In due course Mont and Brown returned, and with them came news of fresh complications. Madame Cheape had gone! She had been back to her room, packed up all her belongings and taken them with her, leaving behind only the assurance that the other young ladies had the money for her rent. Mrs. Sargeant had evidently been drinking again, but not to the point of forgetting the piano. It belonged to her daughter, it seemed; it had been lent without its lawful owner's leave, and if it was not in its place when that daughter returned at eleven, Mrs. Sargeant contemplated being half-slaughtered by her offspring, whose temper, when aroused, she described as "enough to make the 'air stand up on your 'ead."
"Oh dear! I forgot the piano," faltered Jess.
"I tried to get it out, I swear I did," avowed Douglas. "The owner of the hall made two men sit on it until the door was locked. He's going to keep it in pawn until he gets his nine pounds fourteen."
"And Madame Cheape never gave us any money, did she?"
"Not one farthing."
A grim silence prevailed. How were they to face this terrible Miss Sargeant? One of the lodgers and the piano, both departed—flitted away!
"I advise this," said Archie ultimately. "Let Miss Stornway's basket be brought round here, and you girls go and pack up all your other belongings and bring them along too. Then each pay Mrs. Sargeant your respective shares of the rent you had all agreed upon—twelve-and-six, wasn't it? That's four and twopence each. Tell her old Cheape has sloped, but that the piano is all right, and will come home sooner or later. Then if she still chooses to kick up a row, she can't stick to any of your props, that's one thing."
"We really oughtn't to be expected to suffer for either the Cheape's or the Punter's tricks, ought we?" demanded Jess, and so Archie's plan of campaign was adopted.
The interview passed off quite easily. The terrible Miss Sargeant had not yet returned; the old woman accepted their eight-and-fourpence without demur, and a blouse that Madame Cheape had overlooked as a substitute for the remaining four-and-twopence. Both girls united in assuring her that the precious piano was in safe keeping, and that she was to impress this fact upon her daughter.
They then hastened back to Mrs. Shiells's warm, cosy kitchen, feasted on hot broth and discussed the desperate state of affairs. At last it became needful to return to their own cheerless rooms to sleep. The men in a group escorted them through the dark, deserted roads. But Archie was in a thoroughly furious temper, and Douglas was never a sucking dove. As the group stood for a final chat in the street outside Mrs. Sargeant's house, these two, from angry disputing, set to work to settle their differences of opinion by seeing who could hit hardest.