“Your juggler, ‘The Wonderful Whalley.’”
“Did you find out anything about him, Monsieur Dupin?” asked Miss
Ravenden.
“Nothing worth while. If he was out last night, no one knows it.”
“And the dead sheep?”
But Haynes only shook his head and attacked his breakfast.
After breakfast the party separated, Haynes riding over to see some of
the fishermen, Helga busying herself with household affairs, Miss
Ravenden joining her father in a butterfly expedition to the Hither
Wood, and Colton going off alone in ill-humour after a signal
discomfiture.
He had endeavoured to convince Miss Ravenden that he cherished a
passionate fondness for entomology, hoping thereby to gain an
invitation to join the party. Unfortunately he undertook the role of a
semi-expert, and being by nature the most honest and open of men had
fallen into the pit she dug. Upon his profession of faith she at once,
so he flattered himself, accepted him as a fellow enthusiast, and began
to describe to him a procession of _Arachnidae_ across a swamp.
“In the lead was one great, tiger-striped fellow,” she said. “Are you
familiar with the beautiful, big _arachnid_ with the yellow-and-black
wings?”
“Yes, indeed!” said Colton eagerly. “I used to see’em flitting around
the roses at our summer place.”
“Then,” she said mischievously, “you ought to alter your habits. The
_arachnids_ are spiders. Anyone who sees winged spiders is safer
fishing than on a butterfly hunt. Good-bye, Dr. Colton.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
THE WONDERFUL WHALLEY
THUS cruelly disabused of his hopes, Dick Colton went fishing. But his
heart was not in the sport. Absentmindedly he made up a cast of flies
and spent an hour of fruitless whipping before it dawned upon him that
he had been using a scarlet ibis and a white miller in a blaze of
direct sunshine. Having changed to a carefully prepared leader of grey
and black hackles, he had better luck; but for the first time in his
life successful angling had lost its savour. Laying aside his rod, he
climbed a hillock to look over the landscape. It was a blank. Nowhere
in the range of vision could he discern a butterfly net. The rock where
he had spread his coat suggested a seat. He sat down there, and for one
solid hour proved with irrefutable logic that that which was, couldn’t
possibly be so, because he had known Dolly Ravenden only two days.
Having attained this satisfactory conclusion, he took out the
twenty-dollar bill and regarded it with miserly fervour. Haynes, coming
over the hill, caused a hasty withdrawal of currency.
The reporter seemed tired and worried. In answer to the physician’s
inquiry whether anything new had developed, he shook his head. Colton
dismissed that subject, and with his accustomed straightforwardness
went on to another, upon which he had been deliberating with an uneasy
mind.
“Mr. Haynes,” he said, “I want to speak to you on rather a difficult
subject.”
The reporter looked at him keenly. “Most difficult subjects are better
let alone,” he said shortly.
“In fairness to you I can’t let this one alone. It concerns Miss
Johnston.”
“Whom you have known since Monday, I believe.” Haynes’ face was
disagreeable.
“Pardon me,” said the other. “My interest is in my brother.”
“I can’t pretend to share it,” returned Haynes.
“His name is Everard Colton. Do you know him?”
“Perhaps when I tell you that I know something of your family’s
entirely unnecessary solicitude as to Miss Johnston, you will
appreciate the bad taste of pursuing the subject,” said Haynes.
Dick’s equable temper and habituated self-control stood him in good
stead now.
“I am regarding you as standing in the place of Helga Johnston’s
brother,” he said.
“Are you appealing to me for help in your family affairs?” asked the
reporter rather contemptuously.
“I am trying to be as frank with you as I should like you to be with
me,” returned the other steadily. “I want your consent to my sending
for Everard to come down here.”
Haynes stared at him, amazed. “What do you mean by that?”
“Exactly what I say. There have been some hotheaded and unfortunate
judgments on the part of my family, which report has greatly magnified.
I realise now the full extent of the error.”
“And what has brought about this change of heart?” sneered the other.
“My acquaintance with Miss Johnston. There are some women who carry the
impress of fineness and of character in their faces and their smallest
actions. Even if I had learned nothing else about her, after seeing
Helga Johnston I would think it an honour for any family to welcome
her.”
Haynes’ face softened, but it still was with some harshness that he
said: “There are other Coltons who think otherwise.”
“That is because they don’t know,” was the quick reply. “I want Everard
to have his chance, and I’ve put this case before you because I know
and respect your relation to Miss Johnston, and because I believe it is
your right.”
“Yes, you’re fair about it,” said Haynes, and fell into deep thought.
