Pamela went back to Moss Cottage with new courage. The secret, which had almost overwhelmed her when she had tried to bear it alone, assumed a different aspect now she shared it with her friends. Captain Harper had taken the full responsibility of the affair, and as one of His Majesty's officers she knew he could be trusted. She placed herself entirely in his hands, and followed his directions implicitly. To keep watch without arousing her uncle's suspicions was to be her present rÔle. Under cover of going to tea with the Watsons, she met Captain Harper at Walden, and learnt from him the Morse code. Once she had mastered that, she was able to write down some of the wireless messages. To her they were absolutely unintelligible, for they were in cipher, but she made a faithful record of what she heard through the receiver, and sent it by David or Anthony to the young officer. For the moment Captain Harper acknowledged himself baffled. "We have the keys to a number of ciphers, but there's one here we don't understand. It's solely for this reason we're allowing this wireless apparatus at Moss Cottage to remain where it is. To David and Anthony the affair was of the supremest interest. They envied Pamela her unique chance of serving her country. They were glad enough to be employed as carriers, and would take the notes from her when they met her in the morning, and, according to arrangement, convey them to Captain Harper. Sometimes they took them direct to the Camp, after they returned from school, and sometimes they handed them to an orderly who would be strolling about near the station. As for Pamela, she lived from day to day in a ferment of expectation, waiting and watching for her opportunity. And one evening she found it. Mr. Hockheimer had come, as was his custom, to Moss Cottage, and had set his niece to listen for messages while he took his ease in the house. For an hour or more Pamela had sat with the receiver to her ears, but had heard nothing. At last came the familiar humming. She jotted down the letters, put the paper safely in her pocket, and ran up the garden to warn her uncle. That night he had been drinking more heavily than usual. He lurched in his walk as he approached the stable, and it was with difficulty that he climbed the ladder. Pamela followed him nervously. His hands shook as he fitted on the receiver, but he nevertheless took down
Pamela backed away cautiously towards the ladder. Just as she reached it her uncle turned round and called to her. "Give me a hand, Pam! Don't feel—very well to-night," he stammered thickly. "Got to go out, too. Must go home and get the car. Little store of petrol they don't know about! And I shan't tell them either!" (He hinnied at his own joke.) "Give me your hand." He leaned heavily on his niece, and she helped him down the ladder. She watched him as he stumbled along the narrow path in the darkness. He called to her, but she did not follow him to the cottage. Instead, she went to the palings and scrambled over into the high road. She surmised that she had surprised a most important secret, one which she felt must be communicated at once to head-quarters. It was absolutely necessary that Captain Harper should know of this. By warning him in time she might prevent some great disaster. She must get to the Camp as quickly as possible. It was late, long past eleven o'clock (Mr. Hockheimer "What is it?" cried David out of the window. "It's I—Pamela! I've brought news!" she gasped. The Watsons were downstairs directly. They listened breathlessly to the story she had to tell. David and Anthony hurried to the outhouse for their bicycles, and set off at once for the Camp to find Captain Harper. Who could say how much might depend on their speed? Pamela watched them go with a feeling of intense relief. Her part of the business was finished; she had now set the machinery in motion that would accomplish the rest. The reaction after the intense strain was so great that she burst into tears. "I must go home!" she sobbed. "Mother will think I am lost!" "Daphne and I will go with you. I can't let you walk back alone at this time of night," said Mrs. Watson kindly. "If you'll take my advice, dear, you'll tell your mother everything now. She ought to know." Pamela's friends escorted her to the door of Moss The boys looked out for Pamela next morning on the road to the station, but she was not there. The train for once went without her. They spent an agitated day at school and hurried back from Netherton that afternoon at topmost speed. They found Captain Harper in the garden at Walden. He looked very grave. "Do you know what that message was you brought me?" he asked. "Translated into English it meant, 'U-boat in Channel to-night. Show light on Berry Head.' I hear a certain important vessel