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I heard an exclamation both from Jean and the doctor. "Son?" said Jean. "What! Did you think Jock was a Scollay?" "He was sent up here about a couple of years ago to be looked after by these Scollays," explained the doctor. "We always supposed he was somebody's ?" he glanced at Jean and hesitated "er somebody's son." "Good Heavens!" I cried. "What a fool I've been!"
He had been boarded out previously, it appeared, but too near home, and now here was an ideal out-of-the-way spot for his retirement! The terms were so handsome that further enquiries on the Scollays' part seemed superfluous, and so in a week's time Jock had arrived.
On my last visit to the knoll near the Scollays', Jock had been watching me, and by way of playing my part thoroughly I had affected a vast interest in certain large slabs of stone showing here and there through the grass. Looking at stones was the last thing I was keen about this afternoon, but there was simply no resisting Jock.
So next morning I went to the Scollays and paid them a friendly visit and began talking about Jock and his habits and movements, and I found he had disappeared for a good part of that day when Bolton was murdered. I also found he was often out at nights, and that he kept that locked box in the barn." "So you felt sure?" "I would have if you hadn't made me rather less confident about my guesses.
I enquired, and though I had come here meaning to confide in him, I found myself instinctively putting in a touch of accent; not with a wet brush as I did for the Scollays' benefit, still I threw in a little, and, as I say, quite without intending it. Curiously enough I saw his face clear the moment I spoke. "Oh," said he, with an air of relief, "it's the doctor you're wanting, is it?
I told her of my night at the Scollays' and my plan for trapping the spies. My self-respect as a criminal catcher was distinctly soothed to hear her hearty approval of this scheme. "It was awfully ingenious," she said decidedly. "I can't imagine a better plan, and you did it so well that you took us all in completely.
Sir Francis standing up over him, with the torch in his own hand, now turned the light on to his face. When I saw what it revealed I nearly let go our prisoner's legs through sheer bewilderment. For there in the torch's bright circle lay the poor idiot Jock, cursing us in fluent German. "Does any one know him?" demanded my uncle. "It's the Scollays' idiot son!" I gasped.
Could it possibly be that my entire adventure had been an hallucination? I confessed frankly to myself that I have a pretty lively imagination, and I recalled vividly how I had almost collapsed on my way to the Scollays under the strain of an intense reaction, how my brain had whirled, and how I peopled the farm kitchen with full thrice the number of persons actually assembled.
Plainly and distinctly these mems. were jotted: "Proof positive O'B. or confederate. "To be discovered whether O'B. himself or the other? "Possibilities Thomsons No Scotts No Scollays No." The Thomsons and Scotts I knew to be tenants of seaboard farms like the Scollays, and after the Scollays came three other names, each with "No" written after them.
This was the Scollays' story and I think we all believed that in the main it was true. In fact, since then it has stood the test of all the evidence that could be got to check it. At the same time it seemed pretty clear that their greed had made them blinder than any one without a strong monetary interest could possibly have been.
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