Introductory material (continued 3)

“Did you sleep?” she asked.

He nodded.

“I didn’t get up till lunch time,” he said. “And you?”

She shook her head.

“No, I couldn’t sleep. Poor Arthur!”

“Did you try beefsteak?” he asked brutally. “Really, the most incongruous company I can imagine is a black eye and Arthur Gwyn!”

“He is awfully shaken,” she said seriously. “I have never known him to be so upset. It was Mr. Gilder.”

“I knew,” said Dick, “or, at least, I guessed. Did you find out the cause of the quarrel?”

She hesitated.

“I don’t know; I think it was something to do with me.”

“What was Gilder doing at your house?”

“Arthur didn’t tell me,” she replied. “From what he said I gather that Mr. Gilder had been watching Arthur and had followed him somewhere.”

“To the Abbey ruins—yes, that is quite possible. And of course your brother objected to that, naturally. Why are they watching each other?”

“Is Arthur watching Gilder?” she asked in surprise.

“It almost looks like it. Leslie, I want to tell you something that nobody else knows, not even Harry. It may bring a little ease to your mind in the dark hours of the night. Puttler is a detective, a Scotland Yard man.”

She stared at him.

“A detective? Why on earth——?”

“Things have been happening that I don’t very much like,” said Dick. “I’ve been worried nearly sick about them, and though I’m quite capable of dealing with most contingencies, the Lord has ordained that I should take seven hours’ rest in every twenty-four, and there must be somebody awake when I’m asleep.”

“The Black Abbot—is that what is worrying you?”

He bit his lip thoughtfully.

“Yes and no. Some aspects of the Black Abbot’s activities trouble me more than I should like to confess. Leslie, do you believe in the treasure?”

“The Chelford treasure?” she asked, in surprise. “And what do you mean by believing in it? It is true that the gold was brought to Fossaway Manor in olden times, isn’t it?”

“Perfectly true,” said Dick, “and perfectly true, I should imagine, that it was taken away. But do you believe that it has any existence, that it can be found? Suppose one dug up every square inch of the park, pulled down this old house of ours, probed into the bowels of the earth, do you think it is possible that the gold could be found? Because, if you don’t, there are other people who do besides Harry.”

“Do you believe?” she challenged.

He heaved a deep sigh.

“Heaven knows, I’m ready to believe anything! And I thought I should never drag down my lofty intelligence to such deeps. But, Leslie, my dear, I am getting——” He paused for a word.

“Convinced?”

“Not exactly convinced, but shaken in my obstinacy. I’ve become a doubter of my own scepticism, and that’s the worst mental condition a man can reach—or almost the worst,” he added.

“Does Harry know you are a convert?” Her fine eyes twinkled with mischief.

“He suspects me,” said Dick gloomily. “If I thought the money was here——”

She regarded him steadily.

“Would it make a big difference to you, Dick?” she asked.

“Me personally?” He shook his head. “Lord, no! It would make a difference to the——” He paused. “To Harry. I was going to say the estate. The estate, to me, is something distinct from any personality. It stands for the agglomeration of dead men’s efforts, the cumulative sum of all their strivings.”

She looked at him for a long time in wonder. She loved him in this serious mood of his.

“You’ve made rather a fetish of Fossaway Manor and the Chelford estates, haven’t you?”

“Have I?” He was genuinely surprised. “I wonder…” And then he laughed. “It isn’t a bad line for a second son to exalt the estates to which he will never succeed, above the personality of the man who will get it! It makes him rather superior to the real heir. Put my fetish worship down to vanity, for the Lord knows I have my share of that.”

“I doubt it,” she said quietly. “Come out on to the terrace. Your flowers are lovely.”

“ ‘Everything in the garden——’ ” he began, but she checked him with a warning finger.

“If you get banal I shall go in and find Puttler.”

XXV

She leaned on the gray stone balustrade and looked down upon the wind-stirred tresses of great golden chrysanthemums, each as big as a large-sized saucer. They were not all gold; there were deep red blooms and snowy white and flaming orange, and beyond them a huge bed of late-flowering roses; even from this distance, she could catch the delicate fragrance of them.

“It’s a beautiful old place,” she said in a hushed voice. “I don’t wonder that you love it. How long has your family owned this estate, Dick?”

“Eight hundred years,” he said. “The first of the Chelfords sliced off the head of the original owner and stole the property. Successive generations of Chelfords, whose own heads were cut off with monotonous regularity, enclosed a few thousand acres of common land belonging to the people—and there you are!”

She laughed softly.

“You have very few illusions, have you?”

“None,” was his curt reply, and somehow the answer hurt her.

They had to send twice for Harry before he put in an appearance, and he seemed disappointed to find that Puttler was not there.

“That is quite an intelligent fellow, Dick,” he said, delicately spearing a cucumber sandwich. “He has an extraordinary knowledge of history, particularly English history. Unfortunately, he doesn’t read German” [Harry read German as well as he read English, French, or Italian] “but I have persuaded him to take up the study. Have you everything you want, Leslie?”

He had helped her to nothing, and was happy to find that her requirements had been supplied. Only twice he spoke to her: once to ask about Arthur, and the other time when he made an oblique reference to his forthcoming marriage.

“Marriage ceremonies and the pomp of them are a little indelicate, I think. It is a barbarous custom, these veils and bridesmaids and barbaric orange-blossoms. Now in America I am told that it is quite the usual thing to be married in a drawing-room. I’m sure that could be arranged, couldn’t it, Dick? The bishop is quite an obliging old gentleman.”

“Turn Puttler on him: he’s an authority on church ritual,” said Dick.

“The man is an authority on most things,” said Harry, with unaccustomed enthusiasm. “He was telling me that possibly there was some cryptogram in existence which would give a direct clue as to the treasure.” And then, seeing the half smile on the girl’s face, he gave one of his rare boyish laughs. “We are still chasing shadows, Leslie, but it is a very substantial shadow, believe me. Now, Puttler thinks…”

They listened without comment to Puttler’s views, which in this case were neither informative nor particularly brilliant.

“Puttler’s mind apparently runs to dungeons, and there are dungeons to this place,” said Harry vigorously. “I am going to have a look round to-morrow. There are probably secret places under the floor which might be profitably examined.”

“The dungeons, as you call them, are wine cellars,” said Dick ominously; “and if Puttler goes fooling around my port there will be trouble! Besides which, Harry, I don’t suppose there has been a single ancestor of ours who hasn’t dug up the floor of that unfortunate dungeon—one of them in the days of the Regency had the walls stripped, and the beggar never replaced the stone. It cost our father the best part of a thousand pounds to repair the damage done by this old gold-hound!”

Dick noticed that whilst Harry was present the girl’s manner was just a little strained and unreal, and she was nervous, too, started when she was addressed, and was content to listen without including herself in the conversation. It was not until Harry had gone, with a lame apology, back to the library that she became her real self again, and the old Leslie crept forth from its hiding place. Once, whilst he and his brother were discussing the affair of the dungeons, she had walked on to the terrace, and out of the corner of his eye he saw her in profile, a slim, frail-looking girl, with her delicate face and her glorious hair, and in the setting she looked almost ethereal. It was as though some old masterpiece of Botticelli had come to life.

When the door had closed on Harry she came back and sat down with a little grimace.

“Was it very rude of me to go out? Dicky, I can’t work up any interest in the things that really fascinate Harry! Whatever will he talk about when the treasure is found?”

“The treasure? Oh, you mean the gold? He will probably talk about you.”

She made a little moue.

“I’m too young to be interesting to Harry, three hundred years too young,” she said. “Now tell me about your detective. I liked what I saw of him. He is to be your little guardian angel? And, Dick, will he have a beat—is that the word? Because, if he has, I do hope he’ll take in Willow House. I’ll even lend him my car.”

“Are you really frightened?”

She thought for a while before she replied.

“I think I am,” she said. “When I was a child the first air raids fascinated me, the second were interesting, but after the third or fourth they became—just air raids. And the Black Abbot—well, he’s very picturesque, Dick, but he’s rather terrifying. Didn’t you tell me that Harry feared him?”

“He does a little.”

“Why, I wonder?”

“Harry is naturally of a nervous temperament,” said Dick. “People are born that way, and it is absurd to talk of ‘cowardice’ where they are concerned. Now I was born without the knowledge of nerves, and I daresay if you saw me chasing the Black Abbot you would think I was terribly brave. As a matter of fact, it is simply because I’ve no imagination.”

“That isn’t true,” she said. “Why do you always belittle yourself?”

“Because I am by nature excessively modest,” he said gravely, and at that moment they caught sight of Mr. Puttler strolling through the long lines of rose trees that ran parallel with the eastern wing. Together they went down the terrace steps and intercepted him.

“It is a lovely place,” said Mr. Puttler, shaking his head in admiration. “I’ve never seen so many roses together in my life, except at Covent Garden Market, and they’re not roses, they’re just merchandise.”

“I’ve told Miss Gwyn that you’re a detective, Puttler.”

Puttler frowned at this.

“You know Miss Gwyn better than I do,” he said good-humouredly. “Speaking for myself, I find that life is much easier to live if you keep your mouth shut. Not,” he added hastily, “that I want to be offensive. That’s only my way of reasoning and my way of talking. There used to be an officer in our division who rose from the rank of plain police constable to superintendent by the simple process of never saying anything to anybody. If he was asked for his opinion on a matter he used to shake his head and say there was much to be said on both sides but he had his own private opinion, and even when he was called into a case he’d say nothing, but listen to what everybody else said and smile. That smile was worth a thousand a year to him.”

