“TO LET”
ETC.
“TO LET”
BY
B. M. CROKER
AUTHOR OF
“A FAMILY LIKENESS,” “INTERFERENCE,” “TWO MASTERS,” ETC.
[Illustration]
PHILADELPHIA
J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY
1906
CONTENTS.
PAGE
“TO LET” 1
MRS. RAYMOND 39
THE KHITMATGAR 90
THE DÂK BUNGALOW AT DAKOR 114
“THE OTHER MISS BROWNE” 145
“IF YOU SEE HER FACE” 181
THE FORMER PASSENGERS 195
THE SECRET OF THE AMULET 215
“_TO LET._”
“List, list, O list!”--HAMLET, _Act I_.
Some years ago, when I was a slim young spin, I came out to India to
live with my brother Tom: he and I were members of a large and somewhat
impecunious family, and I do not think my mother was sorry to have one
of her four grown-up daughters thus taken off her hands. Tom’s wife,
Aggie, had been at school with my eldest sister; we had known and
liked her all our lives, and regarded her as one of ourselves; and as
she and the children were at home when Tom’s letter was received, and
his offer accepted, she helped me to choose my slender outfit, with
judgment, zeal, and taste; endowed me with several pretty additions to
my wardrobe; superintended the fitting of my gowns and the trying on of
my hats, with most sympathetic interest, and finally escorted me out
to Lucknow, under her own wing, and installed me in the only spare room
in her comfortable bungalow in Dilkousha.
My sister-in-law is a pretty little brunette, rather pale, with dark
hair, brilliant black eyes, a resolute mouth, and a bright, intelligent
expression. She is orderly, trim, feverishly energetic, and seems to
live every moment of her life. Her children, her wardrobe, her house,
her servants, and last, not least, her husband, are all models in
their way; and yet she has plenty of time for tennis, and dancing,
and talking and walking. She is, undoubtedly, a remarkably talented
little creature, and especially prides herself on her nerve, and her
power of will, or will power. I suppose they are the same thing? and
I am sure they are all the same to Tom, who worships the sole of her
small slipper. Strictly between ourselves, she is the ruling member of
the family, and turns her lord and master round her little finger. Tom
is big and fair (of course), the opposite to his wife, quiet, rather
easy-going and inclined to be indolent; but Aggie rouses him up, and
pushes him to the front, and keeps him there. She knows all about his
department, his prospects of promotion, his prospects of furlough,
of getting acting appointments, and so on, even better than he does
himself. The chief of Tom’s department--have I said that Tom is in the
Irritation Office?--has placed it solemnly on record that he considers
little Mrs. Shandon a surprisingly clever woman. The two children, Bob
and Tor, are merry, oppressively active monkeys, aged three and five
years respectively. As for myself, I am tall, fair--and I wish I could
add pretty! but this is a true story. My eyes are blue, my teeth are
white, my hair is red--alas, a blazing red; and I was, at this period,
nineteen years of age; and now I think I have given a sufficient
outline of the whole family.
We arrived at Lucknow in November, when the cold weather is delightful,
and everything was delightful to me. The bustle and life of a great
Indian station, the novelty of my surroundings, the early morning
rides, picnics down the river, and dances at the “Chutter Munzil,”
made me look upon Lucknow as a paradise on earth; and in this light I
still regarded it, until a great change came over the temperature, and
the month of April introduced me to red-hot winds, sleepless nights,
and the intolerable “brain-fever” bird. Aggie had made up her mind
definitely on one subject: we were not to go away to the hills until
the rains. Tom could only get two months’ leave (July and August),
and she did not intend to leave him to grill on the plains alone. As
for herself and the children--not to speak of me--we had all come out
from home so recently that we did not require a change. The trip to
Europe had made a vast hole in the family stocking, and she wished to
economize; and who can economize with two establishments in full swing?
Tell me this, ye Anglo-Indian matrons? With a large, cool bungalow,
plenty of punkahs, khuskhus tatties, ice, and a thermantidote, surely
we could manage to brave May and June--at any rate the attempt was
made. Gradually the hills drained Lucknow week by week; family after
family packed up, warned us of our folly in remaining on the plains,
offered to look for houses for us, and left by the night mail. By the
middle of May, the place was figuratively empty. Nothing can be more
dreary than a large station in the hot weather--unless it is an equally
forsaken hill station in the depths of winter, when the mountains are
covered with snow, the mall no longer resounds with gay voices and
the tramp of Jampanies, but is visited by bears and panthers, and the
houses are closed, and, as it were, put to bed in straw! As for Lucknow
in the summer, it was a melancholy spot; the public gardens were
deserted, the chairs at the Chutter Munzil stood empty, the very bands
had gone to the hills! the shops were shut, the baked white roads, no
longer thronged with carriages and bamboo carts, gave ample room to the
humble ekka, or a Dhobie’s meagre donkey, shuffling along in the dust.
Of course we were not the _only_ people remaining in the place,
grumbling at the heat and dust and life in general; but there can be
no sociability with the thermometer above 100° in the shade. Through
the long, long Indian day we sat and gasped, in darkened rooms, and
consumed quantities of “Nimbo pegs,” _i.e._ limes and soda-water, and
listened to the fierce hot wind roaring along the road and driving
the roasted leaves before it; and in the evening, when the sun had
set, we went for a melancholy drive through the Wingfield Park, or
round by Martiniere College, and met our friends at the library, and
compared sensations and thermometers. The season was exceptionally bad
(but people say that every year), and presently Bobby and Tor began
to fade: their little white faces and listless eyes appealed to Aggie
as Tom’s anxious expostulations had never done. “Yes, they must go to
the hills with _me_.” But this idea I repudiated at once; I refused
to undertake the responsibility--I, who could scarcely speak a word
to the servants--who had no experience! Then Bobbie had a bad go of
fever--intermittent fever; the beginning of the end to his alarmed
mother; the end being represented by a large gravestone! She now became
as firmly determined to go, as she had previously been resolved to
stay; but it was so late in the season to take a house. Alas, alas, for
the beautiful tempting advertisements in the _Pioneer_, which we had
seen and scorned! Aggie wrote to a friend in a certain hill station,
called (for this occasion only) “Kantia,” and Tom wired to a house
agent, who triumphantly replied by letter, that there was not _one_
unlet bungalow on his books. This missive threw us into the depths of
despair; there seemed no alternative but a hill hotel, and the usual
quarters that await the last comers, and the proverbial welcome for
children and dogs (we had only four); but the next day brought us good
news from Aggie’s friend Mrs. Chalmers.
