Part 10

"Major Fraser was thinking about it while he talked to us," remarked Hughie dryly, "_he_ was wondering, I saw him."

"Well, he'll have to wonder," answered Pamela shortly, "I'm getting fed up with this girl. By the way, Midget, her face isn't like mine. She's frightfully pretty."

"So are you," said her brother with firmness.

Pamela turned pink.

"Oh no--not pretty. I may be interesting--I hope I am. And I know my hair's decent. But really and honestly this girl is lovely--and yet--she didn't exactly draw one. Some people make you love them on the spot."

"Like Miss Lasarge," said Hughie.

"Yes, she's simply adorable--and that reminds me of an idea that came on me at supper. I can't go into it now--but remember to remind me, would you, I might forget with all this rush of confusion. Oh dear! How tiresome people are sometimes--what was I saying?"

"You said the girl was pretty, and she didn't draw you," reminded Hughie with painstaking care, "was she nice, Pam?"

"I couldn't say. She's clever. It was she thought of the petticoat. She climbs like a cat; she isn't a bit nervous--somehow she has a look of being used to it. There's something about her that impresses one--her nose is a bit hooky." Pamela paused and considered the matter, Hughie watched her intently; then she began again:

"She's only told me one thing, Midget, and that came up by accident. Somehow brothers and fathers happened to be mentioned, and she said _her_ father was killed in the war. Just that. She looked so queer when she said it, kind of fierce. She's got funny eyes--dark eyes, but not black--or hazel, there's a sort of tinge of red in them, and when she told me that, the red shone."

There was another pause, then Hughie remarked:

"We _did_ see you, Pam."

"Who did?"

"Why don't you remember Miss Chance said that we saw you in the mist against the sky, and thought it was two Pams carrying something."

"I'd forgotten. Yes, you must have."

"I didn't say a word. She just thought she was mistaken afterwards. But I did rather wonder about it--especially when I felt pretty sure you couldn't have got up the Beak."

Pamela laughed.

"You have sense, Midget--heaps. Now, look here, you'd better go to bed, I'm sleepy."

Hughie slid off the bed.

"Shall you go to Clawtol Wood?" he asked.

"I don't know. I'm not sure. Besides, how can I tell which 8.30 she means?"

"She can't mean breakfast-time," suggested her brother with reason. "They'd tell her we have it at half past eight, and usually wait about till nine in holidays. Besides, it's a bad time for hiding oneself considering everybody in Bell Bay is going back to work."

"So it is. Well, I must say going to meet people at 8.30 in the evening is rather a vulgar sort of action," Pamela lay down as she gave this distinctly sensible opinion. "I don't care about going. I don't think I will, Midget."

"I wouldn't," remarked Hughie decidedly, and went off--silently as he entered.

The crew of the yawl was good as its word, and turned up at breakfast-time--half past eight. Indeed they were in the cove much earlier, and riding on the moorings like a white swan on a pond. It was calm and fresh as fairyland. Mist seemed to have lasted most of the night, but cleared with sunrise, leaving a wonderful feeling of cleanness.

Christobel and Adrian were in high spirits, they had done what they most wished; anchored out all night, and slept on board--on their own responsibility, and they felt entirely satisfied with the experience, also, anxious to do it again. The more they did, the more they might be allowed to do without bother or question, for when Mrs. Romilly understood that they were as safe as in Penberthy's day, she would cease to trouble about them.

Addie shouted up to her window, and imparted news in cheerful tones. Crow went in to have a bath and do her hair before the bell rang.

There was a general stir of excitement.

In the middle of breakfast Adrian said:

"Pam was up as early as we were. I congratulate you, my dear girl--never saw anything so athletic in my life! Talk about our risks! They were jolly small compared to your plan of speeding about all over the Beak at sunrise--jolly slippy hour too."

Pamela sat up with a sort of a start, and sat staring at the speaker while a flush of colour crept over her face, saying nothing at first.

"No good you saying you were in bed--this time," continued Adrian with a good-natured emphasis on the last two words, "we saw you, as plain as we saw the old Beak--ripping it looked, too--didn't we, Crow?"