They crossed the rose garden and were strolling across the lawn. Under a huge elm Mr. Puttler stopped to continue a story which was fated never to be finished.

“One day the superintendent said to this man, whose name was Carter, ‘Carter,’ he said, ‘I can’t understand——’ ”

Crack!

A bullet snicked past the detective’s face, struck the bole of the tree, and sent the bark splintering. From a clump of rhododendron bushes two hundred yards away floated a pale blue cloud.

“Down on your face!” said Dick hoarsely, and dragged the girl to the ground, only just in time.

Crack!

The second bullet struck a little lower. A splinter of bark hummed past the girl’s ear.

“There’s someone in those bushes who doesn’t like me,” said Mr. Puttler.

Pulling a long-barrelled Browning from his pocket and bending low, he sprinted toward the bushes, zigzagging as he ran.

A third shot rang out and the running man pitched forward on his face and lay still.

XXVI

Dick flew forward to the prostrate figure, and, kneeling by his side, turned him on his back. His eyelids were working spasmodically, but there was no sign of injury, except a bruise on the side of his face which had been caused by his coming violently into contact with the ground. And then Dick saw the man’s right boot. The sole had been ripped off and there was a patch of blood showing on the toe of the sock. At the sound of a rustling skirt Dick turned his head. The girl was coming toward them.

“Go back behind that tree and don’t move,” he shouted authoritatively, but for once she did not obey him.

She was rather pale, but there was no other evidence of fear, as she knelt by his side and began to unfasten the collar of the stricken man.

“He’s stunned. I don’t think it’s anything worse than that,” said Dick. “I thought at first he was finished—look at his boot!”

He was pulling it off gingerly and the operation must have hurt a little, because the detective winced and opened his eyes.

“Hullo! What has happened?” he asked, looking round. “Did that bird shoot me?”

“I don’t think he’s hurt you very much.” Dick was looking at the foot. The bullet had ricochetted, cutting a shallow gash on the man’s instep, but there was no other injury.

“Do you feel fit enough to look after Miss Gwyn?” said Dick.

The detective reached round for the gun he had dropped and humped himself to his feet. Without another word, Dick raced across the grass-land to the bushes, and the girl watched him in terror, expecting every second to hear the fourth and the fatal shot.

After five minutes he emerged from the bushes, holding something in his hand which he was examining curiously as he walked toward them.

“A Lee-Enfield rifle, army pattern,” he said. “I found these shells.”

He put them into the detective’s hand. Puttler examined the exploded cartridges carefully.

“You didn’t see him, of course?” he said.

“No, I think he must have got round to the back of the house. The bushes ran practically from the west wing of Fossaway Manor to the end of the Mound. He might of course be still hidden in the bushes, but the probability is that he made his getaway as soon as he saw you fall,” said Dick. “I think we’d better go inside and I will find you a pair of shoes, unless you have a spare supply.”

They were halfway to the house when they met Lord Chelford.

“Who was that shooting?” he asked irritably. “Dick, I told you that I did not want rabbit shooting or any other kind of shooting within half a mile of the house. It gets on my nerves terribly. Really, I think you must show a little more consideration.”

The girl had opened her lips to explain when Dick caught her eye, and with splendid mendacity she invented a hurried but effective excuse.

“My fault, Harry. I saw a stoat, and I hate stoats.”

The fact that none of them carried a rifle was unnoticed by Harry.

“Well, of course…” He was obviously taken back by her championship. “If that’s the case it can’t be helped. Only in future, Dick, old boy…”

He walked rapidly back to the house.

“Why shouldn’t he be told?” asked Leslie. Then, realizing the foolishness of the question, she was all penitence. “There is no reason why he should be, of course. I was silly to suggest it. But, Dick, who did such a terrible thing? It couldn’t have been an accident.”

“It wasn’t an accident: of that I can assure you,” said Mr. Puttler, nursing his injury. “The first two shots that were fired hit the tree within three inches of each other. Are you going to notify the local police, Mr. Alford?”

Dick thought for a moment, then decided against that course, and to Leslie’s surprise the detective approved.

“I think you’re right,” said Puttler. “Where is the nearest rifle range?”

“About fifteen miles away,” said Dick sardonically. “You needn’t follow that line of thought.”

“I’m not following any line of thought,” said the detective. “I’m only foreseeing possible alibis. I spend my life standing in front of alibis and waving a red flag.”

Through the tan, Dick’s face was gray. He seemed suddenly to have gone old, and Leslie looked at him anxiously.

“Dick, at whom were they shooting?”

“I don’t know that they were shooting at anybody,” he said wearily. “They just loosed off a few rounds to scare us.”

And then he laughed; it was a fierce, hard little laugh, and she winced at the sound of it.

“I am thinking of Harry and his nerves, and the stoat and every damned ridiculous—— I beg your pardon, Leslie; I’m afraid I’m getting rattled.”

She smiled at this.

“Dick, will you say good-bye to Harry for me? I promised my brother I would come home early. No, really, you need not take me. I’m not at all afraid of being held up by armed desperadoes!”

“Neither am I,” said Dick, “but I don’t fancy you overmuch as a driver.”

And in her annoyance at this false accusation she forgot to resist his escort.

By the time he had returned to the house, Puttler had secured a dressing for his foot. The injury was so slight that he could resume his shoes, and pooh-poohed the suggestion that he had better lie up that night.

“It was a narrow escape,” he said, “but I’m rather glad I got that bullet, and that it didn’t go where it was intended.”

Dick looked at him steadily.

“For whom was it intended?” he asked.

Without hesitation came the reply:

“For Miss Leslie Gwyn: I thought you knew that.”

Dick could find no answer, but in his heart of hearts he knew that Puttler was speaking the truth.

XXVII

Mr. Fabrian Gilder, sometime head clerk to the firm of Gwyn & Gwyn, and now a gentleman of leisure, was in one sense a hard man. He did not forgive even slight injuries, and in the past had gone a long way out of his path to get even with those who had the misfortune to affront him. And Arthur Gwyn had offended beyond hope of forgiveness. A few days before, Gilder would have thought it a very simple matter to be revenged upon his enemy; but now the simple process of laying an information and of preferring a charge of forgery was contingent upon four bills which were in his possession being repudiated by the man who was alleged to have backed them.

He could do no more than present those interesting documents, and this he did through his bank. Dick had already made arrangements for their redemption. It was not entirely an act of philanthropy on his part, for he was a business man, and took over from the frankly reluctant Mr. Gwyn the choice of a number of unsalable shares which Dick regarded as having a certain value. The bills, which had been renewed from time to time, were met, and that ended Mr. Gilder’s chance of carrying his threat into execution.

He was the type of man who thrived on opposition. Though it would be true to say that he had fallen in love with Leslie Gwyn the first time he had seen her, which was months before that unpleasant scene at his flat, his desire for her grew as his chance of winning her receded farther and farther into the background.

On the night that Dick had found him examining the ruins of the Abbey, Mr. Gilder had returned to the cut road when he thought the coast was clear and had discovered yet another in quest of the treasure. He had witnessed the interview between the two men and had followed Arthur back to Willow House with no other intention than to offer his help, for a consideration, in discovering this mythical fortune. For Mr. Gilder had heard quite enough that day he surprised his employer with Mary Wenner, to know that somewhere under the Abbey lay either the fortune or its key. He had overtaken Arthur on the drive, and Arthur was in an unpleasant mood: hot with the man at the interruption of his search, smarting under the sting of Dick Alford’s sarcasm.

At first, startled by the unexpected apparition of his head clerk, Arthur had snarled round on him, and there and then discharged him from his service and defied him to do his worst. It was Gilder who had struck the first blow.

When Arthur was in his more unpleasant moods he said things that no self-respecting man could endure, and the black eye which the lawyer nursed was an advertisement of his indiscretion.

Gilder might be a bookmaker, but he was not a thief. At least, “thief” was rather an extravagant description of his duplicity. He went back to London half crazy with rage, but a day in bed restored his mental equilibrium and he sat down to plan how best he could frustrate any plans which his late employer had formed for gaining possession of the treasure. By this time Gilder, too, was convinced; his last doubts removed. He had been sceptical as to the treasure’s existence, but he knew such things had happened, and he had a natural desire to be in any scheme which produced immediately and without great labour a vast, undreamed-of sum.

His cut lip healed in a few hours, though it was still swollen, and toward the evening of the second day after his retirement from the firm of Gwyn & Gwyn, he dressed himself with great care, and, calling a taxi, drove to an address he had once scribbled on his white shirt-cuff.

Mary Wenner occupied a tiny flat, every compartment of which might have been contained in one large-sized room. It was perched on the top floor of an apartment house near Baker Street—37, Cranston Mansions. She enjoyed an uninterrupted view of the Metropolitan Railway and such shunting operations as are carried out in that busy centre, and she was as a rule free from callers; for there were no elevators in the house, and to climb up four steep flights of stairs was something of an undertaking.

Mr. Gilder was not strong for physical exertion and cursed the parsimonious builder who had neglected to put in this easy method of transportation. Nevertheless, he climbed, and presently was ringing at the polished bell of No. 135.

Mary had a daily servant, who was a charwoman in the morning, a parlour-maid in the afternoon, and her own natural self after six, at which hour she left for the night. This aged woman, with her dingy white cap askew, opened the door and took the card in to her mistress, leaving Mr. Gilder on the mat. She came back with an ingratiating smile, and pointed to the room where Mary was to be found.

