The Fanshawe Murder
Date: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00
Description: More of a thriller than a murder mystery, with something very mysterious being built secretly in the Works. The new owner, a young American woman who inherited the Liverpool business, finds herself in an ever deepening mystery, and thena prisoner in a weird castle in Wales. A little on the Gothic side, perhaps.

THE FANSHAWE

MURDER

Guy Thorne

1931

Contents

Chapter 1 | Chapter 2

Chapter 3 | Chapter 4

Chapter 5 | Chapter 6

Chapter 7 | Chapter 8

Chapter 9 | Chapter 10

Chapter 11 | Chapter 12

Chapter 13

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Chapter 1

VIOLET MILTON stood at the window of her private sitting room at the Midland Adelphi Hotel in Liverpool, in the north of England.

Mrs. Herbert Wilkins, Violet's newly engaged companion, who had arrived at Liverpool the night before, was sitting at the breakfast table. She was a plump, placid lady of fifty who liked the good things of life. She knew that there was only a certain amount of fillet steak in the world, and was determined to get as much of it as she could for herself, so to speak.

"She will do," thought Violet Milton to herself. "She will give me respectability, as they seem to think it necessary for an unmarried girl to have someone like this with her in England. I'll take good care she never interferes with me in any way. Not that I have any fear of that. If I give her everything she wants to eat and drink, and a comfortable motorcar to be driven about in— well, Mrs. Herbert Wilkins will be satisfied, and so shall I."

She came to the table, a tall girl with a springy walk, dressed in a simple coat and skirt of tweed, but cut by an artist in Bond Street, who earned fifteen hundred a year with his scissors.

"Aren't you going to have any breakfast, my dear?" asked Mrs. Herbert Wilkins.

Violet surveyed the table. "Grilled kidneys," she said, lifting one cover, "and, of course, bacon and eggs. How odd it seems to see an English breakfast-table again after America!

"You have lived in America a long time, haven't you, my dear?" said the elder lady, pouring out another cup of coffee.

"Since I was fifteen, Mrs. Wilkins. My father took me out then after my mother's death. He was an unsuccessful man and hoped to retrieve his fortunes in the States."

"Which," said Mrs. Wilkins, looking round the expensive sitting room, "which, of course, my dear, he did."

"Not a bit of it, poor thing. He died penniless when I was seventeen, By that time I had learnt shorthand and typewriting and I became a stenographer in Wall Street, New York."

Mrs. Wilkins was not at all sure what a stenographer was, so she wisely gave a little murmur intended to simulate interest, and said nothing.

Violet continued: "I got eight dollars a week at first, then ten, then fifteen, until I had worked myself up to the princely salary of twenty dollars."

"A great deal of money for a young girl," said Mrs. Wilkins, who had a vague idea that a dollar was an immense round coin of solid gold.

"I assure you I thought myself lucky. I became private secretary to Terence Kinsolving— Bud Kinsolving he was called in the street."

"Do you mean that people shouted this at the poor gentleman?"

"Oh no; Bud was his nickname in Wall Street. Wall Street is a great business street and Bud, my proprietor, was one of the smartest business men in the section. He was very good to me, and taught me more business than most girls of my age know."

Mrs. Herbert Wilkins had now finished her breakfast, She leant back in her chair with a little sigh o£ content and prepared to devote her whole attention to her young hostess.

"Only to think of it!" the girl went on, her oval face glowing with health and excitement under its coronet of dead-black hair. "Two months ago I was a stenographer in Wall Street. Now I am the sole owner of the largest paper mills in Europe, and I have nearly a million of money as well."

Mrs. Herbert Wilkins woke up. She wished she had asked for four or five hundred a year instead of three— her first thought. "What a charming child it is," was her second. For, in common with many people, Mrs. Wilkins would have thought the Witch of Endor charming if she had owned to the possession of a million pounds.

"Do tell me all about it," said the old lady.

"Well, my father had an elder brother, Sir William Milton, my uncle. They had a very violent quarrel when they were young and they never made it up at all. I never saw Sir William and hardly knew of his existence. Two months ago he died, and has left me simply everything without reservation. That's all. It's very simple, but it's extremely startling."

"God bless you, my dear," said Mrs. Wilkins, with heart-felt emotion. "Why, you have the world at your feet. You may marry a duke, or even a member of some reigning European house!"

"I am half an American," said Violet, "but that's not one of my ambitions, thank heavens! Marry a duke ? Why, I should have a duck-fit."

"A what?"

"Oh, nothing. It's only an expression people use in America sometimes."

Mrs. Wilkins shook her head. She had always thought it a great pity that Columbus did not stay at home. "Well, what are your plans? What are you going to do?" she asked.

Violet looked at her wrist-watch. "In an hour," she said, "my new automobile— motorcar, you know— will be at the door and we are going to inspect my works."

"Where the paper is made?"

"Yes, and the money too. Being with Bud Kinsolving six years has made me keen on industrial enterprises. I guess I could show the people at my works a thing or two. I don't know what I shall do after, but for the present I am going to run those works myself."

"My dear!" said the old lady.

Violet gave a little nod, a nod which Mrs. Herbert Wilkins and a great many other people soon began to know. It simply meant "the queen wishes it and there is no more to be said."

"I employ," said Miss Milton proudly, "some two thousand five hundred hands, an army of clerks, sub-managers, managers, up to lofty people who draw their two and three thousand a year. I have a private wharf and landing-stage on the River Mersey. I have six steamers, with their captains, mates and crews. What a field for energy, Mrs. Wilkins! I expect they will open their eyes some this morning when I put them wise as to my intentions."

Violet was enjoying the impression made by her American slang. She did not talk it usually, but the temptation to do so now was irresistible, for she had a keen sense of humour.

"Mrs. Wilkins is a precious old thing," she said to herself. "I shan't want to go to the theatre after my day's work is over."

The chaperon understood little or nothing of what the girl was saying. She only heard one unpleasant word, a word which she had always disliked and always would— the word "energy," and it faltered from her lips now.

"That will be my department, not yours," said Violet, with a radiant smile. "You will have nothing whatever to do but make yourself comfortable in every way. There is everything that the world can offer to be got in Liverpool, just the same as in London. I will not ask you to help me in my schemes. You will have your own car and driver, and do just what you like. And if you would like a Pekinese I will wire for one tomorrow."

"Dear child," murmured the old lady, considerably relieved. "Of course I shall be delighted to see them make the paper which supplies the money. In an hour, did you say? Very well, then, I will be ready."

Violet went to her bedroom— she had no maid as yet— put on her hat and then returned to the sitting room. She quite meant what she said. The girl had a will of steel, though she was not in the least unfeminine or unsexed. She knew she had a good brain. She wanted to prove her ability to herself for a time, at any rate. She did not want the vote. She did not want to oust men from their positions. She simply wanted to see if she could run a great business, and when she had proved that to her own satisfaction she would probably give up the whole thing and turn to something else.

"I am only two-and-twenty: there are years before me yet," she murmured to herself. "I will have a try, at any rate. Certainly it will be the greatest possible fun."

AN HOUR afterwards a Rolls Royce stood at the door of the hotel. Violet, with her companion, the former in a great coat of sable, were bowed into the car.

"My first two extravagances," said Violet, touching the sable motor-coat. "This and the car. You have no idea how I enjoy it, Mrs. Wilkins. I suppose you have lived in luxury all your life."

"Since my husband's death, certainly. I have been very fortunate. But," she added, with a wistful note in her voice, "it has always been the luxury of other people."

Violet began to have a greater respect for the old lady's intellectual capacity as they rolled away through the streets of the old seaport.

There is always something brisk and nimble in the air of Liverpool. It is one of the most exhilarating cities in Europe. The navies of the world go up and down its mighty river. Men of all nations jostle each other in the streets, and the excitement that broods over the centre of arrival and departure is never absent. A bright spring sun, though the day was cold, poured down upon the magnificent facade of St. George's Hall and the Picture Gallery beyond.

"I like this city," said Violet. "It is stimulating. It is real. I am going to be happy here."

The chauffeur was a local man and knew his way about Liverpool. He drove them through the busy parts of Walton towards Bootle, and over and over again they caught a glimpse of the tossing estuary, all yellow and pearl lights, while the south-west wind that blew over the Blundell sands was like champagne. All around them was a monumental industry, a gigantic and inspiring toil, and when the car stopped at last before gates set in a long, high wall, which extended almost as far as the eye could see, Violet was in the highest spirits. She felt the joy of power. Hitherto she had only known it vicariously and through others. Her dark blue eyes sparkled. The lovely curve of the mouth was tremulous and eager, and from the low forehead to the firm and resolute chin the girl's face was one picture of happiness.

Half a dozen people were waiting at the gates, which were thrown open for the automobile to enter. The ladies found themselves in a huge yard— a miniature township, rather— surrounded on all sides by tall buildings, and taller chimneys, while the throbbing of engines was ceaseless. Mingled with the salt air from the sea Violet detected a curious, but not unpleasant, smell of chemicals.

A shortish, venerable old man was waiting, and helped them to alight. By his side stood a much taller man, who instantly attracted Violet's attention. His age was perhaps forty-three or four. He was dressed with an extraordinary care, a dandyism that seemed out of place in this kingdom of machinery and smoke. He wore a small golden beard, trimmed to a careful point, and a golden moustache, which showed a rather large, red mouth and a splendid row of shining teeth. The nose was aquiline and powerful, the eyes a deep, penetrating grey, and the hair, which was cut short in military fashion, was the same colour as his beard. Altogether, he was a singularly handsome man, moving and speaking with the assured air of a man of the world, at home wherever he might be. The old gentleman was Mr. Hallet, solicitor to the late Sir William Milton and now to Violet herself. Him she knew, and she guessed who the other man was.

"Let me, my dear Miss Milton," said the old gentleman, "introduce Mr. Peter Fanshawe to you. Of course you know his name as the director of the Milton Mills."

The tall man smiled and bowed. "You have brought the spring with you, Miss Milton," he said, in a beautifully modulated voice. "So you have come to survey your kingdom!"

Mrs. Herbert Wilkins was introduced and the little party moved across a corner of the vast enclosure to where an immense building of stone housed the offices of the firm.

"This, Miss Milton, is the Board Room," said old Mr. Hallet, introducing the little party into a panelled room with an open fireplace, in which a large fire glowed. There was a morocco covered table in the centre of the room and various padded chairs set round it.

"Hardly an interesting room to you, Miss Milton," said Peter Fanshawe. "Still, this is where we meet when we want to confer upon any point connected with our operations."

"We?" said Violet.

Mrs. Herbert Wilkins had promptly sat down in an armchair by the fire. Mr. Hallet, and especially Mr. Fanshawe, looked up quickly at the word.

Fanshawe smiled. "I mean your colonels and captains, Miss Violet," he said, and he spoke in the tones of a man offering a box of chocolates to a young girl.

"Well, I hope you are all loyal and devoted," said Violet, infusing a dry, New York note into her voice. "As you are only colonels and captains, you obviously want a general. I am here, Mr. Fanshawe!"

"And delighted to see you, Miss Milton."

"I am glad to hear it," the girl said, and her voice rang out in the room. "I am going to take charge of this business, right here and now. I hope you will all work under my banner as loyally as you did under that of my uncle."

Old Mr. Hallet stared. Mr. Peter Fanshawe stared too, but his eyes were not quite so dull and fish-like as the solicitor's.

"How charming!" Fanshawe said. "You will really come and look us up now and then, Miss Violet?"

Violet shook her head. "No," she said shortly. "I am going to stay here and supervise. I had a very good business training in the States and I am going to see what it is worth at Milton Mills, Liverpool, County Lancashire, England."

"But, my dear Miss Milton..." the old solicitor spluttered.

"I am glad you think so kindly of me," Violet replied. "Thank you, Mr. Hallet. Mr. Fanshawe. Kindly tell me if you use resin soap or aluminium sulphate in the production of engine-sized paper. Printers' ink spreads on paper treated with resin soap alone. There are complaints from some of my customers as to the recent issue of solid surface paper from my mills."

Peter Fanshawe opened his mouth, shut it again and stared at Violet.

Mr. Hallet clucked like a frightened hen.

"You see," Violet went on, with dangerous sweetness, "I rather foresaw this moment. You're only accustomed to English girls and soft-shell heiresses. I am an heiress who has come plumb in the centre of her inheritance. I am going to hold the reins of this business in my two hands for as long as it pleases me."

There was a dead silence. Hallet broke it

"But, my dear Miss Milton, it is impossible, quite impossible."

"I will ask you two questions, Mr. Hallet," Violet said. "The first is this. Am I, or am I not, the sole proprietress of this business?"

"Well, of course..."

"Answer me, please."

"You are."

"So I sort of guessed, Mr. Hallet. My second question is: Do you wish me to retain you as solicitor to my estate and my personal advisor, or don't you? Anticipating your objections, I have already communicated with Messrs. Leuson & Leuson in London. They will be ready to relieve you of your responsibilities."

The old man was not without some dignity. "I am not accustomed to these pertinacious questions," he said. "You are a very charming and beautiful young lady. Everything is yours. For many, many years I was your uncle's trusted advisor. From my connection with him I have made a not inconsiderable fortune. I now beg to resign my responsibilities and will meet Messrs. Leuson & Leuson whenever you please, my dear."

It was beautifully done and it was sincere. A pang of regret went through Violet's heart. She went up to the old gentleman and shook him by the hand. He, she knew very well, did not matter very much either way. But she knew also— with her hard business training in New York— that if she weakened with him, there would be a much harder battle to fight. "I thank you for all you have done," she said sweetly. "You and I must have many talks over the past. Meanwhile, I accept your resignation, and be sure that, if I may say so, you will not be the loser."

Then she turned to Peter Fanshawe. "And now, Mr. Fanshawe," she said graciously, but with a very decided note in her voice, "I will be glad if you will conduct me round the principal parts of the works. I only want to get a bird's-eye view this morning. I just want to see how your methods differ from ours in the States."

This was sheer American bluff on Violet's part. When the news of her inheritance had come, and she had determined to try her hand at managing her own affairs, she had evoked the assistance of Terence Kinsolving. The "Bud" had given her introductions to the director of a famous paper mill at Holyoke, Massachusetts, and she had spent a week at these works, picking up a superficial knowledge of what was going on. Of course, she had only touched the fringe of the subject, but her alert and receptive mind had, at least, made it possible for her to talk glibly on the subject.

She knew that this smiling man, Peter Fanshawe, was one of the first chemists and inventors in connection with paper making in Europe. He was probably the very best man that could be found for his position. Old Sir William had seen to that, and had allowed him the greatest liberty. Violet did not hope to deceive such an expert for long. But she was determined not to be cross-questioned and to keep her own counsel.

They started on their tour— Mrs. Herbert Wilkins excusing herself on the plea of fatigue. For nearly an hour and a half the girl progressed over her domains.

Through the vast bleaching houses, where the pulp poured from the breaking engines into the huge potchers, to the great hall of the press rollers and the sand-traps, they went to the loading-houses. Then they visited the paper machines, where the pulp, white as milk, spread itself over endless wire meshes until, after passing through the great rollers, it entered the hall of the drying cylinders, from thence only to emerge again to the embraces of the chilled rollers and the calenders.

Peter Fanshawe explained everything with suave deference. He seemed to take it for granted that Miss Milton meant what she said, and he treated the girl with an equality and confidence which would have flattered her had she felt it was sincere. She could not feel this. She had taken a violent dislike to Mr. Fanshawe. An instinct warned her that he was raging inwardly at her decision. However, she allowed nothing of her knowledge to escape her, but made a resolve to go very fully into the matter of Mr. Fanshawe at no distant date. After an hour and a half's steady progress, when she was beginning to feel a little tired, they came to the very end of the works, where they abutted the riverside.

"And what is this, Mr. Fanshawe?" Violet asked, pointing to a high wall covered with iron spikes and with a small but massive door in it.

"That, Miss Milton, is your uncle's private house."

"His private house? I thought he lived at Southport."

"Sir William had a house there, certainly, but he spent much of his time at the works themselves. He had this house built for himself, walled off, as you see."

"I should like to see inside it, Mr. Fanshawe."

"Certainly, Miss Milton, but I am afraid I haven't got the key now. Perhaps some other day would suit you."

"No time like the present, Mr. Fanshawe. 'Do it now' is our motto in America. Where is the key?"

Fanshawe thought for a little. Stealing a glance at him the girl saw his face was overcast and lowering. As a matter of fact," he said at length, "I believe Mr. Gerald Boynton has it. He went to fetch some plans which have been in the house since Sir William died and which he wanted."

During her progress Violet had been introduced to the heads and foremen of many departments. She had shaken hands with all of them, pleased at their hearty, North Country greeting and the keen, appreciative eyes by which they regarded her.

"Boynton? "she said. "I don't remember any such name. Who is Mr. Boynton?"

"Well, as a matter of fact, Mr. Boynton was engaged this morning upon some experiments, so I thought it would be best to leave him undisturbed," Fanshawe answered. He shrugged his shoulders and there was a slightly depreciative note in his voice. "Boynton holds the post of independent experimentalist— under myself, of course."

"An important post, Mr. Fanshawe?

"Not really, Miss Milton. The young fellow certainly made one or two minor improvements in our machinery, and he has a fair knowledge of the caustic soda and calcium bisulphite process, but his work is of very little consequence. We pay him eight hundred a year, but perhaps when we get into harness, Miss Milton," and here Mr. Fanshawe showed his strong, white teeth in a somewhat ironical smile, "perhaps you will consider the matter of employing someone who can do the work equally well at half the salary."

"Certainly, Mr. Fanshawe," Violet answered sweetly, making a mental note that Fanshawe was an enemy of this Mr. Boynton. "And now about the key?"

Fanshawe bit his lip. "If you really wish it, Miss Milton," he began, "I will send a man to Mr. Boynton."

"Please do, Mr. Fanshawe."

Fanshawe was turning round when he stopped short: a somewhat peculiar expression came upon his face. "I don't think it will be necessary," he said. "Here is Mr. Boynton himself."

A tall, clean-shaven young man, with dark red hair and a finely chiselled face, was walking towards them. He had a roll of plans under his arm, and Violet noticed that he walked with the springy step of an athlete. He raised his cap as he came up to them, and was about to pass through the door in the wall when Fanshawe stopped him.

"This is fortunate," he said. "Boynton, this is Miss Milton, who is now, you know, our chief. She wants to go over Sir William's house."

The young man started. A look of surprise came into his eyes for a moment and then he bowed. Violet held out her hand.

"I have been going round the works and making everyone's acquaintance," she said pleasantly, "but somehow I missed you."

"I have been in my own office all the morning," the young man said, with a little flush. "Had I known you were coming I should have made every effort to see you, of course"

"You have the key, Boynton? "Fanshawe interrupted.

And Violet made another mental note that this extremely handsome and attractive young man had been told nothing of her visit. A wicked impulse came to her.

"As you have been so very kind as to show me everything this morning, Mr. Fanshawe, and I have kept you for nearly two hours, I am sure you must have important duties elsewhere in the works. I will ask Mr. Boynton to show me the house and to bring me back to the office. Would you mind telling Mrs. Herbert Wilkins that I shall not be very long?"

This was such a definite dismissal, although it was charmingly done, that Fanshawe could not but accept it. "Certainly, Miss Milton," he said, and his voice cracked on the word, although he smiled as usual. "I will tell Mrs. Wilkins at once." Lifting his hat he turned away, and Violet caught an ugly gleam in the grey eyes, which confirmed her sudden dislike of the director.

Violet gave a cry of delight as Boynton unlocked the door in the high wall and they passed through. She might have been a hundred miles away from the busy factory behind them.

A low house of stone, with a roof of red tiles and tall Tudor chimneys, stood before them. Steps led down to the porch— for the ground sloped away to the river— and on each side of the steps was a sunken Dutch garden, beautifully kept and tended. There were two stone pools of water in which goldfish were swimming: this side of the high, encircling wall was covered with ivy. There was something so unexpected and fantastic in this sudden vision of quiet beauty that it seemed like an illustration to a fairy story.

"It is beautiful," Violet cried enthusiastically, dancing down the steps. "Who would have expected it here!"

"It was Sir William's whim," Gerald Boynton answered. "He loved this house, Miss Milton, and spent a great deal of his time here. It is beautiful inside too, and even then you have not seen its chief feature."

As he spoke, he unlocked the front door and passed through a small vestibule into a charming lounge hall, panelled in green. There was an open hearth of tiles. Persian rugs lay about the parquet floor, and delightful lounges and deep, embracing chairs stood about everywhere.

"This is one of the pleasantest rooms in the house, Miss Milton," the young man said. "To the right is the dining room. To the left is a large room which Sir William used as his study. There are six bedrooms, a beautifully fitted marble bathroom and an orchid-house, which you reach through the dining room."

"It is a dream! "Violet said again. "I think you will say so more than ever if you will just come this way."

Violet followed him to the other end of the hall, where there was a curtained door. He pulled aside the curtain, opened the door, and they came out upon a long, glass-roofed veranda which went the whole length of the house. It was very wide and spacious. Again the floor was of parquet, and there were many saddle-back chairs. Against the wall of the house were two big shelves filled with volumes, and one or two tall palms stood in green barrels with copper bands. The veranda was entirely enclosed by glass, but sliding doors could open it at various points. Boynton pulled back one of these now and they went out on to a little gravel terrace with a low stone wall. In the centre of the wall was a water-gate, and steps leading down to the tideway itself.

"This creek, Miss Milton," Boynton said, "is quite private. You see, it ends fifty yards to the right there— where there is another wall, which Sir William had built to shut out the view of the works. Round to the left— you can't see it from here, owing to the garden wall— is our own private wharf where the steamers load and unload and take paper to all parts of the world. This little bit of water is absolutely screened off from everything. Sir William kept a fine little motorboat in that boathouse you see at the end of the terrace. He used to come out here and smoke on summer evenings and talk to Elijah Winterbotham. He found the place a great relief from business cares, and yet he was always on the spot."

"It's perfectly ideal, Mr. Boynton. It will suit me down to the ground. Since you weren't told I was coming to the works this morning, you will not have heard my decision?"

Boynton bowed, but said nothing.

"I am a business woman," Violet said, unconscious how ludicrous the words sounded coming from her. "I am going to take charge of the works and be at the head of everything. For the present, at any rate, I shall live here."

Boynton showed no surprise whatever. Violet had been attracted by him from the first. She liked the quiet certainty of his manner. She saw at once that he was a thoroughly well-bred man. It had pleased her immensely that he had expressed no surprise at what must have been a startling statement to him.

"It is a great task, Miss Milton," he said earnestly, "but we want someone with absolute power here. Miss Milton, may I ask you something? I hope you won't think it presumptuous of me."

"Ask anything you like, Mr. Boynton," she replied.

"It isn't for myself: it is for the man I spoke about just now, Elijah Winterbotham."

"Who is he, Mr. Boynton?"

"He is a Lancashire man of the best type; shrewd, witty and faithful as a bulldog. In his spare time he is a clever amateur gardener, and he directed Sir William's people in the making of the Dutch gardens on the other side of the house. Latterly, he was much with Sir William in this very place. Sir William trusted him entirely, and would doubtless have made provision for him had not his end been so unexpected and sudden. The man is the most valuable employee that any master could wish for."

"You want me to promote him or raise his salary?" Violet asked.

"No, Miss Milton," Boynton replied. "The day after Sir William died Winterbotham was given a month's wages and dismissed. It's not my place to offer you advice. I know that. But as I shall not be here much longer I venture to do so this once." He paused for a moment, his brow knitted into thought. He seemed to be pondering what he should say. Finally he looked up and she saw how clear and frank his brown eyes were. "If you were to reinstate Winterbotham, Miss Milton," he said, "you would be doing yourself, as well as a very worthy fellow, a very great service."

They had been walking up and down the terrace for some minutes in the soft, spring air. Far away on the water a great liner was slipping out towards the sea. The gulls wheeled about the estuary, rejoicing in the sunlight. Only a faint and distant throbbing spoke of the great hive of industry behind them.

"I will do what you ask with the greatest pleasure," Violet said, quite certain that some deep reason underlay this request. She had made several discoveries that morning— had become aware of curious undercurrents, antagonisms, a hint of mystery. But she knew how to wait and only register these things in her mind for future reference.

Five minutes later they were back in the office, and Violet had announced her intention of moving into the secluded house within three days.

As far as the Milton Paper Mills were concerned— or, at least, those who directed them— the next three days were a whirlwind.

The beautiful, imperious girl crushed down every obstacle and established herself in Sir William's "Fancy" with an ease and certainty which astonished everyone.

Peter Fanshawe went grinning about the works explaining to everyone that Miss Milton had acted upon his advice and that everyone must look to their laurels now.

Gerald Boynton sat tight in his laboratory and said nothing. There was a great hum and stir in the mills.

Violet's domestic requirements were simple. The cook-housekeeper was the wife of the butler— both servants who had been with Sir William. A housemaid, a maid for Mrs. Herbert Wilkins— Violet saw the efficacy of that at once— and the House behind the Wall was complete.

In the rush of all this Violet had seen little or nothing of her lieutenants of industry. Once Mr. Fanshawe had arrived and hoped that she was settling in very comfortably. She had not met Gerald Boynton again.

About eleven o'clock upon the night of her second day of occupation, Violet sat alone in the glass veranda. Mrs. Wilkins had retired early and the servants had also gone to bed. With a shaded electric light upon the table opposite her, Violet leant back in a long chair, thinking deeply. She was thoroughly settled. Unlimited wealth and unlimited energy had done that. Tomorrow she would take up the reins of government.

She got up from her seat and looked through the great panes of plate-glass. There was a shimmering gleam of gold upon the water. It was a clear night and the moon was high in the heavens. Pushing open one of the sliding glass panels she went down the steps to the terrace. The air was fresh and sweet, and the riding lights of the liners moored in the fairway beyond shone like jewels. The night hum of the vast city behind her was faint and far away. She went to the stone parapet and leaned upon it, listening with pleasure to the soft lap, lap of the tide, wondering what new experiences were in store for her, resolving she would not fail in the task she had undertaken.

As she leant there she became conscious of the click of oars in the rowlocks, and even as she turned her head to the left a small boat shot round the edge of the dividing wall and made straight for the terrace steps. It was sculled by a single man.

The iron gates leading to the steps were, as Violet knew, unlocked. There was certainly something stealthy and purposeful about the dark figure. Nine girls out of ten would have rushed back into the house and summoned the servants. Violet did nothing of the kind. She was not a pupil of Bud Kinsolving for nothing. She stepped up to the gate just as the man was fastening his boat to a ring in the wall.

"What do you want here?" she said sternly.

"Miss Milton?" came in a low voice.

"Yes. What do you want?"

"Eh, that's a bit of luck," said the man, in pronounced Lancashire accent. "Miss, can I have a word wi' ye? It's a matter of great importance."

"Why do you come here like a thief in the night, if you want to see me?"

"I want to see ye privately, miss. I am Elijah Winterbotham. I hear that you kindly promised to reinstate me. Mister Boynton sent me t'news."

"Well, you can come and thank me tomorrow if you like," Violet said, though she was beginning to be interested, for there was something appealing in the man's manner.

"I thank ye right heartily now. But I must have a word wi' ye, if y' please. Miss..." his face became pleading and earnest, "...miss, I was in the confidence of your uncle. I've come by night in order that I might get a word wi' ye and no one know of it."

"Come in," said Violet.

The man touched his cap and mounted the steps. Violet led him into the veranda and turned on several electric lights. She saw a small, wiry-bearded man of about fifty, with iron-grey hair and deep-set, honest eyes. The man's face reassured her at once.

"What have you to tell me?" she asked.

The man looked straight at her. "Ye're going to take over the management of the mills, miss?" he enquired. "It's common talk."

"I am," replied Violet.

"Well, then, miss, as I were a faithful servant to Sir William, so I'll be to you. Miss, there's summat going on in these works that's black and wicked! There's summat which, if I'm not mistaken, and Sir William wasn't mistaken— though he was taken so sudden— is going on within three hundred yards of your house, which is as bad as bad can be."

Chapter 2

"YOU HAD BETTER come into the dining room," Violet Milton said to the little bearded man with deep-set, honest eyes, and led the way through the veranda and turned up the lights.

"Now, Mr. Winterbotham," she began, "you said a very strange thing just now. Please explain yourself at greater length."

"Thank ye, miss. It's like this. Just before Sir William died he began to suspect that there was very queer things going on in the works at night. He told me about it, for he trusted me, miss, and I set about to watch. No one else knows anything at all of the matter. I felt it my duty to try and see ye in private, so I come by way of t'water."

"I never knew my uncle, Mr. Winterbotham. I wish I had. But as he saw fit to leave me his great possessions, and the great responsibilities attaching to them, I only want to do what he would have done."

"That's the right spirit, miss, if I may say so," Winterbotham answered. "Now I'll tell ye. There's a certain building in the works which hardly anyone is allowed to enter. It's called the Experiment House. Mister Fanshawe has the keys. It's where Mister Fanshawe invents new processes and secrets connected with the trade."

Violet nodded. She was listening carefully.

Winterbotham hesitated for a moment and flushed. At last he burst out into a torrent of speech. "Ye'll think it ill becomes me, a mere works foreman, to have a word to say about anyone so highly placed as Mister Fanshawe, who's director of these mills and knows more about paper-making than anyone else in the world. Mebbe I am going against my own interests in telling ye, miss, but I can't help that. Sir William trusted me, and now he's dead I must go on just the same as if he were alive."

"You need not have the slightest fear in saying anything to me," Violet answered.

The wiry little foreman heaved a sigh of relief. "Well, then, I'll put it bluntly. Mister Fanshawe is a rogue. Night after night, when the works are empty except for the two night watchmen, Mister Fanshawe is at work in the Experiment House. It's never been his custom to work at night, for Mister Fanshawe is a well-known man of pleasure. But there's more than that. No accounts of what is being done in that building ever come to Sir William. It was his rule to have reports of all experiments made to him. He never got none. When Sir William died we had only just found this out, and his death stopped any further investigations. Mister Fanshawe sacked me at once. He never liked me at any time, though I don't think that he suspects that Sir William and I were beginning to watch him."

"I don't quite see," Violet interrupted, "that there is anything to be alarmed about. Surely, if Mr. Fanshawe prefers to carry out experiments by night instead of daytime, there is nothing very strange in that."

"Ye haven't heard all, miss," Winterbotham went on. "When Sir William was away on a holiday in Switzerland, about two months before he died, a quantity of new machinery was put in the Experiment House. I saw some of t'parts, and they set me thinking, for I am accustomed to machinery, miss, as you may suppose. Then, enormous quantities of raw material— the very finest Alfa grass and bale after bale of high-priced linen rag— poured into the Experiment House. There has been hundreds of tons of material and yet nothing whatever has come out. Now, I know for a fact, miss, that there's operations going on there on a large scale. Yet none of the men of the works ever go to the Experiment House at night. I've made myself certain of that. To work the machinery in there and to do anything in a large way there must be several hands. Mister Fanshawe, with all his knowledge, couldn't do anything by himself."

Violet was beginning to be a little impressed. The man's manner was in deadly earnest. She did not quite understand at what he was driving, but she began to be affected by him. The lateness of the hour, the stealthy urgency of his arrival, the constant recurrence of her uncle's name— that uncle to whom she owed her vast possessions— all had their influence upon her.

"Then you think, Mr. Winterbotham, that Mr. Fanshawe is conducting some secret operations and is assisted by unknown people?"

