Delphi Complete Works of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (Illustrated) (587 page)

“Here’s some one a-comin’,” cried Stevens. “Clear out from here — it’s the governor’s orders.”

“Oh, do let me stay and say one word to the lady!” Stevens seized his great stick savagely. “Clear out!” he cried in a hoarse, angry voice, and made a step towards her as if he would strike her. She shrank away from him, and then, a sudden thought seizing her, she turned and ran through the woods as fast as her feeble strength would allow. The instant that she was out of sight, Stevens very deliberately and carefully tore up the little slip of paper with which she had entrusted him, and scattered the pieces to the wind.

CHAPTER XXXIX
.

A GLEAM OF LIGHT
.

Kate Harston fled as quickly as she could through the wood, stumbling over the brambles and crashing through the briars, regardless of pain or scratches or anything else which could stand between her and the possibility of safety. She soon gained the shed and managed to mount on to the top of it by the aid of the barrel. Craning her neck, she could see the long dusty lane, with the bare withered hedges upon either side, and the dreary line of the railway embankment beyond. There was no pony-carriage in sight.

She hardly expected that there would be, for she had taken a short cut, and the carriage would have to go some distance round. The road along which it was travelling ran at right angles to the one which she was now overlooking, and the chances were equal as to whether the lady would turn round or go straight on. In the latter case, it would not be possible for her to attract her attention. Her heart seemed to stand still with anxiety as she peered over the high wall at the spot where the two roads crossed.

Presently she heard the rattle of wheels, and the brown pony trotted round the corner. The carriage drew up at the end of the lane, and the driver seemed to be uncertain how to proceed. Then she shook the reins, and the pony lumbered on along the road. Kate gave a cry of despair and the last ray of hope died away from her heart.

It chanced, however, that the page in the carriage was just at that happy age when the senses are keen and on the alert. He heard the cry, and glancing round he saw through a break in the hedge that a lady was looking over the wall which skirted the lane they had passed. He mentioned the fact to his mistress.

“Maybe we’d better go back, ma’am,” he said.

“Maybe we’d better not, John,” said the buxom lady. “People can look over their garden walls without our interfering with them, can’t they?”

“Yes, ma’am, but she was a-hollerin’ at us.”

“No, John, was she though? Maybe this is a private road and we have no right to be on it.”

“She gave a holler as if some one was a-hurtin’ of her,” said John with decision.

“Then we’ll go back,” said the lady, and turned the pony round.

Hence it came about that just as Kate was descending with a sad heart from her post of observation, she was electrified to see the brown pony reappear and come trotting round the curve of the lane, with a rapidity which was altogether foreign to that quadruped’s usual habits. Indeed, the girl turned so very white at the sight, and her face assumed such an expression of relief and delight, that the lady who was approaching saw at once that it was no common matter which had caused her to summon them.

“What is it, my dear?” she cried, pulling up when she came abreast of the place. Her good, kind heart was touched already by the pleading expression upon the girl’s sweet face.

“Oh, madam, whoever you may be,” said Kate, in a low, rapid voice, “I believe God has sent you here this day. I am shut up in these grounds, and shall be murdered unless help comes.”

“Be murdered!” cried the lady in the pony-carriage, dropping back in her seat and raising her hands in astonishment.

“It is only too true,” Kate said, trying to speak concisely and clearly so as to enforce conviction, but feeling a choking sensation about her throat, as though an hysterical attack were impending. “My guardian has shut me up here for some weeks, and I firmly believe that he will never let me out alive. Oh, don’t, pray don’t think me mad! I am as sane as you are, though, God knows, what I have gone through has been enough to shake my reason.”

This last appeal of Kate’s was in answer to an expression of incredulity and doubt which had passed over the face of the lady below. It was successful in its object, for the ring of truth with which she spoke and the look of anxiety and terror upon her face were too genuine to be mistaken. The lady drew her rein so as to bring the carriage as near the wall as was possible without losing sight of Kate’s face.

“My dear,” she said, “you may safely tell me everything. Whatever I can do to help you shall be done, and where I am powerless there are others who are my friends and may be of assistance. Scully is my name — Mrs. Lavinia Scully, of London. Don’t cry, my poor girl, but tell me all about it, and let us see how we can put matters right.”

Thus encouraged, Kate wiped away the tears which had been brought to her eyes by the unwonted sound of a friendly voice. Leaning forward as far as she could, and preventing herself from falling by passing her arm round a great branch which shot across the top of the shed, she gave in as few words as she could a detailed account of all that had befallen her. She described her guardian’s anxiety that she should marry his son, her refusal, their sudden departure from London, their life at the Priory, the manner in which she was cut off from all human aid, and the reasons which made her believe that an attempt would be made upon her life. In conclusion, she narrated the scene which had occurred that very morning, when her guardian had tempted her to commit suicide. The only incident which she omitted from her story was that which had occurred the night before, for she felt that it might put too severe a tax upon Mrs. Scully’s credulity. Indeed, looking back at it, she almost persuaded herself that the sight which she had seen might be some phantom conjured up by her own imagination, weakened as she was in mind and in body.

