had Boyne obeyed his call?



IV


It leaped out at her suddenly, like a grin out of the dark, that
they had often called England so little--"such a confoundedly
hard place to get lost in."

A CONFOUNDEDLY HARD PLACE TO GET LOST IN! That had been her
husband's phrase. And now, with the whole machinery of official
investigation sweeping its flash-lights from shore to shore, and
across the dividing straits; now, with Boyne's name blazing from
the walls of every town and village, his portrait (how that wrung
her!) hawked up and down the country like the image of a hunted
criminal; now the little compact, populous island, so policed,
surveyed, and administered, revealed itself as a Sphinx-like
guardian of abysmal mysteries, staring back into his wife's
anguished eyes as if with the malicious joy of knowing something
they would never know!

In the fortnight since Boyne's disappearance there had been no
word of him, no trace of his movements. Even the usual
misleading reports that raise expectancy in tortured bosoms had
been few and fleeting. No one but the bewildered kitchen-maid
had seen him leave the house, and no one else had seen "the
gentleman" who accompanied him. All inquiries in the
neighborhood failed to elicit the memory of a stranger's presence