The House 'Round the Corner

"They are, indeed!" agreed Armathwaite, wondering what white-haired philosopher had come on the scene.

"You'll be Mr. Armathwaite, I'm thinkin'?" went on the other.

"Yes."

"My name's Smith, sir. Mr. Leadbitter, the policeman, told me you had taken on the Grange. Mebbe you'll be wantin' a gardener."

A light broke in on Armathwaite.

"Oh! Begonia Smith!" he cried. "Come back to the old love – is that it?"

"That's it, sir. She looks as if she wanted someone to look after her."

"Very well. Take charge. It's too late in the year to grow flowers or vegetables, but you can tidy things up a bit."

"A man who has his heart in the job, sir, can grow flowers at any time of the year. If I was to drop a line to the Nuttonby carrier to-night, I'd have a fair show of geraniums, calceolarias, lobelia, an' marguerite daisies in the front here by to-morrow evenin'."

Armathwaite was not one to check enthusiasm. Moreover, the notion of brightening the surroundings appealed to him.

"That would be sharp work," he said, eyeing the jungle.

Smith, with the suspiciousness of an old man eager to show that he was as good as some of the young ones, misunderstood that critical survey.

"Before Tom Bland brings the plants from the nursery I'll have a canny bit o' soil ready for 'em," he vowed.

"I'm sure of it," said Armathwaite, quickly alive to the aged gardener's repudiation of any doubt cast on his powers. "But surely you can be better employed than in mere digging. Are there laborers to be hired in the village?"

Smith swept the bare meadow-land with the appraising eyes of knowledge.

"Plenty of 'em, sir. The hay is in, an' they'll be slack enough now for another month."

"Very well. Send your order to Bland, including such implements as you may need. Hire three or four men, and get them busy. By the way, have you heard that Miss Meg is here?"

"Miss Meg! Our Miss Meg?"

Smith's astonishment was not feigned. He was slightly dazzled already by the way in which his new employer had received suggestions for the regeneration of the garden; now, he was thoroughly bewildered.

"Yes," said Armathwaite, watching him narrowly. "She may join us any minute. Of course, if she expresses any preference for a particular method of laying out the flower-beds, you will adopt it without question."

"Why, sir," said the old man simply, "if it's the same Miss Meg as I hev' in mind I'll not charge you a penny for what little I can do about the place. It'll be enough for me to see her bonnie face again an' hear her voice."

"I'll tell her that," laughed Armathwaite. "But we don't trade on those terms. You were happy here, I suppose, before Mr. Garth died?"

"No man could ha' worked for nicer people, sir. It bruk me all to pieces when t' maister tellt me to go. An' I never rightly understood it, until – until the sad thing happened you'll hev' heerd of. Mr. Garth was just as much cut up about me goin' as I was meself – that was the queer part of it… Sir, tell me this, D'you mean to live here any length o' time?"

"I hope so."

"Well, it's a bold thing to say, afore I've known ye five minnits, so to speak, an' there may be nowt in it other than owd wives' blether, but, if you ain't such a great lover o' stained glass, I advise ye to hev' yon staircase window riven out by t' roots."

"Now, why in the world do you say that?"

"I can't put it into plain words, sir, an' that's a fact, but I'd be glad to see the house shut o' that grinnin' death's head. I well remember my own father tellin' me there was a curse in it, an' many's the time Mr. Garth laughed at me when I spoke on't. But t' owd man's prophecy kem yam (came home) to roost at last. It did, an' all."

"What reason did your father give for his belief?"

"It's a strange story, sir, but I know bits of it are true, so mebbe the rest isn't so far out. D'you see yon farm?" and Begonia Smith pointed to the Burt homestead.

"Yes," said Armathwaite. "I met Mr. Burt yesterday."

