CHAPTER XVII

In her utter dismay and despair the events of the previous week flash across Norah's mind like a swift dream.

They say that even the most cunning criminals, even such astute experts as have learnt every clever device to cover up their tracks, usually neglect some simple precaution or commit some perfectly childish blunder which leads to their undoing.

So it has now proved, after all the ingenious and elaborate precautions of Patrick Sheridan and his fair accomplices; one little fact overlooked, and the whole conspiracy is threatened with exposure.

Or is it not rather one turn of the wheel of fate which was quite beyond the power of the plotters to foresee or to avoid?

For who could have foretold that Dick Baynes, able seaman and volunteer, would have been sent to this remote part of the world when there were so many other places, so many other ships, to which he might have been drafted?

Indeed, Dick Baynes himself had distinctly said that he was expecting to go out to the Mediterranean. He had even named the ship which he was going to join, and the actual date on which he was to depart.

Norah remembers that a certain vague feeling of distrust had chilled her from the very first moment when Baynes came into the house at Glasgow where she and her cousins were staying while making their final plans.

It was the house of certain sympathisers with the great cause. Known and trusted sympathisers; yet not wholly trusted, for it was not well to take too many people into complete confidence in such a desperate venture as this.

So the Maloney family, in their mean house in one of the poorest quarters of Glasgow, knew but little of the doings and plans of the Sheridans beyond the fact that they were to give the visitors shelter for a few days and assist them without questioning in everything that might be required. The word was passed to them to this effect, and it was an order which they dared not disobey even if they desired to do so.

No difficulty was experienced in maintaining the necessary secrecy, owing to the fact that secrecy and mystery were the dearest delights of Sheridan and his fellow-plotters. The society, league, or organisation, or whatever its correct name was, to which he belonged, dabbled in mystery and secrets like a child playing with its pet toys. Indeed, there was very much that was childish in the whole business; coupled with a good deal of malevolent purpose. The conspirators took themselves very seriously: if they had possessed a grain of their proverbial national humour their enterprise would have died at its birth. But just as in the case of similar enterprises emanating from a similar source, that grain of humour was unhappily lacking. So there were pass-words, oaths, secret sessions, codes, signs, and all the rest of it, highly diverting to the very serious conspirators who succeeded thereby in impressing themselves with an enormous sense of their own importance and would sooner have parted with life itself than have divulged a single one of their precious secrets--all of which, by the way, might have been discovered with ease by any village constable had he thought it worth while. But, unhappily, the official mind does not always think it worth while to investigate every hare-brained scheme compounded of play-acting and murder in equal parts; with the result that the comedy sometimes becomes overtaken by the tragedy.

Nor was money lacking to provide for the complete carrying out of the plot. The headquarters of the association supplied ample funds--though where these funds came from originally was not known to every casual member; only the inner circle possessed this particular secret.

As far as the Maloneys were concerned, their only part was to provide a fast sea-going motor-boat, and to give house-room to the Sheridans. The former of these requirements was one which they were easily able to supply, owing to their knowledge of the Clyde and the many firms on its banks. The boat was purchased, not openly--that would never have done!--but by underground channels and devious ways, through sub-agents and second and third parties under assumed names and every conceivable falsification--a process which gave the greatest pleasure to Patrick Sheridan and his mysterious chiefs at headquarters.

Buying an old ship's lifeboat, fitting her out so as to look as she was intended to look, and then concealing her in an unfrequented creek somewhere on the west coast of Scotland was a matter that called for rather more care and precaution. But even this was effected at last, though it necessitated many trips to and fro, always by sea so as to avoid inquisitive observation.

All went very well, so long as the Sheridans had to deal with the Maloneys alone. They were decent enough people in their way, very poor, and in all probability quite ignorant of the blacker side of the organisation to which they belonged as very subordinate members; nothing but their poverty had induced them to join it, poverty and the discontent which ensues therefrom, causing them to leave no source of possible aid untried. And they did find some help in this league; many were the pickings they gained by assisting it in their humble way--and they were content to remain ignorant and ask no questions so long as the trickle of gold continued.