“DEAR MRS. SHANDON (she said),
“I received your letter, and went at once to Cursitjee, the agent.
Every hole and corner up here seems full, and he had not a single
house to let. To-day I had a note from him, saying that Briarwood is
vacant; the people who took it are not coming up, they have gone to
Naini Tal. You _are_ in luck. I have just been out to see the house,
and have secured it for you. It is a mile and a half from the club,
but I know that you and your sister are capital walkers. I envy
you. Such a charming place--two sitting-rooms, four bedrooms, four
bath-rooms, a hall, servants’ go-downs, stabling, and a splendid view
from a very pretty garden, and only Rs. 800 for the season! Why, I am
paying Rs. 1000 for a _very_ inferior house, with scarcely a stick of
furniture and no view. I feel so proud of myself, and I am longing
to show you my treasure-trove. Telegraph when you start, and I shall
have a milkman in waiting and fires in all the rooms.
“Yours sincerely,
“EDITH CHALMERS.”
We now looked upon Mrs. Chalmers as our best and dearest friend, and
began to get under way at once. A long journey in India is a serious
business, when the party comprises two ladies, two children, two ayahs,
and five other servants, three fox terriers, a mongoose, and a Persian
cat--all these animals going to the hills for the benefit of their
health--not to speak of a ton of luggage, including crockery and lamps,
a cottage piano, a goat, and a pony. Aggie and I, the children, one
ayah, two terriers, the cat and mongoose, our bedding and pillows, the
tiffin basket and ice basket, were all stowed into one compartment,
and I must confess that the journey was truly miserable. The heat was
stifling, despite the water tatties. One of the terriers had a violent
dispute with the cat, and the cat had a difference with the mongoose,
and Bob and Tor had a pitched battle; more than once I actually
wished myself back in Lucknow. I was most truly thankful to wake one
morning, to find myself under the shadow of the Himalayas--not a
mighty, snow-clad range of everlasting hills, but merely the spurs--the
moderate slopes, covered with scrub, loose shale, and jungle, and
deceitful little trickling watercourses. We sent the servants on
ahead, whilst we rested at the Dâk bungalow near the railway station,
and then followed them at our leisure. We accomplished the ascent in
dandies--open kind of boxes, half box, half chair, carried on the
shoulders of four men. This was an entirely novel sensation to me,
and at first an agreeable one, so long as the slopes were moderate,
and the paths wide; but the higher we went, the narrower became the
path, the steeper the naked precipice; and as my coolies would walk at
the extreme edge, with the utmost indifference to my frantic appeals
to “Beetor! Beetor!”--and would change poles at the most agonizing
corners--my feelings were very mixed, especially when droves of loose
pack ponies came thundering downhill, with no respect for the rights
of the road. Late at night we passed through Kantia, and arrived at
Briarwood, far too weary to be critical. Fires were blazing, supper
was prepared, and we despatched it in haste, and most thankfully went
to bed and slept soundly, as any one would do who had spent thirty-six
hours in a crowded compartment, and ten in a cramped wooden case.
The next morning, rested and invigorated, we set out on a tour of
inspection; and it is almost worth while to undergo a certain amount of
baking in the sweltering heat of the lower regions, in order to enjoy
those deep first draughts of cool hill air, instead of a stifling,
dust-laden atmosphere; and to appreciate the green valleys and blue
hills, by force of contrast to the far-stretching, eye-smarting, white
glaring roads, that intersect the burnt-up plains--roads and plains,
that even the pariah abandons, salamander though he be!
To our delight and surprise, Mrs. Chalmers had by no means overdrawn
the advantages of our new abode. The bungalow was solidly built of
stone, two-storied, and ample in size. It stood on a kind of shelf,
cut out of the hillside, and was surrounded by a pretty flower garden,
full of roses, fuchsias, and carnations. The high road passed the
gate, from which the avenue descended, direct to the entrance door,
at the end of the house, and from whence ran a long passage. Off this
passage three rooms opened to the right, all looking south, and all
looking into a deep, delightful, flagged, verandah. The stairs were
very steep. At the head of them, the passage and rooms were repeated.
There were small nooks, and dressing-rooms, and convenient out-houses,
and plenty of good water; but the glory of Briarwood was undoubtedly
its verandah: it was fully twelve feet wide, roofed with zinc, and
overhung a precipice of a thousand feet--not a startlingly sheer khud,
but a tolerably straight descent of grey-blue shale, rocks, and low
jungle. From it there was a glorious view, across a valley, far away,
to the snowy range. It opened at one end into the avenue, and was not
inclosed; but at the side next the precipice, there was a stout wooden
railing, with netting at the bottom, for the safety of too enterprising
dogs or children. A charming spot, despite its rather bold situation;
and as Aggie and I sat in it, surveying the scenery and inhaling the
pure hill air, and watching Bob and Tor tearing up and down, playing
horses, we said to one another that “the verandah alone was worth half
the rent.”
“It’s absurdly cheap,” exclaimed my sister-in-law complacently. “I wish
you saw the hovel _I_ had, at Simla, for the same rent. I wonder if it
is feverish, or badly drained, or what?”
