‘Oh, so you thought it was this door too, did you?’ Peter said. ‘What’s the matter with you, Bowers?’
Bowers cast him a look of reproach. ‘We heard it, sir, Mrs Bowers and me. Seemed to come from somewhere quite close. It gave Mrs Bowers such a turn she nearly dropped her frying-pan. “Good gracious alive!” she said. “Who’s being murdered?” And she’s not one to fancy things, sir, as you well know.’ Gloomily he watched Charles open the door into the garden. It squeaked dismally, but the sound was not the groan they had heard before. ‘No, sir, it’s not that, and nor it’s not any other door in the house, though they do squeak, I won’t deny. There’s something uncanny about this place. I said it as soon as I set eyes on it, and I can tell you, sir, it’s taking years off my life, living here.’
‘Is there any other door leading out on this side of the house?’ Peter said. ‘I could swear it came from this direction.’
‘There’s only the long window in the drawing-room,’ said Margaret. She stepped out on to the gravel-path, and looked along the side of the house. ‘I can’t see any other. I say, it is rather beastly, isn’t it? Of course I know things do echo in these places, but… Why, who’s that?’
Charles came quickly out to her side. ‘Where?’ he said sharply. ‘Hullo, there’s a chap walking past the shrubbery!’ He started forward, Peter at his heels, and hailed the stranger rather sharply.
A man in fisherman’s attire, and carrying a creel and a rod, was walking through the trees beyond the shrubs that ran close up to the wall of the house. He stopped as Charles hailed him, and came to meet him. He was a dark young man of about thirty, with very black brows that grew close over the bridge of his nose, and a mouth that was rather grim in repose. ‘I beg your pardon,’ he said, ‘I’m afraid I’m trespassing.’ He spoke in a curt way, as though he were either shy or slightly annoyed. ‘I’ve been fishing the Crewel, and a man told me I could get back to the village by a short cut through your grounds. Only I don’t seem able to find it.’
Charles said: ‘There is a right-of-way, but you are some distance from it. In fact, your guide seems to have directed you to the wrong side of the house.’
The stranger reddened. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said stiffly. ‘Could you point out the way to it?’
Margaret who had come up, and had been listening curiously, said suddenly: ‘Why you’re the man who changed the wheel for me yesterday!’
The stranger raised his hat, slightly bowing.
‘Are you staying at the Bell?’ Margaret inquired.
‘Yes. I’ve come down for some trout-fishing,’ he answered.
‘There seems to be some quite good fishing here,’ Peter said, bridging yet another gap in the conversation.
‘Quite good,’ agreed the dark young man. He shifted his rod from one hand to the other. ‘Er – can I reach the right-of-way from here, or must I get back to the road?’
‘Oh no, I’ll show you the way,’ Margaret said, with her friendly smile. ‘It’s only just across the drive.’
‘It’s very good of you, but really you must not trouble…’
‘It’s no trouble. And this place is so overgrown with trees and bushes you can easily miss the way. Peter, you’d better go back and tell Celia it’s all right. Come on, Mr – I don’t think I know your name?’
‘Strange,’ said the young man. ‘Michael Strange.’
‘I’m Margaret Fortescue,’ she told him. ‘This is my brother, and this is my brother-in-law, Mr Malcolm.’
Again the young man bowed. ‘Are you staying long in this part of the world?’ asked Charles.
‘Just for a week or two,’ Strange replied. ‘I’m on my holiday.’
‘Er – won’t you come into the house?’ Peter suggested. ‘And have a cocktail or something?’
‘Thanks, but I think I must be getting along. If Miss Fortescue will really be so kind as to show me the short cut to the village…’
‘Yes, rather,’ Margaret said. ‘Perhaps you’ll look us up some other time. Come on.’
They set off together, leaving the two others to watch them out of sight.
‘Well, there you are,’ said Charles. ‘Apparently she’s got off again. And would you explain to me how a man making for a perfectly well-known right-of-way fetches up under our drawing-room windows?’
Peter was frowning. ‘He doesn’t – if he is looking for the right-of-way. Common sense must tell him that it can’t run this side of the house. To tell you the truth, Chas, I don’t like your black-browed friend. Just what was he doing, snooping around here?’
