Part 13 (2/2)

”I don't think so. He doesn't seem to like to go to bed. He sits up very late, and talks to the men when they start to go home from the Red Dog. He likes to talk, you see. We'll soon know--that's one thing. We'll be there now in no time.”

Sure enough, the old man was still up when they arrived. He was just saying good-night, in a high, piping voice, to a little group of men who had evidently been having a nightcap in the inn next to his house. When he saw Jack he smiled. They were very good friends, and the old man had found the boy one of his best listeners. The Gaffer liked to live in the past; he was always delighted when anyone would let him tell his tales of the things he remembered.

”Good-evening, Gaffer,” said Jack, respectfully. ”This is my friend, d.i.c.k Mercer. He's a Boy Scout from London.”

”Knew it! Knew it!” said Gaffer Hodge, with a senile chuckle. ”I said they was from Lunnon this afternoon when I seen them fust! Glad to meet you, young maister.”

Then Jack described Graves as well as he could from his brief sight of him, and d.i.c.k helped by what he remembered.

”Did you see him come into town this afternoon, Gaffer?” asked Jack.

”Let me think,” said the old man. ”Yes--I seen 'um. Came sneaking in, he did, this afternoon as ever was! Been up to the big house at Bray Park, he had. Came in in an automobile, he did. Then he went back there. But he was in the post office when you and t'other young lad from Lunnon went by, maister!” nodding his head as if well pleased.

This was to d.i.c.k, and he and Jack stared at one another. Certainly their visit to Gaffer Hodge had paid them well.

”Are you sure of that, Gaffer?” asked Jack, quietly. ”Sure that it was an automobile from Bray Park?”

”Sure as ever was!” said the old man, indignantly. Like all old people, he hated anyone to question him, resenting the idea that anyone could think he was mistaken. ”Didn't I see the machine myself--a big grey one, with black stripes as ever was, like all their automobiles?”

”That's true--that's the way their cars are painted, and they have five or six of them,” said Jack.

”Yes. And he come in the car from Lunnon before he went there--and then he come out here. He saw you and t'other young lad from Lunnon go by, maister, on your bicycles. He was watching you from the shop as ever was!”

”Thank you, Gaffer,” said Jack, gravely. ”You've told us just what we wanted to know. I'll bring you some tobacco in the morning, if you like. My father's just got a new lot down from London.”

”Thanks, thank'ee kindly,” said the Gaffer, overjoyed at the prospect.

Then they said good-night to the old man, who, plainly delighted at the thought that he had been of some service to them, and at this proof of his sharpness, of which he was always boasting, rose and hobbled into his house.

”He's really a wonderful old man,” said d.i.c.k.

”He certainly is,” agreed Jack. ”His memory seems to be as good as ever, and he's awfully active, too. He's got rheumatism, but he can see and hear as well as he ever could, my father says.”

They walked on, each turning over in his mind what they had heard about Graves.

”That's how he knew we were here,” said d.i.c.k, finally. ”I've been puzzling about that. I remember now seeing that car as we went by. But of course I didn't pay any particular attention to it, except that I saw a little American flag on it.”

”Yes, they're supposed to be Americans, you know,” said Jack. ”And I suppose they carry the flag so that the car won't be taken for the army.

The government has requisitioned almost all the cars in the country, you know.”

”I'm almost afraid to think about this,” said d.i.c.k, after a moment of silence. ”Graves must know those people in that house, if he's riding about in their car. And they--”

He paused, and they looked at one another.

”I don't know what to do!” said d.i.c.k. ”I wish there was some way to tell Harry about what we've found out.”

Jack started.

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