John did not miss him. His desire for company had passed. What he wanted now was to be alone and to think. Not that there was any likelihood of his thoughts being pleasant ones. The more he contemplated the iniquity of the Molloy family, the deeper did the iron enter into his soul. If ever he set eyes on Thomas G. Molloy again....
He set eyes on him again, oddly enough, at this very moment. From where he stood, looking out through the bars of the window, there was visible to him a considerable section of the drive. And up the drive at this juncture, toiling painfully, came Mr. Molloy in person, seated on a bicycle.
As John craned his neck and glared down with burning eyes, the rider dismounted, and the bicycle, which appeared to have been waiting for the chance, bit him neatly in the ankle with its left pedal. John was too far away to hear the faint cry of agony which escaped the suffering man, but he could see his face. It was a bright crimson face, powdered with dust, and its features were twisted in anguish.
John went back to the jug and took another long drink. In the spectacle just presented to him he had found a faint, feeble glimmering of consolation.
CHAPTER XII
I
On leaving John, Sergeant-Major Flannery's first act was to go to what he was accustomed to call the orderly room and make his report. He reached it only a few minutes after its occupant's return to consciousness. Chimp Twist had opened his eyes and staggered to his feet at just about the moment when the Sergeant-Major was offering John the cup of tea.
Mr. Twist's initial discovery, like John's, was that he had a headache. He then set himself to try to decide where he was. His mind clearing a little, he was enabled to gather that he was in England ... and, assembling the facts by degrees, in his study at Healthward Ho (formerly Graveney Court), Worcestershire. After that, everything came back to him, and he stood holding to the table with one hand and still grasping the lily with the other, and gave himself up to scorching reflections on the subject of the resourceful Mrs. Molloy.
He was still busy with these when there was a forceful knock on the door and Sergeant-Major Flannery entered.