Kitabı oku: «Johnstone of the Border», sayfa 9

CHAPTER XVI
TRAILING THE MOTORCYCLE

For a few minutes Whitney's machine turned in and out of narrow streets between rows of tall, old houses, and then went cautiously down the dip to the Nith. There was some traffic on the bridge, and when they had crossed, carts encumbered the road on the Galloway side. Whitney fumed at the delay; but he opened out his engine as they entered a stretch of open road, and the wind began to fan Andrew's face.

For a mile in front of them the river-plain ran level, the stubble shining yellow among squares of pasture and the dark green of turnip-fields; then a ridge of hills rose steeply across their way. The sun that flooded the valley with mellow light was getting low, and while the trees upon the summit of the ridge stood out sharply distinct, the wooded slopes were steeped in soft blue shadow.

"Looks like a climb," Whitney remarked. "I suppose we go right up there?"

"Maxwellton braes," said Andrew. "I expect you have heard of then. It's an easy gradient up a long glen."

"Then sit tight, and we'll rush her up on the top gear."

The dust whirled behind them, and the cropped hedgerows spun past; they swung giddily round a curve at a bridge, and the throb of the engine grew louder as they breasted the hill. Dark firs streamed down to meet them; here and there a leafless birch and an oak that gleamed like burnished copper swept by. There was a tinkle of running water in the wood; and, now that they were out of the sunshine, the air felt keen. Ahead, the ascending road unrolled like a white riband through faint, shifting lights and lilac shadow.

Soon the glen ran out into a wide hollow that led westward across a tableland. Low, green hills with gently rounded tops shut off the rugged moors beyond; the shallow vale was cultivated and tame, but the road was good, and Andrew felt the thrill of speed. Long fields and stone dykes swept behind into the trail of dust. The sun sank toward a bank of slate-colored cloud; its rays raked the valley, throwing the black shadows of the scattered ash-trees far across the fields.

Andrew kept his eyes fixed steadily upon the road. This ran, for the most part, straight and level; but, though they were traveling very fast, there was no speeding streak of dust ahead.

After a time a long white village rose from the rolling pasture; and when they ran in among the low houses Whitney pulled up. There was a smith's shop by the roadside, and a man stood outside, holding a cartwheel, while another moved a glowing iron hoop amid the flame of a circular fire.

"You have been watching that tire heat for a while, I guess," said Whitney.

"Lang enough," the other answered. "She's no' stretching weel."

"Then have you seen a small, black motorcycle pass?"

"No; there was a big gray yin, an' anither with a side-car."

"How long have you been outside?"

"Maybe twenty minutes; maybe a few mair."

"Thanks," said Whitney; and started the motorcycle.

"It's curious. He's traveling light, but I don't think a single-cylinder engine could beat the machine I'm driving by a quarter of an hour. Anyhow, I'll try to speed her up."

The sunlight faded off the grass as they raced away; the slaty clouds rolled higher up the sky; and the wind that whipped their faces bit keen. Andrew was swung to and fro in the rocking car, and sometimes felt uneasy when his comrade dashed furiously round the bends; but for most of the way the road ran straight, and they could see nothing on the long, white streak ahead. After a time they came to a narrow loch, ruffled by the wind, that lay in a lonely, grassy waste, and as they ran past the thin wood on its edge Andrew asked Whitney to stop.

"A motor scout," he said, indicating a man in uniform who rode leisurely toward them on a bicycle.

The scout dismounted when they called to him, and said he had left Castle Douglas an hour before and had kept to the main road, but had not seen a single-cylinder motorcycle. They let him go and Whitney lighted a cigarette.

"Now," he said, "we have to think. Our man pulled out for Castle Douglas, but hasn't gone there; my notion is that he didn't mean to. Where's he likely to have headed?"

"It's hard to tell. A road runs northwest to New Galloway, but I can't see what would take him there. It's a small place on the edge of the moors."

"And right away from the Eskdale road!" Whitney ejaculated, looking hard at him.

"Well," said Andrew quietly, "I'll admit I thought of that."

"As a matter of fact, you've been thinking of something like it for quite a time."

Andrew was silent for a moment or two.

"There was a chance of my being mistaken," he said slowly. "However, I now feel that it's my duty to get upon the fellow's track, if I can."

"Would you rather I dropped out?"

