第29章 CHAPTER XII(1)

>From where Hamel stood a queer object came strangely into sight.

Below the terrace of St. David's Hall - from a spot, in fact, at the base of the solid wall - it seemed as though a gate had been opened, and there came towards him what he at first took to be a tricycle. As it came nearer, it presented even a weirder appearance. Mr. Fentolin, in a black cape and black skull cap, sat a little forward in his electric carriage, with his hand upon the guiding lever. His head came scarcely above the back of the little vehicle, his hands and body were motionless. He seemed to be progressing without the slightest effort, personal or mechanical, as though he rode, in deed, in some ghostly vehicle. From the same place in the wall had issued, a moment or two later, a man upon a bicycle, who was also coming towards him. Hamel was scarcely conscious of this secondary figure. His eyes were fixed upon the strange personage now rapidly approaching him. There was something which seemed scarcely human in that shrunken fragment of body, the pale face with its waving white hair, the strange expression with which he was being regarded. The little vehicle came to a standstill only a few feet away. Mr. Fentolin leaned forward. His features had lost their delicately benevolent aspect; his words were minatory.

"I am under the impression, sir," he said, " that I saw you with my glasses from the window attempting to force an entrance into that building."

Hamel nodded.

"I not only tried but I succeeded," he remarked. "I got in through the window."

Mr. Fentolin's eyes glittered for a moment. Hamel, who had resumed his place upon the rock close at hand, had been mixed up during his lifetime in many wild escapades. Yet at that moment he had a sudden feeling that there were dangers in life which as yet he had not faced.

"May I ask for your explanation or your excuse?" "

"You can call it an explanation or an excuse, whichever you like,"

Hamel replied steadily, "but the fact is that this little building, which some one else seems to have appropriated, is mine. If I had not been a good-natured person, I should be engaged, at the present moment, in turning out its furniture on to the beach."

"What is your name?" Mr. Fentolin asked suddenly.

"My name is Hamel - Richard Hamel."

For several moments there was silence. Mr. Fentolin was still leaning forward in his strange little vehicle. The colour seemed to have left even his lips. The hard glitter in his eyes had given place to an expression almost like fear. He looked at Richard Hamel as though he were some strange sea-monster come up from underneath the sands.

"Richard Hamel," he repeated. "Do you mean that you are the son of Hamel, the R.A., who used to be in these parts so often? He was my brother's friend."

"I am his son."

"But his son was killed in the San Francisco earthquake. I saw his name in all the lists. It was copied into the local papers here."

Hamel knocked the ashes from his pipe.

"I take a lot of killing," he observed. "I was in that earthquake, right enough, and in the hospital afterwards, but it was a man named Hamel of Philadelphia who died."

Mr. Fentolin sat quite motionless for several moments. He seemed, if possible, to have shrunken into something smaller still. A few yards behind, Meekins had alighted from his bicycle and was standing waiting.

"So you are Richard Hamel," Mr. Fentolin said at last very softly.

"Welcome back to England, Richard Hamel! I knew your father slightly, although we were never very friendly."

He stretched out his hand from underneath the coverlet of his little vehicle - a hand with long, white fingers, slim and white and shapely as a woman's. A single ring with a dull green stone was on his fourth finger. Hamel shook bands with him as he would have shaken hands with a woman. Afterwards he rubbed his fingers slowly together. There was something about the touch which worried him.

"You have been making use of this little shanty, haven't you?" he asked bluntly.

Mr. Fentolin nodded. He was apparently begin ning to recover himself.

"You must remember," he explained suavely, "that it was built by my grandfather, and that we have had rights over the whole of the foreshore here from time immemorial. I know quite well that my brother gave it to your father - or rather he sold it to him for a nominal sum. I must tell you that it was a most complicated transaction. He had the greatest difficulty in getting any lawyer to draft the deed of sale. There were so many ancient rights and privileges which it was impossible to deal with. Even now there are grave doubts as to the validity of the transaction. When nothing was heard of you, and we all concluded that you were dead, I ventured to take back what I honestly believed to be my own. Owing," he continued slowly, "to my unfortunate affliction, I am obliged to depend for interest in my life upon various hobbies. This little place, queerly enough, has become one of them. I have furnished it, in a way; installed the telephone to the house, connected it with my electric plant, and I come down here when I want to be quite alone, and paint. I watch the sea - such a sea sometimes, such storms, such colour! You notice that ridge of sand out yonder? It forms a sort of natural breakwater. Even on the calmest day you can trace that white line of foam."

"It is a strange coast," Hamel admitted.

Mr. Fentolin pointed with his forefinger northwards.

"Somewhere about there," he indicated, "is the entrance to the tidal river which flows up to the village of St. David's yonder.

You see?"

His finger traced its course until it came to a certain point near the beach, where a tall black pillar stood, surmounted by a globe.