Ravensdene Court Part 2

CHAPTER XIV
SOLOMON FISH

It needed but one glance at Scarterfield's visitor to assure me that he was a person who had used the sea. There was the suggestion of salt water and strong winds all over him, from his grizzled hair and beard to his big, brawny hands and square set build; he looked the sort of man who all his life had been looking out across wide stretches of ocean and battling with the forces of Nature in her roughest moods. Just then there was questioning in his keen blue eyes—he was obviously wondering, with all the native suspicion of a simple soul, what Scarterfield might be after.

"You're asking for me?" said the detective.

The man glanced from one to the other of us; then jerked a big thumb in the direction of some region beyond the open door behind his burly figure.

"Mrs. Ormthwaite," he said, bending a little towards Scarterfield. "She said as how there was a gentleman stopping in this here house as was making inquiries, d'ye see, about Netherfield Baxter, as used to live hereabouts. So I come along."

Scarterfield contrived to jog my elbow. Without a word, he turned towards the door of the smoking room, motioning his visitor to follow. We all went into the corner wherein, on the previous afternoon, Scarterfield had told me of his investigations and discoveries at Blyth. Evidently I was now to hear more. But Scarterfield asked for no further information until he had provided our companion with refreshment in the shape of a glass of rum and a cigar, and his first question was of a personal sort.

"What's your name, then?" he inquired.

"Fish," replied the visitor, promptly. "Solomon. As everybody is aware."

"Blyth man, no doubt," suggested Scarterfield.

"Born and bred, master," said Fish. "And lived here always—'cepting when I been away, which, to be sure, has been considerable. But whether north or south, east or west, always make for the old spot when on dry land. That is to say—when in this here country."

"Then you'd know Netherfield Baxter?" asked Scarterfield.

Fish waved his cigar.

"As a baby—as a boy—as a young man," he declared. "Cut many a toy boat for him at one stage, taught him to fish at another, went sailing with him in a bit of a yawl that he had when he was growed up. Know him? Did I know my own mother!"

"Just so," said Scarterfield, understandingly. "To be sure! You know Baxter quite well, of course." He paused a moment, and then leant across the table round which the three of us were sitting. "And when did you see him last?" he asked.

Fish, to my surprise, laughed. It was a queer laugh. There was incredulity, uncertainty, a sense of vagueness in it; it suggested that he was puzzled.

"Aye, once?" said he. "That's just it, master. And I asks you—and this other gent, which I takes him to be a friend o' yours, and confidential—I asks you, can a man trust his own eyes and his own ears? Can he now, solemn?"

"I've always trusted mine, Fish," answered Scarterfield.

"Same here, master, till awhile ago," replied Fish. "But now I ain't so mortal sure o' that matter as I was! 'Cause, according to my eyes, and according to my ears, I see Netherfield Baxter, and I hear Netherfield Baxter, inside o' three weeks ago!"

He brought down his big hand on the table with a hearty smack as he spoke the last word or two; the sound of it was followed by a dead silence, in which Scarterfield and I exchanged quick glances. Fish picked up his tumbler, took a gulp at its contents, and set it down with emphasis.

"Gospel truth!" he exclaimed.

"That you did see him?" asked Scarterfield.

"Gospel truth, master, that if my eyes and ears is to be trusted I see him and I hear him!" declared Fish. "Only," he continued, after a pause, during which he stared fixedly, first at me, then at Scarterfield. "Only—he said as how he wasn't he! D'ye understand? Denied his-self!"

"What you mean is that the man you took for Baxter said you were mistaken, and that he wasn't Baxter," suggested Scarterfield. "That it?"

"You puts it very plain, master," assented Fish. "That is what did happen. But if the man I refers to wasn't Netherfield Baxter, then I've no more eyes than this here cigar, and no more ears than that glass! Fact!"

"But you've never had reason to doubt either before, I suppose," said Scarterfield. "And you're not inclined to doubt them now. Now then, let's get to business. You really believe, Fish, that you met Netherfield Baxter about three weeks ago? That's about it, isn't it? Never mind what the man said—you took him to be Baxter. Now, where was this?"

"Hull!" replied Fish. "Three weeks ago come Friday."

"Under what circumstances?" asked Scarterfield. "Tell us about it."

"Ain't such a long story, neither," remarked Fish. "And seeing as how, according to Widow Ormthwaite, you're making some inquiries about Baxter, I don't mind telling, 'cause I been mighty puzzled ever since I see this chap. Well, you see, I landed at Hull from my last voyage—been out East'ard and back with a trading vessel what belongs to Hull owners. And before coming home here to Blyth, knocked about a day or two in that port with an old messmate o' mine that I chanced to meet there. Now then one morning—as I say, three weeks ago it is, come this Friday—me and my mate, which his name is Jim Shanks, of Hartlepool, and can corrob'rate, as they call it, what I says—we turns into a certain old-fashioned place there is there in Hull, in a bit of an alley off High Street—you'll know Hull, no doubt, you gentlemen?"

"Never been there," replied Scarterfield.

"I have," said I. "I know it well—especially the High Street."

"Then you'll know, guv'nor, that all round about that High Street there's still a lot o' queer old places as ancient as what it is," continued Fish. "Me and my mate, Shanks, knew one, what we'd oft used in times past—the Goose and Crane, as snug a spot as you'll find in any shipping-town in this here country. Maybe you'll know it?"

"I've seen it from outside, Fish," I answered. "A fine old front—half timber."

"That's it, guv'nor—and as pleasant inside as it's remarkable outside," he said. "Well, my mate and me we goes in there for a morning glass, and into a room where you'll find some interesting folk about that time o' day. There's a sign on the door o' that room, gentlemen, what reads 'For Master Mariners Only,' but it's an old piece of work, and you don't want to take no heed of it—me and Shanks we ain't master mariners, though we may look it in our shore rig-out, and we've used that room whenever we've been in Hull. Well, now we gets our glasses, and our cigars, and we sits down in a quiet corner to enjoy ourselves and observe what company drops in. Some queer old birds there is comes in to that place, I do assure you, gentlemen, and some strange tales o' seafaring life you can hear. Howsomever, there wasn't nothing partic'lar struck me that morning until it was getting on to dinner-time, and me an Shanks was thinking o' laying a course for our lodgings, where we'd ordered a special bit o' dinner to celebrate our happy meeting, like, when in comes the man I'm a talking about. And if he wasn't Netherfield Baxter, what I'd known ever since he was the heighth o' six-pennorth o' copper, then, says I, a man's eyes and a man's ears isn't to be trusted!"

"Fish!" said Scarterfield, who was listening intently. "It'll be best if you give us a description of this man. Tell us, as near as you can, what he's like—I mean, of course the man you saw at the Goose and Crane."

Our visitor seemed to pull his mental faculties together. He took another pull at his glass and several at his cigar.

"Well," he said, "t'aint much in my line, that, me not being a scholar, but I can give a general idea, d'ye see, master. A tallish, good-looking chap, as the women 'ud call handsome, sort of rakish fellow, you understand. Dressed very smart. Blue serge suit—good stuff, new. Straw hat—black band. Brown boots—polished and shining. Quite the swell—as Netherfield always was, even when he'd got through his money. The gentleman! Lord bless your souls, I knew him, for all that I hadn't seen him for several years, and that he'd grown a beard!"

"A beard, eh—" interrupted Scarterfield.

"Beard and moustache," assented Fish.

"What colour?" asked Scarterfield.

"What you might call a golden-brown," replied Fish. "Cut—the beard was—to a point. Suited him."

Scarterfield drew out his pocket-book and produced a slightly-faded photograph—that of a certain good-looking, rather nattish young man, taken in company with a fox-terrier. He handed it to Fish.

"Is that Baxter?" he asked.

"Aye!—as he was, years ago," said Fish. "I know that well enough—used to be one o' them in the phottygrapher's window down the street, outside here. But now, d'ye see, he's grown a beard. Otherwise—the same!"

"Well?" said Scarterfield, "What happened? This man came in. Was he alone?"

"No," replied Fish. "He'd two other men with him. One was a chap about his own age, just as smart as what he was, and dressed similar. T'other was an older man, in his shirt sleeves and without a hat—seemed to me he'd brought Baxter and his friend across from some shop or other to stand 'em a drink. Anyways, he did call for drinks—whisky and soda—and the three on 'em stood together talking. And as soon as I heard Baxter's voice, I was dead sure about him—he'd always a highish voice, talked as gentlemen talks, d'ye see, for, of course, he was brought up that way—high eddicated, you understand?"

"What were these three talking about?" asked Scarterfield.

"Far as I could make out about ship's fittings," answered Fish. "Something 'o that sort, anyway, but I didn't take much notice o' their talk; I was too much taken up watching Baxter, and growing more certain every minute, d'ye see, that it was him. And 'cepting that a few o' years does make a bit o' difference, and that he's grown a beard, I didn't see no great alteration in him. Yet I see one thing."

"Aye?" asked Scarterfield. "What, now?"

"A scar on his left cheek," replied Fish. "What begun underneath his beard, as covered most of it, and went up to his cheek-bone. Just an inch or so showing, d'ye understand? 'That's been knife's work!' thinks I to myself. 'You've had your cheek laid open with a knife, my lad, somewhere and somehow!' Struck me, then, he'd grown a beard to hide it."

"Very likely," assented Scarterfield. "Well, and what happened? You spoke to this man?"

"I waited and watched," continued Fish. "I'm one as has been trained to use his eyes. Now, I see two or three little things about this man as I remembered about Baxter. There was a way he had of chucking up his chin—there it was! Another of playing with his watch-chain when he talked—it was there! And of slapping his leg with his walking-stick—that was there, too! 'Jim!' I says to my mate, 'if that ain't a man I used to know, I'm a Dutchman!' Which, of course, I ain't. And so, when the three of 'em sets down their glasses and turns to the door, I jumps up and makes for my man, holding out a hand to him, friendly. And then, of course, come all the surprise!"

"Didn't know you, I suppose?" suggested Scarterfield.

"I tell 'ee what happened," answered Fish.

"'Morning, Mr. Baxter!' says I. 'It's a long time since I had the pleasure o' seeing you, sir!'—and as I say, shoves my hand out, hearty. He turns and gives me a hard, keen look—not taken aback, mind you, but searching-like. 'You're mistaken, my friend,' he says, quiet, but pleasant. 'You're taking me for somebody else.' 'What!' says I, all of a heap. 'Ain't you Mr. Netherfield Baxter, what I used to know at Blyth, away up North?' 'That I'm certainly not,' says he, as cool as the North Pole. 'Then I ax your pardon, sir,' says I, 'and all I can say is that I never see two gentlemen so much alike in all my born days, and hoping no offence.' 'None at all!' says he, as pleasant as might be. 'They say everybody has a double.' And at that he gives me a polite nod, and out he goes with his pals, and I turns back to Shanks. 'Jim!' says I. 'Don't let me ever trust my eyes and ears no more, Jim!' I says. 'I'm a breaking-up, Jim!—that's what it is. Thinking I sees things when I don't.' 'Stow all that!' says Jim, what's a practical sort o' man. 'You was only mistook' says he. 'I've been in that case more than once,' he says. 'Wherever there's a man, there's another somewheres that's as like him as two peas is like each other; let's go home to dinner,' he says. So we went off to the lodgings, and at first I was sure I'd been mistaken. But later, and now—well, I ain't. That there man was Netherfield Baxter!"

"You feel sure of it?" suggested Scarterfield.

"Aye, certain, master!" declared Fish. "I've had time to think it over, and to reckon it all up, and now I'm sure it was him—only he wasn't going to let out that it was. Now, if I'd only chanced on him when he was by himself, what?"

"You'd have got just the same answer," said the detective laconically. "He didn't want to be known. You saw no more of him in Hull, of course—"

"Yes, I did," answered Fish. "I saw him again that night. And—as regards one of 'em at any rate, in queerish company."

"What was that?" asked Scarterfield.

"Well," replied Fish, "me and Jim Shanks, we went home to dinner—couple o' roast chickens, and a nice bit o' sirloin to follow. And after that we had a nice comfortable sleep for the rest of the afternoon, and then, after a wash-up and a drop o' tea, we went out to look round the town a bit for an evening's diversion, d'ye see. Not to any partic'lar place, but just strolling round, like, as sailor-men will, being ashore and stretching their legs. And it so came about that lateish in the evening we turned into the smoking-room of the Cross Keys, in the Market Place—maybe this here friend o' yours, seeing as he's been in Hull, knows that!"

"I know it, Fish," said I.

"Then you'll know that you goes in at an archway, turns in at your right, and there you are," he said. "Well, Shanks and me, we goes in, casual like, not expecting anything that you wouldn't expect. But we'd no sooner sat us down in that smoking-room and taken an observation that I sees the very man that I'd seen at the Goose and Crane, him that I'd taken for Baxter. There he was, in a corner of the room, and the other smart-dressed man with him, their glasses in front of 'em, and their cigars in their mouths. And with 'em there was something else that I certainly didn't go for to expect to see in that place."

"What?" asked Scarterfield.

"What I seen plenty of, time and again, in various parts o' this here world, and ain't so mighty fond o' seeing," answered Fish, with a scowl. "A chink!"

"A—what?" demanded the detective. "A—chink?"

"He means a Chinaman," I said. "That's it, isn't it, Fish?"

"That's it, guv'nor," assented Fish. "A yellow-skinned, slit-eyed, thin-fingered Chinee, with a face like a image and a voice like silk—which," he added, scowling more than ever, "is pison that I can't abide, nohow, having seen more than enough of."

I looked at Scarterfield. He had been attentive enough all through the course of our visitor's story, but I saw that his attention had redoubled since the last few words.

"A Chinaman!" he said in a low voice. "With—him!"

"As I say, master, a Chinee, and with that there man, what, when all's said and done, I'm certain was and is Netherfield Baxter," reiterated Fish. "But mind you, and here's the queer part of it, he wasn't no common Chinaman. Not the sort that you'll see by the score down in Limehouse way, or in Liverpool, or in Cardiff—not at all. Lord bless you, this here chap was smarter dressed than t'other two! Swell-made dark clothes, gold-handled umbrella, kid gloves on his blooming hands, and a silk top-hat—a reg'lar dude! But—a chink!"

"Well?" said Scarterfield, after a pause, during which he seemed to be thinking a good deal. "Anything happen?"

"Nothing happened, master—what should happen?" replied Fish. "Them here were in their corner, and Jim Shanks and me, we was in ours. They were busied talking amongst themselves—of course, we heard nothing. And at last all three went out."

"Did the man you take to be Baxter look at you?" asked Scarterfield.

"Never showed a sign of it!" declared Fish. "Him and t'other passed us on their way to the door, but he took no notice."

"See him again anywhere?" inquired Scarterfield.

"No, I didn't" replied Fish. "I left Hull early next morning, and went to see relatives o' mine at South Shields. Only came home a day or two since, and happening to pass the time o' day with widow Ormthwaite this morning, I told her what I've told you. Then she told me that you was inquiring about Baxter, guv'nor—so I comes along here to see you. What might you be wanting with my gentleman, now?"

Scarterfield told Fish enough to satisfy and quieten him; and presently the man went away, having first told us that he would be at home for another month. When he had gone Scarterfield turned to me.

"There!" he said. "What d'you think of that, Mr. Middlebrook?"

"What do you think of it?" I suggested.

"I think that Netherfield Baxter is alive and active and up to something," he answered. "And I'd give a good deal to know who that Chinaman is who was with him. But there's ways of finding out a lot now that I've heard all this, Mr. Middlebrook!—I'm off to Hull. Come with me!"

Until that instant such an idea had never entered my head. But I made up my mind there and then.

"I will!" said I. "We'll see this through, Scarterfield. Get a time-table."

 

NBY—SHIP BROKER

There were reasons, other than the suddenly excited desire to follow this business out to whatever end it might come at, which induced me to consent to the detective's suggestion that I should go to Hull with him. As I had said to Solomon Fish, I knew Hull—well enough. In my very youthful days I had spent an annual holiday there, with relatives, and I had vivid recollections of the place.

Already, in those days, they had begun to pull Hull to pieces, laying out fine new streets and open spaces where there had been old-fashioned, narrow alleys and not a little in the slum way. But then, as happily now, there was still the old Hull of the ancient High Street, and the Market Place, and the Land of Green Ginger, and the older docks, wharves, and quays; it had been amongst these survivals of antiquity, and in the great church of Holy Trinity and its scarcely less notable sister of St. Mary in Lowgate that I had loved to wander as a boy—there was a peculiar smell of the sea in Hull, and an atmosphere of seafaring life that I have never met with elsewhere, neither in Wapping nor in Bristol, in Southhampton nor in Liverpool; one felt in Hull that one was already half-way to Bergen or Stockholm or Riga—there was something of North Europe about you as soon as you crossed the bridge at the top of Whitefriargate and plunged into masts and funnels, stacks of fragrant pine, and sheds bursting with foreign merchandise. And I had a sudden itching and half-sentimental desire to see the old seaport again, and once more catch up its appeal and its charm.

"Yes, I'll certainly go with you, Scarterfield!" I repeated. "In for a penny, in for a pound, they say. I wonder, though, what we are in for! You think, really, we're on the track of Netherfield Baxter?"

"Haven't a doubt of it!" asserted Scarterfield, as he turned over the pages of the railway guide. "That man who's just gone was right—that was Baxter he saw. With who knows what of mystery and crime and all sorts of things behind him!"

"Including the murder of one of the Quicks?" I suggested.

"Including some knowledge of it, anyway," he said. "It's a clue, Mr. Middlebrook, and I'm on it. As this man was in Hull, there'll be news of him to be picked up there—very likely in plenty."

"Very well," said I. "I'm with you. Now let's be off."

Going southward by way of Newcastle and York, we got to Hull that night, late—too late to do more than eat our suppers and go to bed at the Station Hotel. And we took things leisurely next morning, breakfasting late and strolling through the older part of the town before, as noon drew near, we approached the Goose and Crane. We had an object in selecting time and place. Fish had told us that the man whom he had seen in company with our particular quarry, the supposed Baxter, had come into the queer old inn in his shirt-sleeves and without his hat—he was therefore probably some neighbouring shop or store-keeper, and in the habit of turning into the ancient hostelry for a drink about noon. Such a man—that man—Scarterfield hoped to encounter. Out of him, if he met him, he could hope to get some news.

Although, as a boy, I had often seen the street front of the Goose and Crane, I had never passed its portals. Now, entering it, we found it to be even more curious inside than it was out. It was a fine relic of Tudor days—a rabbit warren of snug rooms, old furniture, wide chimney places, tiled floors; if the folk who lived in it and the men who frequented it had only worn the right sorts of costume, we might easily have thought ourselves to be back in "Elizabethan times." We easily found the particular room of which Solomon Fish had spoken—there was the door, half open, with its legend on an upper panel in faded gilt letters, "For Master Mariners Only." But, as we had inferred, that warning had been set up in the old days, and was no longer a strict observance; we went into the room unquestioned by guardians or occupants, and calling for refreshments, sat ourselves down to watch and wait.

There were several men in this quaint old parlour; all seemed, in one degree or another, to be connected with the sea. Men, thick-set, sturdy, bronzed, branded in solid suits of good blue cloth, all with that look in the eye which stamps the seafarer. Other men whom one supposed to have something to do with sea-trade—ship's chandlers, perhaps, or shipping-agents. We caught stray whiffs of talk—it was all about the life of the port and of the wide North Sea that stretches away from the Humber. And in the middle of this desultory and apparently aimless business in came a man who, I am sure from my first glimpse of him, was the very man we wanted. A shortish, stiffly-built, paunchy man, with a beefy face, shrewd eyes, and a bristling, iron-gray moustache; a well-dressed man, and sporting a fine gold chain and a diamond pin in his cravat. But—in his shirt sleeves, and without a hat. Scarterfield leaned nearer to me.

"Our man for a million!" he muttered.

"I think so," said I.

The new-comer, evidently well known from the familiar way in which nods and brief salutations were exchanged for him, bustled up to the bar, called for a glass of bitter beer and helped himself to a crust of bread and a bit of cheese from the provender at his elbow. Leaning one elbow on the counter and munching his snack he entered into conversation with one or two men near him; here, again, the talk as far as we could catch it, was of seafaring matters. But we did not catch the name of the man in the shirt-sleeves, and when, after he had finished his refreshment, he nodded to the company and bustled out as quickly as he had entered, Scarterfield gave me a look, and we left the room in his wake, following him.

Our quarry bustled down the alley and turned the corner into the old High Street. He was evidently well known there; we saw several passers-by exchange greetings with him. Always bustling along, as if he were a man whose time was precious, he presently crossed the narrow roadway and turned into an office, over the window of which was a sign—"Jallanby, Ship Broker." He had only got a foot across his threshold, however, when Scarterfield was at his elbow.

"Excuse me, sir," he said politely. "May I have a word with you?"

The man turned, stared, evidently recognized Scarterfield as a stranger he had just seen in the Goose and Crane, and turned from him to me.

"Yes?" he answered questionably. "What is it?"

Scarterfield pulled out his pocket-book and produced his official card.

"You'll see who I am from that," he remarked. "This gentleman's a friend of mine—just now giving me some professional help. I take it you're Mr. Jallanby?"

The ship-broker started a little as he glanced at the card and realized Scarterfield's calling.

"Yes, I'm Mr. Jallanby," he answered. "Come inside, gentlemen." He led the way into a dark, rather dismal and dusty little office, and signed to a clerk who was writing there to go out. "What is it, Mr. Scarterfield?" he asked. "Some information?"

"You've hit it sir," replied Scarterfield. "That's just what we do want; we came here to Hull on purpose to find you, believing you can give it. From something we heard only yesterday afternoon, Mr. Jallanby, a long way from here, we believe that one morning about three weeks ago, you were in the Goose and Crane in that very room where we saw you just now, in company with two men—smartly dressed men, in blue serge suits and straw hats; one of them with a pointed, golden-brown beard. Do you remember?"

I was watching the ship-broker's face while Scarterfield spoke, and I saw that deep interest, wonder, perhaps suspicion was being aroused in him.

"Bless me!" he exclaimed. "You don't mean to say they're—wanted?"

"I mean to say that I want to get some information about them, and very particularly," answered Scarterfield. "You do remember that morning, then?"

"I remember a good many mornings," said Jallanby, readily enough. "I went across there with those two several times while they were in the town. They were doing a bit of business with me—we often dropped in over yonder for a glass before dinner. But—I'm surprised that—well, to put it plainly—that detectives should be inquiring after 'em!—I am, indeed."

