Billy Topsail, M.D.

It was darkly, vitally mysterious.

"'Tis the queerest thing ever I knowed!"

The letter was a folded brown paper, sealed tight, doubtless with a paste of flour and water; and it was inscribed in an illiterate scrawl: Brednbutr – which Billy Topsail had the wit to decipher at once. Bread-and-Butter – nobody in particular at Bread-and-Butter; anybody at all at Bread-and-Butter. Need was signified; haste was besought – a letter in a cleft stick, left to do its own errand, served by its own resources, with a fluttering red flannel rag to arrest and entreat the traveller.

Obviously it was intended for the mail-man. But the mail-man, old Bob Likely, with his long round – the mail-man, where was he? Billy Topsail did not open the letter; it was sealed – it was an inviolate mystery. Fingering it, scrutinizing it, in astonished curiosity, he reflected, however, upon the coincidence of its immediate discovery – the tracks were fresh in the snow and the brown paper was not yet weather-stained; and so remarkable did the coincidence appear that he was presently obsessed with the impulse to fulfill it.

He pushed back his cap in bewilderment.

"Jus' seems t' me," he reflected, gravely, "as if I was meant t' come along an' find this letter."

It was, truly, a moving coincidence.

"I ought t' be shot," Billy Topsail determined, "if I doesn't get this here letter t' Bread-and-Butter the morrow night!"

CHAPTER XXXIII

In Which the Letter is Opened, Billy and Archie are Confronted by a Cryptogram, and, Having Exercised Their Wits, Conclude that Somebody is in Desperate Trouble

It was a woman's doing. The signs of a woman were like print – little tracks in the snow – a woman's little foot; and the snow was brushed by a skirt. What woman? A girl? It was a romantic suggestion. Billy Topsail was old enough to respond to the appeal of chivalry. A perception of romance overwhelmed him. He was thrilled. He blushed. Reflecting, thus, his thought tinged with the fancies of romance, his chivalry was fully awakened. No; he would not open the letter. It was a woman's letter. An impulse of delicacy forbade him to intrude. Wrong? Perhaps. Yet it was a fine impulse. He indulged it. He stowed the letter away. And at dawn, still in a chivalrous glow, he set out for Bread-and-Butter Tickle, resolved to deliver the letter that night; and he was caught by dusk on the ridge of Spear Head, with a flurry of wet snow in the wind and the night threatening thick.

Having come to the edge of the moving ice, Billy Topsail looked across to the lights of Bread-and-Butter.

"Might 's well," he decided.

Between Spear Head and Bread-and-Butter Tickle, that night, Billy Topsail had a nip-and-tuck time of it. It was dark. Snow intermittently obscured his objective. The ice was fragmentary – driving and revolving in a slow wind. It was past midnight when he hauled down the heads of Bread-and-Butter and knocked Archie Armstrong out of bed.

"Archie," said he, "I found a queer thing."

Archie's sleepiness vanished.

"Queer?" he demanded, eagerly. "Something queer? What is it?"

"'Tis a letter."

"A letter! Where is it?"

Billy related the circumstances of the discovery of the letter. Then he said:

"'Tis a sealed letter. I wants t' show it t' Doctor Luke."

"He's not back."

"Not back? That's queer!"

"Oh, no," said Archie, easily; "the case has turned out to be more serious than he thought and has detained him. Where's the letter?"

Billy gave the letter to Archie.

"Bread-and-Butter," Archie read. "No other address. That is queer. What shall we do about it?"

"I don't know," Billy replied. "What do you say?"

"I say open it," said Archie, promptly.

"Would you?"

"There's nothing else to do. Open it, of course! It is addressed to Bread-and-Butter. Well, we're in Bread-and-Butter. Doctor Luke isn't here. If he were, he'd open it. There is something in this letter that somebody ought to know at once. I'm going to open it."

"All right," Billy agreed.

Archie opened the letter and stared and frowned and pursed his lips.

"What does it say?" said Billy.

"I can't make it out. Have a try yourself. Here – read it if you can."

Billy was confronted by a cryptogram:

Dokr com quk pops goncras im ferd

"What do you make of it?" said Archie.

"I'm not much of a hand at readin'," Billy replied; "but I knows that first word there or I misses my guess."

"What is it?"

"D-o-k-r. That means what it sounds like. It means Doctor."

Archie exclaimed.

"That's it!" said he. "And the second word's plain. C-o-m – that's Come."

"'Doctor, come,'" said Billy.

"Right. Somebody's in trouble. Deep trouble, too. The third word is Quick. 'Doctor, come quick.' We're right so far. P-o-p-s. What's that?"

"It means Father."

"Right. 'Doctor, come quick. Pop's —' What now? 'G-o-n-c-r-a-s.' What in the world is that? It must be a kind of sickness. Can't you guess it, Billy?"

Billy puzzled.

"G-o-n-c-r-a-s. I don't know what it means."

"Anyhow," Archie put in, "the next word must be I'm. Don't you think so, Billy? No? Looks like that. Hum-m! Look here, Billy – what's F-E-R-D? What does it sound like?"

"Sounds like feared."