This happy turn of the conversation exactly suitedBlake. He began to be very amusing about magic, and brownies, and ‘the downy she,’ as Miss Macrae called the People of Peace. The ladies presently declared that they were afraid to go to bed; so they went, Miss Macrae indicating her displeasure to Merton by the coldness of her demeanour.
The men, who were rather dashed by the pleasant intelligence which the telegraph had communicated, sat up smoking for a while, and then retired in a subdued state of mind.
Next morning, which was Sunday, Merton appeared rather late at breakfast, late and pallid. After a snatch of disturbed slumber, he had wakened, or seemed to waken, fretting a good deal over the rusticity of his bearing towards Blake, and over his hopeless affair of the heart. He had vexed his lady. ‘If he is good enough for his hosts, he ought to be good enough for their guests,’ thought Merton. ‘What a brute, what a fool I am; I ought to go. I will go! I ought not to take coffee after dinner, I know I ought not, and I smoke too much,’ he added, and finally he went to breathe the air on the roof.
The night was deadly soft and still, a slight mist hid the furthest verges of the sea’s horizon. Behind it, the summer lightning seemed like portals that opened and shut in the heavens, revealing a glory without form, and closing again.
‘I don’t wonder that these Irish poets dreamed of Isles of Paradise out there:
‘Lands undiscoverable in the unheard-of West,Round which the strong stream of a sacred seaRuns without wind for ever.’
‘Lands undiscoverable in the unheard-of West,Round which the strong stream of a sacred seaRuns without wind for ever.’
thought Merton. ‘Chicago is the realisation of their dream. Hullo, there are the lights of a big steamer, and a very low one behind it! Queer craft!’
Merton watched the lights that crossed the sea, when either the haze deepened or the fainter light on the smaller vessel vanished, and the larger ship steamed on in a southerly direction. ‘Magic boat of Bran!’ thought Merton. He turned and entered the staircase to go back to his room. There was a lift, of course, but, equally of course, there was nobody to manage it. Merton, who had a lighted bedroom-candle in his hand, descended the spiral staircase; at a turning he thought he saw, ‘with the tail of his eye,’ a plaid, draping a tall figure of a Highlander, disappear round the corner. Nobody in the castle wore the kilt except the piper, and he had not rooms in the observatory. Merton ran down as fast as he could, but he did not catch another view of the plaid and its wearer, or hear any footsteps. He went to the bottom of the staircase, opened the outer door, and looked forth. Nobody! The electric light from the open door of his own room blazed across the landing on his return. All was perfectly still, and Merton remembered that he had not heard the footsteps of the appearance. ‘Was it Eachain?’ he asked himself. ‘Do I sleep, do I dream?’
He went back to bed and slumbered uneasily. He seemed to be awake in his room, in broad light, and to hear a slow drip, drip, on the floor. He looked up; the roof was stained with a great dark splash of a crimson hue. He got out of bed, and touched the wet spot on the floor under the blotch on the ceiling.
His fingers were reddened with blood! He woke at the horror of it: found himself in bed in the dark, pressed an electric knob, and looked at the ceiling. It was dry and white. ‘I certainly have been smoking too much lately,’ thought Merton, and, switching off the light, he slumbered again, so soundly that he did not hear the piper playing round the house, or the man who brought his clothes and hot water, or the gong for breakfast.
When he did wake, he was surprised at the lateness of the hour, and dressed as rapidly as possible. ‘I wonder if I was dreaming when I thought that I went out on the roof, and saw mountains and marvels,’ said Merton to himself. ‘A queer thing, the human mind,’ he reflected sagely. It occurred to him to enter the smoking-room on his way downstairs. He routed two maids who perhaps had slept too late, and were hurriedly making the room tidy. The sun was beating in at the window, and Merton noticed some tiny glittering points of white metallic light on the carpet near the new telegraphic apparatus. ‘I don’t believe these lazy Highland Maries have swept the room properly since the electric machine was put up,’ Merton thought. He hastily seized, and took to his chamber, his book on old Irish literature, which was too clearly part of Blake’s Celtic inspiration. Merton wanted no more quatrains, but he did mean to try to be civil. He then joined the party at breakfast; he admitted that he had slept ill, but, when asked by Blake, disclaimed having seen Eachain of the Hairy Arm, and did not bore or bewilder the company with his dreams.
Miss Macrae, in sabbatical raiment, was fresher than a rose and gay as a lark. Merton tried not to look at her; he failed in this endeavour.
The day was Sunday, and Merton, who had a holy horror of news, rejoiced to think that the telegraphic machine would probably not tinkle its bell for twenty-four hours. This was not the ideal of the millionaire. Things happen, intelligence arrives from the limits of our vast and desirable empire, even on the Day of Rest. But the electric bell was silent. Mr. Macrae, from patriotic motives, employed a Highland engineer and mechanician, so there was nothing to be got out of him in the way of work on the sabbath day. The millionaire himself did not quite understand how to work the thing. He went to the smoking-room where it dwelt and looked wistfully at it, but was afraid to try to call up his correspondents in London. As for the usual manipulator, Donald McDonald, he had started early for the distant Free Kirk. An ‘Unionist’ minister intended to try to preach himself in, and the majority of the congregation, being of the old Free Kirk rock, and averse to union with the United Presbyterians, intended to try to keep him out. They ‘had a lad with the gift who would do the preaching fine,’ and as there was no police-station within forty miles it seemed fairly long odds on the Free Kirk recalcitrants. However, there was a resolute minority of crofters on the side of the minister, and every chance of an ecclesiastical battle royal.Accompanied by the stalker, two keepers, and all the gardeners, armed with staves, the engineer had early set out for the scene of brotherly amity, and Mr. Macrae had reluctantly to admit that he was cut off from his communications.
Merton, who was with him in the smoking-room, mentally absolved the Highland housemaids. If they had not swept up the tiny glittering metallic points on the carpet before, they had done so now. Only two or three caught his eye.
Mr. Macrae, avid of news, accommodated himself in an arm-chair with newspapers of two or three days old, from which he had already sucked the heart by aid of his infernal machine. The Budes and Blake, with Miss Macrae (an Anglican), had set off to walk to the Catholic chapel, some four miles away, for crofting opinion was resolute against driving on the Lord’s Day. Merton, self-denying and resolved, did not accompany his lady; he read a novel, wrote letters, and felt desolate. All was peace, all breathed of the Sabbath calm.
‘Very odd there’s no call from the machine,’ said Mr. Macrae anxiously.
‘It is Sunday,’ said Merton.
‘Still, they might send us something.’
‘They scarcely favoured us last Sunday,’ said Merton.
‘No, and now I think of it, not at all on the Sunday before,’ said Mr. Macrae. ‘I dare say it is all right.’
‘Would a thunder-storm further south derange it?’ asked Merton, adding, ‘There was a lot of summer lightning last night.’
‘That might be it; these things have their tempers. But they are a great comfort. I can’t think how we ever did without them,’ said Mr. Macrae, as if these things were common in every cottage. ‘Wonderful thing, science!’ he added, in an original way, and Merton, who privately detested science, admitted that it was so.