"I'm sure of it, miss."

"But how do the other people get there, then?"

"Same way as I come t'ye tonight, miss. By water. I've seen them!"

Violet started. The plot was thickening.

"Aye, I've made it my business to watch, miss. I can manage a boat with anyone on the Mersey. I were brought up in the docks. For several nights now I've been lying off our own wharf— just round the corner of your garden, miss. There's generally one or two of the steamers lying there, and it has been easy to keep my dinghy in the shadow. At half-past eleven every night, miss, there's a little steam launch, painted invisible-green, comes up river from Birkenhead way. It comes to the far end of our wharf, and five men get out and walk to the Experiment House close by. Mister Fanshawe lets them in. At three o'clock in the morning they go back."

Violet considered, sorting out facts from impressions, determining on a line of action with her quick business training.

"It amounts to this," she said, "that Mr. Fanshawe is conducting experiments in my works— experiments which it is obvious he wants to shroud in profound secrecy. It certainly looks very strange, Mr. Winterbotham."

"Sir William thought it were worse than that, miss," the little man interrupted.

"Well, if Mr. Fanshawe is doing anything underhand, and against the interests of the firm, I can deal with Mr. Fanshawe, no doubt. But at the same time, his position here is practically absolute, and he may have a hundred reasons for wishing to keep his invention, or whatever it is, till the right time comes."

Winterbotham pursed his lips and shook his head. "You don't know Mister Fanshawe, miss," he answered. "Mister Fanshawe keeps a racing stable at Aintree. He has one of the biggest houses in Birkenhead and his dinner parties are famous. He has a couple of motorcars. He is up in London half the week— a man doesn't do that on a salary of three thousand a year, miss. And it was common talk in Lancashire that he dropped ten thousand pounds over the Grand National of last year."

"Then you mean to imply?"

"I'll tell ye what Sir William said to me, miss. 'Winterbotham,' he says, 'I've been learning a lot about that damned scoundrel.' Sir William was an outspoken gentleman and never cared to mince his words. Then he told me about Mister Fanshawe's goings-on. I've only touched the fringe of them in what I've told you, miss. There's no need to go into the whole story. 'If I had known a few years ago what I know about that rascal now, he would not be at the head of my works, Winterbotham. It is my belief,' he says, 'that Fanshawe is enriching himself at my expense. What he is at, I don't know, but you and I'll find out. He is one of the cleverest chemists and milling engineers in Europe,' he said, 'and for that I shall be loath to lose him, though I believe that Mr. Gerald Boynton will be as good as him in a few years. Well, we will be as cunning as Mister Fanshawe!' Those were almost the last words I heard Sir William say, miss. The next morning when I come to t'works there was my master dead in his sleep from heart disease."

"The simple solution is to keep on looking till we do find out," Violet answered.

"No time like the present, miss, if I may make so bold," the little man replied. "Could you bring yourself to come out into t'works with me tonight? They are still at it, I can swear to that."

Violet was absolutely without fear of any kind. She loved an adventure above all things. After all, she was mistress of her surroundings. There was no one to say her nay. She would commence her reign in helping to carry out her uncle's wishes.

"I believe you, Mr. Winterbotham," she said; "and I will go with you. Shall we knock at the door and make Mr. Fanshawe let us in? He will have to give an explanation if I demand one."

Winterbotham shook his head vigorously. "Nay, nay, miss, that's not t'way to go to work with a man like Mister Fanshawe. He might explain things to you easily enough. He'll not be unprovided with a story, and you won't be able to understand what's going on in there, even if he does conduct you round. On the other hand, if it's anything really big, as Sir William thought, there might be danger for you."

Violet laughed. "We're not on a desert island, Mr. Winterbotham," she said.

"You would talk differently if you knew as much as I do about Mr. Fanshawe in the first place, and industrial secrets in the second," the foreman said dryly. "No, miss, you be guided by me. I've a better plan."

"And what is that?"

Winterbotham withdrew a bunch of keys from his pocket. "There's a key to every door in the works here," he said, "except the key to the Experiment House. The building is lighted from the roof, miss. There are no windows in the walls at all. Clapped to the wall at one side— the side farthest away from the river— the steel fire escape ladder still remains. At one time the building was a sorting house with several floors. That was before the windows were all blocked up to ensure privacy in experimental work."

"Yes?"

"We can get up this ladder quite easily, miss, or at least I can. There's a handrail and no danger at all. I had no idea until this very day that the escape had not been removed. It's against the wall of the building, which is quite close to the main wall that encircles the works. There's only two or three yards between them. Consequently, no one ever goes there, and I don't suppose that Mister Fanshawe has any idea that the thing exists. We can get up it quite easily, and it's long odds that we don't see something when we look down through the glass of the roof."

"Then let us go," Violet said eagerly. "We will get to the very heart of this affair if we can."

For the first time since their meeting, the foreman smiled. "Eh," he said, relapsing into broader Lancashire, "ye favour your uncle! Thou art a gradely lass! I'll see that no harm comes to thee, miss."

Violet smiled inwardly. The little man took an electric torch from one pocket and a short, stick-like object, terminating in a large bulb at one end, from the other.

"That's cane bound round with leather and the knob at the top is filled with lead. That's what I carry with me, miss."

"Wait here till I come back," Violet said. She was away a couple of minutes, and when she returned was wearing tennis shoes with rubber soles, a dark blouse instead of a light one and the tweed shooting hat she had worn coming over on board the steamer when it was rough.

Then they went quietly out of the house through the front door, traversed the beautifully laid-out garden and came to the door in the wall. Violet unlocked it with a little Yale key and they stood in the works themselves.

The immense vista of silent buildings, the tall shafts of the chimneys, the central space, almost as big as the parade ground of a barracks, were all washed in moonlight. Seen thus, there was something strangely romantic, and even beautiful, about this sleeping citadel of toil.

Not a soul was stirring. The lines of the miniature railway which ran through every part of the works shone like rods of silver. A little breeze eddied up from the river, fresh and cool.

Violet stopped for a moment and surveyed the scene. She must have unconsciously communicated something of what she felt to the quick-witted man at her side.

"Aye," he said solemnly, and as a father might speak to a daughter, "aye, it's a big responsibility and a heavy weight for one pair of shoulders, and they young!":

Violet was beginning to like the reinstated foreman immensely. His unconventional manner of speech, no less than his transparent earnestness and sincerity, pleased the girl fresh from the easier conventions of America and ever responsive to all that was sincere.

"You are right," she answered, in a low voice. "It makes me realize it as I look round tonight."

"There's nearly three thousand human beings dependent upon ye for their daily bread, miss. But talking won't get on with our job. This way, if you please."

He went off with a light, springy step for all his fifty odd years, and Violet followed. First of all they crossed an angle of the great square and then plunged into a labyrinth of lanes and streets made by the gigantic buildings on every side. Violet felt it was like walking in a city of the dead.

They came to an immense building which threw a black, enveloping shadow as they drew near. Winterbotham selected a key and opened a small door. A gush of hot air came out to them.

"This is the boiler shed, miss," the foreman whispered. ''The fires are all banked up till the first shift comes on at four o'clock in the morning. But I would like to show ye something."

Holding Winterbotham by the hand, Violet descended into a cave of warm blackness. She seemed to hear gentle, sighing murmurs all around her, as if a multitude of people slept. Then a switch clicked and a light sprang up.

She stood by the first of an immense range of boilers. The riveted monster before her towered up into the gloom. It was like the entrance of a tunnel closed by steel doors.

Winterbotham switched on his little electric torch and focused it upon a brass-framed dial, where a handle trembled.

"Look at that, miss," he said in a hoarse whisper. "It's been so for many nights. There's a big head of steam going to the Experiment House."

There was a soft roar and a low, hissing noise. It seemed to Violet that she had wandered into the secret home of gigantic forces, the terrible lair of the god Steam, who has changed the modern world.

They went out again into the cool night air.

"All yours, miss," said Winterbotham.

Then, for nearly five minutes, they twisted in and out among the caverns of shadow and valleys of moonlight, until Winterbotham touched her upon the arm and pointed straight ahead. "That's it, miss," he said.

She saw before her a high, narrow building of blackened brick. There was a certain sinister suggestion about it, because no windows lightened its gaunt sides. It was immense but furtive— one could indeed imagine that curious things went on within.

Winterbotham began to walk so rapidly that Violet had a difficulty in following him. They approached the building, turned to the right and were confronted by a high wedge of deepest shadow. To the right was the encircling wall of the works— as high as the wall of a prison. To the left, and only three yards away from it, was the side of the Experiment House. To the girl who had lived so much of her life in America it suggested the entrance of the canon of Colorado. There was a sound of dripping water.

"Can ye manage it, miss?" Winterbotham said in a hoarse whisper.

Violet gave the little man a prod in the back. "I can do all that you can do," she said, and she heard a little chuckle of satisfaction in front of her.

It was frightfully cold as they entered this appalling alley. The ground was covered with half bricks, an empty can or two, the debris of a forgotten place. Now and again the electric lamp flashed out for an instant to guide them, until Winterbotham stopped at the foot of a steel ladder reaching up into the darkness.

"This is about twelve feet high, miss, and then we get on to the first platform. After that there are steps of open ironwork going up in a zigzag, with a handrail. It'll be covered with rust, but ye mustn't mind that."

"Go on, Mr. Winterbotham," said Violet, and the words had hardly left her lips when the little man was halfway up the ladder, climbing like a monkey. She followed and found him waiting for her upon a little landing of open iron grid. Then she clasped the handrail to her left and felt the wall of the building with her right hand. It was easy going, though the sensation of mounting through the dark upon this flimsy structure might well have unnerved a great many people.

Still they climbed on, with an occasional rest, until a faint moonlight fell upon them from above, and they could look down upon the black-velvet void through which they had come. More than once they heard a dull thud from within the building. At last they came into a brighter light. They were now level with the top of the outside wall, and looking over it from her high perch Violet could see the glittering Mersey stretching away to the horizon, and the red, green and yellow lights of the boats moored in the centre of the stream. She could even see the roof of her own house, the private quay and the sunk Dutch garden— looking like squares upon a chess-board. Then, gazing upwards, she saw that they were within six feet of the roof itself.

"Be careful, miss," came to her from Winterbotham. "There's a broad space on top, but there's no rail of any sort. You'll want your head now, miss, and we mustn't make any noise."

She followed him, took a hazardous step and stood upon the top of the coping, high up in the silver night. The vision was wonderful— an immense vista of river and city, with the black stump of the growing cathedral in silhouette against the sky. For a moment the glory of it drove all other thoughts from her mind, until she saw Winterbotham, on his hands and knees, crawling towards the oblong dome of glass, which was lit with a blue-white radiance. She fell upon her knees and followed him, and the instinct of the hunt awoke in her. In ten seconds she was crouching by the side of her guide and peering downwards.

At first she could see nothing. Rays of steely brightness crossed and re-crossed themselves below. They came from the high power electric arc lamps which were hung from the centre of the glass roof and illuminated the space below. Gradually, however, her eyes became accustomed to the glare, and she stared downwards, with beating heart and a fascination of every nerve such as she had never known before. She could distinguish figures moving about amid a complicated mass of machinery. At this height they were, of course, foreshortened— grotesque little objects from whom arose a murmur of voices, now and then punctuated by an order in a louder key, and followed by the creak and clank of steel or iron. She counted six or seven people in all.

"They are rare busy, miss," Winterbotham whispered. "Men don't work at that rate in the middle of the night for nothing! It's piecework, and very highly paid too."

His face was grim and he was trembling with excitement. Violet was irresistibly reminded of a hunting dog straining at the leash, waiting for the moment of freedom and pursuit.

She looked down again. Things became clearer. As far as she could see, there was a series of great presses along the far side of the wall— at least so she imagined the objects to be. Winterbotham, she knew, would explain later. Then she saw that in the very centre of the floor there was a square object. The men were clustering round it. It appeared to be an immense box or bale, larger than any bale or packing case Violet had ever seen or heard of.

"It's like two bathing machines taken off their wheels and made into one," she thought. She felt Winterbotham touch her hand.

"There's Mister Fanshawe, right enough," he muttered.

Violet saw one of the figures look upwards, straight towards her. In the little pink oval she distinctly recognized the director.

"Has he seen us?" she whispered, in a moment of sickening fear.

"Nay, miss; no one could see us out here. He's but looking at the crane. See, it's begun to travel!"

Violet watched on with such intensity of observation that it was almost pain. She saw that the overhead crane was travelling along its girders like a giant spider, until it came to rest some ten feet below their own height and some thirty or forty feet above the floor. A heavy chain cable slowly descended from the machine.

Almost simultaneously, from part of the building they could not see, two men appeared. They were pushing a large four-wheeled trolley which ran on steel rails.

"They are going to hoist that big thing down there on to the trolley, miss," Winterbotham hissed, and there was something so peculiar in his voice that Violet turned to him in alarm.

"So I thought," she said.

"Think again, miss. Look at the size of that thing there and the size of the trolley. Wouldn't ye suppose that any ordinary trolley would break down under its weight?"

He said no more, and Violet was conscious of a growing sense of mystery and an excitement which only increased as the seconds ticked away, but she asked for no explanation. She knew that would come after.

She saw the hook of the crane attached to the square object. She saw it rise easily into the air; the arm of the crane moving until the box was immediately over the trolley, and then it fell gently into its place without a sound.

She was disturbed by a sudden gasp at her side, followed by a low, suppressed growl, like the growl of a great dog. Winterbotham had risen erect and had snatched the life-preserver from his pocket. Going round the lighted back of the dome was the figure of a man. He was walking the parapet as noiselessly as a cat, when he caught sight of Winterbotham.

Instantly he stopped and turned a little, and as he did so the moonlight fell full upon his face.

It was Gerald Boynton, and he held a glittering revolver in his hand.

Chapter 3

VIOLET REMAINED crouching where she was. She felt no fear, only an intense and overmastering interest. Still, she dared not rise and stand upright upon that narrow platform, high in the air.

The two men, Winterbotham and Gerald Boynton, were confronting each other. There was nothing between them and the sky. The great round moon hung above them, and Violet thought, half hysterically, that this was exactly like the crude poster of some cruder melodrama outside a booth in Coney Island.

"Put that gun down. It's me, Mister Boynton."

The silver-plated revolver sunk and Boynton bent forward. "You, Winterbotham? What on earth are you doing here?

"I've been reinstated by our new boss, Mister Boynton."

"Miss Milton, yes. I spoke to her about you. But—"

"Miss Milton and myself are just looking round, Mister Boynton. She is here!"

Perilous as the whole situation was, Violet could not help a ripple of laughter. Boynton had come straight up to Winterbotham and was peering over his shoulder.

The two men stood almost arm in arm, like acrobats. She saw the young man's clear-cut face as a mask of amazement. In the moonlight the face was like that of some pallid Grecian statue, but it was beautiful nevertheless. A tragic mask! She rose to her feet, a little dizzy and uncertain, almost staggered to the top of the fire escape, clutched it and the descending rail with a sigh of relief, and then felt herself again. She descended two steps and looked up at the men— knowing that whatever might happen she could not fall now.

"You see, Mr. Boynton," she said, "I am surveying my new possessions in my own fashion."

She heard a mutter of explanation from Winterbotham. Then Boynton cautiously moved round the foreman— he was within four inches of the parapet as he did so— and came to her. He stood at the top of the stairway and bent till his head was almost on a level with her own.

"Winterbotham has told me," he said in a quick and hurried whisper. "He has told me that your uncle suspected something and that he and Winterbotham had been on the look-out for some time. I had no idea of this. I have been investigating on my own for a long time. When my proofs were complete I was going to take them to Sir William. I did not think that he had any inkling of what was going on."

"Then I have a new recruit," Violet said. "This begins to be more and more exciting!"

"Miss Milton,"— the words came to her with a tense vibration— "if Winterbotham had known as much as I know he would never have let you come up here. You've not the least idea of what's going on. Even Winterbotham has not, though he seems to have discovered a great deal. You must come down with me at once. You must hurry back to your house. There is not a moment to lose."

The young man's voice had a ring of command in it. Secretly Violet was delighted, outwardly she was determined to resent it. "I think, Mr. Boynton," she replied coldly, "that you rather overestimate the importance of the occasion. Surely I can do as I like? And as for my life being in danger, don't you think we are all a little moonstruck tonight?"

Her words had not the slightest effect. She saw the white brow furrow into a frown and the curved lips set hard.

"Whatever you may think, Miss Milton, you must obey me now. Tomorrow morning you can give me six months' salary and kick me out of the works. That is as you please. Tonight I am not the second in command of the Milton Paper Mills, or one of your lieutenants; I am simply a man who won't let an impulsive young lady run into terrible danger."

She knew that the young man was speaking with absolute conviction. "Danger?" she asked.

"Yes. If you and I and Winterbotham were discovered here, or at the bottom of the fire escape, I would not give five minutes for our lives. The people down below"— he lightly tapped his foot upon the parapet and made a gesture with his right hand towards the lighted dome— "would stick at nothing. We should disappear, that's all, and all the police in Europe would never solve the mystery."

There was a dull, thudding sound from the interior of the building, the noise and groan of great iron. It seemed to emphasize Gerald Boynton's words.

"Let's go down," said Violet, and in an instant she was descending the flimsy fire escape like a bird. She heard the other two coming after her. She was frightened now, but not unpleasantly. There was a wild exhilaration in her veins. How splendid Boynton's face had looked as the moonlight fell upon it before it sank into the shadow of the wall!

Within a minute they were standing in the black void among the broken bricks and empty cans, then came out into the street of pulping sheds which led to the boiler house and the great central square.

Somehow Violet found herself running, or at least walking so quickly that it was almost that. Now and again Boynton and Winterbotham took her by the elbows and lifted her over a tangle of rail points, or steered her out of the way of some waiting trolley. It was not until they were halfway across the square and approaching the high wall of Sir William's house that their speed slackened and Violet thought it right to assume a dignity that she was far from feeling.

"And now, Mr. Boynton," she said, "may I ask why you have bundled me off in this fashion?"

"Yes, Miss Milton. Because they were just going to open the large gates at the end of the Experiment House and run a trolley down to the quay."

She asked no questions, but walked towards her postern gate. When she was nearly there she turned. "I don't understand all this," she said in a faltering voice. "Winterbotham came to me with a strange story. He was in the confidence of my uncle, Mr. Boynton. I agreed to go with him and see what was happening. You, it seems, have been investigating upon your own account. I must go in now. I must try and sleep. You and Winterbotham will talk matters over together, I suppose."

The little foreman's face was alive with excitement. "If I'd but known, if Sir William and I'd but known that Mr. Boynton was on to it too! You'll have a lot to tell miss and me, Mister Boynton?"

"Something sufficiently startling," Boynton answered.

"Thank you very much indeed," Violet said, with her hand upon the private door. "I cannot thank you enough. Mr. Boynton, will you call here at eleven o'clock tomorrow morning and tell me all you know?"

Boynton hesitated for a moment. "Miss Milton," he said, "I don't think it would be wise. It would be known. I am watched carefully. I feel sure, if I may say so, that even now you do not appreciate the gravity of what is going on. Another thing is this: Mister Fanshawe has requested me to go to Manchester tomorrow by the ten o'clock train. I have to see a big chemical manufacturer there."

Violet thought for a moment and then made a quick decision. "Very well, then," she said, "we must have our talk in Manchester, that's all. I am quite in the dark at present, but I take your word for it, and Winterbotham's, that the matter is very serious. I will get my driver to take me to Manchester during the morning and meet you anywhere you like for lunch."

The young man's face lighted up. "That is very good of you, Miss Milton," he said. "I can tell you everything tomorrow, then. Suppose we say the Midland Hotel at half-past one?"

"That will do very well indeed. Good night." And then, moved by an impulse, she shook hands with Boynton and afterwards with Winterbotham.

The moon was setting now. The dawn was at hand as Violet crept through the sunken garden and round the house to the veranda. She was physically tired, but the extraordinary experiences of the night left her mentally alert.

"The first day almost!" she said to herself as she went noiselessly upstairs to her bedroom. "What does it all mean? Have I stumbled into some dark conspiracy? Do these gaunt buildings and halls of machinery hide some terrible secret? It seems so indeed. And I thought I was going to merely amuse myself by picking up the details of a large business. It seems that something very different is in store for me. At any rate, at the very beginning I have discovered two firm and courageous helpers. I would trust that little man Winterbotham with anything. And as for Mr. Boynton..." She fell asleep and in her troubled dreams she saw again the moonlight on the young man's clear-cut face.

THE next morning she breakfasted at nine o'clock.

"I find this quaint house beautifully peaceful, a positive hermitage, my dear," said Mrs. Herbert Wilkins. "At first I doubted the wisdom of your suggestion that we should come and live here, but now I see how wise you were. It is so peaceful. Nothing could happen to disturb us in such a placid spot. And I really think very highly of the new cook."

"I am so glad you like it here, Mrs. Wilkins," said Violet. "I hope you slept well."

"Like a top, my dear. This sea air conduces to sleep. And you?"

"I had a perfect night," Violet answered. "By the way, I am going to Manchester today on some business. You won't mind lunching alone? Perhaps, though, you would take the small car and go into Liverpool and do some shopping for me?"

Mrs. Herbert Wilkins thought— as Violet had intended her to think— that this was exactly what she wanted to do, and when at eleven o'clock Violet left her with a few instructions and a considerable sum of money Mrs. Herbert Wilkins again felt that her lines had fallen in pleasant places.

Violet reached Manchester in an hour and a half— she had told the chauffeur not to go too fast— and after a drive round the principal streets of the city, which she had not seen before, she arrived at the Midland Hotel just before half-past one.

Gerald Boynton was waiting for her in the covered courtyard and they ascended to the great central hall together.

Violet gave a little sigh of pleasure. "This reminds me of America," she said, as she looked round. "I did not know you had hotels like this in England."

"Not very many, Miss Milton. They say this is one of the finest hotels in Europe. Shall we have lunch at once, or would you rather wait?"

"Now, please. I am hungry after my journey, and I am anxious to hear all you have to tell me."

She noticed, and with pleasure, that Boynton, whose manner the night before had been slightly deferential, though perfectly natural and unembarrassed, now spoke to her as he would to any other young lady. He was not Mr. Gerald Boynton of the Milton Mills. He was a host entertaining a charming guest. It was a new experience for Violet. In America her position and hard, strenuous work with Bud Kinsolving had left her little opportunity for social diversion. The young men at the boarding-house where she lived were polite and gallant, but they were not of the same class as this well-bred young Englishman. She liked the masterful way he had, the ease and quickness with which he ordered lunch, the deference paid him by the hotel waiters. Yes, she was enjoying herself and she knew it.

At the beginning of the meal Boynton said nothing of what had brought them together. He was a good talker, and she found herself listening to him with a pleasure to which she had long been a stranger. He told her many things which interested her— of his life at Oxford, the glorious days when he stroked the Trinity boat upon the Isis, his bent for science and the kindness of her uncle who had placed him in the position which he now enjoyed. He was a little autobiographical, as young men are when a pretty and charming girl allows them to talk about themselves. They took their coffee at a secluded table in the palm court and Violet gave him permission to light a cigarette.

"I am afraid I have been boring you very much, Miss Milton," he said, "but now to business."

Violet gave a little sigh. She did not particularly want to talk business just then, but she did not let him see that. "Yes," she replied, "I want to know exactly what is going on, Mr. Boynton. Suppose I ask you a few questions."

He bowed.

"First of all, this Mr. Fanshawe, the director of my works. Who and what is he ?"

Boynton's forehead wrinkled. "It is difficult to answer that question, Miss Milton," he said. "And yet I must be perfectly frank with you. Fanshawe is my superior. Fanshawe detests me. This makes it an invidious thing for me to say what I have to say. It seems a sort of treachery. And yet, I assure you, I should have said just the same to Sir William had he lived. Sir William trusted me to a considerable extent."

"And so do I. I perfectly understand your motives. Please say anything you like."

Boynton ground the end of his cigarette into an ashtray and leant forward in his chair with clasped hands. "Fanshawe is a man of enormous scientific intelligence. I admire his achievements and his brain more than I can say. He has no equal in Europe in his particular line, perhaps in the whole world. But, and this is the whole point, the man is two people."

"We are all of us more or less that, are we not?"

"More or less, but I never knew anyone with the dividing line so clearly marked as in the case of Fanshawe. One side of him is a great inventor and scientist; the other is an unscrupulous, loose-living hunter after pleasure and excitement. The man spends enormous sums of money, Miss Milton. He might be a millionaire. I need not go into details, but you can take it from me that everything I say is absolutely true. Indeed, it is common knowledge all over the north of England."

Violet thought of what Winterbotham had told her. The two stories exactly agreed.

"Now there is always an end to such a career as that," Boynton went on. "A man with no resources but a large salary, and who spends his money as quickly as he makes it, must sooner or later get into serious difficulties. There must be a time when he is faced with ruin. Now, I believe, indeed I know, Peter Fanshawe has arrived at that time. It is touch and go with him."

"I had a good business experience in New York," Violet answered. "I understand the position very well. It is not a new one."

"That simplifies matters. Then you must also know, Miss Milton, that when a man is pushed into a corner, especially a man who lives for pleasure, he will do almost anything. If he is a solicitor he embezzles his clients' money. If he is a bank manager he runs away with the contents of the vaults. It is a common story. The newspapers of the world provide an instance every week. What does Fanshawe do?"

"Ah!" said Violet quietly, "that's the question."

"He does not embezzle money. He has nothing to do with the financial side of your business— as you may or may not have assured yourself. The financial side is run by Mr. Mosscrop, the head cashier, and various other officials. There is a check system so careful and complete that embezzlement on a large scale is impossible. I do not think that Fanshawe or anyone else in a high position at the mills could get hold of more than two or three thousand pounds and stave off discovery for many months. There are plenty of ways of doing that, though discovery would be certain. But to Fanshawe two or three thousand pounds would be a mere drop in the bucket. His only other resource is his supreme ability. Let us assume, therefore, that he turns to this in order to save himself. Let us say that he calls upon all the resources of his genius, aided by his unexampled experience in experiments at the mills, and invents something entirely new and wonderful."

"Quite so, Mr. Boynton; that is exactly how the position has occurred to me. But surely, although it may be an act of disloyalty, a sort of misdemeanour, to invent something wonderful, with the aid of the machinery and so forth at the mills, it is not a crime."

"Quite so, Miss Milton. You put your finger on the salient point marvellously. Let us go on with our assumptions. We will say Fanshawe has invented something. Now all new processes, even with such a name as his behind them, require long testing and investigation before they can be put upon the market. Supposing Fanshawe has found out some secret of inestimable benefit to the paper making industry. He could not work upon that undetected for many months, and I am speaking of what I know. Even if he had gone to Sir William with a new invention, Sir William would have given him nothing for it until it had been tested by long experience. It is the same with all other kinds of industry. Fanshawe wants money at once."

"Then you think—"

"I believe Fanshawe is manufacturing something secretly. That something is being sent away from the works at night."

"Surely a difficult thing to manage without detection, Mr. Boynton?"

"You will be startled at what I am going to tell you. Enormous cases like the one you saw last night are being shipped aboard a large private yacht, which comes to the quay at midnight."

"Good heavens! A private yacht? What does it mean?"

"That is what we have to find out, Miss Milton. Of course the night-watchmen— there are two of them— must have been bribed to say nothing. This yacht always chooses the time for arrival when there are none of our own boats at the quay, which happens, on an average, two nights a week. It steams right up to the wharf. The big case is pushed out of the Experiment House on a trolley and a crane swings it up into the steam yacht, which then backs away, turns round and heads for the open sea."

Violet remembered what the foreman had said upon the roof. "Winterbotham discovered something," she said. "He remarked upon the extreme lightness of the case in comparison with its size."

"Exactly, Miss Milton. I know partially what are in those cases."

Violet looked quickly around the hotel, and saw no one she recognized. "Tell me quickly."

"Fanshawe is engaged in the production of papier-mâché."

The girl looked at him in surprise. "Is that all?" she cried. "What an anti-climax to the mystery. I am not quite sure that I know what papier-mâché is."

"Ordinary papier-mâché is made from old paper by boiling it to a pulp with water, pressing, mixing it with glue or starch paste and then forcing it into a mould which has previously been oiled. Engineers use it for covering boilers. It is used in decorating houses instead of wood carving. Trays, fancy boxes and furniture are made of it. It is extremely hard and extremely light. In America, some years ago, they even attempted to make locomotive wheels of it, but this was a failure."

Violet laughed. "Have we been discovering a mare's nest?" she said. "It seems very much like it, and it sounds most uninteresting."

"I think you will find it far from that, Miss Milton. Now let us see where we have arrived. Fanshawe is making an article of papier-mâché. This article, whatever it is, is being constructed with the profoundest secrecy and with the help of a gang of strange men who steal into the works at night. It is of such importance that it is taken away at night by a large private yacht. Now, knowing Fanshawe as I do, I think it is quite likely that he has at last hit upon a secret which may well revolutionize industry. To produce papier-mâché which will have the hardness and other properties of steel, combined with lightness, is the philosopher's stone of our trade. Paper manufacturers have been experimenting for years. I myself have done a good deal of work in this direction, but have obtained no satisfactory results. Fanshawe, I know, has studied the problem for many years. I believe he has solved it."

"Then if he has," Violet answered— she was beginning to realize the tremendous importance of all this— "and he takes his secret away with him, he will acquire an immense fortune."

"Precisely; but not in a moment. I am convinced that only the immediate possession of a large sum of money can save Fanshawe from ruin. And when I say ruin I mean the ruin from which he would never be able to rise. There is some horrible exposure threatening him. Time is the essence of the whole thing."

"What can he be making?"

"That's what we have to find out. Something tells me— you may think it fantastic, Miss Milton, but I have an intuition— something tells me that we are only on the fringe of the whole affair. There is a much darker secret beneath all that we know and all that we suspect."

There was such deep conviction and earnestness in his voice that Violet was powerfully impressed. "I will co-operate with you in every way," she said. "Have you any plans?"

"Yes, Miss Milton. Obviously there is someone behind Fanshawe— the person who supplies the yacht, the person who is responsible for those men who steal into the Experiment House like thieves in the night. If we can locate that person, then we will be on our way to find out what we want to know. You saw last night that another great case is ready. Tonight the wharf at the works will be clear of your boats. I propose to charter a tug and lie off in the middle of the river. Then, when the yacht goes out to sea, the tug follows and discovers its destination— which from the very nature of things cannot be far away. I propose pretending to be ill and so account for my absence from the works. Fanshawe must not suspect a thing. Of course I may be away two or three days, one never knows. Do you think it is worth while doing this, Miss Milton?"

"Certainly I think it worth while."

"It may cost one hundred and fifty pounds."

"I don't care if it costs five thousand pounds. You and Winterbotham between you have succeeded in thoroughly intriguing me. I am going through with this to the end. And what's more, Mr. Boynton, I am going to be on board that tug myself."

Boynton started. "The accommodation would be very rough," he said. "Moreover, there's no saying what may happen. We are facing the absolutely unknown. And a man like Fanshawe and the people behind him are not likely to stick at trifles."

"You think there will be danger?"

Boynton shrugged his shoulders. "It is possible," he said.

"Then I am coming, Mr. Boynton. I wouldn't miss the opportunity for anything. The romance of it appeals to me immensely. ... Mr. Boynton, what's the matter?

Boynton's face had suddenly gone deadly pale. His lips were parted and his eyes were nearly starting out of his head. He was looking across Violet to the right of the hotel palm court.

