Nicky, whom she found sitting up in bed and partaking of a substantial breakfast, seemed to be little the worse for his adventure. Mrs. Barrow had fashioned a sling for his left arm and whenever he did not need the use of this arm he gratified her by slipping it into the sling. He too had been thinking over the night’s adventure, and he greeted Elinor with the pleasing suggestion that his assailant had been a French spy.
“A spy!” she exclaimed. “Oh, do not say so!”
““Well, one of Boney’s agents,” he amended. “John says he has any number of them and we do not know them all by any means.”
“But what should a French agent want with your cousin?”
“I don’t know, and, to tell you the truth, I should not have thought Eustace was the kind of fellow to be of the least use to anyone,” he replied. “But depend upon it, that is what it is!” He inserted a generous portion of cold beef into his mouth and added, somewhat thickly, “I dare say we have not seen the last of that fellow, not by a very long way. Why, for anything we know we have stumbled upon a really bang-up adventure!”
It was plain that he viewed the prospect with enthusiasm. Elinor could not share it. She said, with a shiver, “I wish you will not talk so! If it were true, only consider what might happen to us in this dreadful house!”
“Just what I was thinking,” nodded Nicky, spreading mustard over another portion of beef. “There is no saying indeed! I shall stay here.”
“Well, I shall not!” declared Elinor tartly. “I have no desire to lead a life of such adventure!”
“You would not like to catch one of Boney’s agents?” said Nicky incredulously.
“Not at all. I should not know what to do with him if I did. Yes, I should, though! I should set your horrid dog to guard him!”
“Yes, and he would do so, wouldn’t he?” grinned Nicky. “Oh, Cousin Elinor, would you be so very obliging as to let the old fellow out of the stables? I told Barrow to do so, but he would not. He is a paltry creature!”
“Will he bite me if I do?” demanded Elinor.
“Oh, I should not think he would do so!” Nicky said encouragingly. “But pray do not let him make off! I should not like Sir Matthew’s cursed keepers to shoot him.”
“I should!” retorted Elinor, going off to release the prisoner.
Bouncer, so far from offering to bite her, greeted her as a benefactress from whom he had been parted for years. He jumped up at her several times, barking on a high, ear-splitting note, dashed three times round the stable yard at speed, and finally brought her an unwieldy branch of wood which he seemed to think she might like to throw for him. She declined to enter upon a sport of which, she guessed, he would not readily tire, and invited him to accompany her to the house. Picking up his branch, he trotted along beside her. He would have carried his toy into the hall had she not prevented him. Since he remained deaf to her adjurations to him to drop it, she laid hold of one end and tried to pull it away from him. Pleased that she was ready to play a game he knew and liked, he threw himself wholeheartedly into a tug of war, growling in a bloodcurdling way and wagging his tail furiously. Fortunately, since Elinor was no match for him, the groom came round the corner of the house just then, and Bouncer, perceiving him, let go of the branch in order to chase him back to his proper quarters. Elinor hastily threw the branch into a thicket of brambles. Bouncer soon returned to her, prancing along in the manner of a dog who has acquitted himself well, and cocked his ears at her expectantly. He consented to accompany her into the house but obviously thought poorly of her taste in choosing to be indoors on a fine morning. But when she took him upstairs to Nicky’s room nothing could have exceeded his joy at being reunited with the master whom he had not seen for ten hours. He leaped up onto the bed, uttering screaming barks, and ecstatically licked Nicky’s face. After that, being forcibly adjured thereto, he jumped down again, cast himself down by the fire, and lay panting.
“What he needs, of course, is a good run,” said Nicky, fondly regarding him.
“Oh, yes?” said Elinor politely.
“I was only thinking, Cousin, that if you did happen to be going out for a walk you might like to take him with you,” he explained.
“I know that that is what you were thinking,” she returned. “I am well able to imagine what that walk would be like, I thank you!”
“Oh, but he is quite well behaved now!” Nicky assured her. “I have very nearly trained him not to. kill chickens or chase sheep, and if only you do not meet any other dogs you will not have the least trouble with him.”
“He has already had a very nice run, chasing the groom,” said Elinor hardheartedly. “And I do not mean to go out walking today.”
“Oh, well, I dare say I shall be able to take him myself presently!” he said.
“You will not get up today!”
“Not get up? Good God, of course I shall! There is nothing amiss with me beyond this hole in my shoulder!”
She extracted a promise that at least he would not get up until Dr. Greenlaw had seen him, and went off to confer with Mrs. Barrow. By the time she had emerged from the kitchen the doctor’s gig was at the door and he was taking off his greatcoat in the hall. She was able to give him a comfortable account of his patient, but begged him as she led him upstairs not to permit of Nicky’s leaving his bed that day. He said dryly that he doubted whether anyone could keep Nicky in bed if he had taken it into his head to get up.
“I wish his brother were here!” she said.
“Ay, Mr. Nicholas would mind him,” he agreed.
“I hold myself entirely to blame for what has happened!”
He looked surprised. “I am sure I do not know why you should, ma’am.”
She recollected that Nicky had not taken him into his confidence, and said quickly, “For permitting him to remain here last night, I mean!”
“Ah, well!” he said. “If it is not one thing with Mr. Nick, it must needs be another! He has taken no serious hurt, ma’am.”
When he saw Nicky, he found that the wound was healing quite as well as could be expected and that the pulse, though a little fast, was by no means tumultuous. He condemned in round terms the breakfast which he learned, upon inquiry, that Nicky had consumed, and said that he would bleed him, to be on the safe side.
“Oh, no, you will not!” Nicky said, drawing the bedclothes up to his chin.
“Ay, but I will, Mr. Nick,” said Greenlaw, once more getting out his bag of instruments. “We do not want to run the risk of any fever.”
“I have no fever, and I’ll be damned if I’ll let you cup me!”
“Now, sir, you know I have often done so and you have been the better for it!”
Nicky would by no means allow it to have been so and vociferated his protests so loudly that Bouncer sat up, bristling. He had not so far paid any heed to the doctor, with whom he was acquainted, but he now clearly perceived that his attitude was menacing and with a growl of warning he bounded up onto the bed and stood astride Nicky’s legs, daring Greenlaw to touch him.
Nicky gave a shout of laughter and grasped him by the scruff of his neck. “Good dog, Bouncer! Sick him off, then!”
“Very well,” said Greenlaw, smiling reluctantly. “But if you are in a high fever by nightfall do not blame me, sir!”