“You’re a good fellow,” said Philip, gratefully. “I must go on to ‘The Three Watermen’ at once, and trust to luck to bring me safely out of it again. If you will come on later, and take your lodging there in the ordinary course, I shall be glad; I might want to have such a friend near me. But, should you see me there, don’t recognise me, or take the faintest notice of me, unless I call upon you to do so. Will you undertake to carry out my wishes?”
Captain Peter Quist, though evidently much disturbed in mind, nodded slowly, in token that he would do as he was asked; and Philip Chater set out alone for “The Three Watermen.”
Guessing that the late Dandy Chater was probably well acquainted with the house and its inmates, Philip, for his own protection, determined to put on a moody sullen demeanour, and to lounge at the bar of the place until he was accosted by some one; he felt that he could take his cue more readily, if he led those who imagined they knew him to speak first.
In pursuance of this plan, he roughly pushed open the door with his shoulder, and lounged into the place—looking about him with an air that was half insolent, half quarrelsome. Making his way to the bar, he gave a curt nod to the man behind it, and gruffly ordered some brandy.
The man who presided there regarded him with a sort of obsequious leer; and took the opportunity to lean across the bar, and whisper huskily—“All gone upstairs, Mr. Dandy.”
“What the devil do I care where they’ve gone?” asked Philip, roughly.
“They’ll be expecting you, Mr. Dandy,” ventured the man, after a pause.
“Well—let them wait till I choose to go,” said Philip, in the same reckless manner. “I’ve been looking for the Count.”
“And he ain’t come,” replied the man. “They expected he’d come along with you. There’s something big afoot”—the man leaned over the bar to whisper this—“hadn’t you better go up and see them, Mr. Dandy?”
As a matter of fact, that was precisely what Philip Chater most desired to do; but, in the first place, he did not know which way to turn, or where to go; and, in the second, he had no intention of presenting himself before whatever company might be expecting Dandy Chater, in such a place as that, unannounced and unprepared. Therefore, trusting to the good-fortune which had not yet deserted him, he waited to see if some event would not occur, to prepare the way for him.