"You have promised, you know," she said, with her eyes cast down.
"Yes," said he, regarding her for an instant with a strange look—earnest perhaps, and yet timid—as if it would ask a question, and dared not—"I will keep my promise." Then he jumped into the boat.
That was a hard pull away to the quay; and even in the bay the water was rough, so that the back-sweep of the oars sometimes caught the waves and sent the spray flying in the wind. The Chevalier had rung her bells. We made sure he would be too late. What was the reason of this good-natured indulgence? We lost sight of the gig in at the landing-slip.
Then the great steamer slowly steamed away from the quay: who was that on the paddle-box waving good-bye to us?
"Oh, yes, I can see him plainly," calls out Queen T., looking through a glass; and there is a general waving of handkerchiefs in reply to the still visible signal. Mary Avon waves her handkerchief, too—in a limp fashion. We do not look at her eyes.
And when the gig came back, and we bade good-bye for the time to the brave old White Dove, and set out for Castle Osprey, she was rather silent. In vain did the Laird tell her some of the very best ones about Homesh; she seemed anxious to get into the house and to reach the solitude of her own room.
But in the meantime there was a notable bundle of letters, newspapers, and what not, lying on the hall-table. This was the first welcome that civilisation gave us. And although we defied these claims—and determined that not an envelope should be opened till after dinner—Mary Avon, having only one letter awaiting her, was allowed to read that. She did it mechanically, listlessly—she was not in very good spirits. But suddenly we heard her utter some slight exclamation; and then we turned and saw that there was a strange look on her face—of dismay and dread. She was pale, too, and bewildered—like one stunned. Then without a word, she handed the letter to her friend.
"What is the matter, Mary?"
But she read the letter—and, in her amazement, she repeated the reading of it, aloud. It was a brief, business-like, and yet friendly letter, from the manager of a certain bank in London. He said he was sorry to refer to painful matters; but no doubt Miss Avon had seen in the papers some mention of the absconding of Mr. Frederick Smethurst, of ——. He hoped there was nothing wrong; but he thought it right to inform Miss Avon that, a day or two before this disappearance, Mr. Smethurst had called at the bank and received, in obedience to her written instructions, the securities—U.S. Funded Stock—which the bank held in her name. Mr. Smethurst had explained that these bonds were deliverable to a certain broker; and that securities of a like value would be deposited with the bank in a day or two afterwards. Since then nothing had been heard of him till the Hue and Cry appeared in the newspapers. Such was the substance of the letter.
"But it isn't true!" said Mary Avon, almost wildly. "I cannot believe it. I will not believe it. I saw no announcement in the papers. And I did give him the letter—he was acting quite rightly. What do they want me to believe?"