The Talisman Ring

‘“Hovering” is the word,’ said Ludovic, with a gleam of mischief. ‘Free-trading seemed to me an occupation eminently suited to an outlaw. Besides, I always liked the sea.’

Sir Tristram said scathingly: ‘I suppose that was reason enough.’

‘Why not? I knew some of the Gentlemen, too, from old days. But I was never off these shores till now. Don’t like ’em: there’s too much creeping done, and the tidesmen are too cursed sharp. I’ve been helping to run cargoes of brandy and rum – under Bergen papers, you know – into Lincolnshire. That’s the place, I can tell you. I’ve been dodging revenue cruisers for the past fifteen months. It’s not a bad life, but the fact of the matter is I wasn’t reared to it. I only came into Sussex to glean what news there might be from Nye.’

‘But you will stay, mon cousin, won’t you?’ asked Eustacie anxiously.

‘He can’t stay,’ Shield said. ‘It was madness to come at all.’

Ludovic lifted his head, and regarded Sylvester’s ring through half-closed eyes. ‘I shall stay,’ he said nonchalantly, ‘and I shall find out who holds the talisman ring.’

‘Ludovic, you may trust me to do all I can to discover it, but you must not be found here!’

‘I’m not going to be found here,’ replied Ludovic. ‘You don’t know Joe’s cellars. I do.’

‘Go over to Holland, and wait there,’ Shield said. ‘You can do no good here.’

‘Oh yes, I can!’ sad Ludovic, turning his hand so that the jewel caught the light. ‘Moreover, I’ll be damned if I’ll be elbowed out of my own business!’

‘What can you hope to do in hiding that I cannot do openly?’ asked Shield. ‘Why add to your folly by running the risk of being arrested?’

‘Because,’ said Ludovic, at last raising his eyes from the ruby, ‘if the Beau has the ring I know where to look for it.’

Six

This announcement produced all the effect upon the ladies which Ludovic could have desired. They gazed at him in surprise and admiration, breathlessly waiting for him to tell them more. Shield, not so easily impressed, said: ‘If you really know where to look for it you had better tell me, and I’ll do it for you.’

‘That’s just the trouble,’ replied Ludovic shamelessly. ‘I’m not at all sure of the place.’ He saw Eustacie’s face fall, and added: ‘Oh, I should know it again if I saw it! The thing is that I’d be mighty hard put to it to direct anyone how to find it. I shall have to go myself.’

‘Go where?’ demanded Sir Tristram.

‘Oh, to the Dower House!’ replied Ludovic airily. ‘There’s a secret panel. You wouldn’t know it.’

‘A secret panel?’ repeated Miss Thane in an awed voice. ‘You mean actually a secret panel?’

Ludovic regarded her in some slight concern. ‘Yes, why not?’

‘I thought it too good to be true,’ said Miss Thane. ‘If there is one thing above all others I have wanted all my life to do it is to search for a secret panel! I suppose,’ she added hopefully, ‘it would be too much to expect to find an underground passage leading from the secret panel?’

Eustacie clasped her hands ecstatically. ‘But yes, of course! An underground passage –’

‘With bats and dead men’s bones,’ shuddered Miss Thane.

French common sense asserted itself. Eustacie frowned. ‘Not bats, no. That is not reasonable. But certainly some bones, chained to the wall.’

‘And damp – it must be damp!’

‘Not damp; cobwebs,’ put in Ludovic. ‘Huge ones, which cling to you like –’

‘Ghostly fingers!’ supplied Miss Thane.

‘Oh, Ludovic, there is a passage?’ breathed Eustacie.

He laughed. ‘Lord, no! It’s just a priest’s hole, that’s all.’

‘How wretched!’ said Miss Thane, quite disgusted. ‘It makes me lose all heart.’

‘If there is not a passage we must do without one,’ decreed Eustacie stoutly. ‘One must be practical. Tout même, it is a pity there is not a passage. I thought it would lead from the Court to the Dower House. It would have been magnifique! We might have found treasure!’