EPISODE III CIRCUMSTANTIAL EVIDENCE

Superlative virtues of construction and design, never before suspected, were boldly claimed for the “Jane Gladys” in the auctioneer’s announcement which advertised her imminent sale. So respect-compelling was the list of good qualities now stated to be embodied in the unlovely hulk of that ancient vessel that even the two members of her crew who lingered on in residence as caretakers felt that their social standing was enhanced by association with such a superior craft. In order to demonstrate their new-found dignity, they left unperformed as much menial work as possible, preferring to sun themselves on deck in more fitting and gentlemanly leisure.

Thus it was that Mr. Joseph Tridge was idly leaning against the side one morning, surveying the horizon with a certain bored restfulness, and Mr. Peter Lock was reclining on deck in triple enjoyment of pipe and newspaper and slippered ease, when a voice hailed the “Jane Gladys” from a small boat further out in the river.

In the boat was the venerable Mr. Samuel Clark, formerly the doyen of the “Jane Gladys’” crew, and now, by the grace of Fate and the artifice of man, the motive-power of the little ferry which plied across Shorehaven Harbour at its mouth.

“Why, ’ullo, Sam!” greeted Mr. Tridge, waking to extreme cordiality. “Just the chap I was ’oping to see! Tie up and come aboard!”

“Not me!” replied Mr. Clark, very definitely.

“Not just for a chat?” wheedled Mr. Tridge. “It’s a bit dull for us ’ere, you know, Sam.”

“I ain’t going to risk it,” replied Mr. Clark. “I only give you a friendly shout as I was passing, like. You ain’t going to cut my ’air again to-day, Joe, so you might just as well understand that at once. You cut it yesterday, and you cut it last Thursday, and you cut it last Toosday. I don’t mean to be unfriendly or un’elpful, Joe, but you’ve got to give it a rest to-day!”

“Well, I must practice on something!” protested Mr. Tridge.

“Practice on Peter Lock, then,” recommended Mr. Clark.

Mr. Lock rose and looked over the side. Mr. Lock’s hair, oiled and combed to a miracle of sleekness, glistened in the sun; Mr. Lock’s chin and cheeks, bizarrely ornamented with strips of sticking-plaster, presented an object-lesson in first aid to the injured.

“I’ve struck!” announced Mr. Lock. “I ain’t going to humour him no more. I’ve let ’im practise shaving on me till me face looks as if some one had been playing noughts-and-crosses on it in red ink, and I’ve let him shampoo and brilliantine my hair till I can’t hardly read for the smell of it.”

“’Orace told me to put in all the practice I could,” said Mr. Tridge, stoutly. “And I’m going to.”

“But what for?” queried Mr. Clark. “What for? That’s what I wants to know.”

“So do I!” admitted Mr. Tridge. “’Orace ’asn’t told me yet. All ’e’s told me to do is to train meself for ’air-dressing, and that’s what I’m doing. What ’Orace says is good enough for me!”

Mr. Clark nodded approval of such simple loyalty. He mentioned that even when Horace had been cook to the “Jane Gladys” he was always averse from premature revelation of the workings of his mind; and went on to say that now Horace was no longer Horace the cook, but had blossomed out into Mr. Horace Dobb, second-hand dealer, carrying on business in a little shop in Fore Street, Shorehaven, he cultivated an even greater reticence in matters of diplomacy.

“‘Learn a bit of ’air-dressing,’ says ’Orace to me,” narrated Mr. Tridge, “and I’m learning a bit of ’air-dressing according. ’Orace ’as got something in ’is mind, you can depend on that. And I take it a bit uncharitable of you, Sam, not to ’elp me and ’Orace. ’Ow can I practise ’air-dressing if I don’t get no ’air to dress?”

“Practise on the ship’s mop,” put forward Mr. Clark.

“I’ve done that,” said Mr. Tridge, with scorn for so obvious a suggestion. “I’ve propped that up and give it a ’air-cut over and over again, till it’s only a bare stump now. Yes, and I’ve clean-shaved the ship’s scrubbing-brush, too, to see how I’d get on with a really stiff beard. But you must ’ave living models to do any good. ’Ow else can you tell if you’re ’urting?”