‘He wasn’t exactly communicative, so I can’t say. Might have wanted to take a look at the Priory, of course. Lots of people can’t keep off a ruin.’
‘He didn’t look to me that sort,’ Peter said, still frowning.
Charles yawned. ‘Probably a mere ass without any bump of locality.’
‘And he didn’t look like that either.’
‘Oh, all right, then, no doubt he came to abduct Margaret. Now what about this groaning door?’
But Michael Strange made no attempt to abduct Margaret. She led him round the corner of the house on to the avenue that ran down to the gates, and cut across this into the wood that lay between the house and the road.
‘I’m taking you past the chapel,’ she said. ‘The footpath is beyond that, you know. You must have asked the way of one of the yokels. Isn’t it odd that they never can direct one intelligibly?’
‘They always assume too much local knowledge on one’s part,’ he nodded. A smile, which showed a row of very white teeth, put his rather grim expression to flight. ‘There’s altogether too much of the “past-Parson-Gregory’s-and-turn-right-handed-when-you-get-to- Jackson’s-farm” about their directions.’
‘I know,’ she said, laughing. ‘I’m one of those unfortunate people who never know which way I ought to go, too. Tell me, do you know many of the people down here, or is it your first visit?’
‘My first,’ he answered. ‘I was told the fishing was good, and the inn comfortable, so I thought I’d give it a trial. You’re new to the place yourself, aren’t you?’
‘Yes, we only moved in a week ago.’ Her dimple peeped out. ‘I must tell you, because it’s really rather funny: when we saw you just now we thought you were our ghost.’
He glanced down at her. ‘Have you got a ghost?’ he asked. ‘How exciting! What sort of a ghost?’
‘Well, we’re not sure about that. A squeaking one, anyway.’
‘That doesn’t sound very awful. Haven’t you seen it?’
‘No, thank goodness. Of course I don’t suppose it’s a ghost at all, really, but when we came out we’d just heard the most gruesome sort of a groan. Honestly, it made one’s blood run cold. So Chas – my brother-in-law – is going round oiling all the door-hinges. Look, that’s the chapel. Doesn’t it look eerie and romantic?’
‘Yes, I don’t think I should care to spend the night up there alone,’ Strange admitted.
They stood still for a moment, surveying the ruin. Strange glanced back towards the house. ‘H’m. It’s rather cut off by the trees, isn’t it? Can you see it from the house at all?’
‘No, not from downstairs. You can from my window, and the landing window. Why?’
‘I only thought it was rather a pity anything so picturesque should be out of sight.’
They walked on slowly. ‘If the place is haunted at all, I’m sure the ghost lives in the chapel,’ Margaret said lightly. ‘If I had the courage of a mouse, which I haven’t, I’d get my brother to sit up with me and watch.’
‘I think it’s just as well you haven’t,’ said Strange, with another of his swift transforming smiles. ‘You never know, and – I should hate you to get a fright.’
‘Oh, nothing would induce Peter to forsake his bed,’ she said. ‘Besides, he doesn’t believe in ghosts. Here’s your path. You can’t miss the way now.’ She stopped and held out her hand.
Michael Strange took it in hi
s. ‘Thank you very much,’ he said. ‘It was awfully good of you to bother. I – hope you get another puncture when I’m in the offing.’
‘How nice of you.’ She smiled, and withdrew her hand. ‘Do come and see us if ever you feel like it. Good-bye!’
She watched him stride away down the footpath, and turned, and went slowly back to the house.
‘Well, did you find out anything about the fellow?’ her brother asked when she entered the library.
‘Oh, he’s just on his holiday,’ she replied.
‘So we gathered,’ said Charles. ‘What’s his job?’
‘I didn’t ask. Why were you two so stuffy? You don’t think he was responsible for the noise we heard, do you?’
‘That solution hadn’t occurred to me,’ said Charles. ‘I admit he didn’t give me the impression of one who would stand under someone else’s window and groan at them. Still, you never know.’
Celia held up her finger. ‘I protest. We are not going to talk about groans or ghosts any more. Carried?’
‘Carried unanimously,’ said Peter.
