Sarah snorted. She was not so impressed with Jerry's angelic qualities as the rest of the company. However, Jerry, who had his own reasons to retire, slipped away unostentatiously and read Victoria's letter for the second time. Then he talked to himself in a whisper.
"He's alive after all," he said, "and he's stopping at that castle. I daresay the old girl"—he thus profanely described his mistress—"went over to there to see him with Miss Alice. And they brought him back, dropping him on the way so that he could get into the house quietly. He knows my whistle. No one but him could know it, as he heard me on that night. What's to be done? I'll go out and have a look round. He may come back again."
Jerry was too young to be so exact as he should be. There were several flaws in his argument. But he was too excited to think over these. It never struck him that Miss Plantagenet could have smuggled Gore easier into the house by bringing him in her carriage after swearing James to secrecy, than by letting him approach the house in the character of a tramp. But it was creditable to the lad's observation that he so quickly conjectured the mysterious stranger at the castle should be Bernard. Jerry knew that Conniston was a close friend of Gore's, and saw at once that Bernard had sought the refuge of the castle where he would remain undiscovered. But for Victoria's hint Jerry would never have guessed this. It was his duty to communicate this knowledge to Beryl, but for reasons of his own connected with the chance of a reward or a bribe to hold his tongue, from someone who could pay better than Beryl—say Lord Conniston—Jerry determined to wait quietly to see how things would turn out. Meanwhile he strolled round to the fowls, where he thought it likely the tramp—if he was a tramp—might come. If not a tramp he might come this way also as the easiest to enter the grounds.
The poultry yard was carved out of a large meadow by the side of the gardens. It ran back a considerable distance from the high road, and at the far end was fenced with a thin plantation of elms. Wire netting and stout fences surrounded the yard, and there was a gate opening on to the meadow aforesaid. Jerry hovered round these precincts watching, but he did not expect any luck. However, the boy, being a born bloodhound, waited for the sheer excitement of the thing.
Now it happened that Miss Berengaria had left the house of a pair of Cochin fowls unlocked. She would have gone out to lock it herself but that she was so weary. All the same, she would not delegate the duty to her servants, as she considered they might not execute the commission properly. Finally Alice offered to go, and, after putting on a thick waterproof and a large pair of rubber boots which belonged to Miss Plantagenet, she ventured out. Thus it was that she paddled round to the yard with a lantern and came into the neighborhood of Jerry. That suspicious young man immediately thought she had heard of Bernard's coming and had come out to meet him. He snuggled into a corner near the gate and watched as best he could in the darkness.
It was pouring rain, and the sky was black with swiftly-moving clouds. These streamed across the face of a haggard-looking moon, and in the flaws of the wind down came the rain in a perfect drench.
Alice, with her dress drawn up, a lantern in one hand and an umbrella of the Gamp species extended above her head, ventured into the yard, and locked up the precious fowls. Then she came back round by the gate to see if it was barred. To her surprise it was open. Rather annoyed she closed it again, and put up the bar. Then she took her way round by the side of the house to enter by the front door.
Jerry followed with the step of a red Indian. He was rewarded.
Just as Alice turned the corner of the house, she heard a groan, and almost stumbled over a body lying on the flower-bed under the wall of the house. At first she gave a slight shriek, but before she could step back the man clutched her feet—"Alice! Alice!" moaned the man. "Save me!—it's Bernard."
"Bernard here," said Alice, with a shudder, and wondered how he had come from the castle. She turned the light on to his face, and then started back. This was not Bernard.