The Talisman Ring

“I do not know why you should complain,” remarked Sir Tristram. “You have had a great deal of adventure, which is what I understood you both to want.”

“Yes, that is true,” acknowledged Eustacie, “but some of it was not very comfortable. And I must say that I am not at all pleased that it is you who have found the ring, because you did not want to have an adventure, or to do anything romantic. It seems to me very unfair.”

“So it is!” said Miss Thane, much struck by this point of view. “It is quite odious, my love, for who could have been more disagreeable, or more discouraging? Really, it would have been better in some ways had we insisted upon his remaining the villain.”

Sir Tristram smiled a little at this, but in rather an abstracted way, and said: “It’s very well, but we are not yet out of our difficulties. Let me have the ring, Ludovic. It is true that we have found it, but we did not find it in the Beau’s possession. Oh, don’t look so dubious, my dear boy! I shan’t lose it.”

“Ah!” said Miss Thane, nodding wisely. “One has to remember, after all, that you are a collector of such things. I don’t blame him, I dare say it is all a Plot.”

“Sarah, you’re outrageous!” said Ludovic, handing the ring across the table to his cousin. “For God’s sake be careful with it, won’t you, Tristram? What do you mean to do?”

Sir Tristram fitted the ring back into its hiding-place, and closed the circlet with a snap. “For the present I’ll keep this. I think our best course—” He stopped, frowning.

They waited in anxious silence for him to continue, but before he spoke again Nye caught the sound of a coach pulling up in the yard and said apologetically: “Beg pardon, sir, but I’ll have to go. That’ll be the night mail.”

Sir Tristram’s voice arrested him as he reached the door. “Do you mean it’s the London mail, Joe?”

“Ay, that’s the one, sir. I want a word with the guard, if you’ll excuse me.”

Sir Tristram’s chair rasped on the oaken floor as he sprang up. “Then that’s my best course!” he said. “I’ll board it!”

Nye stared at him. “If that’s what you mean to do, you’d best make haste, sir. It don’t take them more than two minutes to change the horses, and they’ll be off the moment that’s done.”

“Go and tell them to wait!” ordered Sir Tristram. “I have but to get my hat and coat.”

“They won’t wait, sir!” expostulated Nye. “They’ve got their time to keep, and you’ve no ticket!”

“Never mind that! Hurry, man!” said Sir Tristram, thrusting him before him out of the room.

“But what are you going to do?” cried Eustacie, running after them.

“I’ve no time to waste in explaining that now!” replied Sir Tristram, already halfway up the stairs.

Miss Thane, following in a more leisurely fashion with Ludovic, said darkly: “I said it was a Plot. It’s my belief he is absconding.” She discovered that her butt was already out of hearing, and added: “There! How provoking! That remark was quite wasted. Who would have supposed that the wretched creature would be taken with such a frenzy?”

Sir Tristram reappeared again at this moment, his coat over his arm, his hat in his hand. As he ran down the stairs, he said: “I hope to return tomorrow if all goes well. For God’s sake take care of yourself, Ludovic!”

He was across the coffee-room and out of the door almost before they could fetch their breath. Miss Thane, blinking, said: “If only we had a horse ready saddled!”

“Why? Isn’t the mail enough for him?” inquired Ludovic.

“If there had been a horse, I am persuaded we should have seen him ride off ventre a terre!” mourned Miss Thane.

“But where is he going?” stammered Eustacie. “He seems to me suddenly to have become entirely mad!”

“He’s going to London,” replied Ludovic. “Don’t ask me why, for I haven’t a notion!”

“Well!” Eustacie turned quite pink with indignation. “It is too bad! This is our adventure, and he has left us without a word, and, in fact, is trying to take it away from us!”

“Men!” said Miss Thane, with a strong shudder.

Sir Hugh came wandering into the coffee-room at this moment, and asked what had become of Shield. When he heard that he had departed suddenly for London, he looked vaguely surprised, and complained that he seemed to be another of these people who spent their time popping in and out of the inn like jack-in-the-boxes. “It’s very unrestful,” he said severely. “No sooner do we get comfortably settled than either someone breaks into the house or one of you flies off the Lord knows where! There’s no peace at all. I shall go to bed.”