was blind?"
"We were afraid it would upset her too much," I answered, and then
suddenly realising the point of the question, I added, "but how on
earth did you know we hadn't?"
"Because," he said thoughtfully, "if you had, she strikes me as the
sort of girl who would have asked me straight away what I thought I
could do for him."
"You seem to understand human nature as well as you do science," I
said admiringly.
"The two are identical, or at least co-incident, Mr. Ewart," he
replied solemnly. "But what was it you _did_ tell her?"
"We said he was suffering from a sort of eczema, which looked as if
it might be infectious, and we thought she ought not to be near him
for a bit. Otherwise, of course, she would have wanted him with her
all the time."
When the examination was over for the time being, I chained Sholto
to a hook in an old harness-rack, for he was strong and unused to
captivity, and the door had no lock, only a small bolt outside.
Garnesk packed away his instruments, carried them carefully to the
house, and then we sprinted upstairs to dress hurriedly for dinner.
Myra, poor child, was sensitive about joining us, but the specialist
was very anxious that she should do so, and we all dined together.
There was no allusion whatever to the strange events which had brought
us together, but, with my professional knowledge of the mysteries of
cross-examination, I noticed that Garnesk contrived to acquire more
knowledge of various circumstances on which he seemed to wish to be
enlightened than Sir Gaire Olvery had gleaned from forty minutes'
blunt questioning.
Myra had hardly left us after the meal was over when the butler handed
the General a card, and almost simultaneously a tall, shadowy figure
passed the window along the verandah.
"'Pon my soul, that's kind of him," said the simple-hearted old man.
"Run after him, Ronald, and fetch him back."
"Who is it?" I asked, rising.
"'Mr. J. G. Hilderman wishes to express his sympathy with General
McLeod in his daughter's illness.' Very neighbourly indeed."
I ran out after Hilderman, and found that his long legs had taken him
nearly half-way to the landing-stage by the time I overtook him. He
stopped as I called his name.
"Why, Mr. Ewart," he exclaimed in surprise, "you back again already? I
hope you had a very satisfactory interview with the specialist."
I told him briefly that our visit to London had given us no
satisfaction at all, and gave him the General's invitation to come
up to the house.
"I wouldn't think of it, Mr. Ewart," he declared emphatically. "Very
kind of General McLeod, but he don't want to worry with strangers just
now."
He was very determined; but I insisted, and he eventually gave way. I
was glad he had come. I had a somewhat unreasonable esteem for his
abilities and resource, and every assistance was welcomed with open
arms at Invermalluch Lodge at that time. His extensive knowledge even
included some slight acquaintance with the body's most wonderful
organ, for he told us some very interesting eye cases he had heard of
in the States. He was genuinely dumbfoundered when we told him that
Sholto was an additional victim.
"You don't say so!" he exclaimed. "Well, that _is_ remarkable. It
sounds as if it came out of a book. In broad daylight a young lady
goes out, and is as well as can be. An hour later she is stone blind.
Two days afterwards her dog goes out, and _he_ comes in blind. Yes,
it's got me beaten."
"It's got us all beaten," said Garnesk deliberately, and I was shocked
to hear him say it. I reflected that he had not even examined Myra,
and my disappointment was the keener that he should admit himself
nonplussed so early. But he left me no loophole of doubt.
"I can make nothing whatever of it," he added, ruefully shaking his
head. "I wonder if I ever shall?"
"Come, come! my dear sir," said Hilderman cheerily. "You scientist
fellows have a knack of making your difficulties a little greater than
they really are, in order to get more credit for surmounting them. I
know your little ways. I'm an American, you know, professor; you can't
get me that way."
Garnesk laughed--fortunately. And again I was grateful to Hilderman
for his timely tact, for it cheered the old man immensely, and helped
me a little, too. Presently the General left the room, and Garnesk
leaned forward.
"Mr. Hilderman," he said earnestly, "do everything in your power to keep
the old man's spirits up. I can give him no hope, professionally--I
dare not. But you, a layman, can. It is difficult in the circumstances
for Mr. Ewart to give much encouragement, but I know he will do his
best."
"J. G. Hilderman is yours to command," said the American, with a bow
that included us both. And then the oculist suggested that we should
have a look at Sholto. I led the way to the coach-house with a heavy
heart. I should not have minded a mystery which would have endangered
my own life. Apart from any altruism, the personal peril would have
afforded a welcome stimulant. But this unseen horror, which stabbed in
the dark and robbed my beautiful Myra of her sight, chilled my very
soul. I climbed wearily up the wooden stair to Sholto's new den,
carrying a stable lantern in my hand, for it was getting late, and the
carefully darkened room would be as black as ink. The other two
followed close on my heels. I opened the door and called to the dog. A
faint, sickly-sweet odour met me as I did so.
"You give your dogs elaborate kennels," said Hilderman, as he climbed
the stairs, and I laughed in reply.
At that instant Garnesk stood still and sniffed the air. With a sudden
jerk he wrenched the lantern from my hand and strode into the room.
Sholto was gone. Only half his chain dangled from the hook, cut
through the middle with a pair of strong wire-nippers.
The oculist turned to us with an expression of acute interest.
"Chloroform," he said quietly.
CHAPTER VII.
THE CHEMIST'S ROCK.
By the time we gave up our hunt for Sholto that night and saw
Hilderman into the _Baltimore II._ at the landing-stage, the harvest
moon had splashed the mountain side with patches of silver in reckless
profusion. But we were in no mood for æsthetics. We applied the
moonlight to more practical purposes.
"Show me the river, Mr. Ewart," said Garnesk, as we turned away from
the shore. Accordingly I took him up stream till we came to Dead Man's
Pool.
"What do you make of things now?" I asked, as we walked along.
"I can't make anything of the stealing of a dog except that someone
coveted it and has now got it. Can you?"
"No," I answered thoughtfully, "I can't. But it's an extraordinary
coincidence, at the least; and who on earth could have stolen him? You
see, no one round here would dream of taking anything that belonged to
Miss McLeod. And, though Sholto is well enough bred, he's never been
in a show, and has no reputation. I can't make it out."
"I'm very sorry it happened just now," said the oculist. "I was in
hopes that by experimenting on the animal I could cure the girl. But
at any rate that is beyond grieving about now. Is this the place?"
"Yes," I said, "this is Dead Man's Pool. That dim white shape there is
the Chemist's Rock. It was there that Miss McLeod lost her sight, and
here that the General had his extraordinary experience. It looks
innocent and peaceful enough," I added, with a sigh.
"The General was very lucky--very lucky indeed!" murmured my
companion.
"Why?" I asked.
"He was down here looking at the rock, and he saw some sort of vision;
Miss McLeod was up at the rock looking down at the pool, and she lost
her sight. The General might have been looking this way instead of
that, in which case we might have had another case on our hands."
"Then you think the two adventures are different aspects of the same
thing? If only we knew where Sholto was it might give us even more to
go on."
"Have you any tobacco?" he asked abruptly. "I've got a pipe, but I
left my tobacco in my room."
We were in evening dress, and my pouch and pipe were in the house; so
I left him there while I ran in to fetch them. When I returned he was
nowhere to be seen, and for a moment I half suspected some new
tragedy; but as I looked round I caught the gleam of the moonlight on
his shirt-front. I found him kneeling on the Chemist's Rock, looking
out to sea.
"Many thanks, Mr. Ewart," he said, as he handed me back my pouch and
took the light I offered him. "Ah! I'm glad to see you smoke real
tobacco. By the way," he added, "have you a friend--a real friend--you
can trust?"
"I have, thank God!" I replied fervently. "Why?"
"I should like you to send for him. Do anything you can to get him
here at once. Go and drag him here, if you like--only get him here."
"But why this urgency?" I asked again. "I admit that we have some very
horrible natural phenomena to deal with; but, apart from the fact that
some wretched poacher has stolen a dog, we have no human element to
fear. I don't see how he can help, and he might run a risk himself."
"Never mind--fetch him or send for him. If you could have seen
yourself start when you returned to the pool yonder to find me
missing, you would realise that your nervous system would be the
better for a little congenial companionship. Frankly, Mr. Ewart, I
don't like the idea of you being left alone here during the next few
days with a blind girl and an old man--if you'll pardon me for being
so blunt."
"But you'll be here," I said; "and I hope you will have something to
say to us that will put nerves out of the question when you have
examined Myra."
Garnesk rose to his feet and laid a friendly hand on my arm.
"As soon as I've seen what this place looks like at a quarter-past
four to a quarter-past five in the afternoon I shall leave you."
"But--good heavens, man!" I cried, aghast, "you won't leave us like
that. We hoped for so much from your visit. You can't realise, man,
what it may mean to--to us all! You see----"
"My dear chap," said my companion, cutting me short with a laugh, "it
is just because I do realise that my presence here may be dangerous to
Miss McLeod that I propose to leave."
"Dangerous to her?" I gasped. "What on earth do you mean now?" The
whole world seemed to have taken leave of its senses, and I mentally
vowed that I should wire for Dennis first thing in the morning.
"I say that because her dog has been drugged and taken away."
"But some fool of a poacher was responsible for that!" I cried.
My companion looked at me thoughtfully as he puffed at his pipe.
"I was the cause of the dog's disappearance," he said quietly.
"I see what you're driving at," I said. "You pretended to steal the
dog because you were afraid Myra would make overwhelming objections to
your vivisecting him, or whatever you want to do. Of course, now I see
you would be the only person about Invermalluch Lodge likely to have
chloroform. But even then I don't see what you mean by saying that
your presence here would be dangerous to Miss McLeod."
"That's a very ingenious construction to put on my words, my dear
fellow," he said; "but in my mind I was relying on you to overcome my
patient's objections to any experiments that might be deemed advisable
on her dog. I meant something much more serious than that. I have
known you only a few hours, Mr. Ewart; but nobody need tell me you are
anything of a fool, unless he wants a very flat contradiction. You are
looking at this affair from a personal point of view--and no wonder,
either. But if you were not so worried about your _fiancée_ your brain
would have grasped my point at once. That is why I want you to send
for a friend."
"I will," I promised solemnly. "Now tell me--what did you mean?"
"When I said I was the cause of the dog's disappearance, I meant that
if I hadn't arrived on the scene the dog would never have been
touched. The dog was taken by someone who knew he was blind, who knew
that I would experiment on him, and who was determined to get there
first."
"But," I exclaimed, "that would be carrying professional jealousy a
bit too far--if that's what you mean!"
"It would be carrying it so far that we can rule it out of court," he
answered. "So that's what I don't mean. Let's go back and analyse the
occurrence. I say the dog was not stolen by poachers, because of the
chloroform; you said the same yourself. I say that the thief knew the
dog was blind, because he knew he was in a darkened room above the
coach-house, and he stole him from there. A poacher would have gone to
the kennel, and found it empty--and that would have been the end of
that. But the man who knew the dog was in a special room must have
known why he was there; and it seems to me that the man who steals a
blind dog steals him because, for some reason or other, he wants a
blind dog--that very one, probably. Have you got me?"
"Yes," I said, "I follow you so far. Go on." And I was surprised to
find how relieved I was at this suggested complication. I felt that if
we could only attribute this amazing week of mysteries to some human
agent I should be able to grapple with it.
"Now I come to my main point," Garnesk continued, "and it's this: The
man who wanted Sholto because he was blind wanted him to experiment
on. But no professional man would do a thing like that, even supposing
there to be one about. That motive again is ruled out of court. There
remains one possible solution----"
"Well?" I asked breathlessly, for even now I failed to grasp the
conclusion my scientific companion could be coming to. "Go on!"
"If this thief did not want Sholto to experiment on himself, he stole
the dog in order to prevent me from experimenting on him."
I laughed aloud from sheer excitement and the relief of finding some
tangible thing to go on, for the oculist's argument struck me as very
nearly perfect.
"You ought to be at Scotland Yard," I said. "You seem to me to have
hit the nail on the head."
"The two callings are very closely allied," he said modestly.
"Detectives deal with murderers and thieves, and I with nerves and
tissues. It is all a question of diagnosis."
"I must say I think you've diagnosed this case very well, Mr.
Garnesk," I said, "though we are just at the beginning of our troubles
if what you suppose is correct."
"I can't think of any other solution," he answered thoughtfully; "and
we are, as you say, just at the beginning of our troubles. The first
thing to do is----"
"To find the man who stole the dog," I cut in.
"To find the man who knew the dog was blind," he corrected. "By that
means we may come to the man who stole the dog; then we may get his
reason from his own lips, if we are exceptionally lucky. But I fancy I
can supply his motive, failing a full confession."
"You can?" I cried. "Let's hear it."
"You've thought of one yourself, of course?" he asked.
"The only motive I can think of is too fantastic altogether. It is
weak enough to presuppose that someone has a grievance against Miss
McLeod or the General, and that someone took advantage of the
extraordinary circumstances to steal Sholto, and if possible prevent
Myra getting her sight back. Oh, it's too ridiculous!"
"We have to remember," my companion suggested, "that our unknown
quantity not only knew that the dog was blind, but also knew that I
was coming or had arrived, and would probably experiment on the beast.
It argues a very terrible urgency that the animal disappeared within
an hour or two of my arrival. From all that I deduce what seems to me
the only possible motive. The dog was stolen by the man who made Miss
McLeod blind."
"_Made_ her blind!" I cried. "You don't seriously mean that you think
someone--some fiend of hell--deliberately blinded her?"
"Not deliberately," my companion replied. "But I believe it was
through some human agency that she was blinded. I think some person or
persons were anxious that Miss McLeod should remain blind, in case we
should, in the process of recovering her sight, hit upon the cause of
her losing it."
In silence I sat for a few moments, thinking over this extraordinary
new outlook. I must certainly wire for Dennis in the morning.
"Mr. Garnesk," I said presently, "you are bringing a very terrible
charge against some human monster whom we have yet to discover. But I
must admit that you seem to have logic on your side. It remains for
me to discover who these people are--if there are more than one."
"Yes," he mused; "that is what we must discover."
"We!" I exclaimed. "Then you're not going away?"
"Yes," he said. "I think it would be fairer to you all if I left you.
I think my arrival has done some good--my departure may do more. But I
assure you, Mr. Ewart, I shall not give up this case till Miss McLeod
recovers her sight. I give you my hand on that."
I shook hands with him warmly.
"Thank you," I said, as I noticed the eager look on his keen, handsome
face. "Thank you from the bottom of my heart. To-morrow I hope I shall
find the man who knew Sholto was blind."
"I only know of one outside the General's household," he answered.
"But I don't even know that!" I cried, forgetting Dennis for the
moment. As for Olvery, he had gone clean out of my mind. "Who do you
mean?"
"The American," said my companion.
"Hilderman!" I exclaimed. "Surely you must be mistaken. Why, he was
absolutely astonished when we told him. He can't have known."
"Still," Garnesk insisted, "I felt sure he knew. I suspected something
about him, but I was wrong to do that, quite wrong; I admit that now.
I couldn't at first see why he pretended he hadn't heard that Sholto
was blind. You may have noticed that I tried to give him the
impression that I had examined Miss McLeod and come to the conclusion
that I could do nothing. I confess I did that to see how he took it.
But I was on a wrong scent altogether. He knew about the dog, that was
obvious, but it was also obvious that he hadn't been told from an
official source, so to speak. He kept fishing for information. He
brought up the dog several times, each time with a query mark in his
voice--as you might say. He remarked that the _last_ time he saw Miss
McLeod she had her beautiful dog with her. That made me suspicious,
because from what you told me she always had her dog with her. Then he
said her dog must be feeling it very keenly, you remember. I tried him
with my pessimistic conclusions to see how he took it. You see, as
soon as I saw the dog I put contagious disease out of the question.
Natural forces unguided seemed impossible, but natural forces of some
nature that we can't yet understand seemed probable. Still I was wrong
to suspect Hilderman, quite wrong. Besides he couldn't possibly have
stolen the dog."
"I'm glad you feel you were wrong there," I said, "because I rather
like the man. I shouldn't care to have to suspect him."
"Don't suspect him, whatever you do," said the oculist earnestly.
"Whatever you do, don't do that. He might be very useful. Make a
friend of him. You'll want all your friends."
He rose and stretched his legs, and I followed suit. We stood for a
moment on the Chemist's Rock and gazed up the river, over the top of
the falls, into the silver and purple symphony of a highland night.
Presently my companion turned and took my arm.
"I've seen all I want to see," he said as he began to lead me down to
the pool again. "They'll wonder what has become of us. And as I've
seen enough for one night, let's get back to the house."
"It's a wonderful view at any time of the day or night," I agreed, and
I sighed as I thought of poor Myra.
"It must be," said Garnesk absently, picking his way across the rocks.
"It must be a magnificent view. I haven't noticed it; you must bring
me here to-morrow."
CHAPTER VIII.
MISTS OF UNCERTAINTY.
When we got back to the house we found Myra and her father--not
unnaturally--wondering what had become of us.
"What have you been doing, and where have you been, and what do you
mean by it?" she asked, playfully. "I wish I could see you. I'm sure
you must be looking very guilty."
Garnesk and I exchanged hurried glances. It was obvious from her
remark that the General had not told her of Sholto's disappearance. I
decided there and then that I would have to tell her the whole truth
myself, and I gave the others a pretty broad hint that we would like
to be left alone. I left the drawing-room and went with them to the
library, and answered the old man's feverish questions as to the
result of our search.
Then I returned to Myra. It was a difficult and unpleasant task that I
had to perform, but I got through it somehow; and, as I expected, Myra
was very distressed about her dog, but not in the least frightened. I
had thought it wiser not to acquaint her with the specialist's
deductions as to the connection between her own affliction and the
theft of Sholto. When I had given her as many particulars as I thought
advisable, the other two rejoined us.
"Can you think of anyone at all, Miss McLeod," the specialist asked,
"who would be likely to steal Sholto?"
"I can't," the girl replied helplessly. "I wish I could."
"The two classes of people we want to find," I suggested, "are those
who like Sholto so much as to be prepared to steal him, and those who
dislike him so much as to be anxious to destroy him."
"You don't think they'll hurt him," she cried, anxiously. "Poor old
fellow! It's bad enough his being blind; but I would rather know he
was dead than being ill-treated."
"It's much more likely to be the act of some very human person who
covets his neighbour's goods," said Garnesk, reassuringly. "But, at
the same time, we must not overlook the other possibility. Can you
remember anyone who does dislike the dog?"
"Only one," said Myra, thoughtfully, "and I don't think he could have
done it. He has a small croft away up above Tor Beag, and Sholto and
I were up there one day; but it's months ago. Sholto went nosing round
as usual, and the man came out and got very excited in Gaelic--and you
know how excited one can be in that language. He was very rude to me
about the dog, and it made me rather suspicious. I told daddy about it
after."
"Yes, and I hope you won't go wandering about so far from home
without saying where you're going in future, my dear; because----"
said the old man, and pulled himself up in pained confusion as he
realised the tragic significance of his words.
"Some sort of poacher, perhaps," suggested Garnesk, coming quickly to
the rescue.
"An illicit whisky still somewhere about, more likely," Myra replied.
And as she could think of no other likely person, and the crofter
seemed out of the question, we had to confess ourselves puzzled. I had
hoped that Myra would have been able to give us some clue with which
we could have satisfied her, while we kept our suspicions to
ourselves. Then we left Myra with the specialist, who made a temporary
examination. In twenty minutes he assured us that he could make
nothing of the case, but that he was willing to stake his reputation
that there was nothing organically wrong; and he gave us, so far as he
dared, distinct reason to hope that she would eventually regain full
possession of her lost faculty. So, after general rejoicings all
round, in which I quite forgot the mystery of the man who stole the
dog, I went to bed feeling ten years younger, and slept like a top.
When I awoke in the morning much of my elation of spirit had
evaporated, and I felt again the oppression of surrounding tragedy. I
got up immediately--it was just after six--dressed, and went down
to bathe. I was strolling down the drive, with a towel round my
neck, when Garnesk put his head out of his window and shouted that
he would join me. The tide being in, we saved ourselves a walk to
the diving-rock, as the point was called, and bathed from the
landing-stage. Refreshed by the swim, we determined to scour the
country-side for any tracks of the thief.
"What beats me is how anybody in a place like this, where everybody
for miles round knows more about you than you do yourself, could
get rid of an enormous beast like Sholto. He was big even for a Dane,
and his weight must have been tremendous when he was drugged," said
Garnesk, as we walked up the beach path. "Have you ever tried to carry
a man who's fainted?"
"I have," I answered with feeling, "and I quite agree with you. If the
thief wanted to do away with the dog the beast's body is probably
somewhere near."
"What about the river?" my companion suggested.
"More likely the loch," I decided, "or the sea. But that would mean
a boat, because it would have to be buried in deep water, or the
body would be washed up again on the rocks, even with a heavy weight
attached. There are many deep pools in the river, but they are
constantly fished, and that would lead to eventual detection. We are
dealing with a man who knows his way about. It might be the loch or
one of the burns, easily."
Accordingly we decided to try the loch first; but though we followed
the path from the house, carefully studying the ground every foot of
the way, and examined the banks equally carefully, we were forced to
the conclusion that we were on the wrong scent. Then we came down one
of the burns that runs from the loch to the sea, and met with the same
result.
"We'll walk along the beach and go up the next stream," Garnesk
suggested. "Hullo," he exclaimed suddenly, as we clambered over the
huge rocks into a tiny cove, "there's been a boat in here!"