“Of course,” said Dick uneasily, “if having Everard here is going to
be—er—painful to you, I won’t ask him. I should have thought of that
first. I don’t know that Everard would have a chance anyway.”
“Dr. Colton, I believe that Helga did care for your brother.”
“But is it an open field?” asked Dick impulsively.
A slight smile appeared on Haynes’ lined face. “You mean, do I want to
marry Helga myself? She has never thought of me in that way. In a way
it would be painful, yet I should be glad to know, while I have time,
that she was going to marry some good man—but not any man whose family
could not accept her as she deserves.”
“While you have time,” said the young physician slowly. “While you
have——” He broke off, advanced a step and peered into the other’s face.
Haynes bore the scrutiny with a grim calmness.
As Colton scrutinised, the harsh lines that he had translated into
irritable temperament leaped forth into the terrible significance of
long-repressed pain.
“I don’t want to be professionally intrusive,” said the young doctor
slowly, “but I think—I’m afraid—I know what you mean.”
“Ah, I see you are something of a diagnostician,” said Haynes quietly.
“How long has it been going on?”
“Nearly a year. It’s just behind the left armpit. Rather an unusual
case, I believe. You see, I’m not on the lists as a marrying man.”
Colton walked to and fro on the little level stretch, half a dozen
times. He had seen sickness and suffering in its most helpless forms;
but this calm acceptance of fate affected him beyond his professional
bearing.
“Do your people know?”
“I have no people. It hasn’t seemed worth while to mention it to my
friends. So you will regard this as a professional confidence?”
“Oh, look here!” burst out Colton. “I can’t sit around and watch this
go on. I’ve got more money than I can rightly use. You don’t know me
much, and you don’t like me much, but try to put that aside. Let me pay
your——” he glanced at Haynes and swiftly amended—“let me lend you
enough to take you abroad for a year. I’ll write to some people in
Vienna and Berlin. They’re away ahead of us in cancerous affections.
I’d go with you, only——”
He stopped short, as he realised that the controverting reason was Miss
Dorothy Ravenden’s presence on the American side of the ocean.
The reporter walked over and put his hand on Colton’s shoulder. His
harsh voice softened to something of the tone that he used toward
Helga, as he said: “My dear Colton, all the money in the world won’t do
it. If it would, well,” with a sudden, rare smile, “I’m not sure I
wouldn’t take yours, provided I needed it.”
“Try it,” urged the other. “You don’t know how much those foreign
experts may help you.”
Haynes shook his head. “_O, terque quaterque beati, queis ante ora
patrum contigit oppetere_,” he quoted. “That’s one of my few remnants
of Virgil. It means a great deal to me. I shall not die in exile. Well,
Colton, send for your brother.”
“And what will you do?”
“Stay here and work. There’s something in life besides pain when
inexplicable strokes from the void kill men and sheep. I’m going over
to do some more investigating.”
“And I to wire my brother,” said Colton.
“Don’t forget that ‘The Wonderful Whalley’ is to give his exhibition
this evening.”
They met at dinner, and before they had finished the juggler was
announced. The whole party joined him outside, where he had been
arranging his simple paraphernalia. Running to Helga, he dropped on his
knee in exaggerated and theatrical courtliness.
“Mademoiselle, I am your adoring slave for always,” he said, lifting
his brilliant, unsteady eyes to her for a moment. “Weeth your kind
permission I exheebit my powers.”
He led them to the barnyard, where there was a favourable open space,
and began with some simple acrobatics. His audience was Mr. and Mrs.
Johnston, Helga, Haynes, Colton, and the servants. Professor Ravenden
and his daughter had not returned. After the acrobatics came
sleight-of-hand with cards and handkerchiefs.
“Now I show you ze real genius,” said the performer.
From his belt he drew the two heavy blades which had so interested
Haynes. These he supplemented with smaller knives, until he held half a
dozen in hand. Facing the great barn door, he dexterously slanted a
card into the air. As it rose he poised one of the smaller knives. Down
came the card, paralleling the surface of the door. Swish! The knife
shot through the air and nailed the card to the wood. Another card
flew. Thud! It was pinned fast. A third, less accurately reckoned,
fluttered by one corner.
“Now, ze ace of hearts!” cried the juggler. “We shall face it.”
Forward he flipped it. It turned in air, showing the central spot. It
struck the door at a slight angle and was about turning when the knife
met it Straight through the single heart passed the blade. “The
Wonderful Whalley” struck an attitude.
“Well, by Jove!” exclaimed Colton. “I’ve seen knife-play in Mexico by
the best of the Greasers, but nothing like this.”
