He waved Borkins out with an imperious hand, and went on with his dressing, his heart sick. What if Collins had met with the same fate as Dacre Wynne? What were those fiendish flames, anyhow, that men disappeared completely, leaving neither sight nor sound? Surely there was some brain clever enough to probe the mystery of them.
"If Collins doesn't turn up this morning," he told himself as he shaved with a very unsteady hand, "I'll go straight up to London by the twelve o'clock train and straight to Scotland Yard. But I'll find him—damn it, I'll find him."
But no trace of James Collins could be found. He was gone—completely. No one had seen him, no one but Borkins had known of his probable journey across the Fens at night-time, and Borkins excused himself upon the plea that Collins hadn't actually said he was going that way. He had simply vanished as Dacre Wynne had vanished, as Will Myers and all that long list of others had vanished. Eaten up by the flames—and in Twentieth Century England! But the fact remained. Dacre Wynne had disappeared, and now James Collins had followed him. And a new flame shone among the others, a newer, brighter flame than any before. Merriton saw it himself, that was the devilish part of it. His own eyes had seen the thing appear, just as he had seen it upon the night when Dacre Wynne had vanished. But he didn't shoot at it this time. Instead, he packed a small bag, ran over and said good-bye to 'Toinette and told her he was going to have a day in town, but told her nothing else. Then he took the twelve o'clock train to town. A taxi whisked him to Scotland Yard.
CHAPTER X
—AND THE LADY
And this was the extraordinary chain of events which brought young Merriton into Mr. Narkom's office that day while Cleek was sitting there, and on being introduced as "Mr. Headland" heard the story from Sir Nigel's lips.
As he came to the last "And no trace of either body has ever been found," Cleek suddenly switched round in his chair and exclaimed:
"An extraordinary rigmarole altogether!" Meeting Merriton's astonished eyes with his own keen ones, he went on: "The flames, of course, are a plant of some sort. That goes without saying. But the thing to find out is what they're there for to hide. When you've discovered that, you'll have got half way to the truth, and the rest will follow as a matter of course.... What's that, Mr. Narkom? Yes, I'll take the case, Sir Nigel. My name's Cleek—Hamilton Cleek, at your service. Now let's hear the thing all over again, please. I've one or two questions I'd like to ask."
Merriton left Scotland Yard an hour later, lighter in heart than he had been for some time—ever since, in fact, Dacre Wynne's tragic disappearance had cast such a gloom over his life's happiness. He had unburdened his soul to Cleek—absolutely. And Cleek had treated the confession with a decent sort of respect which was enough to win any chap over to him. Merriton in fact had found in Cleek a friend as well as a detective. He had been a little astonished at his general get-up and appearance, but Merriton had heard of his peculiar birthright, and felt that the man himself was capable of almost anything. Certainly he proved full of sympathetic understanding.