CHAPTER IVTHE FACE IN THE THICKETWhen the three friends arrived at the inn it was full to the door. Rogers, wigless again, caught sight of Warrender over the heads of the crowd, and came from behind the counter, edging his way outwards through the press of villagers."Missus have got the rooms shipshape, sir," he said. "She's a rare woman for making a man comfortable.""I'm sure she is," returned Warrender, "and I'm only sorry we shan't know it by personal experience. The fact is, we're going to camp on No Man's Island; there's plenty of time before sunset to fix ourselves up.""She'll be main sorry, that she will," said the innkeeper, pocketing the two half-crowns Warrender handed him. "No Man's Island, did 'ee say? Maybe you haven't heard what folk do tell?""We have heard something, but I dare say it's just talk, you know. Anyhow, we're going to try it, and we'll let you know in the morning how we get on.""Now, Rogers--drat the man!" cried his wife's voice from behind. She came out into the porch, flourishing his wig. "How many times have I told 'ee I won't have 'ee showing yourself without your hair? If you do be a great baby, there's no need for 'ee to look like one."Rogers meekly allowed her to adjust the wig, explaining meanwhile the intention of the expected guests. She received the news with disappointment and concern."I hope nothing ill will come o't," she said. "Fists bain't no mortal use against spirits; 'twould be like hitting the wind. Howsomever, the young will always go their own gait. 'Tis the way o' the world." She went back into the inn."That furriner chap was hurt more in his temper than his framework," said Rogers. "And knowing what furriners be, I'd keep my weather eye open. There's too many of 'em in these parts.""I understand they're servants of Mr. Pratt; they should be fairly respectable.""Ay, that's where 'tis. A gentleman must do as he likes, and we haven't got nothing to say to't. But we think the more. And I own I was fair cut up when my sister Molly married the cook; a little Swiss feller he is.""We saw him up at the post office a while ago; the shopwoman inquired after your sister, I remember.""And well she might. I never see the girl nowadays; girl, I say, but she's gone thirty, old enough to know better. By all accounts Rod's uncommon clever at the vittles, and the crew down yonder be living on the fat of the land, while the skipper's a-dandering round in furren parts.""Mr. Pratt's away from home, then?""Ay sure. He haven't been seen a good while, and 'tis just like him to go off sudden-like. You'd expect he'd be tired of it at his time o' life, but 'tis once a wanderer, always a wanderer. Well, the evening's getting on, so I won't keep 'ee. Good luck, sir."Warrender rejoined his companions, who had taken over the boat from the ferryman, and they were soon floating down on the current. They took the narrow channel on the left of the island which they had avoided on the way up, and found it less difficult to navigate than it had appeared at the other end. The dusk was deepening beneath the trees, but in a few minutes they discovered a wide open space that offered more accommodation than they needed. Running the boat close to the shore, they sprang to land, moored to a tree overhanging the stream, and set to work with a will to make their preparations for the night.The clearing was carpeted with long grass, damp from yesterday's rain, and encircled by dense undergrowth, thicket, and bramble. They pitched the tent in the centre, beat down a stretch of grass in front of it on which to place the stove and the bulk of their impedimenta, and by the time that darkness enwrapped them had everything in order. The moon, almost at full circle, had risen early, and soon, peering over the tree-tops on the mainland, flung her silver sheen into the enclosure, whitening the tent to a snowy brilliance and throwing into strong relief the massed foliage beyond. A light breeze set the leaves quivering with a murmurous rustle. The hour and the scene made an appeal to Pratt's sentimental soul too strong to be resisted. Opening one of the folding chairs, he lay back in it with crossed legs, gazed up into the serene, star-flecked heavens, and began with gentle touches of his strings to serenade the moon.Warrender, having slipped on his overalls, kindled a lamp and went down to tinker with his engine. Unmusical Armstrong, always accused by Pratt of being "fit for treasons, stratagems, and spoils," sauntered, hands in pockets, across the clearing. Elbowing his way through the undergrowth he found, after some fifty or sixty yards, that the vegetation thinned. The lesser shrubs gave way to trees, which grew close together, but with a regularity that suggested planting on a definite plan. Pursuing his way, he came by and by to a more spacious clearing than the one he had quitted; and on the left, in the midst of what had evidently been at one time a small garden, he saw the shell of a two-storeyed cottage. The walls were covered with creepers growing in rank disorder; the windows gaped, empty of glass; the doorless entrance shaped a rectangle of blackness; and bare rafters, shaggy with unpruned ivy, drew parallel lines upon the inky gloom of half the upper storey. Ruins, in daylight merely picturesque, take a new beauty in the cold radiance of the moon, but present at the same time an image of all that is desolate and forlorn. Practical, unemotional as Armstrong was, he thrilled to the impression of vacuity and abandonment, and stood for a while at gaze, as though unwilling to disturb the loneliness.Presently, however, he stepped lightly across the unmown lawn, and the moss-grown path beyond, and, entering the doorway, struck a match and looked around. From the narrow hall--strewn with fragments of brick and mortar, broken tiles, heaps of plaster, and here and there spotted with fungi--sprang the staircase, whole as to the stairs, but showing gaps in the banisters. Curling strips of torn discoloured paper hung from the walls. The match went out; through the open roof the stars glimmered. Deciding to defer exploration till daylight, lest a tile or brick should fall on his head, or the staircase give way under him, Armstrong turned to go out. As he did so he was aware of a low moaning sound, such as a person inside a house may hear when a high wind soughs under the eaves. It rose and fell in cadences eerily mournful, as though the spirit of solitude itself were lonely and in pain. Armstrong shivered and sought the doorway, and as he felt how gentle was the breeze he met, he wondered at its having power enough to produce such sounds. The moaning ceased; he listened for a moment or two; it did not recur, though the zephyr had not sensibly dropped. Puzzled, he started to retrace his way to the camp. At the farther side of the clearing the melancholy sound once more broke upon his car. Almost involuntarily he wheeled round to look back at the cottage; then, impatient with himself, turned again to quit the scene.His feeling, which was neither awe nor timorousness, but rather a vague discomfort, left him as soon as his active faculties were again in play. Pushing his way through the undergrowth, he was inclined to deride his unwonted susceptibility. All at once, however, without sound or any other physical fact to account for it, he was seized with the fancy that some one was behind him. Does every human being move in the midst of an invisible, intangible aura, that acts as a sixth sense? Whatever the truth may be, certain it is that we have all, at one time or another, been conscious of the proximity of some bodily presence, which neither sight nor sound nor touch has revealed.Armstrong swung quickly round, and started, for there in the thicket, within a dozen yards of him, a shaft of moonlight struck upon a face, pallid amidst the green. It disappeared in a flash."Who's there?" called Armstrong, sharply; then impulsively started forward, parting the foliage.There was no answer, nobody to be seen. Indeed, within a yard of him the thicket was so dense, so closely overarched by loftier trees, that no ray of moonshine percolated into its pitchy blackness.Holding the branches apart, peering into the gloom, he listened. Overhead the leaves softly rustled; within the thicket there was not a murmur. He let the branches swing back; stood for a few moments irresolute; then, with an impatient jerk of the shoulders, strode away towards the camp.Armstrong was not what the pathologist would call a nervous subject. His physical courage had never been questioned; in his healthy life of work and play his moral courage had never been called upon; his lack of imagination had saved him from the tremors and terrors that prey upon the more highly strung.To find himself mentally disturbed was a novel experience; it filled him with a sense of humiliation and self-contempt; it enraged him. Thoughts of Pratt's mocking glee when the tale should be told made him squirm. "I say, the old bean's seen a spook"--he could hear the light, ringing tones of Pratt's voice, see the bubbling merriment in his large, round eyes. "I swear itwasa face!" he angrily told himself. "Dashed if I don't come in daylight and hunt for the fellow--some tramp, I expect, who finds a lodging gratis in the ruins."By the time he reached the camp he had made up his mind to say nothing about the incident. Emerging into the silent clearing, he saw Pratt and Warrender side by side on their chairs, fast asleep, the latter with folded arms and head on breast, the former holding his banjo across his knees, his face, the image of placid happiness, upturned to the sky. Apparently the swish of Armstrong's boots through the long grass penetrated to the slumbering consciousness