CHAPTER VII
The Locked Room
It was no great coincidence that we should have been speaking of EdgarNettleton that night. Uvo Delavoye was full of him just then, and I hadthe man on my mind for other reasons. Besides, I had to talk to Uvoabout something, since he was down with a quinsy caught from the perfectsanitation in advertised vogue on the Estate, and could hardly open hisown mouth. And perhaps I had to talk to somebody about the unpleasantduty hanging over me in connection with this fellow Nettleton, who hadtaken his house about the same time as Colonel Cheffins and his gang,had made up to Delavoye over that affair, and was himself almost asundesirable a tenant from my point of view.
"I know he's a friend of yours, and I haven't come to curse him to yourface," I had been saying. "But if you would just tell Nettleton, whenyou see him again, that we're in dead earnest this time, you might bedoing both him and us a service. I sent him a final demand yesterday; ifhe doesn't pay up within the week, my orders are to distrain withoutfurther notice. Muskett's furious about the whole thing. He blames mefor ever having truck with such a fellow in the first instance. But whena man has been science beak in a public school--and _such_ a school--itsounds good enough for Witching Hill, doesn't it? Who would have thoughthe'd had the sack? Public-school masters don't often get it."
"They've got to do something pretty desperate first, I fancy," whisperedUvo, with a gleam in his sunken eyes. He had not denied the fact. I feltencouraged to elaborate my grievance against Edgar Nettleton.
"Besides, I had his banker's reference. That was all right; yet we hadtrouble to get our very first rent, more trouble over the second, andthis time there's going to be a devil of a row. I shouldn't wonder ifNettleton had a bill of sale over every stick. I know he's owing all thetradesmen. He may be a very clever chap, and all that, but I can't helpsaying that he strikes me as a bit of a wrong 'un, Uvo."
Of course I had not started with the intention of saying quite so much.But the brunt of the unpleasantness was falling on my shoulders; and thefellow had made friends with my friend, whose shoes he was not fit toblack. Uvo, moreover, was still according me a patient, interestedhearing, as he lay like a bright-eyed log in his bed at the top of No.7. Altogether it was not in my allowance of human nature to lose such anopportunity of showing him his new friend in his true colours.
"He _is_ clever," whispered Uvo, as though that was the bond betweenthem. "He knows something about everything, and he's a wonderfulcarpenter and mechanic. You must really see the burglar-trap that heconcocted after the scare. If another Cheffins paid him a visit, he'dput his foot in it with a vengeance."
"It would be six of one and very nearly half a dozen of the other," saidI with hardihood. "Set a Nettleton to catch a Cheffins, as you mightsay, Uvo!"
But he only smiled, as though he would not have hesitated to say it infun. "Of course you're only joking, Gilly, but I could quite understandit if you weren't. There's no vice in old Nettleton, let alone crime;but there's a chuckle-headed irresponsibility that might almost let himin for either before he knew it. He never does seem to know what he'sdoing, and I'm sure he never worries about anything he's once done. Ifhe did, he'd have gone further afield from the scene of his downfall, orelse taken rooms in town instead of a red elephant of a house that heevidently can't afford. As a tenant, I quite agree that he is hopeless."
"If only he hadn't come here!" I grumbled. "What on earth can havebrought him to Witching Hill, of all places?"
Uvo's eyes were dancing in the light of the reading gas-lamp, with thesmelly tube, which had been connected up with his bedroom bracket.
"Of course," he whispered, "you wouldn't admit for a moment that itmight be the call of the soil, and all there's in it, Gilly?"
"No, I wouldn't; but I'll tell you one thing," I exclaimed, as it struckme for the first time: "the man you describe is not the man to trustwith all those morbid superstitions of yours! I know he enters intothem, because you told me he did, and I know how much you wanted to findsome one who would. But so much the worse for you both, if he's the kindyou say he is. An idle man, too, and apparently alone in the world! Idon't envy you if Nettleton really does come under the influence of yourold man of the soil, and plays down to him!"
"My dear Gilly, this is a great concession," whispered Uvo, on his elbowwith surprise.
"I don't mean it for one," said I sturdily. "I only mean the influenceof your own conception of your old man and his powers. I disbelieve inhim and them as much as ever, but I don't disbelieve in your ability tomake both exist in some weaker mind than your own. And where they docatch on, remember, those wild ideas of yours may always get the upperhand. It isn't everybody who can think the things you do, Uvo, and neverlook like doing 'em!"
"I don't agree with you a bit, Gilly. I never believe those blitheringblighters who attribute their crimes to the bad example of some criminalhero of the magazines or of the stage. Villain-worship doesn't carry youto that length unless you're a bit of a villain in the first instance."
"But suppose you are?" I argued, almost before I saw the point that Iwas making. "Suppose you have as few scruples, principles, 'pangs andfears'--call them what you like--as this fellow Nettleton. Supposeyou're full of fire of sorts, but also as irresponsible andchuckle-headed as you yourself say he is. Well, then, _I_ say, it'staking responsibility for two to go pumping your theories into assensitive an engine as all that!"
Uvo clapped his thin hands softly as there came a knock at the door."Well, he's a practical man, Gilly, I must admit, so let's leave it atthat. Come in! What is it, Jane?"
"The servant from Mr. Nettleton's, sir, wants to see Mr. Gillon," saidthe maid.
I began by explaining why this scarcely comes into the category ofWitching Hill coincidences. Yet it was rather startling at the time, andUvo Delavoye looked as though his evil ancestor had materialised at thefoot of the bed.
"All right, Jane! Mr. Gillon will be down directly."
It was the first time his voice had risen to more than a whisper, and itwas shaky. The maid seemed to catch some echo of an alarm alreadycommunicated to herself, and faintly sounded in her own announcement.
"Sarah seems very anxious to see you, sir," she ventured, turning to me,and then withdrew in some embarrassment.
I rose to follow. Sarah was almost as great a character as her master,and I for one liked her the better of the two. She was a simple,faithful, incompetent old body, who once told me that she had known Mr.Nettleton, man and boy, most of his life, but without betraying a pageof his past. She had come with him to Witching Hill Road ascook-general. There had been a succession of auxiliary servants who hadnever in any instance outstayed their month. The last of them had leftprecipitately, threatening a summons, to the scandal of the neighbours;but beyond that fact the matter had been hushed up, and even I only knewthat Sarah was now practically single-handed through her coming to meabout a charwoman. I thought I ought to see her at once, but Uvodetained me with an almost piteous face.
"Do wait a moment! Of course it's probably nothing at all; but you'vegiven me an idea that certainly never crossed my mind before. I won'tsay you've put the fear of God on me, Gilly, but you have put me inrather a funk about old Nettleton! He is a rum 'un--I must admit it. Ifhe should have done anything that could possibly be traced to ... allthat.... I'll never open my mouth about it again."
"Oh, bless your life, it's only more servant troubles," I reassured him."I shouldn't wonder if old Sarah herself finds him more than she canstick. They do say he assaulted that last girl, so that she could hardlylimp into her cab!"
Uvo rolled his head on the pillow.
"It wasn't an assault, Gilly. I know what happened to her. But I mustknow what's happened to old Sarah, or to Nettleton himself. Will youpromise to come back and tell me?"
"Certainly."
"Then off you go, my dear fellow, and I'll hang on to my soul till youget back. You may have to go along with her, if he's been doing anythingvery mad. Take my key, and tell the
m downstairs not to lock you out."
Sarah was waiting for me on the front-door mat, but she refused to makeany communication before we left the house. She really was what sheherself would have described as an elderly party, though it is doubtfulwhether even Sarah would have considered the epithet appropriate to heryears. She certainly wore a rather jaunty bonnet on her walks abroad. Ithad a garish plume that nodded violently with her funny old head, andsimply danced with mystery as she signified the utter impossibility ofspeech within reach of other ears.
"I'm very sorry to trouble you, sir, very," said the old lady, as shetrotted beside me up Mulcaster Park. "But I never did know such a thingto 'appen before, and I don't like it, sir, not at all I don't, I'msure."
"But what has happened, Sarah?"