“This is an unexpected pleasure, Mr. Gilder,” said Miss Wenner conventionally. “I’m sure I never thought that you would be as good as your word. Sit down, won’t you?”

She really was pretty, he observed; in her plain house dress she was prettier than in a more elaborate attire. The flat, though small, was well but not expensively furnished. It left him with the impression that she had bought everything with her own money and he had rather a nice feeling toward her in consequence. For Fabrian Gilder was a queer mixture of Puritan and adventurer. Later, Mary had her flat to thank for certain pleasant developments.

There was only one chair on which he could sit, and this he took.

“You’d like a cup of tea? I’m just going to have mine,” said Miss Wenner. “I’ve been out all day shopping and everything.”

“Are you—er—working?” asked Gilder delicately.

“No, I’m not in business,” replied Miss Wenner, more correctly. Only common people “work”: the gentility “go to business.”

She went out, disappearing into a mysterious cupboard, which had just enough room for a tiny kitchen table and a gas stove, and he heard the rattle of cup against saucer, the plomp! of a gas ring being lighted, and after a while she came back, a little flushed and apologetic.

“Maids are so stupid, aren’t they?” she asked. “You can never trust these common daily people. I had an awfully nice maid but she went away and got married, the stupid child!”

She received very few visitors, she told him. Her “sewing woman” came twice a week. She had a very dear friend—a girl, she hastened to assure him—who spent Tuesday evenings with her and sometimes slept in the flat. But a male visitor was the rarest of phenomena.

“You can’t be too careful,” said Miss Wenner primly. “A girl’s character is her principal asset—don’t you agree Mr. Gilder?”

Mr. Gilder agreed.

“That is what I have always said about my work with Harry—excuse me, I mean Lord Chelford, only we were such awfully good friends that I’ve never dreamt of calling him anything but by his Christian name.”

“And did you call Richard Alford by his Christian name?” asked Mr. Gilder, not without malice.

Her nose went up in the air.

“Him!” she said contemptuously. “I don’t take any more notice of him than I do of any of the other upper servants! He’s educated and all that—went to Eton and Harrow” (even Mr. Gilder winced at this) “but you judge a man by his manners and not by his education. There’s no doubt at all that Dick Alford has the manners of a pig!”

She said this with feeling and no little vehemence. Mr. Gilder, who knew something of the circumstances, understood and almost sympathized.

“I was going to say that down at Fossaway I often felt that it wasn’t right to be in that big house with no lady there except the housekeeper, who of course is a servant, and—— Oh! here you are, Gladys!”

XXVIII

She rose as Gladys brought in the tea tray and laid it carefully on the table. Gladys was sixty, toothless, and more or less chinless. She wore most of her hair in a bun, which overflowed, drooping over her neck in picturesque confusion. Gladys had the smile of one who enjoyed the privilege of entertaining a visitor. She smiled at the girl, smiled at Mr. Gilder, and smiled herself out of the room. Fabrian Gilder thought he had never seen a more ghastly exhibition.

“You’re a good friend of Gwyn’s, aren’t you?” he asked, as he sipped his tea.

She dropped her eyes in maidenly embarrassment.

“We are rather good friends, but no more. We may be something closer—who knows? He has always behaved like a perfect gentleman and treated me like a lady. I must say that for Arthur. But he’s a little trying; don’t you find him so?” she asked, with a girlish naïveté that was a little overdone.

“I have left him,” said Mr. Gilder briefly. “He and I disagreed over a question of policy and I retired. In fact, we had a very bad row and came to blows—I tell you this because you’ll probably learn the facts from him sooner or later.”

Mary was shocked; and when Mary was shocked she covered her rather generous mouth with her two small white hands.

“You don’t tell me!” she said in a hushed voice. “Blows! Is that it?” She nodded her head to his lip.

“That’s it,” said Gilder shortly.

“Blows!” repeated Mary Wenner. “How perfectly disgusting and vulgar!”

“I wanted to talk to you about Arthur Gwyn,” Gilder broke in upon her horrified wonder. “We’re not good friends, but that doesn’t mean I bear him any malice. But, naturally, as we are parted, I don’t feel called upon to protect him and stand between him and his dupes”—he emphasized the last word—“as I have done in the past. You know him as well as I do,” he went on, as she was about to speak. “You know his vanity; you know how perfectly unreliable and insincere he is; you know, too, that he’d get out of any promise he ever made, even if it was in black and white.”

He was watching her narrowly all the time he spoke, and now he saw her eyebrows arch.

“Indeed?” she said coldly. “I don’t know anything about the law, but I can’t see how a gentleman, or a common man for the matter of that, could get out of—what is the expression—legal obligations?”

“Then you don’t know Arthur Gwyn as well as I do,” he said. “But that is beside the point. I haven’t come here to blackguard him or to make him look smaller in your eyes. Not that I could,” he said, anticipating her protest a little ambiguously. “But I believe in a girl having a square deal, especially a working girl who may have nobody in the world to look after her interests. And I tell you that that fellow couldn’t go straight if he was fired from a gun. Now, what about the Chelford treasure?”

At the words she sat bolt upright, and a look of blank astonishment came to her face.

“Do you know?” she gasped.

“Of course I know! You’re going to help him find the gold, and in return——” He paused.

That was exactly what he had come to find out. What obligation had Arthur undertaken in return for the information she would give him? And he was pretty sure of his ground. He knew the girl; had had some dealings with her when she was with Chelford; and since he lived on his knowledge of human beings, he had analyzed her with more or less accuracy. He knew her vanity, her ambition; had heard something of her summary discharge from Fossaway Manor. There was only one reward that Arthur Gwyn could offer.

“He has promised to marry you,” he said, and he was not altogether drawing a bow at a venture.

“Did he tell you that?” she said, with a little catch in her voice. “I hope you don’t think, Mr. Gilder, that I’ve thrown myself at his head? That I wouldn’t do for the best man in the world.” She looked at him thoughtfully, and added: “Old or young. I trust Arthur as a gentleman to fulfil any promise he has made. I am going to do something for him that will make all the difference in the world——”

“When is he going to marry you? After the treasure is discovered, I suppose?”

She nodded.

“He will have to marry me then,” she said.

“I realize that. You’re a girl that has to make her way in the world without influence, and possibly without friends.” Mr. Gilder knew he was on the right tack here. “He can offer you a position and you can offer him money. After all, that is exactly what his sister is doing, and nobody thinks any worse of her for that.”

“Exactly,” murmured Miss Wenner, who had never seen the matter in that light before.

“The point I want to make is this,” he went on: “What bond has he given you?”

“His word of honour,” said Miss Wenner dramatically.

“I daresay. But what valuable bond has he given you?”

“I’ll show you.”

She went into the next room, which was evidently her bedroom, and, returning with her bag, placed it on her knee, opened the flap, and took out, amongst other things, a slip of paper, which she passed across to Mr. Gilder. He read it at a glance, noted the careful emendation which Arthur had made, and passed it back.

“That is valueless,” he said, and her face fell. “What is to prevent his going to Chelford and striking a bargain with him? Where do you come in then? Besides, this is what is known in law as a promise under duress—that is to say, under compulsion. If he is acting in the interests of his client, he can plead that he had to make this promise in order to secure information which you were illegally withholding.”

She stared at him.

“It’s not illegal to know and not to tell?”

He nodded.

“To know of the existence of hidden treasure and to withhold your information is a crime in some countries, and I daresay it is in England. But that’s beside the point. Where do you come in, Miss Wenner?”

She bit her lip thoughtfully.

“I never saw it in that way,” she confessed. “What can I do, Mr. Gilder?”

He felt inclined to offer the obvious solution, “Get him to marry you first,” but changed his mind. Mary Wenner married would be a useless ally.

At the back of his mind he was certain that this rather vulgar girl—for he had a nice and finicking taste in the matter of women—had discovered the Chelford millions. If he had not had this belief he would not have made his call. He believed that by some accident, or by reason of her close association with Harry Chelford, she had unveiled the mystery of the lost gold; and his object now was to discover how far his theory was justified by facts.

“Is there no way of making that agreement more binding, Mr. Gilder?” she asked. “You’re a lawyer—couldn’t you draw up something he wouldn’t wriggle out of? Naturally, I’m too much of a lady to want any man to marry me, if he doesn’t want to marry me. If he just hinted as much I should tell him to go—I should simply say, ‘Oh, very well, I’m not at all anxious to marry, thank you very much.’ I think a girl who throws herself at a man’s head is despicable, don’t you, Mr. Gilder?”

He did not answer this query.

“I could draw you up an agreement that would be legally binding, but I doubt if even that would help you. Why trust him at all?” he asked bluntly.

She dropped her eyes at this.

“Who—or rather whom—could I trust?” she asked, and took an invisible crumb off her dress. “This is such an awful world, and men are so very deceitful, Mr. Gilder. The young ones are the worst, of course, but they haven’t experience. I do think that a man isn’t in the prime of life till he’s about forty-five.” She waited. “Or fifty. He’s sort of settled down and sowed his wild oats, and he doesn’t want to go out at nights and all that. And I’ll admit that Arthur is flighty. I wouldn’t tell it to anybody but you, but he tried to kiss me any number of times, and he once said the most terrible thing to me at Fossaway Manor. I said to him: ‘Arthur, you seem to forget that you’re speaking to a lady,’ and he just curled up and died, if you understand me. I don’t mean that he actually perished——”

“I understand what you mean,” said Gilder, and went on to make his most startling revelation. “Now, listen, Miss Wenner. You’re a sensible girl and I can talk to you as I could talk to very few people.”

