"Get that telegram sent off before the post-office closes, if you kill the horse!" he said.
There was a rattle of wheels, and Chatterton laughed a grim laugh as he turned toward the women.
"No great cause for anxiety as yet. I know Hilton Dane better than either of you, and I think I know Maxwell too. It would take several legions of niggers to hem them in—and I should be sorry for many of the black men."
A few days later, Thomas Chatterton sat beside his hearth one evening in an unpleasant frame of mind. The weather might have caused a more even tempered person some discontent, because the windows rattled under the impact of the sleet-laden blast, and the snugly curtained room was swept by chilling draughts. But Chatterton was not considering the weather; he glanced at the clock before he turned toward the owner of Culmeny.
"That lazy rascal is stopping somewhere to gossip on the way," he said.
"The telegraph office is closed now, and he must be here shortly," replied Maxwell. "I was sorry to hear that Miss Chatterton was no better. Have you any more favorable news to give me?"
"No. She is rather worse than better, and we are distinctly uneasy about her to-night," he said. "Dr. Gilmour was here an hour ago, looking rather more owl-like than usual, but I could get no opinion out of him. In fact, the man puzzled me. He appeared dazed, and either would not listen to my questions or was incapable of understanding plain English."
"Dazed? You do not as a rule speak ambiguously. If Miss Chatterton is seriously ill I think it is my duty to tell you what you evidently do not know, though it is no secret. Gilmour is not free from a weakness for alcohol."
Chatterton was a man of action; making no comment, he wrenched upon the rope of the bell before he pulled out his watch.
"Send Robertson here at once!" he ordered; and when his groom appeared, he asked: