The next moment he heard his friend heartily thanking the visitor for the assistance he had been in the matter of the Indo-Scythian inscription, as they walked across the hall together. Then a door closed.
“I believe that there is something positively uncanny about Max at times,” murmured the perturbed gentleman to himself.
THE TRAGEDY AT BROOKBEND COTTAGE
“Max,” said Mr Carlyle, when Parkinson had closed the door behind him, “this is Lieutenant Hollyer, whom you consented to see.”
“To hear,” corrected Carrados, smiling straight into the healthy and rather embarrassed face of the stranger before him. “Mr Hollyer knows of my disability?”
“Mr Carlyle told me,” said the young man, “but, as a matter of fact, I had heard of you before, Mr Carrados, from one of our men. It was in connexion with the foundering of the Ivan Saratov.”
Carrados wagged his head in good-humoured resignation.
“And the owners were sworn to inviolable secrecy!” he exclaimed. “Well, it is inevitable, I suppose. Not another scuttling case, Mr Hollyer?”
“No, mine is quite a private matter,” replied the lieutenant. “My sister, Mrs Creake—but Mr Carlyle would tell you better than I can. He knows all about it.”