“Perhaps it has a ghost,” I suggested facetiously; and at such an
absurd idea we both went into peals of laughter.
At this moment Mrs. Chalmers appeared, brisk, rosy, and breathlessly
benevolent, having walked over from Kantia.
“So you have found it,” she said as we shook hands. “I said nothing
about this delicious verandah! I thought I would keep it as a surprise.
I did not say a word too much for Briarwood, did I?”
“Not half enough,” we returned rapturously; and presently we went in a
body, armed with a list from the agent, and proceeded to go over the
house and take stock of its contents.
“It’s not a bit like a _hill_ furnished house,” boasted Mrs. Chalmers,
with a glow of pride, as she looked round the drawing-room; “carpets,
curtains, solid, _very_ solid chairs, and Berlin wool-worked screens, a
card-table, and any quantity of pictures.”
“Yes, don’t they look like family portraits?” I suggested, as we gazed
at them. There was one of an officer in faded water colours, another
of his wife, two of a previous generation in oils and amply gilded
frames, two sketches of an English country house, and some framed
photographs--groups of grinning cricketers, or wedding guests. All
the rooms were well, almost handsomely, furnished in an old-fashioned
style. There was no scarcity of wardrobes, looking-glasses, or even
armchairs, in the bedrooms, and the pantry was fitted out--a most
singular circumstance--with a large supply of handsome glass and china,
lamps, old moderators, coffee and teapots, plated side dishes, and
candlesticks, cooking utensils and spoons and forks, wine coasters and
a cake-basket. These articles were all let with the house (much to our
amazement), provided we were responsible for the same. The china was
spode, the plate old family heirlooms, with a crest--a winged horse--on
everything, down to the very mustard spoons.
“The people who own this house must be lunatics,” remarked Aggie,
as she peered round the pantry; “fancy hiring out one’s best family
plate, and good old china! And I saw some ancient music-books in the
drawing-room, and there is a side saddle in the bottle khana.”
“My dear, the people who owned this house are dead,” explained Mrs.
Chalmers. “I heard all about them last evening from Mrs. Starkey.”
“Oh, is _she_ up there?” exclaimed Aggie, somewhat fretfully.
“Yes, her husband is cantonment magistrate. This house belonged to
an old retired colonel and his wife. They and his niece lived here.
These were all their belongings. They died within a short time of one
another, and the old man left a queer will, to say that the house was
to remain precisely as they left it for twenty years, and at the end
of that time, it was to be sold and all the property dispersed. Mrs.
Starkey says she is sure that he never intended it to be _let_, but the
heir-at-law insists on that, and is furious at the terms of the will.”
“Well, it is a very good thing for us,” remarked Aggie; “we are as
comfortable here, as if we were in our own house: there is a stove in
the kitchen, there are nice boxes for firewood in every room, clocks,
real hair mattresses--in short, it is as you said, a treasure-trove.”
We set to work to modernize the drawing-room with phoolkaries, Madras
muslin curtains, photograph screens and frames, and such-like portable
articles. We placed the piano across a corner, arranged flowers in
some handsome Dresden china vases, and entirely altered and improved
the character of the room. When Aggie had despatched a most glowing
description of our new quarters to Tom, and when we had had tiffin,
we set off to walk into Kantia to put our names down at the library,
and to inquire for letters at the post-office. Aggie met a good many
acquaintances--who does not, who has lived five years in India in the
same district?
Among them Mrs. Starkey, an elderly lady with a prominent nose and
goggle eyes, who greeted her loudly across the reading-room table, in
this agreeable fashion:
“And so you have come up after _all_, Mrs. Shandon. Some one told me
that you meant to remain below, but I knew you never could be so wicked
as to keep your poor little children in that heat.” Then coming round
and dropping into a chair beside her, she said, “And I suppose this
young lady is your sister-in-law?”
Mrs. Starkey eyed me critically, evidently appraising my chances in the
great marriage market. She herself had settled her own two daughters
most satisfactorily, and had now nothing to do, but interest herself
in other people’s affairs.
“Yes,” acquiesced Aggie; “Miss Shandon--Mrs. Starkey.”
“And so you have taken Briarwood?”
“Yes, we have been most lucky to get it.”
“I hope you will think so, at the end of three months,” observed Mrs.
Starkey, with a significant pursing of her lips. “Mrs. Chalmers is a
stranger up here, or she would not have been in such a hurry to jump at
it.”
“Why, what is the matter with it?” inquired Aggie. “It is well built,
well furnished, well situated, and very cheap.”
“That’s just it--_suspiciously_ cheap. Why, my dear Mrs. Shandon, if
there was not something against it, it would let for two hundred rupees
a month. Common sense would tell you that!”
“And what is against it?”
“It’s haunted! There you have the reason in two words.”
“Is that all? I was afraid it was the drains. I don’t believe in
ghosts and haunted houses. What are we supposed to see?”
“Nothing,” retorted Mrs. Starkey, who seemed a good deal nettled at our
smiling incredulity.
“Nothing!” with an exasperating laugh.
“No, but you will make up for it in hearing. Not now--you are all right
for the next six weeks--but after the monsoon breaks, I give you a week
at Briarwood. No one would stand it longer, and indeed you might as
well bespeak your rooms at Cooper’s Hotel _now_. There is always a rush
up here in July, by the two months’ leave people, and you will be poked
into some wretched go-down.”
Aggie laughed, rather a careless ironical little laugh, and said,
“Thank you, Mrs. Starkey; but I think we will stay on where we are--at
any rate for the present.”
“Of course it will be as _you_ please. What do you think of the
verandah?” she inquired, with a curious smile.
“I think, as I was saying to Susan, that it is worth half the rent of
the house.”
“And in _my_ opinion the house is worth double rent without it;” and
with this enigmatic remark, she rose, and sailed away.