‘Shall we go to see the horses?’ suggested Mr. Macrae, and they did go and stare, as is usual on Sunday in the country, at the hind-quarters of these noble animals. Merton strove to be as much interested as possible in Mr. Macrae’s stories of his fleet American trotters. But his heart was otherwhere. ‘They will soon be an extinct species,’ said Mr. Macrae. ‘The motor has come to stay.’
Merton was not feeling very well, he was afraid of a cigarette, Mr. Macrae’s conversation was not brilliant, and Merton still felt as if he were under the wrath, so well deserved, of his hostess. She did not usually go to the Catholic chapel; to be sure, in the conditions prevailing at the Free Kirk place of worship, she had no alternative if she would not abstain wholly from religious privileges. But Merton felt sure that she had really gone to comfort and console the injured feelings of Blake. Probably she would have had a little court of lordlings, Merton reflected (not that Mr. Macrae had any taste for them), but everybody knew that, what with the weather, and the crofters, and the grouse disease, the sport at Castle Skrae was remarkably bad. So the party was tiny, though a number of people were expected later, and Merton and the heiress had been on what, as he ruefullyreflected, were very kind terms—rather more than kind, he had hoped, or feared, now and then. Merton saw that he had annoyed her, and thrown her, metaphorically speaking, into the arms of the Irish minstrel. All the better, perhaps, he thought, ruefully. The poet was handsome enough to be one that ‘limners loved to paint, and ladies to look upon.’ He generally took chaff well, and could give it, as well as take it, and there were hours when his sentiment and witchery had a chance with most women. ‘But Lady Bude says there is nothing in it, and women usually know,’ he reflected. Well, he must leave the girl, and save his self-respect.
When nothing more in the way of pottering could be done at the stables, when its proprietor had exhausted the pleasure of staring at the balloon in its hall, and had fed the fowls, he walked with Merton down the avenue, above the shrunken burn that whispered among its ferns and alders, to meet the returning church-goers. The Budes came first, together; they were still, they were always, honeymooning. Mr. Macrae turned back with Lady Bude; Merton walked with Bude, Blake and Miss Macrae were not yet in sight. He thought of walking on to meet them—but no, it must not be.
‘Blake owes you a rare candle, Merton,’ said Bude, adding, ‘A great deal may be done, or said, in a long walk by a young man with his advantages. And if you had not had your knife in him last night I do not think she would have accompanied us this morning to attend the ministrations of Father McColl. He preached in Gaelic.’
‘That must have been edifying,’ said Merton, wincing.
‘The effect, when one does not know the language, and is within six feet of an energetic Celt in the pulpit, is rather odd,’ said Bude. ‘But you have put your foot in it, not a doubt of that.’
This appeared only too probable. The laggards arrived late for luncheon, and after luncheon Miss Macrae allowed Blake to read his manuscript poems to her in the hall, and to discuss the prospects of the Celtic drama. Afterwards, fearing to hurt the religious sentiments of the Highland servants by playing ping-pong on Sunday in the hall, she instructed him elsewhere, and clandestinely, in that pastime till the hour of tea arrived.
Merton did not appear at the tea-table. Tired of this Castle of Indolence, loathing Blake, afraid of more talk with Lady Bude, eating his own heart, he had started alone after luncheon for a long walk round the loch. The day had darkened, and was deadly still; the water was like a mirror of leaden hue; the air heavy and sulphurous.
These atmospheric phenomena did not gladden the heart of Merton. He knew that rain was coming, but he would not be withherby the foaming stream, or on the black waves of the loch. Climbing to the top of the hill, he felt sure that a storm was at hand. On the east, far away, Clibrig, and Suilvean of the double peak, and the round top of Ben More, stood shadowy above the plain against the lurid light. Over the sea hung ‘the ragged rims of thunder’ far away, veiling in thin shadow the outermost isles, whose mountain crestslooked dark as indigo. A few hot heavy drops of rain were falling as Merton began to descend. He was soaked to the skin when he reached the door of the observatory, and rushed up stairs to dress for dinner. A covered way led from the observatory to the Castle, so that he did not get drenched again on his return, which he accomplished punctually as the gong for dinner sounded.
In the drawing-room were the Budes, and Mr. Macrae was nervously pacing the length and breadth of the room.
‘They must have taken refuge from the rain somewhere,’ Lady Bude was saying, and ‘they’ were obviously Blake and the daughter of the house. Where were they? Merton’s heart sank with a foolish foreboding.
‘I know,’ the lady went on, ‘that they were only going down to the cove—where you and I were yesterday evening, Mr. Merton. It is no distance.’
‘A mile and a half is a good deal in this weather, said Merton, ‘and there is no cottage on this side of the sea loch. But they must have taken shelter,’ he added; he must not seem anxious.
At this moment came a flash of lightning, followed by a crack like that of a cosmic whip-lash, and a long reverberating roar of thunder.
‘It is most foolish to have stayed out so late,’ said Mr. Macrae. ‘Any one could see that a storm was coming. I told them so, I am really annoyed.’
Every one was silent, the rain fell straight and steady, the gravel in front of the window was a series of little lakes, pale and chill in the wan twilight.
‘I really think I must send a couple of men down with cloaks and umbrellas,’ said the nervous father, pressing an electric knob.
The butler appeared.
‘Are Donald and Sandy and Murdoch about?’ asked Mr. Macrae.
‘Not returned from church, sir;’ said the butler.
‘There was likely to be a row at the Free Kirk,’ said Mr. Macrae, absently.
‘You must go yourself, Benson, with Archibald and James. Take cloaks and umbrellas, and hurry down towards the cove. Mr. Blake and Miss Macrae have probably found shelter on the way somewhere.’
The butler answered, ‘Yes, sir;’ but he cannot have been very well pleased with his errand. Merton wanted to offer to go, anything to be occupied; but Bude said nothing, and so Merton did not speak.
The four in the drawing-room sat chatting nervously: ‘There was nothing of course to be anxious about,’ they told each other. The bolt of heaven never strikes the daughters of millionaires; Miss Macrae was indifferent to a wetting, and nobody cared tremulously about Blake. Indeed the words ‘confound the fellow’ were in the minds of the three men.
The evening darkened rapidly, the minutes lagged by, the clock chimed the half-hour, three-quarters, nine o’clock.
Mr. Macrae was manifestly growing more and more nervous, Merton forgot to grow more and more hungry. His tongue felt dry and hard; he was afraid of he knew not what, but he bravely tried to make talk with Lady Bude.
The door opened, letting the blaze of electric light from the hall into the darkling room. They all turned eagerly towards the door. It was only one of the servants. Merton’s heart felt like lead. ‘Mr. Benson has returned, sir; he would be glad if he might speak to you for a moment.’
‘Where is he?’ asked Mr. Macrae.
‘At the outer door, sir, in the porch. He is very wet.’
Mr. Macrae went out; the others found little to say to each other.
‘Very awkward,’ muttered Bude. ‘They cannot have been climbing the cliffs, surely.’
‘The bridge is far above the highest water-mark of the burn, in case they crossed the water,’ said Merton.
Lady Bude was silent.
Mr. Macrae returned. ‘Benson has come back,’ he said, ‘to say that he can find no trace of them. The other men are still searching.’
‘Can they have had themselves ferried across the sea loch to the village opposite?’ asked Merton.
