"A fine afternoon," I remarked, without rising, and I hope without showing any sign of emotion other than pleasure at making an acquaintance.
"Aye," said he, briefly and warily.
This discouraging manner was very ominous, for the man was as good-natured and agreeable-looking a fellow as I ever met.
"The weather looks like keeping up," I said.
He continued to look at me steadily, and made no answer at all this time. Then he turned his back to me very deliberately, lifted his felt hat, and waved it two or three times round his head, evidently to some one in the distance. I saw instantly that mischief was afoot and time precious, yet the fellow was evidently determined and stout-hearted, besides being physically very powerful, and it would never do to rouse his suspicions to the pitch of grappling with me. Of course I might use my revolver, but I had no wish to add a civilian's death to the other charge I might have to face before that sun had set. Suddenly luck served me well again by putting into my head a well-known English cant phrase.
"Are you often taken like that?" I inquired with a smile.
He turned round again and stared blankly. I imitated the movement of waving a hat, and laughed.
"Or is it a family custom?" I asked.
He was utterly taken aback, and looked rather foolish. I sat still and continued to smile at him. And then he broke into a smile himself.
"I was just waving on a friend," he explained, and I could detect a note of apology in his voice. For the moment he was completely hoodwinked. How long it would last Heaven knew, but I clearly could not afford to imitate Mr Asquith, and "wait and see."
"Oh," I said with a laugh, "I see!"
And then I glanced at my wristlet watch, and sprang to my feet with an exclamation.
"By Jove, I'll be late!" I said, and picking up my cycle wheeled it briskly to the road, remarking genially as I went, "the days are not so long as they were!"
I never saw a man more obviously divided in mind. Was I the suspicious person he fancied at first? Or was I an honest and peaceable gentleman? Meanwhile I had cast one brief but sufficient glance along the road. Just at the foot of the steep hill down which I had come in the morning a man was mounting a motor-cycle. Beside him stood one or two others—country folk, so far as I could judge at the distance, and piecing things together, it seemed plain that my friend had lately been one of the party, and that the man they had been gossiping with was a motor-cyclist in search of me, who had actually paused to make inquiries within little over a quarter of a mile from where I sat. Quite possibly he had been there for some time, and almost certainly he would have ridden past without suspecting my presence if it had not been for the diabolical mishap of this chance encounter.
I had planted my cycle on the road, and was ready to mount before my friend had made up his mind what to do. Even then his procedure luckily lacked decision.
"Beg pardon, sir—!" he began, making a step towards me.
"Good evening!" I shouted, and the next instant the engine had started, and I was in my saddle.
Even then my pursuer had got up so much speed that he must surely have caught me had he not stopped to make inquiry of my late acquaintance. I was rounding a corner at the moment, and so was able to glance over my shoulder and see what was happening. The cyclist was then in the act of remounting, and I noted that he was in very dark clothes. It might or might not have been a uniform, but I fancied it was. Anyhow, I felt peculiarly little enthusiasm for making his acquaintance.
On I sped, working rapidly up to forty miles an hour, and quite careless now of any little sensation I might cause. I had sensations myself, and did not grudge them to other people. The road quickly left the coast and turned directly inland, and presently it began to wind along the edge of a long reedy stretch of water, with a steep bank above it on the other side. The windings gave me several chances of catching a glimpse of my pursuer, and I saw that I was gaining nothing; in fact, if anything he was overhauling me.
"I'll try them!" I said to myself.
"Them" were nails. Wiedermann had done me no more than justice in assuming I had come well provided against possible contingencies. Each of my side-pockets had a little packet of large-headed, sharp-pointed nails. I had several times thrown them experimentally on the floor of my cabin, and found that a gratifying number lay point upwards. I devoutly prayed they would behave as reasonably now.
This stretch of road was ideal for their use—narrow, and with not a house to give succour or a spectator to witness such a very suspicious performance, I threw a handful behind me, and at the next turn of the road glanced round to see results. The man was still going strong. I threw another handful and then a third, but after that the road ran straight for a space, and it was only when it bent to the right round the head of the loch that I was able to see him again. He had stopped far back, and was examining his tyres.
The shadows by this time were growing long, but there were still some hours before darkness would really shelter me, and in the meantime what was I to do with myself, and where to turn? Judging from the long time that had elapsed between my discovery in the early morning and the appearance of this cyclist at the very place which I had thought would be the last where they would seek me, the rest of the island had probably been searched and the hue and cry had died down by this time. So for some time I ought to be fairly safe anywhere: until, in fact, my pursuer had reached a telegraph office, and other scouts had then been collected and sent out. And if my man was an average human being, he would certainly waste a lot of precious time in trying to pump up his tyres or mend them before giving it up as a bad job and walking to a telegraph office.
