Kitabı oku: «The House 'Round the Corner», sayfa 13

CHAPTER XIII
DEUS EX MACHINA

After a while, Betty came to Armathwaite again.

"If you please, sir, breakfast is ready. Shall I bring it in, or will you wait for Miss Meg?" she said.

That a second inquiry as to Marguérite's whereabouts should be necessary seemed to surprise him.

"You were looking for Miss Garth a few minutes ago. Didn't you find her?" he inquired.

"No, sir. She's not in the house."

"But what can have become of her?"

"I thought, sir, she might ha' gone into t' village."

"Why?"

"She knows everybody i' t' place. She said last night that now she was makin' a bit of a stay she'd be seein' some o' t' folk."

"I think I should have noticed her if she had gone out by the gate," he said, weighing the point. "Smith!" he called, "has Miss Meg left the house recently – within the past ten minutes, I mean?"

"Not that I know of, sir," said Smith; "but I'm that worritted by the state of some o' these here beds that ammost owt (almost anything) might ha' happened without me givin' it heed."

"Bang that gong at the front door," said Armathwaite to Betty. "It should be heard in every house in Elmdale, and she will understand."

The gong was duly banged, and its effect on Elmdale was immediately perceptible. Old Mrs. Bolland vowed afterwards that she would sit permanently at the back bedroom window, because, being rheumaticky, she couldn't get upstairs quickly enough, and there was summat to see nowadays at t' Grange.

But the tocsin failed to reach the one ear for which it was intended. The village produced every live inhabitant except Marguérite Ogilvey.

"Was Miss Meg friendly with the Burts?" inquired Armathwaite, when he and Betty realized it was useless to gaze expectantly either at the corner of the roadway visible from the porch, or at such small cross-sections of the village "street" as could be seen at irregular intervals between the houses.

"Yes, sir. She'd often walk over there," said the girl, gazing at once in the direction of the Castle Farm, which was the name of the holding.

"She would know that breakfast was on the way?"

"Oh, yes, sir! I axed her meself when I brought her a cup of tea. She said that nine o'clock would suit."

Betty turned involuntarily to consult the grandfather's clock in the hall. The hands stood at ten minutes past nine; but, in the same moment, she remembered that the clock was not going. Armathwaite followed her glance, and looked at his watch.

"Ten minutes past nine," he answered, with a laugh. "The old clock is right to a tick. Was it in use while the Sheffield lady remained in the house?"

"No, sir. It stopped at that time when the old man died."

Then she giggled. There is hardly a man or woman in Yorkshire who does not know that the words of a famous song were suggested by the behavior of a clock which is still exhibited in an inn on the south side of the Tees at Pierce Bridge, and the girl had unconsciously repeated the tag of verses and chorus.

Armathwaite had yet to learn of this treasured possession of the county of broad acres, so he eyed Betty rather disapprovingly. Moved by an impulse which he regarded as nothing more than a desire to check such undue levity, he strode into the hall, found a key resting on a ledge of the clock's canopy, wound up the heavy weights, and started the pendulum.

"Perhaps our ancient friend may be more accurate than you, Betty," he said. "You mean, I suppose, that it stopped at that time because it was not wound. How do you know the hour, or even the day, anyone died here?"

"Well, I don't, sir, an' that's a fact," she admitted. "But what about breakfast?"

"Attend to Mr. Whittaker – I'll wait!"

He went out again, and saw Smith hobbling down the bye-road.

"Hi!" he cried, "if you're going into the village you might ask if anyone has seen Miss Meg!"

Smith replied with a hand wave. He was thinking mainly of begonias, planning a magician's stroke, because his new master had told him to spare no expense. Within ten minutes he returned, but not alone. Four able-bodied rustics came with him, each carrying a spade or a garden fork. But he had not forgotten Armathwaite's request.

"Miss Meg hasn't gone that way, sir," he said. "Plenty of folk saw her in t' garden, an' they couldn't ha' missed her had she been in t' street. But she'll be comin' i' now. No fear o' her bein' lost, stolen, or strayed i' Elmdale. These chaps are good for a day's diggin' at four shillin' an' two quarts o' beer each. Is that right, sir?"

"Make it five shillings and no beer," said Armathwaite.

The laborers grinned.