“Horrid old frump!” exclaimed Aggie, as we walked home in the
starlight. “She is jealous and angry that she did not get Briarwood
_herself_--I know her so well. She is always hinting, and repeating
stories about the nicest people--always decrying your prettiest dress,
or your best servant.”
We soon forgot all about Mrs. Starkey, and her dismal prophecy, being
too gay, and too busy, to give her, or it, a thought. We had so many
engagements--tennis-parties and tournaments, picnics, concerts, dances,
and little dinners. We ourselves gave occasional afternoon teas in
the verandah--using the best spode cups and saucers, and the old
silver cake-basket--and were warmly complimented on our good fortune
in securing such a charming house and garden. One day the children
discovered, to their great joy, that the old chowkidar belonging to
the bungalow possessed an African grey parrot--a rare bird indeed in
India; he had a battered Europe cage, doubtless a remnant of better
days, and swung on his ring, looking up at us inquiringly, out of his
impudent little black eyes.
The parrot had been the property of the former inmates of Briarwood,
and as it was a long-lived creature, had survived its master and
mistress, and was boarded out with the chowkidar, at one rupee per
month.
The chowkidar willingly carried the cage into the verandah, where the
bird seemed perfectly at home.
We got a little table for its cage, and the children were delighted
with him, as he swung to and fro, with a bit of cake in his wrinkled
claw.
Presently he startled us all by suddenly calling “Lucy,” in a voice
that was as distinct as if it had come from a human throat. “Pretty
Lucy--Lu--cy.”
“That must have been the niece,” said Aggie. “I expect she was the
original of that picture over the chimney-piece in your room; she looks
like a Lucy.”
It was a large, framed, half-length photograph of a very pretty girl,
in a white dress, with gigantic open sleeves. The ancient parrot talked
incessantly now that he had been restored to society; he whistled
for the dogs, and brought them flying to his summons--to his great
satisfaction, and their equally great indignation. He called “Qui hye”
so naturally, in a lady’s shrill soprano, or a gruff male bellow, that
I have no doubt our servants would have liked to have wrung his neck.
He coughed and expectorated like an old gentleman, and whined like a
puppy, and mewed like a cat, and, I am sorry to add, sometimes swore
like a trooper; but his most constant cry was, “Lucy, where are you,
pretty Lucy--Lucy--Lu--cy?”
* * * * *
Aggie and I went to various picnics, but to that given by the Chalmers
(in honour of Mr. Chalmers’ brother Charlie, a captain in a Ghoorka
regiment, just come up to Kantia on leave) Aggie was unavoidably
absent. Tor had a little touch of fever, and she did not like to leave
him; but I went under my hostess’s care, and expected to enjoy myself
immensely. Alas! on that selfsame afternoon, the long-expected monsoon
broke, and we were nearly drowned! We rode to the selected spot, five
miles from Kantia, laughing and chattering, indifferent to the big
blue-black clouds that came slowly, but surely, sailing up from below;
it was a way they had had for days, and nothing had come of it! We
spread the table-cloth, boiled the kettle, unpacked the hampers, in
spite of sharp gusts of wind and warning rumbling thunder. Just as we
had commenced to reap the reward of our exertions, there fell a few
huge drops, followed by a vivid flash, and then a tremendous crash
of thunder, like a whole park of artillery, that seemed to shake the
mountains--and after this the deluge. In less than a minute we were
soaked through; we hastily gathered up the table-cloth by its four
ends, gave it to the coolies, and fled. It was all I could do to stand
against the wind; only for Captain Chalmers I believe I would have
been blown away; as it was, I lost my hat, it was whirled into space.
Mrs. Chalmers lost her boa, and Mrs. Starkey, not merely her bonnet,
but some portion of her hair. We were truly in a wretched plight, the
water streaming down our faces, and squelching in our boots; the little
trickling mountain rivulets were now like racing seas of turbid water;
the lightning was almost blinding; the trees rocked dangerously, and
lashed one another with their quivering branches. I had never been
out in such a storm before, and sincerely hope I never may again. We
reached Kantia more dead than alive, and Mrs. Chalmers sent an express
to Aggie, and kept me till the next day. After raining as it only _can_
rain in the Himalayas, the weather cleared, the sun shone, and I rode
home in borrowed plumes, full of my adventures, and in the highest
spirits. I found Aggie sitting over the fire in the drawing-room,
looking ghastly white: that was nothing uncommon; but terribly
depressed, which was most unusual.
“I am afraid you have neuralgia?” I said, as I kissed her.
She nodded, and made no reply.
“How is Tor?” I inquired, as I drew a chair up to the fire.
“Better--quite well.”
“Any news--any letter?”
“Not a word--not a line.”
“Has anything happened to Pip”--Pip was a fox-terrier, renowned
for having the shortest tail and being the most impertinent dog in
Lucknow--“or the mongoose?”
“No, you silly girl! Why do you ask such ridiculous questions?”
“I was afraid something was amiss; you seem rather down on your luck.”
Aggie shrugged her shoulders, and then said, “Pray, what put such an
absurd idea into your head? Tell me all about the picnic,” and she
began to talk rapidly, and to ask me various questions; but I observed
that once she had set me going--no difficult task--her attention
flagged, her eyes wandered from my face to the fire. She was not
listening to half I said, and my most thrilling descriptions were
utterly lost on this indifferent, abstracted little creature! I noticed
from this time, that she had become strangely nervous (for her).
She invited herself to the share of half my bed; she was restless,
_distrait_, and even irritable; and when I was asked out to spend the
day, dispensed with my company with an alacrity that was by no means
flattering. Formerly, of an evening she used to herd the children home
at sundown, and tear me away from the delights of the reading-room at
seven o’clock; now she hung about the library, until almost the last
moment, until it was time to put out the lamps, and kept the children
with her, making transparent pretexts for their company. Often we did
not arrive at home till half-past eight o’clock. I made no objections
to these late hours, neither did Charlie Chalmers, who often walked
back with us and remained to dinner. I was amazed to notice that Aggie
seemed delighted to have his company, for she had always expressed a
rooted aversion to what she called “tame young men,” and here was this
new acquaintance dining with us, at least twice a week!