That, in fact, was what he did, for in this open country I was able a few minutes later to see him in the far distance still stopping by that loch shore. But though I believe in trusting to chance, I like to give myself as many chances as possible. I knew where all the telegraph offices were, and one was a little nearer him than I quite liked. So half a mile farther on, at a quiet spot on a hill, I jumped off and swarmed up one of the telegraph-posts by the roadside, and then I took out of my pocket another happy inspiration. When I came down again, there was a gap in the wire.
There was now quite a good chance that I might retain my freedom till night fell, and if I could hold out so long as that—well, we should see what happened then! But what was to be done in the meantime? A strong temptation assailed me, and I yielded to it. I should get as near to my night's rendezvous as possible, and try to find some secluded spot there. It was not perhaps the very wisest thing to risk being seen there by daylight and bring suspicion on the neighbourhood where I meant to spend two or three days; but you will presently see why I was so strongly tempted. So great, in fact, was the temptation that till I got there I hardly thought of the risk.
I rode for a little longer through the same kind of undulating, loch-strewn inland country, and then I came again close to the sea. But it was not the open sea this time. It was a fairly wide sound that led from the ocean into a very important place, and immediately I began to see things. What things they were precisely I may not say, but they had to do with warfare, with making this sound about as easy for a hostile ship to get through, whether above the water or below, as a pane of glass is for a bluebottle. As I rode very leisurely, with my head half turned round all the while, I felt that my time was not wasted if I escaped safely, having seen simply what I now noted. For my eye could put interpretations on features that would convey nothing to the ordinary traveller.
Gradually up and up a long gentle incline I rode, with the sound falling below me and a mass of high dark hills rising beyond it. Behind me the sun was now low, and my shadow stretched long on the empty road ahead. For it was singularly empty, and the country-side was utterly peaceful; only at sea was there life—with death very close beside it. And now and then there rose at intervals a succession of dull, heavy sounds that made the earth quiver. I knew what they meant!
Then came a dip, and then a very steep long hill through moorland country. And then quite suddenly and abruptly I came to the top. It was a mere knife-edge, with the road instantly beginning to descend steeply on the other side, but I did not descend with the road. I jumped off and stared with bated breath.
Ahead of me and far below, a wide island-encircled sheet of water lay placid and smiling in the late afternoon sunshine. Strung along one side of it were lines of grey ships, with a little smoke rising from most of their funnels, but lying quite still and silent—as still and silent as the farms and fields on shore. Those distant patches of grey, with the thin drifts of smoke and the masts encrusted with small grey blobs rising out of their midst, those were the cause of all my country's troubles. But for them peace would have long since been dictated and a mightier German Empire would be towering above all other States in the world. How I hated—and yet (being a sailor myself) how I respected them!
One solitary monster of this Armada was slowly moving across the land-locked basin. Parallel to her and far away moved a tiny vessel with a small square thing following her at an even distance, and the sun shining on this showed its colour red. Suddenly out of the monster shot a series of long bright flashes. Nothing else happened for several seconds, and then almost simultaneously "Boom! boom! boom!" hit my ear, and a group of tall white fountains sprang up around the distant red target. The Grand Fleet of England was preparing for "The Day"!
I knew the big vessel at a glance; I knew her, at least, as one of a certain four, and for some moments I watched her gunnery practice, too fascinated to stir. I noted how the fall of her shells was spread—in fact I noted several things; and then it occurred to me abruptly that I stood a remarkably good chance of having a wall at my back and a handkerchief over my eyes if I lingered in this open road much longer. And the plea that I was enjoying the excellent gun-practice made by H.M.S.Blankwould scarcely be accepted as an extenuating circumstance!
I glanced quickly round, and then I realised how wonderfully luck was standing by me. At the summit of that hill there were naturally no houses, and as the descending road on either side made a sharp twist almost immediately, I stood quite invisible on my outlook tower. The road, moreover, ran through a kind of neck, with heather rising on either side; and in a moment I had hauled my cycle up the bank on the landward side, and was out of sight over the edge, even should any traveller appear.