"No beer is even to be bought during working hours," he added sharply. "You can work harder and longer on tea. You may have all the tea, milk, bread and cheese you want, but not a drop of beer, this day or any other day, while at work here. I know what I am talking about. I am no teetotal fanatic, but I've proved the truth of that statement during many a day of more trying labor than digging soft earth."

The terms were agreed to without a murmur. The incident, slight as it was, had its bearing on the day's history. Smith was leading his cohort to the attack, when one of the men, apparently bethinking himself, approached Armathwaite and touched his cap.

"Beg pardon, sir," he said, "but was ye axin' about Miss Meg?"

"Yes."

"Well, I seed her goin' up t' moor road nigh on half an hour sen" (since).

The Grange itself was the only house on the moor road for many a mile, and it was most unlikely that Marguérite would take a protracted stroll in that direction at such an hour. Somehow, Armathwaite was aware of a chill in the air which he had not felt earlier. It was his habit to disregard those strange glimpses of coming events, generally of misfortune, which men call premonitions. When confronted by accomplished facts, he acted as honor and experience dictated; for the rest, he said, with Milton —

 
"I argue not
Against Heaven's hand or will, nor bate a jot
Of heart and hope; but still bear up and steer
Right onward."
 

But this all-sufficing rule of conduct had availed him little from the moment he crossed the threshold of the Grange. Right well had it served him in the strenuous years of vigilant governance now so remote; since his coming to Elmdale he seemed ever to be striving against shapeless phantoms. He had sought quiet and content in that peaceful-looking village; he had found only care and gnawing foreboding, brightened, it is true, by a day-dream, which itself left bitter communing when it waned. For he was his own severest censor. He regarded himself as one already in the sere and yellow leaf. Fortune had called him to the high places only to cast him forth discredited, if not humbled. That he, a man who believed he had done with the great world, should think of allying his shattered life with the sweet and winsome creature whose feminine charm was enhanced by a frank girlishness, was a tantalizing prospect which, like the mirage in a desert, merged with the arid wastes when subjected to close scrutiny. With Marguérite near, reason fled, and all things seemed possible; when the thrall of her presence was withdrawn, cold judgment warned him that gratitude for help rendered should not be mistaken for love.

He felt now that another crisis had arisen, yet the past yielded no ray of guidance. He glared at the poor laborer who, all unconsciously, was fate's herald in this new adversity, for he was instantly aware, without other spoken word, that Marguérite Ogilvey had fled. The man's troubled face showed that he feared he had done wrong.

"I'm main sorry, sir," said he, "if I've said owt te vex ye, but, hearin' the talk of Miss Meg, I thought – "

Armathwaite's drawn features relaxed, and he placed a friendly hand on the villager's shoulder.

"You've done right," he said. "I am very much obliged to you. I have a stupid habit of allowing my mind to wander. Just then I was thinking of something wholly unconnected with Miss Garth's disappearance, which will arouse Mrs. Jackson's wrath because of bacon and eggs frizzled to a cinder. I must go and condole with her."

He was turning to re-enter the house, mainly to set at rest any suspicion that Marguérite's absence arose from other cause than sheer forgetfulness, when the clang of the gate stayed him. A youth had dismounted from a bicycle, and was hastening up the path with an air of brisk importance.

"Telegrams for Garth and Whittaker," he said. "Any answer, sir?"

Armathwaite took the two buff envelopes which the lad produced from a leather pouch.

"Have you come from Bellerby?" he inquired.

"Yes, sir."

"Well, wait a few minutes. There may be some reply."

He went into the dining-room. So sure was he that Marguérite had gone away that he had not the slightest hesitation about opening the telegram addressed to "Garth, The Grange, Elmdale." As he anticipated, it was from Mrs. Ogilvey. It had been dispatched at seven o'clock from Tavistock, and read:

"Arriving to-night if possible. Don't take any action until I am with you. – Mother."

The early hour at which it had been sent off – from a town, too, which he rightly estimated as a good many miles distant from Warleggan, showed that Mrs. Suarez had contrived to get a telegram through to Cornwall the previous night, so Percy Whittaker's mischievous interference had proved quite successful.