"We saw a girl climbing down the Beak--who looked exactly like Pam----"

"Well, who else could it be _but_ Pam," interrupted Adrian, "need we haggle over a thing like that? If we were in London, or even Peterock, one might see a few samples of girls, but not in Bell Bay."

Everyone was looking at Pamela, and for one wild moment she contemplated saying she was the person seen, just to stop the conversation. Then she remembered that nothing is so silly--apart from wrong--as a fib, even a harmless fib, because you are bound to tangle yourself up in a network of bother, and afterwards, when you do tell the truth, people will not believe.

"I wasn't on the Beak this morning," she said; "I didn't get up till nearly eight."

There was silence of a tense kind. Adrian raised his eyebrows and looked at Christobel. Christobel winced, gazed at her plate and turned pink. Mrs. Romilly glanced from one face to the other, puzzled.

Hughie came to the rescue.

"Pam got up soon before eight. I know, because when she opened her door I heard."

Poor Pamela cast a grateful look towards her faithful ally.

Then the Floweret--faintly conscious of uneasiness, but believing in everybody's good faith, as usual--burst into the conversation.

"I call that quite an odd coincidence--don't you, dear Mrs. Romilly? To think that Pamela should have risked her life to save that of another, on the Beak last evening, while we were all in ignorance. And that this morning when she was not there, Adrian should fancy she was! Most strange, is it not?"

Nobody entered into argument as to the strangeness of the Floweret's "coincidence", but Crow demanded eagerly what was the story about Pam.

She was told--by everybody except Pamela, who sat listening. Christobel was intensely interested; Adrian asked many questions. Finally, it was decided that someone must go up to Clawtol and inquire about Reuben; then the party dispersed, the decision having been reached that Crow and Adrian would go up that morning, carrying certain delicacies for Reube; and Mrs. Romilly would go herself to see Mrs. Ensor later in the afternoon, probably after tea.

Nothing particular happened to the elder pair as they walked up, taking the shorter and easier way through Crown Hill park, except that Adrian gave it as his assured conviction--first, that Pamela had been on the Beak that morning; secondly, that she had not rescued Reube Ensor.

"Addie, how _can_ you!" said Crow, almost tearful, "besides, it's silly. Hughie heard her get up; and how could she be telling a story about the Beak? Reube was brought up by someone--there he is, badly hurt. I think you carry things too far sometimes."

"My dear friend," pronounced Adrian weightily, "I assure you on my honour that it would take every inch of muscle _I've_ got to haul that child up the Beak."

"But, Addie, Pam is as active as a cat!"

"She may be, but she can't do impossible things. That cliff is fairly precipitous, and the mist makes the whole show as greasy as butter. I tell you, Crow----"

"Perhaps she didn't come up the worst bit," urged Christobel eagerly.

"The place we saw her on this morning is the worst bit--well, as bad as any. It's all bad. What did she tell that lie for, Crow, I ask you? _I_ saw her. You saw her. Rum thing is she must have seen us. She was there the whole time we took getting from opposite the lighthouse to the north of the Beak. Just crawling up and down, and moving along. Why, the thing was patent. It was blazing. I swear I don't understand what Pamela is up to."

Christobel was on the point of suggesting a lame excuse; because she certainly had seen Pamela, when they became aware of a lady wandering over the grass in the wake of a King Charles spaniel whose nose was buttoned up so high that it seemed miraculous he could live upside down, as it were. He was attached to a long lead, and as he ran round tree trunks the lady became a fixture at unexpected moments, because she never let go whatever happened. She did not see the Romillys because she was as short-sighted as the spaniel.

Christobel hurried towards her, with a cry of "Good morning, Auntie A.," unwound the dog and the lady, and started them again on a clear space.

"My dear children," said Auntie A., beaming, "how nice to see you both, and looking so well too, but surely it is not summer holidays yet--what? Ah, I should have remembered. I saw you last week I believe, dear Adrian, before Mollie went. I miss her so much, especially in the matter of Charles and his exercise--I do assure you he sets me at defiance. Indeed he does. The spirit of the age, is it not? So sad! Excuse me, dear Christobel, but is my veil on my hat, I believe Dickens put it there when I came out, I feel certain she must have done so, yet I cannot find it."