“Zere is no one like ‘Ze Wonderful Whalley,’” declared that artist
coolly, as he gathered his knives, all except the one that held the ace
of hearts. He stepped back. “You look at ze spot,” he added, addressing
Haynes.
Haynes moved forward to draw out the blade.
There was a cry from Helga and Colton. Something struck the wood so
close to his ear that he felt the wind of it, and the handle of one of
the big blades quivered against his cheek.
“Eet is for warning,” said “The Wonderful Whalley” urbanely. “Ze heart,
eet could——”
He choked as the powerful grasp of Johnston closed on his throat.
Haynes and Colton ran forward; but there was no need. The man was
passive.
“Eeet was onlee a trick,” he said. “I am insult. I go home.”
“Shall we let him go?” said Haynes undecidedly.
The question was settled for them. With a sudden blow, the juggler
knocked down Johnston, dodged between Haynes and Colton, caught his
knife from the door as he ran with great swiftness, and threatening
back pursuit at the ready point, disappeared not toward the Sand Spit
station, but straight over the hills. The baffled captors looked at
each other in dismay.
“We’ve got a loose wild animal to deal with now,” said Colton.
CHAPTER EIGHT
THE UNHORSED NIGHTFARER
ROUND the big fireplace with its decorations of blue-and-white Colonial
china, which many a guest by vast but vain inducements had tried to buy
from the little hostelry, sat Dick Colton, Haynes and old Johnston. The
clock had struck nine some minutes earlier.
“Your brother couldn’t have caught the afternoon train,” remarked
Haynes. “Was he to ride over?”
“Yes, I arranged for a saddle-horse to meet him at Amagansett,”
answered Colton.
“Reckon the Professor and Miss Dolly stopped at the fishermen’s for
dinner,” opined the old man, as a soft and sudden breeze stirred the
curtains. “If they ain’t in pretty quick they’ll get wet. There’s
somebody now!”
A tramp of feet clumped on the porch, the door was thrown open and a
young man limped in. He was tall, almost as tall as Dick Colton, but
much slenderer, and extremely dark. Despite his unsteady gait, he bore
himself with an inimitably buoyant and jocund carriage. His well-made
riding-suit was muddied and torn, his head was bare, and from a long
but shallow cut on his forehead blood had trickled down one side of his
handsome face, giving him an appearance of almost theatrical
rakishness.
“Hello, Dick, old man!” he cried. “How goes the quest for slumber?”
“Good Lord, Ev!” responded Dick Colton, hurrying to meet him. “What’s
the matter with you? Are you hurt?”
Keenly watching the greeting, Haynes noted the evident and open
affection between the two brothers.
“Just a twisted knee,” said the younger. “Thrown, Dick—thrown like a
riding-school novice. I’d hate to have it get back to the troop.”
“It must have been something extraordinary to get you out of the
saddle,” said Dick, for Everard Colton was one of the best of the
younger polo men.
“It was extraordinary enough, all right,” acquiesced the younger man,
“Let me clean up and I’ll tell you about it.”
“Wait a moment,” said Dick Colton, and introduced his brother to the
other men. “Several queer things have been happening here lately,” he
continued. “We’re all interested in them, particularly Mr. Haynes. Tell
us now—unless you’re in pain,” added Dick anxiously. “Let’s look at
your knee.”
“Oh, that’s nothing. I’m not suffering any except in my temper. Things
I don’t understand disturb my judicial poise.”
“Did your horse roll into one of the gullies?” asked Haynes. “There are
some nasty slides if you get off the road.”
“No, my horse didn’t; but I did,” replied the other. “The Professor of
Prevarication who keeps the Amagansett livery stable told me that the
mare knew the road. If she did know it, she carefully concealed her
knowledge, for as soon as the pitch darkness fell (by the way, I don’t
remember a blacker night) she began to stroll across the verdant meads
like a man chewing a straw and thinking of his troubles. Except for the
sound of the surf, I had no way to steer her, so I just said to her:
‘If you lug me back to Amagansett, I’ll break every rib in your
umbrella,’ and let her amble. About half an hour ago I sighted your
light here. Without any cause that I could make out, my lady friend
began to toss her head upward and sniff the air and tremble.”
“You think the horse heard something?” asked Haynes.
“If I’d been in a big game country I should have said she scented
something. It was a dead calm, and I could have heard any noise, I
think. Well, Jezebel began to buck-jump, and I was rather enjoying
myself when suddenly she did a thing that was new to me in the equine
line. Her legs just seemed to give way from under her, and she slumped
so completely that I was flipped off sidewise. As I got to my feet I
felt a little gust of air that brought a curious odour very plainly to
me.”
