"I don't know where she is."

"Don't know?"

"She disappeared."

"Where did you see her last?" asked his lordship, as if Molly were a mislaid penknife.

"New York."

"But how do you mean, disappeared? Don't you know her address?"

"I don't even know her name."

"But dash it all, I say, I mean! Have you ever spoken to her?"

"Only once. It's rather a complicated story. At any rate, she's gone."

Lord Dreever said that it was a rum business. Jimmy conceded the point.

"Seems to me," said his lordship, "we're both in the cart."

"What's your trouble?"

Lord Dreever hesitated.

"Oh, well, it's only that I want to marry one girl, and my uncle's dead set on my marrying another."

"Are you afraid of hurting your uncle's feelings?"

"It's not so much hurting his feelings. It's—oh, well, it's too long to tell now. I think I'll be getting home. I'm staying at our place in Eaton Square."

"How are you going? If you'll walk, I'll come some of the way with you."

"Right you are. Let's be pushing along, shall we?"

They turned up into the Strand, and through Trafalgar Square into Piccadilly. Piccadilly has a restful aspect in the small hours. Some men were cleaning the road with water from a long hose. The swishing of the torrent on the parched wood was musical.

Just beyond the gate of Hyde Park, to the right of the road, stands a cabmen's shelter. Conversation and emotion had made Lord Dreever thirsty. He suggested coffee as a suitable conclusion to the night's revels.

"I often go in here when I'm up in town," he said. "The cabbies don't mind. They're sportsmen."

The shelter was nearly full when they opened the door. It was very warm inside. A cabman gets so much fresh air in the exercise of his professional duties that he is apt to avoid it in private life. The air was heavy with conflicting scents. Fried onions seemed to be having the best of the struggle for the moment, though plug tobacco competed gallantly. A keenly analytical nose might also have detected the presence of steak and coffee.

A dispute seemed to be in progress as they entered.

"You don't wish you was in Russher," said a voice.

"Yus, I do wish I wos in Russher," retorted a shriveled mummy of a cabman, who was blowing patiently at a saucerful of coffee.

"Why do you wish you was in Russher?" asked the interlocutor, introducing a Massa Bones and Massa Johnsing touch into the dialogue.

"Because yer can wade over yer knees in bla-a-a-ad there," said the mummy.

"In wot?"

"In bla-a-ad—ruddy bla-a-ad! That's why I wish I wos in Russher."

"Cheery cove that," said Lord Dreever. "I say, can you give us some coffee?"

"I might try Russia instead of Japan," said Jimmy, meditatively.

The lethal liquid was brought. Conversation began again. Other experts gave their views on the internal affairs of Russia. Jimmy would have enjoyed it more if he had been less sleepy. His back was wedged comfortably against the wall of the shelter, and the heat of the room stole into his brain. The voices of the disputants grew fainter and fainter.

He had almost dozed off when a new voice cut through the murmur and woke him. It was a voice he knew, and the accent was a familiar accent.

"Gents! Excuse me."

He looked up. The mists of sleep shredded away. A ragged youth with a crop of fiery red hair was standing in the doorway, regarding the occupants of the shelter with a grin, half-whimsical, half-defiant.

Jimmy recognized him. It was Spike Mullins.

"Excuse me," said Spike Mullins. "Is dere any gent in dis bunch of professional beauts wants to give a poor orphan dat suffers from a painful toist something to drink? Gents is courteously requested not to speak all in a crowd."

"Shet that blanky door," said the mummy cabman, sourly.

"And 'op it," added his late opponent. "We don't want none of your sort 'ere."

"Den you ain't my long-lost brudders after all," said the newcomer, regretfully. "I t'ought youse didn't look handsome enough for dat. Good-night to youse, gents."

"Shet that door, can't yer, when I'm telling yer!" said the mummy, with increased asperity.

Spike was reluctantly withdrawing, when Jimmy rose.

"One moment," he said.

Never in his life had Jimmy failed to stand by a friend in need. Spike was not, perhaps, exactly a friend, but even an acquaintance could rely on Jimmy when down in the world. And Spike was manifestly in that condition.

A look of surprise came into the Bowery Boy's face, followed by one of stolid woodenness. He took the sovereign that Jimmy held out to him with a muttered word of thanks, and shuffled out of the room.

"Can't see what you wanted to give him anything for," said Lord Dreever. "Chap'll only spend it getting soused."

"Oh, he reminded me of a man I used to know."

"Did he? Barnum's what-is-it, I should think," said his lordship. "Shall we be moving?"



CHAPTER X

JIMMY ADOPTS A LAME DOG

A black figure detached itself from the blacker shadows, and shuffled stealthily to where Jimmy stood on the doorstep.

"That you, Spike?" asked Jimmy.

"Dat's right, boss."

"Come on in."

He led the way up to his rooms, switched on the electric light, and shut the door. Spike stood blinking at the sudden glare. He twirled his battered hat in his hands. His red hair shone fiercely.

Jimmy inspected him out of the corner of his eye, and came to the conclusion that the Mullins finances must be at a low ebb. Spike's costume differed in several important details from that of the ordinary well-groomed man about town. There was nothing of the flaneur about the Bowery Boy. His hat was of the soft black felt fashionable on the East Side of New York. It was in poor condition, and looked as if it had been up too late the night before. A black tail-coat, burst at the elbows and stained with mud, was tightly buttoned across his chest, this evidently with the idea of concealing the fact that he wore no shirt—an attempt which was not wholly successful. A pair of gray flannel trousers and boots out of which two toes peeped coyly completed the picture.

Even Spike himself seemed to be aware that there were points in his appearance which would have distressed the editor of a men's fashion-paper.

"'Scuse these duds," he said. "Me man's bin an' mislaid de trunk wit' me best suit in. Dis is me number two."

"Don't mention it, Spike," said Jimmy. "You look a perfect matinee idol. Have a drink?"

Spike's eyes gleamed as he reached for the decanter. He took a seat.

"Cigar, Spike?"

"Sure. T'anks, boss."

Jimmy lighted his pipe. Spike, after a few genteel sips, threw off his restraint, and finished the rest of his glass at a gulp.

"Try another," suggested Jimmy.

Spike's grin showed that the idea had been well received.

Jimmy sat and smoked in silence for a while. He was thinking the thing over. He felt like a detective who has found a clue. At last, he would be able to discover the name of the Lusitania girl. The discovery would not take him very far certainly, but it would be something. Possibly, Spike might even be able to fix the position of the house they had broken into that night.

Spike was looking at Jimmy over his glass in silent admiration. This flat which Jimmy had rented for a year, in the hope that the possession of a fixed abode might help to tie him down to one spot, was handsomely, even luxuriously, furnished. To Spike, every chair and table in the room had a romance of its own, as having been purchased out of the proceeds of that New Asiatic Bank robbery, or from the revenue accruing from the Duchess of Havant's jewels. He was dumb with reverence for one who could make burglary pay to this extent. In his own case, the profession had rarely provided anything more than bread and butter, and an occasional trip to Coney Island.

Jimmy caught his eye, and spoke.

"Well, Spike," he said. "Curious that we should meet like this?"

"De limit," agreed Spike.

"I can't imagine you three thousand miles from New York. How do you know the cars still run both ways on Broadway?"

A wistful look came into Spike's eyes.

"I've been dis side t'ree months. I t'ought it was time I give old Lunnon a call. T'ings was gettin' too fierce in Noo York. De cops was layin' fer me. Dey didn't seem like as if they had any use fer me. So, I beat it."

"Bad luck," said Jimmy.

"Fierce," agreed Spike.

"Say, Spike," said Jimmy, "do you know, I spent a whole heap of time before I left New York looking for you?"

"Gee! I wish you'd found me! Did youse want me to help on some lay, boss? Is it a bank, or—jools?"

"Well, no, not that. Do you remember that night we broke into that house uptown—the police-captain's house?"

"Sure."

"What was his name?"

"What, de cop's? Why, McEachern, boss."

"McWhat? How do you spell it?"

"Search me," said Spike, simply.

"Say it again. Fill your lungs, and enunciate slowly and clearly. Be bell-like. Now."

"McEachern."

"Ah! And where was the house? Can you remember that?"

Spike's forehead wrinkled.

"It's gone," he said, at last. "It was somewheres up some street up de town."

"That's a lot of help," said Jimmy. "Try again."

"It'll come back some time, boss, sure."

"Then, I'm going to keep an eye on you till it does. Just for the moment, you're the most important man in the world to me. Where are you living?"

"Me! Why, in de Park. Dat's right. One of dem swell detached benches wit' a Southern exposure."

"Well, unless you prefer it, you needn't sleep in the Park any more. You can pitch your moving tent with me."

"What, here, boss?"

"Unless we move."

"Me fer dis," said Spike, rolling luxuriously in his chair.

"You'll want some clothes," said Jimmy. "We'll get those to-morrow. You're the sort of figure they can fit off the peg. You're not too tall, which is a good thing."

"Bad t'ing fer me, boss. If I'd been taller, I'd have stood fer being a cop, an' bin buyin' a brownstone house on Fifth Avenue by dis. It's de cops makes de big money in little old Manhattan, dat's who it is."

"The man who knows!" said Jimmy. "Tell me more, Spike. I suppose a good many of the New York force do get rich by graft?"

"Sure. Look at old man McEachern."

"I wish I could. Tell me about him, Spike. You seemed to know him pretty well."

"Me? Sure. Dere wasn't a woise old grafter dan him in de bunch. He was out fer de dough all de time. But, say, did youse ever see his girl?"

"What's that?" said Jimmy, sharply.

"I seen her once." Spike became almost lyrical in his enthusiasm. "Gee! She was a boid—a peach fer fair. I'd have left me happy home fer her. Molly was her monaker. She—"

Jimmy was glaring at him.

"Cut it out!" he cried.

"What's dat, boss?" said Spike.

"Cut it out!" said Jimmy, savagely.

Spike looked at him, amazed.