About a month after the picnic we had a spell of dreadful
weather--thunderstorms accompanied by torrents. One pouring afternoon,
Aggie and I were cowering over the drawing-room fire, whilst the rain
came fizzing down among the logs, and ran in rivers off the roof, and
out of the spouts. There had been no going out that day, and we were
feeling rather flat and dull, as we sat in a kind of ghostly twilight,
with all outdoor objects swallowed up in mist, listening to the violent
battering of the rain on the zinc verandah, and the storm which was
growling round the hills. “Oh, for a visitor!” I exclaimed; “but no one
but a fish, or a lunatic, would be out on such an evening.”
“No one, indeed,” echoed Aggie, in a melancholy tone. “We may as well
draw the curtains, and have in the lamp and tea to cheer us up.”
She had scarcely finished speaking, when I heard the brisk trot of a
horse along the road. It stopped at the gate, and came rapidly down
our avenue. I heard the wet gravel crunching under his hoofs, and--yes,
a man’s cheery whistle. My heart jumped, and I half rose from my chair.
It must be Charlie Chalmers braving the elements to see _me!_--such, I
must confess, was my incredible vanity! He did not stop at the front
door as usual, but rode straight into the verandah, which afforded
ample room, and shelter for half a dozen mounted men.
“Aggie,” I said eagerly, “do you hear? It must be----”
I paused, my tongue silenced, by the awful pallor of her face, and the
expression of her eyes, as she sat with her little hands clutching the
arms of her chair, and her whole figure bent forward in an attitude of
listening--an attitude of rigid terror.
“What is it, Aggie?” I said. “Are you ill?”
As I spoke, the horse’s hoofs made a loud clattering noise on the
stone-paved verandah outside, and a man’s voice--a young man’s eager
voice--called, “Lucy.”
Instantly a chair near the writing-table was pushed back, and some one
went quickly to the window--a French one--and bungled for a moment with
the fastening. I always had a difficulty with that window _myself_.
Aggie and I were within the bright circle of the firelight, but the
rest of the room was dim, and outside the streaming grey sky was
spasmodically illuminated by occasional vivid flashes, that lit up the
surrounding hills as if it were daylight. The trampling of impatient
hoofs, and the rattling of a door-handle, were the only sounds that
were audible for a few breathless seconds; but during those seconds
Pip, bristling like a porcupine, and trembling violently in every
joint, had sprung off my lap and crawled abjectly under Aggie’s chair,
seemingly in a transport of fear. The door was opened audibly, and a
cold, icy blast swept in, that seemed to freeze my very heart, and
made me shiver from head to foot. At this moment there came, with a
sinister blue glare, the most vivid flash of lightning I ever saw. It
lit up the whole room, which was empty save for ourselves, and was
instantly followed by a clap of thunder, that caused my knees to knock
together, and that terrified me and filled me with horror. It evidently
terrified the horse too; there was a violent plunge, a clattering
of hoofs on the stones, a sudden loud crash of smashing timber, a
woman’s long, loud, piercing shriek, which stopped the very beating
of my heart, and then a frenzied struggle in the cruel, crumbling,
treacherous shale, the rattle of loose stones, and the hollow roar of
something sliding down the precipice.
I rushed to the door and tore it open, with that awful despairing cry
still ringing in my ears. The verandah was empty; there was not a soul
to be seen, or a sound to be heard, save the rain on the roof.
“Aggie,” I screamed, “come here! Some one has gone over the verandah,
and down the khud! You heard him.”
“Yes,” she said, following me out; “but come in--come in.”
“I believe it was Charlie Chalmers”--shaking her violently as I spoke.
“He has been killed--killed--killed! And you stand, and do nothing.
Send people! Let us go ourselves! Bearer! Ayah! Khidmatgar!” I cried,
raising my voice.
“Hush! It was _not_ Charlie Chalmers,” she said, vainly endeavouring to
draw me into the drawing-room. “Come in--come in.”
“No, no!” pushing her away, and wringing my hands. “How cruel you are!
How inhuman! There is a path. Let us go at once--at once!”
“You need not trouble yourself, Susan,” she interrupted; “and you need
not cry and tremble;--_they_ will bring him up. What you heard was
supernatural; it was not real.”
“No--no--no! It was all real. Oh! that scream is in my ears still.”
“I will convince you,” said Aggie, taking my hand as she spoke. “Feel
all along the verandah. Are the railings broken?”
I did as she bade me. No, though very wet, and clammy, the railing was
intact!
“Where is the broken place?” she asked, imperatively.
Where, indeed?
“Now,” she continued, “since you will not come in, look over, and you
will see something more presently.”
Shivering with fear, and the cold, drifting rain, I gazed down as she
bade me, and there, far below, I saw lights moving rapidly to and fro,
evidently in search of something. After a little delay they congregated
in one place. There was a low, buzzing murmur--they had found him--and
presently they commenced to ascend the hill, with the “hum-hum” of
coolies carrying a burden. Nearer and nearer the lights and sounds
came; up to the very brink of the khud, past the end of the verandah.
Many steps and many torches--faint blue torches held by invisible
hands--invisible but heavy-footed bearers carried their burden slowly
upstairs, and along the passage, and deposited it with a dump in
Aggie’s bedroom! As we stood clasped in one another’s arms, and shaking
all over, the steps descended, the ghostly lights passed up the avenue,
and gradually disappeared in the gathering darkness. The repetition of
the tragedy was over for that day.