That resolution might have been kept longer had it not been for the happenings of the next night.
It was about half-past ten when a crash that resounded through the house penetrated even to Mrs Bosanquet’s ears, and made Celia, who was improvising idly on the piano, strike a jangling discord. The crash seemed to come from the upper landing, and it was followed by a bump-bump-bump, as though some hard object were rolling down the stairs.
‘Good Lord, who’s smashing up the place now?’ said Charles, getting out of his chair. He went to the door, and opened it. ‘That you, Peter?’ he called.
The study door opposite opened. ‘No. What on earth’s happened?’ Peter asked.
‘Dunno. Without wishing to leap to conclusions I should hazard a guess that something has fallen over.’ Charles picked up the lamp that stood on the hall table, and walked to the foot of the stairs.
‘I believe it was a picture,’ Celia said, at his side. ‘It sounded to me like glass breaking.’
She ran up ahead of him, and rounded the half-landing. A little exclamation broke from her. ‘Oh, there’s something on the stairs! Do hurry up with the lamp, Charles.’ She bent and groped for the thing her foot had kicked against. ‘Whatever can it be?’ she wondered. Then Charles reached the half-landing, and the light he carried showed Celia what she held between her hands.
It was a human skull and the hollow eye-sockets glared up at her, while the teeth of the fleshless upper jaw grinned as though in macabre mockery.
Celia gave a shuddering cry, and dropped the hideous thing, shrinking back against the wall. ‘Oh Charles! Oh Charles!’ she whispered, like a frightened child.
He was beside her in a moment, holding her in the circle of his arm, himself staring down at the skull at their feet. For a moment words apparently failed him.
Peter came up the stairs two at a time. ‘What is it?’ he asked impatiently. Then he too saw, and stopped dead. ‘Gosh!’ he gasped. Over his shoulder he jerked: ‘Don’t come up, Margaret.’
‘But what is it?’ she called. ‘Why did Celia scream?’
‘Oh, it’s nothing!’ said Charles, recovering his sangfroid. ‘Just a skull rolling about the place. You trot off downstairs, Celia, while I investigate.’
‘I – I think I will,’ she said, and went past the skull with her eyes steadily averted.
‘Take her into the library, Peg,’ Charles ordered. He watched her go shakily downstairs, and turned to Peter. ‘Look here, this is a bit thick,’ he said. ‘I don’t know about you, but I’m all of a sweat. Footsteps and groans I can put up with, but when it comes to finding people’s remains lying about the place I’ve had enough.’
Peter bent and picked up the skull, and placed it on the window-seat. ‘Question is, where did it come from?’ he said. ‘Bring that lamp upstairs.’
They went on up to the landing, holding the lamp high so that the light was thrown before them. At the head of the stairs a big picture had fallen to the ground, and pieces of glass winked at them from the carpet. The lamplight showed a dark aperture where the picture had hung, and when the two men went closer they saw that part of the panelling was apparently missing. Peter felt in his pocket for the torch he carried, and switched it on, flashing the light into the hidden cupboard. It revealed a small chamber in the wall, and something else besides. A heap of bones were huddled on the floor of the chamber.
‘Good Lord! A priest’s hole!’ Peter said. ‘And some poor devil got in and couldn’t get out. I say – pretty beastly, what?’
Charles set the lamp down on the table against the wall, and in silence looked at the dreadful remains. After a moment Peter cleared his throat, and said: ‘Well – that’s that. How did it all happen? I mean – there must have been something besides the picture hiding this hole.’ He began to inspect the moulding all round the cavity. One of the rosettes was out of place. He put his hand on it, trying to see whether it would move, and found that it twisted stiffly between his fingers. The missing panel at once slid back into place. He opened it again, frowning. ‘Odd. It looks as though the corner of the picture must have knocked it as it fell, yet I don’t quite see how it can have forced the rosette round like that. Obviously the – the skeleton was huddled against the panel, and when it opened the skull fell out. You know, Chas, the idea of that poor beggar shut up there, dying of thirst…’
‘Just a moment,’ Charles said. ‘Give me the torch, will you? Thanks.’ He directed its light into the hole again and closely scrutinised the bones that lay there. ‘Take a look, Peter. Does it strike you the bones are in rather a funny position?’