"Sure," he said, puzzled, but realizing that his words had not pleased the great man.

Jimmy chewed the stem of his pipe irritably, while Spike, full of excellent intentions, sat on the edge of his chair, drawing sorrowfully at his cigar and wondering what he had done to give offense.

"Boss?" said Spike.

"Well?"

"Boss, what's doin' here? Put me next to de game. Is it de old lay? Banks an' jools from duchesses? You'll be able to let me sit in at de game, won't you?"

Jimmy laughed.

"I'd quite forgotten I hadn't told you about myself, Spike. I've retired."

The horrid truth sank slowly into the other's mind.

"Say! What's dat, boss? You're cuttin' it out?"

"That's it. Absolutely."

"Ain't youse swiping no more jools?"

"Not me."

"Nor usin' de what's-its-name blow-pipe?"

"I have sold my oxy-acetylene blow-pipe, given away my anaesthetics, and am going to turn over a new leaf, and settle down as a respectable citizen."

Spike gasped. His world had fallen about his ears. His excursion with. Jimmy, the master cracksman, in New York had been the highest and proudest memory of his life; and, now that they had met again in London, he had looked forward to a long and prosperous partnership in crime. He was content that his own share in the partnership should be humble. It was enough for him to be connected, however humbly, with such a master. He had looked upon the richness of London, and he had said with Blucher, "What a city to loot!"

And here was his idol shattering the visions with a word.

"Have another drink, Spike," said the lost leader sympathetically. "It's a shock to you, I guess."

"I t'ought, boss—"

"I know, I know. These are life's tragedies. I'm very sorry for you. But it can't be helped. I've made my pile, so why continue?"

Spike sat silent, with a long face. Jimmy slapped him on the shoulder.

"Cheer up," he said. "How do you know that living honestly may not be splendid fun? Numbers of people do it, you know, and enjoy themselves tremendously. You must give it a trial, Spike."

"Me, boss! What, me, too?"

"Sure. You're my link with—I don't want to have you remembering that address in the second month of a ten-year stretch at Dartmoor Prison. I'm going to look after you, Spike, my son, like a lynx. We'll go out together, and see life. Brace up, Spike. Be cheerful. Grin!"

After a moment's reflection, the other grinned, albeit faintly.

"That's right," said Jimmy. "We'll go into society, Spike, hand in hand. You'll be a terrific success in society. All you have to do is to look cheerful, brush your hair, and keep your hands off the spoons. For in the best circles they invariably count them after the departure of the last guest."

"Sure," said Spike, as one who thoroughly understood this sensible precaution.

"And, now," said Jimmy, "we'll be turning in. Can you manage sleeping on the sofa one night? Some fellows would give their bed up to you. Not me, however. I'll have a bed made up for you tomorrow."

"Me!" said Spike. "Gee! I've been sleepin' in de Park all de last week. Dis is to de good, boss."



CHAPTER XI

AT THE TURN OF THE ROAD

Next morning, when Jimmy, having sent Spike off to the tailor's, with instructions to get a haircut en route, was dealing with a combination of breakfast and luncheon at his flat, Lord Dreever called.

"Thought I should find you in," observed his lordship. "Well, laddie, how goes it? Having breakfast? Eggs and bacon! Great Scott! I couldn't touch a thing."

The statement was borne out by his looks. The son of a hundred earls was pale, and his eyes were markedly fish-like.

"A fellow I've got stopping with me—taking him down to Dreever with me to-day—man I met at the club—fellow named Hargate. Don't know if you know him? No? Well, he was still up when I got back last night, and we stayed up playing billiards—he's rotten at billiards; something frightful: I give him twenty—till five this morning. I feel fearfully cheap. Wouldn't have got up at all, only I'm due to catch the two-fifteen down to Dreever. It's the only good train." He dropped into a chair.

"Sorry you don't feel up to breakfast," said Jimmy, helping himself to marmalade. "I am generally to be found among those lining up when the gong goes. I've breakfasted on a glass of water and a bag of bird-seed in my time. That sort of thing makes you ready to take whatever you can get. Seen the paper?"

"Thanks."

Jimmy finished his breakfast, and lighted a pipe. Lord Dreever laid down the paper.

"I say," he said, "what I came round about was this. What have you got on just now?"

Jimmy had imagined that his friend had dropped in to return the five-pound note he had borrowed, but his lordship maintained a complete reserve on the subject. Jimmy was to discover later that this weakness of memory where financial obligations were concerned was a leading trait in Lord Dreever's character.

"To-day, do you mean?" said Jimmy.

"Well, in the near future. What I mean is, why not put off that Japan trip you spoke about, and come down to Dreever with me?"

Jimmy reflected. After all, Japan or Dreever, it made very little difference. And it would be interesting to see a place about which he had read so much.

"That's very good of you," he said. "You're sure it will be all right? It won't be upsetting your arrangements?"

"Not a bit. The more the merrier. Can you catch the two-fifteen? It's fearfully short notice."

"Heavens, yes. I can pack in ten minutes. Thanks very much."

"Good business. There'll be shooting and all that sort of rot. Oh, and by the way, are you any good at acting? I mean, there are going to be private theatricals of sorts. A man called Charteris insisted on getting them up—always getting up theatricals. Rot, I call it; but you can't stop him. Do you do anything in that line?"

"Put me down for what you like, from Emperor of Morocco to Confused Noise Without. I was on the stage once. I'm particularly good at shifting scenery."

"Good for you. Well, so long. Two-fifteen from Paddington, remember. I'll meet you there. I've got to go and see a fellow now."

"I'll look out for you."

A sudden thought occurred to Jimmy. Spike! He had forgotten Spike for the moment. It was vital that the Bowery boy should not be lost sight of again. He was the one link with the little house somewhere beyond One Hundred and Fiftieth Street. He could not leave the Bowery boy at the flat. A vision rose in his mind of Spike alone in London, with Savoy Mansions as a base for his operations. No, Spike must be transplanted to the country. But Jimmy could not seem to see Spike in the country. His boredom would probably be pathetic. But it was the only way.

Lord Dreever facilitated matters.

"By the way, Pitt," he said, "you've got a man of sorts, of course? One of those frightful fellows who forgot to pack your collars? Bring him along, of course."

"Thanks," said Jimmy. "I will."

The matter had scarcely been settled when the door opened, and revealed the subject of discussion. Wearing a broad grin of mingled pride and bashfulness, and looking very stiff and awkward in one of the brightest tweed suits ever seen off the stage, Spike stood for a moment in the doorway to let his appearance sink into the spectator, then advanced into the room.

"How do dese strike you, boss?" he inquired genially, as Lord Dreever gaped in astonishment at this bright being.

"Pretty nearly blind, Spike," said Jimmy. "What made you get those? We use electric light here."

Spike was full of news.

"Say, boss, dat clothin'-store's a willy wonder, sure. De old mug what showed me round give me de frozen face when I come in foist. 'What's doin'?' he says. 'To de woods wit' you. Git de hook!' But I hauls out de plunks you give me, an' tells him how I'm here to get a dude suit, an', gee! if he don't haul out suits by de mile. Give me a toist, it did, watching him. 'It's up to youse,' says de mug. 'Choose somet'in'. You pays de money, an' we does de rest.' So, I says dis is de one, an' I put down de plunks, an' here I am, boss."

"I noticed that, Spike," said Jimmy. "I could see you in the dark."

"Don't you like de duds, boss?" inquired Spike, anxiously.

"They're great," said Jimmy. "You'd make Solomon in all his glory look like a tramp 'cyclist."

"Dat's right," agreed Spike. "Dey'se de limit."

And, apparently oblivious to the presence of Lord Dreever, who had been watching him in blank silence since his entrance, the Bowery boy proceeded to execute a mysterious shuffling dance on the carpet.

This was too much for the overwrought brain of his lordship.

"Good-bye, Pitt," he said, "I'm off. Got to see a man."

Jimmy saw his guest to the door.

Outside, Lord Dreever placed the palm of his right hand on his forehead.

"I say, Pitt," he said.

"Hullo?"

"Who the devil's that?"

"Who? Spike? Oh, that's my man."

"Your man! Is he always like that? I mean, going on like a frightful music-hall comedian? Dancing, you know! And, I say, what on earth language was that he was talking? I couldn't understand one word in ten."

"Oh, that's American, the Bowery variety."

"Oh, well, I suppose it's all right if you understand it. I can't. By gad," he broke off, with a chuckle, "I'd give something to see him talking to old Saunders, our butler at home. He's got the manners of a duke."

"Spike should revise those," said Jimmy.

"What do you call him?"

"Spike."

"Rummy name, isn't it?"

"Oh, I don't know. Short for Algernon."

"He seemed pretty chummy."

"That's his independent bringing-up. We're all like that in America."

"Well, so long."

"So long."

On the bottom step, Lord Dreever halted.

"I say. I've got it!"

"Good for you. Got what?"

"Why, I knew I'd seen that chap's face somewhere before, only I couldn't place him. I've got him now. He's the Johnny who came into the shelter last night. Chap you gave a quid to."

Spike's was one of those faces that, without being essentially beautiful, stamp themselves on the memory.

"You're quite right," said Jimmy. "I was wondering if you would recognize him. The fact is, he's a man I once employed over in New York, and, when I came across him over here, he was so evidently wanting a bit of help that I took him on again. As a matter of fact, I needed somebody to look after my things, and Spike can do it as well as anybody else."

"I see. Not bad my spotting him, was it? Well, I must be off. Good-bye. Two-fifteen at Paddington. Meet you there. Take a ticket for Dreever if you're there before me."

"Eight. Good-bye."

Jimmy returned to the dining-room. Spike, who was examining as much as he could of himself in the glass, turned round with his wonted grin.

"Say, who's de gazebo, boss? Ain't he de mug youse was wit' last night?"

"That's the man. We're going down with him to the country to-day, Spike, so be ready."

"On your way, boss. What's dat?"

"He has invited us to his country house, and we're going."

"What? Bot'of us?"