Andrew knew that the suggestion was prompted by delicacy, but he made a negative sign.

"After all, you know something, and may as well know the rest – if there is anything more to learn. Besides, you're quicker than I am in several ways, and I might want you."

"When you do, you'll find me ready," Whitney answered. "But we'll get back to business. Which way do you suppose he's gone?"

"On the whole, I think south toward Dalbeattie; it's nearer the Solway. As it might be better to follow the road he'd take, we'll have to run back nearly to Dumfries."

"That's all right," said Whitney. "Get in. She seems to be feeling particularly good to-day, and I'm going to let her hum."

They raced back eastward while the distant hills turned gray in front of them. Then they turned sharply to the south, and soon the road skirted a railway line. Whitney got down when they reached a station.

"Have you seen a small, black motorcycle?" he asked a lounging porter.

"Yes; I mind her because I thought she was running verra hard for a wee machine. If yon man's a friend o' yours, ye'll no' catch him easy."

"When did he pass?"

"It would be about five minutes after the Stranraer goods cam' through, and that's an hour ago."

Whitney ran back to his machine and jumped into the saddle.

"We're on his trail, but he must have come straight and fast from Dumfries. Well, we'll get after him."

The car leaped forward as the clutch took hold; dykes and trees swept down the road; and Criffell's bold ridge rose higher against the eastern sky. Here and there a loch gleamed palely in the desolate tableland, and in the distance a river caught the fading light, but the cloud-bank was spreading fast and the west getting dim. At last they saw from the top of a rise a gray haze stretched across a hollow, and Andrew told his comrade that it was the smoke of Dalbeattie. Then a man with a spade and barrow came into view on the slope of another hill, and Andrew asked Whitney to stop. The man was cutting back the grass edges on the roadside; he had not seen a bicycle of the kind they described.

"How long have you been here?" Andrew asked.

"Since seven o'clock this morning."

Whitney started the car slowly, and pulled up when the roadmender was hidden behind the hill.

"We want to talk this over," he said. "Williamson left the road between the station and where we met the man. We know he hasn't gone west or farther south. What about the east?"

Andrew glanced at Criffell, which rose between them and the sea. Its summit cut sharply against the sky, but its slopes were blurred and gray and the stone dykes that ran toward its foot had lost their continuity of outline. Two or three miles away, to the southeast, the mountain ran down in a long ridge.

"It's obvious that he hasn't gone over the top. He could cross the shoulder yonder, but he'd have some trouble."

"He'd have to leave the motorcycle."

"That's so," said Andrew thoughtfully. "There's an old road between here and the station and he might reach the moors by what we call a loaning – a green track that sometimes leads to a farm or cothouse and sometimes ends in a bog. Of course, if he found one and crossed the hill on foot, he'd cut the main road from Dumfries round the coast before he reached the Solway beach."

"You're taking it for granted that he'd try to make the beach – which means the wreck."

"Yes," said Andrew quietly; "I believe it's what he'd do."

"Well, there are two things to note. He could have gone straight from Dumfries by a good road on the other side of the mountain, but he preferred this way and a rough climb across. Then he started for Castle Douglas, when he might as well have told the garage people he was going to Dalbeattie. This implies that he'd a pretty good reason for covering his trail." Whitney paused and looked hard at Andrew. "Before we go any farther, you have to decide whether you really want to find out that reason. You can quit the business now, but you may not be able to do so afterward."

"I'd rather stop, but I must go on," said Andrew grimly.

"Very well; we'll try to follow him."

They drove back, passing the roadmender, who leaned upon his spade looking after them; and a little while later Whitney pulled up at a broken gate that hung open. A rough track, grown with grass, led away from it between loose stone walls.

"Not intended for automobiles!" Whitney remarked, as he cautiously steered between the ruts. "Williamson must have found it easier than we do."

Andrew nodded. His comrade's eyes were keen, for only a crushed tuft of grass here and there suggested the track of a bicycle tire. Farther along they stopped at a gate where the loaning forked. One branch ran on; the other turned off, and in the distance a lonely white house showed amidst a clump of bare, wind-bent trees.

"He would not have gone to the farm," said Whitney. "Jump down and open the gate."

They went on again carefully, but after a time the loaning got very rough and rushes grew across it where the ground was soft. After narrowly escaping an upset into the ditch on one side, Whitney stopped.