“Have you heard it before?” I asked with chattering teeth, as I bolted
the drawing-room window.
“Yes, the evening of the picnic, and twice since. That is the reason
I have always tried to stay out till late, and to keep you out. I was
hoping and praying you might never hear it. It always happens just
before dark: I am afraid you have thought me very queer of late. I
have told no end of stories to keep you and the children from harm. I
have----”
“I think you have been very kind,” I interrupted. “Oh, Aggie, shall you
ever get that crash, and that awful cry out of your head?”
“_Never!_” hastily lighting the candles as she spoke.
“Is there anything more?” I inquired tremulously.
“Yes; sometimes at night, the most terrible weeping and sobbing in my
bedroom;” and she shuddered at the mere recollection.
“Do the servants know?” I asked anxiously.
“The ayah Mumà has heard it, and the khánsámáh says his mother is
sick, and he must go, and the bearer wants to attend his brother’s
wedding. They will _all_ leave.”
“I suppose most people know too?” I suggested dejectedly.
“Yes; don’t you remember Mrs. Starkey’s warnings, and her saying that
without the verandah the house was worth double rent? We understand
that dark speech of hers _now_, and we have not come to Cooper’s Hotel
yet.”
“No, not _yet_. I wish we _had_. I wonder what Tom will say? He will be
here in another fortnight. Oh, I wish he was here now!”
In spite of our heart-shaking experience, we managed to eat, and drink,
and sleep, yea, to play tennis--somewhat solemnly, it is true--and go
to the club, where we remained to the very _last_ moment; needless to
mention, that I now entered into Aggie’s manœuvre _con amore_. Mrs.
Starkey evidently divined the reason of our loitering in Kantia, and
said in her most truculent manner, as she squared up to us--
“You keep your children out very late, Mrs. Shandon.”
“Yes, but we like to have them with us,” rejoined Aggie, in a meek
apologetic voice.
“Then why don’t you go home earlier?”
“Because it is so stupid, and lonely,” was the mendacious answer.
“Lonely is not the word _I_ should use. I wonder if you are as wise as
your neighbours now? Come now, Mrs. Shandon.”
“About what?” said Aggie, with ill-feigned innocence.
“About Briarwood. Haven’t you heard it yet? The ghastly precipice and
horse affair?”
“Yes, I suppose we may as well confess that we _have_.”
“Humph! you are a brave couple to stay on. The Tombs tried it last year
for three weeks. The Paxtons took it the year before, and then sub-let
it; not that _they_ believed in ghosts--oh, dear no!” and she laughed
ironically.
“And what is the story?” I inquired eagerly.
“Well, the story is this. An old retired officer and his wife, and
their pretty niece, lived at Briarwood a good many years ago. The girl
was engaged to be married to a fine young fellow in the Guides. The day
before the wedding, what you know of happened, and has happened every
monsoon ever since. The poor girl went out of her mind, and destroyed
herself, and the old colonel and his wife did not long survive her. The
house is uninhabitable in the monsoon, and there seems nothing for it
but to auction off the furniture, and pull it down; it will always be
the same as long as it stands. Take _my_ advice, and come into Cooper’s
Hotel. I believe you can have that small set of rooms at the back. The
sitting-room smokes--but beggars can’t be choosers.”
“That will only be our very last resource,” said Aggie, hotly.
“It’s not very grand, I grant you; but any port in a storm.”
Tom arrived, was doubly welcome, and was charmed with Briarwood,
chaffed us unmercifully, and derided our fears until _he_ himself had
a similar experience, and heard the phantom horse plunging in the
verandah, and that wild, unearthly and utterly appalling shriek. No,
he could not laugh _that_ away; and seeing that we had now a mortal
abhorrence of the place, that the children had to be kept abroad in
the damp till long after dark, that Aggie was a mere hollow-eyed
spectre, and that we had scarcely a servant left, that--in short, one
day, we packed up precipitately and fled in a body to Cooper’s Hotel.
But we did not basely endeavour to sub-let, nor advertise Briarwood
as “a delightfully situated pucka built house, containing all the
requirements of a gentleman’s family.” No, no. Tom bore the loss of
the rent, and--a more difficult feat--Aggie bore Mrs. Starkey’s
insufferable “I told you so.”
Aggie was at Kantia again last season. She walked out early one
morning to see our former abode. The chowkidar and parrot are still in
possession, and are likely to remain the sole tenants on the premises.
The parrot suns and dusts his ancient feathers in the empty verandah,
which re-echoes with his cry of “Lucy, where are you--pretty Lucy?”
The chowkidar inhabits a secluded go-down at the back, where he passes
most of the day in sleeping, or smoking the soothing “huka.” The place
has a forlorn, uncared-for appearance now; the flowers are nearly all
gone; the paint has peeled off the doors and windows; the avenue is
grass-grown. Briarwood appears to have resigned itself to emptiness,
neglect, and decay, although outside the gate there still hangs a
battered board, on which, if you look very closely, you can decipher
the words “_To Let_.”
_MRS. RAYMOND._
“I am just going to leap into the dark.”--RABELAIS.
CHAPTER I.
We had come home from India on three months’ furlough, taking return
tickets, and, after the manner of Anglo-Indians, stayed to the very
last moment of our leave; in fact, if the cab that conveyed us across
Paris, from the Gare-de-l’Ouest to the Gare-de-Lyons, had broken
down--a not impossible contingency, for our _cocher_ was drunk--we
would have missed not merely our train, but our steamer, and Charles
would have had to forfeit I don’t know how much pay, and go to the
bottom of his grade.
Charles is in the Civil Service; we are middle-aged people without
any family, and are comfortably off, and think very little of running
home. We were just in time to get our luggage weighed, swallow some
soup, and climb into the carriage ere it started. We rattled through
France all night; next afternoon we were at Turin; that same evening,
cramped with two days’ sitting in the train, and nearly black with
dust, we found ourselves in Genoa. “No time to go to the hotel,” was
the unwelcome intelligence; “we must go on board at once.” Our steamer
lay off in the harbour, and sailed in two hours.