"It is under your chin, Auntie A.," said Crow gently and unsmiling, "I expect it got crooked and you pulled it down. Shall I undo it, and start again?"

"If you would, dear, I should be most grateful," said Miss Ashington, beaming, and she stood still while Christobel undid the veil, took it off, and put it on again neatly over the brim of her wide hat. She stood still, but she talked earnestly all the time about land girls and farming, which was her special hobby at the moment.

Adrian teased the King Charles. He hated it, and its way of making snuffling noises and barks like coughs. Auntie A. never noticed that the dog was being teased, but she heard the coughing barks, and said she must go home and give poor Charles some tea made from stewed herbs. She had invented the cure herself. She and Charles drank it--at least it was forced down the spaniel's throat when he became extra snuffly.

"I really think he ought to have something, Miss Ashington," said Adrian gravely, "he sounds as though he'd got congestion of the lungs, or bronchitis, doesn't he, Crow?"

Christobel said: "Oh no, I don't think it's as bad as that," reproachfully, but Miss Ashington turned homeward; she was pulling the edge of her veil--already it was coming slowly down.

"Of course you want to know about poor little what's-his-name," she said, drifting on from the farm questions. "I sent to inquire, because the milk boy told Mrs. Homer about the affair. Dear Pamela seems to have rescued the child in a most heroic manner. So difficult to climb up cliff's with a boy on your back----"

"On her back," echoed Christobel in a surprised tone.

"Mrs. Ensor--or somebody--Oh yes, little Joe said she was carrying the child on her back, and he was unconscious. Really, you know, my dear children, I think steps should be taken to obtain the Humane Society's medal for dear Pamela."

"Isn't that to do with drowning, though?" murmured Crow.

"Well, dear, the child _would_ have been drowned had he fallen from the Beak. It is practically the same thing. I will write to my brother and put the matter before him--something really must be done. I feel that we ought not to lose sight of your sister's courageous act. Sir Marmaduke would, I am certain, be the first to insist----"

She was stopped suddenly by finding herself entangled in the lead. Charles had gone twice round a tree stem.

"Really," murmured Auntie A., "really, this is _most_----" the rest of the protest was lost in the folds of the veil which was coming off the brim of her hat again.

Adrian picked up Charles and, walking backwards twice round the tree trunk, set the confusion clear.

Miss Ashington did not laugh--she had not the faintest sense of humour, but a very large heart. She beamed with gratitude from a space between the veil and the hat.

"Thank you, dear Adrian, how good of you. We must go home. I feel convinced poor Charles is not himself."

Charles was not himself, if his normal condition was good temper. He was enraged with his persecutor and the worst of it was that he found it impossible to explain, except in snuffles, which did not count.

"Rosemary tea," murmured Aunt A., jerking the string, "or was it sage?"

"I should give him laurel water, Miss Ashington," said Adrian in a serious tone, "it has the most lasting effect on dogs of that breed."

"Laurel water! Really, I must remember that. Thank you, dear Adrian--come, Charles, come----"

She went--with the veil round her shoulders, and Charles coughing defiance at the enemy. Charles had heard the parting advice and knew perfectly well that "laurel water" was only a polite name for prussic acid.

"How could you, Addie?" Christobel expostulated.

"Oh, it does them good--they both enjoy it," said her brother, "you heard what she said about Pamela."

Christobel nodded. She was pleased. There was no doubt in the world that Pam had behaved like a heroine, yet Addie was trying to make her out something of a criminal! The matter was still more decided when the two reached Clawtol. They were overwhelmed with gratitude and honour by little Mrs. Ensor in the first place, and Ensor himself in the second.

These two had removed their son from Pamela's shoulders, and referred several times to his disconnected recollections of that awful time on the cliff front.

"They 'adn't a drop of water, sir," said Mrs. Ensor to Adrian, her eyes full of tears, "if I'd a known, my cup o' tea would 'ave choked me. And boy says--Miss Pam takes 'er handkercher, and lays it on the grass--to get misty like, then she puts it in 'is mouth. 'Suck that, Reube,' says she 'an I wish I could do better for you.' Wonderful I call it. _Wonderful_. And she nobbut a child 'erself when it comes to years. He's asleep now, missie, or you could see him."