I looked at the shingly beach, and saw the keel-marks of a boat and
the footprints of its occupants in the middle of the cove. We went up
gingerly, for fear of disturbing the ground of our investigations. I
looked at the marks, and pondered them for a moment. By this time my
senses were wide awake.
"What do you make of it?" the oculist asked.
"Well," I replied, with an apologetic laugh, "I'm afraid you'll
think me more picturesque than businesslike if I tell you all the
conclusions I've already come to; but the man who came ashore in
this boat didn't steal Sholto."
"Go on," he said. "Why, I told you I knew you weren't a fool."
"Thank you!" I laughed. "It seems to me that if a man arrived in a
boat and went ashore to steal a dog, he would go away again in the
same boat."
"And didn't he?"
"I feel convinced he didn't," I replied, and pointed out to him what
must have been obvious to both of us. "Compare the keel-marks with
high-water mark. There is less than half a boat's length of keel-mark,
and it is just up above high-water mark. This craft, which appears to
have been a small rowing-boat, was run ashore at high tide, or very
near it, and run out again very quickly. It might conceivably have
come in and been caught up by the sea. But Sholto was stolen between a
quarter past eight and half-past nine, when the tide was well on the
way out. If Sholto went out to sea it was not in this boat."
"Well," said Garnesk, thoughtfully, "your point is good enough for me.
We must look somewhere else."
"I hope my attempts at detective work will not put us off the scent,"
I said, doubtfully.
"I don't think they will, Ewart," said my companion, graciously. "Not
in this case, anyway. I'm sure you're right, because this bay can be
seen from the top windows of the house."
"You evidently reached my conclusions with half the effort in half the
time," I laughed.
"Oh, nonsense!" he exclaimed. "It was you who pointed out that the
one man in this boat came in daylight."
"Why 'one man' so emphatically?" I asked.
"When two men come in a boat to commit a theft, and only one of them
goes ashore, the other would hardly be expected to sit in the boat and
twiddle his thumbs. It's a thousand pounds to a penny that he would
get out and walk about the beach. Now, only one gentleman came ashore
from this boat, and only one got on board again. One set of footprints
going and one coming decided me on that. Besides, if anyone came along
and saw a solitary man sitting in a boat, they might ask him how his
wife and children were, and he would have to reply; whereas an empty
boat, being unable to answer questions, would raise no suspicions."
"You seem to be arguing that this boat may have been the one we are
looking for," I pointed out; "and yet we are agreed that the state of
the tide made it impossible for Sholto to have been taken away in it."
"Yes," said Garnesk, "I agree to that. But I fancy the thief came by
that boat. It seems to me that our man jumps out of the boat, runs
ashore, and his friend pulls away and picks him up elsewhere--probably
nearer the house. It would look perfectly natural for a man who has
apparently been giving a companion a pull across from Skye, say, to
land him and then go back. The more I think of this the more it
interests me. You see, if the top windows of the house can be seen
from the bay, it means that the lower windows can be seen from the top
of the cliff. If we can find where our thief lay in wait on the cliff
and watched the house, probably with his eyes glued on the dining-room
windows to see when we commenced dinner, if we can also find where he
left his sea-boots while he went to the house, and then where he
rejoined his companion, we are getting on."
"What makes you say 'sea-boots'?" I asked. "You can't tell a top-boot
by the footmarks."
"Indirectly you can," Garnesk replied, puffing thoughtfully at his
pipe. "That boat was pulled in and pushed out by a man who exerted
hardly any pressure, although the beach only slopes gently. His
companion did not lend a hand by pushing her out with an oar; if he
had done so we should have seen the marks, and I couldn't find any.
The only other way to account for it is that our friend, who exerted
so little pressure, was wearing sea-boots and walked into the water
with the boat. Had he been alone, the jerk of his final jump into the
boat would have left a deeper impression on the beach. The tide was
just going out; it would have no time to wash this mark away. I looked
for the mark, and it wasn't there; so I came to the final conclusion
that two men arrived in the cove shortly after seven last night in a
small open boat. One of them--a tall, left-handed man in
sea-boots--pushed the boat out again and went ashore."
I am afraid I was rude enough to shout with laughter at this very
definite statement; but it was mainly with excited admiration that I
laughed--certainly not with ridicule. Garnesk turned to me
apologetically.
"I know it sounds far-fetched, my dear chap," he said; "but we shall
have to think a lot over this business, and I am simply thinking aloud
in order that you can give me your help in my own conclusions."
"My dear fellow," I cried, "don't, for heaven's sake, imagine that I
am laughing at you. It was the left-handed touch that made me guffaw
with sheer excitement."
"Well, I think he was left-handed, because the footmarks were going
ashore on the right-hand side of the keel-marks, and going seawards on
the left-hand side. Jump out of a boat and push it out to sea, and
notice which side of the boat you stand by instinct--provided you were
doing as he was, pushing on the point of the bows. The fact that his
feet obliterate the keel-marks in one place proves that. So now we
want to find a left-handed man in sea-boots who knew Sholto was
blind"--and he laughed in a half-apology.
"What about these sea-boots," I asked, "and the place we are to find
where he left them?"
"We'll look for that now; and if we find it we can be pretty sure our
mariner stole the dog."
"You seem to be taking it for granted already," I pointed out.
"The easiest way to prove he didn't is to satisfy ourselves that
there's no evidence he did," said the oculist. "But I fancy he did."
"From the way you've sized it up so far I should be inclined to back
your fancy," I admitted frankly. "I take it, from your diagnosis, that
our nautical friend came ashore here, went up on to the cliff, and
glued his eye to the dining-room window. When he saw we were at
dinner, and it was getting dusk--in fact, almost dark--he took off his
sea-boots and slipped up to the Lodge in his stocking-soles. So if we
climb the cliff, we expect to find the spot on which he deposited his
boots."
"If we expected that," Garnesk replied, "we should also expect to find
his boots; and he wouldn't be likely to leave such incriminating
evidence in our hands as that. No, my dear Ewart; when he left the
cliff he was wearing his boots, and he left them at some point on the
path between the house and his embarking place. Come--let's look."
I was intensely interested in my friend's deductions, and I felt
convinced that he was right. So we climbed the cliff, he by one route
and I by another, in order to see if we could find any traces of last
night's visitor. But that was impossible; the rocks were too
storm-swept to harbour any sort of lichen which would have shown
evidence of footmarks. Still, we were not disappointed when we reached
the top, and Garnesk looked at me with a charming expression of boyish
triumph when we came across a patch of ground where the heather had
obviously been trampled about and worn down by someone recently lying
there.
"I don't think we'll worry about tracing him from here just now," said
the specialist. "It would be a very difficult job, and we may as well
make for the most likely spot to embark from."
"Right you are," I agreed. "I think there can only be one--that is a
secluded little inlet, almost hidden by the rocks on the other side of
the house."
"Come on, let's have a look at it," my companion urged; and we
blundered down the side of the cliff and hurried along the shore. But
when we came to the small bay which I had in mind there was certainly
some sign of disturbance among the rough gravel with which the shore
was carpeted; and that was all the evidence we could find.
"It is such an ideal spot for the job that this almost knocks our
theory on the head," murmured Garnesk ruefully. "There are no
boat-marks, or anything."
"Which, in a way, bears out your diagnosis," I cried, suddenly
hitting on what I thought to be the solution of the difficulty.
"How, in heaven's name?"
"Our old friend the tide," I declared, with returning confidence.
"Of course," he almost shouted. "I've got you, Ewart. The boat came in
here while the tide was going out--when, in fact, it was some distance
out, possibly nearly an hour after it ran into the other cove. Since
then the tide has come in again and obliterated any marks the men may
have made. If we find any evidence on a line running between this
place and the house, we can call it a certainty."
In feverish excitement we hurried towards the house, casting anxious
glances to right and left, but the stubborn heather showed no sign of
any recent passenger that way. At last Garnesk, who was some distance
to my right, hailed me with an exultant shout. There, sure enough, was
a broad patch bearing marks of recent occupation, much the same as the
other at the top of the cliff. We were able easily to distinguish the
exact spot where the thief had laid the unconscious dog while he put
on his boots. The discovery of an unmistakable footprint in a more
marshy spot, which could only have been imprinted by a stockinged
foot, completed my friend's triumph.
"My dear fellow," I cried heartily, slapping my companion on the back,
"I congratulate you. If you go on like this we shall have the dog and
the thief in no time."
"It will be some days, even at this rate," he warned me solemnly,
"before we get as far as that. Now, back to the embarking-point, and
see if we can reconstruct the thing fully."
So we retraced our steps, and studied the shingle once more, but
failed to discover any marks of any value. Then we sat down, and the
oculist drew a vivid picture of the journey the thief had made. At
last, feeling more than satisfied with our work, we rose to go in to
breakfast.
"Ewart, I want you to wire for that friend of yours before you do
anything else. You may want him soon. I will leave by the morning
train to-morrow, but I shall continue on this case till the mystery is
solved. In the meantime, you will need someone you can trust at your
side all the time."
"I'll go into Glenelg, and wire immediately after breakfast," I
promised. "Hullo, more reflections," I laughed, and pointed to a
small, bright object some distance away on the rocks, which was
catching the glint of the sun.
"We seem to be surrounded by a spying army of glittering objects,"
laughed my companion, as we strolled on. We had walked some forty
yards when some instinct--I know not what--prompted me to investigate
the affair. I turned back, and went to pick up the shining object,
though for the life of me I could not have told you what I expected
to find.
"Garnesk!" I bawled. "Garnesk! Come here!"
"What is it?" he shouted to me, as he came hurtling over the rocks.
"Look at it," I replied tersely, and placed it in his outstretched
palm. He glanced at it, and then at me.
"That settles it," he said, and whistled softly, for I had found a
small piece of brass, and on it was engraved:--
"Sholto, The Douglas, Invermalluch Lodge, Inverness-shire."
It was the name-plate from Sholto's collar.
CHAPTER IX.
THE MYSTERY OF SHOLTO.
We discussed our discovery pretty thoroughly on the way back to the
house, and both agreed that it left no doubt upon one aspect of this
strange affair--the man who stole Sholto was no ordinary thief.
The General was standing on the verandah, looking about for us, as we
came up the beach path. I told him of Garnesk's deductions and their
interesting result, and the old man was greatly affected.
"I never dreamt I should live to see the old place abused in this
shocking manner," he grunted. "'Pon me soul, it's--it's begad
disgraceful. I've lived here all my life, on and off, and I've never
been troubled with anything like this, scarcely so much as a tramp
even. I hope to God it'll soon be over, that's all."
"Thanks to Mr. Garnesk, we're moving along in the right direction," I
tried to reassure him. "And we have the satisfaction, in one way, of
being able to tell Myra that Sholto is still alive, even if we don't
know where he is."
"Seems to me, Ronald," said the General, "you don't know that, or
anything about the poor beast, except that he has been stolen, and
probably taken away in a boat. Judging by Mr. Garnesk's theory, they
probably threw him overboard in deep water."
"No one who intended destroying a dog would take the trouble to wrench
the name-plate off his collar," I pointed out. "The dog is alive, and
not unconscious. They need his collar to keep him in hand, but they
are afraid the plate might give them away. Mr. Garnesk is right, I'm
sure, and if we find the thief we find the cause for Myra's terrible
misfortune."
"Where do you imagine they can have taken him to then? Seems to me
we're getting some pretty queer neighbours."
"That is just what we have to find out," said Garnesk, "and I for one
will not rest until I do."
"'Pon my soul, my dear chap," said the old man warmly, "it's very good
of you to take so much interest in the affairs of total strangers. It
is, indeed, thundering good of you."
"Not at all, General," laughed the visitor. "If you spent your life
trying to cure fussy ladies of imaginary eye trouble, without putting
it to them that their livers are out of order, you'd welcome this as a
very appetising antidote."
"Talking about appetites," his host suggested, "who says breakfast?"
"I fancy we both do," I answered, and we turned indoors.
During breakfast Garnesk announced his determination to devote as much
of the day as necessary to an examination of Myra, and then catch the
evening train from Mallaig, but the girl herself rose in rebellion at
this immediately.
"You mustn't do anything of the sort," she declared emphatically.
"Daddy, tell him he's not to. The idea of coming up here, and looking
at me, and then going away again! It's ridiculous!"
"I assure you, it is ample reward," declared the oculist gallantly,
and everybody laughed at the frank compliment.
"But you must fish the river, have a day on the loch. Ron must take
you in the motor-boat up to Kinlochbourn. Then you've simply got to
see Scavaig and Coruisk--oh! and a hundred other things besides."
Garnesk insisted that, much as he would like to stay, he felt bound to
leave at once, but Myra was equally obstinate; and, as was natural,
being a woman, she won on a compromise. Garnesk agreed to stay over
the week-end. I was very glad that Myra liked my new friend. She had
been very shy of Olvery, but she took an immediate fancy to the
Glasgow specialist. She liked his voice, she told me afterwards, and
on the second day of his visit she asked him if his sister was very
much younger than he. Garnesk looked up in surprise.
"One of them is," he replied, "nearly twenty years. What made you
ask?"
"I guessed it by the way you talk to me," Myra declared confidently.
"The detective instinct seems to be in the air," I laughed.
So when I borrowed Angus's ramshackle old cycle, and went into Glenelg
along a road which is more noteworthy for its picturesqueness than its
navigable qualities, I left Garnesk to his examination with the
knowledge that he would do his utmost, and that she would help him all
she could.
I wired to Dennis: "I can meet you at Mallaig Monday morning. Wire
reply.--RONALD." Then I sent a couple of picture postcards to Tommy
and Jack, wishing them luck, and explaining that I had not returned to
join them because Myra was ill. I was sure Dennis would appreciate the
urgency of my message, but I worded it carefully, deliberately making
it appear to be the answer to an inquiry, for the reason that it is
always wise to do as little as you can to stimulate local gossip.
Anything like "Come at once; most urgent," despatched by one who was
known to be a visitor at the lodge, would have set the entire
country-side talking. So I jumped on to Angus's collection of old
metal, and jolted back again as fast as I could. Garnesk was still
engaged with Myra, and I took the opportunity of a chat with her
father.
"Would you care to see the discoveries we made this morning?" I asked,
when I found him in the library.
"Yes, I should indeed, my boy," he responded eagerly, and I think he
was glad of the diversion. "I'll come with you now."
"There is one thing I want to say, sir, before we go any farther."
"What is it?" he asked, looking rather anxiously at me.
"I want to tell you," I said, "that in the event of Myra not regaining
her sight I should like your permission to marry her as soon as she
herself wishes it. As you know, I have a small private income, which
is sufficient for my needs in London, and would be more than I should
require up here. If Myra is to be blind, I should like to marry her in
order that I may always be able to take care of her, and I should
propose to settle down somewhere near you. I dabble in contributory
journalism, and I could extend that as far as possible, and I might
even do pretty well at it. Both she and you would know then that, in
the event of anything happening to you, she would be cared for by
someone she loves."
"My dear Ronald," exclaimed the old man, affectionately laying a hand
on my shoulder, "I'm very glad to hear you say that. As a matter of
fact, whatever happens, I don't care how soon you marry my dear girl.
She wants it with all her heart, and I have always been fond of you
myself. The only thing that has held me back up to now is the question
of money, and, possibly, a little selfishness. I'm not a rich man, as
you know, and if it were not for my pension I couldn't even live in
my father's house. But now my one desire is to see my poor little girl
happy, and we'll scrape together a shilling or two somehow. Shake
hands, my boy."
We both of us forgot all about the terrible war, and, naturally
enough, the mysterious trouble which faced us then was sufficient for
the moment. Having settled that question at last, I conducted the old
man to the small cove where we had made our first discovery, but we
began by visiting the coach-house. I daresay that to the trained eye
there may have been valuable evidence lying under our very noses, but
the only confused marks which we found on the surrounding ground
conveyed nothing to either of us. Later, on our way back to the house,
from what we now called "the embarking-point," we came upon a spot
where the heather had been cut off in fairly large quantities. The old
man stood, and contemplated the shorn stumps for a moment, and shook
his head solemnly. It was not that he had any sentimental regret for
the heather which grew on almost every inch of ground for hundreds of
miles round, but he objected to the sign of visitors, or, as he would
have said, "trippers."
"Who would want to cut heather here?" I asked, for I could not see the
slightest reason for gathering anything which could be obtained at
your door wherever you lived in the Highlands.
"Holiday-makers," he said ruefully. "They take rooms in the village,
and get it into their heads that the heather in one spot is better
than anything else for miles round, so they walk out to that spot, and
cut some to take away with them when they go back home. I wish they'd
always go back home and stop there."
When I showed the General the keel-marks in the cove and explained to
him in detail how Garnesk had arrived at his conclusions, the old man
was quite awed.
"'Pon me soul, he must be thundering clever, thundering clever," he
muttered. "But it's not healthy, you know, Ronald; in fact, it's begad
unhealthy. I've always been a bit scared of these people who see
things that are not there. Still, I suppose it's the modern way;
reading all these detective yarns and so on does it, no doubt."
He was still marvelling at this new mystery when we got back to the
house to find Myra sitting on the verandah with the specialist, who
was keeping her in fits of laughter with anecdotes of some of his
wealthy women patients.
He sprang up as he saw us approaching, and ran down to meet us.
"I'm certain of one thing," he said excitedly, as he walked between
us, and answered the General's question. "We have got to solve the
mystery, and she will see again. This is something new, but it has a
very simple solution, which we must find out by hook or by crook.
When I know how Miss McLeod lost her sight I shall very likely be able
to find out how to restore it, and I shall also know something that
perhaps no other oculist has ever dreamed of. There isn't the
slightest sign of any organic disease, which probably means that
Nature will assert herself, and she will eventually regain her sight
naturally. But we mustn't wait for that. We've got to be up and doing.
I tell you, sir, I wouldn't have missed this for anything. Have you
been exploring?"
"We've been having a look at those marks which meant so much to you
and conveyed nothing whatever to me, although I was once considered
something of a scout," the General admitted.
"Did you find anything fresh?"
"No, only some trippers, as the General calls them, had been cutting
heather," I replied.
"That's not likely to help us much," the oculist agreed, "unless they
were not trippers at all, and were cutting the heather as a blind.
What were they like?"
"Oh, we didn't see them. We only saw the results of their iconoclasm.
The heather was recently, but not freshly, cut," I replied, and the
old man glanced at me with some slight suspicion, as if he feared I,
too, was about to take up the deduction business.
"Recent, but not fresh?" muttered Garnesk.
"Now, why should a man who wanted----Good heavens! I've got it."
"What _are_ you dear people getting so excited about?" Myra asked, for
by this time we had almost reached the verandah.
"We'll tell you in a minute, dear," I called, and waited for Garnesk
to explain.
"Of course," he continued, as if thinking aloud, "it's obvious. The
man came ashore in a small boat, picked some heather, and carried it
in his arms. Anyone who noticed him would have noticed his load of
heather. Then he stole Sholto, concealed him under the heather, and
was still apparently only carrying a bundle of innocent heath. Why!
they seem to have thought of everything, and made no mistake."
"Except that the man was wandering about the country-side, gathering
wild flowers, in his stockinged soles," I pointed out.
"Still, it was almost dark, and he chanced that," said Garnesk.
"What I don't understand about it is this," the General joined in:
"Where did he come from to gather this heather? A man must know that
if he is seen to come ashore and pick heather and get into his boat
again he is doing a very curious thing. That boat can only have come
from Knoydart or Skye at the farthest, and everybody knows you
wouldn't take heather there."
"Yes, I'm afraid you're right, General," Garnesk admitted, with a
sigh of regret, and I was compelled to agree with him.
"I know where he came from, then."
It was said so quietly that it startled us all, though it was Myra who
spoke.
"Where, then?" we all asked together.
"He must have come from a yacht."
CHAPTER X.
THE SECRET OF THE ROCK.
We made exhaustive inquiries everywhere, but no one had seen a yacht
anchored or otherwise resting off the point the previous night. One or
two vessels had been noticed passing the mouth of Loch Hourn during
the evening, but they were mostly recognisable as belonging to
residents in the neighbourhood, and in any case not one of them had
been seen to drop the two men in a boat who were causing us so much
anxiety. When Garnesk and I went up the river to the Chemist's Rock we
were equally unsuccessful there.
"Look here," I said, "suppose you were to go blind, Mr. Garnesk? I
can't allow you to run any risks of that sort. We have every reason to
know that there is something gruesome and uncanny about this spot, and
I should feel happier if you would keep at a safe distance."
"How about yourself?" he replied.
"It's a personal affair with me," I pointed out, "but I can't let your
kindness in assisting us as you are doing run the length of possible
blindness."
"Nonsense, my dear fellow," he exclaimed; "we're in this together. I
am just as keen to get to the bottom of this matter as you are. But it
behoves us both to be careful. It is most important that you should
take care of yourself at the present moment. What would happen to Miss
McLeod if I carried you back to the house in a state of total
blindness?"
"Oh, I shall be all right," I declared confidently. "But, of course,
your point is a good one, and I shall not run any risks."
"And yet you start by careering up the river here when we have very
excellent reasons for supposing that it is hardly the place to spend a
quiet afternoon."
"You don't really believe that there is anything curious about the
river itself, do you?" I asked. "We have agreed that some human agency
is responsible for the tragic affliction that has fallen upon poor
Myra. In that case we are not safe anywhere."
