The Hunt Ball Mystery Part 4

Next morning Captain Kelson took his guest for a long drive round the neighbourhood. Before starting he asked the landlord at what time Henshaw had returned.

"He didn't come in at all, captain," Dipper answered in an aggrieved tone. "His fire was kept up all night for nothing."

"I suppose he has been here this morning," Kelson observed casually.

"No," was the prompt reply. "Nothing has been seen or heard of him here since he left last night for the ball."

Kelson whistled. "That looks rather queer, doesn't it, Hugh?"

Gifford nodded. "Very, I should say. What do you make of it?" he asked the landlord.

That worthy spread out his hands in a gesture of helplessness. "It's beyond me, gentlemen. We can none of us make it out. I've never known anything quite like it happen all the years I've been in the business."

"Oh, you'll have an explanation in the course of the morning all right,"

said Kelson with a smile at the host's worry. "Don't take it too seriously; it isn't worth it. You've got Mr. Henshaw's luggage, which indemnifies you, and he is manifestly a person quite capable of taking care of himself."

Mr. Dipper gave a doubtful jerk of the head. "It is very mysterious all the same."

Kelson laughed as he went off with his friend.

"I'm afraid I can't get up much interest in the doings of the objectionable Henshaw," he remarked lightly as they started off. "Such men as he know what they are about, and are not too punctilious with regard to other people's inconvenience."

"No," Gifford responded quietly. "All the same, his non-appearance is a little mysterious."

Kelson blew away the suggestion of mystery in a short, contemptuous laugh.

"Oh, he is probably up to some devilry with some fool of a girl," he said in an offhand tone. "I know the type of man. They have a keen scent for impressionable women, of whom a fellow of that sort has always half-a-dozen in tow. No doubt that is what he came down here for--a tender adventure. That's the only kind of hunting he is keen on, take my word for it."

"I quite agree with you there," Gifford answered with conviction, and the subject dropped.

When they returned for luncheon they found that nothing had been heard of the _Golden Lion's_ missing guest.

"It is rather an extraordinary move of our friend's," Kelson observed with a laugh. "He surely can't be living all this time in his evening clothes. Not but what a man like that would not let a trifle stand in his way if he had some scampish sport in view. No doubt he is up to a dodge or two by way of obviating these little difficulties."

In the afternoon the two friends went up to Wynford Place to call after the dance. Kelson had naturally been much more inclined to drive over to the Tredworths, about seven miles away, in order to settle his betrothal, but Gifford suggested that the duty call should be paid first, and so it was arranged. To Kelson's delight he heard that Muriel Tredworth and her brother were coming over next day to stay with the Morristons for another dance in the neighbourhood and a near meet of the hounds; so he, warming to the Morristons, chatted away in all a lover's high spirits.

"By the way," he said presently, as they sat over tea, "rather an extraordinary thing has happened at the _Golden Lion_."

"What's that?" asked his host.

"Did you notice a man named Henshaw here last night? A big, dark fellow, probably a stranger to you, but by way of being a former follower of the c.u.mberbatch."

"An old fellow?" Morriston asked.

"Oh, no. About six-and-thirty, I should say; eh, Hugh?"

"Under forty, certainly," Gifford answered.

"Tall and very dark, almost to swarthiness; of course I remember the man."

Morriston exclaimed with sudden recollection. "I introduced him to a partner."

"I noticed the fellow," observed Lord Painswick, who also was calling.

"Theatrical sort of chap. What has he done?"

Kelson laughed. "Simply disappeared, that's all."

"Disappeared!" There was a chorus of interest.

"How do you mean?" Morriston asked.

"Left the hotel at nine last night and has never turned up since," Kelson said with an air of telling an amusing story. "Poor Host Dipper is taking it quite tragically, notwithstanding the satisfactory point in the case that the egregious Henshaw's elaborate kit still remains in his unoccupied bedroom."

"Do you mean to say he never came back all night?" Miss Morriston asked.

"Never," Kelson a.s.sured her. "Old Dipper came to us, half asleep, at four o'clock to ask whether he was justified in locking up the establishment."

"And nothing has been seen or heard of the man since," Gifford put in.

"That is queer," Morriston said, as though scarcely knowing whether to take it seriously or otherwise. "Now I come to think of it I don't recollect seeing anything of the man after quite the first part of the evening. Did you, Painswick?"

"No, can't say I did," Painswick answered.

"And," observed Kelson, "he was not a man to be easily overlooked when he was on show. I missed him, not altogether disagreeably, after the early dances."

"What is the idea?" Edith Morriston inquired. "Is there any theory to account for his disappearance?"

"No," Kelson answered, "unless a discreditable one. Gone off at a tangent."

"And still in his evening things?" Painswick said with a laugh. "Rather uncomfortable this weather."

"That reminds me," Morriston said with sudden animation, "one of the footmen brought me a fur coat and a soft hat this morning and asked me if they were mine. They had been unclaimed after the dance and he had ascertained that they belonged to none of the men who were staying here.

Nor were they mine."

"That is most curious," Kelson said with a mystified air. "Henshaw was wearing a fur coat and soft hat when we saw him in the hall of the _Lion_ just before starting. Don't you remember, Hugh?"

"Yes; certainly he was," Gifford answered.

"Then they must be his," Morriston concluded.

"And where is he--without them?" Painswick added with a laugh.

"Dead of cold?"

"It is altogether quite mysterious," Morriston observed with a puzzled air. "He can't be here still."

"Hardly," his sister replied. "You know him?" she asked Kelson.