‘No!’
‘I did! And I loathe the little beast. Yesterday I got up at dawn and plucked a nosegay of flowers for her, wet with the dew.’
‘Rodman!’
‘It’s a fact. I laid them at her door and went downstairs kicking myself all the way. And there in the hall was the apple-cheeked housekeeper regarding me archly. If she didn’t murmur “Bless their sweet young hearts!” my ears deceived me.’
‘Why don’t you pack up and leave?’
‘If I do I lose the five thousand pounds.’
‘Ah!’ said Mr McKinnon.
‘I can understand what has happened. It’s the same with all haunted houses. My aunt’s subliminal ether vibrations have woven themselves into the texture of the place, creating an atmosphere which forces the ego of all who come in contact with it to attune themselves to it. It’s either that or something to do with the fourth dimension.’
Mr McKinnon laughed scornfully.
‘Tut-tut!’ he said again. ‘This is pure imagination. What has happened is that you’ve been working too hard. You’ll see this precious atmosphere of yours will have no effect on me.’
‘That’s exactly why I asked you to come down. I hoped you might break the spell.’
‘I will that,’ said Mr McKinnon jovially.
The fact that the literary agent spoke little at lunch caused James no apprehension. Mr McKinnon was ever a silent trencherman. From time to time James caught him stealing a glance at the girl, who was well enough to come down to meals now, limping pathetically; but he could read nothing in his face. And yet the mere look of his face was a consolation. It was so solid, so matter of fact, so exactly like an unemotional coconut.
‘You’ve done me good,’ said James with a sigh of relief, as he escorted the agent down the garden to his car after lunch. ‘I felt all along that I could rely on your rugged common sense. The whole atmosphere of the place seems different now.’
Mr McKinnon did not speak for a moment. He seemed to be plunged in thought.
‘Rodman,’ he said, as he got into his car, ‘I’ve been thinking over that suggestion of yours of putting a love interest into The Secret Nine. I think you’re wise. The story needs it. After all, what is there greater in the world than love? Love – love – aye, it’s the sweetest word in the language. Put in a heroine and let her marry Lester Gage.’
‘If,’ said James grimly, ‘she does succeed in worming her way in she’ll jolly well marry the mysterious leper. But look here, I don’t understand—’
‘It was seeing that girl that changed me,’ proceeded Mr McKinnon. And as James stared at him aghast, tears suddenly filled his hard-boiled eyes. He openly snuffled. ‘Aye, seeing her sitting there under the roses, with all that smell of honeysuckle and all. And the birdies singing so sweet in the garden and the sun lighting up her bonny face. The puir wee lass!’ he muttered, dabbing at his eyes. ‘The puir bonny wee lass! Rodman,’ he said, his voice quivering, ‘I’ve decided that we’re being hard on Prodder & Wiggs. Wiggs has had sickness in his home lately. We mustn’t be hard on a man who’s had sickness in his home, hey, laddie? No, no! I’m going to take back that contract and alter it to a flat 12 per cent. and no advance royalties.’
‘What!’
‘But you shan’t lose by it, Rodman. No, no, you shan’t lose by it, my manny. I am going to waive my commission. The puir bonny wee lass!’
The car rolled off down the road. Mr McKinnon, seated in the back, was blowing his nose violently.
‘This is the end!’ said James.
* * *
It is necessary at this point to pause and examine James Rodman’s position with an unbiased eye. The average man, unless he puts himself in James’s place, will be unable to appreciate it. James, he will feel, was making a lot of fuss about nothing. Here he was, drawing daily closer and closer to a charming girl with big blue eyes, and surely rather to be envied than pitied.
But we must remember that James was one of Nature’s bachelors. And no ordinary man, looking forward dreamily to a little home of his own with a loving wife putting out his slippers and changing the gramophone records, can realize the intensity of the instinct for self-preservation which animates Nature’s bachelors in times of peril.
James Rodman had a congenital horror of matrimony. Though a young man, he had allowed himself to develop a great many habits which were as the breath of life to him; and these habits, he knew instinctively, a wife would shoot to pieces within a week of the end of the honeymoon.