“Just touch and go,” grumbled Charles; “never saw such a shave. All
your fault, Louisa.”
Charles was put out. He wanted to have a tub and his dinner; and,
moreover, he hated to be fussed and driven about by porters, being
accustomed to the grand leisure of an important Indian official. I
never argue with Charles when he is hungry, therefore I scrambled
out of the boat in silence, and went to my own cabin--secured months
previously. I wondered if any of our friends had turned up? Colonel
and Mrs. Hatton were going back in our steamer, Mrs. Clapp, and young
Brownlow of the Secretariat, who had come home with us. We would be a
nice little party, and all sit at the same table. When I was dressed I
went up on deck; it looked crowded, and I was immediately accosted by
half a dozen Indian friends, and soon engaged in exchanging items of
news. It was a bright starlight night, and Genoa looked lovely, rising
from her harbour, but it was unpleasantly chilly. I was afraid of my
neuralgia, and presently beat a retreat downstairs, and seated myself
at a central table with my gold eye-glasses and blotter, and began
to write a letter. As I sat there alone, listening to the tramping
overhead--the sailors weighing anchor--I heard a saloon door clap,
and some one came over and took a seat directly opposite me, with
the evident intention of sharing the saloon inkstand. I am rather
near-sighted, and peered across the table over my spectacles, and saw a
strikingly handsome man, who was deliberately opening his writing-case.
Dark, with regular features, black hair and moustache, and slender
hands. He looked at me searchingly. His eyes were the keenest I ever
saw; rather narrow, but piercing as cold steel. We both wrote away
industriously for some time in dread silence, and then he addressed
me with some little civility about the ink. He had a well-bred voice,
and a slightly foreign accent. We discussed the dust of the journey,
the beauty of the night--for I am not of the usual order of ancient
British matrons, and when I am spoken to politely, I reply in kind.
This gentleman was more than polite; he was absolutely fascinating.
From Genoa we drifted to India, but he and I had never been in the same
parts, and, after all, we had not much in common beyond Bombay.
“You know India well?” he inquired insinuatingly.
“I cannot say that,” I rejoined; “but I have been in India for many
years. I know it superficially, and from the European standpoint.”
I fished clumsily, and in vain, to discover what he was. An officer?
no, he was not like one. A civilian? a traveller? but he parried all
my queries with an ease and politeness that was actually amusing.
How clever he was! I felt myself a mere child in his hands. In a few
moments, he had extracted from me my husband’s position, residence,
length of service, prospects. I believe that, if he had chosen to ask,
I would have told him the amount of our ages, income, and savings.
He was so _very_ agreeable, and so exceptionally interested in me
and my affairs, that I was led away to forget that I was now a stout
elderly woman of forty-five, and, alas! no longer the station belle I
once had been. Presently brisk voices and steps were heard descending
the companion-ladder. Enter Charles, looking blue with cold, but in
an excellent temper. I saw it in his eye. He has met Buffer, the
Sudder Judge, of Kuloo, a first-rate whist-player--whist is Charles’s
passion--and they are going to have a split whisky peg between them,
as they discuss assessment of land--Charles’s hobby. Mrs. Sharpe, an
old neighbour of mine, a plain but clever little woman, and known as
“Becky,” sidled into a place beside me, and took a good long look at
my opposite neighbour. The tables were filling fast, and people were
calling for lemonade and soda-water, for it was after nine o’clock. In
the lamplight I recognized a good many familiar faces. The Brownes of
Dodeypore; the Goodwins of Punea; Major Caraway of the Pioneers (with
a bride). How smart every one looked, especially the young girls, and
young married women! What a change it makes in some of my friends, a
run home! Where is the old jacket, the joke of the station? Where is
Mrs. Mills’ celebrated black hat? I would hardly recognize her. She
wears a fringe; she has had something done to her teeth; she has quite
a pretty figure! Who would believe she was the dowdy creature I saw at
Cheetapore last July? Besides these well-known faces, are many strange
ones--globe-trotters, Americans, French, and English, going out to
stay with friends, or to do the cold weather in India. Those who sit
at our table are no doubt impressed by our intimacy and jargon. Mrs.
Sharpe always interlards her conversation with Hindostani, and speaks
of her children at school as my “butchas;” “and as to going home again
for only three months, as you, Mrs. Paulet” (to me), “persuaded me into
doing, ‘cubbi-nay, cubbi-nay, cubbi-nay,’”--_i.e._ “never, never, never
again.”
The dark stranger opposite looked amused, and then she said, “What
_do_ you think! I hear there is a native prince on board, enormously
wealthy, and travelling with part of his Zenana, and all his jewels!”
The dark stranger still kept his eyes on her, but the expression of
amusement died out of his face, and he suddenly resumed his writing.
“Who told you so?” I asked.
“My maid,” she answered triumphantly. “You know I am taking one out; I
really found that I could not exist without a European servant.”
“You will have to do so, all the same,” I rejoined, “for if she is at
all good-looking, and under fifty, she is bound to marry a soldier.”
“Oh, Dobbs would not look at a soldier!” retorted her mistress
indignantly; “she is _much_ too grand!”
“Wait till you see,” I replied. “I have had two, and they were two too
many; so particular about their meals, always complaining of native
servants and of want of society, insisting on going to sergeants’
balls, and finally wheedling me out of a wedding breakfast. No, give me
an honest elderly ayah, with no family, and followers.”
“Who wears tight calico trousers, and smokes a huka,” she sneered.
“And welcome to both, my dear, as long as _I_ never see them,” I
answered, as I rose and said good night.