‘Emmiline had not the key of our boat,’ said Mr. Macrae, ‘I have made sure of that; and not a man in the village would launch a boat on Sunday.’
‘We must go and help to search for them,’ said Merton; he only wished to be doing something, anything.
‘I shall not be a minute in changing my dress.’
Bude also volunteered, and in a few minutes, having drunk a glass of wine and eaten a crust of bread, they and Mr. Macrae were hurrying towards the cove. The storm was passing; by the time when they reachedthe sea-side there were rifts of clear light in the sky above them. They had walked rapidly and silently, the swollen stream roaring beneath them. It had rained torrents in the hills. There was nothing to be said, but the mind of each man was busy with the gloomiest conjectures. These had to be far-fetched, for in a country so thinly peopled, and so honest and friendly, within a couple of miles at most from home, on a Sunday evening, what conceivable harm could befall a man and a maid?
‘Can we trust the man?’ was in Merton’s mind. ‘If they have been ferried across to the village, they would have set out to return before now,’ he said aloud; but there was no boat on the faint silver of the sea loch. ‘The cliffs are the likeliest place for an accident, if therewasan accident,’ he considered, with a pang. The cliffs might have tempted the light-footed girl. In fancy he saw her huddled, a ghastly heap, the faint wind fluttering the folds of her dress, at the bottom of the rocks. She had been wearing a long skirt, not her wont in the Highlands; it would be dangerous to climb in that; she might have forgotten, climbed, and caught her foot, and fallen.
‘Blake may have snatched at her, and been dragged down with her,’ Merton thought. All the horrid fancies of keen anxiety flitted across his mind’s eye. He paused, and made an effort over himself. Theremustbe some other harmless explanation, an adventure to laugh at—for Blake and the girl. Poor comfort, that!
The men who had been searching were scattered about the sides of the cove, and, distinguishing the new-comers, gathered towards them.
‘No,’ they said, ‘they had found nothing except a little book that seemed to belong to Mr. Blake.’
It had been discovered near the place where Merton and Lady Bude were sitting on the previous evening. When found it was lying open, face downwards. In the faint light Merton could see that the book was full of manuscript poems, the lines all blotted and run together by the tropical rain. He thrust it into the pocket of his ulster.
Merton took the most intelligent of the gillies aside. ‘Show me where you have searched,’ he said. The man pointed to the shores of the cove; they had also examined the banks of the burn, and under all the trees, clearly fearing that the lost pair might have been lightning-struck, like the nymph and swain in Pope’s poem. ‘You have not searched the cliffs?’ asked Merton.
‘No, sir,’ said the man.
Merton then went to Mr. Macrae, and suggested that the boat should be sent across the sea ferry, to try if anything could be learned in the village. Mr. Macrae agreed, and himself went in the boat, which was presently unmoored, and pulled by two gillies across the loch, that ran like a river with the outgoing tide.
Merton and Bude began to search the cliffs; Merton could hear the hoarse pumping of his own heart. The cliff’s base was deep in flags and bracken, then the rocks began climbing to the foot of the perpendicular basaltic crag. The sky, fortunately, was now clear in the west, and lent a wan light to the seekers. Merton had almost reached the base of thecliff, when, in the deep bracken, he stumbled over something soft. He stooped and held back the tall fronds of bracken.
It was the body of a man; the body did not stir. Merton glanced to see the face, but the face was bent round, leaning half on the earth. It was Blake. Merton’s guess seemed true. They had fallen from the cliffs! But where was that other body? Merton yelled to Bude. Blake seemed dead or insensible.
Merton (he was ashamed of it presently) left the body of Blake alone; he plunged wildly in and out of the bracken, still shouting to Bude, and looking for that which he feared to find. She could not be far off. He stumbled over rocks, into rabbit holes, he dived among the soaked bracken. Below and around he hunted, feverishly panting, then he set his face to the sheer cliff, to climb; she might be lying on some higher ledge, the shadow on the rocks was dark. At this moment Bude hailed him.
‘Come down!’ he cried, ‘she cannot be there!’
‘Why not?’ he gasped, arriving at the side of Bude, who was stooping, with a lantern in his hand, over the body of Blake, which faintly stirred.
‘Look!’ said Bude, lowering the lantern.
Then Merton saw that Blake’s hands were bound down beside his body, and that the cords were fastened by pegs to the ground. His feet were fastened in the same way, and his mouth was stuffed full of wet seaweed. Bude pulled out the improvised gag, cut the ropes, turned the face upwards, and carefully dropped a little whisky from his flask into the mouth. Blake opened his eyes.
‘Where are my poems?’ he asked.
‘Where is Miss Macrae?’ shrieked Merton in agony.
‘Damn the midges,’ said Blake (his face was hardly recognisable from their bites). ‘Oh, damn them all!’ He had fainted again.
‘She has been carried off,’ groaned Merton. Bude and he did all that they knew for poor Blake. They rubbed his ankles and wrists, they administered more whisky, and finally got him to sit up. He scratched his hands over his face and moaned, but at last he recovered full consciousness. No sense could be extracted from him, and, as the boat was now visible on its homeward track, Bude and Merton carried him down to the cove, anxiously waiting Mr. Macrae.
He leaped ashore.
‘Have you heard anything?’ asked Bude.
‘They saw a boat on the loch about seven o’clock,’ said Mr. Macrae, ‘coming from the head of it, touching here, and then pulling west, round the cliff. They thought the crew Sabbath-breakers from the lodge at Alt Garbh. What’s that,’ he cried, at last seeing Blake, who lay supported against a rock, his eyes shut.
Merton rapidly explained.
‘It is as I thought,’ said Mr. Macrae resolutely. ‘I knew it from the first. They have kidnapped her for a ransom. Let us go home.’
Merton and Bude were silent; they, too, had guessed, as soon as they discovered Blake. The girl was her father’s very life, and they admired his resolution, his silence. A gate was taken from its hinges,cloaks were strewn on it, and Blake was laid on this ambulance.
Merton ventured to speak.
‘May I take your boat, sir, across to the ferry, and send the fishermen from the village to search each end of the loch on their side? It is after midnight,’ he added grimly. ‘They will not refuse to go; it is Monday.’
‘I will accompany them,’ said Bude, ‘with your leave, Mr. Macrae, Merton can search our side of the loch, he can borrow another boat at the village in addition to yours. You, at the Castle, can organise the measures for to-morrow.’
‘Thank you both,’ said Mr. Macrae. ‘I should have thought of that. Thank you, Mr. Merton, for the idea. I am a little dazed. There is the key of the boat.’
Merton snatched it, and ran, followed by Bude and four gillies, to the little pier where the boat was moored. He must be doing something for her, or go mad. The six men crowded into the boat, and pulled swiftly away, Merton taking the stroke oar. Meanwhile Blake was carried by four gillies towards the Castle, the men talking low to each other in Gaelic. Mr. Macrae walked silently in front.
Such was the mournful procession that Lady Bude ran out to meet. She passed Mr. Macrae, whose face was set with an expression of deadly rage, and looked for Bude. He was not there, a gillie told her what they knew, and, with a convulsive sob, she followed Mr. Macrae into the Castle.