of the sleepers. Warrender lifted his head, unclosed his eyes for a moment, muttered "Hallo!" and slept again. Pratt, without moving, looked lazily through half-shut eyelids."'O moon of my delight, who know'st no wane!'" he murmured. "Well, old bean, seen the spook?""Rot!" growled Armstrong."I believe you have!" cried Pratt, starting up, his face kindling. "What's she like?""Ass!""Well, whatdidyou see? You don't, as a rule, snap for nothing. I'll say that for you. Only cats will scratch you for love. What's upset the apple-cart?""I saw the ruined cottage, if you want to know--a ghastly rotten hole. I'm dead tired--I'm going to turn in.""All right, old chap; you shall have a lullaby." He struck an arpeggio."Sing me to sleep, the shadows fall;Let me forget the world and all;Lone is my heart, the day is long;Would it were come to evensong!Sing me to sleep, your hand in mine----"Armstrong had fled into the tent."I say, Warrender," murmured Pratt, nudging the somnolent form at his side, "something's put the old sport in a regular bait.""Eh?" returned Warrender, drowsily."Armstrong's got the pip. Never knew him like this. Something's curdled the milk.""Well, it's time to turn in," said Warrender, rising and stretching himself. "He'll be all right in the morning. Good-night.""Same to you. I suppose I must follow you, but it's so jolly under this heavenly moon."And Warrender, undressing within the tent, smiled as he heard the lingerer's pleasant voice."Dark is life's shore, love, life is so deep:Leave me no more, but sing me to sleep."CHAPTER VTHE GAME BEGINSFor all his loquacity, his gamesomeness of temper, Pratt was not without a modicum of discretion. Next morning, when they had taken their swim and were preparing breakfast, he did not revive the subject of spooks, or make any allusion to Armstrong's ill-humour. Armstrong, for his part, always at his best in the freshness of the early hours, had thrown off the oppression of the night, and appeared his cheerful, vigorous, rather silent self."You fellows," said Warrender, as they devoured cold sausages and a stale loaf, "after I've overhauled the engine, I think of pulling up stream in the dinghy and getting some new bread at the village----""Rolls, if you can," Pratt interpolated."And some butter and cheese, etcetera. Now we're on this island, we may as well explore it. You can do that while I'm away.""And hand you a neatly written report of our discoveries. All right, Mr. President.""I shan't be gone more than about a couple of hours.""Unless you get another tinkering job. By the way, why not call at old Crawshay's, and ask if she got home safe? I think that would be a very proper thing to do, and the old buffer would appreciate it. Good for evil, you know; coals of fire; turning the other cheek, and all that.""You can turn your own cheek, Percy. You've got enough of it.""Do you allude to my facial rotundity, which is Nature's gift, or to my urbanity of manner, my----""Dry up, man. It's too early in the morning for fireworks. So long."Pratt gave a further proof of his tact when he started with Armstrong on their tour of exploration. Instead of striking southward, in the direction of the ruins, he set off to the north-west. "The island's so small," he reflected, "that we are bound to work round to that cottage, and then----"Daylight showed the undergrowth dense indeed, but not so impenetrable as it had seemed overnight. At the cost of a few scratches from bramble bushes laden with ripening blackberries, they pushed their way through to the western shore, overlooking the broader channel and the right bank of the river; then they turned south, zigzagging to find the easiest route.Hitherto, except for the whirr of a bird, or the scurry of some small animal, they had neither seen nor heard anything betokening that the island had any other visitors than themselves. But not long after their change of course they came to a spot where the grass had recently been trampled."Oh, poor Robinson Crusoe!" hummed Pratt."Here's a wire snare," exclaimed Armstrong. "Some one's rabbiting.""Very likely Siren Rush," Pratt returned. "It wasn't original malice that prompted him to warn us against the island, but a sophisticated fear of competition. I dare say he made tons of money out of rabbits in the lean time during the war; skinned them and the shop people too!"Armstrong let this pass; the face he had seen for a brief moment overnight had not recalled the leering countenance of the poacher.They went on, skirted the southern shore, and turned northward. Presently Pratt caught a glimpse through the trees of the roof of the ruined cottage. He did not mention it, but struck to the right towards the narrow channel, and led the way as close as possible to its brink. A minute or two later, in a shallow indentation of the shore, they discovered the remains of a small pier or landing-stage. The planks had rotted or broken away; only a few moss-covered piles and cross-stretchers were left, still, after what must have been many years, defying the destructive energy of the stream that swirled around them. Through the channel, at this spot contracted to half its average width, the swollen river poured with the force of a millrace."The old chap kept a boat, evidently," said Pratt. "There ought to be a path from here to the house, but there's no sign of one. Let's strike inland, and see if we can trace it somewhere."They pushed through the thicket, here as closely tangled as anywhere else, and emerging suddenly into the wilderness garden, in which perennial plants were stifling one another, they saw the ruined cottage before them."Jolly picturesque," said Pratt, halting. "I dare say distance lends enchantment to the view; no doubt it's a pretty dismal place inside; but the sunlight makes a gorgeous effect with those old walls. The creepers running over warm red bricks--it's a harmony of colour, old man. I'd like to make a sketch of it.""Houses were built to be lived in," grunted Armstrong.Pratt made no reply at once. For the moment the schoolboy was sunk in the artist. He let his eyes linger on the spectacle--the broken roof; the one gable that here survived; the creepers straggling round it and over the glassless window of the room beneath; the heap of shattered brick-work at the base, half-clothed with greenery and gay with flowers."Of course, it looked very different by moonlight," he said at last. "You'd lose all the colour. Still----""I saw it from the other side," said Armstrong. "That won't please you so much--it's not so much ruined.""Well, let's go and see."He was leading through the riot of untended flowers, Armstrong close behind him, when he stopped suddenly, and in a tone of voice involuntarily subdued, asked--"Did you see that?"[image]"'DID YOU SEE THAT?'""What?" said Armstrong, starting in spite of himself."A figure--something--I don't know; at the back of the room."The sunlight, slanting from the south-east, shone full upon the cottage, but left the back of one of the rooms on the ground floor shadowed by the screen of creepers falling over the gaping window."Well, suppose there was, why the mysterious whisper?" said Armstrong, his own doubts and remembered tremors disposing him to ridicule Pratt's excitement. "Why shouldn't there be some one there?Weare here--why not others?""Yes, but--well, I didn't expect it. Perhaps you did.""It may have been only the shadow of the creeper on the wall.""It may have been your grandmother! Let's get into the place and have a look round. The window's too high to climb; is the door open?""There's no door.""So much the better. Come on."They hastened to the front, and through the doorway into the hall. The house was silent as a tomb. On either side opened a doorless room. They entered the one on the right--that in which Pratt had believed he saw a moving figure. It was pervaded by a subdued greenish sunlight, becoming misty by reason of the dust their footsteps had stirred up. It held neither person nor thing. They crossed to the opposite room, which, being out of the sunshine, was in deep gloom. This, too, was empty. Passing the staircase they arrived at the back premises, a stone-flagged kitchen and scullery. Both were bare; even the grate had been removed."Now for upstairs," said Pratt. "They've made a clean sweep down here."They mounted the staircase, at first treading carefully, then with confident steps as they found that the creaking stairs were sound. There were four rooms on the upper storey, two of them exposed to the sky. Of these the floors were thick with blown leaves, twigs, birds' feathers, fragments of tiles and bricks, broken rafters, and the debris of the ceiling. The other two, roofed and whole, were as bare as the rooms below. Through the empty casement of one they caught sight of the tower in the grounds of Mr. Ambrose Pratt's house, and the upper windows and roof of the house itself. Pratt's appreciative eye was instantly seized by the prospect--the foreground of low thicket; the glistening stream; the noble trees beyond, springing out of a waving sea of sun-dappled bracken; the gentle slope on whose summit stood the buildings, and in the far background the rolling expanse of purple moorland. For the moment he forgot the shadowy figure he had seen, and lingered as if unwilling to miss one detail of the enchanting landscape."There's no one here," said Armstrong, matter-of-fact as ever."I dare say it was an illusion. Look how the sunlight catches the ripples, Jack. And did you see that kingfisher flash between the banks?""I'll go and have another look downstairs," Armstrong responded. "I'll give you a call if I find anything."He felt, as he went down, that perhaps he would have done better to be candid with Pratt. Why