6

When Simon returned to his lodgings the following evening he saw Miss Dido Twite in her nightgown looking out rather forlornly from the front window into the twilit street. Her face brightened immediately at sight of him and as he entered the house she put her head around her bedroom door.

"Wotcher, my cully" she greeted him hoarsely but joyfully.

"Hallo, brat. What's the matter with you?" Simon inquired. She was flushed, and had a long red stocking wound around her throat.

"I have the quinsy," Dido croaked, "and Ma and Pa and Penny-lope and Aunt Poke and Aunt Tinty and everybody has gone off to Theobalds' Fair and I'm that put about and blue-deviled. Mean, hateful things they are—I wish they was all dead!" She stamped her bare foot on the floor and her lip quivered. "There was to be a Flaming Lady, too, and a Two-Headed Sheep and Performing Fleas and a G-giant C-carnivorous Crocodile."

"Here, don't you think you ought to be in bed?" said Simon, anxious to avert an explosion of tears which seemed imminent. "I'm sure if you have the quinsy you shouldn't be running about in your nightgown. Come on, I'll tuck you up."

"Will you stay and play cribbage with me?" asked Dido instantly.

"All right—only jump in quickly."

She retired through the doorway to a very untidy groundfloor bedchamber evidently shared by the two sisters, for, as well as Dido's meager collection of playthings, it contained curling tongs, copies of the Ladies' Magazine, and a great quantity of frilly garments strewn about in a state of disrepair, which plainly belonged to Penelope.

"Now you sit there," ordered Dido, jumping into a skimpy disheveled bed and patting the coverlet. "Here's the cribbage board. Shall we play for money?"

"No, we certainly shall not," said Simon reprovingly. "Besides, I don't for one moment suppose that you have any."

"No, I haven't a tosser to my kick," Dido said, bursting out laughing. "What a hum it would have been if you'd won! Come on—you can start."

They played for an hour, Dido winning all the time, largely because she was prepared to cheat in the most unabashed manner. Then she began to get restless and peevish, and suggested they change over to loo. Simon, who thought she ought to get some rest, proposed that he should straighten her covers and leave her to try and go to sleep, but she raised vehement objections.

"I don't want to go to sleep! I don't want to be left alone! There's too many people come into this house at night, walking about and bumping on the stairs."

"I don't believe there's a soul except us," said Simon. "You're not scared of ghosts, are you?"

"I ain't afeared of anything," said Dido with spirit. "I jist don't like people walking about on the stairs and bumping. They clanks, too, sometimes."

"Shall I get you something to eat or drink?" Simon suggested.

Dido thought she would like a drink of hot milk. "Ma said she'd leave a mug of milk in the kitchen, but I'd sooner you hotted it. My throat feels like someone's been at it with sandpaper." She gave him a pitiful grin, looking more than ever like a small, molting sparrow.

Simon found the Twites' kitchen, a huge gloomy room in the basement. The mug of milk was on the table, but it took some hunting to discover a clean saucepan. The fire in the range was very low and the coal scuttle empty; he returned to Dido and asked where the coal was kept.

"In the cellar. Door's back o' the pantry. Mind how you go down the steps, they're steep," she croaked. "Ma won't let me go down there."

There were some half-used candles on the kitchen dresser. Simon lit one, took the hod, and went down the steep, narrow cellar stairs. There was another door at the foot, which was locked, but the key was in the lock. He opened this and cautiously entered the darkness beyond, holding his candle high. His foot struck against something metallic which clinked on the stone floor. He lowered the candle and was astonished to see a musket—and another—dozens of them, neatly stacked. And beyond the muskets were barrels of a greyish substance which Simon, by feel and sniff, holding the candle at a safe distance, identified as gunpowder. The room was a regular arsenal!

