“Uncle Robert had told us about his engagement to a young woman, the sister of a comrade in the war.  She was stopping at Paignton with her parents and he was now going to return to her.  He made us promise to come to Paignton next August for the Torbay Regatta; and in secret I begged him to write to both, my other uncles and explain that he was now satisfied Michael had done his bit in the war.  He consented to do so and thus it looked as though our anxieties would soon be at an end.

“Last night Uncle Robert and Michael went, after an early tea, to the bungalow, but I did not accompany them on this occasion.  They ran round by road on Uncle Robert’s motor bicycle, my husband sitting behind him, as he always did.

“Supper time came and neither of them appeared.  I am speaking of last night now.  I did not bother till midnight, but then I grew frightened.  I went to the police station, saw Inspector Halfyard, and told him that my husband and uncle had not come back from Foggintor and that I was anxious about them.  He knew them both by sight and my husband personally, for he had been of great use to Michael when the moss depot was at work.  That is all I can tell you.”

Mrs. Pendean stopped and Brendon rose.

“What remains to be told I will get from Inspector Halfyard himself,” he said.  “And you must let me congratulate you on your statement.  It would have been impossible to put the past situation more clearly before me.  The great point you made is that your husband and Captain Redmayne were entirely reconciled and left you in complete friendship when you last saw them.  You can assure me of that?”

“Most emphatically.”

“Have you looked into your uncle’s room since he disappeared?”

“No, it has not been touched.”

“Again thank you, Mrs. Pendean.  I shall see you some time to-day.”

“Can you give me any sort of hope?”

“As yet I know nothing of the actual event, and must not therefore offer you hope, or tell you not to hope.”

She shook his hand and a fleeting ghost of a smile, infinitely pathetic but unconscious, touched her face.  Even in grief the beauty of the woman was remarkable; and to Brendon, whose private emotions already struck into the present demands upon his intellect, she appeared exquisite.  As he left her he hoped that a great problem lay before him.  He desired to impress her—­he looked forward with a passing exaltation quite foreign from his usual staid and cautious habit of mind; he even repeated to himself a pregnant saying that he had come across in a book of quotations, though he knew not the author of it.

     “There is an hour in which a man may be happy all his
      life, can he but find it.”

Then he grew ashamed of himself and felt something like a blush suffuse his plain features.