James liked to breakfast in bed; and, having breakfasted, to smoke in bed and knock the ashes out on the carpet. What wife would tolerate this practice?
James liked to pass his days in a tennis shirt, grey flannel trousers and slippers. What wife ever rests until she has inclosed her husband in a stiff collar, tight boots and a morning suit and taken him with her to thés musicales?
These and a thousand other thoughts of the same kind flashed through the unfortunate young man’s mind as the days went by, and every day that passed seemed to draw him nearer to the brink of the chasm. Fate appeared to be taking a malicious pleasure in making things as difficult for him as possible. Now that the girl was well enough to leave her bed, she spent her time sitting in a chair on the sun-sprinkled porch, and James had to read to her – and poetry, at that; and not the jolly, wholesome sort of poetry the boys are turning out nowadays, either – good, honest stuff about sin and gas works and decaying corpses – but the old-fashioned kind with rhymes in it, dealing almost exclusively with love. The weather, moreover, continued superb. The honeysuckle cast its sweet scent on the gentle breeze; the roses over the porch stirred and nodded; the flowers in the garden were lovelier than ever; the birds sang their little throats sore. And every evening there was a magnificent sunset. It was almost as if Nature were doing it on purpose.
At last James intercepted Doctor Brady as he was leaving after one of his visits and put the thing to him squarely:
‘When is that girl going?’
The doctor patted him on the arm.
‘Not yet, Rodman,’ he said in a low, understanding voice. ‘No need to worry yourself about that. Mustn’t be moved for days and days and days – I might almost say weeks and weeks and weeks.’
‘Weeks and weeks!’ cried James.
‘And weeks,’ said Doctor Brady. He prodded James roguishly in the abdomen. ‘Good luck to you, my boy, good luck to you,’ he said.
It was some small consolation to James that the mushy physician immediately afterward tripped over William on his way down the path and broke his stethoscope. When a man is up against it like James every little helps.
* * *
He was walking dismally back to the house after this conversation when he was met by the apple-cheeked housekeeper.
‘The little lady would like to speak to you, sir,’ said the apple-cheeked exhibit, rubbing her hands.
‘Would she?’ said James hollowly.
‘So sweet and pretty she looks, sir – oh, sir, you wouldn’t believe! Like a blessed angel sitting there with her dear eyes all a-shining.’
‘Don’t do it!’ cried James with extraordinary vehemence. ‘Don’t do it!’
He found the girl propped up on the cushions and thought once again how singularly he disliked her. And yet, even as he thought this, some force against which he had to fight madly was whispering to him, ‘Go to her and take that little hand! Breathe into that little ear the burning words that will make that little face turn away crimsoned with blushes!’ He wiped a bead of perspiration from his forehead and sat down.
‘Mrs Stick-in-the-Mud – what’s her name? – says you want to see me.’
The girl nodded.
‘I’ve had a letter from Uncle Henry. I wrote to him as soon as I was better and told him what had happened, and he is coming here tomorrow morning.’
‘Uncle Henry?’
‘That’s what I call him, but he’s really no relation. He is my guardian. He and daddy w
ere officers in the same regiment, and when daddy was killed, fighting on the Afghan frontier, he died in Uncle Henry’s arms and with his last breath begged him to take care of me.’
James started. A sudden wild hope had waked in his heart. Years ago, he remembered, he had read a book of his aunt’s entitled Rupert’s Legacy, and in that book—
‘I’m engaged to marry him,’ said the girl quietly.
‘Wow!’ shouted James.
‘What?’ asked the girl, startled.
‘Touch of cramp,’ said James. He was thrilling all over. That wild hope had been realized.
‘It was daddy’s dying wish that we should marry,’ said the girl.
‘And dashed sensible of him, too; dashed sensible,’ said James warmly.
‘And yet,’ she went on, a little wistfully, ‘I sometimes wonder—’
‘Don’t!’ said James. ‘Don’t! You must respect daddy’s dying wish. There’s nothing like daddy’s dying wish; you can’t beat it. So he’s coming here tomorrow, is he? Capital, capital! To lunch, I suppose? Excellent! I’ll run down and tell Mrs Who-Is-It to lay in another chop.’
