The Spy in Black Part 27

Again I gave it up.

"Because you take her hand and get forward! That was one for my wife's benefit. It made her fairly sick!"

"Do you mean," I demanded, "that you were actually in the habit of holding Miss--er--Holland's hand?"

"Oh, no fears. I'm past that game. But Mrs Craigie is a great one for p's and q's and not being what she calls vulgar, and a joke like that is a sure draw. I get her every time with my governess riddles.

Here's a good one now--Why's a pretty governess like a----"

In spite of the need for caution, my impatience was fast overcoming me.

"Then you have been sent by Mrs Craigie to make inquiries about Miss Holland?" I interrupted a trifle brusquely.

Mr Craigie seemed at least to have the merit of not taking offence readily.

"That's the idea," he agreed. "You see, it's this way: my wife's been at me ever since our governess bolted, as she calls it. Well now, what's the good in making inquiries about a thing that's happened and finished and come to an end? If it was a case of engaging another governess, that's a different story. I'd take care not to have any German spies next time!"

"German spies!" I exclaimed, with I hope well-simulated horror; "you don't mean to suspect Miss Holland of that surely!"

"Oh, 'German Spy' is just a kind of term nowadays for any one you don't know all about," said Mr Craigie easily. "Every one you haven't seen before is a German Spy. I spotted five myself in my own parish at the beginning of the war, and Mrs Craigie wrote straight off to the Naval Authorities and reported them all."

"And were they actually spies?" I asked a trifle uncomfortably.

"Not one of them!" laughed he. "The nearest approach was a tinker who'd had German measles! Ha, ha! It's no good my wife reporting any more spies, and I just reminded her of that whenever she worried me, and pulled her leg a bit about me and Miss Holland being in the game together, and so it was all right till she got wind of a girl who was the image of the disappearing governess being here at the manse as Mr Burnett's sister, and then there was simply no quieting her till I'd taken the car and run over to see what there was in the story. Mind you, I didn't think there was a word of truth in it myself; but when I'd got here, by Jingo, there I saw Miss Holland's tweed coat in the hall! Now that's a funny kettle of fish, isn't it?"

I didn't say so, but I had to admit that he was not so very far wrong.

The audacity of the performance was quite worthy of Tiel, but its utter recklessness seemed not in the least like him. Had the vanishing governess's employer been any one less easy-going than Mr Craigie, how readily our whole scheme might have been wrecked! Even as it was, I saw detection staring me straight in the face. However, I put on as cool and composed a face as I could.

"I understood that Miss Holland's brother had written to you about it,"

I said brazenly.

"Oh! he is really her brother, is he?" said he, looking at me very knowingly.

"Certainly."

"He being Burnett and she Holland, eh?"

"You have heard of half-brothers, haven't you?" I inquired with a condescending smile.

"Oh, I have heard of them," winked Mr Craigie as good-humouredly as ever; "only I never happened to have heard before of half-sisters running away from a situation they'd taken without a word of warning, just whenever their half-brothers whistled."

"Did Mr Burnett whistle?" I inquired, with (I hope) an air of calm and slightly superior amus.e.m.e.nt.

"Some one sent her a wire, and I presume it was Mr Burnett," said he.

"By Jingo!"

He stopped suddenly with an air as nearly approaching excitement as was conceivable in such a gentleman.

"What's the matter?" I asked a trifle anxiously.

"One might get a good one about how to make a governess explode, the answer being 'Burn it!' By Jove, I must think that out."

Before I could recover from my amazement at this extraordinary att.i.tude, he had suddenly resumed his shrewd quizzical look.

"Are you an old friend of Mr Burnett?" he inquired.

"Oh, not very," I said carelessly.

"Then perhaps you'll not be offended by my saying that he seems a rum kind of bird," he said confidentially.

"In what way?"

"Well, coming up here just for a Sunday to preach a sermon, and then not preaching it, but staying on as if he'd taken a lease of the manse--him and his twelve-twenty-fourths of a sister!"

"But," I stammered, before I could think what I was saying, "I thought he did preach last Sunday!"

"Not him! Oh, people are talking a lot about it."

This revelation left me absolutely speechless. Tiel had told me distinctly and deliberately that he had gone through the farce of preaching last Sunday--and now I learned that this was a lie. What was worse, he had a.s.sured me that he was causing no comment, and I now was told that people were "talking." Coming straight on top of my discovery of his reckless conduct of Eileen's affair, what was I to think of him?

It was at this black moment that Tiel and Eileen entered the room. My heart stood still for an instant at the thought that, in their first surprise, something might be disclosed or some slip made by one of us.

But the next instant I saw that they had learned who was here and were perfectly prepared.

"How do you do, Mr Craigie!" cried Eileen radiantly.

Mr Craigie seemed distinctly taken aback by the absence of all signs of guilt or confusion.

"I'm keeping as well as I can, thank you, considering my anxiety," said he.

"About my sister, sir?" inquired Tiel with his most brazen effrontery, coming forward and smiling cordially. "Surely you got my letter?"

I started. The man clearly had been at the key-hole during the latter part of our conversation, or he could hardly have made this remark fit so well into what I had said.

"I'm afraid I didn't."

"Tut, tut!" said Tiel, with a marvellously well-a.s.sumed air of annoyance. "The local posts seem to have become utterly disorganised.

Apparently they pay no attention to civilian letters at all."

"You're right there," replied Mr Craigie with feeling. "The only use we are for is just to be taxed."

"What must you think of us?" cried Eileen, whose acting was fully the equal of Tiel's. "However, my brother will explain everything now."

"Yes," said Tiel; "if Mr Craigie happens to be going--and I'm afraid we've kept him very late already--I'll tell him all about it as we walk back to his car."

He gave Mr Craigie a confidential glance as though to indicate that he had something private for his ear. Our visitor, on his part, was obviously reluctant to leave an audience of three, especially as it included his admired governess; but Tiel handled the situation with quite extraordinary urbanity and skill. He managed to open the door and all but pushed Mr Craigie out of the room, without a hint of inhospitality, and solely as though he were seeking only his convenience. I could scarcely believe that this was the man who had made at least two fatal mistakes--mistakes, at all events, which had an ominously fatal appearance.

When Mr Craigie had wished us both a very friendly good-bye and the door had closed behind him, I turned instantly to Eileen and cried, perhaps more hotly than politely--

"Well, I have been nicely deceived!"