CHAPTER V
A RED TAM-O’-SHANTER
I looked out on the bright October morning with arenewed sense of isolation. Trees crowded about mywindows, many of them still wearing their festal colors,scarlet and brown and gold, with the bright green ofsome sulking companion standing out here and therewith startling vividness. I put on an old corduroy outingsuit and heavy shoes, ready for a tramp abroad, andwent below.
The great library seemed larger than ever when I beheldit in the morning light. I opened one of theFrench windows and stepped out on a stone terrace,where I gained a fair view of the exterior of the house,which proved to be a modified Tudor, with battlementsand two towers. One of the latter was only half-finished,and to it and to other parts of the house the workmen’sscaffolding still clung. Heaps of stone and piles of lumberwere scattered about in great disorder. The houseextended partly along the edge of a ravine, throughwhich a slender creek ran toward the lake. The terracebecame a broad balcony immediately outside the library,and beneath it the water bubbled pleasantly aroundheavy stone pillars. Two pretty rustic bridges spannedthe ravine, one near the front entrance, the other at therear. My grandfather had begun his house on a generousplan, but, buried as it was among the trees, it sufferedfrom lack of perspective. However, on one side towardthe lake was a fair meadow, broken by a water-tower,and just beyond the west dividing wall I saw a littlechapel; and still farther, in the same direction, the outlinesof the buildings of St. Agatha’s were vaguely perceptiblein another strip of woodland.
The thought of gentle nuns and school-girls as neighborsamused me. All I asked was that they should keepto their own side of the wall.
I heard behind me the careful step of Bates.
“Good morning, Mr. Glenarm. I trust you restedquite well, sir.”
His figure was as austere, his tone as respectful andcolorless as by night. The morning light gave him apallid cast. He suffered my examination coolly enough;his eyes were, indeed, the best thing about him.
“This is what Mr. Glenarm called the platform. Ibelieve it’s in Hamlet, sir.”
I laughed aloud. “Elsinore: A Platform Before theCastle.”
“It was one of Mr. Glenarm’s little fancies, you mightcall it, sir.”
“And the ghost,—where does the murdered majesty ofDenmark lie by day?”
“I fear it wasn’t provided, sir! As you see, Mr. Glenarm,the house is quite incomplete. My late master hadnot carried out all his plans.”
Bates did not smile. I fancied he never smiled, andI wondered whether John Marshall Glenarm had playedupon the man’s lack of humor. My grandfather hadbeen possessed of a certain grim, ironical gift at jesting,and quite likely he had amused himself by experimentingupon his serving man.
“You may breakfast when you like, sir,”—and thusadmonished I went into the refectory.
A newspaper lay at my plate; it was the morning’sissue of a Chicago daily. I was, then, not wholly out ofthe world, I reflected, scanning the head-lines.
“Your grandfather rarely examined the paper. Mr.Glenarm was more particularly interested in the oldtimes. He wasn’t what you might call up to date,—ifyou will pardon the expression, sir.”
“You are quite right about that, Bates. He was amedievalist in his sympathies.”
“Thank you for that word, sir; I’ve frequently heardhim apply it to himself. The plain omelette was a greatfavorite with your grandfather. I hope it is to your liking,sir.”
“It’s excellent, Bates. And your coffee is beyondpraise.”
“Thank you, Mr. Glenarm. One does what one can,sir.”
He had placed me so that I faced the windows, anattention to my comfort and safety which I appreciated.The broken pane told the tale of the shot that had sonarrowly missed me the night before.
“I’ll repair that to-day, sir,” Bates remarked, seeingmy eyes upon the window.
“You know that I’m to spend a year on this place;I assume that you understand the circumstances,” Isaid, feeling it wise that we should understand eachother.
“Quite so, Mr. Glenarm.”
“I’m a student, you know, and all I want is to be leftalone.”
This I threw in to reassure myself rather than forhis information. It was just as well, I reflected, to asserta little authority, even though the fellow undoubtedlyrepresented Pickering and received orders fromhim.
“In a day or two, or as soon as I have got used to theplace, I shall settle down to work in the library. Youmay give me breakfast at seven-thirty; luncheon at one-thirtyand dinner at seven.”
“Those were my late master’s hours, sir.”
“Very good. And I’ll eat anything you please, exceptmutton broth, meat pie and canned strawberries.Strawberries in tins, Bates, are not well calculated tolift the spirit of man.”
“I quite agree with you, sir, if you will pardon myopinion.”