"Mr. Jallanby," said Scarterfield, "I'll be plain with you. This is, so far, merely a matter of suspicion. I'm not sure of the identity of one of these men—it's but one I want to trace at present, though I should like to know who the other is. But—if my man is the man I believe him to be, there's a matter of robbery, and possibly of murder. So you see how serious it is! Now, I'll jog your memory a bit. Do you remember that one morning, as you and these two men were leaving the Goose and Crane, a big seafaring-looking man stepped up to the bearded man you were with and claimed acquaintance with him as being one Netherfield Baxter?"

Jallanby started. It was plain that he remembered.

"I do!" he exclaimed. "Well enough! I stood by. But—he said he wasn't. There was a mistake."

"I believe there was no mistake," said Scarterfield. "I believe that man is Netherfield Baxter, and—it's Netherfield Baxter I want. Now, Mr. Jallanby, what do you know of those two? In confidence!"

We had all been standing until then, but at this invitation to disclosure the ship-broker motioned us to sit down, he himself turning the stool which the clerk had just vacated.

"This is a queer business, Mr. Scarterfield," he said. "Robbery? Murder? Nasty things, nasty terms to apply to folk that one's done business with. And that, of course, was all that I did with those two men, and all I know about them. Pleasant, good-mannered, gentlemanly chaps I found 'em—why, Lord bless me, I dined with 'em one night at their hotel!"

"Which hotel?" asked Scarterfield.

"Station Hotel," replied Jallanby. "They were there for ten days or so, while they did their business with me. I never saw aught wrong about 'em either—seemed to be what they represented themselves to be. Certainly they'd plenty of money—for what they wanted here in Hull, anyway. But of course, that's neither here nor there."

"What names did you know them under?" inquired Scarterfield. "And where did they profess to come from?"

"Well, the man with the brownish beard called himself Mr. Norman Belford," answered Jallanby. "I gathered he was from London. The other man was a Frenchman—some French lord or other, from his name, but I forget it. Mr. Belford always called him Vicomte—which I took to be French for our Viscount."

Scarterfield turned and looked at me. And I, too, looked at him. We were thinking of the same thing—old Cazalette's find on the bush in the scrub near the beach at Ravensdene Court. And I could not repress an exclamation.

"The handkerchief!"

Scarterfield coughed. A dry, significant cough—it meant a great deal.

"Aye!" he said. "Just so—the handkerchief! Um!" He turned to the ship-broker. "Mr. Jallanby," he continued, "what did these two want of you? What was their business here in Hull?"

"I can tell you that in a very few words," answered Jallanby. "Simple enough and straight enough, on the surface. So far as I was concerned, anyhow. They came in here one morning, told me they were staying at the Station Hotel, and said that they wanted to buy a small craft of some sort that a small crew could run across the North Sea to the Norwegian fiords—the sort of thing you can manage with three or four, you know. They said they were both amateur yachtsmen, and, of course, I very soon found out that they knew what they were talking about—in fact, between you and me, I should have said that they were as experienced in sea-craft as any man could be!—I soon detected that."

"Aye!" said Scarterfield, with a nod at me. "I dare say you would."

"Well, it so happened that I'd just the very thing they seemed to want," continued the ship-broker. "A vessel that had recently been handed over to me for disposal, and then lying in the Victoria Dock, just at the back here, beyond the old harbour: just the sort of craft that they could sail themselves, with say a man, or a boy or two—I can tell you exactly what she was, if you like."

"It might be very useful to know that," remarked Scattered, with emphasis on the last word. "We may want to identify her."

"Well," said Jallanby, "she was a yawl about eighteen tons register; thirty tons yacht measurement; length forty-two feet; beam thirteen; draught seven and a half feet; square stern; coppered above the water-line; carried main, jib-headed mizen, fore-staysail, and jib, and in addition had a sliding gunter gaff-topsail, and——"

"Here!" interrupted Scarterfield with a smile. "That's all too technical for me to carry in my head! If we want details, I'll trouble you to write 'em down later. But I take it this vessel was all ready for going to sea?"

"Ready any day," asserted Jallanby. "Only just wanted tidying up and storing. As a matter of fact, she'd been in use, quite recently, but she was a bit too solid for her late owner's tastes—the truth was, she'd been originally built for a Penzance fishing-lugger—splendid sea-going boats, those!"

"Do I understand that this vessel could undertake a longish voyage?" asked Scarterfield. "For instance, could they have crossed, say, the Atlantic in her?"

"Atlantic? Lord bless you, yes!" replied the ship-broker. "Or Pacific, either. Go tens o' thousands o' miles in a craft of that soundness, as long as you'd got provisions on board!

"Did they buy her?" asked Scarterfield.

"They did—at once," replied Jallanby. "And paid the money for her—in cash, there and then."

"Cheque?" inquired Scarterfield, laconically.

"No, sir—good Bank of England notes," answered Jallanby. "Oh, they were all right as regards money—in my case, anyway. And you'll find the same as regards the tradesmen they dealt with here—cash on the spot. They fitted her out with provisions as soon as they'd got her—that, of course, took a few days."

"And then went off—to Norway?" asked Scarterfield.

"So I understand," assented Jallanby. "That's what they said. They were going, first of all, to Stavanger—then to Bergen—then further north."

"Just the two of them?" asked Scarterfield.

"Why, no," replied Jallanby. "They were joined, a day or two before they sailed, by a friend of theirs—a Chinaman. Queer combination—Englishman, Frenchman, Chinaman. But this Chinaman, he was a swell—what we should call a gentleman, you know—Mr. Belford told me, in private, that he belonged to the Chinese Ambassador's suite in London."

"Oh!" said Scarterfield. "Just so! A diplomat. And where did he stop—here?"

"Oh, he joined them at the hotel," answered Jallanby. "He'd come there that night I dined with them. Quiet, very gentlemanly little chap—quite the gentleman, you know."

"And—his name?" asked Scarterfield.

But the ship-broker held up a deprecating hand.

"Don't ask me!" he said. "I heard it, but I'm not up to those Chinese names. Still, you'd find it in the hotel register, no doubt. But really, gentlemen, you surprise me!—I should never have thought—yet, you never know who people are, do you? Nice, pleasant, well-behaved fellows these were, and——"

"Ah!" said Scarterfield, with deep significance. "It's a queer world, Mr. Jallanby. Now then, for the moment, oblige me by keeping all this to yourself. But two questions—first, how long since is it that these chaps sailed for Bergen; second, what is the name of this smart little vessel?"

"They sailed precisely three weeks ago next Monday," answered the ship-broker, "and the name of the vessel is the Blanchflower."

We left Mr. Jallanby then, promising to see him again, and went away. I was wondering what the detective made out of all this, and I waited with some curiosity for him to speak. But we had got half way up the old High Street before Scarterfield opened his lips. And then his tone was a blend of speculation and distrust.

"Now, I wonder where those chaps have gone?" he muttered. "Of course they haven't gone to Norway! Of course that Chinese chap wasn't from the Chinese Legation in London! The whole thing's a bluff. By this time they'll have altered the name of that yawl, and gone—where? In search of that buried stuff, to be sure!"

"If the man who called himself Belford is really Baxter, he'll know precisely where it is," I said.

"Aye, just so, Mr. Middlebrook," assented Scarterfield. "But—there's been time in all these years to shift that stuff from one place to another! I haven't the slightest doubt that Belford is Baxter, and that he and his associates bought that vessel as the easiest way of getting the stuff from wherever it's hid—but where are we to look for them and their craft? Have they gone north or south! It would be waste of time and money to cable to the Norwegian ports for news of them—they're not gone there, that I'll swear."

"Scarterfield," said I, feeling convinced on the matter. "If the man's Baxter, and he's after that stuff, he's gone north. The stuff is near Blyth! Dead certain!"

"I dare say you're right," he said slowly. "And as I've found out all there is to find out here in Hull, I suppose a return to Blyth is the most advisable thing. After all, we know what to look out for on that coast—a twenty-ton yawl, with an Englishman, a Frenchman, and a Chinaman aboard her. Very well."

So that afternoon, after seeing the ship-broker again, and making certain arrangements with him in case he heard anything of the Blanchflower and her crew of three queerly-assorted individuals, we retraced our steps northward. But while Scarterfield turned off at Newcastle for Tynemouth and Blyth, I went forward alone, for Alnwick and Ravensdene Court.

CHAPTER XVI
THE PATHLESS WOOD

Being very late in the evening when I arrived at Alnwick, I remained there for that night, and it was not until noon of the next day that I once more reached Ravensdene Court. Lorrimore was there, he had come over to lunch, and for the moment I hoped that he had brought some news from his Chinese servant. But he had heard nothing of Wing since his departure: it would scarcely be Wing's method, he said, to communicate with him by letter; when he had anything to tell, he would either return or act, of his own initiative, upon his acquired information: the way of the Chinaman, he remarked with a knowing look at Mr. Raven, was dark, subtle, and not easily understandable to Western minds.

"And yourself, Middlebrook?" asked Mr. Raven. "What did the detective want, and what have you found out?"

I told them the whole story as we sat at lunch. They were all deeply absorbed, but no one so much as Mr. Cazalette, who, true to his principle of doing no more than crumbling a dry biscuit and sipping a glass or two of sherry at that hour, gave my tale of the doings at Blyth and Hull his undivided attention. And when he had heard me out, he slipped away in silence, evidently very thoughtful, and disappeared into the library.

"So there it all is," I said in conclusion, "and if anybody can make head or tail of it and get a definite and dependable theory, I am sure that Scarterfield, from a professional standpoint, will be glad to hear whatever can be said."

"It seems to me that Scarterfield is on the high road to a very respectable theory already," remarked Lorrimore. "So are you! The thing—to me—appears to be fairly plain. It starts out with the association of Baxter and the dishonest bank-manager. The bank-manager, left in charge of this old-fashioned bank at Blyth, where any supervision of his doings was no doubt pretty slack, and where he was, of course, fully trusted, examines the nature of the various matters committed to his care, and finds out the contents of those Forestburne chests. He then enters into a conspiracy with Baxter for purloining them and some other valuables—those jewels you mentioned, Middlebrook. It would not be a difficult thing to get them away from the bank premises without anyone knowing. Then the two conspirators secrete them in a safe and unlikely place, easily accessible, I take it, from the sea. Probably, they meant to remove them for good and all, just before the dishonest bank-manager's temporary residence in the town came to an end. But his fatal accident occurs. Then Master Baxter is placed in a nice fix! He knows that his fellow-criminal's sudden death will necessarily lead to some examination, more or less thorough, of the effects at the bank. That examination, to be sure, was made. But Baxter has gone, cleared out, vanished, before the result is known. He may have had an idea—we can only guess at it—that suspicion would fall on him. Anyway, he leaves the town, and is never seen in or near it again. If this theory is a true one, things seem pretty clear up to this point."

"Of course," said I, "it is theory! All supposition, you know."

"Right!" assented Lorrimore. "But let us theorise a bit further—I am, you see, merely following out the train of thought which seems to have been set up in you and in Scarterfield. Baxter disappears. Nobody knows where he's gone. There is a veil drawn over a certain period—pretty thickly. But we, who have had occasion to try to pierce it, have seen, so we think, through certain tears and rifts in it. We know that a certain number of years ago there was a trading ship in the Yellow Sea, the Elizabeth Robinson, concerning the fate of which there is more mystery than is quite in accordance with either safety or respectability. She was bound from Hong-Kong to Chemulpo, and she never reached Chemulpo. But we also know that on her, when she left Hong-Kong there were two men, presumably brothers, whose names were Noah Quick and Salter Quick, set down, mind you, not as members of the crew, but as passengers. Also there was a Chinese cook, of the name of Lo Chuh Fen. And there was another man, who called himself Netherfield, and who hailed from Blyth, in Northumberland."

He looked round the table, evidently bent on securing our attention to their particular point. We were all, of course, fully acquainted with the details he was unfolding, but he was summing things up in quite judicial fashion, and there was a certain amount of intellectual satisfaction in listening to a succinct résumé. One of us, at any rate, was following him with rapt attention—Miss Raven. I fancied I saw why—Baxter, or Netherfield, had already presented himself to her as a personage of a dark and romantic, if deeply-wicked and even blood-stained sort.

"Now," continued Lorrimore, becoming more judicial than ever, "according to the official accounts, as shown at Lloyds, the Elizabeth Robinson never reached Chemulpo, and she is—officially—believed to have been lost, with all hands, during a typhoon, in the Yellow Sea. All hands! But we know that, whatever happened to the Elizabeth Robinson, and to the rest of the crew, certain men who were on board her when she left Hong-Kong, for Chemulpo, did escape whatever catastrophe occurred. The Elizabeth Robinson may be at the bottom of the Yellow Sea, and most of her folk with her. But in course of time Noah Quick turns up at Devonport in England, in possession, evidently, of plenty of money. He takes a licensed house, runs it on highly respectable lines, and comports himself as a decent member of society; also he prospers, and has a very good balance at his bankers. So there is one man who certainly did not go down with the Elizabeth Robinson. And now—to keep matters in chronological order—we hear of another. A Chinaman, undoubtedly Lo Chuh Fen, turns up at Lloyds and endeavours to find out if this Elizabeth Robinson ever did reach Chemulpo. There is a strange point here—Lo Chuh Fen certainly sailed out of Hong-Kong with the Elizabeth Robinson, bound for Chemulpo, yet, some years later, he is inquiring in London, if the Elizabeth Robinson ever reached her destination. Why? Did the Elizabeth Robinson touch at any port after leaving Hong-Kong? Did Lo Chuh Fen leave her at any such port? We don't know—and for the moment it is not material; what is material is that a second member of the company on board the Elizabeth Robinson did not go down with her in the Yellow Sea if, as is said, she did go. So there are two survivors—Noah Quick and Lo Chuh Fen. And now a third is added in the person of another Quick—Salter, who turns up at Devonport as the guest of Noah, and who, like his brother, is evidently in possession of a plenitude of this world's goods. He has money in the bank, is a gentleman of leisure, and, like Noah, a person of reserved speech."

Lorrimore was now fairly into his stride, and becoming absorbed in his summing-up. He pushed aside his glass and other table impediments, and leaning forward spoke more earnestly, emphasising his words with equally emphatic gestures.

"A person of reserved speech!" he continued. "But—on one occasion, at any rate, so eager to get hold of information, that he casts his habitual reserve aside. On a certain day in March of this year, Salter Quick, with a handsome amount of ready money in his pocket, leaves Devonport, saying that he is going away for a few days. We next hear of him at an hotel in Alnwick, where he is asking for information about certain churchyards on this Northumbrian coast wherein he will find the graves of people of the name of Netherfield—the name of a man, be it remembered, who was with him and his brother Noah Quick, on board the Elizabeth Robinson. Next morning he meets with Mr. Middlebrook on the headlands between Alnmouth and Ravensdene Court and taking him for an inhabitant of these parts, he puts the same question to him. He accompanies Mr. Middlebrook to an inn on the cliffs; he asks the same question there—and there, evidently to his great discomfiture, he hears that another man, whose identity did not then appear, but who, we now know, was only a casual traveller who was merely repeating Salter Quick's own questions of the previous evening which he had overheard at Alnwick, had been asking similar questions. Why had Salter Quick travelled all the way from Devonport to Northumberland to find the graves of some people named Netherfield? We don't know—but we do know that on the very night of the day on which he had asked his questions of Mr. Middlebrook and of Claigue, the landlord, Salter Quick was murdered. And on that same night, at Devonport, four hundred miles away, his brother, Noah Quick, met a similar fate."

Mr. Cazalette came back into the room. He was carrying a couple of fat quarto books under one arm, and a large folio under the other, and he looked as if he had many important things to communicate. But Miss Raven smilingly motioned him to be seated and silent, and Lorrimore, with a glance at him which a judge might have bestowed on some belated counsel who came tip-toeing into his court, went on.

"Now," he said, "there were certain similarities in these two murders which lead to the supposition that, far apart as they were, they were the work of a gang, working with common purpose. There was no robbery from the person in either instance, though each victim had money and valuables on him to a considerable amount. But each man had been searched. Pockets had been turned out—clothing ripped up. In the case of Salter Quick, we are familiar with the details of the tobacco-box, on the inner lid of which there was a roughly-scratched plan of some place, and of the handkerchief bearing a monogram which Mr. Cazalette discovered near the scene of the murder. These are details—of great importance—the true significance of which does not yet appear. But the real, prime detail is the curious, mysterious connection between the name Netherfield, which Salter Quick was so anxious to find on gravestones in some Northumbrian churchyard or other, and the man of that name who was with him on the Elizabeth Robinson. And we are at once faced with the question—was the man, Netherfield Baxter, who left Blyth some years ago, the man Netherfield, described as of Blyth, whose name was on the Elizabeth Robinson's list?"

Mr. Raven treated us to one of his characteristic sniffs. He had a way, when he was stating what he considered to be a dead certainty, or when he was assenting to one, of throwing up his head and sniffing, with a somewhat cynical smile as accompaniment. He sniffed now, and Lorrimore went on—to a peroration.

"There can be no doubt about it!" he said with emphasis. "A Blyth man, a seafarer, named Solomon Fish, chances to be in Hull and, in a tavern there which is evidently the resort of sea-faring folk, sees a man whom he instantly recognizes as Netherfield Baxter, whom he had known as child, boy and young man. He accosts him—the man denies it. We need pay no attention whatever to that denial: we may be quite sure from the testimony of Fish that the man is Baxter. Now then, what is Baxter doing? He is evidently in possession of ample funds—he and his companions buy a small vessel, a twenty-ton yawl, in which, they said, they want to cross the North Sea to the Norwegian fiords. And who are his companions? One is a Chinaman. Probably Lo Chuh Fen. The other is a Frenchman, who, says Mr. Jallanby, the Hull ship-broker, was addressed as Vicomte. He, probably, is an adventurer, and a criminous one, like Baxter, and—he is also probably the owner of the handkerchief which Mr. Cazalette found, stained with Salter Quick's blood!"

Lorrimore paused a moment, looking round to see how this impressed us. The last suggestion was new to me, but I saw its reasonableness and nodded. Lorrimore nodded back, and continued.

"Now a last word," he said. "I, personally, haven't a doubt that these three, one or other of 'em, murdered the Quicks, and that they're now going to take up that swag which Baxter and the dishonest bank-manager safely planted somewhere. But—I don't believe it's buried or secreted in any out-of-the-way place on the coast. I know where I should look for it, and where Scarterfield ought to search for it."

"Where, then?" I exclaimed.

"Well," he answered, "the thing is—to consider what those fellows were likely to do with the old monastic plate and the jewels and so on when they'd got them. They probably knew that the ancient chalices, reliquaries, and that sort of thing would fetch big prices, sold privately to collectors—especially to American collectors, who, as everybody knows, are not at all squeamish or particular about the antecedents of property so long as they secure it. I should say that Baxter, acting for his partner in crime, stored these things, and has waited for a favourable opportunity to resume possession of them. I incline to the opinion that he stored them at Hartlepool, or at Newcastle, or at South-Shields—at any place whence they could easily be transferred by ship. He may, indeed, have stored them at Liverpool, for easy transit across the Atlantic. I don't believe in the theory that they're planted in some hole-and-corner of the coast."

"In that case, what becomes of Salter Quick's search for the graves of the Netherfields?" I suggested.

"Can't say," replied Lorrimore, with a shrug of his shoulders. "But Salter Quick may have got hold of the wrong tale, or half a tale, or mixed things up. Anyway, that's my opinion—that this stolen property is not cached anywhere, but is somewhere within four respectable walls, and if I were Scarterfield, I should communicate with stores and repositories asking for information about goods left with them some time ago and not yet reclaimed."

"Good idea!" agreed Mr. Raven. "Much more likely than the buried treasure notion."

"To which, however, I incline," I said stubbornly. "When Salter Quick sought for the graves of the Netherfields, he had a purpose."

Mr. Cazalette came nearer the table with his big volumes. It was very evident that he had made some discovery and was anxious to tell us of it.

"Before you go any further into that matter," said he, laying down his burdens, "there are one or two things I should like to draw your attention to in connection with what Middlebrook told us before I left the room just a while since. Now about that monastic plate, Middlebrook, of which you've seen the inventories—you may not be aware of it, but there's a reference to that matter in Dryman's 'History of the Religious Foundations of Northumberland' which I will now read to you. Hear you this, now:

"Abbey of Forestburne.—It is well known that the altar vessels, plate, and jewels of this house were considerable in number and in value, but were never handed over to the custodians of the King's Treasury House in London. They were duly inventoried by the receivers in these parts, and there are letters extant recording their dispatch to London. But they never reached their destination, and it is commonly believed that like a great deal more of the monastic property of the Northern districts these valuables were appropriated by high-placed persons of the neighbourhood who employed their underlings, marked and disguised, to waylay and despoil the messengers entrusted to carry them Southward. N. B.—These foregoing remarks apply to the plate and jewels which appertained to the adjacent Priory of Mellerton, which were also of great value."

"So," continued Mr. Cazalette, "there's no doubt, in my mind, anyway, that the plate of which Middlebrook saw the inventories is just what they describe it to be, and that it came, in course of time, into the hands of the Lord Forestburne who deposited it in yon bank. And now," he went on, opening the biggest of his volumes, "here's the file of a local paper which your respected predecessor, Mr. Raven, had the good sense to keep, and I've turned up the account of the inquest that was held at Blyth on yon dishonest bank-manager. And there's a bit of evidence here that nobody seems to have drawn Scarterfield's attention to. 'The deceased gentleman,' it reads, 'was very fond of the sea, and frequently made excursions along our beautiful coast in a small yacht which he hired from Messrs. Capsticks, the well-known boat-builders of the town. It will be remembered that he had a particular liking for night-sailing, and would often sail his yacht out of harbour late of an evening in order, as he said, to enjoy the wonderful effects of moonlight on sea and coast.' That, you'll bear in mind," concluded Mr. Cazalette, with a more than usually sardonic grin, "was penned by some fatuous reporter before they knew that the deceased gentleman had robbed the bank. And no doubt it was on those night excursions that he, and this man Baxter that we've heard of, carried away the stolen valuables, and safely hid them in some quiet spot on this coast—and there you'll see, they'll be found all in good time. And as sure as my name is what it is, Dr. Lorrimore, it was that spot that Salter Quick was after—only he wasn't exactly certain where it was, and had somehow got mixed about the graves of the Netherfields. Man alive! yon plate of the old monks is buried under some Netherfield headstone at this minute!"