He found a heap of coal in one corner. Thoughtfully he filled his hod and returned to the kitchen, locking the cellar door behind him again. While he mended the fire and waited for the milk to heat he pondered over this discovery. No wonder Dido heard people bumping and clanking on the stairs! No doubt about it, the Twites must be Hanoverian plotters, bent on removing good King James from the throne, and bringing in the young pretender, Bonnie Prince Georgie from over the water.

The milk came to the boil and, remembering Mrs. Cobb's Special, he shook in some aniseed and took the mug to Dido. She sipped the hot drink gratefully while he beat up her pillows and straightened the blankets with clumsy good will.

"Now you must try to sleep," he ordered when the mug was empty.

"You've got to stay with me till I go off," she countered. She looked hot-cheeked and heavy-eyed, ready to fall asleep at any moment.

"Very well," said Simon. "I'll blow out the candle."

"No, don't do that. Put it over on that cupboard where it won't shine in my eyes."

"Lie down, then." She curled up, sighing, with her back to him, and he placed the candle on the cupboard. As he did so his attention was caught by a small drawing pinned on the wall. He held the light close and saw that it was a sketch portrait of Dido, done roughly but full of life and animation. She was sitting on the front steps, eating a piece of bread and jam. Simon let out an exclamation under his breath and studied the picture intently. The style of drawing was unmistakable: it could be by no other hand than that of Gabriel Field. He looked at the lower right-hand corner where the doctor always signed with his initials, but saw that the whole corner of the paper had been neatly removed by somebody's thumbnail.

He put the candle down and returned to Dido, intending to question her, but she was so drowsy he had not the heart. "Kind," she whispered hoarsely. "Nobody else..." Her voice died out. She took a firm hold of Simon's hand and sank into sleep. In any case, what would be the use of questioning her? She would only tell lies about it. Best to mention it to Mr. Twite in the morning—it offered complete proof that Dr. Field had been in the house and seen Dido.

Had Dr. Field stumbled on some evidence of the Hanoverian plot and been put out of the way?

Dido stirred and suddenly opened her eyes.

"Where's your kitty?" she muttered.

"I've lent it to a lady called Mrs. Cobb."

"Why?"

"To catch mice for her."

Dido lay silent. Presently a large tear rolled out from under her closed eyelid.

"What's the matter?"

"First the donkey went—then the kitty went—next you'll go. I don't have anyone nice to play with—they allus leaves."

"I shan't leave," Simon soothed her. "You go back to sleep." But as the words left him it suddenly occurred to him to wonder what would happen if the Twites realized that he had seen the arms in the cellar. Would he, like Dr. Field, mysteriously disappear?

Dido's eyelids flickered open, then shut once more. Her breathing slowly became deep and even, her clutch on his hand loosened. Fifteen minutes went by and then he judged it safe to slip his hand free and stand up. As he did so she moved and muttered in her sleep, "Can't tell, you see. Pa would larrup me."

"Never mind," said Simon softly, "I think I know." And he tiptoed from the room.

Simon took a long time to go to sleep. He lay awake worrying, and woke next day with his problem still unsolved. His first impulse had been to inquire his way to the office of the Bow Street constabulary and put the whole matter before them. What would happen then? There would be commotion, uproar, publicity—the Twites would be arrested, no doubt, the guns and ammunition removed, but would he be any nearer discovering what had happened to Dr. Field? He doubted it. After much pondering he decided to keep his own counsel a bit longer, and to watch the Twites even more closely.

To this end, when, as he ate his breakfast, he heard a violent quarrel break out on the stairs, he went quietly onto the landing and stood listening by the banisters out of sight.

"I'll teach you to leave keys in doors!" Mrs. Twite was crying angrily. "Didn't I tell you to see to the fire and lock the cellar before we set out? Oh, you nasty little minx, you! I'll wager you never even fetched the coal. Oh, you hussy, you! All you cared about was prinking and powdering and sticking on beauty spots!"

Simon heard what sounded like a hearty box on the ear followed by an angry shriek from Penelope.

"Leave me be, Ma! Pa, make her leave me be or I declare I'll leave home. I won't stay here to be abused!"

