The Man from the Clouds Part 4

As to his build, he seemed thick-set and st.u.r.dy, but then who does not in an oilskin coat? It would take a very slight figure indeed to look slender in an oilskin. So here again I could only say that he was neither a remarkably stout man nor a remarkably thin man. And this was really all I could swear to in the matter of his outward appearance; though I told myself confidently enough that if I actually fell in with him again I should recognise him fast enough.

"He can't disguise his voice anyhow," I said to myself.

And then here again I began to realise a small difficulty; though nothing, it seemed to me very serious. After his first involuntary reply to me in German, the man had spoken in low, half-whispered tones. In ordinary conversation, especially if he were on his guard, he would speak quite differently. But could he eradicate his distinct touch of foreign accent? No; I thought decidedly that was beyond him.

I was so immersed in my thoughts that I had become quite oblivious to everything outside them. Beyond the fact that I had struck a hard macadamed road and was striding down it, I realised nothing else, till of a sudden I looked up and noticed a large house close before me, and at that I stopped dead and awoke from my reverie.

That it was Mr. Rendall's mansion I never doubted. I saw now that it was not a really big house, but it was large compared with the small farm houses, and its utterly bare situation and the way in which it was set on a slight rise in the ground made it seem obviously the "big hoose" I was looking for. But somehow or other at the sight of it my spirits were instantly damped. Indeed I never saw a chillier, less inviting looking habitation, or one that seemed to repel confidence in it more subtly.

The road ran straight at it and then curved round the low wall that bounded the domains. And these domains consisted of absolutely nothing more than a rough gra.s.s paddock with a short straight drive leading from an open and dilapidated iron gate in the wall just where the curve began.

There was no ivy, or any sort of creeper on the walls, but, instead, a sort of grey-green damp hue, broken only by a very few staring windows.

I pa.s.sed through that dilapidated gate with no temptation at all to sing.

The drive was covered with an infamous species of large pebble, so uncomfortable to walk on that I chose the gra.s.s at the side and I only stepped on to this apology for gravel when I was quite close to the house; approaching the front of it, I may say, at an angle. My footsteps made a noise like a cart and horse, and instantly down went the blind of the nearest window of the ground floor.

I stopped dead instinctively and looked at this bleak mansion narrowly.

At the angle from which I had approached the front, I could see the blind go down quite plainly, but it was impossible to get even a glimpse into the room behind it.

"What the devil!" I murmured.

And then I told myself that I was really getting too suspicious. It must be a lady's bed-room obviously. The ground floor near the front door seemed an odd place for such an apartment. Still, one never knows what a lady's fancy may be. In any case there was nothing to be achieved by standing there staring, so I resumed my resounding progress across the pebbles.

I was at the front door and just going to ring, when round the corner of the house, right ahead of me, appeared a gentleman, and my spirits fell still further. I can't exactly say that his was a face I disliked, but it was decidedly not one I took to. He had eyes set somewhat close together, a well trimmed short black beard, and an expression in which I seemed to read impudence and certainly read suspicion. He stopped at the sight of me and looked me up and down at least as curiously as I studied him. Only I trust I conducted my inspection less obviously.

"Mr. Rendall?" I enquired, and though I had come here meaning to confide in him, I found myself instinctively putting in a touch of accent; not with a wet brush as I did for the Scollays' benefit, still I threw in a little, and, as I say, quite without intending it.

Curiously enough I saw his face clear the moment I spoke.

"Oh," said he, with an air of relief, "it's the doctor you're wanting, is it? Well, he's at home. Come in."

So the laird was a doctor? Of which sort, I wondered; medical, theological, or what?

"I'm Mr. O'Brien," added my new acquaintance as he opened the front door for me. "You're quite sure it's not me you're wanting?"

I had noticed more than a trace of accent in his own voice when he spoke, and there was no doubt now what it was; a very palpable Irish brogue. As he asked this question he looked at me with a curious mixture of humour and defiance. It seemed to me that the humour was a.s.sumed and the defiance genuine, but that may have been simply because the man impressed me unfavourably.

"No," I replied with a continental bow, "I am not so fortunate."

And then suddenly a thought flashed across me. Ought I to have answered in a very different key? But we were in the hall now and the next moment another gentleman appeared.

"Here's Dr. Rendall," said Mr. O'Brien, and I bowed again.

