The Disentanglers Part 63

Macrae wished first to remove the machine in the smoking-room, but Blake ventured to suggest that it had better be left where it was.

'The conspirators,' he said, 'have made one blunder already, by mentioning "The Seven Hunters," unless, indeed, that was intentional; they _may_ have meant to lighten our anxiety, without leaving any useful clue. They may make another mistake: in any case it is as well to be in touch with them.'

At this moment the smoking-room machine began to tick and emitted a message. It ran, 'Glad you visited the Hunters. You see we do ourselves very well. Hope you drank our health, we left some bottles of champagne on purpose. No nasty feeling, only a matter of business. Do hurry up and come to terms.'

'Impudent dogs!' said Mr. Macrae. 'But I think you are right, Mr. Blake; we had better leave these communications open.'

Mr. Gianesi agreed that Blake had spoken words of wisdom. Merton felt surprised at his practical common sense. It was necessary to get another pole to erect on the roof of the observatory, with another box at top for the new machine, but a flagstaff from the Castle leads was found to serve the purpose, and the rest of the day was pa.s.sed in arranging the installation, the new machine being placed in Mr. Merton's own study.

Before dinner was over, Mr. Gianesi, who worked like a horse, was able to announce that all was complete, and that a brief message, 'Yours received, all right,' had pa.s.sed through from his firm in London.

Soon after dinner Blake retired to his room; his head was still suffering, and he could not bear smoke. Gianesi and Mr. Macrae were in the Castle, Mr. Macrae feverishly reading the newspaper speculations on the melancholy affair: leading articles on Science and Crime, the potentialities of both, the perils of wealth, and such other thoughts as occurred to active minds in Fleet Street. Gianesi's room was in the observatory, but he remained with Mr. Macrae in case he might be needed.

Merton and Logan were alone in the smoking-room, where Bude left them early.

'Now, Merton,' said Logan, 'you are going to come on in the next scene.

Have you a revolver?'

'Heaven forbid!' said Merton.

'Well, I have! Now this is what you are to do. We shall both turn in about twelve, and make a good deal of clatter and talk as we do so. You will come with me into my room. I'll hand you the revolver, loaded, silently, while we talk fishing shop with the door open. Then you will go rather noisily to your room, bang the door, take off your shoes, and slip out again--absolutely noiselessly--back into the smoking-room. You see that window in the embrasure here, next the door, looking out towards the loch? The curtain is drawn already, you will go on the window-seat and sit tight! Don't fall asleep! I shall give you my portable electric lamp for reading in the train. You may find it useful. Only don't fall asleep. When the row begins I shall come on.'

'I see,' said Merton. 'But look here! Suppose you slip out of your own room, locking the door quietly, and into mine, where you can snore, you know--I snore myself--in case anybody takes a fancy to see whether I am asleep? Leave your dog in your own room, _he_ snores, all Spanish bull- dogs do.'

'Yes, that will serve,' said Logan. 'Merton, your mind is not wholly inactive.'

They had some whisky and soda-water, and carried out the manoeuvres on which they had decided.

Merton, unshod, silently re-entered the smoking-room, his shoes in his hand; Logan as tactfully occupied Merton's room, and then they waited.

Presently, the smoking-room door being slightly ajar, Merton heard Logan snoring very naturally; the Spanish bull-dog was yet more sonorous.

Gianesi came in, walked upstairs to his bedroom, and shut his door; in half an hour he also was snoring; it was a nasal trio.

Merton 'drove the night along,' like Dr. Johnson, by repeating Latin and other verses. He dared not turn on the light of his portable electric lamp and read; he was afraid to smoke; he heard the owls towhitting and towhooing from the woods, and the clock on the Castle tower striking the quarters and the hours.

One o'clock pa.s.sed, two o'clock pa.s.sed, a quarter after two, then the bell of the wireless machine rang, the machine began to tick; Merton sat tight, listening. All the curtains of the windows were drawn, the room was almost perfectly dark; the snorings had sometimes lulled, sometimes revived. Merton lay behind the curtains on the window-seat, facing the door. He knew, almost without the help of his ears, that the door was slowly, slowly opening. Something entered, something paused, something stole silently towards the wireless machine, and paused again. Then a glow suffused the further end of the room, a disc of electric light, clearly from a portable lamp. A draped form, in deep shadow, was exposed to Merton's view. He stole forward on tiptoe with noiseless feet; he leaped on the back of the figure, threw his left arm round its neck, caught its right wrist in a grip of steel, and yelled:

'Mr. Eachain of the Hairy Arm, if I am not mistaken!'

At the same moment there came a click, the electric light was switched on, Logan bounced on to the figure, tore away a revolver from the right hand of which Merton held the wrist, and the two fell on the floor above a struggling Highland warrior in the tartans of the Macraes. The figure was thrown on its face.

'Got you now, Mr. Blake!' said Logan, turning the head to the light. 'D--- n!' he added; 'it is Gianesi! I thought we had the Irish minstrel.'

