“You haven’t been robbed,” said Sir Tristram. “What I want to discover is why it is so vital to Basil to regain possession of that glass. Thane, where did you put it? For God’s sake try to remember! I suspect it may be of the utmost importance!”
“It is still in the inn, then!” Miss Thane said. “Hugh, think, I implore you!”
“Are you talking about the quizzing-glass you all said was Basil’s?” inquired Ludovic.
Shield turned. “What do you mean, Ludovic? Did you not recognize it?”
“No, I can’t say that I did,” answered Ludovic. “Not that I’m disputing that it’s his, mind you. I dare say he bought it since my time.”
“That,” said Sir Tristram, “is precisely what I think he did do. It must be found if we have to turn this whole place upside down to do it!”
“You needn’t do that,” said Ludovic calmly. “Thane put it on the mantelshelf in the coffee-room. I saw him do it.”
Sir Tristram wheeled about, and went quickly back to the coffee-room, and stretching up his arm ran his hand along the high mantelpiece. The quizzing-glass was just where Sir Hugh had left it. Shield held it in his hand, looking at it so oddly that Nye, who was standing beside him, ventured to ask if anything were amiss.
Sir Tristram shook his head, and carried the prize back into the parlour.
“You have found it!” exclaimed Eustacie. “But why is it important?”
He put her aside, and sitting down at the table, subjected the quizzing-glass to a minute inspection. The others gathered round him, even Sir Hugh betraying a mild interest.
“Myself I like ’em made slimmer,” remarked Ludovic. “The shaft’s too thick. Clumsy.”
Sir Tristram said dryly: “I think there is a reason.” He had picked up Sir Hugh’s eyeglass, and through its magnifying lens was looking at the heavily-encrusted circlet at the end of the shaft, through which a ribbon was meant to pass. He put Sir Hugh’s glass down and inserted his thumb-nail into a groove on the circlet.
There was a tiny click; the circle parted, and something fell out of it on to the table, rolled a little way, and lay still.
“The talisman ring!” said Sir Tristram.
Chapter Fourteen
A sound almost like a sob broke from Ludovic. His hand shot out across the table and snatched up the ring. “My ring!” he whispered. “My ring!”
“Well, upon my soul, that’s a devilish cunning device!” said Sir Hugh, taking the quizzing-glass out of Shield’s hand. “You see, Sally? The ring fitted into the circlet at the end of the shaft.”
“Yes, dear,” said Miss Thane. “I see it did. When I think how it has been lying where anyone might have found it I feel quite faint with horror.”
Eustacie was looking critically at it. “Is that a talisman ring?” she enquired. “‘I thought it would be quite different! It is nothing but a gold ring with some figures on it!”
“Careful, Eustacie!” said Sir Tristram, with a slight smile. “You will find that Ludovic regards it as sacrosanct.”
Ludovic raised his eyes from adoration of the ring. “By God, I do! There is nothing I can say to you, Tristram, except that I could kiss your feet for what you have done for me!”
“I beg you won’t, however. I have done very little.”
Miss Thane said: “It has been under our very noses. The audacity of it! How could he dare?”
“Why not?” said Sir Tristram. “Would any of us have suspected it had it not been lost, and then searched for in such a desperate fashion?”
An idea occurred to Miss Thane. She turned her eyes towards her brother, and said in moved tones: “So we owe it all to Hugh! My dear, this becomes too much for me. I shall not easily recover from the shock.”
“And everything—but everything!—we did was quite useless!” said Eustacie, quite disgusted.
“I know,” said Miss Thane, sadly shaking her head. “It does not bear thinking of.”
“I do not know why you should complain,” remarked Sir Tristram. “You have had a great deal of adventure, which is what I understood you both to want.”
“Yes, that is true,” acknowledged Eustacie, “but some of it was not very comfortable. And I must say that I am not at all pleased that it is you who have found the ring, because you did not want to have an adventure, or to do anything romantic. It seems to me very unfair.”
“So it is!” said Miss Thane, much struck by this point of view. “It is quite odious, my love, for who could have been more disagreeable, or more discouraging? Really, it would have been better in some ways had we insisted upon his remaining the villain.”
Sir Tristram smiled a little at this, but in rather an abstracted way, and said: “It’s very well, but we are not yet out of our difficulties. Let me have the ring, Ludovic. It is true that we have found it, but we did not find it in the Beau’s possession. Oh, don’t look so dubious, my dear boy! I shan’t lose it.”
“Ah!” said Miss Thane, nodding wisely. “One has to remember, after all, that you are a collector of such things. I don’t blame him, I dare say it is all a Plot.”
“Sarah, you’re outrageous!” said Ludovic, handing the ring across the table to his cousin. “For God’s sake be careful with it, won’t you, Tristram? What do you mean to do?”
Sir Tristram fitted the ring back into its hiding-place, and closed the circlet with a snap. “For the present I’ll keep this. I think our best course—” He stopped, frowning.
They waited in anxious silence for him to continue, but before he spoke again Nye caught the sound of a coach pulling up in the yard and said apologetically: “Beg pardon, sir, but I’ll have to go. That’ll be the night mail.”
Sir Tristram’s voice arrested him as he reached the door. “Do you mean it’s the London mail, Joe?”
“Ay, that’s the one, sir. I want a word with the guard, if you’ll excuse me.”
Sir Tristram’s chair rasped on the oaken floor as he sprang up. “Then that’s my best course!” he said. “I’ll board it!”
Nye stared at him. “If that’s what you mean to do, you’d best make haste, sir. It don’t take them more than two minutes to change the horses, and they’ll be off the moment that’s done.”
“Go and tell them to wait!” ordered Sir Tristram. “I have but to get my hat and coat.”
“They won’t wait, sir!” expostulated Nye. “They’ve got their time to keep, and you’ve no ticket!”
“Never mind that! Hurry, man!” said Sir Tristram, thrusting him before him out of the room.
“But what are you going to do?” cried Eustacie, running after them.
“I’ve no time to waste in explaining that now!” replied Sir Tristram, already halfway up the stairs.
Miss Thane, following in a more leisurely fashion with Ludovic, said darkly: “I said it was a Plot. It’s my belief he is absconding.” She discovered that her butt was already out of hearing, and added: “There! How provoking! That remark was quite wasted. Who would have supposed that the wretched creature would be taken with such a frenzy?”
Sir Tristram reappeared again at this moment, his coat over his arm, his hat in his hand. As he ran down the stairs, he said: “I hope to return tomorrow if all goes well. For God’s sake take care of yourself, Ludovic!”
He was across the coffee-room and out of the door almost before they could fetch their breath. Miss Thane, blinking, said: “If only we had a horse ready saddled!”
“Why? Isn’t the mail enough for him?” inquired Ludovic.
“If there had been a horse, I am persuaded we should have seen him ride off ventre a terre!” mourned Miss Thane.
“But where is he going?” stammered Eustacie. “He seems to me suddenly to have become entirely mad!”
“He’s going to London,” replied Ludovic. “Don’t ask me why, for I haven’t a notion!”