‘Mr. Blake must be taken to his room,’ said Mr.Macrae. ‘Benson, bring something to eat and drink. Lady Bude, I deeply regret that this thing should have troubled your stay with me. She has been carried off, Mr. Blake has been rendered unconscious; your husband and Mr. Merton are trying nobly to find the track of the miscreants. You will excuse me, I must see to Mr. Blake.’
Mr. Macrae rose, bowed, and went out. He saw Blake carried to a bathroom in the observatory; they undressed him and put him in the hot water. Then they put him to bed, and brought him wine and food. He drank the wine eagerly.
‘We were set on suddenly from behind by fellows from a boat,’ he said. ‘We saw them land and go up from the cove; they took us in the rear: they felled me and pegged me out. Have you my poems?’
‘Mr. Merton has the poems,’ said Mr. Macrae. ‘What became of my daughter?’
‘I don’t know, I was unconscious.’
‘What kind of boat was it?’
‘An ordinary coble, a country boat.’
‘What kind of looking men were they?’
‘Rough fellows with beards. I only saw them when they first passed us at some distance. Oh, my head! Oh damn, how these bites do sting! Get me some ammonia; you’ll find it in a bottle on the dressing-table.’
Mr. Macrae brought him the bottle and a handkerchief. ‘That is all you know?’ he asked.
But Blake was babbling some confusion of verse and prose: his wits were wandering.
Mr. Macrae turned from him, and bade one of themen watch him. He himself passed downstairs and into the hall, where Lady Bude was standing at the window, gazing to the north.
‘Indeed you must not watch, Lady Bude,’ said the millionaire. ‘Let me persuade you to take something and go to bed. I forget myself; I do not believe that you have dined.’ He himself sat down at the table, he ate and drank, and induced Lady Bude to join him. ‘Now, do let me persuade you to go back and to try to sleep,’ said Mr. Macrae gently. ‘Your husband is well accompanied.’
‘It is not for him that I am afraid,’ said the lady, who was in tears.
‘I must arrange for the day’s work,’ said the millionaire, and Lady Bude sighed and left him.
‘First,’ he said aloud, ‘we must get the doctor from Lairg to see Blake. Over forty miles.’ He rang. ‘Benson,’ he said to the butler, ‘order the tandem for seven. The yacht to have steam up at the same hour. Breakfast at half-past six.’
The millionaire then went to his own study, where he sat lost in thought. Morning had come before the sound of voices below informed him that Bude and Merton had returned. He hurried down; their faces told him all. ‘Nothing?’ he asked calmly.
Nothing! They had rowed along the loch sides, touching at every cottage and landing-place. They had learned nothing. He explained his ideas for the day.
‘If you will allow me to go in the yacht, I can telegraph from Lochinver in all directions to the police,’ said Bude.
‘We can use the wireless thing,’ said Mr. Macrae. ‘But if you would be so good, you could at least see the local police, and if anything occurred to you, telegraph in the ordinary way.’
‘Right,’ said Bude, ‘I shall now take a bath.’
‘You will stay with me, Mr. Merton,’ said Mr. Macrae.
‘It is a dreadful country for men in our position,’ said Merton, for the sake of saying something. ‘Police and everything so remote.’
‘It gave them their chance; they have waited for it long enough, I dare say. Have you any ideas?’
‘They must have a steamer somewhere.’
‘That is why I have ordered the balloon, to reconnoitre the sea from,’ said Mr. Macrae. ‘But they have had all the night to escape in. I think they will take her to America, to some rascally southern republic, probably.’
‘I have thought of the outer islands,’ said Merton, ‘out behind the Lewis and the Long Island.’
‘We shall have them searched,’ said Mr. Macrae. ‘I can think of no more at present, and you are tired.’
Merton had slept ill and strangely on the night of Saturday; on Sunday night, of course, he had never lain down. Unshaven, dirty, with haggard eyes, he looked as wretched as he felt.
‘I shall have a bath, and then please employ me, it does not matter on what, as long as I am at work for—you,’ said Merton. He had nearly said ‘for her.’
Mr. Macrae looked at him rather curiously. ‘Youare dying of fatigue,’ he said. ‘All your ideas have been excellent, but I cannot let you kill yourself. Ideas are what I want. You must stay with me to-day: I shall be communicating with London and other centres by the Giambresi machine; I shall need your advice, your suggestions. Now, do go to bed: you shall be called if you are needed.’
He wrung Merton’s hand, and Merton crept up to his bedroom. He took a bath, turned in, and was wrapped in all the blessedness of sleep.
Before five o’clock the house was astir. Bude, in the yacht, steamed down the coast, touching at Lochinver, and wherever there seemed a faint hope of finding intelligence. But he learned nothing. Yachts and other vessels came and went (on Sundays, of course, more seldom), and if the heiress had been taken straight to sea, northwards or west, round the Butt of Lewis, by night, there could be no chance of news of her. Returning, Bude learned that the local search parties had found nothing but the black ashes of a burned boat in a creek on the south side of the cliffs. There the captors of Miss Macrae must have touched, burned their coble, and taken to some larger and fleeter vessel. But no such vessel had been seen by shepherd, fisher, keeper, or gillie. The grooms arrived from Lairg, in the tandem, with the doctor and a rural policeman. Bude had telegraphed to Scotland Yard from Lochinver for detectives, and to Glasgow, Oban, Tobermory, Salen, in fact to every place he thought likely, with minute particulars of Miss Macrae’s appearance and dress. All this Merton learned from Bude, when, long after luncheontime, our hero awoke suddenly, refreshed in body, but with the ghastly blank of misery and doubt before the eyes of his mind.
‘I wired,’ said Bude, ‘on the off chance that yesterday’s storm might have deranged the wireless machine, and, by Jove, it is lucky I did. The wireless machine won’t work, not a word of message has come through; it is jammed or something. I met Donald Macdonald, who told me.’
‘Have you seen our host yet?’
‘No,’ said Bude, ‘I was just going to him.’
They found the millionaire seated at a table, his head in his hands. On their approach he roused himself.
‘Any news?’ he asked Bude, who shook his head. He explained how he had himself sent various telegrams, and Mr. Macrae thanked him.
‘You did well,’ he said. ‘Some electric disturbance has cut us off from our London correspondent. We sent messages in the usual way, but there has been no reply. You sent to Scotland Yard for detectives, I think you said?’
‘I did.’
‘But, unluckily, what can London detectives do in a country like this?’ said Mr. Macrae.
‘I told them to send one who had the Gaelic,’ said Bude.
‘It was well thought of,’ said Mr. Macrae, ‘but this was no local job. Every man for miles round has been examined, and accounted for.’
‘I hope you have slept well, Mr. Merton?’ he asked.
‘Excellently. Can you not put me on some work if it is only to copy telegraphic despatches? But, by the way, how is Blake?’
‘The doctor is still with him,’ said Mr. Macrae; ‘a case of concussion of the brain, he says it is. But you go out and take the air, you must be careful of yourself.’
Bude remained with the millionaire, Merton sauntered out to look at the river: running water drew him like a magnet. By the side of the stream, on a woodland path, he met Lady Bude. She took his hand silently in her right, and patted it with her left. Merton turned his head away.
‘What can I say to you?’ she asked. ‘Oh, this is too horrible, too cruel.’