Violet turned her head and followed his glance. She saw a tall man with a mass of curling dead-black hair— he might have been in his mid thirties. The clean-shaven face was of a clear ivory tint and without a vestige of colour. It was the most striking face that Violet had ever seen. A colossal, overwhelming pride lay upon it— the pride of a Roman emperor, or a Pharaoh of Egypt, whom men once worshipped as divine. The great dark eyes, the eagle nose, the beautifully shaped but cruel lips all breathed a pride so enormous and unquenchable that it struck the mere casual spectator with a sense of chill.

This impression flashed upon Violet's mind in a single instant. Then she saw another figure coming through the archway by which the stranger had entered. It was Peter Fanshawe, and he was talking earnestly to the tall man with the face of Lucifer.

She looked at Boynton again, and the colour now ebbed from her cheeks also.

"Turn your head round," he whispered. "They have not seen us yet and they will pass in a minute, and then we must leave the hotel at once. Miss Milton, I know who that tall man is. A great flood of light is beginning to pour in upon me."

Chapter 4

VIOLET AND GERALD BOYNTON hurried out of the hotel. Boynton was quite certain that neither Fanshawe nor his companion had noticed them. Violet's car was waiting, and they got into it and were driven rapidly away.

"Don't tell me anything yet," Violet said to her companion. "I want to think."

The talk she had just had with Boynton had deeply impressed her. She had definitely made up her mind to get to the bottom of the mystery of the mills. At first she had begun to make light of the whole affair, but it was not so now. What had decided her? Was it the earnestness of the capable and handsome young man who sat by her side in the fast Rolls Royce. She asked herself the question, but found no answer. As they circled the great curve of the Irwell, and Peel Park flashed behind, the face of the stranger who had preceded Fanshawe into the palm court was very vividly before her. Just before they turned into the Eccles Road she turned to Boynton.

"Don't think me rude, Mr. Boynton," she said, with a flashing smile, "but I wanted to arrange all the details in my mind. Now, what made you turn so pale when you saw that extraordinary-looking man with Mr. Fanshawe?"

"If it were known that that man was in Lancashire," Boynton answered, "the Midland Hotel could not hold the people who would crowd to catch a glimpse of him. Fortunately for him very few people indeed know what he is like. There are no portraits of him in existence."

Violet let him tell his story in his own way. "But you knew," was all she said.

"Yes," he replied; "I am just the one man in a million who chances to know. I am a Welshman by birth, Miss Milton. Our family estate is in North Wales and belongs to my elder brother. The man who was talking to Fanshawe is Carradoc David Pantydwr, the Earl of Llandrylas."

Violet tried an Americanism. "Some name, Mr. Boynton, as we should say in the States. If a name like that could fly, I guess it could catch birds."

Boynton laughed. It was the first time she had seen him laugh that morning. His face was transformed, the keenness went out of it and he looked like a happy boy.

"Admirable language, American," he said. "One thing I can see, Miss Milton, is that the name of Lord Llandrylas conveys nothing to you at all."

She shook her head. "I am afraid it doesn't. Is he a very important person?

"I should say," Boynton continued, "that Lord Llandrylas is the most extraordinary human being in the three kingdoms. He is certainly one of the most romantic figures in existence. I should have thought America would have been full of him and his story."

"I never read the papers much, I was too hard-worked when I was in New York," said Violet. "But you quite excite me. Explain."

"In as few words as I can. Lord Llandrylas is the premier earl of Wales. He is a nobleman of immense fortune and enormous estates. He claims, and I believe his claim is perfectly correct, to have descended from the Welsh king, Hywel Dda, who died about a hundred years before the Norman Conquest. It is even whispered— though this is possibly an invention— that he claims to be the rightful king of the Welsh."

"How very trying for his wife," said Violet.

"He is not married, Miss Milton. He is a recluse. He seldom, if ever, leaves his estates. It must have been a thing of the utmost importance to have brought him to Manchester today. He never goes to Court or moves in London society. He refuses to take any part in English affairs. It is an extraordinary instance of one of the greatest living noblemen burying himself in his great sombre medieval stronghold in the mountains of Wales, many of which are his property. He lives very like an eagle in its nest, and no one but a little circle of intimates ever sees him. He is guarded from all possible access, Miss Milton. I feel almost terrified when I think of that man talking to Peter Fanshawe in a Manchester hotel!"

Violet took his meaning. She was becoming singularly sympathetic to this young man's ideas. She realized, given the circumstances Boynton had outlined, that this appearance of the great feudal chief of Wales was significant indeed.

"He has a marvellous face," she said. "I have never seen a face quite like it. It is beautiful, but with a baleful beauty. The pride of the man shouts out like a trumpet, and yet he was talking quite confidentially to that abominable Mr. Fanshawe, with his oily manner and white teeth like a dog's! Isn't he a horrid man!"

Boynton said eagerly, "I am so glad you think so, Miss Milton. You will observe that I kept my own opinion on that point to myself."

He was speaking like a boy and Violet looked at him curiously. "I wonder," she said, "what it is that makes you perfectly ready to tell me the man is a villain and yet forbids you to call him a cad until I do."

Boynton flushed and shrugged his shoulders. "Oh, I don't know," he said a little awkwardly, "only one doesn't do it, Miss Milton."

She liked that immensely, but she did not show it. It was a new experience for her to probe and expose a young man's mind. It gave her a glorious sense of power and at the same time rather frightened her. The combination was delicious!

"About those two being together," Boynton said, "you have certainly put your finger upon the crux of the matter. I am as certain as possible that nothing but an extraordinary occasion would ever make Lord Llandrylas confidential to a man like Peter Fanshawe. I believe that Providence, or chance, has plunged us into the very heart of the mystery this morning."

"Tell me some more about this strange Welsh peer."

"There is so very little known about him, Miss Milton, though there are a thousand rumours and stories. Lord Llandrylas is deeply imbued with ancient Druidic law and is said to possess many Druid secrets. I believe it is true that he is the finest harpist in Wales."

They were silent for a mile or two.

"What about the tug?" Violet said suddenly.

Boynton looked at his watch. "We will be back in Liverpool in a few minutes. There is plenty of time to charter a fast tug; in fact, I know of one, the Sea Gull. Her skipper is an old friend of mine, which simplifies things."

"I am more than ever looking forward to it," Violet said. "Don't you think we might take Winterbotham?"

"By all means. We cannot have a better man. But you are determined on going, Miss Milton?"

"Quite determined, Mr. Boynton. I lived for many years in America, where girls have much more freedom than here, and no one thinks anything about it. And then again, since I am going to take over the direction of the mills, this is a matter which touches me very nearly, and I have a perfect right to investigate for myself. Thirdly, I know that I can trust you, Mr. Boynton, and also trust my late uncle's foreman. No one will know anything about the affair. Nobody has come to call on me yet. It was only this morning that I saw the news of my arrival in Liverpool in the papers."

Boynton bowed and said no more. He had felt bound to make his protest in the first instance. Now that it was done his conscience was at ease. He began to feel a quickening of all his pulses, a warm glow stole about his heart. She was going with him, then! They were partners in this mysterious enterprise. He would be with her many hours still.

Her voice recalled him from his reverie, and he blushed a little as he turned to her.

"Now as to the final arrangements, Mr. Boynton."

"You had better drop me at St. George's Hall, Miss Milton," he answered, pulling himself together and becoming once more the quick and resolute man of affairs. "It will take me from two to three hours to engage the tug. Then I will come back to the works and communicate with you. I don't think Fanshawe will appear again until this evening. But to make the assurance doubly sure, something which I had forgotten has just occurred to me. There will be no need for me to come to your house at all. Every part of the works is connected by telephone with a central exchange. There is an instrument on the writing table in Sir William's study."

"I have seen it," Violet answered. "That is very convenient. As you say, Fanshawe must not see you come into the house. I quite realize the necessity for that."

"And one other point. The girl at the telephone exchange is an excellent creature, but"— he laughed— "well, being the first time anyone has been switched on to you, it might be too much for her curiosity. Do you speak French?"

"Very fairly, Mr. Boynton."

"So do I, and I will communicate with you in that language and refer to a certain gentleman simply as 'Notre Ami.' Now about the tug. One thing is quite certain, the unknown yacht will not come to the quay until one or two o'clock in the morning. However, we must be on board the tug a couple of hours before then. I will see Winterbotham. He can come to your house about ten. Sir William's motorboat, a fast and powerful little vessel, is in the boathouse at the end of your garden terrace. Winterbotham is a capable mechanic. He will take you out to the tug, which will be lying a mile or so up the river. I will be on board and we will then await events. We will have to take Captain Harrop into our confidence to a certain extent, for it is essential that the yacht does not know that she is being followed. But, still, I know Captain Harrop very well. He is a skilful seaman, and, between you and me, I have known him employed on more than one little confidential affair quite unconnected with his usual duties as a tug master. We could not have a better man for our purpose. He is a thorough rascal; in short, he will do anything for money. But, at the same time, he has two great merits: he is extremely cunning and quite fearless, while he is absolutely faithful to his employer for the time being. Of course he will have to be highly paid."

"That all seems excellent," Violet said, "and here we are. Thank you a thousand times for all you have done and are going to do."

Boynton lifted his hat and jumped out of the car. She saw him disappear in the direction of the landing stage and asked her chauffeur to drive her home to the mills, her brain in a whirl of excitement and adventure.

There was Mrs. Herbert Wilkins to be considered, and that problem presented some slight difficulties. Violet asked herself if by any human possibility she could manage to bundle that ease-loving old lady on board a Liverpool tug at midnight en route to an unknown destination.

"It would be as easy to add four pounds of butter to four o'clock," she concluded, and her manner was especially kind and affectionate as she entered the drawing room and found Mrs. Herbert Wilkins presiding over China tea and muffins.

"What a wonderful thing business is!" said Mrs. Wilkins. "I spent such a pleasant morning, my dear. It seems that your arrival in Liverpool to take up your— er— vast responsibilities as head of the mills is already widely known. The people at the principal shops were most anxious to do everything they could. It was so refreshing!"

"I believe they are very obliging in the North," said Violet.

"Money talks, my dear," said Mrs. Wilkins. "When I was companion to Lady Griffin— she was an earl's daughter, unmarried and rather weak-minded— her high rank never brought me such consideration as I have enjoyed this morning. But then, poor thing," Mrs. Wilkins said compassionately, "her income was under two thousand a year."

Violet saw her chance. "Business is everything nowadays," she replied, "and I am just going away for a day or two on business connected with the mills. One cannot have too much money, can one?"

This was a sentiment with which the old lady thoroughly agreed, but her assent was tempered with reluctance. "Do you think it wise, my dear, that we should leave so soon, just as we are settling in so comfortably? As you gave me a free hand, I have ordered quite a lot of things for the house, and they will come directly. There is a beautifully padded chair, the back of which can be adjusted to any angle, and only twenty guineas! I thought it would rest you after your activities."

"How charming of you, Mrs. Wilkins. But I shall go alone. I could not think of asking you to come with me, as the matter is purely one of business and would not interest you in the least."

"You are most considerate, my dear. Are you sure you can do without me?"

"Oh, quite, quite sure," said Violet, relieved the matter was settled so easily. "It is connected with some of my shipping interests, so I shall probably leave here tonight in the motorboat to go on board one of our vessels. Of course I shall be accompanied by responsible members of the firm."

"Much wiser," said Mrs. Wilkins, wagging her head, "much, much wiser. You have an old head upon young shoulders, my dear. Is not this walnut cake delicious?"

Smiling at the easy acquiescence of the lazy old creature, Violet left the drawing room and went into the library. A large fire was burning there and she sank down into a padded leather chair. Then she thought of the telephone and looked at the writing table. It was there, a little gleaming instrument of silver plate and vulcanite, but she noticed something else. There was a letter in a large envelope upon the blotting pad. She went to the table and took it up. It was addressed to herself in large, firm handwriting, which she did not know, and it bore no stamp. The words "By Hand" were written in one corner.

Taking up a paperknife, she opened it. It bore the heading, "The Milton Paper Mills," and ran as follows:

Dear Madam,

I am writing to place my resignation from the post of Director of the Milton Paper Mills in your hands. By the terms of my agreement with the late Sir William Milton, in the event of my dismissal, I was to receive six months' notice, or fifteen hundred pounds, half of my yearly salary— independent, of course, of such royalties of my various patents in connection with the business earned for me. If I myself desired to terminate the agreement, the same rules apply. A copy of the agreement is in the hands of Mr. Hallet, the solicitor, to whom I have sent a cheque for fifteen hundred pounds today.

I am sorry to terminate a long and successful connection with the business which has now passed into your hands. I beg to say that your determination to take up the reins of government has had nothing to do with my decision. Tomorrow I beg the honour of an interview, in which I may, perhaps, be of assistance to you in suggesting plans for the future conduct of the mills.

I may say I am leaving almost immediately for the United States of America, where I intend starting business on my own account. I have sent a similar letter to Mr. Hallet.

Believe me, dear madam, yours most faithfully,

Peter Fanshawe.

The letter dropped upon the table. Violet stared at it in amazement. What did this mean? How did it affect the enterprise in which she was engaged? She rang the bell and the butler answered it.

"When did this letter come, Jelf?" she asked.

"About lunchtime, miss," the man answered. "It came by hand. It was brought by one of the clerks from Mr. Fanshawe's office to await your return."

When the man had gone Violet began to walk up and down the room. She could think better so. Fanshawe the enemy, Fanshawe the villain, was suddenly removing himself from their path!

"I must get this right. I must focus this properly," she said aloud, as she bent all her swift intelligence to the problem.

Bit by bit one or two things emerged clearly. First, Fanshawe's secret business in the Experiment House was done and finished with. Secondly, his pecuniary embarrassments must surely be now a thing of the past. His manner of going was quite open. He had paid a forfeit of fifteen hundred pounds— a thing which no ruined man on the point of flight would ever do. The mysterious activities of the Experiment House would cease. Tonight the private yacht would visit the wharf on a final trip. As far as the Milton Paper Mills were concerned, the whole thing was at an end.

For a moment she heaved a sigh of relief but then she shook her head vigorously. She thought of all that Boynton had hinted. No, she had promised an investigation, and she would stand by her promise. It might be— time would show— that all this was only the starting point of something much more important. Gerald Boynton had been certain of it, and she knew that his intelligence was not one lightly to disregard. Indeed, as she continued her promenade up and down the room, the sense of excitement was quickened to an almost unbearable pitch. She had focused the thing at last! Surely Fanshawe's strange resignation was only another significant indication that things were far from well. The affair had begun in her own works. She would see it through.

After an hour she went upstairs and packed two travelling bags with all she thought she might require for an absence of two or three days. Then she went back to the library and waited eagerly for the whir of the telephone bell. At last it came, just as she was dozing off to sleep, and she leapt up from her chair and ran to the table.

"Hello!"

"Qui va la?" It was Gerald Boynton's voice, and he was speaking in French as he promised. "It is all right about the tug. I had a long talk with Captain Harrop. He wants two hundred pounds to put himself at our disposal for four days. I have agreed to that. Was I right?"

"Perfectly right."

"Thank you," Boynton continued in French. "Our plans are somewhat altered. Captain Harrop tells me that there will be plenty of time to follow the yacht if we join the tug after the yacht has been to the wharf and taken its cargo on board. He proposes that I should wait in hiding as before— on the roof of the Experiment House— and actually watch the packing case shipped on board the yacht. This will make things certain, and I think it is an excellent suggestion."

"So do I. And what afterwards?"

"Instead of lying a mile up the river as he proposed, Harrop will wait with the tug hugging the other shore, almost abreast of the works. Directly the boat moves off I shall hurry to you with Winterbotham, get out the motorboat and we will join the tug. It will only be a matter of a quarter of an hour or so until we get aboard. Harrop will then follow the yacht at a considerable distance. He knows exactly what to do and the best method to avoid the people on board the yacht thinking they are being tracked."

"Well, I will be in readiness whenever you come. I have something to tell you of the utmost importance." And Violet read Fanshawe's letter into the telephone receiver, translating it into French as she did so. She heard a long low whistle in answer.

"What do you think?" she asked.

"I think that this is the last opportunity we shall ever have of discovering the truth."

"Exactly what I thought. This action of "notre ami" hastens matters very considerably."

"I am glad you see that. Our friend is eliminated from the game— or as far as we know he is. The whole thing, of course, may be a blind. But the mystery itself grows far more interesting and subtle than before. If we assume that our friend's work is done and he is going to the United States to start work for himself, we must also assume that he has been paid an enormous sum of money for what he has done. But I have much to do yet. We will talk it all over tonight. Good-bye.

"Good-bye."

"He is wonderful," Violet thought to herself with a little thrill. "He sees things exactly as they are." All the sporting instincts within her awoke, and a strange sense of exhilaration and happiness possessed her.

At ten o'clock she sent the whole household to bed. At eleven she brought down her bags to the veranda. At twelve she ate a light supper. Precisely as the clock in the library chimed half-past one she heard the ring of an electric bell, and knew that Boynton and Winterbotham were waiting at the door in the wall. She hurried through the sunken garden and opened the door. The two men, in heavy overcoats and caps, each of them carrying a bag, stood outside in the yard.

"It's all right," Boynton whispered. "The yacht came quietly up at one, and in a quarter of an hour the men had wheeled the trolley out of the Experiment House down to the quay. The yacht had a winch and tackle rig at the yard, and the case was got on board by the donkey engine in five minutes. She is now just moving away. It is a significant fact that the men in the Experiment House are all aboard her."

"And Mr. Fanshawe?" Violet asked, as they went through the house on the way to the veranda.

"I could not see him anywhere, but I am almost certain he was not with them. I know his figure very well, and none of the little party round the trolley resembled him."

They came out upon the veranda, and Winterbotham hurried to the end of the terrace, where stood the boathouse. Violet and Boynton were left alone.

"The plot thickens," Boynton said in a grave voice. "I can tell you I do not like the look of things at all, Miss Milton. I have not been wasting my time, either, this afternoon. Are you still resolved to go with us?"

"I am quite resolved, Mr. Boynton."

"Very well, then. I see the boat is coming out. Let us go."

He took up her two bags, carrying them as well as his own with the greatest ease, and they went out into the night, Violet closing the glass doors behind her. As they crossed the terrace towards the low wall and the dark, lapping water below, Violet felt a momentary chill. She looked round at the discreet and comfortable house behind her and then into the void beyond.

She was starting out with two unknown men upon an unknown mission, stealing from her house like a thief at the dead of night, to be tossed in a little boat upon a vast and heaving estuary. And then she would steam onboard a tug into the dark night over the dark sea in pursuit of a mystery darker than they. Would it not be better, after all, to stop before it was too late? Would she not rejoice at her wisdom in the morning when she saw the sun again in innocence and safety?

For a moment she hesitated, but only for a moment. She looked up at Boynton, walking by her side, and her courage came back to her in a flash.

Winterbotham had brought the motorboat to the steps, where he steadied it with a boathook. He took the bags, which Boynton handed to him, and then Violet stepped lightly on the gunwale and sat down in the stern. Boynton followed her and took the helm, while Winterbotham busied himself with the engines amidships. A shove of the boathook sent them gliding out into the creek. There was a crack, a series of small explosions, followed by a louder one, and then the powerful engines sank into a steady hum. The propeller began to revolve, a white wake spread out behind them and the wall of the terrace and the house above seemed to be gliding away.

In a minute they had passed out of the creek and were on the tossing waters of the river. The acetylene lamp in the bows spread a fan of light before them. The night was almost windless and the sky spangled with stars, though the moon was not visible. There were twinkling lights of different colours everywhere. The immense arc of star-spangled sky, the black water through which they raced, so that the white plumes of spray rose on each side of the bows were strangely beautiful and uplifting.

Violet turned to Boynton. "'The sea moans round with many voices,'" she quoted.

And he answered her again in Tennyson's words: "'To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield!'"

Just then there was a soft thud and the boat swerved off her course.

"What's that?" Boynton cried sharply.

Winterbotham was at the engines in a moment. "We have hit something," he said, as they sank to half speed. "It's astern of us now— something large and black. I can see it. Put your helm hard to the starboard, Mister Boynton. We must go back and get a look at it."

The boat went slowly round in a half circle, as Winterbotham unshipped the lamp at the bows and came back amidships. He held the lamp high in one hand and grasped a boathook in the other. "It's a body!" he cried.

"Don't look, Miss Milton," Boynton said quickly. He had seen bodies found in the river before.

But he was too late— Violet had seen.

The body of a man was floating on the water and the light fell full upon it. The eyes were wide open and there was a flash of strong white teeth.

The face was the face of Peter Fanshawe!

Chapter 5

WITH A SUDDEN movement Winterbotham shut off the engines. The boathook fell clattering on the bottom boards.

"Oh, my God!" Gerald Boynton cried.

He turned to Violet. Violet was standing up by his side and her hand was on his shoulder.

"Did you see?" he said in a harsh voice. "Did you see who it was?"

"Yes, I saw." She swayed for a moment as the boat rocked a little, and his arm went around her.

"Steady, steady, Miss Milton! Sit down on the stern-sheets. Oh, this is awful!"

They had overshot the body by some ten yards. The bows of the motorboat were pointed towards the creek from which they had come. The body was floating out beyond their stern into the full tideway.

This being so, Violet and Boynton saw it drifting behind them, so to speak. Winterbotham was standing by the engines, holding the lamp high and still focusing it on the retreating horror.

Then they saw a strange thing.

The light was focused on the drowned face, with its staring eyes and hideous grin, and then the face sank beneath the water. There was a little oily swirl and the body itself sank far out of sight.

As it did so, Winterbotham's voice came harshly to them. "He's gone for many days. It's always so. A man that's been drowned, or knocked on the head, maybe, and put into t'river, has a certain amount of air in his lungs. Mister Fanshawe couldn't have been long dead, which was the reason for him floating. Us coming along so fast disturbed the equilibrium. T'poor chap's gone down below. Nobody won't see him again for a fortnight. I've known them washed up unrecognizable at Hoylake or West Kirby. On the other hand, the currents may take them up to Southport, or, again, they've been known to turn up at Ellesmere and the Ship Canal."

There was a little slap against the bows of the motorboat. Some spray and a pint or two of water came over the side.

The stars spangled the great black-velvet arc of heaven. The fresh salt breezes moaned round them. The swell of the black waters seemed to be increasing. It was immeasurably vast and splendid— and the little motorboat was turning, twisting and drifting in the strong currents of the Mersey.

"How awful! How incredibly awful!" Boynton heard Violet say. He sat down beside her. "Put that lamp back in the bows, Winterbotham," he said in crisp, commanding tones. "Get your engines started. We have only lost five minutes. We have got to get to the Sea Gull as quickly as possible."

As she heard the ringing voice of command, Violet made a great effort to pull herself together. As if in a dream she saw the little mechanic bending over the engine hatchway and pulling aside the shutter. He crouched over the central hump like a grotesque dwarf. Again there was a sound like a revolver fired rapidly, and then the rising hum and the swish of the boat as it turned its nose once more to the central river, and the cold air of its passage blew across her face.

They raced at full speed into the fairway, passed the promontory of New Brighton and into the stream. Boynton was crouching over the tiller. Violet felt his warm, ungloved hand upon hers.

"You understand," he whispered, "you understand we must go on and see this thing through. Are you frightened?"

Instinctively she moved closer to him until there was only the tiller between them. She liked his hand on hers. "No, I am not frightened. I know now that we must go on, Mr. Boynton. But it was terrible, terrible!"

"Try and keep your spirits up. It was more awful than I could ever have thought. But you see what has happened?"

"He ... he has been murdered?"

"Unquestionably. Fanshawe dead. Oh, how brilliant he was in his work! I have always revered him for that. Fanshawe has served the purpose of those who have employed him. They have paid an enormous sum for the work he has done. Then, in order that he could never betray them, he has been cast away like this. Poor fellow, poor fellow!"

"I disliked him intensely when I met him first," Violet said in a low, vibrating voice. "When I knew more, and was caught up into this secret business, I hated and feared him. Now I have no feeling but utter sorrow."

"May he find rest," the young man answered. "I see now that he was a mere pawn in some stupendous game. But, Miss Milton, this has just occurred to me: as far as you are concerned, the matter is over. Shall we not return, even now?"

"I do not know whether you are testing me, Mr. Boynton," she answered, "but I tell you this: nothing will stop me now! I am in the dark— we are both in utter darkness— but we have set our hands to the plough. This has not all come by chance. Let us go on to the very end."

Her low, vibrating voice had hardly ceased when the young man's hand left hers and he stood up in the stern-sheets. "The Sea Gull!" he cried. "The tug! She is not three hundred yards away."

With his left hand upon the tiller he stretched out his right arm to where something like an enormous black porkpie lay sullen on the water. There was an arrangement of two green lights, a red light and then another green upon the side.

There was a swish and a snarl as the motorboat described a curve and shot off at an angle towards the lights. At the same time Winterbotham put a whistle to his lips and a shrill call shivered over the intervening space.

It was answered by a roaring voice coming to them through a megaphone. In two minutes the motorboat was at rest and its crew was going up the accommodation ladder, which slanted from the high side of the tug.

"Where's the lady?" came in a hoarse growl as Violet climbed up to the tug.

"Miss Milton is here, skipper," she heard Gerald's voice, and then she found her hand enclosed in a huge paw and shaken vigorously.

"This is Captain Harrop, Miss Milton," Boynton said.

"And very much at your service, miss. You have rented me and the Sea Gull till further orders, and you are queen of the tug! This way. I think you will say we've done you pretty."

Violet was too excited and upset to realize quite what she was doing. One thing she knew— that was the guiding arm of Gerald Boynton— and then she found herself in the cabin of the boat.

"We've done our best, Miss Milton," said Captain Harrop, filling up the doorway. "At least, Mr. Boynton has. I hope you'll be comfortable."

Violet looked at the skipper and smiled mechanically. She saw an extraordinary personality. The man was not five feet two in height, and he was nearly as broad. He had a great, clean-shaven face as big as a ham. Below his peaked cap little black eyes sparkled at the end of two lanes of flesh. The nose was like a piece of coral, the mouth enormous, irresistibly genial and strong. This pantomime mask grinned, nodded and disappeared. As the cabin door slid closed, there was a bellow and a whistle, the sharp ting-ting of the engine room gong and a deep-writhing throb.

"I have done my best, Miss Milton," Gerald Boynton was saying. "I hope you will find this quite comfortable."

Violet looked around with a little exclamation of pleasure and surprise. The portholes were covered with curtains of bright chintz— she saw at once that there had been no time to hem them. A Turkish rug covered the stained oilcloth on the floor. The captain's bunk was full of white pillows and fragrant linen sheets. The table in the middle of the cabin was covered with an embroidered cloth, and a copper bowl full of nodding daffodils stood in the centre. The whole place had a mingled odour of strong tobacco, rum and lavender water. Under the bunk Violet's quick eyes discerned a battered tin bowl with three or four nasty-looking pipes in it, an immense pair of sea boots and a square bottle— doubtless containing the skipper's accustomed solace.

The cabin door slid open again and Winterbotham brought in Violet's bags.

"We are off now, Miss Milton," Boynton said, going towards the door and losing all his usual confidence. "I do hope it is all right in here."

She saw him look round swiftly with a worried face, and then he was gone, and she was alone.

Violet sat down upon the plush seat opposite the bunk on the starboard side and began to laugh hysterically. Her hand discovered a large bottle of lavender water and a scent-spray shoved under the cushion on which she sat.

"Oh, you dear!" she cried. "You funny dear! This wonderful improvisation! The chintz curtains with all the ragged ends hanging down at the bottom, and the captain's boots and rum all under my bed."

She held up the bottle of lavender water and smelt the strong fragrance of it, the stronger fragrance of rum, and the all-permeating odour of ships' tobacco. And then she saw again the wide-open, staring eyes and dog's grin of the drowned Fanshawe, and she wrestled with her hysteria, gripping the edge of the table, until it seemed that the whole ship vibrated with her.

Indeed, it was vibrating. The immensely powerful engines of the tug were full at work. The cabin was aft. The drone of the propeller shaft in the thrust-blocks was immediately below the floor on which she stood. There was a slight swaying movement of the cabin and a curious impression of swiftness. She knew that the boat was kicking its way out to the open sea and going at full speed.

The hunt had begun.

Half an hour afterwards there was a knock at the cabin door and Boynton and Winterbotham entered, the latter carrying a bowl of soup.

"Do you think you could hold a council of war, Miss Milton?" Boynton asked. "But first of all I beg you to drink this. It will do you good."

Violet was glad of the soup and drank it in silence.

"It is good of you to have thought of it," she said at length. "I was more unnerved than I knew. That poor, poor man!"

"I never liked the man," said Boynton gravely, "but whatever his faults he has paid terribly for them."

"Then you do not think it might possibly have been an accident?

"It weren't no accident, miss," said Winterbotham. "I saw more than ye did. Mister Fanshawe was knocked over the head and thrown into t'water."

"You are quite sure he was murdered?"

"That's what they call it, miss," said the little man dryly.

"You see the extreme significance of it, don't you?" Boynton interrupted. "Quite putting any sentimental considerations on one side. You will remember what I said to you in the motorboat?"

"I remember everything."

"Well, I have learnt a great deal since I left you this afternoon. The plot thickens— oh, the plot thickens!" he said with a dramatic gesture, so unlike him that Violet started. She saw the brown eyes were suddenly flecked with little gold sparkles. The strong mouth tightened.

Violet leant forward on the table. Her elbows were upon it and her head was in her hands. "Go on," she said.

"About the yacht, Miss Milton, the mysterious yacht. She is not mysterious any longer. She was the Shamrock of Bray, just outside Dublin. Captain Harrop knows her quite well. The Sea Gull often goes to Dublin. Only a month ago she was bought, and now she turns up at Liverpool as the Mabinogion. She is a fast turbine boat of six hundred tons, and she was bought by Mr. Conway Flint."

"And who may that be, Mister Boynton?" Winterbotham asked.

"No one you would be likely to know, Winterbotham. Very few people in Liverpool have heard of him, but I know him."

He turned to Violet. "I think I told you," he said, "that I am a Welshman and that our family estate is at Moell. I am of the soil. My people were minor chiefs of the mountains in the past. Now my brother is a Welsh squire of good repute. Though I have broken away from all that and have become a scientist, yet I know what goes on in Wales. Conway Flint is an extraordinary person. He is of good Welsh blood, but he has been mixed up in various scandals. For the last five years— since his estates were sold under his feet— he has been the right-hand man of Lord Llandrylas. He lives with the earl at Ynad— the huge fortress-palace up in the clouds of the Pendrylas Range. It must be what we thought yesterday when we saw Lord Llandrylas at the Midland Hotel. Llandrylas is the sinister influence behind it all."

"Yesterday!" Violet cried. "Was it only yesterday! I seem to have lived a hundred years since then. Yesterday," she went on with gathering passion, "I saw Mr. Fanshawe walking through the palm court of the hotel— with the man whose face was like the face of Lucifer. Tonight I have seen that poor man dead and drowned in the sea. What does it mean, what does it all mean?"

"Who can say, who can tell?" Boynton rejoined. "But I think it means something very horrible. And I think, too, that you, Miss Milton, Winterbotham and myself are destined to get to the bottom of it all."

There was a sharp rap and the door of the cabin slid back. A gust of cool, ozone-laden air flooded in, and the light fell upon the great face of Captain Harrop, which seemed hanging there like a Japanese lantern without visible support.

