You stop in bed, and let me try to get rid of them."

"I won't stop in bed," returned Gage. "Where are these brutes?"

"Sent 'em down to _The Pigeons_," Peckover answered. "Lady Agatha wouldn't have 'em in the house. Don't blame her. Their manners aren't exactly Vere de Vere. Things were a bit awkward at lunch. Carnaby, the beauty, had been mixing his liquors and fell asleep with his ugly head in the salad bowl, and the tomato which Lalage aimed at him to wake him up, missed, and spattered on Bisgood's shirt-front. Lady Aggy wasn't pleased."

"It's all very well," said Gage sulkily, "but I'm going to get up. The woman can't make me marry her against my will, nor can the great ox, her brother."

"No," Peckover agreed, "but he can have a good try for it, and the process might not be pleasant."

"I never heard such nonsense."

"No; I wouldn't have believed it," said Peckover, "if I hadn't had the fellow's dukes round my windpipe. He is just a buffalo in trousers.

And if you get up, and shy at the sister, who is a hyaena in petticoats, you'll know it; that is, if he leaves you in a state to know anything."

"A pretty abominable treat you've let me in for," said Gage sourly.

"But I'm not going to stay in this four-poster. You've got to go and square this at once. Ask them what they'll take to go back."

"I've offered them a couple of hundred," Peckover replied, "and got nearly strangled for my trouble."

"Couple of hundred!" said Gage contemptuously. "You'll have to make it thousands and take it out of your five."

"Oh, I say!" the other protested.

"All right; if you don't," Gage declared resolutely, "I'll chuck the t.i.tle and leave you and your friends to fight it out among yourselves.

If she means Lord Quorn she shall have him, but not me, my boy. And I'm not going to stop between the sheets for any bush-ranger in Australia or out of it. So there!"

CHAPTER XIX

After Lord Quorn--supposed to be Percy Peckover--had been carried to Dr. Barton's surgery, he lay for several days in a state of now total, now semi, unconsciousness. The astute Mr. Doutfire, pluming himself on his neat capture, hovered about the unfortunate peer, drank whisky and water with the much-bored medico, and discussed over sundry cigars the chances of the patient's slipping through his fingers into the next world. The object of his solicitude did slip through them, though not quite so far as that. And it happened in this wise.

When Doutfire was not himself on guard (to the accompaniment of nicotine sedatives and alcoholic tonics) he took care to post a constable about the doctor's premises with instructions to keep a sharp look-out for any sign of activity on the part of the lethargic criminal. Then suddenly the police authorities of Bunbury and district were thrown into a state of excitement by the news of a daring burglary which had taken place at Mansetter Park, the seat of Sir James Rumbelow, the importance of which crime was heightened by the fact that the stout baronet, roused from his post-prandial nap by the news, had unwisely attempted to pursue the thieves, who had by that time got four or five miles' start, and had cut short the chase, so far as he was concerned, by tripping over a croquet-hoop on the lawn and thereby severely injuring himself.

It was clearly a case that called for the utmost activity on the part of the representatives of the law; the Bunbury police force was on its mettle, and the fussy Mr. Doutfire became in a moment the incarnation of bustling importance. The comatose culprit at Dr. Barton's was forgotten in the gravity of Sir James Rumbelow's stolen plate and broken nose. And it so happened when the detective was reminded of him it was by a communication from headquarters announcing that Peckover's a.s.sociate, Cutbush, had been arrested, and he had volunteered a statement which made it appear that there might not be much of a case against his dupe. Under the circ.u.mstances, Mr. Doutfire felt little hesitation in withdrawing the guard and drafting him into the Mansetter district, especially as the doctor a.s.sured him that he might be under no uneasiness as to the likelihood of the patient's being in a condition to get up and walk about.

Nevertheless, that is exactly what Lord Quorn did. Suddenly waking from a lethargic sleep, he stretched himself, sat up, looked round in a dazed fashion, and after a futile attempt to remember who and where he was, feeling an irresistible longing for fresh air, he got up, shuffled into his clothes, and walked unnoticed into the street.

It was market day; the noise and the bustle worried him, and in his weak state the jostling of the yokels was more than he could stand. So he turned into one of the quieter streets and thence wandered off into the country, his mind still a blank as to what had recently happened to him. Although the fresh air revived him and was grateful after the drug-laden atmosphere of the doctor's dispensary, yet it did not quite drive the fumes from his brain, and his existence and ident.i.ty were, as he strolled on, as much a puzzle to him as ever.

"Have a lift?" asked a good-natured farmer, overtaking him on the dusty road, and noticing his dragging footsteps. Quorn mechanically got into the cart, in his aimless, drifting state of mind; all he knew was he had begun to feel tired and wanted to get right away from the place whence he had come.

"Going far?" inquired the farmer, as they bowled along.

"Far as you like," was the dull answer.

The farmer stared at him, and then proceeded to cross-examine him, with the result that he came to the conclusion that he had picked up an escaped lunatic. With this idea he resolved to set his pa.s.senger down at the first village they came to, which happened to be Staplewick.