‘If I had listened to you and not irritated her I might have been with her, not Blake,’ said Merton, with keen self-respect.
‘I don’t quite see that you would be any the better for concussion of the brain,’ said Lady Bude, smiling. ‘Oh, Mr. Merton, youmustfind her, I know how you have worked already. You must rescue her. Consider, this is your chance, this is your opportunity to do something great. Take courage!’
Merton answered, with a rather watery smile, ‘If I had Logan with me.’
‘With or without Lord Fastcastle, youmust do it!’ said Lady Bude.
They saw Mr. Macrae approaching them deep in thought and advanced to meet him.
‘Mr. Macrae,’ asked Lady Bude suddenly, ‘have you had Donald with you long?’
‘Ever since he was a lad in Canada,’ answered the millionaire. ‘I have every confidence in Donald’s ability, and he was for half a year with Gianesi and Giambresi, learning to work their system.’
Donald’s honesty, it was clear, he never dreamed of suspecting. Merton blushed, as he remembered that a doubt as to whether the engineer had been ‘got at’ had occurred to his own mind. For a heavy bribe (Merton had fancied) Donald might have been induced, perhaps by some Stock Exchange operator, to tamper with the wireless centre of communication. But, from Mr. Macrae’s perfect confidence, he felt obliged to drop this attractive hypothesis.
They dined at the usual hour, and not long after dinner Lady Bude said good-night, while her lord, who was very tired, soon followed her example. Merton and the millionaire paid a visit to Blake, whom they found asleep, and the doctor, having taken supper and accepted an invitation to stay all night, joined the two other men in the smoking-room. In answer to inquiries about the patient, Dr. MacTavish said, ‘It’s jist concussion, slight concussion, and nervous shoke. No that muckle the maiter wi’ him but a clour on the hairnspan, and midge bites, forbye the disagreeableness o’ being clamped doon for a wheen hours in a wat tussock o’ bracken.’
This diagnosis, though not perfectly intelligible to Merton, seemed to reassure Mr. Macrae.
‘He’s a bit concetty, the chiel,’ added the worthy physician, ‘and it may be a day or twa or he judgeshe can leave his bed. Jist nervous collapse. But, bless my soul, what’s thon?’
‘Thon’ had brought Mr. Macrae to his feet with a bound. It was the thrill of the electric bell which preluded to communications from the wireless communicator! The instrument began to tick, and to emit its inscribed tape.
‘Thank heaven,’ cried the millionaire, ‘now we shall have light on this mystery.’ He read the message, stamped his foot with an awful execration, and then, recovering himself, handed the document to Merton. ‘The message is a disgusting practical joke,’ he said. ‘Some one at the central agency is playing tricks with the instrument.’
‘Am I to read the message aloud?’ asked Merton.
It was rather a difficult question, for the doctor was a perfect stranger to all present, and the matters involved were of an intimate delicacy, affecting the most sacred domestic relations.
‘Dr. MacTavish,’ said Mr. Macrae, ‘speaking as Highlander to Highlander, these are circumstances, are they not, under the seal of professional confidence?’
The big doctor rose to his feet.
‘They are, sir, but, Mr. Macrae, I am a married man. This sad business of yours, I say it with sorrow, will be the talk of the world to-morrow, as it is of the country side to-day. If you will excuse me, I would rather know nothing, and be able to tell nothing, so I’ll take my pipe outside with me.’
‘Not alone, don’t go alone, Dr. MacTavish,’ said Merton; ‘Mr. Macrae will need his telegraphic operatorprobably. Let me play you a hundred up at billiards.’
The doctor liked nothing better; soon the balls were rattling, while the millionaire was closeted alone with Donald Macdonald and the wireless thing.
After one game, of which he was the winner, the doctor, with much delicacy, asked leave to go to bed. Merton conducted him to his room, and, returning, was hailed by Mr. Macrae.
‘Here is the pleasant result of our communications,’ he said, reading aloud the message which he had first received.
‘The Seven Hunters. August 9, 7.47 p.m.‘Do not be anxious about Miss Macrae. She is in perfect health, and accompanied by three chaperons accustomed to move in the first circles. The one question is How Much? Sorry to be abrupt, but the sooner the affair is satisfactorily concluded the better. A reply through your Gianesi machine will reach us, and will meet with prompt attention.’
‘The Seven Hunters. August 9, 7.47 p.m.
‘Do not be anxious about Miss Macrae. She is in perfect health, and accompanied by three chaperons accustomed to move in the first circles. The one question is How Much? Sorry to be abrupt, but the sooner the affair is satisfactorily concluded the better. A reply through your Gianesi machine will reach us, and will meet with prompt attention.’
‘A practical joke,’ said Merton. ‘The melancholy news has reached town through Bude’s telegrams, and somebody at the depôt is playing tricks with the instrument.’
‘I have used the instrument to communicate that opinion to the manufacturers,’ said Mr. Macrae, ‘but I have had no reply.’
‘What does the jester mean by heading his communication “The Seven Hunters”?’ asked Merton.
‘The name of a real or imaginary public-house, I suppose,’ said Mr. Macrae.
At this moment the electric bell gave its signal, and the tape began to exude. Mr. Macrae read the message aloud; it ran thus:
‘No good wiring to Gianesi and Giambresi at headquarters. You are hitched on to us, and to nobody else. Better climb down. What are your terms?’
‘This is infuriating,’ said Mr. Macrae. ‘Itmustbe a practical joke, but how to reach the operators?’
‘Let me wire to-morrow by the old-fashioned way,’ said Merton; ‘I hear that one need not go to Lairg to wire. One can do that from Inchnadampf, much nearer. That is quicker than steaming to Loch Inver.’
‘Thank you very much, Mr. Merton; I must be here myself. You had better take the motor—trouble dazes a man—I forgot the motor when I ordered the tandem this morning.’
‘Very good,’ said Merton. ‘At what hour shall I start?’
‘We all need rest; let us say at ten o’clock.’
‘All right,’ replied Merton. ‘Now do, pray, try to get a good night of sleep.’
Mr. Macrae smiled wanly: ‘I mean to force myself to readEmma, by Miss Austen, till the desired effect is produced.’
Merton went to bed, marvelling at the self-command of the millionaire. He himself slept ill, absorbed in regret and darkling conjecture.
After writing out several telegrams for Merton to carry, the smitten victim of enormous opulence sought repose. But how vainly! Between him and the pages which report the prosings of Miss Bates andMr. Woodhouse intruded visions of his daughter, a captive, perhaps crossing the Atlantic, perhaps hidden, who knew, in a shieling or a cavern in the untrodden wastes of Assynt or of Lord Reay’s country. At last these appearances were merged in sleep.
As Merton sped on the motor next day to the nearest telegraph station, with Mr. Macrae’s sheaf of despatches, Dr. MacTavish found him a very dull companion. He named the lochs and hills, Quinag, Suilvean, Ben Mór, he dwelt on the merits of the trout in the lochs; he showed the melancholy improvements of the old Duke; he spoke of duchesses and of crofters, of anglers and tourists; he pointed to the ruined castle of the man who sold the great Montrose—or did not sell him. Merton was irresponsive, trying to think. What was this mystery? Why did the wireless machine bring no response from its headquarters; or how could practical jokers have intruded into the secret chambers of Messrs. Gianesi and Giambresi? These dreams or visions of his own on the night before Miss Macrae was taken—were they wholly due to tobacco and the liver?