"Best leave her be, then, Ella my dove."

"Hold your tongue, Abednego!"

There followed the sound of a door slamming. Simon waited a moment or two, then ran quietly downstairs.

By the front door he came face to face with Mr. Twite.

"Ah, it's our distinguished young Raphael, our Leonardo-to-be," said Mr. Twite with a wide smile which seemed almost to meet around the back of his head while leaving the upper half of his face quite undisturbed. "I trust you are rejoicing in the pursuit of your studies? Art, art, a hard but rewarding taskmaster!" Evidently rather pleased with the sound of these last words, he repeated them over to himself, shutting his eyes and opening his mouth very wide at each syllable, pronouncing "rewarding" like "guarding." Meanwhile Simon waited for an opportunity to ask about the sketch.

"I delay you," said Mr. Twite, opening his eyes and giving Simon a very sharp look.

"No, sir. I was going to ask how Dido does this morning."

"Poorly, poorly. A delicate sprite," sighed Mr. Twite. "Dido Twite: a delicate sprite," he chanted, to the air of "Three Blind Mice." "It is the curse of our family, young man, to be afflicted by spirits too strong for our bodies."

Simon thought that if Dido were given rather more food, and warmer clothes, and in general more care and attention, her body would be equal to maintaining its spirit, but he did not say so.

"In point of fact," Mr. Twite confided, "the poor child is quite feverish—my wife has just sent along to the pharmacy for a drop of Tintagel water."

"Is that young Thingummy?" called the sharp voice of Mrs. Twite, and she came out of the kitchen, attired for the morning in plum-colored plush. Directing at Simon a smile as glittering as it was insincere, she exclaimed, "It must have been you, dear boy, who heated up a mug of milk for our little one last night."

"Yes it was, ma'am. She didn't fancy it cold, so I heated it and put in a pinch of aniseed. I hope I did nothing wrong?"

"Not a bit, dear boy. Not a bit. It was a truly Samaritan act."

"The Samaritans came in two by two,
And paused to bandage the kangaroo—"

sang Mr. Twite.

"Will you be quiet, Abednego! I do hope, Mr. Thingummy," pursued Mrs. Twite, looking at Simon very attentively, "that you weren't put to too much trouble about it—I hope you didn't have to mend the fire, or fetch coals, or anything of that kind?"

"No trouble, ma'am," Simon said. Luckily Mrs. Twite took this to mean that he had not had to fetch coal. "Penny must have told the truth, then," she murmured, glancing significantly at her husband. "She forgot to take the key, but no harm's done."

"She'd better not forget it again, or she'll have a taste of my hoboy."

Simon seized the chance, when Mrs. Twite had retired, of asking who had drawn the little sketch of Dido that hung in her room.

"Sketch of Dido, my boy?" Mr. Twite looked vague. "Is there such a thing? I confess I do not recall it but surrounded as we are by talent, it may be by any of a dozen friends."

"I'll show it to you," Simon said eagerly.

"Later, later, my dear fellow." Mr. Twite held up a restraining hand. "This evening, perhaps. For here comes the lad with the Tintagel water, and Aesculapius must rule supreme." He gently shoved Simon out of the front door as the boy Tod came up the steps with a large black bottle.

That evening Simon was washing out his shirt in a pail of water when Tod opened his door without knocking, and remarked, "Young Dido's calling for you and Aunt Twite says, can you sit with her?"

"Very well." Simon left his shirt soaking. Tod muttered, "Can't think why she wants you..."

"Oh, there you are, Mr. Thingummy. I declare," exclaimed Mrs. Twite, who looked flushed and irritable, "I'm clean distracted with that child so feverish as she is; keeps trying to get out of bed, and Penelope gone out to goodness knows where, and a meeting of the Glee Society in half an hour. She's been calling for you, dear boy, so if you would just sit with her till she goes off..."

"Of course I will," Simon said.

He found Dido in a high fever, throwing herself restlessly about in her bed, muttering random remarks, singing odd snatches of songs. When he took her hand she quieted somewhat and lay back on the pillow.

"Hallo, brat," said Simon. "Do you want to play cards?"

"Too hot," she muttered. "Tell story."

Mrs. Twite put her head around the door long enough to nod gracious approval, and went quickly back to her Glee Society preparations. Simon racked his brains for a story. Then he hit on the notion of telling his adventures during the years when he had lived in his cave in the forest of Willoughby Chase, playing hide-and-seek with the wolves all winter long. This answered famously. Dido left off her restless fidgeting and settled down, holding on to his finger, listening in languid content.

"I'd like to go there..." she whispered.

"I expect you will someday."

Her eyes opened in a drowsy flicker. "Will you take me?"

"Yes, very likely, if you are good and go to sleep now."

"Promise?"

"Very well."

Her eyes closed and she slept. Simon carefully withdrew his hand and tiptoed across the room to re-examine the little sketch. But it was gone. Annoyed at not having anticipated this and showed it to Mr. Twite in the morning, he tried to open the door but found it locked. Since he did not like to knock and risk waking Dido he found himself a prisoner; having searched the room for some occupation and rejected the chance of reading numerous copies of the Maids' Wives' and Widows' Penny Magazine, he went philosophically to sleep, curled up on the floor.

He woke to find Mr. Twite shaking him.

"So sorry, my dear boy, a most unfortunate oversight. My wife thought you had already retired. No doubt you will wish to do so directly."

"Thank you," said Simon, yawning. Then he recollected the sketch. "Mr. Twite, that little drawing of Dido—the one that hung just there—"

"No, no, dear boy, no picture hung there. You imagined it, I daresay—yes, yes, your fancy is full of pictures, it is most natural."

"But I saw—"

"Ah, we artists," said Mr. Twite, waving him out of the door. "Always at the mercy of our visions. By the way," he added in quite another tone, "have you seen my daughter Penelope by any chance?"

"I'm afraid not, sir."

"Strange—most strange. Where can she have got to? Doubtless she will turn up, but it is vexatious. Ah well, I'll keep you no longer from the arms of Morpheus."

Dido was feverish for several days and Simon sat with her each evening until she was pronounced well enough to get up and lie outside on the patch of thistly grass by the river.

"I shan't be able to sit and tell you stories this evening," said Simon, finding her so placed one morning as he went off.

"Why not?"

"Because I shan't be home till late."

"Why? Where are you going? To a circus?" Dido asked with instant suspicion.

"No, no. When I go to a circus I'll take you too. I'm going to play chess with an old gentleman."

"Stupid stuff," said Dido, her interest waning. "I wouldn't care to do so. Did you know Penny had run off? She left a note saying she wouldn't be put upon. You should have heard Ma create."

Simon recollected that he had not seen Penelope for several days. He could not feel any sense of loss at her departure.

"P'raps Ma'll make some togs for me, now," Dido said hopefully, echoing Simon's thought. Then she added, "Where're you playing chess, anyways?"

"At Battersea Castle," Simon called over his shoulder as he walked off. "Good-by, brat. See you tomorrow."

"Mr. Cobb," Simon said that evening as he mended the springs of a lady's perch-phaeton. "What would you do if you thought you had discovered a Hanoverian plot?"

Mr. Cobb lowered the wash leather with which he was polishing the panels and regarded Simon with a very shrewd expression.

"Me boy," he said, "it's all Lombard Street to a China orange that I'd turn a blind eye and do nothing about it. Yes, yes, I know—" raising a quelling hand—"I know the Hanoverians are a crew of fire-breathing traitors who want to turn good King James, bless him, off the throne and bring in some flighty German boy. But, I ask you, what do they actually do? Nothing. It's all a lot of talk and moonshine, harmless as a kettle on a guinea pig's tail. Why trouble about them when they trouble nobody?"