“Oh, well,” yielded Mr. Clark, “just to keep your ’and in, I’ll let you shave the back of my neck if you like, only don’t forget that the back of me neck don’t leave off level with the top of my ears.”

He fastened his boat and went aboard his old home. Seating himself resignedly on a packing-case, he submitted to the ministrations of Mr. Tridge. So that Mr. Horace Dobb, appearing presently on the gang-plank, expressed commendation of the assiduity with which Mr. Tridge was seeking to acquire tonsorial skill.

“All the same, ’Orace,” remarked Mr. Tridge, “I should like to know what the idea is.”

“Only another day or two, Joe,” promised Mr. Dobb, “and then, if things pan out right, you’ll be cutting ’air in a little shop practically your own. ’Ow’s that, eh?”

“Well, I take it as very kind of you, ’Orace,” said Mr. Tridge, with gratitude.

“Then you takes it wrong,” retorted Mr. Dobb. “You know my motter, don’t you?”

“Yes, we all knows it,” put in Mr. Lock, a little hostilely. “It’s ‘Strictly Business!’ Saved you a pint or two in its time, hasn’t it, that motter?”

“It ’as,” confirmed Mr. Dobb, by no means abashed. “It is a jolly good motter, far as I’m concerned. And this ’air-dressing idea is strictly business. I’m working it for all our sakes, and mine most of all. When I’ve got Joe settled as a barber and found something for you, Peter, the four of us ought to work some good deals together, from my little place.”

“A ferryman, a barber, a—a something else, and a second-hand dealer,” catalogued Mr. Lock. “It ain’t a bad web to spread. Lots of rubbish gets sold because of rumours about them being vallyble.”

“Exackly!” concurred Mr. Dobb. “And barbers’ shops and ferry-boats is the place for gossip. And there’s lots of strangers visits Shore’aven during the year.”

“And so you’re going to start me in a barber’s shop!” remarked Mr. Tridge, with great satisfaction. “Will there be a cash-register?” he asked, as an interesting after-thought.

“No, I ain’t going to start you, Joe,” corrected Mr. Dobb. “It’s a Mrs. Jackson what’s going to start you, only she don’t know it yet.”

“A widow!” divined Mr. Tridge.

“A old widow, and a bit of a pal of my missis’s,” supplemented Mr. Dobb.

“Ah, I guessed there was a catch somewhere!” sourly stated Mr. Tridge. “Well, I ain’t going to get married, see? I ain’t at all the marrying sort. I prefers to remain single, thank you. Besides which, I’ve got one somewhere, already.”

“That’s all right, Joe,” returned Mr. Dobb, soothingly. “I expect she’d turn up ’er eyes at you in ’oly ’orror in any case. She’s a pillar of temp’rance, Joe, and a anti-smoker and a anti-gambler, and all the rest of it.”

“No wonder she’s a widow!” softly commented Mr. Lock.

“And, anyway,” said Mr. Tridge, churlishly, “I don’t want no business dealings with a woman like that!”

“You won’t see ’er often, Joe,” returned Mr. Dobb. “She only comes into Shore’aven once a month or so, just to collect the rents of a few cottages she’s got. Comes in for the day, she does, settles ’er business, gets a cheap tea along of my missis, and back she goes ’ome, a good three miles away.”

“Well, where do I come in?” asked Mr. Tridge.

“You comes in at one hundred and twenty-one, ’Igh Street,” replied Mr. Dobb. “That belongs to ’er. It’s a little, tiny, squeezed-in shop what she owns. It’s a barber’s shop.”

“I see. And I’m to be the hassistant,” surmised Mr. Tridge.

“Hassistant? Why, it’s so small that if there was to be a hassistant there’d be no room left for a customer! No, Joe; you’re to run the ’ole show. The chap what’s there now is leaving soon, you see.”

Mr. Dobb, anticipating the further curiosity of Mr. Tridge, went on to explain that the present tenant was in occupation of the premises on profit-sharing terms with the landlady. The stock and fixtures had recently come into Mrs. Jackson’s possession in the course of business, subsequent to the temporary employment of a broker’s man.