"That's true enough," he agreed, "but everything that has happened so
far has happened here. Sooner or later, no doubt, the operations will
be extended to some other region, but at present we know there is a
possibility of our being overcome by some strange peril between the
Chemist's Rock and Dead Man's Pool."
"Well, as we don't know how to deal with the danger when it does
arrive," I suggested, "suppose we see as much as we can from the
banks. I will go up the centre of the stream and report to you, if you
like, but you stay here."
"You'll do nothing of the sort," he cried. "I can't imagine what we
can possibly learn by standing on that rock, but if either of us goes,
we go together, or I, in my capacity of bachelor unattached, go
alone."
Naturally, I could only applaud such generous sentiments, and at the
same time refuse to countenance his proposal. So we sat among the
heather, some distance above the bank, and awaited developments.
"It is four-twenty now," said my companion presently, looking at his
watch. "If anything is going to happen it should happen soon."
"Don't you think it was mere coincidence that Myra's blindness and the
General's strange illusion occurred about this time? Why should this
green ray only be visible between four and five?"
"It hasn't really been visible at all," Garnesk pointed out. "Miss
McLeod saw a green flash, and the General saw a green rock, which had
taken upon itself the responsibilities of transportation. That's all
we know about the green ray, except the green veil that Miss McLeod
tells us of. I don't expect to see that."
"I wish I knew what we did expect to see," I sighed.
"Exactly," he replied solemnly. "By the way," he added after a pause,
"do you see anything peculiar about the rocks or the pool between four
and five; I mean anything that you couldn't notice at any other time
of the day?"
"Nothing at all," I answered despondently; "it is pleasanter here then
than at any other time--or was until we came under this mysterious
spell."
"Why is it pleasanter?" he asked.
"It is just then that it gets most sunshine," I pointed out.
I made the remark idly enough, for the course of the river, with its
rugged banks and great massive rocks, looked particularly beautiful as
the sun streamed full upon it, and I was immeasurably surprised when
Garnesk jumped to his feet with a shout.
"What is it?" I cried in alarm. "You're not----"
"The sun, Ewart, the sun!" he exclaimed, and, snatching a pair of
binoculars which I carried in my hand, he dashed up the slope to the
foot of a cliff that overhung the stream. I gazed after him for a
moment in astonishment, and then set out in pursuit.
"Stop where you are, man!" he called to me as he turned, and saw me
tearing after him. "No, no; I want you there. Don't follow me."
I did as I was told, for I trusted him implicitly, and I knew that he
would not run any risk without first acquainting me of his intention,
and I took it for granted that he had arranged a part for me to
play, although he had not had time to tell me what it was. But my
astonishment increased as I watched him climb the rock, for when he
arrived a few feet from the summit he sat down on a ledge and calmly
lighted a cigarette!
"What is it all about?" I called to him, when I had fully recovered
from my surprise.
"I only wanted to have a look at the view," he laughed back, and put
the glasses to his eyes. First he examined the house, and then he
turned his gaze in the direction of the sea. It was then that it
dawned on me that he was looking for a yacht. This was the fateful
hour, and it had naturally struck him that the unknown yacht might be
in the vicinity.
"Well," I shouted, "can you see the yacht?"
"No," he replied, "there's nothing in sight, only a paddle steamer;
looks like an excursion of some sort."
"Oh! that's the _Glencoe_," I explained; "she won't help us at all.
She runs with tourists from Mallaig."
"She seems to be barely able to take care of herself," he laughed. "I
shouldn't like to be on her in a storm."
We conversed fairly easily while he was on the cliff, for we were not
many yards apart, and I began to wonder when he was coming down again.
"Have you any objection to my joining you?" I asked presently, as
there seemed to be nothing for me to do below.
"Stop where you are for a bit, old man," he advised. "I shall be down
in a minute."
"As long as you like," I replied. "You've got a fine view from there,
anyway. Don't worry about me."
I sat down on a rock, refilled my pipe, and prepared to wait till he
rejoined me.
"Hi! Ewart!" he called presently, for my mind had already wandered to
that darkened "den" at the house.
"Hullo," I answered, jumping to my feet. "What is it?"
"Do you notice anything unusual?"
"No," I shouted, "nothing that----," but suddenly I felt a strange
singing in my ears, my pulses quickened, my voice died away into
nothing. I looked up at Garnesk; he was leaning perilously near the
edge of the cliff waving to me. I saw his lips move, yet I heard no
sound. My heart was thumping against my chest with audible beats. I
looked round me in every direction. No, there was nothing strange
happening that the eye could see, yet here was I with a choking
pulsation in my throat. My temples too were throbbing like a couple of
steam hammers. Again I looked up at Garnesk; he was climbing hurriedly
down the cliff. He paused and waved to me, and again his lips moved,
and again I heard nothing.
Surely, I told myself, the events of the past few days had told on my
strength. This was nerves, sheer nerves. Garnesk must give me his arm
to the house. I would lie down and rest, and I should be all right in
a few moments. It was nerves, that was all. But if Garnesk were not
very quick about it I should have burst a blood-vessel in my brain
before he reached me. Already my chest seemed to have swelled to
twice its size. Garnesk, as I looked, seemed to be farther off than
ever, a tiny speck in the distance.
The singing in my ears became a rushing torrent. It was the waterfall,
I told myself; how stupid of me! Of course I should be all right in a
minute. But my friend must hurry. I collapsed on the rock and gasped
for breath. I looked for Garnesk. Still he seemed to be as far away as
ever, and he scarcely seemed to be moving at all. I must tell him to
be quick. It was simply nerves, of course; but I mustn't let them get
the better of me, or what would poor Myra do? I staggered to my feet
to call to Garnesk.
"Hurry up; I'm not well." I framed the words in my brain, but no sound
passed my lips. I struggled for breath, and called again with all the
power I could muster. I could not hear myself speak. And then I
understood! My knees rocked beneath me, the river swirled round me, a
rowan tree rushed by me in a flash, and as I fell sprawling on my face
among the heather a thousand hammers seemed to pound the hideous
sickening truth into the heaving pulp that was once my brain.
CHAPTER XI.
HOW THE UNEXPECTED HAPPENED.
When I came to myself I was lying with my head pillowed on Garnesk's
arm. My coat and collar were on the ground beside me, and my head and
shoulders were dripping with water.
"Ah!" said my companion, with a sigh of relief, "that's better. You'll
be all right in a few minutes, Ewart. Take it easy, old chap, and
rest."
"Where am I?" I asked. "Good heavens!" I exclaimed, as I heard my own
voice, and sat bolt upright in my astonishment, "I thought I was
dumb!"
"Well, never mind about that now, old fellow," Garnesk advised. "We'll
hear all about that later. Shut your eyes and rest a minute."
"All right," I agreed, "pass me my pipe and I will."
Garnesk laughed aloud as he leaned over to reach my coat pocket.
"When a man shouts for his pipe he's a long way from being dead or
dumb or anything else," he said.
Truth to tell, I was feeling very queer. I was dizzy and confused, but
I felt that I wanted my pipe to help me collect my thoughts. So I lay
there for some minutes quietly smoking, and indeed I felt as if I
could have stayed like that for ever.
"I must have fainted," I explained presently, overlooking the fact
that Garnesk probably knew more about my ridiculous seizure than I did
myself. "I don't know when I did a thing like that before," I added,
beginning to get angry with myself.
"Well, I hope you won't do it again," said my friend fervently. "It's
not a thing to make a hobby of. And don't you come near this infernal
river any more until we know something definite."
"You mean that the place has got on my nerves," I said. "I suppose it
has; I'm very sorry."
"Do you feel well enough to tell me all about it?" he asked, "or would
you rather wait till we get up to the house?"
"Oh, I'll tell you now," I agreed readily. "We mustn't say anything
about this at the house." So I told him exactly how I had felt.
"When did it first come on?" he asked.
"When I heard you shout, and jumped up to see what it was. By the way,
what was it?"
"Well," he replied, "we'll discuss the matter if you wouldn't mind
releasing my arm?"
"My dear fellow," I cried, sitting up suddenly, as I realised that he
was still propping up my head, "I'm most awfully sorry."
"Now then," he said, as he lighted his pipe and made himself
comfortable, "we'll go into the latest development. You remember what
made me rush off and leave you there?"
"I remember saying something about the sunlight, and you suddenly
dashed off."
"To tell you the truth, I had very little faith in the theory that at
this hour, above all, the spook of the Chemist's Rock was active,
until you pointed out that only about that time is the whole of the
river course up to the rock, and the whole of the rock itself, flooded
with sunlight. Then, when you made that remark, I suddenly felt that I
ought to be on the cliff on the look out for this unknown yacht. We
connect the two together in some way which we don't yet understand, so
I meant to go and have a look for the ship. I saw nothing of any
importance until I shouted to you. Just then I was looking through the
glasses at the shore. I turned them on the landing-stage and along the
beach, and I had just lighted on the bay where we explored this
morning when suddenly, for half a second or so, all the shadows of the
rocks turned a vivid green, and then as suddenly resumed their natural
colour again."
"Good heavens!" I exclaimed. "Green again! Can you make anything of it
at all, Garnesk? I'm sorry I'm such a duffer as to faint at the
critical moment, when I might have been of some assistance to you.
What in God's name can it all mean?"
"I'm no further on," he replied bitterly; "in fact, I'm further back."
"Further back!" I cried. "How? I don't see how you can be."
"I'll tell you what my theory was about all this affair, and it struck
me as a good one--strange, of course, but then, this is a strange
business."
"It is, indeed," I agreed ruefully. "Well, go on."
"I had an idea, Ewart, that we should find some sort of wireless
telegraphy at the bottom of this business. I had almost made up my
mind that we had stumbled across the path of some inventor who was
working with a new form of wireless transmission. I felt that in that
way we might account for Miss McLeod's blindness and the blindness of
the dog. It also seemed to hold good as to the disappearance of
Sholto. The inventor hears of the extraordinary effect of his
invention, and is afraid he will get into a mess if it is found out.
The yacht to experiment from fitted in beautifully. But now all that's
knocked on the head."
"Why?" I asked. "It seems to me, Garnesk, that you are doing all the
thinking in this affair, as if you had been used to it all your life.
Your only trouble is that you're too modest. I take it that because
you didn't see the yacht when you noticed the green flash you are
taking it for granted you were wrong to expect it. I must say, old
chap, I think you've done thundering well, as the General would put
it, and even if you are prepared to admit your theory has been
knocked on the head I'm not--at any rate, not until I have a jolly
good reason. Yet it doesn't seem to matter much what I say or do if
I'm going to faint like a girl at the first sign of danger. If you
hadn't come to my rescue I might still be lying there waiting to come
round, or something," I finished in disgust.
My companion looked at me thoughtfully.
"Ewart," he said, and solemnly shook his head, "you have brought me to
the very thing that made me say my theory was exploded."
"What thing?" I asked. "Surely my fainting can't have made any
difference to conclusions you had already come to?"
"But then you see," my friend replied, "you didn't faint. And if I had
not seen you were in difficulties you would probably never have
recovered."
"Didn't faint?" I exclaimed. "Well, I don't know what the medical term
for it is, and I daresay there are several technical phrases for the
girlish business I went through. That idea of being dumb was simply
imagination, but I assure you it was just what I should call a
fainting fit."
"I don't want to alarm you if you're not feeling well," he began
apologetically.
"Go on," I urged. "I'm as fit as I ever was."
"Well," the young specialist responded, in a serious tone, "if you
want to know the truth, Ewart, you were suffocated."
"Suffocated!" I shouted, jumping to my feet. "What in heaven's name do
you mean?"
"I can't tell you exactly what I mean because I don't know, but yours
was certainly not an ordinary fainting fit. To put the whole thing in
non-medical terms, you were practically drowned on dry land!"
I sat down again--heavily at that. Should we never come to an end of
these mysterious attacks which were hurled at us in broad daylight
from nowhere at all?
"I'm not sure that you hadn't better rest before we go into this
fully, Ewart," Garnesk remarked doubtfully. "You're not by any means
as fit as you've ever been, in spite of your emphatic assurance."
"Tell me what you think, why you think it, and what you feel we ought
to do. Why, man, Myra might have been here alone, with no one to
rescue her and--and----"
"Quite so," said Ewart sympathetically. "So you must comfort yourself
with the knowledge that it may be a great blessing that she has
temporarily lost her sight. Now, I say you didn't faint, because,
medically, I know you didn't. For the same reason I say you were
suffocating as surely as if you had been drowning. Hang it, my dear
chap, it's my line of business, you know. I can't account for it, but
there is the naked fact for you."
"How does this affect your previous conclusions?" I asked. "Before you
tell me what you think brought on this suffocation I should like to
hear why you give up your theory."
"Simply because no wireless, or other electric current, could have
that effect upon you. If you had had an electric shock in any of its
many curious forms I could have said it bore me out; but, you see,
it's impossible. And, as I refuse to believe that we are continually
bumping into new mysteries which have no connection with each other,
it follows that if this suffocation was not caused by the supposed
wireless experiments, the other can't have been either."
"I'm not making the slightest imputation on your medical knowledge," I
ventured, "but are you absolutely certain that you are not mistaken?"
"My dear fellow," he laughed, "for goodness sake don't be so
apologetic. I can quite see that you find it difficult to believe. But
I am prepared to swear to it all the same. For one thing, the symptoms
were unmistakable; for another, it seems impossible that we should
both faint at exactly the same time and place for no reason at all."
"You didn't faint too, surely?" I cried.
"No," he admitted, "but we might very easily have been suffocated
together--smothered as surely as the princes in the Tower. When I saw
you were in difficulties I shouted to you. Obviously you didn't hear
me. I naturally didn't wait to see what would happen to you; I
cleared down the cliff, and sprinted to you as fast as I could. When I
came to within about twenty yards of you I found a difficulty in
breathing. I went on for a couple of paces, and realised that the air
was almost as heavy as water. So I rushed back, undid my collar, took
a deep breath; and bolted in to you, picked you up, and carted you
here. _Voilà!_ But I very nearly joined you on the ground, and then we
would never have regained consciousness, either of us. I applied the
simplest form of artificial respiration to you, dowsed your head, and
now you're all right. On the whole, Ewart, we can consider ourselves
very well out of this latest adventure."
"What you're really telling me," I pointed out gratefully, "is that
you saved my life at the risk of your own. I'm no good at making
speeches, or anything of that sort, Garnesk, but I thank you, if you
know what that means. And Myra will----"
"Not a word to her, Ewart," my companion interrupted eagerly.
"Whatever you do, don't on any account worry that poor girl with this
new complication. Anything on earth but that."
"No," I agreed; "you're right there. Myra must be kept in the dark."
"Yes," he replied, with a look of relief. "It might have a serious
effect on her chances of recovery if she had this additional worry.
And I don't think it would be advisable to tell the old man either. I
think we had better keep it to ourselves absolutely. Tell no one,
Ewart, except your friend when he comes."
"Very well," I answered, for I was very anxious to spare both Myra and
her father from the knowledge of any further trouble. "I'll tell
Dennis when he comes, but otherwise it is our secret."
"Good," said Garnesk. "Now put your coat on, old chap, and we'll
stroll back to the house."
I got up and buttoned my collar, retied my bow, and slipped into my
jacket. I was rather uncomfortably damp, and I felt a bit shaky and
queer, and decided that I could do with a complete rest from the
mysteries of the green ray. But the subject remained uppermost in my
mind, and my tired brain still strove to unravel the tangled threads
of the puzzle.
"By the way," I said, as we walked slowly up to the house, "you have
not yet explained what there was in my remark about the sunlight that
made you think of the yacht."
"Well," he replied, "you see I had an idea that perhaps they might
come here when the gorge, through which the river flows, was flooded
with light, so that they could see if any strange effects were
produced. But that suffocation was not brought about by any electrical
experiment, and I am beginning to be afraid that, after all, we may be
up against some strange natural phenomena, some terrible combination
of the forces of Nature, which has not yet been observed, or at any
rate recorded."
"Why afraid?" I asked, for although I had been glad to believe that we
were faced with a problem which would prove to have a human solution,
the revulsion had come, and I should have welcomed the knowledge that
some weird, freakish application of natural power might be held
accountable.
"Afraid?" queried Garnesk, with a note of surprise. "I am very often
afraid of Nature. She is a devoted slave, but a cruel mistress. I
don't think that I should ever be very much scared by a human being,
even in his most fiendish aspect, but Nature--I tell you, Ewart, there
are things in Nature that make me shudder!"
"Yes," I agreed heavily, "you're right, of course. That's how I have
felt for the past twenty-four hours. It was a tremendous relief to me
to feel that we were men looking for men. But the last few minutes I
have had an idea that it would be comforting to explain it all out of
a text-book of physics. Still, you're right. It is better far to be
men fighting men than to be puny molecules tossed in the maëlstrom of
immutable power which created the world, and may one day destroy it."
"I'm glad you agree," he said simply. "You see you could not possibly
live for a second in electrically produced atmosphere which was
so thick that you couldn't hear yourself speak. Death would be
instantaneous. It couldn't have been our unknown professor's wireless
experiments after all. Yet it seems impossible that a sudden new power
should crop up suddenly at one spot like this. Imagine what would
happen if this had occurred in a city, in a crowded street. Hundreds
would have been stricken blind, then hundreds would have been
suffocated. Vehicles would have run amok, and the result would have
been an indescribable chaos of the maimed, mangled and distraught. A
flash like this green ray (which blinded Miss McLeod and her dog,
deluded the General, and nearly suffocated us) at the mouth of a
harbour, say, the entrance to a great port--Liverpool, London, or
Glasgow--would be responsible for untold loss of life. If this
terrible phenomenon spread, Ewart, it would paralyse the industry of
the world in twenty-four hours. If it spread still farther the face of
the globe would become the playing-fields of Bedlam in a moment. Think
of the result of this everywhere! Some suffocated, some blinded, and
millions probably mad and sightless, stumbling over the bodies of the
dead to cut each other's throats in the frenzy of sudden imbecility."
"Don't, Garnesk," I begged. "It won't bear thinking about. We have
enough troubles here to deal with without that!"
"Yes," my companion admitted, "we need not add to them by any idle
conjectures of still more hideous horrors to come. But it is an
interesting, if terrible speculation. And it means one thing to us,
Ewart, of the very greatest importance. We must solve the riddle
somehow."
"You mean," I cried, as I realised the tremendous import of his
words--"you mean that the sanity of the universe may rest with us! You
mean that if we can solve this riddle we, or others, may be able to
devise some means of prevention, or at least protection? You mean that
we are in duty bound to keep at this night and day until we find out
what it is?"
"That is just what I do mean," he replied seriously. "It is a solemn
duty; who knows, it may be a holy trust. Ewart, we agree to get to the
bottom of this? We have agreed once, but are we still prepared to go
on with this now that we know we may be crushed in the machinery that
controls the solar system and lights the very sun?"
"I shall certainly go on," I replied eagerly. "But we can hardly
expect you to run risks on our behalf."
"It may be in the interests of civilisation," he answered, "and in
that case it is our duty. Now look here, Ewart, this will have to be a
secret. It is essential that we should not get ourselves laughed at
because, for one thing, the scoffers may get into serious trouble if
they start investigating our assertions in a spirit of levity. You
and I must keep this to ourselves entirely. What about your friend?"
"I can trust him," I replied simply.
"Then tell him everything," Garnesk advised. "If you know you can rely
upon him he may be of great assistance to us."
"What about Hilderman?" I asked. "He knows a good deal already."
"There is no need for him to know any more. He may be of some use to
us. I had thought he might be of the greatest use, but he may be able
to help us still. We should decrease, rather than augment, his
usefulness by telling him these new complications."
"How do you mean?" I asked.
"Well, for instance, he might think we are mad, although he's a very
shrewd fellow."
"Yes," I agreed, "I think he's pretty cute. Funny that Americans so
often are. Anyway, he's been cute enough to make sufficient to retire
on at a fairly early age, and retire comfortably too."
"H'm," was my companion's only comment.
After dinner that evening we discussed all sorts of subjects, mainly
the war, of course, and went to bed early.
"Now, Ron," exclaimed Myra, as we said good-night, "if Mr. Garnesk is
really going to leave us on Monday, you mustn't let him worry about
things to-morrow. Do let him have one day's holiday while he is with
us, anyway."
"I will," I agreed. "We'll have a real holiday to-morrow. Suppose we
all go up Loch Hourn in the motor-boat in the afternoon?"
So it was arranged that we should have an afternoon on the sea and a
morning's fishing on the loch. Garnesk fell in with the idea readily.
"It will do you good," he declared. "You won't be feeling too frisky
in the morning after your adventure this afternoon."
As it turned out he was quite right, for I awoke in the morning with a
slight headache and a tendency to ache all over. So we fished the loch
in a very leisurely fashion for an hour or two, and after lunch the
four of us went up to Kinlochbourn. We took a tea-basket with us, and
very nearly succeeded in banishing the green ray altogether from our
minds. I had taken my Kodak with me, and we ran in shore, and
otherwise altered our course occasionally in order to enable me to
record some choice peep of the magnificent scenery. When we got back
to the lodge we were all feeling much the better for the outing. After
dinner Myra, who had taken the greatest interest in the photographs,
although, poor child, she could not see what I had taken, and would
not be able to see the result either, was anxious to know how they had
turned out.
