CHAPTER XXII
I READ MY OWN OBITUARY
It was my turn to stare again--and stare I did, from one to the other insilence, and being far too much amazed to find ready speech. And before Icould get my tongue once more, my mother, who was always remarkably sharpof eye, got her word in.
"What're you doing in that new suit of clothes?" she demanded. "Andwhere's your own good clothes that you went away in yesterday noon? Imisdoubt this stewardship's leading you into some strange ways!"
"My own good clothes, mother, are somewhere in the North Sea," retortedI. "Top or bottom, sunk or afloat, it's there you'll find them, if you'remore anxious about them than me! Do you tell me that Carstairs has neverbeen home?" I went on, turning to Mr. Lindsey, "Then I don't know wherehe is, nor his yacht either. All I know is that he left me to drown lastnight, a good twenty miles from land, and that it's only by a specialmercy of Providence that I'm here. Wherever he is, yon man's amurderer--I've settled that, Mr. Lindsey!"
The women began to tremble and to exclaim at this news, and to ask onequestion after another, and Mr. Lindsey shook his head impatiently.
"We can't stand talking our affairs in the station all night," said he."Let's get to an hotel, my lad--we're all wanting our suppers. You don'tseem as if you were in very bad spirits, yourself."
"I'm all right, Mr. Lindsey," I answered cheerfully. "I've been down toJericho, it's true, and to worse, but I chanced across a good Samaritanor two. And I've looked out a clean and comfortable hotel for you, andwe'll go there now."
I led them away to a good hotel that I had noticed in my walks, and whilethey took their suppers I sat by and told them all my adventure, to theaccompaniment of many exclamations from my mother and Maisie. But Mr.Lindsey made none, and I was quick to notice that what most interestedhim was that I had been to see Mr. Gavin Smeaton.
"But what for did you not come straight home when you were safely onshore again?" asked my mother, who was thinking of the expense I wasputting her to. "What's the reason of fetching us all this way whenyou're alive and well?"
I looked at Mr. Lindsey--knowingly, I suppose.
"Because, mother," I answered her, "I believed yon Carstairs would goback to Berwick and tell that there'd been a sad accident, and I wasdead--drowned--and I wanted to let him go on thinking that I wasdead--and so I decided to keep away. And if he is alive, it'll be thebest thing to let the man still go on thinking I was drowned--as I'llprove to Mr. Lindsey there. If Carstairs is alive, I say, it's the rightpolicy for me to keep out of his sight and our neighbourhood."
"Aye!" agreed Mr. Lindsey, who was a quick hand at taking up things."There's something in that, Hugh."
"Well, it's beyond me, all this," observed my mother, "and it all comesof me taking yon Gilverthwaite into the house! But me and Maisie'll awayto our beds, and maybe you and Mr. Lindsey'll get more light out of thematter than I can, and glad I'll be when all this mystery's cleared upand we'll be able to live as honest folk should, without all this flyingabout the country and spending good money."
I contrived to get a few minutes with Maisie, however, before she and mymother retired, and I found then that, had I known it, I need not havebeen so anxious and disturbed. For they had attached no particularimportance to the fact that I had not returned the night before; they hadthought that Sir Gilbert had sailed his yacht in elsewhere, and that Iwould be turning up later, and there had been no great to-do after meuntil my own telegram had arrived, when, of course, there wasconsternation and alarm, and nothing but hurry to catch the next trainnorth. But Mr. Lindsey had contrived to find out that nothing had beenseen of Sir Gilbert Carstairs and his yacht at Berwick; and to that pointhe and I at once turned when the women had gone to bed and I went withhim into the smoking-room while he had his pipe and his drop of whisky.By that time I had told him of the secret about the meeting at thecross-roads, and about my interview with Crone at his shop, and SirGilbert Carstairs at Hathercleugh, when he offered me the stewardship;and I was greatly relieved when Mr. Lindsey let me down lightly and saidno more than that if I'd told him these things, at first, there mighthave been a great difference.
"But we're on the beginning of something," he concluded. "That SirGilbert Carstairs has some connection with these murders, I'm nowconvinced--but what it is, I'm not yet certain. What I am certain aboutis that he took fright yesterday morning in our court, when I producedthat ice-ax and asked the doctor those questions about it."
"And I'm sure of that, too, Mr. Lindsey," said I. "And I've beenwondering what there was about yon ice-ax that frightened him. You'llknow that yourself, of course?"
"Aye, but I'm not going to tell you!" he answered. "You'll have to awaitdevelopments on that point, my man. And now we'll be getting to bed, andin the morning we'll see this Mr. Gavin Smeaton. It would be a queerthing now, wouldn't it, if we got some clue to all this through him? ButI'm keenly interested in hearing that he comes from the other side of theAtlantic, Hugh, for I've been of opinion that it's across there that thesecret of the whole thing will be found."
