Spanish Gold/Chapter 11

AJOR KENT and Meldon had finished their eggs and were eating bread-and-jam when Higginbotham, rowed by Jamesy O'Flaherty, reached the Spindrift. At the sound of a bump against the yacht's side Meldon went on deck.

"Come along, Higginbotham," he said. "Come below and have a cup of tea. Jamesy O'Flaherty, do you make your curragh fast and get on board. I'll bring you up a glass of whisky in a minute."

He shepherded Higginbotham into the cabin. The Major rose to his feet nervously. He foresaw that the process of persuading Higginbotham to set out for Inishmore in a curragh at six the next morning would be trying.

"I think," he said, "I'll go on deck and have a chat with Jamesy O'Flaherty."

"Do," said Meldon, "and take a glass of whisky with you. I want to have a quiet talk with Higginbotham."

The Major departed, well satisfied that he would escape taking part in the quiet talk which was to follow.

"Help yourself to some tea," said Meldon to Higginbotham, "and make yourself comfortable with a slice of bread-and-jam. I think I mentioned to you yesterday that Sir Giles Buckley is rather a big bug in his own way."

"You said he was something in the Castle."

"He is. I hinted, I think, that either Crimes Acts or Royal Commissions were his particular line. I was wrong there. I confused him for the moment with another man whose name is somewhat similar. The fact is that Sir Giles is the man whom they keep unattached, as it were, to take up any particular job that happens to be prominent at the moment. It may be a famine, or it may be crochet, or sick nurses, or Christmas-trees for workhouse children. Whatever it is, Sir Giles is the man who runs it. At present it happens to be tuberculosis."

"I never heard of there being any such man in the Castle."

"I dare say not. You official people get into very narrow grooves. You all of you seem to think that your own footy little Board is the only one in the country. Whereas there are lots and lots of others besides the one you happen to be connected with. Not that I mean to suggest that Sir Giles is a Board. He isn't. He's simply, as I said, unattached."

"Still, I think I must have heard of him if he's what you say."

"You might not. I tell you, Higginbotham, there aren't half a dozen men in Ireland who could tell you even the principal kinds of regular officials; and when it comes to unattached freelances like Sir Giles, hardly anybody knows exactly what they are. I'm liable to make mistakes about them myself, as you saw when I spoke about Sir Giles yesterday."

"Still"

"I may not be using technically correct language when I call Sir Giles an unattached official. I dare say there's some other name for what he is which you would recognise if you heard it. But the gist of the matter is the same, however you express it. He's in charge of the anti-tuberculosis movement, fighting the Great White Plague. That's what he's here for. This morning he made an examination of young Mrs. O'Flaherty's baby, little Michael Pat. You might have seen him going off in that direction at about half-past eight."

"I did."

"You saw him talking to her on the side of the road and her with the baby in her arms?"

"Yes. I happened at the time to be going"

"Well, there you are. If Sir Giles isn't investigating tuberculosis on behalf of the Government, why should he bother his head about making a prolonged and minute examination of Mrs. O'Flaherty's baby? Tell me that."

"I don't know. I suppose it's all right."

"Well, then, don't contradict me flat when I'm giving you information which may come in useful to you. The fact is that Sir Giles wants you to help him to-morrow."

"But—but I don't know anything about tuberculosis."

"Nobody supposes you do. What he wants you to do is to go over early to-morrow to Inishmore in Jamesy O'Flaherty's curragh and make a list of all the cases of consumption you can find. You know the people, or at any rate you ought to, and of course Sir Giles doesn't. His plan is to follow you later on in the Aureole. You're to start about six a.m. Allowing an hour and a half for the row over, you'll be there by seven-thirty. After you've had a bit of breakfast—Sir Giles was most particular that you should breakfast properly—he thinks you might catch the thing yourself if you went at it on an empty stomach. After breakfast you're to stroll round the island and keep your eye lifting for consumptives. You needn't drag them out and lay them on the beach or anything of that sort. Just take a note of any case you come across so that when Sir Giles arrives there'll be no unnecessary waste of time."

"I never heard of such a job in my life."

"Very likely not. But you ought to recollect, Higginbotham, that you'd never heard of Sir Giles till I told you about him. And you'd never heard of the anti-tuberculosis crusade."

"I had heard of that."

"Oh, had you? Well, this morning you saw with your own eyes the way Sir Giles was examining little Michael Pat."

"I didn't say I saw him examining the child. I said I saw"

"Don't go back on what you've just admitted. You said you were watching Sir Giles this morning. I don't call it a very gentlemanly action. But there's no use making the matter worse now by denying that you did it."

Higginbotham stroked his moustache nervously. He took off his spectacles and rubbed the glasses with his handkerchief. He cleared his throat.

"I can't do a thing like that," he said. "I don't know how."

"It'll be all right," said Meldon. "Call on the parish priest when you land; he'll help you."

Higginbotham still displayed signs of uneasiness.

"Why does Sir Giles send me this message through you?" he asked. "Why doesn't he speak to me himself."

"He tried to. He and I were searching the island for you all afternoon. He went up to old Thomas O'Flaherty's place to look for you. I told him that you were likely to be there, but you weren't."