"I guess this is as far as she'll take us, and I see a peat-stack where we could leave her."

Lifting down a small fir that closed a gap in the wall, they pushed the motorcycle across a strip of heath and against a pile of turf; and then they stopped to look about.

The light was rapidly going and the wind was falling. In front lay a stretch of moor, seamed by black peat-hags, in some of which water glistened; beyond the moor rough heather-covered slopes ran up to the black hillcrest. A curlew whistled overhead, and the sharp cry of a grouse rose from the darkening heath. Except for this, it was very still and the landscape looked strangely desolate. Not far ahead a patch of roof showed faintly among some stunted ash-trees.

"A cothouse," said Andrew in surprise.

"We'll look at it," Whitney answered, and started for the building.

One end had fallen down, but half the thatch remained upon the bending rafters. The rest had gone, and it was plain that the cot had been abandoned for a long time. Crossing a ditch by a rotten plank, they stood knee-deep among withered nettles at the door, and the ruined walls struck a mournful note in the gathering dark.

"There's a track here," said Whitney. "I guess the sheep go in."

He struck a match as they entered, and, avoiding stones and fallen beams, they made for the door of an inner room. When they reached it, Whitney struck another match, and smiled as he held it up, for the light fell upon a single-cylinder motorcycle with a gun-case strapped to the carrier.

"Well," he said, "I expected this. If we cross the end of the hill going southeast, we would strike the sands somewhere abreast of the wreck?"

"Yes."

"How's the tide?"

"High-water's about one o'clock. That means it's a big tide and, of course, runs out a long way on the ebb."

"Then the sands will be dry and there'll be no gutters to cross. Well, I guess it's a long walk, but we've got to make it. Take your overalls off."

Three or four minutes later they left the cothouse and struck across the heath. There was no track, but Andrew headed for a knoll on the mountain's sloping shoulder. After they left the level, the heather grew tall and strong, brushing about their knees and entangling their feet. Then there were awkward rabbit-holes and granite boulders scattered about, and they bruised their shins as they laboriously plodded upward. The light had almost gone, and there was nothing visible but the stretch of shadowy hillside in front.

Whitney heard Andrew breathing hard, and imagined that his injured leg was giving him trouble.

"Are we rushing it too much?" he asked.

"I can hold out until we get to the top, and I'll be all right then. It's gripping the brae with the side of my foot that bothers me."

He went on without slackening speed, and the slope grew easier and the light breeze keener. Then the stretch of heather which had shut off their view suddenly fell away, and they looked down through the soft darkness on to a vast, black plain. There was nothing to distinguish land from sea; but a faint cluster of lights that pricked the gloom like pin-points marked the English-shore, and farther off the flickering glare of blast-furnaces was reflected in the sky. In the middle distance, a twinkle showed where the Solway lightship guarded the fairway through the shoals; but there was no light near them, nor any sound except the distant murmur of the sea. They stood remote from the homes of men in the mountain solitude.

Andrew, stooping behind a mass of granite, struck a match and took out his watch.

"We haven't much time to spare. I wish I knew if the lightship yonder was still riding to the ebb," he said. "There's a burn somewhere below us and running water is generally a good guide down."

They went on, floundering through tangled heather and falling into rabbit-burrows, until the tinkle of water reached them softly. After that they wound downhill beside the growing burn, past brakes of thorn and hazel and over banks of stones, until a long wood led them to the road. Following the wood for a time they went down again through smooth pasture and turnip-fields and came to a wall that ran along the beach. The empty space beyond it looked black and lonely, and the mournful crying of wildfowl came out of the gloom, but at some distance a beam from a lighthouse cast its reflection upon the sloppy sand.

"Can you hit the wreck from here?" Whitney asked.

"I'll try," said Andrew. "It's a long way, and the tide must be on the turn."

They took off their boots, and as they launched out across the dark level the sand felt sharply cold. Here and there they splashed through pools, but for the most part the bank was ribbed with hard ridges. The shore soon vanished; Criffell's black bulk grew blurred and shapeless against the sky; and they had only the misty beam from the lighthouse for guide. Whitney, however, imagined that Andrew was going straight, which was comforting, when they came to a wide depression where water glimmered. He thought this was the channel that had stopped them before, and he felt somewhat uneasy as he waded in. There was now no boat they could retreat to on the other side of the wreck.