"Don't believe it, sir!" said Lorrimore. "It's much more likely to be stored in some handy seaport where it can be easily called for without attracting attention. And if Middlebrook'll give me Scarterfield's address that's what I'm going to suggest to him."

I suppose Lorrimore wrote to the detective. But during the next few days I heard nothing from Scarterfield; indeed nobody heard anything new from anywhere. I believe that Scarterfield from Blyth, gave some hints to the coastguard people about keeping a look-out for the Blanchflower, but I am not sure of it. However, two of us at Ravensdene Court took a mutual liking for walks along the loneliest stretches of the coast—myself and Miss Raven. Before my journey to Blyth and Hull, she and I had already taken to going for afternoon excursions together; now we lengthened them, going out after lunch and remaining away until we had only just time to return home by the dinner-hour. I think we had some vague idea that we might possibly discover something—perhaps find some trace, we knew not of what. Then we were led, unexpectedly, as such things always do happen, to the threshold of our great and perilous adventure. Going further afield than usual one day, and, about five o'clock of a spring afternoon, straying into a solitary ravine that opened up before us on the moors that stretched to the very edge of the coast, we came upon an ancient wood of dwarf oak, so venerable and time-worn in appearance that it looked like a survival of the Druid age. There was not an opening to be seen in its thick undergrowth, nor any sign of path or track through it, but it was with a mutual consent and understanding that we made our way into its intense silence.

CHAPTER XVII
HUMFREY DE KNAYTHVILLE

In order to arrive at a proper understanding of the peculiar circumstances and position in which Miss Raven and myself very shortly found ourselves placed, it is necessary to give some information as to the geographical situation of the wood into which we plunged, more I think, out of a mingled feeling of curiosity and mystery than of anything else. We had then walked several miles from Ravensdene Court in a northerly direction, but instead of keeping to the direct line of the cliffs and headlands we had followed an inland track along the moors, which, however, was never at any point of its tortuous way more than a mile from the coast. The last mile or two of this had been through absolute solitudes—save for a lonely farmstead, or shepherd's cottage, seen far off on the rising ground, further inland, we had not seen a sign of human habitation. Nor that afternoon did we see any sail on the broad stretch of sea at our right, nor even the smoke-trail of any passing steamer on the horizon. Yet the place we now approached seemed even more solitary. We came to a sort of ravine, a deep fissure in the line of the land, on the south side of which lay the wood of ancient oak of which I have spoken. Beyond it, on the northern side, the further edge of this ravine rose steeply, masses of scarred limestone jutting out of its escarpments; it seemed to me that at the foot of the wood and in the deepest part of this natural declension, there would be a burn, a stream, that ran downwards from the moor to the sea. I think we had some idea of getting down to this, following its course to its outlet on the beach, and returning homeward by way of the sands.

The wood into which we made our way was well-nigh impregnable; it seemed to me that for age upon age its undergrowth had run riot, untrimmed, unchecked, until at last it had become a matted growth of interwoven, strangely twisted boughs and tendrils. It was only by turning in first one, then another direction through it that we made any progress in the downward direction we desired; sometimes it was a matter of forcing one's way between the thickly twisted obstacles. We exchanged laughing remarks about our having found the forest primeval; before long each was plentifully adorned with scratches and tears. All around us the silence was intense; there was no singing of birds nor humming of insects in that wood. But more than once we came across bones—the whitened skeletons of animals that had sought these shades and died there or had been dragged into them and torn to pieces by their fellow beasts. Altogether there was an atmosphere of eeriness and gloom in that wood, and I began—more for my companion's sake than my own—to long for a glimpse of some outlet, a sight of the sunlit sea beyond, and for the murmur of the burn which I felt sure, ran rippling coast-wards beneath the fringes of this almost impassable thicket.

And then at the end of quite half-an-hour's struggling, borne, I must say, by Miss Raven, with the truly sporting spirit which was a part of her general character, a sudden exclamation from her, as she pushed her way through a clump of wilding a little in advance of me, caused me to look ahead.

"There's some building just in front of us!" she said. "See—grey stones—a ruin!"

I looked in the direction she indicated, and through the interstices of the thickly-leaved branches, just then prodigal of their first spring foliage, saw, as she said, a grey wall, venerable and time-stained, rising in front. I could see the topmost stones, a sort of broken parapet, ivy clustering about it, and beneath the green of the ivy, a fragment of some ornamentation and the cavernous gloom of a window place from which glass and tracery had long since gone.

"That's something to make for, anyway," I said. "Some old tower or other. Yet I don't remember anything of the sort, marked on the maps."

We pushed forward, and came out on a little clearing. Immediately in front of us stood the masonry of which we had caught glimpses; a low, squat, square tower, some forty feet in height, ruinous as to the most part, but having the side facing us nearly perfect and still boasting a fine old doorway which I set down as of Norman architecture. North of this lay a mass of fallen masonry, a long line of grass-grown, weed-encumbered stone, which was evidently the ruin of a wall; here and there in the clearing were similar smaller masses. Rank weed, bramblebush, beds of nettles, encumbered the whole place; it was a scene of ruin and desolation. But a mere glance was sufficient to show me that we had come by accident on a once sacred spot.

"Why this," said I, as we paused at the edge of the wood, "this is the ruin of some ancient church, or perhaps of a religious house! Look at the niche there above the arch of the door—there's been an image in that—and at the general run of the stone lying about. Certainly this is an old church! Why have we never heard of it?"

"Utterly forgotten, I should think," said Miss Raven. "It must be a long time since there were people about here to come to it."

"Probably a village down on the coast—now swept away," I remarked. "But we must look this place out in the local books. Meanwhile let's explore it."

We began to look about the clearing. The tower was almost gone as to three sides of it; the fourth was fairly intact. A line of fallen masonry lay to the north and was continued a little on the east, where it rose into a higher, ivy-covered mass. Within this again was another, less obvious line, similar in plan, and also covered with unchecked growth: within that the uneven surface of the ground was thickly encumbered with rank weeds, beds of thistle, beds of nettle, and a plenitude of bramble and gorse; in one place towards the eastern mass of overgrown wall, a great clump of gorse had grown to such a height and thickness as to form an impenetrable screen. And, peering and prying about, suddenly we came, between this screen and the foot of the tower on signs of great slabs of stone, over the edges of which the coarse grass had grown, and whose surfaces were thickly encumbered with moss and lichen.

"Gravestones!" said Miss Raven. "But—I suppose they're quite worn and illegible."

I got down on my knees at one of the slabs less encumbered than the others and began to tear away the grass and weed. There was a rich, thick carpet of moss on it, and a fringe of grey, clinging lichen, but by the aid of a stout pocket-knife I forced it away, and laid bare a considerable surface of the upper half of the stone. And now that the moss, which had formed a sort of protecting cover, was removed, we saw lettering, worn and smoothed at its edges in common with the rest of the slab, but still to be made out with a little patience.

There may be—probably is—a certain density in me, a slowness of intuition and perception, but it is the fact that at this time and for some minutes later, I had not the faintest suspicion that we had accidentally lighted upon something connected with the mystery of Salter Quick. All I thought of, I think, just then was that we had come across some old relic of antiquity—the church of some coast hamlet or village which had long been left to the ruinous work of time, and my only immediate interest was in endeavouring to decipher the half-worn-out inscription on the stone by which I was kneeling. While my companion stood by me, watching with eager attention, I scraped out the earth and moss and lichen from the lettering—fortunately, it had been deeply incised in the stone—a hard and durable sort—and much of it remained legible, once the rubbish had been cleared from it. Presently I made out at any rate several words and figures:

Hic jacet dominus ....
Humfrey de Knaythville ...
quond' vicari huius .
ecclie qui obéit .......
anno dei mccccxix ....

Beneath these lines were two or three others, presumably words of scripture, which had evidently become worn away before the moss spread its protecting carpet over the others. But we had learnt something.

"There we are!" said I, regarding the result of my labours with proud satisfaction. "There it runs—'Here lies the lord, or master, Humphrey de Knaythville, sometime vicar of this church, who died in the year of our Lord one thousand four hundred and nineteen'—nearly six hundred years ago! A good find!"

"Splendid!" exclaimed Miss Raven, already excited to enthusiasm by these antiquarian discoveries. "I wonder if there are inscriptions on the other tombs?"

"No doubt," I assented, "and perhaps some, or things of interest, on this fallen masonry. This place is well worth careful examination, and I'm wondering how it is that I haven't come across any reference to it in the local books. But to be sure, I haven't read them very fully or carefully—Mr. Cazalette may know of it. We shall have something to tell him."

We began to look round again. I wandered into the base of the tower; Miss Raven began to explore the weed-choked ground towards the east end. Suddenly I heard a sharp, startled exclamation from her. Turning, I saw her standing by the great clump of overgrown gorse of which I have already spoken. She glanced at me; then at something behind the gorse.

"What is it?" I asked.

Unconsciously, she lowered her voice, at the same time glancing, half-nervously, at the thick undergrowth of the wood.

"Come here!" she said. "Come!"

I went across the weed-grown surface to her side. She pointed behind the gorse-bush.

"Look there!" she whispered.

I knew as soon as I looked that we were not alone in that wild, solitary-seeming spot; that there were human ears listening, and human eyes watching; that we were probably in danger. There behind the yellow-starred clump of green was what at first sight appeared to be a newly-opened grave, but was in reality a freshly-dug excavation; a heap of soil and stone, just flung out, lay by it; on this some hand had flung down a mattock; near it rested a pick. And suddenly, as by a heaven-sent inspiration, I saw things. We had stumbled on the graveyard which Salter Quick had wished to find; de Knaythville and Netherfield were identical terms which had got mixed up in his uneducated mind; here the missing treasure was buried, and we had walked into this utterly deserted spot to interrupt—what, and who?

Before I could say a word, I heard Miss Raven catch her breath; then another sharp exclamation came from her lips—stifled, but clear.

"Oh, I say!" she cried. "Who—who are these—these men?"

Her hand moved instinctively towards my arm as she spoke, and as I drew it within my grasp I felt that she was trembling a little. And in that same instant, turning quickly in the direction she indicated, I became aware of the presence of two men who had quietly stepped out from the shelter of the high undergrowth on the landward side of the clearing and stood silently watching us. They were attired in something of the fashion of seamen, in rough trousers and jerseys, but I saw at first glance that they were not common men. Indeed, I saw more, and realized with a sickening feeling of apprehension that our wandering into that place had brought us face to face with danger. One of the two, a tallish, slender-built, good-looking man, not at all unpleasant to look on if it had not been for a certain sinister and cold expression of eye and mouth, I recognized as a stranger whom I had noticed at the coroner's inquest on Salter Quick and had then taken for some gentleman of the neighbourhood. The other, I felt sure, was Netherfield Baxter. There was the golden-brown beard of which Fish had told me and Scarterfield; there, too, was the half-hidden scar on the left cheek. I had no doubt whatever that Miss Raven and myself were in the hands of the two men who had bought the Blanchflower from Jallanby, the ship-broker of Hull.

The four of us stood steadily gazing at each other for what seemed to be a long and—to me—a painful minute. Then the man whom I took to be Baxter moved a little nearer to us; his companion, hands in pockets, but watchful enough, lounged after him.

"Well, sir?" said Baxter, lifting his cap as he glanced at Miss Raven. "Don't think me too abrupt, nor intentionally rude, if I ask you what you and this young lady are doing here?"

His voice was that of a man of education and even of refinement, and his tone polite enough; there was something of apology in it. But it was also sharp, business-like, compelling; I saw at once that this was a man whose character was essentially matter-of-fact, and who would not allow himself to stick at trifles, and I judged it best to be plain in my answer.

"If you really want to know," I replied, "we are here by sheer accident. Exploring the wood for the mere fun of the thing, we chanced upon these ruins and have been examining them, that's all?"

"You didn't come here with any set purpose?" he asked, looking from one to the other. "You weren't seeking this place?"

"Certainly not!" said I. "We hadn't the faintest notion that such a place was to be found."

"But here it is, anyway," he said. "And—there you are! In the possession of the knowledge of it. And so—you'll excuse me—I must ask a question. Who are you? Tourists? Or—do you live hereabouts?"

The other man made a remark under his breath, in some foreign language, eyeing me the while. And Baxter spoke again watching me.

"I think you, at any rate, are a resident?" he said. "My friend has seen you before in these parts."

"I have seen him," I said unthinkingly. "I saw him amongst the people at Salter Quick's inquest."

The faintest shadow of an understanding glance passed between the two men, and Baxter's face grew stern.

"Just so!" he remarked. "That makes it all the more necessary to repeat my question. Who are you—both?"

"My name is Middlebrook, if you must know," I answered. "And I am not a resident of these parts—I am visiting here. As for this lady, she is Miss Raven, the niece of Mr. Francis Raven, of Ravensdene Court. And really—"

He waved his hand as if to deprecate any remonstrance or threat on my part, and bowed as politely to my companion as if I had just given him a formal introduction to her.

"No harm shall come to you, Miss Raven," he said, with evidently honest assurance. "None whatever!"

"Nor to Mr. Middlebrook, either, I should hope!" exclaimed Miss Raven, almost indignantly.

He smiled, showing a set of very white, strong teeth.

"That depends on Mr. Middlebrook," he said. "If Mr. Middlebrook behaves like a good and reasonable boy—Mr. Middlebrook," he went on, interrupting himself and turning on me with a direct look, "a plain question? Are you armed?"

"Armed!" I retorted scornfully. "Do you think I carry a revolver on an innocent country stroll?"

"We do!" he answered with another smile. "You see, we don't know with whom we may meet. It was a million to one—perhaps more—against our meeting anybody this afternoon, yet—we've met you."

"We are sorry to have interrupted you," I said, not without a touch of satirical meaning. "We won't interrupt any longer if you will permit us to say good-day."

I motioned to Miss Raven to follow me, and made to move. But Baxter laughed a little and shook his head.

"I'm not sure that we can allow that, just yet," he said. "It is unfortunate—I offer a thousand apologies to Miss Raven, but business is business, and—"

"Do you mean to tell me that you intend to interfere with our movements, just because you chance to find us here?" I demanded. "If so—"

"Don't let us quarrel or get excited," he said, with another wave of his hand. "I have said that no harm shall come to you—a little temporary inconvenience, perhaps, but—however, excuse me for a moment."

He stepped back to his companion; together they began to whisper, occasionally glancing at us.

"What does he mean?" murmured Miss Raven. "Do they want to keep us—here?"

"I don't know what they intend," I said. "But—don't be afraid."

"I'm not afraid," she answered. "Only—I've a pretty good idea of who it is that we've come across! And—so have you?"

"Yes," I replied. "Unfortunately, I have. And—we're at their mercy. There's nothing for it but to obey, I think."

Baxter suddenly turned back to us. It was clear that his mind was made up.

"Miss Raven—Mr. Middlebrook," he said. "I'm sorry, but we can't let you go. The fact is, you've had the bad luck to light on a certain affair of ours about which we can't take any chances. We have a yacht lying outside here—you'll have to go with us on board and to remain there for a day or two. I assure you, no harm shall come to either of you. And as we want to get on with our work here—will you please to come, now?"

We went—silently. There was nothing else to do. In a similar silence they led us through the rest of the wood, along the side of the stream which I had expected to find there, and to a small boat that lay hidden by the mouth of the creek. As they rowed us away in it, and rounded a spit of land, we saw the yacht, lying under a bluff of the cliffs. Ten minutes' stiff pulling brought us alongside—and for a moment, as I glanced up at her rail, I saw the yellow face of a Chinaman looking down on us. Then it vanished.

CHAPTER XVIII
THE PLUM CAKE

In the few moments which elapsed between my catching sight of that yellow face peering at us from the rail and our setting foot on the deck of what was virtually a temporary prison, I had time to arrive at a fairly conclusive estimate of our situation. Without doubt we were in the hands of Netherfield Baxter and his gang; without doubt this was the craft which they had bought from the Hull ship broker; without doubt the reason of its presence on this lonely stretch of the coast lay in the proceedings amongst the ruins beneath whose walls we had come face to face with our captors. I saw—or believed that I saw—through the whole thing. Baxter and his accomplices had bought the yawl, ostensibly for a trip to the Norwegian fjords, but in reality that they might sail it up the coast, in the capacity of private yachtsmen, recover the treasure which had been buried near the tombs of the de Knaythevilles, and then—go elsewhere. Miss Raven and I had broken in upon their operations, and we were to pay for the accident with our liberty. I was not concerned about myself—I fancied that I saw a certain amount of honesty in Baxter's assurances—but I was anxious about my companion, and about her uncle's anxiety. Miss Raven was not the sort of girl to be easily frightened, but the situation, after all, was far from pleasant—there we were, defenceless, amongst men who were engaged in a dark and desperate adventure, whose hands were probably far from clean in the matter of murder, and who, if need arose, would doubtless pay small regard to our well-being or safety. Yet—there was nothing else for it but to accept the situation.

We went on deck. The vessel was at anchor; she lay, a thing of idleness, quiet and peaceful enough, in a sheltered cove, wherein, I saw at a glance, she was lost to sight from the open sea outside the bar at its entrance, and hid from all but the actual coastline of the land. And all was quiet on her clean, freshly-scoured decks—she looked, seen at close quarters, just what her possessors, of course, desired her to be taken for—a gentleman's pleasure yacht, the crew of which had nothing to do but keep her smart and bright. No one stepping aboard her would have suspected piracy or nefarious doings. And when we boarded her, there was nobody visible—the Chinaman whom I had seen looking over the side had disappeared, and from stem to stern there was not a sign of human life. But as Miss Raven and I stood side by side, glancing about us with curiosity, a homely-looking grey cat came rubbing its shoulder against the woodwork and from somewhere forward, where a wisp of blue smoke escaped from the chimney of the cook's galley, we caught a whiff of a familiar sort—somebody, somewhere, was toasting bread or tea-cakes.

We stood idle, like prisoners awaiting orders, while our captors transferred from the boat to the yawl two biggish, iron-hooped chests, the wood of which was stained and discoloured with earth and clay. They were heavy chests, and they used tackle to get them aboard, setting them down close by where we stood. I looked at them with a good deal of interest; then, remembering that Miss Raven was fully conversant with all that Scarterfield had discovered at Blyth, I touched her elbow, directing her attention to the two bulky objects before us.

"Those are the chests that disappeared from the bank at Blyth," I whispered. "Now you understand?"

She gave me a quick, comprehending look.

"Then we are in the hands of Netherfield Baxter?" she murmured. "That man—there."

"Without a doubt," I answered. "And the thing is—show no fear."

"I'm not a scrap afraid," she answered. "It's exciting! And—he's rather interesting, isn't he?"

"Gentlemen of his kidney usually are, I believe," I replied. "All the same, I should much prefer his room to his company."

Baxter just then came over to us, rubbing from his fingers the soil which had gathered on them from handling the chests. He smiled politely, with something of the air of a host who wants to apologise for the only accommodation he can offer.

"Now, Miss Raven," he said, with an accent of almost benevolent indulgence, "as we shall be obliged to inflict our hospitality upon you for a day or two—I hope it won't be for longer, for your sake—let me show you what we can give you in the way of quarters to yourself. We can't offer you the services of a maid, but there is a good cabin, well fitted, in which you'll be comfortable, and you can regard it as your own domain while you're with us. Come this way."

He led us down a short gangway, across a sort of small saloon evidently used as common-room by himself and his companion, and threw open the door of a neat though very small cabin.

"Never been used," he said with another smile. "Fitted up by the previous owner of this craft, and all in order, as you see. Consider it as your own, Miss Raven, while you're our guest. One of my men shall see that you've whatever you need in the way of towels, hot water, and the like. If you'll step in and look round, I'll send him to you now. As he's a Chinaman, you'll find him as handy as a French maid. Give him any orders or instructions you like. And then come on deck again, if you please, and you shall have some tea."

He beckoned me to follow him as Miss Raven walked into her quarters, and he gave me a reassuring look as we crossed the outer cabin.

"She'll be perfectly safe and secluded in there," he said. "You can mount guard here if you like, Mr. Middlebrook—in fact, this is the only place I can offer you for quarters for yourself—I dare say you can manage to make a night's rest on one of these lounges, with the help of some rugs and cushions, and we've plenty of both."

"I'm all right, thank you," said I. "Don't trouble about me. My only concern is about Miss Raven."

"I'll take good care that Miss Raven is safe in everything," he answered. "As safe as if she were in her uncle's house. So don't bother your head on that score—I've given my word."

"I don't doubt it," I said. "But as regards her uncle—I want to speak to you about him."

"A moment," he replied. "Excuse me." We were on deck again, and he went forward, poked his head into an open hatchway, and gave some order to an unseen person. A moment later a Chinaman, the same whose face I had seen as we came aboard, shot out of the hatchway, glided past me as he crossed the deck with silent tread, and vanished into the cabin we had just left. Baxter came back to me, pulling out a cigarette case. "Yes?" he said, offering it. "About Mr. Raven?"

"Mr. Raven," said I, "will be in great anxiety about his niece. She is the only relative he has, I believe, and he will be extremely anxious if she does not return this evening. He is a nervous, highly-strung man—"

He interrupted me with a wave of his cigarette.

"I've thought of all that," he said. "Mr. Raven shall not be kept in anxiety. As a matter of fact, my friend, whom you met with me up there at the ruins, is going ashore again in a few minutes. He will go straight to the nearest telegraph office, which is a mile or two inland, and there he will send a wire to Mr. Raven—from you. Mr. Raven will get it by, say, seven o'clock. The thing is—how will you word it?"

We looked at each other. In that exchange of glances, I could see that he was a man who was quick at appreciating difficulties and that he saw the peculiar niceties of the present one.

"That's a pretty stiff question!" said I.

"Just so!" he agreed. "It is. So take my advice. Instead of having the wire sent from the nearest office, do this—my friend, as a matter of fact, is going on by rail to Berwick. Let him send a wire from there: it will only mean that Mr. Raven will get it an hour or so later. Say that you and Miss Raven find you cannot get home to-night, and that she is quite safe—word it in any reassuring way you like."

I gave him a keen glance.

"The thing is," said I. "Can we get home tomorrow?"