"I heard he was up there. I thought he might have been speaking to the old man about"

"Well, he wasn't. He was simply looking for you. Now, Higginbotham, the question is simply this: will you go or will you not? I'd go myself in a minute, only I thought you'd like to get the chance. I've nothing to gain by being civil to Sir Giles, but you have. Why, man, your whole future depends upon the kind of impression you make upon these big officials. You know the way they talk to each other in their clubs after luncheon. I tell you there's very little they don't know about every inspector and engineer in the country. If you've any sense you'll make yourself as pleasant and obliging to Sir Giles as you possibly can. I hope you don't mind my speaking plainly. It's for your own good."

"I think," said Higginbotham, "that I'll row over now and see Sir Giles myself."

"You'd much better not."

"Why?"

"Oh, well, I don't like repeating these things. But of course it's pretty well public property. The fact is"

Meldon took a cup from the table, put it to his lips, slowly raised his elbow and threw back his head.

"Only in the evenings," he continued, "after he's left the office. He never allows it to interfere with his work in the slightest."

Higginbotham gasped. Meldon nodded solemnly.

"Naturally," he went on, "the poor fellow doesn't care about having unexpected visitors dropping in on him during the evening."

"Good God!" said Higginbotham.

"Yes, it's frightfully sad. In every other respect he's a splendid fellow, one of the very best. We keep it as quiet as we can, but, you can see it for yourself. You've only got to look at Langton's face to see it. You told me yourself that he'd got sacked out of the College Library for drink."

"But Sir Giles!"

"Oh, tarred with the same brush. Birds of a feather, you know. You see now why it wouldn't do for you to be going over there this evening. You're an official yourself, and I need scarcely say that a subordinate official is the very last kind of man who should mix himself up in a business of this kind."

"I see that, of course."

"I needn't say, Higginbotham, that it's no pleasure to me to repeat stories of this kind. I wouldn't have said a word if you hadn't forced me. I'm extremely sorry for Sir Giles and for poor Langton. What a promising career that man had before him! With his taste for manuscripts and the whole College Library at his disposal, he might have made a European reputation. Drink's an awful curse."

"But I thought you said he wasn't the same man."

"I may have said that at the time. I naturally wanted to shield Sir Giles as long as I could. But he is the exact same man. Poor old Euseby Langton! But we'll drop the subject now. I don't care to spend the whole evening gloating over other men's infirmities. The point I want to get at is this: Will you go to Inishmore to-morrow morning?"

"I suppose I'd better."

"Quite right. Take my word for it you'll be glad afterwards you did. And now, as you've got to make an early start I daresay you'd like to be getting home. Don't let Jamesy O'Flaherty oversleep himself in the morning."

"Major," said Mel don, when Higginbotham had departed, "I've settled that all right. Higginbotham and the curragh go to Inishmore to-morrow. They start at six a.m."

"How did you arrange it?"

"Don't ask me. I had a tough job."

Meldon lit his pipe and puffed great clouds of smoke. His nerves required steadying after the conversation with Higginbotham. For a time he remained silent.

The Major was filled with curiosity—the morbid curiosity which makes some men eager to gaze on sights which fill them with horror. He pressed Meldon to tell him how the expedition to Inishmore had been arranged.

"I'm glad we'll get that treasure to-morrow," said Meldon. "I don't believe it will be possible to keep Higginbotham going much longer without his suspecting that there is something up. He's becoming extraordinarily sceptical about the things I tell him. I give you my word, Major, that at times to-night it took me all I knew to persuade him that I was telling the truth."

"I shouldn't wonder."

"I've made up my mind," said Meldon, after another pause, "that, if we get anything like the haul I expect to-morrow out of the Spanish captain's hoard, we'll give Higginbotham a good bagful of doubloons for himself. We owe it to him to do him a good turn of some sort. I don't feel that we've treated him quite fairly. It's rough on a man to set him searching for tubercle bacilli all day long on an island by himself. It's not in Higginbotham's regular line of work and I'm afraid he won't like it at all. I'm sorry I had to do it."

"What have you done?"

"I've just told you. I've sent him off to Inishmore to make a kind of census of all the consumptive people on the island. I told him he'd better get the parish priest to help him. By the way, what sort of a fellow is the parish priest of Inishmore?"

"He's a man called Mulcrone."

"Has he a sense of humour? I mean, will he see the joke afterwards, or is he the kind who'll make a row?"

"He can see ordinary jokes. At least he has something of a reputation for making them, but whether he'll see your kind of joke, of course I can't say."

"Oh, well, it won't much matter what he does once we have the treasure, and there's very little between us and it now. I think I'll turn in, Major. I'm a bit fagged. Michael Pat took more out of me this afternoon than I suspected at the time. I advise you to turn in too. We've a long day before us to-morrow. Good-night."

Half an hour later Meldon from his bunk addressed Major Kent, who had been on deck to wash his teeth.

"Major, Higginbotham's not nearly such a fool as you appear to think. If I were you I'd slide off that geological survey story of yours quietly and unobtrusively. Don't try and keep the thing up. I doubt very much whether you'll be believed if you do. Any disguise you assume in future when dealing with Higginbotham had better be very carefully tested beforehand. Good-night."