As a witness Sarah would not have been a success; she believed inbeginning her story very far back, in following it into every by-way andblind alley of immaterial fact, in reporting every scrap of dialoguethat she could remember or improvise, and in eschewing the obliqueoration as an unworthy economy of time and breath. If interrupted, shewould invariably answer a question that had not been asked, and ongetting up to any real point she would shy at it like a fractious oldsteed. It was then impossible to spur her on, and we had to retrace muchground at her pleasure. The _ipsissima verba_ of this innocent creatureare therefore frankly unprintable. But towards the top of Mulcaster ParkI did make out that a number of pointless speeches, delivered by Mr.Nettleton at his lunch, had culminated in the announcement that he wasgoing to the theatre that night.
"The theatre!" I cried. "I thought he never even went up to town?"
I had gathered that from Delavoye, and Sarah confirmed it with muchembroidery. I was also told his reasons for making such a suddenexception, and as given by Sarah they were certainly not convincing.
"Then he's in the theatre now, or ought to be?" I suggested; for it wasthen just after nine o'clock.
"Ah, that's where it is, sir!" said Sarah, weightily. "He _ought_ to be,as you say, sir. But he's locked his lib'ry, and there's a light underthe door, and I can't get no answer, not though I knock, knock, knock,till I'm tired of knocking!"
I now ascertained that Sarah also had been given money to make a nightof it, in her case at the Parish Hall, where one of the churchentertainments was going on. Sarah made mention of every item on theprogramme, as far as she had heard it out. But then it seemed she hadbecome anxious about her kitchen fire, which she had been ordered tokeep up for elaborate reasons connected with the master's bath. Therehad been no fire in the lib'ry that day; it was late in February, butexceptionally mild for the time of year. She knew her master sometimesleft his lib'ry locked, after that what happened the lasthouse-parlourmaid, and serve people right for going where they had nobusiness. She could not say that he had left it locked on this occasion;she only knew it was so now, and a light under the door, though he hadgone away in broad daylight.
This room, in which Nettleton certainly kept his books, but also hiscarpenter's bench, test-tubes and retorts, and a rack of stopperedbottles, was the one at the back leading into the garden. It was meantfor the drawing-room in this particular type of house, was ofconsiderable size, but only divided from the kitchen by a jerry-builtwall. Sarah could not say that she had heard a sound in thelib'ry--though she often did hear master, as she was setting there of aevening--since he went away without his tea. Of course she had notnoticed the light under the door till after dark; not, in fact, till shecame back from her entertainment. No; she had not thought of going intothe room to draw the curtains. The less she went in there, withoutorders, the better, Sarah always thought. And yet, when she trotted infront of me through her kitchen and scullery, and so round to the Frenchwindows of the sealed chamber, we found them closely shuttered, as theymust have been left early in the afternoon, unless Nettleton hadreturned from his theatre and locked himself in.
It was with rather too vivid a recollection of the finding of AbercrombyRoyle, in a corresponding room in Mulcaster Park, that I went on to myoffice for an assortment of keys.
"Now, Sarah, you stand sentinel at the gate," I said on my return. "IfMr. Nettleton should come back while I'm busy, keep him in conversationwhile I slip out through your kitchen. I don't much like my job, Sarah,but neither do I think for a moment that there's anything wrong."
Yet there was a really bright layer of light under the door in which Inow tried key after key, while the old body relieved me of her presencein order to keep a rather unwilling eye up the road.
At last a key fitted, turned, and the door was open for me to enter if Idared; and never shall I forget the scene that presented itself when Idid.
The room was unoccupied. That was one thing. Neither the quick nor thedead lay in wait for me this time. A mere glance explored every corner;the scanty furniture was that of a joiner's shop and a laboratory inone; all the library to be seen was a couple of standing bookcases, notnearly full. But my eyes were rooted in horror to the floor. It also wasbare, in the sense that there was no carpet, though a rug or two hadbeen roughly folded and piled on the carpenter's bench. In their place,from skirting-board to skirting-board, the floor was ankle-deep inshavings. And among the shavings, like so many lighthouses in a yellowsea, burnt four or five fat ecclesiastical candles. They were not incandlesticks; at first I thought that they were mounted merely in theirown grease. But Nettleton had run no such risk of one toppling beforeits time. Their innocent little flames were within an inch or so of theshavings--one was nearer still--but before I could probe the simplesecret of the vile device, there was a rustle at my elbow, and therestood Sarah with her nodding plume.
"Well, I never did!" she exclaimed in a scandalised whisper. "Trying toset fire to the 'ouse--oh, fie!"
The grotesque inadequacy of these comments, taken in conjunction withher comparative composure, made me suspect for one wild moment thatSarah herself was an accomplice in the horrible design. She grasped itat a glance, much quicker than I had done, and it seemed to shock hervery much less. I snatched up one of the candles--they were pinned inplace with black-headed toilet pins--and I lit the gas with it beforestalking through the shavings and setting a careful foot upon the restin turn.
When I had extinguished the last of them, I turned to find my innocentold suspect snivelling on the threshold, and nodding her gay plume moreemphatically than ever.
"'Ow awful!" she ejaculated in hushed tones. "Madness, I call it.Setting fire to a nice 'ouse like this! But there, he's been gettingqueer for a long time. I've often said so--to myself, you know, sir--Iwouldn't say it to nobody else. That burgular business was thebeginning."
"Well, Sarah," I said, "he's got so queer that we must think what's tobe done, and think quickly, and do it double-quick! But I shall beobliged if you'll stick to your excellent rule of not talking tooutsiders. We've had scenes enough at Witching Hill, without thisgetting about."
"Oh! I shan't say a word, sir," said Sarah, solemnly. "Even pore Mr.Nettleton, he shall never know from _me_ how I found him out!"
I could hardly believe my ears. "Good God, woman! Do you dream ofspending another night under this maniac's roof?"
"Why, of course I do, sir," cried old Sarah, bridling. "Who's to lookafter him, if I go away and leave him, I should like to know? The veryidea!"
"I'll see that he's looked after," said I, grimly, and went and boltedthe front door, lest he should return before I had decided on mytactics.
In the few seconds that my back was turned, Sarah seemed to haveacquired yet another new and novel point of view. I found the oldheroine almost gloating over her master's dreadful handiwork.
"Well, there, I never did see anything so artful! Him at his theatre, tocome home and look on at the fire, and me at my concert, safe and soundas if I was at church! Oh, he'd see to that, sir; he wouldn't've done itif he 'adn't've arranged to put me out of 'arm's way. That's Mr.Nettleton, every inch. Not that I say it was a right thing to do, sir,even with the 'ouse empty as it is. But what can you ex
pect when a poregentleman goes out of 'is 'ead? There's not many would care what'appened to nobody else! But the artfulness of 'im: in another minutethe whole 'ouse might've been blazing like a bonfire! Well, there, youdo 'ear of such things, and now we know 'ow they 'appen."
To this extraordinary tune, with many such variations, I was meanwhilemaking up my mind. The first necessity was to place the intrepid oldfool really out of harm's way, and the next was to save the house ifpossible, but also and at all costs the good name of the Witching HillEstate. We had had one suicide, and it had not been hushed up quite assuccessfully as some of us flattered ourselves at the time; one case ofgross intemperance, most scandalous while it lasted, and one gang ofburglars actually established on the Estate. People were beginning totalk about us as it was; a case of attempted arson, even if theincendiary were proved a criminal lunatic, might be the end of us as aflourishing concern. It is true that I had no stake in the Company whoseservant I was; but one does not follow the dullest avocation for threeyears without taking a certain interest of another kind. At any rate Iintended the secret of this locked room to remain as much a secret as Icould keep it, and this gave me an immediate leverage over Sarah. Unlessshe took herself off before her master returned, I assured her I wouldhave him sent, not to an asylum, but to the felon's cell which Idescribed as the proper place for him. I was not so sure in my own mindthat I meant him to go to one or the other. But this was the bargainthat I proposed to Sarah.
It came out that she had friends, in the shape of a labouring brotherand his wife and family, whom I strongly suspected of having migrated onpurpose to keep in touch with Sarah's kitchen, no further away than theVillage. I succeeded in packing the old thing off in that direction,after making her lock her door at the top of the house. Previously I hadremoved the marks of my boot from the extinguished candles, and had leftthe locked room locked once more and in total darkness. Sarah and Iquitted the house together before ten o'clock.