This cliché of intensive flattery, which so seldom fails even when employed upon intelligent people, produced in Miss Wenner the strained attentiveness which was called for.

“Suppose I tell you,” said Fabrian Gilder darkly, “that Gwyn is already trying to anticipate your discovery?”

“I beg your pardon?” Mary Wenner was not very strong on the more flowery expressions of speech.

“Suppose he’s trying to get ahead of you—trying to find the gold without your assistance?”

“He wouldn’t dare!” she gasped.

Mr. Gilder nodded very slowly, very deliberately.

“He has already tried,” he said. “Two nights ago I was watching him, suspecting his plan. He went at three o’clock in the morning to the ruins of Chelford Abbey, and he took with him a crowbar.…”

Whilst he was speaking, the red in her face deepened and the wide-opened eyes grew brighter.

“The hound!” she breathed. “The twisting, double-faced monkey!”

It was not a ladylike expression, but for the moment she was superior to shame.

“The dirty, thieving, twisting sneak! To the Abbey—with a crowbar! I’ll take my oath on a Bible that I never breathed a word of where it was hid—I mean hidden. Let him go with his crowbar—ha-ha!” She laughed shrilly, but gave no other evidence of supreme amusement. “I’ll crowbar him! Let him search and scrape and dig and see what he can find.”

He tried to soothe her, but for the moment her soul was breaking in tumultuous waves upon the muddy flats of Arthur’s duplicity.

“He has deceived me! I don’t mean in an unladylike way—I mean—you know what I mean, Mr. Gilder? I trusted that man. I gave him all my heart.” The sob came naturally, but it was largely due to intensified annoyance. “I gave him all that a woman could give a man—information I mean, Mr. Gilder. I don’t want you to get any wrong ideas about me, because I’ve always behaved like a lady, and nobody can point their fingers of scorn at me.”

She grew calm after a while.

“Who can you trust?” she asked bitterly. “Who—can—you—trust?”

“You can trust me.” Fabrian Gilder’s voice was very gentle, almost pleading.

He was rather a good-looking man, she observed; his gray hair gave him distinction.

“You wouldn’t want a legal document from me.…”

“Yes, I would,” she said obstinately. “I don’t trust men.”

“You shall have any document you wish. I will even go as far as compromising myself hopelessly.”

She coughed.

“I don’t think I should go quite as far as that,” she said, misunderstanding him.

“I mean that I would take the risk of detection without safeguarding myself as Arthur Gwyn has done.”

She dabbed her eyes with her pocket-handkerchief.

“Of course, Mr. Gilder—I don’t know you very well, but I’m not going to say that I don’t like you. I’ve always said to Agatha—my Tuesday friend, as I call her—‘Mr. Gilder’s a perfect gentleman.’ In fact, I’m—Mr. Gilder, what is your Christian name?”

“Fabrian,” he said.

She lingered tenderly over the word and smiled, a wistful sideways smile.

“I should call you Fabe, I suppose? It’s a perfectly lovely name.… As I was saying, I don’t want to throw myself at any man’s head.”

“Let us go down to-night.”

Her face changed.

“To the Abbey—to-night?”

He nodded.

“My car will get us down in an hour and a half, and we can wait till it’s dark; and unless there’s a lot of digging to be done——”

“There is no digging,” she said. “But to-night?”

“Why not?” he demanded. “My cottage is less than a mile from the Abbey. If the gold is there and reachable, we could get away with enough to make us rich for life.”

She pondered this, and then:

“I know you’ll think it horrid of me, Mr. Gilder—Fabe—that does sound familiar, doesn’t it?—but I would like something in black and white.”

There and then Mr. Fabrian Gilder produced a document that was enough, as he observed jocularly, to hang him, and, reading it, even Mary Wenner, with her keen instinct for safeguards, was impressed. He wrote the agreement with his own fountain pen, on paper which he provided, and he had brought along that pen in his pocket with a view to such a contingency. It was a new pen, filled with an ink that he had purchased at a novelty store in Wardour Street, and which was guaranteed to fade within six hours of writing.

Miss Wenner read it through, folded it, and put it into her bag, and disappeared into her bedroom. She came back with the bag, but he guessed that the agreement was disposed in some safe place.

“Now, Fabe, what time do you want to start?”

“At nine-thirty?” he suggested, and she nodded.

“And don’t trouble to bring a crowbar,” she said a little viciously, as she remembered Arthur Gwyn’s rank treachery. “I’ll carry all the tools we want in my bag.”

XXIX

The weather had changed that afternoon. Big black clouds had come up from the west; a steady drizzle of rain had set in when Fabrian Gilder brought his car to the rendezvous in Marylebone Road. He had pulled up the hood, and, as a matter of precaution, he had cleared out every portable thing from the tonneau. If there was gold he must find room for it, and he made a careful calculation as to the weight he could carry on each journey.

He was surprised at himself that he had accepted as a fact so readily that there was gold to be taken. From the girl he learned for the first time the extent of the treasure. He had inquired casually of his garage man the amount of strain the back axle would stand. That was unnecessary, for he had once driven four fairly heavy men a considerable journey. Supposing they weighted 170 pounds, that would be the equivalent of twenty bars of gold.

It was nearly ten before the girl appeared. She was wearing a long raincoat and stepped into the seat by his side with a voluble apology.

“I nearly didn’t come,” she said. “I only just remembered after you’d gone that awful Black Abbot.”

He was a little amused.

“You don’t believe in that kind of hokum, do you?” he asked, as the car went swiftly down Baker Street.

“I don’t know.” She was dubious. “He did appear once or twice when I was at the Manor, but we used to believe that these were villagers’ stories. According to the newspapers, they’ve seen more of him lately—ugh!” She shivered.

He tapped his pocket significantly with his hand.

“I’ve got something here that’s mighty bad for abbots black or white!” he said. “Don’t you worry, little girl.”

“No, Fabe,” she said meekly.

Very delicately he suggested that she might call him by the Christian name his parents had given him. There was no diminutive, he explained, and excused his correction by telling her that there was a possibility that she might address him and he would not know to whom she was speaking.

“I don’t believe in long engagements, do you?” She went off at a tangent.

“No, I don’t. They should be short—and sweet!”

They both laughed together, and were in excellent humour by the time they reached the deserted streets of Dorking.

“I only have one anxiety,” he told her. “Mr. Richard Alford has got a habit of prowling round at odd hours. On a night like this he’ll hardly leave his comfortable apartment.”

“Comfortable apartment!” she scoffed. “Why, he’s only got a tiny little office, and his bedroom’s not much bigger than mine. I simply detest the man. He gives himself more airs in a day than dear Harry gives himself in ten years—you don’t mind me saying ‘dear Harry?’ You’re not jealous, are you?”

He assured her he was not at all jealous.

“I should have married Harry if it hadn’t been for him. Harry was simply crazy about me, but Dick hated me—how that man hated me! Mind you, I’ve always snubbed him when he got a little too fresh. I don’t say that he was chasing me—I hate girls who think every man is after them—but he was certainly very attentive once or twice. After lunch or dinner he’d get up and open the door for me, and that’s a thing that Harry never did. But of course I saw through it. It was all deceit and artfulness.”

She chattered at rare intervals, except during the five miles of driving rain that forced its way under the cover and lashed her face.

“It’s a horrible night,” she complained.

“On the contrary, it’s one of the best nights I could have chosen even if I had the ordering of the weather,” said Mr. Gilder.

When they reached the secondary road that led to Chelfordbury he proceeded with greater caution, extinguishing the flaming headlamps and relying upon the two small lights that were placed on the front mudguard. He knew the road so well that there was no danger of mishap; his chief anxiety was that he should not, by the reflected rays of the bigger headlights, be recognized.

A mile from Fossaway Manor he switched out the remaining two lights, for he had a shrewd idea that this section of the road was visible from Lord Chelford’s house. To the nervous girl riding at his side, it seemed that they were in imminent danger every minute of colliding with one of the telegraph posts which ran along the side of the road. Happily she was not aware that the smaller lamps had been extinguished.

“Don’t worry,” he assured her. “I know every inch of this road; I’ve driven up it a hundred times. My cottage lies just beyond Willow House.”

The car, which had been moving silently and smoothly, began to slow as it went up the hill that led to Fontwell Cutting. He switched off the engine, and, jamming on the brakes, got out and opened the gate into Red Farm field. Then, walking alongside the car, he released the brakes and guided it to the place where Dick had found the machine a few nights before.

“Here we are,” he said.

He took her arm; she was shivering, and when she spoke he heard the chatter of her teeth.

“I wish I hadn’t come,” she said, started, and pointed into the dark. “What is that over there?” she whispered fearfully.

“A pollard willow,” he said. “Really, there’s nothing to be afraid of—Mary.”

“I don’t know about that,” she quavered. “Don’t let go of my arm, will you? Have you got a pistol?”

He assured her that he had.

Through the little gate, which he knew was unlocked, up the steep and slippery slope, and immediately ahead of them in the darkness were the solemn ruins.

“I’d rather not show a light,” he said in a low voice. “That was how Gwyn was discovered. Do you know your way?”

“If I can see the tower,” she suggested.

Stooping down to get an artificial skyline, he saw the bulk of the ruined tower and guided her forward. Once she stumbled over a heap of stones and would have screamed if his hand had not covered her mouth.

“For God’s sake, be careful!” he urged. “Now, how do we get to the vault?”

