Chapter Five.
An Unexpected Ally
At some little distance from where we now stood was a sort of terrace-walk, for this side of the house, though not that of the front entrance, was evidently intended to be the best. The windows looking out this way were somewhat wider, one or two reaching to the ground, as if to give easy egress from the rooms within.
At one side of the walk was a carefully kept piece of lawn; on the other – that nearest the house – a border, even at this early season presenting a lovely, and, in contrast to the severity and gloom of the building itself, an almost startling blaze of colour. It was filled with spring flowers, tulips, hyacinths, etc, beautifully arranged, so that the groups and their shades harmonised perfectly together. It was evidently a sheltered spot, and evidently, too, this bit of garden ground was most carefully tended. One felt by instinct that it was somebody’s pet or hobby.
“How lovely!” Zella exclaimed under her breath. “I had no idea that there were flowers at this side. Naturally so, for of course we couldn’t see it from the road. We have no spring show to compare with this at the Manor-house, Regina!” And she was moving on eagerly, forgetting in her excitement for she was a great gardener – that we were trespassers, when suddenly there broke on our ears the peculiar sound of “tap tap” coming round the other side of the house, and in another moment we caught sight of the slowly approaching figure of the younger Mr Grey, the cripple brother, with his crutch.
In less time than it takes to tell it, we had fled – fled ignominiously – too startled to know whether we were ashamed of ourselves or only alarmed.
But as soon as we had reached the friendly shelter of the farther side of the bushes, my audacity reasserted itself.
“Stop, Isabel,” I whispered. “Do let us see what he is going to do. He can’t possibly have caught sight of us.”
“I don’t know that,” returned Isabel, who was all in a quiver. “He may have heard us, if he didn’t see us – the sound of our skirts as we rushed off, in this perfect silence.” And so it appeared. For, as we stood there peeping out, we saw that the newcomer stopped short and seemed to be listening attentively.
“Good gracious?” I ejaculated, “he has heard us. There is something rather uncanny about him. I dare say he has extra-acute eyes and ears – delicate people often have – for we made next to no sound. But we must stay here for the present,” I continued, rather pleased, in spite of our alarm, that we were forced into remaining where we were, as with care it was quite possible to watch the newcomer.
“Do be quiet,” said Isabel in a whisper, speaking, for once, almost crossly. “Your voice will be heard if you don’t take care.”
I subsided meekly enough, for I felt conscious that in my excitement I had not been very cautious. So we stood there like two naughty children, as indeed in a sense we were, furtively watching the poor man’s movements. It was touching to see him. He walked and stooped with difficulty, but his heart was evidently in his work as he carefully removed any dead flowers and leaves and raised here and there a drooping tulip in need of support, standing still now and then, while he drew back a few paces, to enjoy apparently the whole beautiful effect of the lovely colours.
“I dare say,” I thought to myself, for I did not venture to speak at all, – “I dare say he is an artist as well as an amateur gardener. If so, he is not so much to be pitied after all, though he must long sometimes to pull down that hideous house!”
He went on quietly attending to the borders for some little time, having apparently reassured himself as to the sounds he had heard. And at last, when he had moved on a little, Isabel touched my arm, whispering —
“Don’t you think we might go now?”
I agreed, and we were on the point of stealing away, when another little incident revived our curiosity, and made us stop short. We heard a whistle; in response to it the cripple raised himself from bending over a flower-bed and listened. The whistle was repeated, and then Mr Grey called out —
“Here I am – waiting for you.”
“Your brother wants you for a moment,” was the reply, in a man’s voice undoubtedly, though assuredly not that of a servant. “He won’t keep us long, and then we can – ” But the rest of the sentence was inaudible.
The cripple moved in the direction of the voice, and as he turned the corner of the house, the tap of his crutches growing fainter, we heard a cheery voice greeting him and the sound of laughter, to our amazement, reached our ears.
“There now!” I exclaimed. “Perhaps you’ll be convinced at last, Isabel! There is a fifth person living in that house.”
“Wait till we are outside to talk about it, for goodness’ sake,” said Isabel. “I never knew any one so impulsive as you are, Regina.”
But I was too elated by what I considered our successful investigations, even though to some extent they had but deepened the mystery, to take offence.
We closed the door in the wall cautiously, for I was rather afraid of its shutting with a spring, and thus debarring us from ever making use of it again. And as soon as we were safely outside I took up the thread of my discourse.
