“Hallucinations?” I asked anxiously. “What sort of hallucinations?”
“I hardly like to tell you, my boy,” he answered, nervously twirling his liqueur glass in his fingers. “You see, you’re young, and I’m—well, to tell you the truth, I’m getting old, and when you get old you get nerves, and they can be terrible things, nerves.” I looked up at the haggard face, drawn into deep furrows with the new trouble that had fallen on the old man, and I was shocked and startled to see a look of absolute fear in his eyes. I leaned forward, and laid my hand on his wrist.
“Tell me,” I suggested, as gently as I could. He brightened at once, and patted my arm affectionately.
“I couldn’t tell the little woman,” he muttered. “She—she’d have been frightened, and she might have thought I was going mad. I couldn’t bear that. I hadn’t the courage to tell Whitehouse either; but you’re a good chap, Ronald, and you’re very fond of my girlie, and your father and I were pals, as you boys would say. I daresay it was only a sort of waking dream, or——” He broke off and stared at the table-cloth. I took the glass from his hand, and filled it with liqueur brandy, and put it beside him. He sipped it thoughtfully. Suddenly he turned to me, and brought his hand down on the table with a bang.
“I swear I’m not mad, Ronald!” he cried fiercely. “There must be some explanation of it. I know I’m sane.”
“What was it exactly?” I asked quietly. “Nothing on God’s earth will persuade me that you are mad, sir.”
“Thank you, my boy. I’ll tell you what happened to me. You won’t be able to explain it, but you shall hear just what it was. You may think it’s silly of me to get nervous of what sounds like an absurdity, but you see it happened where—where to-day’s tragedy happened.”
“What Myra calls the Chemist’s Rock?” I asked, by this time intensely interested.
“At the Chemist’s Rock,” he replied. “It was a lovely afternoon, just such an afternoon as to-day. I had been going to fish with girlie, but I was a little tired, and—er—I had some letters to write, so I said I would meet her later in the afternoon. It was agreed we should meet at the Chemist’s Rock at half-past four. I left the house about a quarter-past, and strolled down the river to the Fank Pool, crossed the stream in the boat that lies there, and walked up the opposite bank past Dead Man’s Pool towards the Chemist’s Rock. I mention all this to show you that I was feeling well enough to enjoy a stroll, and a very rocky stroll at that, because, if I hadn’t been feeling perfectly fit, I should have gone up the back way past the stable, the way you came back this afternoon. So you see, I was undoubtedly quite well, my boy. However, to get on with the tale. As soon as I came in sight of our meeting-place I looked up to see if girlie had got there before me. She was not there. I looked further up stream, and saw Sholto come tearing down over the rocks. I knew that he had seen me, and that she was following him. I naturally strolled on to go to the rock—I say I went——” He broke off, and passed his hands across his eyes.
“Yes,” I said softly; “you went to the rock, and Myra met you——”