‘I thought I was awake,’ said Merton to himself, ‘when I was only dreaming about the crimson blot on the ceiling. Was I asleep when I saw the tartans go down the stairs? I used to walk in my sleep as a boy. It is very queer!’
‘Frae the top o’ Ben Mór,’ the doctor was saying,‘on a fine day, they tell me, with a glass you can pick up “The Seven Hunters.”’
‘Eh, what? I beg your pardon, I am so confused by this wretched affair. What did you say you can pick up?’
‘Just “The Seven Hunters,”’ said the doctor rather sulkily.
‘And what are “The Seven Hunters”?’
‘Just seven wee sma’ islandies ahint the Butt of Lewis. The maps ca’ them the Flanan Islands.’
Merton’s heart gave a thump. The first message from the Gianesi invention was dated ‘The Seven Hunters.’ Here was a clue.
‘Are the islands inhabited?’ asked Merton.
‘Just wi’ wild goats, and, maybe, fishers drying their fish. And three men in a lighthouse on one of them,’ said the doctor.
They now rushed up to the hotel and telegraph office of Inchnadampf. The doctor, after visiting the bar, went on in the motor to Lairg; it was to return for Merton, who had business enough on hand in sending the despatches. He was thinking over ‘The Seven Hunters.’ It might be, probably was, a blind, or the kidnappers, having touched there, might have departed in any direction—to Iceland, for what he knew. But the name, ‘the Seven Hunters,’ was not likely to have been invented by a practical joker in London. If not, the conspirators had really captured and kept to themselves Mr. Macrae’s line of wireless communications. How could that have been done? Merton bitterly regretted that his general information did not include electrical science.
However, he had first to send the despatches. In one Mr. Macrae informed Gianesi and Giambresi of the condition of their instrument, and bade them send another at once with a skilled operator, and to look out for probable tamperers in their own establishment. This despatch was in a cypher which before he got the new invention, and while he used the old wires, Mr. Macrae had arranged with the electricians. The words of the despatch were, therefore, peculiar, and the Highland lass who operated, a girl of great beauty and modesty, at first declined to transmit the message.
‘It’s maybe no proper, for a’ that I ken,’ she urged, and only by invoking a local person of authority, and using the name of Mr. Macrae very freely, could Merton obtain the transmission of the despatch.
In another document Mr. Macrae ordered ‘more motors’ and a dozen bicycles, as the Nabob of old ordered ‘more curricles.’ He also telegraphed to the Home Office, the Admiralty, the Hereditary Lord High Admiral of the West Coast, to Messrs. McBrain, of the steamers, and to every one who might have any access to the control of marine police or information. He wired to the police at New York, bidding them warn all American stations, and to the leading New York newspapers, knowing the energy and inquiring, if imaginative, character of their reporters. Bude ought to have done all this on the previous day, but Bude’s ideas were limited. Nothing, however, was lost, as America is not reached in forty-eight hours. The millionaire instructed Scotland Yard to warn all foreignports, and left themcarte-blancheas to the offer of a reward for the discovery of his missing daughter. He also put off all the guests whom he had been expecting at Castle Skrae.
Merton was amazed at the energy and intelligence of a paternal mind smitten by sudden grief. Mr. Macrae had even telegraphed to every London newspaper, and to the leading Scottish and provincial journals, ‘No Interviewers need Apply.’ Several hours were spent, as may be imagined, in getting off these despatches from a Highland rural office, and Merton tried to reward the fair operator. But she declined to accept a present for doing her duty, and expressed lively sympathy for the poor young lady who was lost. In a few days a diamond-studded watch and chain arrived for Miss MacTurk.
Merton himself wired to Logan, imploring him, in the name of friendship, to abandon all engagements, and come to Inchnadampf. Where kidnapping was concerned he knew that Logan must be interested, and might be useful; but, of course, he could not invite him to Castle Skrae. Meanwhile he secured rooms for Logan at the excellent inn. Lady Fastcastle, he knew, was in England, brooding over her first-born, the Master of Fastcastle.
Before these duties were performed the motor returned from Lairg, bearing the two London detectives, one disguised as a gillie (he was the detective who had the Gaelic), the other as a clergyman of the Church of England. To Merton he whispered that he was to be an early friend of Mr. Macrae, come to comfort him on the first news of his disaster. As tothe other, the gillie, Mr. Macrae was known to have been in want of an assistant to the stalker, and Duncan Mackay (of Scotland Yard) had accepted the situation. Merton approved of these arrangements; they were such as he would himself have suggested.
‘But I don’t see what we can do, sir,’ said the clerical detective (the Rev. Mr. Williams), ‘except perhaps find out if it was a put up thing from within.’
Merton gave him a succinct sketch of the events, and he could see that Mr. Williams already suspected Donald Macdonald, the engineer. Merton, Mr. Williams, and the driver now got into the motor, and were followed by the gillie-detective and a man to drive in a dog-cart hired from the inn. Merton ordered all answers to telegrams to be sent by boys on bicycles.
It was late ere he returned to Castle Skrae. There nothing of importance had occurred, except the arrival of more messages from the wireless machine. They insisted that Miss Macrae was in perfect health, but implored the millionaire to settle instantly, lest anxiety for a father’s grief should undermine her constitution.
Mr. Williams had a long interview with Mr. Macrae. It was arranged that he should read family prayers in the morning and evening. He leftThe Church Quarterly Reviewand numbers ofThe Expositor,The Guardian, andThe Pilotin the hall with his great coat, and on the whole his entry was very well staged. Duncan Mackay occupied a room at the keeper’s, who had only eight children.
Mr. Williams asked if he might see Mr. Blake; hecould impart religious consolation. Merton carried this message, in answer to which Blake, who was in bed very sulky and sleepy, merely replied, ‘Kick out the hell-hound.’
Merton was obliged to soften this rude message, saying that unfortunately Mr. Blake was of the older faith, though he had expressed no wish for the ministrations of Father McColl.
On hearing this Mr. Williams merely sighed, as the Budes were present. He had been informed as to their tenets, and had even expressed a desire to labour for their enlightenment, by way of giving local colour. He had, he said, some stirring Protestant tracts among his clerical properties. Mr. Macrae, however, had gently curbed this zeal, so on hearing of Blake’s religious beliefs the sigh of Mr. Williams was delicately subdued.
Dinner-time arrived. Blake did not appear; the butler said that he supported existence solely on dried toast and milk and soda-water. He was one of the people who keep a private clinical thermometer, and he sent the bulletin that his temperature was 103. He hoped to come downstairs to-morrow. Mr. Williams gave the party some news of the outer world. He had brought theScotsman, and Mr. Macrae had the gloomy satisfaction of reading a wildly inaccurate report of his misfortune. Correct news had not reached the press, but deep sympathy was expressed. The melancholy party soon broke up, Mr. Williams conducting family prayers with much unction, after the Budes had withdrawn.
