Chapter ELEVEN

During dinner Mr. Collop was not silent. In vain did the Home Secretary indicate to his servant by a grimace that Mr. Collop's wine should be spared. Mr. Collop had all the assurance of his breeding, and when he wanted more wine he asked for it. It added, if that were possible, to his remarkable courage.

That night was forever memorable to all those present for the instructive lecture which he delivered upon the habits of the people of Bogotar. They all inwardly suffered, or chuckled, as their temperaments demanded. Vic ignored Marjorie's eyes and shamefully stayed on at table as late as possible to carry the torture forward.

The men did not stop long over their wine--for by that name I deign to call the beverage. The evening passed as on a rack for most, while Mr. Collop roared busily of Bogotar, with many a droll tale and many a gesture of large effect to underline it. Once more Vic stuck it out. She was in heaven. She egged the Startler on. She asked question after question on the famous oil-town of the Pearson Contracts. She even asked about the women's love affairs and the British prospectors' entanglements in that ill-known resort.

The Master of the House had to force the situation.

"I am going to ask you," said the Home Secretary, rather pompously, "to excuse me for the rest of the evening. I have to talk of very important matters with Mr. Collop. We shall be closeted together, I fear, till the small hours of the morning; and I beg that you will not think me discourteous."

The only one of the clot to whom this public speech could possibly be addressed--all the rest were of the Family--was the lately unfortunate, but now radiant, McTaggart. But it is a politician's habit to be pompous whenever he gets the least excuse, and McTaggart was the excuse.

"On official business connected with the ... ah, with the ... well ... it would not be to the public interest to say precisely."

McTaggart looked very carefully from under his eyelashes at his nearest neighbour; Victoria Mosel darted a corner look at Galton, and Galton grimly smiled at Marjorie. Aunt Amelia did not hear properly. Only the Professor rose to the occasion, carolling:

"Certainly, Humphrey, certainly. By all means, Humphrey, by all means." Then he squeezed his bony hands together, as though he had made a joke.

The women dropped out of the room. Marjorie waited above with her door ajar till she should know the way was clear. Then she was to come down.

"Shall we go into my study?" said the Home Secretary to his latest guest, when the women had gone.

"Thank you, I would not give ye that trouble, I wouldn't," said Mr. Collop heartily. "I'd as soon talk 'ere. I think better like in large rooms." And as he said that, the three men went out--perforce. But Galton went not to bet but to the small smoking-room, and Victoria Mosel did the same. Collop filled himself a whiskey and soda. And without giving his employer time to open the ball, he entered on the plan engendered by his mighty brain.

As he began to speak, Marjorie, following the sound of voices, slipped in. Mr. Collop stared at her, said "'Ullo?" but returned to his business.

"First of all," he said, with a good gulp at the spirits, "ye want a plan made of this here West Room, as ye call it. Now mark me," he insisted, as the Home Secretary half opened his never-quite-shut mouth, "that plan'll 'ave to be in not less than five colours--and I'll tell you for why. In a case of this kind, you 'ave got to distinguish between materials. Remember what ye're looking for! Ye're looking for a object that might be called transparent in a manner o' speaking."

"Mr. Collop," broke in the Home Secretary desperately, "how long will it take to make such a plan?"

"If there's a harchitect 'andy, it needn't take three days. I've 'ad dozens. And next," said Mr. Collop, as loudly as before, "we 'ave to 'ave measurements. We don't need regular surveys and we don't need to fill the garden wi' standards nor flags, but just measurements."

"And how long will these take?" asked the Home Secretary, a fabulous sum mounting up before his eyes, and the impossibility of keeping his guests forever.

"You will observe," said Mr. Collop, clearing his throat as for a speech, and addressing the lady--"you will observe, Miss, that what two men can do in one time, four men can do in arf the time, and eight men--why, eight men in a quarter of the time. And sixteen men," he continued, turning to her progenitor, "they'd take arf as much again. While they're making the plan in one room, if you 'ave enough men with chains in the grounds. Then there's the probing."

"The what?" asked de Bohun.

"The probing," answered his guest briefly. "That's a longer job, 'specially as I noticed that there's stone floors about. Now 'ere's another matter. Look at this carpet. That's Aubusson, that is. Ah, I notice everything! Aubusson--that's what it is."

"Mr. Collop," broke in Marjorie, in her suffering....

