Fred M. White

“ But I appreciated it right enough when I met you at Madeira, and I saw the danger in a moment. I hope I'm not boring you?"
"Not at all," Edenbridge said politely. "On the contrary, I am most interested. Pray go on."
"Well, you see, that meeting was most awkward for me. In the first place, it looked like upsetting all my arrangements. I had no idea that you intended coming back to England so soon. One of your trustees is now mentally unfit to take any part in business, and the other one is a careless sort of man who never troubles about anything. ”

“ Denham-Carter applied a few inches of exquisite lace to her eyes and sobbed. Denham-Carter was understood to say that these things were all for the best, and that the trouble might not be so serious as it seemed.
"Our guests will quite understand," he said. "But I hope they won't let this unfortunate message cast a gloom upon them. It will be time enough to think about trains and Bradshaws and all that sort of thing in the morning. I hope you good people will make yourselves quite at home till to-morrow, at any rate. ”

“ Nature should reproduce two girls in the same family so exactly resembling their famous ancestresses. I hope you won't think I am sentimental."
"Oh, the contrary," Eversleigh said warmly. "And now I begin to understand why Miss Canning reminds me of someone. I begin to understand why it is that when I see her, my mind is full of Old Masters and early Georgian painters. Seeing that I am acquainted with Morton Dene, I must have seen that portrait, and it must have impressed me more than I was aware. And so Edenbridge has let Morton Dene to your friend Denham-Carter? ”

“ Denham-Carter said thoughtfully. "Nobody knows that you are in England. You have never approached any of your friends yet, and you are always spoken of as 'Eversleigh.' You haven't been in this neighbourhood since you were a boy, so there is no chance of anybody recognising you. Now, by to-morrow afternoon we shall have cleared out of here, and when I go away, I shall take the Reynolds with me. ”

“ It was the night before the boat reached Madeira, and he got some sort of a clue to the mystery which worried and at the same time fascinated him. For once. Flora Canning was not on deck, so, on the principle of being near the rose in the absence of it, Eversleigh was smoking his cigar with her father.
"No, I shan't be in England very long," the latter was saying. "Really, I am going there for more or less sentimental reasons. I shouldn't have mentioned it if I hadn't found out quite by accident that you know so much about the early English school of portrait painters. Now, I am a collector. ”

“ Mr. Canning said. "At any rate, you may have saved me the loss of a good deal of money. Picture experts are not always right, you know. Sometimes they err."
"They wouldn't have done so in this case," Edenbridge laughed, "because the picture is perfectly genuine. I didn't tell Denham-Carter so, for obvious reasons. I proved to him beyond a demonstration that my grandfather sold the picture and had a copy painted, but I didn't tell him that when the trustees found it out, they compelled my grandfather to buy the Reynolds back again. ”

“ It isn't a bad chance of getting the picture."
"I suppose not," Eversleigh said thoughtfully. "In fact, it's rather cute. They would probably fetch a lot more money if they were seen by wealthy collectors on their native heath, so to speak. And it so happens that I know something about Morton Dene. I was born in that neighbourhood myself. Doesn't the house belong to a man called Edenbridge?"
"I believe that is so," Canning said. "But, at any rate, I shall know all about it at Madeira. I expect to meet Denham-Carter there, and he will go back on our boat." ”

“ Canning and cashed his cheque. At the end of four days you ought not only to have done this, but you ought to have reached a place of safety. I see you follow me now. And now I am coming to the first flaw in that little scheme of yours. Mr. Canning is quite prepared to pay the price you ask for the Reynolds, but being a business man, he declines to part with his cheque till a well-known expert has reported favourably. Is not that so?"
"The point is conceded," Denham-Carter said.
"Very well, then. Now I am going to tell you something. It so happens that my grandfather was a great spendthrift. ”

“ I propose to lock you in here and leave you to make your way out as best you can. It was done once, a century or two ago, as you are quite aware. An ancestor of yours, who was confined in his own house, managed to make a hole in the floor by using his broken sword as a tool, and subsequently dived into the moat. ”