The next morning I went on deck before breakfast; there was a faint
fresh breeze, but the sky and water were both blue, the latter as
smooth as a lake. We were passing quite close to the beautiful coast of
Italy, and meeting various fishing-boats, and small coasting steamers.
As I turned to search for my deck-chair, I was saluted by the stranger,
as I mentally called him.
And now, in the full broad daylight, instead of the dim swinging lamps,
I saw, with the eye of an old Qui Hye, that he was undoubtedly a native
of India. Yes, although possibly fairer-skinned than thousands of the
inhabitants of the shores we were passing, he was an Asiatic, without
question; very handsome also, without doubt, with perfectly chiselled
features, and a broader chest and shoulders, and a finer physique than
one generally sees.
“A lovely morning; may I bring your chair under the awning?” he
inquired, in a most deferential manner.
“Yes, and a lovely scene,” I responded, as I seated myself.
“It is. I am very fond of Italy; are not you?”
“I am sure I should be, if I knew it well, but all my travelling has
been in India. When my husband retires we hope to see something of
Europe.”
“I have what is called ‘done’ Europe--France, Germany, Switzerland,
Italy, Spain.”
“And to what country do you give the palm?”
“For country, Italy; as a city, Paris. London is too foggy, too
straggling.”
“Then you will enjoy a winter in India.”
“Yes, it is three years since I was there.” He pronounced his _w_’s as
_v_’s, the only way in which you could have discovered that he was a
foreigner.
“How well you speak English!” I remarked.
“Then you have detected that I am not an Englishman,” he said, with
evident surprise.
“Yes.”
“Of what country do you think I am a native?”
“Asia--possibly India, or Persia,” I ventured.
“Why?--why not a Spaniard, an Italian, a South American, or a Greek?”
“Yes, you might be a Greek, or an Armenian, but all the same I think
you were born further East.” I had not been nineteen years in India for
nothing!
“You are right,” he admitted with an indulgent smile. “My mother was
a Persian, but I have been much in Europe. I was partly educated in
England.”
I was scarcely listening to him; my attention was riveted on a
lovely girl, who had just reached the top of the companion-ladder,
and was looking timidly about. Suddenly she caught sight of my new
acquaintance, and came towards us, with short hurried steps.
She appeared to be about twenty years of age, was slight, and of middle
height, and wore an elaborately made white dress and a sailor hat,
underneath which was the prettiest face I had ever seen. Her complexion
was simply marvellous--pure milk and roses; her eyes, the colour of the
sky, with long black lashes; her hair was really fair, with flaxen and
golden shades through it. I could not take my eyes off her. As she came
up to my companion, she said with an apologetic glance--
“You see, I found my way on deck myself.”
“Yes, so I see,” he answered, in a not particularly genial tone.
“The cabin was so stuffy, and I longed for a breath of the sea air,”
she continued, with pleading eyes.
“Madam,” he said, suddenly turning to me, “may I introduce my
wife--Mrs. Raymond?”
His wife? I was so taken aback, that for a second I was speechless with
astonishment, and then I said, as I held out my hand--
“How do you do, Mrs. Raymond? _Your_ first trip to India, I suppose?”
“Yes,” she replied, with rather a tremor in her voice; “it is the first
time I have ever been from home.”
“Ah, and I dare say you are a little homesick.”
“It is not so bad as being sea-sick,” remarked her husband,
unsympathetically. “She has never experienced that yet.”
“Oh yes, once--long ago on the Clyde--I was awfully sick,” she
protested.
Now that I came to look closely at Mrs. Raymond, and to hear her speak,
I was aware that, although she was a strikingly beautiful girl, she was
not quite a lady; something in her voice and her carriage was wanting.
She held herself badly; her hands were large, though adorned by superb
diamond rings. Yes, I, Louisa Paulet, who rather prided myself on my
diamond rings, had not one that could compare with the least of those
on this girl’s ugly fingers.
“Do you think it will be like this all the way?” she asked, nervously
twisting these fingers.
“I hope so, for my own sake and yours; but at any rate, let us make the
best of the present moment. There is the breakfast bell at last!”
As cheerful, hungry crowds came flocking to the different tables
(where they had previously placed their visiting cards), I was rather
surprised to see the Raymonds take seats almost opposite to me.
He had been beforehand with Major and Mrs. Barker, of the Nizam’s
horse, and the Barkers had to go among the Americans at table number
two--outcasts from the congenial society of their Anglo-Indian friends.
I considered Mr. Raymond’s manœuvre was rather pushing. Surely he
might have seen that we had made up a party, and that he would be _de
trop_. And all tables were alike to him--so I thought then. This was
the humdrum married people’s table; number two was American and French;
number three was surrounded by gay bachelors, grass widows, and brides
and bridegrooms. There was more “go” about it than the other two put
together. Why had not Mr. Raymond established himself there?
I received his advances with mustard, sugar, butter, and salt with
marked coldness, and in my most freezing “Burra mem Sahib” manner.
But who could be stiff with a pair of piteous forget-me-not blue eyes
wistfully appealing to them? The Raymonds were a strikingly handsome
couple; he with his dark resolute face, she with her wonderful fair
beauty. She had already been noted, for many heads were bent forward,
and glances sent in her direction, and whispered comments made. They
both joined in conversation, he particularly, and showed himself to be
a clever, agreeable, well-informed man. There was apparently no topic
on which he had not formed an opinion--from the Irish question, and
the new magazine rifle, down to the last style of dressing the hair.
She did not talk much, and seemed perplexed at the _ménu_, especially
the “anti-pasto.” I saw her skin an olive and taste it, and make a
face; she scraped her plate with her knife, and drank with her spoon
in her cup. No, no, no, she was not a lady. I noticed that she looked
behind her, and up and down the table rather furtively, and seemed
transparently pleased to be one of such a large and lively community.
Possibly she had never been in such good society in all her life.