The Talisman Ring

Chapter Ten

In pursuance of her plan, Miss Thane took care to remain out of sight of the two Runners for the rest of the day. She repaired to her own room, and sat there with an agreeable and blood-curdling romance, and from time to time Eustacie came up to report on the proceedings below-stairs.

Mr Stubbs took an early opportunity of subjecting Eustacie to a searching cross-examination, but from this she emerged triumphant. Having established a reputation for excitability, it was easy for her when in difficulties to become incoherent, and consequently (since she at once took refuge in the French tongue) unintelligible. At the end of half an hour’s questioning, Mr Stubbs, and not his victim, felt quite battered.

He and his companion spent a wearing and an unsatisfactory day. The cellar, besides being extremely cold, revealed no secrets, and a locked cupboard which Mr Peabody discovered in a dark corner of the passage leading to the kitchen was responsible for an unpleasant interlude with the landlord. As soon as Mr Peabody discovered the cupboard, which was partly hidden behind a pile of empty cases and baskets, he demanded the key of Nye. When the landlord, after a prolonged search in which Clem joined, announced that he had lost it, the hopes of both Runners rose high, and Mr Stubbs warned Nye that if he did not immediately produce the key, they would break in the door. Nye retorted that if damage were done to his property, he would lodge a complaint in Bow Street. He said so many times, and with such unwonted emphasis, that there was nothing in the cupboard but some spare crockery that both Runners became agog with suspicion, and resembled nothing so much as a couple of terriers at a rat-hole. They pulled all the empty cases away from the cupboard door, so that Miss Nye, coming out of the kitchen with a loaded tray, fell over them, smashing three plates and scattering a dish of cheese-cakes all down the narrow passage. Miss Nye, too deaf to hear Mr Peabody’s profuse apologies, spoke bitterly and at length on the subject of Men in general, and Bow Street Runners in particular, and when Mr Peabody, with an unlucky idea of repairing the damage, collected all the dusty cheese-cakes together on the larger portion of the broken dish and handed them to her, she so far forgot herself as to box his ears.

The next thing to do, Miss Nye having retired, seething, to the kitchen, was to break down the door of the cupboard. Mr Stubbs thought that Mr Peabody should perform this office, and Mr Peabody considered Mr Stubbs, who was of bulkier build, the man for the task. It was not until the argument had been settled that they discovered that the door opened outwards. When Mr Stubbs demanded of Nye why he had not divulged this fact at the outset, Nye replied that he did not wish them to break into that cupboard. He added that they would regret it if they did, a hint that made Mr Stubbs draw an unwieldy pistol from his pocket, and warn the supposed occupant of the cupboard that if he did not instantly give himself up, the lock would be blown out of the door. No answer being forthcoming, Mr Stubbs told his assistant to stand ready to Pounce, and, setting the muzzle of his pistol to the lock, pulled the trigger.

The noise made by the shot was quite deafening, and an ominous sound of breaking glass was heard faintly through its reverberations. Commanding Mr Peabody to cover the cupboard with his own pistol, Mr Stubbs seized the handle of the door and pulled it open, carefully keeping in the lee of it as he did so.

Mr Peabody lowered his gun. The cupboard was quite a shallow one, and contained nothing but shelves bearing glass and crockery. Such specimens as had come within the range of the shot had fared badly, a circumstance which roused Nye to immediate and loud-voiced wrath.

The explosion had been heard in other parts of the house, and even a dim echo of it by Miss Nye. She erupted once more from the kitchen, this time armed with the rolling-pin, at precisely the same moment as Sir Hugh Thane, eyeglass raised, loomed up at the other end of the passage.

“What the devil’s toward?” demanded Sir Hugh, with all the irritability of a man rudely awakened from his afternoon sleep.

Mr Stubbs tried to say that it was only a matter of his duty, but as Miss Nye, who had the peculiarly resonant voice of most deaf persons, chose at the same time to announce that if she were given her choice, she would sooner have a pair of wild bulls in the house than two Runners, his explanation was not heard. Before he could repeat it, Nye had given Sir Hugh a brief and faithful account of the affair, particularly stressing his own part in it. “Over and over again I told them there was only some spare crockery in the cupboard, sir, but they wouldn’t listen to me. I hope I’m a patient man, but when it comes to them smashing four of my best glasses, not to mention spoiling a whole dish of cheese-cakes that was meant for your honour’s dinner, it’s more than what I can stand!”