After a few minutes' laborious dragging of my cycle I found myself in a small depression in the heather, where, by lying down, I could remain quite out of sight unless some one walked right into me—and it seemed improbable that any one should take such a promenade with the good road so close at hand. By raising myself on my knees I could command the same engrossing view I had seen from the road, only I now also saw something of the country that sloped down to the sea; and with a thrill of exultation I realised that this prospect actually included our rendezvous.
What I saw when I cautiously peered over the rim of that little hollow was (beginning at the top) a vast expanse of pale-blue sky, with fleecy clouds down near the horizon already tinged with pink reflections from the sunset far off behind my back. Then came a shining glimpse of the North Sea; then a rim of green islands, rising on the right to high heather hills; then the land-locked waters and the grey ships now getting blurred and less distinct; then some portions of the green land that sloped up to where I lay; and among these fields, and not far away from me, the steep roof and gable-top of a grey, old-fashioned house. It was the parish manse, the pacific abode of the professional exponent and exemplar of peace—the parish minister; and yet, curiously enough, it was that house which my eyes devoured.
The single ship had now ceased firing and anchored with her consorts, the fleet had grown too indistinct to note anything of its composition, and there was nothing to distract my attention from the house. I looked at it hard and long and studied the lie of the ground between it and me, and then I lay down on a couch of soft heather and began to think.
So far as I could see I had done nothing yet to draw suspicion to this particular spot, for no one at all seemed to have seen me, but it was manifest that there would be a hard and close hunt for the mysterious motor-cyclist on the morrow. I began to half regret that I had cut that telegraph wire and advertised myself so patently for what I was. Now it was quite obvious that for some days to come motor-cycling would be an unhealthy pastime in these islands. Even at night how many ears would be listening for my "phut-phut-phut," and how many eyes would be scanning the dark roads? A few judiciously placed and very simple barricades—a mere bar on two uprights, with a sentry beside each—and what chance would I have of getting back to that distant bay, especially as I had just been seen so near it?
"However," I said to myself, "that is looking too far ahead. It was not my fault I brought this hornet's nest about my ears. Just bad luck and a clumsy sailor!"
Just then I heard something approaching on the road below me, and in a minute or two it became unmistakably the sound of a horse and trap. At one place I could catch a glimpse of this road between the hummocks of heather, and I raised myself again and looked out. In a moment the horse and trap appeared and I got a sensation I shall not soon forget. Not that there seemed to the casual passer-by anything in the least sensational about this equipage. He would merely have noticed that it contained, besides the driver, a few articles of luggage and a gentleman in a flat-looking felt hat and an overcoat—both of them black. This gentleman was sitting with his back to me (he was in a small waggonette), but I could scarcely doubt who it was. But only arriving to-night!
Curiosity and anxiety so devoured me that I ran a little risk. Getting out of my hollow, I crawled forward on my hands and knees till I could catch a glimpse of the side road leading to that house; and there I lay flat on my face and watched.
Down the steep hill the horse proceeded at a walk, and what between my impatience to make sure, and my consciousness of my own rashness in quitting even for a moment my sheltered hollow, I passed a few very uncomfortable minutes. The light by this time was failing fast, but it was quite clear enough to see (or be seen), and at last I caught one more glimpse of that horse and trap—turning off the road just where I expected. And then I was crawling back with more haste than dignity.
It was "him"! And he had only arrived to-night. If it had not been for my accident, in what a nice dilemma I should have been landed! Never did I bless any one more fervently than that awkward sailor who had let my cycle slip, and as for the wave of salt water which wet it, it seemed to have sprung from the age of miracles.
The trouble of my discovery and its possible consequences still remained, but I thought little enough of that now, so thankful did I feel for what hadnothappened. And then I stretched myself out again on the heather, waiting with all the patience I could muster for the falling of night.
It was in July of that same year that the Rev. Alexander Burnett was abashed to find himself inadvertently conspicuous. He had very heartily permitted himself to be photographed in the centre of a small group of lads from his parish who had heard their country's call and were home in their khaki for a last leave-taking. Moreover, the excellence of the photograph and the undeniably close resemblance of his own portrait to the reflection he surveyed each morning when shaving, had decidedly pleased him. But the appearance of this group, first as an illustration in a local paper and then in one that enjoyed a very wide circulation indeed, embarrassed him not a little. For he was a modest, publicity-avoiding man, and also he felt he ought to have been in khaki too.
