My uncle’s earnestness was delightful. At this suggestion he put on his spectacles, and drew a paper from his pocket.
“Let me see,” said he. “Here are a few directions given me by my own doctor, Sir James Macpherson. I had to give him some inkling of what I was after, but he is sworn to secrecy. Hum—No, Roger, you are trying religiously to cure yourself, and only very occasionally must the craving so far overcome you that you actually endeavour to secure alcoholic refreshment, as Sir James calls it. No promiscuous sponging, my boy, but a sponge now and then at considerable intervals might be advisable.”
There was an interval of general conversation while one course succeeded another, and then Sir Francis resumed his instructions.
“With the help of a few tips from Sir James and my friends at the Admiralty, I have worked out the scheme very carefully, and I must beg you to get every detail most firmly into your head, Roger. Mind you, these poisonous fellows won’t hesitate to stick a knife or a bullet into you, if they have the least suspicion of you. You know that as well as I do, and I don’t want you to go and throw your life away, my boy.”
I felt half inclined to smile, and half to do something more sentimental. He was such a dictatorial boss, and yet such a dear old fellow.
“I assure you I set more value on my life even than my friends do,” I said.
“Well then get these instructions off by heart—and don’t forget one of them! I’ll give you the paper to take away with you tonight, but meanwhile here are the principal points. In the first place, your name is Hobhouse—Thomas Sylvester Hobhouse.”
I saw he was very pleased with this selection and asked tactfully,
“How did you manage to choose such excellent names, Uncle Francis?”
“I chose one name from the Red Book, another from the Peerage, and another from the Clerical Directory, so that one gets—er—a more natural and lifelike combination in that way; and yet avoids a real name. I think Thomas came from the Clerical directory—or was it the Peerage? Well, no matter, that’s your name.”
“And my occupation?”
“None: it saves prevarication and confusion. You’ve always been an idle dog, Roger, so I think ‘a gentleman of no occupation’ will be a sufficiently correct description. You are very well connected by the way.”
“I am aware of it,” I said, with a polite bow to my uncle and cousin.
But my uncle had grown too serious to appreciate such small change of conversation.
“Your relatives,” he continued, “are in such high positions that they are entitled to ask Dr. Rendall not to make any indiscreet enquiries of his patient regarding his family, and also to appeal with success to a certain influential gentleman in the Government for permission to dump you in these prohibited islands. You, of course, know nothing of these steps. You have just recovered from a severe attack of delirium tremens—”
“My dear uncle!” I gasped, “is that Sir James’s idea?”
“It is putting into definite terms what he obviously suggested. Under those circumstances you naturally know nothing of what your friends have been doing on your behalf. Dr. Rendall being informed of all these facts will of course refrain from putting awkward questions, the answers to which you might forget, even if I composed them for you.”
“And how did my relatives hear of Dr. Rendall and the island of Ransay?” I enquired.
“I have thought over that point very carefully, Roger, and I think the best plan will be to take Sir James a little more into my confidence and get him to write a personal letter to Dr. Rendall. He will do it if I assure him it is for his country’s sake, and his name will lull all suspicions.”
My cousin and I thoroughly agreed with this last suggestion. In fact we found little fault with any part of the programme dictated to us, except the delirium tremens. Even Jack, though he itched to see me thus labelled, agreed with me that a less definite form of drunkenness would be safer, and finally Sir Francis decided to substitute “an alcoholic breakdown.”
As for the rest of my instructions, I made one or two mental reservations. For instance, if Dr. Rendall himself was mixed up in the affair, he would scarcely refrain from putting questions to find out all about his guest; but I felt I need scarcely trouble my worthy uncle to compose the replies before hand.
I remember that little dinner very vividly. As it chanced it was my one glimpse of the old life of town and clubland and everything that goes with evening dress, seen just for that brief evening between months of mine-dodging and blizzard-facing in the North Sea followed by a hospital bed, and the lonely tempestuous isle of Ransay. The white napery, the gleam of glasses, the shaded electric lamps, the blazing fire, and the lofty soft-carpeted room left an impression that stayed with me for many a month to come. And in an easy chair after dinner, smoking the special cigar that my uncle conscientiously recommended and sipping the ancient cognac he advised, I should have been perfectly willing to listen to him had he suggested pushing me into a soft shore billet and letting some other poor devil grow a beard and hunt for spies in northern gales instead.
But he was not that sort of uncle.
“It’s the chance of your life, Roger,” he said. “By Gad, I wish I were young enough to take on the job myself. But you’ll do the family credit I’m sure—if you only remember that this business requires discretion and caution quite as much as daring and resource!”
“Hear, hear!” said Jack. “Put that in your pipe and smoke it thoroughly, Roger.”
“Whatever you do, don’t trust one living soul in that place! The unlikeliest person may prove to be up to the neck in the business.”
“Or only up to