Ensor came to the gate with his visitors. There was quite a ceremonial of respect in his manner. Christobel gave the message that Mrs. Romilly would call in the evening, and the two went off home by the cliff road.

Adrian said nothing much till they reached the much-discussed summit. Then he went out over the ground, slowly descending, looking about as he went.

"Don't, Addie," protested Crow, following, "it's simply beastly. Just look!" She stood still.

After some minutes her brother came back.

"No time now," he said, "but I shall have a try later. In any case though, I shall stick to my opinion. I bet you everything I possess, old girl, that Pamela couldn't have done that job alone."

*CHAPTER XII*

*In which Pam defies the Countess*

Pamela was growing angry. This seldom happened with her, because though she had a temper "of her own", as Mrs. Jeep declared, it was well under control. She had a great contempt for people who are angry in a "senseless" way, that is to say, without adequate reason. In the present situation she considered she had reason, and therefore indignation was brewing up into serious anger.

"Why can't people leave other people's affairs alone," said Pamela to herself. What business had this handsome strange girl to mix up in Romilly affairs? She melted occasionally when she remembered the affair of the cliff. It was well never to forget that the cool courage of this inconvenient "double" had saved her from tortures indescribable, and probably death. One must never forget gratitude, and a debt of honour like that; at the same time poor Pamela was grievously hurt at Adrian's suspicions and scepticism.

The worst of it was, they were true.

Addie knew, of course, she could not have done the work alone. Yet she dare not speak. She had heard what the stranger said to Reube--Sir Marmaduke Shard was at the back of this mystery, he was a great K.C. and a person of untold wisdom; if she talked she might set on foot a whole host of mischief; she might offend the Shards and endanger the present joys of the yawl. She might destroy the friendship between the Bell House and Crown Hill.

Pamela's imagination saw herself a perfect outcast, scorned by both families, because she had not been able to hold her tongue for a brief period.

The conditions were quite distinct to her eyes. Sir Marmaduke, having brought down the girl in secrecy--telling no one, not even Mrs. Romilly or his own daughter--must intend it to remain a secret, for the present anyway. And to prove it came the girl's warning to Reube.

It was plain that she went out early or late. She had been on the Beak again that morning at seven o'clock. Now was that by permission? Pamela believed it was not. She believed that her double gave the keepers at Woodrising a most anxious time.

"She would," muttered Pam, with her head against the window frame, "she would--she hasn't got that nose for nothing. She may trample on that wretched Chipman, and give Mrs. Trewby jaundice, but she shan't trample on me. I can't help looking like her, but there it ends--no human power shall turn me into a door-mat--to be ordered about by that nose."

These metaphors were confused certainly, but the intention was very distinct. Pamela had made up her mind about that message thrown into Hughie's window. She was going to proceed on direct lines--and at once. There, in the window-seat of her room, she had reasoned it out and come to the conclusion that she must take decided action.

Nothing should make her meet the girl in secret. She would go to Woodrising after tea, ask to see her, and tell her so, once for all.

Hughie asked no questions that day, he was a tactful child. Miss Chance had a headache, and the two elders were going out in the dinghy to fish for whiting, taking their tea. Pamela felt a pang when Crow said: "Won't you ever come in the boat, Pam?" It looked as though she had private concealments, and the horrible part was that she had--only they were honourable and with excellent intentions.

She excused herself with such anxious humility that Christobel's sympathy was with her entirely. Adrian said nothing.

Mrs. Romilly started for Clawtol escorted by Hughie. Then Pamela Romilly made preparations to put her foot down with credit to her family.

She brushed her long hair, changed her blouse, and put on a different hat, a shady one. She got out clean washed gauntlet gloves, and polished her brown shoes. Then she went up to Woodrising.

She met no one by the way, and all the time was conscious of surprise at her own boldness--for no one can deny it was bold.

Arrived outside the carriage-gate in the wall she found it was locked. There was a pair of big gates with little spikes along the top, and in one of these was a small gate.

"Anyone would think it was a lunatic asylum," thought the girl, and from that sprang a sudden amazing question: "Was it? Was this strange girl a 'funny person'? She did not look 'cracked'," as Pam breathlessly put it, but one never knows!