“It’s my belief,” said Sir Hugh, looking fixedly at the unfortunate Runners, “that they’re drunk. Both of them.”

Mr Stubbs, who had not been offered any liquid refreshment at all, protested almost tearfully.

“If you’re not drunk,” said Sir Hugh, with finality, “you’re mad. I had my suspicions of it from the start.”

After this painful affair the Runners withdrew to watch the inn from the outside. While one kept an eye on the back door from the postboy’s room, the other walked up and down in front of the inn. From time to time they met and exchanged places. They were occasionally rewarded by the sight either of Nye or of Clem peeping out of one or other of the doors as though to see whether the coast were clear. These signs of activity were sufficiently heartening to keep them at their posts. But it was miserable work for a raw February day, and had the house under observation been other than an inn, it was unlikely that a sense of duty would have triumphed. However, although Nye, according no more nice treatment to the Runners, might withhold all offers of brandy, he could not refuse to serve them as customers. The only pleasant moments they spent during the remainder of the afternoon were in the cosy taproom, and even these were somewhat marred by the black looks cast at them by the landlord and the caustic comments he made on the drinking proclivities of law officers.

But when dusk fell they had their reward. It was Mr Stubbs’ turn to sit at the window of the stable-room, and it was consequently he who saw the back door open very gradually, and Eustacie look cautiously out into the yard. He knew it was she, because the candles had been lit inside the house, and she stood full in a beam of light.

Mr Stubbs drew back from the window and watched from behind the curtain. Behind him one post-boy sprawled in a chair by the fire, snoring rhythmically, and two others sat at the table playing cards.

Eustacie, having peered all round through the twilight, turned and beckoned to someone inside the house. Mr Stubbs, breathing heavily, reached for his stout ash-plant, and grasped it in his right hand. With his eyes starting almost out of his head, he saw a tall female figure, muffled from head to foot in a dark cloak, slip out of the house and glide round it towards the front, keeping well in the shadow of the wall. Eustacie softly closed the door; but Mr Stubbs did not wait to see this. In two bounds he had reached the yard, and was creeping after his quarry, taking care, however, to stay well behind until he could summon Mr Peabody to his assistance.

The cloaked figure was moving swiftly, yet in a cautious fashion, pausing at the corner of the house to look up and down the road before venturing further. Mr Stubbs stopped too, effacing himself in the shadows, and realized, when the quarry made a dart across the road, that Mr Peabody must be enjoying a session in the taproom, saw dimly that the unknown female (or male) was hurrying down the road under cover of the hedge, and bounced into the inn, loudly calling on Mr Peabody for support.

Mr Peabody, ever-zealous, hastened to his side, wiping his mouth on the back of his hand. When he heard the glorious news, he stayed only to pick up his cudgel, and ran out with Mr Stubbs in pursuit of the fugitive.

“It were that self-same abigail, William,” panted Mr Stubbs. “All along I thought—too big for a female! There he goes!”

Hearing the sounds of heavy-footed pursuit, the figure ahead looked once over its shoulder, and then broke into a run. Mr Stubbs had no more breath to spare for speech, but Mr Peabody, a leaner man, managed to shout: “Halt!”

The figure ahead showed signs of flagging; the Runners, getting their second wind, began to gain upon it, and in a few moments had reached it, and grabbed at the enveloping cloak, gasping: “In the name of the Law!”

The figure spun round, and landed Mr Stubbs a facer that made his nose bleed.

“Mind his pops, Jerry!” cried Mr Peabody, grappling with the foe. “Lordy, what a wild cat! Ah, would you, then!”

Mr Stubbs caught the figure’s left arm in a crushing grip, and panted: “I arrest you in the name of the Law!”

The captive said in a low, breathless voice: “Let me go! Let me go at once!”