And now Mrs. Jackson, loth to lose her interest in the barbering profession, designed to procure yet another hairdresser to fill the place, on the same terms of partnership, of the dispossessed tenant.

“Of course,” said Mr. Dobb, “I ain’t supposed to know much about it. I only know what she’s told my missis in gossip, and I must say my missis is a good ’un at asking a few simple questions over a cup of tea without appearing nosey over it.”

“Well, and what do I do now?” asked Mr. Tridge. “Go up and ask ’er for the job?”

“Bless you, no!” was Horace’s baffling response. “Why, she’s filled it already, far as she’s concerned.”

“That’s the back of my neck, Joe, when you’ve finished cutting rashers out of it,” came Mr. Clark’s mild reminder.

“Well, ’Orace shouldn’t go giving me shocks like that!” indignantly exclaimed Mr. Tridge. “’Ere ’ave I been spending a ’ole week learning ’air-dressing in all its branches, and now, just when I’m perfect, ’e breaks the noos to me in a roundabout way that I’ve wasted my time for nothing!”

“I said as far as she was concerned, Joe,” remarked Mr. Dobb. “Not as far as I was concerned. That’s a very different matter. You just carry on and wait a day or two. And you, Sam Clark, you tell your boss that you’re rather hexpecting to ’ave another attack of colic soon, and stand by to take horders from me at any minute.”

Refusing to shed further enlightenment at this juncture, Mr. Dobb turned and left the “Jane Gladys” with rather a consciously Napoleonic stride.

For the rest of that day Mr. Tridge and Mr. Lock found engrossing employment in devising theories as to the exact nature of Mr. Dobb’s machinations. Mr. Lock was of opinion that Mr. Tridge would be called on to impersonate Mrs. Jackson’s new partner in the hairdressing business, though he admitted that he could not imagine how this was to be carried through to complete success. On the other hand, Mr. Tridge, displaying a truculent species of pessimism, obstinately inclined to the belief that yet a parson and a wedding-ring would be found to be lurking at the back of Mr. Dobb’s strategy.

And Mr. Samuel Clark, ever somewhat crude and confused in his ideas, plied his ferry all that afternoon, oblivious of his surroundings even to the point of returning thanks for a tip of a French halfpenny. The only thing his mind could dwell on was that, at some near date, the widowed Mrs. Jackson was to be lured by Horace into a hairdressing saloon and there relieved, by some pretext, of the money she had been collecting in rents. The morality of such a proceeding did not trouble the plump sailorman; he found sufficient extenuation in the thought that it was the job of the police to prevent such things.

But late that same evening, at the “Jolly Sailors,” Mr. Dobb exhibited himself in a more communicative mood. Assembling his former shipmates around him, he extended a strictly rationed hospitality towards them, and then, of his own free-will, reverted to the twin subjects of the hairdressing business and Mrs. Jackson.

“The old gal came in to tea quite unexpected to-day,” he said. “That’s three times in a little over a fortnight. ’Owever, I sold ’er a second-’and dish-cover, so she’s paid for more than she’s ate up to now. She sat a long time over ’er tea chatting to my missis. Of course it didn’t hinterest me, so I went out into the shop. Only I couldn’t ’elp ’earing a lot, because some-’ow I’d left the door open, and it would ’ave looked so rude to ’ave closed it deliberate between us.”

He leaned back and, with a smile of profound self-satisfaction, eyed each of his friends in turn.

“Well?” prompted Mr. Tridge.

“The new chap she’s got ’er eye on is arriving the day after to-morrow to see the place and fix up finally with ’er. Oh, she’s very took with ’im! She ain’t ever seen ’im yet, but ’is letters ’ave touched ’er ’eart proper. It seems ’e’s just the very sort of chap she’s been advertising for—a lifelong teetotaller, a nonsmoker, never bets nor swears, always punctual, steady, and methodical.”

“In short,” restively summarized Mr. Tridge, “just the sort of chap I ain’t! Seems to me I stands a fine chance against ’im with a silly old geezer like ’er!” he added, ungallantly. “’Owever, go on!”