"I'll see that your master doesn't do himself any damage to-night,"were my last words to her. "He'll think the candles have been blown outby a draught under the door--which really wouldn't catch them till theyburnt quite low--and that you are asleep in your bed at the top of thehouse. You've left everything as though you were; and that alone, as youyourself have pointed out, is enough to guarantee his not trying it onagain to-night. You see, the fire was timed to break out before you leftyour entertainment, as it would have done if you'd seen the programmethrough. Tell your people that Mr. Nettleton's away for the night, andyou've gone and locked yourself out by mistake. Above all, don't comeback, unless you want to give the whole show away; he'd know at oncethat you'd discovered everything, and even your life wouldn't be safefor another minute. Unless you promise, Sarah, I'll just wait for himmyself--with a policeman!"
My reasoning was cogent enough for that simple mind; on the other hand,the word of such an obviously faithful soul was better than the bond ofmost; and altogether it was with considerable satisfaction that I heardold Sarah trot off into the night, and then myself ran every yard of theway back to the Delavoyes' house.
Up to this point, as I still think, I had done better than many mighthave done in my place. But for my promise to Uvo, and the fact that hewas even then lying waiting for me to redeem it, I would not have rushedto a sick man with my tale. Yet I must say that I was thankful I had noother choice, as matters stood. And I will even own that I had formed nodefinite plans beyond the point at which Uvo, having heard all, was togive me the benefit of his sound judgment in any definite dilemma.
To my sorrow he took the whole thing in an absolutely different way fromany that I had anticipated. He took it terribly to heart. I had entirelyforgotten the gist of our conversation before I left him; he had beenthinking of nothing else. The thing that I had expected to thrill him tothe marrow, that would have done nothing else at any other time, simplyharrowed him after what it seemed that I had said three-quarters of anhour before. Whatever I had said was overlaid in my mind, for themoment, by all that I had since seen and heard. But Uvo Delavoye mighthave been brooding over every syllable.
"You said you wouldn't envy me," he cried, huskily, "if poor oldNettleton fell under the influence in his turn. You spoke as if it was_my_ influence; it isn't, but it may be that I'm a sort of medium forits transmission! Sole agent, eh, Gilly? My God, that's an awfulthought, but you gave it me just now and I sha'n't get shot of it in ahurry! None of these beastly things happened before _I_ came here--I,the legitimate son of this infernal soil! I'm the lightning-conductor,I'm the middleman in every deal!"
"My dear Uvo, we've no time for all that," I said. He had started up inbed, painfully excited and distressed, and I began to fear that I mighthave my work cut out to keep him there. "We agreed to differ about thatlong ago," I reminded him.
"It's only another way of putting what you said just now," he answered."You said you did believe in my power of infecting another fellow withmy ideas; you spoke of my responsibility if the other fellow put theminto practice; and now he's done this hideous thing, had done it evenwhen we were talking!"
"He hasn't done it yet, and I mean to know the reason if he ever does,"said I, perhaps with rather more confidence than I really felt. I wenton to outline my various notions of prevention. Uvo found no comfort inany of them.
"You can't trust him alone there for the night, after this, Gilly! He'llpull it off, Sarah or no Sarah, if you do. And if you send him either toprison or an asylum--but _you_ won't be sending him! That's just it,Gilly. He'll have been sent by me!"
It was a case of the devil quoting scripture, but I was obliged to tellUvo, as though I had found it out for myself, that criminals andcriminal lunatics were not made that way. Villain-worshippers did not goto such lengths unless they had the seeds of madness or of crime alreadyin them. Uvo could not repudiate his own thesis, but he said that ifthat were so he had watered those seeds in a way that made him theworst of the two. There was no arguing with him, no taking his partagainst this ruthless self-criticism. He owned that in Nettleton he hadfound a sympathetic listener at last, that he had poured the whole virusof his ideas into those willing ears, and now here was the result. Hethreatened to get up and dress, and to stagger into the breach with meor instead of me. No need to recount our contest on that point. Iprevailed by undertaking to do any mortal thing he liked, as long as helay where he was with that quinsy.
"Then save the fellow somehow, Gilly," he cried, "only don't you go nearNettleton to-night! He obviously isn't safe; take the other riskinstead. Since the old soul's out of the house, let him set fire to itif he likes; that's better than his murdering you on the spot. Then wemust get him quietly examined, without letting him know that we knowanything at all; and if a private attendant's all he wants, I swear I'mhis man. It's about the least I can do for him, and it would give me ajob in life at last!"
I did not smile at my dear old lad. I gave him the assurance hisgenerosity required, and I meant to carry it out, subject to a plan ofmy own for watching Nettleton's house all night. But all my proposalssuffered a proverbial fate within ten minutes, when I was about to passthe still dark house, and was suddenly confronted by Nettleton himself,leaning over the gate as though in wait for me.
And here I feel an almost apologetic sense of the inadequacy ofNettleton's personality to the part that he was playing that night; forthere was nothing terrifying about him, nothing sinister or grotesque.The outward man was flabbily restless and ineffective, distinguishedfrom the herd by no stronger features than a goatee beard and the light,quick, instantaneously responsive eye of an uncannily intelligent child.And no more than a child did I fear him; man to man, I could havetwisted his arm out of its socket, or felled him like an ox with oneblow from mine. So I thought to myself, the very moment I stopped tospeak to him; and perhaps, by so thinking, recognised some subtlerquality, and confessed a subtle fear.
"I was looking for my old servant," said Nettleton, after a civilgreeting. "She's not come in yet."
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p; "Oh! hasn't she?" I answered, and I liked the ring of my own voice evenless than his.
"Anyhow I can't make her hear, and the old fool's left her door locked,"said Nettleton.
"That's a bad plan," said I, not to score a silly point, but simplybecause I had to say something with conviction. It was a mistake.Nettleton peered at me by the light from the nearest lamp-post.
"Have you seen anything of her?" he asked suspiciously.
"Yes!" I answered, in obedience to the same necessity of temperament.
"Well?" he cried.
"Well, she seemed nervous about something, and I believe she has gone toher own people for the night."
We stood without speaking for nearly a minute. A soft step came marchinground the asphalt curve, throwing a bright beam now upon its indigosurface, and now over the fussy fronts of the red houses, as a childplays with a bit of looking-glass in the sun. "Good-night, officer,"said Nettleton as the step and the light passed on. And I caught myselfthinking what an improvement the asphalt was in Witching Hill Road, andhow we did want it in Mulcaster Park.
"We can't talk out here, and I wish to explain about this wretchedrent," said Nettleton. "Come in--or are you nervous too?"
I gave the gate a push, and he had to lead the way. I should not havebeen so anxious to see a real child in front of me. But Nettleton turnedhis back with an absence of hesitation that reassured me as to his ownsuspicions, and indeed none were to be gleaned from his unthoughtfulcountenance when he had lit up his hall without waiting for me to shutthe front door. At that I did shut it, and accepted his invitation tosmoke a pipe in his den; for I thought I could see exactly how it was.
Nettleton, having found his candles out and his servant flown, havingeven guessed that I knew something and perhaps suspected more, wasabout to show me my mistake by taking me into the very room where theconflagration had been laid for lighting. Of course I should see nosigns of it, and would presently depart at peace with a tenant whoseworst crime was his unpunctuality over the rent. Nothing could suit mebetter. It would show that the house really was safe for the night,while it would give time for due consideration, and for any amount ofconferences with Uvo Delavoye.
So I congratulated myself as I followed Nettleton into the room that hadbeen locked; of course it was unlocked now that he was at home, but itwas still in perfect darkness as I myself had left it. The shavingsrustled about our ankles; but no doubt he would think there was nothingsuspicious about the shavings in themselves. Yet there was onedifference, perceptible at once and in the dark. There was a smell thatI thought might have been there before, but unnoticed by Sarah and me inour excitement. It was a strong smell, however, and it reminded me oftoy steamers and of picnic teas.
"One moment, and I'll light the gas. We're getting in each other's way,"said Nettleton. I moved instinctively, in obedience to a light touch onthe arm, and I heard him fumbling in the dark behind me. Then I let outthe yell of a lifetime. I am not ashamed of it to this day. I hadreceived a lifetime's dose of agony and amazement.
My right foot had gone through the floor, gone into the jaws of somefrightful monster that bit it to the bone above the ankle!
