ee me?"

"We had hoped," I ventured to suggest, "that you would be able to run
up and see her, and have a look at the ground. You could then examine
the dog as well."

"I'll be perfectly candid with you, Mr. Ewart," he replied. "I was
just going to start on a short holiday. I was going to Switzerland;
but the war has knocked that on the head, so I am just running up to
Perthshire for a week's fishing. I need a holiday very badly, more
especially as I have undertaken some Government work in connection
with the war. Fortunately, I am a bachelor, and I will willingly give
up a couple of days to Miss McLeod."

"Why not combine business with pleasure?" I suggested. "There's good
fishing at Invermalluch, gorgeous scenery, a golf-course a mile or two
away, and you can do just as you please on the General's estate. He'll
be delighted."

"Are you sure?" he asked. "Well, anyway, I can go to the Glenelg Hotel
and fish up Glenmore. Now, Mr. Ewart, we will catch the afternoon
train, the earliest there is--though I suppose there's only one."

"I can't tell you how grateful I am, Mr. Garnesk," I said. "It may
mean a very great deal to us that you are so anxious to see Miss
McLeod."

"I am not anxious to see Miss McLeod," he answered, cryptically. "I'm
anxious to see the dog."

I left him, to telegraph to the General that I was arriving that night
bringing the specialist with me; and I need hardly say that I left the
telegraph office with a comparatively light heart. The journey to
Mallaig was one of the most interesting afternoons I have spent.
Garnesk was consulting oculist to all the big chemical, machine, naval
and other manufacturers in the great industrial centre on the Clyde,
and he kept me enthralled with his accounts of the sudden attacks of
various eye diseases which were occasionally the fate of the workers.
The effects of chemicals, the indigenous generation of gases in the
furnace-rooms, and so on, had afforded him ample scope for experiment;
and, fortunately for us all, he was delighted to have found new ground
for enlarging his experience. The mixture of professional anecdote and
piscatorial prophecy with which he entertained me, now and then
rushing across the carriage to get a glimpse of a salmon-pool in some
river over which we happened to be passing, gave me an amusing insight
into the character of one whom I have since learned to regard as a
very brilliant and charming man. When we arrived at the landing-st