“Wait.” She released his arm and went toward the wall of the tower. He saw her once more, when she was groping her way round. Presently she whispered: “Come along.”

He followed her and reaching out her hand she took his.

“There’s a step down,” she whispered.

They were going into the tower, although he did not remember having seen any opening. He heard a rusty squeak.…

“It’s very narrow; you’ll have to squeeze through.”

The opening, he judged, was about a foot wide, and he had some trouble to pass the obstacle.

“It’s a big corner stone,” she said, in a low voice. “It swings round and opens like a door. It’s the way the old Abbot used to go out when he carried on with Lady Chelford—you’ve heard that bit of scandal, I suppose?”

The “bit of scandal” was some eight hundred years old and was news to him.

“If you’ve got a lamp you can put it on.”

He pulled out his torch and turned the switch. They were in a tiny stone chamber at the top of a circular flight of moss-grown stairs. Above was a vaulted roof, which seemed to be cut out of one piece of stone, as it might well be, for the interior measurements of the tower could not have been much more than four by five. The thickness of the walls he could judge; they had been built in the days when walls had other functions than to support a roof.

“Come along.” She led the way, stepping gingerly on the slithery moss.

He counted twenty-five steps, and then they were in a large stone chamber, so weatherworn that it seemed to be a natural cave. Walls and roof had lost their symmetry, and only the square of it told him that it was the work of man’s hands.

“Have you got the key?”

He nodded. Many years before, Gwyn & Gwyn had defended a famous burglar and had secured his acquittal on a technical error in the indictment. In reward he had presented to his lawyer a key which he claimed would open any door, big or small. It was a curious contrivance, consisting of a steel rod into the end of which strangely shaped projections could be screwed. Arthur had given it to his head clerk as a souvenir, having no interest in such matters himself, and rather scandalized that the firm was engaged in so discreditable a business as defending a burglar. This souvenir had now become an instrument of providence.

“Here is the place.” She still spoke in a whisper, though it was hardly likely they could be overheard.

In each corner of the room, facing them as they turned from the foot of the stairs, was a small, narrow door, deeply recessed. They reminded Mr. Gilder of the cell doors in Dartmoor, and there was a further likeness in another respect. Near the top of the left-hand door was a tiny iron grille, consisting of three rusted bars.

“Look!” she whispered.

He flashed the light of the lamp inside, where a deep, narrow cavern showed, along two sides of which ran a stone bench, and on the bench were innumerable cylinders of significant shape. He inspected the nearest; there was a curious seal at one end.

Fabrian Gilder’s heart beat faster. The girl’s hand that held his arm tightly was trembling.

“I’m so frightened,” she whimpered.

“What are you frightened about?”

“I’m so afraid of that awful Black Abbot.” She was on the verge of hysterical breakdown. He must work quickly.

He was fitting one of the accessories to the rod, and he pushed it in the big keyhole and turned. There was a grind and a click, but when he pulled the door it was fast. Again he tried, fitting another steel accessory, and on the third attempt the key turned with a horrible squeak, and he pulled the door open.

As he did so, the girl gripped his arm frenziedly.

“Look! Oh, my God! Look!” she screamed, and he turned.

Standing at the foot of the stairs was a figure in black, his face hidden under a long cowl. Two eyes they saw, gleaming feverishly upon them. Terrible, menacing, the Black Abbot was coldly surveying them!

XXX

With an oath, Gilder whipped a pistol from his pocket, but in doing so the beam of his lamp fell for a second. When he brought it up again, pistol extended, the figure had vanished.

“Don’t go, don’t go!” she shrieked, gripping his arm. “Oh, Mr. Gilder! Oh, Fabrian—don’t leave me!”

He thrust her aside and ran to the foot of the winding stairs and went cautiously up. He heard the sobbing breath of the girl coming behind him.

“Don’t leave me! Don’t leave me in the dark!” she sobbed.

Higher, higher, cautious, watchful, but no sign of a black habit. The little room above was as they had left it; the tiny slit of a door was open.

Brushing past him, the girl stumbled and staggered into the open air and collapsed on to her knees.

“Take me away! Take me away!” she raved. “I wish I had never come!”

Gilder turned with a curse and swung the stone door close, then, half-carrying, half-dragging her, beside himself with fury, in which was mingled no little fear, he brought her to the road and to the car.

The rain was pouring down. He pushed back the hood of the car savagely, so that the full force of the storm should beat upon her—he dare not allow himself to be burdened with a fainting girl. He would take her back to her flat and leave her—there would be plenty of time for him to return and investigate those cylinders.

As for the Black Abbot… he breathed a little more quickly when he thought of that terrifying appearance. Whoever it was—and that it was human he did not doubt—would live to regret this night’s interference.

By the time they reached Horsham, the girl, drenched to the skin, cold and shivering, had got back a little of her balance. Her teeth were chattering, but not with fear. She was inclined to be garrulous, but he answered in monosyllables or not at all.

“I wonder I didn’t die,” she said. “I’ve never seen anything so perfectly horribly ghastly! Did you see the way his eyes glared? They looked as if they were alight, didn’t they, Fabe?”

“Fabrian,” he snapped.

“I never saw anything like it, not even in the pictures,” said Miss Wenner. “Couldn’t we have the hood up, Fabe—Fabrian?”

He stopped the car with a jerk, pulled up the hood and fastened it.

“What are you going to do?”

“I’m taking you home. We’ll make another attempt to-morrow night. By the way, how did you get that stone corner piece to turn?”

“I can’t tell you that, Fabrian,” she said firmly and truly. “That’s my only hold over you.”

“Don’t be stupid. You used a bodkin or something, didn’t you? I noticed there was a space between two stones which looked to be artificial.”

“A pair of scissors,” she said. “There’s an iron catch inside that slit—I only found it by accident.”

He knew all he wanted to know now; could dispense with her for the rest of the night, forever, as it happened. He declined her invitation to come upstairs for a drink, and no sooner was she out of sight than he was flying back into Sussex.

Halfway between Dorking and Leatherhead, his gasoline gave out, and he had to wait on the charity of a passing motorist, and it was not a night when traffic was very thick. At last he found a good Samaritan who gave him enough to take the machine to the nearest filling station, and at Dorking, with his tank replenished and a few extra tins against emergency, he went on confidently.

Two o’clock showed on the illuminated dial of his watch when he backed the car into the field and mounted the slope to the ruins. From here onward he moved noiselessly, one step at a time, stopping every few paces to listen. But there was no sign or sound of the cowled figure.

He found the corner of the tower, with his penknife pressed back the catch, and, pulling at the rough stone, the edges of which crumbled in his hand, he opened the door.

Stopping only to examine the upper chamber, he went slowly down the stairs, his pistol in one hand, his lamp in the other. There was no sign of the intruder, but——

The door of the treasure house was closed. He pulled, and it swung open. Flashing his lamp into the long, narrow cell, he saw something that sent the blood from his face. The “ingots” had disappeared, every one of them! Neither the bench to the left nor right held a single cylinder. Beads of perspiration were running down his face as he turned, and it would have been death to any human spook who opposed him, for his heart was bitter against whosoever it was had checked his enterprise.

He made another inspection of the underground chamber. Unlike its fellow, the second door in the opposite corner of the room was solid. Neither peephole nor grating gave a view into the room it guarded. He guessed that behind the nail-studded portal was a room similar to that in which the cylinders had been stored. Trying his key on the lock, he could produce no result. He put his shoulder to the oaken face but the door did not budge by so much as a fraction of an inch.

Before this room the flooring consisted of a long slab of stone that ran without a break to the centre of the apartment, and was the exact width of the narrow doorway. Had this any significance? Kneeling, he examined the stone carefully. It was different from the rest of the paving. The broken stones that formed the floor of the room were worn smooth by the passage of generations of men; this oblong strip was rough-dressed, more like the underside of a paving stone than its chiselled surface. He stamped on one end and felt it give ever so slightly; stamped on the other end and had a like experience. In the middle ran a staple, balancing the stone, and beneath there was a hollow space. Some day or night he would come along and conduct a more careful inspection.…

He came into the upper room to confront a more urgent problem. Just as he was about to extinguish his lamp preparatory to passing through the opening, he saw the stone move. Before he could spring forward it had thudded into its place. From somewhere outside he heard an unearthly chuckle of laughter.

Trapped! He pushed at the door, but it was inflexible. Inch by inch he examined its surface. There must be an opening somewhere, he thought. He remembered the story of the amorous Abbot and his clandestine excursions. It was certain that a means existed for opening the door from the inside.

He searched the wall; nothing appeared. And then it occurred to him to send his light slowly along the floor, which was made up of broken flagstones. One, smaller than the others, attracted his attention, because it lay at a truer level than the rest, and he tugged at its end, and, with great effort, pulled it up. Beneath he saw a great iron ring, so rusted that it was almost razor-thin. With his handkerchief he gripped it and pulled. It gave a little, and, as it did, he saw the door move. Again he strained at the handle and slowly it came up; although the door had moved only an inch he knew it was clear of the invisible catch which held it. Running to the stone, he pressed with all his might. It swung open and he came staggering out into the eerie light of dawn.

The storm had passed; overhead, the stars were shining in the paling sky. Far away to his left a wisp of smoke curled up from the twisted chimneys of Fossaway Manor. Fabrian Gilder wiped his hot face and strove to overcome the bitterness of his defeat. And then, at his feet, he saw something and, stooping with a cry, picked it up. It was one of the cylinders, heavy and laden, that had been dropped by those who had cleared the vault. It was not heavy enough for gold. He knew that at once. The cover was of lead. He tore away the seal, expecting to find an opening, but the cylinder had been sealed at both ends. He carried it quickly down the slope, and in the shelter of the cut road he took out his knife and slit the thin lead end, and pulled out a tightly rolled sheet of parchment. He opened it and stared. It was an ancient missal, beautifully painted and, as a work of art, priceless, but a poor substitute for thirty-five pounds weight of solid gold!

