“Well, it’s hardly a country for pleasure-seeking,” I laughed; then changing my tone, I said: “You two have given me a nice fright! I returned to find you both missing, and feared lest something awful had happened to you.”
“Fear of something happening caused us to disappear,” he answered; then he practically repeated what Natalia had told me earlier in the day. “My aunt very kindly offered to put Miss Gottorp up, and I have since lived down at St. Fillans under the name of Gregory.”
I told him of the search in progress in order to discover him. But he declared that a Scotch village or the back streets of a manufacturing town were the safest places in which to conceal oneself.
“But how long do you two intend causing anxiety to your friends?” I asked, glancing from one to the other.
Natalia looked at her lover with wide-open eyes of admiration.
“Who knows?” she asked. “Dick has to decide that.”
“But Miss West and Davey, and all of them at Hove are distracted,” I said, and then, turning to Drury, added, “Your man in Albemarle Street and the people at your offices in Westminster are satisfied that you’ve met with foul play. You certainly ought to relieve their minds by making some sign.”
“I must, soon,” he said. “But meanwhile—” and he turned his eyes upon his well-beloved meaningly.
“Meanwhile, you are both perfectly happy—eh?”
“Now don’t lecture us, Uncle Colin!” cried the little madcap, leaning over the back of a chair and holding up her finger threateningly; and then to Dick she added: “Oh! you don’t know how horrid my wicked uncle can be when he likes. He says such caustic things.”