“You’ve tumbled to it exactly, Mary. If neither of you see me, neither of you know anything at all.”
She got a last glimpse of his sympathetic smile as she closed the door, and then she went faithfully to the kitchen for her talk with cook. It was quite a pleasant gossip at first, but half an hour is a long time to keep talking, when one has been asked not to stop sooner, and it so happened, moreover, that cook was somewhat busy that morning and began at length to indicate distinctly that unless her friend had some matter of importance to communicate she would regard further verbiage with disfavour. At this juncture Mary decided that twenty minutes was practically as good as half an hour, and the conversation ceased.
Passing out of the kitchen regions, Mary glanced towards a distant window, hesitated, and then came to another decision. Mr. Carrington must surely have left the garden now, so there was no harm in peeping out. She went to the window and peeped.
It was only a two minutes’ peep, for Mr. Carrington had not left the garden, and at the end of that space of time something very disturbing happened. But it was long enough to make her marvel greatly at her sympathetic friend’s method of solving the riddle of the master’s conduct. When she first saw him, he seemed to be smoothing the earth in one of the flower beds with his foot. Then he moved on a few paces, stopped, and drove his walking stick hard into the bed. She saw him lean on it to get it further in and apparently twist it about a little. And then he withdrew it again and was in the act of smoothing the place when she saw him glance sharply towards the gate, and the next instant leap behind a bush. Simultaneously the hum of a motor car fell on her ear, and Mary was out of the room and speeding upstairs.
She heard the car draw up before the house and listened for the front door bell, but the door opened without a ring and she marvelled and trembled afresh. That the master should return in a car at this hour of the morning seemed surely to be connected with the sin she had connived at. It swelled into a crime as she held her breath and listened. She wished devoutly she had never set eyes on the insinuating Mr. Carrington.
But there came no call for her, or no ringing of any bell; merely sounds of movement in the hall below, heard through the thrumming of the waiting car. And then the front door opened and shut again and she ventured to the window. It was a little open and she could hear her master speak to the chauffeur as he got in. He was now wearing, she noticed, a heavy overcoat. A moment more and he was off again, down the drive, and out through the gates. When she remembered to look again for her sympathetic friend, he was quietly driving his walking stick once more into a flower bed.
About ten minutes afterwards the front door bell rang and there stood Mr. Carrington again. His eye seemed strangely bright, she thought, but his manner was calm and soothing as ever.
“I noticed Mr. Rattar return,” he said, “and I thought I would like to make sure that it was all right, before I left. I trust, Mary, that you have got into no trouble on my account.”
She thought it was very kind of him to enquire.
“The master was only just in and out again,” she assured him.
“He came to get his overcoat, I noticed,” he remarked.
Mr. Carrington’s powers of observation struck her as very surprising for such an easygoing gentleman.
“Yes, sir, that was all.”
“Well, I’m very glad it was all right,” he smiled and began to turn away. “By the way,” he asked, turning back, “did he tell you where he is going to now?”
“He didn’t see me, sir.”
“You didn’t happen to overhear him giving any directions to the chauffeur, did you? I noticed you at an open window.”
For the first time Mary’s sympathetic friend began to make her feel a trifle uncomfortable. His eyes seemed to be everywhere.
“I thought I heard him say ‘Keldale House,’ ” she confessed.
“Really!” he exclaimed and seemed to muse for a moment. In fact, he appeared to be still musing as he walked away.
Mary began to wonder very seriously whether Mr. Carrington was going to prove merely a fresh addition to the disquieting mysteries of that house.
XXXVII
Bisset’s Advice
The short November afternoon was fading into a gusty evening, as Ned Cromarty drew near his fortalice. He carried a gun as usual, and as usual walked with seven league strides. Where the drive passed through the scrap of stunted plantation it was already dusk and the tortured boughs had begun their night of sighs and tossings. Beyond them, pale daylight lingered and the old house stood up still clear against a broken sky and a grey waste with flitting whitecaps all the way to the horizon. He had almost reached the front door when he heard the sound of wheels behind him. Pausing there, he spied a pony and a governess’ car, with two people distinct enough to bring a sudden light into his eye. The pony trotted briskly towards the door, and he took a stride to meet them.
“Miss Farmond!” he said.
A low voice answered, and though he could not catch the words, the tone was enough for him. And then another voice said:
“Aye, sir, I’ve brought her over.”
“Bisset!” said he. “It’s you, is it? Well, what’s happened?”
He was lifting her out of the trap and not hesitating to hold her hand a little longer than he had ever held it before, now that he could see her face quite plainly and read what was in her