Not that Mr Burnett had anything really to reproach himself with, for he was in the forties, some years above military age. But he was a widower without a family, who had already spent fifteen years in a sparsely inhabited parish in the south-east of Scotland not very far from the Border; and ever since he lost his wife had been uneasy in mind and a little morbid, and anxious for change of scene and fresh experiences. He was to get them, and little though he dreamt it, that group was their beginning. Indeed, it would have taken as cunning a brain to scent danger in the trifling incidents with which his strange adventure began as it took to arrange them. And Mr Burnett was not at all cunning, being a simple, quiet man. In appearance he was rather tall, with a clean-shaven, thoughtful face, and hair beginning to turn grey.
A few days later a newspaper arrived by post. He had received several already from well-meaning friends, each with that group in it, and he sighed as he opened this one. It was quite a different paper, however, with no illustrations, but with a certain page indicated in blue pencil, and a blue pencil mark in the margin of that page. What his attention was called to was simply the announcement that the Rev. Mr Maxwell, minister of the parish of Myredale, had been appointed to another charge, and that there was now a vacancy there.
Mr Burnett looked at the wrapper, but his name and address had been typewritten and gave him no clue. He wondered who had sent him the paper, and then his thoughts naturally turned to the vacant parish. He knew that it lay in a certain group of northern islands, which we may call here the Windy Isles, and he presumed that the stipend would not be great. Still, it was probably a better living than his own small parish, and as for its remoteness, well, he liked quiet, out-of-the-way places, and it would certainly be a complete change of scene. He let the matter lie in the back of his mind, and there it would very likely have remained but for a curious circumstance on the following Sunday.
His little parish church was seldom visited by strangers, and when by any chance one did appear, the minister was very quickly conscious of the fact. He always took stock of his congregation during the first psalm, and on this Sabbath his experienced eye had noted a stranger before the end of the opening verse. A pleasant-looking gentleman in spectacles he appeared to be, and of a most exemplary and devout habit of mind. In fact, he hardly once seemed to take his spectacled gaze off the minister's face during the whole service; and Mr Burnett believed in giving his congregation good measure.
It was a fine day, and when service was over the minister walked back to his manse at a very leisurely pace, enjoying the sunshine after a week of showery weather. The road he followed crossed the river, and as he approached the bridge he saw the same stranger leaning over the parapet, smoking a cigar, and gazing at the brown stream. Near him at the side of the road was drawn up a large dark-green touring car, which apparently the gentleman had driven himself, for there was no sign of a chauffeur.
"Good day, sir!" said the stranger affably, as the minister came up to him. "Lovely weather!"
Mr Burnett, nothing loath to hear a fresh voice, stopped and smiled and agreed that the day was fine. He saw now that the stranger was a middle-sized man with a full fair moustache, jovial eyes behind his gold-rimmed spectacles, and a rosy healthy colour; while his manner was friendliness itself. The minister felt pleasantly impressed with him at once.
"Any trout in this stream?" inquired the stranger.
Mr Burnett answered that it was famed as a fishing river, at which the stranger seemed vastly interested and pleased, and put several questions regarding the baskets that were caught. Then he grew a little more serious and said—
"I hope you will pardon me, sir, for thanking you for a very excellent sermon. As I happened to be motoring past just as church was going in I thought I'd look in too. But I assure you I had no suspicion I should hear so good a discourse. I appreciated it highly."
Though a modest man, Mr Burnett granted the stranger's pardon very readily. Indeed, he became more favourably impressed with him than ever.
"I am very pleased to hear you say so," he replied, "for in an out-of-the-way place like this one is apt to get very rusty."
"I don't agree with you at all, sir," said the stranger energetically, "if you'll pardon my saying so. In my experience—which is pretty wide, I may add—the best thinking is done in out-of-the-way places. I don't say the showiest, mind you, but thebest!"
Again the minister pardoned him without difficulty.
"Of course, one needs a change now and then, I admit," continued the stranger. "But, my dear sir, whatever you do, don't go and bury yourself in a crowd!"
This struck Mr Burnett as a novel and very interesting way of putting the matter. He forgot all about the dinner awaiting him at the manse, and when the stranger offered him a very promising-looking cigar, he accepted it with pleasure, and leaned over the parapet beside him. There, with his eyes on the running water, he listened and talked for some time.
The stranger began to talk about the various charming out-of-the-way places in Scotland. It seemed he was a perfervid admirer of everything Scottish, and had motored or tramped all over the country from Berwick to the Pentland Firth. In fact, he had even crossed the waters, for he presently burst forth into a eulogy of the Windy Islands.