"Yes. I told him you were my servant. I hope you aren't offended."

"Nit. What's dere to be raw about, boss?"

"That's all right. Well, we'd better be packing. We have to be at the station at two."

"Sure."

"And, Spike!"

"Yes, boss?"

"Did you get any other clothes besides what you've got on?"

"Nit. What do I want wit more dan one dude suit?"

"I approve of your rugged simplicity," said Jimmy, "but what you're wearing is a town suit. Excellent for the Park or the Marchioness's Thursday crush, but essentially metropolitan. You must get something else for the country, something dark and quiet. I'll come and help you choose it, now."

"Why, won't dis go in de country?"

"Not on your life, Spike. It would unsettle the rustic mind. They're fearfully particular about that sort of thing in England."

"Dey's to de bad," said the baffled disciple of Beau Brummel, with deep discontent.

"And there's just one more thing, Spike. I know you'll excuse my mentioning it. When we're at Dreever Castle, you will find yourself within reach of a good deal of silver and other things. Would it be too much to ask you to forget your professional instincts? I mentioned this before in a general sort of way, but this is a particular case."

"Ain't I to get busy at all, den?" queried Spike.

"Not so much as a salt-spoon," said Jimmy, firmly. "Now, we'll whistle a cab, and go and choose you some more clothes."

Accompanied by Spike, who came within an ace of looking almost respectable in new blue serge ("Small Gent's"—off the peg), Jimmy arrived at Paddington Station with a quarter of an hour to spare. Lord Dreever appeared ten minutes later, accompanied by a man of about Jimmy's age. He was tall and thin, with cold eyes and tight, thin lips. His clothes fitted him in the way clothes do fit one man in a thousand. They were the best part of him. His general appearance gave one the idea that his meals did him little good, and his meditations rather less. He had practically no conversation.

This was Lord Dreever's friend, Hargate. Lord Dreever made the introductions; but, even as they shook hands, Jimmy had an impression that he had seen the man before. Yet, where or in what circumstances he could not remember. Hargate appeared to have no recollection of him, so he did not mention the matter. A man who has led a wandering life often sees faces that come back to him later on, absolutely detached from their context. He might merely have passed Lord Dreever's friend on the street. But Jimmy had an idea that the other had figured in some episode which at the moment had had an importance. What that episode was had escaped him. He dismissed the thing from his mind. It was not worth harrying his memory about.

Judicious tipping secured the three a compartment to themselves. Hargate, having read the evening paper, went to sleep in the far corner. Jimmy and Lord Dreever, who sat opposite each other, fell into a desultory conversation.

After awhile, Lord Dreever's remarks took a somewhat intimate turn. Jimmy was one of those men whose manner invites confidences. His lordship began to unburden his soul of certain facts relating to the family.

"Have you ever met my Uncle Thomas?" he inquired. "You know Blunt's Stores? Well, he's Blunt. It's a company now, but he still runs it. He married my aunt. You'll meet him at Dreever."

Jimmy said he would be delighted.

"I bet you won't," said the last of the Dreevers, with candor. "He's a frightful man—the limit. Always fussing round like a hen. Gives me a fearful time, I can tell you. Look here, I don't mind telling you—we're pals—he's dead set on my marrying a rich girl."

"Well, that sounds all right. There are worse hobbies. Any particular rich girl?"

"There's always one. He sicks me on to one after another. Quite nice girls, you know, some of them; only, I want to marry somebody else, that girl you saw me with at the Savoy."

"Why don't you tell your uncle?"

"He'd have a fit. She hasn't a penny; nor have I, except what I get from him. Of course, this is strictly between ourselves."

"Of course."

"I know everybody thinks there's money attached to the title; but there isn't, not a penny. When my Aunt Julia married Sir Thomas, the whole frightful show was pretty well in pawn. So, you see how it is."

"Ever think of work?" asked Jimmy.

"Work?" said Lord Dreever, reflectively. "Well, you know, I shouldn't mind work, only I'm dashed if I can see what I could do. I shouldn't know how. Nowadays, you want a fearful specialized education, and so on. Tell you what, though, I shouldn't mind the diplomatic service. One of these days, I shall have a dash at asking my uncle to put up the money. I believe I shouldn't be half-bad at that. I'm rather a quick sort of chap at times, you know. Lots of fellows have said so."

He cleared his throat modestly, and proceeded.

"It isn't only my Uncle Thomas," he said. "There's Aunt Julia, too. She's about as much the limit as he is. I remember, when I was a kid, she was always sitting on me. She does still. Wait till you see her. Sort of woman who makes you feel that your hands are the color of tomatoes and the size of legs of mutton, if you know what I mean. And talks as if she were biting at you. Frightful!"

Having unburdened himself of these criticisms, Lord Dreever yawned, leaned back, and was presently asleep.

It was about an hour later that the train, which had been taking itself less seriously for some time, stopping at stations of quite minor importance and generally showing a tendency to dawdle, halted again. A board with the legend, "Dreever," in large letters showed that they had reached their destination.

The station-master informed Lord Dreever that her ladyship had come to meet the train in the motorcar, and was now waiting in the road outside.

Lord Dreever's jaw fell.

"Oh, lord!" he said. "She's probably motored in to get the afternoon letters. That means, she's come in the runabout, and there's only room for two of us in that. I forgot to telegraph that you were coming, Pitt. I only wired about Hargate. Dash it, I shall have to walk."

His fears proved correct. The car at the station door was small. It was obviously designed to seat four only.

Lord Dreever introduced Hargate and Jimmy to the statuesque lady in the tonneau; and then there was an awkward silence.

At this point, Spike came up, chuckling amiably, with a magazine in his hand.

"Gee!" said Spike. "Say, boss, de mug what wrote dis piece must have bin livin' out in de woods. Say, dere's a gazebo what wants to swipe de heroine's jools what's locked in a drawer. So, dis mug, what 'do you t'ink he does?" Spike laughed shortly, in professional scorn. "Why—"

"Is this gentleman a friend of yours, Spennie?" inquired Lady Julia politely, eying the red-haired speaker coldly.

"It's—" Spennie looked appealingly at Jimmy.

"It's my man," said Jimmy. "Spike," he added in an undertone, "to the woods. Chase yourself. Fade away."

"Sure," said the abashed Spike. "Dat's right. It ain't up to me to come buttin' in. Sorry, boss. Sorry, gents. Sorry loidy. Me for de tall grass."

"There's a luggage-cart of sorts," said Lord Dreever, pointing.

"Sure," said Spike, affably. He trotted away.

"Jump in, Pitt," said Lord Dreever. "I'm going to walk."

"No, I'll walk," said Jimmy. "I'd rather. I want a bit of exercise. Which way do I go?"

"Frightfully good of you, old chap," said Lord Dreever. "Sure you don't mind? I do bar walking. Right-ho! You keep straight on."

He sat down in the tonneau by his aunt's side. The last Jimmy saw was a hasty vision of him engaged in earnest conversation with Lady Julia. He did not seem to be enjoying himself. Nobody is at his best in conversation with a lady whom he knows to be possessed of a firm belief in the weakness of his intellect. A prolonged conversation with Lady Julia always made Lord Dreever feel as if he were being tied into knots.

Jimmy watched them out of sight, and started to follow at a leisurely pace. It certainly was an ideal afternoon for a country walk. The sun was just hesitating whether to treat the time as afternoon or evening. Eventually, it decided that it was evening, and moderated its beams. After London, the country was deliciously fresh and cool. Jimmy felt an unwonted content. It seemed to him just then that the only thing worth doing in the world was to settle down somewhere with three acres and a cow, and become pastoral.

There was a marked lack of traffic on the road. Once he met a cart, and once a flock of sheep with a friendly dog. Sometimes, a rabbit would dash out into the road, stop to listen, and dart into the opposite hedge, all hind-legs and white scut. But, except for these, he was alone in the world.

And, gradually, there began to be borne in upon him the conviction that he had lost his way.

It is difficult to judge distance when one is walking, but it certainly seemed to Jimmy that he must have covered five miles by this time. He must have mistaken the way. He had doubtless come straight. He could not have come straighter. On the other hand, it would be quite in keeping with the cheap substitute which served the Earl of Dreever in place of a mind that he should have forgotten to mention some important turning. Jimmy sat down by the roadside.

As he sat, there came to him from down the road the sound of a horse's feet, trotting. He got up. Here was somebody at last who would direct him.

The sound came nearer. The horse turned the corner; and Jimmy saw with surprise that it bore no rider.

"Hullo?" he said. "Accident? And, by Jove, a side-saddle!"

The curious part of it was that the horse appeared in no way a wild horse. It gave the impression of being out for a little trot on its own account, a sort of equine constitutional.

Jimmy stopped the horse, and led it back the way it had come. As he turned the bend in the road, he saw a girl in a riding-habit running toward him. She stopped running when she caught sight of him, and slowed down to a walk.

"Thank you ever so much," she said, taking the reins from him. "Dandy, you naughty old thing! I got off to pick up my crop, and he ran away."

Jimmy looked at her flushed, smiling face, and stood staring.

It was Molly McEachern.



CHAPTER XII

MAKING A START

Self-possession was one of Jimmy's leading characteristics, but for the moment he found himself speechless. This girl had been occupying his thoughts for so long that—in his mind—he had grown very intimate with her. It was something of a shock to come suddenly out of his dreams, and face the fact that she was in reality practically a stranger. He felt as one might with a friend whose memory has been wiped out. It went against the grain to have to begin again from the beginning after all the time they had been together.

A curious constraint fell upon him.

"Why, how do you do, Mr. Pitt?" she said, holding out her hand.

Jimmy began to feel better. It was something that she remembered his name.

"It's like meeting somebody out of a dream," said Molly. "I have sometimes wondered if you were real. Everything that happened that night was so like a dream."

Jimmy found his tongue.

"You haven't altered," he said, "you look just the same."

"Well," she laughed, "after all, it's not so long ago, is it?"

