The Lost Valley

a little more presentable, I dug up a frying-pan, asked Bryce if he liked sausages and, being told that he did, thanked Heaven that his tastes were similar to mine and set about c

for it-that, if I do like things done any particular way, I

ced to scrub it. He used up an inordinate amount of soap and quite a lot of elbow-grease, but when he had finished the wood looked as if it had just been newly cut and trimmed. What took my attention about it was that it was covered from end to end with queer little marks or scratches. These seemed to interest Bryce very

to slip the wood into his pocket and face me with a look in his eye that said as plainly as so many words, "You're not going to steal a march on me, my lad. That's fo

use one if I tried and hoped he didn't want me to learn, as I was sure I'd only make a mess of it. He seemed rather relieved at that and later in the aftern

dropped it into the heart of the fire. I'm hanged if he didn't sit there and watch it until it had burnt into a charred heap of ashes. While he had been attending to it he had left a sheet of typewritten paper down on the table and as he turned to

"335 "49-5@3

k the paper. "Have you ever done

red promptly, and this

on, indicating the paper, though he was ca

affair of mine, "and it looked to me like the sort of th

he said with a smile. There was more than humor in that smile

a fervent hope in my heart that I wasn't over-doing my

ething furtive and cat-like about him that told me just how insistent must be the menace of a sudden death. He moved so silently that I never knew he was there until I looked up and saw him. He glided from room to room like some obese

w me in other ways that she regarded me as an intruder in the house, and if any one thing about me was more preferable than another it was my room rather than my company. Still as I kept out of her way

t I was never away from the house more than half an hour at a time. The more I thought over the mystery surrounding him the deeper and more inexplicable it became. I knew of whom he was afraid, but I had no more idea of the reason of his fear than I had of the name of the man in the moon. My occupation was more reminiscent of revolutionary South America than of a civilised country, and the thought of it set me wondering whether Bryce had ever lived amongst the volatile Latins on the other side of the Pacific. Come to thi

down wrong, for, try as I would, I could make nothing out of them. As a matter of

e, and it occurred to me that such a course wasn't in his own interest

ter you get I might as well be miles away. I don't want to be hanging on to your skirts every ten minutes or so

won't be distu

happened to be in the room when you arrived. Don't you see that

ny uncommon noise

had wouldn't make a row at all. And while I'm on it, wouldn't it be just as well to give me a sketch of the plot? I'm workin

e was doubt in his glance, the sort of doubt that a man does not care to see in the eyes of a friend. I saw that I ha

and I'm trying to justify your expenditure. If I know your enemies and all about them, I can certainly plan level and, maybe, occasional

d of dismissal, so without more ado I said, "If there's nothing further you want, I'l

a piece of paper with a few names scribbled on the back-"and here's the money. Go down to the Lands Department and they'll fix you up

n at the outside," I said.

e key grate in the lock as I walked down the passage and I remember

I crossed over the busiest street a motor-lorry swerved out and nearly collided with me. I did some very neat wheel-work, but my new course took me right across to the gutter, and before I had quite realised what had happened I had speared my tyre with a jagged piece of glass. The tyre popped off with a report like that of a small revolver, and the next second I was bumping on the frame. I pulled

ish, and on looking over the side I saw that the new wheel was wobbling, not very much indeed, but just enough to show me that I had bu

my path deliberately. But as this is in real life and the lorry belongs to a firm

ll reasonable care. After my first few spasmodic attempts at resistance I had succumbed rather quickly to his enticing offer. After all, I thought, I wouldn't be putting myself in any greater danger than I had been in for the past four years. I had faced sud

ce had said nothing to me about expecting a visitor, I decided that the sooner I entered the house and investigated the better for the safety of all concerned. I drove the car into the garage in record time and darted into the house as if the devil were at my heels. There wasn't a sound to be heard; even the eternal clatter of the typewriter had ceased. With a caution born of experience I tip-toed up the passage, all my senses instinctively on the alert. The door of Bryce's room was still locked and everything, to all outward seeming, was just as I had left it. I don't know what I had expected to find

oth and well-modulated, and there was the faintest touch of music in it. In some curious way it touched a stray chord in my memory. I knew at once that I h

w all the circumstances, if you knew just how and why we parted you wouldn't ask me. I'm sorry for it all now, more sorr

up his sleeve," I thought. "This sort of c

than I had ever heard them, "I know more perhaps than you think. I'm doing

terrupted sharply. "D

d put to me ... any time now." The last three words were spoken very slowly and distinctly, as if Bryce wished them to sink into the mind of his companion. "You're

f anger, "I tell you I won't have anything to do with

wrong and make it all the harder

he replied. "I know I was wrong, but I just can'

oped...." I did not catch the nature of his hope, for his voi

t I twisted round on my heel and went back down the hall. I hadn't any desire to be caught listening to conversations that were obviously not intended for me and that anyway weren't

e girl stood in her own light so that the shadows masked her face, but the

with a little c

e most matter-of-fact tones I could mu

n-I thought I loved her more than anything or anyone in this world-but a dying father's wish had come between us. The poor old Dad had made a life study of the Islands-how monumental a study it was let his three volumes of Solomon Island Eth

he ends of a scarf streaming from the neck of a hurrying woman. All the world was gay that evening and I whistled as I went. She was waiting at the

ou," I said; "I want

ught. She had no idea what was coming, but she always

it, Jim?"

, and then I told w

burying yourself in New Guinea and

aid. "There is

nvinced that she would see things in a proper light-but now I turned on her.

te relish the

id quite frankly. "I don't know wh

his last hour happy, and he died in the knowledge that I

hrough?" The abruptness of

said. "What e

e said. "What is

ered, "and then I'll come back to

your father would die easy, and that's the end of it. If you are going to be b

nd a Carstairs neve

that you are going away to ...

absurd," I

d wilfully. "If you go,

here is no other course open to me. I'm sorry that yo

th that little touch of anger with which a woman alway

protested. "Ca

u'd do this rather than listen to me. It shows all you think

r last word?

last," she an

t my promise, and if a man had spoken to me about it as yo

im, you were always something of a savage. That, I suppose, is why

ing hot within me, kept me from feeling as bad as I might have felt. In two months' time I landed at Tulagi on Florida Island, and for the next four years or so the civilised world knew me not. I

I said ungramm

a queer little gesture. "I didn't qui

emarked. "I've come back at last, thoug

Jim. I'

d, and nodded towards the

ow that?" she

gs," I told her. "I'm a profess

not told her everything. It behoved me to pla

here, Moira?" I as

"But I am here, not from any desire to meet you-I di

he send for yo

e moving about her lips now; she had turned a

est reason in the w

he want you?

d ask such a question. But there was that in my eyes wh

ay you don't know?" s

stion you about it," I said s

uplift of her eyebrows-an old theatrical trick that I used

to myself. But her quick ear caught the drift of my r

that devouring flame I knew so well flaring up in he

at she knew more about everything than I did, but I was perfectly sure th

but I judged it best to let it pass. One would think from the way she spoke that there was somethi

, falling in with her own humor. "I ha

Island jungle I had crushed that smile out of my life, for ever I had thought. I had deliberately erased it from my memory, and at night beside the smudge fire, when my eyes closed for an instant and that beautiful imperious face peeped at me from out of the mazes of recollection, I would open my e

ve changed. You usen't to be like that before.

back. And now if you'll excuse me," I ran on before she

turned on my heel and