"The most delightful spot, sir, I have ever visited!" he said enthusiastically. "There is a peacefulness and charm, and at the same time something stimulating in the air I simply can't describe. In body and mind I felt a new man after a week there!"
The minister was so clearly struck by this, and his interest so roused, that the stranger pursued the topic and added a number of enticing details.
"By the way," he exclaimed presently, "do you happen to know a fellow-clergyman there called Maxwell? His parish is—let me see—Ah, Myredale, that's the name."
This struck Mr Burnett as quite extraordinary.
"I don't know him personally," he began.
"A very sensible fellow," continued the stranger impetuously. "He told me his parish was as like heaven as anything on this mortal earth!"
"He has just left it," said Mr Burnett.
The stranger seemed surprised and interested.
"What a chance for some one!" he exclaimed.
Mr Burnett gazed thoughtfully through the smoke of his cigar into the brown water of the river below him.
"I have had thoughts of making a change myself," he said slowly. "But of course they might not select me even if I applied for Myredale."
"In the Scottish Church the custom is to go to the vacant parish to preach a trial sermon, isn't it?" inquired the stranger.
The minister nodded. "A system I disapprove of, I may say," said he.
"I quite agree with you," said the stranger sympathetically. "Still, so long as that is the system, why not try your luck? Mind you, I talk as one who knows the place, and knows Mr Maxwell and his opinion of it. You'll have an enviable visit, whatever happens."
"It is a very long way," said Mr Burnett.
"Don't they pay your expenses!"
"Yes," admitted the minister. "But then I understand that those islands are very difficult for a stranger to enter at present. The naval authorities are extremely strict."
The stranger laughed jovially.
"My dear sir," he cried, "can you imagine even the British Navy standing between a Scotch congregation and its sermon! You are the one kind of stranger who will be admitted. All you have to do is to get a passport—and there you are!"
"Are they difficult to get?"
The stranger laughed again.
"I know nothing about that kind of thing," said he. "I'm a Lancashire lad, and the buzz of machinery is my game; but I can safely say this: thatyouwill have no difficulty in getting a passport."
Mr Burnett again gazed at the water in silence.
Then he looked up and said with a serious face—
"I must really tell you, sir, of a very remarkable coincidence. Only a few days ago some unknown friend sent me a copy of a newspaper with a notice of this very vacancy marked in it!"
The Lancashire lad looked almost thunder-struck by this extraordinary disclosure.
"Well, I'm hanged!" he cried—adding hurriedly, "if you'll forgive my strong language, sir."
"It seems to me to be providential," said Mr Burnett in a low and very serious voice.
With equal solemnity the stranger declared that though not an unusually good man himself, this solution had already struck him forcibly.
At this point the minister became conscious of the distant ringing of a bell, and recognised with a start the strident note of his own dinner bell swung with a vigorous arm somewhere in the road ahead. He shook hands cordially with the stranger, thanked him for the very interesting talk he had enjoyed, and hurried off towards his over-cooked roast.
The stranger remained for a few moments still leaning against the parapet. His jovial face had been wreathed in smiles throughout the whole conversation; he still smiled now, but with rather a different expression.
Mr Burnett was somewhat slow in coming to decisions, but once he had taken an idea to do a thing he generally carried it out. In the course of a week or ten days he had presented himself as a candidate for the vacant church of Myredale, and made arrangements for appearing in the pulpit there on a certain Sunday in August. He was to arrive in the islands on the Thursday, spend the week-end in the empty manse, preach on Sunday, and return on Monday or Tuesday. His old friend Mr Drummond in Edinburgh, hearing of the plan, invited him to break his journey at his house, arriving on Tuesday afternoon, and going on by the North train on Wednesday night. Accordingly, he arranged to have a trap at the manse on Tuesday afternoon, drive to Berwick and catch the Scotch express, getting into Edinburgh at 6.15.
He was a reticent man, and in any case had few neighbours to gossip with, so that as far as he himself knew, the Drummonds alone had been informed of all these details. But he had in the manse a very valuable domestic, who added to her more ordinary virtues a passion for conversation.
On the Saturday afternoon before he was due to start, he was returning from a walk, when he caught a glimpse of a man's figure disappearing into a small pine wood at the back of his house, and when his invaluable Mary brought him in his tea, he inquired who her visitor had been.
"Oh, sic a nice young felly!" said Mary enthusiastically. "He's been a soger, wounded at Mons he was, and walking to Berwick to look for a job."