“’E’s coming down from London by the hexpress. Well, now, supposing ’e didn’t harrive, or something went wrong and they failed to come to a hagreement? Why, the shop would be standing empty from next Saturday, and she’d be at ’er wits’ ends to find some one else! She’s spent pounds in hadvertising for a teetotal, non-smoking barber as it is. Well, up you goes to see ’er, Joe Tridge, gives me as a reference, and gets the job temporary. And once you’re in, you ain’t the man you used to be if anything short of dynamite gets you out of that job again.”

“But why couldn’t you ’ave recommended me to start with?”

“I didn’t know in time. And, for another thing, she was so set on getting a pattern of virtue. But when she finds things ’ave gone wrong, and there’s no time to spare, unless she’s willing to lose money by it, she won’t be so partic’lar, and she’ll overlook some of your faults, Joe, if you keeps the rest of ’em dark.”

“You seem pretty sure things are going wrong,” said Mr. Tridge.

“I can feel it in me bones,” returned Mr. Dobb. “Anyway Mrs. Jackson’s coming in the day after to-morrow to meet this chap at one hundred and twenty-one, ’Igh Street. Now, I may be at the station when ’e arrives, and pass the time of day with ’im.”

“I can ’ear the dawn breaking,” observed Mr. Tridge, humorously. “You’ll tell ’im there’s nothing doing, and say you were sent by ’er to meet ’im and tell ’im so. And she’ll think ’e never come?”

“Helementary, Joe,” criticized Mr. Dobb. “Most helementary! ’E’d write to ’er when ’e got back, and then the fat ’ud be out of the frying-pan and into the fire. No, I mean to fix it so that she’s finished with ’im for good and all two minutes after she’s first set eyes on ’im!”

“And ’ow do you do that?” asked Mr. Lock. “Mesmerism?”

“No, circumstantial hevidence,” returned Mr. Dobb, happily. “There’s more people comes a cropper over circumstantial hevidence than over the truth coming out by haccident, and that’s saying a lot!”

He glanced warily about him, and then raised his arms in a gesture inviting closer heed to his words. Four heads bent over the table; three pairs of ears listened attentively. From one pair of lips came a whispered fluency of instruction and explanation. Finally, Mr. Dobb sat back with simpering pride, and his three companions unanimously expressed their awed respect for his brain-powers.

Again Mr. Dobb bent forward to add sundry details, promising to instruct those selected for dramatic roles at a more private opportunity on the morrow.

Mr. Samuel Clark, flattered by having the star part assigned to him, promised that he would rehearse on every possible occasion during the following day. Some twenty-two hours later Mr. Dobb called at Mr. Clark’s lodgings to see whether he was fulfilling this promise, and Mr. Clark at once afforded him something in the nature of a dress rehearsal.

“Puffect!” declared Horace, with enthusiasm. “A born actor couldn’t do it better, especially when you rolls your eyes up like that. I see it was blowing a bit fresh when I come along just now, so there’ll be a nice little ground-swell off the ’arbour-mouth to-morrow. ’Ave you arranged to ’ave colic to-morrow, like I told you?”

“All fixed up; and I’ve got some one else to look after the ferry for the day, and I’ve borrowed a small boat, like what you said. And I shall be waiting where you told me all the morning.”

“That’s the idea!” approved Horace. “And now we’ll just go and see if Peter Lock remembers all he’s got to say, and then we’ll see if the clock in the ‘Jolly Sailors’ keeps good time.”

Mr. Horace Dobb was patrolling the platform of Shorehaven railway-station next morning when the express from London came to a standstill there.

Of the few passengers that thankfully alighted, the majority were sailormen. Several women and children made up a goodly share of the rest of the number. Of the half-dozen residue, five were gentlemen known to Mr. Dobb by sight or personally. The sixth was a complete stranger, and Mr. Dobb, with a pious expression of gratitude for this simplification of his task of identifying Mrs. Jackson’s expected visitor, at once approached him.

“Are you going straight back to the Town ’All, Mr. Binson?” asked Horace, innocently.

