The Happy Adventurers by Lydia Miller Middleton (best thriller novels of all time TXT) 📖

Dick commented. “Do you think our white aunt can be induced to come and play golf after tea, Moll, or is she afraid of rain?”

“Good gracious, no,” Mollie replied. “Aunt Mary goes out in all the weathers ever invented. She will love a round of golf; she hasn’t played since I sprained my ankle. I wish I could come too. I wonder if I could hop round with my stick and look on. I do love to watch Aunt Mary drive; I learnt a lot from her last week before I sprained my ankle in that idiotic way.”

The boys negatived this proposal. “You’d get a ball in the eye to finish you up with,” Dick said. “We’ll plan some picnics till you are better, and explore the country a bit and knock some fat off this animal—hullo!—what’s that?”

A sudden twist in the narrow road had brought into view a motor bicycle, leaning dejectedly against the hedge, whilst its owner squatted beside it and tinkered at its mechanism—tinkered in vain apparently, for, as the boys drew up beside him to offer assistance, he rose to his feet and shook his head hopelessly.

“Can we help you?” Dick asked, eyeing the bicycle with interest. “I’m afraid we’ve got no tools here, but there is a smithy about a mile farther on and the chap there has a motor bike, so I expect he could lend you a hand.”

“Thank you very much,” replied the stranger, looking relieved. “I’ll shove her along there and leave her. I am much afraid she’s gone altogether phut for the time being, and will have to be trundled back to town by rail. Can you tell me if I am anywhere near a place called Chauncery?”

“Rather,” Dick answered, with a grin. “That’s our place. It’s about half a mile up the next turning to the left.”

“Indeed!” said the stranger, looking somewhat surprised and slightly dismayed; “I understood that it was occupied by Mrs. and Miss Gordon, not by anyone with chil—young people,” he corrected himself hastily.

“So it is. But at present they’ve got us, owing to circs. We are Mrs. Gordon’s grandchildren.”

“Oh—I see! I hope that Mrs. and Miss Gordon are in good health?”

“Pretty bobbish, thank you,” Dick was answering when Mollie interrupted:

“Can we give you a lift? We are on our way home, and I am sure it is going to rain hard presently.”

“That is a very kind offer,” the motorist replied gratefully, “and I wish I could accept it, as I am a trifle lame; but I can’t very well leave my machine lying derelict by the roadside, and I fear that your hospitality cannot be extended to the old bus, I thought perhaps—if you would be so very kind—you might drop a message at the smithy you mentioned, and I will wait here until they send someone along.”

But the word “lame” had roused all Mollie’s sympathy. “How lame are you?” she asked. “Is it a wound? I am lame too—only a sprained ankle, but I should hate to walk from here to Chauncery.”

“Of course you couldn’t,” the motorist said kindly. “I am not so bad as that. My wound healed long ago, but it has left rather a crocky foot behind. I could manage well enough, however, if someone from the smithy would come and push the bike.”

“Tell you what,” Dick suggested; “if you hop in and look after Mollie, Jerry and I will push the bike to the smithy; we’ll be after you in two jiffs.”

The stranger looked at Dick with a smile and a slight lift of his eyebrows. “You are very trusting, young man. Supposing I run away with the pony and the cart and the sister? What will you do then?”

“Stick to the bike,” Dick answered promptly, “I have been wanting one most frightfully badly, and Father says I might as well ask him to give me the Isle of Wight. Besides—you said you knew Grannie and Aunt Mary.”

“Well, I happen to be quite a safe person, so you’re all right this time, but it wouldn’t always do, you know,” and the stranger gave his head a warning shake. “You are exceedingly kind. I only fear it would be rather a heavy job for you.”

But this the boys denied strenuously. “If we stick, one of us will go and collect young Simpson and the other will watch the bike; but we’ll be as right as rain—and we’d better hurry up.” Dick left the trap as he spoke by the simple means of dropping over the side, and Jerry followed his example.

“I had better give you my name for Mr.—Simpson, did you say?—Major Campbell—Hugh Campbell.”

There was a dead silence. If the stranger had said “George the Fifth of England” he could not have produced more effect. All three stared at him with their mouths open. “What’s the matter with that?” he asked. “It’s a very respectable name, and it really does belong to me. Perhaps I should give you my card.” He put his hand in his breastpocket.

“Oh no,” Mollie said rather breathlessly. “No—please don’t mind— it’s quite all right, only—you look so young.”

“So what?” exclaimed Major Campbell, standing stock still with his hand in his pocket.

“I mean,” Mollie explained nervously, “I mean—” looking at the boys for help, but in vain, “I—you—so young to be a friend of Grannie’s” she ended feebly.

“You’re a goose, Moll,” Dick broke in. “We once knew a Hugh Campbell, but it was years and years ago, and he was ever so much younger than you—he was my age—and there must be thousands of Hugh Campbells.”

“Years and years ago! Your age! And she says I look too young!” repeated Major Campbell in pardonable bewilderment. “How old do I look—five perhaps?”