make any bones about an incident capable, no doubt, of a simple explanation? The tramp, if tramp he was, had, of course, the objection of his kind to being found on enclosed premises, even though they were a ruin. Yet it was strange that he had left no tracks--had he not? Armstrong was suddenly aware of something that had hitherto escaped him. There was no dust, no litter on the stairs. Singular phenomenon in a long-deserted house! And surely the floor of the room in which Pratt now stood, unlike the other floors, was clear. It, and the staircase, must have been swept. Why? Not for tidiness--no tramp would bother about that. For what, then? Secrecy? Dusty floors would leave tell-tale marks--and with the thought Armstrong hurried down to the room in which the figure had been seen, and examined the floor. Yes! besides the footprints of himself and Pratt between door and window, there were others along the wall at the back of the room. The fellow must have slipped out with the speed of a hare. Armstrong perceived at once the clumsiness of the attempt at secrecy, for the very fact that some of the floors were swept gave the game away. At the same time, he was puzzled to account for the man's motive. The island was deserted; it was no longer the scene of picnics; the villagers avoided it; why then should a casual visitor--for there was no evidence of continuous occupation--be at the pains even to try to cover up his movements? The strange oppression of the previous night returned upon Armstrong's mind, and he roamed about the lower floor in a mood of curious expectancy.He came once more to the kitchen, and noticed that between it and the scullery was a closed door--the only door that remained in the house. Instinctively bracing himself, he turned the handle; the door opened, disclosing a dark hole and a downward flight of stone steps. He went down into the darkness, at the foot of the steps struck a match, and found himself in a low, spacious cellar, empty except for a strewing of coal dust. As the match flickered out he caught sight of something white in a corner. Striking another, he crossed the floor and picked up a jagged scrap of paper, slightly brown along one edge. At the same moment he observed a little heap of paper ashes.Throwing down the match he trod upon it, and turned, intending to examine the paper in the daylight above. Pratt's voice shouting, and a sound of some one leaping down the staircase to the hall, caused him to spring up the steps two at a time."What's up?" he shouted back, unable to distinguish Pratt's words.He reached the hall just in time to see Pratt dash through the doorway and sprint at headlong pace towards the river. Stuffing the paper into his pocket, Armstrong doubled after him. Pratt was already plunging into the thicket, and, when Armstrong came within sight of the channel, the other had flung off his cap and blazer, and was diving into the stream.[image]"THE OTHER WAS DIVING INTO THE STREAM.""What mad trick----"He cut short his exclamation, for his long strides had brought him to the pier, and he saw the cause of Pratt's desperate haste. The motor-boat, broadside to the stream, was drifting down the channel. Already it was some thirty yards beyond the spot where Pratt had taken the water, and Pratt was swimming after it with the ease of a water-rat.Feeling that there was no reason why himself should get soaked too, Armstrong forged his way through the vegetation at the brink of the channel, but made slow progress compared with the swimmer. Pratt was rapidly overhauling the boat. Watching him, instead of his own steps, Armstrong tripped over a creeper, and fell headlong. By the time he had picked himself up, Pratt had disappeared. Armstrong's momentary anxiety was banished by the sight of the boat moving slowly in towards the shore of the island."Good man," he shouted. "You headed it off splendidly."Pushing and swimming, Pratt was evidently making strenuous efforts to drive the boat into the bank before the current swept it past the island. If he failed, Armstrong saw that he would have to change his tactics and run it ashore on the left bank--his uncle's property. It would then be necessary for Armstrong to swim across, for Pratt had never taken the trouble to learn the working of the engine."Stick it, old man," he called.In a few moments more Pratt contrived to edge the boat among the low branches of an overhanging tree. Its downward progress thus partly checked, he was able to exert more force in the shoreward direction. When Armstrong, after a rough scramble, arrived at the spot, he had just rammed the boat's nose securely into a tangled network of branches, and was clambering, a dripping, bedraggled object, up the bank.A prolonged "Coo-ee!" sounded from far up the river."There's old Warrender, shrieking like a bereaved hen," said Pratt, shaking himself. "And it's all through his not tying the thing up properly! Armstrong, water is very wet.""I say, did you ever know Warrender not tie it up properly?""How else would it break away?""You didn't see it break away?""No, you can't see our camping-place from the ruins. It was a good way down before I caught sight of it.""Well, they've kicked off; the game's begun!""What on earth do you mean?""Wring yourself dry, and we'll talk."CHAPTER VIA SCRAP OF PAPERPratt had just stripped off his clothes, and spread them to dry, when Warrender arrived in the dinghy."What's the game, you chaps?" he inquired. "Why a second bath, Pratt?""Eyes left!" responded Pratt. "The sight of my habiliments basking in the sunlight will inform you that I have just been performing a cinema stunt--plunging fully clothed into the boiling torrent to rescue the heroine, whom the villain----""Dry up!" said Armstrong."Just what I am trying to do. But you are bursting with information, old chap. Expound. I am all ears.""You tied up the boat as usual, Warrender?" Armstrong asked."Of course. Why?""Pratt saw her drifting down the stream, that's all, and had to dive in to prevent her getting right past the island.""That's rum," said Warrender. "The knot couldn't have worked loose. Who's been monkeying with her?""That's the point," said Armstrong. "There's some one else on the island, and whoever it is, wants the place to himself. Setting the boat adrift seemed to him a first step to driving us away, which shows he is a juggins.""Q.E.D.," said Pratt. "Now the corollary, if you please.""Wait a bit," Warrender interposed. "It may be only a stupid practical joke--the sort of thing the intelligence of that poacher fellow might rise to.""It may be, of course," returned Armstrong, "but I think it's more. You remember what Miss Crawshay and the people at the inn told us about the island being haunted, you know? Well, rumours of that sort are just what might be set going by some one who has reasons of his own for keeping people away. It may be Rush; we found a rabbit-snare this morning; but if it is, there's some one else in the game. Last night, as I was returning to camp, I saw a face in the thicket, just for a moment; it was gone in a flash; but it wasn't Rush's face; it was a different type altogether.""Why on earth didn't you tell us?" asked Warrender."Well, I might have been mistaken; moonlight plays all sorts of tricks; besides----""Just so, old man," said Pratt. "Are there visions abroad? The witching hour of night----""Let's keep to cold fact," Warrender put in. "You saw a face, and it wasn't Rush's; but Rush lied to us about the island to keep us off it; therefore Rush and some unknown person are in league. What next?""Pratt saw some one in one of the rooms of the ruined cottage as we approached it an hour or so ago. We hunted through the place, but couldn't find any one. I noticed one strange fact: that while some of the rooms are thick with dust, the staircase and one of the rooms upstairs are pretty clear, although there's no sign whatever of anybody living there. There's not a stick of furniture. What is the cottage used for?""Is there anything particular about the upstairs room?" Warrender asked."Nothing that I could see," replied Armstrong."Except that it gives a magnificent view," Pratt added. "You can see my uncle's grounds, and up and down the river. It was when I was looking out of the window that I saw the boat adrift.""Well, I think I'll have a look at the place," said Warrender, "and if you'll take my advice, Percy, you'll go up in the dinghy, get into dry togs, and give an eye to the camp.""Righto! There ought to be some one at home to receive callers. You'll be back to lunch, I suppose?"Warrender nodded, and strode off with Armstrong towards the ruins. Together they explored the house from roof to cellar, seeking, not for an inhabitant, but for some clue to the puzzle suggested by the partly cleared floors. No discovery rewarded them. It was not until they were inspecting the cellar that Armstrong remembered the scrap of paper he had picked up there. Taking it out of his pocket when they returned to daylight, he handed it to Warrender."Is it Greek?" he asked."No," replied Warrender. "I fancy it's Russian; a scrap torn from a Russian newspaper, by the look of it. Pretty old, too, judging by the colour.""I don't know. It's brown at the edge, but that's due to the scorching it got when the other papers were burned. It's fairly clean everywhere else. You can't read it, then?""Not a word; how should I? Russian's a modern language; belongs more to your side than mine. Besides, what if I could? A newspaper wouldn't tell us anything.""Very likely not. But a Russian newspaper would hardly be in the possession of anybody but a Russian, and what was a Russian ever doing here?""Ah! I think I see daylight. What if it belonged to one of what Pratt calls his