Then, with lightning clarity came the belief that Percy Whittaker was responsible for Marguérite's flight. Armathwaite scouted the notion that she had such a thing in her mind when she came to him in the garden. Her nature was incapable of guile. Had she formed some fantastic scheme during the watches of the night she would never have put her troubles aside to share in his light-hearted planning of a new and glorified garden. In fact, he recalled her sudden dismay because of her seeming neglect of the invalid, and now he knew that he had not seen her since she went upstairs, whereas Whittaker himself had sent more than one urgent summons for her subsequently.

Stifling his fury as best he might, Armathwaite hurried to Whittaker's room.

"A telegram has just come for you," he said, and watched the younger man's face as he read. It was a long screed, and evidently bored its recipient.

"Oh, it's only from my sister," came the languid explanation. "By the way, where's Miss Garth?"

"Gone, I think."

"Gone!" Whittaker rose on an elbow and glowered at Armathwaite. "What the devil do you mean by 'gone'? Where has she gone to?" he cried.

"I want you to answer that question," and Armathwaite's voice was strangely harsh and threatening. "She came to you half an hour ago. Did you say anything likely to distress her? Tell me the truth, or I'll pound your face to a jelly."

His aspect had suddenly become so menacing that Whittaker wilted; his head sank back to the pillow, and his eyelids twitched with fright.

"That's no way to talk – " he began, but the other seized him by the shoulder with his left hand and clenched his right fist suggestively.

"You think I ought not to threaten you with violence because you are lying there helpless," was the savage interruption; "but, if you have not forgotten the ways of Ind, you must know that a poisonous snake is never so venomous as when disabled. Speak, now, and speak truthfully, or, as sure as God is in heaven, I'll strike!"

There was no withstanding the set purpose revealed by those blazing eyes, and Whittaker was so alarmed that he dared not attempt to lie.

"I – I've asked Meg – half a dozen times – to marry me," he stuttered, "and this morning – I told her – she'd have to consent – now."

"Why now?" and the fierce grip tightened, drawing the livid face nearer.

"Because – she must."

"Explain yourself, you dog!"

"I – I was afraid of your influence, so I warned her – that if – she wanted to save her father… Ah! Let go! Curse you, let go! You're breaking my bones!"

That eldritch scream restored Armathwaite's senses. It startled the men in the garden. It brought Mrs. Jackson and Betty running from the kitchen. Happily, Armathwaite struck no blow. He flung off Whittaker's limp body as though he were, indeed, one of the vicious reptiles to which he had compared him.

"You sug!" he breathed, using the bitterest term of contempt known to the East, for the Persian word means all that the Anglo-Saxon implies when he likens a fellow-creature to a dog, with the added force of an epithet which signifies "dog" in that despicable sense, and in none other.

Striding down the stairs, his fire-laden glance met the ghastly smile of the painted figure. With an active bound, he was on the window ledge, and the clenched fist which had ached to scatter some of the hapless Percy's features fell heavily on the scowling face in the window. The glass, which proved exceedingly thin and brittle, shivered into countless fragments within and without, and the inner sheet of transparent paper was so dry and tense that it shriveled instantly when exposed to the air. Indeed, Armathwaite, despite his rage, was aware of a peculiar sensation. It seemed as though he had struck at something impalpable as air. His hand was not cut. It appeared to have touched nothing. He thrust straight and hard, and the only evidence of his destroying zeal was a quantity of powdered glass on the landing, some curled wisps of paper adhering to the leaden frame, and an oval of blue sky shining through the visor.

As he leaped to the floor again, Mrs. Jackson reached the center of the hall. She screeched frantically, thinking that the Black Prince himself was springing from the window. But she was a stout-hearted old woman, and quickly recovered her wits when she saw what Armathwaite had done.

"They've long wanted a man i' this house!" she cried, in a voice that cracked with excitement, "and it's glad I am te see they've gotten yan at last! Eh, sir, ye med me jump! Ye did an' all! But ye'll never rue t' day when ye punched a hole in t' fëace o' that image of Owd Nick!"

By this time Smith and his helpers, aware that something unusual was going on inside the house, were gathered at the front door, which had remained wide open since the early morning.

"Listen, all of you!" said Armathwaite, addressing the two women and five men as though they were an army and he their emperor. "I am master here, and I expect you to obey my orders. I am going out now, and I may be away some hours, possibly all day. You, Smith, must put a padlock and chain on the gate and refuse to open it for anyone except Dr. Scaife and a nurse. You, Mrs. Jackson, must keep the doors locked while I am gone, and let no one enter, excepting, as I have told Smith, Dr. Scaife and the nurse who will accompany him. Do you understand?"

