Rosamund gasped, and was somewhat inclined to storm, but not another syllable would the Under Secretary add to his amazing statement, though he undertook to communicate with her immediately when news of Warden’s whereabouts reached him. In the meantime, she had to be content with knowledge that was no knowledge, and that only added to her perplexity. On the way to the hotel she stopped her carriage at a map–seller’s and bought a map of Morocco, and a book which revealed many things about Rabat, but no one thing calculated to explain why Warden had gone there.
In some sense, the Under Secretary was more puzzled than Rosamund. He turned to his notes and pored over them. One paragraph stood out boldly.
“Captain Warden, when at Cowes, met a young lady, Miss Evelyn Dane, engaged as companion to Baumgartner’s daughter. He took her in a dinghy to the Sans Souci, and this slight chance led to the discovery that the yacht was in charge of a shore watchman.”
The Under Secretary actually rumpled his hair with those immaculate fingers of his.
“I am lost in a fog,” he confessed ruefully. “Mrs. Laing is not engaged to Warden—Lady Hilbury herself told me so only this morning. Warden is the last man alive to discuss Government affairs with Mrs. Laing or any other woman. Why, then, does she pretend that he did the very thing he did not do? And who is this girl, Evelyn Dane, to whom he telegraphed from Ostend and London before sailing in the Water Witch? Can she shed light on the dark places of Rabat? It is worth trying. The Sans Souci arrives at Madeira to–morrow. I shall instruct some one to call on Evelyn Dane, and find out how far she is mixed up in the wretched muddle. Confound Rabat, and the Benuë, and the men of Oku, and may Baumgartner be blistered! I shall not get a day’s hunting before the frost sets in.”
CHAPTER XI
THE BLUE MAN—AND A WHITE
When Warden came to his senses he found himself lying in impenetrable darkness. A half–formed belief that he was blind impelled him to put his hands to his face. Then he awoke to realities. His wrists were bound tightly, movement was painful and almost impossible, yet he seemed to be strapped to something that moved. By using his eyelids he soon succeeded in convincing himself that his eyes were uninjured, but the cold sweat of fear induced by that first horrible suspicion revived him more speedily than any stimulant. Straining his cramped limbs to test both his bonds and his injuries, he was not long in reaching a fairly accurate estimate of a disastrous plight. His head and left shoulder were stiff and sore, and he believed he had been rendered unconscious by a blow that caused a slight concussion of the brain. There was a bitter taste in his mouth which he recognized as poppy–juice, a preparation of opium widely used in Northern Africa as a soothing tonic. This, in itself, was somewhat reassuring. It suggested a crude effort to revive him. Again, though tied hand and foot, he was lying comfortably, and the irregular swaying motion which puzzled his waking thoughts was quickly explained by the shuffling of sandals and the occasional grunting comments of the men who carried the palanquin, or litter, in which he was pent.