“In one word,” I said, “you are a psychologist.”

“A psychologist,” she assented; “I suppose so; and the police—­ well, the police are not; they are at best but bungling materialists.  They require a clue.  What need of a clue if you can interpret character?”

So certain was Hilda Wade of her conclusions, indeed, that Mrs. Mallet begged me next day to take my holiday at once—­which I could easily do—­and go down to the little bay in the Hartland district of which she had spoken, in search of Hugo.  I consented.  She herself proposed to set out quietly for Bideford, where she could be within easy reach of me, in order to hear of my success or failure; while Hilda Wade, whose summer vacation was to have begun in two days’ time, offered to ask for an extra day’s leave so as to accompany her.  The broken-hearted sister accepted the offer; and, secrecy being above all things necessary, we set off by different routes:  the two women by Waterloo, myself by Paddington.

We stopped that night at different hotels in Bideford; but next morning, Hilda rode out on her bicycle, and accompanied me on mine for a mile or two along the tortuous way towards Hartland.  “Take nothing for granted,” she said, as we parted; “and be prepared to find poor Hugo Le Geyt’s appearance greatly changed.  He has eluded the police and their ‘clues’ so far; therefore, I imagine he must have largely altered his dress and exterior.”

“I will find him,” I answered, “if he is anywhere within twenty miles of Hartland.”

She waved her hand to me in farewell.  I rode on after she left me towards the high promontory in front, the wildest and least-visited part of North Devon.  Torrents of rain had fallen during the night; the slimy cart-ruts and cattle-tracks on the moor were brimming with water.  It was a lowering day.  The clouds drifted low.  Black peat-bogs filled the hollows; grey stone homesteads, lonely and forbidding, stood out here and there against the curved sky-line.  Even the high road was uneven and in places flooded.  For an hour I passed hardly a soul.  At last, near a crossroad with a defaced finger-post, I descended from my machine, and consulted my ordnance map, on which Mrs. Mallet had marked ominously, with a cross of red rink, the exact position of the little fishing hamlet where Hugo used to spend his holidays.  I took the turning which seemed to me most likely to lead to it; but the tracks were so confused, and the run of the lanes so uncertain—­let alone the map being some years out of date—­that I soon felt I had lost my bearings.  By a little wayside inn, half hidden in a deep combe, with bog on every side, I descended and asked for a bottle of ginger-beer; for the day was hot and close, in spite of the packed clouds.  As they were opening the bottle, I inquired casually the way to the Red Gap bathing-place.

The landlord gave me directions which confused me worse than ever, ending at last with the concise remark:  “An’ then, zur, two or dree more turns to the right an’ to the left ’ull bring ’ee right up alongzide o’ ut.”