‘I have thought of the outer islands,’ said Merton, ’out behind the Lewis and the Long Island.’

‘We shall have them searched,’ said Mr. Macrae.  ’I can think of no more at present, and you are tired.’

Merton had slept ill and strangely on the night of Saturday; on Sunday night, of course, he had never lain down.  Unshaven, dirty, with haggard eyes, he looked as wretched as he felt.

’I shall have a bath, and then please employ me, it does not matter on what, as long as I am at work for—­you,’ said Merton.  He had nearly said ‘for her.’

Mr. Macrae looked at him rather curiously.  ‘You are dying of fatigue,’ he said.  ’All your ideas have been excellent, but I cannot let you kill yourself.  Ideas are what I want.  You must stay with me to-day:  I shall be communicating with London and other centres by the Giambresi machine; I shall need your advice, your suggestions.  Now, do go to bed:  you shall be called if you are needed.’

He wrung Merton’s hand, and Merton crept up to his bedroom.  He took a bath, turned in, and was wrapped in all the blessedness of sleep.

Before five o’clock the house was astir.  Bude, in the yacht, steamed down the coast, touching at Lochinver, and wherever there seemed a faint hope of finding intelligence.  But he learned nothing.  Yachts and other vessels came and went (on Sundays, of course, more seldom), and if the heiress had been taken straight to sea, northwards or west, round the Butt of Lewis, by night, there could be no chance of news of her.  Returning, Bude learned that the local search parties had found nothing but the black ashes of a burned boat in a creek on the south side of the cliffs.  There the captors of Miss Macrae must have touched, burned their coble, and taken to some larger and fleeter vessel.  But no such vessel had been seen by shepherd, fisher, keeper, or gillie.  The grooms arrived from Lairg, in the tandem, with the doctor and a rural policeman.  Bude had telegraphed to Scotland Yard from Lochinver for detectives, and to Glasgow, Oban, Tobermory, Salen, in fact to every place he thought likely, with minute particulars of Miss Macrae’s appearance and dress.  All this Merton learned from Bude, when, long after luncheon time, our hero awoke suddenly, refreshed in body, but with the ghastly blank of misery and doubt before the eyes of his mind.

‘I wired,’ said Bude, ’on the off chance that yesterday’s storm might have deranged the wireless machine, and, by Jove, it is lucky I did.  The wireless machine won’t work, not a word of message has come through; it is jammed or something.  I met Donald Macdonald, who told me.’

‘Have you seen our host yet?’

‘No,’ said Bude, ‘I was just going to him.’

They found the millionaire seated at a table, his head in his hands.  On their approach he roused himself.

‘Any news?’ he asked Bude, who shook his head.  He explained how he had himself sent various telegrams, and Mr. Macrae thanked him.