The White Virgin Part 39

"G.o.d bless you!" he said. "I'll believe that Clive Reed is honest, but the money has gone.--Good-bye."

Dinah stood watching him till he disappeared over the shoulder of the mountain slope on his ten-mile walk to the Blinkdale station, and then returned to the cottage, cold and s.h.i.+vering, as a sense of loneliness and want of protection crept over her.

Martha was waiting at the door.

"Oh, my dear, I hope there is no more trouble. Is it about money?"

Dinah bowed gravely.

"Dear, dear! What a nuisance money is. But I have a little saved up, master can have. I wish I'd told him before he went. He won't be very long gone, will he, my dear? I mean he will be back to-night?"

"No, Martha," said Dinah, with the chilly sensation increasing.

"Perhaps not to-morrow night."

"And us alone!" cried Martha, "and no Rollo."

Dinah shuddered slightly.

"And I don't want to frighten you, my dear, but I've seen that big dark man from the mine come about here sometimes of a night. Why, my dear child, it must have been him who poisoned that poor dog."

The cold s.h.i.+ver ran through Dinah again, but she made a spasmodic effort to master her feelings.

"Don't--don't say that," she said hoa.r.s.ely. "Martha, dear, we must bury poor Rollo to-day. Will you help me?"

"Poor fellow! yes. I always hated him, my dear, but I'm very sorry he's dead. There, we must make the best of it. Come and finish your breakfast, lovey, and then we'll get a spade, and bury him under one of the trees."

Dinah went in dreamy and thoughtful, but no breakfast pa.s.sed her lips; and as, about an hour and a half later, the poor dog was being carried to his last resting-place, there was the sound of hoofs on the bridle-path, and five minutes later she received a telegram for her father, brought over from the town on the other side of the mine.

She hesitated a moment, but the case was so urgent, and she opened the message to read Clive's rea.s.suring words.

"I knew it," she cried, as a flood of bright hope sent joy into her heart.

But it was too late to try and overtake the Major, who was miles away in the other direction, and the messenger was dismissed.

"He will know as soon as he reaches town, and telegraph," thought Dinah, but the day wore away without news, and the night closed in dark and stormy, with the girl's fancy conjuring up strange sounds about the house of so startling a nature in her nervous state, that at last she could bear them no longer. Again and again she had imagined that faces were peering through the window, and though she drew blind and curtain, there was the fancy still. And in this spirit she at last, about nine o'clock, determined to go and sit with their old servant in the kitchen.

"It will be company for us both," she said, and hurriedly gathering together her work, she left the little room, and entered the kitchen to find all dark.

"Martha--Martha!" she cried, but there was no reply, and hurrying back for a lamp, she found that the candle had burned out, the tea things were still on the table, and the woman was seated there with her head down upon her hands, apparently fast asleep.

"Martha!" she cried, shaking her; but there was no reply, only a heavy stertorous breath, and as the old chill came back, Dinah's eyes lit upon the cup and saucer by the woman's side.

A flash of light illumined her brain, and instinctively she raised the tea-cup, and smelt, and then tasted the tea at the bottom.

It was unmistakable. A peculiar, heavy, clammy taste was evident. The cup fell from her hand, and she looked wildly round, as her position came with tenfold horror. Alone there in that solitary dale, far from help. Even her old friend the dog taken from her side--quite alone, for Martha was beyond rousing for hours to come, plunged as she was in a deep stupor, the result of a drug.

CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE.

ANOTHER PIGEON PLUCKED.

"Major Gurdon? Show him in."

The Major was shown in to the business-like-looking little grey man in his office at Drapers Buildings, but he did not take the seat offered.

"Now then, Mr Caley, I've come up. It is all a scare, is it not?"

The stockbroker shrugged his shoulders.

"Scare, sir? Perhaps; but everybody who holds these shares is realising for anything he can get."

"But I heard such excellent reasons for buying them on the best authority," cried the Major. "It promised to be almost a fortune."

"My dear sir," said the stockbroker; "most people who invest in mining shares do so on the best authority, and antic.i.p.ate fortunes."

"Yes, yes, but--"

"And then, to use the old simile, sir, find that they have cast their money down a deep hole."

"Tut-tut-tut-tut!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed the Major. "But the latest news of the mine?"

"The latest news on 'Change, sir, is worse than that which we wired to you. It is disastrous, and seems to me like the bursting of a bubble.

But it may not be so bad. We are quiet men, Major Gurdon, and deal with old-fas.h.i.+oned investors in government and corporation stocks. Two and a half, three, three and a half, and debentures. We do nothing with speculative business."

"No, I know. You advised me strongly against what I did."

"Yes, sir. We felt it our duty. But this, as I have before said, may only be a scare."

"But money means so much to me, Mr Caley. Now tell me this: what would you do if you were in my place?"

"You wish for my advice, Major Gurdon?"

"Of course."

Mr Caley touched the table gong and a clerk appeared.

"My compliments to Mr Bland, and ask him to step here."

"I think he's out, sir," said the man. "I'll see." He left the office, and a minute later a thin, dark, anxious-looking man entered.

"Major Gurdon, I think? We met once before."

"Bland, Major Gurdon wants our advice about `White Virgin' shares. What would you do if you held any?"

"Give them away at once if they are not fully paid up."

"Only a pound a share on call," said Mr Caley. "What would you do?"

"Sell them at once for anything they would fetch; but there would be no buyers."