'There, then, you're free. Now I'll just tell you, in effect, what you did hear,' said Miles, whose inventive brain had been busy from the moment he had discovered Robson. 'You heard Edmonstone speak to me as though I was a villain: well, he firmly believes I am one. You heard him read me a letter from some one 'wanting' me: he has read me many such letters. I believe you heard me asking him in effect not to tell any one, and thanking him: this is what I make a point of doing. The fact is, Edmonstone is under the delusion that I am a man who robbed him in Australia. This is what's the matter!'
Miles tapped his forehead significantly.
'You don't mean it!' cried Robson, starting back.
'I do; but not so loud, man. His friends don't suspect anything; they needn't know; it's only on this one point. What, didn't you hear our last words? I said, 'It seems like madness.' He answered, 'My old mate'—meaning the man who was with him at the time of the robbery—'my old mate,' he says, 'swears that I am mad on that subject.''
'Whew!' whistled the doctor. 'Yes, I heard that.'
'It speaks for itself, eh? But I put it to you as a medical man,' said Miles, rising still more fully to the occasion, and remembering the doctor's weak point: 'I put it to you as a medical man—has there not been something strange about his manner?'
Robson thought at once of the disagreeable incident of the morning.
'There has, indeed,' he said, without hesitation; 'I have noticed it myself!'
Even Miles marvelled at his own adroitness; he was elated, and showed it by fetching a deep sigh.
'Poor Edmonstone! he is quite touched on the point. Perhaps the affair brought on a fever at the time, for he is an excitable fellow, and that would account for it.'
'But is he safe?' asked Robson, eagerly. 'He can't be!'
'Oh, yes, he is; quite. I repeat, it is only on that one point, and nobody knows it here. And, mind, you are not to breathe a word of it to any single soul!'
Philip was entirely taken in for the time being; but his silence was another matter. That could only be pardoned, even on short lease, by an apology from the rude Colonial. The doctor's wrists smarted yet; his self- esteem was still more sore.
'I am so likely,' said he, with fine irony, 'to do your bidding after the manner in which you have treated me!'
'Call it taking my hint,' said Miles, with a nasty expression in the eyes again. 'You will find it a hint worth acting upon.'
'You had no business to treat me as you did. It was a gross outrage!' said the doctor, haughtily.
'Come, now, I apologise. It arose from my irritation on Edmonstone's account, at the thing getting out. For his sake, you must indeed promise to hold your tongue.'
'Very well,' said Philip Robson, reluctantly; 'I—I promise.'
And he meant at the time to keep his promise, if he could. In fact, he did keep it. For a little calm reflection, away from the glamour thrown by Miles's plausibility, and in the sober light of Philip's own professional knowledge, served to weaken the case of insanity against Dick Edmonstone. At the same time, reflection strengthened Edmonstone's case against Miles, though Robson had only oblique information as to the specific nature of that case. But at any rate there was no harm in opening the letter-box (which was cleared in the morning) late at night, and sending just one anonymous line to the same name and address as those upon the envelope directed in Edmonstone's hand. If Miles was really a forger of some kind, and Edmonstone was really shielding him, then there was an excellent chance of scoring off them both at once. And Philip Robson had contracted a pretty strong grudge against both these men since morning.
Meanwhile Miles remained subdued and pensive, furtively attentive, but extremely humble, towards Miss Bristo, and talkative to one person only—Mrs. Parish. He was indeed, as he said, no fool. He was full of cunning and coolness, foresight and resource. He was biding his time—but for what?
XXIII
THE EFFECT OF A PHOTOGRAPH
Laurence Pinckney was a hopeless sportsman. When he realised this for himself he laid down his gun, and presently took up with Miss Bristo's camera as a weapon better suited to him.
Alice had made no use of the apparatus for weeks and weeks; it was sent down with other luggage without her knowledge, and she never thought of unpacking it until Mr. Pinckney pleaded for instruction; when—perhaps because Alice felt that without an occupation this visitor would be on her hands all day—he did not plead in vain. He did not, however, require many lessons. He knew something about it already, having given the subject some attention (in the reading room of the British Museum) before writing one of his rollicking articles. Nor were the lessons she did give him much of a nuisance to Alice, for when he forgot to talk about his work, and refrained from coruscation, there was no more sensible and polite companion than Laurence Pinckney.
When, therefore, he set out on that Friday's ramble, which produced one really good negative, and a number of quaint little Arcadian observations jotted down in his notebook, it was with the entire photographic impedimenta slung about his person, and some idea in his head of an article on 'The North Yorkshire Dales,' to be illustrated by the writer's own photographs.
His destination was a certain ancient abbey, set in gorgeous scenery, eight long miles from Gateby. But long before he got there a hollow of the plain country road tempted him, and he fell.
It was quite an ordinary bit of road; a tall hazel-hedge, and a pathway high above the road on the left; on the right, a fence with trees beyond it, one of them, an oak of perfect form, that stood in the foreground, being of far greater size than most of the trees in this district, and in strong contrast to its neighbours. That was really all. It never would have been picturesque, nor have taken our artist's fancy, but for the sunlight on the wet road and the fleecy pallor of the sky where it met the sharp line of distant dark blue hills far away over the hazel-hedge, to the left. But the sunlight was the thing. It came, as though expressly ordered, from, so to say, the left wing. It rested lightly on the hedge-tops. It fell in a million golden sparks on the shivering leaves of the old oak. But it cleared the deep-cut road at a bound, leaving it dark. Only a long way further on, where the bend to the right began, did his majesty deign to step down upon the road; and just there, because everything was wet from last night's rain, it was a road of silver.