“I’m afraid you’re making an error,” was the reply. “My name is not Binson.”

“Mean to tell me you’re not Mr. Binson, our town-clerk of Shore’aven ’ere?” demanded Mr. Dobb, incredulously.

“No, I am not. I am a complete stranger to this town.”

“Well, well,” marvelled Mr. Dobb, “you are the exact image of Mr. Binson, that’s all I can say.”

“Indeed?” returned the other, with scant interest in the coincidence. “Well, as I say, I am a perfect stranger here. I should be glad, in fact, if you would tell me the nearest way to the High Street. I have a business appointment there.”

“Oh!” said Mr. Dobb, with equal listlessness. “Which end of ’Igh Street? It makes a difference ’ow you goes from ’ere, according to which end you want.”

“Number one hundred and twenty-one. It’s a barber’s shop.”

“I know it,” said Mr. Dobb. “Name of Bonner.”

“At present, yes,” conceded the other. “It really belongs to a lady, though—to Mrs. Jackson. Perhaps you know her?”

“’Eard of ’er, I fancy,” returned Mr. Dobb, cursorily. “Pity you got out at this station, though. Your nearest would ’ave been the station the other side of the river. ’Owever, you come along of me, and I’ll see you on the right road. Shall we just ’ave one gargle before we start?”

“Gargle?” asked the other one, in perplexity.

“Tonic,” elucidated Mr. Dobb. “Drink.”

“Thank you, no,” was the reply. “I am a lifelong abstainer from all alcoholic drinks.”

“Just as you like,” said Mr. Dobb, readily. “Well, come along with me, and I’ll take you down to the ferry and get you taken across the river, and you’ll soon be there.”

“I didn’t know there was another station. I suppose the ferry is the shortest way? I’m not a good sailor, and—”

Mr. Dobb’s eyes glinted.

“Oh, you’ll be all right!” he declared, and led the other man by devious paths away from the neighbourhood of the High Street and down to the harbour. To avoid questions which might be thorny to answer, Mr. Dobb walked swiftly and a little in advance of his companion, who, evidently deeming Mr. Dobb something of a roisterous blade, seemed relieved by this arrangement. Arrived at the quay, Mr. Dobb perceived the lounging form of Mr. Samuel Clark, and led the stranger up to him.

“This gent wants you to row ’im over to near the ’Igh Street, ferryman,” said Mr. Dobb. “Oh, and be as quick over it as you can,” he added, holding Mr. Clark’s gaze; “because ’e says ’e’s not a very good sailor.”

“I’ll be as quick as I can,” promised Mr. Clark; “but there’s a pretty strong tide running, sir, don’t forget.”

“There’s no risk I suppose?” asked the visitor, smiling a little anxiously.

“Bless you, no, sir,” declared Mr. Clark, cosily. “You’ll be as safe as ’ouses with me!”

With a courteous exchange of compliments, Mr. Dobb parted from his new acquaintance. A minute later Mr. Clark had begun to convey his passenger across the river, and Mr. Dobb was returning homeward with the mien of one whose morning has been well spent.

“The current seems quite strong,” remarked the gentleman from London.

“It are,” agreed Mr. Clark, straining at his sculls. “The current’s always pretty strong ’ere when the tide’s running out. Like a mill-stream sometimes, and the worst of it is that you don’t know it till you get well out on it.”

“I hope we’ll land at the nearest point opposite.”

“We’ll try to land there,” amended Mr. Clark, gravely. “Matter of fact, the tide’s stronger to-day than I’ve ever known it before.”

“We seem to be drifting further and further down the river,” observed the other, now clearly falling prey to nerves. “Do you think it would be better to turn round and go back?”

“Turn round, sir—with the tide running out?” asked Mr. Clark, in accents almost scandalized. “Why, we should be capsized for dead, certain sure, in less than no time. Begging your pardon, sir, but it’s plain you’re no sailor, to talk like that. No, we can’t turn back.”

“Well, perhaps if you were to—to keep the—the front of the boat pointed straighter for the bank opposite—”

“I can’t!” stated Mr. Clark. “The tide’s too strong. We must land as near as we can, that’s all. I never knoo such a tide!” he ended, pettishly.