"Well—possibly tomorrow night—late," he answered. "I will do my best. I may be—I hope to be—through with my business tomorrow afternoon. Then—"

At that moment the other man appeared on deck, emerging from somewhere. He had changed his clothes—he now presented himself in a smart tweed suit, Homburg hat, polished shoes, gloves, walking cane. Baxter signed to him to wait, turning to me.

"That's the wisest thing to do," he remarked. "Draft your wire."

I wrote out a message which I hoped would allay Mr. Raven's anxieties and handed it to him. He read it over, nodded as if in approbation, and went across to the other man. For a moment or two they stood talking in low tones; then the other man went over the side, dropped into the boat which lay there, and pulled himself off shorewards. Baxter came back to me.

"He'll send that from Berwick railway station as soon as he gets there, at six-thirty," he said. "It should be delivered at Ravensdene Court by eight. So there's no need to worry further, you can tell Miss Raven. And when all's said and done, Mr. Middlebrook, it wasn't my fault that you and she broke in upon very private doings up there in the old churchyard—nor, I suppose, yours either. Make the best of it!—it's only a temporary detention."

I was watching him closely as he talked, and suddenly I made up my mind to speak out. It might be foolish, even dangerous, to do it, but I had an intuitive feeling that it would be neither.

"I believe," I said, brusquely enough, "that I am speaking to Mr. Netherfield Baxter?"

He returned me a sharp glance which was half-smiling. Certainly there was no astonishment in it.

"Aye!" he answered. "I thought, somehow, that you might be thinking that! Well, and suppose I admit it, Mr. Middlebrook? What then? And what do you—a Londoner, I think you told me—know of Netherfield Baxter?"

"You wish to know?" I asked. "Shall I be plain?"

"As a pike-staff, if you like," he replied. "I prefer it."

"Well," said I, "a good many things—recently discovered by accident. That you formerly lived at Blyth, and had some association with a certain temporary bank-manager there, about whose death—and the disappearance of some valuable portable property—there was a good deal of concern manifested about the time that you left Blyth. That you were never heard of again until recently, when a Blyth man recognized you in Hull, where you bought a yawl—this yawl, I believe—and said you were going to Norway in her. And that—but am I to be still more explicit?"

"Why not?" said he with a laugh. "Forewarned is forearmed. You're giving me valuable information."

"Very well, Mr. Baxter," I continued, determined to show him my cards. "There's a certain detective, one Scarterfield, a sharp man, who is very anxious to make your acquaintance. For if you want the plain truth, he believes you, or some of your accomplices, or you and they together, to have had a hand in the murders of Noah and Salter Quick. And he's on your track."

I was watching him still more closely as I spoke the last sentence or two. He remained as calm and cool as ever, and I was somewhat taken aback by the collected fashion in which he not only replied to my glance, but answered my words.

"Scarterfield—of whose doings I've heard a bit—has got hold of the wrong end of the stick there, Mr. Middlebrook," he said quietly. "I had no hand in murdering either Noah Quick or his brother Salter. Nor had my friend—the man who's just gone off with your telegram. I don't know who murdered those men. But I know that there have always been men who were ready to murder them if they got the chance, and I wasn't the least surprised to hear that they had been murdered. The wonder is that they escaped murder as long as they did! But beyond the fact that they were murdered, I know nothing—nor does anybody on board this craft. You and Miss Raven are amongst—well, you can call us pirates if you like, buccaneers, adventurers, anything!—but we're not murderers. We know nothing whatever about the murders of Noah and Salter Quick—except what we've read in the papers."

I believed him. And I made haste to say so—out of a sheer relief to know that Miss Raven was not amongst men whose hands were stained with blood.

"Thank you," he said, as coolly as ever. "I'm obliged to you. I've been anxious enough to know who did murder those two men. As I say, I felt no surprise when I heard of the murders."

"You knew them—the Quicks?" I suggested.

"Did I?" he answered with a cynical laugh. "Didn't I? They were a couple of rank bad 'uns! I have never professed sanctity, Mr. Middlebrook, but Noah and Salter Quick were of a brand that's far beyond me—they were bad men. I'll tell you more of 'em, later—here's Miss Raven."

"I may as well tell you," I murmured hastily, "that Miss Raven knows as much as I do about all that I've just told you."

"That so?" he said. "Um! And she looks a sensible sort of lass, too—well, I'll tell you both what I know—as I say, later. But now—some tea!"

While he went forward to give his orders, I contrived to inform Miss Raven of the gist of our recent conversation, and to assert my own private belief in Baxter's innocence. I saw that she was already prejudiced in his favour.

"I'm glad to know that," she said. "But in that case—the mystery's all the deeper. What is it, I wonder, that he can tell."

"Wait till he speaks," said I. "We shall learn something."

Baxter came back, presently followed by the little Chinaman whom I had seen before, who deftly set up a small table on deck, drew chairs round it, and a few minutes later spread out all the necessaries of a dainty afternoon tea. And in the centre of them was a plum cake. I saw Miss Raven glance at it; I glanced at her; I knew of what she was thinking. Her thoughts had flown to the plum cake at Lorrimore's, made by Wing, his Chinese servant.

But whatever we thought, we said nothing. The situation was romantic, and not without some attraction, even in those curious circumstances. Here we were, prisoners, first-class prisoners, if you will, but still prisoners, and there was our gaoler; he and ourselves sat round a tea-table, munching toast, nibbling cakes and dainties, sipping fragrant tea, as if we had been in any lady's drawing-room. I think it speaks well for all of us that we realized the situation and made the most of it by affecting to ignore the actual reality. We chatted, as well-behaved people should under similar conditions, about anything but the prime fact of our imprisonment; Baxter, indeed, might have been our very polite and attentive host and we his willing guests. As for Miss Raven, she accepted the whole thing with hearty good humour and poured out the tea as if she had been familiar with our new quarters for many a long day; moreover, she adopted a friendly attitude towards our captors which did much towards smoothing any present difficulties.

"You seem to be very well accommodated in the matter of servants, Mr. Baxter," she observed. "That little Chinaman, as you said, is as good as a French maid, and you certainly have a good cook—excellent pastry-cook, anyway."

Baxter glanced lazily in the direction of the galley.

"Another Chinaman," he answered. He looked significantly at me. "Mr. Middlebrook," he continued, "is aware that I bought this yawl from a ship-broker in Hull, for a special purpose—"

"Not aware of the special purpose," I interrupted, with a purposely sly glance at him.

"The special purpose is a run across the Atlantic, if you want to know," he answered carelessly. "Of course, when I'd got her, I wanted a small crew. Now, I've had great experience of Chinamen—best servants on earth, in my opinion—so I sailed her down to the Thames, went up to London Docks, and took in some Chinese chaps that I got in Limehouse. Two men and one cook—man cook, of course. He's good—I can't promise you a real and proper dinner tonight, but I can promise a very satisfactory substitute which we call supper."

"And you're going across the Atlantic with a crew of three?" I asked.

"As a matter of fact," he answered candidly, "there are six of us. The three Chinese; myself; my friend who was with me this afternoon, and who will join us again tomorrow, and another friend who will return with him, and who, like the crew, is a Chinaman. But he's a Chinaman of rank and position."

"In other words, the Chinese gentleman who was with you and your French friend in Hull?" I suggested.

"Just so—since we're to be frank," he answered. "The same." Then, with a laugh, he glanced at Miss Raven. "Mr. Middlebrook," he said, "considers me the most candid desperado he ever met!"

"Your candour is certainly interesting," replied Miss Raven. "Especially if you really are a desperado. Perhaps—you'll give us more of it?"

"I'll tell you a bit—later on," he said. "That Quick business, I mean."

Suddenly, setting down his tea-cup, he got up and moved away towards the galley, into which he presently disappeared. Miss Raven turned sharply on me.

"Did you eat a slice of that plum-cake?" she whispered. "You did?"

"I know what you're thinking," I answered. "It reminds you of the cake that Lorrimore's man, Wing, makes."

"Reminds!" she exclaimed. "There's no reminding about it! Do you know what I think? That man Wing is aboard this yacht! He made that cake!"

CHAPTER XIX
BLACK MEMORIES

There was so much of real importance, not only to us in our present situation, but to the trend of things in general, in Miss Raven's confident suggestion that her words immediately plunged me into a thoughtful silence. Rising from my chair at the tea-table, I walked across to the landward side of the yawl, and stood there, reflecting. But it needed little reflection to convince me that what my fellow-prisoner had just suggested was well within the bounds of possibility. I recalled all that we knew of the recent movements of Dr. Lorrimore's Chinese servant. Wing had gone to London, on the pretext of finding out something about that other problematical Chinese, Lo Chuh Fen. Since his departure, Lorrimore had had no tidings of him and his doings—in Lorrimore's opinion, he might be still in London, or he might have gone to Liverpool, or to Cardiff, to any port where his fellow-countrymen are to be found in England. Now it was well within probabilities that Wing, being in Limehouse or Poplar, and in touch with Chinese sailor-men, should, with others, have taken service with Baxter and his accomplice, and, at that very moment there, in that sheltered cove on the Northumbrian coast, be within a few yards of Miss Raven and myself, separated from us by a certain amount of deck-planking and a few bulkheads. But why? If he was there, in that yawl, in what capacity—real capacity—was he there? Ostensibly, as cook, no doubt—but that, I felt sure, would be a mere blind. Put plainly, if he was there, what game was that bland, suave, obsequious, soft-tongued Chinaman playing? Was this his way of finding out what all of us wanted to know? If it came to it, if there was occasion—such occasion as I dared not contemplate—could Miss Raven and myself count on Wing as a friend, or should we find him an adherent of the strange and curious gang, which, if the truth was to be faced, literally held not only our liberty, but our lives at its disposal? For we were in a tight place—of that there was no doubt. Up to that moment I was not unfavourably impressed by Netherfield Baxter, and, whether against my better judgment or not, I was rather more than inclined to believe him innocent of actual share or complicity in the murders of Noah and Salter Quick. But I could see that he was a queer mortal; odd, even to eccentricity; vain, candid and frank because of his very vanity; given, I thought, to talking a good deal about himself and his doings; probably a megalomaniac. He might treat us well so long as things went well with him, but supposing any situation to arise in which our presence, nay, our very existence, became a danger to him and his plans—what then? He had a laughing lip and a twinkle of sardonic humour in his eye, but I fancied that the lip could settle into ruthless resolve if need be and the eye become more stony than would be pleasant. And—we were at his mercy; the mercy of a man whose accomplice might be of a worse kidney than himself, and whose satellites were yellow-skinned slant-eyed Easterns, pirates to a man, and willing enough to slit a throat at the faintest sign from a master.

As I stood there, leaning against the side, gloomily staring at the shore, which was so near, and yet so impossible of access, I reviewed a point which was of more importance to me than may be imagined—the point of our geographical situation. I have already said that the yawl lay at anchor in a sheltered cove. The position of that cove was peculiar. It was entered from seawards by an extremely narrow inlet, across the mouth of which stretched a bar—I could realize that much by watching the breakers rolling over it; it was plain to me, a landsman, that even a small vessel could only get in or out of the cove at high water. But once across the bar, and within the narrow entry, any vessel coming in from the open sea would find itself in a natural harbour of great advantages; the cove ran inland for a good mile and was quite another mile in width; its waters were deep, rising some fifteen to twenty feet over a clear, sandy bottom, and on all sides, right down to the bar at its entrance, it was sheltered by high cliffs, covered from the tops of their headlands to the thin, pebbly stretches of shore at their feet by thick wood, mostly oak and beech. That the cove was known to the folk of that neighbourhood it was impossible to doubt, but I felt sure that any strange craft passing along the sea in front would never suspect its existence, so carefully had Nature concealed the entrance on the landward side of the bar. And there were no signs within the cove itself that any of the shore folk ever used it. There was not a vestige of a human dwelling-place to be discovered anywhere along its thickly-wooded banks; no boat lay on its white beach; no fishing-net was stretched out there to dry in the sun and wind; the entire stretch was desolate. And I knew that an equal desolation lay all over the land immediately behind the cove and its sheltering woods. That was about the loneliest part of a lonely coast—by that time I had become well acquainted with it. For some miles, north and south of that exact spot, there were no coast villages—there was nothing, save an isolated farmstead, set in deep ravines at wide distances. The only link with busier things lay in the railway—that, as I also knew, lay about two or two-and-a-half miles inland; as far as I could recollect the map which lay in my pocket, but which I did not dare to pull out, there was a small wayside station on this line, immediately behind the woods through which Miss Raven and I had unthinkingly wandered to our fate; from it, doubtless, the Frenchman, Baxter's accomplice, had taken train for Berwick, some twenty miles northward. Everything considered, Miss Raven and I were as securely trapped and as much at our captor's mercy as if we had been immured in a twentieth-century Bastille.

I went back, presently, to the tea-table and dropped into my deck-chair again. Baxter was still away from us; as far as I could see, there was no one about. I gave her a look which was intended to suggest caution, but I spoke in a purposely affected tone of carelessness.

"I shouldn't wonder if you are right in your suggestion," I said. "In that case, I think we should have a friend on board in case we need one."

"But you don't anticipate any need?" she asked quickly.

"I don't," said I. "So don't think I do."

"What do you suppose is going to happen to us?" She asked, glancing over her shoulder at the open door of the galley into which Baxter had vanished.

"I think they'll detain us until they're ready to depart, and then they'll release us," I answered. "Our host, or jailor, or whatever you like to call him, is a queer chap—he'll probably make us give him our word of honour that we'll keep close tongues."

"He could have done that without bringing us here," she remarked.

"Ah, but he wanted to make sure!" said I. "He's taking no risks. However, I'm sure he means no harm to us. Under other conditions, I shouldn't have objected to meeting him. He's—a character."

"Interesting, certainly," she agreed. "Do you think he really is a—pirate?"

"I don't think he'll have any objection to making that quite clear to us if he is," I replied, cynically. "I should say he'd be rather proud of it. But—I think we shall hear a good deal of him before we get our freedom."

I was right there. Baxter seemed almost wistfully anxiously to talk with us—he behaved like a man who for a long time had small opportunity of conversation with the people he would like to converse with, and he kept us both talking as the afternoon faded into evening and the evening fell towards night. He was a good talker, too, and knew much of books and politics and of men, and could make shrewd remarks, tinged, it seemed to me, with a little cynicism that was more good-humoured than bitter. The time passed rapidly in this fashion; supper-time arrived; the meal, as good and substantial as any dinner, was served in the little saloon-like cabin by the soft-footed Chinaman who, other than Baxter, was the only living soul we had seen since the Frenchman went away in the boat; all through it Baxter kept up his ready flow of talk while punctiliously observing his duties as host. Until then, the topics had been of a general nature, such as one might have heard dealt with at any gentleman's table, but when supper was over and the Chinaman had left us alone, he turned on us with a queer, inquisitive smile.

"You think me a strange fellow," he said. "Don't deny it!—I am, and I don't mind who thinks it. Or—who knows it."

I made no reply beyond an acquiescent nod, but Miss Raven—who, all through this adventure, showed a coolness and resourcefulness which I can never sufficiently praise—looked steadily at him.

"I think you must have seen and known some strange things," she said quietly.

"Aye—and done some!" he answered, with a laugh that had more of harshness in it than was usual with him. Then he glanced at me. "Mr. Middlebrook, there, from what he told me this afternoon, knows a bit about me and my affairs," he said. "But not much. Sufficient to whet your curiosity, eh, Middlebrook?"

"I confess I should like to know more," I replied. "I agree with Miss Raven—you must have seen a good deal of the queer side of life."

There was some fine old claret on the table between us; he pushed the bottle over to me, motioning me to refill my glass. For a moment he sat, a cigar in the corner of his lips, his hands in the armholes of his waistcoat, silently reflecting.

"What's really puzzling you this time," he said suddenly, "is that Quick affair—I know because I've not only read the newspapers, but I've picked up a good deal of local gossip—never mind how. I've heard a lot of your goings-on at Ravensdene Court, and the suspicions, and so on. And I knew the Quicks—no man better, at one time, and I'll tell you what I know. Not a nice story from any moral point of view, but though it's a story of rough men, there's nothing in it at all that need offend your ears, Miss Raven—nothing. It's just a story—an instance—of some of the things that happen to Ishmaels, outcasts, like me."

We made no answer, and he re-filled his own glass, took a mouthful of its contents, and glancing from one to the other of us, went on.

"You're both aware of my youthful career at Blyth?" he said. "You, Middlebrook, are, anyway, from what you told me this afternoon, and I gather that you put Miss Raven in possession of the facts. Well, I'll start out from there—when I made the acquaintance of that temporary bank-manager chap. Mind you, I'd about come to the end of my tether at that time as regards money—I'd been pretty well fleeced by one or another, largely through carelessness, largely through sheer ignorance. I didn't lose all my money on the turf, Middlebrook, I can assure you—I was robbed by more than one worthy man of my native town—legally, of course, bless 'em! And it was that, I think, turned me into the Ishmael I've been ever since—as men had robbed me, I thought it a fair thing to get a bit of my own back. Now that bank-manager chap was one of those fellows who are born with predatory instincts—my impression of him, from what I recollect, is that he was a born thief. Anyway, he and I, getting pretty thick with each other, found out that we were just then actuated by similar ambitions—I from sheer necessity, he, as I tell you, from temperament. And to cut matters short, we determined to help ourselves out of certain things of value stored in that bank, and to clear out to far-off regions with what we got. We discovered that two chests deposited in the bank's vaults by old Lord Forestburne contained a quantity of simply invaluable monastic spoil, stolen by the good man's ancestors four centuries before: we determined to have that and to take it over to the United States, where we knew we could realize immense sums on it, from collectors, with no questions asked. There were other matters, too, which were handy—we carefully removed the lot, brought them along the coast to this very cove, and interred them in those ruins where we three foregathered this afternoon."

"And whence, I take it, you have just removed them to the deck above our heads?" I suggested.

"Right, Middlebrook, quite right—there they are!" he admitted with a laugh. "A grand collection, too—chalices, patens, reliquaries, all manner of splendid mediaeval craftsmanship—and certain other more modern things with them—all destined for the other side of the Atlantic—the market's sure and safe and ready—"

"You think you'll get them there?" I asked.

"I shall be more surprised than I ever was in my life if I don't," he answered readily, and with that note of dryness which one associates with certainty. "I'm a pretty cute hand at making and perfecting and carrying out a plan. Yes, sir, they'll be there, in good time—and they'd have been there long since if it hadn't been for an accident which I couldn't foresee—that bank-manager chap had the ill-luck to break his neck. Now that put me in a fix. I knew that the abstraction of these things would soon be discovered, and though I'd exercised great care in covering up all trace of my own share in the affair, there was always a bare possibility of something coming out. So, knowing the stuff was safely planted and very unlikely to be disturbed, I cleared out, and determined to wait a fitting opportunity of regaining possession of it. My notion at that time, I remember, was to get hold of some American millionaire collector who would give me facilities for taking up the stuff, to be handed over to him. But I didn't find one, and for the time being I had to keep quiet. Inquiries, of course, were set afoot about the missing property, but fortunately I was not suspected. And if I had been, I shouldn't have been found, for I know how to disappear as cleverly as any man who ever found that convenient."

He threw away the stump of his cigar, deliberately lighted another, and leaned across the table towards me in a more confidential manner.

"Now we're coming to the more immediately interesting part of the story," he said. "All that I've told you is, as it were, ancient history. We'll get to more modern times, affairs of yesterday, so to speak. After I cleared out of Blyth—with a certain amount of money in my pocket—I knocked about the world a good deal, doing one thing and another. I've been in every continent and in more sea-ports than I can remember. I've taken a share in all sorts of queer transactions from smuggling to slave-trading. I've been rolling in money in January and shivering in rags in June. All that was far away, in strange quarters of the world, for I never struck this country again until comparatively recently. I could tell you enough to fill a dozen fat volumes, but we'll cut all that out and get on to a certain time, now some years ago, whereat, in Hong-Kong, I and the man you saw with me this afternoon, who, if everybody had their own, is a genuine French nobleman, came across those two particularly precious villains, the brothers Noah and Salter Quick."

"Was that the first time of your meeting with them?" I asked. Now that he was evidently bent on telling me his story, I, on my part, was bent on getting out of him all that I could. "You'd never met them before—anywhere?"

"Never seen nor heard of them before," he answered. "We met in a certain house-of-call in Hong-Kong, much frequented by Englishmen and Americans; we became friendly with them; we soon found out that they, like ourselves, were adventurers, would-be pirates, buccaneers, ready for any game; we found out, too, that they had money, and could finance any desperate affair that was likely to pay handsomely. My friend and I, at that time, were also in funds—we had just had a very paying adventure in the Malay Archipelago, a bit of illicit trading, and we had got to Hong-Kong on the look-out for another opportunity. Once we had got thoroughly in with the Quicks, that was not long in coming. The Quicks were as sharp as their name—they knew the sort of men they wanted. And before long they took us into their confidence and told us what they were after and what they wanted us to do, in collaboration with them. They wanted to get hold of a ship, and to use it for certain nefarious trading purposes in the China seas—they had a plan by which the lot of us could have made a lot of money. Needless to say, we were ready enough to go in with them. Already they had a scheme of getting a ship such as they particularly needed. There was at that time lying at Hong-Kong a sort of tramp steamer, the Elizabeth Robinson, the skipper of which wanted a crew for a trip to Chemulpo, up the Yellow Sea. Salter Quick got himself into the confidence and graces of this skipper, and offered to man his ship for him, and he packed her as far as he could—with his own brother, Noah, myself, my French friend, and a certain Chinese cook of whom he knew and who could be trusted—trusted, that is, to fall in whatever we wanted."

"Am I right in supposing the name of the Chinese cook to have been Lo Chuh Fen?" I asked.

"Quite right—Lo Chuh Fen was the man," answered Baxter. "A very handy man for anything, as you'll admit, for you've already seen him—he's the man who attended on Miss Raven and who served our supper. I came across him again, in Limehouse, recently, and took him into my service once more. Very well—now you understand that there were five of us all in for the Quick's plan, and the notion was that when we'd once got safely out of Hong-Kong, Salter, who had a particularly greasy and insinuating tongue, should get round certain others of the crew by means of promises helped out by actual cash bribes. That done, we were going to put the skipper, his mates, and such of the men as wouldn't fall in with us, in a boat with provisions and let them find their way wherever they liked, while we went off with the steamer. That was the surface plan—my own belief is that if it had come to it, the two Quicks would have been quite ready to make skipper and men walk the plank, or to have settled them in any other way—both Noah and Salter, for all their respectable appearance, were born out of their due time—they were admirably qualified to have been lieutenants to Paul Jones or any other eighteenth-century pirate! But in this particular instance, their schemes went all wrong. Whether it was that the skipper of the Elizabeth Robinson, who was an American and cuter than we fancied, got wind of something, or whether somebody spilt to him, I don't know, but the fact is that one fine morning when we were in the Yellow Sea he and the rest of them set on the Quicks, my friend, myself, and the Chinaman, bundled us into a boat and landed us on a miserable island, to fend for ourselves. There we were, the five of us—a precious bad lot, to be sure—marooned!"