"Yes, sir."

"And you, Smith?"

"Yes, sir."

"Betty, put some thin slices of bread and meat between two small plates, and tie them in a napkin. Fill a bottle with milk. Quick! I have no time to lose."

He turned to the gaping boy who had brought the telegrams from Bellerby.

"Did you ride here on your own bicycle?" he asked.

"Yes, sir."

"Is it a strong machine?"

"Yes, sir."

"Lend it to me for the day, and I'll give you a sovereign."

"Right you are, sir!" came the hearty response. "Is there anything to go back to the post office?"

"Nothing. Raise the saddle of your bicycle, and see that the tires are in good order. Here's your money."

In an incredibly short time Armathwaite was pushing the bicycle up the steep road to the moor. He walked with long, swinging strides, and was soon lost to sight, because the trees behind the Grange hid the highway from any part of the house or grounds, and no one dared risk his wrath by going out into the road to watch him.

He climbed swiftly yet steadily, and conquered the worst part of the hill in fifteen minutes. Then he mounted the bicycle, and got over the ground rapidly. Thus, within less than an hour after Marguérite Ogilvey had escaped from the Grange – in the first instance by taking refuge in her bedroom, and, while Betty was talking to Whittaker, by slipping downstairs and climbing through a window in the library – Armathwaite saw her – a lonely figure in that far-flung moorland, walking in the direction of Leyburn.

Apparently, she had grabbed her hat and mackintosh coat when passing through the hall, and was carrying them, because the sun was glinting in her coils of brown hair. No stranger who met her would take her for other than a summer visitor. Certainly, no one would guess the storm of grief and terror that raged in her heart.

The bicycle sped along with a silent speed that soon lessened the distance between the two. Armathwaite did not wish to startle her by a too sudden appearance, so he rang the bell when yet fifty yards in the rear.

She turned instantly. When she saw who the pursuer was, she stopped. Neither spoke until Armathwaite had alighted, and the two had exchanged a long and questioning look.

Then she said:

"I'm going to my father. My place is with him. He must be hidden somewhere. I dare not wait until my mother came or wrote. I'm sorry, Bob. I could not even explain, though I should have telegraphed from York. Please don't ask me to say any more, or try to detain me."

"Any explanation is unnecessary," he said, smiling gravely into the sweet face with its aspect of unutterable pain. "I squeezed the facts out of Percy Whittaker. I'm afraid I hurt him, but that is immaterial."

"You made him tell you what he said to me?" and the brown eyes momentarily lost their wistfulness in a whirl of surprise and maidenly dismay.

"Yes."

"Everything – even his threat?"

"Everything."

"Oh, Bob! What am I to do? I must go to dad!"

"Undoubtedly; but I don't see why you should walk fourteen miles practically without food. I've brought some breakfast – of a sort. We'll go shares – half the sandwiches and half the milk. Then you'll ride on the step of the bike when the road permits, and trudge the remainder, and we'll be in Leyburn in half the time it would take you to walk. Here are the eatables, and this is just the place for a picnic."

He spoke and behaved in such a matter-of-fact way that he almost persuaded the bewildered girl that her conduct, and his, and Percy Whittaker's was ruled and regulated by every-day conditions. Placing the bicycle by the roadside, he produced the package prepared by Betty, and was uncorking the milk when a strangled sob caught his ear.

Marguérite had turned to hide her face, for a rush of emotion had proved too much for her self-control. Laying the bottle on a bank of turf, he caught the girl's shoulder, and turned her gently until her swimming eyes met his.

"There's nothing to be gained by hailing trouble half way, Meg," he said. "I don't wish to hide my belief that you are faced with conditions of a most extraordinary nature, but I am convinced that they will shape themselves differently to any forecast we can arrive at now. I followed you for two reasons. I wanted you to begin a long journey better prepared than was possible after flight on a moment's notice, and I did not want you to go away thinking I was in ignorance of your motives. I can tell you here and now that you will save your father, if his position is such that he needs safe-guarding; further, you will never be compelled to marry Percy Whittaker."

"Bob," she whispered brokenly. "I would rather die!"

Then Armathwaite flung restraint to the winds. He gathered her in his arms, and lifted the tear-stained face to his.