"Had your little talk with missy?" said the skipper. "If so, I comes along as ordered."

He proceeded to worm himself into the cabin, smiling extensively, and Violet detected a quick glance towards the space underneath her bunk. She thought she knew what Captain Harrop had come for and she rose to the occasion.

"Well, since you ask me, missy," said the captain, "I did leave my little drop of comfort under the bunk, though you've quick eyes to notice it. Thank you kindly. The Mabinogion— the Shamrock, that was— is just about three miles ahead of us upon the port bow. Her lights are quite plain."

"And where are we, Captain?" Winterbotham asked.

"Off Rhyl," the skipper answered. "We shall be abreast of Colwyn Bay in an hour. Then we turn north past Llandudno and make the Great Orme at dawn."

"Then it is as you suspected, Captain Harrop?" Boynton asked.

"I'm pretty sure of it," Harrop answered. "The yacht is going to Pendrylas Harbour."

"And what is Pendrylas Harbour, Captain?" Violet asked.

"It's a creek some way east of Conway, missy. There's a huge stone jetty built out. It's where the slate ships come. All the mountains beyond are full of slate quarries, which belong to Lord Llandrylas. Slate goes from there in his lordship's ships to all parts of the world. There's a biggish village behind the harbour."

"We must be absolutely certain," Boynton replied.

"Well, we shall steam past Pendrylas and watch the Mabinogion make the harbour," said the captain. "She can't have any idea we're following her if we go straight on."

"It would be much better if one of us could go ashore without attracting attention," said Boynton.

"Well, that's the difficulty," said the captain. "There are plenty of seafaring men in the port. If I put in there without a reason they would want to know why, and I take it that would defeat your purpose."

"You know what we are trying to find out, Captain. First, we want to be quite sure that the yacht does put in at Pendrylas. We already know that it must belong to Lord Llandrylas. But, as you are aware, there is something on board which has been taken from the works in Liverpool. We want to see what becomes of it."

The captain scratched his head. "If I were to drop anchor and you watched the shore with glasses you would not see very much, and that would be suspicious again. As there is some hanky-panky going on, they are sure to be on the lookout."

"They do not know either Winterbotham or myself," Boynton said. "Do they know you, Captain?"

"Aye, I've put in there once or twice. I remember I had an evening there with a skipper of a slate boat." The captain paused, as his eye fell upon Violet. "Well, we had a convivial evening, so to speak. Now I tell you what I could do. It has just occurred to me. I'll go ashore in the dingy and take Mr. Winterbotham with me. I can fit him up with a suit of slops and he can be the mate. We will go to the public house on the quay for an hour or two and keep our eyes open. And what's more, I can let out casually that there's an Argentine barque about due and I am cruising to meet her and take her in tow. How will that do, gentlemen?"

"That will do excellently," Boynton answered.

"Then if you will come along with me, Mr. Winterbotham," said the skipper, slipping the bottle of rum into his pocket with a wink, "I'll see you fitted out."

"Oughtn't you to try and get some sleep, Miss Milton?" said Boynton as the other two left the cabin. "You must be tired out."

Violet shook her head. "I could not possibly sleep a wink. There will be time for that by and by. Let's go on deck. I want fresh air."

They went up the companion ladder and on to the deck, which trembled with the powerful engines below. Dawn was at hand. Ahead of them all was dark, though the low, black hump of Anglesea could be seen upon the horizon, and the powerful light between it and Puffin Island gleamed like a red eye. But astern it seemed as if glowing coals of crimson were being pushed up from the floor of the sea and a rosy light hovered and spread above them. The air was cool and life-giving, and so incredibly, marvellously pure.

"I will have a yacht of my own!" Violet said to Boynton. "I will buy a beautiful yacht. How perfect this is!"

She heard him sigh beside her and wondered why, though she said nothing.

"Look!" he said at length, leading her forward past the bridge. "You can just see her now."

Following the direction of his arm and straining her eyes through the rapidly dispersing dark, Violet saw the green port lights and the long, shadowy form of the white yacht two miles away on the starboard bow.

"There!" Boynton said with an almost dramatic gesture. "There goes the mystery. I have spent hours of concentrated thought in trying to imagine what that ghost ship has on board, and I am as far from the solution as ever. Whatever it is, it is evil, Miss Milton. I know that in my very soul. It has already cost the life of one man. Who knows what its future influence is to be!"

He spoke with some emotion and shuddered as he did so. Violet was again surprised— these outbursts of passion were so curiously unlike him— but she was influenced also, and stared out to the east with eyes that were sombre with thought.

And then a miracle. The sun heaved itself from the eastern waters and great spears of golden light stabbed the dark with their enormous glory.

Boynton led Violet to the port side of the vessel. "Look!" he said.

Range upon range of purple mountains rose out of the sea, height piled on height, till the eye was lost in the distant immensity of the Snowdon Range. The light spread out and up those mighty sides with incomparable grandeur, and a great skein of birds came clanging out to sea to welcome the dawn.

"It's there," Boynton said, "five miles away in the heart of the mountains, that the real mystery lies. Beyond that cone-shaped peak is the Castle Ynad, and over all these mountains Lord Llandrylas rules like a dark king!"

Chapter 6

THE PROPRIETOR of the hotel at Pwylog, the select little watering place a mile from the slate-cutters' village and port of Pendrylas, was singularly pleased with himself.

In the ordinary course of events it was far too early for the season to begin. It would be several weeks before the earliest visitors arrived, despite the fineness of the spring, and yet good Mr. Price had let the whole of his first floor to a wealthy old lady and her daughter. There was a French maid, a fine motorcar and a chauffeur in addition. Some beautiful furniture had arrived to supplement the landlord's own somewhat scanty comforts. Mrs. Wilkins had assented to his terms without the slightest demur.

The fast train for Holyhead had just run through the little station by the side of the sea and its echoes rolled like thunder in the mountains above. A bale of the morning's newspapers and letters had been thrown out automatically as the express tore past. In another twenty minutes the hotel bag was brought to the door, where Mr. Price was standing admiring the beauty of the morning. He himself took the letters and papers up to the first floor. Knocking at the door, he was bidden to enter, and found Miss Wilkins just finishing breakfast, her mother never appearing much before noon."

"A fine day whatever, miss," said Mr. Price, gazing appreciatively at the tall young lady with the dead-black hair and brilliant blue eyes. "And here's your letters and the papers from Liverpool."

Miss Wilkins took her bundle with a bright smile. Immediately the door closed she glanced rapidly over the envelopes. Apparently the one she sought was not there, for with a slight frown she put the letters aside and opened a Liverpool daily. She spread the broadsheet out upon the table and began to go through the columns carefully, as if looking for something. Then her face lighted up.

Under the heading "Personal" she read as follows:

We understand that Miss Violet Milton, niece and heiress of our late honoured townsman, Sir William Milton of the Milton Paper Mills, has left Liverpool for London. Miss Milton had, it is known, thought of making a considerable stay in the city, but recent sad events— in which she has the sympathy of everyone— have altered her decision.

"That's all right," Violet said to herself. "Gerald"— she called him Gerald to herself now— "has managed that very well. I wonder at what hotel I am staying in London."

With a little laugh she went on with her scrutiny of the paper and then suddenly stiffened into attention as her eye fell upon some headlines in large black type. It was the report of the inquest on Peter Fanshawe, late director of the Milton Paper Mills. The body had been found five days ago, at a moment when the prolonged absence of Fanshawe from business had already begun to draw comment and alarm, more particularly as no one at the works had received any intimation of a proposed absence.

The whole business world of Liverpool had been greatly excited by the event. This Violet knew very well, not only from the reports in the newspapers, but also from Gerald Boynton's exhaustive letters. The wildest rumours had got about. Fanshawe's method of life was no secret to a great many important people, and there were many whisperings, mutterings and noddings of heads on the Exchange and in the clubs. Nothing, however, had been definitely known, and today public curiosity was set at rest.

The inquest was reported verbatim, but the evidence condensed amounted to this: The body of Peter Fanshawe had been discovered floating off New Brighton. It had been taken to the mortuary and was identified by Mr. Mosscrop, the head cashier of the Milton Mills, and also by Mr. Gerald Boynton, the chief chemist. Doctors announced that the body had been immersed for several days. In their opinion death was not due to drowning, but to a blow on the head, delivered by some blunt instrument which had fractured the skull. It was an unsettled question whether Fanshawe was dead or only unconscious when he fell or was thrown into the river.

His movements were traced up to a point some seven days before. The last known of them was that he had gone to Manchester by an early morning train. The waiter at the Midland Hotel, Manchester, who knew deceased slightly, swore that he had lunched there upon that day in company with a tall gentleman, whose face he had not seen, as they were not at his particular table. From that moment all traces of Fanshawe's movements were lost. Apparently he had not returned to the works.

The police had interrogated everyone who was likely to have seen him, and no one had. His housekeeper and butler at Birkenhead stated that their master's movements were very erratic. He had left the house early on the day he was seen in Manchester at lunchtime; since then he had not returned. The supposition was that he had come by his death on the night of that day.

And there the evidence stopped dead.

Various people were interrogated as to the facts of Mr. Fanshawe's private life. The answers were all very guarded, but anyone reading through the report could see that Fanshawe, in addition to his business activities, had led a life of reckless pleasure. Nevertheless there was not the slightest hint of his having any personal enemies. The police brought forward several witnesses— reluctant witnesses, be it said— who, under pressure of the coroner, admitted that Fanshawe owed them very large sums of money, but one and all made haste to state that they had not held the slightest fear of not being paid. Finally, the manager of Fanshawe's bank admitted that his balance stood at nearly fifty thousand pounds.

Further questioning of this witness elicited an extraordinary fact. It was that until quite recently the dead man had been heavily overdrawn, but that his personal assurance of an immediate settlement was so precise and confident that the bank authorities forbore to press him. This statement was verified only a day or so before his death. The money was paid on a draft on a New York bank, which had been duly honoured. This bank had been questioned by cable and had replied that the money had been lodged with them through various sources in such a way that they were quite unable to trace it. It was an ordinary discounting transaction and no more.

The coroner remarked that doubtless pressure could be brought and the original payer of the money found, though if the bank authorities were unwilling to give information it would be very difficult. Here the police intervened and said they were satisfied, and this was not relevant to the inquiry. The jury returned an open verdict.

Violet put down the paper. So that was all! It seemed that the police, at least, would never solve the mystery, but then they did not know what she and Boynton knew. To her it seemed one more link in the chain. The money must have been given to Fanshawe by Lord Llandrylas, or through his agents.

Well, Gerald was coming to the hotel that night for the first time. The real campaign was only just beginning.

What had happened many days earlier was this:

WITH THE FULL dawn they had made Pendrylas and watched the long, white Mabinogion edge its way into the harbour.

About a quarter of an hour afterwards, the tug had steamed up and anchored some quarter of a mile out. A boat had been lowered and Harrop and Winterbotham had rowed ashore.

They were there for nearly three hours, while Gerald and Violet sat secure from shore observation in the cabin in a fever of impatience. They had breakfasted together, and during the meal had said but little. Afterwards, in order to relieve the tension of her thoughts, the young man had talked upon every subject but the one nearest their hearts. And he had succeeded in interesting her. In that long two hours' conference, while the sun climbed the clear sky and the tug rocked lazily on a sea like glass, he seemed to grow nearer to her than before. Hitherto all their meetings had been full of action and excitement. Now, for the first time, there was an enforced lull.

He told her, shyly at first, but more confidently afterwards, in answer to her questioning, much about his own life. He had touched on that subject at the Midland Hotel, but now his unconscious revelation of self was freer and more complete. He was an excellent companion, witty and trenchant in all his views of life. But he was much more than this. Violet was under no illusion as to her own mental abilities. She knew they were high above the average. But now, for the second time in her life, she came in close contact with an intellect of the first order.

Her late employer, Bud Kinsolving, was a marvellous man, but he was limited. His brain was a steel machine for making money and nothing more. The man had cared for nothing whatever outside Wall Street. Here, in the grotesque little cabin of the tug, was a brain of wide culture, in addition to its quality of specialization. Moreover, Violet defined a strength of purpose equal to that of the famous American financier's.

It was with real surprise that they both heard the approaching boat hail the tug and found that it was nearly noon.

Captain Harrop, very flushed, and with an aroma of strong spirits, but sober enough, tumbled on deck and down into the cabin, his vast face grinning like "Humpty Dumpty" in the picture-book. He was followed by little Winterbotham, whose keen, terrier-like face was blazing with excitement.

"We've found out what you want to know, sir," said the captain thickly. "I'm going to start the engines again and we will steam on round Anglesea. We can make for Liverpool again towards dusk. I'll leave my new first mate to tell his story."

When he had gone they shut the door, and Winterbotham sat down. "It's for Ynad Castle right enough," he began breathlessly. "Miss, there's been more than twenty of these cases coming from the mill to Pendrylas during the last two months. They have always arrived at dawn from Liverpool and in the yacht. While Captain Harrop was drinking his whisky I went out on to the harbour side and got into talk with one or two. It was easy to make friends— I took a couple of chaps and filled them up wi' beer. Them cases are taken on a lorry to the foot of the slate-hauling railway. It goes straight up the mountainside almost like a ladder, and the great railway trucks come down to load up the steamers in the river. They have had a crane fixed up on the quay, and the cases are swung onto the trucks and hauled to the very top of the mountain. Then another truck and horses take them over the winding road to the Castle Ynad. That's all that is known about them. The earl gets lots of things from all over the world like that. He won't have anything to do with the railways because he doesn't own them. But the Mabinogion is a new arrival and these cases something special, so they've been noticed."

"And no one has any idea what they contain?" Boynton asked.

"Not a soul knows anything," said Winterbotham. "No one ever sees his lordship. Mr. Conway Flint manages everything at Pendrylas— that is to say, there's a regular manager, Mr. Rees, but when there's anything special Mr. Flint comes down over the mountains and sees to it. Not one of the people in the village has ever been into the castle, or near it. It's guarded like the Tower of London in the old days!"

This had been the substance of Winterbotham's information, though he subsequently added many details, all of which Boynton noted down for future reference. The tug had weighed anchor and proceeded westwards. At the approach of dusk, and far out to sea, it turned and made for the Mersey at full speed.

At eight o'clock that night Violet had quietly returned to her house in the Milton Paper Works, and at nine o'clock Boynton came to her again. He shook his head as he entered the library. "Nothing, Miss Milton," he said. "Of course I have not made any direct inquiries, except in a casual way to ask if Mr. Fanshawe has been at the works. Nothing has been seen of him, so it is evident that the body has not been discovered."

"And you have thought out our plans, as you promised?"

"Yes. What I propose is this. About a mile from Pendrylas there is a pretty little watering-place called Pwylog. It consists of a few villas owned by Manchester people, a row of superior lodging-houses and a charming hotel at the top of the village on the lowest slope of the mountains. Now neither you nor I— we have every reason to believe— are known to any of Lord Llandrylas' people. I want you and Mrs. Wilkins to go tomorrow to this hotel. It will be quite empty now. I want you to settle down there for some time. Somehow or other you must get Mrs. Wilkins to agree that you will pass as her daughter, Miss Wilkins. Do you think that is possible?"

Violet's cheque book was lying on the table beside her. She tapped it with one finger and smiled. Boynton smiled too.

"Very well, then, I shall leave that part of it to you. It is essential that there will be no connection between Miss Wilkins of the Victoria Hotel, Pwylog, and Miss Milton of Liverpool. Leave all your servants here on board wages. I will arrange to get a car for you from Manchester and engage a new chauffeur, and by the month. If you want a maid, don't take your present one, but telegraph for a French maid from London."

"Very well," said Violet meekly— she liked taking orders from this masterful young man.

"You see my plan?"

"Vaguely."

"It will mean that, quite unsuspected, we can have a base for operations within a few miles of the castle itself. You have already told me that you are prepared to spend any amount of money in getting to the very heart of this dark matter. I warn you it may cost a great deal. But with your intelligence and money and with my co-operation we will get to the bottom of it!"

"I will twenty tomorrow," Violet said. "I would not give it up now for the whole of my fortune."

"Then I will remain here for the present. Poor Fanshawe's body is certain to be discovered before long. There will be a great uproar and scandal. I must be on the spot. Winterbotham and myself will have to exercise the very greatest care, but I don't see how anything can be discovered. As soon as everything is over, things will go on as before, but if you will allow me, I will constantly be at Pwylog. We will draw out a definite plan of campaign and carry it through to the bitter end."

"Will it not be thought strange that I should disappear in this way?"

"I will arrange all that. I will have paragraphs put in the papers at the right moment. Fortunately no one in Liverpool knows you yet."

Violet took a sudden resolution. "There is one other thing, Mr. Boynton. Nobody yet knows what we know, but we are aware that the works are now without a director. As soon as the discovery is made I wish you to take up Mr. Fanshawe's position and assume entire direction of the mills."

Boynton flushed deeply. "Miss Milton," he said in a hesitating voice, "I don't think I can; I really don't think"

"You don't think you are capable of doing it, Mr. Boynton?" she asked quietly. "Answer me frankly."

The young man bit his lip. "I could do it, of course," he said. "It would be childish of me to pretend otherwise. I am not Fanshawe's equal in experimental work, but I believe I will become so in the future."

"Then why"

"It is too big a thing for me, Miss Milton. I am already in one of the finest positions in the paper-making trade— for a young man, that is. To accept this directorship would be too— oh, well, it would be as if some simple curate was suddenly made Archbishop of Canterbury. I should immediately become one of the world dictators in the paper trade."

There was a very long ivory paperknife in the shape of a sword on the library table. Violet took it up and with a laugh she struck Gerald on the shoulder.

"There!" she said, "you have received the award. You must obey me in all things."

There was a sudden gleam in the young man's eyes, and his lips tightened, while his face went white. The girl was almost afraid of what she had done. Her heart was beating rapidly. Then she saw him make a tremendous effort at self-control. For a second or two he shook with it, and her whole heart rejoiced to see it.

He got up from his chair on the other side of the writing table where he had been sitting, and asked permission to light a cigarette. He walked up and down the library for half a minute. Then he threw the cigarette away.

"Very well, then, Miss Milton," he said. "I accept this stupendous, this most generous offer of yours. I will make no propositions except one. I will do my best and," he continued, with a little laugh that relieved the tension, "there will be no midnight experiments and no strange ships in the night!"

Thus it had been arranged, and now Violet was sitting in the pleasant room of the Pwylog Hotel, which overlooked the sea, and wondering what was going to happen. "The decks are all clear for action," she thought. "Now the real battle begins."

And again the strangeness and unreality of it overwhelmed her. Less than three months ago she was a stenographer in a New York office, now she was rich beyond dreaming. And even that was not enough! She was embarked upon a dark and perilous enterprise, which so far was wrapt in the profoundest mystery. Of her own free will she had gone into it, determined to pursue it to the end. And by her side, counselling, directing, leading, was the One Man in the world! For she knew that now, knew it very well, and as the deep sweetness of the thought stabbed her heart with a divine pain, she covered her face with her hands as if it might betray her secret.

Then she rose from her seat, folded up the papers and put them in a drawer before going through her correspondence, which was uninteresting. He would be there that night, and she longed for his coming. Meanwhile there was a long day to get through. She started out to Pendrylas and sat upon the quay, watching the great slate trucks run up the mountainside behind, like flies, or come rolling and rattling along the rails to the end of the pier where a steamer was waiting for their load.

Now and again, faint and far away, came the muffled roar of blasting, echoing like thunder among the tops of the mountains. The sea was placid as a mirror. The sun was full and strong, and the quarrymen sang at their work with tuneful Celtic voices.

Mrs. Herbert Wilkins appeared at lunch, placid and incurious as ever. Hers was not to reason why. She was perfectly content to do all that Violet bade her: to eat largely and sleep long, and to watch her little balance at the bank putting forth fresh shoots.

"What I always say, my dear," was about the only remark she vouchsafed at lunch, "is that you never really appreciate sole unless it has been caught the same morning as it is eaten, as these are. I have never tasted better, and that good Mr. Price assures me that red mullet will be coming in very soon."

In the afternoon they drove to Conway in the car and spent an hour or two wandering over the quaint old castle, and then at six they returned. Dinner was ordered at eight, and punctually at half-past seven Violet heard the throb of a powerful motor coming up the long road by the sea, which gleamed white in the dusk between the flower-studded hedges. Gerald had arrived!

The dinner was a joyful one, Mrs. Herbert Wilkins making Boynton's arrival the excuse for ordering a bottle of champagne, "as Mr. Boynton must be tired after his long journey." Mr. Boynton, it turned out, did not drink champagne, so the old lady nearly finished the bottle herself, retiring to her virtuous couch at nine o'clock, cooing a benediction on the young people, and conscious of a day well spent.

The waiter removed the dinner things, candles were lit upon the mantelpiece, and Gerald and Violet were alone. The long windows, which led out to a balcony, were wide open. Nothing could be heard but the soft lapping noise of the tide upon the shingle, the voices of sailors and the creak of oars as boats passed to and fro from a ship that had come in during the evening. It lay a quarter of a mile out to sea and had three red lights burning on its mast. The air was soft and warm; it was an ideal night.

"I have much to tell you, Miss Milton," Gerald began. "I believe we are on the threshold of great things. You saw the papers this morning? Well, the business of Fanshawe need trouble us no longer— for the present at any rate. Nothing whatever has been discovered. There is no link to connect his death with the man up there." He made a quick gesture with his hand towards the mountains behind the hotel. "And nothing whatever has transpired about the visits of the yacht by night. We start fair."

They were standing by the window looking out to sea, and Violet was trembling with eagerness to heat more.

"First of all," Gerald began, and then he stopped suddenly.

In an instant, pat upon his words, the whole sea, sky, encircling mountains and the room where they stood became bright, as bright as day.

There was a sound like a deep sigh and then an appalling crash, louder than the loudest thunder, so awful in its suddenness and alarm that the very heart stood still. In less than a second afterwards there came a noise as of the beating of a million gongs, long, reverberating and beyond all description. Simultaneously a whirlwind struck the house, until it seemed rocking to its very foundations. The windows were blown in with a crash of broken glass and woodwork. Violet was thrown against the opposite wall of the room as if by a giant hand. Boynton crashed against the table, staggered, caught his head on the side and fell upon the floor like a doll.

The mighty gongs thundered away in the distance. There was a loud chorus of shouts and shrieks, while Violet fought and struggled like a drowning person against a great blackness that seemed to overwhelm her. With all the forces of her will she struggled, gasping, crying out aloud, and then the horror passed from her and she was sane.

She tottered from the wall and looked around her with a wild stare. The four candles upon the mantelpiece were burning with perfect stillness, and in their light she saw Gerald, white and still, among the broken glass upon the floor. A thin crimson stream was flowing down his cheek.

In an instant Violet was on her knees beside him, supporting his head upon her arm, bending over him, calling to him. "Gerald! Gerald! My love! Are you dead? Oh, Gerald, come back, come back!"

It was indeed as if her voice had called him. She felt a slight movement upon her arm. Then the eyes opened slowly and gazed into her own. They were glazed and dull, but as she called to him consciousness came back and they became starry bright. "Violet!" he said.

Chapter 7

THERE WERE ladders up the front of the Victoria Hotel as Violet came out, with a large rush basket on her arm and a tall alpenstock with an iron point in her hand.

Glaziers were still putting glass in all the broken windows. It was four days after the explosion of the ship which had brought blasting powder for the quarries.

Mr. Price, the proprietor, was standing in the front garden watching the workmen. He was dressed in a new suit of shining black.

"Good morning, Mr. Price," said Violet.

"Good morning, Miss Wilkins." He looked with polite inquiry at the basket on the girl's arm.

"I am going up the mountain, Mr. Price," Violet said sweetly. "I am taking a few little comforts to Winter, our old gardener, for whom you so kindly found a home in the Carnedd Farm."

"Very kind of you, miss, I'm sure. Up there in the clear air the poor fellow will benefit extremely. I've always said," Mr. Price continued, "why send consumptives to Switzerland when our own Welsh mountain air is quite as good?

"I quite agree with you, Mr. Price, and that is why my mother and I brought poor Winter here. The funerals are today, are they not?

"Yes, miss; and I don't blame you for being well out of the whole affair. You see, the ship was his lordship's. It was one of the three boats that bring blasting powder regularly for the quarries. Of course most of the crew will never be recovered, but the captain's and the mate's bodies have been found. They were both Pendrylas men, both married and with large families. Then three of the stevedores were killed— they were in the boats."

"It is frightfully sad, Mr. Price," said Violet.

"It is indeed, miss; but his lordship has come down very handsome, that I must say. The widows will all be pensioned and the children provided for. And as for the funerals, there will be black horses and plumes, and all the coffins have silver fittings. Mr. Conway Flint is in Pendrylas now overseeing all the arrangements."

Violet nodded farewell and set out upon her walk. She wore a short golfing skirt and high boots with nails in the soles. Coming out of the hotel grounds, she walked a little along the sea road and then entered a winding lane with high hedges on either side. For nearly half a mile she tramped upwards. On either side of the lane, at various distances, she came across large gates opening into the drives of terraced villas, belonging to rich Manchester and Liverpool people. Then, little by little, the lane grew narrower, the big houses were left behind and it became a path between scattered bungalows, until at last a gate and a stile opened straight upon the lower slopes of the mountain.

In front of her stretched the Green Gorge— a narrow cleft between two great hills, covered with soft turf. She pushed open the gate and felt her feet upon the real beginning of the hills. With the basket on her arm and the alpenstock assisting her progress, she strode blithely onwards to where the high top of the Gorge cut the sky between the peaks with a straight line of purple heather. "I'll sit down when I get to the top," Violet said to herself.

It took her nearly half an hour of climbing, and then she came out upon an immense plateau or tableland, one thousand feet above the sea. She turned and looked back. The Gorge now seemed like the green waterway of a brook. Immediately below it were the red-tiled roofs of the villas. Below that again she saw the Victoria Hotel, looking like a Swiss toy— a fringe of greenery, a tiny white ribbon of road, a white beach and then the sea.

She stood, tall and beautiful, gazing down below upon the sunlit glories, and then filling her lungs with the clean air she turned and faced another prospect. She was on a great high tableland. Rolling moors of heather and budding gorse stretched away in an unending vista. To her left, a quarter of a mile away, a huge, stony, rounded dome rose up into the sky— the famous Bilberry Hill. To her right, and far higher than either, was a grim, scarped peak of slate, rising so high that even on this jocund midday a little fleecy cloud caressed its summit. And beyond, at the edge of the vast moors, were other peaks, higher and more menacing. They seemed to make a great rampart to the unknown.

A lark or two were singing high in the turquoise sky. Some early bees were booming among the bilberry bushes— it was high noon, glorious and peaceful.

Violet sat down upon a large boulder stained with grey and orange lichens. She stuck her alpenstock in the ground and pulled a letter from her pocket.

"Now, darling," she said, "I'll read you again up here in the clean, pure air."

She opened the envelope. It had arrived by the morning's post, together with several small parcels— the parcels were in the rather heavy basket she had carried from the hotel.

This was the letter:

You will get this tomorrow, darling, with my directions. The night after I shall come again to Pwylog. The things I send, you must take to Winterbotham directly you get them. It has been a fine move to establish him in that mountain farm as a consumptive. He will tell you what he has discovered, and when you come down from the mountains send me a telegram detailing everything. The cipher is quite simple. I am sure you won't have any difficulty as far as that is concerned.

For my part, I have been very hard at work, and I have discovered two things— both of them most significant. The first is in connection with the explosion of the Quarry Queen. It is this: No cargo of ordinary blasting powder— which is gelatine— could possibly have had the effect upon the land that the explosion actually did have.

Thanks to you, I am rather a great person in Liverpool now. I heard the explosion discussed by people who knew— experts. I also met Major Sayer, the stupid old Board of Trade expert, at the Reform Club. Of course the affair was not of any great importance as far as Liverpool went; still, it was talked over.

To cut a long story short, the Board of Trade could see nothing extraordinary in the incident, but one or two real experts are confident that there must have been some very different explosives on board the Quarry Queen. I give you this for what it is worth, but it may be another link. Secondly, I want you to remember a certain name— Sachs.

I have discovered that Mr. Conway Flint has recently been entertaining a certain Carl Sachs at the Midland Adelphi Hotel. We are stumbling along in the dark, but every clue may prove of immense assistance. Sachs has been recognized in Liverpool. He is the famous expert of the Skoda Steel Foundry in Austria. I cannot say in the least what it may mean, but strange thoughts are beginning to revolve in my mind.

Violet made a little grimace as she turned a page of small and clear handwriting. This was all very well, but... Ah! there was what she wanted to see far more.

She devoured the burning words of love that closed the letter, until the high place where she sat became golden and irradiated to the exclusion of all other thoughts. What did it matter, after all, about their quest? She loved Gerald, Gerald loved her— the sky, the sea, the mountains sang and shone in chorus.

For nearly half an hour she sat there in a dream. Then, as a slight shadow of cloud passed before the sun and turned the heather grey, she rose with a sigh.

"Go on, you little beast," she said to herself, "go and do your work. Both you and he made it a solemn condition that you should not marry before this mystery was probed to the bottom. Get to work, Violet, my girl."

She laughed aloud at her fantasy, gathered up the heavy basket, caught up her stick and began to tramp onwards through the heather and gorse.

She knew what she had to do for the next mile. She followed a smooth green sheep track which did not deviate in any way. When she came to a clump of wind-bitten birch trees and a little ruined chapel she was to look at her map and take out the pocket compass which she had bought in Conway.

She strode along, the rich mountain air filling her lungs, until the huddled trees and the ruined granite chapel rose into view. She came up to the place. It was indescribably melancholy. The walls of the little meetinghouse still stood, but the slate roof had fallen in. There was a pool of stagnant water before the doorway— a forlorn and deserted spot. It was the first time she had climbed so high up among the mountains and a slight but very definite depression stole over her.

She pulled out the envelope upon which Mr. Price had traced her route in blue pencil, put it upon a flat stone and the little compass on that. She watched the needle quiver, pause and stop.

"That must be the way," she said to herself, as she saw a narrow path stretching westwards. "There is the green hill behind which the farm must stand. Poor Winterbotham— what a remote and lonely life for him!

In that clear air all the landmarks seemed much nearer than they really were. Violet had walked for nearly an hour over the moor and round the base of the green eminence before she came in sight of the mountain farm. It was a long, low, whitewashed building, covered with slate and surrounded by a granite wall. As she came up to the gate of the little garden in front of the house she heard voices. An old Welsh woman came out of the porch, followed by a little fat man of about fifty, wearing gold-rimmed spectacles. His cheeks were rosy, his eyes bright blue, and his hair, which was plentiful, was the colour of straw. Winterbotham followed. He looked pale— he had naturally a sallow complexion, and this had been assisted by art. He walked with a bowed back, leaning upon a stick, and every now and then he coughed.

"Well, I thank you," said the plump and smiling little stranger to the farmer's wife. "Never have I better milk tasted. I was fatigued with my walk upon the mountains. You will not take any money, so I thank you for your hospitality." He bowed and smiled.

"And you, my poor man," he said to Winterbotham, "I hope your complaint will cured be soon. This air is wonderful! I have been here for three weeks now and am much improved in health."

"Staying at the castle, sir, I suppose?" Winterbotham said, humbly touching his cap.