CHAPTER XX
THE POSSIBLE REASON

At that last word, spoken with an emphasis which showed that it awoke no very pleasant memories in the speaker, Miss Raven looked questioningly from one to the other of us.

"Marooned?" she said. "What is that, exactly?"

Baxter gave her an indulgent and me a knowing look.

"I daresay Mr. Middlebrook can give you the exact etymological meaning of the word better than I can, Miss Raven," he answered. "But I can tell you what the thing means in actual practice! It means to put a man, or men, ashore, preferably on a desert island, leaving him, or them, to fend for himself, or themselves, as best he, or they, can! It may mean slow starvation—at best it means living on what you can pick up by your own ingenuity, on shell-fish and that sort of thing, even on edible sea-weed. Marooned? Yes! that was the only experience I ever had of that—it's all very well talking of it now, as we sit here on a comfortable little vessel, with a bottle of good wine before us, but at the time—ah!"

"You'd a stiff time of it?" I suggested.

"Worse than you'd believe," he answered. "That old Yankee skipper was a vindictive chap, with method in him. He'd purposely gone off the beaten track to land us on that island, and he played his game so cleverly that not even the Quicks—who were as subtle as snakes!—knew anything of his intentions until we were all marched over the side at the point of ugly-looking revolvers. If it hadn't been for that little Chinese whom you've just seen we would have starved, for the island was little more than a reef of rock, rising to a sort of peak in its centre—worn-out volcano, I imagine—and with nothing eatable on it in the way of flesh or fruit. But Chuh was a God-send! He was clever at fishing, and he showed us an edible sea-weed out of which he made good eating, and he discovered a spring of water—altogether he kept us alive. All of which," he suddenly added, with a darkening look, "made the conduct of these two Quicks not merely inexcusable, but devilish!"

"What did they do?" I asked.

"I'm coming to it," he said. "All in due order. We were on that island several weeks, and from the time we were flung unceremoniously upon its miserable shores to the day we left it we never saw a sail nor a wisp of smoke from a steamer. And it may be that this, and our privations, made us still more birds of a feather than we were. Anyway, you, Middlebrook, know how men, thrown together in that way, will talk—nay, must talk unless they'd go mad!—talk about themselves and their doings and so on. We all talked—we used to tell tales of our doubtful pasts as we huddled together under the rocks at nights, and some nice, lurid stores there were, I can assure you. The Quicks had seen about as much of the doubtful and seamy side of seafaring life as men could, and all of us could contribute something. Also, the Quicks had money, safely stowed away in banks here and there—they used to curse their fate, left there apparently to die, when they thought of it. And it was that, I think, that led me to tell, one night, about my adventure with the naughty bank-manager at Blyth, and of the chests of old monastic treasure which I'd planted up here on this Northumbrian coast."

"Ah!" I exclaimed. "So you told Noah and Salter Quick that?"

"I told Noah and Salter Quick that," he replied slowly. "Yes—and I can now explain to you what Salter was after when he appeared in these parts. I read the newspaper accounts, of the inquest and so on, and I saw through everything, and could have thrown a lot of light on things, only I wasn't going to. But it was this way—I told the Quicks all about the Blyth affair—the truth was, I didn't believe we should ever get away from that cursed island—but I told them in a fashion which, evidently, afterwards led to considerable puzzlement on their part. I told them that I buried the chests of old silver, wherein were the other valuables taken from the vaults of the bank, in a churchyard on this coast, close to the graves of my ancestors—I described the spot and the lie of the ruins pretty accurately. Now where the Quicks—Salter, at any rate—got puzzled and mixed was over my use of the word ancestors. What I meant—but never said—was that I had planted the stuff near the graves of my maternal ancestors, the old De Knaythevilles, who were once great folk in these parts, and of whose name my own Christan name, Netherfield, is, of course, a corruption. But Salter Quick, to be sure, thought the graves would bear the name Netherfield, and when he came along this coast, it was that name he was hunting for. Do you see?"

"Then Salter Quick was after that treasure?" I said.

"Of course he was!" replied Baxter. "The wonder to me is that he and Noah hadn't been after it before. But they were men who had a good many irons in the fire—too many and some of them far too hot, as it turned out—and I suppose they left this little affair until an opportune moment. Without a doubt, not so long after I'd told them the story, Salter Quick scratched inside the lid of his tobacco-box a rough diagram of the place I'd mentioned, with the latitude and longitude approximately indicated—that's the box there's been so much fuss about, I read in the papers, and I'll tell you more about it in due process. But now about that island and the Quicks, and how they and the rest of us got out of it. I told you that the centre of this island rose to a high peak, separating one coast from the other—well, one day, when we'd been marooned for several weary weeks and there didn't seem the least chance of rescue, I, my French friend, and the Chinaman crossed the shoulder of that peak and went along the other coast, prospecting—more out of sheer desperation than in the hope of finding anything. We spent the next night on the other side of the island, and it was not until late on the following afternoon that we returned to our camp, if you can call that a camp which was nothing but a hole in the rocks. And we got back to find Noah and Salter Quick gone—and we knew how they had gone when the Chinaman's sharp eyes made out a sail vanishing over the horizon. Some Chinese fishing-boat had made that island in our absence, and these two skunks had gone away in her and left us, their companions, to shift for ourselves. That's the sort the Quicks were!—those were the sort of tricks they'd play off on so-called friends! Do you wonder, either of you, that both Noah and Salter eventually got—what they got?"

We made no answer to that beyond, perhaps, a shake of our heads. Then Miss Raven spoke.

"But—you got away, in the end?" she suggested.

"We got away in the end—some time later, when we were about done for," assented Baxter, "and in the same way—a Chinese fishing-boat that came within hail. It landed us on the Kiang-Su coast, and we had a pretty bad time of it before we made our way to Shanghai. From that port we worked our passage to Hong-Kong: I had an idea that we might strike the Quicks there, or get news of them. But we heard nothing of those two villains, at any rate. But we did hear that the Elizabeth Robinson had never reached Chemulpo—she'd presumably gone down with all hands, and we were supposed, of course, to have gone down with her. We did nothing to disabuse anybody of the notion; both I and my friend had money in Hong Kong, and we took it up and went off to Singapore. As for our Chinaman, Chuh, he said farewell to us and vanished as soon as we got back to Hong-Kong, and we never set eyes on him again until very recently, when I ran across him in a Chinese eating-house in Poplar."

"From that meeting, I suppose, the more recent chapters of your story begin?" I suggested. "Or do they begin somewhat earlier?"

"A bit earlier," he said. "My friend and I came back to England a little before that—with money in our pockets—we'd been very lucky in the East—and with a friend of ours, a Chinese gentleman, mind you, we decided to go in for a little profitable work of another sort, and to start out by lifting my concealed belongings up here. So we bought this craft in Hull—then ran her down to the Thames—then, as I say, I came across Lo Chuh Fen and got his services and those of two other compatriots of his, then in London, and—here we are! You see how candid I am—do you know why?"

"It would be interesting to know, Mr. Baxter," said Miss Raven. "Please tell us."

"Well," he said, with a queer deliberation. "Some men in my position would have thought nothing about putting bullets through both of you when we met this afternoon—you hit on our secret. But I'm not that sort—I treat you as what you are, a gentlewoman and a gentleman, and no harm whatever shall come to you. Therefore, I feel certain that all I've said and am saying to you will be treated as it ought to be—by you. I daresay you think I'm an awful scoundrel, but I told you I was an Ishmael—and I certainly haven't got the slightest compunction about appropriating the stuff in those chests on deck—one of the Forestburnes stole it from the monks—why shouldn't I steal it from his successor? It's as much mine as his—perhaps more so, for one of my ancestors, a certain Geoffrey de Knaytheville, was at one time Lord Abbot of the very house that the Forestburnes stole that stuff from! I reckon I've a prior claim, Middlebrook?"

"I should imagine," I answered, guardedly, "that it would be very difficult for anybody to substantiate a claim to ecclesiastical property—of that particular nature—which disappeared in the sixteenth century. What is certain, however, is that you've got it. Take my advice—hand it over to the authorities!"

He looked at me in blank astonishment for a moment; then laughed as a man laughs who is suddenly confronted by a good joke.

"Hah! hah! hah!" he let out at the top of his voice. "Good! you're a born humorist, friend Middlebrook!" He pushed the claret nearer. "Fill your glass again! Hand it over to the authorities? Why, that would merit a full-page cartoon in the next number of Punch. Good, good! but," he went on, suddenly becoming grave again, "we were talking of those scoundrelly Quicks. Of course we—that is, my French friend and I—have been, and are, suspected of murdering them?"

"I think that is so," I answered.

"Well, that's a very easy point to settle, if it should ever come to it," he replied. "And I'll settle it, for your edification, just now. Noah and Salter Quick were done to death, one near Saltash, in Cornwall, the other near Alnwick, in Northumberland, several hundreds of miles apart, about the same hour of the same evening. Now, my friend and I, so far from being anywhere near either Saltash or Alnwick on that particular evening and night, spent them together at the North Eastern Railway Hotel at York. I went there that afternoon from London; he joined me from Berwick. We met at the hotel about six o'clock; we dined in the hotel; we played billiards in the hotel; we slept in the hotel; we breakfasted in the hotel; the hotel folks will remember us well, and our particulars are duly registered in their books on the date in question. We had no hand whatever in the murders of Noah and Salter Quick, and I give you my word of honour—being under the firm impression that though I am a pirate, I am still a gentleman—that neither of us have the very slightest notion who had!"

Miss Raven made an involuntary murmur of approval, and I was so much convinced of the man's good faith that I stretched out my hand to him.

"Mr. Baxter!" said I, "I'm heartily glad to have that assurance from you! And whether I'm a humorist or not, I'll beg you once more to take my advice and give up that loot to the authorities—you can make a plausible excuse, and throw all the blame on that bank-manager fellow, and take my word for it, little will be said—and then you can devote your undoubtedly great and able talents to legitimate ventures!"

"That would be as dull as ditch-water, Middlebrook," he retorted with a grin. "You're tempting me! But those Quicks—I'll tell you in what fashion there is a connection between their murder and ourselves, and one that would need some explanation. Bear in mind that I've kept myself posted in those murders through the newspapers, and also by collecting a certain amount of local gossip. Now—you've a certain somewhat fussy and garrulous old gentleman at Ravensdene Court—"

"Mr. Cazalette!" exclaimed Miss Raven.

"Mr. Cazalette is the name," said Baxter. "I have heard much of him, through the sources I've just referred to. Now, this Mr. Cazalette, going to or coming from a place where he bathed every morning, which place happened to be near the spot whereat Salter Quick was murdered, found a blood-stained handkerchief?"

"He did," said I. "And a lot of mystery attaches to it."

"That handkerchief belongs to my French friend," said Baxter. "I told you that he joined me at York from Berwick. As a matter of fact, for some little time just before the Salter Quick affair, he was down on this coast, posing as a tourist, but really just ascertaining if things were as I'd left them at the ruins in the wood above this cove and what would be our best method of getting the chests of stuff away. For a week or so, he lodged at an inn somewhere, I think, near Ravensdene Court, and he used sometimes to go down to the shore for a swim. One morning he cut his foot on the pebbles, and staunched the blood with his handkerchief, which he carelessly threw away—and your Mr. Cazalette evidently found it. That's the explanation of that little matter. And now for the tobacco-box."

"A much more important point," said I.

"Just so," agreed Baxter. "Now, my friend and I first heard of the murder while we were at York. In the newspapers that we read, there was an account of a conversation which took place in, I believe, Mr. Raven's coach-house, or some out-building, whither the dead man's body had been carried, between this old Mr. Cazalette and a police-inspector, regarding a certain metal tobacco-box found on Salter Quick's body. Now I give you my word that that news was the first intimation we had ever had that the Quicks were in England! Until then we hadn't the slightest idea that they were in England—but we knew what those mysterious scratches in the tobacco-box signified—Salter had made a rude plan of the place I had told him of, and was in Northumberland to search for it. Then, later, we read your evidence at the opening of the inquest, and heard what you had to tell about his quest of the Netherfield graves, and—just to satisfy ourselves—we determined to get hold of that tobacco-box, for, don't you see, as long as it was about, a possible clue, there was a danger of somebody discovering our buried chests of silver and valuables. So my friend came down again, in his tourist capacity; put up at the same quarters, strolled about, fished a bit, botanized a bit, attended the adjourned inquest as a casual spectator, and—abstracted the tobacco-box under the very noses of the police! It's in that locker now," continued Baxter, with a laugh, pointing to a corner of the cabin, "and with it are the handkerchief, your old friend Mr. Cazalette's pocket-book——"

"Oh! your friend got that, too, did he?" I exclaimed. "I see!"

"He abstracted that, too, easily enough, one morning when the old fellow was bathing," assented Baxter. "Naturally, we weren't going to take any chances about our hidden goods being brought to light. We're highly indebted to Mr. Cazalette for making so much fuss about the tobacco-box, and we're glad there was so much local gossip about it. Eh?"

I remained silent awhile, reflecting.

"It's a very fortunate thing for both of you that you could, if necessary, prove your presence at York on the night of the murder," I remarked at last. "Your doings about the tobacco-box and the other things might otherwise wear a very suspicious look. As it is, I'm afraid the police would probably say—granted that they knew what you've just told us so frankly—that even if you and your French friend didn't murder Salter Quick and his brother, you were probably accessory to both murders. That's how it strikes me, anyway."

"I think you're right," he said calmly. "Probably they would. But the police would be wrong. We were not accessory, either before or since. We haven't the ghost of a notion as to the identity of the Quicks' murderers. But since we're discussing that, I'll tell you both of something that seems to have completely escaped the notice of the police, the detectives, and of you yourself, Middlebrook. You remember that in both cases the clothing of the murdered men had been literally ripped to pieces?"

"Very well," said I. "It had—in Salter's, anyway, to my knowledge."

"And so, they said, it had in Noah's," replied Baxter. "And the presumption, of course, was that the murderers were searching for something?"

"Of course," I said. "What other presumption could there be?"

Baxter gave us both a keen, knowing look, bent across the table, and tapped my arm as if to arrest my closer attention.

"How do you know that the murderers didn't find what they were seeking for?" he asked in a low, forceful voice. "Come, now!"

I stared at him; so, too, did Miss Raven. He laughed.

"That, certainly, doesn't seem to have struck anybody," he said. "I'm sure, anyway, it hasn't struck you before. Does it now?"

"I'd never thought of it," I admitted.

"Exactly! Nor, according to the papers—and to my private information—had anybody," he answered. "Yet—it would have been the very first thought that would have occurred to me. I should have said to myself, seeing the ripped-up clothing, 'Whoever murdered these men was in search of something that one or other of the two had concealed on him, and the probability is, he's got it.' Of course!"

"I'm sure nobody—police or detectives—ever did think of that," said I. "But—perhaps with your knowledge of the Quicks' antecedents and queer doings, you have some knowledge of what they might be likely to carry about them?"

He laughed at that, and again leaned nearer to us.

"Aye, well!" he replied. "As I've told you so much, I'll tell you something more. I do know of something that the two men had on them when they were on that miserable island and that they, of course, carried away with them when they escaped. Noah and Salter Quick were then in possession of two magnificent rubies—worth no end of money!"

CHAPTER XXI
THE CHINESE GENTLEMAN

I could not repress an unconscious, involuntary start on hearing this remarkable declaration; it seemed to open, as widely as suddenly, an entirely new field of vision; it was as if some hand had abruptly torn aside a veil and shown me something that I had never dreamed of. And Baxter laughed, significantly.

"That strikes you, Middlebrook?" he said.

"Very forcibly, indeed!" said I. "If what you say is true—I mean, if one of those two men had such valuables on him, then there's a reason for the murder of both that none of us knew of. But—is it probable that the Quicks would still be in possession of jewels that you saw some years ago?"

"Not so many years ago, when all's said and done," he answered. "And you couldn't dispose of things like those very readily, you know. You can take it from me, knowing what I did of them, that neither Noah nor Salter Quick would sell anything unless at its full value, or something like it. They weren't hard up for money, either of them; they could afford to wait, in the matter of a sale of anything, until they found somebody who would give their price."

"You say these things—rubies, I think—were worth a lot of money?" I asked.

"Heaps of money!" he affirmed. "Do you know anything about rubies? Not much?—well, the ruby, I daresay you do know, is the most precious of precious stones. The real true ruby, the Oriental one, is found in greatest quantity in Burma and Siam, and the best are those that come from Mogok, which is a district lying northward of Mandalay. These rubies that the Quicks had came from there—they were remarkably fine ones. And I know how and where those precious villains got them!"

"Yes?" I said, feeling that another dark story lay behind this declaration. "Not honestly, I suppose?"

"Far from it!" he replied, with a grim smile. "Those two rubies formed the eyes of some ugly god or other in a heathen temple in the Kwang-Tung province of Southern China where the Quicks carried on more nefarious practices than that. They gouged them out—according to their own story. Then, of course, they cleared off."

"You saw the rubies?" I asked.

"More than once—on that island in the Yellow Sea," he answered. "Noah and Salter would have bartered either, or both, for a ship at one period. But!" he added, with a sneering laugh, "you may lay your life that when they boarded that Chinese fishing-boat on which they made their escape they'd pay for their passage as meanly as possible. No—my belief is that they still had those rubies on them when they turned up in England again, and that, as likely as not, they were murdered for them. Take all the circumstances of the murder into consideration—in each case the dead man's clothing was ripped to pieces, the linings examined, even the padding at chest and shoulder torn out and scattered about. What were the murderers seeking for? Not for money—as far as I remember, each man had a good deal of money on him, and not a penny was touched. What was it, then? My own belief is that after Salter Quick joined Noah at Devonport, both brothers were steadily watched by men who knew what they had on them, and that when Salter came North he was followed, just as Noah was tracked down at Saltash. And I should say that whoever murdered them got the rubies—they may have been on Noah; they may have been on Salter; one may have been in Salter's possession; one in Noah's. But there—in the rubies—lies, in my belief, the secret of those murders."

I felt that here, in this lonely cove, we were probably much nearer the solution of the mystery that had baffled Scarterfield, ourselves, the police, and everybody that we knew. And so, apparently, did Miss Raven, who suddenly turned on Baxter with a look that was half an appeal.

"Mr. Baxter!" she said, colouring a little at her own temerity. "Why don't you follow Mr. Middlebrook's advice—give up the old silver and the rest of it to the authorities and help them to track down those murderers? Wouldn't that be better than—whatever it is that you're doing?"

But Baxter laughed, flung away his cigar, and rose to his feet.

"A deal better—from many standpoints, my dear young lady!" he exclaimed. "But too late for Netherfield Baxter. He's an Ishmael!—a pirate—a highwayman—and it's too late for him to do anything but gang his own gait. No!—I'm not going to help the police—not I! I've enough to do to keep out of their way."

"You'll get caught, you know," I said, as good-humouredly as possible. "You'll never get this stuff that's upstairs across the Atlantic and into New York or Boston or any Yankee port without detection. As you are treating us well, your secret's safe enough with us—but think, man, of the difficulties of taking your loot across an ocean!—to say nothing of Customs officers on the other side."

"I never said we were going to take it across the Atlantic," he answered coolly and with another of his cynical laughs. "I said we were going to sail this bit of a craft across there—so we are. But when we strike New York or New Orleans or Pernambuco or Buenos Ayres, Middlebrook, the stuff won't be there—the stuff, my lad, won't leave British waters! Deep, deep, is your queer acquaintance, Netherfield Baxter, and if he does run risks now and then, he always provides for 'em."

"Evidently you intend to tranship your precious cargo?" I suggested.

"The door of its market is yawning for it, Middlebrook, and not far away," he answered. "If this craft drops in at Aberdeen, or at Thurso, or at Moville, and the Customs folks or any other such-like hawks and kites come aboard, they'll find nothing but three innocent gentlemen and their servants a-yachting it across the free seas. Verbum sapienti, Middlebrook, as we said in my Latin days—far off, now! But—wouldn't Miss Raven like to retire?—it's late. I'll send Chuh with hot water—if you want anything, Middlebrook, command him. As for me, I shan't see you again tonight—I must keep a watch for my pal coming aboard from his little mission ashore."

Then, with curt politeness, he bade us both good night, and went off on deck, and we two captives looked at each other.

"Strange man!" murmured Miss Raven. She gave me a direct glance that had a lot of meaning in it. "Mr. Middlebrook," she went on in a still lower voice, "let me tell you that I'm not afraid. I'm sure that man means no personal harm to us. But—is there anything you want to say to me before I go?"

"Only this," I answered. "Do you sleep very soundly?"

"Not so soundly that I shouldn't hear if you called me," she replied.

"I'm going to mount guard here," I said. "I, too, believe in what Baxter says. But—if I should, for any reason, have occasion to call you during the night, do at once precisely what I tell you to do."

"Of course," she said.

The Chinaman who had been in evidence at intervals since our arrival came into the little saloon with a can of hot water and disappeared into the inner cabin which had been given up to Miss Raven. She softly said good-night to me, with a reassurance of her confidence that all would be well, and followed him. I heard her talking to this strange makeshift for a maid for a moment or two; then the man came out, grinning as if well-pleased with himself, and she closed and fastened the door on him. The Chinaman turned to me, asking in a soft voice if there was anything I pleased to need.

"Nothing but the rugs and pillows that your master spoke of," I answered.

He opened a locker on the floor of the place and producing a number of cushions and blankets from it made me up a very tolerable couch. Then, with a polite bow, he, too, departed, and I was left alone.

