The Mystery of the Moor

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 426, 7 August 1928, Page 5

The Mystery of the Moor

By

CHAPTER XV. —YOUTHS’ FREEMASONRY. She came a little nearer to me; as if unconsciously, her eyes swept the . moorland. “Do you mean—here?” she asked. "On the moor?” “That’s just it,” I assented. “He went out from the inn, last night, after dinner, alone, and he’s never re- 1 turned. You know these parts? Are there places ” “There are many dangerous places,” : she interrupted hastily. “Have you searched ?” : “Several of us, all night,” I an- : swered. “We’ve seen nothing, heard i nothing of him.” : “Your father?” she asked, eyeing i me half sympathetically. , “No —a friend, with whom I’m travelling,” I replied. “I’m awfully anxious about him. It was unusually < dark last evening, and I’m afraid he’s : come to harm —fallen over something [ or into something. Yet —we’ve been , a great deal over the ground.” ■ “Who searched?” she demanded. ] “I have been out all the time,” I , said, “and our chauffeur, and Musgrave. In almost every direction, too.” • "Musgrave doesn’t know the moor,” i she remarked. “At least, only super- ; ficially. I wonder if our peoplegamekeepers, you know—have heard , anything? If you’d walk with me to , the house —” She pointed across the moor to where the gables and chim- ‘ neys of Marrasdale Tower showed , above the surrounding trees. “We ■ might hear something there,” she continued. “My stepfather, Mr. Elphinstone, will be out and about now, and he may have heard something ■ from the men. We can go there in a few minutes.” She led me across the 1 heather by a winding track that took • us through a part of the moorland ; which I had not previously traversed. We talked —I told her something of our adventures up to that point: I also j told her Mr. Mazaroff’s name, and my - own. Of his secret history or of the : fact that he already knew the district I carefully abstained from saying anything. “And you say there are really dangerous places?” I asked when we had come to some understanding of the ■ situation. "You, of course, know the 1 [country?” ■

J. S. Fletcher

“There are several dangerous places,” she assented. “Places where the moorland paths run along what are virtually precipices, and other places where, in the dark, you can quite easily walk into a bottomless bog! Only those who really know the moors well ought to venture on them after dark. Of course, if you know the tracks ” We came before long to Marrasdale Tower—an ancient, irregularly-built place that looked like an old Border fortress. There In the courtyard, talking to a man in velveteens, we met Mr. Elphinstone, a tall, thin, grey-haired studious-looking man, who glanced at me wonderingly over the top of an unusually large pair of spectacles. His step-daughter led me up to him without ceremony; I had already discovered that she wasted no time on formalities. “This is Mr. Holt—Mr. Mervyn Holt,” she said. “He and a friend of his, Mr. Mazaroff, an elderly gentleman, have motored from London, and are staying a few days at the Woodcock. Last night Mr. Mazaroff went out alone on the moors, and he’s never returned. Mr. Holt wants to find him; he’s anxious.” Mr. Elphinstone, who looked to me to be one of those men who take in things very leisurely, nodded, and glanced at the man in velveteens. "A gentleman lost on the moor, eh?” he said. “ ’Urn! Parker—go and inquire among the men in the stables and in the gardens. Some of them cross the moors from one point or another, don’t they? Yes—just ask. Um! Lost all night, er? Dear me! Er—won’t you come in, Mr. —er —” “My name is Holt, sir,” I said, prompting his absent-mindedness. “Holt, er?” he answered, with a sudden gleam of interest. “Um! I was at Merton with a man of that name —in fact, we were at Rugby together, before our Oxford days. He and I were great rowing men. He’s vicar of some country parish in Buckinghamshire now, I believe —long time since we foregathered.” “I think you are speaking of my father, Mr. Elphinstone,” I remarked. “He was at Rugby and Merton, and he’s now Vicar of Chellingham, near Aylesbury. I remember now that he has in his study some old photograph groups of Merton crews —I think I’ve

seen your name underneath, one or two of them.’* He turned and gave me his hand, shaking mine, in evident high delight. “Bless me!’* he exclaimed. “Now just imagine it! This is a great pleasure. I thought much of Holt —he was a fine, handsome fellow —now I come to look more closely at you, you’re the very image of what he was in those days! Come in—come in! —this is excellent!” He pushed me before him into a room where Mrs. Elphinstone was evidently waiting breakfast for her husband and daughter. She did not see me at first, being concerned with teamaking, but she evidently recognised Mr. Elphinstone’s step. “Are you and Sheila never coming to breakfast, Malcolm?” she demanded. “The tea —” Then she turned and saw me, and I saw that she recognised me as the young man she had passed two days before. Her finely-marked eyebrows went up in wonder at my presence in her break-fast-room. Mr. Elphinstone pushed me forward. “Marion!” he exclaimed. “A truly most wonderful and fortunate thing! This young gentleman is the son—and the very image—of my old friend Tom Holt! Isn’t it extraordinary that he should drop on me from the clouds like this? He came—let’s see—how did he come? —oh, I remember now, Sheila brought him, to be sure.” “Yes,” said Sheila, “and you’ve already forgotten why I brought him! Mother,” she went on rapidly, “Mr. Holt is staying at the Woodcock with that old gentleman we saw him with the other day—they’re motoring. And the old gentleman is lost, and Mr. Holt has been out all night searching the moors for him.” Mrs. Elphinstone gave me a politely welcoming, if somewhat frigid hand- j shake, and pointed me to a chair j near her tea-tray. “Then I’m quite sure Mr. Holt will i do with some breakfast,” she said, in practical fashion. “Attend to him, j Sheila —your father will let everything | go cold —Mr. Elphinstone,” she continued, turning to me, “is so very—-absent-minded, we’ll say, that —there you see, he’s off now—gone, of course, to find some memorial of the days in which he knew your father —just like him! Tea or coffee?” “This is very kind of you,” I said, as I watched Mr. Elphinstone meander away into other rooms, evidently on the search for something, “but I “THE SHINE OF THE TIMES.” Radium Polishes Boots, Floors. Metals. Save Coupons—win a prize. 6.