“You’re coming along of us, that’s what you’re going to do,” replied Mr Stubbs.

The sound of a horse trotting towards them made the Runners drag their captive to the side of the road. The horse and rider came into sight, and the prisoner, recognizing the rider, cried: “Sir Tristram, help! Help!”

The horse seemed to bound forward as under a sudden spur. The prisoner, struggling madly, shrieked again for help, and the next instant Sir Tristram was abreast of the group, and had swung himself out of the saddle. Before the Runners could explain matters, he had taken the management of the affair into his own swift and capable hands. Mr Stubbs, starting to proclaim his calling, encountered a smashing right and left which dropped him like a log, and Mr Peabody, releasing his captive and aiming a blow at Sir Tristram with his cudgel, quite failed to find his mark, and the next moment was sprawling on the road, having been neatly thrown on Sir Tristram’s hip.

Sir Tristram paid no further heed to either of them, but took a quick stride towards the cloaked figure, saying sharply: “Are you hurt? What in heaven’s name is the meaning of this, Miss Thane?”

“Oh, I am bruised from head to foot!” shuddered Miss Thane. “These dreadful creatures set upon me with cudgels! I shall die of the shock!”

This dramatic announcement, instead of arousing Sir Tristram’s chivalrous instincts anew, made him look penetratingly at her for one moment, and say in a voice torn between amusement and exasperation: “You must be out of your mind! How dared you do such a crazy thing?”

The Runners had by this time begun to pick themselves up. Mr Stubbs, cherishing his nose, seemed a little dazed, but Mr Peabody advanced heroically, and said: “I arrest you, Ludovic Lavenham, in the name of the Law, and it will go hard with them as seeks to interfere!”

Sir Tristram released Miss Thane’s hands, which he had been holding in a sustaining manner, and replied: “You fool, this is not Ludovic Lavenham! This is a lady!”

Mr Stubbs said thickly: “It’s the abigail. It ain’t no female.”

“Oh,, don’t let them touch me!” implored Miss Thane, shrinking artistically towards Sir Tristram.

“I’ve no intention of letting them touch you, but don’t get in my way,” said Sir Tristram unromantically. “Now then, my man, perhaps you will tell me what the devil you mean by arresting this lady?”

“It ain’t a lady!” said Mr Peabody urgently. “He’s a desperate criminal dressed up for an abigail! No lady couldn’t fight like him!”

“I tell you she is Sir Hugh Thane’s sister!” said Sir Tristram. “Look, is this a man’s face?” He turned as he spoke, and put back the hood from Miss Thane’s head.

The Runners peered at her doubtfully. “When my brother hears of this, you will be sorry!” said Miss Thane in a tearful voice.

A look of deep foreboding stole into Mr Stubbs’s watering eyes. “If we’ve made a mistake—” he began uncertainly.

“It’s my belief it’s a plot, and they’re both in it!” declared Mr Peabody.

“Take me to my brother!” begged Miss Thane, clinging to Sir Tristram’s arm. “I fear I may be going to swoon!”

Mr Stubbs looked at her over the handkerchief which he was holding to his nose. Also he looked at Sir Tristram, and rather unwisely accused him of having assaulted an officer of the Law.

“Oh, you’re law officers, are you?” said Sir Tristram grimly “Then you may come and explain yourselves to Sir Hugh Thane. Can you walk, ma’am, or shall I carry you?”

Miss Thane declined this offer, though in a failing voice, and accepted instead the support of his arm. The whole party began to walk slowly towards the Red Lion, Sir Tristram solicitously guiding Miss Thane’s tottering steps, and Mr Peabody leading Sir Tristram’s horse.

They entered the inn by the door into the coffee-room, and here they were met by Eustacie, who, upon sight of Miss Thane, gave a dramatic start, and cried: “Bon Dieu! What has happened? Sarah, you are ill!”

Miss Thane said faintly: “I scarce know ... Two men attacked me ...”

“Ah, she is swooning!” exclaimed Eustacie. “What an outrage! What villainy!”

Miss Thane, having assured herself that Sir Tristram was close enough to catch her, closed her eyes and sank gracefully back into his arms.

“Hartshorn! Vinegar! shrieked Eustacie. “Lay her on the settle, mon cousin!”

Nye, who had come in from the taproom, said: “What! Miss Thane in a swoon? I’ll call Sir Hugh this instant!” and strode away to the parlour.

Sir Tristram carried his fair burden to the settle and laid her down upon it. A glance at her charming complexion was sufficient to allay any alarm he might otherwise have felt and with his fingers over her steady pulse, he said: “I think we should throw water over her, my dear cousin. Cold water.”

Miss lips parted a little. A very soft whisper reached Sir Tristram’s ears. “You dare!” breathed Miss Thane.

“Wait! I will instantly fetch the hartshorn!” said Eustacie, and turning sharp on her heel, collided with Mr Peabody, who was anxiously peeping over her shoulder at Miss Thane’s inanimate form. “Brute! Bully! Imbecile!” she stormed.

Mr Peabody stepped aside in a hurry. Having seen Miss Thane’s shapely figure in the candlelight, he was now quite sure that a mistake had been made, and the look he cast at Mr Stubbs, standing glumly by the door, was one of deep reproach.

Eustacie came running down the stairs again just as Sir Hugh walked into the coffee-room with the landlord at his heels.

“What’s all this?” demanded Sir Hugh. “Here’s Nye telling me some story about Sally fainting. She never faints!”

Sir Tristram, looking down at Miss Thane, saw a shade of annoyance in her face. His lips twitched slightly, but he answered In a grave voice: “I fear it is too true. You may see for yourself.”

“Well, of all the odd things!” said Sir Hugh, surveying her through his eyeglass with vague surprise. “I’ve never known her do that before.”

“She has sustained a great shock to her nerves,” said Shield solemnly. “We can only trust that she has received no serious injury.”

“Ah, la pauvre!” exclaimed Eustacie, enjoying herself hugely. “I wonder she is not dead with fright!” She thrust her cousin out of the way as she spoke, and sank upon her knees by the settle, holding the hartshorn under Miss Thane’s nose. “Behold, she is recovering! C’est cela, ma chère! Doucement, alors, doucement!” Over her shoulder she addressed Sir Hugh. “Those wicked men attacked her—with sticks!” she added, observing the Runners’ cudgels.

It took a moment for Sir Hugh to assimilate this. He turned and stared at the two Runners, incredulous wrath slowly gathering in his eyes. “What!” he said. “They attacked my sister? These gin-swilling, cross-eyed numskulls? This pair of brandy-faced, cork-brained—”

Miss Thane interrupted this swelling diatribe with a faint moan, and opened her eyes. “Where am I?” she said in a weak voice.

“Dieu soit bien!” said Eustacie devoutly. “She is better!”

Miss Thane sat up, her hand to her brow. “Two men with sticks,” she said gropingly. “They ran after me and caught me ... Oh, am I safe indeed?”

“A little brandy, ma’am?” suggested Nye. “You are all shook up, and no wonder! It’s a crying scandal, that’s what it is! I never heard the like of it!”

“Sally,” said Sir Hugh, “do you tell me that these blundering jackasses set upon you?”

She followed the direction of his pointing finger, and gave a small shriek, and clutched his arm. “Do not let them touch me!”

“Let them touch you?” said Sir Hugh, a martial light in his eye. “They had better try!”

“It was all a mistake, ma’am! No one don’t want to touch you!” said Mr Peabody. “I am sure we never meant no harm! It was the poor light, and us not knowing you.”

“All a matter of Dooty,” said Mr Stubbs, still holding his handkerchief to his nose.

“You hold your tongue!” said Sir Hugh. “Sally, what happened?”

“I scarce know,” replied his sister. “I went out for a breath of air, and before I had gone above a dozen steps I heard someone running behind me, and turning, saw these two men coming for me, and waving their sticks. I tried to escape, but they caught me, and handled me so roughly that I was near to swooning away on the spot. Then, by the mercy of Providence, who should come riding by but Sir Tristram! I screamed to him for help—indeed, I thought I was to be murdered or beaten into insensibility—and he flung himself from his horse and rescued me! He knocked the fat man down, and when the other one made for him with his cudgel threw him sprawling in the road!”

“Tristram did that?” exclaimed Eustacie. “Voyons, mon cousin, I begin to like you very much indeed!”

Sir Hugh, his wrath giving place momentarily to professional interest, said: “Threw him a cross-buttock, did you?”

“On my hip,” said Shield. “You know the trick.”

Sir Hugh put up his glass and surveyed Mr Stubbs’s afflicted nose. “Drew his cork, too,” he observed, with satisfaction.

“No,” replied Sir Tristram. “I fancy Miss Thane deserves the credit for that.”

“I did hit him,” admitted Sarah.

“Good girl!” approved her brother. “A nice, flush hit it must have been. But what were they chasing you for? That’s what beats me.”

“They said I was Ludovic Lavenham, and they arrested me,” said Miss Thane.

Sir Hugh repeated blankly: “Said you were Ludovic Lavenham?” He looked at the Runners again. “They are mad,” he said.

“Drunk more like, sir,” put in the landlord unkindly. “They’ve spent the better part of the afternoon in my taproom, drinking Blue Ruin till you’d wonder they could walk straight.”

A protesting sound came from behind Mr Stubbs’s handkerchief.

“So that’s it, is it?” said Sir Hugh. “You’re right: they reek of gin!”

“It ain’t true, your Honour!” said Mr Peabody, much agitated. “If we had a drop just to keep the cold out—”

“Drop!” ejaculated the landlord. “Why, you’ve pretty near had all there is in the house!”

Mr Stubbs ventured to emerge from behind his handkerchief. “I take my solemn oath it ain’t true,” he said. “We suspicioned the lady was this Loodervic Lavenham—that’s how it come about.”

Sir Tristram looked him over critically. “That settles it: they must be badly foxed,” he remarked.

“Of course they are,” agreed Thane. “Thought my sister was a man? I never heard of anything to equal it! They’re so foxed they can’t see straight.”

Mr Peabody hastened to explain. “No, your Honour, no! It were all on account of that abigail we saw here, and which was turned off so sudden, and which we thought was the lady.”

“You are making matters worse for yourselves,” said Sir Tristram. “First you say you thought Miss Thane was Ludovic Lavenham, and now you say you thought she was my cousin’s abigail. Pray, what were you about to chase an abigail?”

“It’s as plain as a pikestaff what they were about,” said Thane severely.

“I knew she was a low, vulgar wretch!” cried Eustacie, swift to improve on this point.

The maligned Runners could only gape at her in dismay.

“Well, Wright shall know how his precious Runners conduct themselves once they are out of his reach!” promised Sir Hugh.

“But, your Honour—but, sir—it weren’t like that at all! It was the abigail we thought was Loodervic Lavenham, on account of her being such a great, strapping wench, and when Miss here came so cautious out of the back door, like as if she was scared someone might see her, it was natural we should be mistook in her. What would the lady go out walking for when it was almost dark?”

Sir Hugh turned to look at his sister, his judicial instincts roused. “I must say, it seems demmed odd to me,” he conceded. “What were you doing, Sally?”

Miss Thane, prompted partly by a spirit of pure mischief, and partly by a desire to be revenged on Sir Tristram for his inhuman suggestion of throwing cold water over her, turned her face away and implored her brother not to ask her that question.

“That’s all very well,” objected Thane, “but did you go out by the back door?”

“Yes,” said Miss Thane, covering her face with her hands.

“Why?” asked Sir Hugh, faintly puzzled.

“Oh,” said Miss Thane, the very picture of maidenly confusion, “must I tell you, indeed? I went to meet Sir Tristram.”

“Eh?” said Thane, taken aback.

Miss Thane found that she had underrated her opponent. Not a muscle quivered in Shield’s face. He said immediately: “This news should have been broken to you at a more suitable time, Thane. Spare your sister’s blushes, I beg of you!”

Miss Thane, for once put out of countenance, intervened in a hurry. “We cannot discuss such matters now! Do, pray, send those creatures away! I will believe they meant me no harm, but I vow and declare the very sight of them gives me a Spasm!”

This request was so much in accordance with the Runners’ own wishes that they both looked hopefully at Sir Hugh, and gave him to understand that if he cared to order them back to London, they would be very glad to obey him. The day’s disasters had succeeded in convincing them that their errand was futile; and their main concern now was not to arrest a fugitive from the Law but to induce Sir Hugh to refrain from complaining of them to his friend, Sampson Wright. They were not drunk, and their motives had been of the purest, but against the testimony of Sir Hugh, and his sister, and Sir Tristram, and the landlord, they did not feel that they had any hope of being attended to in Bow Street.

Somewhat to their surprise, Miss Thane came to their support, saying magnanimously that for her part she was ready to let the matter rest.

“Wright ought to know of it,” said Sir Hugh, shaking his head.

“Very true, but you forget that they have been punished already for their stupidity. Sir Tristram was very rough with them, you know.”

Sir Hugh was slightly mollified by this reflection. After telling the Runners that he hoped it would be a lesson to them, and warning them that if he ever caught sight of their faces again within the portals of the Red Lion it would be the worse for them, he waved them away. They assured him they would go back to London by the night mail, and with renewed apologies to Miss Thane, bowed themselves out of the inn as fast as they could.

“Well, now that they’ve taken themselves off,” said Nye, “I’ll go and let Mr Ludovic out of the cellar.”

Sir Hugh was not at the moment interested in Ludovic’s release. He was regarding Shield in a puzzled way, and as soon as the landlord had left the room, accompanied by Eustacie, said: “I dare say Sally knows what she’s about, but I don’t think you should appoint her to meet you like that. It’s not at all the thing. Besides, there’s no sense in it. If you want to see her, you can do it here, can’t you? I’ve no objection.”

“I fear you can have no romantic leanings,” said Shield, before Miss Thane could speak. “A star-lit sky, the balmy night breezes—”

“But this is February! The breeze isn’t balmy at all—in fact, there’s been a demmed north wind blowing all day,” pointed out Sir Hugh.

“To persons deep in love,” said Sir Tristram soulfully, “any breeze is balmy.”

“Hateful wretch!” said Miss Thane, with deep feeling. “Pay no heed to him, Hugh! Of course, I did not go to meet him!”

Sir Tristram appeared to be overcome. “You play fast and loose with me,” he said reproachfully. “You have dashed my hopes to the ground, shattered my self-esteem—”

“If you say another word, I’ll box your ears!” threatened Miss Thane.

Sir Hugh shook his head at her in mild disapproval. “I see what it is: you’ve been flirting again,” he said.

“Don’t be so vulgar!” implored Miss Thane. “There’s not a word of truth in it! I went out merely to trick the Runners. Sir Tristram’s arrival was quite by chance.”

“But you told me—”

“The truth is that you have stumbled upon a secret romance, Thane,” said Sir Tristram, with a great air of candour.

Thane looked from Sir Tristram’s imperturbable countenance to his sister’s indignant one, and gave it up. “I suppose it’s all a hum,” he remarked. “Are you coming into the parlour? There’s a devilish draught here.”

“Presently,” replied Sir Tristram, detaining Miss Thane by the simple expedient of stretching out his hand and grasping her wrist.

She submitted to this, and when her brother had gone back to the parlour, said: “I suppose I deserved that.”

“Certainly you did,” agreed Sir Tristram, releasing her. “You would have been well served had I really thrown cold water over you. Are you at all hurt?”

“Oh no, merely a bruise or two! Your intervention was most timely.”

“And if I had not happened to have been there?”

“I should have allowed them to drag me back here, of course, and fainted in Hugh’s arms instead of yours.”

He smiled a little, but only said: “You shouldn’t have done it.”

“Oh, perhaps it was not, as Eustacie would say, quite convenable,” she replied, “but you will admit that it has rid us of a grave danger.”

“You might have been badly hurt,” he answered.

“Well, I was not badly hurt, so we shall not consider that.”

At this moment Ludovic strolled into the room, and slid his sound arm round Miss Thane’s waist, and kissed her cheek. “Sally, I swear you’re an angel!” he declared.

“Anything less angelic than her conduct during the past half-hour I have yet to see,” observed Sir Tristram. “An accomplished liar would be nearer the mark.”

“Quant a ça, you also told lies,” said Eustacie. “You pretended to be in love with her: you know you did!”

“Did he?” said Ludovic. “Perhaps he is in love with her. I vow I am!”

“Cream-pot love, my child,” interposed Miss Thane composedly. “You are pleased with me for having rid you of those Runners. And now that they have gone, when shall we break into the Dower House?”

“Rid your mind of the notion that you are to make one of that party,” said Shield. “Neither you nor Eustacie will come with us—if we go at all.”

“Hey, what’s this?” demanded Ludovic. “Of course we shall go!”

Miss Thane looked at Shield with a humorous gleam in her eyes. “Now pray do not tell me that after all the trouble I have been put to to remove the bars of our adventure we are not to have any adventure!”

“I think you are likely to have all the adventure you could desire without going to the Dower House to look for it,” replied Shield. “I fancy the Beau’s suspicions will not be as easily allayed as the Runners’ were.”

“Well, if Basil comes spying after me himself, we shall see some sport,” said Ludovic cheerfully. “I wish you will discover when he means to go to town, Tristram.”

This was not a difficult task to accomplish, for the Beau, paying a friendly call upon his cousin that evening after dinner, volunteered the information quite unprompted. He wandered into the library at the Court, a vision of pearl-grey and salmon-pink, and smiled sweetly at Shield, lounging on the sofa by the fire.

Shield greeted him unemotionally, and nodded towards a chair. “Sit down, Basil: I’m glad to see you.”

The Beau raised his brows rather quizzically. “My dear Tristram, how unexpected!”

“Yes,” said Shield, “I’ve no doubt it is. I feel you should be told of an excessively odd circumstance. Are you aware that there have been a couple of Bow Street Runners in the neighbourhood, searching for Ludovic?”

For a moment the Beau made no reply. The smile still lingered on his lips, but an arrested expression stole into his eyes, as though he found such direct methods of warfare disconcerting. He drew up a chair to the fire and sat down in it, and said: “For Ludovic? Surely you must be mistaken? Ludovic is not in Sussex, is he?”

“Not that I am aware of,” replied Sir Tristram coolly, “but from what I could make out from the Runners someone has started a rumour that Eustacie’s smuggler was he.”

The Beau opened his snuffbox. “Absurd!” he murmured. “If Ludovic were in Sussex, he must have sent me word.”

“That is what I thought,” agreed Shield. “You are quite sure he has not sent you word?”

The Beau was in the act of raising a pinch of snuff to his nostrils, but he paused and looked across at his cousin with a slight frown. “Certainly not,” he answered.

“Oh, you need not be afraid to tell me if you have heard from him,” said Sir Tristram. “I wish the boy no harm. But if the rumour should be true, after all, you would be wise to get him out of the country again.”

The Beau did not say anything for several moments, nor did he inhale his snuff. His eyes remained fixed on Shield’s face. He shut his snuffbox again, and at last replied: “Perhaps. Yes, perhaps. But I do not anticipate that I shall hear from him.” He leaned back in his chair and crossed one leg over the other. “I am amazed that such a rumour should have arisen—quite amazed. It had not reached my ears. In fact, my errand to you had nothing to do with poor Ludovic, wherever he may be.”

“I am happy to hear you say so. What is your errand to me?”

“Oh, quite a trifling one, my dear fellow! It is merely that I find myself obliged to go to London on a matter of stern necessity tomorrow—my new coat, you know: it sags across the shoulders: the most lamentable business!—and it occurred to me that you might wish to charge me with a commission.”

“Why, that is very good of you, Basil, but I believe I need not trouble you. I expect to leave this place almost any day now.”

“Oh?” The Beau regarded him thoughtfully. “I infer then that Eustacie is also leaving this place?”

Sir Tristram replied curtly: “I believe so. Shall you be in London for many days? Do you mean to return here?”