uncle's menagerie of foreigners? They might come here in their off times. There's nothing very wonderful about it after all; but as there's nothing valuable in the ruins, they can't have any object in trying to keep us out. My belief is that that fellow Rush set the boat drifting out of sheer mischief, and we'd better keep our eye on him."On leaving the ruins it occurred to Armstrong to examine the surroundings more narrowly than he had yet done. The flower-beds and the moss-grown path in the direction of the jetty showed the impress of his own and Pratt's feet, but another path, which they had not trodden, also bore slight marks of use. Following it up with Warrender, he found that it led to a narrow track through the undergrowth, leading southward almost in a straight line. In single file they made their way along this, and came presently to a shallow indentation in the western shore, near its southern end."Pratt and I must have crossed this track a while ago," said Armstrong; "but I didn't notice it, and I'm sure he didn't.""Look here," said Warrender, who had bent down to examine the grass and shrubs growing on the low bank. "Wouldn't you say that a boat had been run in? In fact, it's been drawn up on to the bank. Here's a distinct mark of the keel--a small rowing-boat, I should think.""Not very recent, is it?""But certainly not very ancient, or it wouldn't be so distinct. It's on Crawshay's arm of the river, though. D'you know, Armstrong, I shouldn't be surprised if it turns out we're a set of jackasses. I dare say the place teems with rabbits, and there are plenty of fellows besides Rush who'd be glad of getting their dinner for nothing, and would want to keep other people out of their preserves. Let's be getting back."On arriving at their encampment they took the precaution of drawing the bow of the motorboat well on to the bank, and securing it firmly to a stout sapling. The dinghy, which Pratt had tied to a projecting root, they carried ashore, and placed behind the tent.Pratt was sitting on his chair, tuning his banjo."You perceive I have not been idle," he said. "You couldn't have carried the dinghy with such agile ease if I hadn't emptied her first. Your marketing was a success, Warrender?""Yes, I got everything we wanted except petrol. By the way, Pratt, there's a rival troubadour in the village.""I say! Surely not a banjo?""A banjo it is, and the player is no other than that general dealer fellow--what's his name? Blevins. I went up to the shop to get a can of petrol, and heard the tum-ti-tum and a tenor voice as good as your own----""Don't crush me quite!""Warbling one of your own songs out of the open window above the shop--'Love me and the world is mine.' Really it might have been you, only the fellow has a little more of what you call the tremolo, don't you?""Vibrato--if you want to know. But hang it! The glory is departed. Another banjo, another tenor--and singing my songs! Pity we're not in Spain.""Why on earth?" asked Armstrong."Because then we'd meet on some delicious moonlit night under the window of some fair senorita, and after trying to sing each other down like a couple of cats, we'd have a bit of a turn-up, and I'd have a chance to show I'm the better man. But how do you know it was the general dealer? It might have been some fair swain as comely as myself.""I'll tell you. I went into the shop, and asked the sheepish young fellow there for one of the cans of petrol I saw against the wall. He declared they were all for Mr. Pratt at the Red House. There were at least half a dozen, and I protested that Mr. Pratt couldn't possibly want them all at once, and insisted on his fetching his employer. The singing had been going on all the time. It stopped a couple of seconds after the fellow had gone into the house, and the man Blevins came into the shop. It's a fair deduction that he and the singer were one.""It is, it is," murmured Pratt, mournfully, throwing a glance across the river."Whatareyou squinting at?" asked Armstrong. "I've noticed you several times; what's there to look at?""There's me," replied Pratt, quickly. "Look at me, old chap, or at any rate, don't look that way; tell you why presently. Well, what about old Blevins, Warrender? My hat! what a name for a light tenor!""I asked him for one can to go on with. He was very polite--oily, in fact;--regretted extremely that he couldn't oblige me; the whole supply had been ordered for Mr. Pratt, and he daren't offend so good a customer.""But I thought my uncle was away from home.""Of course. Why didn't I remember that? Anyhow, while he was talking, in came that little foreign chauffeur we saw yesterday--an Italian, I fancy: he talked just like those Italian waiters at Gatti's. He had come to order a car; said that Mr. Pratt's car had broken down, and he had had to tow it to Dartmouth for repairs. He'd keep Blevins's car until the repairs were done. Blevins was a bit offhand with me after that. I suppose it was the regular tradesman's attitude to a less important customer. Anyhow, he told me rather bluntly that I couldn't have any petrol till to-morrow, and I came away.""Quite right. You couldn't argue with a fellow who sucks up to my uncle, and sings my songs. I say, I think I shall go in for diplomacy. Don't you think I'd make a first-class attaché, or whatever they call 'em?"Astonished at the sudden change of subject, they looked at him. He winked."You know," he went on--"one of those fellows in foreign capitals whose job it is to see and hear everything, and look innocent, while inside they're as wily as the cunningest old serpent. Your chronicle of Blevins is very small beer, Warrender; and while you've been yarning on about your old petrol, I've been corking myself up with something vastly more interesting, and you hadn't the least notion of it. That's why I'm sure I'd make no end of a hit in the diplomatic corps. Just keep your eyes fixed on my goodly countenance, will you? and I'll enlighten your understanding."He took up his banjo, which he had laid across his knees, struck a note or two, then proceeded--"After I'd changed, and carried up your purchases, I sat me down to beguile the tedium of waiting for you with my unfailing resource. Happening to glance across the river, I caught sight of some one watching me from the thick of a shrub, and my lively imagination conjured up the goose-flesh sensations of old Armstrong last night. With that presence of mind which will serve me well in my climb up the diplomatic ladder to a peerage, I hummed a stave of 'Somewhere a voice is calling,' and turned my head away with the grace of a peacefully browsing gazelle; but the fellow's been watching me for the last half-hour, and I bet he doesn't know he's been spotted. Armstrong, you've got the best eyes. While I go on gassing, just look round as if you were jolly well bored stiff--no, I've a better idea; go into the tent, and take a squint through that small tear on the side facing the river, and fix your eyes on the shrub--I fancy it's a lilac past its prime--that fills the space between two beeches in the background. I don't flatter myself that the fellow was attracted by my dulcet strains, and if he's watching me, you may be sure he's watching all of us."Armstrong got up, thrust his hands into his trousers pockets, and strolled nonchalantly into the tent. In a couple of minutes he returned in the same unconcerned way."You're right," he said, drawing up his chair beside Pratt's. "I saw a slight movement among the leaves, and a face. I'm not quite sure, but I believe it's that poacher fellow. It's certainly not the face I saw last night.""Well, now, what interest do you suppose Siren Rush takes in us? And what's he doing in my uncle's grounds? D'you think my uncle's a bit potty, and sets Rush to keep watch like a warder on a tower? Is he afraid of some one squatting on his land in his absence? I don't suppose we're far wrong in accusing Rush of setting the boat adrift, but what's his motive in watching us? It's not mere curiosity; but if not curiosity, what is it?""We must wait and see," said Warrender."That's very prudent, but it promises poor sport," Pratt rejoined. "By the way, I suppose you didn't find anything fresh in the ruins?""Nothing. But Armstrong picked up a scrap of paper in the cellar this morning--a bit of a Russian newspaper. Hand it over, Armstrong.""No," said Pratt, quickly. "Don't show it. I don't suppose Siren Rush can read Russian any more than I can; the paper can't be his, but he'd better not see us examining anything. Where did you find it, Armstrong?""In the cellar, by a heap of paper ash.""Incriminating documents, as they say in the police courts. But why Russian? Look here, I know a man in London who reads Russian; he seems to like it. Give me the paper presently. We'll go into the village this afternoon and post it to him. I can't see how it will throw any light on things here, but we can at least get it translated. And now, let's have lunch."
CHAPTER IV
THE FACE IN THE THICKET
When the three friends arrived at the inn it was full to the door. Rogers, wigless again, caught sight of Warrender over the heads of the crowd, and came from behind the counter, edging his way outwards through the press of villagers.
"Missus have got the rooms shipshape, sir," he said. "She's a rare woman for making a man comfortable."
"I'm sure she is," returned Warrender, "and I'm only sorry we shan't know it by personal experience. The fact is, we're going to camp on No Man's Island; there's plenty of time before sunset to fix ourselves up."
"She'll be main sorry, that she will," said the innkeeper, pocketing the two half-crowns Warrender handed him. "No Man's Island, did 'ee say? Maybe you haven't heard what folk do tell?"