Simon wondered whether Mr. Cobb would think them so harmless if he were to see the contents of the Twites' cellar. But, just as he was opening his mouth to speak of this the Chelsea Church clock boomed out the hour of nine and he had to hurry off to Battersea Castle.

He took the main way over Chelsea Bridge and through the great gates beyond it. A tree-bordered avenue led to the castle, which rose like some fabulous pink flower among the encircling gas flares.

"Oo the devil are you and where the devil d'you think you're going?" growled a voice ahead of him. A burly man came out of a porter's lodge halfway along the avenue and halted Simon by pressing a button which caused two crossed lances to rise out of the ground, barring the road.

"The Duke has invited me to play chess with him," Simon said.

"Play chess with a ragged young tyke like you? A likely story," the gatekeeper sneered. As a matter of fact it was a likely story, since the Duke made friends with all kinds of odd characters, and this the man knew quite well, but he hoped to wring some gate money out of Simon.

"I'm not ragged and the Duke is expecting me," Simon said calmly. "Let me in, please."

"Ho, no! I'm not so green as to let riffraff and flash coves in, to prig whatever they can mill! I'm not lowering that barricade for you, no, not if you was to go down on your benders to me. Not if you was to offer me so much as half a guinea!"

Simon remained silent and the man said angrily, "Not if you was to offer me a whole guinea, I wouldn't open it."

"I shan't do that," Simon said.

"Oh? And why not, my young shaver?"

"Because you'll have to open it anyway. The Duchess's carriage is just behind you."

The gatekeeper swung around with an oath. True enough, the carriage, which Simon had observed leaving the castle as he reached the lodge, was pulling up smoothly just behind the man, and the coachman was crying impatiently "Jump to it, there, Daggett, d'you think her Grace wants to wait all night?"

Red with suppressed emotion, Daggett hastened to obey.

Sophie, who was sitting in the carriage opposite her Grace, holding a reticule, a telescope, and a mah-jongg set, dimpled a smile at Simon, and the Duchess inquired, "Is that your young friend, Sophie? He looks a very personable lad."

"Yes, ma'am," said Sophie.

The Duchess addressed Simon. "So you're the young man who is kindly coming to play chess with William and keep him amused while I go to the opera? It is very obliging of you. William detests opera—and I only find it tolerable if I play mah-jongg with Sophie while the singing is going on. But of course one has one's box and must attend regularly."

"I hope you have a pleasant evening, ma'am," Simon said politely.

"Thank you, my dear boy. We shall meet again, I trust. A delightful face," the Duchess went on, speaking to Sophie as the carriage rolled away. "You have excellent taste, Sophie dear."

"Thank you, your Grace."

The main entrance to the castle lay up a tremendous flight of curving steps. At the top stood two haughty bewigged footmen in cream-and-gold livery with rose-colored buttons.

"Good evening," Simon said civilly. "I've come to play chess with the Duke."

Evidently they had been told to expect him. One of them led him in through a lofty hall, up another flight of stairs, and across a great black-and-white-tiled anteroom to a pair of doors which he threw open, announcing, "The young person, your Grace."

The room Simon entered was a large library with fireplaces on either side. The Duke jumped from a chair by one fireside and came hurrying forward. He was elegantly dressed tonight in satin knee breeches and a velvet jacket, but still looked absent-minded and untidy—the old-fashioned wig he wore was twisted askew, so was his cravat, and one of his velvet cuffs was covered in ash.

"Ah, this is a pleasure!" he exclaimed. "I have been greatly looking forward to our game." He bustled about, pulling forward a comfortable chair and ringing several bells.

"You'll take a little something?" he inquired. "Black-currant brandy? Prune wine? Scrimshaw, bring the chess set. Jabwing, prune wine and biscuits."

The Duke's chess set was very beautiful. The pieces were of greenish glass, cunningly twisted and carved. The Duke set them out lovingly on a leather board, polishing each one on his cravat. The white men were clear right through, the black were veined with streaks of darker glass.