In a private interview with the millionaire Mertontold him how he had discovered the real meaning of ‘The Seven Hunters,’ whence the first telegram of the kidnappers was dated. Neither man thought the circumstance very important.
‘They would hardly have ventured to name the islands if they had any idea of staying there,’ the millionaire said, ‘besides any heartless jester could find the name on a map.’
This was obvious, but as Lady Bude was much to be pitied, alone, in the circumstances, Mr. Macrae determined to send her and Bude on the yacht, theFlora Macdonald, to cruise round the Butt of Lewis and examine the islets. Both Bude and his wife were devoted to yachting, and the isles might yield something in the way of natural history.
Next day (Wednesday) the Budes steamed away, and there came many answers to the telegrams of Mr. Macrae, and one from Logan to Merton. Logan was hard by, cruising with his cousin, Admiral Chirnside, at the naval manœuvres on the northeast coast. He would come to Inchnadampf at once. Mr. Macrae heard from Gianesi and Giambresi. Gianesi himself was coming with a fresh machine. Mr. Macrae wished it had been Giambresi, whom he knew; Gianesi he had never met. Condolences, of course, poured in from all quarters, even the most exalted. The Emperor of Germany was most sympathetic. But there was no news of importance. Several yachting parties had been suspected and examined; three young ladies at Oban, Applecross, and Tobermory, had established their identity and proved that they were not Miss Macrae.
All day the wireless machine was silent. Mr. Williams was shown all the rooms in the castle, and met Blake, who appeared at luncheon. Blake was most civil. He asked for a private interview with Mr. Macrae, who inquired whether his school friend, Mr. Williams, might share it? Blake was pleased to give them both all the information he had, though his head, he admitted, still rang with the cowardly blow that had stunned him. He was told of the discovery of the burned boat, and was asked whether it had approached from east or west, from the side of the Atlantic, or from the head of the sea loch.
‘From Kinlocharty,’ he said, ‘from the head of the loch, the landward side.’ This agreed with the evidence of the villagers on the other side of the sea loch.
Would he recognise the crew? He had only seen them at a certain distance, when they landed, but in spite of the blow on his head he remembered the black beard of one man, and the red beard of another. To be sure they might shave off their beards, yet these two he thought he could identify. Speaking to Miss Macrae as the men passed them, he had called one Donald Dubh, or ‘black,’ and the other Donald Ban, or ‘fair.’ They carried heavy shepherds’ crooks in their hands. Their dress was Lowland, but they wore unusually broad bonnets of the old sort, drooping over the eyes. Blake knew no more, except his anguish from the midges.
He expressed his hope to be well enough to go away on Friday; he would retire to the inn at Scourie, and try to persevere with his literary work.Mr. Macrae would not hear of this; as, if the miscreants were captured, Blake alone could have a chance of identifying them. To this Blake replied that, as long as Mr. Macrae thought that he might be useful, he was at his service.
To Merton, Blake displayed himself in a new light. He said that he remembered little of what occurred after he was found at the foot of the cliff. Probably he was snappish and selfish; he was suffering very much. His head, indeed, was still bound up, and his face showed how he had suffered. Merton shook hands with him, and said that he hoped Blake would forget his own behaviour, for which he was sincerely sorry.
‘Oh, the chaff?’ said Blake. ‘Never mind, I dare say I played the fool. I have been thinking, when my brain would give me leave, as I lay in bed. Merton, you are a trifle my senior, and you know the world much better. I have lived in a writing and painting set, where we talked nonsense till it went to our heads, and we half believed it. And, to tell you the truth, the presence of women always sets me off. I am a humbug; I donotknow Gaelic, but I mean to work away at my drama for all that. This kind of shock against the realities of life sobers a fellow.’
Blake spoke simply, in an unaffected, manly way.
‘Semel in saninivimus omnes!’ said Merton.
‘Nec lusisse pudet!’ said Blake, ‘and the rest of it. I know there’s a parallel in theGreek Anthology, somewhere. I’ll go and get my copy.’
He went into the observatory (they had been sitting on a garden seat outside), and Merton thought to himself:
‘He is not such a bad fellow. Not many of your young poets know anything but French.’
Blake seemed to have some difficulty in finding his Anthology. At last he came out with rather a ‘carried’ look, as the Scots say, rather excited.
‘Here it is,’ he said, and handed Merton the little volume, of a Tauchnitz edition, open at the right page. Merton read the epigram. ‘Very neat and good,’ he said.
‘Now, Merton,’ said Blake, ‘it is not usual, is it, for ministers of the Anglican sect to play the spy?’
‘What in the world do you mean?’ asked Merton. ‘Oh, I guess, the Rev. Mr. Williams! Were you not told that his cure of souls is in Scotland Yard? I ought to have told you, I thought our host would have done so. What was the holy man doing?’
‘I was not told,’ said Blake, ‘I suppose Mr. Macrae was too busy. So I was rather surprised, when I went into my room for my book, to find the clergyman examining my things and taking books out of one of my book boxes.’
‘Good heavens!’ exclaimed Merton. ‘What did you do?’
‘I locked the door of the room, and handed Mr. Williams the key of my despatch box. “I have a few private trifles there,” I said, “the key may save you trouble.” Then I sat down and wrote a note to Mr. Macrae, and rang the bell and asked the servant to carry the note to his master. Mr. Macrae came, and I explained the situation and asked him to be kind enough to order the motor, if he could spare it, or anything to carry me to the nearest inn.’
‘I shall order it, Mr. Blake,’ said Mr. Macrae, ‘but it will be to remove this person, whom I especially forbade to molest any of my guests. I don’t know how I forgot to tell you who he is, a detective; the others were told.’
‘He confounded himself in excuses; it was horribly awkward.’
‘Horribly!’ said Merton.
‘He rated the man for visiting his guests’ rooms without his knowledge. I dare say the parson has turned over allyourthings.’
Merton blenched. He had some of the correspondence of the Disentanglers with him, rather private matter, naturally.
‘He had not the key of my despatch box,’ said Merton.
‘He could open it with a quill, I believe,’ said Blake. ‘They do—in novels.’
Merton felt very uneasy. ‘What was the end of it?’ he asked.
‘Oh, I said that if the man was within his duty the accident was only one of those which so singular a misfortune brings with it. I would stay while Mr. Macrae wanted me. I handed over my keys, and insisted that all my luggage and drawers and things should be examined. But Mr. Macrae would not listen to me, and forbade the fellow to enter any of—the bedrooms.’
‘Begad, I’ll go and look at my own despatch box,’ said Merton.
‘I shall sit in the shade,’ said Blake.
Merton did examine his box, but could not seethat any of the papers had been disarranged. Still, as the receptacle was full of family secrets he did not feel precisely comfortable. Going out on the lawn he met Mr. Macrae, who took him into a retired place and told him what had occurred.
‘I had given the man the strictest orders not to invade the rooms of any of my guests,’ he said; ‘it is too odious.’
The Rev. Mr. Williams being indisposed, dined alone in his room that night; so did Blake, who was still far from well.
The only other incident was that Donald Macdonald and the new gillie, Duncan Mackay, were reported to be ‘lying around in a frightfully dissolute state.’ Donald was a sober man, but Mackay, he explained next morning, proved to be his long lost cousin, hence the revel. Mackay, separately, stated that he had made Donald intoxicated for the purpose of eliciting any guilty secret which he might possess. But whisky had elicited nothing.