"We have heard something, but I dare say it's just talk, you know. Anyhow, we're going to try it, and we'll let you know in the morning how we get on."
"Now, Rogers--drat the man!" cried his wife's voice from behind. She came out into the porch, flourishing his wig. "How many times have I told 'ee I won't have 'ee showing yourself without your hair? If you do be a great baby, there's no need for 'ee to look like one."
Rogers meekly allowed her to adjust the wig, explaining meanwhile the intention of the expected guests. She received the news with disappointment and concern.
"I hope nothing ill will come o't," she said. "Fists bain't no mortal use against spirits; 'twould be like hitting the wind. Howsomever, the young will always go their own gait. 'Tis the way o' the world." She went back into the inn.
"That furriner chap was hurt more in his temper than his framework," said Rogers. "And knowing what furriners be, I'd keep my weather eye open. There's too many of 'em in these parts."
"I understand they're servants of Mr. Pratt; they should be fairly respectable."
"Ay, that's where 'tis. A gentleman must do as he likes, and we haven't got nothing to say to't. But we think the more. And I own I was fair cut up when my sister Molly married the cook; a little Swiss feller he is."
"We saw him up at the post office a while ago; the shopwoman inquired after your sister, I remember."
"And well she might. I never see the girl nowadays; girl, I say, but she's gone thirty, old enough to know better. By all accounts Rod's uncommon clever at the vittles, and the crew down yonder be living on the fat of the land, while the skipper's a-dandering round in furren parts."
"Mr. Pratt's away from home, then?"
"Ay sure. He haven't been seen a good while, and 'tis just like him to go off sudden-like. You'd expect he'd be tired of it at his time o' life, but 'tis once a wanderer, always a wanderer. Well, the evening's getting on, so I won't keep 'ee. Good luck, sir."
Warrender rejoined his companions, who had taken over the boat from the ferryman, and they were soon floating down on the current. They took the narrow channel on the left of the island which they had avoided on the way up, and found it less difficult to navigate than it had appeared at the other end. The dusk was deepening beneath the trees, but in a few minutes they discovered a wide open space that offered more accommodation than they needed. Running the boat close to the shore, they sprang to land, moored to a tree overhanging the stream, and set to work with a will to make their preparations for the night.
The clearing was carpeted with long grass, damp from yesterday's rain, and encircled by dense undergrowth, thicket, and bramble. They pitched the tent in the centre, beat down a stretch of grass in front of it on which to place the stove and the bulk of their impedimenta, and by the time that darkness enwrapped them had everything in order. The moon, almost at full circle, had risen early, and soon, peering over the tree-tops on the mainland, flung her silver sheen into the enclosure, whitening the tent to a snowy brilliance and throwing into strong relief the massed foliage beyond. A light breeze set the leaves quivering with a murmurous rustle. The hour and the scene made an appeal to Pratt's sentimental soul too strong to be resisted. Opening one of the folding chairs, he lay back in it with crossed legs, gazed up into the serene, star-flecked heavens, and began with gentle touches of his strings to serenade the moon.
Warrender, having slipped on his overalls, kindled a lamp and went down to tinker with his engine. Unmusical Armstrong, always accused by Pratt of being "fit for treasons, stratagems, and spoils," sauntered, hands in pockets, across the clearing. Elbowing his way through the undergrowth he found, after some fifty or sixty yards, that the vegetation thinned. The lesser shrubs gave way to trees, which grew close together, but with a regularity that suggested planting on a definite plan. Pursuing his way, he came by and by to a more spacious clearing than the one he had quitted; and on the left, in the midst of what had evidently been at one time a small garden, he saw the shell of a two-storeyed cottage. The walls were covered with creepers growing in rank disorder; the windows gaped, empty of glass; the doorless entrance shaped a rectangle of blackness; and bare rafters, shaggy with unpruned ivy, drew parallel lines upon the inky gloom of half the upper storey. Ruins, in daylight merely picturesque, take a new beauty in the cold radiance of the moon, but present at the same time an image of all that is desolate and forlorn. Practical, unemotional as Armstrong was, he thrilled to the impression of vacuity and abandonment, and stood for a while at gaze, as though unwilling to disturb the loneliness.
Presently, however, he stepped lightly across the unmown lawn, and the moss-grown path beyond, and, entering the doorway, struck a match and looked around. From the narrow hall--strewn with fragments of brick and mortar, broken tiles, heaps of plaster, and here and there spotted with fungi--sprang the staircase, whole as to the stairs, but showing gaps in the banisters. Curling strips of torn discoloured paper hung from the walls. The match went out; through the open roof the stars glimmered. Deciding to defer exploration till daylight, lest a tile or brick should fall on his head, or the staircase give way under him, Armstrong turned to go out. As he did so he was aware of a low moaning sound, such as a person inside a house may hear when a high wind soughs under the eaves. It rose and fell in cadences eerily mournful, as though the spirit of solitude itself were lonely and in pain. Armstrong shivered and sought the doorway, and as he felt how gentle was the breeze he met, he wondered at its having power enough to produce such sounds. The moaning ceased; he listened for a moment or two; it did not recur, though the zephyr had not sensibly dropped. Puzzled, he started to retrace his way to the camp. At the farther side of the clearing the melancholy sound once more broke upon his car. Almost involuntarily he wheeled round to look back at the cottage; then, impatient with himself, turned again to quit the scene.
His feeling, which was neither awe nor timorousness, but rather a vague discomfort, left him as soon as his active faculties were again in play. Pushing his way through the undergrowth, he was inclined to deride his unwonted susceptibility. All at once, however, without sound or any other physical fact to account for it, he was seized with the fancy that some one was behind him. Does every human being move in the midst of an invisible, intangible aura, that acts as a sixth sense? Whatever the truth may be, certain it is that we have all, at one time or another, been conscious of the proximity of some bodily presence, which neither sight nor sound nor touch has revealed.
Armstrong swung quickly round, and started, for there in the thicket, within a dozen yards of him, a shaft of moonlight struck upon a face, pallid amidst the green. It disappeared in a flash.
"Who's there?" called Armstrong, sharply; then impulsively started forward, parting the foliage.
There was no answer, nobody to be seen. Indeed, within a yard of him the thicket was so dense, so closely overarched by loftier trees, that no ray of moonshine percolated into its pitchy blackness.
Holding the branches apart, peering into the gloom, he listened. Overhead the leaves softly rustled; within the thicket there was not a murmur. He let the branches swing back; stood for a few moments irresolute; then, with an impatient jerk of the shoulders, strode away towards the camp.
Armstrong was not what the pathologist would call a nervous subject. His physical courage had never been questioned; in his healthy life of work and play his moral courage had never been called upon; his lack of imagination had saved him from the tremors and terrors that prey upon the more highly strung.
To find himself mentally disturbed was a novel experience; it filled him with a sense of humiliation and self-contempt; it enraged him. Thoughts of Pratt's mocking glee when the tale should be told made him squirm. "I say, the old bean's seen a spook"--he could hear the light, ringing tones of Pratt's voice, see the bubbling merriment in his large, round eyes. "I swear itwasa face!" he angrily told himself. "Dashed if I don't come in daylight and hunt for the fellow--some tramp, I expect, who finds a lodging gratis in the ruins."
By the time he reached the camp he had made up his mind to say nothing about the incident. Emerging into the silent clearing, he saw Pratt and Warrender side by side on their chairs, fast asleep, the latter with folded arms and head on breast, the former holding his banjo across his knees, his face, the image of placid happiness, upturned to the sky. Apparently the swish of Armstrong's boots through the long grass penetrated to the slumbering consciousness of the sleepers. Warrender lifted his head, unclosed his eyes for a moment, muttered "Hallo!" and slept again. Pratt, without moving, looked lazily through half-shut eyelids.
"'O moon of my delight, who know'st no wane!'" he murmured. "Well, old bean, seen the spook?"
"Rot!" growled Armstrong.
"I believe you have!" cried Pratt, starting up, his face kindling. "What's she like?"
"Ass!"
"Well, whatdidyou see? You don't, as a rule, snap for nothing. I'll say that for you. Only cats will scratch you for love. What's upset the apple-cart?"
"I saw the ruined cottage, if you want to know--a ghastly rotten hole. I'm dead tired--I'm going to turn in."