“You—you don’t think there’s any chance of being carried out beyond that lighthouse there at the very end, do you?”

“I ’ope and pray not!” soberly returned Mr. Clark.

He bent to his sculls with the greatest determination. A more sophisticated passenger might have noticed that the ferryman was pulling far harder with one arm than the other. The present fare, however, was engrossed in observing more and more of the opposite bank slip by.

“I do believe we shall be carried right out to sea!” he said at last, with the utmost concern.

“Not if I can ’elp it!” denied Mr. Clark, and gave a straining, spectacular display of oarsmanship.

“We shall be carried out to sea!”

Mr. Clark, shipping his skulls with commendable neatness, stared owlishly at the passenger for a few moments, and then ejaculated:

“Ooh! Ooh, ah!” with intensity of feeling.

“What is it? Whatever is it?”

“Ooh! Ooh, ah!” repeated Mr. Clark. “It’s my ’eart!” he explained, hollowly, and made a fearsome rolling of his eyes. “I’ve strained it, or busted it, or something.”

“But—but we shall be capsized—drowned!”

“I couldn’t row another stroke just now, not to save my life,” groaned Mr. Clark. “And you mustn’t try to take the oars, not even if you know ’ow to manage ’em. You’d upset the boat if you tried to change places with me, and you’d upset it if you tried to row from where you’re sitting.”

His passenger, abandoning a half-formed intention, sat very still.

“Can’t we shout to the people ashore?” he asked, dismally, as the little boat swept on past the harbour lighthouse.

“They couldn’t ’ear you,” moaned Mr. Clark.

“I could wave to them!”

“And upset the boat?” asked Mr. Clark, faintly. “She’s very, very easy upset. The chap what owns this boat never tells ’er ’istory when ’e’s ’iring it out to visitors in the summer.”

“What can we do? What can we do?”

“Do? Why, nothing, except ’ope. We must just let the old boat float out and trust to luck.”

“But—but—” protested the other, wildly.

“Ooh! Ooh, ah!” bellowed Mr. Clark, in accents of acute anguish, as the easiest way to foreclose vain conversation.

He sat back, groaning horribly, and rubbing various portions of his anatomy, a fearful glare in his eyes.

The other man, watching him miserably, took a firm grasp of the seat as the little craft began to pitch and dance over the turmoil of the harbour-bar.

“We—we—we—” murmured Mr. Clark, with difficulty.

“We what?” asked the other, eagerly.

“I dunno,” said Mr. Clark, blankly.

There was dire silence. The little boat drifted further and further out, till it was clear of the harbour, and here the scour of the tide carried it well away from the roadstead.

Mr. Clark, opening one eye, shrewdly surveyed the locality.

“Just—just remembered,” he said. “We’ve got a anchor ’ere in the locker—a anchor and any amount of cable. We’ll chuck it over, and we’ll ride ’ere, as easy as easy, till the tide turns.”

“Don’t you feel strong enough to row us back now?”

“’Ave a ’eart, sir!” begged Mr. Clark, reproachfully. “It ’ud pull my arms out of their sockets to row against this current. But we’ll be all right ’ere. Once I get the anchor overboard, like this, we’ll be as safe as safe.”

“All very well!” fulminated the passenger, recovering a little spirit when he noted that the anchor had checked further seaward flow. “But why—”

“Ooh! Ooh, ah!” interrupted Mr. Clark. “For ’eaven’s sake, sir, don’t go a-hagitating of me. When I ’ave attacks like this, I’m sometimes liable to fits, and if I ’ave a fit ’ere, over goes the boat, and it’s all up with both of us!”

“Oh, dear—oh, dear!” wailed the other, subsiding.

“I—I’m going to lie down in the bottom of the boat,” announced Mr. Clark, wanly. “And if I smokes a pipe that might do me good, by composing of my nerves.”

He kindled his pipe, and forthwith settled himself very comfortably in the bottom of the boat. For headrest, he had a pillow he fortunately happened to have brought with him. By a similar kindness of chance, he had also provided himself with a thick overcoat, and with this he now snugly covered himself.