The water, however, hardly covered their ankles; and some time afterward Andrew touched Whitney's arm as a dim, formless mass rose from the sand. It got plainer as they cautiously approached it, their bare feet falling noiselessly, and in a minute or two they stopped and listened beside the wreck. There was no sound but the drip of water, and Andrew, grasping a broken beam, swung himself up. Whitney followed, his nerves tense, his muscles braced; and he held his breath when he dropped into the forecastle. The next moment a pale light sprang up, and he saw Andrew holding out a match. The feeble glow spread along the wet planks and filled the forecastle before the match went out, and Whitney was more relieved than disappointed to see that nobody else was there.

"We have missed him," he said. "Take my box; they're wax and burn better than the wooden kind."

Andrew struck another light, and it burned clearer. The candle they had used and replaced on the last visit had gone, but two or three matches floated in a pool. He picked them up and Whitney examined them closely.

"These are quite fresh," he said. "Looks as if they'd just been struck, though we can't be sure of that. Extra thick wax, same make as mine; I got the best I could, because I wanted them to light the bicycle lamp."

Then the match burned low, and Andrew threw it down.

"It proves nothing except that the man who used them wanted a good article. The make is well known, but in this part of the country you couldn't find it except at a tobacconist's."

"That's a point. Anything is good enough for a fisherman or a sailor to get a light with. The fellow who came here must have meant to have the best."

"After all, the matches don't tell us who he is," Andrew said slowly.

"They don't, but they may help us later. And now we'll hustle for the beach. It would be awkward if we found the tide running up the gutter."

They set off across the sands and waded through the channel without trouble. Reaching land, they put on their boots and laboriously struggled up the dark hill. Both were tired when they floundered down through the heather on the other side, but they found the boggy heath, and came at last to the cothouse. As they expected, the motorcycle was no longer there. They trudged on to the peat-stack, and shortly afterward Whitney started his machine, and with some difficulty kept out of the ruts and ditches until he turned into the highroad.

CHAPTER XVII
THE MATCHBOX

The dead leaves were driving round Appleyard before a boisterous wind that lashed the granite walls with bitter rain. A fire had been lighted in the drawing-room, and Staffer sat talking to his sister. Mrs. Woodhouse was a quiet woman, generally content to remain in the background; and the influence she exercised at Appleyard was, as a rule, negative. She rarely claimed authority, even over her daughter, or openly interfered, but the things she disapproved of were seldom done. Now her usually placid face was firm.

The drawing-room door was open, and she watched Williamson, who stood near Elsie in the hall. His pose was gracefully easy as he smiled at a remark of the girl's. He looked suave and well-bred, but Mrs. Woodhouse's expression hardened.

"Will that man be here long?" she asked, when Williamson and Elsie moved away.

Staffer gave her a quick glance. It was desirable that his relations with Williamson should be cordial, but of late his guest had shown some reserve. It was so slight that Staffer, knowing of no cause for their disagreement, felt it instinctively rather than noticed it by any particular sign. For all that, something had come between them, and he wondered whether his sister was to blame for this.

"It looks as if you didn't wish him to stay," he said.

"I don't. His society is not good for Dick."

Staffer smiled, though he was puzzled. On his last visit Williamson had rather avoided Dick.

"He can't do him much harm; and, after all, it does not look as if Dick would marry Elsie, as we once thought was possible."

"No; Elsie will not marry him, and I would not wish it, if she were willing."

Staffer was somewhat surprised.

"Then why need you bother about him?" he said. "If he indulges in foolish extravagances, it's his affair."

She looked at Staffer with a listless expression.

"I don't think you would understand; but I do not want him to come to harm."

"Well, there's something else to talk about. It won't be long before Dick is his own master, and we must leave Appleyard. This will make a big difference, because our means are small and Elsie has been taught no profession. What will she do then, unless she marries somebody?"

"I do not know," Mrs. Woodhouse answered in a placid tone.

Staffer mastered his impatience, for his sister sometimes baffled him, and there was a matter of importance about which he wished to sound her.

"I'm sorry you seem to have a prejudice against Williamson. Is it only on Dick's account?"

"No; I feel that he may bring trouble to us all. We were happier before his visits began. There is a difference now at Appleyard, and I don't like mystery. Why does he call himself Williamson?"

"Ah! You imagine it is not his name?"

"I have known for some time that it is not."