"I should love to know if the snapshots are good," she said,
"particularly the one at Caolas Mor. Develop them in the morning,
Ronnie, won't you? If you don't you'll probably take them away, and
forget all about them."
Garnesk looked at me. He was always on the _qui vive_ for any
opportunity to give Myra a little pleasure. He felt very strongly that
she must be kept from worrying at all costs.
"Why not develop them now, Ewart?" he suggested.
"Certainly," I said, "if everybody will excuse me."
"Dad's in the library," Myra replied, "but everybody else will come
with you if you ask us nicely. Besides, I shall have to tell you where
everything is. There's plenty of room for us all."
"Right you are," I agreed readily, and went out to get a small folding
armchair from the verandah. We went up to the dark-room at the top of
the house, and Myra sat in the corner, giving me instructions as to
the position of the bottles, etc. I prepared the developer while
Garnesk busied himself with the fixing acid.
"Now we're ready," I announced, as I made sure that the light-tight
door was closed, and lowered the ruby glass over the orange on Myra's
imposing dark-room lamp; she believed in doing things comfortably; no
messing about with an old-fashioned "hock-bottle" for her. I took the
spool from my pocket and began to develop them _en bloc_.
"How are they coming along?" Myra asked, leaning forward interestedly.
"They're beginning to show up," I replied; "they look rather
promising."
"It's rather warm in here," said the girl presently; "do you think it
would matter if I removed my shade, Mr. Garnesk?"
"Not if you put it on again before we put the light up," the
specialist answered. Myra took off the shade and the heavy bandage
with a sigh of relief, and leaned her elbow on the table beside her.
"There's a glass beaker just by your arm, dear," I said; "just a
minute and I'll put it out of reach."
"All right," said Garnesk, moving forward, "I'll move it; don't you
worry."
But before he could reach the table there was a crash. The beaker went
smashing to the floor. I turned with a laugh, which died on my lips.
Myra was standing up with her hand to her head.
"What is it, darling?" I cried, dropping the length of film on the
floor. Garnesk made a grab for the shade. Myra gave a short, shrill
little laugh, which had a slightly ominous, hysterical note in it.
"Don't be alarmed, dear," she said quietly, in a curiously tense
voice, "_I can see!_"
CHAPTER XII.
WHO IS HILDERMAN?
I must admit that I was so delighted to find that Myra had recovered
her sight that I very nearly made what might have been a very serious
mistake. I gave a loud shout of triumph and made a dive for the light,
intending to switch it on. This might, of course, have had a very bad
effect upon my darling's eyes, but fortunately Garnesk darted across
the room and knocked up my arm in the nick of time.
"Not yet, Ewart, not yet," he warned me. "We must run no risks until
we are quite sure."
"But, Ronnie, I can see quite well," Myra declared delightedly. "I see
everything just as easily as I usually can by the light of the
dark-room lamp."
"Still, we won't expose you to the glare of white light just at
present, Miss McLeod," said Garnesk solemnly. "We must be very
careful. Tell me, how did your sight return, gradually or suddenly?"
"Suddenly, I think," the girl replied. "I took off the shade and laid
it down, and then when I looked up I could distinctly see the lamp."
"Immediately the shade was removed?"
"No," she answered, "not just immediately. You see, I was looking at
the floor, which is so dark, of course, that you couldn't see it in
the ordinary way. Then as soon as I looked up I could see the lamp.
For a moment I thought it was my imagination, but when I found I could
see Ron stooping over the developing-dish I knew that I was all right
again."
"This is very extraordinary, you know," said Garnesk. "Can you count
the bottles on the middle shelf?"
"Oh, yes!" laughed Myra, "I can make them out distinctly. Of course, I
know pretty well what they are, but in any case I could easily
describe them to you if I'd never seen them before."
"What have I got in my hand?" the specialist queried, holding his arm
out.
"A pair of nail-clippers," Myra declared emphatically, and Garnesk
laughed.
"Well," he said, "you can obviously see it pretty well; but, as a
matter of fact, it's a cigar-cutter."
"Oh! well, you see," the girl explained airily, "I always put
necessity before luxury!"
So then the oculist made her sit down again and questioned and
cross-questioned her at considerable length.
"I'm puzzled, but delighted," he admitted finally. "It's strange, but
it is at the same time decidedly hopeful."
"I suppose it means that she will always be able to see in a red light
at any rate?" I suggested.
"Probably it does," he agreed, "and, of course, her sight may be
completely restored. There is also a middle course; she may be able to
see perfectly after a course of treatment in red light. I will get her
a pair of red glasses made at once. We can see how that goes. But I
feel that it would be advisable to introduce her to daylight in
gradual stages, in case of any risk."
"Oh, if we could only find poor old Sholto!" Myra exclaimed eagerly.
Garnesk turned to her with a look of frank admiration.
"You're a lucky young dog, Ewart," he whispered to me, "by Jove you
are!"
So Myra graciously, but a little regretfully I think, placed herself
in the hands of the young specialist and replaced her shade. Then we
left the dark-room, allowing the films to develop out on the floor,
and went downstairs. We took her out on to the verandah and removed
the shade for a moment, but the chill air of the highland night made
her eyes smart after their unaccustomed imprisonment, and we gave up
the experiment for that night.
As Garnesk and I bathed together in the morning we were both brighter
and more cheerful than we had been since his arrival.
"I shall catch the train from Mallaig," he declared. "Can you take me
in and meet your friend without having long to wait?"
"If you insist on going," I replied, "I can get you there in time to
meet him and you will have an hour or more to wait for your train."
"Oh, so much the better! We can tell him everything and give him all
the news in the interval."
"Are you still determined to go?" I asked.
"Yes," he said, "I _must_ go. It will be necessary for me to make one
or two inquiries and get a pair of glasses made for Miss McLeod."
"I shall be very sorry to lose you, Garnesk," I said earnestly. "Don't
you think you could write or wire for the glasses? You see, if we have
come to the conclusion that this green ray is some chemical production
of Nature unassisted there isn't the same reason for you to leave us."
"No, that's true," he agreed, "but we were both a bit scared
yesterday, old chap, and the more I think of this dog business the
less I like it. It was mere conceit on my part that made me say it was
bound to be some natural phenomenon merely because I couldn't
understand how the effect could have been humanly produced."
"Perhaps," I suggested, "our best course would be to keep an open mind
about the whole thing."
"Yes," he replied, "I'm with you entirely. And in that case my going
away is not going to aggravate the effects of a natural phenomenon,
while it may restrain the human agency by removing the necessity for
further activity."
"Well, that's sound enough," I acquiesced; "but I shall hear from you,
I hope?"
"Of course, my dear fellow," he laughed, "we're in this thing
together. You'll hear from me as often as you want, and who knows what
else besides. I have no intention of dropping this for a minute,
Ewart. But I think I can do more if I am not on the spot. We're agreed
that my presence here may be a source of danger to you all."
"Yes," I said, "I think yours is the best plan. What do you propose to
do?"
"Well, to begin with, I shall devote an hour or two to knocking our
panic theory on the head."
"You mean the natural phenomenon idea?"
"Precisely," said he. "I don't think that it will be able to exist
very long in the light of physical knowledge--not that that is a very
powerful light, but it should be strong enough for our purpose. As
soon as I have convinced myself that our enemy is a mere human being I
shall take such steps as I may think necessary at the time. Then, of
course, I shall acquaint you with the steps that I have taken, and we
shall work together and round up our man, and, figuratively speaking,
make him swallow his hideous green ray."
"What sort of steps do you mean?" I asked.
"Well, that all depends," my friend answered, "on what sort of man we
have to deal with. But it will certainly include providing ourselves
with the necessary means of self-defence, and may run to calling in
the assistance of the authorities."
"I'm not sure that the presence of the police in a quiet spot like
this might not have a disastrous effect on our plans," I pointed out.
"I shouldn't worry about the police," he laughed. "I should make for
the naval chaps. I'm rather pally with them just now; I'm booked up to
do some work of various descriptions for the period of the war, and I
think if I can give them the promise of a little fun and excitement
they would be willing to help."
"Which indeed they could," I agreed readily. "Any attempt our enemy
might make to get away from us would probably mean a bolt for the open
sea, and a few dozen dreadnoughts would be cheerful companionship."
Garnesk laughed, and we strolled up to the house, putting the
finishing touches to our toilet as we went. Shortly after breakfast we
made ready for our trip to Mallaig. Myra was very anxious to come with
us until I explained that we should have to wait there till we had met
Dennis and seen the specialist off. She was naturally sensitive about
appearing in public with the shade on, poor child, so she readily gave
up the idea.
"I'm very sorry you're going, Mr. Garnesk," said Myra, as she shook
hands.
"I shall see you again soon," he replied. "I have by no means finished
with your case, and as soon as you report the effect of the glasses I
shall send you'll see me come tripping in one afternoon, or else I
shall ask you to come down to me."
"It's very good of you to take so much trouble about it," said Myra
gratefully.
"Not at all," he responded lightly. "It is a pleasure, Miss McLeod, I
assure you."
The old general was still more effusive of his gratitude, and as he
waved good-bye from the landing-stage his face was almost comically
eloquent of regret.
"By the way," said Garnesk as we passed Glasnabinnie, "don't tell
Hilderman much about what has happened. We feel we can trust him, but
you never know a man's propensity for talking until you know him very
well."
"Right," I agreed. "I'll take care of that. We can't afford to get
this talked about. It would be very painful for Myra and her father if
it became the chatter of the country-side."
"Besides," Garnesk pointed out, "it will be much safer to be quiet
about it. If we are dealing with men they will probably prove to be
desperate men, and we don't want to run any risks that we can avoid."
"No," said I, "this is going to be quite unpleasant enough without
looking for trouble."
So when we arrived in Mallaig and met Hilderman on the fish-table I
was careful to remember my companion's advice.
"Ah, Mr. Ewart!" the American exclaimed in surprise, "How are you? And
you, Professor? I hope your visit has proved entirely satisfactory.
How is Miss McLeod?"
"Just the same, I am sorry to say," Garnesk replied glibly. "There
is no sign at all of her sight returning. I can make nothing of it
whatever."
"Dear, dear, Professor!" Hilderman exclaimed, with a shake of the
head. "That is very bad, very bad indeed. Haven't you even any idea
as to how the poor young lady lost her sight?"
"None whatever," said Garnesk, with a hopeless little shrug. "I can't
imagine anything, and I'm not above admitting that I know nothing.
There is no use my pretending I can do anything for poor Miss McLeod
when I feel convinced that I can't."
"So you've given it up altogether, Mr. Garnesk?" Hilderman asked, as
we strolled to the station.
"What else can I do?" the oculist replied. "I can't stop up here for
ever, much as I should prefer to stay until I had done something for
my patient."
"You have my sympathy, Mr. Ewart," said Hilderman in a friendly voice.
"It is a terrible blow for you all. I fervently hope that something
may yet be done for the poor young lady."
"I hope so too," I answered, with a heavy sigh, but the sigh was
merely a convincing response to the lead Garnesk had given me, for, as
a matter of fact, I was quite certain that we had found the basis of
complete cure.
"Yes," Hilderman muttered, as if thinking aloud, "it is a very
terrible and strange affair altogether. Have you had any news about
the dog?"
"None whatever," I replied, this time with perfect truth.
"Surely you must suspect somebody, though," the American urged. "It is
a very sparsely populated neighbourhood, you know."
"We can't actually suspect anybody, nevertheless," said I. "On the one
hand, it may have been an ordinary, uninteresting thief who stole the
dog with a view to selling him again. On the other hand----"
"Well," said Hilderman with interest, as I paused, "on the other
hand?"
"It may have been someone who had other reasons for stealing him," I
concluded.
"I don't quite follow you."
"Ewart means," said Garnesk, cutting in eagerly, evidently fearing
that I was about to make some indiscreet disclosure of our suspicions,
though I had not the slightest intention of doing so, "Ewart means
that it may have been someone who regarded the dog as a personal
enemy. Miss McLeod informs us that there was a man in the hills,
ostensibly a crofter, who disliked Sholto, quite unreasonably. He
drove the dog away from his croft and was very rude to Miss McLeod
about it. She suspected an illicit still, and thought the fellow was
afraid Sholto might nose out his secret and give the show away."
"Ah!" said Hilderman. "An illicit still, eh! Where was this still, or,
rather, where was the croft?"
I remembered that Myra had told us it was somewhere up Suardalan way,
above Tor Beag, and I was just about to explain, when I felt my
friend's boot knock sharply against my ankle. Taking this as a hint
and not an accident, I promptly lied.
"It was miles away," I announced readily, "away up on The Saddle. Miss
McLeod wanders pretty far afield with Sholto at times."
"Indeed," said the American, "I should think that might be quite a
likely explanation, and rather a suitable place for a still, too. I
climbed The Saddle some months ago with an enthusiastic friend of
mine. We went by water to Invershiel, and then drove up the Glen. I
shouldn't like to walk from Invermalluch and back; there are several
mountains in between, and surely there is no road."
Evidently our shrewd companion suspected that I had either made a
mistake or deliberately told him an untruth, but I was quite ready for
him. I had no time to consider the ethics of the matter. I was out to
obey what I took to be my instructions, and obey them I did.
"Oh, there are quite a lot of ways of getting there," I replied
airily; "but perhaps the easiest would be to take the motor-boat to
Corran and walk up the Arnisdale, or follow the road to Corran and
then up the river. Miss McLeod has her own ways of getting about this
country, though, and she may even know some way of avoiding the
difficulties of the Sgriol and the other intervening mountains."
Hilderman looked at me in considerable surprise for a moment.
"You seem to know the district pretty well yourself, Mr. Ewart," he
remarked.
"Well, I ought to," I explained; "I was born in Glenmore."
"Oh, I didn't know that," he murmured; "that accounts for it, then."
And at that moment we heard the train approaching, and we hurried into
the station to meet our respective visitors.
"Fact or fancy?" asked Garnesk in an undertone as we strolled down the
platform, Hilderman having hurried on ahead.
"Fancy," I replied. "I took it you wanted me to avoid giving him the
precise details."
"Yes, I did," he laughed. "But you certainly made them precise enough.
It is better to be careful how you explain these things to strangers."
"Why?" I asked. "If we suspected Hilderman I should be inclined to
agree with you that we should feed him up with lies; and if you think
it will help us at all to suspect him I'm on at once. But as we both
feel that his disposition is friendly and that we have no cause to
doubt him, what is your reason for putting him off the scent every
time? I know you well enough by this time to feel sure that you
haven't been making these cryptic remarks for the sake of hearing
yourself speak."
"Here's the train," he said. "I'll tell you later."
I looked along the carriages for Dennis, but I had evidently missed
him, for as I turned back along the platform I found him looking round
for me, standing amid the _mêlée_ of tourists and fisherfolk, keepers
and valets, sportsmen and dogs, which is typical of the West Highland
terminus in early August, and which seemed little affected by the fact
that a state of war existed between Great Britain and the only nation
in the world which was prepared for hostilities.
"Well, old man," I greeted him as we shook hands heartily. "You got my
wire, of course. I hope you had a decent journey."
"Rather, old chap, I should think I did!" he replied warmly. "Slept
like a turnip through the beastly parts, and woke up for the bit from
Dumbarton on. I also had the luck to remember what you said about the
breakfast and took the precaution of wiring for it. Here I am, and as
fit as a fiddle."
"That's great!" I exclaimed cheerily, for Dennis's bright attitude had
exactly the effect on me that it was intended to have--it made me feel
about twenty years younger. "This is Mr. Garnesk, the specialist, who
very kindly came from Glasgow to see Myra. Mr. Garnesk--Mr. Burnham."
The two shook hands, and the oculist suggested lunch. We left the
station to go up to the hotel, but we saw Hilderman and his newly
arrived friend--the same man who had seen me taking Myra up to
London--walking leisurely up the hill in front of us. Garnesk took my
arm.
"Steady, my boy, steady," he said quietly. "We don't want to be
overheard giving the lie to your dainty conversation of a few minutes
ago. Isn't there anywhere else we can lunch, because they are
evidently on the same tack?"
"Yes," I replied, turning back, "there's the Marine just behind you.
That'll do us well. Then we can come out and talk freely where there's
no chance of our being overheard."
So we lunched at the Marine Hotel, after which we strolled round
the harbour, along the most appalling "road" in the history of
civilisation, popularly and well named "the Kyber." Safely out of
earshot, I made a hurried mental _précis_ of the events of the past
few days, and gave Dennis the resultant summary as tersely as I could.
"I'm very glad you had Mr. Garnesk with you," said Dennis at last,
with a glance of frank admiration at the young specialist.
"Not so glad as I am," I replied fervently. "What I should have done
without him heaven only knows. I can't even guess."
"Oh, nonsense!" cried Garnesk, in modest protest. "I haven't been
able to do anything. Our one advance was a piece of pure luck--the
discovery that Miss McLeod could see by the light of a red lamp. We
have decided to keep that quite to ourselves, Mr. Burnham."
"Of course," agreed Dennis, so emphatically that I laughed.
"Why so decided, Den?" I asked, for I felt that I should like to climb
to the topmost pinnacle of the highest peak in all the world and shout
the good news to the four corners of the earth.
"I'm not a scientist, Ron," Dennis replied. "That may account for the
heresy of my profound disbelief in science. I wouldn't cross the road
to see a 'miracle.' The twentieth century is uncongenial to anything
of that sort. Take it from me, old chap, there's a man at the back of
this--not a nice man, I admit, but an ordinary human being to all
outward appearances--and when we catch a glimpse of his outward
appearances we shall know what to do."
"Yes, _when_ we do," I sighed.
"You mustn't let Ewart get depressed about things, Mr. Burnham. He
very naturally looks at this business from a different standpoint.
With him it is a tragic, mysterious horror, which threatens the
well-being, if not the existence, of a life that is dearer to him than
his own."
"I'll look after him," said Dennis, with a grim determination which
made even Garnesk laugh.
"When you two precious people have finished nursing me," I said, "I
hope you'll allow me to point out that that very reason gives me a
prior claim to take any risks or run into any dangers that may crop up
from now on. If there is any trouble brewing, particularly dangerous
trouble, then it is my place to tackle it. I am deeply grateful to you
fellows for all you have done and are doing and intend to do, but the
nursing comes from the other side. I can't let you run risks in a
cause which is more mine in the nature of things than yours."
"I fancy," said Dennis, "that even your eloquent speeches will have
very little effect when it comes to real trouble. If danger comes
it'll come suddenly, and we shall be best helping our common cause by
looking after ourselves."
"Hear, hear," said Garnesk, and I could only mutter my thanks and my
gratitude for the possession of two staunch friends.
"To get back to business," I said presently, "why did you want me to
bluff Hilderman like that?"
"Because," said Garnesk slowly, "I'm not sure that Hilderman is the
man to take into our confidence too completely. It's not that I don't
trust the man, but he looks so alert and so cute, and has such a
dreamy way of pretending he isn't listening to you when you know jolly
well that he is, that I have a feeling we ought to be careful with
him."
"Very much what Dennis said about him the first time he saw him. But
if you don't suspect him, and he is a very cute man, why not trust him
and have the benefit of his intelligence?"
"How would you answer that question yourself, Ewart?" the specialist
asked quietly.
"Oh," I laughed, "I should point out that his cuteness may be the very
reason that we don't suspect him."
"Precisely," Garnesk agreed; "and that is partly my answer as well."
"And the other part?" put in Dennis quietly.
"Well, it's a difficult thing to say, and it's all conjecture. But
I have a feeling that Hilderman is not what he says he is. He has
a knack of doing things, a way of going about here, that gives me
the impression he is employing his intelligence, and a very fine
intelligence it probably is, all the time. I don't think he is retired
at all. There's a restless energy about the fellow that would turn
into a sour discontent if his mind were not fully occupied with work
which it is accustomed to, and probably enjoys doing."
"Have you anything to suggest?" I asked.
"I have an idea," he replied; "but I haven't mentioned it because it
doesn't satisfy me at all. I have an idea that the man is some sort
of detective hard at work all the time. But I can't imagine what sort
of detective would take a house up here and keep himself as busy as
Hilderman appears to be over some case in the neighbourhood. I can't
imagine what sort of case it can be."
"What about a secret German naval base in the Hebrides?" I suggested.
"It's not by any means impossible or even unlikely that the Germans
have utilised the lonely lochs and creeks to some sinister purpose.
Many of the lochs are entirely hidden by surrounding mountains, which
come right down to the edge of a narrow opening, and make the place
almost unnoticeable unless you happen to be looking for it."
"There's something in that, certainly," Garnesk agreed; "but we must
remember he's been here since May. Surely our precious Government
would have managed to find what they wanted, and clear it out by this
time. Then again, did they suspect the base, or did they have a
general idea that war was coming so far back as May?"
"As to the war," Dennis put in, "we don't really know when the
authorities had their first suspicions."
"No," said I; "but I fancy it was not a very definite suspicion until
after the Archduke was assassinated. But look here, Garnesk, just let
us suppose Hilderman really is a Government detective in the guise of
an American visitor. Wouldn't he be just about the man we want, or do
you think it would make too much stir to take him into our
confidence?"
"Far too much," Garnesk replied emphatically. "It's not that he
would talk; but if he has been here all this time his opponents have
got wind of him long before this, and his arrival on the scene in
connection with our case would give any suspicious character the tip
to bolt. I should advise keeping in touch with Hilderman, learn as
much as you can about him, and be ready to run to him for help if you
come to the conclusion that he is the man to give it."
