The Man from the Clouds

by J. Storer Clouston

"Be dashed and damned to you!" I growled.

The old boy started perceptibly, and in rather an eager voice he asked,

"Have you got a wax match, mister?"

"Wax match? No, and be confounded!" said I.

For the next quarter of a mile or so I felt too ashamed of myself and too contrite to think much about what the old fellow had said, and then suddenly it began to strike me that a wax match was rather a curious thing to ask for. A match was natural enough, but why need it be wax?

And then I stopped, wheeled round, and walked back. I told myself that I was growing absurd and getting passwords on the brain. Still, there seemed no harm in exchanging a few more remarks with the old man.

But when I reached the same spot on the road he was gone. There were one or two small houses not far away and it was quite possible he had reached them by now, especially if he wanted his match badly; though it would mean moving a little faster than I had given him credit for. Or he might be lying down out of sight having a nap, and as the day was warm and he had apparently nothing better to do, that seemed a very possible solution. Anyhow, there was no sign of him, and if there had been, I told myself he would probably have proved to be merely the island patriarch with a senile fancy for wax vestas, so I resumed my journey to the "big house."

As I topped another rise I got the best view I had yet seen of the lie of the island. A group of larger buildings on another hillock, still well over a mile ahead, was evidently the mansion at last. Behind me I saw the doctor's house and noted with a nod unto myself that it stood distinctly in the northwest district of the island. It was no long walk from that bleak habitation to the Scollays' on the shore.

And now I addressed myself to a delicate question. If I were going to keep up the part of suspicious stranger at the Rendall's, at all events to begin with, what account of my arrival should I give? It must be a tale plausible enough to keep them in doubt, for unless the laird himself were actually up to his neck in treason (and though I was prepared for anything by this time, there were limits to the assumptions I ventured to make), he would certainly wire either to the police or the naval authorities and I should immediately become a mere spectator. In fact, I would probably not be allowed even to stay and look on.

And this was not mere selfish desire for glory and excitement. I was quite capable of seeing that my tale might not convince older and wiser people as thoroughly as it convinced myself. In fact I felt a strong presentiment that I should merely be put down as a brilliant liar and the spy hunt would come to an end—with the spy still in the island. That was where I still do think I was justified in playing the hand myself.