"At the castle," said the little fat man with a wave of his hand. "I am an engineer and am superintending pumping machinery of a deep artesian well the Lord Pendrylas has bored." He beamed upon the farmer's wife and tapped her upon the shoulder. "Ah, the water," he cried with a chuckle and in an ecstasy of admiration, "from the very heart of the mountain, so cold as ice it come. But not better than your milk, madam. Ah, see, a goddess approaches."

He had turned and noticed Violet at the gate, and taking off his soft felt hat the little man made a low and sweeping bow, like a cavalier upon the stage.

"It's my mistress, sir," said Winterbotham in a thin voice. "My kind mistress that has put me here to get well," and he hobbled down to the gate towards the girl.

The fat little man preceded him and pulled the gate open with another bow. Then with a final smile of goodwill he skipped out on to the moor and trotted away, waving his stick and humming a merry tune.

Violet, after a word or two with the farmer's wife, a placid old dame to whom Winterbotham introduced her, accompanied the sick man into the sitting room set apart for his use.

She closed the door. Immediately Winterbotham rose erect. He was a clever actor. Ten years seemed to fall from him in a second as he pulled out a chair for Violet.

"Eh, miss, I'm rather glad ye've come."

Violet laughed. "I hope you feel stronger today," she said. "Isn't it very lonely here?"

Winterbotham gave a sudden sharp cackle of laughter. Humour was not his strong point. "Lonely, miss? On the contrary, every moment I can get away from this house is full of interest. Eh, but it's a strange world I'm in, and more like living in a story of bogles than ordinary Christian life."

"Bogles?" Violet asked. She did not understand the North Country word.

"Yes, miss, wizards and magicians. I shouldn't be surprised to meet the Witch of Endor at sundown in this place."

"Well, you can tell me all about it in a minute. First of all, several parcels arrived this morning from Mr. Boynton. Here they are. I pretended I was bringing you calves-foot jelly."

Winterbotham was on the basket like a monkey on a nut and withdrew several packages. He whipped out a knife from his pocket and cut the string of the first one. It contained a small square box, which he opened and lifted out an instrument of dull steel which extended as he did so like a pair of lazy tongs.

"What's that? "Violet asked in some surprise.

"A small skeleton periscope, miss. With this I can lie hidden in the heather and just push it up and see all that's going on around about the castle, and who goes in and out each day. And this," he continued, "is a pair of strong prism binoculars, plus eight magnification. They also will be useful."

He laid his hand upon a third package. "That will be the cylinder which I asked Mister Boynton to make for me," he muttered. "I'll tell you the use of that in a minute, miss, when ye've heard my story."

"I'll tell you something first, Winterbotham," Violet said. "It is a dead secret, of course, like all that passes between you and me."

He looked up quickly, and his face grew bright at what he saw in hers. "Is that so, missy," he said, before she had spoken a word. "Aye, I'm reet glad to hear it. Eh, that's the best of news."

Violet blushed. "But I have told you nothing," she said, marvelling at the man's keenness.

"Your bonny face has told me," he said. "You and Mister Boynton have fixed it up, isn't that so, miss?

His hand was outstretched in the splendid North Country warmth of feeling, so frequently hidden under a dry and cold exterior. She took it.

"Yes, Winterbotham," she said. "Some day we are going to be married. But we have both agreed that we will not even think of it until we have discovered the mystery which started with Peter Fanshawe at the works. By the way, to change the subject, who was that man I saw going out of the house just now?"

"He had been for a walk on the moors, miss, and he knocked at the farm door to ask Mrs. Llewellyn for a glass of milk as he was parched. I was in the kitchen and we had a bit of a chat like. He comes from the castle. He has a sort of foreign turn to his speech, though his English is good enough."

"Have you ever heard of the Skoda Works in Austria?"

Why, yes, miss, everyone that has to do with machinery knows them."

"Well, unless I am very much mistaken, that gentleman comes from there."

"I shouldn't be at all surprised, miss," Winterbotham said. "He said he was erecting pumping machinery at the castle."

"Yes, I heard him. One more question. Is the name 'Sachs' familiar to you?"

"Sachs, miss? I should rather think so. There's no engineer that doesn't know it. Sachs is the first hydraulic engineer. He is to hydraulic machinery what Faraday is to electricity."

:"Well, you have just been talking to him."

Winterbotham jumped up from his chair. "Good heavens, miss, you don't say so! To think that Elijah Winterbotham should have shaken hands with the great Sachs. Eh, this is a day that I shall remember."

Violet smiled at the little man's professional eagerness. "Quite so," she said dryly; "but what is Mr. Sachs doing at the castle? Erecting machinery for an ornamental artesian well? Do you think that?"

Winterbotham sobered in a moment. "Lord!" he said, "the plot thickens, miss, and no mistake."

"It does," she answered gravely. "Both Mr. Boynton and myself think we are on the threshold of very great events. And now tell me, Winterbotham, have you discovered anything?"

"I'm on my way to do so, miss. First of all, I have surveyed the castle. I've got as near to it as I could. It's not allowed to be photographed or included in any of the pictures of the great houses of England, therefore few people have got any idea of it. I'm not an antiquarian, miss, but the castle is a real wild place of the old days. The outer walls go all round it and there are towers everywhere. There's a deep moat all round filled with water fed by a running stream from the mountains. In the centre is a great square tower like the White Tower in the Tower of London— the keep, I think they call it. The whole place must cover many acres of ground."

"But people must be constantly passing in and out? It is not a prison!" Violet said.

"Perhaps not, miss, but it's summat like it. It's a little kingdom contained within itself. Except for milk, butter, eggs and such-like, which come from the moor farms, and which are taken in at the entrance, all the other supplies come in by sea in the earl's ships. They go up in the quarry trucks, and wagons and horses and sometimes a big motor lorry meet the packages at the top and take them to the castle along the road that has been especially made. There are private telephone and telegraph wires from the castle to Pendrylas. There's an office with two men in charge, and that's how his lordship communicates with the outer world."

Violet sighed. "It seems rather hopeless."

"Don't think that, miss," Winterbotham said. "His lordship and his people are so secure in there, they have taken so many precautions to keep intruders away, that you may be sure by this time that they think no one will ever penetrate beyond the veil they have cast over this part of the country."

"Exactly, Winterbotham."

"Quite so; and their very confidence will end in their undoing. If Mister Boynton and myself, together, backed by your money, miss, can't get inside that place somehow or other, my name is not Elijah Winterbotham."

"You might manage it at night, perhaps," Violet said. "I suppose they do not have armed guards walking about the battlements!

"Too clever for that, miss. Even in the mountains that would attract too much attention. No, there's something else, but just as good."

"And what is that?"

"Have you ever heard of a Welsh mastiff, miss?"

Violet shook her head.

''Well, you wouldn't have. Not one person in a hundred ever has. Only a few scientific dog breeders know the name. I know a bit about dogs myself, miss. I've done a bit of coursing with greyhounds. I have also had a few prize whippets in my time, but it's only just lately I've heard of the Welsh mastiff. The breed is almost extinct, miss. There are only about thirty in the world."

"You are a many-sided man, Winterbotham," Violet said. "Go on."

"Those thirty belong to his lordship. A Welsh mastiff, miss, is a great, tawny-coloured, short-haired dog, as big as a calf, and fierce as a tiger. One of them would pull down an elephant, I do believe. Each night, miss, as the tenants of these lonely farms in the mountains know, two couples of these dogs are loosed round the castle."

Violet shuddered. "It sounds like the Middle Ages," she said.

Winterbotham smiled. He touched the unopened parcel. "This'll solve the problem, miss."

"What is that?"

"It's a cylinder of highly concentrated gas with a tap to let out a jet of it at any moment. A mere whiff of it will down one of those dogs— or a man for that matter— in an instant. I told Mister Boynton exactly what I wanted, and he has sent it. He's a great chemist, miss."

"But if you kill the dogs they will be found in the daytime and suspicion will be aroused."

"It won't kill them; it'll simply put them to sleep for a few hours. When they wake up they will be sick dogs, but there won't be any harm done that anyone could detect. We're going to carry out this business by scientific methods, miss. That's what we're going to do!"

They talked for a little longer, and Violet lunched upon a bowl of fresh milk and some biscuits. She told Winterbotham that Boynton would arrive on the evening of the next day, and about half-past two in the afternoon she left the farm.

The brightness of the morning had gone. The high upland was ashen-grey. All the colours seemed to have faded out of the heather and gorse. The silence was absolute.

As she followed the sheep track Violet saw that on all the great peaks that rose out of the plateau fleecy clouds like masses of cotton wool were beginning to descend.

The light grew livid, and she seemed the only living thing in those vast solitudes. As little by little the mist rolled down the peaks, a great awe stole into her soul. Yes, this might well be an enchanted land! It was a fit setting for that gloomy castle three miles away, which was beginning to colour and dominate all her thoughts— the Castle Dangerous, with its hidden and sinister chief.

She pushed along briskly, anxious to strike the Green Gorge again and come down into the world of life and movement. But it seemed very far away. She had been thinking deeply and had not noticed the flight of time, but when she looked at her wristwatch she found she had been walking for more than an hour. She stood still and gazed around. A little frightened exclamation came from her.

Great walls of mist were rolling over the moor, descending upon her from all points like a converging army of ghosts. She pulled out the little map, realizing that she must lose no time, and then felt her pocket for the compass. The compass was not there.

In an instant she knew that she was lost. She had not the slightest idea of her direction. The mist was upon her, white, cold and damp. It circled and pirouetted round her as if in mockery, and she braced herself with all her courage to meet the situation.

What was she to do? If she stood where she was she might remain there all night long. On the other hand, if she went on walking she might come to the terrible quarry precipices, which would mean instant death. She shuddered at the thought. Then she remembered that she was on the plateau— level in all directions for at least a mile and a half. She stood in a well-defined track; it must lead somewhere. The only thing to do was to go on.

She set her teeth, dug viciously into the turf with her alpenstock, and once more started to walk. For nearly twenty minutes she stumbled on. Now and then the mist thinned and she could see a hundred yards or so before her. Again it would thicken into a horrible grey twilight. The ground continued level, but it began to be interspersed with great granite boulders, which seemed like crouching shapes of evil watching her as she went by. She was not exactly frightened. She had gone through too much during the last few weeks to know actual fear, but she was highly strung and nervous, and when a curious muffled sound struck her ear she stood still and trembled. What was it coming through the mist? It was like no sound she had ever heard before— a deep, vibrating hum, felt rather than heard.

She bent her head forward and listened intently. Could it be that she was near some little chapel of the mountains, and that some unknown person was playing on the pedal notes of an organ ? No, it was not that. The sound began to change as she hurried towards it, pressing through the mist like a noise heard under a blanket. There was now a definite sense of music, but it was not organ music.

Louder and louder it grew in gusty waves of wild and eerie harmony; music not of this world— witches' music! Her heart beat furiously. Each instant the giant's thrilling grew louder and more perilously sweet. She lost all sense of fear. She began to hurry as if drawn by an overmastering power which had her in its grip. She almost danced along the path. She knew she was listening to the telyn, or giant harp of Wales. Suddenly something vast and black rose up before her, seeming to sway in the mist. She stood and stared upwards, and something like an immense square archway, an enormous gallows of stone, hung blank against the white. There was a swirling of the mist, and other vast erections started into view on either side.

The music was quite close now, and was rising by half-tones and tones to a wild march of triumph, utterly barbaric, terribly beautiful, and as if the very soul of Evil itself were calling upon strange gods.

She knew where she was then. This was the world-renowned Druid circle of Twmpa, of which she had heard. It was not more than half a mile from Castle Ynad.

A loud cry burst from her. She had no control over her voice. It seemed forced from the very depths of her being. A great throbbing wail of music crashed out in answer and died away into silence.

As if at that moment the unseen harpist had chosen to become embodied— a spirit taking the form of flesh— the mist rolled back like a curtain. Twelve yards away there was a tall black figure standing upon a little mound with the great arm of the harp rising above its head. On either side of this apparition there were the figures of two huge beasts, motionless, as if carved in stone.

Chapter 8

VIOLET TOOK TWO STEPS forward. Then she stood still. She rested one hand on the side of the great Druid stone and stared in front of her.

There was no illusion. The last rich, chords of the harp ceased. The figure of a man in black— immensely tall it seemed— was flanked by two huge animals, like lions guarding the throne of a king.

"Where am I?" Violet tried to say, and was surprised to hear that her voice was a croaking whisper.

The immense black figure did not answer, but an arm went out in a commanding gesture, and she saw an arm beckoning.

All willpower seemed to have left her. She felt as if she was being drawn to the centre of the Druid circle by strong steel cables. She hesitated for a moment. She clutched the damp, rough granite of the monolith, but the cords drew her onwards. She stepped out on the short green turf. She was now within the circle of great stones.

In a second she knew she had gone too far. The grey mist receded until it made a wall, into which the stark Druid altars seemed inlaid. A sharp pang of agony went through her. She tried to turn and flee from this magic round, but she knew it was useless.

Then she saw the place where she stood begin to brighten with a pale yellow radiance— a sort of fallen sunlight, as if the king of day was piercing through the clouds and sending a pallid shaft of light to this unhallowed spot.

She saw everything quite distinctly. The two tawny-coloured dogs, as big as mountain donkeys, which she had thought were carved things of granite, gambolled towards her. One of them put its great head upon her shoulder and bayed aloud with a deep musical note. The other frisked around her. It was horrible, as these immense and ghastly creatures fawned and slobbered upon her in welcome.

The tall man in the black cloak came down the little mound towards her. She saw his face. He was the man she had watched through the palm court of the Midland Hotel in Manchester with Peter Fanshawe.

He came up to her with welcoming hands outstretched. The ravaged, beautiful countenance looked down upon her from his height with a fierce welcome. The black eyes blazed. The cameo-cut lips were parted. He was as beautiful as a fallen angel.

"Ah!" he said, and his voice was sweeter than a band of violins played by the masters of the world. "So my lady has come at last!"

Violet stared at him, trembling.

He passed one strong white hand over his forehead and eyes. "I knew," he said, as though to himself in a voice of awed surprise. "I believed that I could call my mate out of the air!"

Violet crouched upon the damp ash of her alpenstock until it seemed that the very wood would break. "Lord Llandrylas," she said, "I have lost my way upon the moor. Show me the way home, please."

Still his head was a little bent, and he spoke to himself as a man in a dream. "It was all ordained," he murmured, and his voice was like the sound of wind over harp strings. "Oh, I was wrong to have doubted. Spirit of the Mistletoe and Oak, forgive me! Mialgenn, hear my prayer of thanks."

The man's arms were lifted high above his head, and his face was raised until the last faint yellow light of the afternoon touched it with a fantastic glory.

"Lord Llandrylas, let me go home." The cry was sharp and staccato and throbbed with terror. Terror had come to the girl at last.

"Come," was all he said in answer, and once again he beckoned and she had to follow. He turned his back upon her and leapt up to the top of the green mound where Violet saw an immense slab of granite making a platform. He flung the black cloak from his shoulders. He bent forward and kissed the strings of the great harp. He sat upon the Druid stone and pulled the instrument towards him. A deep, soul-searching throb of the plucked strings sent Violet crouching like a flower.

"Listen!" he cried "You know me for what I am. I am Carradoc David Llewellyn Pantydwr, Lord of Llandrylas, Prince of North Cwmry and the Marches. I am he who has long awaited your coming. Moel and Ynad, Llandrylas and Llangarth, are awaking from their sleep. The king is here, the queen comes! Listen!"

The two great dogs crouched on either side of Violet. Hardly knowing what she did, she put her arms round them— they were warm and living at least. One of them turned and looked up in her face. The broad head, the black muzzle and the powerful jaw would have terrified her at an ordinary moment. She had never seen a dog like this— few people ever had. But the great red tongue lolled out in friendship and there was a look of love in the black eyes.

"Listen! This is the song of waiting."

"They say he is the greatest harpist in Wales." These words of Gerald's came back to Violet now. The proud head was bowed, the long arms flashed backwards and forwards over the strings, and once again the wild, barbaric wail which she had heard as she approached the Druid circle filled all the air with pain and longing.

She was hypnotized, fascinated as a snake is by some Eastern flute player. She felt as if she was rooted to the spot, incapable of movement or flight. And yet, curiously enough, one side of her brain— the active, business side, so to speak— was working rapidly.

"The man must be mad," she thought; "but if so, it is a madness unlike any other I have seen or heard about. He lives in a strange, fantasy world of his own, a world where he is king and supreme. I have strayed into it by chance."

She began to busy herself with plans. Could she possibly turn this strange meeting to advantage? How could she use it to further the campaign? Surely there must be some possibility in it, though at the moment she was at a loss to know what it was.

A shout— a great tenor call, rather— clear and musical as a bell, brought back her thoughts to the present. "The waiting is over! Through the mountain clouds the queen is coming!

The music suddenly sank to a muffled throb pregnant with meaning, the very spirit of approach. It was indeed as though someone was drawing near with soft footsteps over the heather, and Violet knew that it was herself that came. And now, instant by instant, the footsteps were merged in the beginnings of a stately march. The sound gathered volume every second— it was marvellous what a fury of melody was torn from the great instrument. In a few seconds it seemed that a whole diabolic orchestra was at work. There was the crash of the Druid cymbals, the drone of choric song, and then, coming into the grand harmonic melody, rose the first shouts of ecstasy, as if the wild priests of the mountains were at their altars once again and cutting themselves with knives, like the priests of Baal.

The great dogs rose and quivered. A low growl escaped from one of them and its hackles rose. The music had become terrible. The figure of the musician seemed to grow larger. To the eyes of the terrified girl his form seemed clothed in gloomy shades, out of the darkness of which his music shrieked with evil triumph. Utterly unnerved as she was, she almost thought she saw a tall black figure standing behind him, and that long arms stretched over his shoulders and mingled with his own, plucking madly at the harp strings. She thought she heard a bleating, goat-like laugh— a hideous obbligato amid the rush of agonizing sound. Then the ground seemed rushing upwards, the mist falling like sheets of grey snow, and everything faded away.

SHE CAME to herself with a sound of rushing waters in her ears like the receding tide. For how long she had swooned she did not know, but as she opened her eyes she felt an arm around her and saw the face of the harpist looking into her own.

All the wildness and fury had gone. The beautiful dark eyes glowed with tenderness. The pure, proud lips were half parted in a smile. There was an extraordinary, wistful gentleness upon the face, and yet it was royal too.

"Ah, you are better. You were overcome by my music. I can only play like that when I am alone in the sacred places. Then the spirit of the past descends upon me and the blood of my ancestors speaks."

Violet murmured something and strove to rise. He assisted her to a sitting posture.

"In a minute you will be better— so!"

With the word he placed one long white hand upon her forehead for a moment. It seemed to burn like fire, and then she realized it was icy cold. Some strange, magnetic force proceeded from it, for she felt the mists go from her brain, the cramp and inertness from her limbs, and warmth suffuse her body in a flood.

Then she stood up.

"Thank you very much, Lord Llandrylas," she said steadily. "As I told you, I lost my way. I am staying at Pwylog with my mother at the hotel. Perhaps you will put me on the right way home."

He did not speak for a moment or two. He regarded her with a curious, steadfast gaze.

"Go?" he said at length, and in a slightly puzzled voice like a child. "Go away?

"Yes; it must be very late in the afternoon. I must get back at once."

"But you are in my kingdom," he said. "I cannot let you go. You are mine now."

Violet felt as if she moved through a scene of some fantastic dream. The man said these extraordinary words in a tone that was almost matter of fact. He made a statement— that was all. It was as though some Eastern despot whose will was utterly supreme had spoken, and a great rush of anger came over her. She stamped her foot upon the ground.

"How dare you say such a thing to me, sir?" she cried. "You must be mad to talk like that in the twentieth century, and within three miles of an English town."

He looked at her darkly and then he smiled. "She does not know," he said quietly to himself.

He snapped his fingers. Immediately the great dog that had growled leapt at him and put its paws upon his shoulders. He stooped and seemed to whisper something in its ear, and in a moment it had bounded away into the mist and had disappeared.

Violet gripped her alpenstock. "Let me pass, if you please, Lord Llandrylas," she said.

He made no sign of having heard her, but stared in sombre meditation, as if his thoughts were far away from the present. Then she turned and walked away.

He did not pursue her or make the slightest movement, but she had not gone more than ten yards from the Druid circle when she saw figures of men barring her path on every side. Perhaps the mist distorted them and made them seem more than they really were, but she could have sworn to a regiment. They were tall men, all clean shaven and all curiously alike. Their faces were singularly impassive and wooden, and they were dressed in a sort of dark green uniform, such as huntsmen wear when the monarchs of Continental countries attend the chase.

With a terrible pang of fear at her heart she turned to call to Lord Llandrylas, but he had disappeared. One of the men stepped up to her, bowed low and touched her upon the arm. In an instant a second man was at her side. They pointed before them without speaking and she knew she must go with them. Resistance was impossible and out of the question. At that moment of crisis her good sense did not entirely desert her. Of what use would it have been to fight and struggle with these gloomy sentinels? she asked herself. None whatever. The thing could only end in one way.

"I will go with you," she said quietly, though the fear and indignation in her voice was manifest enough. "But remember this: at your master's bidding you are committing an assault that will have the very gravest consequences if there is any law in Britain."

Once more the man who appeared to be in charge, bowed. It seemed as though he had seen her speaking but had not understood her words. Then she began to walk over the heather towards the unknown, on and on through the clinging, wetting mist. The sun by now had long disappeared, the light turned into grey, and the girl's heart began to sink like falling lead.

Then, as she stumbled along with her sinister guards, struggling to keep down the rising tears, she heard a great fanfare of trumpets. The heart-searching call snarled and echoed, and in a moment the gloom was pierced by innumerable red lights. Torch bearers came running towards Violet and her guards.

She saw a great lane of crimson light extend itself on either side, and still the trumpets pealed and snarled and called, until their exultant voices rang backwards and forwards from one great tower to another.

She put her hands before her face. The whole visible world seemed reeling away into fantasy. Then as she looked up again she saw a low carriage of black and silver. A tall footman in a long yellow coat look her by the arm and assisted her into the carriage.

The man then ran round and mounted on the box by the side of the coachman. There was a crack of the whip and the two horses plunged forward.

It seemed that the whole moorland was alight. The orange and blood-red flames of the torches were tossed up and down in a great avenue of mysterious light. The snarling of the trumpets died down.

The carriage was galloping over a turf road. It swayed upon its perfect springs. There was a horrible purpose and design in all this wizard pageantry.

Violet was clutching the edge of the padded seat on which she sat. Her eyes were stretched wide open, her consciousness was like a battlefield on which all was obscure. But her heart called and called unceasingly to Gerald: "The brute has got me! The dreadful man has got me! Oh, Gerald! Gerald!"

The hoofs of the galloping horses made a sharp metallic sound now as they beat upon a road of stone or concrete. The powerful animals plunged forward, and Violet saw something like an immense precipice of rock rise up in front. Here the mist had gone, but the dusk of evening had taken its place. As she stared above she saw two vast towers etched black against the grey and fading sky. There was a hollow thunder as the carriage galloped over the drawbridge of Castle Ynad and a sudden darkness as it rushed beneath the vaulted gate tower. Then grooms came running from every quarter of a great quadrangle, surrounded by massive buildings, glowing with orange light in the tall Gothic windows.

Somewhere high above, perhaps in the great central tower of the keep, a mighty bell began to toll. Boom! Boom! Boom!

She alighted from the carriage like a person in a trance. A man in black clothes came to her and bowed, saying something she hardly heard. She followed him, however, through a low postern door set in the angle made by a circular tower and the wall of the massive central pile.

Violet could never at any time remember the full details of her progress through gloomy passages and up winding stone stairways worn by the feet of centuries. On this landing or on that doors seemed to open, faces peered. There were liveried servants everywhere. It was as though she were walking through a palace of a king hundreds of years ago, a palace where a great court held royal state.

At last in a narrow corridor she came to a door. The servant opened it, bowed and invited her to enter. She did so, and it closed behind her.

She found herself in an immense apartment with a roof of vaulted stone. Many electric lights hung from the roof, and the place was as brilliant as at noon. The windows, which seemed to be filled with stained glass, were tall and narrow, high up in the walls and far out of reach. For a space of some ten feet between the windows and the floor the walls were covered with marvellous tapestry, depicting hunting scenes dating from the days of the Black Prince. The knightly figures, the coursing hounds and antlered stags belonged to a period of art which has been lost in our day. In an immense hearth of stone supported by carved heraldic figures a fire of logs was burning. It would have roasted an ox.

The floor was covered with soft rugs and skins. The furniture was of very ancient oak, and the chairs and stools round the fire were piled with silken cushions. At one end of the room was an immense trophy of arms— spears, swords, javelins and daggers, inlaid with gold and jewels, shining with a wonderful lustre in the bright light.

Violet advanced to the centre of the room. The door by which she had entered was closed. She was still alone. "Whatever happens, I must keep my head," she said hurriedly to herself several times, as if she were addressing someone else. She stared round her and suddenly became aware of all the richness and beauty of this untouched medieval place. "It is a queen's room! "she murmured with a shudder.

Her eyes fell upon the weapons at the farther end of the room. She looked fearfully round her, and then with noiseless footsteps she glided up to the wall. Close to her hand, in a sheath of gold-rimmed leather, was small dagger with a ten-inch blade and a richly jewelled hilt. Snatching it from its supports, she drew the blade. I was beautifully damascened in gold, and both edges were as sharp as a razor, and the point was needle-fine.

"I have a weapon, at all events," she thought, as with trembling hands she thrust the beautiful, evil-looking thing into the bosom of her dress.

She hurried away from the wall, afraid of being found there and betraying her secret. Going to a cushioned bench by the fire, she sank down upon it with a moan. For the first time she felt utterly helpless and forlorn. The unthinkable, the incredible had happened. She was a prisoner in Castle Ynad, snatched out of the living world by an imperious hand, as if time had suddenly run backwards to the lawless days when a Llandrylas was a veritable king of Wales.

Then she began to laugh— helpless, hysterical laughter it was. "It is too funny!" she gurgled. "Who would believe that such a thing was possible today? What would Bud Kinsolving say if he knew?"

Her voice rang in the high, vaulted roof above, rang and died away. Then with the precision of an echo— though it was not that— she was answered by a harsh cackle of merriment.

She sprang to her feet and turned, her hand moving instinctively to her breast as she did so. Three yards away stood a figure, which seemed to have stepped straight out of the visions of delirium, or some horrible and fantastic dream.

Chapter 9

GERALD BOYNTON sat in the director's room of the great Milton Paper Works. It was about eleven o'clock in the morning. Clerks and secretaries had been hurrying in and out for nearly two hours— secretaries and clerks who had already learnt to recognize their new ruler. The young, keen-faced man so suddenly promoted to one of the most important commercial positions in Liverpool was beginning to make things hum. Yet they all liked him. As chief experimental chemist at eight hundred a year he had made no enemies. As director of the great concern with three thousand and commission he seemed likely to achieve a real loyalty among his subordinates. He was as simple and quiet as ever— but they all knew that he must be obeyed.

"No, I cannot see anyone else, except Sir Ramsey Homan. He will be here in a minute or so. I am leaving the works at midday and will not be back until Thursday."

"Very good, Mr. Boynton," the secretary said, and left the large, richly furnished room.

In a minute he was back again, opening the door and ushering in a short, thick-set man with a pointed grey beard and heavy black eyebrows.

"This is extremely kind of you, Sir Ramsey," Boynton said, shaking hands. "I would have come to you, you know."

The great man laughed. "Don't be humble," he said in a broad Scots accent. "Besides, ye're not that at all."

Boynton grinned. "It is a new thing for me," he said, "to receive a famous captain of industry in a private room!"

Sir Ramsey laughed again, and his keen grey eyes had a glint of affection in them as he looked at the young man. "You will be that yourself before long," he said. "I am glad that you have succeeded to that rascal Fanshawe's place. We've all of us had our eye on you, my boy, for a long time. I had it in my mind to get you from old Sir William Milton last year, but I waited. You've made good, as the Yankees say, on your own, laddie. Well, the more power to your elbow. What's this yarn going about that the works are now controlled by a young and lovely lady with her hair down her back and a governess in charge of her?"

Gerald laughed— it was beautifully done. "Oh," he said, "the young heiress did turn up here a week or two ago. She is not a flapper, though, Sir Ramsey, and she looked round the works. Then they ran her off to London, where, I suppose, she remains. And now my car will be ready in half an hour. We can discuss the paper engine-packing as we go. Will you just come with me to another part of the works and give me your private opinion on something I want to show you?"

"By all means," Sir Ramsey answered, in high good humour with his young friend with whom he had just concluded an advantageous deal, and he passed out of the offices and began to cross the yard with him.

"On what d'ye want an opinion?" the great iron-founder asked, every now and then remembering to drop into the Glasgow accent of his youth.

"On something Fanshawe left behind him, Sir Ramsey. I know a good bit about machinery, of course, but only the machinery of the paper trade."

"Fanshawe has left something behind him, then?"

"Yes, I know you won't speak about this at all. We are going to the Experiment House, where Fanshawe was occupied a good deal— and in a very private way— before he disappeared."

"Ah!" said Sir Ramsey, and there was a world of meaning in the exclamation.

Doors were unlocked and the two men passed into the large hall, lit by its glass roof. On all sides stood masses of cold and lifeless machinery.

"Let's start here and walk round," Gerald said.

They did so, and it took a considerable time. More than once Sir Ramsey stopped in front of some complicated apparatus, bent forward, mounted a few steps up a little steel ladder and felt among wheels and levers.

"Well, what should you say?" Gerald asked at length.

The Scotsman looked at him. "You've got a working knowledge of hydraulics?" he said sharply.

Gerald shrugged his shoulders. "Oh, yes," he said. "I am a chemist really, but I am a qualified engineer as well."

Sir Ramsey nodded. "Then you will realize," he said, "that this is a very particular installation. There is an improved Pelton wheel here, a very queer and novel forging press and plate-bender. I've not seen the like before."

Sir Ramsey had been smoking a cigarette. He threw it away, and bent and peered over the piston and ram of a flanging press. He felt in his waistcoat pocket and took out a little silver-mounted magnifying glass. Then he dropped on his knees and regardless of his beautiful dove-coloured trousers, crawled half out of sight. He emerged flushed in face and rusty of garments. His eyes were shining.

"This will be work from Skoda," he said. "This is a new application of the Sachs Multiplying Sheaves. Man, this installation here must have cost the better part of twenty thousand pounds! What was old Sir William Milton about? I knew him well, and I liked him, but I would not have said that the old gentleman had a soul above paper."

Boynton laughed. "It was not Sir William at all," he said. "It was Fanshawe. I am very glad to have had your expert opinion, Sir Ramsey. Now you've seen everything, have you any idea as to the reason of it?"

Sir Ramsey carefully lit another cigarette. "I've an idea in my mind," he said, "and I think you've got another one."

"Well, tell me yours first."

"This is the most ingenious and perfect machinery I've ever seen for exercising an almost unprecedented pressure on some material unknown."

"Exactly," Gerald answered.

"It was not steel," Sir Ramsey said.

"No, it was not," Gerald replied.

"And here, I think," Sir Ramsey continued, "we have certain moulds?"

"Yes."

The short, thick-set man polished his glasses, and for nearly five minutes inspected various huge trough-like cylinders of steel, together with various other pieces of machinery.

"Well," he said at length, "you are going to motor to North Wales, and you are very kindly going to take me as far as Colwyn Bay and drop me at my little villa there. We're lunching at the 'Bear's Paw,' I think you said. Well, let's get to it."