We sat down among the heather at the foot of the Mallaig Vec road, and
looked out over the harbour.
"Don't turn your heads," said Dennis quietly, "but glance down at the
pier."
"Yes," said Garnesk in a moment, "he seems to be as interested in us
as we are in him."
Hilderman and his friend were standing on the end of the pier watching
us through their field-glasses.
CHAPTER XIII.
THE RED-HAIRED MAN.
"I'll send the glasses at once," said Garnesk, as the train steamed
out of the station. Dennis and I stood on the platform and watched him
out of sight.
"He seems a good fellow," said Dennis.
"Splendid!" I agreed readily. "He's exceeding clever and wide-awake,
and very charming. What we should have done without him heaven only
knows. I fancy his visit saved the entire household from a nervous
collapse."
"We've no time for collapses, nervous or otherwise," Dennis replied.
"We shall want our wits about us, and we shall need all the vitality
we can muster. But at the same time I don't think there is any cause
for nerves. You're not the sort of man, Ron, to let your nerves get
the better of you in an emergency, especially if we can prove that our
enemy is a tangible quantity, and not a conglomeration of waves and
vibrations."
"Hilderman and his friend appear to be waiting for us," I interrupted.
"You may as well introduce me," said Dennis. "I'd like to meet the
man. Who is his friend, do you know?"
"Haven't the remotest idea," I replied. "I have seen him once before,
but that is all. I don't know who he is."
"Is he staying with Hilderman, or does he live in the neighbourhood?"
"That I couldn't tell you either," I said. "I'm sure he doesn't live
anywhere near Invermalluch."
As we strolled out of the station Hilderman and his companion were
standing chatting by the gate which leads on to the pier. As we
approached, Hilderman turned to me with a smile.
"Ah, Mr. Ewart," he exclaimed, "your friend has left you, then. I hope
you won't let his inability to help Miss McLeod depress you unduly.
While there's life there's hope."
"I shall not give up hope yet awhile, anyway," I answered heartily.
"May I introduce my friend Mr. Fuller?" he asked presently, and I
found myself shaking hands with the round-faced little man, who
blinked at me pleasantly through his glasses. I returned the
compliment by introducing Dennis.
"On holiday, Mr. Burnham?" asked the American. Dennis was so prompt
with his reply that I was convinced he had been thinking it out in the
meanwhile.
"Well, I hardly know that I should call it a holiday," he replied
immediately. "I have just run up to say good-bye to Ewart before
offering my services to my King and country. We had intended to join
up together, but he has, as you know, been detained for the time
being, so I am off by myself."
"We are very old friends," I explained, "and Burnham very decently
decided to come here to see me as I was unable to go south to see
him."
"Never mind, Mr. Ewart," said Hilderman. "I guess you'll be able to
join him very soon. I wish you luck, Mr. Burnham. I suppose it won't
be long before you leave."
"He's talking of returning to-morrow," I cut in. "I wish you'd tell
him it's ridiculous, Mr. Hilderman. Fancy coming all this way for
twenty-four hours. He must have a look round, to say nothing of his
stinginess in depriving me of his company so soon."
"Well, I can quite understand Mr. Burnham's anxiety to join at the
earliest possible moment," he answered. "But I've no doubt Lord
Kitchener wouldn't miss him for a day. I think he might multiply his
visit by two, and stop till Wednesday, at any rate. Ah, here's the
_Fiona_!"
I looked out to the mouth of the harbour, and saw the steam yacht,
which was in the habit of calling at Glasnabinnie, gliding past the
lighthouse rock. I was about to make some comment on the boat when
Hilderman forestalled me.
"How are you going back?" he asked.
"In a motor-boat," I replied. "I am afraid Angus is getting weary of
waiting already."
"I'm sure Mr. Fuller would be delighted to have you fellows on board.
Why not let your man take Mr. Burnham's luggage to Invermalluch, and
come to Glasnabinnie on the _Fiona_? You can lunch with me, and when
you tire of our company I will run you across in the _Baltimore_. Eh?
What do you say?"
"I shall be delighted, of course," his companion broke in.
I hesitated for a moment, and glanced at Dennis. His face obviously
said, "Accept," so I accepted.
"Thank you," I said; "we shall be very pleased. It will be more jolly
than going back by ourselves."
"Good!" cried Hilderman, "and I can show you the view from my
smoking-room. I hope it will make you green with envy."
So I gave Angus his instructions, and the four of us waited at the
fish-table steps for the dinghy to come ashore from the yacht. She was
not a particularly beautiful boat, but she looked comfortable and
strong, and her clumsy appearance was accentuated by the fact that her
funnel was aft a commodious deck dining-saloon, on the top of which
was a small wheel-house. Myra had been right, as it turned out; she
was a converted drifter. The two men who came in to pick us up wore
the usual blue guernsey, with _S.Y. Fiona_ worked in an arc of red
wool across the chest. They were obviously good servants and useful
hands, but there was none of that ridiculous imitation of naval
custom and etiquette which delights the heart of the Cotton Exchange
yacht-owner. We boarded the _Fiona_ with the feeling that we were going
to have a pleasant and comfortable time, and not with the fear that
our setting of a leather-soled shoe upon the hallowed decks was in
itself an act of sacrilege. We were no sooner aboard than Fuller set
himself to play the host with a charm which was exceedingly attentive
and neither fussy nor patronising.
"The trivial but necessary question of edible stores will detain us
for a few moments," he said. "But we shall be more comfortable here
than wandering about among the herrings." So we made ourselves
comfortable in deck-chairs in the stern, while the steward went ashore
and made the all-important purchases.
"You cruise a good deal, I suppose?" was my first question.
"Yes, a fair amount," our host replied. "I pretty well live on board,
you know, although I have a small house further north, on Loch Duich,
if you know where that is."
"Mr. Ewart was born up here, and knows it backwards," Hilderman
informed him. And we chatted about the district and the fishing and
the views until the steward returned, and we got under weigh. I should
have liked to have seen the accommodation below, but the journey was a
short one, and I had no opportunity to make the suggestion. Dennis
was sitting nearest the rail, and there was a small hank of rope at
his feet.
"I beg your pardon, Mr. Burnham," said Fuller suddenly. "I didn't
notice that rope was in your way." And he learned over and tossed the
rope away. As he did so some hard object fell with a clatter from the
coil.
"It's not interfering with me in the least," laughed Dennis, and
looked down at a large, bone-handled clasp-knife which had dropped in
front of him. He picked it up idly, and weighed it in his hand.
"Useful sort of implement," he said.
"Oh, these sailor-chaps like a big knife more than anything," said
Hilderman; "and, of course, they need them strong. I daresay that has
been used for anything, from primitive carpentry to cutting tobacco.
The one knife always does for everything."
We continued our conversation while Dennis idly examined the knife,
opening it and studying the blade absently. Presently Fuller, noticing
his absorption, began to chaff him about it.
"Well," he laughed, "have you compiled a complete history of the knife
and it's owner? If you're ready to sit an examination on the subject I
will constitute myself examiner, then we'll find who the knife belongs
to, and corroborate or contradict your conclusions."
"It's a very ordinary knife to find on board a boat, I should think,"
said Dennis.
"Oh come, Mr. Burnham," Hilderman joined in, "you mustn't wriggle out
of it. Surely you can answer Mr. Fuller's questions."
"If Mr. Fuller will allow me to put one or two preliminary questions
to him," Dennis replied, entering into the spirit of fun, "I am ready
to go into the witness-box and swear quite a number of fanciful
things."
"Come now, Fuller," chaffed Hilderman. "You must give him a run for
his money, you know. He is risking his reputation at a moment's
notice. I think you ought to let him ask you three questions, at any
rate."
"Fire away, Mr. Burnham," said our host. "I'll give you a start of
three questions, and then you must be prepared to answer every
reasonable question I put to you, or be branded publicly as an
unreliable witness and an incompetent detective."
Dennis puffed at his pipe and smiled, and I was surprised to see that
he really was bringing his mind to bear on the trivial problem with
all the acuteness he had in him.
"Well, in the first place," he asked, "do you stop in port very often
overnight, or for any length of time during the day?"
"I never stop in port longer than I can help," laughed Fuller, "or the
owner of that knife would probably take the opportunity of buying a
new one, and throwing this old thing away. All the same, I don't see
how that is going to help you."
"Ah," said Dennis, in bantering vein, "you mustn't expect me to give
away my process, you know. The secret's been in the family for years."
"What's your second question, Den?" I asked.
"Is there a hotel within reasonable distance of your house on Loch
Whatever-it-is, Mr. Fuller?"
"Loch Duich?" our host replied. "There's one about six miles by road
and eleven or twelve by the sea."
"I don't think I need ask you the third question, then," said Dennis.
"You can begin your examination now."
"Now, Mr. Burnham," Fuller commenced, "you quite understand that
anything you say will be taken down in writing, and may be used as
evidence against you?"
"I assure you I have a keen appreciation of the gravity of the
situation," Dennis replied seriously.
"Well," said Fuller, "I'll begin with an easy one--one that won't tax
your powers of observation beyond endurance."
"Yes," I urged, "let him down gently. He does his best."
"What profession does the owner of that knife follow?"
Hilderman and I laughed.
"We may as well count that answer as read," he said.
"There's a catch there, Dennis," I warned him. "The legal designation
is 'mariner.'"
"I don't think it is," said my friend.
"We won't quarrel about terms," laughed our host graciously. "Sailor
or seaman or deckhand will do just as well."
"No," said Dennis, "it won't. The owner of this knife is not a sailor
by profession."
"But," Fuller protested, "it must belong to one of my crew, and it is
obviously a seaman's knife."
"In that case," Dennis answered, "I think you'll find that you have a
man on board who is not a professional seaman in the ordinary use of
the term. I'll tell you what I think of this knife, shall I?"
"By all means," urged Hilderman and his friend together, and I began
to take a keen interest in this curious discussion, for I could see
that Dennis was no longer playing. He turned the knife over in his
hand, and looked up at Fuller.
"Mr. Fuller," he said quietly, "the owner of this knife is not a
sailor by profession. He is probably a schoolmaster. I can't be sure
of that, but I can say this definitely: he is a professional man of
some sort, possibly an engineer, but, as I say, more probably a
mathematical master. He is left-handed, has red hair, a wife, and at
least one child."
I shouted with laughter when I realised how thoroughly my friend had
pulled my leg, but I broke off abruptly when Hilderman sat bolt
upright, and his chair and Fuller's cigar fell unheeded on to the
deck. But in a second they took their cue from me, and roared with
laughter.
"Oh, excellent, Mr. Burnham," said Hilderman between his guffaws. "But
you forgot to mention that his sister married a butcher's assistant."
"Ah, but I don't admit she did," Dennis protested.
"I'm very much indebted to you for exposing this masquerader," said
Fuller. "I shall have the matter inquired into. But seriously, Mr.
Burnham, you made one extraordinary fluke in your deductions, which
almost took my breath away. I have a man on board with red hair, and
when the boat came into the harbour he was working about here. I saw
him leave his work to come ashore for us. I shouldn't be at all
surprised to find that the knife belonged to him."
"Oh, well," Dennis laughed, "one shot right is not a bad average for a
beginner, you know."
"No," said Hilderman, puffing a cloud of smoke, and dreamily following
its ascent with his eyes, "not bad at all. Not bad at all."
And then, the joke of the clasp-knife being played out, we admired the
scenery, and conversed of less speculative subjects till we arrived at
Glasnabinnie.
We were pulled ashore by the man with the red hair, and when our host
confronted him with the knife he promptly claimed it.
"I think you won, Mr. Burnham," laughed Fuller, and Dennis smiled
in reply. We slid alongside the landing-stage and stepped out, and
Dennis's schoolmaster was about to slip the painter through a ring
and make the boat fast. But evidently the ring was broken. The man
came ashore, and Hilderman began to lead us up the path. But Dennis
deliberately turned and watched the sailor. Hilderman and his
companion strolled ahead while I stood beside Dennis. The man with the
red hair fished among a pile of wire rope, and picked out a small
marline-spike. Then he lifted a large stone, held the marline-spike on
the wooden planking of the landing-stage, and hammered it in with the
stone. Then he threw the painter round it, and made the boat secure in
that way.
"Yes," murmured Dennis quietly, as we turned to join the others, "I
think I won."
For the man had held the stone in his left hand.
CHAPTER XIV.
A FURTHER MYSTERY.
"Well," said Hilderman, as we caught them up, "what about lunch? After
his journey I daresay Mr. Burnham has an appetite, not to mention his
excursion into the realm of detective fiction."
"We lunched at Mallaig," I explained, "with Mr. Garnesk before we saw
him off."
"Oh, did you?" he asked, with evident surprise. "I didn't see you at
the hotel."
"We went to the Marine," I replied, "to save ourselves a climb up the
hill."
"We had a snack at Mallaig too," the American continued, "intending to
lunch here. Are you sure you couldn't manage something?"
"It would have to be a very slight something," Dennis put in. "But I
daresay we could manage that."
"Good!" said Hilderman. "Come along, then, and let's see what we can
do."
We strolled into the drawing-room through the inevitable verandah,
and though Hilderman was the tenant of the furnished house he had
contrived to impart a suggestion of his own personality to the room.
The furniture was arranged in a delightfully lazy manner that almost
made you yawn. The walls were hung with photographic enlargements of
some of the most beautiful spots in the neighbourhood. I remembered
what Myra had told me as to his being an enthusiastic photographer, so
I asked him about them.
"Did you take these, Mr. Hilderman?"
"Yes," he answered. "These are just a few of the best. I have many
others which I should like you to see some time. I always leave the
enlarging to keep me alive during the winter months. These are a few
odd ones I enlarged for decorative purposes."
"They are beautiful," I said enthusiastically, for they were real
beauties, more like drawings in monochrome than photographs. "And
you certainly seem to have got about the neighbourhood since your
arrival."
"Yes," he laughed, "I don't miss much when I get out with my camera.
Most of these were taken during the first month of my stay here."
"These snow scenes from the Cuchulins are simply gorgeous, and surely
this is the Kingie Pool on the Garry?"
"Right first time," he admitted, evidently pleased to see his work
admired. I thought of Garnesk's suspicion that our American friend was
engaged on detective work of some kind, and it struck me that with his
camera and his obvious talent he had an excellent excuse for going
almost anywhere, supposing he were called upon at any time to explain
his presence in some outlandish spot.
"You must have kept yourself exceedingly busy," I remarked in
conclusion.
After the meal we adjourned to the hut above the falls. Hilderman
certainly had some right to be proud of his view. It was magnificent.
We stood outside the door and gazed out to sea, north, south and west,
for some minutes.
"You have the same uninterrupted view from inside," said Hilderman, as
we mounted the three steps to the door. He held the door open, and I
stepped in first, followed by Dennis and Fuller. The window extended
the whole length of the room, and folded inwards and upwards, in the
same way as some greenhouse windows do. Suddenly I laughed aloud.
"What's the joke?" asked Hilderman.
"This," I said, pointing to a large carbon transparency of a mountain
under snow, which hung in the window on the north side. "You've no
idea how this has been annoying us over at Invermalluch."
"How?" asked Dennis.
"It swings about in the breeze," I replied, "and it reflects the light
and catches everybody's eye. It's a very beautiful photograph, Mr.
Hilderman, but, like many human beings, it's exceedingly unpopular
owing to the position it holds."
"A thousand apologies, Mr. Ewart," said the American. "It shall be
removed at once."
"Oh, not at all!" I protested. "Surely you are entitled to hang a
positive of a photograph in your window without receiving a protest
from neighbours who live nearly three miles away."
"That's Invermalluch Lodge, then, across the water," Dennis asked.
"Yes," I replied, and we forgot about the transparency, which remained
in undisputed possession of a pitch to which it was certainly
entitled. We sat and smoked, and looked out at the mountains of Skye
and the wonderful panorama of sea and loch, with an occasional glance
at the gurgling waterfall at our feet, and presently I picked up a
copy of an illustrated paper which was lying at my hand. I turned the
pages idly, and threw a cursory glance at the photographs of the
week's brides, and the latest efforts of the theatrical press agents,
and I noticed, without thinking anything of the fact, that one page
had been roughly torn out. I was about to remark that probably the
most interesting or amusing picture in the whole paper had been
accidentally destroyed, when Fuller leaned across Dennis, and took the
paper out of my hands.
"Don't insult Mr. Hilderman's precious view by reading the paper in
his smoking-room, Mr Ewart," he said, with a loud laugh. "As a
Highlander you should have more tact than that."
Hilderman turned round, and looked from one to other of us.
"What paper is he reading? I didn't know there was one here."
I explained what paper it was, adding, "I quite admit that it was a
waste of time when I ought to be admiring your unrivalled view, Mr.
Hilderman. I offer you my sincere apologies."
Hilderman threw a quick glance at Mr. Fuller.
"Better give it him back, Fuller," he said. "There is nothing more
annoying than to have a paper snatched away from you when you're
half-way through it."
Shortly after that Fuller declared that he must be leaving, and asked
Hilderman rather pointedly whether he felt like a trip to Loch Duich.
I determined to step in with an idea of my own.
"I was going to make a suggestion myself, Mr. Hilderman," I began,
"but it doesn't matter if you are engaged."
"Well, I don't know that I'm particularly keen to come with you this
afternoon, Fuller," he remarked. "What was your suggestion, Mr.
Ewart?"
"I was wondering whether you would come over to Invermalluch with
Burnham and me and--er--have a look round with us?"
"Well, if Fuller doesn't think it exceedingly rude of me, I should
like to," the American replied, "especially as Mr. Burnham will be
leaving you to-morrow, or the day after at latest."
"Incidentally, I don't know how we shall get back without you," I
pointed out. "You see, we sent the motor-boat on."
"By Jove, so you did!" Hilderman exclaimed. "Well, that settles it,
Fuller."
"I could take them on the _Fiona_ and put them ashore," his companion
persisted. Hilderman gave Fuller a look which seemed to clinch the
matter, however, for the little man beamed at me through his
spectacles, and explained that if he took us in his yacht it would be
killing two birds with one stone.
"Still, of course, my dear fellow," he concluded, "you must please
yourselves entirely."
So we saw him safely on board the _Fiona_, and then started for
Invermalluch in Hilderman's magnificent Wolseley launch.
"Fuller knows me," he explained, by way of apology. "I go up with him
sometimes as often as three times a week, but I gathered that you
asked me with a view to discussing the mystery of the green flash, or
whatever you call it."
"You're quite right; I did," I replied. "I simply want you to come and
have a look at the river, and see what you can make of it."
"Anything I can do, you know, Mr. Ewart," he assured me, "I shall be
delighted to do. If you think it will be of any assistance to you if I
explore the river with you--well, I'm ready now."
From that we proceeded to give him, at his request, minute details of
Garnesk's conclusions on the matter, and I am afraid I departed from
the truth with a ready abandon and a certain relish of which I ought
to have been most heartily ashamed.
When we stepped ashore at Invermalluch Hilderman looked back across
the water.
"If I'd waited for Fuller," he laughed, "I should have been stuck
there yet. He's let the water go off the boil or something."
We went up to the house and had tea on the verandah, for the General
had taken Myra up Loch Hourn in the motor-boat. After tea we got to
business.
"Now that I've had a very refreshing cup of tea," the American
remarked, "I feel rather like the mouse who said '_Now_ bring out your
cat' when he had consumed half a teaspoonful of beer! Now show me the
river."
"I don't want to sound at all panicky," I said, "but I think I ought
to warn you that our experiences at the particular spot we are going
to have--well, shall we say they have provided a striking contrast
from the routine of our daily life?"
"I'm not at all afraid of the river, Mr. Ewart," he replied lightly.
"I should be the last person to doubt the statements of yourself and
Miss McLeod and the General, but I am inclined to think the river has
no active part in the proceedings."
"You hold the view that it was the merest coincidence that Miss McLeod
and the General both had terrible and strange experiences at the same
spot?" asked Dennis.
"It seems to be the only sensible view to hold," Hilderman declared
emphatically. "I must say I think Miss McLeod's blindness might have
happened in her own room or anywhere else, and the General's strange
experience seems to me to be the delusion of overwrought nerves. I
confess there is only one thing I don't understand, and that is the
disappearance of the dog. That's got me beaten, unless it was that
crofter."
"We intend to go to the Saddle to-morrow and make a few
investigations. I was going by myself," I added cautiously, "but I
think I can persuade Burnham to stay and go with me."
"I certainly should stay for that, Mr. Burnham," Hilderman advised.
"One more day can't make much difference."
"I'll think it over," said Dennis, careful not to commit himself
rashly.
We came to the Dead Man's Pool, and crossed over the river, and began
to walk up the other side.
"This is about the right time for a manifestation of the mystery," I
remarked lightly, though I was far from laughing about the whole
thing.
"Well," said Hilderman, "if we are to see the green flash in operation
I hope it will be in a gentle mood, and not pull our teeth out one by
one or anything of that sort." Evidently he had little sympathy with
our fear of the green ray and the awe with which we approached the
neighbourhood of the river.
"Are we going to the right place?" Dennis asked. "I mean the identical
spot?"
"That lozenge-shaped thing up there is the Chemist's Rock," I replied,
"and the other important place is Dead Man's Pool, which we have just
left."
"Miss McLeod went blind on the Chemist's Rock, didn't she?" Dennis
inquired.
"Yes," I replied, with a shudder. "She was fishing from it."
