"Oh, dear, Aunt Ida! Ralph Endicott does not care how I treat him. I wish you could have heard him when we were coming up from Lower Trillion the other day in his _Fenique_. Called me "kid"! Girls mean nothing to him. At least, not _this_ girl," and she laughed airily.
"But, Lorna," said her aunt, "can it be possible that this tale you have heard is true-about the loss of Henry"s money?"
"Well, Aunt Ida, how did the professor impress you just now?"
"As acting very strangely-even for him. And his peculiar manner did not seem to arise as usual from his habitual absent-mindedness."
"That is what I thought. Of course the poor old fellow always does have a "lost, strayed, or stolen" way about him--"
"Why, Lorna! Professor Henry Endicott is not old-not at all!"
admonished Miss Ida heatedly.
So near did Tobias Ba.s.sett"s scheme fall through. Had John Nicholet been at home the fanciful tale of financial disaster, at either the Nicholet or Endicott side of the big lawn, would have been exploded!
As it was, the next morning, before Miss Ida could make up her mind to go to Professor Endicott and put a plain question or two, the latter had plunged into a new series of experiments from which the family did not dare to try to recall him under any circ.u.mstances. And on the professor"s part, he had quite forgotten the Nicholets" financial troubles.
Ralph "fiddled about," as Tobias Ba.s.sett said, as uncertain in his direction as a crab.
"I give it as my opinion," the lightkeeper observed to Miss Heppy, "that the boy can"t make up his mind whether to go about or keep on the main tack. He is as onsartain as April weather."
"I do hope he ain"t sick," said his sister. "Maybe he"s comin" down with something."
"Oh, sugar! There ain"t nothing the matter with that fellow"s health,"
chuckled Tobias. "All he"s sickenin" for is _girlitis_-got it the worst way. Only he don"t know it."
Nor was it thought of Conny Degger that disturbed Ralph"s mind. At least he did not fear that individual"s approach to the Clay Head or the Twin Rocks Light. He did not, however, take into consideration the possibility of Lorna"s meeting the treacherous Degger at a distance.
One must occasionally shop. An entire summer could not pa.s.s without the need of renewal in the Nicholet household of clothing and domestic necessities. Clinkerport stores did not carry much variety in any merchandise. So Lorna started early one morning, driven by Jackson, the Nicholets" gardener and chauffeur, for the Big Town.
It was when she was returning and was still several miles on the far side of Clinkerport that Lorna spied a familiar figure walking ahead of the automobile in the road. She leaned over the back of the driver"s seat and spoke to Jackson:
"That is Mr. Degger ahead of us, Jackson. Stop when you reach him. I wish to speak to him."
They were almost upon the pedestrian before Lorna saw the bandage about his head and that he carried his left hand in a sling. The noise of the stopping car made him look around.
Ralph had certainly fulfilled his promise. He had so greatly changed Conny Degger"s facial appearance that only from the rear was he to be easily recognized.
Besides his swathed forehead he had one rainbow-colored eye and a bruise on his cheek that gave him the appearance of carrying what the children call an "all-day-sucker" in that side of his mouth. When he opened his lips to speak to Lorna the absence of two teeth made an ugly gap in an otherwise perfect upper set.
"Mercy"s sake!" gasped Lorna. "What has happened to you, Mr. Degger?"
For the second time since she had known him, Lorna gained a look right into the very soul of the fellow. She had seen him display cowardice in the face of danger. She scorned him for that, yet realized that he was a landsman and-unlike Ralph and herself-was unused to the more boisterous phases of the sea.
Here was something different. He did not sneer. It was a positively wolfish snarl that he displayed in reply to her question. The blood rushed into his face, making the whole of it almost as dark as though his bruises were a complete mask.
"So you haven"t heard the glad news?" he lisped through his missing teeth.
"What do you mean, Mr. Degger?" she demanded. "Get in here. I wish to speak with you. Oh! is your arm broken?"
"My finger. When I hit him," said Degger, with a harsh laugh. "I guess he carries the mark. Haven"t you seen him?-"
"Seen whom?"
"Endicott."
"I don"t understand," murmured Lorna. "I have not spoken with Ralph for two days. You-were you fighting with him?"
"I tried to defend myself," snarled Degger. "He caught me unaware. I had no idea he was such a brute."
"Oh!"
"He"ll come to you and brag about it, all right, when time has erased the few marks I put on him. I fought back the best I could. But he gave me no real chance-none at all."
"What did Ralph attack you for?" the girl asked, her practical sense coming to the fore. It was not easy for her to believe that Ralph Endicott had been so unfair as Degger declared.
"Oh, we had words," was the latter"s hesitating reply.
"Over what?"
He looked at her from under lowered lids. The color receded from his face. The corners of his lips curled in a wolfish smile. He was not a pretty sight.
"It was nothing you would care to hear about, Miss Nicholet," was his apparently evasive reply.
She knew he desired her to urge his confidence. It would have been wiser had she refused to be thus baited. But curiosity is a most irritating complaint, and Lorna was not immune.
"I want to know what you quarreled about, Mr. Degger," she said. "I know you and Ralph had words when you left us aboard the _Fenique_ down there at Lower Trillion. You were angry, or you would not have gone away from the light without bidding any of us good-bye. I think you two men are very foolish. Fighting and quarreling. Like dogs! It is most disgraceful.
"And if I thought," she added, "that you and Ralph quarreled about me--"
He flashed her another lowering glance. His smile now was most malicious.
"No, Miss Nicholet," he said quite truthfully, "your name was not mentioned between us." Then: "Our difficulty arose over quite a different person."
"Yes?"
"I was a fool!" he exclaimed with apparent anger. "I tried to do somebody a favor. I thought I might be able to show Endicott wherein he was wrong. Never will I try again to point out his duty to a man!"
Lorna listened with growing amazement. This certainly was a new side to Degger"s character!
"Just what do you mean?" she asked wonderingly.
"Well, I do not feel myself bound to secrecy. It is Endicott"s affair.
I only tell you what is common knowledge. There was a girl Endicott was chasing after more than a year ago."
"Indeed?" said Lorna stiffly. "I do not believe I care to hear--"
"Well, you wanted to know what the row was about, didn"t you?" he snarled. "I have mentioned Cora Devine before to you. I thought it was something of a joke then. But since I have found out that Endicott treated her very shabbily. She was a silly girl, I guess-one of that kind that believe everything a fellow like Endicott tells her. And she probably knew he was rich, too."