"Why, what's the matter?" cried Nettleton, but not from the part of theroom where I had heard him fumbling, neither had he yet struck a light.
"You know, you blackguard!" I roared, with a few worse words than that."I'll sort you for this, you see if I don't! Strike a light and let meloose this instant! It's taking my foot off, I tell you!"
"Dear, dear!" he exclaimed, striking a match at once. "Why, if youhaven't gone and got into my best burglar-trap!"
He stood regarding me from a safe distance, with a sly pale smile, andthe wax vesta held on high. I dropped my eyes to my tortured leg: acouple of boards had opened downward on hinges, and I could see therusty teeth of an ancient man-trap embedded in my trousers, and mytrousers already darkening as though with ink, where the pierced clothpressed into quivering flesh and bone.
"It's the very same thing that happened to that last maid of mine,"continued Nettleton. "I shouldn't wonder if you'd never seen a trap likethat before. There aren't so many of 'em, even in museums. I picked thisone up in Wardour Street; but it was my own idea to set it like that,and I went and quite forgot I'd left it ready for the night!"
That was the most obvious lie. He had set the thing somehow when he hadpretended to be going to light the gas. But I did not tell him so. I didnot open my mouth--in speech. I heard him out in a dumb horror; for hehad stooped, and was lighting the candles one by one.
They were all where they had always been, except one that I must havekicked over on entering. Nettleton looked at that candle wistfully, andthen at me, with a maniacally sly shake of the head; for it lay withinmy reach, but out of his; and it lay in a pool, beneath glisteningshavings, for the whole room was swimming in the stuff that stank.
The lighting of the candles--in my brain as well as on the floor--hadone interesting effect. It stopped my excruciating pain for severalmoments. We stood looking at each other across the little low lights,like Gullivers towering over Lilliputian lamp-posts; that is, he stood,well out of arm's-length, while I leant with all my weight on one bentknee. Suddenly he gleamed and slapped his thigh.
"Why, I do believe you thought I was going to set fire to the house!" hecried.
"I knew you were."
"No--but now?"
"Yes--now--I see it in your damned face!"
"Really, Mr. Gillon!" exclaimed Nettleton, with a shake of his crackedhead. "I hadn't thought of such a thing. But I am in a difficulty. Thegas is on your side of the room, just out of your reach. So is thecontrol of the very unpleasant arrangement that's got you by the heel.Is it the ankle? Oh! I'm sorry; but it's no use your looking round. Ionly meant the trap-door control; the trap itself has to be taken outbefore you can set it again, and it's a job even with the proper lever.After what's happened and the language you've been using, Mr. Gillon,I'm afraid I don't care to trust myself within reach of your verypowerful arms, either to light the gas or to meddle with my littlemonster."
"See here," I said through the teeth that I had set against my pain."You're as mad as a hatter; that's the only excuse for you----"
"Thank you!" he snapped in. "Then it won't be the worse for me if I _do_give you a taste of hell before your death and--cremation!"
"I'm sorry for you," I went on, partly because I did not know that theinsane call for more tact than the sane, and partly because I was farfrom sure which this man was, but had resolved in any case to appealwith all my might to his self-interest. "I'm sorry for anybody who loseshis wits, but sorriest for those who get them back again and have to payfor what they did when they weren't themselves. You go mad and commit amurder, but you're dead sane when they hang you! That seems to me aboutthe toughest luck a man could have, but it looks very like being yourown."
"Which of these four candles do you back to win?" inquired Nettleton,looking at them and not at me. "I put my money on the one nearest you,and I back this one here for a place."
"Two people know all about this, I may tell you," said I with moreeffect. Nettleton looked up. "Uvo Delavoye's one, and your old Sarah'sthe other."
"That be blowed for a yarn!" he answered, after a singularly lucidinterval, if he was not lucid all the time. "I think I see you walkinginto a trap like this if you knew it was here!"
"It's the truth!" I blustered, feeling to my horror that the truth hadnot rung true.
"All right! Then you deserve all you get for coming into another man'shouse----"
"When your servant came for me, and when we found out together that youwere trying to burn it down?"
I was doing my best to reason with him now, but he was my master, saneor crazy. His cleverness was diabolical. He took the new point out of mymouth. "Yes--for going away and standing by to see me do it!" he cried."But that's not the only crow I've got to pluck with you, young fellow,and the other jacks-in-office behind you. Must pay your dirtyextortionate rent, mu
st I? Very last absolutely final application, wasit? Going to put a man in possession, are you? Very nice--very good!You're in possession yourself, my lad, and I wish you joy of your job!"
He made for the door, hugging the wall with unnecessary caution, leavinga bookcase tottering as an emblem of his respect. But at the door herecovered both his courage and his humour.
"I always meant to give him a warm reception," he cried--"and by Godyou're going to get one!"
He opened the door--made me a grotesque salute--and it was all that Icould do to keep a horrified face till he was gone. Never had I thoughthim mad enough to leave me before he was obliged. Yet the front doorclosed softly in its turn; now I was alone in the house, and could haveclapped my hands with joy. I plunged them into my pockets instead, tookout the small shot of my possessions, and fired them at the candles,even to my watch. But my hand had shaken. I was balanced on one leg andsuffering torments from the other. The four flames burnt undimmed. ThenI stripped to the waist, made four bundles of coat and waistcoat, shirtand vest. It was impossible to miss with these. As I flung the fourth,darkness descended like a kiss from heaven--and a loud laugh brokethrough the door.
Nettleton came creeping in along the wall, lit the candles one by one,and said he was indebted to me for doing exactly what he thought Iwould, and throwing away my own last means of meddling with hisarrangements!
I went mad myself. I turned for an appreciable time into the madder manof the two; the railing and the raving were all on my side. They arenot the least horrible thing that I remember. But I got through thatstage, thank God! I like to think that one always must if there is time.There was time, and to spare, in my case. And there were those four calmcandles waiting for me to behave myself, burning away as though they hadnever been out, one almost down to the shavings now, all four in theirlast half-inch, yet without another flicker between them of irresolutionor remorse, true ecclesiastical candles to the end!
I had spat at them till my mouth was like an ash-pit; but there theyburnt, corpse candles for the living who was worse than dead, mocking mewith their four charmed flames. But mockery was nothing to me now.Nettleton had killed the nerve that mockery touches. When I shouted hegave me leave to go on till I was black in the face; nobody would hearme through the front of the house, and perhaps I remembered the heavyshutters he had made for the French windows at the time of the burglarscare? He went round to see if he could hear me through them, and hecame back rubbing his hands. But now I took no more notice of histaunts. The last and cruellest was at the very flecks of blood on floorand shavings, flung far as froth in my demented efforts to tear eithermy foot from the trap or myself limb from limb.... And I had only swornat him in my terrible preoccupation.
"No, that's where _you're_ going, old cock!" he had answered. "And bythe way, Gillon, when you get there I wish you'd ask for your friendDelavoye's old man of the soil; tell him his mantle's descended on goodshoulders, will you? Tell him he's not the only pebble on the shores ofStyx!"
That gave me something else to think about towards the end; but I had nolonger any doubt about the man's inveterate insanity. His pale eyes hadrolled and lightened with unstable fires. There had been somethinginconsecutive even in his taunts. Consistent only in keeping out of myway, he had explained himself once when I was trying to picture thewrath to come upon him, in the felon's dock, in the condemned cell, onthe drop itself. It was only fools who looked forward or back, saidEdgar Nettleton.
And I, who have done a little of both all my life, like most ordinarymortals, as I look back to the hour which I had every reason torecognise as my last on earth, the one redeeming memory is that of thecomplete calm which did ultimately oust my undignified despair. It mayhave been in answer to the prayers I uttered in the end instead ofcurses; that is more than man can say. I only know that I was not merelycalm at the last, but immensely interested in what Nettleton would havecalled the winning candle. It burnt down to the last thin disk ofgrease, shining like a worn florin in the jungle of shavings that seemedto lean upon the flame and yet did not catch. Then the wick fell over,the last quarter-inch of it, and I thought that candle had done itsworst. Head and heart almost burst with hope. No! the agony was not tobe prolonged to the next candle, or the next but one. The very end ofthe first wick had done the business in falling over. I had forgottenthat strong smell and the pools now drying on the floor.