“You see, Isabel,” I went on, “the person who whistled and called was a man evidently, and a gentleman, and assuredly not the elder brother, as he spoke of him. I believe in my heart that it was the very man I met the other day – possibly the one you met some time ago.”
Isabel looked perplexed and a little worried. Her nerves had suffered with the morning’s excitement and adventures, which in my case had only stimulated my curiosity and audacity.
“Perhaps so,” she replied; “but really, Regina, I wish you’d forget about it. I never felt so ashamed and frightened in my life as when we were hiding behind these bushes.”
“I do think you are exaggerating,” I said, gently I hope; for though I was rather provoked by her want of adventurous spirit, as I called it to myself, I was also sorry for her, and at the bottom of my heart I almost think I felt a little guilty for involving her in anything that her father would disapprove of. Possibly, too, though I did not acknowledge it to myself, the salve which I applied to my own misgivings was not altogether effectual, though I proceeded to use it for Isabel’s benefit.
“Don’t you see,” I continued, “we may perhaps be on the way to be of real use to these poor people by finding out a little more about them? I would not have minded – indeed I was almost hoping for it – if the cripple Mr Grey had seen us and asked what we wanted.”
“Oh,” exclaimed Isabel, “I should have died of shame!”
“Not at all,” I replied. “We could easily have said that we were tempted by the open doorway to take a look at the grounds; or even,” I proceeded, “we might have asked him if he knew that the door had been left open, as we felt sure it was not intended to be!”
“That would have been,” said Isabel sharply, “not – ”
“You are not to say that it would have been untrue,” I interrupted rather indignantly. “It would only have been part of the truth, I allow, but still – ”
“Oh, well, don’t let us quarrel about it,” said Isabel, smiling; “but I do think, Regina, we had better not continue our investigations; we might get ourselves, and possibly other people, into trouble somehow.”
“Ourselves perhaps,” I agreed, “but not other people, that I can see. And I don’t mind risking something myself, if it could do any good.”
“It might do harm,” Isabel persisted. “Whatever it is, the motive must be of the strongest – the Greys’, I mean – which compels them to live as they do. And any attempt at breaking down the barrier might lead to mischief that we cannot picture to ourselves, so completely in the dark as we are.”
I did not agree with her, or perhaps, to speak more accurately, my true judgment was more than half convinced, but my self-will would not allow me to be guided by it.
The result was, that I felt, and probably appeared, very cross. But an unexpected distraction of my thoughts was in store. That afternoon’s post brought two letters for me, both with the same news, though from different sources. One was from mother and one from Moore.
They announced that an epidemic of some kind, though not of a very serious nature, had broken out in his “house,” and that the boys were disbanded for two or three weeks, Moore amongst them, as no exceptions could be made under the circumstances, though as it was an illness he had already had, he was considered proof against infection.
“He is coming home,” wrote my mother, “at once. It is a great pity, and I shall not know what to do with him alone here. He will miss you so dreadfully. If it were not a shame to propose it, I should be inclined to shorten your visit.”
And Moore’s lamentations were even more outspoken.
“Do come back as soon as ever you can, Reggie,” he wrote. “I really can’t stand home without you, and you can go back to Millflowers again later.”
I looked up gravely.
“Isabel,” I exclaimed, “I must go home;” and I told her what my letter contained.
Isabel looked greatly distressed.
“Oh, no, Regina,” she replied, “you cannot leave us yet. You have been here barely a fortnight, and you were to stay five or six weeks at least. I should feel so unhappy if you left just now,” she went on, “for – I don’t quite know how it is – I feel as if I had been rather disagreeable to you about that tiresome old Grim House, but I am sure I didn’t mean to be so. Only – ”
“You are quite right,” I replied; “quite right not to do anything that you are at all afraid might vex your father;” at which Isabel’s face cleared. She little suspected that I was saying to myself that I, not being Mr Wynyard’s daughter, was not restricted in the same way.
“I am so glad,” she said, “that you see it that way now, for that is my principal reason, though it is true too that I am naturally cowardly in some ways. I have not got your spirit and love of adventure. But as to your going home now, it really cannot be thought of. We must plan something. Stay! I have got an idea. Wait here a moment, Regina; I will be back directly.”
She ran off to look for her father, I felt sure. We were sitting in the drawing-room; it was nearly tea-time, and in a few moments she reappeared, followed by Mr Wynyard, her face fall of pleasure.
“It is all right,” she began. “I knew it would be. Regina, Moore is to come here as soon as it can be managed. Father says so.”
