Moggy kept her promise, and night after night Dare received at the hands of the gypsy-girl her brief and half-illegible reports, the writing of which caused her many groans, and was the cause of much perturbation of spirit. But it was not till ten days had gone by that she found anything of consequence to communicate. Then, indeed, her news was of a sufficiently startling kind.
It had been arranged, Moggy wrote, that Mrs. Balchin, the child's attendant, together with her husband, who was Mrs. Bullivant's coachman, were to start next evening for Liverpool on their way to America, the report being that, by the death of a relative in the States, they had come in for a small fortune, which, however, could not be paid over to them without their presence on the spot. But it was not till Dare had got nearly to the end of Moggy's ill-spelt effusion--he was painfully deciphering it in his room at the inn by the light of a solitary candle--that of a sudden he sat up and gave vent to a low whistle. The child, the mysterious child, about whom none of the servants at Homecraft knew anything, was to accompany the Balchins on their long journey--a journey, in those days, infinitely more formidable than it is now.
The little party of three were to leave Homecraft in Mrs. Bullivant's carriage at half-past eight p.m., so as to reach Tuxford in time to catch the night coach bound for the south.
Dare sat for some time staring at the letter, but without seeing it, when he had succeeded in mastering its contents. What step ought he to take next? was the question he was revolving in his brain, and for some time no satisfactory answer was forthcoming.
Of course, all along he had been without any absolute certainty that the child in question was young Evan Cortelyon. Morally sure he might be, but that was hardly foundation enough on which to base any action of a definite kind. If he were to go to Piljoy and state his conviction in the matter, what could the lawyer do? At present no evidence was available conclusive enough to justify an application for a warrant, especially against a person of the social standing of the Hon. Mrs. Bullivant. And yet, if the child were really Evan (as to which he felt no sort of doubt in his own mind), then must he be rescued at every cost.
For a full hour he sat with bent brows, excogitating one scheme after another, only to reject each in turn, till he had worked round to the notion which had struck him first of all, but which he had put temporarily aside till he had satisfied himself that no other plan was equally feasible.
At length he rose abruptly and pushed back his chair, "'Tis the only way," he said aloud. "'Twas the first notion that came to me, and if I had only had the sense to embrace it there and then, I might have saved myself all this useless muddling of my brains. A year ago--nay, far later than that--I should not have hesitated a moment; but now----! What has come over me? What strange change has been at work within me? Is that a conundrum very hard to crack, Geoff, my boy? It may be true, after all, that the moon is made of green cheese."
[CHAPTER XXII.]
THE HON. MRS. BULLIVANT TO CAPTAIN FERRIS.
"My dear Wilton," wrote Mrs. Bullivant to her half-brother a couple of days subsequently to the events recorded in the last chapter, "I have some very singular news for you which I lose no time in communicating; but whether--bearing in mind the peculiar features of the case--you will be inclined to stigmatize it as bad news or to bless it as good, seems to me somewhat problematical, and I at once confess that I am myself at a loss to know in which light to regard it.