It was with a gay and uplifted heart that James strolled the garden and smoked his pipe next morning. A great cloud seemed to have rolled itself away from him. Everything was for the best in the best of all possible worlds. He had finished The Secret Nine and shipped it off to Mr McKinnon, and now as he strolled there was shaping itself in his mind a corking plot about a man with only half a face who lived in a secret den and terrorized London with a series of shocking murders. And what made them so shocking was the fact that each of the victims, when discovered, was found to have only half a face too. The rest had been chipped off, presumably by some blunt instrument.
The thing was coming out magnificently, when suddenly his attention was diverted by a piercing scream. Out of the bushes fringing the river that ran beside the garden burst the apple-cheeked housekeeper.
‘Oh, sir! Oh, sir! Oh, sir!’
‘What is it?’ demanded James irritably.
‘Oh, sir! Oh, sir! Oh, sir!’
‘Yes, and then what?’
‘The little dog, sir! He’s in the river!’
‘Well, whistle him to come out.’
‘Oh, sir, do come quick! He’ll be drowned!’
James followed her through the bushes, taking off his coat as he went. He was saying to himself, ‘I will not rescue this dog. I do not like the dog. It is high time he had a bath, and in any case it would be much simpler to stand on the bank and fish for him with a rake. Only an ass out of a Leila J. Pinckney book would dive into a beastly river to save—’
At this point he dived. Toto, alarmed by the splash, swam rapidly for the bank, but James was too quick for him. Grasping him firmly by the neck, he scrambled ashore and ran for the house, followed by the housekeeper.
The girl was seated on the porch. Over her there bent the tall soldierly figure of a man with keen eyes and greying hair. The housekeeper raced up.
‘Oh, miss! Toto! In the river! He saved him! He plunged in and saved him!’
The girl drew a quick breath.
‘Gallant, damme! By Jove! By gad! Yes, gallant, by George!’ exclaimed the soldierly man.
The girl seemed to wake from a reverie.
‘Uncle Henry, this is Mr Rodman. Mr Rodman, my guardian, Colonel Carteret.’
‘Proud to meet you, sir,’ said the colonel, his honest blue eyes glowing as he fingered his short crisp moustache. ‘As fine a thing as I ever heard of, damme!’
‘Yes, you are brave – brave,’ the girl whispered.
‘I am wet – wet,’ said James, and went upstairs to change his clothes.
* * *
When he came down for lunch, he found to his relief that the girl had decided not to join them, and Colonel Carteret was silent and preoccupied. James, exerting himself in his capacity of host, tried him with the weather, golf, India, the Government, the high cost of living, first-class cricket, the modern dancing craze, and murderers he had met, but the other still preserved that strange, absent-minded silence. It was only when the meal was concluded and James had produced cigarettes that he came abruptly out of his trance.
‘Rodman,’ he said, ‘I should like to speak to you.’
‘Yes?’ said James, thinking it was about time.
‘Rodman,’ said Colonel Carteret, ‘or rather, George – I may call you George?’ he added, with a sort of wistful diffidence that had a singular charm.
‘Certainly,’ replied James, ‘if you wish it. Though my name is James.’
‘James, eh? Well, well, it amounts to the same thing, eh, what, damme, by gad?’ said the colonel with a momentary return of his bluff soldierly manner. ‘Well, then, James, I have something that I wish to say to you. Did Miss Maynard – did Rose happen to tell you anything about myself in – er – in connection with herself?’
‘She mentioned that you and she were engaged to be married.’
The colonel’s tightly drawn lips quivered. ‘No longer,’ he said.
‘What?’
‘No, John, my boy.’
‘James.’
‘No, James, my boy, no longer. While you were upstairs changing your clothes she told me – breaking down, poor child, as she spoke – that she wished our engagement to be at an end.’
James half rose from the table, his cheeks blanched.
‘You don’t mean that!’ he gasped.
Colonel Carteret nodded. He was staring out of the window, his fine eyes set in a look of pain.