“Yes,” Mr Wynyard agreed, “it is by far the best solution of the difficulty. There is no fear of infection. Isabel has had all these childish illnesses long ago – and you too, Regina, I suppose? Otherwise your mother would not think of your returning home to meet your brother.”
“Yes,” I answered, “Moore and I, and Horry, I think, had scarlet fever and all these things together. It would be quite delightful to have Moore here, if you are sure he would not be at all in the way. He is really not a tiresome kind of boy, I must say.”
“No, indeed,” exclaimed Isabel. “We saw that at Weissbad, when he was so often alone with you and me, Regina, and quite content with our society.”
“In some ways,” I said, “the others call me more of a boy than him at home;” and I reddened a little, feeling half ashamed of the confession before Mr Wynyard. But he did not seem to mind it; rather the other way indeed.
“It would do Zella no harm to have a little of the boy element instilled into her,” he said with a smile. “But there is no time to be lost in arranging this new plan. Let me see! Must Moore go home first? Yes, I suppose it is on the way.”
“I think it would be better,” I replied. “Winchester is really only a short way from home, and he is sure to want to pick up things there. I do hope father won’t think it too far for him to come for so short a time.”
“It need not be so short a time, as far as we are concerned,” said Mr Wynyard hospitably. “But of course the boy will have to get back to school again whenever he can. I’ll tell you what,” he went on, “I will write to your father myself, which I think will ensure Moore’s being allowed to come.”
“Oh, thank you,” I said gratefully, and indeed I felt so.
“Your father is very kind,” I said to Isabel when we were by ourselves. “I am getting to feel much less afraid of him.”
Isabel looked pleased at this.
“I told you so,” she said. “I can’t imagine being afraid of him unless I knew I was doing something wrong.”
Her words recalled our discussion about the Grim House.
“I know,” I thought to myself, “who would sympathise with me about it to the full, and that’s Moore. I wonder if I dare tell him.”
Then another warning returned to my mind – that of Jocelyn.
“How curious that he should have thought of such a possibility as Moore’s coming here,” I said to myself. “I feel half inclined to look at things from the ‘Kismet’ point of view. ‘What is to be, will be.’ If Moore’s coming here helps me to go on with my investigations without involving Isabel, which I now see I have no right to do, it will seem as if it was all meant. That’s to say, if I make up my mind to tell him about it, in spite of Jocelyn’s fatherly advice.”
And in my heart I think I knew that I should never have the resolution to keep the fascinating subject to myself, once Moore was on the spot.
All came to pass as we had hoped. Moore arrived, brimful of delight, and very much inclined to think the epidemic at school an unlimited subject of congratulation. He was looking very well, I was pleased to see – altogether in a mood for viewing everything with rose-coloured spectacles.
“This is a jolly place, Regina,” he confided to me when we were strolling about the first morning after his arrival, I acting “cicerone,” as Isabel was engaged in her housekeeping cares. “Now I hope you’ll give me some credit for knowing what I’m about when I make friends with people! Do you remember how angry you were that day at Weissbad when I came in and told you I had been speaking to the Wynyards? Even mother looked rather funny about it.”
“What nonsense!” I exclaimed. “Angry! I wasn’t the least angry! I was only rather shy at the idea of making new acquaintances.”
“And the Paynes,” Moore resumed, “they were thoroughly nice people too. By-the-bye, Reggie, I forgot to tell you that Leo, the youngest, is almost sure to come to my ‘house’ next term. I knew that he was down for Winchester, but I had no idea we’d be together. It isn’t quite certain yet – it depends on a vacancy.”
“That will be nice for you,” I replied, half absently. Not that I had not taken in what he said, but that his mention of the Payne family had recalled to me Rupert’s talk of sensational stories, “facts stranger than fiction,” which had come to his knowledge, and I began wishing that I could see him again to talk over the Millflowers mystery, now that I had seen for myself the Grim House and its inhabitants. But on that occasion I did not allude to it to Moore.
For some days our pleasantest anticipations were realised. Moore proved a great acquisition in our drives and walks. Mr Wynyard encouraged to the full everything of the kind, and gratified me more than once by saying that active exercise in the open air, and all that sort of thing, was “so good for Isabel.”
“A little roughing it would really do her no harm,” he said. “She is as unselfish and conscientious as she can be, but life has been in some ways perhaps too sheltered for her. I don’t know how she could ever stand alone, as she may have to do any day,” he added with a little sigh which touched me.