Having concluded her narrative, she wound up by imploring her new-found friend to assist her by letting her friends in London know what had become of her and where she was. Mrs. Scully listened with a face which expressed alternately the most profound pity and the most burning indignation. When Kate had finished, she sat silent for a minute or more entirely absorbed in her own thoughts. She switched her whip up and down viciously, and her usually placid countenance assumed an expression so fierce that Kate, looking down at her, feared that she had given her offence. When she looked up at last, however, she smiled so pleasantly that the poor girl was reassured, and felt instinctively that she had really found a true and effective friend at last.

“We must act promptly,” she said, “for we don’t know what they may be about, or what their plans are for the future. Who did you say your friends were?”

“Dr. Dimsdale, of Phillimore Gardens, Kensington.”

“Hasn’t he got a grown-up son?”

“Yes,” said Kate, with a slight flush on her pale cheeks.

“Ah!” cried the good lady, with a very roguish smile. “I see how the land lies. Of course, of course, why shouldn’t it? I remember hearing about that young man. I have heard about the Girdlestones also. African merchants they were in the City. You see I know all about you.”

“You know Tom?” Kate cried in astonishment.

“Oh, don’t let us get talking of Tom,” said Mrs. Scully good-humouredly. “When girls get on a subject of that sort there’s an end to everything. What I want now is business. In the first place I shall drive down to Bedsworth, and I shall send to London.”

“God bless you!” ejaculated Kate.

“But not to Phillimore Gardens. Hot-headed young men do foolish things under such circumstances as these. This is a case that wants careful management. I know a gentleman in London who is just the man, and who I know would be only too proud to help a lady in distress. He is a retired officer, and his name is Major Clutterbuck — Major Tobias Clutterbuck.”

“Oh, I know him very well, and I have heard of you, too,” said Kate, with a smile. “I remember your name now in connection with his.”

It was Mrs. Scully’s turn to blush now. “Never mind that,” she said. “I can trust the major, and I know he will be down here at a word from me. I shall let him have the facts, and he can tell the Dimsdales if he thinks it best. Good-bye, dear; don’t be unhappy any more, but remember that you have friends outside who will very quickly set all right. Good-bye!” and waving her hand in encouragement, the good widow woke up the pony, which had fallen fast asleep, and rattled away down the lane in the direction from which she had come.

CHAPTER XL
.

THE MAJOR HAS A LETTER
.

At four o’clock Mr. Girdlestone stepped into the Bedsworth telegraph office and wired his short message. It ran thus: “Case hopeless. Come on to-morrow with a doctor.” On receipt of this he knew by their agreement that his son would come down, bringing with him the man of violence whom he had spoken of at their last interview. There was nothing for it now but that his ward should die. If he delayed longer, the crash might come before her money was available, and then how vain all regrets would be.

It seemed to him that there was very little risk in the matter. The girl had had no communication with any one. Even of those around her, Mrs. Jorrocks was in her dotage, Rebecca Taylforth was staunch and true, and Stevens knew nothing. Every one on the country side had heard of the invalid young lady at the Priory. Who would be surprised to hear that she had passed away? He dare not call in any local medical man, but his inventive brain had overcome the difficulty, and had hit upon a device by which he might defy both doctors and coroner. If all went as he had planned it, it was difficult to see any chance of detection. In the case of a poorer man the fact that the girl’s money reverted to him might arouse suspicion, but he rightly argued that with his great reputation no one would ever dream that such a consideration could have weight with him.

Having sent the telegram off, and so taken a final step, John Girdlestone felt more at his ease. He was proud of his own energy and decision. As he walked very pompously and gravely down the village street, his heart glowed within him at the thought of the long struggle which he had maintained against misfortune. He passed over in his mind all the successive borrowings and speculations and makeshifts and ruses which the firm had resorted to. Yet, in spite of every danger and difficulty, it still held up its head with the best, and would weather the storm at last. He reflected proudly that there was no other man in the City who would have had the dogged tenacity and the grim resolution which he had displayed during the last twelve months. “If ever any one should put it all in a book,” he said to himself, “there are few who would believe it possible. It is not by my own strength that I have done it.”

