"So I did, on the instant," said young Raynor, tackling yet a fourth
glass of brandy. "It was as plain as the nose on your face that somebody
had tried to spoof me; somebody had an interest in sending me off to
town on a wild-goose chase and getting me out of this neighbourhood
to-night, and that that somebody hadn't reckoned upon my doing what I
did, and didn't know about my having promised you to take you to see
Mignon de Varville, when that blithering letter intervened. And speaking
of that-- I say, Barchie, we'll go to-night, if you like--eh, what?"

"Sorry, dear boy," said Cleek, whose intention was to get out on the
Common to-night and test the truth of Geoff Clavering's story; "sorry,
but I'm afraid we'll have to put that off until to-morrow. Thinking you
weren't coming back in time, I arranged with the ladies for an evening
of bridge; so, if you don't join us, you'll have to pay your respects to
'Pink Gauze' to-night without me. And, by the way, how did you get that
bit of pink gauze, old chap? Any particular significance attached to
it?"

"Lord, no! Bit of gauze scarf she wore the other night--always wears
pink, by the way--caught in my watch chain. Tore in gettin' loose, and I
kept the bit as a memento."

"Ah, I see. Well, get on with the other subject; I'm immensely
interested. As soon as you'd found out that Katie What's-her-name
couldn't have written the letter, and that you'd been deceived by
somebody, then what?"

"Why, then I put back home by the first possible train. I had my
suspicions--yes, rather--so I came back to prove them true."

"And did you?"

"Ah, didn't I? Nobody knew of my affair with Katie outside of my father,
and my father has a typewriter ready to hand, and typewriters don't
betray anybody's 'fist.' I went to the lodgekeeper. No messenger had
passed him to-day. I went to Hawkins and Hamer. No messenger had brought
any letter that they knew of to the house. I couldn't ask Johnston,
because this is his evening off; but no doubt that when I do ask him
he'll say the same. Well, now, you put all those things together, Barch,
and see for yourself what they make. As nobody but my father knew
anything about the girl, and nobody gave him a letter, and he has a
typewriter ready to hand, why there you are. He wrote the letter, that's
what. And if he wrote it to get me away and keep me away until late at
night, why he's got a devilish good reason for it; and if he has got a
reason for doing