The Maloneys were but two, husband and wife, both of them somewhat over the middle age. Well, there was a third, but so small that it hardly counted. This was wee Sheila, the two-year old child of the Maloneys' only daughter. Kathleen Maloney, at the age of twenty, had disgraced her parents and brought shame upon her home--at least, so the parents themselves said--by marrying a man in the hated uniform of the tyrant English King.

Kathleen however, did not altogether share her parents' sentiments--especially when a counter-argument was presented in the form of handsome young Dick Baynes who came a-courting her and speedily won her.

But as the misguided girl made amends for her treachery by dying at the birth of her child no great harm was done. Wee Sheila was taken to live with her grandparents, and the unhappy widower was packed off to go about his lawful occasions in the British Navy.

Just at the time when the Sheridans came to Glasgow, able seaman Baynes was stationed at Portsmouth Barracks, waiting to be drafted to a ship.

Then, quite unexpectedly, he appeared at Glasgow.

Pat Sheridan scowled darkly when he saw the fresh-complexioned spruce young seaman cross the threshold. Little use had he for any man belonging to the British Navy!

Norah did not scowl; but she understood well all that this man stood for--and all that she was committed to. And she feared, though scarcely knowing why.

As for Netta, she neither scowled nor feared, but was openly and genuinely pleased to have someone about the premises of a different type from the dark conspirators around her--especially one of such a pleasing appearance and manner as the handsome and lively Dick Baynes.

The gallant young sailor was quite wrapped up in his motherless daughter, a fascinating little mite with pretty ways and lovely face; but he found space also in his large heart to devote a good deal of dog-like attention to Miss Netta Sheridan--always with the utmost deference and respect, like a peasant worshipping a princess.

Had Netta been of a humbler station in life, it is just possible that Dick Baynes might have made the attempt to console himself for his lost Kathleen; and who knows but what he might have succeeded, with his honest manly bearing and his handsome open face? As it was, Netta suffered him to the extent of permitting him to act as her escort day after day while the others plotted. And many were the walks they took through the Clydebank suburbs, and sometimes in the parks of Glasgow itself. Mopsey, the sailor's dog, acted as chaperon on these occasions; that is to say, sometimes, for mostly the fickle Mopsey preferred to remain at home in company with Norah, to whom he had taken a very great fancy.

And then wee Sheila fell ill. Very ill indeed was the poor mite, sick nigh unto death.

It was Norah who nursed her, sitting up three nights by the child's bedside and never leaving her even for a single hour. Norah, who soothed her delirium and quieted her with a touch of her tender motherly hand--Norah, in whose heart at the same moment was the plan of sending hundreds of men to their death! It was Norah who remained in the sick-room when the worst peril was past, and amused the child, tossing fretfully on her little bed, by telling her fairy stories for hour after hour, stories woven out of the love in her mother-heart, such as no one can invent but those who love little children and have--or ought to have--little children of their own.

And it was Netta--who scarcely went near the sick room--who got all the gratitude from Dick Baynes. For this is a part of that mysterious thing, the Way of a Man with a Maid, that when he is deeply in love his eyes can see no one else but her, and if the whole world beside come showering gifts upon him he fondly imagines that she alone is the source of all gifts.

Norah saw this, and understood. As for Netta, it is doubtful whether she even saw, and if she did, certainly she took it all as a matter of course and accepted the homage without comment.

When Dick Baynes' leave was up, he went back to Portsmouth, taking Mopsey the dog with him. He said he expected this to be his final visit before going abroad, as he thought he would be leaving for the Mediterranean almost immediately. Whereat Patrick Sheridan was morosely glad, and Norah was unaccountably relieved; and Netta was slightly sorry for at least twenty-four hours.

And none of the three ever dreamed that at the very last moment the drafting of able seaman Baynes to a Mediterranean ship would be cancelled and that he would be sent instead to this Northern base.

Norah, gazing wide-eyed at the man in her utter surprise and dismay, reviews all this in a moment of thought, and even finds time to reflect how utterly powerless one is, after taking the most scrupulous precautions, to foresee or to combat the blind blows of destiny.

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