Of one thing I was firmly determined—I was not going to allow myself to sleep. I firmly believed in Baxter's good intentions—in spite of his record, strange and shady by his own admission, there was something in him that won confidence; he was unprincipled, without doubt, and the sort of man who would be all the worse if resisted, being evidently naturally wayward, headstrong, and foolishly obstinate, but like all bad men, he had good points, and one of his seemed to be a certain pride in showing people like ourselves that he could behave himself like a gentleman. That pride—a species of vanity, of course—would, I felt sure, make him keep his word to us and especially to Miss Raven. But he was only one amongst a crowd. For anything I knew, his French friend might be as consummate a villain as ever walked, and the Chinese in the galley cut-throats of the best quality. And there, behind a mere partition, was a helpless girl—and I was unarmed. It was a highly serious and unpleasant situation, at the best of it, and the only thing I could do was to keep awake and remain on the alert until morning came.

I took off coat and waistcoat, folded a blanket shawl-wise around my shoulders, wrapped another round my legs, and made myself fairly comfortable in the cushions which the Chinaman had deftly arranged in an angle of the cabin. I had directed him to settle my night's quarters in a corner close to Miss Raven's door, and immediately facing the half-dozen steps which led upwards to the deck. At the head of those steps was a door; I had bade him leave it open, so that I might have plenty of air; when he had gone I had extinguished the lamp which swung from the roof. And now, half-sitting, half-lying amongst my cushions and rugs, I faced the patch of sky framed in that open doorway and saw that the night was a clear one and that the heavens were full of glittering stars.

I had just refilled and lighted my pipe before settling down to my vigils, and for a long time I lay there smoking and thinking. My thoughts were somewhat confused—confused, at any rate, to the extent that they ranged over a variety of subjects—our apprehension that afternoon; the queer, almost, if not wholly, eccentric character of Netherfield Baxter; his strange story of the events in the Yellow Sea; his frank avowal of his share in the theft of the monastic spoils; his theory about Noah and Salter Quick, and other matters arising out of these things. The whirl of it all in my anxious brain made me more than once feel disposed to sleep; I realized that in spite of everything, I should sleep unless I kept up a stern determination to remain awake. Everything on board that strange craft was as still as the skies above her decks; I heard no sound whatever save a very gentle lapping of the water against the vessel's timbers, and, occasionally, the far-off hooting of owls in the woods that overhung the cove; these sounds, of course, were provocative of slumber; I had to keep smoking to prevent myself from dropping into a doze. And perhaps two hours may have gone in this fashion, and it was, I should think, a little after midnight, when I heard, at first far away towards the land, then gradually coming nearer, the light, slow plashing of oars that gently and leisurely rose and fell.

This, of course, was the Frenchman, coming back from his mission to Berwick—he would, I knew, have gone there from the little wayside station that lay beyond the woods at the back of the cove and have returned by a late train to the same place. Somehow—I could not well account for it—the mere fact of his coming back made me nervous and uneasy. I was not so certain about his innocence in the matter of Salter Quick's murder. On Baxter's own showing the Frenchman had been hanging about that coast for some little time, just when Salter Quick descended upon it. He, like Baxter, if Baxter's story were true, was aware that one or other of the Quicks carried those valuable rubies; even if, the York episode being taken for granted, he had not killed Salter Quick himself he might be privy to the doings of some accomplice who had. Anyway, he was a doubtful quantity, and the mere fact that he was back again on that yawl made me more resolved than ever to keep awake and preserve a sharp look-out.

I heard the boat come alongside; I heard steps on the deck just outside my open door; then, Baxter's voice. Presently, too, I heard other voices—one that of the Frenchman, which I recognised from having heard him speak in the afternoon; the other a soft, gentle, laughing voice—without doubt that of an Eastern. This, of course, would be the Chinese gentleman of whom I had heard—the man who had been seen in company with Baxter and the Frenchman at Hull. So now the three principal actors in this affair were all gathered together, separated from me and Miss Raven by a few planks, and close by were three Chinese of whose qualities I knew nothing. Safe we might be—but we were certainly on the very edge of a hornet's nest.

I heard the three men talking together in low, subdued tones for a few minutes; then they went along the deck above me and the sound of their steps ceased. But as I lay there in the darkness, two round discs of light suddenly appeared on a mirror which hung on the boarding of the cabin, immediately facing me, and turning my head sharply, I saw that in the bulkhead behind me there were two similar holes, pierced in what was probably a door, which would, no doubt, be sunk flush with the boarding and was possibly the entrance to some other cabin that could be entered from a further part of the deck. Behind that, under a newly-lighted lamp, the three men were now certainly gathered.

I was desperately anxious to know what they were doing—anxious, to the point of nervousness, to know what they looked like, taken in bulk. I could hear them talking in there, still in very low tones, and I would have given much to hear even a few words of their conversation. And after a time of miserable indecision—for I was afraid of doing anything that would lead to suspicion or resentment on their part, and I was by no means sure that I might not be under observation of one of those silky-footed Chinese from the galley—I determined to look through the holes in the door and see whatever was to be seen.

I got out of my wrappings and my corner so noiselessly that I don't believe anyone actually present in my cabin would have heard even a rustle, and tip-toeing in my stockinged feet across to the bulkhead which separated me from the three men, put an eye to one of the holes. To my great joy, I then found that I could see into the place to which Baxter and his companions had retreated. It was a sort of cabin, rougher in accommodation than that in which I stood, fitted with bunks on three sides and furnished with a table in the center over which swung a lamp. The three men stood round this table, examining some papers—the lamp-light fell full on all three. Baxter stood there in his shirt and trousers; the Frenchman also was half-dressed, as if preparing for rest. But the third man was still as he had come aboard—a little, yellow-faced, dapper, sleek Chinaman, whose smart, velvet-collared overcoat, thrown open, revealed an equally smart dark tweed suit beneath it, and an elegant gold watch-chain festooned across the waistcoat. He was smoking a cigar, just lighted; that it was of a fine brand I could tell by the aroma that floated to me. And on the table before the three stood a whisky bottle, a syphon of mineral water, and glasses, which had evidently just been filled.

Baxter and the Frenchman stood elbow to elbow; the Frenchman held in his hands a number of sheets of paper, foolscap size, to the contents of which he was obviously drawing Baxter's attention. Presently they turned to a desk which stood in one corner of the place, and Baxter, lifting its lid, produced a big ledger-like book, over which they bent, evidently comparing certain entries in it with the papers in the Frenchman's hand. What book or papers might be, I of course, knew nothing, for all this was done in silence. But had I known anything, or heard anything, it would have seemed of no significance compared with what I just then saw—a thing that suddenly turned me almost sick with a nameless fear and set me trembling from toe to finger.

The dapper and smug Chinaman, statuesque on one side of the table, immovable save for an occasional puff of his cigar, suddenly shot into silent activity as the two men turned their backs on him and bent, apparently absorbed, over the desk in the corner. Like a flash (it reminded me of the lightning-like movement of a viper) his long, thin fingers went into a waistcoat pocket; like a flash emerged, shot to the glasses on the table and into two of them dropped something small and white—some tabloid or pellet—that sank and dissolved as rapidly as it was put in. It was all over, all done, within, literally, the fraction of a second; when, a moment or two later, Baxter and the Frenchman turned round again, after throwing the ledger-like book and the papers into the desk, their companion was placidly smoking his cigar and sipping the contents of his glass between the whiffs.

I was by that time desperately careless as to whether I might or might not be under observation from the open door and stairway of my own cabin. I remained where I was, my eye glued to that ventilation-hole, watching. For it seemed to me that the Chinaman was purposely drugging his companions, for some insidious purpose of his own—in that case, what of the personal safety of Miss Raven and myself? For one moment I was half-minded to rush round to the other cabin and tell Baxter of what I had just seen—but I reflected that I might possibly bring about there and then an affair of bloodshed and perhaps murder in which there would be four Chinese against three others, one of whom—my miserable self—was not only unarmed, but like enough to be useless in a scene of violence. No—the only thing was to wait, and wait I did, with a thumping heart and tingling nerves, watching.

Nothing happened. Baxter gulped down his drink at a single draught; the Frenchman took his in two leisurely swallows; each flung himself on his bunk, pulled his blankets about him, and, as far as I could see, seemed to fall asleep instantly. But the Chinaman was more deliberate and punctilious. He took his time over his cigar and his whisky; he pulled out a suit-case from some nook or other and produced from it a truly gorgeous sleeping-suit of gaily-striped silk; it occupied him quite twenty minutes to get undressed and into this grandeur, and even then he lingered, fiddling about in carefully folding and arranging his garment. In the course of this, and in moving about the narrow cabin, he took apparently casual glances at Baxter and the Frenchman, and I saw from his satisfied, quiet smirk that each was sound and fast asleep. And then he thrust his feet into a pair of bedroom slippers, as loud in their colouring as his pyjamas, and suddenly turning down the lamp with a twist of his wicked-looking fingers, he glided out of the door into the darkness above. At that I, too, glided swiftly back to my blankets.

CHAPTER XXII
RED DAWN

I heard steps, soft as snowflakes, go along the deck above me; for an instant they paused by the open door at the head of my stairway; then they went on again and all was silent as before. But in that silence, above the gentle lapping of the water against the side of the yawl, I heard the furious thumping of my own heart—and I did not wonder at it, nor was I then, nor am I now ashamed of the fear that made it thump. Clearly, whatever else it might mean, if Baxter and the Frenchman were, as I surely believed them to be, soundly drugged, Miss Raven and I were at the positive mercy of a pack of Chinese adventurers who would probably stick at nothing.

But my problem—one sufficient to wrack every fibre of my brain—was, what were they after? The Chinese gentleman in the flamboyant pyjamas had without doubt, repaired to his compatriots in the galley, forward: at that moment they were, of course, holding some unholy conference. Were they going to murder Baxter and the Frenchman for the sake of the swag now safely on board? It was possible: I had heard many a tale far less so. No doubt the supreme spirit was a man of subtlety and craft; so, too, most likely was our friend Lo Chuh Fen; the other two would not be wanting. And if, of these other two, Wing, as Miss Raven had confidently surmised and as I thought it possible, was one, then, indeed, there would be brains enough and to spare for the carrying out of any adventure. It seemed to me as I lay there, quaking and sweating in sheer fright—I, a defenceless, quiet, peace-loving gentleman of bookish tastes, who scarcely knew one end of a revolver from the other—that what was likely was that the Chinese were going to round on their English and French associates, collar the loot for themselves, and sail the yawl—Heaven alone knew where! But—in that case, what was going to become of me and my helpless companion? It was not likely that these Easterns would treat us with the consideration which we had received from the queer, eccentric, somewhat muddle-headed Netherfield Baxter, who—it struck me with odd inconsequence at that inopportune moment—was certainly a combination of Dick Turpin, Gil Blas, and Don Quixote.

I suppose it was nearly an hour that passed: it may have been more; it may have been less; what I know is that it gave me some idea of what an accused man may feel who, waiting in a cell below, wonders what the foreman of a jury is going to say when he is called upstairs once more to the dock which he has vacated pending that jury's deliberations. Once or twice I thought of daring everything, rousing Miss Raven, and attempting an escape by means of the boat which no doubt lay at the side of the yawl. But reflection suggested that so desperate a deed would only mean getting a bullet through me, and perhaps through her as well. Then I speculated on my chances of making a sinuous way along the deck on my hands and knees, or on my stomach, snake-fashion, with the idea of listening at the hatch of the galley—reflection, again, warned me that such an adventure would as likely as not end up with a few inches of cold steel in my side or through my gullet. So there I lay, sweating with fear, rapidly disintegrating as to nerve-power, becoming a lump of moral rag-and-bone—and suddenly, unheralded by the slightest sound, I saw the figure of a man on my stairway, his outline silhouetted against the sky and the stars.

It was not because of any bravery on my part—I am sure of that—but through sheer fright that, before I had the least idea of what I was doing, I had thrown myself clear of rugs and pillows, sprung to my feet, made one frenzied leap across the bit of intervening space and clutched my intruder by his arms before his softly-padded feet touched the floor of the cabin. My own breath was coming in gasps—but the response to my frenzy was quiet and cool as an autumnal afternoon.

"Can you row a boat?"

I shall never forget the mental douche which dashed itself over me in that clear, yet scarcely perceptible whisper, accompanied as it was by a ghost-like laugh of sheer amusement. I released my grip, staring in the starlight at my visitor. Lo Chuh Fen!

"Yes!" I answered, steadying my voice and keeping it down to as low tones as his own. "Yes—I can!"

He pointed to the door behind which lay Miss Raven.

"Wake missie—as quietly as possible," he whispered. "Tell her get ready—come on deck—make no noise. All ready for you—then you go ashore and away, see? Not good for you to be here longer."

"No danger to—her?" I asked him.

"No danger to anybody, you do as I say," he answered. "All ready for you—nothing to do but come on deck, forward; get into the boat, be off. Now!"

Without another word he glided up the stairway and disappeared. For a few seconds I stood irresolute. Was it a trick, a plant? Should we be safe on deck—or targets for Chinese bullets, or receptacles for Chinese knives? Maybe!—yet—

I suddenly made up my mind. It was but one step to the door of the little inner cabin—I scraped on its panels. It opened instantly—a crack.

"Yes?" whispered Miss Raven.

I remembered then that if need arose she was to do unquestioningly anything I told her to do.

"Dress at once and come out," I said. "Be quick!"

"I've never been undressed," she answered. "I lay down in my clothes."

"Then come, just now," I commanded. "Wait for nothing!"

She was out of the room at once and by my side in the gloom. I laid a hand on her arm, giving its plump softness a reassuring pressure.

"Don't be afraid!" I whispered. "Follow me on deck. We're going."

"Going!" she said. "Leaving?"

"Come along!" said I.

I went before her up the stairway and out on the open deck. The night was particularly clear; the stars very bright; the patch of water between the yawl and the shore lay before us calm and dark; we could see the woods above the cove quite plainly, and at the edge of them a ribbon of white, the silver-sanded beach. And also, at the forward part of the vessel we were leaving I saw, or fancied I saw, shadowy forms—the Chinese were going to see us off.

But one form was not shadowy, nor problematical. Chuh was there, awaiting us, his arms filled with rugs. Without a word he motioned us to follow, preceded us along the side of the yawl to the boat, went before us into it, helped us down, settled us, put the oars into my hands, climbed out again, and leaned his yellow face down at me.

"You pull straight ahead," he murmured. "Good landing place straight before you: dry place on beach, too—morning come soon; you get away then through woods."

"The boat?" I asked him.

"You leave boat there—anywhere," he answered. "Boat not wanted again—we go, soon as high water over bar. Hope you get young missie safe home."

"Bless you!" I said under my breath. Then, remembering that I had some money in my pocket—three or four loose sovereigns as luck would have it, I thrust a hand therein, pulled them out, forced them into the man's claw-like fingers. I heard him chuckle softly—then his head disappeared behind the rail of the yawl, and I shoved the boat off, and for the next few minutes bent to those oars as I had certainly never bent to any previous labour, mental or physical, in my life. And Miss Raven, seeing my earnestness, said nothing, but quietly took the tiller and steered us in a straight line for the spot which the Chinaman had indicated. Neither of us—strange as it may seem—spoke one single word until, at the end of half an hour's steady pull, the boat's nose ran on to the shingly beach, beneath a fringe of dwarf oak that came right down to the edge of the shore. I sprang out, with a feeling of thankfulness that it would be hard to describe—and for a good reason found my tongue once more.

"Great Scott!" I exclaimed. "I've left my boots in that cabin!"

Despite the strange situation in which we were still placed, Miss Raven's sense of humour asserted itself; she laughed.

"Your boots!" she said. "Whatever will you do? These stones!—and the long walk home?"

"There are things to be thought of before that," said I. "We're still in the middle of the night. But this boat—do you think you can help me to drag it up the beach?"

Between us, the boat being a light one, we managed to pull it across the pebbles and under the low cliff beneath the overhanging fringe of the wood. In the uncertain light—for there was no moon and since our setting out from the yawl masses of cloud had come up from the south-east to obscure the stars—the wood looked impenetrably black.

"We shall have to wait here until the dawn comes," I remarked. "We can't find our way through the wood in this darkness—I can't even recollect the path, if there was one, by which they brought us down here from the ruins. You had better sit in the boat and make yourself comfortable with those rugs. Considerate of them, at any rate, to provide us with those!"

She got into the boat again and I wrapped one rug round her knees and placed another about her shoulders.

"And you?" she asked.

"I must do a bit of amateur boot-making," I answered. "I'm going to cut this third rug into strips and bind them about my feet—can't walk over stones and thorns and thistles, to say nothing of the moorland track, without some protection."

I got out my pocket-knife and sitting on the side of the boat began my task; for a few minutes she watched me, in silence.

"What does all this mean!" she said at last, suddenly. "Why have they let us go?"

"No idea," I answered. "But—things have happened since Baxter said good-night to us. Listen!" And I went on to tell her of all that had taken place on the yawl since the return of the Frenchman and his Chinese companion. "What does it look like?" I concluded. "Doesn't it seem as if the Chinese intend foul play to those two?"

"Do you mean—that they intend to—to murder them?" she asked in a half-frightened whisper. "Surely not that?"

"I don't see that a man who has lived the life that Baxter has can expect anything but a violent end," I replied callously. "Yes, I suppose that's what I do mean. I think the Chinese mean to get rid of the two others and get away with the swag—cleverly enough, no doubt."

"Horrible!" she murmured.

"Inevitable!" said I. "To my mind, the whole atmosphere was one of—that sort of thing. We're most uncommonly lucky."

She became silent again, and remained so for some time, while I went on at my task, binding the strips of rug about my feet and ankles, and fastening them, puttee fashion, around my legs.

"I don't understand it!" she exclaimed, after several minutes had gone by. "Surely those men must know that we, once free of them, would be sure to give the alarm. We weren't under any promise to them, whatever we were to Baxter."

"I don't understand anything," I said. "All I know is the surface of the situation. But that gentle villain who saw us off the yawl said that they were sailing at high water—only waiting until the tide was deep on the bar outside there. And they could get a long way, north or south or east, before we could set anybody on to them. Supposing they did get rid of Baxter and his Frenchman, what's to prevent them making off across the North Sea to, say, some port in the north of Russia? They've got stuff on board that would be saleable anywhere—no doubt they'll have melted it all into shapeless lumps before many hours are out."

Once more she was silent, and when she spoke again it was in a note of decision.

"No, I don't think that's it at all," she said emphatically. "They're dependent on wind and weather, and the seas aren't so wide, but that they'd be caught on our information. I'm sure that isn't it."

"What is it, then?" I asked.

"I've a sort of vague, misty idea," she answered, with a laugh that was plainly intended to be deprecatory of her own power. "Supposing these Chinese—you say they're awfully keen and astute—supposing they've got a plot amongst themselves for handing Baxter and the Frenchman over to the police—the authorities—with their plunder? Do you see?"

I had just finished the manufacture of my novel foot-wear, and I jumped to my padded feet with an exclamation that—this time—did not come from unpleasant contact with the sharp stones.

"By George!" I said. "There is an idea in that!—there may be something in it!"

"We thought Wing was on board," she continued. "If so, I think I may be right in offering such a suggestion. Supposing that Wing came across these people when he went to London; took service with them in the hope of getting at their secret; supposing he's induced the other Chinese to secure Baxter and the Frenchman—that, in short, he's been playing the part of detective? Wouldn't that explain why they sent us away?"

"Partly—yes, perhaps wholly," I said, struggling with this new idea. "But—where and when and how do they intend—if your theory's correct—to do the handing over?"

"That's surely easy enough," she replied quickly. "There's nothing to do but sail the yawl into say Berwick harbour and call the police aboard. A very, very easy matter!"

"I wonder if it is so?" I answered, musingly. "It might be—but if we stay here until it's light and the tide's up, we shall see which way the yawl goes."

"It's high water between five and six o'clock," she remarked. "Anyway, it was between four and five yesterday morning at Ravensdene Court—which now seems to be far away, in some other world."

"Hungry?" I asked.

"Not a bit," she answered. "But—it's a long way since yesterday afternoon. We've seen things."

"We've certainly seen Mr. Netherfield Baxter," I observed.

"A fascinating man!" she said, with a laugh. "The sort of man—under other circumstances—one would like to have to dinner."

"Um!" said I. "A ready and plausible tongue, to be sure. I dare say there are women who would fall in love with such a man."

"Lots!" she answered, with ready assent. "As I said just now, he's a very fascinating person."

"Ah!" said I, teasingly. "I had a suspicion last night that he was exciting your sympathetic interest."

"I'm much more sympathetic about your lack of boots and shoes," she retorted. "But as you seem to have rigged up some sort of satisfactory substitute, don't you think we might be making our way homewards? Is there any need to go through the woods? Why should we not follow the coast?"

"I'm doubtful about our ability to get round the south point of this cove," I answered. "I was looking at it yesterday afternoon from the deck of the yawl, and I saw that just there a sort of wall of rock runs right out into the sea. And if the tide's coming in—"

"Then, the woods," she interrupted. "Surely we can make our way through them, somehow. And it will begin to get light in another hour or so."

"If you like to try it," I answered. "But it's darker in there than you think for, and rougher going, too. However—"

Just then, and before she had made up her mind, we were both switched off that line of action by something that broke out on another. Across the three-quarters of a mile of water which separated us from our recent prison came the sound, clear and unmistakable, of a revolver shot, followed almost instantly by another. Miss Raven, who had risen to her feet, suddenly sat down again. A third shot rang out—a fourth—a fifth; we saw the flashes of each; they came, without doubt, from the deck of the yawl.

"Firing!" she murmured.

"Fighting!" said I. "That's just—listen to that!"

Half a dozen reports, sharp, insistent, rang out in quick succession; then two or three, all mingling together; the echoes followed from wood and cliff. Rapidly as the flashes pierced the gloom, the sounds died out—a heavy silence followed.

"That's just what?" asked Miss Raven—calmly.

"Well, if not just what I expected, it's at any rate partly what I expected," I said. "It had already struck me that if—well, supposing whatever it was that the Chinaman dropped into those glasses didn't act quite as soporifically as he intended it to, and Baxter and his companion woke up and found there was a conspiracy, a mutiny, going on, there'd be—eh?"

"Fighting?" she suggested.

"You're not a squeamish girl," I answered. "There'd be bloody murder! Their lives—or the others. And I should say that death's stalking through that unholy craft just now."

She made no answer and we stood staring at the black bulk lying motionless on the grey water; stood for a long time, listening. I, to tell the truth, was straining my ears to catch the plash of oars: I thought it possible that some of those on board the yawl might take a violent desire to get ashore.

