“Something must be done at once,” she said. “Everything possible must be done. Poor little Mite!”
“Of course, my lady, ’e may ’ave run away!”
“Oh no!” she cried, “he hasn’t run away. He hasn’t run away. How can you be so wicked, Mergleson. Of course he hasn’t run away. He’s there now. And it’s too dreadful.”
She became suddenly very firm and masterful. The morning’s colliery tragedy inspired her imagination.
“We must get pick-axes,” she said. “We must organize search parties. Not a moment is to be lost, Mergleson—not a moment.... Get the men in off the roads. Get everyone you can....”
And not a moment was lost. The road men were actually at work in Shonts before their proper dinner-hour was over.
They did quite a lot of things that afternoon. Every passage attainable from the dining-room opening was explored, and where these passages gave off chinks and crannies they were opened up with a vigour which Lady Laxton had greatly stimulated by an encouraging presence and liberal doses of whisky. Through their efforts a fine new opening was made into the library from the wall near the window, a hole big enough for a man to fall through, because one did, and a great piece of stonework was thrown down from the Queen Elizabeth tower, exposing the upper portion of the secret passage to the light of day. Lady Laxton herself and the head housemaid went round the panelling with a hammer and a chisel, and called out “Are you there?” and attempted an opening wherever it sounded hollow. The sweep was sent for to go up the old chimneys outside the present flues. Meanwhile Mr. Darling had been set with several of his men to dig for, discover, pick up and lay open the underground passage or disused drain, whichever it was, that was known to run from the corner of the laundry towards the old ice-house, and that was supposed to reach to the abbey ruins. After some bold exploratory excavations this channel was located and a report sent at once to Lady Laxton.
It was this and the new and alarming scar on the Queen Elizabeth tower that brought Mr. Beaulieu Plummer post-haste from the estate office up to the house. Mr. Beaulieu Plummer was the Marquis of Cranberry’s estate agent, a man of great natural tact, and charged among other duties with the task of seeing that the Laxtons did not make away with Shonts during the period of their tenancy. He was a sound compact little man, rarely out of extreme riding breeches and gaiters, and he wore glasses, that now glittered with astonishment as he approached Lady Laxton and her band of spade workers.
At his approach Mr. Darling attempted to become invisible, but he was unable to do so.
“Lady Laxton,” Mr. Beaulieu Plummer appealed, “may I ask—?”