It began in a thin blue spoonful of flame, that scooped up the worngrease coin, grew into a saucerful of violet edged with orange, and inten or twenty seconds had the whole jungle of shavings in a blaze. Butit was a violet blaze. It was not like ordinary fire. It was more likethe thin blue waves that washed over the rocks of white asbestos in somany of our tenants' grates. And like a wave it passed over the surfaceof the floor, without eating into the wood.
There were no hangings in the room. The incendiary had relied entirelyon his woodwork, and within a minute the floor was a sea of violetflames with red crests. There was one island. I had stooped afterNettleton left me for the last time, and swept the shavings clear of meon all sides, garnering as many as possible into the hole in the floorwhere the trap had been set, and drying the floor within reach as wellas I could with the bare hand. There was this island, perhaps the sizeof a hearth-rug; and I cannot say that I was ever any hotter than Ishould have been on such a rug before a roaring fire.
But this fire did not roar, though it surged over the rest of the floorin its blue billows and its red-hot crests, flowing under thecarpenter's bench as the sea flows under a pier. And the floor was noton fire; the fire was on the floor; and it was dying down! It was dyingdown before my starting eyes. Where the violet wave receded, it leftlittle more mark than the waves of the sea leave on the sands. It wasonly the fiery crests that lingered, and crackled, and turned black andmy senses left me before I saw the reason, or more than the firstblinding ray of hope!
* * * * *
It was not Uvo Delavoye, and it was not Sarah, who was standing over mewhen I awoke to the physical agony on which that of the mind had actedlately as a perfect anodyne. It was the Delavoyes' doctor. Uvo had sentfor him in the middle of the night, telling his poor people he felt muchworse--having indeed a higher temperature--but being in reality onlyunbearably anxious about Nettleton and me. He wanted to know whatNettleton was doing. He wanted to be sure that I was safe in my bed. Ifhis sister had not been nursing him, he would have made a third madmanby crawling out to satisfy himself; as it was, he had sent for thedoctor and told him all. And the doctor had not only come himself, buthad knocked up his partner on the way, as they were both tenants on theEstate.
They might have been utter strangers to me that night, and for a littletime after. Nor was it in accordance with their orders that I got toknow things as soon as I did. That was where Uvo Delavoye did come in,and with him his mother's new cook, Sarah, in the bonnet with thenodding plume--just as she had been to see her pore old master.
"It's a beautiful mad-'ouse," said Sarah, with a moist twinkle in herfunny old eye. "I only 'ope he won't want to burn it down!"
"_I_ only hope you're keeping his effort to yourselves," said I. "It'lldo the Estate no good, if it gets out, after all the other things thathave been happening here."
"Trust us and the doctors!" said Uvo. "We're all in the same boat,Gilly, and your old Muskett's the only other soul who knows. By theway"--his glance had deepened--"both they and Sarah think it must havebeen coming on for a long time."
"I'm quite sure it 'as," said Sarah, earnestly. "I never did 'ear suchthings as Mr. Nettleton used to say to me, or to hisself, it didn't seemto matter who it was. But of course it wasn't for me to go aboutrepeating them."
I saw Uvo's mouth twitching, for some reason, and I changed the subjectto the miraculous preservation of the house in Witching Hill Road. Thedoctors had assured me that the very floor, which my own eyes had behelda sea of blazing spirit, was scarcely so much as charred. And UvoDelavoye confirmed the statement.
&
nbsp; "It wasn't such a deep sea as you thought, Gilly. But it was the spiritthat saved the show, and that's just where our poor friend overshot themark. Spirit burns itself, not the thing you put it on. It's like thebrandy and the Christmas pudding. Those shavings would have been farmore dangerous by themselves, but drenched in methylated spirit theyburnt like a wick, which of course hardly burns at all."
"_My_ methylated!" Sarah chimed in. "He must have found it when he waslooking for me all over my kitchens, pore gentleman, and me at mybrother's all the time! I'd just took a gallon from Draytons' Stores,because you get it ever so much cheaper by the gallon, Mr. Hugo. I mustremember to tell your ma."
CHAPTER VIII
The Temple of Bacchus
That spring I did what a great many young fellows were doing in thoseparticular days. I threw up my work at short notice, and went very farafield from Witching Hill. It was a long year before I came back,unscathed as to my skin, but with its contents ignobly depreciated andreduced, on a visit to 7, Mulcaster Park.
Uvo Delavoye met me at the station, and we fled before the leisurelytide of top-hats and evening papers, while one of the porters followedwith my things. There were no changes that I could see, except in myselfas I caught sight of myself in my old office window. The creepers mighthave made a modest stride on the Queen Anne houses; brick and tile wereperhaps a mellower red; and more tenants appeared to be growing betterroses in their front gardens. But the place had always been at its bestat the end of May: here was a giant's nosegay of apple-blossom, andthere a glimpse of a horse-chestnut laden like a Christmas-tree with itscockades of pure cream. One felt the flight of time only at such homelyspectacles as Shoolbred's van, delivering groceries at the house whichEdgar Nettleton had tried to burn down with me in it. And an emptyperambulator, over the way at Berylstow, confirmed the feeling whenDelavoye informed me that the little caller was a remarkable blend ofour old friend Guy Berridge and the whilom Miss Hemming.
Mulcaster Park had moved bodily with the times. It had its asphalt pathsat last. Incidentally I missed some blinds which had been taken over astenant's fixtures in my first or second year. The new ones were not red.The next house lower down had also changed hands; a very striking woman,in a garden hat, was filling a basket with roses from a William AllenRichardson which had turned the painted porch into a bower; and insteadof answering a simple question, Uvo stopped and called her to the gate.
"Let me introduce you to Mrs. Ricardo, Gilly," said he, as the ladyjoined us with a smile that set me thinking. "Mrs. Ricardo knows allabout you, and was looking forward to seeing the conquering hero comemarching home."
It was not one of Uvo's happiest speeches; but Mrs. Ricardo was neitherembarrassed nor embarrassing in what she found to say to me. I liked herthen and there: in any case I should have admired her. She was a talland handsome brunette, with thick eyebrows and that high yet duskycolouring which reminds one in itself of stormlight and angry skies. ButMrs. Ricardo seemed the most good-natured of women, anxious at once notto bore me about my experiences, and yet to let us both see that shethoroughly appreciated their character.
"You will always be thankful that you went, Mr. Gillon, in spite ofenteric," said Mrs. Ricardo. "The people to pity were those who couldn'tgo, but especially the old soldiers, who would have given anything tohave gone."
I had just flattered myself that she was about to give each of us arose; she had certainly selected an obvious buttonhole, and appeared tobe seeking its fellow in the basket, when suddenly I saw her lookingpast us both and up the road. A middle-aged man was hobbling towards usin the thinning stream of homing citizens. He did not look one of them;he wore light clothes and a straw hat which he did not remove inaccosting my companions; and I thought that he looked both hot and crossas he leant hard upon a serviceable stick.
"Gossiping at the gate, as usual!" he cried, with a kind of raspingraillery. "Even Mr. Delavoye won't thank you for keeping him standing onthis villainous asphalt till his feet sink in."
"That would have been one for you, Gilly, in the old days," said Uvo."Captain Ricardo--Mr. Gillon."
Captain Ricardo also seemed to have heard of me. He overhauled me withhis peevish little eyes, and then said two or three of the bitterestthings about the British forces, regular and irregular, that it ever wasmy lot to hear. I made no attempt to reply to them. His wife tried topresent him with the rose which I fancied had been meant for one of us,and his prompt rejection of the offering only hardened me in thatimpression. Then Uvo asked him if he had seen good play at the Oval; andso the vitriolic stream was diverted into such congenial channels as thedecadence of modern cricket and the calibre of the other members of theSurrey Club.
"But won't you come in?" concluded the captain in his most forbiddingmanner. "I hate this talking at the gate like a pack of servants, but mywife seems to have a mania for it."
It is only fair to state that Mrs. Ricardo had withdrawn during thedenunciation of the game which her husband spent his useless days inwatching, as Uvo told me when we had declined his inhospitality and wereout of earshot. It was all he did say about Captain Ricardo, and I saidnothing at all. The people were evidently friends of his; at least thewife was, and it was she who had set me thinking with her first smile.I was still busy wondering whether, or where, I could have seen herbefore.
