The Red Redmaynes | Page 5

get a bit darker."
"Well, so long. Take care you don't catch anything that'll pull you in."
Laughing at his joke and making another echo ring sharply over the
still face of the water, the red man strode off through the gap fifty yards
distant. Then in the stillness Mark heard the purr of a machine. He had
evidently departed upon a motor bicycle to the main road half a mile
distant.
When he was gone Brendon rose and strolled down to the other
entrance of the quarry that he might see the bungalow of which the
stranger had spoken. Leaving the great pit he turned right-handed and
there, in a little hollow facing southwest, he found the building. It was
as yet far from complete. The granite walls now stood six feet high and
they were of remarkable thickness. The plan indicated a dwelling of six
rooms and Brendon perceived that the house would have no second
story. An acre round about had been walled, but as yet the boundaries
were incomplete. Magnificent views swept to the west and south.
Brendon's rare sight could still distinguish Saltash Bridge spanning the
waters above Plymouth, where Cornwall heaved up against the dying
afterglow of the west. It was a wonderful place in which to dwell, and
the detective speculated as to the sort of people who would be likely to
lift their home in this silent wilderness.
He guessed that they must have wearied of cities, or of their fellow
creatures. Perhaps they were disappointed and disillusioned with life
and so desired to turn their backs upon its gregarious features, evade its
problems, as far as possible, escape its shame and follies, and live here
amid these stern realities which promised nothing, yet were full of

riches for a certain order of mankind. He judged that the couple, who
designed to dwell beside the silent hollow of Foggintor, must have
outlived much and reached an attitude of mind that desired no greater
boon than solitude in the lap of nature. Such people could only be
middle-aged, he told himself. Yet he remembered the big man had said
that the pair felt "love was enough." That meant romance still active
and alive, whatever their ages might be.
The day grew very dim and the fret of light and shadow died off the
earth, leaving all vague and vast and featureless. Brendon returned to
his sport and found a small "coachman" fly sufficiently destructive. The
two pools yielded a dozen trout, of which he kept six and returned the
rest to the water. His best three fish all weighed half a pound.
Resolved to pay the pools another visit, Mark made an end of his sport
and chose to return by road rather than venture the walk over the rough
moor in darkness. He left the quarry at the gap, passed the half dozen
cottages that stood a hundred yards beyond it, and so, presently,
regained the main road between Princetown and Tavistock. Tramping
back under the stars, his thoughts drifted to the auburn girl of the moor.
He was seeking to recollect how she had been dressed. He remembered
everything about her with extraordinary vividness, from the crown of
her glowing hair to her twinkling feet, in brown shoes with steel or
silver buckles; but he could not instantly see her garments. Then they
came back to him--the rose-coloured jumper and the short, silvery
skirts.
Twice afterward, during the evening hour, Brendon again tramped to
Foggintor, but he was not rewarded by any glimpse of the girl; but as
the picture of her dimmed a little, there happened a strange and
apparently terrible thing, and in common with everybody else his
thoughts were distracted. To the detective's hearty annoyance and much
against his will, there confronted him a professional problem. Though
the sudden whisper of murder that winged with amazing speed through
that little, uplifted church-town was no affair of his, there fell out an
incident which quickly promised to draw him into it and end his
holiday before the time.

Four evenings after his first fishing expedition to the quarries, he
devoted a morning to the lower waters of the Meavy River; at the end
of that day, not far short of midnight, when glasses were empty and
pipes knocked out, half a dozen men, just about to retire, heard a
sudden and evil report.
Will Blake, "Boots" at the Duchy Hotel, was waiting to extinguish the
lights, and seeing Brendon he said:
"There's something in your line happened, master, by the look of it. A
pretty bobbery to-morrow."
"A convict escaped, Will?" asked the detective, yawning and longing
for bed. "That's about the only fun you get up here, isn't it?"
"Convict escaped? No--a man done in seemingly. Mr. Pendean's
uncle-in-law have