hen I thought of Elsie's
promise, and the hope of finding my father without any other person in
the world to help us, I snapped my finger and thumb like a pistol shot,
and cried as loud as I could--

"That for old Mustard! Wait till Saturday!"

All the same, I thought it best for the moment to say nothing at all
about the matter to my mother. Indeed, I looked out for Peter Kemp on
my way up the village and swore him to secrecy. He said that nobody
knew about it but Tommy Bottle, who was now dog-boy and
cartridge-filler at Rushworth Court. The gamekeeper said that he was
all right. And he was. For Tommy Bottle knew me, and also that I
would flay him alive if he told anything I wanted him not to.

I was, if one may say so in the circumstances, jubilant. I don't know
that I had loved my father more than just average. He never gave me
much chance, you see. But I liked to think of him so strong and ready.
And, above all, I thought with pride of his coming back, and finding
that I had kept everything in good order, with the help, of course, of
John Brown, our good cashier, in the office, and Bob Kingsman in the
yard.

But after all, between Thursday and Saturday there is always Friday.
And all sorts of superstitious people call that an unlucky day. Now, I
never could see any difference myself. A day on which I lost money
through a hole in my pocket, or got a cut finger, or got caught at the
cupboard, or had a headache, was "an unlucky day, whether it happened
to be Monday or Friday. And Sunday was Sunday, and the worst of all,
mostly; for if mother caught me in a secluded crib reading what she
called a "novelle," she marched me straight up to my father, who whaled
me proper--not that he cared himself, but just to satisfy mother's
conscience and for disturbing him in his after-dinner nap.

But, at all events, there was this Friday, which proved to be unlucky
or not--just as you look at it. At any rate, it was with that day that
there began the solving of the real mystery of Deep Moat Grange, which
had puzzled Breckonside in general, and me in particular, for so long.

Somehow I made sure that Elsie would be looking out for me at the same
corner of the road on Friday morning, just where I had met her the day
before. At any rate, I did not doubt but that she would have it in her
head. And I was such a fool that it pleased me, like a cat stroked on
the back, to think that Elsie was thinking about me.

It wa