"Then suppose we go back to the pool," he suggested. We agreed readily
enough, for I had no desire to hang about the fateful rock, and
Hilderman for his part seemed to have no faith in the idea at all. I
fancy he thought it would make no difference to us in what part of the
river we might be, only provided we didn't fall in. So Dennis led the
way back, and he was the first to pick his way to the middle of the
stream. Hilderman and I were some distance behind. Suddenly we stopped
stock-still, and looked at him. He had begun to cough and splutter,
and he seemed rooted to the small stone he was standing on in the
middle of the stream. In a flash I understood, and with a cry I
bounded after him, Hilderman following at my heels.
"It's all right, Ewart," cried Hilderman behind me. "He's only choked,
or something of that sort. He'll be all right in a minute."
Dennis had crossed to the centre of the stream by a way of his own,
and we ran down to the stepping-stones by which we had come, in order
to save the time which we should have been compelled to waste in
feeling for a foothold as we went. Every second was of importance, and
I fully expected to see Dennis topple unconscious into the pool below
before I should be able to save him. I knew what it was exactly; he
was going through my own horrible experience of "drowning on dry
land," to quote Garnesk's vigorous phrase. Imagine my astonishment,
therefore, when I reached Dennis's side with only a slight difficulty
in breathing. There was no sign, or at least very little, of the air
which was "heavier than water." Hilderman plunged along behind me,
and we reached the stone on which my friend was standing almost
simultaneously. Dennis held an arm pointing up the river, his face
transfixed with an expression of horrified amazement. Suddenly
Hilderman gave a hoarse, shrill shout, breaking almost into a scream.
"Shut your eyes!" he yelled. "Shut your eyes! Oh, for heaven's sake,
shut your eyes!"
But I never thought of following his advice. Dennis's immovable arm,
pointing like an inanimate signpost up the river, fascinated me.
Slowly I raised my eyes in that direction. Then I stepped back with a
startled cry, lost my footing, slipped, and fell on my face among the
rocks.
_The river had disappeared!_
CHAPTER XV.
CONCERNS AN ILLUSTRATED PAPER.
The river had disappeared!
In front of us was a great green wall of solid rock, which seemed to
tower into the sky above us, and to stretch away for miles to right
and left. The curious part about it was that the rock was undoubtedly
solid. The shrubs that grew upon it, the great crevices and clefts,
were all real. I knew--though I had a hard struggle to make myself
believe--that it was all a marvellous and indescribable delusion, for
there could be no cliff where only a few seconds before there had been
a mighty, rushing torrent.
And yet I could have planted finger and foot on the ledges of that
solid precipice and climbed to the invisible summit. Hilderman was
muttering to himself beneath his breath, but I was too dazed, my brain
was too numbed to make any sense out of the confused mumble of words
which came from him. Dennis held my arm in a vice-like grip that
stopped the circulation, and almost made me cry out with the pain.
Hilderman staggered, his arm over his eyes, across the stepping-stones
to the side of the stream. I found my voice at last.
"Dennis!" I shouted at the top of my voice, though why I should have
shouted I can never explain, for my friend was standing just beside
me. "Dennis, come away, man. Get out of this!"
I exerted my strength to the uttermost, but Dennis was immovable,
rooted to the spot by the strange, snake-like fascination of the
nightmare. Then, as suddenly as it had arisen, the rock disappeared
again, and there before our startled gaze was a peacefully flowing
river. Dennis turned to me with a face as white as a sheet.
"The place is haunted," he said, with a somewhat hysterical laugh.
"Let's get away from it and sit down, and think it over," I urged,
pulling him away. We made for the side of the river and sat down, at
a very safe distance from the bank. I rolled up my sleeve, and had a
look at my arm.
"Great Scott!" Dennis exclaimed, as I dangled the pinched and purple
limb painfully. "What on earth did that?"
"I'm afraid it was your own delicate touch and dainty caress that did
it, old man. You seized hold of me as if you hadn't seen me for years,
and I owed you a thousand pounds."
"Ron, my dear fellow," he said penitently, "I'm most awfully sorry.
Why didn't you shout?"
I burst out laughing.
"I entered a protest in vigorous terms, but you were otherwise engaged
at the moment, and, anyway, don't look so scared about it, old man;
it'll be quite all right in a minute."
Poor Dennis was quite upset at the evidence I bore of his absorption
in the miracle, and we postponed our discussion while he massaged the
injured arm in order to restore the flow of blood.
"Where's Hilderman?" I asked presently, and though we looked
everywhere for the American he was nowhere to be seen.
"He didn't look the sort to funk like that," said Dennis thoughtfully.
"I should have been prepared to bet he was quite brave," I concurred.
"Well, anyway," I added, "the main point is, what do you think of our
entertainment? You've come a long way for it, but I hope you are not
disappointed now you've seen it. It's original, isn't it?"
"By heaven, Ron!" he cried, "you're right. It is original. It is even
a more unholy, indescribable mystery than I expected, and I never
accused you of exaggerating it, even in my own mind."
"I'm glad that both you and Hilderman have had ocular demonstration
of it," I remarked. "It is so much more convincing, and will help
you to go into the matter without any feeling that we are out on a
hare-brained shadow-chase."
"We're certainly not that, anyhow," Dennis agreed emphatically. "It is
a real mystery, Ronald, my boy. A real danger, as well, I'm afraid.
But we'll stick at it till the end."
"Thanks, old fellow," I said simply, and then I added, "I wonder what
can have become of Hilderman?"
"Gad!" cried Dennis, in sudden alarm. "He can't have fallen into the
river by any chance?"
We jumped to our feet and looked about us.
"No," I said presently, "he hasn't fallen into the river." And I
pointed a finger out to sea. The _Baltimore II._, churning a frantic
way across to Glasnabinnie, seemed to divide the intervening water in
one great white slash.
"I wonder," said Dennis quietly, "_is_ that funk, or isn't it?"
We watched the diminishing craft for a minute or two in silence, and
finally decided to keep an open mind on the subject until we might
have an opportunity to see Hilderman and hear his own explanation.
"Talking about explanations, what about the left-handed schoolmaster
with the red-headed wife, or whatever it was?" I asked.
"That was a bit of luck," said Dennis modestly, "and I will admit, if
you like, that we owe that to Garnesk."
"Garnesk wasn't there," I protested.
"No," my friend admitted, "he wasn't there at the time, but he put
me on the look-out for a left-handed sailor. I was very much
impressed with his deductions about the man who stole Miss McLeod's
dog, and I determined to be on the look-out for a left-handed man. I
also admit that I carefully watched everyone we met, especially the
fishermen at Mallaig, to see if I could detect the sort of man I wanted.
I was rewarded when we were pulled out to the _Fiona_ by those
two men of Fuller's. One of them was red-headed, you remember? Well,
that man was left-handed. It was very easy to observe that by the way
he held his oar and generally handled things. Of course I was very
bucked about it, so I paid very close attention to him. He wore a
wedding-ring--ergo, he was married. It is not conclusive, of course,
but a fairly safe guess when you're playing at toy detectives. So when
I found the knife I looked for some sign that it belonged to him, and
found it. It was all quite simple."
"I daresay it will be when you explain it, but you haven't in the
least explained it yet," I pointed out. "How about the schoolmaster
and all that, and what made you think the knife belonged to him."
"Simply because he was very probably--working on the law of
averages--the only left-handed man among the crew, and that knife
belonged to a left-handed man."
"But my dear old fellow," I cried, "you don't seriously mean to tell
me that you can say whether a man is left-handed or not by looking at
marks on the handle of his knife?"
"Not on the handle," Dennis explained; "on the blade. Have you got a
knife on you?"
I produced my pen-knife.
"I'll trust you with it," I declared confidently. "I've never held any
secrets from you, Den."
Dennis opened the knife and laid it in the palm of his hand. I stood
still and watched him.
"You've sharpened pencils with this knife and the pencils have left
their mark. If you hold the knife as you would when sharpening a
pencil and look down on the blade there are no pencil marks visible.
Now turn the knife over and you will find the marks on the other side
of the blade."
"Half a minute," I said eagerly, "let's have a look. The knife is in
position for sharpening a pencil and the back of the knife is pointing
to my chest. The marks are underneath." I took a pencil from my pocket
and tried it. "Yes, I've got you, Dennis. It's quite clear. If I held
the knife with the point to my right instead of to my left, as I
should do in sharpening with my left hand, the marks appear on the
other side of the blade. It is not quite conclusive, Den, but it's
jolly cute."
"Not when you're looking for it," he said. "I was struck by the fact
that the knife which, by its size and weight, was a seaman's handy
tool, had also been used for the repeated sharpening of a blue pencil.
When I saw those indications I went through the motion and came to the
conclusion that the marks were on the wrong side. Then I tried with my
left hand and accounted for it. The blue pencil made me suspicious. I
have no knowledge of a yacht-hand's duties, but surely sharpening blue
pencils is not one of them. Then the knife had also been carried in
the same pocket as a piece of white chalk. The only sort of person I
could think of who would carry a piece of chalk loose in his pocket
and use a blue pencil continuously was a schoolmaster. So I stated
definitely--there's nothing like bluff--that the knife belonged to the
left-handed man, who quite obviously had red hair, who appeared to
wear the insignia of the married state, and who--again according to
the law of averages--had at least one child. I naturally slumped the
schoolmaster idea in with it, and there you have the whole thing in a
nutshell. But it was Garnesk who set me looking for left-handed clues,
and if I hadn't been looking for it, it would never have entered my
head."
"But look here," I suggested, "some people sharpen pencils by pointing
the pencil to them. Wouldn't that produce the same effect?"
"Yes," he admitted, "I thought of that. But the marks would have been
very much fainter, because there would have been much less pressure. I
put that idea aside."
"Good!" I exclaimed. "I should much prefer to swallow your theory
whole, Dennis, but it struck me that might be a possible source of
error, which, of course, might have led us on to a false trail. And,
I say, those questions you asked about the time he stayed in port and
the hotel. Were those all bluff? Or had you some sort of idea at the
back of them?"
"I had a very definite idea at the back of them," Dennis replied. "I
thought perhaps the white chalk which was deposited in the blade-pocket,
and was even noticeable on the handle, might be due to billiard chalk.
But, of course, I didn't mention billiards, because it would have given
my line of reasoning away. I thought it was better to spring it on them
with a bump."
"Which you certainly did," I laughed. "As a matter of fact, I thought
you were simply having a game with us all. But now that you've told me
the details, Den, do you remember what happened when you did spring it
on them?"
"Well, of course I do," he replied. "But even so, I hardly know what
to make of it. I should like to feel confidently that Fuller is the
man we are after. But we must remember that both he and Hilderman
might very easily have thought I really had discovered something from
the knife and been exceedingly surprised without having any guilty
connection with the discovery."
"H'm," I muttered, "I prefer to suspect Fuller."
"Oh, I do too," Dennis agreed. "It is safer to suspect everybody in a
case like this. But why are you so emphatic?"
"Well," I explained, "we have a few little things to go on. Myra
diagnosed that Sholto was taken on a yacht by Garnesk's left-handed
man in sea-boots. Then you produce a left-handed member of a yacht's
crew out of an old pocket-knife, and Fuller jumps out of his skin when
you mention it. That seems to be something to go on, and then there
was that incident in the smoking-room."
"When you were reading the paper?" he asked. "I couldn't make that
out. Did you notice anything suspicious about it?"
"Of course I was in a suspicious mood," I admitted, "but it struck me
as a singularly rude thing to do to snatch the paper out of my hand
like that. His remark about Hilderman's precious view was very weak.
I think there was something behind it."
"What?" asked Dennis.
"It may have been that there was a letter, or something in the way of
a paper, which he didn't want me to see laid inside the paper; but
there was another curious point about it. There was a page torn out. I
had just noticed this and was on the point of making some silly remark
about it when Fuller leaned right across you and took the thing from
me, as you saw."
"If the page he didn't want you to see was torn out, there was no
chance of your seeing it," Dennis argued, logically enough.
"No," I agreed, "but after your exhibition, if he had anything to
conceal he may have been afraid of my even seeing that the page was
torn out."
"What do you imagine the missing page can possibly have contained?"
"I don't know," I answered, and thought hard for a minute. "By Jove,
Den!" I cried suddenly, "I believe I've got it. This takes us back to
Garnesk's idea of a wireless invention causing all the trouble. We
think we have reason to believe that Fuller may have stolen the dog.
We also think we have reason to believe that one of his yacht-hands is
what you called 'a mathematical master.' Now, suppose the paper had
got hold of this and printed an illustration of the mysterious
invention or perhaps a photograph of the mysterious inventor?"
"And the inventor, knowing that we should accuse him of blinding Miss
McLeod and making off with her dog, the moment we could identify him,
tears out the offending illustration in case either we or anyone else
in the neighbourhood should see it? He admitted, by the way, that he
never went into port if he could help it."
"Well, anyway," I said, "we'll have a look for the paper and find the
missing page."
"You noticed the date?" Dennis asked, anxiously.
"Oh! it was this week's issue," I replied.
"Do they take it at the house?" he inquired, again with a note of
anxiety.
"Not that I know of, but we'll rake one up somewhere, don't you fret.
And, I say, this is a fine way to welcome a visitor; you haven't even
said how-do to your host and hostess. I'm most awfully sorry."
"Don't be an ass, Ronnie," said Dennis, cheerfully. "With the utmost
respect, as you barrister chaps would say, I hadn't noticed your
departure from the requirements of conventional hospitality. I
wouldn't have missed this for all the world and a bit of Bond Street."
So then we hurried to the house with a nervous energy, which spoke
eloquently to our state of suppressed excitement.
"All the same," Den muttered dolefully, as we hurried down the stable
path, "it's going to be what the Americans would call 'some' wireless
invention that can plant a grown-up mountain in the middle of an
innocent river in the twinkling of an eyelash."
"It is, indeed, old fellow," I agreed, "but don't let us worry about
that. We'll get in and see Myra and the General, and then have a look
round for the _Pictures_--the paper you were looking at."
We found Myra sitting on the verandah and wondering what on earth had
kept us, and if we had changed our minds and gone straight back south
with Garnesk.
"I'm most awfully sorry, darling," I apologised. "It's all my fault,
of course. We went to Glasnabinnie, and since then I've been showing
Dennis the river and generally forgetting my duties as deputy host."
"What did you go to the river for?" Myra asked, suspiciously.
"Oh! just to have a look round, you know, dear. It's a very nice
river," I replied, airily.
"Ronnie, dear, please," she said gently, laying her hand on my arm and
turning her veiled and shaded face to mine, "please don't joke about
it. I can't bear to think of you running risks there."
I looked at my beautiful, blind darling, and a pang shot through me.
"God knows I'm not joking about it, dearest," I said sadly.
"I know you weren't really, Ronnie. But, please, oh! please, keep away
from the river."
"Very well, dear," I promised, "I will, unless an urgent duty takes me
there. We must solve this mystery somehow, and it may mean my going to
the river. But I promise not to run any unnecessary risks."
"I'll keep an eye on him and see that he takes care of himself, Miss
McLeod," said Dennis, coming to the rescue.
"Thank you, Mr. Burnham," the girl replied, "but you know it applies
to you as well. You must look after yourself also."
"By the way, dear," I asked, changing the subject, "have you a copy of
this week's _Pictures_?"
"I'm afraid not," she answered. "Must it be the _Pictures_? I've just
been looking at another illustrated paper."
"Looking at what?" I cried, jumping to my feet. "Darling, who's
talking about running risks?"
"Oh, it's all right, dear," she assured me. "I got Mary to bring my
dark-room lamp down to the den and just glanced at the pictures by the
red light. But I won't do it again, if it alarms you, dear. All the
same, I'm quite sure I could see by daylight."
"You promised Garnesk you wouldn't till you heard from him, darling,"
I urged. "It might be very dangerous, so please don't for my sake."
"Very well, then," Myra sighed, "I'll try to be good. But I hope he'll
write soon."
"Where do you think we could get a copy of the paper?" I asked
shortly.
"If it's frightfully important, dear, you might get one in Glenelg,
and, failing that, Doctor Whitehouse would lend you his. I know he
takes it in. Why are you so keen about it?"
"We'll go into the den and tell you everything in a minute or two,
dear," I promised. "Is there any objection to my sending Angus in to
the doctor?"
"None whatever," Myra declared, "he can go now if you like."
So after I had despatched Angus into the village with strict
instructions not to come back without a copy of the paper if he valued
his life, we all adjourned to Myra's den, and my friend and I told her
in detail everything that had happened. About an hour and a half later
Angus returned with the paper. I took it from him with a hurried word
of thanks and nervously turned over the pages.
"Ah! here's a page I didn't see," I exclaimed excitedly, but the only
thing on the whole page was a photograph of a new dancer appearing in
London. Without waiting for me to do so, Dennis leaned over me and
turned the page over with a quick jerk of the wrist.
"Phew!" I exclaimed involuntarily, and Dennis gave a long, low
whistle.
"Oh! what is it? Tell me!" pleaded Myra, anxiously.
"It's a photograph of our friend Fuller," I replied slowly, in a voice
that shook with excitement. "And he's wearing court dress, and
underneath the photograph are the words 'Baron Hugo von Guernstein,
Secretary of the Military Intelligence Department of the Imperial
German General Staff.'"
CHAPTER XVI.
DISCLOSES CERTAIN FACTS.
"There's no doubt about it," I remarked as soon as we had partially
recovered from our surprise. "That's Fuller right enough."
"Oh! there's no doubt it's our man," said Dennis emphatically. "Even
if we had not the evidence of the torn page to corroborate it, the
likeness is perfect."
"Yes," I agreed, "but what do you think his game can be? I'm coming
round to Garnesk's wireless theory."
"Whatever it is, we've stumbled on something of real importance this
time. We must find out what it is and show it up at once."
"I hope you'll take care," said Myra anxiously. "I shouldn't mind so
much if I could be with you to help, but it's dreadful to sit here and
know you are in danger and not be able to do anything at all."
"I'm very glad you can't, darling," I said heartily, as I threw my arm
round her shoulders. "I don't want you to come rushing into these
dangers, whatever they may be. In a way I am glad you are not able to
join us, because I know how difficult it would be to stop you if you
were."
"I suppose this is all one affair," she said doubtfully. "You don't
think this is something quite different from the green ray? It might
be two quite separate things, you know."
"I don't think we are likely to meet with two such interesting
problems in such a remote locality unless they are connected with each
other, Miss McLeod, and especially as everything else apart from the
photograph of Baron von Guernstein points to Fuller as the culprit. I
think we can take it that in solving one mystery we provide the
solution to the other."
"I quite agree with you, Dennis," I said, "but what I am worrying
about now is, what we are going to do."
"The first thing you must do is to dress for dinner, and not let
anyone imagine there is anything untoward about," Myra advised. "And
please don't tell father you have been lunching with one of the
Kaiser's principal spies, if that's what the Baron's title really
means. I would much rather you said nothing to him at all about it for
the present, and in any case you must have something definite in mind
as to your plans before you put the matter to him. If you tell him you
don't know what to do about it he will be in a dreadful state. He is
very far from well, and all this business has told on him dreadfully."
"That is very excellent advice, Miss McLeod," Dennis agreed warmly.
"Ronald, we'll go and disguise ourselves as ordinary, undisturbed
human beings and hide our fears and doubts behind the breastplate of
a starched shirt. Come along."
So Dennis dragged me away, and then, realising his indiscretion,
allowed me to return to my _fiancée_ "just for two minutes, old
fellow."
Dinner was a curious meal, though not quite so strange as the meal the
General and I had together the night, less than a week before, that
Myra lost her sight.
I hope I shall never live through a week like that again. Even now, as
I look back, I cannot believe that it all happened in seven days. It
still seems to have been something like seven months at the very
least.
We had one thing in our favour as we sat down to the table; we all had
a common object in view. We were each of us determined to forget the
green ray for a moment. Fortunately the old man took an immediate
fancy to Dennis and that brightened me considerably. There are few
things so pleasant as to see those whose opinion you value getting on
with your friends. Only once, and that after Mary McNiven had come to
take poor Myra away, did the subject of the green ray crop up.
"Mr. Burnham knows about it all, I suppose?" the General asked.
"I've told him everything, and Garnesk and I went over the whole thing
with him before the train went."
"Good!" said the old man emphatically. "Excellent fellow
Garnesk--excellent; in fact, I don't know when I've met such a
thundering good chap. No new developments, I suppose?"
I hesitated. I could not have brought myself to lie to him, and in
view of the startling complications with which we had so recently been
confronted, I was at a loss for an answer. Dennis came to my rescue
just in time.
"I think Ron's difficulty is in defining the word 'developments,'
General," said he. "If we said there were developments it would
naturally convey the impression that we had something definite to
report. I think perhaps the best way to put it would be that we
believe we are getting on the right scent, by the simple process of
putting two and two together and making them four. We hope to have
something very decided to tell you in a day or two."
"I shall be glad to hear something, I can assure you," said the old
man, "but in the meantime we will try to forget about it. You have had
a tiring journey, Mr. Burnham, followed by a strange initiation into
what is probably a new sphere of life altogether--the sphere of
mysteries and detectives, and so forth. No, Ronald, we'll give Mr.
Burnham a rest for to-night."
But just as I was congratulating myself that we had escaped from the
painful necessity of putting him off with an evasive answer, if not a
deliberate lie, the butler entered and announced that he had shown
Mr. Hilderman into the library.
