He was more fortunate in the case of Reggie Beauchamp, and he had his
daughter to thank for the capture. Enid, not having outgrown her
schoolgirl devotion to sweets, had lingered round the tables for a final
ice, and the young sailor was still in faithful attendance. Mr. Mallory
pounced on the pair just as they had realized that a general stampede
was in progress, and were preparing to follow.
"Beauchamp, I wish you would remain with Mr. Maynard and myself for a
little," he said. "There is a point on which I want to fortify myself
with your opinion. We can walk back to the Manor afterwards."
Enid began to pout and toss her head, but she knew every phase of her
idolized father's moods, and one glance at the network of creases round
the keen eyes was sufficient to quell her incipient mutiny. The
appearance of those filaments on the stern, ascetic face was a sure
danger-signal that her father was not to be trifled with--that the
active brain was at work on some serious problem. She put her ice-plate
down and, bidding the Lieutenant "make himself generally useful," ran
away to overtake the fast-receding party.
She had hardly departed when Montague Maynard came bustling up, wiping
his brow with a silk handkerchief. He stopped for an instant to order
the wondering servants to pack up the crockery ready for the cart and to
get home as quick as they could, and then he turned to Mr. Mallory,
while Reggie, with instinctive modesty, fell back a pace or two.
"Aunt Sally is a masterpiece; I'll tell you how she did it later," he
said, his eyebrows uplifted inquiringly in the direction of the young
torpedo-boat commander.
"It is all right. He's wanted," interpolated Mr. Mallory shortly.
"Well, then this is what I have done," the screw magnate went on in a
hoarse undertone. "I have sent a footman into the town direct for the
police-sergeant, and another to hurry up one of the local medicos. All
these maids will have skedaddled before either the sergeant or the
doctor can turn up. Now shall we go and have a look at the--the place?
You have no idea who the poor fellow is, I suppose?"
"I am not sure; it is on that point that I want Beauchamp to corroborate
me," was the reply. And, calling Reggie forward, Mr. Mallory told him,
as the three went towards the swamps under the embankment, of the
gruesome discovery he had made, and how he wished to learn if his view
of the dead man's identity coincided with his own.
No more was said till they had picked their way over the firmest
foothold they could find to the pool where the horrible sight awaited
them. The body lay half in and half out of the water, the upturned face
being afloat while the remains below the shoulders were embedded in the
ooze at the brink and nearly concealed by the reeds.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account