"All right, old chap; you shall have a lullaby." He struck an arpeggio.
"Sing me to sleep, the shadows fall;Let me forget the world and all;Lone is my heart, the day is long;Would it were come to evensong!Sing me to sleep, your hand in mine----"
"Sing me to sleep, the shadows fall;Let me forget the world and all;Lone is my heart, the day is long;Would it were come to evensong!Sing me to sleep, your hand in mine----"
"Sing me to sleep, the shadows fall;
Let me forget the world and all;
Lone is my heart, the day is long;
Would it were come to evensong!
Sing me to sleep, your hand in mine----"
Armstrong had fled into the tent.
"I say, Warrender," murmured Pratt, nudging the somnolent form at his side, "something's put the old sport in a regular bait."
"Eh?" returned Warrender, drowsily.
"Armstrong's got the pip. Never knew him like this. Something's curdled the milk."
"Well, it's time to turn in," said Warrender, rising and stretching himself. "He'll be all right in the morning. Good-night."
"Same to you. I suppose I must follow you, but it's so jolly under this heavenly moon."
And Warrender, undressing within the tent, smiled as he heard the lingerer's pleasant voice.
"Dark is life's shore, love, life is so deep:Leave me no more, but sing me to sleep."
"Dark is life's shore, love, life is so deep:Leave me no more, but sing me to sleep."
"Dark is life's shore, love, life is so deep:
Leave me no more, but sing me to sleep."
CHAPTER V
THE GAME BEGINS
For all his loquacity, his gamesomeness of temper, Pratt was not without a modicum of discretion. Next morning, when they had taken their swim and were preparing breakfast, he did not revive the subject of spooks, or make any allusion to Armstrong's ill-humour. Armstrong, for his part, always at his best in the freshness of the early hours, had thrown off the oppression of the night, and appeared his cheerful, vigorous, rather silent self.
"You fellows," said Warrender, as they devoured cold sausages and a stale loaf, "after I've overhauled the engine, I think of pulling up stream in the dinghy and getting some new bread at the village----"
"Rolls, if you can," Pratt interpolated.
"And some butter and cheese, etcetera. Now we're on this island, we may as well explore it. You can do that while I'm away."
"And hand you a neatly written report of our discoveries. All right, Mr. President."
"I shan't be gone more than about a couple of hours."
"Unless you get another tinkering job. By the way, why not call at old Crawshay's, and ask if she got home safe? I think that would be a very proper thing to do, and the old buffer would appreciate it. Good for evil, you know; coals of fire; turning the other cheek, and all that."
"You can turn your own cheek, Percy. You've got enough of it."
"Do you allude to my facial rotundity, which is Nature's gift, or to my urbanity of manner, my----"
"Dry up, man. It's too early in the morning for fireworks. So long."
Pratt gave a further proof of his tact when he started with Armstrong on their tour of exploration. Instead of striking southward, in the direction of the ruins, he set off to the north-west. "The island's so small," he reflected, "that we are bound to work round to that cottage, and then----"
Daylight showed the undergrowth dense indeed, but not so impenetrable as it had seemed overnight. At the cost of a few scratches from bramble bushes laden with ripening blackberries, they pushed their way through to the western shore, overlooking the broader channel and the right bank of the river; then they turned south, zigzagging to find the easiest route.
Hitherto, except for the whirr of a bird, or the scurry of some small animal, they had neither seen nor heard anything betokening that the island had any other visitors than themselves. But not long after their change of course they came to a spot where the grass had recently been trampled.
"Oh, poor Robinson Crusoe!" hummed Pratt.
"Here's a wire snare," exclaimed Armstrong. "Some one's rabbiting."
"Very likely Siren Rush," Pratt returned. "It wasn't original malice that prompted him to warn us against the island, but a sophisticated fear of competition. I dare say he made tons of money out of rabbits in the lean time during the war; skinned them and the shop people too!"
Armstrong let this pass; the face he had seen for a brief moment overnight had not recalled the leering countenance of the poacher.
They went on, skirted the southern shore, and turned northward. Presently Pratt caught a glimpse through the trees of the roof of the ruined cottage. He did not mention it, but struck to the right towards the narrow channel, and led the way as close as possible to its brink. A minute or two later, in a shallow indentation of the shore, they discovered the remains of a small pier or landing-stage. The planks had rotted or broken away; only a few moss-covered piles and cross-stretchers were left, still, after what must have been many years, defying the destructive energy of the stream that swirled around them. Through the channel, at this spot contracted to half its average width, the swollen river poured with the force of a millrace.
"The old chap kept a boat, evidently," said Pratt. "There ought to be a path from here to the house, but there's no sign of one. Let's strike inland, and see if we can trace it somewhere."
They pushed through the thicket, here as closely tangled as anywhere else, and emerging suddenly into the wilderness garden, in which perennial plants were stifling one another, they saw the ruined cottage before them.
"Jolly picturesque," said Pratt, halting. "I dare say distance lends enchantment to the view; no doubt it's a pretty dismal place inside; but the sunlight makes a gorgeous effect with those old walls. The creepers running over warm red bricks--it's a harmony of colour, old man. I'd like to make a sketch of it."
"Houses were built to be lived in," grunted Armstrong.
Pratt made no reply at once. For the moment the schoolboy was sunk in the artist. He let his eyes linger on the spectacle--the broken roof; the one gable that here survived; the creepers straggling round it and over the glassless window of the room beneath; the heap of shattered brick-work at the base, half-clothed with greenery and gay with flowers.
"Of course, it looked very different by moonlight," he said at last. "You'd lose all the colour. Still----"
"I saw it from the other side," said Armstrong. "That won't please you so much--it's not so much ruined."
"Well, let's go and see."
He was leading through the riot of untended flowers, Armstrong close behind him, when he stopped suddenly, and in a tone of voice involuntarily subdued, asked--
"Did you see that?"
[image]"'DID YOU SEE THAT?'"
[image]
[image]
"'DID YOU SEE THAT?'"
"What?" said Armstrong, starting in spite of himself.
"A figure--something--I don't know; at the back of the room."
The sunlight, slanting from the south-east, shone full upon the cottage, but left the back of one of the rooms on the ground floor shadowed by the screen of creepers falling over the gaping window.
"Well, suppose there was, why the mysterious whisper?" said Armstrong, his own doubts and remembered tremors disposing him to ridicule Pratt's excitement. "Why shouldn't there be some one there?Weare here--why not others?"
"Yes, but--well, I didn't expect it. Perhaps you did."
"It may have been only the shadow of the creeper on the wall."
"It may have been your grandmother! Let's get into the place and have a look round. The window's too high to climb; is the door open?"
"There's no door."
"So much the better. Come on."
They hastened to the front, and through the doorway into the hall. The house was silent as a tomb. On either side opened a doorless room. They entered the one on the right--that in which Pratt had believed he saw a moving figure. It was pervaded by a subdued greenish sunlight, becoming misty by reason of the dust their footsteps had stirred up. It held neither person nor thing. They crossed to the opposite room, which, being out of the sunshine, was in deep gloom. This, too, was empty. Passing the staircase they arrived at the back premises, a stone-flagged kitchen and scullery. Both were bare; even the grate had been removed.
"Now for upstairs," said Pratt. "They've made a clean sweep down here."
They mounted the staircase, at first treading carefully, then with confident steps as they found that the creaking stairs were sound. There were four rooms on the upper storey, two of them exposed to the sky. Of these the floors were thick with blown leaves, twigs, birds' feathers, fragments of tiles and bricks, broken rafters, and the debris of the ceiling. The other two, roofed and whole, were as bare as the rooms below. Through the empty casement of one they caught sight of the tower in the grounds of Mr. Ambrose Pratt's house, and the upper windows and roof of the house itself. Pratt's appreciative eye was instantly seized by the prospect--the foreground of low thicket; the glistening stream; the noble trees beyond, springing out of a waving sea of sun-dappled bracken; the gentle slope on whose summit stood the buildings, and in the far background the rolling expanse of purple moorland. For the moment he forgot the shadowy figure he had seen, and lingered as if unwilling to miss one detail of the enchanting landscape.
"There's no one here," said Armstrong, matter-of-fact as ever.
"I dare say it was an illusion. Look how the sunlight catches the ripples, Jack. And did you see that kingfisher flash between the banks?"
