The Scarlet Bat. Fergus Hume

said Eustace, emphatically; "it certainly is not."

      "That's what I say," replied Mrs. Baker, not seeing the intended rebuke. "As I always says to Baker, if people managed their own affairs without being talked about, people wouldn't be so bothered. And how do you like the country, sir?" This last was to Frank.

      "It is extremely pretty," replied Lancaster, cautiously.

      "Ah, when you're here long enough, you'll say so, sir. But I suppose you've just come?"

      "He came last night, Mrs. Baker, from Ireland?"

      "Dear me! I get butter from there. And will you be staying long, sir?"

      "I hope so," answered Lancaster, seeing why Jarman had brought him into the company of this inquiring lady. "I am Mr. Jarman's secretary."

      "Well, I'm glad you've a companion at last, Mr. Jarman, though a wife would be more to a single gentleman's mind. And I always thought--"

      "Good-morning!" interposed Eustace, hastily, and left the shop, tucking a bundle of newspapers and letters under his arm. When they got some distance along the road he laughed.

      "What do you think of Mrs. Baker?" he asked.

      "She seems to be a kind of gazette. I suppose you took me in so that she could talk of my personal appearance, and my engagement as a secretary, and all the rest of it."

      "Precisely. The wider you are known the safer you will be. Mrs. Baker will describe your appearance, and detail how you came from Ireland where she gets her butter. We'll send a few letters through her hands, addressed to Desmond O'Neil, and then she'll drop talking. So even if you are traced by any chance, Frank, there will be no danger of a detective connecting you with the man who is wanted."

      Lancaster shuddered. "It's like a nightmare," he said. "Yesterday I was a free man, with a career before me; now I'm an outlaw, with a price set on my head."

      "It's unpleasant. But wait--wait. Time works wonders. The real criminal may be discovered. Let us hear what news has come to Rose Cottage."

      "Is that where Miss Starth lives?"

      "Yes. She and Mrs. Perth share the place. Their united incomes are just enough to keep them in comfort."

      "Is Miss Starth engaged?" asked Lancaster, with a side glance.

      "No," said the other, with unnecessary fierceness. "Why do you ask?"

      "Well, she's so pretty that I thought--"

      "Oh, bother your thinking!" broke in Eustace, testily. "Mildred isn't the girl to get engaged in a hurry."

      "You seem to know her well, calling her by her name."

      "I've known her for some years, and as she is something of a poetess I help her to get her poems into print. She looks on me as a kind of--of father," added Jarman, colouring.

      Frank nodded. He guessed the truth, but was too languid to argue it. But he couldn't help asking what Mrs. Baker had been about to observe when Eustace left the shop. "Was she speaking of Miss Starth?"

      "I don't know. Mrs. Baker is by way of being a matchmaker, and always couples names. There was a rumour that I was engaged to Mildred."

      "It wasn't true?"

      "No. I've had enough of women. Seven years ago in 'Frisco--" Jarman checked himself impatiently. "What's the use of raking up old tales. You seem very interested in Miss Starth?"