“But you are not at all old, Mr Wynyard,” I said, rather brusquely perhaps. “You can’t be older than father, and we look upon him as – oh! quite a young man. Then, too, Margaret, Mrs Percy, and her husband are devoted to dear Zella!”
“Yes,” he agreed, “but still the best of brothers and sisters are not like a parent, and I suppose, to confess the truth, I have spoilt Zella a little. Circumstances seemed to make it inevitable.”
I knew that he alluded to his wife’s death, so I said no more. But the effect of this little conversation was, I now see, somewhat to increase my own self-confidence, and rather to lead me to think more than heretofore that in some ways Isabel was babyish, and almost morbid in her scrupulous conscientiousness.
Between us, with the best intentions in the world, her father and I at this juncture went rather to an extreme with poor Isabel. She was very far from being as strong as I constitutionally, and when she hung back, as happened now and then, from any scheme of long walks or drives, which Moore and I, in spite of his past delicacy, felt quite equal to, we urged her joining us, Mr Wynyard always endorsing what was said.
“You mustn’t be lazy, my dear child,” he would say rallyingly; “now that you have got companions you must profit by them.”
And she always gave in, accusing herself of want of energy and spirit, when in reality she was not fit for what she attempted.
I have often felt sorry, now that years and greater experience have taught me better – I have often felt sorry to think of the efforts dear little Isabel must have made in order to keep up with us and to please her father. But after all, no very great harm was done, for the poor child caught cold one day through getting drenched in a thunderstorm, which necessitated a visit from the doctor, who had known her all her life, and who pronounced her decidedly “below par.”
Any suggestion of chest danger terrified Mr Wynyard, for Zella’s mother had died of consumption; so her catching cold was probably a benefit in disguise, as it put a stop once for all to her forcing herself to do more than she was able for. She took it to heart so much, that Moore and I felt on our mettle to prove to her, and indeed also to Mr Wynyard, who blamed himself almost unduly, that we could manage to amuse ourselves very well indeed in spite of our regret at her absence. For fully a week she was not able to go out at all, and during that week – well, I must narrate what happened circumstantially.
I think it was on one of our expeditions before Isabel fell ill, and not many days after his arrival, that Moore, on our return to Millflowers one evening down the hill-road, noticed the Grim House for the first time. Hitherto I had not mentioned it to him. I think I was secretly a little afraid of awakening his curiosity on the subject, and conscious that if I talked of it at all, I should probably be tempted to tell him all I knew.
He stopped short, I remember, at the point on the road whence the best, in fact the only, view of the place was attainable.
“What a gloomy-looking house!” he exclaimed. “It might be a small prison or a private lunatic asylum.”
“On the contrary,” said Isabel. “Such places, asylums at least, are now-a-days very cheerful-looking, I believe.”
“But what is the place?” he asked, and Isabel told him, shortly enough, that it was a private residence, though its inhabitants kept very much to themselves, and then she changed the subject. Something in her tone, however, must have struck him, though she said so little, for afterwards, when we were alone – I cannot quite remember if it were the same day, or not till we were again passing the spot – he alluded to it.
“Is there anything queer about that house?” he inquired. “Isabel seemed mysterious! Is it haunted or anything of that kind? How jolly it would be if it were,” and his eyes gleamed. “I’d find my way into it somehow, and make the fellows stare at my adventures when I get back to school.”
“No,” I said cautiously, “it is not haunted;” but my tone – perhaps I did it purposely – only stimulated his inquisitiveness.
He glanced at me suspiciously.
“It is something, then?” he exclaimed. “And you know about it, and don’t mean to tell me! It’s too bad! You know you can trust me if it’s a secret.”
“It isn’t exactly a secret,” I replied. “But if I do tell you, Moore, you must promise me – solemn word of honour – that you’ll not – ”
I stopped and hesitated. It was rather difficult to say what I wanted him to promise, for the very suggestion that he was not to think of doing certain things was enough to put them into his head.
“Promise you what?” he asked, seeing my hesitation.
“Well,” I resumed, “that you won’t do anything in the way of trying to discover the mystery – for a mystery there is – without telling me.”
The word was enough. The boy would have promised me anything and everything under its fascinating influence.
“Of course I will,” he replied. “Honour bright! So fire away, Regina.”
So I did as he asked, and before we reached home, my brother was as fully versed in the whole details of the queer story as I was myself, inclusive of my own bit of adventure, the advent of the stranger; not to speak of a very fair amount of entirely groundless speculations which I had got into the habit of indulging in.