“And the bills—”
“They are provided for by Mr. Pickering. He sendsme an allowance for the household expenses.”
“So you are to report to him, are you, as heretofore?”
I blew out a match with which I had lighted a cigarand watched the smoking end intently.
“I believe that’s the idea, sir.”
It is not pleasant to be under compulsion,—to feelyour freedom curtailed, to be conscious of espionage. Irose without a word and went into the hall.
“You may like to have the keys,” said Bates, followingme. “There’s two for the gates in the outer walland one for the St. Agatha’s gate; they’re marked, asyou see. And here’s the hall-door key and the boat-housekey that you asked for last night.”
After an hour spent in unpacking I went out into thegrounds. I had thought it well to wire Pickering ofmy arrival, and I set out for Annandale to send him atelegram. My spirit lightened under the influences ofthe crisp air and cheering sunshine. What had seemedstrange and shadowy at night was clear enough byday.
I found the gate through which we had entered thegrounds the night before without difficulty. The stonewall was assuredly no flimsy thing. It was built in athoroughly workmanlike manner, and I mentally computedits probable cost with amazement. There were,I reflected, much more satisfactory ways of spendingmoney than in building walls around Indiana forests.But the place was mine, or as good as mine, and therewas no manner of use in quarreling with the whims ofmy dead grandfather. At the expiration of a year Icould tear down the wall if I pleased; and as to the incompletehouse, that I should sell or remodel to myliking.
On the whole, I settled into an amiable state of mind;my perplexity over the shot of the night before was passingaway under the benign influences of blue sky andwarm sunshine. A few farm-folk passed me in thehighway and gave me good morning in the fashion ofthe country, inspecting my knickerbockers at the sametime with frank disapproval. I reached the lake andgazed out upon its quiet waters with satisfaction. Atthe foot of Annandale’s main street was a dock whereseveral small steam-craft and a number of catboats werebeing dismantled for the winter. As I passed, a manapproached the dock in a skiff, landed and tied his boat.He started toward the village at a quick pace, but turnedand eyed me with rustic directness.
“Good morning!” I said. “Any ducks about?”
He paused, nodded and fell into step with me.
“No,—not enough to pay for the trouble.”
“I’m sorry for that. I’d hoped to pick up a few.”
“I guess you’re a stranger in these parts,” he remarked,eying me again,—my knickerbockers no doubtmarking me as an alien.
“Quite so. My name is Glenarm, and I’ve just come.”
“I thought you might be him. We’ve rather been expectingyou here in the village. I’m John Morgan, caretakerof the resorters’ houses up the lake.”
“I suppose you all knew my grandfather hereabouts.”
“Well, yes; you might say as we did, or you mightsay as we didn’t. He wasn’t just the sort that you gotnext to in a hurry. He kept pretty much to himself.He built
a wall there to keep us out, but he needn’t havetroubled himself. We’re not the kind around here tomeddle, and you may be sure the summer people neverbothered him.”
There was a tone of resentment in his voice, and Ihastened to say:
“I’m sure you’re mistaken about the purposes of thatwall. My grandfather was a student of architecture. Itwas a hobby of his. The house and wall were in the lineof his experiments, and to please his whims. I hope thepeople of the village won’t hold any hard feelingsagainst his memory or against me. Why, the labor theremust have been a good thing for the people hereabouts.”
“It ought to have been,” said the man gruffly; “butthat’s where the trouble comes in. He brought a lot ofqueer fellows here under contract to work for him,Italians, or Greeks, or some sort of foreigners. Theybuilt the wall, and he had them at work inside for halfa year. He didn’t even let them out for air; and whenthey finished his job he loaded ’em on to a train oneday and hauled ’em away.”
“That was quite like him, I’m sure,” I said, rememberingwith amusement my grandfather’s secretiveways.
“I guess he was a crank all right,” said the man conclusively.
It was evident that he did not care to establish friendlyrelations with the resident of Glenarm. He was aboutforty, light, with a yellow beard and pale blue eyes. Hewas dressed roughly and wore a shabby soft hat.
“Well, I suppose I’ll have to assume responsibilityfor him and his acts,” I remarked, piqued by the fellow’ssurliness.
We had reached the center of the village, and he leftme abruptly, crossing the street to one of the shops. Icontinued on to the railway station, where I wrote andpaid for my message. The station-master inspected mecarefully as I searched my pockets for change.
“You want your telegrams delivered at the house?”he asked.
