“I agree with you, sir,” he said. “I endeavoured to persuade one of these gentlemen to play another nine holes—unsuccessfully, I regret to state.”
Granet lit a cigarette.
“Well,” he remarked, “it’s too far to get down to the links again but I’ll play you a game of bowls, if you like.”
The other glanced out upon the lawn and rose to his feet.
“It is an excellent suggestion,” he declared. “If you will give me five minutes to fetch my mackintosh and galoshes, it would interest me to see whether I have profited by the lessons I took in Scotland.”
They met, a few moments later, in the garden. Mr. Collins threw the jack with great precision and they played an end during which his superiority was apparent. They strolled together across the lawn, well away now from the house. For the first time Granet dropped his careless tone.
“What do you make of this change in the weather?” he asked quickly.
“It’s just what they were waiting for,” the other replied. “What about this afternoon?”
“I am not scientist, worse luck,” Granet replied impatiently, “but I saw enough to convince me that they’ve got the right idea. Sir Meyville thought I was the man commanding the escort they’ve given him,—actually rowed me out to the workshop and showed me the whole thing. I tell you I saw it just as you described it,—saw the bottom of the sea, even the colour of the seaweed, the holes in the rocks.”
“And they’ve got the shells, too,” Collins muttered, “the shells that burst under water.”