He was conscious of a dull hurt. To him, it had seemed years. But he was nothing to her—just an acquaintance, one of a hundred. But what more, he asked himself, could he have expected? And with the thought came consolation. The painful sense of having lost ground left him. He saw that he had been allowing things to get out of proportion. He had not lost ground. He had gained it. He had met her again, and she remembered him. What more had he any right to ask?

"I've crammed a good deal into the time," he explained. "I've been traveling about a bit since we met."

"Do you live in Shropshire?" asked Molly.

"No. I'm on a visit. At least, I'm supposed to be. But I've lost the way to the place, and I am beginning to doubt if I shall ever get there. I was told to go straight on. I've gone straight on, and here I am, lost in the snow. Do you happen to know whereabouts Dreever Castle is?"

She laughed.

"Why," she said, "I am staying at Dreever Castle, myself."

"What?"

"So, the first person you meet turns out to be an experienced guide. You're lucky, Mr. Pitt."

"You're right," said Jimmy slowly, "I am."

"Did you come down with Lord Dreever? He passed me in the car just as I was starting out. He was with another man and Lady Julia Blunt. Surely, he didn't make you walk?"

"I offered to walk. Somebody had to. Apparently, he had forgotten to let them know he was bringing me."

"And then he misdirected you! He's very casual, I'm afraid."

"Inclined that way, perhaps."

"Have you known Lord Dreever long?"

"Since a quarter past twelve last night."

"Last night!"

"We met at the Savoy, and, later, on the Embankment. We looked at the river together, and told each other the painful stories of our lives, and this morning he called, and invited me down here."

Molly looked at him with frank amusement.

"You must be a very restless sort of person," she said. "You seem to do a great deal of moving about."

"I do," said Jimmy. "I can't keep still. I've got the go-fever, like that man in Kipling's book."

"But he was in love."

"Yes," said Jimmy. "He was. That's the bacillus, you know."

She shot a quick glance at him. He became suddenly interesting to her. She was at the age of dreams and speculations. From being merely an ordinary young man with rather more ease of manner than the majority of the young men she had met, he developed in an instant into something worthy of closer attention. He took on a certain mystery and romance. She wondered what sort of girl it was that he loved. Examining him in the light of this new discovery, she found him attractive. Something seemed to have happened to put her in sympathy with him. She noticed for the first time a latent forcefulness behind the pleasantness of his manner. His self-possession was the self-possession of the man who has been tried and has found himself.

At the bottom of her consciousness, too, there was a faint stirring of some emotion, which she could not analyze, not unlike pain. It was vaguely reminiscent of the agony of loneliness which she had experienced as a small child on the rare occasions when her father had been busy and distrait, and had shown her by his manner that she was outside his thoughts. This was but a pale suggestion of that misery; nevertheless, there was a resemblance. It was a rather desolate, shut-out sensation, half-resentful.

It was gone in a moment. But it had been there. It had passed over her heart as the shadow of a cloud moves across a meadow in the summer-time.

For some moments, she stood without speaking. Jimmy did not break the silence. He was looking at her with an appeal in his eyes. Why could she not understand? She must understand.

But the eyes that met his were those of a child.

As they stood there, the horse, which had been cropping in a perfunctory manner at the short grass by the roadside, raised its head, and neighed impatiently. There was something so human about the performance that Jimmy and the girl laughed simultaneously. The utter materialism of the neigh broke the spell. It was a noisy demand for food.

"Poor Dandy!" said Molly. "He knows he's near home, and he knows it's his dinner-time."

"Are we near the castle, then?"

"It's a long way round by the road, but we can cut across the fields. Aren't these English fields and hedges just perfect! I love them. Of course, I loved America, but—"

"Have you left New York long?" asked Jimmy.

"We came over here about a month after you were at our house."

"You didn't spend much time there, then."

"Father had just made a good deal of money in Wall Street. He must have been making it when I was on the Lusitania. He wanted to leave New York, so we didn't wait. We were in London all the winter. Then, we went over to Paris. It was there we met Sir Thomas Blunt and Lady Julia. Have you met them? They are Lord Dreever's uncle and aunt."

"I've met Lady Julia."

"Do you like her?"

Jimmy hesitated.

"Well, you see—"

"I know. She's your hostess, but you haven't started your visit yet. So, you've just got time to say what you really think of her, before you have to pretend she's perfect."

"Well—"

"I detest her," said Molly, crisply. "I think she's hard and hateful."

"Well, I can't say she struck me as a sort of female Cheeryble Brother. Lord Dreever introduced me to her at the station. She seemed to bear it pluckily, but with some difficulty."

"She's hateful," repeated Molly. "So is he, Sir Thomas, I mean. He's one of those fussy, bullying little men. They both bully poor Lord Dreever till I wonder he doesn't rebel. They treat him like a school-boy. It makes me wild. It's such a shame—he's so nice and good-natured! I am so sorry for him!"

Jimmy listened to this outburst with mixed feelings. It was sweet of her to be so sympathetic, but was it merely sympathy? There had been a ring in her voice and a flush on her cheek that had suggested to Jimmy's sensitive mind a personal interest in the down-trodden peer. Reason told him that it was foolish to be jealous of Lord Dreever, a good fellow, of course, but not to be taken seriously. The primitive man in him, on the other hand, made him hate all Molly's male friends with an unreasoning hatred. Not that he hated Lord Dreever: he liked him. But he doubted if he could go on liking him for long if Molly were to continue in this sympathetic strain.

His affection for the absent one was not put to the test. Molly's next remark had to do with Sir Thomas.

"The worst of it is," she said, "father and Sir Thomas are such friends. In Paris, they were always together. Father did him a very good turn."

"How was that?"

"It was one afternoon, just after we arrived. A man got into Lady Julia's room while we were all out except father. Father saw him go into the room, and suspected something was wrong, and went in after him. The man was trying to steal Lady Julia's jewels. He had opened the box where they were kept, and was actually holding her rope of diamonds in his hand when father found him. It's the most magnificent thing I ever saw. Sir Thomas told father he gave a hundred thousand dollars for it."

"But, surely," said Jimmy, "hadn't the management of the hotel a safe for valuables?"

"Of course, they had; but you don't know Sir Thomas. He wasn't going to trust any hotel safe. He's the sort of a man who insists on doing everything in his own way, and who always imagines he can do things better himself than anyone else can do them for him. He had had this special box made, and would never keep the diamonds anywhere else. Naturally, the thief opened it in a minute. A clever thief would have no difficulty with a thing like that."

"What happened?"

"Oh, the man saw father, and dropped the jewels, and ran off down the corridor. Father chased him a little way, but of course it was no good; so he went back and shouted, and rang every bell he could see, and gave the alarm; but the man was never found. Still, he left the diamonds. That was the great thing, after all. You must look at them to-night at dinner. They really are wonderful. Are you a judge of precious stones at all?"

"I am rather," said Jimmy. "In fact, a jeweler I once knew told me I had a natural gift in that direction. And so, of course, Sir Thomas was pretty grateful to your father?"

"He simply gushed. He couldn't do enough for him. You see, if the diamonds had been stolen, I'm sure Lady Julia would have made Sir Thomas buy her another rope just as good. He's terrified of her, I'm certain. He tries not to show it, but he is. And, besides having to pay another hundred thousand dollars, he would never have heard the last of it. It would have ruined his reputation for being infallible and doing everything better than anybody else."

"But didn't the mere fact that the thief got the jewels, and was only stopped by a fluke from getting away with them, do that?"

Molly bubbled with laughter.

"She never knew. Sir Thomas got back to the hotel an hour before she did. I've never seen such a busy hour. He had the manager up, harangued him, and swore him to secrecy—which the poor manager was only too glad to agree to, because it wouldn't have done the hotel any good to have it known. And the manager harangued the servants, and the servants harangued one another, and everybody talked at the same time; and father and I promised not to tell a soul; so Lady Julia doesn't know a word about it to this day. And I don't see why she ever should—though, one of these days, I've a good mind to tell Lord Dreever. Think what a hold he would have over them! They'd never be able to bully him again."

"I shouldn't," said Jimmy, trying to keep a touch of coldness out of his voice. This championship of Lord Dreever, however sweet and admirable, was a little distressing.

She looked up quickly.

"You don't think I really meant to, do you?"

"No, no," said Jimmy, hastily. "Of course not."

"Well, I should think so!" said Molly, indignantly. "After I promised not to tell a soul about it!"

Jimmy chuckled.

"It's nothing," he said, in answer to her look of inquiry.

"You laughed at something."

"Well," said Jimmy apologetically, "it's only—it's nothing really—only, what I mean is, you have just told one soul a good deal about it, haven't you?"

Molly turned pink. Then, she smiled.

"I don't know how I came to do it," she declared. "It just rushed out of its own accord. I suppose it is because I know I can trust you."

Jimmy flushed with pleasure. He turned to her, and half-halted, but she continued to walk on.

"You can," he said, "but how do you know you can?"

She seemed surprised.

"Why—" she said. She stopped for a moment, and then went on hurriedly, with a touch of embarrassment. "Why, how absurd! Of course, I know. Can't you read faces? I can. Look," she said, pointing, "now you can see the castle. How do you like it?"

They had reached a point where the fields sloped sharply downward. A few hundred yards away, backed by woods, stood the gray mass of stone which had proved such a kill-joy of old to the Welsh sportsmen during the pheasant season. Even now, it had a certain air of defiance. The setting sun lighted the waters of the lake. No figures were to be seen moving in the grounds. The place resembled a palace of sleep.

"Well?" said Molly.

"It's wonderful!"

"Isn't it! I'm so glad it strikes you like that. I always feel as if I had invented everything round here. It hurts me if people don't appreciate it."

They went down the hill.

"By the way," said Jimmy, "are you acting in these theatricals they are getting up?"

"Yes. Are you the other man they were going to get? That's why Lord Dreever went up to London, to see if he couldn't find somebody. The man who was going to play one of the parts had to go back to London on business."