But the silence continued. And now we said no more of setting out on our homeward journey: curiosity as to what had happened kept us there, whispering. The time passed—almost before we realized that night was passing, we were suddenly aware of a long line of faint yellow light that rose above the far horizon.

"Dawn," I muttered. "Dawn!"

And then, at that moment, we both heard something. Somewhere outside the bar, but close to the shore, a steam-propelled vessel was tearing along at a break-neck speed.

CHAPTER XXIII
THE FOURTH CHINAMAN

As we stood there, watching, the long line of yellow light on the eastern horizon suddenly changed in colour—first to a roseate flush, then to a warm crimson; the scenes around us, sky, sea and land brightened as if by magic. And with equal suddenness there shot round the edge of the southern extremity of the cove, outlining itself against the red sky in the distance the long, low-lying hulk of a vessel—a dark, sinister-looking thing which I recognised at once as a torpedo-destroyer. It was coming along, about half a mile outside the bar, at a rare turn of speed which would, I knew, quickly carry it beyond our field of vision. And I was wondering whether from its decks the inside of the cove and the yawl lying at anchor there was visible when it suddenly slackened in its headlong career, went about, seaward, and describing the greater part of a circle, came slowly in towards the bar, nosing about there beyond the line of white surf, for all the world like a terrier at the lip of some rat-hole.

Up to that moment Miss Raven and I had kept silence, watching this unexpected arrival in our solitude; now, turning to look at her, I saw that the thought which had come into my mind had also occurred to hers.

"Do you think that ship is looking for the yawl?" she asked. "It's a gunboat—or something of that sort, isn't it?"

"Torpedo-destroyer—latest class, too," I answered.

"Rakish, wicked-looking things, aren't they? And that's just what I, too, was wondering. It's possible, some news of the yawl may have got to the ears of the authorities, and this thing may have been sent from the nearest base to take a look along the coast. Perhaps they've spotted the yawl. But they can't get over that bar, yet."

"The tide's rising fast, though," she remarked, pointing to the shore immediately before us. "It'll be up to this boat soon."

I saw that she was right, and that presently the boat would be floating. We made it fast, and retreated further up the beach, amongst the overhanging trees, and there, from beneath the shelter of a group of dwarf oaks, looked seaward again. The destroyer lay supine outside the bar, watching. Suddenly, right behind her, far across the grey sea, the sun shot up above the horizon—her long dark hull cut across his ruddy face. And we were then able to make out shapes that moved here and there on her deck. There were live men there!—but on the yawl we saw no sign of life.

Yet, even as we looked, life sprang up there again. Once more a shot rang out, followed by two others in sharp succession. And as we stared in that direction, wondering what this new affray could be, we saw a boat shoot out from beneath the bows, with a low, crouching figure in it which was evidently making frantic efforts to get away. Somebody on board the yawl was just as eager to prevent this escape; three or four shots sounded—following one of them, the figure in the boat fell forward with a sickening suddenness.

"Got him!" I said involuntarily. "Poor devil!—whoever he is."

"No!" exclaimed Miss Raven. "See!—he's up again."

The figure was struggling to an erect position—even at that distance we could make out the effort. But the light of the newly-risen sun was so dazzling and confusing that we could not tell if the figure was that of an Englishman or a Chinaman—it was, at any rate, the figure of a tall man. And whoever he was, he managed to rise to his feet, and to lift an arm in the direction of the yawl, from which he was then some twenty yards away. Two more shots rang out—one from the yawl, another from the boat. It seemed to me that the man in the boat swayed—but a moment later he was again busy at his oars. No further shot came from the yawl, and the boat drew further and further away from it, in the direction of a spit of land some three or four hundred yards from where we stood. There were high rocks at the sea end of that spit—the boat disappeared behind them.

"There's one villain loose, at any rate," I muttered, not too well pleased to think that he was within reach of ourselves. "I wonder which. But I'm sure he was winged—he fell in a heap, didn't he, at one of those shots? Of course, he'll take to these woods—and we've got to get through them."

"Not yet!" said Miss Raven. "Look there!"

She pointed across the cove and beyond the bar, and I saw then that a boat had been put off from the destroyer and was being pulled at a rapid rate towards the line of surf which, under the deepening tide, was now but a thin streak of white. It seemed to me that I could see the glint of arms above the flash of the oars—anyway there was a boat's crew of blue-jackets there.

"They're going to board her!" I exclaimed. "I wonder what they'll find?"

"Dead men!" answered Miss Raven, quietly.

"What else? After all that shooting! I should think that man who's just got away was the last."

"There was a man left on board who fired at him—and at whom he fired back," I pointed.

"Yes—and who never fired again," she retorted. "They must all—oh!"

She interrupted herself with a sharp exclamation, and turning from watching the blue-jackets and their boat I saw that she was staring at the yawl. From its forecastle a black column of smoke suddenly shot up, followed by a great lick of flame.

"Good heavens!" I exclaimed. "The yawl's on fire!"

I guessed then at what had probably happened. The man who had just disappeared with his boat behind the spit of land further along the cove had in all likelihood been one of two survivors of the fight which had taken place in the early hours of the morning. He had wished to get away by himself, had set fire to the yawl, and sneaked away in the only boat, exchanging shots with the man left behind and probably killing him with the last one. And now—there was smoke and flame above what was doubtless a shambles.

But by that time the boat's crew from the destroyer had crossed the bar and entered the cove and the vigorously impelled oars were flashing fast in the sheltered waters. The boat disappeared behind the drifting smoke that poured out of the yawl—presently we saw figures hurrying hither and thither about her deck.

"They may be in time to get the fire under," I said. "Better, perhaps, if they let the whole thing burn itself out. It would burn up a lot of villainy."

"Here are people coming along the beach," remarked Miss Raven, suddenly. "Look! They must have seen the smoke rising."

I turned in the direction in which she was looking, and saw, on the strip of land and pebble, beneath the woods, a group of figures, standing at that moment and staring in the direction of the burning ship, which had evidently just rounded the extreme point of the cove at its southern confines. There were several figures in the group, and two were mounted. Presently these moved forward in our direction, at a smart pace; before they had gone far, I recognized the riders.

"A search party!" I exclaimed. "Look—that's Mr. Raven, in front, and surely that's Lorrimore, behind him. They're looking for us."

She gazed at the approaching figures for a moment, shielding her eyes from the already strong glare of the mounting sun, then ran forward along the shingle to meet them; I followed as rapidly as my improvised foot-wear would permit. By the time I reached them, Mr. Raven and Lorrimore were off their horses, the other members of the party had come up, and my companion in tribulation was explaining the situation. I let her talk—she was summing it all up in more concise fashion than I could have done. Her uncle listened with simple, open-mouthed astonishment; Lorrimore, when it came to mention of the Chinese element, with an obvious growing concern that seemed to be not far away from suspicion. He turned to me as Miss Raven finished.

"How many Chinese do you reckon were on board?" he asked.

"Four—including the last arrival, described as a gentleman," I answered.

"And two English?" he inquired.

"One Englishman, and one Frenchman," said I. "My belief is that the Chinese have settled the other two—and then possibly settled themselves, among them. There's one man somewhere in these woods. Whether he's a Chinaman we can't say—we couldn't make out."

He stared at me wonderingly for a moment; then turned and looked at the yawl. Evidently the blue-jackets had succeeded in checking the fire; the flame had died down, and the smoke now only hung about in wreaths; we could see figures running actively about the deck.

"There may be men on there that need medical assistance," said Lorrimore. "Where's this boat you mentioned, Middlebrook? I'm going off to that vessel. Two of you men pull me across there."

"I'll go with you," said I. "I left my boots in the cabin—I may find them—and a good deal else. The boat's just along here."

The search party was a mixed lot—a couple of local policemen, some gamekeepers, two or three fishermen, one of Mr. Raven's men-servants. Two of the fishermen ran the boat into the water; Lorrimore and I sprang in.

"This is the most extraordinary affair I ever heard of," he said as he sat down at my side in the stern.

"You didn't see all these Chinamen? Miss Raven says that you actually suspected my man Wing to be on board!"

"Lorrimore," said I, "in ten minutes you'll probably see and learn things that you'd never have dreamed of. Whether your man Wing is on board or not I don't know—but I know that that girl and I have had a marvellous escape from a nest of human devils! I can't say for myself, but—has my hair whitened?"

"Your hair hasn't whitened," he said. "You were probably safer than you knew—safe enough, if Wing was there."

"Well, I don't know," I retorted. "In future, let me avoid the sight of yellow cheeks and slit eyes—I've had enough. But tell me—how did you and your posse come this way? Didn't Mr. Raven get a wire last night?"

"Mr. Raven did get a wire," he replied; "but before he got it, he'd become anxious, and had sent out some of his men folk along the moors and cliffs in search of you. One of them, very late in the evening, came across a man who had been cutting wood somewhere hereabouts and had seen you and Miss Raven passing through the woods near the shore in company with two strangers. Mr. Raven's man returned close on midnight, with this news, and the old gentleman was, of course, thrown into a great state of alarm. He roused the whole community round Ravensdene Court, got me up, and we set out, as you see. But—the whole thing's marvellous! I can't help thinking that Wing may have been on board this vessel, and that it was due to him you got away."

"You've heard nothing of him—from London?" I suggested.

"Nothing, from anywhere," he replied. "Which is precisely why I feel sure that when he went there he came in contact with these people and has been playing some deep game."

"Deep, yes!" said I. "Deep indeed! But what game?"

He made no answer; we were now close to the yawl, and he was staring expectantly at the figures on her deck. Suddenly two of these detached themselves from the rest, turned, came to the side, looked down on us. One was a grimy-faced, alert-looking young naval officer, very much alive to his job; the other, not quite so smoke-blackened, but eminently business-like, was—Scarterfield.

"Good Heavens!" I muttered. "So—he's here!"

Scarterfield, as we pulled up to the side of the yawl, was evidently telling the young officer who we were; he turned from him to us as we prepared to clamber aboard and addressed us without ceremony, as if we had been parted from him but a few minutes since our last meeting.

"You'd better be prepared for some unpleasant sights, you two!" he said. "This is no place to bring an empty stomach to at this hour of the morning—and I fancy you've no liking for horrors, Mr. Middlebrook."

"I've had plenty of them during this night, Scarterfield," said I. "I was a prisoner on board this vessel from yesterday afternoon until soon after midnight, and I've sat on yonder beach listening to a good many things that have gone on since I got away from her."

He stared at me in astonishment for a moment; so did his companion, whose sharp eyes, running me over, settled their glance on my swathed feet.

"Yes," I said, staring back at him. "Just so!—I was bundled off in such a hurry that I left my boots behind me. They're in the cabin—and if they aren't burned up I'll be glad of them."

I was making a move in that direction, for I saw that the fire, now well under control, had been confined to the fore-part of the yawl—but Scarterfield stopped me. He was clearly as puzzled as anxious.

"Middlebrook!" he said earnestly. "I don't understand it, at all. You say you were on this vessel—during the night? Then, in God's name, who else was on her—whom did you find here—what men?"

"I left six men on her," I answered. "Netherfield Baxter—a Frenchman—a Chinese gentleman, so described—three Chinese as well. The Frenchman and the Chinese gentleman were those fellows we heard of at Hull, Scarterfield, and one, at any rate, of the other three Chinese was Lo Chuh Fen, of whom we've also heard."

"And you got into their hands—how?" he asked.

"Kidnapped—Miss Raven and myself—by Baxter and the Frenchman, in those woods, yesterday afternoon," I answered. "We came across them by accident, at the place where they'd just dug up that monastic silver—there it is, man!" I continued, pointing to the chests, which still stood where I had last seen them. "You've got it, at last."

He threw an almost careless glance at the chests, shaking his head.

"I want something beyond that," he muttered. "But—you say there were six men altogether—six?"

"I've enumerated them." I replied. "Two Europeans—four Chinese."

He turned a quick eye on the naval officer.

"Then one of 'em's escaped—somehow!" he exclaimed. "There's only five here—and every man Jack is dead! Where's the other!"

"One did escape," said I. I, too, looked at the lieutenant. "He got off in a boat just as you and your men were approaching the bar yonder—I thought you'd see him."

"No," he answered, shaking his head. "We didn't see anybody leave. The yawl lay between us and him most likely. Where did he land?"

"Behind that spit," I replied, pointing to the place. "He vanished, from where I stood, behind those black rocks. That was just as you crossed the bar. And he can't have gone far away, for he was certainly wounded as he left the yawl—a man fired at him from the bows. He fired back."

"We heard those shots," said the lieutenant, "and we found a chap—Englishman—in the bows, dying, when we boarded her. He died just afterwards. They're all dead—the others were dead then."

"Not a man alive!" I exclaimed.

Scarterfield cast a glance astern—the glance of a man who draws back the curtain from a set stage.

"Look for yourselves!" he muttered. "Too late for any of your work, doctor. But—that sixth man?"

Lorrimore and I, giving no heed just then to the detective's questioning about the escaped man, went towards the after part of the deck. Busied with their labours in getting the fire under control, the blue-jackets had up to then left the dead men where they found them—with one exception. The man whom they had found in the bows had been carried aft and laid near the entrance to the little deck-house—some hand had thrown a sheet over him. Lorrimore lifted it—we looked down. Baxter!

"That's the fellow we found right forward," said the lieutenant. "He's several slighter wounds on him, but he'd been shot through the chest—heart, perhaps—just before we boarded her. That would be the shot fired by the man in the boat, I suppose—a good marksman! Was this the skipper?"

"Chief spirit," said I. "He was lively enough last night. But—the rest?"

"They're all over the place," he answered. "They must have had a most desperate do of it. The vessel's more like a slaughter-house than a ship!"

He was right there, and I was thankful that Miss Raven and I for whatever reason on the part of the Chinese, had been so unceremoniously sent ashore before the fight began. As Lorrimore went about, noting its evidences, I endeavoured to form some idea, more or less accurate, of the events which had led up to it. It seemed to me that either Baxter or the Frenchman, awaking from sleep sooner than the Chinese had expected, had discovered that treachery was afoot and that wholesale shooting had begun on all sides. Most of the slaughter had taken place immediately in front of the hatchway which led to the cabin in which I had seen Baxter and his two principal associates; some sort of a rough barricade had been hastily set up there; behind it the Frenchman lay dead, with a bullet through his brain; before it, here and there on the deck, lay three of the Chinese—their leader, still in his gaily-coloured sleeping suit, prominent amongst them; Lo Chuh Fen a little further away; the third man near the wheel, face downwards. He, like Chuh, was a small-made, wiry fellow. And there was blood everywhere.

Scarterfield jogged my elbow as I stood staring at these unholy sights. He was keener of look than I had ever seen him.

"That fourth Chinaman?" he said. "I must get him, dead or alive. The rest's nothing—I want him!"

CHAPTER XXIV
THE SILK CAP

I glanced round; Lorrimore, after an inspection of the dead men, had walked aside with the lieutenant and was in close conversation with him. I, too, drew the detective away to the side of the yawl.

"Scarterfield," I said in a whisper, "I've grounds for believing that the fourth Chinaman is—Lorrimore's servant—Wing."

"What!" he exclaimed. "The man we saw at Ravensdene Court?"

"Just so," said I, "and who went off to London, you remember, to see what he could do in the way of discovering the other Chinaman, Lo Chuh Fen."

"Yes—I remember that," he answered.

"There is Lo Chuh Fen," I said, pointing to one of the silent figures. "And I think that Wing not only discovered him, but came aboard this vessel with him, as part of a crew which Baxter and his French friend got together at Limehouse or Poplar. As I say, I've grounds for thinking it."

Scarterfield looked round, glanced at the shore, shook his head.

"I'm all in the dark—about some things," he said.

"I got on the track of this craft—I'll tell you how, later—and found she'd come up this coast, and we got the authorities to send this destroyer after her—I came with her, hell for leather, I can tell you, from Harwich. But I don't know a lot that I want to know, Baxter, now—you're sure that man lying dead there is the Baxter we heard of at Blyth and traced to Hull?"

"Certain!" said I. "Listen, and I'll give you a brief account of what's happened since yesterday, and of what I've learned since then—it will make things clear to you."

Standing there, where the beauty of the fresh morning and the charm of sky and sea made a striking contrast to the horror of our immediate surroundings, I told him, as concisely as I could, of how Miss Raven and myself had fallen into the hands of Netherfield Baxter and the Frenchman, of what had happened to me on board, and, at somewhat greater length, of Baxter's story of his own career as it related to his share in the theft of the monastic treasure from the bank at Blyth, his connection with the Elizabeth Robinson and his knowledge of the brothers Quick. Nor did I forget Baxter's theory about the rubies—and at that Scarterfield obviously pricked his ears.

"Now there's something in that," he said, with a regretful glance at the place where Baxter's dead body lay under its sheet. "I wish that fellow had been alive, to tell more! For he's right about those rubies—quite right. The Quicks had 'em—two of 'em."

"You know that?" I exclaimed.

"I'll tell you," he answered. "After we parted, I was very busy, investigating matters still further in Devonport and in London. And—through the newspapers, of course—I got in touch with a man who told me a lot. He came to headquarters in London, asking for me—wouldn't tell any of our people there anything—it was a day or two before I got at close quarters with him, for when he called I was away at the time. He left an address, in Hatton Garden—a Mr. Isidore Baubenheimer, dealer, as you may conclude, in precious stones. Well, I drove off at once to see him. He told me a queer tale. He said that he'd only just come back from Amsterdam and Paris, or he'd have been in communication with me earlier. While he'd been away, he said, he'd read the English newspapers and seen a good deal about the two murders at Saltash and Ravensdene Court, and he believed that he could throw some light on them, for he felt sure that either Noah Quick or Salter Quick was identical with a man with whom he had not so long ago talked over the question of the value of certain stones which the man possessed. But I'll show you Baubenheimer's own words—I got him to make a clear statement of the whole thing and had it taken down in black and white, and I have a typed copy of it in my pocket-book—glance it over for yourself."

He produced a sheet of paper, folded and endorsed and handed it to me—it ran thus:

My place of business in Hatton Garden is a few doors away from the Hatton Garden entrance to the old Mitre Tavern, which lies between that street and Ely Place. On, as far as I can remember, the seventh or eighth of March last, I went into the Mitre about half-past eleven o'clock one morning, expecting to meet a friend of mine who was often there about that time. He hadn't come in—I sat down with a drink and a cigar to wait for him.

In the little room where I sat there were three other men—two of them were men that I knew, men who dealt in diamonds in a smallish way. The other was a stranger, a thick-set, middle-aged, seafaring sort of man, hard-bitten, dressed in a blue-serge suit of nautical cut; I could tell from his hands and his general appearance that he'd knocked about the world in his time. Just then he was smoking a cigar and had a tumbler of rum and water before him, and he was watching, with a good deal of interest, the other two, who, close by, were showing each other a quantity of loose diamonds which, evidently to the seafaring man's amazement, they spread out openly, on their palms.

After a bit they got up and went out, and the stranger glanced at me. Now I am, as you see, something of the nautical sort myself, bearded and bronzed and all that—I'm continually crossing the North Sea—and it may be he thought I was of his own occupation—anyway, he looked at me as if wanting to talk.

"I reckon they think nothing of pulling out a fistful o' them things hereabouts, mister," he said. "No more to them than sovereigns and half-sovereigns and bank-notes is to bank clerks."

"That's about it," said I. "You'll see them shown in the open street outside."

"Trade of this part of London, isn't it?" he asked.

"Just so," said I. "I'm in it myself." He gave me a sharp inquiring look at that.

"Ah!" he remarked. "Then you'll be a gentleman as knows the vally of a thing o' that sort when you sees it?"

"Well I think so," I answered. "I've been in the trade all my life. Have you got anything to dispose of? I see you're a seafaring man, and I've known sailors who brought something nice home now and then."

"Same here," said he; "but I never known a man as brought anything half as good as what I have."

"Ah!" said I. "Then you have something?"

"That's what I come into this here neighbourhood for, this morning," he answered. "I have something, and a friend o' mine, says he to me, 'Hatton Garden,' he says, 'is the port for you—they eats and drinks and wallers in them sort o' things down that way,' he says.

"So I steers for this here; only, I don't know no fish, d'ye see, as I could put the question to what I wants to ask."

"Put it to me," said I, drawing out my card-case. "There's my card, and you can ask anybody within half a square mile if they don't know me for a trustworthy man. What is it you've got?" I went on, never dreaming that he'd got anything at all of any great value. "I'll give you an idea of its worth in two minutes."

But he glanced round at the door and shook his head.

"Not here, mister!" he said. "I wouldn't let the light o' day shine on what I got in a public place like this, not nohow. But," he added, "I see you've a office and all that. I ain't undisposed to go there with you, if you like—you seem a honest man."

"Come on then," I said. "My office is just round the corner, and though I've clerks in it, we'll be private enough there."

"Right you are, mister," he answered, and he drank off his rum and we went out and round to my office.

I took him into my private room—I had a young lady clerk in there (she'd remember this man well enough) and he looked at her and then at me.

"Send the girl away," he muttered. "There's a matter of undressing—d'ye see?—in getting at what I want to show you."

I sent her out of the room, and sat down at my desk. He took off his overcoat, his coat, and his waistcoat, shoved his hand into some secret receptacle that seemed to be hidden in the band of his trousers, somewhere behind the small of his back, and after some acrobatic contortions and twistings, lugged out a sort of canvas parcel, the folds of which he unwrapped leisurely. And suddenly, coming close to me, he laid the canvas down on my blotting-pad and I found myself staring at some dozen or so of the most magnificent pearls I ever set eyes on and a couple of rubies which I knew to be priceless. I was never more astonished in my life, but he was as cool as a cucumber.

"What d'ye think o' that lot, mister?" he asked. "I reckon you don't see a little lot o' that quality every day."

"No, my friend," said I, "nor every year, either, nor every ten years. Where on earth did you get them—"

"Away East," said he, "and I've had 'em some time, not being particular about selling 'em, but I've settled down in England now, and I think I will sell 'em and buy house-property with the money. What do you fix their vally at, now, mister—thereabouts, anyway?"

"Good heavens, man!" I said. "They're worth a great deal of money—a great deal."

"I'm very well aware o' that, mister," he answered. "Very well aware indeed—nobody better. I seen a deal o' things in my time, and I ain't no fool."

"You really want to sell them?" I asked.

"If I get the full price," said he. "And that, of course, would be a big 'un."

"The thing to do," I said, "would be to find somebody who wants to complete a particularly fine set of pearls—some very rich woman who'd stick at nothing. The same remark applies to the rubies."

