Foe-Farrell | Page 4

police, who
are closely watching the case. They preserve great reticence on the
whole subject and very rightly so in these days, considering the number
of enemy plotters in our midst, and that the neighbourhood of 'C--' in
particular is known to be infested with their activities.'"
"Is that all?" asked Polkinghorne.

"That's all; and about enough, I should say, for this Penny Reading."
"When did it happen?"
"Can't tell. The top of the sheet's torn off." Barham pushed the paper
across. "By the look, it's a bit of an old Daily Chronicle. I found it
wrapping one of my old riding boots, that I haven't worn since I took to
a sedentary life. Higgs must have picked it up at our last move--"
"Do you want the date?" put in Otway. "If so, it was in January
last--January the 18th, to be exact."
"But--"
"I mean the date of the inquest. The paper would be next morning's--
Wednesday the 19th," Otway went on in a curious level voice, as
though spelling the information for them out of the lamplight on the
table.
Barham stared. "But--" he began again--"but how, sir?"
Polkinghorne, who also had stared for a moment, broke in with a laugh.
"The C.O. is pulling your leg, Sammy. He tore off the top of your
paper--it was lying around all this morning--noted the date and thought
he might safely make a pipe-spill."
"That won't do," retorted Barham, still searching Otway's face on which
there seemed to rest a double shadow. "For when I turned it out of my
valise this morning I carefully looked for the date--I'll swear I did--and
it was missing."
"Then you tore the thing in unpacking, and the C.O. picked up the scrap
you overlooked. Isn't that the explanation, sir?"
"No," said Otway after a pause, still as if he spoke under control of a
muted pedal. He checked himself, apparently on the point of telling
more; but the pause grew into a long silence.
Barham tried back. "January, you said, sir? . . . and now we're close

upon the end of October--"
He could get nothing out of the C.O.'s eyes, which were bent on the
table; and little enough could he read in his face, save that it was
sombre with thought and at the same time abstracted to a degree that
gave the boy a sudden uncanny feeling. It was like watching a man in
the travail of second sight, and all the queerer because he had never
seen an expression even remotely resembling it on the face of this hero
of his, with whose praise he filled his home-letters--"One of the best:
never flurried: and, what's more, you never catch him off his game by
any chance."
Otway's jaw twitched once, very slightly. He put out a hand to pick up
his pen and resume writing; but in the act fell back into the brown study,
the trance, the rapt gaze at a knot in the woodwork of the table. His
hand rested for a moment by the ink-pot around which his fingers felt,
like a blind man's softly making sure of its outline and shape. He
withdrew it to his tunic-pocket, pulled out pipe and tobacco-pouch and
began to fill. . . .
At this point in came young Yarrell-Smith. Young Yarrell-Smith wore
a useful cloak--French cavalry pattern--of black mackintosh, with a
hood. It dripped and shone in the lamplight.
"Beastly night," he announced to the company in general and turned to
report to Otway, who had sat up alert on the instant.
"Yes," quoted Otway,
"'Thou comest from thy voyage-- Yes, the spray is on thy cloak and
hair.'"
That's Matthew Arnold, if the information conveys anything to you.
Everything quiet?"
"Quite quiet, sir, for the last twenty minutes; and the Captain just come
in and unloading. No accidents, though they very nearly met their
match, five hundred yards down the road."

"We heard," said Polkinghorne.
"I tucked the Infant into his little O.P., and left him comfy. He won't
see anything there to-night."
"He'll think he does," said Sammy Barham with conviction.
"The Infant is quite a good Infant," Otway observed; and then, sinking
his voice a tone, "Lord, if at his age I'd had his sense of
responsibility . . ."
Barham noted the change of tone, though he could not catch the words.
Again he threw a quick look towards his senior. Something was wrong
with him, something unaccountable. . . .
Yarrell-Smith noted nothing. "Well, he won't see anything to-night, sir;
and if Sammy will pull himself together and pity the sorrows of a poor
young man whose trembling knees--"
"Sorry," said Sammy, turning to the locker and fishing forth a bottle.
"--I'll tell you why," Yarrell-Smith went on as the tot was filled. "First