"Sweetheart," he said, "in the midst of such madness, let you and me be sane. I love you! You are the only woman I have ever loved. If I am allowed by Providence to begin life once more, you are the only woman I shall ever love. You were brought to me by a kindly fate, and I refuse to let you go now without telling you that you carry my heart with you. I ask for no answer at this moment. Some day in the future, when the clouds have lifted from your young life, I'll come to you – "

But Marguérite gave him her answer then. Lifting herself on tip-toe, she kissed him on the lips.

"Bob," she said tremulously, "I think I knew you were my chosen mate, if God willed it, when we parted on that first night in the Grange."

That first night! It was hardly thirty-six hours ago, yet these two had crowded into that brief space more tribulation than many lovers undergo in a lifetime; and sorrow knits hearts more closely and lastingly than joy.

Armathwaite could hardly credit the evidence of his senses. He had come to regard himself as so immeasurably older than this delightful girl that it seemed wildly improbable that she could return the almost hopeless love which had sprung into sudden and fierce activity in his breast. Yet, here she was, lying snug in his embrace, and gazing up at him with glistening eyes, her lips distended, her arms clasping him, her heart beating tumultuously in the first transports of passion.

He kissed her again and again, and could have held her there seemingly forever; but they were driven apart by a curious humming sound which bore a singular resemblance to the purr of a powerful automobile climbing a steep hill.

Marguérite disengaged herself from her lover's embrace with a flushing self-consciousness that was, in itself, vastly attractive.

"Bob," she murmured, stooping to pick up a fallen hat and mackintosh, "miracles are happening. Here are you and I forgetting a world in which evil things find a place, and here is a motor-car crossing Elmdale moor for the first time in history."

"It would not surprise me in the least if the visitant proved to be a flying-machine," he laughed, finding it hard to withdraw his ardent gaze from those flushed cheeks and that tangled mass of brown hair.

But the insistent drumming of an engine grew ever louder, and soon a long, low-built touring car swept into view over the last undulation. Apparently, it was untenanted save by a chauffeur, and Armathwaite's brain, recovering its balance after a whirl of delirium, was beginning to guess at a possible explanation of this strange occurrence, when the car slowed as it neared them, and finally halted.

"Are you Mr. Armathwaite, sir?" inquired the chauffeur.

"Yes."

The man lifted his cap.

"This is the car you ordered from York last night, sir."

"How thoughtful of you to follow!" cried Armathwaite, overjoyed by this quite unexpected bit of good fortune. He had not only forgotten that the car was on order – an impulse of the moment when he realized how tied he and all others were to the house if anything in the nature of a sudden and rapid journey came on the tapis– but, in any event, he had not looked for its arrival before mid-day, and the hour was yet barely ten o'clock.

"Your servants thought you might need me, sir," explained the man, "so I came after you. It's a scorcher of a road for the first mile, but the rest isn't so bad, if it keeps in the same condition."

Now, what had actually happened was this. The chauffeur had reached the Grange about twenty minutes after Armathwaite's departure. At that moment Smith was chaining and padlocking the gate, but Betty heard the snorting of the car, and came to find out its cause.

When the chauffeur told her that he was there in response to an order, the quick-witted girl told him to hurry up the moor road. He looked at it, and grinned.

"What! Take a valuable machine over a track like that! Not me!" he said.

"Can't it go there?" she inquired.

"It can go anywhere, for that matter."

"Are you afraid, then?"

"Afraid of what? D'ye think I want to twist an axle or smash a wheel?"

Then one of the laboring men joined in.

"I reckon you don't know t' maister," he said. "He wouldn't care a pin if you smashed yourself, but you've got to obey orders. He's one of the sort who has his own way. Good pay, no beer, an' hard work is his motter. It is, an' all."

Between maid and man, the chauffeur decided to risk it. When all was said and done, it would be a bad beginning in a new job if the servants reported his refusal to follow on.

"Is he far ahead?" he inquired.

"Mebbe a mile over t' top."

Starting the engine on the switch, he put the car at the hill, and, like many another difficulty, it was not insurmountable when tackled boldly. So, behold! A comfortable and easy way was opened to Leyburn, at any rate, and Armathwaite laughed gayly.

"Now we'll breakfast, and discuss," said he. "The gods have sent us a chariot!"