On the whole the London detectives had not been entirely a success. Mr. Macrae therefore arranged to send both of them back to Lairg, where they would strike the line, and return to the metropolis.
Merton had casually talked of Logan (Lord Fastcastle) to Mr. Macrae on the previous evening, and mentioned that he was now likely to be at Inchnadampf. Mr. Macrae knew something of Logan, and before he sped the parting detectives, asked Merton whether he thought that he might send a note to Inchnadampf inviting his friend to come and bear him company? Merton gravely said that in such acrisis as theirs he thought that Logan would be extremely helpful, and that he was a friend of the Budes. Perhaps he himself had better go and pick up Logan and inform him fully as to the mysterious events? As Mr. Gianesi was also expected from London on that day (Thursday) to examine the wireless machine, which had been silent, Mr. Macrae sent off several vehicles, as well as the motor that carried the detectives. Merton drove the tandem himself.
Merton found Logan, with his Spanish bull-dog, Bouncer, loafing outside the hotel door at Inchnadampf. He greeted Merton in a state of suppressed glee; the whole adventure was much to the taste of the scion of Rostalrig. Merton handed him Mr. Macrae’s letter of invitation.
‘Come, won’t I come, rather!’ said Logan.
‘Of course we must wait to rest the horses,’ said Merton. ‘The motor has gone on to Lairg, carrying two detectives who have made a pretty foozle of it, and it will bring back an electrician.’
‘What for?’ asked Logan.
‘I must tell you the whole story,’ said Merton. ‘Let us walk a little way—too many gillies and people loafing about here.’
They walked up the road and sat down by little Loch Awe, the lochan on the way to Alt-na-gealgach. Merton told all the tale, beginning with his curious experiences on the night before the disappearance of Miss Macrae, and ending with the dismissal of the detectives. He also confided to Logan the importance of the matter to himself, and entreated him to be serious.
Logan listened very attentively.
When Merton had ended, Logan said, ‘Old boy, you were the making of me: you may trust me. Serious it is. A great deal of capital must have been put into this business.’
‘A sprat to catch a whale,’ said Merton. ‘You mean about nobbling the electric machine? How couldthatbe done?’
‘That—and other things. I don’t knowhowthe machine was nobbled, but it could not be done cheap. Would you mind telling me your dreams again?’
Merton repeated the story.
Logan was silent.
‘Do you see your way?’ asked Merton.
‘I must have time to think it out,’ said Logan. ‘It is rather mixed. When was Bude to return from his cruise to “The Seven Hunters”?’
‘Perhaps to-night,’ said Merton. ‘We cannot be sure. She is a very swift yacht, theFlora Macdonald.’
‘I’ll think it all over, Bude may give us a tip.’
No more would Logan say, beyond asking questions, which Merton could not answer, about the transatlantic past of the vanished heiress.
They loitered back towards the hotel and lunched. The room was almost empty, all the guests of the place were out fishing. Presently the motor returned from Lairg, bringing Mr. Gianesi and a large box of his electrical appliances. Merton rapidly told him all that he did not already know through Mr. Macrae’s telegrams. He was a reserved man, rather young, and beyond thanking Merton, said little, but pushed on towards Castle Skrae in the motor. ‘Some othermotors,’ he said, ‘had arrived, and were being detained at Lairg.’ They came later.
Merton and Logan followed in the tandem, Logan driving; they had handed to Gianesi a sheaf of telegrams for the millionaire. As to the objects of interest on the now familiar road, Merton enlightened Logan, who seemed as absent-minded as Merton had been, when instructed by Dr. MacTavish. As they approached the Castle, Merton observed, from a height, theFlora Macdonaldsteaming into the sea loch.
‘Let us drive straight down to the cove and meet them,’ he said.
They arrived at the cove just as the boat from the yacht touched the shore. The Budes were astonished and delighted to see their old friend, Logan, and his dog, Bouncer, a tawny black muzzled, bow-legged hero, was admired by Lady Bude.
Merton rapidly explained. ‘Now, what tidings?’ he asked.
The party walked aside on the shore, and Bude swiftly narrated what he had discovered.
‘Theyhavebeen there,’ he said. ‘We drew six of the islets blank, including the islet of the lighthouse. The men there had seen a large yacht, two ladies and a gentleman from it had visited them. They knew no more. Desert places, the other isles are, full of birds. On the seventh isle we found some Highland fishermen from the Lewis in a great state of excitement. They had only landed an hour before to pick up some fish they had left to dry on the rocks. They had no English, but one of our crew had the Gaelic,and interpreted in Scots. Regular Gaels, they did not want to speak, but I offered money, gold, let them see it. Then they took us to a cave. Do you know Mackinnon’s cave in Mull, opposite Iona?’
‘Yes, drive on!’ said Merton, much interested.
‘Well, inside it was pitched an empty corrugated iron house, quite new, and another, on the further side, outside the cave.’
‘I picked up this in the interior of the cave,’ said Lady Bude.
‘This’ was a golden hair-pin of peculiar make.
‘That’s the kind of hair-pin she wears,’ said Lady Bude.
‘By Jove!’ said Merton and Logan in one voice.
‘But that was all,’ said Bude. ‘There was no other trace, except that plainly people had been coming and going, and living there. They had left some empty bottles, and two intact champagne bottles. We tasted it, it was excellent! The Lewis men, who had not heard of the affair, could tell nothing more, except, what is absurd, that they had lately seen a dragon flying far off over the sea. Adragon volant, did you ever hear such nonsense? The interpreter pronounced it “draigon.” He had not too much English himself.’
‘The Highlanders are so delightfully superstitious,’ said Lady Bude.
Logan opened his lips to speak, but said nothing.
‘I don’t think we should keep Mr. Macrae waiting,’ said Lady Bude.
‘If Bude will take the reins,’ said Merton, ‘you and he can be at the Castle in no time. We shall walk.’
‘Excuse me a moment,’ said Logan. ‘A word with you, Bude.’
He took Bude aside, uttered a few rapid sentences, and then helped Lady Bude into the tandem. Bude followed, and drove away.
‘Is your secret to be kept from me?’ asked Merton.
‘Well, old boy, you never toldmethe mystery of the Emu’s feathers! Secret for secret, out with it; how did the feathers help you, if theydidhelp you, to find out my uncle, the Marquis?Gifgaff, as we say in Berwickshire. Out with your feathers! and I’ll produce mydragon volant, tail and all.’
Merton was horrified. The secret of the Emu’s feathers involved the father of Lady Fastcastle, of his old friend’s wife, in a very distasteful way. Logan, since his marriage, had never shown any curiosity in the matter. His was a joyous nature; no one was less of a self-tormentor.
‘Well, old fellow,’ said Merton, ‘keep your dragon, and I’ll keep my Emu.’
‘I won’t keep him long, I assure you,’ said Logan. ‘Only for a day or two, I dare say; then you’ll know; sooner perhaps. But, for excellent reasons, I asked Bude and Lady Bude to say nothing about the hallucination of these second-sighted Highland fishers. I have a plan. I think we shall run in the kidnappers; keep your pecker up. You shall be in it!’