They began to play and it did not take Simon long to discover that his Grace was not a very good player. He tended to start well with some bold moves, but then his attention would wander; he would jump up hastily to search for a quotation in a book, or to examine a patch of lichen on one of the burning logs in the hearth.

"You play very well, my boy," the Duke said, after Simon had won two out of three games. "Who taught you?"

"A friend of mine, sir," Simon said, sighing. "A Dr. Gabriel Field."

The Duke's face lit up. "Ah, Dr. Field! He is an excellent player, is he not? And a dear fellow. Where is the good doctor? I have not seen him this age."

"You know Dr. Field?" Simon gazed at him in astonishment.

"Why, yes. I met him at the Academy of Art."

"Rivière's? Where I learn painting?"

"Oh, you learn painting, do you, my boy? I am not surprised to hear it, for you have the face of an artist. Yes, I met Dr. Field at Rivière's—I am one of the patrons, you know, Marius Rivière was married to my aunt. I often drop in at the academy. The good doctor and I have many interests in common; he has advised me on several pieces of scientific research, and helped clean my pictures."

"Clean pictures, your Grace?" Simon was momentarily puzzled.

"Family pictures, old masters, that have become darkened with age." Simon nodded; Dr. Field had given him some instruction in the processes of picture-cleaning on his last visit.

"Indeed," the Duke went on, "I wish he would return, for he was halfway through cleaning Rivière's famous painting of a wolf hunt and I long to have it completed. See, I will show you."

He led the way to the far end of the library—a good hundred yards off. Here he turned, blowing a shrill blast on a small gold whistle. One of the footmen came running from the door.

"Jabwing, light some more tapers, please, and then bring my gruel."

Soon half a hundred candles had been kindled and by their clear blaze Simon was able to study a large canvas occupying most of the end wall of the room. The picture represented a hunt in a snowy wood, and he could see that it was by the hand of a master. A group of hunters, richly dressed in costumes of thirty years ago, were galloping to the help of two men and some hounds who were being attacked by a pack of wolves.

Half the picture had been cleaned and restored, the other half was still dark with grease and grime, so that hunters and wolves alike seemed to be plunging into a black chasm.

"It certainly needs cleaning," Simon remarked. "It looks very old."

"In fact the picture is only thirty years old," the Duke told him. "But it was a great favorite of my father, the fourth Duke, and he would always have it hanging by the fireplace where he used to sit in the evenings. With the smoke from the fire, and the great pipe he smoked, the picture became villainously begrimed. The fair-haired lady on the white horse is Lady Helen Bayswater, my aunt, who was married to the painter; he himself is one of the men on foot and it is thought that his daughter, too, is somewhere in the picture, the part still uncleaned. She was my cousin; they say she was very beautiful but I never met her. She met my younger brother by chance when both were taking the waters at Epsom, they fell in love, and made a runaway match of it. And they both died in the Hanoverian wars." He sighed deeply. "Young Justin, their son, is the last of the line, as you can see from the family tree over there."

Simon looked where he was bidden and saw a chart which meant little to him. Trying to turn the Duke's thoughts in a more cheerful direction—for he looked very melancholy—Simon suggested, "I could perhaps go on cleaning the picture for you, your Grace, if you like. Dr. Field taught me how."

"Would you, my boy? I should like it of all things! When could you begin?"

"Tomorrow, sir, if you like."

"Famous!" declared his Grace. "I will tell my steward to have the glass removed again—we had it off for Field and then put it back when he stopped coming—and to procure you all the cleaning materials that you may need. Upon my word, I can't wait to see those poor dirty wolves smartened up and made neat."

He began pointing out objects in the murk at the foot of the canvas, and Simon leaned forward, intently studying the untouched area. While he was doing so his eye caught a movement reflected in the picture glass from the opposite end of the room.