Though simple, the minister was not without some sad experience of human nature, particularly the nature of wounded heroes, tramping the country for jobs.
"I hope you didn't give him any money," said he.
"He never askit for money!" cried Mary. "Oh, he was not that kind at a'! A maist civil young chap he was, and maist interested to hear where you were gaun, and sic like."
The minister shook his head.
"You told him when I was leaving, and all about it, I suppose?"
"There was nae secret, was there?" demanded Mary.
Mr Burnett looked at her seriously.
"As like as not," said he; "he just wished to know when the man of the house would be away. Mind and keep the doors locked, Mary, and if he comes back, don't let him into the kitchen whatever cock-and-bull story he tells."
He knew that Mary was a sensible enough woman, and having given her this warning, he forgot the whole incident—till later.
Tuesday was fine and warm, a perfect day on which to start a journey, and about mid-day Mr Burnett was packing a couple of bags with a sense of pleasant anticipation, when a telegram arrived. This was exactly how it ran:—
"My friend Taylor motoring to Edinburgh to-day. Will pick you and luggage up at Manse about six, and bring you to my house. Don't trouble reply, assume this suits, shall be out till late. DRUMMOND."
"There's no answer," said Mr Burnett with a smile.
He was delighted with this change in his programme, and at once countermanded his trap, and ordered Mary to set about making scones and a currant cake for tea.
"This Mr Taylor will surely be wanting his tea before he starts," said he, "though it's likely he won't want to waste too much time over it, or it will be dark long before we get to Edinburgh. So have everything ready, Mary, but just the infusing of the tea."
Then with an easy mind, feeling that there was no hurry now, he sat down to his early dinner. As he dined he studied the telegram more carefully, and it was then that one or two slight peculiarities struck him. They seemed to him very trifling, but they set him wondering and smiling a little to himself.
He knew most of the Drummonds' friends, and yet never before had he heard of an affluent motor-driving Mr Taylor among them. Still, there was nothing surprising about that, for one may make a new friend any day, and one's old friends never hear of him for long enough.
The really unusual features about this telegram were its length and clearness and the elaborate injunctions against troubling to answer it.
Robert Drummond was an excellent and Christian man, but he had never been remarkable for profuse expenditure. In fact, he guarded his bawbees very carefully indeed, and among other judicious precautions he never sent telegrams if he could help it, and when fate forced his hand, kept very rigorously within the twelve-word limit. His telegrams in consequence were celebrated more for their conciseness than their clarity. Yet here he was sending a telegram thirty-four words long, apart from the address and signature, and spending halfpenny after halfpenny with reckless profusion to make every detail explicit!
Particularly curious were the three clauses all devoted to saving Mr Burnett the trouble of replying. Never before had Mr Drummond shown such extraordinary consideration for a friend's purse, and it is a discouraging feature of human nature that even the worthy Mr Burnett felt more puzzled than touched by his generous thoughtfulness.
"Robert Drummond never wrote out that wire himself," he concluded. "He must just have told some one what he wanted to say, and they must have written it themselves. Well, we'll hope they paid for it too, or Robert will be terrible annoyed."
The afternoon wore on, and as six o'clock drew near, the minister began to look out for Mr Taylor and his car. But six o'clock passed, and quarter-past six, and still there was no sign of him. The minister began to grow a little worried lest they should have to do most of the journey in the dark, for he was an inexperienced motorist, and such a long drive by night seemed to him a formidable and risky undertaking.
At last at half-past six the thrum of a car was heard, and a few minutes later a long, raking, dark-green touring car dashed up to the door of the modest manse. The minister hurried out to welcome his guest, and then stopped dead short in sheer astonishment. Mr Taylor was none other than the Lancashire lad.
On his part, Mr Taylor seemed almost equally surprised.
"Well, I'm blowed!" he cried jovially. "If this isn't the most extraordinary coincidence! When I got Robert Drummond's note, and noticed the part of the country you lived in, I wondered if you could possibly be the same minister I'd met; but it really seemed too good to be true! Delighted to meet you again!"
He laughed loud and cheerfully, and wrung the minister's hand like an old friend. Mr Burnett, though less demonstrative, felt heartily pleased, and led his guest cordially into the manse parlour.
"You'll have some tea before you start, I hope?" he inquired.
"Ra-ther!" cried Mr Taylor. "I've a Lancashire appetite for tea! Ha, ha, ha!"
"Well, I'll have it in at once," said the minister, ringing the bell, "for I suppose we ought not to postpone our start too long."