‘What do you mean?’ Peter peered at them. ‘I don’t know. There are the leg-bones, and the arms, all right. Difficult to say how they’d fall once the flesh had rotted away.’
‘They look wrong to me,’ Charles said. ‘Almost as though they’d been put there by someone who wasn’t an expert. Give me a hand up: I’m going to see if there isn’t an answering catch on the inside of the panelling.’
Peter helped him to climb into the hole. ‘What are you driving at? D’you mean that the fellow was murdered and his bones thrown in months later?’
‘I don’t know. No, there’s no fastening on this side. Faugh! what a smell of must!’ He clambered out again. ‘Let’s take another look at the catch.’ He tested it several times. It moved very stiffly. ‘I shouldn’t have said that it was possible for the picture to have pushed it out of place,’ he said. He went across to where the picture lay and closely inspected the broken wire. It was old and rusty, and if it had been cut the operation had been performed too skilfully for it to be apparent.
‘I agree with you,’ Peter said. ‘But that’s how it must have happened. Hang it all, who could have faked this, and why? Not quite the sort of practical joke any of us would stage.’
‘If it was faked,’ said Charles slowly, ‘I’ve an idea it wasn’t done for a joke. Mind you, I’m not saying it was faked. It may have happened as we think it did. But I’m not entirely satisfied.’
‘But who would…?’
‘Damn it, I don’t know! Put the skull back, and close it up for to-night.
To-morrow we shall have to bury the bones.’ ‘To-morrow,’ said Peter, ‘Celia and Margaret will pack their trunks and we shall depart.’
Charles looked at him. ‘I’m staying. No ghost, or pseudo-ghost is going to frighten me out of this place. What about you?’
Peter grinned. ‘Righto, I’m with you. But if you think this is part of a campaign to scare us away I’m going to town to fetch my old service revolver. Not that I think you’re right. If the picture caught the rosette a pretty hard knock it might quite well have done the trick. Do you want to search the house?’
‘Too late,’ Charles said. ‘Whoever was here – if anyone was here at all – has had loads of time to make a get-away.’ He placed the skull back in the cavity, and closed the panel. ‘Bowe
rs had better come and clear away these bits of glass. I think we won’t mention the priest’s hole to him.’ He started to go downstairs, and as he reached the half-landing the door leading into the servants’ wing below was burst open, and Bowers himself came into the hall with a very white face, and starting eyes. Charles called to him before he could reach the library door, and the butler jumped as though he had been shot.
A scared face was turned upward. ‘Oh, it’s you, sir!’ Bowers gasped. ‘Sir, I’ve seen it – I’ve seen the Monk! Oh Gawd, sir, we oughtn’t ever to have come here!’
‘Rubbish!’ said Charles testily. ‘What do you mean, you’ve seen the Monk? Where?’
‘Out there in the moonlight, sir, plain as I see you. Gliding over the lawn it was, in a long black cloak. It’s more than flesh and blood can bear, sir, and stay in this place I daren’t, not for a thousand pounds!’
‘Steady, you ass!’ Peter interposed. ‘Just you show us where you think you saw this Monk of yours.’
‘Out of the pantry window, when I was bolting it for the night. Making for the trees at the end of the lawn it was, and it vanished amongst them, sir. You won’t see it now: it’s gone, but we’ve had our warning all right.’
‘We’ll see about that,’ said Charles. ‘Not a word of this to your mistress, Bowers.’ He ran down the remaining stairs into the hall, and selected a stout walking-stick from the stand by the front-door. ‘Bring your torch along, Peter. We’ll go out through the garden-hall.’
‘It’s tempting Providence, sir,’ Bowers moaned, following at their heels.
Charles was drawing back the bolts from the door leading into the garden. ‘Console yourself, Bowers. If it’s a ghost it can’t hurt you.’
‘Don’t you be so sure of that, sir!’ Bowers said forebodingly.
The door swung open. The gardens on that side of the house were flooded by moonlight, but where the spinney flanked the lawn it was very dark. The stillness seemed to wrap them round; not even a breath of wind stirred the leaves on the branches.