"It's built on the ruins o' Holand Castle, sir. It's barely ten years ago since Mr. Burt used the last o' t' stones for his new barn. These Holands were descended from a lady who married Edward, the Black Prince. She had three sons by her first husband, an' one of 'em kem to this part o' Yorksheer. As was the way in them days, he set a church alongside his castle, and was that proud of his step-father, who would ha' bin King of England had he lived, that he had that painted glass window med in his memory. In later times, when there was a cry about images, the owner of Holand Castle had the window taken out an' hidden. Then, to please somebody or another, he set fire to t' church. After that, things went badly with him, an' the castle was deserted, because it had the plague, though I'm thinking the only plague was bad drainage. Anyhow, nigh on two hundred year ago, a man named Faulkner settled i' this quiet spot – you can guess what it was like, sir, when there was no railways, an' the nearest main road ran through Leyburn on t' other side o' t' moor. This Faulkner had gathered his brass in no good way, robbin' ships an' killin' folk on the high seas, it was said. He used to import hogsheads o' wine all the way from Whitby, an' rare good wood was in 'em, because I saw the last of 'em used as a rain barrel, an' I'm not seventy yet. The story goes that one night, in his cups, he was annoyed by the way the Black Prince looked at him, hard an' condemning like a judge. He got a pair o' big pistols, an' fired one at the Prince's face. He shot the eyes out, an' then aimed the second one at the mouth, but that burst, and blew his own right hand off, an' he bled to death afore they could plug the veins. His son, who was a chip o' t' owd block, hired a drunken artist to paint another face. This man knew nowt about stained glass, but he was a rare hand at drawin' terrible things, so he planned yon devil's phiz on oiled paper, an' stuck it between two thin plates o' glass, an' it was leaded in. If you was to climb on a ladder you'd find the difference at once between that part o' t' window an' all t' remainder. Many's the time I've seen it when nailin' up the wistaria, an', if I'd dared, would have put the hammer-head through it. But Mr. Garth refused to have it touched. He called it an antiquarian curiosity. All the same, he wouldn't have Miss Meg told about it, because it might have frightened her but he was always careful to see that the blind was not drawn across the front door on June evenings. Mebbe, you'll have heerd of a ghost, sir?"

A window was raised, and both men looked up. Marguérite was leaning out, her face aglow with pleasure.

"Why, if it isn't my own dear Smith!" she cried. "What lucky wind brought you here? Mr. Armathwaite, is this your doing? Smith, I'll be down in a jiffy. Mind you don't skedaddle before I come!"

Thus it befell that when Betty Jackson brought an early breakfast to Percy Whittaker, and she was asked where Miss Meg was, she answered:

"Out in the garden with Mr. Armathwaite. They're talkin' to Begonia Smith."

"Ah, I heard the voices. And who, pray, is Begonia Smith?" demanded Percy.

"The old gardener," said Betty. "He was here years an' years."

"Does Mr. Armathwaite mean to have the grounds attended to?"

"Looks like it, sir. He an' Miss Meg are measurin' bits, an' Smith's stickin' in pieces of wood. It'll be nice to have the place kept spick an' span again."

It was, perhaps, unfortunate that Meg's glimpse of her friend from the bedroom window should have brought her downstairs pell-mell without even a tap on Whittaker's door to inquire as to his well-being. It was perhaps, equally unfortunate that, when she remembered her remissness, she should have hurried to his room while her cheeks were flushed with the strong moorland air and her eyes shining with excitement.

"How are you, Percy dear?" she said, entering in response to his surly "Come in!" "I ought to have looked in on you sooner, but I could hardly believe my eyes when I saw Mr. Armathwaite in the garden with Smith, our own old gardener, whom I've known ever since I was a baby."

"Why has Armathwaite brought Smith here?" said Whittaker, peering at her fixedly, yet veiling those gray-green eyes under lowered lids.

"He didn't. Smith just came. But isn't it fortunate? He couldn't have found a better man, especially as Smith won't have any of the hard work on his hands. Mr. Armathwaite is giving him all the help he needs."

"To put the place in order?"

"Yes, of course. Smith promises marvels by to-morrow evening. But you haven't told me yet how your poor ankle feels."

"Never mind my poor ankle, Meg. I understood that the house was only let for three months?"

"Oh, much longer, I believe. Mr. Armathwaite —

"Confound Mr. Armathwaite! The devil fly away with Mr. Armathwaite! I'm sick of his name: I spit on him!" He literally writhed in a paroxysm of anger.

"Percy!"

He had chosen an unhappy word when he spoke of spitting on his rival. He reminded her of a toad, and she hated toads.

With a desperate effort he sat bolt upright in the bed.

"It's high time you and I had a few straight words, Meg," he said, and his voice lost its drawl, and the blasé manner was dropped. "You haven't forgotten, I suppose, that I've asked you to marry me?"

"No. Perhaps, if you rack your memory, you'll remember my answer," she said indignantly, for she felt the innuendo, and was resolved to resent it with vigor.

"No, oh, no! You said you didn't mean to marry anybody. That is a maidenly sentiment which is right and proper, and I agreed with it at the time. But the position has altered considerably during the past couple of days. As matters stand now, Meg, you may change your mind, and I beg to inform you that when you do marry, you'll marry me."

"It is hardly fair to take advantage of your accident," she said, with a quiet scorn that only served to infuriate him the more.

"What do you mean?" he said thickly.

"You are not usually so dense. If you were not ill you would never dare speak to me in that fashion."