"No hurry at all, my dear fellow," said Mr Taylor, throwing himself into the easiest chair the minister possessed. "I mean to have a jolly good tuck in before I start!"
At that moment Mr Burnett remembered that this time he had seen a chauffeur in the car. He went hospitably out of the room and turned towards the front door. But hardly had he turned in that direction when he heard Mr Taylor call out—
"Hallo! Where are you going?"
And the next moment he was after the minister and had him by the arm just as they reached the open front door. Mr Burnett ever afterwards remembered the curious impression produced on him by the note in Mr Taylor's voice, and that hurried grip of the arm. Suspicion, alarm, a note of anger, all seemed to be blended.
"I—I was only going to ask your driver to come and have a cup of tea in the kitchen," stammered the embarrassed minister.
"My dear sir, he doesn't want any; I've asked him already!" said Mr Taylor. "I assure you honestly I have!"
Mr Burnett suffered himself to be led back wondering greatly. He had caught a glimpse of the chauffeur, a clean-shaven, well-turned-out man, sitting back in his seat with his cap far over his eyes, and even in that hurried glance at part of his face he had been struck with something curiously familiar about the man; though whether he had seen him before, or, if not, who he reminded him of, he was quite unable to say. And then there was Mr Taylor's extraordinary change of manner the very moment he started to see the chauffeur. He could make nothing of it at all, but for some little time afterwards he had a vague sense of disquiet.
Mr Taylor, on his part, had recovered his cheerfulness as quickly as he had lost it.
"Forgive me, my dear Mr Burnett," he said earnestly, yet always with the rich jolly note in his voice. "I must have seemed a perfect maniac. The truth is, between ourselves, I had a terrible suspicion you were going to offer my good James whisky!"
"Oh," said the minister. "Is he then—er—an abstainer?"
Mr Taylor laughed pleasantly.
"I wish he were! A wee drappie is his one failing; ha, ha! I never allow my chauffeur to touch a drop while I'm on the road, Mr Burnett—never, sir!"
Mr Burnett was slow to suspect ill of any one, but he was just as slow in getting rid of a suspicion. With all his simplicity, he could not but think that Mr Taylor jumped extraordinarily quickly to conclusions and got excited on smaller provocation than any one he had ever met. Over his first cup of tea he sat very silent.
In the meantime the sociable Mary had been suffering from a sense of disappointment. Surely the beautiful liveried figure in the car would require his tea and eggs like his master? For a little she sat awaiting his arrival in the kitchen, with her cap neatly arranged, and an expectant smile. But gradually disappointment deepened. She considered the matter judicially. Clearly, she decided, Mr Burnett had forgotten the tradition of hospitality associated with that and every other manse. And then she decided that her own duty was plain.
She went out of the back door and round the house. There stood the car, with the resplendent figure leaning back in his seat, his cap still over his eyes, and his face now resting on his hand, so that she could barely see more than the tip of his nose. He heard nothing of her approach till she was fairly at his side, and in her high and penetrating voice cried—
"Will ye not be for a cup of tea and an egg to it, eh?"
The chauffeur started, and Mary started too. She had seen his face for an instant, though he covered it quickly, but apparently quite naturally, with his hand.
"No, thanks," he said brusquely, and turned away his eyes.
Mary went back to the kitchen divided between annoyance at the rebuff and wonder. The liveried figure might have been the twin-brother of the minister.
Gradually Mr Burnett recovered his composure. His guest was so genial and friendly and appreciative of the scones and the currant cake that he began to upbraid himself for churlishness in allowing anything like a suspicion of this pleasant gentleman to linger in his mind. There remained a persistent little shadow which he could not quite drive away, but he conscientiously tried his best. As for Mr Taylor, there never was a jollier and yet a more thoughtful companion. He seemed to think of every mortal thing that the minister could possibly need for his journey.
"Got your passport?" he inquired.
"Yes," said the minister. "I am carrying it in my breast-pocket. It ought to be safe there."
"The safest place possible!" said Mr Taylor cordially. "It's all in order, I presume, eh?"
Mr Burnett took the passport out of his pocket and showed it to him. His guest closely examined the minister's photograph which was attached, went through all the particulars carefully, and pronounced everything in order, as far as an ignorant outsider like himself could judge.
"Of course," he said, "I'm a business man, Mr Burnett, and I can tell when a thing looks businesslike, though I know no more about what the authorities require and why they ask for all these particulars than you do. It's all red tape, I suppose."