The man had no consciousness of blasphemy in him as he revolved this thought in his mind. He was as thoroughly in earnest as were any of those religious fanatics who, throughout history, have burned, sacked, and destroyed, committing every sin under heaven in the name of a God of peace and of mercy.

When he was half-way to the Priory he met a small pony-carriage, which was rattling towards Bedsworth at a great pace, driven by a good-looking middle-aged lady with a small page by her side. The merchant encountered this equipage in a narrow country lane without a footpath, and as it approached him he could not help observing that the lady wore an indignant and gloomy look upon her features which was out of keeping with their general contour. Her forehead was contracted into a very decided frown, and her lips were gathered into what might be described as a negative smile. Girdlestone stood aside to let her pass, but the lady, by a sudden twitch of her right-hand rein, brought the wheels across in so sudden a manner that they were within an ace of going over his toes. He only saved himself by springing back into a gap of the hedge. As it was, he found on looking down that his pearl grey trousers were covered with flakes of wet mud. What made the incident more perplexing was that both the middle-aged lady and the page laughed very heartily as they rattled away to the village. The merchant proceeded on his way marvelling in his heart at the uncharitableness and innate wickedness of unregenerated human nature.

Good Mrs. Scully little dreamed of the urgency of the case. Had she seen the telegram which John Girdlestone had just despatched, it is conceivable that she might have read between the words, and by acting more promptly have prevented a terrible crime. As a matter of fact, with all her sympathy the worthy woman had taken a large part of Kate’s story with the proverbial grain of salt. It seemed to her to be incredible and impossible that in this nineteenth century such a thing as deliberate and carefully planned murder should occur in Christian England. That these things occur in the abstract we are ready to admit, but we find it very difficult to realise that they may come within the horizon of our own experience. Hence Mrs. Scully set no importance upon Kate’s fears for her life, and put them down to the excited state of the girl’s imagination. She did consider it, however, to be a very iniquitous and unjustifiable thing that a young girl should be cooped up and separated from all the world in such a very dreary place of seclusion as the Priory. This consideration and nothing more serious had set that look of wrath upon her pleasant face, and had stirred her up to frustrate Girdlestone and to communicate with Kate’s friends.

Her intention had been to telegraph to London, but as she drove to Bedsworth she bethought her how impossible it would be for her within the limits of a telegram to explain to her satisfaction all that she wanted to express. A letter, she reflected, would, if posted now, reach the major by the first post on Saturday morning. It would simply mean a few hours’ delay in the taking of steps to relieve Kate, and what difference could a few hours more or less make to the girl. She determined, therefore, that she would write to the major, explaining all the circumstances, and leave it to him what course of action should be pursued.

Mrs. Scully was well known at the post office, and they quickly accommodated her with the requisites for correspondence. Within a quarter of an hour she had written, sealed, stamped, and posted the following epistle: —

“DEAREST TOBY,

“I am afraid you must find your period of probation very slow. Poor boy! what does he do? No billiards, no cards, no betting — how does he manage to get through the day at all? Smokes, I suppose, and looks out of the window, and tells all his grievances to Mr. Von Baumser. Aren’t you sorry that ever you made the acquaintance of Morrison’s second floor front? Poor Toby!

“Who do you think I have come across down here? No less a person than that Miss Harston who was Girdlestone’s ward. You used to talk about her, I remember, and indeed you were a great admirer of hers. You would be surprised if you saw her now, so thin and worn and pale. Still her face is very sweet and pretty, so I won’t deny your good taste — how could I after you have paid your addresses to me?

“Her guardian has brought her down here and has locked her up in a great bleak house called the Priory. She has no one to speak to, and is not allowed to write letters. She seemed to be heart-broken because none of her friends know where she is, and she fears that they may imagine that she has willingly deserted them. Of course, by her friends she means that curly-headed Mr. Dimsdale that you spoke of. The poor girl is in a very low nervous state, and told me over the wall of the park that she feared her guardian had designs on her life. I can hardly believe that, but I do think that she is far from well, and that it is enough to drive her mad to coop her up like that. We must get her out somehow or another. I suppose that her guardian is within his rights, and that it is not a police matter. You must consider what must be done, and let young Dimsdale know if you think best. He will want to come down to see her, no doubt, and if Toby were to come too I should not be sorry.

“I should have telegraphed about it, but I could not explain myself sufficiently. I assure you that the poor girl is in a very bad way, and we can’t be too energetic in what we do. It was very sad to hear the positive manner in which she declared that her guardian would murder her, though she did not attempt to give any reason why he should commit such a terrible crime. We saw a horrid one-eyed man at the gate, who appeared to be on guard to prevent any one from coming out or in. On our way to Bedsworth we met no less a person than the great Mr. Girdlestone himself, and we actually drove so clumsily that we splashed him all over with mud. Wasn’t that a very sad and unaccountable thing? I fancy I see Toby smiling over that.