“Why, yes, I think so. I shall remain in town for a night only, I trust. I have given the servants leave to absent themselves for no longer. Ah, and that reminds me, Tristram! I wish you will desire that fellow—now, what is the name of Sylvester’s carpenter? Oh, Johnson!—yes, I wish you will desire him to call at the Dower House some time. My man tells me the bolt is off one of the library windows. He might attend to it, perhaps.”

“Certainly,” said Shield impassively. But when his cousin presently went away, he looked after him with a faint smile on his lips, and said: “How very clumsy, to be sure!”

Ludovic, however, when the encounter was described to him on the following morning, exclaimed, with characteristic impetuosity: “Then tonight is our opportunity! We have gammoned the Beau!”

“He seems to have been equally fortunate,” said Shield dryly.

Ludovic cocked an intelligent eyebrow. “Now what might you mean by that?” he inquired.

“Not quite equally,” said Miss Thane, with a smile.

“No,” admitted Shield. “He did underrate me a trifle.”

Ludovic perched on the edge of the table, swinging one leg. “Oh, so you think it’s a trap, do you? Nonsense! Why should you? He can never have had more than a suspicion of my being here, and you may depend upon it we have convinced him that he was mistaken.”

“I do not depend upon anything of the kind,” replied Shield. “In fact, I am astonished at the crudity of this trap. Consider a moment, Ludovic! He has told me that he will be in London tonight, that he has given his servants leave of absence, and that the bolt is off one of the library windows. If you are fool enough to swallow that, at least give me credit for having more common sense!”

“Oh well!” said Ludovic airily. “One must take a risk now and again, after all. Basil daren’t lay a trap for me in his own house. Damn it, man, he can’t take me prisoner and hand me over to the Law! It wouldn’t look well at all.”

“Certainly not,” answered Sir Tristram. “I have no fear of Basil himself coming into the open, but you are forgetting that he has a very able deputy in the shape of that valet of his. If his servants were to catch you in the Dower House, and hand you over to the Law as a common thief, you would be identified, and beyond any man’s help, while Basil was still discreetly in London. He would dispose of you without incurring the least censure from anyone.”

“Well, they may try and take me prisoner if they like,” said Ludovic. “It’ll go hard with them if they do.”

Miss Thane regarded him in some amusement. “Yes, Ludovic, but it will make everything very awkward if you are to leave a trail of corpses in your wake,” she pointed out. “I cannot help feeling that Sir Tristram is right. He is one of those disagreeable people who nearly always are.”

Ludovic thrust out his chin a little. “I’m going to take a look in that priest’s hole if I die for it!” he said.

“If you go, you’ll go alone, Ludovic,” said Sir Tristram.

Ludovic’s eyes flashed. “Ratting, eh? I’ll get Clem in your stead.”

“You may take it from me that Clem won’t go with you on this venture,” replied Sir Tristram.

“Oh, you’ve been working on him, have you? Damn you, Tristram, I must find the ring!”

“You won’t do it that way. It’s to run your head into a noose. You’ve a better hope than this slender chance of finding the ring in a priest’s hole.”

“What is it?” Ludovic said impatiently.

“Basil’s valet,” replied Shield. “He lodged the information against you. I judge him to be fairly deep in Basil’s confidence. How deep I don’t know, but I’m doing what I can to find out.”

“I dare say he is, but what’s the odds? Depend upon it, he’s paid to keep the Beau’s secrets. Slimy rogue,” Ludovic added gloomily.

“No doubt,” agreed Shield. “So I have set Kettering to work on him. If he knows anything, you may outbid Basil.”

“Who is Kettering?” interrupted Miss Thane. “I must have everything made clear.”

“Kettering is the head groom at the Court, and one of Ludovic’s adherents. His son works for the Beau, and he is on good terms with the servants at the Dower House. If he can put it into Gregg’s head that I am collecting evidence that will make things look ugly for Basil, we may find it quite an easy matter to induce the fellow to talk. Have patience, Ludovic!”

“Oh, you’re as cautious as any old woman!” said Ludovic. “Only let me set foot in the Dower House—”

“You may believe that I am too much your friend to let you do anything of the kind,” said Sir Tristram, with finality.