The Next Day
Dawn was only faintly creeping up through the avenues of the forest when
the last wagon, filled with tired merrymakers, drove away from Ripple.
The silence which dropped when they had gone was so appalling that Pam
turned to Sophy with actual consternation in her eyes.
“Is it always as deadly quiet as this?” she asked, and now it was hard
work to keep her voice from quavering. She did not realize that she was
worn out with all the excitement she had gone through.
“You don’t think of the quiet when you are used to it,” Sophy answered.
“At least, I never think about it; but of course our house is not so
remote as this. The fact is, you are so tired that you can hardly stand
on your two feet. Suppose you lie down for a little rest before your
grandfather comes back, and I will do the clearing up.”
“As if I should even dream of letting you work while I take my ease!”
cried Pam in a shocked tone. “I am quite sure that you must be as tired
as I am, only you are made of better stuff and will not cry out about
it. Let us do what is necessary as quickly as we can, then we will just
lie down and sleep the worst of it off. I wonder when Grandfather will
come back, and what he will say when he finds that I have come?”
“He ought to say how sorry he is that he was not here to give you a
welcome,” replied Sophy, as she moved to and fro straightening the
furniture, picking up bits of paper, and restoring the room to the
condition in which they had found it. The house door stood wide open,
and presently they heard the sound of a cow mooing in the barn.
“There are the animals to be fed, and if you are a London girl you will
not know much about milking.” Sophy had paused in her work of clearing
and was standing still with a frown on her face. She did not know very
much about it herself, for in the doctor’s household there were always
men or boys to do that sort of work. But she was going to help Pam all
she could, and if it entailed milking a cow, well, she did not intend to
be beaten at the business. She had seen cows milked often enough, the
operation looked fairly easy, and she was not afraid of the animals.
“I know that milk comes from cows—and coconuts, and that is about all,”
said Pam, shrugging her shoulders as she realized the extent of her
ignorance.
“Come and have your first lesson in milking, then.” Sophy caught up the
cleanest bucket she could find, and tied a towel over her best frock.
“We may have to feed pigs if there are any in the barn. If I had thought
about the live stock I should certainly have asked one of the menfolks
to stay and see us through with the morning chores. As it is, we must
just do the best we can until your grandfather comes home again.”
“You never know what you can do until you try,” exclaimed Pam, as she,
too, tied a towel over her frock in imitation of Sophy. The two stepped
out into the keen, crisp air of the morning, and went across grass which
sparkled with frost to the barn. They were closely followed by the dog.
The creature had apparently decided that Pam was one of the family, and
meant to treat her accordingly.
There were pigs and poultry to be fed, there was a cow to be milked and
turned into a little paddock, which sloped like a wedge into the forest.
There were half a score of sheep in the paddock also, but Sophy said
these would not need feeding, as they were quite able to get their own
living. When the “chores” were all done Pam went back to the house
feeling as if her education had taken great strides since the previous
day, and she envied the ease with which Sophy tackled all the mysteries
of milking and feeding.
The two were just deciding that, now the “chores” were done, they were
free to lie down and take a rest, when from the open door they caught
the sounds of horses approaching. A moment later two men in police
uniform rode up to the front of the house and dismounted.
“The police!” cried Sophy, and her face went as white as her blouse.
“Courage, Pam! I am afraid something must have happened to your
grandfather.”
Pam caught her breath in a little sobbing gasp, and clung to Sophy as
the men rode up and dismounted before the door of the house.
“Is Mr. Peveril at home?” demanded the elder of the two, and at the
question Pam’s courage instantly rose, for of course if the old man had
been found injured or dead the police would not ask if he were at home.
Putting Sophy gently in the background Pam came forward, flushing a
little as she looked into the strong, weather-beaten face of the
policeman. Her voice was quite steady as she answered:
“My grandfather is not at home just now, and we do not know when he will
be back, but we are expecting him at any minute.”
“Is Mr. Peveril your grandfather? I did not know he had any relatives,”
said the officer, and Pam noticed with exceeding dismay that he looked
as if he were sorry for her.
“Mr. Peveril has a daughter, my mother, who lives in England, and I have
come from there to live with Grandfather and take care of him,” she
said. Now there was defiance in her tone, for she was telling herself
that she did not want this man’s pity. Why should people pity her for
coming to live with her grandfather? It was horrid! Moreover, it was a
slur on his character, and because blood is thicker than water every
instinct of affection and defence of which Pam was capable rallied to
champion the old man.
The officer nodded. “What time did Mr. Peveril leave here yesterday?” he
asked. Then, suddenly recognizing Sophy, who had remained in the
background where Pam had thrust her, he said: “Good morning, Miss
Grierson; I am afraid we worked the Doctor rather hard last night.”
“Was Father called out last night?” cried Sophy in dismay. “Oh, I am
sorry for Mother, for Don and I were both away. I do hate for her to be
left alone like that. What time was Father called?”
“Between seven and eight o’clock. He was called to attend Sam Buckle,
whose wife had found him lying near the fence that divides his
quarter-section from Ripple. He was most fearfully battered, but just
alive. I fear there is not much hope of his recovery, he is so badly
knocked about.”
“Oh dear, oh dear, how truly dreadful!” gasped Sophy, and Pam, whose
senses were by this time quite abnormally acute, noticed that she turned
a glance full of pity upon herself.
“What time did Mr. Peveril leave here yesterday?” demanded the officer,
turning to Pam once more, and now his voice had a more peremptory ring.
“I do not know; he was not here when we came last night,” she faltered.
A chill dismay was creeping over her, and she was wondering why Sophy
looked so distressed, and why she had so carefully averted her face.
“What time did you come?” asked the officer sharply.
This time it was Sophy who answered.
“It must have been about half an hour, perhaps three-quarters, after
sundown. We came for a surprise party. We were in two wagons coming
along the trail when we met Miss Walsh, who in walking here from Hunt’s
Crossing had lost her way. We took her into our wagon and brought her
along with us. We found the house deserted, and stayed all night
enjoying ourselves. When the others went at dawn I remained with Miss
Walsh, who is a stranger and a city girl, so she would have been hard
put to it alone. That is all we know.”
“Can you remain here with Miss Walsh still, Miss Grierson? I will tell
your father you are here.”
“Oh, yes, I will stay, of course. I could not leave Miss Walsh alone at
such a time!” exclaimed Sophy, and there was such a thrill in her tone
that Pam’s face blanched with a sudden terror. What was the hidden
meaning of this compassion, and what had Sam Buckle’s accident to do
with her or her grandfather? But she could not ask the officer. Indeed,
she had no chance. Staying only to give a few instructions to Sophy, and
saying that he would probably look round that way later in the day, the
officer rode away accompanied by his companion, and the silence settled
down again.
All desire to sleep seemed to have vanished from both girls. Directly
they were alone, Pam turned to Sophy.
“Why did that man seem to pity me so much? Why should he come here to
know where Grandfather is?” she demanded.
Sophy put her hand up in protest.
“It may be nothing, of course; but when such things happen people always
jump to conclusions. Your grandfather and Sam Buckle have quarrelled
about that fence ever since I was a small girl; as often as Sam has put
it up your grandfather has broken it down. Maybe Sam had been putting
the fence up before he was found so badly hurt.”
A long moment of silence passed. Pam was staring at Sophy with dilated
eyes, and such a feeling of terror in her heart as she had never
experienced before. Then finally she found her tongue.
“Do you mean to tell me,” she asked, “that you think Grandfather injured
that poor man so dreadfully?”
Sophy put her arms about Pam in protecting wise, and her voice was kind
and soothing when she spoke.
“Dear,” she said, “Mr. Peveril was very likely nowhere near the place
where Sam Buckle was found, and when he comes back he will be able to
tell people where he has been; but until then you have this hard thing
to bear, and you will have to be as brave as ever you can.”
“Suppose he never does come back?” Pam shuddered violently, and then hid
her face in her hands, feeling that the trouble was really more than she
could bear.
“He will surely come back unless something has happened to him,” said
Sophy soothingly; then she bent over Pam’s bowed head and comforted her
as best she could. She succeeded so well that presently Pam suffered
herself to be persuaded into lying down. She promptly fell asleep then,
and lay wrapped in profound slumber while the hours of the hot, sunny
noon came and passed. Sophy slept too, but fitfully; there was a sense
of responsibility on her that kept her wakeful and alert. The house door
was open, and the big dog slumbered on the threshold. The creature
seemed to share Sophy’s wakefulness, for it kept lifting an uneasy head.
Once or twice it growled, although apparently there was nothing anywhere
near to growl at, except the chipmunks darting to and fro, busy in the
collection of their winter store of nuts.
Then far away along the trail from the westward came the faint beat of a
horse’s hoofs. Immediately the dog rose to its feet and stood growling,
while Sophy, who had been drifting into deeper slumber, also rose and
rubbed her eyes to get the sleepiness out of them.
“Pam,” she called softly, “Pam, dear, there is someone coming; you had
better wake up.”
But Pam was so sound asleep that it was hard work to rouse her. The
horseman was very near, indeed, before she had come to a real
understanding of what Sophy was saying. Then she stood for some seconds
swaying to and fro, more asleep than awake.
“There is water in the out-kitchen. Run, dip your face in the bucket,
you will feel better then!” urged Sophy, and Pam moved slowly away,
found the bucket of water and a coarse towel, dipped her face, and,
rubbing it vigorously, at once began to feel better. “Why, it is
Father!” Sophy fairly shouted with delight as a grey-haired man mounted
on a powerful black horse rode into view and lifted his whip in
salutation. He rode up to the doorstep, slid from his horse, and Sophy
rushed into his arms.
“The police told me that I should find you here, so I rode round this
way,” said Dr. Grierson, as he held his daughter with one hand and
lifted his hat to Pam with the other. “Is this Miss Walsh, of whom I
have been hearing? I am very pleased to meet you, but I am real sorry
that you should have been pitchforked, as it were, into such a peck of
trouble, my dear. I have heard of your mother very often. Quite the
belle of these parts she was, I should imagine, but more than a bit
headstrong. Do you take after her?”