Staffer felt disturbed. His sister had been shrewder than he expected, and he wondered whether anybody else shared her suspicions; but her statement gave him the lead he wanted.

"Well," he said, "I dare say you can see that to use his proper name just now might make things unpleasant for him."

"He did not use it when he first came here, and nobody would have minded it then."

"I'm not certain; these Scots are prejudiced against foreigners; but it's hard to see why you should dislike the man because he is one of us." He paused and looked at her reproachfully. "Have you forgotten the people you belong to, Gretchen, and where you were born?"

Mrs. Woodhouse's face was troubled, but there was a hint of firmness in her voice as she answered.

"I have not forgotten. But when I married I knew I must choose between my country and my husband's; one could not belong to both. I chose his; his people became mine. He was a good man – I think there are not many like him – and I was happy. When he died, I tried to bring up his daughter as he would have her."

"You succeeded. Elsie is a Scot," Staffer remarked with a sneer.

Something in her face warned him that his sister was not to be moved. It was seldom she had shown him her deeper feelings, but she had a mother's heart, against which he could not prevail. She might have made him a useful if not altogether conscious ally, but that idea must be dropped. He had been beaten by a fundamental quality in human nature; and he was half afraid he had said too much.

"Well," he added, "I'll be content if you treat Williamson as you would any other guest. You needn't go beyond this, if you'd rather not."

She turned and gave him a steady glance.

"I wish you had nothing to do with him, Arnold – I feel he's dangerous. But I will be polite to him, so long as he does not harm Dick."

"That's all I want," said Staffer, turning away.

He entered the billiard-room where the others had gathered. Elsie was knitting, Dick and Andrew were playing, and Williamson stood looking on. Staffer thought this strange, because Andrew did not play well, and Williamson had generally engaged Dick in a game for a stake.

"Making stockings now!" Staffer said to Elsie. "Whom is this lot for?"

"The Border regiment."

"The men who're lucky enough to get them ought to feel flattered," Williamson interposed.

"The brave soldiers are entitled to the best we can send them," Elsie said staunchly.

Williamson carelessly examined the work.

"This is very neat. Knitting's an essentially Scottish accomplishment. It's useful, which no doubt appeals to a race of utilitarian character."

"That's why I like it," Elsie declared. "I am Scottish in all my habits and feelings, you know."

Whitney thought there was something defiant in her voice, but he could not tell whether Williamson noticed it.

When the game was finished, Whitney took out a cigarette and walked to a match-holder, which he knew was empty.

"Will you give me a light?" he asked Williamson.

"Certainly," said Williamson, producing a well-made gun-metal case, which he immediately returned to his pocket. "I think I used the last there, but I have a box somewhere."

He handed Whitney an ordinary card box containing pine matches.

"Thank you."

As Whitney returned the box he noticed that Andrew was watching them. Then he glanced quickly at Elsie, but she was quietly knitting, with her eyes on the stitches.

A few minutes afterward a servant brought in the afternoon edition of a Glasgow newspaper. Staffer glanced at the front page and then sat down near one of the lamps. There was a certain deliberation in his movements that Whitney noticed, though he admitted that he might not have done so had not the matchbox incident roused him to suspicious vigilance. He thought Staffer was waiting for something, and in a moment or two Williamson left Dick and turned toward him.

Then Staffer folded back the newspaper.

"The A. & P. liner Centaur has gone down in the North Channel," he announced calmly.

Whitney started, Dick abruptly put down his cue, and Andrew's face grew hard.

"Do you mean that she was blown up?" Elsie asked with a note of horror in her voice.

"It looks so; but there's not much news yet."

Staffer began to read:

"The captain of the Clyde coaster Gannet reports that when he was off the Skerries near dark one of the big A. & P. liners passed him at some distance to the north. It was blowing fresh, and hazy, but when the vessel was almost out of sight he noticed a dense cloud of smoke. He ran to the box on the bridge-rail, where he kept his glasses, but when he got them out the liner had disappeared. He steered for the spot where he had last seen her, but it was dark when he reached it, and after steaming about for some time, and seeing nothing but a quantity of wreckage, he made for Rathlin and megaphoned the lighthouse-keepers before proceeding. An unconfirmed report from Larne states that a fishing craft passed a steamer's lifeboat, but lost her in the dark. The Centaur, a large and nearly new steamer, left Montreal with wheat and a number of passengers eight days ago."