XXXI

And that was all the other cylinders contained, he thought, with a gleam of satisfaction. Whoever had watched him—and he suspected Arthur Gwyn naturally—had had the same disappointment.

It was in this room that the old monks had stored their ancient music. There was a certain grim humour in the thought of how he had spent his night and the reward for it.

He crossed the road, opened the gate, and went into the field where he had left his car, and stood stock still, petrified with amazement. The car had disappeared!

The tracks were plainly visible. They led through the cutting, along the road toward Willow House. There was nothing to do but to tramp after them. A mile beyond Arthur Gwyn’s residence was Ravensrill Cottage, his own property, he thought with some satisfaction, and a snug retreat where a man could get a hot bath in an hour and a steaming cup of tea in a quarter. The prospect was cheering, for he was wet through, weary and footsore.

The tracks passed the entrance of Willow House and continued on the way to the cottage; and when at last he turned the bend of the road that brought his little country home into view, he saw the car standing before the door. There was no sign of any living creature. He went round the house, searched the tiny plantation to the left, and even descended to the banks of the stream, before he opened the door of his cottage and went in.

He put the key in the lock and, to his surprise, on the pressure of his hand, the door opened. The door which opened into his little dining-room yielded to his pressure before he could turn the key. He gazed, stricken dumb with amazement. A small fire was burning in the grate, on which a kettle was steaming. An open teapot was on the hearth, and somebody had broken open a tin of biscuits. He heard a footstep in the next room and swung round to meet the intruder; and at the sight of him, he dropped the point of his levelled Browning.

“Thomas!” he said, unable to believe his eyes. “What the devil are you doing here?”

“Fired this morning,” said the ex-footman curtly.

“This morning? Why, it’s hardly daylight!”

Thomas nodded.

“Alford found me wandering about the house when I ought to have been in bed and asleep,” he said, “and he hoofed me out.”

“But why?”

The man was uncomfortable.

“How do I know why?” he demanded. “That dog never liked me. I think he suspected me of writing to you.”

Gilder knew that this story was a lie, designed to show him under an obligation to this ex-servant. Thomas had been a useful correspondent of his: all that went on at Fossaway Manor had been faithfully recorded for his information.

“You are in trouble. What have you been doing?”

The man pursed his lips.

“Well…” he hesitated, “I may as well tell you the truth. Have you ever heard of Monkey Puttler? Wait a minute, I’ll make the tea.”

He picked up the steaming kettle and filled the pot, and not till he had put it back on the hob did he continue his narrative.

“Monkey Puttler’s a ‘busy.’ Every crook in London knows him, and I know him as well as anybody because he got me three years for a job I did at the Westinghouse Hotel.”

“Burglary?” asked the other, to whom this was news.

“An inside job,” said the other tersely. “You can call it burglary if it gives you any pleasure. Anyway, Monkey caught me and pushed me over the Alps for three long and weary ones. When I came out I got this job. There were pickings to it, too. Chelford isn’t a man who counts his change, and Alford doesn’t dare ask him what he’s done with his money when he comes for more.”

“An ex-convict, eh?” Gilder was slightly shocked and regarded the man from a new angle. “I didn’t know that or I should never have employed you!”

“I had to kid a bit,” confessed Thomas, with a grin.

“You kidded me all right!” replied Gilder.

“Well, I didn’t exactly kid you,” said the other, amused. “But that day when I went to your office and you started cross-examining me about how things were at the Manor with Gwyn, I didn’t see why I shouldn’t earn a few honest dollars.”

“Well? Go on about your friend Monkey—what is his name?”

“Puttler. He came yesterday.”

“To Chelford’s house?” asked Gilder in surprise.

“Yes,” nodded Thomas. “Alford pretended he is an accountant, but he’s a busy all right; I knew him the moment I saw him, and, what’s worse, he knew me. I’d come to Chelford’s service on a false character and I knew my number was up as soon as I saw his ugly phiz. Sure enough, last night Alford gave me notice, told me to clear out to-day. I’ll catch that bird one of these days,” he said, with an ugly look in his face.

“But why this morning?” asked Gilder.

“I was going to tell you,” said the other impatiently. “Chelford keeps a cash box in his library; it’s in the second left-hand drawer, and he’s generally got a wad of stuff there. He’s childish in the matter of money. I knew if I could get my hooks into the stuff I could lift enough to be happy, and leave enough behind so that Chelford couldn’t swear whether I’d had it or not. I got into the library about four this morning, and was going upstairs when Alford spotted me, told me to go up and dress and clear, which I did—he’s got something on his mind, that fellow, he never sleeps!”

“He caught you with the money?” asked Gilder in disgust.

“Not he—I shoved that out of the library window as soon as I got it. I picked it up later.”

“What was Mr. Alford doing, wandering about the house at that hour?”

The man made a grimace.

“You never know when that bird is around,” he said. “He’s not human; I tell you he doesn’t want sleep!”

Though Gilder was certain he was telling the truth, he was equally sure that the man was concealing something. There seemed to him to be gaps in his story, which he bridged readily enough. Wisely he decided that it was not the moment to cross-examine him. On one point he made up his mind. This man and he must part company, and soon.

“Why did you come here?”

“Thought you were in London,” said the other coolly. “I’ve been here before to see you, and I didn’t think you’d mind my using your house for a day or two—maybe a week or two,” he added, his eyes fixed on the other’s face.

Gilder scratched his chin thoughtfully.

“I don’t know that it will do me much good if it’s known that you’re an ex-convict.”

“They needn’t know, why should they?” said the other.

“Did you bring my car here?”

Thomas nodded.

“I was going over to Red Farm first; there’s a groom there who’s a friend of mine. Then I saw your car and thought something had happened to you. I waited for a time, and when you didn’t turn up I brought it along.”

“Did anybody see you?”

“Nobody. It was nearly dark.”

What was the man concealing? The impression that Gilder had—and he was a skilful reader of minds—was that Thomas was bursting with some vital information. Once or twice it had been at the end of his tongue, and he had inhibited the sensation.

“You can stay here if you like; I’m going to town. If I get a letter from the local police saying you’re living in the house, I shall write saying that you have no authority. You understand that I must protect myself?”

“I can understand that, guv’nor.”

Again his lips moved to speak, and again he checked himself.

“What do you want to tell me?”

“It’s too big to tell. I am going to keep it. Maybe if you come down later I’ll spin you a story that’s worth a million dollars.”

Thomas had once spent twelve months in a Canadian penitentiary, and it was his favourite pose that he was an American crook.

“A million dollars—yep!”

XXXII

Gilder poured out the tea, helped himself to biscuits, and, his hunger relieved, went into his room, and from a bureau took a complete change of clothes. The water was too cold for a bath, and he had a rub down with a rough towel as a substitute. He felt another man when shaved and clean and warm. He came back to Thomas, who was smoking a short briar pipe, peering into the fire.

“When you’ve decided to talk, you had better send me a wire—not from Chelfordbury but from Horsham.”

He wrote his address on a page of his notebook, tore it out and gave it to the man, then, cranking up his car, he went back through the dull morning to London.

At ten o’clock he was roused from a heavy sleep to answer the telephone. It was Mary Wenner, and he cursed her under his breath.

“Is that you, Fabe? I’ve been so worried about you all night, my dear. You didn’t go back to that awful place?”

“I’ll come and see you this afternoon,” he interrupted. “Don’t talk on the telephone: people can hear.”

“Fabe, dear”—there was a real note of anxiety in her voice—“you didn’t go back and get any of that gold, did you? I know you’re awfully brave, but I wouldn’t have you risk your life for the world.”

“No, I didn’t get any gold,” he said.

“Oh!” she replied, and in that “Oh!” was disappointment and annoyance. “It wasn’t so bad for you, a man,” she said, with some asperity in her tone. “Here I’ve been laying in bed all night thinking of you, and worrying about you——”

“I will see you this afternoon,” he rasped, and hung up on her.

He had no intention of seeing her that afternoon or any other afternoon, but in this matter his will was not the determining factor. Soon after tea, when he was preparing to go out, she walked into his dining-room unannounced. What she had told his servants, he shuddered to think. She passed swiftly across to him, stooped and kissed him chastely on the brow, and then seated herself by his side.

“Dear,” she said, and he closed his eyes patiently, “do you mind if I do something that seems a teeny-weeny bit deceitful?”

“I don’t mind——” he began.

“But this is something which affects your honour, dear.” Her sober eyes were fixed on his. “You must never think I’m not faithful to you and all that sort of thing, but he’s written to me such a pleading letter——”

“Who has written?” he asked, suddenly interested.

“Arthur. I’ve also had a letter from his sister; she wants me to go down and spend the week-end with them, and of course I’d much rather stay up here with you. But I feel I ought to have it out with Arthur and let him know that my affections are no longer his. After all, even if we didn’t get the fortune, I know that I’m dealing with a gentleman who doesn’t want me for my money alone. And you’re not exactly a pauper, are you, dear? I went and asked a young gentleman I know at Stubbs’ Agency, and they told me that you were worth at least a hundred thousand pounds.”

Gilder groaned.

“And I have your promise, in writing.”