Ten minutes afterwards the two men rolled away towards the centre of Liverpool, Boynton driving the car. At lunch, which he much enjoyed, Sir Ramsey made no comment at all on what the young man had shown him. But when, warmly wrapped up, for the day was cold and misty, they had started again on their journey Sir Ramsey made one enigmatic remark.

"It was papier-mâché, of course, that yon wastrel Fanshawe was employed on?"

"Yes, Sir Ramsey, it certainly was that. It's the great problem in our trade. I have flirted with it myself. I have often thought that I've seen a way, but I've never had time or apparatus to get anywhere near it."

"Well, it's a thing I've been watching for the last ten years. There are people all over Europe, to say nothing of America, who are trying to solve it."

There was a long, straight road in front of them, a ten mile clear run. Gerald let her out, and the car shovelled the road behind her with a triumphant purr.

"I am thinking that Fanshawe was very near the middle of it before he died. That man had a brain like Napoleon and a heart like Satan," said Sir Ramsey.

"I know nothing about his heart," Gerald said dryly, as the great car rushed on by the side of the sea.

"I expect," Sir Ramsey said, with a little chuckle, "you are wanting my expert opinion!"

"It was why I asked you to come and look at the Experiment Room."

Sir Ramsey put one big hand gloved in sealskin upon Gerald's arm. "This is between you and me," he said quietly. "You've asked me a question, and here's the answer. To get all that machinery into the Experiment House Fanshawe must have got round Sir William Milton. Sir William must have realized that Fanshawe had more or less solved the problem they were both looking for, or he would never have allowed the expenditure on machinery. My own opinion is that Fanshawe had a private axe to grind, and Sir William knew nothing of it."

"I came to that conclusion myself a long time ago," Gerald said.

They were doing sixty miles an hour, but the windscreen protected them. With the most annoying deliberation Sir Ramsey Homan lit a cigar. Gerald kept his hands on the steering wheel and looked straight ahead. He knew that the elder man, with all his Northern caution and malicious humour, was keeping him in suspense.

When he had had his little fun, Sir Ramsey leant to the side of the driver. "Young Boynton," he said, and his voice was very serious now, "I've been thinking it over."

"Yes, Sir Ramsey?"

"Fanshawe was making great cylinders of papier-mâché. One of the moulds was ten feet in diameter. What was he doing? Was he making a model of an underground railway tube, a little less than effective size?"

"I don't think so, Sir Ramsey."

"I've carried away a number of impressions from that carefully constructed machinery— machinery that came from the Skoda Works in Austria, and nowhere else."

"It's not likely that you would be mistaken?"

"I am not mistaken. You know a good deal more than you've told me, Boynton. But those great moulds and the cylinders, what they must have stamped and pressed, only lead to one thought in my mind."

The car swerved almost into the hedge and then righted itself.

"Sorry," Boynton said. "You were saying, Sir Ramsey?"

The great iron-founder tossed away the end of his cigar. "Ah!" he said. "You've been asking yourself this for many weeks. My conclusion? Laddie, it's just this. Fanshawe was crack it. He was mad. He thought that he'd get his papier-mâché as hard, or harder than steel. It's clear enough! The man was spending thousands to make a great gun— a cannon that would shoot the moon!" Sir Ramsey leant back in his seat and laughed.

"A great gun?"

"Lad, if you'd been making ordnance for as many years as I have in my workshops, the thing would have been patent to ye from the moment you saw the poor softie's mechanical insanities! Probably the cloud rolled up from his brain for a moment— for he was a great man in his way was Fanshawe— and he saw the futility of his madness, and cast himself into the river. Now you have it!"

Gerald duly dropped the genial baronet at Colwyn Bay, and after a brief stop at Sir Ramsey's charming seaside villa, where he drank a whisky and soda and smoked a cigarette, he pulled out for Conway. Then, as the great car settled down once more to its work, and the Welsh mountains grew nearer and nearer, Gerald thought deeply.

Sir Ramsey knew what he was talking about, there was no doubt about that. It really did seem as if he had discovered part of Fanshawe's secret. Everything fitted in with the surmise. Gerald, though he had depreciated himself as a mechanical engineer, was in reality a highly trained expert. Yet until the keyword had been spoken he had been far away from what appeared to be the real solution. Now he saw it all plainly. Certainly those gigantic moulds had been used for some such purpose as Sir Ramsey said. There was technical evidence on every side. It was more than probable, indeed almost certain, that Fanshawe had been constructing something like an immense piece of artillery.

As soon as he had determined that, the wild absurdity of the notion made him actually smile. In the first place, such a gun would be the monster of a dream— even in these days of mighty weapons. Why, a section of the mould that Sir Ramsey had shown him pointed to a breech of many feet in diameter. The thing was preposterous, unless, indeed, Fanshawe was mad!

Gerald had told Sir Ramsey nothing about the mysterious night occurrences at the works, but said nothing of the white yacht, and nothing of Lord Llandrylas. The peer's name evolved another thought. Whatever it was Fanshawe was making for that man with such secrecy, it was not what Sir Ramsey said. What on earth would be the use of a great dummy gun to the recluse of the mountains? Carpenters could build one for him of wood in a fortnight. But then, supposing that Fanshawe had, after all, discovered the secret of papier-mâché and found out how to produce it with a toughness and strength beyond that of highly tempered metal!

The subject was too baffling and elusive, and he resolutely put it away from his mind for the time being. Conjecture was useless. It was better to do as they were doing— to take practical steps to discover what was behind it all. Gerald longed to have Winterbotham's report. He was in a fever of anxiety to know if the keen-witted fellow had been able to get to work.

By rights there should have been a telegram from Violet, either last night or early this morning— a telegram in the cipher code that had been decided upon between them. But it had not arrived, nor was there even a letter. From that fact, Gerald thought that something must be going on, some active work not yet completed, and his eagerness to be at Pwylog increased.

The grey towers of Conway Castle, overhanging the river, came into sight at last, and as the petrol in his tank was running low he resolved to replenish it in the town. He drove to the garage of an hotel that was known to him and, while the petrol was being fetched, entered the building and ordered a cup of tea. He would be at Pwylog in less than half an hour.

A big fire was burning in the hotel lounge, and he went up to it and stamped to renew his circulation, for the afternoon had now become damp and cold, and there was a white mist coming down from the mountains.

"It's going to be a thick night," said the barmaid as she brought his tea. "I don't think the mist will clear till morning."

"Very likely not," Gerald answered. "But I am, more or less, a stranger here and not weather-wise."

"Nor was the poor young lady from Pwylog," said the barmaid. "Poor thing! I can't help thinking of her."

"Pwylog? I'm going to Pwylog. What young lady do you mean?"

"Oh, haven't you heard?" said the girl. "A young lady staying at the Victoria Hotel at Pwylog went up the mountains after lunch yesterday and never came down again. They've sent search parties all over the hills for her, but up to midday she had not been found. My sister is in the lounge bar of the Victoria, and she telephoned to me. That's how I know about it. Aren't you well, sir?"

"Can you tell me the young lady's name?" he said in an unsteady voice.

"Watkins or Wilkins I think it was. Aren't you going to drink your tea, sir?"

Gerald had put down a half-crown on the table and rushed out of the room. Scenting a romance, and highly interested and excited, the barmaid ran to the window in time to see a great grey motorcar glide past. The man's face at the steering wheel was set and stern.

"Well, I never!" said the young lady to herself. "I should not wonder if that's the poor girl's fiancé." And she hastened to the telephone to ring up her sister at Pwylog.

First some outlying villas, some of them cold and unoccupied, others beginning to light up in the dusk, then a straight run for half a mile— covered, in despite of regulations, in much less than a minute— and the Victoria Hotel. The car swerved into the drive and stopped in front of the porch with a jar of its brakes, Gerald hurried in. He passed through the outer vestibule and the swing doors into the little lounge. The fire was burning on the hearth. The shaded electric lights sent down a soft radiance upon the armchairs and settees. There was not a soul there.

He stood in the middle of the room for a moment and then called out in a loud and angry voice. A glass door opened and Mr. Price, the proprietor, hurried in. "I'm very glad you've come, sir. We're all awaiting you."

"What's happened?"

Mr. Price made a despairing gesture with his hands. "They are searching the mountains and the quarries now, sir," he said. "The police and many willing helpers are there, but nothing has been heard of the young lady yet."

Gerald pulled off his gloves with great deliberation and threw them upon a little copper-topped table. All the strength of his nature was needed now. He made a supreme effort at self-control and succeeded.

"Mrs. Wilkins," he asked sharply, "where is she?"

"The poor lady is in a dangerous state, sir. She falls out of one fainting fit into another. She can't speak, she can't think. The doctor is with her now. She is only being kept alive by chicken soup and oysters."

Gerald ground his teeth. "I want to hear every detail," he said sternly. "What do you know?"

"Very little indeed. Only that Miss Wilkins left the hotel yesterday morning to take some comforts to her old servant, Mr. Winter the gardener, at Carnedd Farm. Mr. Winter is here now, sir. He has been waiting for your arrival."

"Where is he?"

"In the private sitting room, sir."

Gerald leapt up the stairs, ran along the corridor, flung the door open and saw Winterbotham crouching in a chair by the fire.

"Thank God! Thank God, you've come, Mister Boynton!" cried the little man.

"Winterbotham, I only heard of Miss Milton's disappearance when I was at Conway half an hour ago."

"You didn't get my telegram?"

"I got no telegram from you or from Miss Milton. I expected one from her last night or early this morning to tell me what you had been doing."

"My telegram must have just missed you," Winterbotham said. "I wired to the works at the first moment I had."

Gerald stamped on the carpet. "Get on! Get on, man!" he said. "Can't you see I am in an agony?"

"Yesterday Miss Milton came up to see me at Carnedd Farm. She brought me the things you had posted to her— the gas cylinder, the binoculars and the periscope. She took some food and we had a talk and I told her my plans, and then she set out for the hotel."

"Go on. Go on quickly."

"When Miss Milton left, I went to my bedroom to get some sleep. I knew that the moon was nearly full and I planned to be out scouting round Castle Ynad most of the night. The old farm lady called me at nine at night and brought me a bowl of hot milk. I told her it was good for my complaint to be on the hilltops at midnight, and she believed me. But when I went out there was no light at all. A great mist had come down from the mountains, and it would have been useless for me to attempt it, so I went back to bed again. You'll realize, Mister Boynton, that I had no idea that the mist had come down so early and swallowed up missie in the afternoon."

"Of course, of course, Winterbotham," Gerald said. "Forgive me if I seemed hard, but this news is so terrible. They woke you up at midnight, you said. Who were they?"

"An inspector of police, a constable and two quarrymen from Pendrylas village— men who know the moor well. They told me they had had great difficulty in getting to the farm as it was."

"What happened then?"

"I got up and joined them and we began to search. We could not go very far until the dawn came. It was impossible to see more than a yard or two before one's nose. We discovered absolutely nothing. About ten o'clock we had to stop, while the inspector went down the mountain to organize bigger search parties. The manager of the quarries lent a lot of his men and they have scoured the mountains for ten miles in every direction. They haven't found a trace of our young lady."

Boynton sat down heavily at the table and covered his face with his hands. "She has fallen down some precipice," he said in a broken voice. "We shall never see her again."

Only a single electric light had been turned on. It only made emphasised the gloom of the big room. Winterbotham got up from his chair by the fire.

"Sir," he said, "I never thought to see ye give up so soon. There's no precipice within four miles of the Carnedd Farm. There's absolutely no danger spot whatever. By now the whole tableland up yonder has been searched yard by yard. A lapdog could not have escaped notice, let alone a young lady like ours. Man, pull yourself together! Can't you see what's happened to t'lass?"

Boynton looked up. "I'm sorry, Winterbotham," he said. "It was only for a moment. Did she tell you—"

"That you and she had fixed it up to get married? Aye, she did that. I'll be having at ye with an old shoe and a pound of rice yet! Missie never lost herself. I've worked the whole thing out with mathematical certainty till there's only one possible explanation left, though you may be sure I've said nothing of it to anyone."

"You think...?"

"There's one man at the bottom of it," Winterbotham answered simply. "It's the man that sent yon white yacht slinking to our wharf at midnight. It's the man that bought Mr. Fanshawe and killed him afterwards. It's the owner of the great dogs that range the moors at night."

The two men were facing each other, and Gerald's face, pale and lined, was growing terribly stern. "Great dogs?" he asked.

"Aye; you listen to me, Mister Boynton," and Winterbotham poured the story of his discoveries into the young man's ear.

The narrator concluded by producing a rough map of the high tableland, with distances carefully marked upon it. Men whose business it is to deal with scientific facts speak a language among themselves. Boynton's trained mind understood Winterbotham's explanation in a very few moments. He only asked two questions. Then he looked up.

"Your system of elimination is faultless, Winterbotham," he said. "There's only one possible explanation. By some means or other Miss Milton has gone or has been decoyed into Castle Ynad!"

"That's so," the other answered grimly; "and we're up against a wall of rock, Mister Boynton. We've no proof of what we say, however strongly we believe we're right. Even if we had proof, it'd be easier to steal the Crown Jewels, or break into the gold vaults of the Bank of England, than for you and me to get into Castle Ynad."

Boynton nodded. There was no need for Winterbotham to insist upon that point of view.

There was a knock upon the door. Mr. Price, the landlord, entered. "There's a gentleman called, sir," said Mr. Price. "He wanted to see Mrs. Wilkins, but I told him I thought she was too unwell to speak to anyone, but that a friend of the family was here."

"Who is he, Mr. Price?"

"It's Mr. Conway Flint, sir, his lordship's agent. Mr. Flint manages everything for his lordship. His lordship has heard of the unfortunate young lady's disappearance and sends to ask if he can do anything."

"Ask him to come up, please, Mr. Price," Boynton said.

He turned to Winterbotham as the landlord withdrew. "You sit there by the fire and don't say a word. We don't know what this may mean."

Footsteps and voices were heard on the landing outside, then the door opened and a tall man entered.

Winterbotham crouched in his chair as he had been ordered. Out of the corner of his eye he saw that the newcomer was big, upright and clean-shaven, though in the dim and indifferent light given by the single bulb at the other end of the room he could see no more than this.

"I have called," the visitor began in a smooth voice, "to say how very sorry indeed Lord Llandrylas is to hear of this unfortunate event. He has asked me to say that his services and those of anyone at Castle Ynad are entirely at your disposal, Mr. ..."

Gerald did not answer for several seconds. Winterbotham, listening keenly, thought it very odd. Then he nearly jumped out of his chair.

"Winterbotham," came in tones of sharp command, "turn on the other electric lights quickly!"

The little man stretched out his hand in a flash and pressed the switch by the fire. Then he gasped aloud. Gerald Boynton was covering the newcomer with a revolver.

"So we meet again, Mr. Fanshawe," he said.

Chapter 10

THE FIGURE that confronted Violet in the great hall of tapestry and armour was that of a dwarf. A little old woman stood there smiling. The creature was dressed in a hooped-out skirt of black velvet. A great mob-cap with crimped white edges framed a tiny brown face like the face of a monkey. Small black eyes glittered; shrivelled lips were parted in a toothless grin. The thing— the woman— was incredibly old.

A thin, piping noise came from it— a whining twitter which sounded like the E string of a violin. The words were in Welsh— that much Violet recognized.

She had recoiled in momentary horror from this apparition. Now she took courage— it was so small, fawning, humble and yet wickedly alive!

"What do you want?" Violet said in her clear young voice.

Immediately the little creature began to shuffle across the hall. It walked with a kind of agitated scramble, and every second or so the little monkey head in the great white cap was jerked backwards to see if Violet followed. Once she stopped and beckoned with a hooked finger. A piece of the tapestry was pushed aside and a little pointed door of old oak was revealed. Violet's strange guide opened it and passed through.

The girl followed her. The twittering, whining Welsh became louder. The little old woman waved her hands this way and that in explanation.

The place into which they had come was a bedroom. Here, again, a fire burned upon the hearth. The room was furnished with the most costly luxury. It was modern in many ways, but all the furniture was subordinate to the ancient idea. The low bed of carved oak was filled with snowy linen, and a silken quilt of eiderdown was upon it. The great mirror of the toilet-table was framed in dull copper, and once more it was electric light that hung from the roof of vaulted stone.

The dwarf turned on a tap and hot water flowed into a marble basin. She took a silver bottle of perfume and poured it into the water. She scurried about the room like some strange, unearthly being, a creature out of a fairy tale. Finally she threw a great wrap of purple silk embroidered with green and silver upon the bed. Then she flitted away, and Violet was left alone.

The girl looked round her. She was still bewildered beyond belief, but her fear had passed, though she felt faint and physically weak. Just as she realized this, and the room seemed to sway round her, she gave a cry of delight. Beside the fireplace was a little octagonal table, and on a silver tray was a teapot and a cup. Never had the cup seemed more tonic or been more invigorating. In five minutes Violet felt immeasurably refreshed. She washed in the warm, perfumed water and found toilet materials on the dressing table and rearranged her hair. Then she sat down by the fire to think.

"I am kidnapped, there's no doubt about it, and by a madman. He seems to have unlimited power here and his people obey him like an Eastern king. But there must be limits to which he dare not go. I shall be missed in an hour or two. People will come to look for me. Winterbotham will tell what he knows and Gerald will be telegraphed for. My stay here cannot be very long, for even the Earl of Llandrylas is not above the law."

She reflected that her captor could not possibly know who she was and that her mission was entirely unsuspected. Very well, since this robber chieftain with the angel voice had taken her to his castle, let it be upon his own head. It was dangerous, the situation was critical in the highest degree, but it was a chance. At any rate she, Violet Milton, was the first of all of them to penetrate Castle Ynad. She was near the mystery, the secret of which she had endured so much to discover. Whatever it was, it lurked only a few yards away. It might be that she was to solve it, and she made up her mind bravely to go to any lengths for that end.

"I shall want every ounce of my courage and every wit I possess," she thought. "But it is a game worth the playing!"

A curious exhilaration came over her. The currents of her blood ran fast and free. She felt like a soldier upon the eve of victory. Action! Action! That was the immediate necessity. Feeling for the handle of the dagger in her dress she gave a last look at herself in the long mirror, for she knew she might have need of all her weapons that night. Then, opening the door in the wall-hanging, she passed once more into the great white hall.

It was not empty now. Two footmen with powdered hair, and liveries of green heavily laced with gold, were setting out a small round table. In the centre was a barbaric bowl of soft gold studded with masses of uncut turquoises, and the bowl was heaped and piled with fresh violets. The men moved with incredible quickness and in absolute silence. There were other servants waiting outside the door, for a whole service of glittering plate made its appearance as if by magic. Then, with a sudden throb of her heart, Violet noticed that the table was laid for two people. She sat down by the fire and waited. The servants withdrew, and once again she was left alone.

After about five minutes, somewhere in the distance she heard the deep, muffled roar of a gong and then almost immediately afterwards, but much louder and from close at hand, a sudden blare of trumpets.

The sound caught at the throat with its unexpected and piercing sweetness. It was almost terrible. What did it mean? To whom was it a herald?

In a moment Violet knew.

The door at the far end of the hall was flung open. A man with a white wand appeared and bowed low, though he said no word.

Lord Llandrylas entered, and the door closed.

Violet, from her seat on the oak couch, watched the earl coming up the room towards her. She did not move. There was not the slightest expression in her face. She saw at once that there was an entire difference in his appearance. He wore ordinary evening dress, except for knee breeches of black silk, black silk stockings and shoes with silver buckles. He had not the wild look of wizardry as he had the last time she saw him upon the mountain. Now he was calm and quiet and wonderfully distinguished.

He was like a prince in a court ceremony. Power and pride radiated from him, and yet there was a delicate grace in his every movement. The beautiful, ravaged face, so sad and lofty in expression, glowed with no baleful fires now. He seemed superhuman still— there could be no other man like him, Violet thought— but the barbaric savageness had departed.

He came on easily until he was within three yards of her. Then he stopped, his heels clicked together and he bowed. "Madam," he said, "I ask you to do me the honour of dining with me."

Violet knew that everything depended upon the note she struck from the outset. She had no time to think, but acted as instinct prompted her, and she saw afterwards that she was right. Still sitting where she was, she looked him straight in the face with a pride almost equal to his own. "Sir," she said, "a gentleman does not command a lady."

"Madam," he answered in his deep and musical voice, "it was an entreaty."

"Which I am too helpless to refuse, Lord Llandrylas."

"Madam, you are not helpless in this poor house of mine. You are safe here against the whole world, and you command it!"

For one brief moment the monstrous arrogance of this speech touched Violet's sense of humour. She could have laughed aloud, but she restrained herself and rose slowly from her seat. She was both very hungry and very curious. She was not afraid, but a great sense of expectation informed all she did and thought. There was this strange man from another world. It was a contest between them, a contest of willpower and wit. Here was a supreme mystery. Could she get to the heart of it?

She gave a little inclination of the head and Lord Llandrylas offered her his arm with a courtly gesture. She placed her fingers upon it, again laughing to herself as she thought of her ungloved hands, her simple blouse and skirt of Harris tweed, and together they advanced to the table and sat down.

"If you do not mind, we will wait upon ourselves," said the earl in an ordinary society voice, as though they were two friends who had known each other for years. He ladled some soup from a tureen into a gold plate as if he had been doing nothing else all his life.

"There is just one thing," Violet said, "before I break bread in your house. As your hospitality is enforced, I accept it under protest and recognize no obligations afterwards. You brought me here against my will. You have committed a crime that is against the law, and of course you will have to suffer for it. Meanwhile, if you thoroughly understand that, Lord Llandrylas, I am very hungry and I propose to enjoy my dinner. Moreover, I see no reason why we should not get on very well for the next half-hour or so." And then she smiled.

It was the first time she had smiled that afternoon, and a little colour came into the man's pale face as he bowed again.

"You are a great musician, Lord Llandrylas," Violet said after a moment or two. "It is a pity you do not play in public. There are so few first-rate harpists nowadays."

She had meant to sting him and she saw she had succeeded, though his manner was perfection.

"Ah!" he answered, "I live a very secluded life and I only play for my own pleasure, and"— he hesitated for a moment and a curious look almost of bewilderment came over his face— "and at times when I must."

Violet sipped a little wine— she did not know it, but it was the most famous White Hermitage that the world can produce— and it sent a thrill through her veins.

"And how are your dear dogs?" she went on, with a dangerous glint in her eyes. "Really, I thought I was at the circus when I first came upon you in that curious amphitheatre. Did you teach them their tricks yourself or did your kennel-man? Do you show them at all?

"I have no commerce with the outside world, madam," he answered coldly.

"Then it must be quite refreshing to give a little dinner party like this. Do you always recruit your guests with dogs and huntsmen? It must be wildly exciting, especially in the tourist season."

Little by little the colour was deepening in the earl's face. "I have my own kingdom," he said quietly, "and never venture from it. You know that very well, madam. You are playing a part."

"Yes, by compulsion, the part of your guest. However, it is quite interesting to come across a recluse in these days, though I thought I had heard you were in the slate business."

He gave her one look and it frightened her, though she allowed nothing of it to be seen. But she thought the time had come to play a very daring card. "Since you have admitted me to your jealously guarded domains and are entertaining me so hospitably, Lord Llandrylas," she said, "I think you might be frank with me."

"I was frank with you," he said in a low voice. "I was frank with you on the moors, and I saw by your eyes that you understood me."

"But you told me just now you had no commerce with the outside world, and yet you are interested in papier-mâché, Lord Llandrylas."

There was a sharp, hissing intake of the man's breath. His black eyes dilated. "What do you mean?" he gasped.

"You told me in your Druid song that I was one who came through the mists. Let us assume, then, that I have strange powers. Let us assume that I can see into the recesses of your heart, Lord Llandrylas. I will tell you some pictures that I can see floating all around you in the air."

She bent forward, her left hand on the table, the other raised a little as she pointed over his shoulder. She was acting, and she knew it, but there was a sense of half reality about it also. She threw herself into the part of seer and her voice vibrated strangely.

"I see a ship coming by night to a great city. It comes not once but many times, and what it carries is secret. I see a great genius in that city working for you at your command. I see another city, brighter and fairer than the first. It is a foreign city, with bright boulevards and cafes, and from that city there comes another man, who is a genius also. He is a little, merry man, but there is a great brain hidden away beneath the common place exterior. I see"

She stopped herself just in time. She was about to refer to the murder of Peter Fanshawe, when in one swift moment she realized that this might defeat her whole object. She wanted to frighten her captor. She pretended to far more knowledge than she really had. If he thought that his plans, whatever they were, were discovered and known to others, then they would become useless.

She sank back in her chair and covered her eyes with her hands.

There was a considerable silence. From time to time it was broken by curious little snapping noises like electric sparks— she heard them quite distinctly. At last she looked up.

If a living face can suddenly freeze into marble, with only the eyes malevolent and blazing with black light, then indeed Violet saw such a face then. The man opposite her seemed turned into a statue. There was nor the slightest motion of him— only the black fire from his eyes. She seemed to be confronted by something horribly evil, and all the courage of a pure heart and undaunted will rose up to meet it.

She was holding a spoon in her hand— the spoon with which she had been taking her soup. It was a spoon of solid gold, though she had not noticed it. She rapped with it upon the table.

"Sir," she said, "have I brought you to your bearings now? You met a quiet lady walking about the moors and you brought her here into your fantastic madhouse. You did not think she knew all your secret activities. You know it now!" Each staccato sentence was emphasized by a tap of the spoon on the table.

The man opposite remained a statue. Violet went on.

"In a few hours, Lord Llandrylas, your castle will be assailed. You will have to open your gates to those who will come for me. Do you think because you have forced me here my friends know nothing of where I am? Your crew who ran the ship from Pendrylas to Liverpool, and from Liverpool to Pendrylas, and brought those huge cases from the Milton Paper Works, have not been silent. Lord Llandrylas, you are in a bad way."

The immense crimson fire roared and glowed upon the hearth. The electric lights hanging from the roof of this rich place threw their yellow glory upon fifty thousand pounds' worth of gold plate, and antiquities more valuable than that. The man in the black clothes with the marble face confronted the young, vivid and accusing girl.

Violet was now sure she had won.

"Yes," she said, "the whole world will soon know what you have been doing in Liverpool. And did you not condescend, some time ago, even to honouring Manchester with your presence? The Unseen Powers told me that you— the chieftain of the mountains— were walking through the palm court of the Midland Hotel with your bought genius. Now, Lord Llandrylas!"

Suddenly, with the snap of an electric switch turned off, the whole great hall seemed to fade into dimness. The mist of the mountains seemed pressing through the walls. There was a deep, throbbing sound as if the bass string of a harp were being plucked.

Violet lifted her glass and drank a little wine. Her hand was trembling. She looked around. To the physical eye the hall was just the same, rich and splendid beyond imagining. But she knew in her heart that she had gone too far.

She had awakened something beyond her control. She thought she had won. It was not so. She had been playing with unknown forces, and the chill of a dreadful revolution began to steal over her.

He had seemed sane enough, a strange and compelling personality, but one upon which she could play? No!

Lord Llandrylas rose slowly from his seat. The motion was curiously serpentine. He became elongated, growing taller and taller— it was thus he had seemed upon the moor.

That in itself was horrible, but what ensued was more horrible still. His face began to change— it changed utterly. Up till now he had been a splendid and courteous gentleman, a little irritated at first, angry towards the end. But he was still Lord Llandrylas.

The light on his face went out. Another light took its place. For some reason or other Violet thought of green fire— she even raised her head and glanced round the hanging illuminations of the roof. No, there were no green rays falling from them.

She heard a hollow echo. It was the echo of a word, and the word was "Liverpool."

The name of the city was hissed out with hideous malignancy. The man's face writhed, the terrible eyes blazed with maniacal fire, the lips curled away and showed the teeth. "Liverpool!"

Violet knew what she had done. Lord Llandrylas, as she had suspected, was certainly a madman, but his madness was at times in abeyance. She had called up the evil spirit which possessed him, and which even now was shaking the very tenement of the body as if it would burst its bonds in a paroxysm of hate. He rushed round the table to her side and caught her by the wrist. His touch was like flame, his grip like steel.

"Come," he cried, "witch, or devil, or queen, or whatever you are! You know much. You shall know all! I will show you that proud city!"

He dragged her across the hall and a chair fell behind them with a crash. She could not choose but go. Resistance was utterly hopeless. She ran along with him, feeling as if she were going to her death. He flung open the door and tore through it into a vaulted corridor. Then he laughed, the horrible laughter of a maniac. "Come, come! Quick! Quicker!"

Suddenly he released her wrist, but she fled along with him nevertheless, as if caught up in a whirlwind.

"I am mad too," she thought. "This is the end of everything. But at least I am going to know the truth."

At the end of the corridor there was a door. The earl took a key from his pocket. His hand trembled violently, and when at last he inserted it into the lock it was with a savage snarl. A twisting stairway of stone was revealed, lit by electricity. The walls were of immense masses of hewn stone, the narrow spiral stairs worn by the feet of thousands of people.

"Come!" he cried again, and leapt upwards.

On and on they hurried, higher, higher, and through the narrow slits in the eight foot depth of the wall— slits made for archers in the old days— the cool night air came flowing. On and on, until at last a little railed platform, another door studded with nails and then they were out upon the highest platform of Castle Ynad's central tower— three hundred feet up in the air.

The mist had all gone. The black vault of heaven was spangled with stars. The moon was just setting over the sea— a red, menacing moon, which made a long path as of blood upon the waters far, far below.

All around, the mountain peaks stood sentinel. The scene was inexpressibly solemn and grand.

Lord Llandrylas leant against the battlements, gasping for breath and staring down at the castle buildings— acres of roofs, walls and tower tops— a dreadful spectre of the night.

"Eight hundred years ago," he said, "my ancestor, King Hywel, king of this country— as I am rightful king of it today— was harried in this castle by the knights of the English King John. It was in the year 1207, and the king had granted a charter for the first time to the city of Liverpool. These barons burnt a great part of Castle Ynad and slew my ancestor, whose son swore to be revenged."

He stopped, struggling with overmastering emotion, clutching at his throat and staring up at the stars. Suddenly he beckoned to Violet and she came up to his side— her hand was upon the hilt of the dagger at her breast.

"Look!" he said, stretching out one long arm over the battlements. "Look! It is only fifty miles away, that city whose doom is so near."

Violet almost reeled where she stood. She was on the very threshold of discovery, and it was horror, horror undreamt of.

Following the motion of his arm, she saw a dull red glow against the sky, faint and at an immense distance. That was all, but she knew that it meant the city of Liverpool. For a moment she was startled. She reflected how long the journey from Liverpool to Wales had taken, and then she realized that the way was not direct, and that she was now looking towards the city as the crow flies. Only fifty miles away! Why was it that these words seemed to freeze the blood within her?

"It is doomed," the hollow voice began to chant. "The proud and evil city is doomed, and I, Carradoc David Llewellyn Pantydwr, am the avenger! So the spirits of the past told me— the queen shall come out of the mist and the great city shall burn in ruin."

Suddenly, with monkey-like quickness, the man ran to a little wooden building some yards away like a sentry-box.

"Go to the other side," he shouted, "and look over the battlements down into the courtyard and see what you shall see. Down there lies one who will speak with the city!"

Violet staggered to the opposite side of the tower and stared down at the dark buildings below. She could see the immense central courtyard like the black squares of a chess-board, with here and there a faint, twinkling light. Little ant-like figures were moving everywhere. And in the centre of the courtyard was a long, low building— or so it seemed from this immense height— which became more brilliantly illuminated than all the rest. She saw that the roof was of glass and blazed with the fierce blue radiance of arc lights.

From this building a huge black shape was slowly emerging.

In an instant the girl knew. Like a lightning flash everything was made plain.

"Dear God!" she cried, and fell senseless upon the leaden roof.

Chapter 11

"SO WE MEET AGAIN, Peter Fanshawe!" The words rang out in the quiet hotel sitting room, and the revolver was levelled straight at the heart of the clean-shaven man who had entered it as Conway Flint.

Boynton was at one end of the table, the man he called Peter Fanshawe at the other. Winterbotham crouched in his chair by the fire. The room was now brilliantly lit, and the little man stared in absolute stillness at the dramatic tableau before him. For a moment his throat went dry and his eyes burned. He was not a superstitious man, but how could a man rise from the dead? Had he not seen Peter Fanshawe swirling in the dark night currents of the Mersey, a corpse? Had he not been present at the inquest in Liverpool? But as he looked he saw that Boynton's instant recognition was not a mistake. It was Peter Fanshawe who stood there, livid-white, like the under side of a sole— Peter Fanshawe, with his beard and moustache removed, but nevertheless the man himself. The horror-stricken eyes, the hideous rigidity of terror at Boynton's accusing words were evidence in themselves.

The man choked, gulped, stammered and then spoke. "You! What are you doing here, Boynton?"

"You know me, I see," Gerald answered in an icy voice. "You ask me what I am doing here. I am on your track and that of your master, and have been from the first. Do you think that all you did in the Experiment House at the works escaped my notice? I watched you night by night. I know all about the Mabinogion's secret visits to the wharf. I know what you made with such secrecy and what was afterwards conveyed to Castle Ynad."

The wretched man at the head of the table seemed to sink in upon himself and become perceptibly smaller. "You!" he whispered again, and his face went from white to red and then to white once more, and beads of sweat stood out upon his forehead. He tore with one hand at his waistcoat as if something swelled and choked him and stopped the passage of his breath.

"You expected to see some ordinary person who would not know you for what you are. You came to offer your master's lying condolences. Where is she? Answer me that."

"She? The girl?"

"Quick, or I'll fire. It will be a real death this time, Peter Fanshawe."

"The girl— she is in the castle. Who— what have you to do with her?"

In an instant Gerald perceived that Fanshawe was unaware of Violet's identity. He was debating whether to enlighten him when Fanshawe dropped with incredible swiftness to the floor. He passed out of sight like a falling stone, and with a single diving movement was under the long dining table. There was a scuffling sound and then the audible click of a revolver being cocked.

If Fanshawe was quick, Gerald was ready too. He leapt onto the table with a single movement. He had only done so when his eyes fell upon Winterbotham. The little man, still crouching in his chair, had something dark grey and oblong in his hand. At one end there was something that glittered. It was a little brass tap.

There was a faint pop, like the sound of a soda-water cork heard at some distance away, a sudden angry hiss, a limp thud beneath the table. Winterbotham rose from his chair and placed the grey object upon the mantelshelf.

"That's done for him, Mister Boynton, I think," he said with a chuckle. "Your gas cylinder which you made up for the dogs. Came in very handy, didn't it? Lucky I had it in my pocket."

They pulled the limp form from under the table by the legs. The mouth was open, the nostrils curiously distended and all the muscles rigid in an instantaneous paralysis.

"Just one little whiff," Winterbotham chuckled. "Got him straight in the face."

"Thank God!" Boynton answered. "We've got him now. He will be like this for two or three hours, unless we bring him to. It is astounding, Winterbotham. We've got to think it over and find out what it all means. One thing we do know, and that is Miss Milton is at the castle. But we've got to know much more than that— and here is the one man that can tell us."

"What are we to do with him, sir?

Boynton thought for a moment. "Miss Milton's room is empty," he said. "No one will go there. It's a desecration, but we must put this fellow in it. I believe it's the first door on the right in the corridor."

He went to the door of the sitting room, opened it quietly and listened. The electric light burned on the corridor landing. There was nobody about and not a sound. Together the two men caught the limp body by the arms and legs and carried it into the empty bedroom. Winterbotham went first, and as he got inside the door he felt a sudden tug, as if Boynton were reluctant to enter, but as he was not overburdened with the refinements of sentiment himself he tugged strongly in return and in a second Fanshawe was laid on the bed.

They locked the door and held a whispered conference. "For some reason or other, which I can't explain at present, Fanshawe is known to everyone here as Conway Flint, Lord Llandrylas' agent. He is perfectly well known. He has been seen to come here. We must let the people of the hotel believe he has gone."

"But how, Mr. Boynton?"

"He was shown up by the general staircase, but there is no reason why I should not have shown him out by the private stairs leading to the garden gate. We'll both go down together and lock the door here. I'll talk in a loud voice as I see you to the door. It is quite dark outside, but the garden path goes by the windows of the bar and smoking-room, which are sure to be open. Mr. or Mrs. Price will be in one or the other of the rooms; and at any rate, the barmaid will be there. You'll go tramping off in the night and then a minute or two afterwards stroll into the hotel by the front door with your pipe in your hand, as if you had just been out for a smoke. I think that ought to do the trick."

They walked loudly down the stairs, Gerald talking the whole time and his companion making an answering murmur. It was touch and go, but there were no visitors in the hotel and their luck held.

"Good night, Mr. Flint, and thank Lord Llandrylas very much for his offer of help," Gerald shouted, as Winterbotham tramped away into the darkness.

A minute afterwards Gerald was standing by the bed upon which the unconscious Fanshawe lay. The young man looked around him with a feeling of awe. It was as though he was in some shrine, and all his heart went out to the girl he loved. He permitted himself a few brief seconds of emotion. His grief and horror, which had stood back in the excitement of his arrival and the discovery of Fanshawe, threatened to overwhelm him in a flood. The anguish was terrible, but mingled with it was a white, fierce anger which was like a devastating flame. He cursed the man upon the bed, and far more he cursed the sinister ruler of the mountain— but not for long. Essentially a man of action, he knew that there was not an instant to be lost in private anguish. He must think and think quickly, bending the whole power of his mind upon the immediate present.

First of all, Fanshawe. He felt the man's pulse. It was beating steadily. Boynton knew the effects of the gas very well. He gazed at the face. The cranial development was magnificent— and none knew better than he what a splendid but perverted brain was there enshrined. But the mouth, with the firm white teeth, was weak and sensual. He saw it now for the first time in its fullness, and he marked how small and even receding was the chin, which had hitherto been hidden by the beard. A thought struck him as Winterbotham came into the room.

"I'll go down and order some hot coffee and one or two other things I want," he said to Winterbotham. "Then we will bring this man back to consciousness and find out all he knows."

Leaving Winterbotham in charge, Boynton went down the stairs and into the lounge bar, where he ordered hot coffee to be taken to the sitting room at once. Mr. Price was there, pale and agitated.

"No news yet, sir; but we shall have some soon, I'll be bound. Don't you lose heart."

"Thank you, Mr. Price," Gerald answered. "But this suspense is very hard to bear. Mr. Conway Flint has just gone and he tells me that Lord Llandrylas is doing everything he can. That cheered me somewhat."

"Best news yet," replied the landlord. "I heard Mr. Flint go just now. Nice gentleman, isn't he? Did you know him before?"

"I once had him pointed out to me at Liverpool, Mr. Price, but as far as I can remember he wore a beard then. Wasn't that so?"

"Quite right, sir. Mr. Flint was clean-shaven for several years. About six months ago, however, he grew a beard and moustache, and now I see he has shaven them off again. I suppose he likes the first way better."

Gerald went to the sitting room and waited for the hot coffee. When it came he took it to the bedroom. He was beginning to see a little daylight. The man they had found in the river was not Fanshawe; it was Conway Flint, who, for some reason or other, much resembled the ex-director. Again, when the body was finally recovered, its appearance was naturally much altered, which was an additional safeguard to those in the dark plot. Dark it was, for it involved nothing less than murder, and murder at which the Earl of Llandrylas must have connived for his own sinister purpose.

It took twenty minutes or more to bring Fanshawe to himself. As consciousness returned and he lay pale and gasping on the bed, a look of horrible anxiety came into his eyes. His lower lip trembled, and he gulped and stammered unintelligible sounds before he spoke.

"Where am I?" he began in a dry whisper, and then louder and with an appalling note of anxiety in his voice. "The time! For God's sake, what is the time?"

Boynton took out his watch. It was not much after seven. The terrible urgency of the request meant something, and he watched Fanshawe carefully as he told him the hour.

A great groan of relief came from their prisoner. "Thank God! Thank God!" The words seemed a profanation on those lips. "Thank God, it's not too late!"

"As you are well enough to talk, Mr. Fanshawe," Boynton said quietly, "and as you can see your legs and arms are tied, you can't move, I am going to ask you a few questions. Remember that you are absolutely in my power. If you call out or try to attract attention in any way, Winterbotham here will gas you as he did when you were under the table in the sitting room. Just keep the cylinder ready, Winterbotham. Thank you."

Fanshawe snarled like a clog at bay. "I will answer none of your questions. You will suffer for this dearly."

"I think I'll find means to persuade you," Gerald went on. "If I fail, I'll deliver you up to the police."

"You cannot do anything of the sort. I have done nothing."

"The whole of your actions in regard to your doings at the works will have to be investigated. You will have to explain who the man was whose body was found in the river, and why you changed places with him. The dullest country policeman would detain you on such evidence as Winterbotham and myself have to offer. Then your little transactions with Lord Llandrylas will all have to come out. Need I say any more to a man of your intelligence?"

There was a slight silence. Fanshawe appeared to be thinking deeply. Gerald watched the thoughts pass over his face like waves of heat pass over red-hot iron. The big brain was at work, cunning and resolute to the last. And yet, the young man thought as he waited, the face was not wholly bad. Fanshawe was a scoundrel and a criminal, no doubt, but there had been many that had called him friend in the old days.

"You call me a man of intelligence," Fanshawe said at last. "From your last remarks I can hardly pay you the same compliment. You may not be aware that I wrote to Miss Milton stating that I was going to America and resigning my post as director of the works. Nothing has altered that fact. I am going to America this very night, and how I go, or where the world believes me, it does not matter in the least to you. I am going to leave this country tonight, as I've just remarked, and you cannot detain me."

"That remains to be seen, Fanshawe. May I inquire how you propose to leave for America this evening?"

"I see no harm in telling you. Lord Llandrylas has put his yacht, the Mabinogion, at my disposal and that of my friend, who is journeying with me."

A lightning flash of illumination came into Gerald's mind. He made a long shot— and hit the mark. "Mr. Sachs, I suppose?" he said quietly.

Fear came back into Fanshawe's eyes. "You know too much," he said with dry lips.

"On the contrary, there are many things I wish to know, and which you are going to tell me. Let me reiterate that you won't sail tonight unless my questions are answered, despite the fact that your work and that of Mr. Sachs appears to be complete."

Fanshawe's whole expression and manner changed. The terrible anxiety returned, but there was hope in it too. "If I answer your questions will you let me go?" he said, entirely abandoning his former attitude and almost fawning on the stern-faced young man who stood by the bed.

Gerald waited for nearly half a minute before he replied. He was weighing the pros and cons of the situation. After all, the first thing was to rescue Violet; the second to discover the truth and punish Lord Llandrylas. This man, lying so helpless before him, was, after all, a tool, a minor rogue.

"Yes, Fanshawe, I will let you go if you answer my questions. But you must hold no communication with Castle Ynad when you leave this hotel before you sail. I must see you leave Pendrylas Harbour myself."

Fanshawe gave a great sigh of relief. "We sail with the tide at half-past nine," he said. "My luggage is already on board. I only came here to deliver the earl's message to the lost girl's mother. It was the last thing he asked me to do for him before we said goodbye. Boynton, may I have something to drink? I feel deadly sick and ill from your infernal poison." He turned his head a little and glared at Winterbotham. "I sacked you once, my man, and from what I see now I was quite right. Respectable overseers don't go about carrying cylinders of poison gas."

"Mister Fanshawe," said Winterbotham, quite unmoved, "I'll go and get you a sup o' drink."

Some brandy was brought and Fanshawe drank eagerly, a little colour coming back to his cheeks.

"Winterbotham can hear all I have to say," Gerald Boynton said. "He has been with me in this matter from the first. Why has Lord Llandrylas kidnapped Miss Milton? Where has he put her? And is she safe and unharmed?"

The springs of the bed creaked and rattled. Bound as he was, Fanshawe had jumped like a fish in a basket. "Miss Milton!" he cried. "That charming girl! What has she got to do with this matter?"

"She is the young lady for whom all the countryside is searching and who, by your own admission, is being detained by Lord Llandrylas. This fact, I might tell you, I was pretty well certain about before. It only needed your corroboration."

"Miss Milton!" the other said again, and there was no doubt of the genuineness of his surprise.

"Yes, she has been with us on the quest the whole time. I may tell you that we are engaged to be married."

Fanshawe flushed. "By Jove! Boynton," he said. "I wish you all the luck in the world. You deserve it too. I wish I had run as straight as you and I wouldn't be where I am now. You haven't wasted much time, I must say! Now I'll tell you all I know."

Fanshawe hesitated for a moment, knitting his brows as if in deep recollection, and both of the watchers could see there was no pretence or falseness about him now.

"I have been at the castle finishing a certain piece of work," he said. "I knew that a girl had been found upon the moor. I have not seen her, but she was brought into the castle by Lord Llandrylas' orders. His retainers there will obey his slightest wish or command. He exercises a sort of hypnotic influence over them. They worship him as if he were superhuman."

"And what has happened to her?

"As far as I know, she has been treated very well. She has been lodged in one of the rooms of the central keep. She has a woman to look after her. Llandrylas has got it into his head that she is his destined bride. I suppose you know that the man, with all his brilliancy and power, is half cracked at times? He is not the man to harm her. But Miss Milton! It is terrible!"

His voice suddenly dropped into a startled whisper. "My God, yes!" he said. "I would have given anything if this had not happened. I thought it was some girl from the countryside. indeed, I hardly gave the matter a thought; but now..."

Gerald's brain was unnaturally acute. "Fanshawe," he said in a kinder voice than before, "I thank you for telling me this. I don't know what you have done and I'm not going to judge you. But there is something underneath all this. When you came back to consciousness you wished to know the time with such earnestness that my suspicions were aroused at once. Now I know you are sailing at half-past nine. But unless some matter, of which I am not aware, is not very imminent, you would hardly be in such excitement as you were just now. What you've just told me about Miss Milton only intensifies my certainty."

And now there was a long silence. Fanshawe seemed to be wrestling with himself. "Boynton," he said at length, "I have sworn the most solemn oath which even I, bad as I am, cannot break. I have been considering how much I can tell you. You must not ask me anything more than that."

"I will do my best," Gerald answered.

"I will be brief. A year or so ago," Fanshawe began, "I was coming to the end of my tether. I was on the track of a great discovery, but I was living entirely beyond my means, and I had lost huge sums in speculation on the turf. Up to this time I assure you that though my conduct was wild and headstrong, I was an honest man. At this juncture I was approached by my half-brother, Conway Flint. He was one of the most corrupt scoundrels, I am sorry to say, that ever served the devil in flesh. Flint knew of my experiments."

"In the direction of perfecting papier-mâché?"

"Yes. Of course you must know that. Well, Boynton, I will tell you also that I succeeded— succeeded beyond the wildest dreams of any of us."

"That also I had deduced."

"Unfortunately, I could not wait to gather the fruits of my work. I had to have money, and in enormous sums, at once. Lord Llandrylas tempted me through Conway Flint, and I fell. For months past I have been making something for Llandrylas. It was that something which was removed section by section from the works to Wales."

"And that something is, Fanshawe?"

"There my lips are sealed," the other answered with a shudder in his voice. "Well, I can tell you this: it is something beyond the dreams of the wildest imagination. It is something which, in the wrong hands, as it is now, confers a terrible power on one regardless of any after-consequences. At dawn tomorrow, if nothing goes wrong, events are going to take place at Castle Ynad which, if not prevented, will make a page of evil history. My work is done. Officially I have no knowledge of what my invention is to be used for. Sachs— how you know about him beats me— is in the same position. We are sailing into the unknown tonight, and the world will never hear of us again under our own names. We have been paid huge sums of money. That's all I can tell you, Boynton. I expect it is enough? For God's sake, get Miss Milton out of Castle Ynad tonight!"

"If human power can do it," Gerald answered, and his jaw set and his eyes grew dark and stern. He knew that Fanshawe would tell him no more, and he was certain that the man was speaking the bitter, ghastly truth.

"We must go to the police at once, Mister Boynton," said Winterbotham.

Fanshawe laughed aloud, though there was no mirth in his laughter, and even Gerald smiled faintly.

"That's no use, my friend," Gerald said quietly. "You have heard that it's a question of hours. What policeman would suspect the Earl of Llandrylas, and what magistrate grant a search warrant? And what evidence have we to go upon? Nothing but Mr. Fanshawe's story. It would take us three weeks to move in the matter at all. Remember who the man is we are fighting."

"Then what are we to do?" Winterbotham said hoarsely.

"I'll tell you," Fanshawe answered. "I like you tonight, Boynton, as I've never liked you before, and perhaps what I am doing now may be some little reparation for all that has passed. In the first place, you are quite aware that you will be taking your life in your hands?"

Gerald made an impatient gesture.

"Well, you and Winterbotham must get into the castle alone, and bring Miss Milton away without any other help— that's as far as I can see it. You must take your own measures. But I can help you to get in."

"Ah!" both the others said in a sharp exclamation.

"Untie my hands and feet and bring me paper and a pencil. I'll draw you a plan of the castle. There is one point where a small postern door in the thickness of the outer wall opens to the moat. I have a key to it in my pocket. The lock is oiled. From this door there are steps down to the water. The moat is about six yards wide at this point, but very deep, though, no doubt, you can swim it."

Eagerly they untied their captor, and in a minute or two he was tracing a plan of the castle in quick, firm strokes. He also gave them a hundred and one pieces of information, which Gerald memorized as well as he could.

"How long does it take to get to the castle from here?" Gerald asked suddenly.

"You cannot do it under three hours," Winterbotham replied.

There was a dead silence. Fanshawe broke it.

"Here again I can help," he said. "I am known as Conway Flint. In a few minutes, with your permission, I will be going to the pier at Pendrylas to embark upon the Mabinogion. My word is supreme at Pendrylas— or rather the word of the man who I am thought to be. I will give an order to the foreman of the works to run you up the mountainside on the quarry railway. You will be up in twenty minutes, and from there it is less than three miles over the plateau to Castle Ynad."

Chapter 12

"THERE ARE JUST two hours before the Mabinogion sails," said Boynton, looking at his watch. "It will not take us more than twenty minutes to walk to Pendrylas. I have a few preparations to make. Will you come into the sitting room and wait there, Fanshawe?"

Fanshawe nodded. He was very silent now as they helped him to his feet and led him quickly across the corridor into the sitting room. He sat down by the fire, looking white and ill, while Boynton and Winterbotham talked together in a low voice.

"The cylinder, Winterbotham. You didn't liberate much gas, so I know there must be quite a dozen effective charges left."

"Quite that, sir."

"Very well, that's one of our weapons, perhaps the most important. Then we have our revolvers and plenty of spare cartridges."

"There are two electric torches," Winterbotham said, "and I think I'll take this along with me."

The little man's eye had been roving round the room till it reached the sideboard, where there was a large, old-fashioned cruet. He went up to it and emptied the contents of the ordinary pepper and the red pepper pot into a sheet of paper.

"It isn't nice," he said with a grin, "but it's very effective at close quarters, and we're not going to stand on ceremony tonight. A good stout bit of rope wound round both our waists would be a good thing too, and those mountain-climbing sticks." He pointed to two alpenstocks of ash, shod with iron, which leant in a corner.

"I've got a file in my pocket," he said. "I never travel anywhere without a file and a pair of tweezers and a few other tools. We'll just sharpen the points of yon sticks. They may be useful."

It took them a little time to complete their preparations. There was a large packet of milk chocolate upon the sideboard, a delicacy much liked by Mrs. Herbert Wilkins.

"We don't know when we will get anything to eat, and chocolate is sustaining," said Gerald as he put it in his pocket, while Winterbotham filled two flasks with brandy and water.

Fanshawe looked on with a grim smile. "I see you are going to leave nothing to chance," he said. "For my part, I wish you good luck. I wish I could give you more help than I have, but my oath binds me."

They were ready at last.

"Now," Boynton said, "we're ready, Fanshawe. You, however, are supposed to have already left the hotel." And he detailed the ruse which he had practised with Winterbotham a short time before.

Fanshawe laughed.

"You've all your wits about you, I can see," he said. "Well, I suppose what has been done once can be done again. Anyway, it doesn't much matter, since we have made terms with each other and you're going to let me go free."

"The best thing is for me to go downstairs and keep the landlord and the people below in talk for a minute or two," Gerald said. "I shall tell them that I am going out on the mountains myself to look for Miss Milton. You and Winterbotham, Fanshawe, creep downstairs and get on to the Pendrylas road. Walk slowly and I'll catch you up."

The manoeuvre was executed without the slightest hitch. Boynton spent two minutes or so in the lounge. He procured a couple of pieces of rope from Mr. Price, explaining that they would be useful in the search, and with the landlord's good wishes ringing in his ears he hurried out of the hotel and on to the Pendrylas road.

The night was dark, though the sky was star-spangled. The sea made a low, moaning noise to his right, and to his left the mysterious mountains towered into the heavens. His feet, in their nailed climbing boots, rang sharply upon the hard road as he swung forward at a good pace, until he made out two dark and slowly moving figures a few yards ahead.

"I feel deadly sick," Fanshawe muttered as Gerald joined them. "That stuff of yours is terrible, Boynton. As soon as I get on board I'm going to my cabin to sleep like a log. If you can manage to give a dose of it to Lord Llandrylas, you have my heartiest good wishes, though I am taking a fortune of his lordship's money away with me to the West." He shrugged his shoulders and they went onwards without another word.

At last they came to the straggling village of the slate quarrymen, and passing through it past two brightly lit public houses, from each of which a chorus of song was pouring, they stepped over a tangle of railway lines and onto the pier, which was lit at regular intervals by gas lamps.

Soon they made out the riding lights of the Mabinogion, and then the long white shape of the mysterious yacht came into full view. The tide was nearly at the full and the ship's deck was almost on a level with the pier. A sailor stood smoking at the gangway.

"Is the luggage on board?" Fanshawe asked in a sharp, authoritative voice.

"It's all aboard, sir," the sailor answered, "and the other gentleman too. He's asleep in his cabin."

"Very well, then, I will go on board as well, but first of all run up to Plasmawyr Cottage and tell Mr. Lloyd I want to see him at once."

"Mr. Lloyd, the transport manager, sir?"

"Yes, be quick about it."

The man touched his cap and shambled off.

"We'll wait here," Fanshawe said in a low voice, "unless you would like to go aboard and rest in the saloon?"

"I think we'll wait here," Gerald answered dryly, and he heard Fanshawe give a little chuckle in the dark.

"I'm not so bad as all that, Boynton," Fanshawe said, and indeed to Gerald he seemed a curious mixture of good and evil. "But have it your own way."

In about five minutes a short, thick-set man hurried down the pier with the sailor.

"Good evening, Mr. Flint," he said. "What can I have the pleasure of doing for you?"

"As you know, Lloyd, I am sailing tonight at full tide. His lordship asked me to go and see these two gentlemen at the Pwylog Hotel. They are friends of the young lady that's lost on the mountains."

"Dear, dear," said Mr. Lloyd sympathetically. "A bad business that."

"It is," Fanshawe went on; "and his lordship told me to afford them every possible assistance. They want to go up on the mountains at once, and to save time you must send them up in one of the trucks with a man to show them the way on the moor. You've got steam up, I suppose?

"Oh, yes, Mr. Flint. It is up night and day. I can have them run up within half an hour."

"Very well, then, if you will go to the end of the pier these two gentlemen will join you in a few minutes. I want to have a final word with them."

"Good night, Mr. Flint. See you back soon, I suppose?" the man answered.

"About three days," Fanshawe replied, and then he turned to Gerald.

"Well, goodbye, Boynton," he said. "We shall never meet again. I wish you every possible success. You are going into deadly danger, but I believe you will win through. It is all owing to me that poor Miss Milton is in the position she is— though I could never have foreseen it, of course. Try and think as kindly of me as you can."

He nodded curtly, did not offer to shake hands, and stepped over the gangway on board the deck of the yacht. In the light which flared up from the roof of the saloon they saw him standing there for a moment, a tall, dark figure, and then he went below.

"Now for it, Winterbotham," Boynton said, "and God help us."

They stood in a kind of rough miniature railway station, upon which a single arc light threw a ghostly radiance. A great truck, capable of holding two tons of slate, glided towards them out of the dark.

"It's rough," said Mr. Lloyd, "but you won't mind that, seeing the business you are on. There will be one change when you get up to the first platform, but David Evans will be with you all the way."

They thanked him and scrambled into the truck, accompanied by a silent Welshman in corduroy. Mr. Lloyd went to a lever at the side of the little platform and pulled it. There was a clang, a light winked upon the mountainside, a bell rang, and then the steel cable tightened and the truck began to move. They sat down on some sacks upon the floor as the fore part began to rise and the whole thing gathered momentum. The lights of the village sank below them.

Two twinkling points of red and green marked where the Mabinogion waited at the pier side. Then these dwindled to nothingness and the wind of their passage grew cold, while the noise of their ascent echoed through the deep gully up which they rushed. It was a strange sensation, this fierce storming of the mountain. They could see nothing but the stars above and the vast walls of slate on either side. At last the pace slackened, there was a slight jerk and they rolled along level ground for a few yards.

Evans sot out and motioned them to do likewise. There was a click as an electric standard was turned on, and they found themselves on a little platform surrounded by a high amphitheatre of rock. A low, yawning tunnel slanting upwards, as the light which fell upon the steel rails showed, confronted them. They entered another truck. Again there was the ringing of a bell, the clanging noise and they plunged into the dark. Here the incline was much steeper. It was almost like rolling up a ladder set against a house, as they crouched inside the truck. The noise was deafening, and it seemed to continue for hours.

At last the hot air of the tunnel cleared and they came out into the great central quarry itself, a gigantic, echoing place of unknown extent, forlorn and terrifying. Their guide unlocked the door of a small shed and returned with three lanterns, which he lit.

"If you follow me carefully," he said, "there's no danger, and you'll be up on the moor in ten minutes."

They wound in and out among huge piles of dressed slate, dodging past lines of trucks and innumerable little sheds, until they came to a roughly cut stairway in the side of the artificial precipice before them. On one side was a handrail, on the other the rock itself.

The little man flitted ahead like a monstrous gnome. His lantern made fantastic play of light and shadow as they followed him. Higher and higher they went upon their winding way, until they must have risen nearly three hundred feet, and nothing separated them from the gulf below save the guide rail of dew-drenched rope.

At last it was over. They went through a gate in the fencing which defended the abyss and found their feet among the heather.

"Will you be going to the castle?" the man asked.

"Yes; we want to find out if they have any news," Gerald said.

"Well, it isn't three miles away. The moon will be up soon and you can't miss your way if you keep to this track until you reach the road. Then it's fair going till you get to the castle. You can keep these lanterns."

Gerald thanked him and gave him money, and then he disappeared below the brink of the precipice.

They walked on briskly for two or three hundred yards until they struck a beaten road which led from the castle to another part of the quarries, from which all supplies were brought. Then they blew out the lanterns and hid them in a clump of heather.

Boynton said, "I've got the plan of the castle thoroughly in my mind. I can't make a mistake. When once we're inside we must be guided entirely by circumstances. Personally I shall stick at nothing."

"Nor I, sir," Winterbotham answered, and the other heard his teeth grate together in the dark.

"There's another thing I want to say. Our first plan is to rescue Miss Milton. That's agreed upon?"

"Of course, Mister Boynton."

"Very well, then. The mysterious horror at which Mr. Fanshawe hinted is only a secondary thing. Now it's quite possible in getting Miss Milton away— if we can do it at all— that one of us will have to go under. I want you to promise, Winterbotham, as I promise you, that whoever sees a chance of getting her away, even if he has to abandon the other, he will do it. It's a lot to ask from you. My position is different."

"I'm with ye, sir," the little man answered simply. "I've no one dependent upon me. I've had a good life, and, well, I'd just die for that young lady, same as you would."

Their hands gripped hard in a sacrament of chivalry and mutual faith.

"The moon will be up in about an hour," said Gerald when they had progressed a few yards on their way. "At this rate we shall make the castle in another five and twenty minutes. Don't you agree that it will be a thousand times better to try and get inside while it is still dark?"

"I'll follow ye in everything," Winterbotham rejoined, and they began a quick and steady march on the turf at the side of the faintly gleaming road.

Ten minutes, twenty minutes passed and then Winterbotham touched Gerald's arm. "Yonder!" he whispered.

They strained their eyes through the dark, and an immense pile of goblin masonry seemed to heave itself before them, blacker than night and silent as a tomb. Gerald sank upon his knees, produced Fanshawe's map and placed an illuminated compass upon it.

"This is the side," he whispered, after half a minute's scrutiny. "We must follow the wall to the right for two hundred yards. Ah!"

Two things happened simultaneously. A twinkle of yellow light showed high up in the air, and the deep, musical bay of a distant hound came to them through the silence.

"It's t'other side of t'castle," Winterbotham murmured. "But what are them lights?"

"Come with me and we'll see."

The road wound away to the left. They crossed it without a sound, pushed their way through the heather to the right, which Fanshawe had told them went up to the very edge of the moat. Instant by instant the vast pile grew more distinct to their straining eyes. Battlemented wall and tower detached themselves from the star-spangled background, and above all hung the huge central mass of the keep. It was from there that the lights came— a row of narrow windows.

Gerald heard a sound like someone running. For a moment his hand gripped the butt of his revolver. Then he realized that it was the drumming of his own heart. She was there, up in that grim tower, three hundred feet high! He plunged forward.

"Go easy, Mister Boynton, go easy! We're very close there now."

Winterbotham was right. A few more steps and the towering outer walls of the castle seemed about to fall upon them. They were not fifty yards from the castle.

Gerald dropped upon his hands and knees. The heather had almost ceased. They felt nothing but smooth turf as they crawled onwards, dragging their alpenstocks behind them.

Suddenly Gerald stopped. He saw faint glimmers like scattered glow-worms a yard or two ahead. They did not seem to be quite on his own level, but down a depression of some feet— the stars were reflected in the broad, dark waters of the moat.

He touched Winterbotham upon the arm. Without a sound they crawled on their stomachs to the very edge of the water.

Six yards wide, Fanshawe had said. It seemed a hundred, like an enchanted lake washing the feet of a high precipice. Again, but unmistakably from the other side of the castle, and so perhaps a quarter of a mile away, came the musical baying of the hound.

On this side of the castle there was not a sound, not a light of any sort.

"There's no one watching, at any rate," Gerald whispered, after they had crouched there for several minutes. "I'm going to risk it."

He took a powerful electric torch from his pocket and sent a level ray skimming over the water, moving it this way and that. Finding no break in the huge moss-grown blocks of stone yonder, he shut it off, and without a word began to crawl parallel with the moat, Winterbotham following him. When they had gone some sixty yards, and remained silent for at least a minute, he tried again.

