"Didn't I tell you?" the farmer cried.
But the artist only laughed. "Coincidence, Roscoe." The laugh lingered in
the boy's ears, amused, scoffing. "Your uncle going to be home tonight,
Joe?"
"I think so, Mr. Wingate."
"Tell him we'll be over."
Joe trudged on through the snow. What was this coincidence? Why had Mr.
Sweetman cried out, "Didn't I tell you?" Why were they coming to see
Uncle David? Had it something to do with the Farley house? Why had he
fled in panic from the orchard? Now that he was away from the place the
action seemed foolish and cowardly. It was one thing he would not tell
his uncle, for he could not imagine Dr. David Stone, blind though he was,
fleeing from anything.
At eight o'clock the artist and the farmer came to the house. Frederick
Wingate called: "Don't get up, Doctor," and Dr. Stone held out a hand of
warm greeting. Lady lay at his feet and stared unwinking at the visitors.
Joe Morrow stared, too. Was it the Farley house? Roscoe Sweetman,
ungainly and burly in his leather coat, his corduroy trousers and his
heavy boots, sat uncomfortably in a chair and rubbed a calloused hand
across a stubble of beard. Frederick Wingate, lithe and jaunty, walked
the floor and filled the boy's eyes. An opera cloak draped his shoulders,
his shirt was pleated, his collar was long and loose, and a silk tie was
gathered in a limp, nondescript bow. He seemed, in his dress, to belong
to another age; and this passion for adornments of the past was reflected
in his jewelry. His watch was old--a thick, heavy silver timepiece
elaborately scrolled that had been converted into an ungainly wrist
watch. And on the finger of his right hand was an enormous old-fashioned
ring of gold curiously twisted and knotted.
"Doctor," the artist announced, "I have brought you a man half out of his
wits."
"I know what I have heard," the farmer said, slowly and heavily.
"Just what did you hear, Sweetman?" Dr. Stone asked.
"It was last night. I was coming home from the village and took a short
cut across the Farley place to get quicker to my back door. I came close
past the house, and there were voices coming from the inside. That was
strange because there was no light on the inside. I have long had a key
from Mr. Rodgers, the real estate man, so I went home and got the key and
opened the front door. From inside came groans and cries of suffering.
Then I went and shouted for Mr. Wingate."
"And then?" the doctor asked.
The artist shrugged. "I brought flashlights. We searched the house from
cellar to attic. There was nobody there--nothing had been disturbed."
"Voices?" Dr. Stone suggested.
"He's imagining things," Frederick Wingate said impatiently. "There were
no voices."
"I heard them plain," the farmer insisted stonily.
"'Them'?" The blind man's voice had taken on a note of quick interest.
"What do you mean by 'them'?"
"Ghosts," said Mr. Sweetman. "If it was imagination with me, what was it
with Joe when he came running hard this afternoon?"
Ice crept up and down the boy's back, and his stomach chilled. His uncle
whistled long and softly.
"What did you hear or see, Joe?"
"Nothing."
"But you ran?"
"Yes, sir. From the orchard."
"Why?"
"I--I don't know."
"I do," Mr. Sweetman said with stolid insistence.
Frederick Wingate laughed. "A boy's vivid imagination, Doctor. A sudden
fear of the dark."
"I never knew Joe to be afraid of the dark," Dr. Stone said quietly. "You
still have the key, Sweetman? By the way, how did you come into
possession of the key?"
"I was thinking of buying," the farmer explained. "Mr. Rodgers gave me
the key so that I could look long at the house. Before that Mr. Wingate
had the key."