"Poor brute!" said Jimmy. It seemed to him at this moment that there was only one place in the world where a man might be even reasonably happy. "What sort of part is it? Lord Dreever said I should be wanted to act. What do I do?"

"If you're Lord Herbert, which is the part they wanted a man for, you talk to me most of the time."

Jimmy decided that the piece had been well cast.

The dressing-gong sounded just as they entered the hall. From a door on the left, there emerged two men, a big man and a little one, in friendly conversation. The big man's back struck Jimmy as familiar.

"Oh, father," Molly called. And Jimmy knew where he had seen the back before.

The two men stopped.

"Sir Thomas," said Molly, "this is Mr. Pitt."

The little man gave Jimmy a rapid glance, possibly with the object of detecting his more immediately obvious criminal points; then, as if satisfied as to his honesty, became genial.

"I am very glad to meet you, Mr. Pitt, very glad," he said. "We have been expecting you for some time."

Jimmy explained that he had lost his way.

"Exactly. It was ridiculous that you should be compelled to walk, perfectly ridiculous. It was grossly careless of my nephew not to let us know that you were coming. My wife told him so in the car."

"I bet she did," said Jimmy to himself. "Really," he said aloud, by way of lending a helping hand to a friend in trouble, "I preferred to walk. I have not been on a country road since I landed in England." He turned to the big man, and held out his hand. "I don't suppose you remember me, Mr. McEachern? We met in New York."

"You remember the night Mr. Pitt scared away our burglar, father," said Molly.

Mr. McEachern was momentarily silent. On his native asphalt, there are few situations capable of throwing the New York policeman off his balance. In that favored clime, savoir faire is represented by a shrewd blow of the fist, and a masterful stroke with the truncheon amounts to a satisfactory repartee. Thus shall you never take the policeman of Manhattan without his answer. In other surroundings, Mr. McEachern would have known how to deal with the young man whom with such good reason he believed to be an expert criminal. But another plan of action was needed here. First and foremost, of all the hints on etiquette that he had imbibed since he entered this more reposeful life, came the maxim: "Never make a scene." Scenes, he had gathered, were of all things what polite society most resolutely abhorred. The natural man in him must be bound in chains. The sturdy blow must give way to the honeyed word. A cold, "Really!" was the most vigorous retort that the best circles would countenance. It had cost Mr. McEachern some pains to learn this lesson, but he had done it. He shook hands, and gruffly acknowledged the acquaintanceship.

"Really, really!" chirped Sir Thomas, amiably. "So, you find yourself among old friends, Mr. Pitt."

"Old friends," echoed Jimmy, painfully conscious of the ex-policeman's eyes, which were boring holes in him.

"Excellent, excellent! Let me take you to your room. It is just opposite my own. This way."

In his younger days, Sir Thomas had been a floor-walker of no mean caliber. A touch of the professional still lingered in his brisk movements. He preceded Jimmy upstairs with the restrained suavity that can be learned in no other school.

They parted from Mr. McEachern on the first landing, but Jimmy could still feel those eyes. The policeman's stare had been of the sort that turns corners, goes upstairs, and pierces walls.



CHAPTER XIII

SPIKE'S VIEWS

Nevertheless, it was in an exalted frame of mind that Jimmy dressed for dinner. It seemed to him that he had awakened from a sort of stupor. Life, so gray yesterday, now appeared full of color and possibilities. Most men who either from choice or necessity have knocked about the world for any length of time are more or less fatalists. Jimmy was an optimistic fatalist. He had always looked on Fate, not as a blind dispenser at random of gifts good and bad, but rather as a benevolent being with a pleasing bias in his own favor. He had almost a Napoleonic faith in his star. At various periods of his life (notably at the time when, as he had told Lord Dreever, he had breakfasted on bird-seed), he had been in uncommonly tight corners, but his luck had always extricated him. It struck him that it would be an unthinkable piece of bad sportsmanship on Fate's part to see him through so much, and then to abandon him just as he had arrived in sight of what was by far the biggest thing of his life. Of course, his view of what constituted the biggest thing in life had changed with the years. Every ridge of the Hill of Supreme Moments in turn had been mistaken by him for the summit; but this last, he felt instinctively, was genuine. For good or bad, Molly was woven into the texture of his life. In the stormy period of the early twenties, he had thought the same of other girls, who were now mere memories as dim as those of figures in a half-forgotten play. In their case, his convalescence had been temporarily painful, but brief. Force of will and an active life had worked the cure. He had merely braced himself, and firmly ejected them from his mind. A week or two of aching emptiness, and his heart had been once more in readiness, all nicely swept and garnished, for the next lodger.

But, in the case of Molly, it was different. He had passed the age of instantaneous susceptibility. Like a landlord who has been cheated by previous tenants, he had become wary. He mistrusted his powers of recuperation in case of disaster. The will in these matters, just like the mundane "bouncer," gets past its work. For some years now, Jimmy had had a feeling that the next arrival would come to stay; and he had adopted in consequence a gently defensive attitude toward the other sex. Molly had broken through this, and he saw that his estimate of his will-power had been just. Methods that had proved excellent in the past were useless now. There was no trace here of the dimly consoling feeling of earlier years, that there were other girls in the world. He did not try to deceive himself. He knew that he had passed the age when a man can fall in love with any one of a number of types.

This was the finish, one way or the other. There would be no second throw. She had him. However it might end, he belonged to her.

There are few moments in a man's day when his brain is more contemplative than during that brief space when he is lathering his face, preparatory to shaving. Plying the brush, Jimmy reviewed the situation. He was, perhaps, a little too optimistic. Not unnaturally, he was inclined to look upon his luck as a sort of special train which would convey him without effort to Paradise. Fate had behaved so exceedingly handsomely up till now! By a series of the most workmanlike miracles, it had brought him to the point of being Molly's fellow-guest at a country-house. This, as reason coldly pointed out a few moments later, was merely the beginning, but to Jimmy, thoughtfully lathering, it seemed the end. It was only when he had finished shaving, and was tying his cravat, that he began to perceive obstacles in his way, and sufficiently big obstacles, at that.

In the first place, Molly did not love him. And, he was bound to admit, there was no earthly reason why she ever should. A man in love is seldom vain about his personal attractions. Also, her father firmly believed him to be a master-burglar.

"Otherwise," said Jimmy, scowling at his reflection in the glass, "everything's splendid." He brushed his hair sadly.

There was a furtive rap at the door.

"Hullo?" said Jimmy. "Yes?"

The door opened slowly. A grin, surmounted by a mop of red hair, appeared round the edge of it.

"Hullo, Spike. Come in. What's the matter?"

The rest of Mr. Mullins entered the room.

"Gee, boss! I wasn't sure was dis your room. Say, who do you t'ink I nearly bumped me coco ag'inst out in de corridor downstairs? Why, old man McEachern, de cop. Dat's right!"

"Yes?"

"Sure. Say, what's he doin' on dis beat? I pretty near went down an' out when I seen him. Dat's right. Me breath ain't got back home yet."

"Did he recognize you?"

"Did he! He starts like an actor on top de stoige when he sees he's up ag'inst de plot to ruin him, an' he gives me de fierce eye."

"Well?"

"I was wonderin' was I on Thoid Avenoo, or was I standin' on me coco, or what was I doin' anyhow. Den I slips off, an' chases meself up here. Say, boss, what's de game? What's old man McEachern doin' stunts dis side fer?"

"It's all right, Spike. Keep calm. I can explain. He has retired—like me! He's one of the handsome guests here."

"On your way, boss! What's dat?"

"He left the force just after that merry meeting of ours when you frolicked with the bull-dog. He came over here, and butted into society. So, here we are again, all gathered together under the same roof, like a jolly little family party."

Spike's open mouth bore witness to his amazement.

"Den—" he stammered.

"Yes?"

"Den, what's he goin' to do?"

"I couldn't say. I'm expecting to hear shortly. But we needn't worry ourselves. The next move's with him. If he wants to comment on the situation, he won't be backward. He'll come and do it."

"Sure. It's up to him," agreed Spike.

"I'm quite comfortable. Speaking for myself, I'm having a good time. How are you getting along downstairs?"

"De limit, boss. Honest, it's to de velvet. Dey's an old gazebo, de butler, Saunders his name is, dat's de best ever at handin' out long woids. I sits an' listens. Dey calls me Mr. Mullins down dere," said Spike, with pride.

"Good. I'm glad you're all right. There's no season why we shouldn't have an excellent time here. I don't think that Mr. McEachern will try to have us turned out, after he's heard one or two little things I have to say to him—just a few reminiscences of the past which may interest him. I have the greatest affection for Mr. McEachern—I wish it were mutual—but nothing he can say is going to make me stir from here."

"Not on your life," agreed Spike. "Say, boss, he must have got a lot of plunks to be able to butt in here. An' I know how he got dem, too. Dat's right. I comes from little old New York, meself."

"Hush, Spike, this is scandal!"

"Sure," said the Bowery boy doggedly, safely started now on his favorite subject. "I knows, an' youse knows, boss. Gee! I wish I'd bin a cop. But I wasn't tall enough. Dey's de fellers wit' de big bank-rolls. Look at dis old McEachern. Money to boin a wet dog wit' he's got, an' never a bit of woik fer it from de start to de finish. An' look at me, boss."

"I do, Spike, I do."

"Look at me. Gittin' busy all de year round, woikin' to beat de band—"

"In prisons oft," said Jimmy.

"Sure t'ing. An' chased all roun' de town. An' den what? Why, to de bad at de end of it all. Say, it's enough to make a feller—"

"Turn honest," said Jimmy. "That's it, Spike. Reform. You'll be glad some day."

Spike seemed to be doubtful. He was silent for a moment, then, as if following up a train of thought, he said:

"Boss, dis is a fine big house."

"I've seen worse."

"Say, couldn't we—?"

"Spike!" said Jimmy, warningly.

"Well, couldn't we?" said Spike, doggedly. "It ain't often youse butts into a dead-easy proposition like dis one. We shouldn't have to do a t'ing excep' git busy. De stuff's just lyin' about, boss."