Ensued a bleak period of human silence, accentuated by the lapping of the water round the boat, and the phantom-like scream of wheeling sea-birds. The passenger, sitting humped-up in an attitude of complete dejection, surveyed the prone Mr. Clark and subconsciously became aware of the gentle, rhythmic fall and rise of the anchored craft.

“Really, it’s most unfortunate!” he whined, at last. “Most unfor—”

He stopped abruptly; his expression was a blend of alarm and self-suspicion.

“Dear me!” he muttered. “Oh! I do hope—”

Mr. Clark, stirring, opened one eye sufficiently to see that the complexion of his companion had passed to a strange olive-green shade, and that he was holding his palm to his forehead. Mr. Clark closed his eye again with a warm glow of satisfaction.

Twenty minutes later, Mr. Clark again glanced at his companion. That gentleman’s complexion was now some shades lighter, though still green of hue, and he was sitting with his arms hanging limply by his side. His expression suggested that he had no further interest in life.

“’Ow are you gettin’ on?” asked Mr. Clark.

The other man, turning a pair of glassy eyes on him, shook his head dolefully and groaned. Mr. Clark, settling down again in comfort, was callous enough to smile.

Another half-hour elapsed, with the stout ferryman taking life easily at the bottom of the boat, and with the passenger gaining inside information as to the treacherous nature of a small boat when anchored in deep waters. Then, for the third time, Mr. Clark appraised the state of his passenger and decided that the time for convalescence had come.

Heartily remarking that the rest had done him a world of good, he resumed his seat and began to scull towards the harbour with the greatest of ease. His passenger, drooping woefully in his place, evidenced no emotion whatever at this impending termination to his troubles.

In excellent style Mr. Clark regained the sanctuary of the harbour and drew near to the quay. Mr. Peter Lock, an alert sentinel there for some while past, was waiting to greet him.

“Oh, poor fellow!” sympathized Mr. Lock. “He do look ill!”

“You needn’t trouble to feel sorry for ’im, Peter,” said Mr. Clark. “’E’s in that state ’e don’t know what’s ’appening, or whether it’s ’appening to ’im or somebody else. Got a bit of a ’eadache, ain’t you, sir?” he bawled at the passenger.

“Oh!” groaned the sufferer, making feeble gestures with his hands and showing the yellows of his eyes.

“Oh!” he moaned again, and would have collapsed had not Mr. Clark passed a supportive arm round him.

“There you are, Peter. How’s that?” said Mr. Clark, with something of a showman’s pride. “Give me a hand to get ’im out of the boat and up on to the quay. All O.K., I s’pose?” he added, enigmatically.

Mr. Lock nodded.

“She’s going to ’ave tea with ’Orace’s missis, and she’s there now. She’s been up to the station twice to see if a Mr. Briblett ’ad arrived, but there was no trace of ’im.”

“Briblett,” murmured the passenger, dazedly. “That’s my name. Don’t—oh, don’t bother me! I’m ill—ill!”

“’Orace ’as kept out of ’er way all the time, in case some one might ’ave seen ’im up at the station this morning,” whispered Mr. Lock. “She might begin to smell a rat before the bomb goes off, if she starts putting questions to ’im.”

With a certain inconsiderate vigour the two friends half-lifted, half-dragged Mr. Briblett from the boat and assisted him up the steps to the quay.

“A drop o’ brandy is the only thing to do this poor gent any good,” prescribed Mr. Lock, producing a flask.

The stranger, although in a comatose condition, proved true to his lifelong traditions, and feebly waved the stimulant aside.

“Oh, well,” said Mr. Lock, “if ’e won’t drink it, p’r’aps the smell of it might do ’im good!”

Thus speaking, he delicately sprinkled Mr. Briblett’s shoulder with a few drops of the spirit, and then very fraternally shared the remainder with Mr. Clark.

“And now off we goes!” directed Mr. Lock, and, supported by the two sailormen, the cadaverous Mr. Briblett tottered forward on two swerving, unstable legs. Closed were Mr. Briblett’s eyes, and the expression on his face was one of pained indifference to all mundane affairs.

