CHAPTER VII
Mr. Johnson was genuinely surprised at the expression in his companion'sface when, at the end of that drive home through the drowsy afternoon,she put out her hand to wish him good-by. He forgot her shabby littleblack lace hat with its two rather battered red roses, her scratched andmended gloves, the thin ready-made wrap around her linen frock. She wasno longer a sulky, tired, young woman. For a single moment she wasbeautiful.
"You have given me quite a wonderful afternoon, Mr. Johnson," she said,"and I am ashamed of myself for having been so quiet all the way home. Iam afraid I must have seemed almost ungracious. I wasn't. I was justenjoying it all, and--thank you!"
She was gone before he could do anything but return heartily the warmpressure of her fingers, but she seemed to him to walk with a new graceas she stepped lightly up the tiled path, turned the shining brass doorhandle, and disappeared into the Little House. He turned round to hiscar, but instead of making for his own heavy oak gates, he reversedslowly down the lane, swung round in front of the Ballaston Arms andentered. The same little company were assembled in the bar, with theexception of Rawson and the addition of Walter Beavens, the localwheelwright, and Tom Foulds, the veterinary surgeon.
"Good afternoon, gentlemen," Mr. Johnson said cheerfully. "A long anddusty ride from Norwich, Mr. Landlord. I'll take a whisky and soda--alarge soda, please, and a piece of lemon, if you have such a thing."
He settled down into a chair with the air of a man who intends to makehimself at home, and began to fill his pipe. Mr. Craske was hisimmediate neighbour. A little distance away the young man Fielding wasbusy with a box of flies.
"So you had a look at the Hall this morning, sir," the grocer remarked."I saw you coming through the gates."
"I lunched there," Mr. Johnson confided. "A magnificent place it is, andfull of treasures, too! Why, the pictures and tapestries alone must beworth a fortune."
Mr. Foulds joined in the conversation. He was a ruddy-faced young man,inclined to be stout, dressed in somewhat sporting fashion, with ridingleggings which he was continually tapping with a switch.
"Worth a mint of money, those tapestries," he declared. "Came fromVersailles, some of them--the more modern ones--at the time of theRevolution. Good pictures, too, any quantity of them. I should say thecontents of the Hall were worth the best part of half a million. Queersituation, ain't it?"
"In what way?" Mr. Johnson enquired.
The young man wielded his switch assiduously.
"Well, it's no secret round here," he proclaimed, dropping his voicenevertheless, "that Sir Bertram is devilish hard up. They don't knowwhere to turn for money, any of them. And yet with all that valuableproperty they can't touch it."
"How's that?"
"Every yard of tapestry, every picture worth a snap of the fingers, isan heirloom," Foulds explained. "Every acre of property is entailed. Isuppose there's plenty of money been raised on mortgages, but I thinkthey've come to the end of that, from what one hears. Shame, too! Fineold family!"
"Sir Bertram, I suppose, has been extravagant?" Mr. Johnson suggested.
The veterinary surgeon glanced around.
"Well," he said, "our friend Rawson being absent, we may venture tospeak of his Lordship of the Manor freely. There isn't a person in thecounty could find a word to say against him--him or Mr. Gregoryeither--but I should say that for making the money fly they are justabout the limit."
"Mr. Gregory is reputed to have led a very fast life in town," thegrocer interposed timidly.
"And then I don't know as he was a patch on his father," was theveterinary surgeon's complacent rejoinder.
"Mr. Henry seems to be the sober one of the family," Mr. Johnsonremarked.
"He's a character, he is," Foulds declared. "A real, old-fashioned,Dickens character. You're right about him being the sober one, though.He'd never spend a sixpence he could help, and I'd back his conscienceagainst the Archbishop of Canterbury's. Have a drink, Mr. Craske."
"With pleasure, Tom."
"Will you honour me, Mr. Johnson?"
"The honour is mine as the thirst certainly is," was the promptresponse. "Very kind of you, I am sure."
The young man Fielding, having succeeded with his fly, entereddiffidently into the conversation.
"Have the family a town house?" he enquired.
"Not now," Mr. Craske replied. "There was one in Grosvenor Square, butthat went ten years ago, the year Sir Bertram lost seventy thousandpounds on the Derby."
"They spend most of their time down here then, I suppose?"
"I wouldn't say that," the grocer rejoined. "Mr. Gregory, soon after thewar, disappeared altogether for a year or so, and he's always takinglong trips abroad. The Squire, he just goes up to those things that thegentry from everywhere seem to meet at--the Eton and Harrow, and VarsityCricket Matches at Lord's, and Ascot and Goodwood."
Mr. Johnson made an effort to bring the discussion back to what was tohim its point of greatest interest.
"These financial embarrassments of Sir Bertram and his son," he said, "Ipresume there is nothing absolutely urgent about them."
"I wouldn't go so far as to admit that," Mr. Foulds replied cautiously."There was a rumour yesterday that there was a conference of lawyers inLondon fixed for next week. Mr. Jenkins from Norwich--he's the lawyerwho deals chiefly with the mortgages--he did say last week that theycouldn't see the year through."
