Chapter One.

Concerns a Stranger.

“Yes! I’m certain it was Gordon Gray—the man whose face I can never forget, and whom I could identify among a million! Gordon Gray! Returned from, the dead!”

The white-haired rector, the Reverend Norton Homfray, a tall, sparely-built man of sixty-five, pursed his lips and drew a long breath. He was evidently greatly upset.

He had taken off his surplice in the vestry after evening service, and now stood motionless against the old rood-screen gazing into the cavernous darkness of the empty Norman church.

The congregation had dispersed into the winter darkness, wandering slowly and piously through the churchyard and out by the old lych-gate and down the hill, and old Morley, the verger, had already turned out the lights.

“Yes,” murmured the old clergyman, “he sat in the last pew yonder listening to me as I preached! Surely he cannot have risen from the grave, for I heard that he died at the Waldorf-Astoria in New York eighteen months ago! Forget him? Ah!” he sighed. “How can I ever forget? Why is he here in Little Farncombe, I wonder?”

For a few moments he remained motionless in the silent gloom of the historic old church, with its beautiful Norman arches so admired by archaeologists from all parts of the country. The stillness was broken only by the creaking of old Morley’s Sunday boots and the slow deep tick of the clock in the belfry.

Then, at last, he buttoned his overcoat and made his way out into the windy December night, passing round the churchyard and entering the grounds of his quiet old-world, ivy-clad rectory, a sixteenth-century house too large for his needs and too expensive for his slender pocket.

Norton Homfray was a fine type of country rector, a theological scholar and highly popular with all in his rural parish.

As a young man at Balliol he had taken high honours, and when a curate at Durham he had married. After twenty-seven years of married happiness Mrs Homfray had died four years ago leaving one son, Roderick, a heavy-jawed young fellow, now twenty-six. Mr Homfray had been utterly crushed by his wife’s death, and his house was now conducted by Mrs Bentley, a deaf old woman with a high-pitched voice.

When the latter, in order to make up the fire, came into the long old dining-room, a heavily-furnished apartment with several old portraits on the walls and French windows across which heavy dark-green curtains were drawn, she found Mr Homfray sitting beside the glowing logs staring straight at the embers.

Of late he had been unusually silent and morose. Therefore she put on a couple of logs and left the room without speaking.

When she had closed the door the old man, whose strong face was thrown into bold relief by the fitful light of the fire, stirred uneasily in a manner that showed him to be highly nervous and anxious.

“Roddy must never know! Roddy must never know—never!” he kept whispering to himself.

And the light of the blazing logs rose and fell, illuminating his fine old face, the countenance of an honest, upright man.

“No!” he murmured to himself, too agitated even to enjoy his pipe which he always smoked as relaxation after preaching his sermon. “No, I am not mistaken! Gordon Gray is still in the flesh! But why should he come here, as though risen from the grave? I saw him come in after the service had commenced. He sat there staring straight at me—staring as though in evil triumph. Why? What can it mean?”

And the thin, white-haired man lapsed into silence again, still staring into the blazing logs, the light from which danced about the long dining-room. On a little mahogany side-table near where the rector was seated stood a small tin tobacco-box attached by a cord to a pair of wireless telephones, and also to a thick, rubber-covered wire which ran to the window and passed out to the garden. Roddy Homfray, the rector’s son, was a young mining engineer, and also an enthusiastic wireless amateur. In an adjoining room he had a very fine wireless set, most of which he had constructed himself, but the little tobacco-box was a “freak” crystal-receiver set which he could carry in his pocket, together with the telephones, and by using a little coil of wire, also easily carried—which he could stretch anywhere as an aerial—he could listen to any of the high-power stations such as Paris, Leafield, Carnarvon, Nantes or Bordeaux. It was a remarkably sensitive little piece of apparatus, ships and “spark” stations being also received with peculiar clearness. That wonderful little contrivance had been described in several of the journals devoted to the science of radio, together with photographs, and had caused a sensation.

As the old clergyman’s eyes fell upon it he drew a long breath, and then whispered to himself:

“Poor Roddy! If he knew! Ah! If he knew! But he must never know the truth. It would break his heart, poor boy!”

Sight of the stranger who had sat alone in the pew at the back of the church had brought to him a flood of bitter memories, haunting recollections of a closed page in his history—one that he never dared reopen.

Meanwhile Roddy Homfray, a tall, dark-haired, clean-limbed fellow who, though young, had made several mining expeditions in Brazil and Peru as assistant to a well-known engineer, had left the church after service and walked down the hill towards the village. Recently he had been in Peru for five months, and had only returned a week ago and again taken up his hobby of wireless.

Three days before, while walking down the road from Little Farncombe into Haslemere to take train to London, he had overtaken an extremely dainty chestnut-haired girl, petite and full of charm, warmly clad in rich furs. She was evidently a lady. With her was a black toy pom which ran yapping at Roddy, as was its nature.

“Tweedles! Come here,” she cried, and having called off her pet she in a sweet refined voice apologised. Roddy laughed, assuring her that he was not in the least alarmed, and then they walked the remainder of the way side by side, chatting about the picturesqueness of the Surrey hills, until at last he lifted his hat and left her. She did not look more than seventeen, though he afterwards found that she was twenty. He had become fascinated by her extreme beauty, by her manner, and her inexpressible grace and charm, and as he sat in the express rushing towards London her sweet oval face and deep violet eyes arose time after time before him.

On that Sunday morning he had called upon his old friend Hubert Denton, the village doctor, and while smoking before the fire in the low-pitched sitting-room, he had described his meeting with the fair stranger.

“Oh! That’s Elma Sandys,” replied the doctor, a thick-set man of about forty-five.

“What? The daughter of Mr Purcell Sandys who has just bought Farncombe Towers?” asked Roddy in surprise.

“Yes. As I dare say you know, Purcell Sandys is a well-known financier in the City and has a house in Park Lane,” said the doctor. “A few months ago he bought the Towers and the great estates, including three villages with their