“You’re always ready, Pearson,” returned Mr. Temple Barholm. “I want to get that train.”
Pearson _was_ always ready. Before the last word was quite spoken he had turned and opened the bedroom door.
“I’ll order the dog-cart; that’s quickest, sir,” he said. He was out of the room and in again almost immediately. Then he was at the wardrobe and taking out what Mr. Temple Barholm called his “grip,” but what Pearson knew as a Gladstone bag. It was always kept ready packed for unexpected emergencies of travel.
Mr. Temple Barholm sat at the table and drew pen and paper toward him. He looked excited; he looked more troubled than Pearson had seen him look before.
“The wire’s from Sir Ormsby Galloway, Pearson,” he said. “It’s about Mr. Strangeways. He’s done what I used to be always watching out against: he’s disappeared.”
“Disappeared, sir!” cried Pearson, and almost dropped the Gladstone bag. “I beg pardon, sir. I know there’s no time to lose.” He steadied the bag and went on with his task without even turning round.
His master was in some difficulty. He began to write, and after dashing off a few words, suddenly stopped, and then tore them up.
“No,” he muttered, “that won’t do. There’s no time to explain.” Then he began again, but tore up his next lines also. “That says too much and not enough. It’d scare the life out of her.”
He wrote again, and ended by folding the sheet and putting it into an envelop.
“This is a message for Miss Alicia,” he said to Pearson. “Give it to her in the morning. I don’t want her to worry, because I had to go in a hurry. Tell her everything’s going to be all right; but you needn’t mention that anything’s happened to Mr. Strangeways.”
Mr. Temple Barholm was already moving about the room, doing odd things for himself rapidly, and he went on speaking.
“I want you and Rose to know,” he said, “that whatever happens, you are both fixed all right--both of you. I’ve seen to that.”
“Thank you, sir,” Pearson faltered, made uneasy by something new in his tone. “You said whatever happened, sir--”
“Whatever old thing happens,” his master took him up.
“Not to _you_, sir. Oh, I hope, sir, that nothing--”
Mr. Temple Barholm put a cheerful hand on his shoulder.
“Nothing’s going to happen that’ll hurt any one. Things may change, that’s all. You and Rose are all right, Miss Alicia’s all right, I’m all right. Come along. Got to catch that train.”