"I shouldn't wonder."

"Aw, it's a waste to leave it."

"Spike," said Jimmy, "I warned you of this. I begged you to be on your guard, to fight against your professional instincts. Be a man! Crush them. Try and occupy your mind. Collect butterflies."

Spike shuffled in gloomy silence.

"'Member dose jools youse swiped from de duchess?" he said, musingly.

"The dear duchess!" murmured Jimmy. "Ah, me!"

"An' de bank youse busted?"

"Those were happy days, Spike."

"Gee!" said the Bowery boy. And then, after a pause: "Dat was to de good," he said, wistfully.

Jimmy arranged his tie at the mirror.

"Dere's a loidy here," continued Spike, addressing the chest of drawers, "dat's got a necklace of jools what's wort' a hundred t'ousand plunks. Honest, boss. A hundred t'ousand plunks. Saunders told me dat—de old gazebo dat hands out de long woids. I says to him, 'Gee!' an' he says, 'Surest t'ing youse know.' A hundred t'ousand plunks!"

"So I understand," said Jimmy.

"Shall I rubber around, an' find out where is dey kept, boss?"

"Spike," said Jimmy, "ask me no more. All this is in direct contravention of our treaty respecting keeping your fingers off the spoons. You pain me. Desist."

"Sorry, boss. But dey'll be willy-wonders, dem jools. A hundred t'ousand plunks. Dat's goin' some, ain't it? What's dat dis side?"

"Twenty thousand pounds."

"Gee!...Can I help youse wit' de duds, boss?"

"No, thanks, Spike, I'm through now. You might just give me a brush down, though. No, not that. That's a hair-brush. Try the big black one."

"Dis is a boid of a dude suit," observed Spike, pausing in his labors.

"Glad you like it, Spike. Rather chic, I think."

"It's de limit. Excuse me. How much did it set youse back, boss?"

"Something like seven guineas, I believe. I could look up the bill, and let you know."

"What's dat—guineas? Is dat more dan a pound?"

"A shilling more. Why these higher mathematics?"

Spike resumed his brushing.

"What a lot of dude suits youse could git," he observed meditatively, "if youse had dem jools!" He became suddenly animated. He waved the clothes-brush. "Oh, you boss!" he cried. "What's eatin' youse? Aw, it's a shame not to. Come along, you boss! Say, what's doin'? Why ain't youse sittin' in at de game? Oh, you boss!"

Whatever reply Jimmy might have made to this impassioned appeal was checked by a sudden bang on the door. Almost simultaneously, the handle turned.

"Gee!" cried Spike. "It's de cop!"

Jimmy smiled pleasantly.

"Come in, Mr. McEachern," he said, "come in. Journeys end in lovers meeting. You know my friend Mr. Mullins, I think? Shut the door, and sit down, and let's talk of many things."



CHAPTER XIV

CHECK AND A COUNTER MOVE

Mr. McEachern stood in the doorway, breathing heavily. As the result of a long connection with evil-doers, the ex-policeman was somewhat prone to harbor suspicions of those round about him, and at the present moment his mind was aflame. Indeed, a more trusting man might have been excused for feeling a little doubtful as to the intentions of Jimmy and Spike. When McEachern had heard that Lord Dreever had brought home a casual London acquaintance, he had suspected as a possible drawback to the visit the existence of hidden motives on the part of the unknown. Lord Dreever, he had felt, was precisely the sort of youth to whom the professional bunco-steerer would attach himself with shouts of joy. Never, he had assured himself, had there been a softer proposition than his lordship since bunco-steering became a profession. When he found that the strange visitor was Jimmy Pitt, his suspicions had increased a thousand-fold.

And when, going to his room to get ready for dinner, he had nearly run into Spike Mullins in the corridor, his frame of mind had been that of a man to whom a sudden ray of light reveals the fact that he is on the brink of a black precipice. Jimmy and Spike had burgled his house together in New York. And here they were, together again, at Dreever Castle. To say that the thing struck McEachern as sinister is to put the matter baldly. There was once a gentleman who remarked that he smelt a rat, and saw it floating in the air. Ex-Constable McEachern smelt a regiment of rats, and the air seemed to him positively congested with them.

His first impulse had been to rush to Jimmy's room there and then; but he had learned society's lessons well. Though the heavens might fall, he must not be late for dinner. So, he went and dressed, and an obstinate tie put the finishing touches to his wrath.

Jimmy regarded him coolly, without moving from, the chair in which he had seated himself. Spike, on the other hand, seemed embarrassed. He stood first on one leg, and then on the other, as if he were testing the respective merits of each, and would make a definite choice later on.

"You scoundrels!" growled McEachern.

Spike, who had been standing for a few moments on his right leg, and seemed at last to have come to, a decision, hastily changed to the left, and grinned feebly.

"Say, youse won't want me any more, boss?" he whispered.

"No, you can go, Spike."

"You stay where you are, you red-headed devil!" said McEachern, tartly.

"Run along, Spike," said Jimmy.

The Bowery boy looked doubtfully at the huge form of the ex-policeman, which blocked access to the door.

"Would you mind letting my man pass?" said Jimmy.

"You stay—" began McEachern.

Jimmy got up and walked round to the door, which he opened. Spike shot out. He was not lacking in courage, but he disliked embarrassing interviews, and it struck him that Jimmy was the man to handle a situation of this kind. He felt that he himself would only be in the way.

"Now, we can talk comfortably," said Jimmy, going back to his chair.

McEachern's deep-set eyes gleamed, and his forehead grew red, but he mastered his feelings.

"And now—" said he, then paused.

"Yes?" asked Jimmy.

"What are you doing here?"

"Nothing, at the moment."

"You know what I mean. Why are you here, you and that red-headed devil, Spike Mullins?" He jerked his head in the direction of the door.

"I am here because I was very kindly invited to come by Lord Dreever."

"I know you."

"You have that privilege. Seeing that we only met once, it's very good of you to remember me."

"What's your game? What do you mean to do?"

"To do? Well, I shall potter about the garden, you know, and shoot a bit, perhaps, and look at the horses, and think of life, and feed the chickens—I suppose there are chickens somewhere about—and possibly go for an occasional row on the lake. Nothing more. Oh, yes, I believe they want me to act in some theatricals."

"You'll miss those theatricals. You'll leave here to-morrow."

"To-morrow? But I've only just arrived, dear heart."

"I don't care about that. Out you go to-morrow. I'll give you till to-morrow."

"I congratulate you," said Jimmy. "One of the oldest houses in England."

"What do you mean?"

"I gathered from what you said that you had bought the Castle. Isn't that so? If it still belongs to Lord Dreever, don't you think you ought to consult him before revising his list of guests?"

McEachern looked steadily at him. His manner became quieter.

"Oh, you take that tone, do you?"

"I don't know what you mean by 'that tone.' What tone would you take if a comparative stranger ordered you to leave another man's house?"

McEachern's massive jaw protruded truculently in the manner that had scared good behavior into brawling East Siders.

"I know your sort," he said. "I'll call your bluff. And you won't get till to-morrow, either. It'll be now."

"'Why should we wait for the morrow? You are queen of my heart to-night," murmured Jimmy, encouragingly.

"I'll expose you before them all. I'll tell them everything."

Jimmy shook his head.

"Too melodramatic," he said. "'I call on heaven to judge between this man and me!' kind of thing. I shouldn't. What do you propose to tell, anyway?"

"Will you deny that you were a crook in New York?"

"I will. I was nothing of the kind."

"What?"

"If you'll listen, I can explain—"

"Explain!" The other's voice rose again. "You talk about explaining, you scum, when I caught you in my own parlor at three in the morning—you—"

The smile faded from Jimmy's face.

"Half a minute," he said. It might be that the ideal course would be to let the storm expend itself, and then to explain quietly the whole matter of Arthur Mifflin and the bet that had led to his one excursion into burglary; but he doubted it. Things—including his temper—had got beyond the stage of quiet explanations. McEachern would most certainly disbelieve his story. What would happen after that he did not know. A scene, probably: a melodramatic denunciation, at the worst, before the other guests; at the best, before Sir Thomas alone. He saw nothing but chaos beyond that. His story was thin to a degree, unless backed by witnesses, and his witnesses were three thousand miles away. Worse, he had not been alone in the policeman's parlor. A man who is burgling a house for a bet does not usually do it in the company of a professional burglar, well known to the police.

No, quiet explanations must be postponed. They could do no good, and would probably lead to his spending the night and the next few nights at the local police-station. And, even if he were spared that fate, it was certain that he would have to leave the castle—leave the castle and Molly!

He jumped up. The thought had stung him.

"One moment," he said.

McEachern stopped.

"Well?"

"You're going to tell them that?" asked Jimmy.

"I am."

Jimmy walked up to him.

"Are you also going to tell them why you didn't have me arrested that night?" he said.

McEachern started. Jimmy planted himself in front of him, and glared up into his face. It would have been hard to say which of the two was the angrier. The policeman was flushed, and the veins stood out on his forehead. Jimmy was in a white heat of rage. He had turned very pale, and his muscles were quivering. Jimmy in this mood had once cleared a Los Angeles bar-room with the leg of a chair in the space of two and a quarter minutes by the clock.

"Are you?" he demanded. "Are you?"

McEachern's hand, hanging at his side, lifted itself hesitatingly. The fingers brushed against Jimmy's shoulder.

Jimmy's lip twitched.

"Yes," he said, "do it! Do it, and see what happens. By God, if you put a hand on me, I'll finish you. Do you think you can bully me? Do you think I care for your size?"

McEachern dropped his hand. For the first time in his life, he had met a man who, instinct told him, was his match and more. He stepped back a pace.

Jimmy put his hands in his pockets, and turned away. He walked to the mantelpiece, and leaned his back against it.

"You haven't answered my question," he said. "Perhaps, you can't?"

McEachern was wiping his forehead, and breathing quickly.