Jabwing the footman had brought in a small tray with a basin of gruel which he placed on the chess table. He then stopped and removed something from the Duke's chair; quietly and looking about to make sure he was unobserved (but he did not see Simon watching him in the glass) he bore this object across the room and slipped it into the pocket of Simon's old frieze jacket which had been left lying on a chair. Then he withdrew silently until, when he was just beside the door, he cleared his throat and said in a loud voice, "Your Grace's gruel is ready."

"Thank you, Jabwing, thank you," the Duke said absently. "You may go—unless—do you take gruel, my boy? No? You are certain? My cook has a capital way of making it with white wine and sugar—no? That will be all, then, Jabwing."

The Duke returned to the fireside and swallowed his gruel, happily discussing the cleansing operation.

Simon meanwhile quietly investigated his jacket pocket to discover what the footman had put in it. His fingers encountered a large, round, hard object which, on being withdrawn, proved to be the Duke's gold hunter watch, set with turquoises, which had been left on the arm of his chair.

Simon stared at this article for a moment, with his brow knitted, and then placed it on a small side-table among a number of crystal ornaments. He was curious to see what would happen.

"I only wish Dr. Field would return, he would be so delighted to find that you were helping me," the Duke was saying. "He is forever telling me that my pictures need attention, and his own time is limited, poor fellow."

"Speaking of time," Simon said politely, "I think I should be going, your Grace. It must be late."

"Should you, my boy? What o'clock is it, then? I'll ring for someone to show you out."

By the time Jabwing reappeared the Duke had discovered the loss of his watch and was hunting for it fretfully.

"Jabwing, Jabwing, I've lost my watch, what time is it?"

"Eleven past, your Grace."

"Is it, indeed? I'd no notion it was so late. Jabwing, show the young gentleman out, then come back and find my watch for me."

Jabwing brought Simon's jacket and, as he did so, contrived to turn it upside down, as if by accident, and give it a smart shake. A round object shot out of the pocket and fell with a loud rap to the marble floor.

"Why!" exclaimed Jabwing in pretended astonishment, "isn't that your Grace's watch?"

But he spoke a moment too soon, before he had seen what it was.

"No it isn't, Jabwing," snapped the Duke testily. "Where are your eyes? Any dolt can see that it is a hard-boiled egg!"

"My breakfast," explained Simon, quietly recovering and pocketing the egg.

"And I should like to know," the Duke went on indignantly, still addressing Jabwing, "what you mean by the outrageous suggestion that my watch would be in the pocket of a visitor, eh? Explain yourself, my man!"

Jab wing was covered with confusion.

"Entirely a mistake, your Grace:—very sorry, very sorry indeed. Only on account of the gentleman's being a—a rather a shabby young gentleman—and the egg's being so—so round, you know—wouldn't for the world give any offense—"

"Well, you have given it, blockhead, and it makes it no better to cast aspersions on the young gentleman's clothes. I've a good mind to dismiss you. Don't let such a thing occur again or you'll be sent back to Chippings! Good night, then, my dear boy, I shall look forward with impatience to our next meeting. Why, there is my watch after all," he continued, catching sight of it on the table, "I must have laid it there while showing you the Rivière. And, dear me, how late it is!"

Jabwing ushered Simon out and down the great stairway without a word, but his face spoke volumes and if looks could have done it there would have been a banana skin waiting to trip Simon on every step. As he threw open the hall doors he hissed one word, "Interloper!" into Simon's ear, and then slammed the door behind him with an insulting crash.

Simon walked down the long drive in a very thoughtful frame of mind. He half wished that he had not suggested coming to clean the picture, but he had taken a liking to the Duke, who seemed a kind old fellow and rather lonely. It was plain, though, that it would be necessary to keep a lookout against such hostile acts as that of Jabwing, who had clearly hoped to get Simon turned out and discredited as a common thief. It was almost, Simon thought, remembering the malevolent gatekeeper and the sour looks of Midwink the valet, as if someone had an interest in keeping him out of Battersea Castle. But why should that be? Puzzling over this new problem he went home to bed.