They had brought me a supply of clothes and money with them, and firstthing in the morning I went off to the docks and found my Samaritanskipper, and gave him back his sovereign and his blue serge suit, withmy heartiest thanks and a promise to keep him fully posted up in thedevelopment of what he called the case. And then I went back tobreakfast with the rest of them, and at once there was the question ofwhat was to be done. My mother was all for going homeward as quickly aspossible, and it ended up in our seeing her and Maisie away by the nexttrain; Mr. Lindsey having made both swear solemnly that they would notdivulge one word of what had happened, nor reveal the fact that I wasalive, to any living soul but Andrew Dunlop, who, of course, could betrusted. And my mother agreed, though the proposal was anything butpleasant or proper to her.
"You're putting on me more than any woman ought to be asked to bear, Mr.Lindsey," said she, as we saw them into the train. "You're asking me togo home and behave as if we didn't know whether the lad was alive ordead. I'm not good at the playacting, and I'm far from sure that it'seither truthful or honest to be professing things that isn't so. And I'llbe much obliged to you if you'll get all this cleared up, and let Hughthere settle down to his work in the proper way, instead of wanderingabout on business that's no concern of his."
We shook our heads at each other as the train went off, Maisie wavinggood-bye to us, and my mother sitting very stiff and stern anddisapproving in her corner of the compartment.
"No concern of yours, d'ye hear, my lad?" laughed Mr. Lindsey. "Aye, butyour mother forgets that in affairs of this sort a lot of people aredrawn in where they aren't concerned! It's like being on the edge of awhirlpool--you're dragged into it before you're aware. And now we'll goand see this Mr. Smeaton; but first, where's the telegraph office in thisstation? I want to wire to Murray, to ask him to keep me posted up duringtoday if any news comes in about the yacht."
When Mr. Lindsey was in the telegraph office, I bought that morning's_Dundee Advertiser_, more to fill up a few spare moments than from anyparticular desire to get the news, for I was not a great newspaperreader. I had scarcely opened it when I saw my own name. And there Istood, in the middle of the bustling railway station, enjoying thesensation of reading my own obituary notice.
"Our Berwick-on-Tweed correspondent, telegraphing late last night,says:--Considerable anxiety is being felt in the town respecting the fateof Sir Gilbert Carstairs, Bart., of Hathercleugh House, and Mr. HughMoneylaws, who are feared to have suffered a disaster at sea. At noonyesterday, Sir Gilbert, accompanied by Mr. Moneylaws, went out in theformer's yacht (a small vessel of light weight) for a sail which,according to certain fishermen who were about when the yacht left, was tobe one of a few hours only. The yacht had not returned last night, norhas it been seen or heard of since its departure. Various Berwickfishing craft have been out well off the coast during today, but notidings of the missing gentlemen have come to hand. Nothing has beenheard of, or from, Sir Gilb
ert at Hathercleugh up to nine o'clock thisevening, and the only ray of hope lies in the fact that Mr. Moneylaws'mother left the town hurriedly this afternoon--possibly having receivedsome news of her son. It is believed here, however, that the light vesselwas capsized in a sudden squall, and that both occupants have lost theirlives. Sir Gilbert Carstairs, who was the seventh baronet, had onlyrecently come to the neighbourhood on succeeding to the title andestates. Mr. Moneylaws, who was senior clerk to Mr. Lindsey, solicitor,of Berwick, was a very promising young man of great ability, and hadrecently been much before the public eye as a witness in connection withthe mysterious murders of John Phillips and Abel Crone, which are stillattracting so much attention."
I shoved the newspaper into Mr. Lindsey's hand as he came out of thetelegraph office. He read the paragraph in silence, smiling as he read.
"Aye!" he said at last, "you have to leave home to get the home news.Well--they're welcome to be thinking that for the present. I've justwired Murray that I'll be here till at any rate this evening, and thathe's to telegraph at once if there's tidings of that yacht or ofCarstairs. Meanwhile, well go and see this Mr. Smeaton."
Mr. Smeaton was expecting us--he, too, was reading about me in the_Advertiser_ when we entered, and he made some joking remark about itonly being great men that were sometimes treated to death-notices beforethey were dead. And then he turned to Mr. Lindsey, who I noticed had beentaking close stock of him.
"I've been thinking out things since Mr. Moneylaws was in here lastnight," he remarked. "Bringing my mind to bear, do you see, on certainpoints that I hadn't thought of before. And maybe there's something morethan appears at first sight in yon man John Phillips having my name andaddress on him."
"Aye?" asked Mr. Lindsey, quietly. "How, now?"
"Well," replied Mr. Smeaton, "there may be something in it, and there maybe nothing--just nothing at all. But it's the fact that my father hailedfrom Tweedside--and from some place not so far from Berwick."