“Yes, please,” I answered, and he turned away tohis desk of clicking instruments without looking at meagain.
It seemed wise to establish relations with the post-office,so I made myself known to the girl who stood atthe delivery window.
“You already have a box,” she advised me. “There’sa boy carries the mail to your house; Mr. Bates hireshim.”
Bates had himself given me this information, but thegirl seemed to find pleasure in imparting it with a certainseverity. I then bought a cake of soap at the principaldrug store and purchased a package of smoking-tobacco,which I did not need, at a grocery.
News of my arrival had evidently reached the villagers;I was conceited enough to imagine that my presencewas probably of interest to them; but the station-master,the girl at the post-office and the clerks in theshops treated me with an unmistakable cold reserve.There was a certain evenness of the chill which theyvisited upon me, as though a particular degree of frigidityhad been determined in advance.
I shrugged my shoulders and turned toward Glenarm.My grandfather had left me a cheerful legacy ofdistrust among my neighbors, the result, probably, ofimporting foreign labor to work on his house. The surlyMorgan had intimated as much; but it did not greatlymatter. I had not come to Glenarm to cultivate therustics, but to fulfil certain obligations laid down inmy grandfather’s will. I was, so to speak, on duty, andI much preferred that the villagers should let me alone.Comforting myself with these reflections I reached thewharf, where I saw Morgan sitting with his feet danglingover the water, smoking a pipe.
I nodded in his direction, but he feigned not to seeme. A moment later he jumped into his boat and rowedout into the lake.
When I returned to the house Bates was at work inthe kitchen. This was a large square room with heavytimbers showing in the walls and low ceiling. Therewas a great fireplace having an enormous chimney andfitted with a crane and bobs, but for practical purposesa small range was provided.
Bates received me placidly.
“Yes; it’s an unusual kitchen, sir. Mr. Glenarmcopied it from an old kitchen in England. He tookquite a pride in it. It’s a pleasant place to sit in theevening, sir.”
He showed me the way below, where I found that thecellar extended under every part of the house, and wasdivided into large chambers. The door of one of themwas of heavy oak, bound in iron, with a barred openingat the top. A great iron hasp with a heavy padlock andgrilled area windows gave further the impression of acell, and I fear that at this, as at many other things inthe curious house, I swore—if I did not laugh—thinkingof the money my grandfather had expended in realizinghis whims. The room was used, I noted with pleasure,as a depository for potatoes. I asked Bates whetherhe knew my grandfather’s purpose in providing a cell inhis house.
“That, sir, was another of the dead master’s ideas.He remarked to me once that it was just as well to havea dungeon in a well-appointed house,—his humor again,sir! And it comes in quite handy for the potatoes.”
In another room I found a curious collection of lanternsof every conceivable description, grouped onshelves, and next door to this was a store-room filledwith brass candlesticks of many odd designs. I shall notundertake to describe my sensations as, peering aboutwith a candle in my hand, the vagaries of John MarshallGlenarm’s mind were further disclosed to me. It wasalmost beyond belief that any man with such whimsshould ever have had the money to gratify them.
I returned to the main floor and studied the titles ofthe books in the library, finally smoking a pipe over avery tedious chapter in an exceedingly dull work onNorman Revivals and Influences. Then I went out, assuringmyself that I should get steadily to work in a dayor two. It was not yet eleven o’clock, and time was sureto move deliberately within the stone walls of myprison. The long winter lay before me in which I muststudy perforce, and just now it was pleasant to view thelandscape in all its autumn splendor.
Bates was soberly chopping wood at a rough pile oftimber at the rear of the house. His industry had alreadyimpressed me. He had the quiet ways of an idealserving man.
“Well, Bates, you don’t intend to let me freeze todeath, do you? There must be enough in the pile thereto last all winter.”
“Yes, sir; I am just cutting a little more of the hickory,sir. Mr. Glenarm always preferred it to beech ormaple. We only take out the old timber. The summerstorms eat into the wood pretty bad, sir.”
“Oh, hickory, to be sure! I’ve heard it’s the best firewood.That’s very thoughtful of you.”
I turned next to the unfinished tower in the meadow,from which a windmill pumped water to the house. Theiron frame was not wholly covered with stone, but materialfor the remainder of the work lay scattered at thebase. I went on through the wood to the lake and inspectedthe boat-house. It was far more pretentiousthan I had imagined from my visit in the dark. It wasof two stories, the upper half being a cozy lounging-room,with wide windows and a fine outlook over thewater. The unplastered walls were hung with Indianblankets; lounging-chairs and a broad seat under thewindows, colored matting on the floor and a few printspinned upon the Navajoes gave further color to theplace.