They had hit the spot exactly. The beam shone across the water. Six yards away was a low pointed archway in the wall, closed by a heavy nail-studded door. Three steps descended from it into the water. Then they saw something else. Moored to a nail in the wall by the side of the steps was a small boat.

"Thank God!" Gerald whispered. "That's our way back!" He shut off the light as he spoke.

Winterbotham did not answer, but he seemed to be scuffling oddly at Gerald's side.

"What are you doing?" he asked.

"Taking the things out of my pocket," the other answered quietly. "Catch hold of the cylinder, Mister Boynton. I'm a proper fish in t'water."

Before Gerald could say another word the little man had writhed to the brink of the moat and let himself down into the water without a sound. There was a tiny splash or two and then Gerald cautiously switched on the torch. He saw Winterbotham climbing over the stern of the boat, and in a few seconds more he leant over the edge and caught it by the nose.

"Steady," Winterbotham whispered, as Gerald let himself down. "There are no oars, but there's a boathook."

Even as he spoke he shoved off, and the impetus sent them shooting over the moat, until the little craft grated against the steps. They waited in silence while Gerald returned the cylinder, spare torch and other things to Winterbotham. Then, mooring the boat, they crept out upon the slippery steps up to the heavy door.

The key was in Gerald's waistcoat pocket. He felt for the lock, inserted the key and turned it. The bolt shot back with the faintest of clicks and the door swung open without a sound. The two men entered and closed the door behind them.

They found themselves in a narrow passage between two walls of immense height. There was hardly room for two people to walk abreast. They knew from the map that this passage went on for a few yards, then went sharply to the left and finally came out to the great central courtyard. They crept along it, Boynton leading with his revolver in one hand and torch in the other. Winterbotham followed with the gas cylinder.

Suddenly Boynton stopped. A square band of light shot across the passage at a height of five or six feet and some two yards in front. It came from a small barred window upon the left. Almost immediately he heard voices talking in low tones and a smell of shag tobacco met his nostrils. Putting his hand behind him to stop Winterbotham, he crept up and stood in the darkness, with the light shooting out an inch above his head.

The window was open, and putting his hand upon the sill and standing on tip-toe he peered cautiously in. He saw a small octagonal room of stone, formerly an ancient guard-room. In one corner a fire burned, and there was a massive table of old oak in the centre. On the table a bottle of whisky, two glasses and other objects which he could not for a moment distinguish.

Two men were in the room, both smoking short pipes. One, who was standing by the fire, was a tall man of a military carriage. His iron-grey hair was cut short, his moustache was waxed and his face coarse and dissipated. The other seemed but a second edition of the first.

"Well," said the man by the fire with a foul barrack room oath, "everything— well fixed up. When are you going to shave off your moustache, Blinker? ''

"Fore I turns in, Sergeant."

"Good, and I'll do the same." The man lurched to the table and poured himself a generous measure of whisky. "It's touch and go," he said, "but they can't put it on to us. 'Cause why? We've never been out of this ... prison since we come a month ago. No one has seen us except old Bogie's blooming Welsh retainers. We do the work tomorrow just 'fore it's light. It'll take twenty minutes— not more, with this new Austrian breech screw and hydraulic mechanism. We'll be dressed in them tourists' togs by then. All we've got to do when it's over is to catch up them knapsacks and get over the mountains as fast as we can, until we get down to Bangor, like unknown gents on a walking tour. It's been timed very well for us. We catch the Holyhead boat for Ireland and get on board the American liner at Queensland. Made for life, cully, made for life!

The other man helped himself to drink. Gerald saw his hand was shaking. "Well, here's luck to us," he said thickly. "But it's an awful thing we're going to do."

The big ruffian swore again. "D'ye think I'd have a hand in it if it weren't for that little affair at Aldershot nigh six months ago? Old Bogie's job come quite providential. You know where we'd be now if we hadn't run across that obliging gent, Conway Flint? You and me'd be hanged and lying in quicklime, after a 'melancholy procession' at eight o'clock in the morning."

Again the other man shuddered and stretched out his hand for the whisky. "Stow it, Blinker, you've had enough. Remember we've got to be in the shed in half an hour."

"'Ave we? What for?"

"A message come from old Bogie, and the bloke that brings it tells me that he's got a bit of skirt with him and he wants to show her Billy Buster."

"Never seen a gal in this Gawd-forsaken place before."

"I suppose a pal of his lordship come over for the fireworks tomorrow. Another twenty minutes and we'll go and light up. You've got the key of the side door, 'aven't you?"

"No, I ain't. The door's open, and I left the key in it."

"Against strict orders, Blinker. Not that it matters now. Just unfold them quiet, gentlemanly togs we 'as to wear to get away, and let's have another look at 'em."

Gerald crouched low and passed on under the band of light into the dark. A faint snap of the fingers summoned Winterbotham to follow him. When he had gone three yards he straightened himself again and leant against the stone wall. There was a rush and swirl as of deep waters in his ears. His heart leapt up and fell down, down as into a deep hollow. He stretched out his hand and tried to grip the rough stones, while the stones beneath his feet rocked, swayed, tilted, and the sense of solid things seemed to sink away from under him.

An infamy, a horror such as he had not imagined in his wildest dreams seemed unfolding before him. Even now he did not fully realize, but a half-knowledge of what was to come racked him through and through.

There was a hoarse whisper in his ear. "You've heard summat, sir. Here."

He felt the nozzle of a flask at his lips. He drank, and the brandy gave him a new strength. He made a superhuman effort and regained his calm. "Thanks," he murmured. "Follow me. It is worse than I expected."

Noiseless as cats they continued their way down the narrow passage. It was like walking at the bottom of a well, until suddenly they came out into an immense, ghostly space where the cool air circled round them.

They had arrived at the open courtyard of the castle.

On all sides the vast buildings towered into the sky. Here and there, at considerable distances, there were lights. In a far corner a door was open and shadows passed before it. To the left rose the square tower of the keep, and they saw now that many windows upon every floor glowed brightly. But where they stood they were in deepest shadow and there was not a soul about.

One word rang in Gerald's mind— "The Shed." Where was that? What was it?

He was soon to know. It was lighter here than it had been on the moor. Second by second, as his eyes became adjusted, he saw, not twenty yards away, a long, low building which was apparently set right in the centre of the courtyard. He recalled Fanshawe's map. There was an unexplained oblong upon it. Gerald frowned. First of all, the building was obviously out of place among its surroundings, and obviously modern. In shape it was like a factory building— a weaving shed or something of that sort, and even as the thought came to him he saw that the roof was glass.

He touched Winterbotham and began to glide over the gravel to the courtyard at a rapid pace. They came up to the erection. He touched it. It was a temporary structure of corrugated iron, high, long and narrow. They had struck it on one side. With the utmost care they walked towards the end and found that it consisted of huge wooden doors, like the doors of a great barn. These were closed.

"The entrance door I want to find must be round the other side"

Crash! Gerald had caught his foot in something that ran upon the ground. He just managed to stifle a cry, and Winterbotham helped him to his feet in a moment.

"It's a sunken rail. Heavy steel, too," he whispered.

"Be careful, here's another, Winterbotham. They can run some big thing out of this shed. Quick!"

He was in deadly fear that the noise of his fall might have been heard, and the two men whipped round towards the other side of the building, straining their ears in an agony of apprehension.

But there was no sound. Halfway down the opposite side they felt a wooden door. Gerald found the handle and turned it. The door opened easily, as he expected it would. This was the door of which one of the ex-soldiers— for he had recognized them for what they were— had spoken.

They crept inside the great shed.

It was pitch dark where they stood, but up above the first faint beams of the rising moon fell through the glass roof, fell upon something stark, gaunt and of inconceivable size and length, which seemed to mount towards it.

In a few brief sentences Gerald told Winterbotham all that he had heard in the passage.

"It is as Sir Ramsey said. What they have got here is a great gun, bigger than any gun has ever been before."

As he spoke he switched on his torch.

In that vast place the beam was too feeble and restricted in focus to show them much. But as it hovered here and there, tremulous and uncertain, a cry of astonishment and almost of terror burst from both of them.

Winterbotham fell against Gerald. "Put it out! Put it out, Mister Boynton!" he gasped. "I can't bear to look at such a thing."

The light went out. Gerald staggered back at the impact of the other's body and stumbled against something tall and hard, like a great steel pillar. He turned and felt with his hands. His arms encircled something hard and deadly cold. He moved a step. His arm slithered round a half-circle until his hand knocked between it and another which stretched beyond.

"Good God!" he said, "this is a forest of steel pillars!" And snatching the torch from his pocket he once more turned on the light.

The two men were standing by what seemed like a row of immense steel cones each one of them nearly nine feet high and towering above their heads. The light gleamed upon the polished surfaces, and as it travelled upwards it shone upon a network of hanging chains and pulleys above them.

The monsters stood in two battalions. Between them was a passage wide enough for a man to pass.

"What are they?" Winterbotham whispered in the same terror-stricken voice. "What are these things?

"Shells! The greatest shells the world has ever seen." Boynton raised a finger. "Listen!" There was a sound of heavy footsteps outside. "Quick, down here!" he whispered, and bolted between the steel pillars like a rabbit.

Winterbotham followed him, feeling his way, for the torch had dropped upon the floor and was extinguished.

They found a gap upon the left and squeezed through it, until they stood in a space some five feet square, walled round with steel.

Then the door beyond opened, gruff voices spoke, there was the click of a switch snapped down and the whole building flashed into a brilliancy bright as day.

Through the spaces between the tall steel columns, though hidden themselves in the shadow, the two men could see the whole expanse beyond.

Chapter 13

WHAT THE TWO MEN saw was enough to strike a chill of fear into the most stolid heart. Every detail was as clear as day. The building was a mere shell and cover for something so monstrous that it seemed but the fantasy of a disordered dream.

Imagine the Nelson Column in Trafalgar Square inclined at an angle of thirty degrees, swelling to the size of a tunnel at the breech, and mounted on a vast movable platform with an intricate mechanism of hand-wheels, hydraulic buffers, recoiling pistons and electric range dials.

From where they hid, the monster stretched away almost, it seemed, into infinity. The wicked black muzzle pointing to the roof appeared to be the length of a cricket pitch away from the breech. The thing was stunning in its immensity. It was outside all experience. The two tall artillerymen who stood on the floor of the shed seemed mere pigmies beside it. It was like a man going round the corner of a haystack and being suddenly confronted with a rat the size of a sheep.

Another detail of the genuine terror which the watchers felt was the secrecy of the whole thing. The monster was lurking in its lair all unsuspected by the outside world, a giant rumoured of, but never before seen by men, lurking in his mountain cave.

"There's nearly half an hour yet," said one of the artillerymen. "What's the good of waiting here? They'll ring us up when his lordship's coming with the gal."

They turned and went away noisily.

The door had hardly shut behind them when, disregarding all caution, Gerald ran out of the hiding place among the shells. He sprang up the steps of the gun carriage and ran his trembling hands over the nearest part of the breech. Then he whipped his revolver from his pocket and began tapping all round. A curious muffled ring— quite unlike the ring of metal— reverberated in the shed.

"He's done it," he cried out to Winterbotham, forgetting everything but the keen professional instinct, the joy of a craftsman confronted by a masterpiece. "Fanshawe's done it, Winterbotham. He has solved the great problem. Here, for the first time in the history of the world, is paper harder than steel!" His face was flushed, his eyes sparkling, he was terribly excited.

A warning word from below recalled him to himself. "That'll wait, Mister Boynton. Come down quick off yon devil. They may be here again at any minute."

Slowly and reluctantly Boynton climbed down, to find himself hurried once more into shelter.

"Man, ye must be mad, carrying on in that way!"

"Winterbotham, can't you understand, can't you understand what a revolution this will make in the world? Everything will be altered now. Think of it! That gun has been made in sections at our works and brought here and assembled. It must weigh a hundred times less than a twelve-inch gun on a battleship. It is marvellous. Fanshawe is one of the greatest geniuses the world has ever seen."

"Keep your voice lower, Mister Boynton. And I doubt if he isn't one of the biggest scoundrels too. What's the thing doing here? That's what I want to know. What's it for? D'ye think Miss Milton knows?"

The colour faded from Gerald's face. He breathed hard and was silent. Then he put his hand upon the other's shoulder. "You're right, Winterbotham," he said, "a thousand times right. I had lost myself for the moment. I'd forgotten everything."

"So I saw, sir," the little man answered dryly. "You forgot that we were here to get Miss Milton out of the hands of wicked men, and also the trifling fact that our lives, at a generous computation, are worth about a penny farthing each at this precise moment."

Gerald became himself in an instant. "Look," he said, "in a very few minutes, according to what those ruffians said, Miss Milton will be brought here by Lord Llandrylas. No doubt the soldiers will come back too. I understand she is to be shown this gun, and probably she is fooling Lord Llandrylas to the top of his bent and trying to find out the whole secret."

"It would be just like her," said Winterbotham. "She must know by this time that we are trying to rescue her. She would make no mistake about that. She is just holding on."

"That's what I am hoping, Winterbotham. There will be three men, provided no one else comes into the shed. They will be quite unprepared for us. You have the gas and I have my revolver. It ought to be an easy job. We must do it as quietly as possible, for the castle is swarming with men, no doubt. Then we must hurry Miss Milton to the door in the moat— fight our way there if necessary." His voice died away, for Winterbotham placed his hand upon his mouth.

There was a grating sound outside and then for a moment everything seemed the colour of red flame to Gerald, as three people entered.

One was Lord Llandrylas, dressed as he had been the night before, and by his side walked Violet Milton. She was deadly pale. Her eyes glowed with an unnatural brilliance, and Gerald saw— as well as he was able to see anything in the fury of his emotions— that she kept her hand upon her breast. But with a great throb of relief he saw that her walk was confident and strong, and though she looked strung up to the very highest pitch she was mistress of all her powers.

Just behind Violet and Lord Llandrylas came an extraordinary little object, which slithered along the concrete floor and mewed to itself like a cat as it did so. He heard the hiss of Winterbotham's breath, and staring again made out that the figure was that of a woman, a dwarf of incalculable age. She was dressed in the ancient Welsh costume, with a steeple-crowned hat, like a doll at a bazaar.

The little group was standing in full view near the middle of the gun, and then Lord Llandrylas raised his arm. "There!" he cried in a deep, resonant voice. "That is what you saw last night from the top of the tower, creeping out from this shed, ready to do its work."

Violet did not answer immediately.

Gerald saw that she was trembling, but whether from excitement or fear he could not determine, but he grasped his revolver in his hand and waited.

"It is a cannon," Violet said at length.

"It is the avenger of Wales! All other guns in the world are like children's toys compared to this one. Last night the dread powers which live among the hills and speak to me of the past spoke to you also. It was vouchsafed to you to know of what material the avenger is made. Now you see it! This creation of two great geniuses, inspired by myself and the spirits of the Cromlech, can send a mass of metal weighing many tons hurtling through the air for more than fifty miles, and tomorrow at dawn she speaks!"

Lord Llandrylas paused for dramatic effect. Then he said, "The answer of King Hywel Dda the Second to the insolent marauders of Liverpool, who burnt Castle Ynad in his day, will be spoken at dawn. Those great shells you see at the end of this place"— he waved to where Gerald and Winterbotham were concealed— "are of a size unknown before and filled with an explosive so deadly that even one of them would destroy a small town. And within an hour twenty of those monsters will fall on Liverpool and reduce the proud city to ashes. I, Carradoc David Llewellyn Pantydwr, King of North Wales, have said it. And for evermore I shall reign here undisturbed, with you as my bride."

Violet laughed. The silvery tinkle rang out musically in that place of terror. The man at her side turned and glared at her. His face now came into full view, and Gerald could see that it was working like that of a maniac. All sign of sanity and reason had gone, and yet even now in his supreme madness the man was great.

"You laugh!" he cried. "You laugh when the king deigns to tell his will?"

"I laughed, Lord Llandrylas," she answered, "to think that you are so deceived. That is a toy, a dummy thing."

Lord Llandrylas snarled with rage and stamped upon the ground. He stepped to the door and his voice was heard ringing in the courtyard. A moment afterwards the two soldiers came hurrying in. Lord Llandrylas gave them some quick directions.

"Now," he said, "you shall see if the avenger is a toy. You shall see it sighted and loaded by electrical and hydraulic machinery invented by the two greatest experts in the world."

There was a swish and clank of the hydraulic pistons as the two artillerymen, both somewhat the worse for drink, staggered round the complicated breech mechanism of the gun. Then the immense muzzle sank slowly and described a horizontal arc of several degrees. Despite its size, the sergeant at the wheel could control it as easily as the hands of a watch.

Violet stood watching intently. Gerald knew that she was trying to memorize every detail, game to the very last, unafraid even at this supreme moment, and in his heart he bowed down and worshipped her.

As the great gun swung round there came a horrible diversion. The ancient dwarf began to chuckle and make strange noises. Then, looking upwards with her horny, parrot-like eyes, she started to slither about in an uncouth dance, holding her wide black velvet skirt with two withered hands. Then with a final crow of what seemed like exultation she threw herself upon the ground and worshipped the monster.

"She knows," the earl shouted. "Glwadys, my old nurse— and your slave, Lady of the Mist— worships the avenger!"

Suddenly Violet drew herself to her full height and turned away from Lord Llandrylas. Her voice rang out clear and stern. "Men!" she cried to the soldiers, "I am an English lady, captive here against my will! You are men, not maniacs; you are soldiers. Come to my help!"

The two artillerymen stopped work and stared stupidly at her.

"Now then, sir," said Winterbotham, "you tackle his lordship and I'll do for the other blokes."

He slipped away through the shells like a cat, paused for a single instant at the opening and then leapt on to the gun emplacement with one bound. Gerald just heard a loud shout of alarm and the hiss of escaping gas as he plunged by, calling to Violet.

She gave a cry of welcome and tottered against the wall of the shed. Lord Llandrylas stood like a statue of ebony for a moment, and then without a word hurled himself at Gerald, who fired straight at him as he came.

The shot missed. The long, leaping figure crashed upon Gerald, who fell heavily at the impact, his revolver falling from his hand.

It might have been all up with the younger man, for the floor was of concrete, but the old Oxford three-quarters, who had played in the parks in hard winter weather, just managed to save his head. The old instinct held true. Bracing all the muscles of his neck, he just kept his head off the deadening floor and twisted round a few inches as the black, raging figure came upon him.

Gerald's arms were wide spread in the fall. The other had pounced upon him like a tiger, hands ready, feet gathered up. It was a fearful onslaught.

Two tremendous forces were antagonized. A man of immense physical power, incredibly increased by mania, was fighting for his life with cool, temperate and athletic youth, informed in every vein and muscle with the fires of love.

A loud, exultant cry pealed up in that brightly lit arena. It was a savage cry of combat bursting from the lungs of one who was at grips with his enemy at last.

And then low, panting gasps and the groans of wrestlers engaged in a mighty conflict.

Fingers like tentacles of steel were feeling over Gerald's face, sliding down to the chin and then fastening on his throat. There was a sigh of satisfaction as the fingers sank into the neck muscles and a hot, flame-like breath came upon Gerald's face. He drew up his feet and sent the whole strength of his body into the muscles of his loins and back. For the moment his arms were powerless. Then, with a stupendous effort, he managed to throw his antagonist a little to one side, though the grip on his throat was closing tighter and tighter and his lungs seemed bursting.

Now his right arm was free to work. His left was doubled under his shoulder. He had leverage, and his arm was like a flail. He clenched his fist and brought it down with all its force upon the back of the earl's head. A direct blow, delivered with such force, would have broken in the base of the skull and ended the fight, but it was only a blow at quarter-arm.

He heard a dull snarl above him, and between the red light and the flashing stars he saw the furious devil-face an inch above his own wince and tighten.

A quick thought came to him. He passed his hand almost caressingly over the other's head. As he touched the crisp black hair he felt as if little electric sparks were coming from it and stinging him. Then he caught the man's ear. He heaved his whole body a little to the left— thus giving Lord Llandrylas a momentary chance to restore his equilibrium— and gripping the ear with all the force of his fingers nearly tore it off. There was an instantaneous slackening of all power in his antagonist, and that gave Gerald his chance. He writhed his neck away from the cruel hands, and for a few seconds the two men lay side by side, glaring into each other's face, panting and impotent.

The fury of this encounter had not occupied more than twenty seconds. As he lay there, Gerald heard Winterbotham rushing up towards them and shouting, "Miss Violet, I'm here! It's all right, we're here!"

"Violet!" He raised his head an inch and saw her. She was sinking down by the side of the shed, her eyes closing, her mouth opening, swooning out of consciousness. At the same moment he heard, or he thought he heard, the rush of many feet.

He made a supreme effort.

"Winterbotham!" he called. "I can manage this man. Miss Milton is fainting. Get her out of this, quick! Remember your promise."

A shadow passed over his face. Winterbotham had leapt. With one corner of his eye Gerald saw the little man catching up the swooning girl, and then with a serpentine quiver and heave, the terrible antagonist beside him got to work once more.

For a moment new strength came to Gerald. Violet was safe! He was nearly certain of that. He knew Winterbotham too well to doubt him. He had seen him catch her up and vanish. The rush across the courtyard to the door opening on the moat would only be the work of a few seconds. Yes, Violet was safe!

With a sudden movement he twisted his legs round the other's, and at the same time bent his head and butted Lord Llandrylas full in the face. He knew by now of what a deadly grip the earl's hands were capable— anything rather than have them at his neck again, slowly choking the life out of him. Then with his right arm he caught the earl by the wrist and strove with all his strength to turn the arm and dislocate it in its socket. But it was like a bar of steel in his semi-prone position. He had no real leverage, though with all his might he tried to get on top of his antagonist.

The struggle partially turned the earl and so loosened his left arm, which up till now had been doubled underneath. Then he felt a hand slowly creeping round to the back of his head. Fingers— or a knuckle, was it?— began to press horribly upon the top of the spine, just at the juncture of the neck. There was a dull, roaring sound in his ears. Power seemed ebbing from him in a flood. His mind had just time to formulate the thought that this was a famous Japanese wrestling trick of which he had heard, when there came a little distinct "snick," and then everything flashed away into darkness.

When he came to himself, his first sensation was that of a red-hot iron at his neck. A blue, misty light danced and quivered before his eyes, and something vast and black seemed overhanging him. Little by little, as his senses returned, he became aware that he was lying on his back, his feet bound tightly at the ankles and his arms strapped to his sides. He was utterly powerless, but apart from the violent pain he believed no bones were broken.

Moment by moment things became clearer, and when at length full consciousness returned he saw that he was lying directly underneath the muzzle of the monster cannon, which rose at an angle some fourteen feet above him. He heard voices and the sound of splashing water.

Then came footsteps, a shadow, and Lord Llandrylas was bending over him and gazing into his face. "Who are you that has dared to disturb me in my castle and who has taken my bride from me?"

The voice was hardly human, the face worked with devilish passion. Horrible as it was, the knell of doom as he knew it to be, Gerald yet heard that voice with a throb of exultation. It was true, then. Winterbotham had been successful. Violet was safe!

Gerald did not answer. He smiled up at the distorted face above him. It hung and swayed like a horrible nightmare, and then it whipped away out of the bound man's sight.

A wild screech echoed and ran through the shed, indescribably melancholy and forlorn, yet mingled with hideous passion. In all his after-life, Gerald never forgot that sound.

"They have taken her from me. Revenge! Revenge is left!"

The noise was so intense, so nerve-shattering, that when it died away in a long wail the silence almost hurt. Then through that grey, stunning silence came the silvery strokes of a bell— a clock had struck the hour of four.

Gerald lay staring up at the vast, curved belly of the gun muzzle. He remembered. More than fifty miles away the great city of Liverpool, which he loved, and in which all his best life had been spent, was already turning in her sleep. Dawn was at hand. Violet was safe! Yes! But the terrible engine of destruction was ready to begin its work. He saw it all in one super sensual flash of vision— the pride of the North waking to its morning of doom. He could do nothing, nothing!

Winterbotham knew, but Winterbotham was taking Violet to safety. The colossal crime of the madman would be consummated before there was the slightest possibility of relief.

The realization occupied but a moment of time. The four silvery strokes of the clock gong had hardly died away when the whole incredible horror of what was going to happen had burnt itself into his brain.

One! Two! Three! Four! Then came a soft, grating noise, a mewing noise, and turning his head he saw the little dwarf slithering up to Lord Llandrylas. She was holding out a dagger of polished steel in her hand, waving it about and looking up to his great height like a dog which had retrieved something unusual and wanted to understand. Guttural Welsh came pouring from her as she crouched in front of him.

Then there was another sound, a lurching and crunching of heavy boots, and a filthy oath.

The big, debauched sergeant of artillery, his face purple and swollen, his eyes almost starting out of his head, came into the helpless man's range of vision.

"Damn you!" he hurled at the earl, who was now standing a short distance away. "What you done to me and my mate, Blinker? You? You've poisoned him, and tried to do me in too, you and your gun. You!"

Gerald saw Lord Llandrylas turn and deal the staggering man a furious smack with his open hand. It sounded upon that purple countenance like the crack of a whip.

The artilleryman's arm shot out instantly with the instinct of the trained boxer. It just touched the earl upon the shoulder, and then the little dwarf, still clasping the dagger which Violet had dropped, flung herself at the man's legs and twisted herself round them, chattering and shouting in a high, staccato voice.

He staggered and almost fell, just as Lord Llandrylas crouched himself to spring as he had sprung at Gerald before.

With an oath the ex-sergeant tried to free himself of the writhing, screaming little encumbrance round his legs. He could not do so, but as Lord Llandrylas sprang the man bent aside, snatched the dagger from the dwarf's hand and plunged it into earl's body with a triumphant shout.

There was one loud cry of agony, a thud and— silence.

Gerald had said no word as he watched, made no sign, but now he shouted. "Sergeant!" he said. "Get rid of that little horror quickly. You and I must get out of this or we're done in!" He had used precisely the words that could penetrate to the drugged and drunken mind of the soldier.

The little creature round his legs rolled off in a ball and lay still on the concrete floor.

"Right you are, sir, we must"— the man swayed and stared and his jaw dropped— "we must get out of this and quick too."

"Cut the cord at my ankles and undo this strap."

It seemed an eternity as the man fumbled with his bonds, but at last Gerald was free.

"Now lift me up. I want to get some blood into my veins again."

He was lifted up, and for a moment he and the soldier staggered in a horrible embrace— and they parted. Gerald pointed to the body of Lord Llandrylas.

"You see what you've done?" he said. "You had better clear out of here as quickly as possible. We shall have all the servants of the castle here in a few minutes."

"You're a pal," said the sergeant. "You gimme your 'and. There ain't no servants. Old Bogie sent them all off for two days' holiday."

"Then you had better make tracks without a minute's delay. You nearly swung once before, but this time there will be no doubt about it."

"I dunno who you are, guv'nor, but you're right. Suit of gentlemanly togs for me and Blinker, tourist gents'. But we got to fire that there gun. Captain of battery's orders."

Gerald had been watching his chance. He hit the man full upon the jaw and he went down like a log. Gerald knew that he would not rise again for many hours. Then, walking as if in a dream, he passed out of the shed into the courtyard of the castle.

Dawn was just touching the battlements with long red spears. There was not a sound or sign of human life, only a great skein of rooks went clanging overhead as he turned towards the guard house. He stumbled onwards until he had passed out of the narrow passage and stood on the steps leading to the waters of the moat.

The boat was moored upon the other side and he knew that all had gone well with Violet. Then he dived into the cool, cleansing water and came up against the opposite bank in a single movement.

Scrambling up, he found himself upon the heather, and the light growing stronger every moment. He hurried along the path towards the main road to the castle gate. When he reached it he turned and looked at the immense and frowning pile. There it stood, growing brighter and brighter as the sun came up from the east away over against Liverpool, and he thought he had never seen a place so evil, so sinister and so dead.

He turned his back upon Castle Ynad, the only moving figure in the vast landscape of moor and mountain peaks. He went on steadily, his blood assuming its accustomed course through his veins, and he looked back no more.

When he came near the quarry head the sea was all golden, and far away to the right the little village of Pwylog gleamed like a pearl. Two great, tawny dogs came crouching up to him. They were immense— larger than any dogs he had ever seen— but they fawned and whimpered until he had placed his hands upon their heads.

It was as though they knew that the reign of Castle Ynad was over.

IT WAS TWO MONTHS after, and Mr. Terence "Bud" Kinsolving, the famous New York financier, was talking to Mrs. Herbert Wilkins in that lady's private sitting room at the Midland Adelphi Hotel, Liverpool.

"Well," he said, "I sail in two hours, Mrs. Wilkins, but I guess there's time to run round the city and size it up."

Mrs. Herbert Wilkins started. "But you only arrived from New York last night, Mr. Kinsolving," she said.

"Sure, but I've no time to waste. I came over for the nuptials, and I've seen the nuptials, and a fine, highbrow ceremony it's been, Mrs. Wilkins— all the leading citizens of the burg."

"Well, of course, dear Violet owns a great amount of property, you know, Mr. Kinsolving."

"She's a daisy," said the financier, "and she's not a bit changed from when she was performing chores in my office in New York. And I like the look of that young fellow too. Nickel-steel nerve there."

At that moment a waiter entered with a tea table.

"Just a cup of tea, Mr. Kinsolving?" said Mrs. Herbert Wilkins with an ingratiating smile. She was happy. True, she had lost an admirable situation, but the day before she had banked a certain cheque— a beautiful cheque!

"So as I can make myself long of it in five minutes, I accept your invitation, Mrs. Wilkins," said the American, sitting down with a jerk. "Say, some small ornithological specimen has whispered in my ear that there are circumstances of especial romance to this meeting of two twin souls."

"Ah!" said the old lady, very much in her element now, "so even you've heard something, Mr. Kinsolving?

"Rumour has been busy, Mrs. Wilkins," Bud remarked dryly. "Why did the Lord Mayor of this burg say to the glad groom that he had saved Liverpool? Get my wireless?"

Mrs. Herbert Wilkins understood the sense if not the letter of Bud's inquiry.

"In the confidential position which I held towards darling Violet I cannot, of course, tell you everything. As to the saving of Liverpool, my lips are sealed."

This was literally true, as Mrs. Herbert Wilkins had been allowed to know nothing whatever about a certain remarkable invention formerly of Castle Ynad, that was now being subjected to some very interesting and exhaustive tests at one of his Majesty's forts near Plymouth.

"Wal, what about the earl?" the American asked bluntly. "That's what I'm on."

Mrs. Herbert Wilkins sighed. "His death was a great loss to us all," she said in a mournful voice. "Violet and I were staying close to the castle when it occurred. Indeed, Mr. Kinsolving— of course you must let this go no further— I had hopes at one time that dear Violet might contract a union of a very different nature. It was his lordship's dearest wish, but alas, the hand of Death cut him short and—"

"She married t'other fellow instead. Quite so. Wal, I hadn't the pleasure of Lord Llandrylas' acquaintance. He never came to America for a bride. But I don't think Miss Violet would have done better than she has."

But then Bud Kinsolving, unlike Mrs. Herbert Wilkins, had not spent the greater portion of his life, even in a somewhat menial capacity, among the British aristocracy.

The End

Table of Contents

- Chapter 1
- Chapter 2
- Chapter 3
- Chapter 4
- Chapter 5
- Chapter 6
- Chapter 7
- Chapter 8
- Chapter 9
- Chapter 10
- Chapter 11
- Chapter 12
- Chapter 13