The figure only snarled, and swore in Italian.

'First thing, anyhow, to tie him up,' said Logan, producing a serviceable cord.

Both Logan and Merton were muscular men, and presently had the intruder tightly swathed in inextricable knots and gagged in a homely but sufficient fashion.

'Now, Merton,' said Logan, 'this is a bitter disappointment! From your dream, or vision, of Eachain of the Hairy Arm, it was clear to me that somebody, the poet for choice, had heard the yarn of the Highland ghost, and was masquerading in the kilt for the purpose of tampering with the electric dodge and communicating with the kidnappers. Apparently I owe the bard an apology. You'll sit on this fellow's chest while I go and bring Mr. Macrae.'

'A message has come in on the machine,' said Merton.

'Well, he can read it; it is not our affair.'

Logan went off; Merton poured out a gla.s.s of Apollinaris water, added a little whisky, and lit a cigarette. The figure on the floor wriggled; Merton put the revolver which the man had dropped and Logan's pistol into a drawer of the writing-table, which he locked.

'I do detest all that cheap revolver business,' said Merton.

The row had awakened Logan's dog, which was howling dolefully in the neighbouring room.

'Queer situation, eh?' said Merton to the prostrate figure.

Hurrying footsteps climbed the stairs; Mr. Macrae (with a shot-gun) and Logan entered.

Mr. Macrae all but embraced Merton. 'Had I a son, I could have wished him to be like you,' he said; 'but my poor boy--' his voice broke. Merton had not known before that the millionaire had lost a son. He did understand, however, that the judicious Logan had given _him_ the whole credit of the exploit, for reasons too obvious to Merton.

'Don't thank _me_,' he was saying, when Logan interrupted:

'Don't you think, Mr. Macrae, you had better examine the message that has just come in?'

Mr. Macrae read, 'Glad they found the hair-pin, it will console the old boy. Do not quite see how to communicate, if Gianesi, who, you say, has arrived, removes the machine.'

'Look here,' cried Merton, 'excuse my offering advice, but we ought, I think, to send for Donald Macdonald _at once_. We must flash back a message to those brutes, so they may think they are still in communication with the traitor in our camp. That beast on the floor could work it, of course, but he would only warn _them_; we can't check him. We must use Donald, and keep them thinking that they are sending news to the traitor.'

'But, by Jove,' said Logan, 'they have heard from _him_, whoever he is, since Bude came back, for they know about the finding of the hair-pin.

You,' he said to the wretched captive, 'have you been at this machine?'

The man, being gagged, only gasped.

'There's this, too,' said Merton, 'the senders of the last message clearly think that Gianesi is against them. If Gianesi removes the machine, they say--'

Merton did not finish his sentence, he rushed out of the room. Presently he hurried back. 'Mr. Macrae,' he said, 'Blake's door is locked. I can't waken him, and, if he were in his room, the noise we have made must have wakened him already. Logan, ungag that creature!'

Logan removed the gag.

'Who are _you_?' he asked.

The captive was silent.

'Mr. Macrae,' said Merton, 'may I run and bring Donald and the other servants here? Donald must work the machine at once, and we must break in Blake's door, and, if he is off, we must rouse the country after him.'

Mr. Macrae seemed almost dazed, the rapid sequence of unusual circ.u.mstances being remote from his experience. In spite of the blaze of electric light, the morning was beginning to steal into the room; the refreshments on the table looked oddly dissipated, there was a heavy stale smell of tobacco, and of whisky from a bottle that had been upset in the struggle. Mr. Macrae opened a window and inhaled the fresh air from the Atlantic.

This revived him. 'I'll ring the alarm bell,' he said, and, putting a small key to an unnoticed keyhole in a panel, he opened a tiny door, thrust in his hand, and pressed a k.n.o.b. Instantly from the Castle tower came the thunderous knell of the alarm. 'I had it put in in case of fire or burglars,' explained the millionaire, adding automatically, 'every modern improvement.'

In a few minutes the servants and gillies had gathered, hastily clad; they were met by Logan, who briefly bade some bring hammers, and the caber, or pine-tree trunk that is tossed in Highland sports. It would make a good battering-ram. Donald Macdonald he sent at once to Mr.

Macrae. He met Bude and Lady Bude, and rapidly explained that there was no danger of fire. The Countess went back to her rooms, Bude returned with Logan into the observatory. Here they found Donald telegraphing to the conspirators, by the wireless engine, a message dictated by Merton:

'Don't be alarmed about communications. I have got them to leave our machine in its place on the chance that you might say something that would give you away. Gianesi suspects nothing. Wire as usual, at about half-past two in the morning, when you mean it for me.'

'That ought to be good enough,' said Logan approvingly, while the hammers and the caber, under Mr. Macrae's directions, were thundering on the door of Blake's room. The door, which was very strong, gave way at last with a crash; in they burst. The room was empty, a rope fastened to the ironwork of the bedstead showed the poet's means of escape, for a long rope-ladder swung from the window. On the table lay a letter directed to