IV.
MR DRUMMOND'S VISITOR.
Upon a secluded road in the quiet suburb of Trinity stood the residence of Mr Robert Drummond. It was a neat unpretentious little villa graced by a number of trees and a clinging Virginia creeper, and Mr Drummond was a neat unpretentious little gentleman, graced by a number of virtues, and a devoted Mrs Drummond. From the upper windows of his house you could catch a glimpse of the castled and templed hills of Edinburgh on the one side, and the shining Forth and green coasts of Fife on the other. The Forth, in fact, was close at hand, and of late Mr Drummond had been greatly entertained by observing many interesting movements upon its waters.
He had looked forward to exhibiting and expounding these features to his friend Mr Burnett, and felt considerably disappointed when upon the morning of the day when the minister should have come, a telegram arrived instead. It ran—
"Unavoidably prevented from coming to stay with you. Shall explain later. Many regrets. Don't trouble reply. Leaving home immediately.
"BURNETT."
As Mr Drummond studied this telegram he began to feel not only disappointed but a trifle critical.
"Alec Burnett must have come into a fortune!" he said to himself. "Six words—the whole of threepence—wasted in telling me not to reply! As if I'd be spending my money on anything so foolish. I never saw such extravagance!"
On the following morning Mr Drummond was as usual up betimes. He had retired a year or two before from a responsible position in an insurance office, but he still retained his active business habits, and by eight o'clock every morning of the summer was out and busy in his garden. It still wanted ten minutes to eight, and he was just buttoning up his waistcoat when he heard the front-door bell ring. A minute or two later the maid announced that Mr Topham was desirous of seeing Mr Drummond immediately.
"Mr Topham?" he asked.
"He's a Navy Officer, sir," said the maid.
Vaguely perturbed, Mr Drummond hurried downstairs, and found in his study a purposeful-looking young man, with the two zigzag stripes on his sleeve of a lieutenant in the Royal Naval Reserve.
"Mr Drummond?" he inquired.
"The same," said Mr Drummond, firmly yet cautiously.
"You expected a visit from a Mr Burnett yesterday, I believe?"
"I had been expecting him till I got his wire."
"His wire!" exclaimed Lieutenant Topham. "Did he telegraph to you?"
"Yes: he said he couldn't come."
"May I see that telegram?"
Caution had always been Mr Drummond's most valuable asset.
"Is it important?" he inquired.
"Extremely," said the lieutenant a trifle brusquely.
Mr Drummond went to his desk and handed him the telegram. He could see Topham's eyebrows rise as he read it.
"Thank you," he said when he had finished. "May I keep it?"
Without waiting for permission, he put it in his pocket, and with a grave air said—
"I am afraid I have rather serious news to give you about Mr Burnett."
"Dear me!" cried Mr Drummond. "It's not mental trouble, I hope? That was a queer wire he sent me!"
"He didn't send you that wire," said Lieutenant Topham.
"What!" exclaimed Mr Drummond. "Really—you don't say so? Then who did?"
"That's what we've got to find out."
The lieutenant glanced at the door, and added—
"I think we had better come a little farther away from the door."
They moved to the farther end of the room and sat down.
"Mr Burnett has been knocked on the head and then nearly drowned," said the lieutenant.
Mr Drummond cried aloud in horror. Topham made a warning gesture.
"This is not to be talked about at present," he said in a guarded voice. "The facts simply are that I'm in command of a patrol-boat, and last night we were off the Berwickshire coast when we found your friend in the water with a bad wound in his head and a piece of cord tied round his feet."
"You mean some one had tried to murder him?" cried Mr Drummond.
"It looked rather like it," said Topham drily.
"And him a minister too!" gasped Mr Drummond.
"So we found later."
"But you'd surely tell that from his clothes!"
"He had no clothes when we found him."
"No clothes on! Then do you mean——"
"We took him straight back to the base," continued the lieutenant quickly, "and finally he came round and was able to talk a little. Then we learned his name and heard of you, and Captain Blacklock asked me to run up and let you know he was safe, and also get you to check one or two of his statements. Mr Burnett is naturally a little light-headed at present."
Mr Drummond was a persistent gentleman.
"But do you mean you found him with no clothes on right out at sea?"
"No; close under the cliffs."
"Did you see him fall into the water?"
"We heard a cry, and picked him up shortly afterwards," said the lieutenant, rather evasively, Mr Drummond thought.
"However, the main thing is that he will recover all right. You can rest assured he is being well looked after."