Finding Quorn had no money, the good fellow took out a coin and gave it him, in lieu, as it were, of taking him further, and drove off in a state of cogitation.

Naturally Quorn had been set down opposite an inn, the sight of which, combined with the touch of the silver in his hand, told him he was hungry and more especially thirsty. He went in and called for refreshment, and then took his seat in a room which had already two occupants. They were no others than Messrs. Fanning and Purvis, who, after their discomfiture at the Towers had dropped in at _The Pigeons_ to discuss their all-absorbing grievance.

Until Quorn's hunger and thirst were appeased he paid little attention to his companions, but when he had pushed his plate away and lighted up the churchwarden pipe that the house afforded, he fell to listening lazily to the unrestrained emphasis of their remarks.

"Fi'pun note! Fi'pun note!" exclaimed Mr. Fanning almost tragically.

"And his blooming lordship, who didn't do nothin' more in the water than a cat would 'a done, smothered with wealth, just because 'e 'appens to 'ave a 'andle to his name. Mean, I call it; low mean."

"That it is," agreed Purvis. "And 'im adding insult to injury telling us to get a noo rig-out, and keep the change for our trouble. Noo rig-out? I'll wear my old boots and breeches down to the last nail and st.i.tch first."

"Right!" exclaimed Fanning, with an energy which ignored the aesthetic considerations which such a proceeding would involve. "Fi'pun note!"

he repeated, relapsing into his now chronic state of truculent grievance. "Fi'pun note for us poor deserving 'eroes, and two hundred thousand quid for that bit of gilt gingerbread, Lord Quorn."

"What?"

In a flash of enlightenment the real Lord Quorn jumped from his seat, and stood staring at the two men with distended eyes. "By Gum! You said Lord Quorn?"

"I did," Fanning declared, half defiantly, as not quite sure whether he had not opened his mouth rather too wide and too often. "I said Lord Quorn, and I meant Lord Quorn, but my grievance ain't agin 'is lordship. I blame no man for takin' wot's offered. Wot I blame and 'ate and detest is the meanness of those 'oo call themselves gents and reward a man not accordin' to the services rendered, but accordin' to persition in life."

The trenchant p.r.o.nouncement was entirely wasted on the person to whom it was addressed.

"Lord Quorn!"

He had started to his feet with a great cry of self-recognition. The word seemed to have pierced the mist of oblivion which clouded his brain, and the incidents of the last hour of his former waking existence came thronging to his memory. Lord Quorn? Why, of course, he was Lord Quorn; although exactly what had happened to him in consequence he could not make out. "Lord Quorn?" he demanded eagerly of the astonished pair of grievance-nursers. "What about him?"

"Do you know his lordship?" Fanning asked suspiciously.

"I ought to."

"Well, then," said the butcher resentfully, "you know the man who has earnt two 'undred thousand quid quicker and easier than any man ever did before. Look 'ere!" Determined to speak his mind to his lordship through his acquaintance, Fanning jumped up and tapped Quorn impressively on the chest to emphasize his story. "Wot do you think o'

this, mister? Lord Quorn and a rich millionaire friend of 'is--I won't call 'im a gentleman--goes out fishin' on the lake. They fools themselves overboard into the water, and is within an ace of drownin'.

This gentleman," indicating Purvis who sat stolidly blinking with conscious merit, "and me, goes to the rescue, and at the risk of our lives pulls 'em out when they were just at the last gasp. What 'appens? My n.o.bleman persuades 'is friend that it was 'e 'oo saved 'is life, and ignores what me and this gentleman done. Again wot 'appens?

Millionaire, 'oo, in my opinion ain't fit to own two and sixpence, ups and settles a couple of 'undred thousand sov'rins on his lordship, and when me and this gentleman who 'ad risked our lives and ruined our best suit of clothes 'appens to ask where we comes in--what do you think?--'ee fobs us off with a beggarly fi'pun note."

"I wouldn't have taken it," Quorn commented wonderingly, as he recovered from the extra hard slap with which the last words were driven home.

Mr. Fanning waggled his greasy head knowingly. "P'raps you wouldn't, mister. But you didn't catch me nor this gentleman playin' into 'is 'ands by refusin' it."

"That accounts for it," said Quorn, following his own train of thought rather than Mr. Fanning's bia.s.sed narrative. "That accounts for it.

I've been half drowned. Funny I don't remember anything about it."

"You?" exclaimed Mr. Fanning.

"According to your story," Quorn maintained.

Mr. Fanning turned a glance on Mr. Purvis which suggested a grave doubt as to their companion's sobriety. "Oh," he replied sarcastically, "and 'oo may you be?"

"Well," answered Quorn deliberately, "I rather think I'm Lord Quorn."

Again Mr. Fanning's glance sought Mr. Purvis', and this time it indicated a diagnosis of more serious mental trouble than mere alcohol would account for.