"Maybe you could come across some customer?" he suggested.

"No doubt, in a little time," I answered.

"Well," he said, "I'm going up North—I've a bit o' business that way, and I reckon I'll be back here in London in a week or so—I'll call in then, mister, and if you've found anybody that's likely to deal, I'll show 'em the goods with pleasure."

"You'd better leave them with me, and let me show them to some possible buyers," I said. But he was already folding up his canvas wrapping again.

"Guv'nor," he answered, "I can see as how you're a honest man, and I treats you as such, and so will, but I couldn't have them things out o' my possession for one minute until I sells 'em. I've a brother, mister," he added, "as owns a half-share in 'em—d'ye see?—and I holds myself responsible to him. But now that you've seen 'em guv'nor, find a buyer or buyers—I'll shove my bows round that door o' yours again this day week." And with that he restored his treasures to their hiding-place, assumed his garments once more, and remarking that he had a train to catch, hastened off, again assuring me that he would call in a week, on his return from the North.

It was not until he had been gone several minutes that I remembered that I had forgotten to ask his name. I certainly expected him to be back at the end of the week—but he didn't come, and just then I had to go away. Now I take him to have been the man, Salter Quick, who was murdered on the Northumberland coast—no doubt for the sake of those jewels. As for their value, I estimated it, from my cursory examination of them, to have been certainly not less than eighty thousand pounds.

I folded up the statement and restored it to Scarterfield.

"What do you think of that?" he asked.

"Salter Quick, without a doubt," I answered. "It corroborates Baxter's story of the rubies. He didn't mention any pearls. And I think now, Scarterfield, that Salter Quick's murder lies at the door of—one of those Chinamen who in their turn are lying dead before us!"

"Well, and that's what I think," said he. "Though however a Chinaman could be about this coast without the local police learning something of it at the time they were inquiring into the murder beats me. However, there it is!—I feel sure of it. And I was going to tell you—I got wind of this yawl down Limehouse way—I found out that she'd been in the Thames, and that her owner had enlisted a small crew of Chinamen and gone away with them, and I found out further that she'd been seen off the Norfolk coast, going north, so then I pitched a hot and strong story to the authorities about piracy and all manner of things, and they sent this destroyer in search of Baxter, and me on her. If we'd only been twelve hours sooner!"

Lorrimore and the lieutenant came up to us.

"My men have the fire completely beaten," said the lieutenant glancing at Scarterfield. "If you want to look round——"

We began a thorough examination of the yawl, in the endeavour to reconstruct the affair of the early morning. For there were all the elements of a strange mystery in that and curiosity about the whole thing was as strong in me as in Scarterfield. We knew now many things that we had not known twenty-four hours before—one was that the many affairs, dark and nefarious, of Netherfield Baxter, had nothing to do with the murders of Noah and Salter Quick; another that those murders without doubt arose from the brothers' possession of the pearls and rubies which Salter had shown to the Hatton Garden diamond merchant. All things considered it seemed to me that the explanation of the mystery rested in some such theory as this—the Chinaman, Lo Chuh Fen, doubtless knew as well as Baxter and his French friend that the Quicks were in possession of the rubies stolen from the heathen temple in Southern China; no doubt he had become acquainted with that fact when the marooned party from the Elizabeth Robinson were on the intimate terms of men united by a common fate on the lonely island. Drifting eventually to England, Chuh had probably discovered the whereabouts of the two brothers, had somehow found that the rubies were still in their possession, might possibly have been in personal touch with Salter or with Noah, had taken others of his compatriots, discovered in the Chinese quarters of the East End into his confidence, and engineered a secret conspiracy for securing the valuables. He himself had probably tracked Salter to the lonely bit of shore near Ravensdene Court; associates of his had no doubt fallen upon Noah at Saltash. But how had all this led up to the attack of the Chinese on Baxter and the Frenchman?—and who was the man who, leaving every other member of the yawl's company dead or dying and who had exchanged those last shots with Netherfield Baxter, had escaped to the shore and was now, no doubt, endeavouring to make a final bid for liberty?

Reckoning up everything we saw, it seemed to me, from my knowledge of the preceding incidents, that the drug which the Chinese gentleman, as Baxter had been pleased to style him, had not had the effects that he desired and anticipated, and that one or other of the two men to whom it had been administered had been aroused from sleep before any attack could be made on both. I figured things in this way—Baxter, or the Frenchman, or both, had awakened and missed the Chinaman. One or both had turned out to seek him; had discovered that Miss Raven and I were missing; had scented danger to themselves, found the Chinese up to some game, and opened fire on them. Evidently the first fighting—as I had gathered from the revolver shots—had been sharp and decisive; I formed the conclusion that when it was over there were only two men left alive, of whom one was Baxter and the other the man whom we had seen escaping in the boat. Baxter, I believed, had put up some sort of barricade and watched his enemy from it; that he himself was already seriously wounded I gathered from two facts—one that his body had several superficial wounds on arms and shoulders, and that in the cabin behind the hastily-constructed barricade, sheets had been torn into strips for bandages which we found on these wounds, where, as far as he could, he had roughly twisted them. Then, according to my thinking, he had eventually seen the other survivor, who was probably in like case with himself as regards superficial wounds, endeavouring to make off, and emerging from his shelter had fired on him from the side of the yawl, only to be killed himself by return fire. There was no mistaking the effect of that last shot—chance shot or well-directed aim it had done for Netherfield Baxter, and he had crumpled up and died where he dropped.

A significant exclamation from Scarterfield called me to his side—he, aided by one of the blue-jackets, was examining the body of Lo Chuh Fen.

"Look here!" he murmured as I went up to him. "This chap has been searched! After he was dead, I mean. There's a body-belt that he wore—it's been violently torn from him, his clothing ripped to get at it, and the belt itself hacked to pieces in the endeavour to find—something! Whose work has that been?"

"The work of the man who got away in the boat," said I. "Of course! He's been after those rubies and pearls, Scarterfield."

"We must be after him," he said. "You say you think he was wounded in getting away?"

"He was certainly wounded," I affirmed. "I saw him fall headlong in the boat after the first shot; he recovered himself, fired the shot which no doubt finished Baxter, and must have been wounded again, for the two men again fired simultaneously, and the man in the boat swayed at that second shot. But once more he pulled himself together and rowed away."

"Well, if he's wounded, he can't get far without attracting notice," declared Scarterfield. "We'll organize a search for him presently. But first let's have a look into the quarters that these Chinamen occupied."

The smoke of the fire—which seemed to have broken out in the forecastle and had been confined to it by the efforts of the sailors from the destroyer—had now almost cleared away, and we went forward to the galley. The fire had not spread to that, and after the scenes of blood and violence astern and in the cabin the place looked refreshingly spick and span; there was, indeed, an unusual air of neatness and cleanliness about it. The various pots and pans shone gaily in the sun's glittering lights; every utensil was in its place; evidently the galley's controlling spirit had been a meticulously careful person who hated disorder as heartily as dirt. And on a shelf near the stove was laid out what I took to be the things which the vanished cook, whoever he might be, had destined for breakfast—a tempting one of kidneys and bacon, soles, eggs, a curry. I gathered from this, and pointed my conclusion out to Scarterfield, that the presiding genius of the galley had had no idea of the mutiny into which he had been plunged soon after midnight.

"Aye!" said Scarterfield. "Just so—I see your point. And—you think that man of Lorrimore's, Wing, was aboard, and if so, he's the man who's escaped?"

"I've strong suspicions," said I. "Yet, they were based on a plum-cake."

"Well, and I've known of worse clues," he rejoined. "But—I wonder? Now, if only we knew——"

Just then Lorrimore came along, poking his head into the galley. He suddenly uttered a sharp exclamation and reached an arm to a black silk cap which hung from a peg on the boarding above the stove.

"That's Wing's!" he said, in emphatic tones. "I saw him make that cap himself!"

CHAPTER XXV
CLEAR DECKS

The bit of head-gear which Lorrimore had taken down assumed a new interest; Scarterfield and I gazed at it as if it might speak to us. Nevertheless the detective when he presently spoke showed some incredulity.

"That's the sort of cap that any Chinaman wears," he remarked. "It may have belonged to any of them."

"No!" answered Lorrimore, with emphatic assurance. "That's my man's. I saw him making it—he's as deft with his fingers, at that sort of thing, as he is at cooking. And since this cap is his, and as he's not amongst the lot there on deck, he's the man that you, Middlebrook, saw escaping in the boat. And since he is that man, I know where he'd be making."

"Where, then?" demanded Scarterfield.

"To my house!" answered Lorrimore.

Scarterfield showed more doubt.

"I don't think that's likely, doctor," he said. "Presumably, he's got those jewels on him, and I should say he'd get away from this with the notion of trusting to his own craft to get unobserved on a train and lose himself in Newcastle. A Chinaman with valuables on him worth eighty thousand pounds? Come!"

"You don't know that he's any valuables of any sort on him," retorted Lorrimore. "That's all supposition. I say that if my man Wing was on this vessel—as I'm sure he was—he was on it for purposes of his own. He might be with this felonious lot, but he wouldn't be of them. I know him!—and I'm off to get on his track. Lay you anything you like—a thousand to one!—that I find Wing at my house!"

"I'm not taking you, Lorrimore," said I. "I don't mind laying the same."

Scarterfield looked curiously at the two of us. Apparently, his belief in Chinese virtue was not great.

"Well," he said. "I'm on his track, anyhow, and I propose to get away to the beach. There's nothing more we can do here. These naval people have got this job in charge, now. Let's leave them to it. Yet," he added, as we left the galley, and with a significant glance at me, "there is one thing Middlebrook!—wouldn't you like to have a look inside those two chests that we've heard so much about?—you and I."

"I certainly should!" I answered.

"Then we will," he said. "I, too, have some curiosity that way. And if Master Wing has repaired to the doctor's house he's all right, and if he hasn't, he can't get very far away, being a Chinaman, in his native garments, and wounded."

The chests which had come aboard the yawl with Miss Raven and myself the previous afternoon—it seemed as if ages had gone by since then!—still stood where they had been placed at the time; close to the gangway leading to the main cabin. Lorrimore, Scarterfield, the young naval officer and I gathered round while a couple of handy blue-jackets forced them open—no easy business, for whether the dishonest bank-manager and Netherfield Baxter had ever opened them or not, they were screwed up again in a fashion which showed business-like resolves that they should not easily be opened again. But at last the lids were off—to reveal inner shells of lead. And within these, gleaming dully in the fresh sunlight lay the monastic treasures of which Scarterfield and I had read in the hotel at Blyth.

"Queer!" said the detective, as he stood staring meditatively at patens and chalices, reliquaries and pyxes. "All these, I reckon, are sacred things, consecrated and all that, and yet ever since that Reformation time, they've been mixed up with robbery, and now at last with wholesale murder! Odd, isn't it? However, there they are!—and here," he added, pulling the parchment schedules out of his pocket which he had discovered at Baxter's old lodgings in Blyth, and handing them to the lieutenant, "here is the list of what there ought to be; you'll take all this in charge, of course—I don't know if it comes within the law of treasure trove or not, but as the original owners are dust and ashes four hundred years ago, I should say it does—anyway, the Crown solicitors'll soon settle that point."

We went off from the yawl, the three of us, in the boat which had brought Lorrimore and me aboard her. The group on shore saw us making for the point whereat the escaping figure had landed in the early morning, and followed us thither along the beach. They came up to us as we stepped ashore, and while Lorrimore began giving Mr. Raven an account of what we had found on the yawl I drew his niece aside.

"You had better know the worst in a word," I said. "We were more than fortunate in getting away from the yawl as we did. Don't be upset—there isn't a man alive on that thing!"

"Baxter?" she exclaimed.

"I said—not one!" I answered. "Wholesale! Don't think about it—as for me, I wish I'd never seen it. But now it's a question of a living man—Wing."

"Then it was as I thought?" she asked. "Wing was there?"

"Lorrimore is sure of it—he found a cap of Wing's in the galley," said I. "And as Wing isn't amongst the dead, he's the man who escaped."

Scarterfield came up, the local policeman with him who had joined Mr. Raven's search-party as it came across country.

"Whereabouts did this man land, Middlebrook?" he asked. "You saw him, you and Miss Raven, didn't you?"

"We saw him round these rocks," I replied. "But then they hid him from us—we couldn't see exactly. Somewhere on the other side of them, anyway."

We spread ourselves out along the shore, crossing the spit of sand, now encroached on considerably by the tide, and began to search amongst the black rocks that jutted out of it thereabouts. Presently we came across the boat, slightly rocking in the lapping water alongside a ledge—I took a hasty glance into it and drew Miss Raven away. For on the thwarts, and on the seat in the stern, and on one of the oars, thrown carelessly aside, there was blood.

A sharp cry from one of the men who had gone a little ahead brought us all hurrying to his side. He had found, amongst the rocks, a sort of pool at the sides of which there was dry, sand-strewn rock; there were marks there as if a man had knelt in the sand, and there was more blood, and there were strips of clothing—linen, silk, as if the man had torn up some of his garments as temporary bandages.

"He's been here," said Lorrimore in a low voice. "Probably washed his wounds here—salt is a styptic. Flesh wounds, most likely, but," he added, sinking his voice still lower, "judging from what we've seen of the blood he's lost, he must have been weakening by the time he got here. Still, he's a man of vast strength and physique, and—he'd push on. Look for marks of his footsteps."

We eventually picked up a recently made track in the sand and followed it until it came to a point at the end of the overhanging woods, where they merged into open moorland running steeply downwards to the beach. There, in the short, wiry grass of the close-knitted turf, the marks vanished.

"Just as I said," muttered Lorrimore, whom with Miss Raven and myself, was striding on a little in advance of the rest. "He's made for my place—as I knew he would. I knew enough of this country to know that there's a road at the head of these moors that runs parallel with the railway on one side and the coast on the other towards Ravensdene—he'd be making for that. He'd take up the side of this wood, as the nearest way to strike the road."

That he was right in this we were not long in finding out. Twice, as our party climbed the steep side of the moorland we came across evidences of the fugitive. At two points we found places whereat a man had recently sat down on the bank beneath the trees, to rest. And at one of them we found more—a blood-soaked bandage.

"No man can go far, losing blood in that way," whispered Lorrimore to me as we went onward. "He can't be far off."

And suddenly we came across our quarry. Coming out on the top of the moorland, and rounding the corner of the woods, we hit the road of which Lorrimore had spoken—a long, white, hedgeless, wall-less ribbon of track that ran north and south through treeless country. There, a few yards away from us, stood an isolated cottage, some gamekeeper's or watcher's place, with a bit of unfenced garden before it. In that garden was a strange group, gathered about something that at first we did not see—Mr. Cazalette, obviously very busy, the police-inspector (a horse and trap, tethered to a post close by, showed how they had come) a woman, evidently the mistress of the cottage, a child, open-mouthed wide-eyed with astonishment at these strange happenings, a dog that moved uneasily around the two-legged folk, whimpering his concern. The bystanders moved as we hurried up, and then we caught glimpses of towels and water and hastily-improvised bandages and smelt brandy, and saw, in the midst of all this Wing, propped up against a bank of earth, his eyes closed, and over his yellow face a queer grey-white pallor. His left arm and shoulder were bare, save for the bandages which Cazalette was applying—there were discarded ones on the turf which were soaked with blood.

Lorrimore darted forward with a hasty exclamation, and had Cazalette's job out of the old gentleman's hands and into his own before the rest of us could speak. He motioned the whole of us away except Cazalette and the woman, and the police-inspector turned to Mr. Raven and his niece, and to myself and Scarterfield.

"I think we were just about in time," he said, laconically. "I don't know what it all means, but I reckon the man was about done for. Bleeding to death, I should say."

"You found him?" I asked.

"No," he answered. "Not at first anyway. The woman there says she was out here in her garden, feeding her fowls, when she saw him stagger round the corner of the wood there, and make for her. He fell across the bank where he's lying in a dead faint, and she ran for water. Just then we came along in the trap, saw what was happening and jumped out. Fortunately, when we set off, Mr. Cazalette insisted on bringing a big flask of neat brandy, and some food—he said you never knew what you mightn't want—and we gave him a stiff dose, and pulled him round sufficiently to be able to tell us where he was wounded. And he's got a skinful!—a bullet through the thick part of his left arm, another at the point of the same shoulder, and a third just underneath it. Mr. Cazalette says they're all flesh wounds—but I don't know: I know the man's fainted twice since we got to him. And look here!—just before he fainted the last time, he managed to fumble amongst his clothing with his right hand and he pulled something out and shoved it into my hand with a word or two. 'Give it Lorrimore,' he said, in a very weak voice. 'Tell him I found it all out—was going to trap all of them—but they were too quick for me last night—all dead now.' Then he fainted again. And—look at this!"

He drew out a piece of canvas, twisted up anyhow, and opening it before our wondering eyes, revealed a heap of magnificent pearls and a couple of wonderful rubies that shone in the sunlight like fire.

"That's what he gave me," said the inspector. "What is it? what's it mean?"

"That's what Salter Quick was murdered for," said I. "And it means that Lorrimore's man ran down the murderer."

And without waiting for any comment from him, and leaving Scarterfield to explain matters, I went across the little garden to see how the honest Chinaman was faring.

It was a strange, yet a plain story that Wing told his master and a select few of us a day or two later, when Lorrimore had patched him up. To anybody of a hum-drum life—such as mine had always been until these events—it was, indeed, a stirring story. The queer thing, however—at any rate, queer to me—was that the narrator, as calm and suave as ever in his telling of it—did not seem to regard it as anything strange at all—he might have been explaining to us some new way of making a good cake.

At our request and suggestion, he had journeyed to London and plunged into those quarters of the East End wherein his fellow-countrymen are to be found. His knowledge of the district of which Limehouse Causeway forms a centre soon brought him in touch with Lo Chuh Fen, who, as he quickly discovered, had remained in London during the last two or three years, assisting in the management of a Chinese eating-house. Close by, in a lodging kept by a compatriot, Wing put himself up and cultivated Chuh's acquaintance. Ere many days had passed another Chinaman came on the scene—this was the man whom Baxter had described as a Chinese gentleman. He represented himself to Wing and Chuh as a countryman of theirs who had been engaged in highly successful trading operations in Europe, and was now, in company with two friends, an Englishman and a Frenchman, carrying out another which involved a trip in a small, but well-appointed yacht, across the Atlantic: he wanted these countrymen of his own to make up a crew. An introduction to Baxter and the Frenchman followed, and Wing and Chuh were taken into confidence as regards the treasure hidden on the Northumberland coast. A share of the proceeds was promised them: they secured a third, trustworthy Chinaman in the person of one Ah Wong, an associate of Chuh's, and the yawl, duly equipped, left the Thames and went northward. By this time, Wing had wormed himself completely into Chuh's confidence, and without even discovering whether Chuh was or was not the actual murderer of Salter Quick (he believed him to be and believed Wong to be the murderer of Noah, at Saltash) he had found out that Chuh was in possession of the pearls and rubies which—though Wing had no knowledge of that—Salter had exhibited to Baubenheimer. And as the yawl neared the scene of the next operations, Wing made his own plans. He had found out that its owners, after recovering the monastic treasures, were going to call at Leith, where they were to be met by the private yacht of some American, whose name Wing never heard. Accordingly, he made up his mind to escape from the yawl as soon as it got into Leith, to go straight to the police, and there give information as to the doings of the men he was with. But here his plans were frustrated. He was taken aback by the capture of Miss Raven and myself by Baxter and the Frenchman, and though he contrived to keep out of our way, he was greatly concerned lest we should see him and conclude that he had joined the gang and was privy to its past and present doings. But that very night a much more serious development materialized. The Chinese gentleman, arriving from London, and being met by the Frenchman at Berwick, had a scheme of his own, which, after he had attempted the drugging of his two principal associates, he unfolded to his fellow-countrymen. This was to get rid of Baxter and the Frenchman and seize the yawl and its contents for themselves, sailing with it to some port in North Russia. Wing had no option but to profess agreement—his only proviso was that Miss Raven and myself should be cleared out of the yawl. This proposition was readily assented to, and Chuh was charged with the job of sending us ashore. But almost immediately afterwards, everything went wrong with the conspirator's plans. The drug which had been administered to Baxter and the Frenchman failed to act; Baxter, waking suddenly to find the Chinamen advancing on the cabin with only too evident murderous intent, opened fire on them, and the situation rapidly resolved itself into a free fight, in the course of which Wing barricaded himself into the galley. Before long he saw that of all the men on board, only himself and Baxter remained alive—he saw, too, that Baxter was already wounded. Baxter, evidently afraid of Wing, also barricaded himself into the cabin; for some hours the two secretly awaited each other's onslaught. At last, Wing determined to make a bid for liberty, and cautiously worming his way to the cabin he looked in and as he thought, saw Baxter lying either dead or dying. He then hastily stripped Chuh of the belt in which he knew him to carry the precious stones, and taking to the boat which lay at the side of the yawl, pushed off, only to find Baxter after him with a revolver. In the exchange of shots which followed Wing was hit twice, but a lucky reply of his laid Baxter dead. At that he got away, weak and fainting, managed to make the shore, to bind up as much of his wounded body as he could get at, and set out as well as he was able for his master's house. The rest we knew.

So that was all over, and it only remained now for the police to clear things up, for Wing to be thoroughly whitewashed in the matter of the shooting of Netherfield Baxter, and for everybody in the countryside to talk of the affair for nine days—and perhaps a little more. Mr. Cazalette talked a great deal: as for Miss Raven and myself, as actors in the last act of the drama which ended in such a tragedy, we talked little: we had seen too much at close quarters. But on the first occasion on which she and I were alone again, I made a confession to her.

"I don't want you—of all people—to get any mistaken impression about me," I said. "So, I'm going to tell you something. During the whole of the time you and I were on that yawl, I was in an absolute panic of fear!"

"You were?" she exclaimed. "Really frightened?"

"Quaking with fright!" I declared boldly. "Especially after you'd retired. I literally sweated with fear. There! Now it's out!"

She looked at me not at all unkindly.

"Um!" she said at last. "Then, all I have to say is that you concealed it admirably—when I was about, at any rate. And"—here she sunk her voice to a pleasing whisper—"I'm sure that if you were frightened, it was entirely on my account. So—"

In that way we began a courtship which, proving highly satisfactory on both sides, is now about to come to an end—or a new beginning—in marriage.

THE END.

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