“That’s a new development,” said Haynes quietly. “What was it like?”
“Did you ever smell a copperhead snake?”
“Often. Like ripe cucumbers.”
“Yes. Well, this was something on that order, only much stronger and
pretty sickening. Are there any copperheads in Montauk?”
“No, nor ever was,” said Johnston positively. “Anyway, I think it was a
snake. The mare thought it was something uncanny. She went crazy, and
began to rave and tear like a bucking automobile. Just as I thought I
was getting her calmed I stepped on a round stone, that slid me down
into a gully on one side of my face. Again I felt that strange rush of
foul air. Jezebel gave a yell and broke away, and I was adrift on the
broad prairies. There’s one thing I noticed—oh, well, I suppose I
imagined it.”
“No. Go on. Tell us what it was.”
“Well, the draft of wind seemed to come from opposite directions. It
seemed as if something had passed and repassed above me.”
Dick Colton turned to Haynes. “‘The Wonderful Whalley’ is somewhere on
the knolls,” he said.
“Yes; but he isn’t flying around in the air on a broomstick.”
“One could almost believe he had other attributes of the vampire
besides the blood-thirst,” replied Colton. “Ev, Mr. Johnston will show
you your room. Come down when you’re ready. I’ve got something to look
after.”
“You’re worried about Miss—about the Ravendens,” said Haynes to Dick as
the junior Colton left the room. “Wait a moment, till I get lanterns.
I’m going with you.”
“Thank you,” said Dick quietly. “I thought you would. Ev won’t like it
much when he finds there’s something afoot and he has been left out.”
“He’s had his share. I’ve an idea that your brother has been near to
death to-night.”
“The more reason for haste, then.”
“I’ll strike off inland. You take the sea side,” said Haynes, as the
two lighted lanterns and passed out into the dead blackness. “And, by
the way,” he added, “I wouldn’t make my light any more conspicuous than
necessary.”
“All right,” said Dick. “I’ve no particular desire to attract Whalley’s
attention.”
Within ten minutes the young doctor heard voices, and called. Professor
Ravenden’s dry accents answered him. With a hail to Haynes, Colton ran
forward. He almost plunged into Dolly Ravenden’s horse, which reared
and snorted.
“What is it?” cried the girl. “Oh, it’s Dr. Colton. Are you hunting the
night-flying _arachnida?_”
“I was looking for you.”
“Has anything happened?” asked the girl quickly, sobered by his tone.
“Helga? Mr. Haynes?”
“No, all are safe.” He laid his hand on the neck of her mount. “But you
must come home at once. There is danger abroad.”
“Why, Dr. Colton, you’re trembling! I wouldn’t have believed you knew
what it was to be afraid.”
“You don’t know what it is to care——” he cut off the words with
something like a sob. “Thank God, we found you!”
Then the girl had cause to bless the darkness, for from her heart there
surged a flood to her face, and with it woman’s first doubt and fear
and glory. “Perhaps I do know,” she thought. For an instant, she closed
her eyes and saw him as he had come draggled and staggering from the
sea. She opened them upon his stalwart figure and the clean-cut, manly
face, still drawn with anxiety, clear in the light of the lantern.
“It was good of you to brave the danger,” she said sweetly. “I have had
a premonition of some tragedy overhanging, since we found the sheep.”
“Well, Professor! Hello, Miss Dolly!” called Haynes, as he swung up on
a trot. “Are you all right? Better hurry in. There’s a storm coming.”
“It is something besides a storm that brought you gentlemen out on a
search for us,” said Professor Ravenden shrewdly. “While properly
appreciative, I should be glad to have an explanation.” The explanation
came swiftly, from the direction of the sea. It was a long-drawn,
high-pitched scream. There was in it a cadence of mortal terror; the
last agony rang shrill and unmistakable from its quivering echoes. Miss
Ravenden’s horse bounded in the air; but Colton’s weight on the bridle
brought it down shaking.
“That was a horse,” said the girl tremulously. “Poor thing!”
“In dire extremity, if I mistake not,” added the professor. “I am
beginning to feel an interest which I trust is not unscientific in this
succession of phenomena.”
“I think,” said Haynes quickly, “that the house is the place for us
just now. That’s the end of your brother’s horse,” he added to Colton
in a low tone.
When Dick Colton lifted the girl from her saddle at the front porch he
said to her: “Miss Ravenden, may I ask you to promise me something?”
“_I_ don’t know,” said the girl, in sudden apprehension. “What is it?”
“That you will not go out alone on the grassland again, nor go out even
with your father after dusk, until Mr. Haynes or I tell you it is
safe?”
“I promise. But won’t you tell me what you have found out?”
“Something unhorsed my brother as he came across the point in the
darkness, and that was his mare’s death-cry you heard from the shore.”
When they were inside, Haynes suggested that they hold a brief
consultation, at which all should be present. Mr. and Mrs. Johnston,
Helga and Everard Colton were sent for. In the stress of the moment
Haynes had forgotten that Helga had not been warned of the younger
Colton’s coming. Everard came into the room first, and provided his
brother with a surprise, by rushing at Miss Ravenden as if bent on
devouring her.
“Little Dot, the butterfly’s Nemesis!” he cried. “When did you get
here, and how? And Professor too! Well, this is a lark!” To which
greeting the Ravendens responded with equal warmth.
“Dick, you scoundrel, why didn’t you tell me they were here?” cried
Everard.
“I didn’t know you knew them,” returned the bewildered Dick.
“Know them? Why, I’ve spent a week of my latest vacation on their
house-boat. The _Lepidoptero_ of half the Southern States shriek aloud
when they see Miss Ravenden and me approaching. Besides, I’m useful, am
I not, Dolly?”
“Not in terms that could be reduced to an estimate,” said that young
woman.
“Ungrateful maiden! Don’t I shoo off your swarming adorers, comprising
all the polyglot of Washington and most of the blue blood of
Philadelphia? I’m the only man in America who can be with Miss Dorothy
Ravenden for three consecutive days without falling desperately in love
with her. I escape only because I know it’s hopeless.”
“Oh, is that it?” said Dolly demurely. “I had heard there was a more
tangible reason for my bereavement. Vardy, you’re looking serious in
spite of all your nonsense. I believe, upon my soul, the stories are
true.”
“Oh, Dick,” said Everard hastily, “I nearly forgot about that package
of books. I dropped’em outside. Here they are and they’ll cost you just
eight dollars and eighty cents and the price of a drink for my trouble
in bringing them. Don’t know what they are, because I turned over your
telegram to Towney; but by their weight they’re worth the money. Let’s
have a look at them.”
Before Dick could protest he had opened the package.
“‘Summer reading for a young physician,’” he began, looking at the
titles. “What have we here? Harris’ ‘Insects Injurious to Vegetation
‘The Butterfly Book,’ by Holland; ‘Special Report on the Spiders of
Long Island’; ‘North American’—well, by my proud ancestral halls!”
“Give me those books, Ev!” said Dick sharply. “Little Everard, the Boy
Wonder, has put a dainty foot in it again!” He laughed banteringly,
looking from Dorothy Ravenden to Dick and back again. “Dick, too? Oh,
Dolly, couldn’t you leave the family alone for my sake? Case of ‘Love
me, love my bugs’!”
But even the much-allowanced Everard had gone too far. Dolly Ravenden
turned upon him with an expression which boded ill for the venturesome
young man, when a volume of song from the hallway, that seemed,
controlled and effortless as it was, to fill full and permeate every
farthest nook and corner of the house, stopped her. It was Helga
singing a quaint and stirring old ballad.
“Where there is no place
For the glow-worm to lie,
Where there is no space
For receipt of a fly;
Where the midge dare not venture
Lest herself fast she lay,
If Love come he will enter
And will find out the way.”
“Heavens!” exclaimed Dick Colton. “What a voice! Who is it?”
“Haven’t you heard Helga sing?” said Dolly Ravenden, in surprise.
“Isn’t it superb!”
Everard had risen and was looking hungrily toward the door. Dolly
looked keenly at him, and saw in his face a look that she had seen in
many a man’s eyes, but that no woman but one had ever before seen in
Everard Colton’s.
“It _is_ true,” she said to herself. The voice went on:
“There is no striving
To cross his intent,
There is no contriving
His plots to prevent;
For if once the message greet him
That his true-love doth stay,
Though Death come forth to meet him,
Love will find out the way.”
The soft, deep, triumphant final note died away. There was a moment’s
silence.
“Dick, you ought to have told me,” said Everard, unsteadily.
But Dick paid no heed. He was looking at Haynes, upon whose cold and
rather hard-lined face was such an expression of loving pride and
yearning, as utterly transfigured it.
“I ought to be kicked for bringing Everard down here,” thought the
gentle-hearted young doctor.
The door opened and Helga entered. As if drawn magnetically, her gaze
went straight to Everard Colton. She stopped short.
“Helga!” said he.
The girl caught her breath sharply. Her hand fluttered toward her
breast, and fell again. Her colour faded; but instantly she was
mistress of herself.