“Yes, you’ve got everything, my dear Mary,” he said wearily.

“And, Fabe, dear, such a curious thing happened about that paper. When I took it from under my pillow this morning what do you think? All the writing had disappeared! You could have knocked me down with a feather.”

He stirred uneasily in his chair.

“That is most extraordinary,” he found words to say.

“I was so upset about it that I took it to a gentleman friend of mine, who’s in the conjuring business. You’ve probably seen him: he takes rabbits out of paper bags, and he says that you must have used invisible ink, and he showed me how to bring the writing back and make it permanent.”

“And did you?” asked Gilder hollowly.

“Why, of course I did, dear. You just squeeze a lemon, rub it over the paper and hold it in front of the fire.”

Gilder’s head reeled. All he could say was “Oh!” This was awkward—very awkward; but it was a difficulty that might easily be surmounted. At the worst he could buy her off for a thousand, and the promise of marriage was contingent.… Still it was a very unpleasant document to be produced even in a breach of promise case; for, strong in the faith of the invisible quality of his ink, he had made an agreement which was very damaging to himself.

“Are you going to stay with the Gwyns?”

“I think so, dear.” The hesitation was assumed, he knew; she had already made up her mind. “I really think that I ought to go. Arthur, of course, is a very old friend, and although he’s nothing to me, any more than the dirt beneath my feet, and I should no more think of throwing myself at his head than I should of flying to the moon—well, I feel I ought to go.”

“Then, for heaven’s sake, go!” he said curtly, and she murmured her thanks, and would have lingered on, but he accompanied her to the door and opened it very pointedly.

He gathered that, whilst she held him to his promise, she had not altogether lost hope of bringing Arthur Gwyn to heel.

She had hardly left the place before a telegraph boy arrived. Gilder was expecting a wire from one of his bookmaking businesses, now in process of liquidation, since their only client had passed from active operations. The telegram was addressed from a village five miles from Chelfordbury and ran:

Get down here as fast as you can. Big news for you.

It was signed “T.”

Would Thomas talk? And what had he to say?

XXXIII

The groom who brought Dick Alford’s horse to the door had a report to make.

“That fellow was seen last night, sir.”

“Which fellow is this?” asked Dick, as he swung into the saddle.

“The Black Abbot, sir. Gill, the gamekeeper up at Long Meadow Cottage, saw him at four o’clock this morning walking through the long meadow. By the time Gill got his gun he’d vanished.”

“And what was the Black Abbot doing in the Long Meadow?” asked Dick sardonically. “Picking buttercups?”

“It’s rather late for buttercups, sir,” said the unimaginative groom. “But Gill says that if he’d had his gun he’d have taken a pot at him.”

“And there would have been an inquest, and the best Gill could hope for would be a verdict of justifiable homicide. You can tell Gill from me that the Black Abbot is to be tackled—by hand! A live ghost will tell us a lot, but a dead ghost is practically useless as an information bureau.”

He cantered through the home meadows, behind the house, and, avoiding the Abbey ruins, rejoined the winding Ravensrill. Setting his horse at a walk, he followed the bank of the stream, his mind so completely occupied by the events of the past twenty-four hours that he would have passed unnoticed the girl who was lying face downward on the opposite bank.

It was a glorious morning, warm and sunny. The sky was an unblemished blue, the world was bathed in yellow radiance. Overhead, a flight of migratory birds were moving southward, and the faint chatter of them came down to him.…

“Good-morning, Sir Galahad!”

He reined up his horse and looked round in bewilderment. Presently he saw her.

“Good-morning, Guinevere!” he said, and, turning his horse’s head to the stream, he came gingerly down the slope and sent the reluctant horse into the water.

“Be careful!”

“There’s a ford here,” he said. “In fact,” as he emerged with his horse’s girth dripping, “this is the original Chelford. Knights in armour, and probably Britons in feathers and woad, have crossed Ravensrill at this spot. What on earth are you doing?”

He slipped to the ground, dropping the reins, and allowed his mount to forage at will. She was lying now at full length, but resting on her elbows. Immediately beneath her face was a slab of rock in the centre of which a hole some eighteen inches in diameter had been worn. When he saw this he laughed softly.

“Leslie, what questions have you to ask the Wishing Well?”

Why it was called the Wishing Well he had never learnt—no water had ever risen from that deep cavity which, by some freak of nature, extended to unplumbed depths. Yet here, generations of country swains had come to prostrate themselves and bellow into the cavity the burden of their hearts’ desire. And tradition had it that the well answered them clearly and intelligibly.

“I’m asking about me.” Her face was pink, probably from her unusual posture.

“And what said the well?” he mocked.

She scrambled to her knees and pushed back the hair from her forehead.

“I’ll not tell you. Ask something!”

With a growl and a groan he stretched himself on the warm grass and, hollowing his hands, roared into the crevice:

“What is going to happen to Leslie?”

They waited, and then the echo came back, queerly distorted yet distinct.

“Marry her!”

They laughed together. It was the trick of some hollow place below that through the ages had sent back the same reply to every question.

He got up to his feet.

“I wish you wouldn’t wander around without my escort,” he said seriously, and she laughed.

Never had he seen her looking more beautiful than that morning. She was a thing of air and sunlight, a baffling unreality that did not belong to the sordid world in which he was living.

“I got up early and was bored, so I went walking, and then I thought of the well and wondered whether it had learnt any new tricks. Arthur’s very conscious of his eye and he won’t go out until his face is normal. Poor Arthur!” She hesitated, looking at him. “You haven’t found——” She did not finish the sentence.

“The gentleman who did the shooting? No, but we have a pretty shrewd idea. By the way, I have fired Thomas. You remember that hang-dog footman who was always near at hand when he shouldn’t have been?”

“What has he done?” she asked.

“Nothing particular. He is an ex-convict: Puttler recognized him as soon as he arrived; and I found him at three o’clock this morning coming out of the library and made him turn out his pockets. He had no very considerable sum of money in his possession, but the chances are that he had cached it. Poor old Harry is such a slacker in the matter of keeping accounts that it will be almost impossible to secure a conviction. Of course, Thomas swore the money we found—not a large amount—was his, and as it meant a fuss in waking up Harry, who I am perfectly sure could have given us no information, we allowed the brute to get away with it.”

“Where is he now?”

“Thomas? I expect he caught the first train for London. I don’t suppose he’ll be applying for a job in the neighbourhood, but to be on the safe side you had better tell your brother.”

There was a moment of silence, then she asked:

“Did you find the rifle?”

He shook his head.

“It was an army rifle, but there isn’t such a thing at Fossaway Manor, though there are plenty in the village. In fact, nearly a dozen of our people working on the estate are Territorials. Puttler says that a poacher’s gang was responsible.”

Dick was a poor liar, but Leslie suspected nothing and did not question this theory. If she had, she might have pointed out that poachers use shotguns and snares, and that the rifle as an instrument for the destruction of game was about as valuable as a steam-hammer for tacking down carpets.

They walked across the field toward Willow House, Dick leading his horse.

“I want you to make me a promise, Leslie,” he said.

“What is it?” she asked, knowing before he spoke what it would be.

“I want you to promise me not to take these early morning walks, to use your car and to keep to the roads.”

Her eyebrows rose.

“Why? Surely there is no danger? You’re not afraid of the Black Abbot?”

But he did not answer her smile.

“No,” he said. “I’m not afraid especially of the Black Abbot, but I’m very much afraid of the something that is behind the Black Abbot.”

She knew that he did not wish to be questioned further, and changed the subject. She had a visitor coming, she told him, and only when she told him who it was, did his eyes twinkle.

“Good Lord! That lady? I suppose you realize you’re harbouring a dangerous rival?”

“Don’t be horrid, Dick. The poor girl was very fond of Harry, and in the letter she wrote to me she told me that she hoped I wouldn’t be embarrassed by her coming——”

“She would say that,” said Dick grimly.

“—and that she had almost forgotten Harry’s stupid infatuation.”

Dick stopped to laugh.

“Can you beat that?” he asked, with tears in his eyes. “Jumping snakes! ‘Harry’s stupid infatuation’! Well, I won’t be ungenerous.”

“Don’t,” she warned him. “I’m rather sorry for the girl.”

“Don’t,” he mimicked. “You need never be sorry for Mary. If you keep her off the subject of me, you’ll have a very pleasant week-end. But in the matter of Richard Alford she is a fanatic. I won’t tell you the horrid things she says of me, because it would prejudice you against her.”

“How do you know?” she challenged. “Quite a number of people say horrid things about Richard Alford.”

“Not to you,” he said quietly, and she flushed and again changed the subject.

“I don’t know why I’m up so early; I didn’t go to bed till two.”

“It was ten minutes past two when your light went out,” he said promptly, and she stared at him.

“How do you know?”

“I happened to be passing your house.”

He was in such a hurry to explain that she was suspicious.

“The Black Abbot was about last night. Puttler and I did a little ghost-hunting.”

“Did you see him?”

He shook his head.

“Nobody saw him except a terrified gamekeeper.”

Suddenly she turned to him with a little gasp of surprise.

“It was you!” she accused.

“What was me?”

“I am sure I saw somebody at the lower end of the drive. You were smoking a cigar: I could see the little red glow; and at first I thought it was Harry, and this morning I found the end of the cigar near the lodge gates—Richard Alford, do you ever sleep?”

“Frequently,” he said, with a smile, and put his arm round her shoulder. “I’m being brotherly: take no alarm,” he mocked her. “Leslie, dear, will you promise?”