"Now, Miss," said Mr. Collop with command, "don't you interrupt me. Let me put the necessaries before you. When you get all this done, sir, what are you to do, then? What are you to do next? Why, I'll tell you. You'll have all the shutters shut: I noticed you 'ad shutters: and those curtains pulled. Then you'll put what they call Marlin's New Irridiant up. That's the light we work by. And I'll tell you for why. You 'ave plain electrics in the room and they casts shadows. Don't they, Miss?" he appealed to his hostess. But before she could agree, he went on, like a mighty river in flood:

"Now, casting shadows, you might miss a small object. That's how objects do get missed. You've got to think of these things. Artificial light that is distributed high and in the corners...."

The Home Secretary could bear no more. "Yes, yes, yes," he said. "Where does one get the stuff?"

"You'll see!" said Mr. Collop tartly, but with pardonable pride. "It's expensive, mind you," he added honestly. "But you got to do this job well or not at all."

"But, Mr. Collop," said poor Marjorie, who could hardly bear another moment, "before all this expense couldn't we ..."

"No, Miss," said the redoubtable Collop, shaking his head firmly. "Not to be thought on! I wouldn't undertake the responsibility, I wouldn't. And mind you, this ain't the first job of the sort I've tackled; not by thousands it ain't." (An exaggeration--due, I am afraid, to the whiskey.) "I wouldn't undertake the responsibility! I'll put no man under a cloud till I've made certain that it's not lost and hiding of its own. If it's not found, why then it'll be time to begin."

It was Marjorie who found the decision to break off the battle. She got up suddenly.

"Good night, Mr. Collop," she said. "I understand all about it now. We leave it to you."

"Thanks, Miss," said Mr. Collop. "That's the right spirit! You leave it to the perfessional man, and you'll never regret it! Is it good night to you, sir?" he added in a voice as loud as ever, stretching out a firm hand and seizing that of the Home Secretary. He crushed it in an iron grip, so that the poor old gentleman winced with pain.

"No, Mr. Collop! ... No, pray ... I must see you again in a moment, indeed I must ... but will you excuse me a moment?" He rose. "My daughter and I must have a private word together I think...."

"It's my place to retire, my lord," said Mr. Collop all in the grand manner, weak in the distinctions. "I'll be in the library, and when you want me, why, come and cop me," and out he went.

Without a moment's warning, Marjorie threw herself upon a sofa, crossed her arms upon the back of it, and began crying and sobbing in a storm. Her father was enormously distressed.

"There, there, my dear," he said, "you are quite overwrought; you are tired. Get to bed. It can't be helped. We must go through with it."

"Oh, papa," she sobbed, "it's intolerable. I can't help thinking! Just think what they'll all think!"

"Yes, my dear; I was thinking that they would be thinking what you say they will be thinking. I'm afraid some of them must have been thinking already."

"Perhaps," moaned poor Marjorie, half consoled by the relief of tears, "that b-b-b-loody b-b-beast will find the b-b-b-b-b-bloody thing after all."

"Yes, my dear, yes. I hope he will. I'm sure he will. I am indeed!"

She dried her eyes, sighed wearily, kissed her father good night, and went off to bed. It was nearly one o'clock. The poor man, as he heard her step go slowly up the great stairs, retained his daughter's despairing voice vividly in his ears. It reminded him of his wife's--only the vocabulary had somewhat changed since the days when Queen Victoria gave so admirable an example to the ladies of the land.

* * * * * * *

He rose wearily, feeling fevered, and the worry on him increasingly intolerable. He stepped out into the hall; it was still fully lit. He rang, and when the servant came he asked him whether the offices were shut up. He was told that all had gone to bed but the man who had come at his summons. He bade him go in his turn, and put out all the lights. Then he himself switched out the bulbs in the hall and stared at the great window beside the door. It was singularly light outside, and the air was oppressive within. Cold as was the weather, he needed to feel the open. He thrust up the sash and drank in the rush of freezing air.

The moon must have just risen, but a slight mist was ascending. Half an hour's light fall of snow had again marked off the lawn, but evidently hours before, since the paths were swept round the house and along up the avenue to the left. He shut down the sash again, a little refreshed, but still most ill at ease.

With a sigh he turned towards the door of the library, within which room, alone, crouched the nightmare policeman. He forced himself in, and found the fellow there.

"We must go into the West Room, Mr. Collop," he said. "My daughter has gone to bed; the house is all shut up, and we can discuss matters undisturbed. It is in the West Room that the thing happened. Come."