By quiet side-streets was Mr. Briblett conducted to the neighbourhood of the little shop in Fore Street. Rounding a corner, the trio at last reached that emporium. Mr. Lock remembered to knock Mr. Briblett’s hat off for him, retrieving it with sundry muddy adhesions, and replacing it on the sufferer’s head at a rakish angle.

Then the door of Mr. Dobb’s shop flew open, the three lurched over the threshold, and Mr. Dobb quickly flitted in after them from nowhere. A moment later Mr. Clark and Mr. Lock were exhaustedly mopping their foreheads, and their burden, unceremoniously dumped into a chair, was lolling back in his seat, too indisposed even for protest at his treatment.

“Good gracious, whatever—” began Horace’s spouse, appearing in vast surprise at the inner door.

Mr. Lock, perceiving a second female rising from a chair in the back parlour, began to speak loudly and rapidly.

“We’ve just found this chap lying ’elpless at the corner of the road,” he stated. “We brought ’im ’ere because ’e said ’e wanted to find a Mrs. Jackson, sir, and we thought that p’r’aps you might know the good lady. Though whether she’d care to admit to knowing him, I shouldn’t like to say, her being a most respectable lady, by all accounts.”

“’E must ’ave been drinking the ’ole of the day!” observed Mr. Clark, in tones of righteous contempt. “I see ’im myself go into the ‘Jolly Sailors,’ and the ‘Blue Lion,’ and the ‘Cutlass and Cannon’.”

“I see ’im myself this morning,” said Horace. “I see him come out of the station, and I thought ’e looked a pretty queer fish. ’E come straight out of the station and went into the ‘Railway Inn.’”

“I see ’im leave the ‘Flag and Pennant’ at dinner-time,” contributed Mr. Lock. “’E left there to go to the ‘Royal George’.”

“Brandy, too!” intoned Mr. Clark, sepulchrally. “You just bend down and sniff. If you can’t smell brandy, I’ll—”

Mr. Briblett, raising his head with extreme difficulty, partly opened his eyes.

“Where am I?” he demanded, weakly. “I’m—I’m not at all well! I feel ill—very ill!”

“So I should think!” concurred Mr. Lock. “And the language he was using!”

“Said ’e’d backed three winners out of five yesterday, and didn’t care if it snowed pink!” supplied Mr. Clark.

“Wanted us to ’ave a game of ’apenny nap with ’im on the steps of the Town Hall,” added Mr. Lock.

“Said ’e’d come down to see about a ’air-dressing business, but it could go to—but ’e wasn’t going to trouble!” stated Mr. Clark.

As one existing on a plane of complete isolation, the stricken Mr. Briblett rose unsteadily to his feet. Clutching at the back of his chair, he swayed delicately a while, and then sat down again.

“I—I’d like to go to sleep,” he announced. “I want to go to sleep! I want to lie down! Oh, I feel so queer! That boat, drifting out to sea—”

“Boat—sea!” cried Mr. Clark, readily. “There you are! Delirious, and no wonder! Raving—raving! What a ’orrible hexample for all right-minded men!”

There was a little wait. Then Mrs. Jackson, coming out of a sort of trance, pushed past her hostess and stepped through the doorway of the back parlour. For three long seconds she stared at Mr. Briblett, and then, drawing a deep breath, she shrilly began to take the predominant part in the conversation. . . .

Five minutes later Mr. Dobb, Mr. Clark, and Mr. Lock were standing some streets away, dazedly fanning their brows.

“’Ow the dooce was I to know?” whispered Mr. Dobb, brokenly. “’Ow the dooce was I to know the chap would be so punctual as to be too early for the hexpress and come straight along to see Mrs. Jackson at ’er ’ome?”

His hearers shook their heads in confession of inability to answer the question.

“And ’ow the dooce was I to know,” continued Mr. Dobb, bitterly, “that she’d asked this other chap to come down and ’elp ’er with ’er business affairs, now ’e’d got back to England after fifteen years in the Colonies, and never been to Shore’aven before to see ’er? ’Ow the dooce was I to know? . . . Why, I didn’t even know she’d got a brother!”