"If you like," said Jimmy, "we'll go down to the drawing-room now, and you shall tell your story, and I'll tell mine. I wonder which they will think the more interesting. Damn you," he went on, his anger rising once more, "what do you mean by it? You come into my room, and bluster, and talk big about exposing crooks. What do you call yourself, I wonder? Do you realize what you are? Why, poor Spike's an angel compared with you. He did take chances. He wasn't in a position of trust. You—"

He stopped.

"Hadn't you better get out of here, don't you think?" he said, curtly.

Without a word, McEachern walked to the door, and went out.

Jimmy dropped into a chair with a deep breath. He took up his cigarette-case, but before he could light a match the gong sounded from the distance.

He rose, and laughed rather shakily. He felt limp. "As an effort at conciliating papa," he said, "I'm afraid that wasn't much of a success."

It was not often that McEachern was visited by ideas. He ran rather to muscle than to brain. But he had one that evening during dinner. His interview with Jimmy had left him furious, but baffled. He knew that his hands were tied. Frontal attack was useless. To drive Jimmy from the castle would be out of the question. All that could be done was to watch him while he was there. For he had never been more convinced of anything in his life than that Jimmy had wormed his way into the house-party with felonious intent. The appearance of Lady Julia at dinner, wearing the famous rope of diamonds, supplied an obvious motive. The necklace had an international reputation. Probably, there was not a prominent thief in England or on the Continent who had not marked it down as a possible prey. It had already been tried for, once. It was big game, just the sort of lure that would draw the type of criminal McEachern imagined Jimmy to be.

From his seat at the far end of the table, Jimmy looked at the jewels as they gleamed on their wearer's neck. They were almost too ostentatious for what was, after all, an informal dinner. It was not a rope of diamonds. It was a collar. There was something Oriental and barbaric in the overwhelming display of jewelry. It was a prize for which a thief would risk much.

The conversation, becoming general with the fish, was not of a kind to remove from his mind the impression made by the sight of the gems. It turned on burglary.

Lord Dreever began it.

"Oh, I say," he said, "I forgot to tell you, Aunt Julia, Number Six was burgled the other night."

Number 6a, Eaton Square, was the family's London house.

"Burgled!" cried Sir Thomas.

"Well, broken into," said his lordship, gratified to find that he had got the ear of his entire audience. Even Lady Julia was silent and attentive. "Chap got in through the scullery window about one o'clock in the morning."

"And what did you do?" inquired Sir Thomas.

"Oh, I—er—I was out at the time," said Lord Dreever. "But something frightened the feller," he went on hurriedly, "and he made a bolt for it without taking anything."

"Burglary," said a young man, whom Jimmy subsequently discovered to be the drama-loving Charteris, leaning back and taking advantage of a pause, "is the hobby of the sportsman and the life work of the avaricious." He took a little pencil from his waistcoat pocket, and made a rapid note on his cuff.

Everybody seemed to have something to say on the subject. One young lady gave it as her opinion that she would not like to find a burglar under her bed. Somebody else had heard of a fellow whose father had fired at the butler, under the impression that he was a house-breaker, and had broken a valuable bust of Socrates. Lord Dreever had known a man at college whose brother wrote lyrics for musical comedy, and had done one about a burglar's best friend being his mother.

"Life," said Charteris, who had had time for reflection, "is a house which we all burgle. We enter it uninvited, take all that we can lay hands on, and go out again." He scribbled, "Life—house—burgle," on his cuff, and replaced the pencil.

"This man's brother I was telling you about," said Lord Dreever, "says there's only one rhyme in the English language to 'burglar,' and that's 'gurgler—' unless you count 'pergola'! He says—"

"Personally," said Jimmy, with a glance at McEachern, "I have rather a sympathy for burglars. After all, they are one of the hardest-working classes in existence. They toil while everybody else is asleep. Besides, a burglar is only a practical socialist. People talk a lot about the redistribution of wealth. The burglar goes out and does it. I have found burglars some of the decentest criminals I have ever met."

"I despise burglars!" ejaculated Lady Julia, with a suddenness that stopped Jimmy's eloquence as if a tap had been turned off. "If I found one coming after my jewels, and I had a pistol, I'd shoot him."

Jimmy met McEachern's eye, and smiled kindly at him. The ex-policeman was looking at him with the gaze of a baffled, but malignant basilisk.

"I take very good care no one gets a chance at your diamonds, my dear," said Sir Thomas, without a blush. "I have had a steel box made for me," he added to the company in general, "with a special lock. A very ingenious arrangement. Quite unbreakable, I imagine."

Jimmy, with Molly's story fresh in his mind, could not check a rapid smile. Mr. McEachern, watching intently, saw it. To him, it was fresh evidence, if any had been wanted, of Jimmy's intentions and of his confidence of success. McEachern's brow darkened. During the rest of the meal, tense thought rendered him even more silent than was his wont at the dinner-table. The difficulty of his position was, he saw, great. Jimmy, to be foiled, must be watched, and how could he watch him?

It was not until the coffee arrived that he found an answer to the question. With his first cigarette came the idea. That night, in his room, before going to bed, he wrote a letter. It was an unusual letter, but, singularly enough, almost identical with one Sir Thomas Blunt had written that very morning.

It was addressed to the Manager of Dodson's Private Inquiry Agency, of Bishopsgate Street, E. C., and ran as follows:

Sir,—

On receipt of this, kindly send down one of your smartest men. Instruct him to stay at the village inn in character of American seeing sights of England, and anxious to inspect Dreever Castle. I will meet him in the village and recognize him as old New York friend, and will then give him further instructions. Yours faithfully,

J. McEACHERN.

P. S. Kindly not send a rube, but a real smart man.

This brief, but pregnant letter cost some pains in its composition. McEachern was not a ready writer. But he completed it at last to his satisfaction. There was a crisp purity in the style that pleased him. He sealed up the envelope, and slipped it into his pocket. He felt more at ease now. Such was the friendship that had sprung up between Sir Thomas Blunt and himself as the result of the jewel episode in Paris that he could count with certainty on the successful working of his scheme. The grateful knight would not be likely to allow any old New York friend of his preserver to languish at the village inn. The sleuth-hound would at once be installed at the castle, where, unsuspected by Jimmy, he could keep an eye on the course of events. Any looking after that Mr. James Pitt might require could safely be left in the hands of this expert.

With considerable fervor, Mr. McEachern congratulated himself on his astuteness. With Jimmy above stairs and Spike below, the sleuth-hound would have his hands full.



CHAPTER XV

MR. MCEACHERN INTERVENES

Life at the castle during the first few days of his visit filled Jimmy with a curious blend of emotions, mainly unpleasant. Fate, in its pro-Jimmy capacity, seemed to be taking a rest. In the first place, the part allotted to him was not that of Lord Herbert, the character who talked to Molly most of the time. The instant Charteris learned from Lord Dreever that Jimmy had at one time actually been on the stage professionally, he decided that Lord Herbert offered too little scope for the new man's talents.

"Absolutely no good to you, my dear chap," he said. "It's just a small dude part. He's simply got to be a silly ass."

Jimmy pleaded that he could be a sillier ass than anybody living; but Charteris was firm.

"No," he said. "You must be Captain Browne. Fine acting part. The biggest in the piece. Full of fat lines. Spennie was to have played it, and we were in for the worst frost in the history of the stage. Now you've come, it's all right. Spennie's the ideal Lord Herbert. He's simply got to be him-self. We've got a success now, my boy. Rehearsal after lunch. Don't be late." And he was off to beat up the rest of the company.

From that moment, Jimmy's troubles began. Charteris was a young man in whom a passion for the stage was ineradicably implanted. It mattered nothing to him during these days that the sun shone, that it was pleasant on the lake, and that Jimmy would have given five pounds a minute to be allowed to get Molly to himself for half-an-hour every afternoon. All he knew or cared about was that the local nobility and gentry were due to arrive at the castle within a week, and that, as yet, very few of the company even knew their lines. Having hustled Jimmy into the part of CAPTAIN BROWNE, he gave his energy free play. He conducted rehearsals with a vigor that occasionally almost welded the rabble he was coaching into something approaching coherency. He painted scenery, and left it about—wet, and people sat on it. He nailed up horseshoes for luck, and they fell on people. But nothing daunted him. He never rested.

"Mr. Charteris," said Lady Julia, rather frigidly, after one energetic rehearsal, "is indefatigable. He whirled me about!"

It was perhaps his greatest triumph, properly considered, that he had induced Lady Julia to take a part in his piece; but to the born organizer of amateur theatricals no miracle of this kind is impossible, and Charteris was one of the most inveterate organizers in the country. There had been some talk—late at night, in the billiard room—of his being about to write in a comic footman role for Sir Thomas; but it had fallen through, not, it was felt, because Charteris could not have hypnotized his host into undertaking the part, but rather because Sir Thomas was histrionically unfit.

Mainly as a result of the producer's energy, Jimmy found himself one of a crowd, and disliked the sensation. He had not experienced much difficulty in mastering the scenes in which he appeared; but unfortunately those who appeared with him had. It occurred to Jimmy daily, after he had finished "running through the lines" with a series of agitated amateurs, male and female, that for all practical purposes he might just as well have gone to Japan. In this confused welter of rehearsers, his opportunities of talking with Molly were infinitesimal. And, worse, she did not appear to mind. She was cheerful and apparently quite content to be engulfed in a crowd. Probably, he thought with some melancholy, if she met his eye and noted in it a distracted gleam, she put it down to the cause that made other eyes in the company gleam distractedly during this week.

Jimmy began to take a thoroughly jaundiced view of amateur theatricals, and of these amateur theatricals in particular. He felt that in the electric flame department of the infernal regions there should be a special gridiron, reserved exclusively for the man who invented these performances, so diametrically opposed to the true spirit of civilization. At the close of each day, he cursed Charteris with unfailing regularity.