The only thing to do was to summon Mrs. Trewby by the gate bell. So she rang it. As she stood waiting, she recalled that Mrs. Trewby had told Mrs. Jeep she always kept the gate locked, because of tramps and trippers.

"Anybody wouldn't believe how folk make free with a person's property," Mrs. Trewby had said. "Here, there, and everywhere--and to sweep up after them is not what I'm paid to do." So the gate was kept locked because of excursionists, not lunatics.

Mrs. Trewby came with slow steps, and Pamela heard her sigh as she undid the chain. The small gate opened, and the two looked at each other through the opening.

"Good afternoon," said Pamela politely, "could I see the young lady who is staying here?"

Mrs. Trewby looked as though someone had fired a squib in her ear. Her sallow face and melancholy eyes became distracted and rather frightened.

"Young lady," she echoed, and moved the gate a few inches as though to close it.

"Yes. We needn't pretend, need we, Mrs. Trewby. I've seen her, and she sent me a note last evening asking me to meet her. I must speak to her."

"Sent you a note, miss!" Mrs. Trewby repeated these words in a startled manner. "Who ever brought it? If it was boy----"

In this way Mrs. Trewby let the cat quite out of the bag, and made it impossible to deny the presence of the young lady at Woodrising.

"She brought it herself," said Pamela, "if you want to know how she gave it in, you'd better ask her, I'm not here to tell things; I'm here to speak to her, it's important."

Mrs. Trewby stood in awe of the Romillys, and at that moment she was almost afraid of Pamela.

"Well, miss," she conceded, "if you'll step inside, I'll tell Mrs. Chipman. She will be in a way, but I can ask her. It's no business of mine--what I say is 'attend to your own business, it'll take all your time'--nobody can say I've put myself forward to interfere; it's not my nature; I never was one for forwardness, that I will say."

These comments on her own character were made by Mrs. Trewby as she shut the gate, locked it, and led the way across the gravel sweep to the square white porch in the square white house-front. Here again was a double-locked door she opened, and Mrs. Trewby led Pamela into the dim hall; then, with a murmured assertion that it was not her fault, she melted into some back passage.

In the briefest time, and before Pamela had time to do more than take in the fact that the hall ran through the house to a glass door at the end, and that there seemed to be several rooms, Mrs. Chipman burst upon her sight.

She was a little woman, stout, and extremely bustling and buxom. She wore the style of garment that used to be called a habit bodice--tight and firm, and bristling with bead trimming and buttons. Her neck was short, but she had a beaded collar fastened by a brooch. Nothing on earth could have been more respectable and farther from any idea of mystery than Mrs. Chipman.

"Good evening, Miss Pamela," she said in a quick bustling voice, suppressed to a low note, "I find Mrs. Trewby's communication difficult of comprehension. Do I understand that you have a message for--me?"

"I wish to see the young lady who is staying here, Mrs. Chipman, and to make things clear I may as well say that I've spoken to her. And she sent me a note--I've really come about the note."

"Excuse me, Miss Pamela, might I request----" Mrs. Chipman motioned towards a door with a flourish of her fat hand, and then led the way to it, flung it open and let Pamela pass in, then she shut the door and practically stood with her back to it, thus barring the way out.

Pamela glanced round expecting to find the person she wanted, but there was no one in the room but themselves. It was apparently a dining-room, comfortably furnished in a very solid manner, and having a window at the end looking over the lawns.

Mrs. Chipman swept on without taking breath.

"I realized some such demand from words conveyed by Mrs. Trewby, but the mental capacity of persons dwelling in the country--as a permanency--being to a great extent limited, I believed she had mistaken your words. I am loath indeed to deny any member of the family what would appear a most reasonable request, but I assure you, Miss Pamela, I stand in a position of trust--nay, more--a position of great responsibility, and therefore I grieve to say that I could not accede--that is to say if there is a young lady at all. To begin with I cannot admit that there is a young lady----"

"Then you must be sillier than people think, Mrs. Chipman," said Pamela blandly, "we've all seen her--only the others take her for me----"

"That is so--the case with many----"