"I'll go and have another look downstairs," Armstrong responded. "I'll give you a call if I find anything."
He felt, as he went down, that perhaps he would have done better to be candid with Pratt. Why make any bones about an incident capable, no doubt, of a simple explanation? The tramp, if tramp he was, had, of course, the objection of his kind to being found on enclosed premises, even though they were a ruin. Yet it was strange that he had left no tracks--had he not? Armstrong was suddenly aware of something that had hitherto escaped him. There was no dust, no litter on the stairs. Singular phenomenon in a long-deserted house! And surely the floor of the room in which Pratt now stood, unlike the other floors, was clear. It, and the staircase, must have been swept. Why? Not for tidiness--no tramp would bother about that. For what, then? Secrecy? Dusty floors would leave tell-tale marks--and with the thought Armstrong hurried down to the room in which the figure had been seen, and examined the floor. Yes! besides the footprints of himself and Pratt between door and window, there were others along the wall at the back of the room. The fellow must have slipped out with the speed of a hare. Armstrong perceived at once the clumsiness of the attempt at secrecy, for the very fact that some of the floors were swept gave the game away. At the same time, he was puzzled to account for the man's motive. The island was deserted; it was no longer the scene of picnics; the villagers avoided it; why then should a casual visitor--for there was no evidence of continuous occupation--be at the pains even to try to cover up his movements? The strange oppression of the previous night returned upon Armstrong's mind, and he roamed about the lower floor in a mood of curious expectancy.
He came once more to the kitchen, and noticed that between it and the scullery was a closed door--the only door that remained in the house. Instinctively bracing himself, he turned the handle; the door opened, disclosing a dark hole and a downward flight of stone steps. He went down into the darkness, at the foot of the steps struck a match, and found himself in a low, spacious cellar, empty except for a strewing of coal dust. As the match flickered out he caught sight of something white in a corner. Striking another, he crossed the floor and picked up a jagged scrap of paper, slightly brown along one edge. At the same moment he observed a little heap of paper ashes.
Throwing down the match he trod upon it, and turned, intending to examine the paper in the daylight above. Pratt's voice shouting, and a sound of some one leaping down the staircase to the hall, caused him to spring up the steps two at a time.
"What's up?" he shouted back, unable to distinguish Pratt's words.
He reached the hall just in time to see Pratt dash through the doorway and sprint at headlong pace towards the river. Stuffing the paper into his pocket, Armstrong doubled after him. Pratt was already plunging into the thicket, and, when Armstrong came within sight of the channel, the other had flung off his cap and blazer, and was diving into the stream.
[image]"THE OTHER WAS DIVING INTO THE STREAM."
[image]
[image]
"THE OTHER WAS DIVING INTO THE STREAM."
"What mad trick----"
He cut short his exclamation, for his long strides had brought him to the pier, and he saw the cause of Pratt's desperate haste. The motor-boat, broadside to the stream, was drifting down the channel. Already it was some thirty yards beyond the spot where Pratt had taken the water, and Pratt was swimming after it with the ease of a water-rat.
Feeling that there was no reason why himself should get soaked too, Armstrong forged his way through the vegetation at the brink of the channel, but made slow progress compared with the swimmer. Pratt was rapidly overhauling the boat. Watching him, instead of his own steps, Armstrong tripped over a creeper, and fell headlong. By the time he had picked himself up, Pratt had disappeared. Armstrong's momentary anxiety was banished by the sight of the boat moving slowly in towards the shore of the island.
"Good man," he shouted. "You headed it off splendidly."
Pushing and swimming, Pratt was evidently making strenuous efforts to drive the boat into the bank before the current swept it past the island. If he failed, Armstrong saw that he would have to change his tactics and run it ashore on the left bank--his uncle's property. It would then be necessary for Armstrong to swim across, for Pratt had never taken the trouble to learn the working of the engine.
"Stick it, old man," he called.
In a few moments more Pratt contrived to edge the boat among the low branches of an overhanging tree. Its downward progress thus partly checked, he was able to exert more force in the shoreward direction. When Armstrong, after a rough scramble, arrived at the spot, he had just rammed the boat's nose securely into a tangled network of branches, and was clambering, a dripping, bedraggled object, up the bank.
A prolonged "Coo-ee!" sounded from far up the river.
"There's old Warrender, shrieking like a bereaved hen," said Pratt, shaking himself. "And it's all through his not tying the thing up properly! Armstrong, water is very wet."
"I say, did you ever know Warrender not tie it up properly?"
"How else would it break away?"
"You didn't see it break away?"
"No, you can't see our camping-place from the ruins. It was a good way down before I caught sight of it."
"Well, they've kicked off; the game's begun!"
"What on earth do you mean?"
"Wring yourself dry, and we'll talk."
CHAPTER VI
A SCRAP OF PAPER
Pratt had just stripped off his clothes, and spread them to dry, when Warrender arrived in the dinghy.
"What's the game, you chaps?" he inquired. "Why a second bath, Pratt?"
"Eyes left!" responded Pratt. "The sight of my habiliments basking in the sunlight will inform you that I have just been performing a cinema stunt--plunging fully clothed into the boiling torrent to rescue the heroine, whom the villain----"
"Dry up!" said Armstrong.
"Just what I am trying to do. But you are bursting with information, old chap. Expound. I am all ears."
"You tied up the boat as usual, Warrender?" Armstrong asked.
"Of course. Why?"
"Pratt saw her drifting down the stream, that's all, and had to dive in to prevent her getting right past the island."
"That's rum," said Warrender. "The knot couldn't have worked loose. Who's been monkeying with her?"
"That's the point," said Armstrong. "There's some one else on the island, and whoever it is, wants the place to himself. Setting the boat adrift seemed to him a first step to driving us away, which shows he is a juggins."
"Q.E.D.," said Pratt. "Now the corollary, if you please."
"Wait a bit," Warrender interposed. "It may be only a stupid practical joke--the sort of thing the intelligence of that poacher fellow might rise to."
"It may be, of course," returned Armstrong, "but I think it's more. You remember what Miss Crawshay and the people at the inn told us about the island being haunted, you know? Well, rumours of that sort are just what might be set going by some one who has reasons of his own for keeping people away. It may be Rush; we found a rabbit-snare this morning; but if it is, there's some one else in the game. Last night, as I was returning to camp, I saw a face in the thicket, just for a moment; it was gone in a flash; but it wasn't Rush's face; it was a different type altogether."
"Why on earth didn't you tell us?" asked Warrender.
"Well, I might have been mistaken; moonlight plays all sorts of tricks; besides----"
"Just so, old man," said Pratt. "Are there visions abroad? The witching hour of night----"
"Let's keep to cold fact," Warrender put in. "You saw a face, and it wasn't Rush's; but Rush lied to us about the island to keep us off it; therefore Rush and some unknown person are in league. What next?"
"Pratt saw some one in one of the rooms of the ruined cottage as we approached it an hour or so ago. We hunted through the place, but couldn't find any one. I noticed one strange fact: that while some of the rooms are thick with dust, the staircase and one of the rooms upstairs are pretty clear, although there's no sign whatever of anybody living there. There's not a stick of furniture. What is the cottage used for?"
"Is there anything particular about the upstairs room?" Warrender asked.
"Nothing that I could see," replied Armstrong.
"Except that it gives a magnificent view," Pratt added. "You can see my uncle's grounds, and up and down the river. It was when I was looking out of the window that I saw the boat adrift."
"Well, I think I'll have a look at the place," said Warrender, "and if you'll take my advice, Percy, you'll go up in the dinghy, get into dry togs, and give an eye to the camp."
"Righto! There ought to be some one at home to receive callers. You'll be back to lunch, I suppose?"
Warrender nodded, and strode off with Armstrong towards the ruins. Together they explored the house from roof to cellar, seeking, not for an inhabitant, but for some clue to the puzzle suggested by the partly cleared floors. No discovery rewarded them. It was not until they were inspecting the cellar that Armstrong remembered the scrap of paper he had picked up there. Taking it out of his pocket when they returned to daylight, he handed it to Warrender.
"Is it Greek?" he asked.
"No," replied Warrender. "I fancy it's Russian; a scrap torn from a Russian newspaper, by the look of it. Pretty old, too, judging by the colour."