had an extremely narrow escape last night. The wireless apparatus at Moss Cottage has been taken down already. The police went up there this morning." "And Mr. Hockheimer?" Captain Harper knocked the end off his cigarette before he answered. "Mr. Hockheimer has gone to settle his great account. He and his car were found in the river at Chadwick this morning. The road turns at a "On our honour!" the boys assured him. The "sad fatality at Chadwick Bridge" made a sensation in the local newspapers. An inquest was held on Mr. Hockheimer, and a verdict of "Death from misadventure" returned. Though many people in the neighbourhood may have had their suspicions as to the nature of his errand on that dark night, no evidence of an incriminating nature was brought before the coroner. He was buried at Lyngates in the Reynolds's family vault, where his wife had been carried two years before. He had left no will, and the question of who was to inherit the Lyngates property might be a matter for Chancery to settle. By the advice of the old solicitor who had managed the estate for many years, Mrs. Reynolds and Pamela took temporary possession of the Hall until a claim could be set up on their behalf. At the time of Squire Reynolds's death it had been the current gossip of the bitter thoughts against you, but love for your country has are, and I am ready to acknowledge your to see them, should they ever come to gones shall be bygones now. I am in your favour, and shall put it is sure to be found, both die, they will be provided
"If this surmise is correct," continued Captain Harper, "and there really was a new will, it may possibly be hidden somewhere at the Hall." "We've searched everywhere," said Pamela sadly. "Two lawyer's clerks have been here and gone through every morsel of paper in the house, and turned out every drawer and cupboard. I think myself that perhaps Uncle Fritz may have found it and destroyed it. Mother and I spend all our spare time looking, but we never have any luck. I don't think we're lucky people. We seem just to have misfortune after misfortune. It has always been like this all our lives." "Cheer up! It's a long lane that has no turning," comforted Captain Harper. "I advise you Pamela's affairs did indeed seem to have reached a crisis. Her fortunes were much discussed in the neighbourhood, and general opinion decided that she would have difficulty in establishing legally her right to what undoubtedly ought to be hers. Several naturalized German relations of Mr. Hockheimer had put in counter-claims for the estate. There was likely to be a long and expensive lawsuit before the case was settled. Then one day a wonderful thing occurred—an utterly unexpected and marvellous thing, but one that—thank God!—has happened in other families since the war began. The postwoman who delivered the letter did not know that it differed from other letters; she popped it through the slit in the front door and rang the bell as usual, and went on her way, all unsuspecting what news she had left behind her. Yet when Mrs. Reynolds saw the handwriting on the envelope she gave a little sharp cry and fainted away. Pamela did not go to school that day nor the next. She wrote to Avelyn to explain her absence. The latter read the letter twice before her amazed brain could really grasp its contents. "My dear Ave, "I hardly know how to tell you our good luck. Daddy is alive! He wasn't killed at Mons after all. He was taken prisoner and never reported. He was kept most fearfully strictly in a "Will you please tell Miss Thompson this is why I'm not at school? We start for town to-morrow morning. "Much love from It was indeed a most happy ending to all the troubles of poor Mrs. Reynolds and Pamela. By the will which had already been proved, Captain Reynolds inherited his father's estate, which had only passed to the daughter Dora in default of a male heir. He was soon able to settle up the legal side of the matter and to obtain formal possession of the whole property. "I've made my own will now, and left everything safely tied up for you and your Mother before I go out to the front again," he told his daughter. "Oh, Daddy! must you leave us and go back to France?" wailed Pamela. "Every hour I spent in that fortress, Pam, made me all the more resolved to help to fight this war to the finish. Would you want me to shirk and fail my country? I know you better than that. Tell me again what you told me in 1914." "Though it tear and break my heart I let you go. When the Motherland is calling, Be it so! Let my own poor need and grief Be set aside, That justice and the right May now abide. "God put courage and true might In your arm! May His mercy keep your life Safe from harm! Every hour my earnest prayer Shall be this: May we meet and greet again With a kiss." |