"Well, as we are ready, we had better join him," said the old man, and
we adjourned to the other room.
Now if Hilderman should by any tactless remark betray our strange
experience in the afternoon there would be the devil to pay. I
followed the General into the library, beckoning to the American with
a warning finger on my lip. He saw at once what I meant, fortunately,
and held his tongue, and we all talked of general matters for some
little time. Then Hilderman took the bull by the horns.
"As a matter of fact, General," he announced boldly, "I ran over to
have a word with Mr. Ewart about a certain matter which is interesting
us all. I don't suppose you wish me to worry you with details at the
moment?"
"I should be very glad to hear what you have to tell us, Mr.
Hilderman, but unfortunately I--er--I have a few letters I simply
must write, so I hope you will excuse me. My daughter is in the
drawing-room, so perhaps you fellows would care to join her there. Her
counsel will be of more use to you than mine in your deliberations, I
have no doubt."
However, when we looked for her in the drawing-room Myra was not
there, and I found her in her den.
"Why not bring him in here?" she asked. "He won't bite, and it will
be more conducive to a free and easy discussion. I should like to
hear what he has to say for himself in view of his running away this
afternoon, and I shouldn't feel comfortable in the drawing-room with
this shade on. In here I feel that he must just put up with any
curiosities he meets."
So we made ourselves comfortable in the den, and Hilderman sat in a
chair by the window.
"Of course, you know what I have come to speak about, Mr. Ewart," he
began at once. "You must have thought my conduct this afternoon was
very strange--very unsportsmanlike, to say the least."
"Oh, I don't know," I replied as lightly as I could. "It was a very
strange affair, and it rather called for strange conduct of one sort
or another."
"Still, you must have thought it cowardly to run away as quickly as I
could," he insisted.
"It was some time before we even noticed you had left us," I laughed,
"and then, I confess, I couldn't quite make out where you had got to
or why you had gone."
"As a matter of fact we were rather scared," Dennis put in. "We
searched for you in the river."
"It sounds a very cowardly confession to make," Hilderman admitted,
"but I went back to the landing-stage, got into my boat, and cleared
off as quickly as I could. I must ask you to believe that I was under
the impression that it would be best for us all that I should. But my
idea proved to be a bad one and nothing came of it. So here I am to
ask you if you have learned anything or have anything to suggest."
"I'm afraid we're more at a loss than ever now," I admitted. "The
further we get with this thing the less we seem to know about it,
unfortunately."
Hilderman was exceedingly sympathetic, and though he made numerous
suggestions he was as puzzled as we were ourselves. I had some
difficulty in defining his attitude. We knew as much as was sufficient
to hang his friend "Fuller," but I could not make up my mind whether
he really was a friend of von Guernstein's or not. It was a small
thing that decided me. On an occasionable table beside the American
lay a steel paper-knife, a Japanese affair, with a carved handle and a
very sharp blade. Hilderman picked up the knife and toyed with it.
"I should be careful with that, Mr. Hilderman," I advised. "That is a
wolf in sheep's clothing; it's exceedingly sharp."
"Oh, yes!" cried Myra. "If you mean my paper-knife, it ought not
really to be used as a paper-knife at all, the point is like a needle.
I must put it away or hang it up as an ornament."
The American laughed and laid the knife down again on the table, and
we resumed our discussion. Both Dennis and I knew that we must be very
careful to conceal our suspicions, but at the same time we did our
best to reach some sort of conclusion with regard to Hilderman
himself.
"And, I suppose, until you have searched about the Saddle," he
remarked, "you will be no further on as to who stole Miss McLeod's
dog. It seems to me that the dog was taken by the man who wished to
conceal an illicit still, and the green flash, or green ray, or
whatever you call it, is simply a manifestation of some strange
electrical combination in the air."
"I'm afraid we shall have to leave it at that," I said with an
elaborate sigh of regret.
"Not when you have Mr. Burnham's distinguished powers of deduction to
assist you, surely, Mr. Ewart?" said Hilderman, and waited for an
answer.
"Flukes are not very consistent things, I fear," Dennis supplied him
readily, "and if we are to make any progress we shall hardly have time
for idle speculation."
"Fortune might continue to favour you," the American persisted. "Don't
you think it's worth trying?"
"I'm afraid not," said Dennis, with a laugh that added emphasis and
conviction to his statement.
"By the way," Myra suggested, "I don't know if anybody would care for
a whisky and soda or anything. I won't have drinks served in here, but
if anybody would like one, you know where everything is, Ron. I always
say if anyone wants a drink in my den they can go and get it, and
then I know they really like being in the den. You see I'm a woman,
Mr. Hilderman," she laughed.
"I must say I think the idea of refreshment would not enter the head
of anyone who had the pleasure of your company here, Miss McLeod,
unless you suggested it yourself."
We laughed at the rather heavy compliment, and I went into the
dining-room to fetch the decanters, syphons and glasses.
"I'll help you to get them," called Dennis, and followed me out of the
room.
"Well?" I asked as soon as we reached the other room. "What do you
make of it?"
"I'm not sure," Dennis admitted. "I'm puzzled. I shouldn't be
surprised if he turned out to be a Government secret service man
keeping an eye on Fuller-von-Guernstein, and that when he has quite
made up his mind that the mystery of the green ray is connected with
his own business he will show his hand."
"Something of the same sort occurred to Garnesk," I said. "Well,
at present we'd better avoid suspicion and go back before he thinks
we're holding a committee meeting."
So I led the way to the den. I was walking carefully and slowly,
because I was unaccustomed to carrying trays of glasses and things,
and consequently I made no noise. I pushed the door open with my
shoulder, Dennis following with a couple of syphons, and as I did so
I chanced to glance upwards.
In a large mirror which hung over the fireplace I saw the reflection
of Hilderman's face, knitted in a fierce frown, gazing intently at
some object which was outside my view. Myra was talking, though what
she was saying I did not notice. I went into the room and put the tray
on the big table, and as I filled the glasses I looked round casually
to see what Hilderman had been looking at. Lying on the sofa on which
Myra was sitting was the copy of the _Pictures_, open at the page
bearing the incriminating photograph!
I mixed Hilderman's drink according to his instructions--for by this
time he had entirely recovered his equanimity--and handed it to him.
As I did so I happened to look in the direction of the small table
beside him. Myra's Japanese paper-knife was still there, but the point
had been stuck more than an inch into the mahogany top of the table. I
turned away quickly, with a laughing remark to Myra, which did not
seem to raise any suspicion at the time, though I have no recollection
now what it was I said.
A few moments afterwards I quietly and unostentatiously slipped out of
the room. Surely there could be no doubt about it now. The whole thing
was obvious. Hilderman had noticed the paper, jumped to the conclusion
that we suspected everything, and in the sudden access of baffled rage
had picked up the paper-knife and stabbed it into the table.
There was only one possible reason for that--Hilderman was an enemy.
In that case, I thought, he has come here to try and find out how much
we know and to keep an eye on us. Possibly he might be attempting to
keep us there so that Fuller could get up to some satanic trick
elsewhere. I decided to act at once. I turned back to the den and put
my head round the door.
"Will you people excuse me for a bit?" I said lightly. "The General
wants me." And with that I left them. I had almost asked Hilderman not
to go till I came back, but I was afraid it might sound suspicious to
his acute ears. I hardly knew what to do. I should have liked to have
been able to speak with Dennis, if only for a moment. Indeed, I am
quite ready to confess that just then I would have given all I
possessed for ten minutes' conversation with my friend. I stole
quietly out of the house, and thought furiously.
If Hilderman wanted to keep us from spying on Fuller, where was
Fuller? Would I be wiser to wait and try to keep an eye on Hilderman,
or was my best plan to ignore him and try and locate his German
friend? I decided on the latter course. I went back and wrote a short
note to Dennis and slipped it inside his cap.
"I'm convinced they are both enemies. Take care of Myra. I may be out
all night. Don't let her worry about me; I may not be back for some
time, but I shall come back all right.--R."
I left this for my friend, knowing that sooner or later he would find
it, and went down to the landing-stage. The _Baltimore II._ and Myra's
boat, the _Jenny Spinner_, were drawn up alongside, and I realised
that if I took the _Jenny_ I should be raising Hilderman's suspicions
at once. Anchored a little way out was another small motor-boat--the
first the General had--which Myra had also called after a trout
fly--the _Coch-a-Bondhu_--though the play upon words was lost on most
people. The boat was still in constant use, and Angus and Hamish
continually went into Mallaig and Glenelg in it to collect parcels and
so on. I ran to the petrol shed, and got three tins of Shell, put them
in the dinghy and pushed out to the _Bondhu_, climbed on board,
sounded the tank, filled it up, and started out across the Loch. I can
only plead my anxiety to get well out of sight and hearing before
Hilderman should think of leaving the house, as an excuse for my
lamentable thoughtlessness on this occasion. Indeed, it was not till
long afterwards that I realised I had forgotten to anchor the dinghy,
and I left it, just as it was, to drift out to sea on the tide.
I made all the pace I could and reached the other side in about twenty
minutes. I was sadly equipped for an adventurous expedition! I had no
flask to sustain me in case of need, no weapon in case I should be
called to defend myself; I was wearing a dinner-jacket, no hat, and a
pair of thin patent-leather pumps!
I ran the boat right in shore, heedless of the danger to the
propeller, in a small sandy cove round the point, so that I was hidden
from Glasnabinnie. Then I realised that I had been a little too
precipitate in my departure. There was no anchor-chain on board, and
the painter was admirably suited for making fast to pier-heads and
landing-stages at high tide, but was nothing like long enough to
enable me to make the craft secure on short. However, I dragged her as
far up as I could, and prayed that I might be able to return before
the tide caught her up and carried her away. In those circumstances I
should have been stranded in the enemy's country, by no means a
pleasing prospect!
Having done the best I could for Myra's faithful motor-boat, I made my
way round the hill, climbing cautiously upwards all the time, my
dinner-jacket carefully buttoned in case a gleam of moonlight on my
shirt-front should give me away at a critical moment. It was a rocky
and difficult climb, and I soon regretted that I had not taken the
bridle path to Glasnabinnie and made my way boldly up the bed of the
burn. However, it was too late to turn back, and eventually, after one
or two false steps and stumbles, I succeeded in reaching a spot from
which I could obtain a good view of the hut. No, there was no light
there, no sign of movement at all. I decided to work my way round to
the other side and then, if I continued to get no satisfaction, to
descend to the house. The windows of the hut, or smoking-room, as the
reader will no doubt remember, extended the whole length of the
structure; and surely, I thought, if there were a light in the place
it would be bound to be visible. I edged round the face of a steep
crag, floundered across the stream between the two falls, getting
myself soaked above the knees as I did so, and crouched among the
heather on the other side of the building. No, there was no one there,
the place was deserted. I knelt down and peered about me listening
intently.
Not a sound greeted my expectant ear save the incessant rumble of the
falls. Then as I turned my attention to the house itself and looked
down the course of the burn to Glasnabinnie, I could scarcely suppress
a cry of astonishment. For there below me, moving to and fro between
the house and the hut, was a constant procession of small lights, like
a slowly moving stream of glow-worms, twenty or thirty yards apart. I
was rooted to the spot. What could it mean? Was this another weird
natural manifestation, or was it, as was much more likely, a couple of
dozen men bearing lights? Yes, that was it, men bearing lights--and
what else besides? Men don't climb up and down steep watercourses in
the night for the sake of giving an impromptu firework display to an
unexpected visitor, I told myself. There was only one thing to do, and
that was to investigate the matter and chance what might happen to me.
I crept down to the hut, and lay on my face among the heather and
listened. Here and there a mumble of voices, now and then a subdued
shout, apparently an order to be carried out by the mysterious
light-bearers, broken occasionally by the shrill call of a gull,
conveyed nothing to me that I could not see. I looked up at the hut.
No, there was no one there, and the windows were not screened, because
I could see the moonlight streaming through the far side. Yet, surely,
the hut must be their objective, I thought. Where else could they be
going to? Fascinated, I crawled on my hands and knees till I could
touch the walls of the smoking-room by putting out my arm. I heard a
great commotion coming, it seemed, from the very ground beneath my
feet.
I laid my ear to the ground and listened. The noise grew louder, and
the voices seemed to be shouting against a more powerful sound--the
waterfall, possibly. I thought perhaps the floor of the hut would give
me more opportunity to locate the source of the disturbance. I threw
caution to the winds and slipped through the wide windows into the
room. I moved as carefully as I could, however, once my feet found the
floor, for if there should be anyone below they would probably hear me
up above. I turned back the carpet in order to hear more distinctly,
and as I did so I noticed a rectangular shaft of light which trickled
through the floor. There was a trap-door. I knelt down and lifted it
cautiously by a leather tab which was attached to one side of it and
peered through. I can never understand how it was I did not drop that
hatch again with a self-confessing crash when I realised the
extraordinary nature of the sight that greeted my eyes. There was I in
the smoking-hut of a peaceful American citizen, where only a few hours
before I had spent a pleasant hour in friendly conversation, and now I
was lying on the edge of the entrance to a great cavern.
Below me there was a confused mass of machinery and men. Some were
working on scaffolding, others were many feet below. The nearest of
them was so close to me that I could have leaned down and laid my hand
on his head. I tried to make out what they were doing, but except that
they were dismantling the machinery, whatever it might be, I could
make nothing of it. I watched them breathlessly, trembling lest at any
moment one of them should look up and detect my presence.
The place was lighted by electricity, though there were not enough
lamps to illuminate the cavern very brightly, and as my eyes got
accustomed to the lights and shadows I was able to make out the cause
of this.
Evidently there was a turbine engine below, driven by the water from
the falls, which supplied the necessary power. After a moment or two
it dawned on me how the cavern came to be there; it was, or had been,
the course of a hidden river, such as are common enough among the
mountains, but the stream had been diverted, probably by some sort of
landslide, and had left this tumbler-shaped cave, resembling a pit
shaft. Now, I thought, I have only to find out what all this machinery
is for and the whole mystery is solved. I opened the trap a little
further, and allowed my body to hang slightly over the edge.
Then for the first time I saw, to my right, fixed so that it almost
touched the floor of the hut, a great round brass object, mounted on
an enormous tripod, which, again, stood on a platform. In front of
this was a large square thing like a mammoth rectangular condenser,
such as is used for photographic enlarging and other projection
purposes. Had it not been for this condenser I should have taken the
whole thing to be an elaborate searchlight. But, I asked myself, what
would be the good of a searchlight there? Suddenly the whole truth
dawned upon me.
The searchlight must operate through a trap in the wall of the hut
just below the floor. I leaned further in, forgetting my danger in the
intoxication of sudden discovery.
Only a foot or two away from me a man was working on the searchlight.
Carefully taking it to pieces, he was handing the parts to another
man, who was perched on the scaffold below him. He was so close to
me that I could hear him breathing. I was about to wriggle back to
safety when he looked up. He gave a sudden loud shout. I lay there
fascinated. After all, I thought, before they can reach me I can slip
out and edge round the cliff, run down on to the shore, and get away
in the motor-boat. But I had reckoned without my host. Even as the man
shouted, and the others left their work to see what was the matter,
Fuller dashed out from behind the platform, gave one terrified look at
me, and, flinging himself at the wall of the cavern, threw all his
weight on a rope which dangled there. I scuttled to my feet, intending
to make a bolt for it. But the boards shivered beneath me, and, before
I could realise what was happening, I found myself hurtling through
the air to the floor of the cavern below.
CHAPTER XVII.
SOME GRAVE FEARS.
And now, as the reader will readily understand, I must continue the
story as it was afterwards related to me.
Myra, the General, and Dennis sat up and waited for me till the
early hours of the morning, but I did not return. The young people did
what they could to assure the old man that my sudden and unexpected
disappearance had been entirely voluntary, and Dennis, who had found
my note, as soon as he put on his cap to stroll out casually, and see
where I had got to, gave him subtly to understand that it was really
part of a prearranged plan, and Myra at length persuaded him to go to
bed at midnight.
When I failed to put in an appearance at breakfast-time, however, even
they began to be a trifle alarmed, but they did their best to conceal
their fears. They scoured the hillside and then went down to the
landing-stage. Dennis had reported the previous night that the
motor-boat was still in its place when he saw Hilderman off, and it
never occurred to Myra that I might make my departure in the
_Coch-a-Bondhu_.
"He hasn't gone by the sea, any way," Dennis announced again, as he
and the girl stood on the landing-stage.
"You mean the _Jenny_ is still there?" she asked.
"Yes," said Dennis, "she's just where she was when we arrived from
Glasnabinnie in Hilderman's boat yesterday."
"Mr. Burnham!" Myra cried suddenly, "is there another boat, a brown
motor-boat, anchored just out there?"
"No," said Dennis, realising how terribly handicapped they were by
Myra's inability to see.
"Are you sure?" the girl asked anxiously.
"Quite sure," said Dennis positively. "There is one motor-boat here,
and that is all."
"I suppose he took that to put Hilderman off the scent," Myra mused,
"and in that case he is probably quite safe. I daresay he's gone to
look for our friend von What's-his name's yacht or his house at Loch
Duich."
Dennis clutched at the opportunity this theory gave him to allay her
fears, and declared that it was ridiculous of him not to have thought
of it before, and he gave Myra his arm to the house. But he was not at
all satisfied with it, and, as it turned out afterwards, Myra was not
very confident about it either. Dennis knew me well enough to know
that I should never have set out with the deliberate intention of
stopping away overnight without leaving some more definite message for
my _fiancée_. However, their thoughts were speedily diverted, for they
had hardly reached the house before a strange man made his way
towards them through the heather.
"Mr. Ewart, sir?" he asked.
"Do you wish to speak to Mr. Ewart?" Dennis asked cautiously.
"I have a parcel and a message for him from Mr. Garnesk," said the
stranger, a young man, who might have been anything by profession.
"Oh, indeed," said Dennis, his suspicions aroused at once. Garnesk, he
knew, had only arrived in Glasgow the night before.
"I see you are wondering how I got here and why I came down the hill,
instead of up a road of some sort," said the youth with a smile.
"Frankly, I was," Dennis admitted.
"Then, perhaps, I had better explain who I am and how I come to
be here. My name is McKenzie. I am employed by Welton and Delaunay,
the Glasgow opticians, makers of the 'Weldel' telescopes and
binoculars. Mr. Garnesk has a good deal to do with our firm in the
matter of designs for special glasses to withstand furnace heat, for
ironworkers, etc. He arrived at the works last night in a car, and,
after consulting with the manager, they kept a lot of us at work all
night on a new design of spectacles.
"I was sent with this parcel in the early hours of the morning.
There was no passenger train, but Mr. Garnesk got me a military pass
on a fish train, and here I am. I was to deliver the parcel to Mr.
Ewart, or, failing him, to Miss McLeod. When I saw this lady with
the--er--the shade over her eyes I thought you were probably Mr.
Ewart, sir."
"I'm not, as a matter of fact," said Dennis. "But where have you come
from, and why didn't you come up the path?"
"Mr. Garnesk gave me instructions, sir, which I read to the boatman
who brought me here. Mr. Garnesk said I would find several fishermen
at Mallaig who had motor-boats, and would bring me across. He also
gave me this paper, and told me on no account to deviate from the
directions he gave."
Dennis held out his hand for the paper. He glanced through it, and
then read it to Myra.
"Take a motor-boat from Mallaig to Invermalluch Lodge," he read. "Tell
the man to cross the top of Loch Hourn as if he were going to Glenelg,
but when he gets well round the point he is to double back, and land
you as near as he can to the house, but to keep on the far side of the
point. You are on no account to be taken to the landing-stage at the
lodge. When you arrive at the lodge insist on seeing Mr. Ewart, or
Miss McLeod personally, if Mr. Ewart is not there. Then rejoin your
motor-boat, and go on to Glenelg. Wait there for the first boat that
will take you to Mallaig, and come back by the train. Do not return to
Mallaig by motor-boat."
"Those are very elaborate instructions, Mr. Burnham," said Myra. "It
would seem that Mr. Garnesk is very suspicious about something."
"Evidently," Dennis agreed. "You'd better let Miss McLeod have that
parcel," he added to McKenzie. The youth handed him the parcel, and at
Myra's suggestion Dennis opened it. Topmost among its contents was a
letter addressed to me. Dennis tore it open and read it.
"Miss McLeod is to wear a pair of these glasses until I see her again.
She will be able to see through them fairly well, but she must not
remove them. The consequences might be fatal. The three other pairs
are for you and Burnham, and one extra in case of accidents. It will
also come in handy if you take Hilderman into your confidence. Wear
these glasses when you are in any danger of coming in contact with the
green ray. I have an idea that they will act as a decided protection.
I also enclose one Colt automatic pistol and cartridges, the only
one I could get in the middle of the night. If you decide to ask
Hilderman's help tell him everything. I am sure he will be very useful
to you. Keep your courage up, old man! The best to you all. In
haste.--H.G."
"We're certainly learning something," said Dennis, as he finished.
"Obviously Garnesk is very suspicious of somebody, but it's not
Hilderman. He writes as if he were pretty sure of himself. Probably he
has proved his theory about Hilderman being a Government detective."
"I have a message for Mr. Ewart, sir," the messenger interrupted.
"You had better tell it me," Dennis suggested.
"I'd rather Miss McLeod asked me," McKenzie demurred. "Those were Mr.