‘But this is nonsense!’ cried James. ‘This is absurd! She – she mustn’t be allowed to chop and change like this. I mean to say, it – it isn’t fair—’
‘Don’t think of me, my boy.’
‘I’m not – I mean, did she give any reason?’
‘Her eyes did.’
‘Her eyes did?’
‘Her eyes, when she looked at you on the porch, as you stood there – young, heroic – having just saved the life of the dog she loves. It is you who won that tender heart, my boy.’
‘Now listen,’ protested James, ‘you aren’t going to sit there and tell me that a girl falls in love with a man just because he saves her dog from drowning?’
‘Why, surely,’ said Colonel Carteret, surprised. ‘What better reason could she have?’ He sighed. ‘It is the old, old story, my boy. Youth to youth. I am an old man. I should have known – I should have foreseen – yes, youth to youth.’
‘You aren’t a bit old.’
‘Yes, yes.’
‘No, no.’
‘Yes, yes.’
‘Don’t keep on saying yes, yes!’ cried James, clutching at his hair. ‘Besides, she wants a steady old buffer – a steady, sensible man of medium age – to look after her.’
Colonel Carteret shook his head with a gentle smile.
‘This is mere quixotry, my boy. It is splendid of you to take this attitude; but no, no.’
‘Yes, yes.’
‘No, no.’ He gripped James’s hand for an instant, then rose and walked to the door. ‘That is all I wished to say, Tom.’
‘James.’
‘James. I just thought that you ought to know how matters stood. Go to her, my boy, go to her, and don’t let any thought of an old man’s broken dream keep you from pouring out what is in your heart. I am an old soldier, lad, an old soldier. I have learned to take the rough with the smooth. But I think – I think I will leave you now. I should – should like to be alone for a while. If you need me you will find me in the raspberry bushes.’
He had scarcely gone when James also left the room. He took his hat and stick and walked blindly out of the garden, he knew not whither. His brain was numbed. Then, as his powers of reasoning returned, he told himself that he should have foreseen this ghastly thing. If there was one type of character over which Leila J. Pinckney had been wont to spread herself, it was the pathetic guardian who loves his ward but relinquishes her to the younger man. No wonder
the girl had broken off the engagement. Any elderly guardian who allowed himself to come within a mile of Honeysuckle Cottage was simply asking for it. And then, as he turned to walk back, a sort of dull defiance gripped James. Why, he asked, should he be put upon in this manner? If the girl liked to throw over this man, why should he be the goat?
He saw his way clearly now. He just wouldn’t do it, that was all. And if they didn’t like it they could lump it.
Full of a new fortitude, he strode in at the gate. A tall, soldierly figure emerged from the raspberry bushes and came to meet him.
‘Well?’ said Colonel Carteret.
‘Well?’ said James defiantly.
‘Am I to congratulate you?’
James caught his keen blue eye and hesitated. It was not going to be so simple as he had supposed.
‘Well – er—’ he said.
Into the keen blue eyes there came a look that James had not seen there before. It was the stern, hard look which – probably – had caused men to bestow upon this old soldier the name of Cold-Steel Carteret.
‘You have not asked Rose to marry you?’
‘Er – no; not yet.’
The keen blue eyes grew keener and bluer.
‘Rodman,’ said Colonel Carteret in a strange, quiet voice, ‘I have known that little girl since she was a tiny child. For years she has been all in all to me. Her father died in my arms and with his last breath bade me see that no harm came to his darling. I have nursed her through mumps, measles – aye, and chicken pox – and I live but for her happiness.’ He paused, with a significance that made James’s toes curl. ‘Rodman,’ he said, ‘do you know what I would do to any man who trifled with that little girl’s affections?’ He reached in his hip pocket and an ugly-looking revolver glittered in the sunlight. ‘I would shoot him like a dog.’
‘Like a dog?’ faltered James.
‘Like a dog,’ said Colonel Carteret. He took James’s arm and turned him toward the house. ‘She is on the porch. Go to her. And if—’ He broke off. ‘But tut!’ he said in a kindlier tone. ‘I am doing you an injustice, my boy. I know it.’