I followed the pebbly shore to the stone wall whereit marked the line of the school-grounds. The wall, Iobserved, was of the same solid character here as alongthe road. I tramped beside it, reflecting that my grandfather’sestate, in the heart of the Republic, would someday give the lie to foreign complaints that we have noruins in America.
I had assumed that there was no opening in the wall,but half-way to the road I found an iron gate, fastenedwith chain and padlock, by means of which I climbedto the top. The pillars at either side of the gate were ofhuge dimensions and were higher than I could reach.An intelligent forester had cleared the wood in theschool-grounds, which were of the same general characteras the Glenarm estate. The little Gothic churchnear at hand was built of stone similar to that used inGlenarm House. As I surveyed the scene a number ofyoung women came from one of the school-buildingsand, forming in twos and fours, walked back and forthin a rough path that led to the chapel. A Sister clad in abrown habit lingered near or walked first with one andthen another of the students. It was all very pretty andinteresting a
nd not at all the ugly school for paupers Ihad expected to find. The students were not the charitychildren I had carelessly pictured; they were not soyoung, for one thing, and they seemed to be appareleddecently enough.
I smiled to find myself adjusting my scarf andstraightening my collar as I beheld my neighbors forthe first time.
As I sat thus on the wall I heard the sound of angryvoices back of me on the Glenarm side, and a crash ofunderbrush marked a flight and pursuit. I croucheddown on the wall and waited. In a moment a manplunged through the wood and stumbled over a low-hangingvine and fell, not ten yards from where I lay.To my great surprise it was Morgan, my acquaintanceof the morning. He rose, cursed his ill luck and, huggingthe wall close, ran toward the lake. Instantly thepursuer broke into view. It was Bates, evidently muchexcited and with an ugly cut across his forehead. Hecarried a heavy club, and, after listening for a momentfor sounds of the enemy, he hurried after the caretaker.
It was not my row, though I must say it quickenedmy curiosity. I straightened myself out, threw my legsover the school side of the wall and lighted a cigar,feeling cheered by the opportunity the stone barricadeoffered for observing the world.
As I looked off toward the little church I found twoother actors appearing on the scene. A girl stood in alittle opening of the wood, talking to a man. Her handswere thrust into the pockets of her covert coat; she worea red tam-o’-shanter, that made a bright bit of color inthe wood. They were not more than twenty feet away,but a wild growth of young maples lay between us,screening the wall. Their profiles were toward me, andthe tones of the girl’s voice reached me clearly, as sheaddressed her companion. He wore a clergyman’s highwaistcoat, and I assumed that he was the chaplain whomBates had mentioned. I am not by nature an eavesdropper,but the girl was clearly making a plea of somekind, and the chaplain’s stalwart figure awoke in me anantagonism that held me to the wall.
“If he comes here I shall go away, so you may as wellunderstand it and tell him. I shan’t see him under anycircumstances, and I’m not going to Florida or Californiaor anywhere else in a private car, no matter whochaperones it.”
“Certainly not, unless you want to—certainly not,”said the chaplain. “You understand that I’m only givingyou his message. He thought it best—”
“Not to write to me or to Sister Theresa!” interruptedthe girl contemptuously. “What a clever manhe is!”
“And how unclever I am!” said the clergyman, laughing.“Well, I thank you for giving me the opportunityto present his message.”
She smiled, nodded and turned swiftly toward theschool. The chaplain looked after her for a few moments,then walked away soberly toward the lake. Hewas a young fellow, clean-shaven and dark, and with apair of shoulders that gave me a twinge of envy. I couldnot guess how great a factor that vigorous figure was tobe in my own affairs. As I swung down from the walland walked toward Glenarm House, my thoughts werenot with the athletic chaplain, but with the girl, whoseyouth was, I reflected, marked by her short skirt, the unconcernwith which her hands were thrust into thepockets of her coat, and the irresponsible tilt of the tam-o’-shanter.There is something jaunty, a suggestion ofspirit and independence in a tam-o’-shanter, particularlya red one. If the red tam-o’-shanter expressed, so tospeak, the key-note of St. Agatha’s, the proximity of theschool was not so bad a thing after all.
In high good-humor and with a sharp appetite I wentin to luncheon.