"Never mind my illness. That will soon pass. And the density you complain of is not so one-sided as you imagine. I pointed out that the position had changed. Two days ago you were free to say 'Yes' or 'No' to my proposal. To-day you are not. You've got to marry me now, Meg. You'll be my wife by fair means or foul. Need I explain myself further?"

"It – it would be as well."

"All right. You've asked for it, and you'll get it. Unless I have your promise here and now that our marriage will take place as soon as I can stand on my feet again, I'll have your father arrested for murder."

"Percy, you must be mad even to think of such a dreadful thing!"

"No, not mad, but sane, very sane and wide-eyed. That fellow, Armathwaite, wants you, and he'll snap you up while I'm lying in this infernal house unless I strike now, and strike hard. I mean exactly what I say. I've thought it all out here, though I'm suffering pain enough to drive me crazy. But the mind can conquer the body, and my mind is not only clear, but fixed. Tell me you'll marry me, and I'll be patient as a saint. I'll take your word for it. I don't want you to sit by my side and hold my hand, as some sniveling fools would wish. You can plan your gardens with Armathwaite, and smile at him and talk with him as much as you please. But you've got to be my wife. Refuse, and the only way you can save your father from arrest is by getting Armathwaite to commit another murder."

"You brute!" she almost whispered. Her lips were quivering pitifully, but the fount of tears was dried, and her eyes blazed with an intensity that conquered Whittaker for the moment.

He lay back on the pillows again, with a smile that was twisted into a rictus of agony as a twinge wrung the injured limb.

"Call me any hard names you like," he muttered, closing his eyes under the intolerable contempt and loathing of Marguérite's steadfast scrutiny. "I've said what I had to say, and I'll not depart from a syllable of it. You'd have married me one of these days if you hadn't met Armathwaite. He has turned your pretty little head with his knight-errant airs and cavalry officer appearance. So I've determined to pull you back by force – see? You'll get over it in time. You and I will be as good chums as ever when this gale has blown itself out. Don't think I shall hold you less dear because your father placed himself in danger of the law. He escaped neatly before, and can escape again. I'll even tell you how. No one here knows – "

He opened his eyes again, to ascertain if some dawning interest in the project he was about to reveal – which was precisely that already set forth by Armathwaite – had driven the horror from her drawn features; but Marguérite had vanished. He listened for her footsteps, and could hear no sound. He shouted loudly, and tugged frenziedly at a bell. Betty came running, thinking he had fallen out of bed, and needed assistance.

"Why, whatever is the matter?" she cried, with true Yorkshire abruptness, when she found him lying as she had left him a few minutes earlier.

"Where is Miss Meg?" he raged. "Tell her she must come here – at once! Tell her that! Use those very words – come at once!"

"My! What a to-do about nowt! I was sure the house was on fire!"

"Confound you, will you go!" he shouted.

"Yes, I'll go! For goodness' sake, keep quiet. You're doing yourself no good by gettin' that excited. Oh, you needn't bawl at me! I'll find her. It isn't such a big place that she can be lost for more'n a minnit or two."

Grumbling audibly at the funny ways some folk had, to be sure, Betty went downstairs. She looked into the drawing-room, dining-room, and library, but Marguérite was in none of those places. Then she passed out into the garden; through the open window Whittaker could hear her asking Armathwaite if he knew where Miss Meg was. He caught the answer, too.

"Yes. She left me to visit Mr. Whittaker."

"She's not there, sir, and he has just sent me for her in an awful hurry," said Betty.

"Is it anything I can do for him?"

"No, sir. He wants Miss Meg."

"Well, she can't be far away. She may be in her bedroom. Go and look there. If I see her, I'll hand on your message."

Soon, when Betty had ransacked the house, she came to the conclusion that Marguérite had gone into the village. For some reason, on hearing this, Whittaker appeared to be calmer, and only growled an order that he was to be informed instantly of Miss Garth's return. Betty retreated to the kitchen. When the door was safely closed she said to her mother:

"That Percy Whittaker is daft, an' it's easy to see what ails him. If I was Miss Meg I wouldn't have him if he was hung with diamonds."

"You're nobbut a fond lass," commented Mrs. Jackson, cracking an egg on the side of a basin preparatory to emptying its contents into a frying-pan. "Always thinkin' of young men, like the rest of 'em. Poor Meg Garth has other things to bother her. If you hadn't lost a good father when you were too little to ken owt about it, you'd know what she's goin' through now."

"But she says her father is livin'," said Betty.

"Tell me summat fresh," retorted her mother. "Wouldn't it be better for her if he wasn't? You mark my words. There'll be a bonny row i' this house afore we're much older. Now, hurry up with t' toast. No matter what else happens, folk mun eat."

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 notAgainst Heaven's hand or will, nor bate a jotOf heart and hope; but still bear up and steerRight 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: