OF OUR FURTHER ACQUAINTANCE WITH MAJOR-GENERAL J. B. HEATHERSTONE
There was, as may well be imagined, much stir amongst our small
community at the news that the Hall was to be inhabited once more, and
considerable speculation as to the new tenants, and their object in
choosing this particular part of the country for their residence.
It speedily became apparent that, whatever their motives might be, they
had definitely determined upon a lengthy stay, for relays of plumbers
and of joiners came down from Wigtown, and there was hammering and
repairing going on from morning till night.
It was surprising how quickly the signs of the wind and weather were
effaced, until the great, square-set house was all as spick-and-span
as though it had been erected yesterday. There were abundant signs that
money was no consideration to General Heatherstone, and that it was not
on the score of retrenchment that he had taken up his abode among us.
“It may be that he is devoted to study,” suggested my father, as we
discussed the question round the breakfast table. “Perhaps he has chosen
this secluded spot to finish some magnum opus upon which he is engaged.
If that is the case I should be happy to let him have the run of my
library.”
Esther and I laughed at the grandiloquent manner in which he spoke of
the two potato-sacksful of books.
“It may be as you say,” said I, “but the general did not strike me
during our short interview as being a man who was likely to have any
very pronounced literary tastes. If I might hazard a guess, I should say
that he is here upon medical advice, in the hope that the complete quiet
and fresh air may restore his shattered nervous system. If you had seen
how he glared at me, and the twitching of his fingers, you would have
thought it needed some restoring.”
“I do wonder whether he has a wife and a family,” said my sister. “Poor
souls, how lonely they will be! Why, excepting ourselves, there is not a
family that they could speak to for seven miles and more.”
“General Heatherstone is a very distinguished soldier,” remarked my
father.
“Why, papa, however came you to know anything about him?”
“Ah, my dears,” said my father, smiling at us over his coffee-cup, “you
were laughing at my library just now, but you see it may be very useful
at times.” As he spoke he took a red-covered volume from a shelf and
turned over the pages. “This is an Indian Army List of three
years back,” he explained, “and here is the very gentleman we
want--'Heatherstone, J. B., Commander of the Bath,' my dears, and 'V.C.',
think of that, 'V.C.'--'formerly colonel in the Indian Infantry, 41st
Bengal Foot, but now retired with the rank of major-general.' In this
other column is a record of his services--'capture of Ghuznee and
defence of Jellalabad, Sobraon 1848, Indian Mutiny and reduction of
Oudh. Five times mentioned in dispatches.' I think, my dears, that we
have cause to be proud of our new neighbour.”
“It doesn't mention there whether he is married or not, I suppose?”
asked Esther.
“No,” said my father, wagging his white head with a keen appreciation
of his own humour. “It doesn't include that under the heading of 'daring
actions'--though it very well might, my dear, it very well might.”
All our doubts, however, upon this head were very soon set at rest, for
on the very day that the repairing and the furnishing had been completed
I had occasion to ride into Wigtown, and I met upon the way a carriage
which was bearing General Heatherstone and his family to their new home.
An elderly lady, worn and sickly-looking, was by his side, and opposite
him sat a young fellow about my own age and a girl who appeared to be a
couple of years younger.
I raised my hat, and was about to pass them, when the general shouted to
his coachman to pull up, and held out his hand to me. I could see now
in the daylight that his face, although harsh and stern, was capable of
assuming a not unkindly expression.
“How are you, Mr. Fothergill West?” he cried. “I must apologise to
you if I was a little brusque the other night--you will excuse an old
soldier who has spent the best part of his life in harness--All
the same, you must confess that you are rather dark-skinned for a
Scotchman.”
“We have a Spanish strain in our blood,” said I, wondering at his
recurrence to the topic.
“That would, of course, account for it,” he remarked. “My dear,” to his
wife, “allow me to introduce Mr. Fothergill West to you. This is my son
and my daughter. We have come here in search of rest, Mr. West--complete
rest.”
“And you could not possibly have come to a better place,” said I.
“Oh, you think so?” he answered. “I suppose it is very quiet indeed, and
very lonely. You might walk through these country lanes at night, I dare
say, and never meet a soul, eh?”
“Well, there are not many about after dark,” I said.
“And you are not much troubled with vagrants or wandering beggars, eh?
Not many tinkers or tramps or rascally gipsies--no vermin of that sort
about?”
“I find it rather cold,” said Mrs. Heatherstone, drawing her thick
sealskin mantle tighter round her figure. “We are detaining Mr. West,
too.”
“So we are, my dear, so we are. Drive on, coachman. Good-day, Mr. West.”
The carriage rattled away towards the Hall, and I trotted thoughtfully
onwards to the little country metropolis.
As I passed up the High Street, Mr. McNeil ran out from his office and
beckoned to me to stop.
“Our new tenants have gone out,” he said. “They drove over this
morning.”
“I met them on the way,” I answered.
As I looked down at the little factor, I could see that his face was
flushed and that he bore every appearance of having had an extra glass.
“Give me a real gentleman to do business with,” he said, with a burst of
laughter. “They understand me and I understand them. 'What shall I fill
it up for?' says the general, taking a blank cheque out o' his pouch and
laying it on the table. 'Two hundred,' says I, leaving a bit o' a margin
for my own time and trouble.”
“I thought that the landlord had paid you for that,” I remarked.
“Aye, aye, but it's well to have a bit margin. He filled it up and threw
it over to me as if it had been an auld postage stamp. That's the way
business should be done between honest men--though it wouldna do if one
was inclined to take an advantage. Will ye not come in, Mr. West, and
have a taste of my whisky?”
“No, thank you,” said I, “I have business to do.”
“Well, well, business is the chief thing. It's well not to drink in the
morning, too. For my own part, except a drop before breakfast to give
me an appetite, and maybe a glass, or even twa, afterwards to promote
digestion, I never touch spirits before noon. What d'ye think o' the
general, Mr. West?”
“Why, I have hardly had an opportunity of judging,” I answered.
Mr. McNeil tapped his forehead with his forefinger.
“That's what I think of him,” he said in a confidential whisper, shaking
his head at me. “He's gone, sir, gone, in my estimation. Now what would
you take to be a proof of madness, Mr. West?”
“Why, offering a blank cheque to a Wigtown house-agent,” said I.
“Ah, you're aye at your jokes. But between oorsel's now, if a man asked
ye how many miles it was frae a seaport, and whether ships come there
from the East, and whether there were tramps on the road, and whether
it was against the lease for him to build a high wall round the grounds,
what would ye make of it, eh?”
“I should certainly think him eccentric,” said I.
“If every man had his due, our friend would find himsel' in a house with
a high wall round the grounds, and that without costing him a farthing,”
said the agent.
“Where then?” I asked, humouring his joke.
“Why, in the Wigtown County Lunatic Asylum,” cried the little man, with
a bubble of laughter, in the midst of which I rode on my way, leaving
him still chuckling over his own facetiousness.
The arrival of the new family at Cloomber Hall had no perceptible effect
in relieving the monotony of our secluded district, for instead of
entering into such simple pleasures as the country had to offer, or
interesting themselves, as we had hoped, in our attempts to improve
the lot of our poor crofters and fisherfolk, they seemed to shun all
observation, and hardly ever to venture beyond the avenue gates.
We soon found, too, that the factor's words as to the inclosing of the
grounds were founded upon fact, for gangs of workmen were kept hard at
work from early in the morning until late at night in erecting a high,
wooden fence round the whole estate.
When this was finished and topped with spikes, Cloomber Park became
impregnable to any one but an exceptionally daring climber. It was as
if the old soldier had been so imbued with military ideas that, like my
Uncle Toby, he could not refrain even in times of peace from standing
upon the defensive.
Stranger still, he had victualled the house as if for a siege, for
Begbie, the chief grocer of Wigtown, told me himself in a rapture
of delight and amazement that the general had sent him an order for
hundreds of dozens of every imaginable potted meat and vegetable.
It may be imagined that all these unusual incidents were not allowed to
pass without malicious comment. Over the whole countryside and as far
away as the English border there was nothing but gossip about the new
tenants of Cloomber Hall and the reasons which had led them to come
among us.
The only hypothesis, however, which the bucolic mind could evolve, was
that which had already occurred to Mr. McNeil, the factor--namely, that
the old general and his family were one and all afflicted with madness,
or, as an alternative conclusion, that he had committed some heinous
offence and was endeavouring to escape the consequences of his misdeeds.
These were both natural suppositions under the circumstances, but
neither of them appeared to me to commend itself as a true explanation
of the facts.
It is true that General Heatherstone's behaviour on the occasion of our
first interview was such as to suggest some suspicion of mental disease,
but no man could have been more reasonable or more courteous than he had
afterwards shown himself to be.
Then, again, his wife and children led the same secluded life that he
did himself, so that the reason could not be one peculiar to his own
health.
As to the possibility of his being a fugitive from justice, that theory
was even more untenable. Wigtownshire was bleak and lonely, but it was
not such an obscure corner of the world that a well-known soldier could
hope to conceal himself there, nor would a man who feared publicity set
every one's tongue wagging as the general had done.
On the whole, I was inclined to believe that the true solution of the
enigma lay in his own allusion to the love of quiet, and that they
had taken shelter here with an almost morbid craving for solitude and
repose. We very soon had an instance of the great lengths to which this
desire for isolation would carry them.
My father had come down one morning with the weight of a great
determination upon his brow.
“You must put on your pink frock to-day, Esther,” said he, “and you,
John, you must make yourself smart, for I have determined that the three
of us shall drive round this afternoon and pay our respects to Mrs.
Heatherstone and the general.”
“A visit to Cloomber,” cried Esther, clapping her hands.
“I am here,” said my father, with dignity, “not only as the laird's
factor, but also as his kinsman. In that capacity I am convinced that he
would wish me to call upon these newcomers and offer them any politeness
which is in our power. At present they must feel lonely and friendless.
What says the great Firdousi? 'The choicest ornaments to a man's house
are his friends.'”
My sister and I knew by experience that when the old man began to
justify his resolution by quotations from the Persian poets there was no
chance of shaking it. Sure enough that afternoon saw the phaeton at the
door, with my father perched upon the seat, with his second-best coat on
and a pair of new driving-gloves.
“Jump in, my dears,” he cried, cracking his whip briskly, “we shall show
the general that he has no cause to be ashamed of his neighbours.”
Alas! pride always goes before a fall. Our well-fed ponies and shining
harness were not destined that day to impress the tenants of Cloomber
with a sense of our importance.
We had reached the avenue gate, and I was about to get out and open it,
when our attention was arrested by a very large wooden placard, which
was attached to one of the trees in such a manner that no one could
possibly pass without seeing it. On the white surface of this board was
printed in big, black letters the following hospitable inscription:
GENERAL AND MRS. HEATHERSTONE
HAVE NO WISH
TO INCREASE
THE CIRCLE OF THEIR ACQUAINTANCE.
We all sat gazing at this announcement for some moments in silent
astonishment. Then Esther and I, tickled by the absurdity of the thing,
burst out laughing, but my father pulled the ponies' heads round, and
drove home with compressed lips and the cloud of much wrath upon his
brow. I have never seen the good man so thoroughly moved, and I am
convinced that his anger did not arise from any petty feeling of injured
vanity upon his own part, but from the thought that a slight had been
offered to the Laird of Branksome, whose dignity he represented.