Nobody spoke for a minute after he put down the newspaper, and Whitney lighted a cigarette to cover his excitement. The news was startling, but he thought it did not take Staffer or Williamson by surprise. There was something curious in their expression. Andrew's face, however, had grown very stern; and Elsie's was angrily flushed.

"This is not war, but murder!" she exclaimed. "The men who blow up unarmed vessels ought to be severely punished."

"When you catch them," Staffer answered. "I expect that it will prove difficult; and I'm afraid we must be prepared for some nasty knocks."

"It's rather exasperating to be hit hard where you flatter yourself you're secure against attack," Williamson remarked. "The Admiralty must have thought the North Channel safe."

"It is except against treachery," Elsie declared. "Don't you think so, Andrew?"

"I do," said Andrew quietly. "It's narrow and commanded by lighthouses and coastguard stations; though perhaps, in a way, its narrowness is a danger. But we must see that this kind of thing doesn't happen again."

"How would you try to prevent it?" Staffer asked, with a calmness that was somewhat overdone.

Whitney gave Andrew a careless glance, and was relieved to note that his grim look had vanished. Andrew's views on this subject would be worth having, but it was obvious that he did not mean to state them.

"I'm not a navy officer," he answered and turned to Elsie. "One feels that it won't bear talking about."

"Yes," she agreed, with a flash in her eyes. "There's no use in giving way to rage when one is hurt. The best one can do after a treacherous blow is to keep very quiet and wait until the time comes to strike back."

"There's a true Scot!" laughed Staffer. "You're a stubborn, unemotional race. I wouldn't like to fall into your hands if I'd wronged your friends."

"The Scots are just: they repay both injuries and favors."

Then, by general consent, they talked about something else; and after a time the others went out, and Whitney and Elsie were left alone. He suspected that she had meant this to happen, but he was surprised by her first question.

"Have you a bad memory?"

"I like to think that it's as good as my neighbor's."

"Then it's strange you lighted a cigarette with a match from your own box after asking Mr. Williamson for his."

"Well, by jove!" Whitney exclaimed. "Do you think he noticed it?"

Elsie's eyes twinkled.

"No; he had his back toward you when you began the next cigarette. But why did you ask for a match when you had some?"

Whitney looked at her frankly.

"I'd rather you didn't press me for an answer," he said.

"Why? Do you mean you wouldn't tell me?"

"Yes. And I shouldn't like to refuse."

Elsie smiled.

"You're not a good plotter. It was easy to catch you out."

"So it seems. But if I'm not as smart as I ought to be, I mean well."

"I don't doubt it, and I have some reason for trusting you. I think you're a good friend of Dick's and Andrew's; and their friends are mine."

"Thank you! But Williamson's by way of being a friend of Dick's."

"Oh, no; he only pretends he is. You must know this."

"Suppose we admit it. Don't you think Andrew's able to take care of his cousin?"

"I'm glad he has your help."

"Perhaps it's more important that he has yours. We're three to one, and that ought to be enough."

Elsie's face was calm, but she was silent for a moment, and Whitney thought she was trying to hide some embarrassment.

"Tell me," she said, "was it on Dick's account you asked Williamson for a match?"

"No; that is, not directly. I can't tell you anything more; but since we are friends, can you arrange that there are no matches put beside the bedroom candles?"

"The man is our guest," Elsie said with some hesitation. "Still perhaps one mustn't be fastidious when – "

"When there's a good deal at stake – Dick's welfare, for one thing."

"Very well," Elsie promised.

An hour later the party broke up. They used oil-lamps at Appleyard, and at night a row of candles in old-fashioned brass holders were placed upon a table on the bedroom landing. As a rule, a few matchboxes were put beside them; but sometimes this was overlooked.

Williamson went upstairs first, and stopped on reaching the table.

"Matches run out here, too!" he said to Whitney, who was close behind him. "Shall I light your candle?"

Whitney's hand moved toward his pocket, but he remembered in time.

"Thanks!" he answered carelessly. "Perhaps you had better light the lot."

Williamson took out the gun-metal box and struck a small pine match.

"I filled it up again," he remarked. "I always like to have matches handy in an old-fashioned house."

"It's a good plan," Whitney agreed, and went away with his candle.

Five minutes later he opened Andrew's door and found him standing by the window.