"It's quite possible," said Uvo, when I had wondered aloud. "I wouldn'tgive her away if it weren't an open secret here. But Witching Hillhasn't called on Mrs. Ricardo since it found out that she was once onthe stage."
"Good Lord!"
"There's another reason, to give the neighbours their due. Ricardo hasinsulted most of them to their faces. A bit of gossip got about, andinstead of ignoring it he limped out on the war-path, cutting half theEstate and damning the other half in heaps."
"But what was her stage name?"
Delavoye gave a grim laugh as he ushered me into the garden of manymemories. "You wouldn't know it, Gilly. You were never a great playgoer,you see, and Mrs. Ricardo was anything but a great actress. But she's avery great good sort, as you'll find out for yourself when you know herbetter."
I could quite believe it even then--but I was not so sure after a day ortwo with Uvo. I found him leading a lonely life, with Nettleton's oldSarah to look after him. Miss Delavoye had been wooed and married whilemy back was turned, and Mrs. Delavoye was on a long visit to the youngcouple. Uvo, however, appeared to be enjoying his solitude rather thanotherwise; his health was better, he was plying his pen, things werebeing taken by all kinds of periodicals. And yet I was uneasy about him.Among many little changes, but more in this house than in most, thesubtlest change of all was in Uvo Delavoye himself.
He could not do enough for me; from the few survivors of his father'sbest bins, to my breakfast served in bed by his own hands, nothing wasgood enough for the fraud he made me feel. Yet we were not in touch aswe had been of old. I could have done with fewer deeds of unnecessarykindness and more words of unguarded intimacy. He did not trust me as heused. He had something or somebody on his mind; and I soon made up minethat it was Mrs. Ricardo, but not from anything else he told me. Henever mentioned her name again. He did not tell me that, with a view toa third road, the Estate had just purchased a fresh slice of thedelightful woodland behind Mulcaster Park; that in its depths was alittle old ruin, just after his heart, and that this ruin was also afavourite haunt of Mrs. Ricardo's. I was left to make all thesediscoveries for myself, on a morning when Uvo Delavoye was expresslycloseted at his desk.
It was, to be sure, my old Mr. Muskett who told me about the new land,and invited me to explore it at my pleasure. On a warm morning it seemeda better scheme than going alone upon the river, as Uvo had suggested. Iaccordingly turned back with Mr. Muskett, who went on to speak of theruin, and in fact set me on my way to it while I was setting him to thestation. Ten minutes later, in a tangle of bush and bracken, I had foundit: an ancient wall, scaled with patches of mouldy stucco, and at oneend an Ionic pillar towering out of the sea of gree
nery like alighthouse clear of the cliffs. Obviously, as Mr. Muskett had said, thefragments that remained of one of those toy temples which were acharacteristic conceit of old Georgian grounds. But it happened to bethe first that I had seen, and I proceeded to reconnoitre the positionwith some interest. Then it was that Mrs. Ricardo was discovered, seatedon one of several stumps of similar pillars, on the far side of thewall.
Mrs. Ricardo, without her hat in the shadow of the old grey wall, butwith her glossy hair and glowing colour stamped against it with richeffect: a charming picture in its greenwood frame, especially as she waslooking up to greet me with a radiant smile. But I was too taken abackto be appreciative for the moment. And then I decided that the highcolouring was a thought too high, and a sudden self-consciousnessdisappointing after her excellent composure in the much more tryingcircumstances of our previous meeting.
"Haven't you been here before, Mr. Gillon?" Mrs. Ricardo seemedsurprised, but quite competent to play the guide. "This mossy heap'ssupposed to have been the roof, and these stone stumps the columns thatheld it up. There's just that one standing as it was. There should be a'sylvan prospect' from where I'm sitting; but it must have been chokedup for years and years."
"You do know a lot about it!" I cried, recovering my admiration for thepretty woman as she recovered her self-possession. And then she smiledagain, but not quite as I had caught her smiling.
"What Mr. Delavoye's friends don't know about Witching Hill oughtn't tobe worth knowing!" said Mrs. Ricardo. "I mean what he really knows, notwhat he makes up, Mr. Gillon. I hear you don't believe in all that anymore than I do. But he does seem to have read everything that was everwritten about the place. He says this was certainly the Temple ofBacchus in the good old days."
"I don't quite see where Bacchus comes in," said I, thinking that Uvoand Mrs. Ricardo must be friends indeed.
"He's supposed to have been on this old wall behind us, in a fresco orsomething, by Villikins or somebody. You can see where it's been gougedout, and the stucco with it."
But I had to say what was in my mind. "Is Uvo Delavoye still harping onabout his bold bad ancestor, Mrs. Ricardo? Does he still call him hisold man of the soil?"
To her, at any rate, yes, he did! She did not think it was a thing hetalked about to everybody. But I had hoped it was an extinct folly,since he had not mentioned it as yet to me. It was almost as though Mrs.Ricardo had taken my old place. Did she discourage him as I had done?She told me it was his latest ambition to lay the ghost. And I marvelledat their intimacy, and wondered what that curmudgeon of a husband had tosay to it!
Yet it seemed natural enough that we should talk about Uvo Delavoye, asI sat on another of the broken columns and lit a cigarette at Mrs.Ricardo's suggestion. Uvo was one of those people who are the first ofbonds between their friends, a fruitful subject, a most human interestin common. So I found myself speaking of him in my turn, with allaffection and yet some little freedom, to an almost complete strangerwho was drawing me on more deliberately than I saw.
"You were great friends, Mr. Gillon, weren't you?"
"We _are_, and I hope we always shall be."
"It must have been everything for you to have such a friend in such aplace!"
"It was so! I stayed on and on because of him. He was the life and soulof the Estate to me."
Mrs. Ricardo looked as though she could have taken the words out of mymouth. "But what a spoilt life, and what a strange soul!" said she,instead; and I saw there was something in Mrs. Ricardo, after all.
She was looking at me and yet through me, as we sat on our broken bitsof Ionic columns. She had spoken in a dreamy voice, with a wonderfulsoftening of her bold, flamboyant beauty; for I was not looking throughher by any means, but staring harder than I had any business, in a freshendeavour to remember where we had met before. And for once she hadspoken without a certain intonation, which I had hardly noticed in herspeech until I missed it now.
"Of course I've heard of all the extraordinary adventures you've bothhad here," resumed Uvo's new friend, as though to emphasise the termsthat they were on.
"Not all of them?" I suggested. There were one or two affairs that heand I were to have kept to ourselves.
"Why not?" she flashed, suspiciously.
"Oh! I don't know."
"Which of them is such a secret?"
She was smiling now, but with obvious effort. Why this pressure on apointless point? And where _had_ I seen her before?
"Well, there was our very first adventure, for one," said I.
"Underground, you mean?"
"Yes--partly."
I could not help staring now. Mrs. Ricardo had reddened so inexplicably.
"There was no need to tell me the other part!" she said, scornfully. "Iwas in it--as you know very well!"
Then I did know. She was the bedizened beauty who had raked in thefive-pound notes, and smashed a magnum of champagne in her excitement,at the orgy in Sir Christopher Stainsby's billiard room.
"I know it now," I stammered, "but I give you my word----"
"Fiddle!" she interrupted. "You've known it all the time. I've seen itin your face. He gave me away to you, and I shan't forgive him!"
I found myself involved in a heated exposition of the facts. I had neverrecognised her until that very minute. But I had kept wondering where wehad met before. And that was all that she could have seen in my face. Asfor Uvo Delavoye, when I had spoken to him about it, he had merelyassured me that I must have seen her on the stage: so far and no furtherhad he given her away. Mrs. Ricardo took some assuring and reassuring onthe point. But the truth was in me, and in her ultimate pacification sheseemed to lose sight of the fact that she herself had done what sheaccused Uvo of doing. Evidently the leakage of her secret mattered farless to Mrs. Ricardo than the horrible thought that Mr. Delavoye had letit out.
Of course I spoke as though there was nothing to matter in the least toanybody, and asked after Sir Christopher as if the entertainment in hisbilliard room had been one of the most conventional. It seemed that hehad married again in his old age; he had married one of the other ladiesof those very revels.
"That's really why I first thought of coming here to live," explainedMrs. Ricardo, with her fine candour. "But there have been all kinds ofdisagreeables."
