And the young couple started, leaving Mr. Rubelius to be put into his coracle, with much splashing, and swearing on his part, by two of the gillies and a volunteer. It was a mild day for April in the North. A single cuckoo called by the riverside, and the Duke and Duchess did not hurry, though Ethelwyne turned back before she reached the Falls, below which the deepest salmon-pools were situated, and where the men, the boats, and the rest of the party waited. She had her rod and gillie, and meant to spin a little desultorily from the bank, the Haste being almost in every part too deep for waders, except in the upper reaches.
“I wonder how that horror is getting on?” she thought, as the gillie baited her prawn-tackle. Then, stepping out upon a natural pier of rough stones leading well out into the turbulent whitey-brown stream, the Duchess skilfully swung out her line, and, after a little manipulation, found herself fast in a good-sized fish.
“What weight should you judge it?” she asked the attendant, when the silvery prey had been gaffed and landed.
“All saxteen,” said the gillie briefly. “Hech! What cry was that?”
As the man held up his hand the noise was repeated.
“It sounds like somebody shouting ‘Help!’” said the Duchess.
And, rod in hand, she ran out upon the pier of bowlders, and, shading her eyes with her hand, gazed upstream, as round a rocky point above came something like a tarred washing-basket with a human figure huddled knees-to-chin inside. The coracle had betrayed the confidence of Mr. Rubelius, and drifted with its hapless tenant down the mile and a half of racing water which lay between Rantorlie and the Falls. The Falls! At that remembrance the laughter died upon the Duchess’s lips, and the ridiculous figure drifting towards her in the bobbing coracle became upon an instant a tragic spectacle. For Death waited for Mr. Rubelius a little below the next bend in the rocky bed of the Haste. And—if the money-lender were drowned—those letters ... yes, those letters, the proofs of the Duchess’s folly, might be regained and destroyed, secretly, and nobody would ever——
It seemed an age of reflection, but really only a second or two went by before the Duchess cried out to Rubelius in her sweet, shrill voice, and ran out to the very end of the pier of rocks, and with a clever underhand jerk sent the heavy prawn-tackle spinning out up and down the river. Once she tried—and failed. The second time, two of the three hooks stuck firmly into the wickerwork of the coracle. It spun round, suddenly arrested in its course, but the strong salmon-gut held, and, after an anxious minute or two, the livid Rubelius safely reached shore.
“I’ve ’ad my lesson,” said he, as the gillie administered whisky. “Never any more salmon-fishing for me! It’s too tryin’,” he gulped—“too ’ard upon the nerves of a man not born to it!” Then he got up, and came bare-headed to the Duchess. His face was very pale and flabby, and his thick lips had lost their color, as he held out a black leather notecase to her Grace. “You—you saved my life,” he said, “and I’m not going to be ungrateful. Here they are—the six letters. Look ’em over, if you like, and see for yourself. And, my obliged thanks to his Grace for his hospitality—but I leave for town to-morrow. Good-by, your Grace. You won’t hear of me again!” And Mr. Rubelius kept his word.