“Keep it up,” I ordered. “This mist will soon be a fog.” My chauffeur did so,—at intervals of course—now catching a reply but oftener not, until from far ahead of us, through the curtain of fog shutting off the road in front, there came in response the four clear precise blasts for which my ears were astretch.
“There are my friends,” I declared. “Go slowly.”
At which we crawled warily along till out of the white gloom a red spark broke mistily upon our view, and guided us to where a long low racing machine stood before a house, the outlines of which were so vague I could not determine its exact character.
Next minute Clarke was by my side.
“I shall have to ask you to get out here,” he said, with a sidelong glance at my chauffeur. “And as the business you have come to settle may take quite a little while, it would be better for the car to swing in beside mine, so as to be a little way off the road.”
“Very good,” I answered, joining him immediately and seeing at the same time that the house was a species of tavern, illy-lit, but open to the public.
“What does it mean?” I questioned anxiously as he led me aside, not towards the tavern’s entrance, but rather to the right of it.
“I don’t know, sir. He is not inside. He drove up here about ten minutes ago, dismissed the car which brought him from the club-house, went in,—which was about the time I appeared upon the scene—and came out again with a man carrying a lantern. As I was then on my feet and about where we are standing now, I got one quick look at him as he passed through the doorway. I didn’t like his looks, sir; he must be feeling very ill. And I didn’t like the way he carried himself as he went about the turn you see there at the rear of the building. And I wanted to follow, though of course he is safe enough with the man he is with; but just then I heard your signal and ran to answer. That is all I have to tell you. But where is he going in such a mist? Shall I run in and ask?”
“Do,” I said; and waited impatiently enough for his reappearance which was delayed quite unaccountably, I thought. But then minutes seem hours in such a crisis.
When he did come, he, too, had a lantern.