As a further precaution he recommended his host to slip a few letters and a receipted bill or two into his pocket-book, so that he would have a ready means of establishing his identity if any difficulty arose. Mr Burnett was somewhat surprised, but accepted his guest's word for it, as a shrewd Lancashire lad, that these little tips were well worth taking.
By this time the evening was falling, and at length Mr Taylor declared himself ready for the road. He had drunk four cups of tea, and hurried over none of them. For a moment Mr Burnett half wondered if he had any reason for delaying their start, but immediately reproached himself for harbouring such a thought. Indeed, why should he think so? There seemed nothing whatever to be gained by delay, with the dusk falling so fast and a long road ahead.
The minister's rug and umbrella and two leather bags were put into the car, he and Mr Taylor got aboard, and off they went at last. Mr Burnett had another glance at the chauffeur, and again was haunted by an odd sense of familiarity; but once they had started, the view of his back in the gathering dusk suggested nothing more explicit.
Presently they passed a corner, and the minister looked round uneasily.
"What road are you taking?" he asked.
"We're going to join the coast road from Berwick," said Mr Taylor.
"Isn't that rather roundabout?"
Mr Taylor laughed jovially.
"My good James has his own ideas," said he. "As a matter of fact, I fancy he knows the coast road and isn't sure of the other. However, we needn't worry about that. With a car like this the difference in time will be a flea-bite!"
He had provided the minister with another excellent cigar, and smoking in comfort behind a glass wind-screen, with the dim country slipping by and the first pale star faintly shining overhead, the pair fell into easy discourse. Mr Taylor was a remarkably sympathetic talker, the minister found. He kept the conversation entirely on his companion's affairs, putting innumerable questions as to his habits and way of life, and indeed his whole history, and exhibiting a flattering interest in his answers. Mr Burnett said to himself at last, with a smile, that this inquiring gentleman would soon know as much about him as he knew himself.
Once or twice the minister wondered how fast they were really going. They did not seem to him to be achieving any very extraordinary speed, but possibly that was only because the big car ran so easily. In fact, when he once questioned his companion, Mr Taylor assured him that actually was the explanation. It was thus pretty dark when they struck the coast road, and it grew ever darker as they ran northward through a bare, treeless country, with the cliff edge never far away and the North Sea glimmering beyond.
They had reached an absolutely lonely stretch of road that hugged the shore closely when the car suddenly stopped.
"Hallo!" exclaimed Mr Taylor, "what's up?"
The chauffeur half-turned round and said in a low voice—
"Did you see that light, sir?"
"Which light?"
The chauffeur pointed to the dark stretch of turf between them and the edge of the cliffs.
"Just there, sir. I saw it flash for a second. I got a glimpse of some one moving too, sir."
Mr Taylor became intensely excited.
"A spy signalling!" he exclaimed.
"Looks like it, sir," said the chauffeur.
Mr Taylor turned to the minister with an eager, resolute air.
"Our duty's clear, Mr Burnett," said he. "As loyal subjects of King George—God bless him!—we've got to have a look into this!"
With that he jumped out and stood by the open door, evidently expecting the minister to follow. For a moment Mr Burnett hesitated. A vague sense that all was not well suddenly affected him. "Do not go!" something seemed to say to him. And yet as a man and a loyal subject how could he possibly decline to assist in an effort to foil the King's enemies? Reluctantly he descended from the car, and once he was on the road, Mr Taylor gave him no time for further debate.
"Come on!" he whispered eagerly; and then turning to the chauffeur, "come along too, James!"
Close by there was a gate in the fence, and they all three went through this and quietly crossed the short stretch of grass between the road and the cliffs, Mr Taylor and the minister walking in front and the chauffeur following close at their heels. Now that the car was silent, they could hear the soft lapping of the water at the cliff foot, but that and the fall of their feet on the short crisp turf were the only sounds.
Mr Burnett peered hard into the darkness, but he could see absolutely nothing. All at once he realised that they were getting very close to the brink, and that if there were any one in front they would certainly be silhouetted against the sky. There could not possibly be any use in going further; why then did they continue to advance? At that a clear and terrifying instinct of danger seized him. He turned round sharply, and uttered one loud ringing cry.
He was looking straight into the chauffeur's face, and it seemed as though he were looking into his own, distorted by murderous intention. Above it the man's hand was already raised. It descended, and the minister fell on the turf with a gasp. He knew no more of that night's adventure.