She had known about the tunnel before she had heard of it from Uvo; somemember of the lively household had discovered its existence, and therehad been high jinks down there on more than one occasion. But LadyStainsby had not been the same person since her marriage. I gatheredthat she had put her reformed foot down on the underground orgies, butthat Captain Ricardo had done his part in the subsequent disagreeables.It further appeared that the blood-stained lace and the diamond bucklehad also been discovered, and that old Sir Christopher had "behaved justlike he would, and froze on to both without a word to Mr. Delavoye'sgrand relations."
I suggested that mining rights might have gone with the freehold, butMrs. Ricardo quoted Uvo's opinion as to what still ailed SirChristopher Stainsby. She made it quite clear to me that our friend, atany rate, still laboured under his old obsession, and that she herselftook it more seriously than she had professed before one confidence ledto another.
"But don't you tell him I told you!" she added as though we wereourselves old friends. "The less you tell Mr. Delavoye of all we've beentalking about, the better turn you'll be doing me, Mr. Gillon. It wasjust like him not to give away ancient history even to you, and I don'tthink you're the one to tell him how I went and did it myself!"
I could have wished that she had taken that for granted; but at leastshe felt too finely to bind me down to silence. Altogether I found her afine creature, certainly in face and form, and almost certainly atheart, if one guessed even charitably at her past, and then at her lifein a hostile suburb with a neglectful churl of a husband.
But to admire the woman for her own sake was not to approve of her onall other grounds; and during our friendly and almost fascinating chat Icontracted a fairly defin
ite fear that was not removed by the manner ofits conclusion. Mrs. Ricardo had looked at a watch pinned to a prettybut audacious blouse, and had risen rather hurriedly. But she had lookedat her watch just a minute too late; as we turned the corner of theruin, there was Delavoye hurrying through the brake towards us; andthough he was far enough off to conceal such confusion as Mrs. Ricardohad shown at my appearance on the scene, and to come up saying that hehad found me at last, I could not but remember how he had shut himselfup for the morning, after advising me to go on the river.
I was uneasy about them both; but it was impossible to say a word toanybody. He never spoke of her; that was another bad sign to mysuspicious mind. It was entirely from her that I had drawn my materialfor suspicion, or rather for anxiety. I did not for a moment supposethat there was anything more than a possibly injudicious friendshipbetween them; it was just the possibilities that stirred my sluggishimagination; and I should not have thought twice about these but forUvo's marked reserve in speaking of the one other person with whom I nowknew that he was extremely unreserved. If only I had known it from him,I should not have deplored the mere detail that Mrs. Ricardo was in oneway filling my own old place in his life.
My visit drew to an end; on the last night I simply had to dine in townwith a wounded friend from the front. It would have been cruel to getout of it, though Uvo almost tempted me by his keenness that I shouldgo. I warned him, however, that I should come back early. And I was evenearlier than my word. And Uvo was not in.
"He's gone out with his pipe," said Sarah, looking gratuitouslyconcerned. "I'm sure I don't know where you'll find him." But thissounded like an afterthought; and there was a something shifty and yetwistful in the old body's manner that inclined me to a little talk withher about the master.
"You don't think he's just gone into the wood, do you, Sarah?"
"Well, he do go there a good deal," said Sarah. "Of course he don'talways go that way; but he do go there."
"Might he have gone into Captain Ricardo's, Sarah?"
"He might," said Sarah, with more than dubious emphasis.
"They're his great friends now, aren't they?" I hazarded.
"Not Captain Ricardo, sir," said Sarah. "I've only seen him in the 'ousebut once, and that was when Miss Hamy was married; but we 'ad all sortsthen." And Sarah looked as though the highways and hedges had beenscoured for guests.
"But do you see much more of Mrs. Ricardo, Sarah?"
"I don't, sir, but Mr. Hugo do," said Sarah, for once off her loyalguard. "He sees more of her than his ma would like."
"Come, come, Sarah! She's a charming lady, and quite the belle of theEstate."
"That may be, sir, but the Estate ain't what it was," declared Sarah,with pregnant superiority. "There's some queer people come since I waswith pore Mr. Nettleton."
"What about Mr. Nettleton himself, Sarah?"
"Mr. Nettleton was always a gentleman, sir, though he did try to setfire to the 'ouse with my methylated."
I left the old dame bobbing in the doorway, and went to look for Uvo inthe wood. I swear I had no thought of spying upon him. What could therebe to spy upon, at half-past nine at night, with Captain Ricardo safeand grumbling at his own fireside? I had been wasting my last evening ata club and in the train, and I did not want to miss another minute ofUvo Delavoye's society.
It was an exquisite night, the year near its zenith and the moon onlyless than full. The wood was changed from a beautiful bright pictureinto a beautiful black photograph; twig and leaf, and silent birds,stood out like motes in the moonbeams. But there were fine intervals ofutter darkness, wide pools and high cascades of pitch, with never abubble in the way of detail. And there was one bird to be heard, givingits own glory to the glorious night. But I was not long alive to theheavenly song, or to the beauty of the moonlit wood.
I had entered by way of a spare site a little higher up than theDelavoyes', who, unlike some of their newer neighbours, had not a gardengate into the wood. I had penetrated some score yards into the pitch andsilver of leafy tree and open space when I became aware that someoneelse had entered still higher up, and that our courses were converging.I thought for a moment that it might be Uvo; but there was somethinghalt yet stealthy about the unseen advance, as of a shackled manescaping; and I knew who it was before I myself stole and dodged to geta sight of him. It was Captain Ricardo, creeping clumsily, often pausingto lean hard upon his tremendous stick. At first I thought he had twosticks; but the other was not one; the other was a hunting crop, for Isaw the lash unloosed in one of the pauses, and a tree-trunk flickedagain and again, about the height of a man's shoulder, as if forpractice.
When the limping, cringing figure again proceeded on its way, the bigstick was in the left hand, the crop in the right, and I was a secondsneak following the first, in the direction of the Temple of Bacchus.
I saw him stop and listen before I heard the voices. I saw the cropraised high in the moonlight, as if in the taking of some silent vow,and I lessened the distance between us with impunity, for he had neveronce looked round. And now I too heard the voices; they were on theother side of the temple wall; and this side was laved with moonlight,so that the edges of the crumbling stucco made seams of pitch, andRicardo's shadow crouched upon the wall for a little age before his bentperson showed against it.
Now he was at one end of the wall, peeping round, listening, instead ofshowing himself like a man. My blood froze at his miserable tactics. Ihad seen men keep cover under heavy fire with less precaution than thiswretch showed in spying on his guilty wife; yet there was I copying him,even as I had dogged him through the wood. Now he had wedged himself inthe heavy shadow between the wall and the one whole pillar at rightangles to the wall; now he was looking as well as listening. And now Iwas in his old place, now I was at his very elbow, eavesdropping myselfin my watch and ward over the other eavesdropper.
The big stick leant against the end of the wall, just between us, nearerto my hand than his. The man himself leant hard against the pillar, thecrop grasped behind him in both hands, its lash dangling like the tailof a monster rat. Those two clasped hands were the only part of him inthe moonlight, and I watched them as I would have watched his eyes if wehad been face to face. They were lean, distorted, twitching, itchinghands. The lash was wound round one of them; there might have been morewhipcord under the skin.
Meanwhile I too was listening perforce to the voices on the other sideof the wall. I thought one came from the stone stump where Mrs. Ricardohad sat the other day, that she was sitting there again. The other voicecame from various places. And to me the picture of Uvo Delavoye,tramping up and down in the moonlight as he talked, was as plain asthough there had been no old wall between us.
"I know you have a thin time of it. But so has he!"
That was almost the first thing I heard. It made an immediate differencein my feeling towards the other eavesdropper. But I still watched hishands.
"Sitting on top of a cricket pavilion," said the other voice, "all daylong!"
"It takes him out of himself. You must see that he is eating his heartout, with this war still on, and fellows like Gillon bringing it home tohim every day."
"I don't see anything. He doesn't give me much chance. If it isn'tcricket at the Oval, it's billiards here at the George, night afternight until I'm sick to death of the whole thing."
"Are you sure he's there now?"
"Oh, goodness, yes! He made no bones about it."
