"You have enough churches for the size of the village."
"Well," said Roddy, "you couldn't be expecting the Wee Frees to go to the U.F. That's the U.F. down there — Mr. Logan's." He pointed down to the right over the edge of the road, where a bald church and a solid four-square manse sheltered in some trees by the river. "The Wee Free is away at the other end of the village, by the sea."
Grant looked interestedly out of the corner of his eyes at the comfortable-looking house that sheltered his quarry. "Nice place," he said. "Do they take boarders?"
No, Roddy thought not. They let the house for a month in the summer. The minister was a bachelor, and his widowed sister, a Mrs. Dinmont, kept house for him. And his niece, Mrs. Dinmont's daughter, was home for holidays just now. She was a nurse in London.
No word of another inmate, and he could not pursue the subject without making the always curious Highlander suspicious. "Many people at the hotel here?"
"Three," said Roddy. As befitted the retainer of a rival concern there was nothing he did not know about the inn at Carninnish. But though all three were men, none of them was Lamont. Roddy had the history and predilections of all of them at his fingertips.
Carninnish House lay on the opposite side of the river from the village, close to the Sea, with the high road to the north at its back. "You'd better wait," Grant said, as Roddy pulled up before the door; and with what dignity Roddy's method of coming to a halt had left him, he descended on to the doorstep. In the hall was a lean, rather sour-looking man in good tweeds. The stockbroker's got a party, thought Grant. He had quite unconsciously pictured the stockbroking gentleman as round and pink and too tight about the trouser legs. It was therefore rather a shock when the lean man came forward and said, "Can I do anything for you?"
"I wanted to see Mr. Drysdale."
"Come in," said the man, and led him into a room littered with fishing tackle. Now Grant had intended quite shamelessly to try sob-stuff on the broker of his imagination, appealing to his generosity not to spoil his holiday; but the sight of the real man made him change his mind. He took out his professional card, and was gratified at the man's surprise. It was a compliment to the perfection of the disguise which his old fishing clothes afforded.
"Well, Inspector, what can I do for you?"