There was another thing that disturbed him. That he should be unable to talk with Molly was an evil, but a negative evil. It was supplemented by one that was positive. Even in the midst of the chaos of rehearsals, he could not help noticing that Molly and Lord Dreever were very much together. Also—and this was even more sinister—he observed that both Sir Thomas Blunt and Mr. McEachern were making determined efforts to foster the state of affairs.

Of this, he had sufficient proof one evening when, after scheming and plotting in a way that had made the great efforts of Machiavelli and Richelieu seem like the work of raw novices, he had cut Molly out from the throng, and carried her off for the alleged purpose of helping him feed the chickens. There were, as he had suspected, chickens attached to the castle. They lived in a little world of noise and smells at the back of the stables. Bearing an iron pot full of a poisonous-looking mash, and accompanied by Molly, he had felt for perhaps a minute and a half like a successful general. It is difficult to be romantic when you are laden with chicken-feed in an unwieldy iron pot, but he had resolved that this portion of the proceedings should be brief. The birds should dine that evening on the quick-lunch principle. Then—to the more fitting surroundings of the rose-garden! There was plenty of time before the hour of the sounding of the dressing-gong. Perhaps, even a row on the lake—

"What ho!" said a voice.

Behind them, with a propitiatory smile on his face, stood his lordship of Dreever.

"My uncle told me I should find you out here. What have you got in there, Pitt? Is this what you feed them on? I say, you know, queer coves, hens! I wouldn't touch that stuff for a fortune, what? Looks to me poisonous."

He met Jimmy's eye, and stopped. There was that in Jimmy's eye that would have stopped an avalanche. His lordship twiddled his fingers in pink embarrassment.

"Oh, look!" said Molly. "There's a poor little chicken out there in the cold. It hasn't had a morsel. Give me the spoon, Mr. Pitt. Here, chick, chick! Don't be silly, I'm not going to hurt you. I've brought you your dinner."

She moved off in pursuit of the solitary fowl, which had edged nervously away. Lord Dreever bent toward Jimmy.

"Frightfully sorry, Pitt, old man," he whispered, feverishly. "Didn't want to come. Couldn't help it. He sent me out." He half-looked over his shoulder. "And," he added rapidly, as Molly came back, "the old boy's up at his bedroom window now, watching us through his opera-glasses!"

The return journey to the house was performed in silence—on Jimmy's part, in thoughtful silence. He thought hard, and he had been thinking ever since.

He had material for thought. That Lord Dreever was as clay in his uncle's hands he was aware. He had not known his lordship long, but he had known him long enough to realize that a backbone had been carelessly omitted from his composition. What his uncle directed, that would he do. The situation looked bad to Jimmy. The order, he knew, had gone out that Lord Dreever was to marry money. And Molly was an heiress. He did not know how much Mr. McEachern had amassed in his dealings with New York crime, but it must be something considerable. Things looked black.

Then, Jimmy had a reaction. He was taking much for granted. Lord Dreever might be hounded into proposing to Molly, but what earthly reason was there for supposing that Molly would accept him? He declined even for an instant to look upon Spennie's title in the light of a lure. Molly was not the girl to marry for a title. He endeavored to examine impartially his lordship's other claims. He was a pleasant fellow, with—to judge on short acquaintanceship—an undeniably amiable disposition. That much must be conceded. But against this must be placed the equally undeniable fact that he was also, as he would have put it himself, a most frightful ass. He was weak. He had no character. Altogether, the examination made Jimmy more cheerful. He could not see the light-haired one, even with Sir Thomas Blunt shoving behind, as it were, accomplishing the knight's ends. Shove he never so wisely, Sir Thomas could never make a Romeo out of Spennie Dreever.

It was while sitting in the billiard-room one night after dinner, watching his rival play a hundred up with the silent Hargate, that Jimmy came definitely to this conclusion. He had stopped there to watch, more because he wished to study his man at close range than because the game was anything out of the common as an exposition of billiards. As a matter of fact, it would have been hard to imagine a worse game. Lord Dreever, who was conceding twenty, was poor, and his opponent an obvious beginner. Again, as he looked on, Jimmy was possessed of an idea that he had met Hargate before. But, once more, he searched his memory, and drew blank. He did not give the thing much thought, being intent on his diagnosis of Lord Dreever, who by a fluky series of cannons had wobbled into the forties, and was now a few points ahead of his opponent.

Presently, having summed his lordship up to his satisfaction and grown bored with the game, Jimmy strolled out of the room. He paused outside the door for a moment, wondering what to do. There was bridge in the smoking-room, but he did not feel inclined for bridge. From the drawing-room came sounds of music. He turned in that direction, then stopped again. He came to the conclusion that he did not feel sociable. He wanted to think. A cigar on the terrace would meet his needs.

He went up to his room for his cigar-case. The window was open. He leaned out. There was almost a full moon, and it was very light out of doors. His eye was caught by a movement at the further end of the terrace, where the shadow was. A girl came out of the shadow, walking slowly.

Not since early boyhood had Jimmy descended stairs with such a rare burst of speed. He negotiated the nasty turn at the end of the first flight at quite a suicidal pace. Fate, however, had apparently wakened again and resumed business, for he did not break his neck. A few moments later, he was out on the terrace, bearing a cloak which, he had snatched up en route in the hall.

"I thought you might be cold," he said, breathing quickly.

"Oh, thank you," said Molly. "How kind of you!" He put it round her shoulders. "Have you been running?"

"I came downstairs rather fast."

"Were you afraid the boogaboos would get you?" she laughed. "I was thinking of when I was a small child. I was always afraid of them. I used to race downstairs when I had to go to my room in the dark, unless I could persuade someone to hold my hand all the way there and back."

Her spirits had risen with Jimmy's arrival. Things had been happening that worried her. She had gone out on to the terrace to be alone. When she heard his footsteps, she had dreaded the advent of some garrulous fellow-guest, full of small talk. Jimmy, somehow, was a comfort. He did not disturb the atmosphere. Little as they had seen of each other, something in him—she could not say what—had drawn her to him. He was a man whom she could trust instinctively.

They walked on in silence. Words were pouring into Jimmy's mind, but he could not frame them. He seemed to have lost the power of coherent thought.

Molly said nothing. It was not a night for conversation. The moon had turned terrace and garden into a fairyland of black and silver. It was a night to look and listen and think.

They walked slowly up and down. As they turned for the second time, Molly's thoughts formed themselves into a question. Twice she was on the point of asking it, but each time she checked herself. It was an impossible question. She had no right to put it, and he had no right to answer. Yet, something was driving her on to ask it.

It came out suddenly, without warning.

"Mr. Pitt, what do you think of Lord Dreever?"

Jimmy started. No question could have chimed in more aptly with his thoughts. Even as she spoke, he was struggling to keep himself from asking her the same thing.

"Oh, I know I ought not to ask," she went on. "He's your host, and you're his friend. I know. But—"

Her voice trailed off. The muscles of Jimmy's back tightened and quivered. But he could find no words.

"I wouldn't ask anyone else. But you're—different, somehow. I don't know what I mean. We hardly know each other. But—"

She stopped again; and still he was dumb.

"I feel so alone," she said very quietly, almost to herself. Something seemed to break in Jimmy's head. His brain suddenly cleared. He took a step forward.

A huge shadow blackened the white grass. Jimmy wheeled round. It was McEachern.

"I have been looking for you, Molly, my dear," he said, heavily. "I thought you must have gone to bed."

He turned to Jimmy, and addressed him for the first time since their meeting in the bedroom.

"Will you excuse us, Mr. Pitt?"

Jimmy bowed, and walked rapidly toward the house. At the door, he stopped and looked back. The two were standing where he had left them.



CHAPTER XVI

A MARRIAGE ARRANGED

Neither Molly nor her father had moved or spoken while Jimmy was covering the short strip of turf that ended at the stone steps of the house. McEachern stood looking down at her in grim silence. His great body against the dark mass of the castle wall seemed larger than ever in the uncertain light. To Molly, there was something sinister and menacing in his attitude. She found herself longing that Jimmy would come back. She was frightened. Why, she could not have said. It was as if some instinct told her that a crisis in her affairs had been reached, and that she needed him. For the first time in her life, she felt nervous in her father's company. Ever since she was a child, she had been accustomed to look upon him as her protector; hut, now, she was afraid.

"Father!" she cried.

"What are you doing out here?"

His voice was tense and strained.

"I came out because I wanted to think, father, dear."

She thought she knew his moods, but this was one that she had never seen. It frightened her.

"Why did he come out here?"

"Mr. Pitt? He brought me a wrap."

"What was he saying to you?"

The rain of questions gave Molly a sensation of being battered. She felt dazed, and a little mutinous. What had she done that she should be assailed like this?

"He was saying nothing," she said, rather shortly.

"Nothing? What do you mean? What was he saying? Tell me!"

Molly's voice shook as she replied.

"He was saying nothing," she repeated. "Do you think I'm not telling the truth, father? He had not spoken a word for ever so long. We just walked up and down. I was thinking, and I suppose he was, too. At any rate, he said nothing. I—I think you might believe me."

She began to cry quietly. Her father had never been like this before. It hurt her.

McEachern's manner changed in a flash. In the shock of finding Jimmy and Molly together on the terrace, he had forgotten himself. He had had reason, to be suspicious. Sir Thomas Blunt, from whom he had just parted, had told him a certain piece of news which had disturbed him. The discovery of Jimmy with Molly had lent an added significance to that piece of news. He saw that he had been rough. In a moment, he was by her side, his great arm round her shoulder, petting and comforting her as he had done when she was a child. He believed her word without question; and his relief made him very tender. Gradually, the sobs ceased. She leaned against his arm.

"I'm tired, father," she whispered.

"Poor little girl. We'll sit down."

There was a seat at the end of the terrace. McEachern picked Molly up as if she had been a baby, and carried her to it. She gave a little cry.

"I didn't mean I was too tired to walk," she said, laughing tremulously. "How strong you are, father! If I was naughty, you could take me up and shake me till I was good, couldn't you?"