I thought Uvo had stopped in his stride to ask the question. I knewthose hands clutched the hunting crop tighter at the answer. I saw theknuckles whiten in the moonlight.
"Because we're taking a bit of a risk," resumed Uvo, finishing furtheroff than he began.
"Oh, no, we're not. Besides, what does it matter? I simply had to speakto you--and you know what happened the other morning. Mornings are theworst of all for people seeing you."
"But not for what they think of seeing you."
"Oh! what do I care what they think?" cri
ed the wife of the man besideme. "I'm far past that. It's you men who keep on thinking and thinkingof what other people are going to think!"
"We sometimes have to think for two," said Uvo--just a little lesssteadily, to my ear.
"You don't see that I'm absolutely desperate, mewed up with a man whodoesn't care a rap for me!"
"I should make him care."
"That shows all _you_ care!" she retorted, passionately.
And then I felt that he was standing over her; there was something inthe altered pose of the head near mine, something that took my eyesfrom the moonlit hands, and again gave me as vivid a picture as thoughthe wall were down.
"It's no use going back on all that," said Uvo, and it was harder tohear him now. "I don't want to say rotten things. You know well enoughwhat I feel. If I felt a bit less, it would be different. It's justbecause we've been the kind of pals we have been ... my dear ... mydear!... that we mustn't go and spoil it now."
The low voice trembled, but now hers was lower still, and I at leastlost most of her answer ... "if you really cared for me ... to take meaway from a man who never did!" That much I heard, and this: "But you'reno better! You don't know what it is to--care!"
That brought an outburst, but not from the man beside me. He might havebeen turned into part of the Ionic pillar. It was Uvo who talked, and Ifor one who listened without another thought of the infamy of listening.I was not there to listen to anybody, but to keep an eye on Ricardo; myfurther action depended on his; but from the first his presence hadblunted my own sense of our joint dishonour, and now the sense wassimply dead. I was there with the best motives. I had even begunlistening with the best motives, as it were with a watching brief forthe unhappy pair. But I forgot both my behaviour and its excuse whileUvo Delavoye was delivering his fine soul; for fine it was, with onegreat twist in it that came out even now, when I least expected it, andto the last conceivable intent. It is the one part of all he said that Ido not blush to have overheard.
"Let us help each other; for God's sake don't let us drag each otherdown! That's not quite what I mean. I know it sounds rotten. I wonder ifI dare tell you what I do mean? It's not we who would do the dragging,don't you see? You know who it is, who's pulling at us both like thevery devil that he was in life!"
Uvo laughed shortly, and now his tone was a tone I knew too well."Nobody has stood up to him yet," he went on; "it's about time somebodydid. Surely you and I can put up a bit of a fight between us? Surely wearen't such ninepins as old Stainsby, Abercromby Royle, Guy Berridgeand all that lot?"
In the pause I figured her looking at him, as I had so often done when acivil answer was impossible. But Mrs. Ricardo asked another questioninstead.
"Is that your notion of laying the ghost?"
"Yes!" he said earnestly. "There's something not to be explained in allthe things that have happened since I've been here. To be absolutelyhonest, I haven't always really and truly believed in all my ownexplanations. I'm not sure that Gilly himself--that unbelievingdog--didn't get nearer the mark on the night he was nearly burned todeath. But, if it's my own ghost, all the more reason to lay it; and, ifit isn't, those other poor brutes were helpless in their ignorance, butI haven't their excuse!"
"I believe every word of it," said the poor soul with a sob. "When wecame here I thought we should be--well, happy enough in our way. But wehaven't had a day's happiness. You, you have given me the only happinessI've ever had here, and now...."
"No; it's been the other way about," interrupted Uvo, sadly. "Butthat's all over. I'm going to clear out, and you'll find things farhappier when I'm gone. It's I who have been the curse to you--to both ofyou--if not to all the rest...."
His voice failed him; but there was no mistaking its fast resolve. Itsvery tenderness was not more unmistakable, to me, than the fixity of aresolution which my whole heart and soul applauded. And suddenly I wasflattering myself that the man by my side shared my intuitive confidenceand approval. He was no longer a man of stone; he had come to lifeagain. Those hands of his were not fiercely frozen to the crop, butturning it gently round and round. Then they stopped. Then they movedwith the man's whole body. He was looking the other way, almost in thedirection by which he and I had approached the temple. And as I looked,too, there were footsteps in the grass, Mrs. Ricardo passed close by uswith downcast eyes, and so back into the wood, with Uvo at arm's lengthon the far side.
Then it was that I found myself mistaken in Ricardo. He had not takenhis eyes off the retreating pair. He was crouching to follow them, onlywaiting till they were at a safe distance. I also waited--till theydisappeared--then I touched him on the shoulder.
He jumped up, gasping. I had my finger before my lips.
"Can't you trust them now?" I whispered.
"Spying!" he hissed when he could find his tongue.
"What about you, Captain Ricardo?"
"It was my wife."
"Well, it was my friend and you're his enemy. And his enemy was armed tothe teeth," I added, handing him the big stick that he had left leaningagainst the wall.
"That wasn't for him. This was," muttered Ricardo, lapping the lashround his crop. "I was going to horsewhip him within an inch of hislife. And now that you know all about it, too, I've a damned good mindto do it still!"
"There are several reasons why you won't," I assured him.
"You're his bully, are you?" he snarled.
"I'm whatever you choose to make me, Captain Ricardo. Already you'veconsoled me for doing a thing I never dreamt of doing in my lifebefore."
"But, good God! I never dreamt of listening either. I was prepared for avery different scene. And then--and then I thought perhaps I'd betternot make one after all! I thought it would only make things worse.Things might have been worse still, don't you see?"
"Exactly. I think you behaved splendidly, all the same."
"But if you heard the whole thing----"
"I couldn't help myself. I found myself following you by pure chance.Then I saw what you had in your hand."
With a common instinct for cover, we had drifted round to the other sideof the wall. And neither of us had raised his voice. But Ricardo neverhad his eyes off me, as we played our tiny scene among the brokencolumns, where Uvo and Mrs. Ricardo had just played theirs.
"Well, are you going to hold your tongue?" he asked me.
"If you hold yours," I answered.
"I mean--even as between you two!"
"That's just what I mean, Ricardo. If neither of us know what'shappened, nothing else need happen. 'Least said,' you know."
"Nothing whatever must be said. I'll trust you never to tell Delavoye,and, if it makes you happier, you can trust me to say nothing to--toanybody. It's my only chance," said Ricardo, hoarsely. "I've not beenall I might have been. I see it now. But perhaps ... it isn't ... toolate...."
And suddenly he seized me violently by the hand. Then I found myselfalone in the shadow of the wall which had once borne a fresco byNollikins, and I stood like a man awakened from a dream. In theflattering moonlight, the sham survivals of the other century might havebeen thousands of years old, their suburban setting some sylvan cornerof the Roman campagna.... Then once more I heard the nightingale, and itsang me back into contemporary realities. I wondered if it had beensinging all the time. I had not heard less of it during the hour thatUvo and I had spent underneath this very wood, four summers ago!
That was on the first night of our life at Witching Hill, and this wasto be our last. I arranged it beautifully when I got in and had tried toexplain how entirely I had lost my bearings in the wood. I told Uvo, andit happened to be true, that I had been wondering why on earth he wouldnot come up north with me next day. And before midnight he had packed.
Then we sat up together for the last time in that back room of his onthe first floor, and watched the moon set in the tree-tops, and silverleaves twinkle as the wood sighed in its sleep. One more pipe, and theblack sky was turning grey. A few more pipes, much talk about old times,and the wood
was a wood once more; its tossing crests were tipped withemeralds in the flashing sun; and as tree after tree broke into a merrydin, we spoke of joy-bells taken up by steeple after steeple, and Uvoread me eight lines that he had discovered somewhere while I was away.
"Some cry up Gunnersbury, For Sion some declare, And some say that with Chiswick House No villa can compare;
"But ask the beaux of Middlesex, Who know the country well, If Witching Hill--if Witching Hill-- Don't bear away the bell."
"I hope you agree, Beau Gillon?" said Uvo, with the old wilful smile."By the way, I haven't mentioned him since you've been back, but on alast morning like this you may be glad to hear that my old ghost of thesoil is laid at last.... The rest is silence, if you don't mind, oldman."
THE END
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