Mollie blushed, and the boys giggled. “Look here,” said Dick, “if we stand here till midnight discussing Major Campbell’s age we won’t get home to tea, and then Aunt Mary will send out a search party, and we’ll look pretty asinine. Long John’s getting baity, he’ll bolt in a minute. Take the reins, Mollie. Don’t eat all the strawberries, and tell Aunt Mary that cherry jam is my fancy. Come on, Young Outram.”

Major Campbell saw the boys start before taking the reins from Mollie. Long John gave his head an impatient toss, and set off with the determination that he would not stop again for anybody till he was in sight of his stable.

A hundred thoughts chased each other through Mollie’s mind. Of course this could not possibly be that Hugh Campbell. It would be altogether too queer. And yet—after all, nothing could be much queerer than the experience they had already had. Putting one thing and another together it did seem to be more than a coincidence that a Hugh Campbell should be on his way to see someone who had a green diamond set in a ring given to her “long, long ago”. She stole a look at her companion as he sat opposite her, his eyes fixed on the road ahead and his thoughts obviously elsewhere. Hugh the inventor had not passed even thirteen years without gathering various little mementoes of his inventions in the shape of scars here and there, and these had not escaped the sharp observation of Mollie, the Girl Guide. There had been a tiny gap in his left eyebrow, the result of inventing a new pattern of firework—a crooked little finger on his left hand—a funny star-shaped mark on his right jaw. Some of these and other remembered marks might have been obliterated by time, but if even one remained she would recognize it. He had removed his hat and disclosed a head of closely cropped grey hair, which made him look older. Yes—there was the gap in his eyebrow and the crooked finger. Mollie felt certain that this was indeed the inventor.

“Have you ever been in Dublin?” she asked abruptly, forgetting for the moment that asking questions was forbidden.

“In Dublin?” echoed Major Campbell, bringing his eyes and his thoughts from the winding road and concentrating both upon Mollie. “Are you a thought-reader, Miss Mollie? For I was thinking of Dublin at that very moment. Yes, I have been there. Indeed, it was there that I first met Miss Gordon, at a ball at Dublin Castle. I was visiting some people she knew, and later on she joined us. My sisters were over here at that time too. Has Miss Gordon ever mentioned the O’Rourkes to you?”

“Yes,” said Mollie, feeling absolutely giddy with excitement, “that is, no—not exactly–-” she felt very confused—“I mean—was there a Desmond O’Rourke?”

“That’s right,” said Major Campbell, nodding his grey head, and apparently too wrapped up in his own memories to notice Mollie’s confused answer. “Good old Desmond! Of course he was home then too. Dublin was a very different place in those days, and we had what you youngsters would call the time of our lives. It was a long time ago—long, long ago.” He sighed, and his thoughts evidently wandered away again from his agitated little companion, which Mollie felt was a good thing, as, if he had been observing her closely, he would certainly have thought that the poor child was “not quite on the spot”.

She was now quite convinced that this was really Hugh, the brother of Prudence and Grizzel. He showed no signs of remembering her, but, of course, she said to herself, what was only yesterday to her was forty years ago to this elderly man—and, besides, perhaps the Time-travelling was all hers and Prue’s and he was never really in it at all. “Like Alice in the Red King’s dream,” she thought vaguely. She felt sure, too, that it was he who had given Aunt Mary the green diamond long ago, though why he had never married her was past Mollie’s power of understanding. Grown-up people did—and left undone—the most incomprehensible things. In the meantime she felt that she would like to give her aunt some sort of warning of the surprise in store, otherwise Aunt Mary might be too much surprised. Mollie herself hated with all her might and main showing her feelings before people—but how to prepare Aunt Mary! That was the difficulty. She put all her Guiding wits to work, but nothing feasible suggested itself. There was no boy to send ahead with a message, and, of course, she could not send Major Campbell himself. How on earth could she get even the slightest warning conveyed.

The had begun to climb the hill which led to Chauncery gate; Long John’s enthusiasm cooled a little, and he dropped into a jogging zigzag walk. Major Campbell was looking about him with interest, “Just the way I did,” Mollie thought—and then the idea came.

“I’m going to signal to Aunt Mary that we are nearly home,” she warned her companion, “so that she’ll have tea ready,” and, putting her hands to her mouth, she gave a long, shrill “cooo-eeeee!” “Now,” she said to herself, “that should remind her of Australia and Desmond O’Rourke and green diamonds.”

But Mollie’s brilliant idea had not exactly the effect she expected. When the sound of that shrill cooo-eeeee penetrated to the morning-room, Aunt Mary did indeed think of Australia, but she also thought, naturally enough, that the children were in difficulties and needed her help. So, a few minutes later, Mollie and Major Campbell saw a slim figure, clad in a short skirt and jumper, running down the hill as fast as a pair of active feet could carry it.

“Oh, dear!” Mollie exclaimed, “Aunt Mary thinks something is wrong, and when she sees no boys and you here instead she will think it is wronger.”

“That can’t be Mary Gordon!” exclaimed Major Campbell. “She doesn’t look much