"I'd like to know more about this," said Mr Drummond with an air of determination.
"So would we," said Topham drily, "and I'd just like to ask you one or two questions, if I may. Mr Burnett was on his way to the Windy Islands, I believe?"
"He was. He had got all his papers and everything ready to start to-night."
"You feel sure of that?"
"He wrote and told me so himself."
Lieutenant Topham nodded in silence. Then he inquired—
"Do you know a Mr Taylor?"
"Taylor? I know a John Taylor——"
"Who comes from Lancashire and keeps a motor-car?"
"No," said Mr Drummond. "I don't know that one. Why?"
"Then you didn't send a long telegram to Mr Burnett yesterday telling him that Mr Taylor would call for him in his motor-car and drive him to your house?"
"Certainly not!" cried Mr Drummond indignantly. "I never sent a long telegram to any one in my life. I tell you I don't know anything about this Mr Taylor or his motor-car. If Mr Burnett told you that, he's light-headed indeed!"
"Those are merely the questions Captain Blacklock asked me to put," said the lieutenant soothingly.
"Is he the officer in command of the base?" demanded Mr Drummond a little fiercely.
"No," said Topham briefly; "Commander Blacklock is an officer on special service at present."
"Commander!" exclaimed Mr Drummond with a menacing sniff. "But you just called him Captain."
"Commanders get the courtesy title of Captain," explained the lieutenant, rising as he spoke. "Thank you very much, Mr Drummond. There's only one thing more I'd like to say——"
"Ay, but there are several things I'd like to say!" said Mr Drummond very firmly. "I want to know what's the meaning of this outrage to my friend. What's your theory?"
Before the war Lieutenant Topham had been an officer in a passenger liner, but he had already acquired in great perfection the real Navy mask.
"It seems rather mysterious," he replied—in a most unsuitably light and indifferent tone, Mr Drummond considered.
"But surely you have some ideas!"
The Lieutenant shook his head.
"We'll probably get to the bottom of it sooner or later."
"A good deal later than sooner, I'm afraid," said Mr Drummond severely. "You've informed the police, I presume."
"The affair is not in my hands, Mr Drummond."
"Then whose hands is it in?"
"I have not been consulted on that point."
Ever since the war broke out Mr Drummond's views concerning the Navy had been in a state of painful flux. Sometimes he felt a genuine pride as a taxpayer in having provided himself with such an efficient and heroic service; at other times he sadly suspected that his money had been wasted, and used to urge upon all his acquaintance the strong opinion that the Navy should really "do something"—and be quick about it too!
Lieutenant Topham depressed him greatly. There seemed such an extraordinary lack of intelligent interest about the fellow. How differently Nelson would have replied!
"Well, there's one thing I absolutely insist upon getting at the bottom of," he said resolutely. "I am accused of sending a long telegram to Mr Burnett about a Mr Taylor. Now I want to know the meaning of that!"
Lieutenant Topham smiled, but his smile, instead of soothing, merely provoked the indignant householder.
"Neither you nor Mr Burnett are accused of sending telegrams. We only know that you received them."
"Then who sent them, I'd like to know?"
"That, no doubt, will appear in time. I must get back now, Mr Drummond; but I must first ask you not to mention a word to any one of this—in the meantime anyhow."
The householder looked considerably taken aback. He had anticipated making a very pleasant sensation among his friends.
"I—er—of course shall use great discretion——" he began.
Lieutenant Topham shook his head.
"I am directed to ask you to tell nobody."
"Of course Mrs Drummond——"
"Not even Mrs Drummond."
"But this is really very high-handed, sir! Mr Burnett is a very old friend of mine——"
The Lieutenant came a step nearer to him, and said very earnestly and persuasively—
"You have an opportunity, Mr Drummond, of doing a service to your country by keeping absolute silence. We can trust you to do that for England, surely?"
"For Great Britain," corrected Mr Drummond, who was a member of a society for propagating bagpipe music and of another for commemorating Bannockburn,—"well, yes, if you put it like that—Oh, certainly, certainly. Yes, you can trust me, Mr Topham. But—er—what am I to say to Mrs Drummond about your visit?"
"Say that I was sent to ask you to keep your lights obscured," suggested the lieutenant with a smile.
"Capital!" said the householder. "I've warned her several times about the pantry window. That will kill two birds with one stone!"
"Good morning, sir. Thank you very much," said the lieutenant.
Mr Drummond was left in a very divided state of mind regarding the Navy's competence, Mr Burnett's sanity, and his own judgment.