"My name is Mr. Roger Merton," I explained. "I have taken the liberty of calling upon you."

"Come into my study, Mr. Merton," said Dr. Rendall.

He spoke in a friendly enough voice, but if there was not a trace of suspicion in his eye too, I am greatly mistaken. And in both cases it seemed to me that it was suspicion tinged with apprehension, rather than the suspicion I was so deliberately cultivating. Indeed, I had not intended to cultivate any suspicion at all in this house, but fortunately (I think) I simply acted automatically.

Taking him altogether, Dr. Rendall was a decidedly more prepossessing looking man than O'Brien. In fact he was rather good-looking, with grey hair and moustache, face of a deep bronze-red hue and very blue eyes. He was well set up, and quite well dressed too in rough tweeds, and the only thing against him was that look in his eye as we exchanged our first sentences.

My wits were very wide awake by this time; I carried a picture of the outside of the house distinctly in my head as we turned out of the hall, and when we entered the study I knew it for the room where the blind had shut down.

"Is Mrs. Rendall at home?" I enquired.

O'Brien laughed.

"There are no ladies in this house, but just the doctor and me!" said he.

So no modest matron or maid had pulled the blind down. It had been Dr.

Rendall's study blind, whipped down obviously by the doctor himself the instant he heard a strange footstep, and now raised again. Why had it been dropped? What had it hidden? In the look of the room itself there was not a suggestion of an answer to either question. It was just an ordinary man's study, a cross between a smoking room and a library, a much more comfortable room than the outside of that house promised. Yet people do not suddenly pull down blinds in the middle of the forenoon for no reason at all.

For a moment I thought of a pa.s.sage at arms with a pretty housemaid as a solution. But it would obviously have been much quicker and simpler for any other party to flee the room than to make for the window and lower the blind. No; something had to be done which took a few minutes to do.

I thought instantly of one possibility--the folding up or putting away of maps or plans. No doubt there were several other possibilities, but there seemed the best of reasons for not giving these worthy gentlemen my confidence. In fact quite a different course of action suggested itself.

Transfixing the doctor suddenly with a significant eye, I demanded in rather a low voice, "Are there many sheep in this island?" I still think it was a shot well worth risking, but to be quite candid it failed to come off. At least it did not come off entirely. Both the gentlemen certainly looked a little startled, but all Dr. Rendall did was to stare at me very hard, while O'Brien exclaimed.

"Faith, he's a dealer!"

But again I refused the proffered explanation, even though it was quite evidently the easiest way of accounting for myself.

"No," said I, "but I am very greatly interested in your beautiful island, Dr. Rendall. What a convenient spot to own!"

I still threw a touch of significance into my remark--especially on the word "convenient"--but this time I got a wholly unexpected answer.

"But I am sorry to say I don't own it," said the doctor. "I am afraid you must be mistaking me for my cousin, Philip Rendall. He's the laird; I'm only the doctor."

"The d.a.m.ned doctor," added Mr. O'Brien with a grin.

I began to apologise, but O'Brien who was by this time in capital spirits, interrupted me with,

"Faith, you needn't apologise, Mr. Merton. As long as you're not one of my d.a.m.ned relations I'm delighted to see you, and the doctor here is always pining for a fresh face. He's getting sick of mine!"

This remark seemed to have a spice of malice behind it, and the doctor certainly frowned, but I was so anxious to seize this opportunity of putting a question or two that I did not stop to wonder what was implied; not, at least, till afterwards.

"I suppose you have little society in this charming island?" I suggested.

O'Brien was certainly ready enough to give me exactly the information I was after.

"There are just four civilised houses in the whole place, counting this,"

said he. "There's the laird's--and saving the dear doctor's presence I must say his cousin is a d.a.m.ned queer fish, besides being as poor as he's cranky, and there are the two ministers, only one's away and the other's as dry as my own throat's getting. What do you say to a drink, doctor?"

He grinned at Dr. Rendall with a malicious significance I could make nothing of. I could see that it perturbed the doctor, who answered in evident embarra.s.sment,

"If Mr. Merton would care for a gla.s.s of lemonade"

A hoot of laughter interrupted him. It reminded me of Jock, except that Mr. O'Brien's laugh had such a flavour of ill-nature. The man might or might not be what I suspected, but he was indubitably objectionable.

"No, thank you," I answered him. "I set out to call on Mr. Rendall and the time is pa.s.sing."