The entrance of Rawson interfered with the trend of the conversation. Itwas a matter of etiquette at the Ballaston Arms that gossip concerningthe Hall was not indulged in while he was present unless he himselfintroduced the subject. The butler greeted the tenant of the Great Housewith the slightly extra respect to which his recent visit entitled him.
"Glad to see you at the Hall with us to-day, sir," he remarked. "Youwill find the Squire a kindly gentleman and hospitable when he takes thefancy."
"I found him most agreeable," Mr. Johnson acknowledged. "I enjoyed verymuch, too, my brief glimpse of your marvellous art treasures."
"Marvellous they are," Rawson sighed, as he held up his glass to thelight. "A bit of tantalisation about them, though, as you might say.Hundreds of thousands there, doing nobody any good."
"By the way," Mr. Johnson continued, "there were two wonderfully carvedwooden Images in Mr. Henry's room. Do they set much store by them?"
"I should say they did, sir. Rather a curious thing about those Images.One of them is damned ugly. That's the one Mr. Gregory sent home fromabroad and that Mr. Henry seemed to take a fancy to. Mr. Gregoryhimself, he has a sort of dislike to it. All the time it was in Mr.Henry's room alone, he never went in if he could help it. Then, about ayear ago, the other one turned up. A nice bit of work, that. They'reside by side now, and Mr. Gregory don't seem to mind. I've seen himhandling them and looking at them for hour after hour, and Sir Bertramtoo. There's a man been down from London to examine them--made me thinkthey might be worth a bit of money."
"I should think they very likely might be," Mr. Johnson agreed.
"It's a curious thing," the butler observed, filling his pipe, "thatmore than once the Squire has been for having them broken up, but Mr.Gregory wouldn't listen to it. They had almost words about it onenight."
"Broken up," Mr. Johnson repeated. "For what purpose?"
"I couldn't quite follow the argument, sir," Rawson admitted. "TheSquire seemed serious enough at the time, but Mr. Gregory had his ownway."
The tenant of the Great House rose to his feet a few minutes later, and,amidst a little chorus of "good evenings", strolled out and, startinghis car, drove slowly up the lane homewards. Afterwards he left thepaved courtyard by a side entrance and paused for a minute or two tolook around lovingly at the old kitchen garden, the peaches ripeningupon the wall, the apple and pear trees full of fruit, the box-borderedpaths, and the little patches of cottage flowers in unexpected places.He walked contentedly around his property, his hands behind his back,his pipe still in his mouth, looked
into his tomato house and approvedof its appearance, exchanged a few words with the gardener about thetrimming of a hedge, and passed out on to the lawn. Here he drew a chairinto the shade of a cedar tree and, still in a reflective frame of mind,leaned back with half-closed eyes.
His peaceful surroundings seemed to fade away from him. He was back inthe steep tangled streets of a Chinese city, on a hand-borne 'rickshawout in the country, travelling up to the top of a hill, beyond which,through the wood, gleamed the green dome of the Temple of Yun-Tse. Hewas back on the turgid river where the cruel sun was blistering the deckof his strange craft, and the sound of his little engine, suddenlybreaking the hot silence, brought consternation to the tall, evil figurewho had been leaning over the side of his boat to watch the oars thrustthrough the opened places. He watched the coming to life of the youngEnglishman, heard his talk, fancied that he smelled again the peculiarodours of that strange warehouse. He saw Endacott once more in hisquaint costume, immersed in his beloved labours--dead now, for the sakeof the treasure which was still withheld.
The tenant of the Great House sat there until a very slight breezestirred the leaves of the tall elm trees and the church clock fromacross the way struck seven. Then he rose to his feet, knocked out theashes from his pipe, and entered the house.
* * * * *
That rustle of west breeze which, heralding eventide, broke the calm ofthe summer day, did not, as usual, die away with the setting of the sun.A little bank of clouds crept up from the horizon, and the wind whichseemed to come suddenly from nowhere bent the tops of the trees anddrove them before it in black and broken pieces. The afterglow from thesunset passed into a stormy obscurity. No rain fell but the wind everincreased in volume and the darkness grew thicker. Mr. Johnson drank hisaccustomed whisky and soda at ten o'clock and retired to his room a fewminutes later. He lay down, however, with a small alarm watch by hisside, and at three o'clock he left the silent house, passed through thepostern gate and into the street. The morning darkness at first baffledhim. He had to feel the wall to know where he was. He stood there withthe palm of his hand flat against it, looking in the direction of theHall. Suddenly, from the middle of the gulf of darkness, three littleflashes of light followed one another quickly. There was a briefpause--then two more--then one. Mr. Johnson turned hurriedly back to thehouse, changed from his sleeping attire and dressing gown back into hisdiscarded dinner clothes, slipped some cartridges into a revolver whichhe took from his bedside, and, descending the stairs carefully, passedinto the library. Silence still reigned throughout the house, andcomplete darkness. Mr. Johnson, with the composed mien and even pulse ofa man who is used to dangers, settled down to wait.