Garnesk's instructions. He said 'failing Mr. Ewart, insist on seeing
Miss McLeod.'"
"Very well," laughed Myra. "I quite appreciate your point. May I know
the message?"
"Mr. Ewart was to take no notice whatever of anything Mr. Garnesk said
in his letter about Mr. Hilderman. He was on no account to trust Mr.
Hilderman, but to be very careful not to let him see he was suspected.
The gentlemen were always to wear their glasses whenever they were in
sight of the hut above--Glas.--above Mr. Hilderman's house."
"Whew!" Dennis whistled. "But why didn't he----? Oh, I see. He was
afraid the letter might fall into Hilderman's hands."
"I wonder where Ron can have got to?" Myra mused wistfully.
"We're very much obliged to you for all the trouble you have taken,
Mr. McKenzie," said Dennis. "You've done very well indeed."
"Oh, Mr. Garnesk also said that Miss McLeod was to put on her glasses
by the red light."
"Yes; that's important," Dennis agreed. "We'll go up to the house now,
shall we, Miss McLeod?"
"Yes," said Myra, "and Mr. McKenzie must come and have a meal and a
rest, as I'm sure he needs both after his journey. I'll send Angus to
look after the boatman." So the three strolled up to the lodge.
"By the way," said Dennis, "of course it's all right, and you've
carried out your instructions to the letter, but how can you be sure
this is Miss McLeod, and how do you know I'm not Hilderman?"
"Mr. Garnesk described everybody I should be likely to meet," McKenzie
replied, "including Mr. Hilderman and Mr. Fuller. I know you are Mr.
Ewart's friend because you have a small white scar above your left
eyebrow. So, being with you, and wearing a shade and an Indian bangle,
I thought I was safe in concluding the lady was Miss McLeod."
"Garnesk doesn't seem to miss much!" Dennis laughed.
"He made me repeat his descriptions about twenty times," said
McKenzie, "so I felt pretty sure of myself."
When they got up to the lodge, and the messenger's requirements had
been administered to, Dennis unpacked the parcel. The spectacles
proved to be something like motor goggles; they fitted closely over
the nose and forehead, and entirely excluded all light except that
which could be seen through the glass. The only curious thing about
them was the glass itself. Instead of being white, or even blue, it
was red, and the surface was scratched diagonally in minute parallel
lines. Myra and Dennis hurried upstairs, and lighted the lamp in the
dark-room. When the girl came down again she declared that she could
see beautifully. Everything was red, of course, but she could see
quite distinctly.
"Have you any idea why these glasses are ruled in lines like this?"
Dennis asked McKenzie.
"I couldn't say for certain, sir," the youth replied. "But I should
think it was because Mr. Garnesk thought the glasses would be so near
the eye as to be ineffective. In photography, for instance, you can't
print either bromide or printing-out paper in a red light. But if you
coat a red glass with emulsion, and make an exposure on it, you can
print the negative in the usual way. I don't know why it is."
"Perhaps there is no space for a ray to form," Myra suggested.
"You must tell Mr. Garnesk how deeply grateful we all are to him,"
said Dennis. "I'll give you a letter to take back to him. It has been
a wonderfully quick bit of work!"
"I should think he has got some hundreds of the glasses finished by
this time," said McKenzie, "and he has already asked for an estimate
for fifty thousand of them."
"Whatever for?" Myra exclaimed.
"I couldn't say at all, but Mr. Garnesk probably has it all mapped
out. He always knows what he's about."
A couple of hours later McKenzie left for Glenelg, with ample time to
catch his boat, and the others sat down to lunch. Myra was delighted
that she could see, even though everything was red. Just as they had
finished lunch a telegram was delivered to Dennis. It was handed in at
Mallaig, and it read: "Don't worry about me. May be away for a few
days.--EWART."
"Oh, good!" exclaimed Dennis. "A wire from Ron. He's all right. 'Don't
worry about me. May be away for a few days.' Sent from Mallaig. He may
have got something he feels he must tell Garnesk about, and has gone
to Glasgow."
"I expect that's it," Myra agreed. "I'm glad he's wired. I do hope
he'll write from wherever he is to-night. Do you think I shall get a
letter in the morning?"
"Certain to," Dennis vowed, laying the telegram on the mantelpiece.
"He's sure to write, however busy he is."
Though Myra was disappointed that there was no personal message for
her, she tried to believe that everything was all right. Dennis went
on what he called coastguard duty, and watched the sea and shores with
the untiring loyalty of a faithful dog. That night, after dinner, he
went out to keep an eye on things, and left Myra with her father. She
has told me since that she felt miserable that I had not wired to her,
and went to fetch my telegram in order to get what comfort she could
from my message to Dennis. She held the telegram under the light, and
read it through. The words were: "May be away for a few days.--EWART."
She made out the faint pencil writing slowly through the red glass.
She read it twice through, and then suddenly collapsed into an
armchair in the horror of swift realisation. "Ewart!" she whispered,
"Ewart! He would never sign a telegram to Mr. Burnham in that way. If
Ronnie didn't send that wire, who did?"
In a moment she jumped to her feet. She must act, and act quickly.
She ran into the den, and picked up the revolver and cartridges which
Garnesk had sent, and which she had put carefully away until I should
come and claim them. She loaded the revolver, and tucked it in the
pocket of the Burberry coat which she slipped on in the hall. Then she
tore down to the landing-stage, and made straight for Glasnabinnie in
the _Jenny Spinner_. She had got about half a mile when Dennis, coming
up to the top of the cliff on his self-imposed coastguard duties, saw
her and recognised her through his binoculars.
He ran down to the landing-stage, putting on his red glasses as he
went. His horror was complete when he found there was no craft of any
kind about, not even a rowboat. Alas! I had idiotically allowed the
dinghy to drift away. He ran along the shore, every now and then
looking anxiously through his binoculars for any sign of any kind of
boat that would get him over to Glasnabinnie in time to fulfil his
promise of looking after "Ron's little girl."
Myra has since admitted--and how proud I was to hear her say it--that
she forgot about everything and everybody except that I was in danger,
and probably Hilderman knew something about it. Her one thought was to
hold the pistol to his head and demand my safe return.
She came ashore a little beyond the house, having made a rather wide
detour, so that she should not be seen. She knew the best way to the
hut, and there was a light in it. She thought Hilderman would be
there. She had passed well to seaward of the _Fiona_, and noticed that
she was standing by with steam up. Myra climbed the hill to the hut
with as much speed as she could.
Hilderman was standing below the door of the smoking-room talking to
three men. She knew that she would have no chance, even with a
revolver, against four men. She might hurt one of them, but she
recognised, fortunately, that the others would overpower her.
Eventually Hilderman went into the hut, and two of the men stayed
outside talking. The other went down the hill. It was in watching
this man that Myra saw the sight that had astonished me, the
continuous stream of lights down the bed of the burn. She waited, so
she said it seemed, for hours and hours, before she could see a real
chance of attacking Hilderman.
Indeed, neither she nor Dennis can give any very clear idea precisely
how long it was that she waited there, but it must have been a
considerable time. At last Hilderman was alone. Myra crept to the edge
of the little plateau on which the hut stood, and then made a dash for
the door. She thrust it open and stepped inside, pulling it to behind
her. Hilderman sprang to his feet with an oath as he saw her.
"Heavens!" he cried. "You!"
Myra drew the revolver and presented it at him.
"Put up your hands, Mr. Hilderman," she said, with a calmness that
astonished herself, "and tell me what you have done with Ronnie--Mr.
Ewart."
"I must admit you've caught me, Miss McLeod!" Hilderman replied. "I
can only assure you that your _fiancé_ is safe."
"Where is he?" Myra asked.
"He is quite close at hand," Hilderman assured her, "and quite safe.
What do you want me to do?"
"You must set him free at once," said Myra quietly.
"And if I refuse?"
"I shall shoot you and anyone else who comes near me."
"Now look here, Miss McLeod," said Hilderman, "I may be prepared to
come to terms with you. If you shot me and half a dozen others it
would not help you to find Mr. Ewart. On the other hand, it would be
awkward for us to have a lot of shooting going on, and I have no wish
to harm Mr. Ewart. If I produce him, and allow you two to go away, are
you prepared to swear to me that you will neither of you breathe a
word of anything you may know to any living soul for forty-eight
hours? I think I can trust you."
Myra thought it over quickly.
"Yes," she said, "if you will----"
But she never finished the sentence. At that moment someone caught her
wrist in a grip of steel, and wrenched the pistol from her.
"Come, come, Miss McLeod," said Fuller. "This is very un-neighbourly
of you."
Myra looked round her in despair. There must be some way out of this.
She cudgelled her brains to devise some means of getting the better of
her captives. Fuller laid the pistol on the table and sat down.
"You need not be alarmed," he said. "We shall not hurt you. You will
be left here, that is all. And we shall get safely away. After this we
shall not be able to leave your precious lover with you, but Hilderman
insists that he shall not be hurt, and we shall take him to Germany
and treat him as a prisoner of war."
Then Myra had an inspiration. She turned her head towards Fuller, as
if she were looking about two feet to the right of his head.
"You may as well kill me as leave me here," she said calmly.
"Nonsense," said Hilderman. "If we leave you here, and see that you
have no means of getting away by sea, you will have to find your way
across the hills or round the cliffs. There is no road, and by the
time you return to civilisation we shall be clear."
"That's very thoughtful of you," said Myra. "You bargain on my falling
over a precipice or something. A blind girl would have a splendid
chance of getting back safely!"
"Good heavens!" Hilderman cried. "I thought you must be able to see.
Fuller, this means that that fellow Burnham came with her, and is
close at hand. What in the name----"
But he, too, was interrupted, for a great, gaunt figure flashed like
some weird animal through the window. A long bare arm reached over
Fuller's shoulder and snatched the pistol.
"Yes, Mr. Burnham is with her," said Dennis quietly, as he stood in
front of them, stripped to the waist, the water pouring off him in
streams, and covered them with the revolver.
Hilderman and Fuller von Guernstein held up their hands as requested.
"This is very awkward," said Fuller. "We shall have to let that
wretched Ewart go."
And then Dennis swayed, threw up his arms, and fell sideways, full
length on the floor. Myra glanced at him, and threw herself on her
knees beside the prostrate form.
"Dead!" she screamed. "_Dead!_"
Hilderman pushed her gently aside, and knelt down to examine Dennis.
"It's his heart," he announced. "Come Hugo. We're safe now, and the
girl's blind. Let's get away."
CHAPTER XVIII.
THE TRUTH REVEALED.
I will here resume my own narrative.
When I came to myself I was dazed and aching, but, so far as I could
discover, there were no bones broken. The curious part about it was
the rapidity with which I recalled my fall into the cavern. When I
found I could move my limbs freely I sat up, and discovered that I was
in a small cabin on board a steamer. I stood up and stretched myself.
I was feeling weak and ill, but that would pass off I thought. A
minute's speculation decided me that I was on board the _Fiona_, in
which case I was shanghaied.
I knew that if I valued my life I must act at once. I opened the door
of the cabin, and was surprised to find that it was unlocked. Then I
crept cautiously in the shadows of the dawn up the companion-ladder to
the deck. Though I heard voices I could see no one close to me. I
stole along the deck and listened. The voices were talking quite
freely in German. Where could we be? And, more important still, where
were we going?
I looked around me, and saw that we were steaming slowly down a narrow
loch, surrounded by mountains which stretched right down to the
shores. I looked across the deck and almost shouted out in my
surprise. For there, moving gracefully alongside of us, was a
submarine. There were two officers on the deck of the submarine
chatting with Hilderman and Fuller, who were leaning over the rail of
the _Fiona_. A submarine! A German submarine in a peaceful Scottish
loch! Then this was the secret base we had discussed. I looked up at
the wheel-house. In front of it was the very searchlight, with its
curious condenser that I had seen in the cavern.
What could it mean? I decided to slip overboard unseen, if possible,
swim to the shore, and get back over the rocks to the mouth of the
loch, and give the alarm if I should be fortunate enough to attract
the attention of any passing steamer.
But suddenly an idea struck me. I crept quickly up the ladder to the
deckhouse, threw my arms round the man at the wheel, flung him down on
to the deck, and swung the wheel round with all the strength I had in
me. There was a dull, crunching sound as the yacht lurched round. A
groaning shiver shook her, and, if I may be pardoned the illustration,
it felt exactly as if the ship were going to be sick. There were
hoarse cries from the men, and as the _Fiona_ righted herself I looked
astern. There was a frothy, many-coloured effervescence of oil and
water.
The submarine had disappeared! The yacht was nearing the head of the
loch. It was now or never. I made a dash for the side, but Fuller was
before me. He tripped me up, and I fell heavily to the deck, bruising
myself badly and giving my head a terrible bump. I put up my arm in a
last feeble attempt to defend myself. Fuller's hands closed on my
throat and nearly choked the life out of me, and as I sank back,
struggling for breath, a loud cry rang out from Hilderman.
"Guernstein! Guernstein!" he yelled.
Fuller let me go and ran to Hilderman. I lifted myself on my elbow.
Somehow or other I would crawl to the side, and get away before he
came back to finish me, but as I looked out over the stern I was
rooted to the spot by the sight that met my eyes. Or was I deluding
myself with the fantastic delirium of a dying man? Not four hundred
yards away was a motor-boat. It was Hilderman's _Baltimore II._, and
in it were Myra, my poor Myra, and Garnesk and Angus, all wearing
motor-goggles. But, strangest of all, a British destroyer was puffing
serenely behind them. No, I must be dreaming. Garnesk had told me he
was sending glasses for Myra. He had mentioned his connection with the
naval authorities. This must be the nightmare of death-agony.
Then Fuller rushed up the wheel-house ladder and jumped on to the
searchlight platform. Suddenly there flashed out on the grey light of
the dawn a vivid green ray. So, then, the mystery was solved--but,
alas! too late. The green ray was produced by a searchlight, and every
man on the destroyer would be blind. I looked back, and as I did so I
remembered, with an uncanny distinctness, old General McLeod's words,
"The rock came to me." The warship seemed suddenly to grow double its
size, and then double that, and so on, growing bigger and bigger until
it appeared to fill the entire loch, and spread out the whole length
of the horizon. I could even see a gold signet-ring on the finger of a
young officer on the bridge. I looked round at the details of the
boat; it stood out in amazing clearness. If one man on that ship,
hundreds of yards away, had opened his mouth I could have counted his
teeth. Suddenly I gasped with astonishment as I awoke to the fact that
every man on board the destroyer was wearing motor-goggles! I had no
time to speculate about this new surprise, for then the _Fiona_, left
to her own devices, suddenly crashed ashore. The ship shook and
shivered, and Fuller was thrown on his face beside the searchlight,
and as I looked again the destroyer had resumed its normal
proportions.
Then the crew of the _Fiona_ rushed about the deck in mad terror,
until, evidently at the wise suggestion of one of their number, they
decided to wait calmly and give themselves up. Hilderman, closely
followed by Fuller, sprang ashore, and made for the mountains. Half a
dozen shots rang out from the destroyer, and a rifle bullet checked
Fuller's progress before he had gone more than a few yards.
Hilderman, however, managed to reach the shelter of a ridge of rock,
and I watched him as he scuttled up the mountain side, and made
straight for a long grey rock which protruded from the foot of a steep
crag. And as I looked, and saw him go to the rock and open a door in
it, I realised that it was really a great, grey, lean-to shed,
cunningly concealed. Hilderman had scarcely opened the door when a
huge, dark shadow seemed to fall out of the shed and envelop him. It
was Sholto. Blind, and half-mad with fury, he sprang at Hilderman's
throat with the unerring aim of his breed. The wretched man staggered
and fell, and Sholto----.
I turned away from the sickening sight, and looked over the side, and
saw Myra standing up, waving to me, as they drew alongside the wrecked
_Fiona_.
And then I'm afraid I must have fainted.
* * * * *
I lay on the sofa in Myra's den, and Myra--God bless her!--was
kneeling beside me. Sholto was with us too, looking incredibly wise in
a pair of motor-goggles.
"So you see, darling," said Myra, "the glasses cured me completely,
and I can see just as well as ever." And I shall not repeat what I
said in reply to such glorious news.
"Tell me, dear," I asked shortly, "what exactly happened with Dennis?
I haven't quite got that."
"Well, he saw me on my way to Glasnabinnie," she explained, "and was
determined to follow. He couldn't find a boat of any kind, so he swam!
Angus saw him in the water and ran and told daddy. When they found
there was no boat they went and fetched the one on the loch, carried
it down to the sea, and called Hamish. Then they pulled across. Then,
you see, when Dennis had his heart attack, I thought he was only
pretending. I thought he saw that we should never be able to get away
again, and that if he pretended to be dead they would leave us alone.
So I followed his lead. I was terribly frightened when I couldn't make
him answer me after they had gone, but before I could do anything
daddy and the men arrived. Angus stopped with me, and told me where
the _Fiona_ had gone. We took the _Baltimore_ because she is much
faster than our boat. He must have been a duffer to lose that race we
had. And then daddy and Hamish took Dennis--I refuse to call him Mr.
Burnham after this--and brought him here and sent for Dr. Whitehouse."
"I'm thankful he's out of danger," I said fervently.
"But the doctor says he must take it very, very gently for a long
time, and he won't be able to walk much for months. Did he know he
had this heart trouble?"
I had scarcely finished explaining the extent of Dennis's heroism when
Garnesk arrived.
"Hilderman's dead!" he said. "He made a full confession. It seems he
is a German, and his name's von Hilder. He has lived most of his life
in America. He is a brilliant physicist, and has done some big things
with electricity and light. He was here to prepare the submarine base
you found, and he also got on with a new invention--The Green Ray. Of
course he didn't give the secret of that away, but we have the
searchlight, and I have already tumbled to it partly. It is
practically a new form of light.
"It is formed by passing violet and orange rays through tourmaline and
quartz respectively. The accident to Miss McLeod was their first
intimation of its blinding properties, and to the end he knew nothing
about the suffocation part of it. I find by experiment that when the
two rays are switched on simultaneously the air does not become
de-oxygenised, but when you put the violet ray first it does, and it
remains so until the orange ray is applied. The effect that Hilderman
imagined, and succeeded in producing, was a ray of light which should
so alter the relative density of the air as to act as a telescope.
He's done it, and it's one of the finest achievements of science.
However, I have a piece of wonderful news for you."
"What is it?" we both demanded at once.
"The Secret of the Green Ray is ours, and ours alone. Hilderman has
admitted that the reason why they did not clear it out at the first
sign of suspicion was that, in their final calculations, they were
unsure of their figures. That means, put popularly, that though he
knew what he was trying to do, and how he meant to do it, the actual
result was something of a fluke. It very often is with inventors. They
had no drawings that they could rely on to make another searchlight
by, so they were bound to take the whole thing back with them. They
could send no figures, because the relative distances and other
quantities baffled them. They could not take the searchlight back in
pieces, because if any piece had been broken they might not have been
able to reconstruct the proportions with critical accuracy, as we say.
So what was to have been Germany's hideous weapon of war is now ours.
We have a searchlight which acts as a telescope, which will pierce the
deepest fog, and which will dispel the most ungodly poisonous gases
ever invented. You can see for yourself that no gas could make headway
against the atmosphere you encountered the other day. Armies and
navies will be absolutely powerless to advance against it. The green
ray is the fourth arm of military power. So you see what you've done
for your country, you lucky dog!"
"_I!_" I cried. "I like that! I've had less to do with it than
anyone. What about you, eh?--coming running up with a gunboat at the
critical moment. How did you manage that?"
"Well," he replied, "as soon as I was in the train on my way back I
solved the problem of the fateful hour--with your help, of course. You
pointed out that only then was the whole of the gorge flooded with
sunshine. Now, it struck me that, if it were not electricity, it would
be heat or some other form of light. Then it flashed into my mind that
if it were done from a searchlight possessed of some devilish
properties the light would not be visible, but the properties would
continue to act. _Voilà!_ Then I had already--also with your help--had
some doubt of von Hilder; and the hut was _the_ place from which a
searchlight would operate on the river. As soon as I got out of the
train I taxied to my naval chief, under whom I am working throughout
the war, and simply paralysed him with the whole yarn. I pitched him
such a tale that he got through to the gunboat to stand by at Mallaig.
They were at Portree, nice and handy. I rushed and got the glasses
done for the men, picked up the destroyer at Mallaig, and made round
here to find out what was happening. Then we sighted Miss McLeod and
Angus, and you know the rest. Miss McLeod refused to take the shelter
the warship offered, and Angus refused to leave her, so I stayed with
them. We acted as pilot-boat, and there you are. That's the lot! Are
you satisfied?"
"I'm satisfied, old man," I said, holding out my hand. "Some day I'll
try and tell you _how_ satisfied."
"Oh, that's all right," he laughed, and left us in great spirits to
return to the searchlight.
And so I was left alone with Myra, who a month ago became my wife. For
my services rendered in connection with the remarkable affair I
received an appointment in the Naval Intelligence Department, while
many of our recent successes on land and on sea have, though the truth
has been withheld from the public, been due to the employment of The
Green Ray.
THE END.
_Printed in Great Britain by Wyman & Sons, Ltd., London and Reading._
TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE:
Minor changes have been made to correct typesetter's errors; otherwise,
every effort has been made to remain true to the author's words and
intent.
End of Project Gutenberg's The Mystery of the Green Ray, by William Le Queux
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