“Good-bye, my dear lad. Be as good as you can. I know you’ve got rather out of the way of it, but practice works wonders.

“Ever yours,

“LAVINIA SCULLY.”

It happened that on the morning on which this missive came to Kennedy Place, Von Baumser had not gone to the City. The major had just performed his toilet and was marching up and down with a cigarette in his mouth and the United Service Gazette in his hand, descanting fluently, as is the habit of old soldiers, on the favouritism of the Horse Guards and the deterioration of the service.

“Look at this fellow Carmoichael!” he cried excitedly, slapping the paper with one, hand, while he crumpled it up with the other. “They’ve made him lieutinant-gineral! The demndest booby in the regiment, sir! A fellow who’s seen no service and never heard a shot fired in anger. They promoted him on the stringth of a sham fight, bedad! He commanded a definding force operating along the Thames and opposing an invading army that was advancing from Guildford. Did iver ye hear such infernal nonsense in your life? And there’s Stares, and Knight, and Underwood, and a dozen more I could mintion, that have volunteered for everything since the Sikh war of ‘46, all neglicted, sir — neglicted! The British Army is going straight to the divil.”

“Dat’s a very bad look-out for the devil,” said Von Baumser, filling up a cup of coffee.

The major continued to stride angrily about the room. “That’s why we niver have a satisfactory campaign with a European foe,” he broke out. “Our success is always half and half, and leads to nothing. Yet we have the finest raw material and the greatest individual fighting power and divilment of any army in the world.”

“Always, of course, not counting de army of his most graceworthy majesty de Emperor William,” said Von Baumser, with his mouth full of toast. “Here is de girl mit a letter. Let us hope dat it is my Frankfort money.”

“Two to one it’s for me.”

“Ah, he must not bet!” cried Von Baumser, with upraised finger.

“You have right, though. It is for you, and from de proper quarter too,

I think.”

It was the letter which we have already quoted. The major broke the seal and read it over very carefully, after which he read it again. Von Baumser, watching him across the table, saw a very anxious and troubled look upon his ruddy face.

“I hope dere is nothing wrong mit my good vriend, Madame Scully?” he remarked at last.

“No, nothing wrong with her. There is with some one else, though;” and with that he read to his companion all that part of his letter which referred to Miss Harston.

“Dat is no joke at all,” the German remarked; and the two sat for some little time lost in thought, the major with the letter still lying open upon his knee.

“What d’ye think of it?” he asked at last.

“I think dat it is a more bad thing than the good madame seems to think. I think dat if Miss Harston says dat Herr Girdlestone intends to kill her, it is very likely dat he has dat intention”

“Ged, he’s not a man to stick at troifles,” the major said, rubbing his chin reflectively. “Here’s a nice kettle of fish! What the deuce could cause him to do such a thing?”

“Money, of course. I have told you, my good vriend, dat since a year de firm has been in a very bad way indeed. It is not generally known, but I know it, and so do others. Dis girl, I have heard, has money which would come to de old man in case of her death. It is as plain as de vingers on my hand.”

“Be George, the thing looks very ugly!” said the major, pacing up and down the room. “I believe that fellow and his beauty of a son are game for anything. Lavinia takes the mather too lightly. Fancy any one being such a scounthrel as to lay a hand on that dear girl, though. Ged, Baumser, it makes ivery drop of blood in me body tingle in me veins!”

“My dear vriend,” Von Baumser answered, “it is very good of your blood for to tingle, but I do not see how dat will help the mees. Let us be practical, and make up our brains what we should do.”

“I must find young Dimsdale at once. He has a right to know.”

“Yes, I should find him. Dere is no doubt that you and he should at once start off for dis place. I know dat young man. Dere vill be no holding him at all when he has heard of it. You must go too, to prevent him from doing dummheiten, and also because good Madame Scully has said so in her letter.”

“Certainly. We shall go down togither. One of us will manage to see the young lady and find out if she requoires assistance. Bedad, if she does, she shall have it, guardian or no guardian. If we don’t whip her out in a brace of shakes me name’s not Clutterbuck.”

“You must remember,” remarked Baumser, “dat dese people are desperate. If dey intend to murder a voman dey vould certainly not stick at a man or two men. You have no knowledge of how many dere may be. Dere is certainly Herr Girdlestone and his son and de man mit de eye, but madame knows not how many may be at de house. Remember also dat de police are not on your side, but rather against you, for as yet dere is no evidence dat any crime is intentioned. Ven you think of all dis I am sure dat you vill agree with me dat it would be vell to take mit you two or tree men dat would stick by you through thin and broad.”