There May Be Danger by Ianthe Jerrold Page A

Good Queen Bess’s day. The way you tell, is chiefly something to do with the timber framing, so Gwyn Lupton was telling me. You see these long upright timbers in the wall here, set so close together without any cross-pieces? Well, that’s mediaeval, it seems. Where the timbers are set out square, with lots of space for bricks or wattle in between, that’s later. And the bigger the spaces and the thinner the timbers, the later you can bet your boots it is. They were real lavish with oak in mediaeval days. Well, here we are in the kitchen again. Let’s creep through to the hall very, very quietly, or Gwyn Lupton in the scullery will hear us and come out and fix us with his eye and start telling us a piece as long as the Ancient Mariner. I’m like you, I just adore that man, but I prefer to choose my own times for sitting at his feet.”
    To Kate’s disappointment, Mr. Morrison was not able, after all, to show her the silver penny of Ceowulf. He had recollected he said, that a friend he had shown it to on his recent visit to London had asked to be allowed to keep it a short while and show it to a numismatist, and that he had agreed.
    â€œPerhaps it was a trifle rash of me,” he admitted, “in view of the nocturnal proceedings over London at this disturbed period of history. But, as I was cheerfully leaving my friend in London, I felt that to refuse to leave my coin would scarcely be preserving the doo proportion of things. I hope he’ll mail it on to me soon. Are you staying long in Hastry, Miss Mayhew?”
    â€œWell—I don’t know,” replied Kate, and explained as well as she could what had brought her here.
    She was getting into the habit of watching people’s reactions to the information that she was searching for a lost boy who was nothing to her but a photograph on a poster and an appeal for help. Miss Brentwood had obviously thought her amiably insane. Mr. and Mrs. Howells had taken her mission as the most natural thing in the world. The woman in charge of the County Library had simply not accepted the idea, and had continually referred to Sidney, in all good faith, as “your little nephew”. Aminta in Aminta-like fashion, had shown no curiosity and very little interest.
    The Morrisons looked at her, and at one another, in silence for a moment.
    â€œSay, I think your real name must be Donna Quixote de la Mancha,” said Mr. Morrison then, admiringly. And Mrs. Morrison said gently:
    â€œMy dear! But that poor li’l boy’s been searched for everywhere !”
    â€œNot everywhere, Auntie,” said Rosaleen, looking thoughtfully at Kate, “because he hasn’t been found. And he can scarcely have been de-materialised.”
    â€œDe-materialised!” echoed Mr. Morrison. “Well, now, for any observations on the possibility or otherwise of de-materialisation, consult the gentleman who called on me this afternoon. He was, as I have intimated, an expert.”
    â€œDavis Pentrewer, as they call him,” said Rosaleen thoughtfully. “Well—maybe you’ve spoken wisdom in jest, Uncle Doug. Davis Pentrewer is hand-in-glove with the gipsies, they tell me. But there, I suppose that old idea of the child that gets stolen by the gipsies is just a li’l bit out of date nowadays, isn’t it? I suppose this kid Sidney couldn’t be being held to ransom by toughs?”
    â€œNobody could pay a ransom worth the risk. His father’s a captain in the Merchant Navy, and his great-aunt lets rooms in a house in Bayswater.”
    â€œWell, I must say I think you’re real magnificent, Miss Mayhew.”
    â€œOh no, I haven’t anything to do just now.”
    â€œNo, but when you don’t have to look for the kid at all, to be so grandly hopeful!” said Rosaleen, half-sadly, getting up as Kate shook hands with Mrs. Morrison and bade her good-bye. “Most of us weaker mortals like our ventures to be