Part 57 (1/2)
They only wanted to have no more truck with you.”
”Have you seen the boy?”
Again Miss Sally nodded.
”Yes, and there's no doubting the parentage. I never saw that cross-hatched under-lip in any but a Chandon, though you _do_ hide it with a beard: let alone that he carries the four lozenges tattooed on his shoulder. Ned Commins did that. There was a moment, belike, when they weakened--either he or the woman. But you had best hear the story, and then you can judge the evidence for yourself.”
She told it. He listened with set face, interposing here and there to ask a question, or to weigh one detail of her narrative against another.
”If the children should be lost--which G.o.d forbid!” she wound up, ”--and if I never did another good day's work in my life, I'll remember that they started me to clear that infernal Orphanage. It's by the interposition of Heaven that you didn't find me on Paddington platform with three-and-twenty children under my wing. 'Interposition of Heaven,' did I say? You may call it, if you will, the constant and consistent foolishness of my brother Elphinstone. In every tight corner of my life I've learnt to trust in Elphinstone for a fool, and he has never betrayed me yet. There I was in the hotel with these twenty-three derelicts, all underfed, and all more or less mentally defective through Gla.s.son's ill-treatment. Two or three were actually crying, in a feeble way, to be 'taken home,' as they called it. They were afraid--afraid of their kind, afraid of strange faces, afraid of everything but to be starved and whipped. I was forced to send out and buy new clothes for some, there and then; and their backs, when I stripped 'em, were criss-crossed with weals--not quite fresh, you understand, for Gla.s.son had been kept busy of late, and the woman Huggins hadn't his arm. Well, there I was, stranded, with these creatures on my hands, all of 'em, as you may say, looking up at me in a dumb way, and wanting to know why I couldn't have let 'em alone--and if ever I smash up another Orphanage you may call me a Turk, and put me in a harem--when all of a sudden it occurred to me to look up the names of the benevolent parties backing the inst.i.tution. The woman had given me a copy of the prospectus, intending to impress me. I promised myself I'd rattle these philanthropists as they 'd never been rattled before in their lives. And then--why had I ever doubted him?--half-way down the list I lit on Elphinstone's name. . . . His place is at Henley-in-Arden, you see, and not far from Bursfield. . . . So I rattled the others (I spent three-quarters of an hour in the telegraph office, and before eleven last night I had thirty-two answers. They are all in my bag, and you shall look 'em over by and by, if you want to be tickled), but I sent Elphinstone what the girl Tilda would call a cough-drop. It ran to five sheets or thereabouts, and cost four-and-eightpence; and I wound up by telling him I meant every word I'd said. He's in Bursfield at this moment, you may bet, carting those orphans around into temporary quarters. And Elphinstone is a kind-hearted man, but orphans are not exactly his line--not what he'd call congenial to him.”
”But these two? You seem to me pretty sure about finding them on Holmness: too sure, I suggest. Either you've forgotten to say why you're certain, or I may have missed--”
”You are getting keen, I see. No, I have no right to be sure, except that I rely on the girl--and on Hucks. (You ought to know Hucks, by the way; he is a warrior.) But I _am_ sure: so sure that I have wired for a steam-launch to be ready by Clatworthy pier. . . . Will you come?”
”I propose to see this affair through,” he said deliberately.
Miss Sally gave him a sharp look, and once again nodded approval.
”And, moreover, so sure,” she went on, ”that I have not wired to send Chichester in search. That's worrying me, I confess; for although Hucks is positive the girl would not start for Holmness without provisions-- and on my reading of her, he's right--this is Tuesday, and they have been missing ever since Sat.u.r.day night, or Sunday morning at latest.”
”If that is worrying you,” said Chandon, ”it may ease your mind to know that there is food and drink on the Island. I built a cottage there two years ago, with a laboratory; I spent six weeks in it this summer; and-- well, s.h.i.+ps have been wrecked On Holmness, and, as an old naval officer, I've provided for that sort of thing.”
Miss Sally slapped her knee. (Her gestures were always unconventional.)
”We shall find 'em there!” she announced. ”I'm willing to lay you five to one in what you like.”
They changed at Taunton for Fair Anchor. At Fair Anchor Station Sir Miles's motor awaited them. It had been ordered by Parson Chichester, instructed by telegram from Taunton.
The parson himself stood on the platform, but he could give no news of the missing ones.
”We'll have 'em before nightfall,” promised Miss Sally. ”Come with us, if you will.”
So all three climbed into the motor, and were whirled across the moor, and down the steep descent into Clatworthy village, and by Clatworthy pier a launch lay ready for them with a full head of steam.
During the pa.s.sage few words were said; and indeed the eager throb of the launch's engine discouraged conversation. Chandon steered, with his eyes fixed on the Island. Miss Sally, too, gazed ahead for the most part; but from time to time she contrived a glance at his weary face-- grey even in the sunset towards which they were speeding.
Sunset lay broad and level across the Severn Sea, lighting its milky flood with splashes of purple, of lilac, of gold. The sun itself, as they approached the Island, dropped behind its crags, silhouetting them against a sky of palest blue.
They drove into its chill shadow, and landed on the very beach from which the children had watched the stag swim out to meet his death.
They climbed up by a pathway winding between thorn and gorse, and on the ridge met the flaming sunlight again.
Miss Sally s.h.i.+elded her eyes.
”They will be here, if anywhere,” said Sir Miles, and led the way down the long saddle-back to the entrance of the gully.
”Hullo!” exclaimed he, coming to a halt as the chimneys of the bungalow rose into view above the gorse bushes. From one of them a steady stream of smoke was curling.
”It's a hundred to one!” gasped Miss Sally triumphantly.