“What?” she asked.

“Not to wander through the fields at odd hours. I don’t want to alarm you—I feel a brute as it is—but there may be real danger for the next day or two. Please don’t ask me what it is, because I can’t tell you; I’m not so sure that I know.”

She turned this over in her mind for a long time.

“Has it to do with the Chelford treasure?” she asked, and, to her surprise, he nodded.

XXXIV

In sight of her house he left her, and, remounting his horse, cantered away. She watched him until a bend of the road hid him from view, and then with a little sigh she walked slowly toward her home.

What was the mystery? She had never taken the Black Abbot very seriously, believing that the apparition had its origin in a stupid practical joke carried out by a villager with a histrionic bent. The legend she knew; Dick had told her, and Harry, who kept alive all the legends of the family, had described in detail the eight-hundred-year-old murder. But how was the Black Abbot affecting her? And what was the meaning of this close guard that Dick Alford was keeping on her? She had no doubt that it was he who was watching the house in the early hours of the morning.

In the night she had reached a momentous decision. It had been made after long thought and heart-searching, and she would have given everything to have had the courage to tell Dick that morning. But in that bright, sunlit world she was averse to hurting him. But would he be hurt? Her life’s future hung on that question.

She had been dimly conscious that a man was standing before the gate of Willow House. She had seen him when she was some distance away, and now, as she drew near, she had a feeling that he was waiting to speak to her. He was tall and wearing an ill-fitting gray suit and a golf cap; from his lips drooped a limp cigarette. He took his hands out of his pockets as she came near and touched his cap, and then she recognized the ill-favoured Thomas, the ex-footman.

“Good-morning, miss,” he said.

“Good-morning, Thomas.”

She viewed with more interest than she had done heretofore the lank, awkwardly made man.

“I wonder if I can have a word with you, miss?”

She hesitated.

“I am afraid I can do nothing for you, Thomas,” she said. “Mr. Alford tells me he has discharged you.”

He forced a grin.

“Mr. Alford never did like me, miss,” he said. “I’ve been falsely accused, and I’m going to see my lawyer when I get to town. One minute, miss,” he said hastily, as she was opening the gate. “I could tell you something that would be worth a lot to you.”

Her gray eyes fixed him in a steady stare.

“You can tell me nothing that would be of the slightest value, Thomas——” she began.

“Oh, couldn’t I!” His head went up and down in a succession of nods. He was ludicrously like a nodding mandarin she had on her writing table. “You don’t know what I know. I could tell you something, and I could tell Mr. Gwyn something that nobody don’t know. People talk about the Chelford treasure——”

“I don’t want to hear any more,” she said, and, turning, walked up the drive.

For a moment he glared after her as though he contemplated following, but thought better of it, and, lighting the cigarette which had gone out, he slouched back to his borrowed home. And then an idea occurred to him. Beyond the low wooden fence was a thick belt of laurels. If one of his plans were carried out and he had to make a quick exit from Chelfordbury, it might be worth while to reconnoitre this house. He jumped over the fence and made a cautious progress through the bushes.…

“Who’s that you were speaking to, Leslie?” Arthur Gwyn was lying in a deck chair on the lawn, his eye covered with a piece of white lint.

“Thomas,” she said.

“The footman from Fossaway? What did he bring—a message?”

“No, he’s been discharged,” she said as she passed him. “Dick suspects him of stealing, and he sent him about his business this morning.”

“Have you seen Dick, then?” he asked in surprise.

“Yes, I met him; he was riding over to see the miller.” She lingered at the back of the chair.

“You always seem to be meeting that fellow,” he mused, with a frown. “It is ‘Dick this’ and ‘Dick that.’ Do you think it’s wise, Leslie, playing with fire and all that sort of thing? You never tell me you meet Harry——”

“Harry never comes out of his library,” she said with a smile, “and it’s difficult to miss Dick if you’re out of doors. Not that I’ve ever tried to miss him.”

He took out his cigarette and looked at it thoughtfully, his lips pursed.

“Dick’s a good fellow,” he said again, “and it is unnecessary for me to remind you that he is a second son, and as poor as a church mouse. Yes, Leslie, I’m going to insist on that poverty. After all, you’re not marrying a pauper in Harry. And I tell you frankly that it is necessary that you should marry a rich man!”

The truth was coming—she braced herself to meet it.

“Who will also take my fortune on trust,” she said quietly. “If I married Dick, who is a business man, he might ask to see my bonds and shares——”

A tense moment of silence, then:

“There are no bonds or shares!”

He had to set his teeth to make his confession. He could not see her face; he dared not look round or meet her eyes.

“There are no bonds or shares?” she repeated slowly. “Then what I said in the car was right? I am penniless!”

XXXV

The truth was out. Leslie stood rigidly behind her brother, looking down on him.

“I am penniless!” she repeated.

He had to wet his dry lips before he could speak.

“I’ve been trying to work up courage to tell you this for a long time,” he said. “I’m a coward—a cur! You have a few thousand pounds that I couldn’t handle, but every other penny of your fortune I have spent!” His voice was hoarse, scarcely recognizable. “You’ll have to know this sooner or later; you might as well know it now. I don’t know what you’ll think of me. I’d like to say that I didn’t care, but that wouldn’t be the truth. I’ve gambled away a quarter of a million, and I’m as near to bankruptcy and ruin as makes no difference.”

He pulled the lint bandage from his eye and got up and faced her. Save for the discolouration of his cheek, he was white as chalk.

“I’d no intention of telling you,” he said in a low voice, “but you piqued me into it, and I’m glad it’s over.”

Raising his eyes to hers, he did not see the look of condemnation he expected. There was neither contempt nor consternation in her face. The red lips were curved in a half-smile, and in her eyes was nothing but kindliness and pity.

“Thank God!” she said in a low voice, and he could not understand her.

“This means, of course, that Chelford will have to take you without a fortune,” he said.

She shook her head.

“I have already written to Harry, breaking off my engagement,” she answered him. And then her arm slipped into his. “Let us go in to breakfast,” she said. “This is one of the happiest days of my life.”

The letter came to Harry Alford, Earl of Chelford, with two or three other personal letters; his main correspondence was with London booksellers, for he was a restless collector of ancient tomes. He looked at the letter, recognizing the handwriting, frowned, and turned it over. Then, with some evidence of annoyance, he slit the flap.

Dear Harry:

I have thought for a long time that we have so little in common that a marriage between us could not possibly lead to happiness for either of us. I suppose the correct thing to do would be to send back my engagement ring, but fortunately or unfortunately, you forgot to present me with this token! I wish you every happiness, and I hope that we shall still be good friends.

Harry read the letter, rubbed his forehead in perplexity, then, rising from his chair, almost ran from the library. Dick was on the lawn, playing with his dog, when his brother burst into the little study.

“I say, look at this! What do you think of it?”

Dick read the letter with a troubled face.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

“Sorry!” said Harry shrilly. “It’s disgraceful! I shall look a perfect fool! Leslie’s treated me very badly indeed—but that reference to the engagement ring is in shocking bad taste.”

“I thought you’d given her one,” said the patient Dick. “Didn’t you?”

“It is a barbarous and stupid practice. I never dreamt of giving her a ring. Why should I? She had a ring, a beautiful one. You must have seen it—a diamond that she always wears. What is the sense of it? The reference is in very bad taste—shocking!”

And yet, in spite of his agitation and anger, Dick thought he detected relief in his brother’s voice. But his vanity had been hurt, and that is a sore place with many men of greater calibre than Lord Chelford.

“Without any warning.… She was here yesterday, but said not a word about it!”

“You hardly gave her a chance,” said Dick. “You scarcely spoke to her, and really, Harry, you took no trouble to entertain her. Be reasonable.”

Harry fondled his chin and glared through the thick lenses of his horn-rimmed spectacles.

“I suppose not,” he said, with sudden mildness. “But, really, I’m not a marrying man. I want no more than my books and my mission. But I’m going to look a fool over this business, Dick.” His anger was rising again. “Everybody in the county knows we’re engaged, and they’ll come prying around to discover what is wrong. We shall have those beastly newspaper men sitting on the front step, and that is more than I can endure!”

“Then let them come to me,” said Dick. “I’ll give them all the explanation they need, and they’ll be sorry they asked. As for newspaper men—I eat ’em alive!”

Still his brother was not wholly mollified.

“What made her do it? Do you think she’s found somebody else she likes better?” He peered at Dick in his short-sighted way. “That would make it even worse. I’m very annoyed with Arthur Gwyn. He threw this girl at me——”

“Don’t let us talk about it,” said Dick sharply. “It isn’t a very dignified attitude to take.”

His brother looked at the letter dubiously.

“What am I to do?”

“Write a charming letter, freeing her,” said Dick. “You can do no less.”

“But do you think she’s got another man in her eye?” demanded Harry.

“She has probably a dozen,” said the other brutally. “Do as I tell you, Harry.”

And Harry Chelford went grumbling back to the library.

So she had done it! Dick hardly knew whether to be elated or depressed. A week ago he would have been the happiest man in England; to-day… he shrugged his broad shoulders, pulled his pipe from his pocket, and savagely stuffed tobacco into the bowl. This would mean a break, for a time, at any rate, between the Gwyns and Harry, and there arose an alarming thought. Suppose Harry transferred his legal business to another firm? That would mean ruin for Arthur Gwyn. Dick had so far been able to cover up the defalcations of Leslie Gwyn’s brother, and in a few months he could have obliterated all trace without hurt to the estate. But at this stage, if Harry insisted——