“I don’t know,” answered Pam, a little dubiously, for she thought the
Doctor was making fun of her. “I am not so wise as my mother, and I am
always getting into muddles.”
“So did she, according to all accounts, so doubtless you are a chip off
the old block,” he said with a laugh; then he asked if Wrack Peveril had
come back.
“No; we have seen nothing of him,” Pam replied; and Sophy immediately
asked how Sam Buckle was.
“He is very bad indeed.” The Doctor’s tone was curt, a sure sign, as
Sophy knew, that there was not much hope. The Doctor simply hated having
his patients die, and he always behaved as if it were a personal affront
when they showed signs of slipping out of life.
“Has he said anything about—about who hurt him?” asked Pam. She was
determined to know all there was to be known, and she feared they would
hide things from her unless she asked right out.
“He has not said much of anything that we can understand except to
mutter over and over again that ‘it is his right, it is his right’,”
said the Doctor; and Pam suddenly felt a great sinking of heart, for why
should the injured man say words like those unless he were living over
again the quarrel with his neighbour?
“He is such a fearfully disagreeable man!” exclaimed Sophy, as if she
read the thought in the heart of Pam, and would give her comfort if she
could. “I never knew anyone yet who really liked Mr. Buckle; even his
own wife admits that he is a dreadfully hard man to live with. Father,
you will never get your money for attending him; he will say that he did
not call you himself, and so there is no obligation to pay you. That was
how he served you the time the tree fell on him and nearly killed him;
don’t you remember it?”
“Some people are made that way,” said the Doctor. “But I guess that I
shall be no poorer in the long run for doing my duty by my fellow
creatures. Would you two like Don to come and stay the night here with
you? It is a lonesome place for two girls.”
“We shall not mind, I think,” put in Sophy hastily. She was thinking of
her mother, and how Mrs. Grierson hated to be left at home at night with
the younger children only.
“Oh, no, we shall not mind!” cried Pam, who understood perfectly the
reason why Sophy did not want Don to come. She, for her own part, was
anxious to get used to being alone at Ripple. If her grandfather failed
to come back, she would have to do as best she could until her family
came out from England to live with her, so it was just as well to get
used to things. “We have the dog, and there are two guns in the
sitting-room; that is one each, and I don’t think we need more than
that.”
“If you take my advice you will leave the guns severely alone,” broke in
the Doctor hastily. “There is nothing so dangerous as fire-arms in the
hands of people who know nothing about them. We don’t want any more
tragedies in the neighbourhood just now.”
“Keep your mind easy, Dad,” said Sophy with a laugh. “The guns are here
right enough, but so far as I have been able to find there is not a dust
of powder or any shot on the place.”
“Hush, don’t talk of it!” cried Pam, holding up her finger in warning.
“All the time no one knows that we have no ammunition the guns will
serve their purpose. If we pointed the things full at any intruder he
would be properly scared, of course, and we should be in no danger, so
it would be quite right.”
“You will do!” said the Doctor heartily, patting Pam on the shoulder as
if she were a little schoolgirl. “Now I must go, but I will look along
to-morrow and let you know how Sam Buckle is getting on. Have you got
enough clothes, Sophy, or would you like Don to bring some over for you
this evening?”
“I have nothing but what I have on, and this is my best frock,” she
answered in a rueful tone, for her best frocks had to last a long time,
and this was only about the third time of wearing that one. “I would
spend the time I am here in helping Pam to clean this house down—very
needful work, too—but what can one do in a best frock?”
“I will ask your mother to put some things in a bag for you, then Don
shall ride over with them,” said the Doctor, who was in a hurry to mount
and ride away, for he was needed in another direction.
“Sophy, I am haunted by the thought that poor Grandfather may have met
with an accident somewhere out in the woods or the fields,” said Pam
when the last echoes of the Doctor’s horse had died away. “Could we not
go and look to see if we can find him?”
“We might, but it would be awkward if he came back while we were away,”
answered Sophy.
“We will leave a paper here on the table to say that we have gone to
look for him, and we can shut the dog indoors to take care of the
place.” Pam had rummaged a pencil and a piece of paper from her bag, and
writing her message, she left it lying in a prominent place on the
table, with a blue mug standing on the edge of the paper to keep it from
being blown away by any draught from the door. The dog was coaxed in and
left to guard the place, and then the two set forth on their quest.
Sophy had never been at Ripple before. Pam also was a stranger in a
sense, and yet she knew so much more of the place from hearsay as to
seem quite at home.
“We will go right round the cleared land first,” she said to Sophy, who
had naturally fallen into the second place and was following Pam’s lead.
“There does not seem to be much cleared land,” Sophy remarked, gazing
round at the crowding forest trees. Here and there a little field had
been made, but even in these great stumps were still standing.
“We will go round all the fields first, and then we will search in the
forest.” A little sob came up in Pam’s throat as she added: “I must find
him somehow, the poor lonely old man!”