"I don't know. It's brown at the edge, but that's due to the scorching it got when the other papers were burned. It's fairly clean everywhere else. You can't read it, then?"
"Not a word; how should I? Russian's a modern language; belongs more to your side than mine. Besides, what if I could? A newspaper wouldn't tell us anything."
"Very likely not. But a Russian newspaper would hardly be in the possession of anybody but a Russian, and what was a Russian ever doing here?"
"Ah! I think I see daylight. What if it belonged to one of what Pratt calls his uncle's menagerie of foreigners? They might come here in their off times. There's nothing very wonderful about it after all; but as there's nothing valuable in the ruins, they can't have any object in trying to keep us out. My belief is that that fellow Rush set the boat drifting out of sheer mischief, and we'd better keep our eye on him."
On leaving the ruins it occurred to Armstrong to examine the surroundings more narrowly than he had yet done. The flower-beds and the moss-grown path in the direction of the jetty showed the impress of his own and Pratt's feet, but another path, which they had not trodden, also bore slight marks of use. Following it up with Warrender, he found that it led to a narrow track through the undergrowth, leading southward almost in a straight line. In single file they made their way along this, and came presently to a shallow indentation in the western shore, near its southern end.
"Pratt and I must have crossed this track a while ago," said Armstrong; "but I didn't notice it, and I'm sure he didn't."
"Look here," said Warrender, who had bent down to examine the grass and shrubs growing on the low bank. "Wouldn't you say that a boat had been run in? In fact, it's been drawn up on to the bank. Here's a distinct mark of the keel--a small rowing-boat, I should think."
"Not very recent, is it?"
"But certainly not very ancient, or it wouldn't be so distinct. It's on Crawshay's arm of the river, though. D'you know, Armstrong, I shouldn't be surprised if it turns out we're a set of jackasses. I dare say the place teems with rabbits, and there are plenty of fellows besides Rush who'd be glad of getting their dinner for nothing, and would want to keep other people out of their preserves. Let's be getting back."
On arriving at their encampment they took the precaution of drawing the bow of the motorboat well on to the bank, and securing it firmly to a stout sapling. The dinghy, which Pratt had tied to a projecting root, they carried ashore, and placed behind the tent.
Pratt was sitting on his chair, tuning his banjo.
"You perceive I have not been idle," he said. "You couldn't have carried the dinghy with such agile ease if I hadn't emptied her first. Your marketing was a success, Warrender?"
"Yes, I got everything we wanted except petrol. By the way, Pratt, there's a rival troubadour in the village."
"I say! Surely not a banjo?"
"A banjo it is, and the player is no other than that general dealer fellow--what's his name? Blevins. I went up to the shop to get a can of petrol, and heard the tum-ti-tum and a tenor voice as good as your own----"
"Don't crush me quite!"
"Warbling one of your own songs out of the open window above the shop--'Love me and the world is mine.' Really it might have been you, only the fellow has a little more of what you call the tremolo, don't you?"
"Vibrato--if you want to know. But hang it! The glory is departed. Another banjo, another tenor--and singing my songs! Pity we're not in Spain."
"Why on earth?" asked Armstrong.
"Because then we'd meet on some delicious moonlit night under the window of some fair senorita, and after trying to sing each other down like a couple of cats, we'd have a bit of a turn-up, and I'd have a chance to show I'm the better man. But how do you know it was the general dealer? It might have been some fair swain as comely as myself."
"I'll tell you. I went into the shop, and asked the sheepish young fellow there for one of the cans of petrol I saw against the wall. He declared they were all for Mr. Pratt at the Red House. There were at least half a dozen, and I protested that Mr. Pratt couldn't possibly want them all at once, and insisted on his fetching his employer. The singing had been going on all the time. It stopped a couple of seconds after the fellow had gone into the house, and the man Blevins came into the shop. It's a fair deduction that he and the singer were one."
"It is, it is," murmured Pratt, mournfully, throwing a glance across the river.
"Whatareyou squinting at?" asked Armstrong. "I've noticed you several times; what's there to look at?"
"There's me," replied Pratt, quickly. "Look at me, old chap, or at any rate, don't look that way; tell you why presently. Well, what about old Blevins, Warrender? My hat! what a name for a light tenor!"
"I asked him for one can to go on with. He was very polite--oily, in fact;--regretted extremely that he couldn't oblige me; the whole supply had been ordered for Mr. Pratt, and he daren't offend so good a customer."
"But I thought my uncle was away from home."
"Of course. Why didn't I remember that? Anyhow, while he was talking, in came that little foreign chauffeur we saw yesterday--an Italian, I fancy: he talked just like those Italian waiters at Gatti's. He had come to order a car; said that Mr. Pratt's car had broken down, and he had had to tow it to Dartmouth for repairs. He'd keep Blevins's car until the repairs were done. Blevins was a bit offhand with me after that. I suppose it was the regular tradesman's attitude to a less important customer. Anyhow, he told me rather bluntly that I couldn't have any petrol till to-morrow, and I came away."
"Quite right. You couldn't argue with a fellow who sucks up to my uncle, and sings my songs. I say, I think I shall go in for diplomacy. Don't you think I'd make a first-class attaché, or whatever they call 'em?"
Astonished at the sudden change of subject, they looked at him. He winked.
"You know," he went on--"one of those fellows in foreign capitals whose job it is to see and hear everything, and look innocent, while inside they're as wily as the cunningest old serpent. Your chronicle of Blevins is very small beer, Warrender; and while you've been yarning on about your old petrol, I've been corking myself up with something vastly more interesting, and you hadn't the least notion of it. That's why I'm sure I'd make no end of a hit in the diplomatic corps. Just keep your eyes fixed on my goodly countenance, will you? and I'll enlighten your understanding."
He took up his banjo, which he had laid across his knees, struck a note or two, then proceeded--
"After I'd changed, and carried up your purchases, I sat me down to beguile the tedium of waiting for you with my unfailing resource. Happening to glance across the river, I caught sight of some one watching me from the thick of a shrub, and my lively imagination conjured up the goose-flesh sensations of old Armstrong last night. With that presence of mind which will serve me well in my climb up the diplomatic ladder to a peerage, I hummed a stave of 'Somewhere a voice is calling,' and turned my head away with the grace of a peacefully browsing gazelle; but the fellow's been watching me for the last half-hour, and I bet he doesn't know he's been spotted. Armstrong, you've got the best eyes. While I go on gassing, just look round as if you were jolly well bored stiff--no, I've a better idea; go into the tent, and take a squint through that small tear on the side facing the river, and fix your eyes on the shrub--I fancy it's a lilac past its prime--that fills the space between two beeches in the background. I don't flatter myself that the fellow was attracted by my dulcet strains, and if he's watching me, you may be sure he's watching all of us."
Armstrong got up, thrust his hands into his trousers pockets, and strolled nonchalantly into the tent. In a couple of minutes he returned in the same unconcerned way.
"You're right," he said, drawing up his chair beside Pratt's. "I saw a slight movement among the leaves, and a face. I'm not quite sure, but I believe it's that poacher fellow. It's certainly not the face I saw last night."
"Well, now, what interest do you suppose Siren Rush takes in us? And what's he doing in my uncle's grounds? D'you think my uncle's a bit potty, and sets Rush to keep watch like a warder on a tower? Is he afraid of some one squatting on his land in his absence? I don't suppose we're far wrong in accusing Rush of setting the boat adrift, but what's his motive in watching us? It's not mere curiosity; but if not curiosity, what is it?"
"We must wait and see," said Warrender.
"That's very prudent, but it promises poor sport," Pratt rejoined. "By the way, I suppose you didn't find anything fresh in the ruins?"
"Nothing. But Armstrong picked up a scrap of paper in the cellar this morning--a bit of a Russian newspaper. Hand it over, Armstrong."
"No," said Pratt, quickly. "Don't show it. I don't suppose Siren Rush can read Russian any more than I can; the paper can't be his, but he'd better not see us examining anything. Where did you find it, Armstrong?"
"In the cellar, by a heap of paper ash."
"Incriminating documents, as they say in the police courts. But why Russian? Look here, I know a man in London who reads Russian; he seems to like it. Give me the paper presently. We'll go into the village this afternoon and post it to him. I can't see how it will throw any light on things here, but we can at least get it translated. And now, let's have lunch."