The time of day was four o’clock in the afternoon. The place was the
lady’s study or boudoir, Knapwater House. The person was Miss Aldclyffe
sitting there alone, clothed in deep mourning.
The funeral of the old Captain had taken place, and his will had been
read. It was very concise, and had been executed about five years
previous to his death. It was attested by his solicitors, Messrs.
Nyttleton and Tayling, of Lincoln’s Inn Fields. The whole of his estate,
real and personal, was bequeathed to his daughter Cytherea, for her sole
and absolute use, subject only to the payment of a legacy to the rector,
their relative, and a few small amounts to the servants.
Miss Aldclyffe had not chosen the easiest chair of her boudoir to sit
in, or even a chair of ordinary comfort, but an uncomfortable, high,
narrow-backed, oak framed and seated chair, which was allowed to
remain in the room only on the ground of being a companion in artistic
quaintness to an old coffer beside it, and was never used except to
stand in to reach for a book from the highest row of shelves. But she
had sat erect in this chair for more than an hour, for the reason that
she was utterly unconscious of what her actions and bodily feelings
were. The chair had stood nearest her path on entering the room, and she
had gone to it in a dream.
She sat in the attitude which denotes unflagging, intense, concentrated
thought--as if she were cast in bronze. Her feet were together, her body
bent a little forward, and quite unsupported by the back of the chair;
her hands on her knees, her eyes fixed intently on the corner of a
footstool.
At last she moved and tapped her fingers upon the table at her side.
Her pent-up ideas had finally found some channel to advance in. Motions
became more and more frequent as she laboured to carry further and
further the problem which occupied her brain. She sat back and drew
a long breath: she sat sideways and leant her forehead upon her
hand. Later still she arose, walked up and down the room--at first
abstractedly, with her features as firmly set as ever; but by degrees
her brow relaxed, her footsteps became lighter and more leisurely; her
head rode gracefully and was no longer bowed. She plumed herself like a
swan after exertion.
‘Yes,’ she said aloud. ‘To get _him_ here without letting him know that
I have any other object than that of getting a useful man--that’s the
difficulty--and that I think I can master.’
She rang for the new maid, a placid woman of forty with a few grey
hairs.
‘Ask Miss Graye if she can come to me.’
Cytherea was not far off, and came in.
‘Do you know anything about architects and surveyors?’ said Miss
Aldclyffe abruptly.
‘Know anything?’ replied Cytherea, poising herself on her toe to
consider the compass of the question.
‘Yes--know anything,’ said Miss Aldclyffe.
‘Owen is an architect and surveyor’s draughtsman,’ the maiden said, and
thought of somebody else who was likewise.
‘Yes! that’s why I asked you. What are the different kinds of work
comprised in an architect’s practice? They lay out estates, and
superintend the various works done upon them, I should think, among
other things?’
‘Those are, more properly, a land or building steward’s duties--at least
I have always imagined so. Country architects include those things in
their practice; city architects don’t.’
‘I know that, child. But a steward’s is an indefinite fast and loose
profession, it seems to me. Shouldn’t you think that a man who had been
brought up as an architect would do for a steward?’
Cytherea had doubts whether an architect pure would do.
The chief pleasure connected with asking an opinion lies in not adopting
it. Miss Aldclyffe replied decisively--
‘Nonsense; of course he would. Your brother Owen makes plans for country
buildings--such as cottages, stables, homesteads, and so on?’
‘Yes; he does.’
‘And superintends the building of them?’
‘Yes; he will soon.’
‘And he surveys land?’
‘O yes.’
‘And he knows about hedges and ditches--how wide they ought to be,
boundaries, levelling, planting trees to keep away the winds, measuring
timber, houses for ninety-nine years, and such things?’
‘I have never heard him say that; but I think Mr. Gradfield does those
things. Owen, I am afraid, is inexperienced as yet.’
‘Yes; your brother is not old enough for such a post yet, of course.
And then there are rent-days, the audit and winding up of tradesmen’s
accounts. I am afraid, Cytherea, you don’t know much more about the
matter than I do myself.... I am going out just now,’ she continued. ‘I
shall not want you to walk with me to-day. Run away till dinner-time.’
Miss Aldclyffe went out of doors, and down the steps to the lawn: then
turning to the left, through a shrubbery, she opened a wicket and passed
into a neglected and leafy carriage-drive, leading down the hill. This
she followed till she reached the point of its greatest depression,
which was also the lowest ground in the whole grove.
The trees here were so interlaced, and hung their branches so near the
ground, that a whole summer’s day was scarcely long enough to change
the air pervading the spot from its normal state of coolness to even a
temporary warmth. The unvarying freshness was helped by the nearness of
the ground to the level of the springs, and by the presence of a deep,
sluggish stream close by, equally well shaded by bushes and a high wall.
Following the road, which now ran along at the margin of the stream,
she came to an opening in the wall, on the other side of the water,
revealing a large rectangular nook from which the stream proceeded,
covered with froth, and accompanied by a dull roar. Two more steps,
and she was opposite the nook, in full view of the cascade forming its
further boundary. Over the top could be seen the bright outer sky in the
form of a crescent, caused by the curve of a bridge across the rapids,
and the trees above.
Beautiful as was the scene she did not look in that direction. The same
standing-ground afforded another prospect, straight in the front, less
sombre than the water on the right or the trees all around. The avenue
and grove which flanked it abruptly terminated a few yards ahead, where
the ground began to rise, and on the remote edge of the greensward thus
laid open, stood all that remained of the original manor-house, to which
the dark margin-line of the trees in the avenue formed an adequate
and well-fitting frame. It was the picture thus presented that was
now interesting Miss Aldclyffe--not artistically or historically,
but practically--as regarded its fitness for adaptation to modern
requirements.
In front, detached from everything else, rose the most ancient portion
of the structure--an old arched gateway, flanked by the bases of two
small towers, and nearly covered with creepers, which had clambered
over the eaves of the sinking roof, and up the gable to the crest of the
Aldclyffe family perched on the apex. Behind this, at a distance of ten
or twenty yards, came the only portion of the main building that still
existed--an Elizabethan fragment, consisting of as much as could be
contained under three gables and a cross roof behind. Against the wall
could be seen ragged lines indicating the form of other destroyed gables
which had once joined it there. The mullioned and transomed windows,
containing five or six lights, were mostly bricked up to the extent
of two or three, and the remaining portion fitted with cottage
window-frames carelessly inserted, to suit the purpose to which the
old place was now applied, it being partitioned out into small rooms
downstairs to form cottages for two labourers and their families; the
upper portion was arranged as a storehouse for divers kinds of roots and
fruit.
The owner of the picturesque spot, after her survey from this
point, went up to the walls and walked into the old court, where the
paving-stones were pushed sideways and upwards by the thrust of the
grasses between them. Two or three little children, with their fingers
in their mouths, came out to look at her, and then ran in to tell their
mothers in loud tones of secrecy that Miss Aldclyffe was coming. Miss
Aldclyffe, however, did not come in. She concluded her survey of the
exterior by making a complete circuit of the building; then turned into
a nook a short distance off where round and square timber, a saw-pit,
planks, grindstones, heaps of building stone and brick, explained that
the spot was the centre of operations for the building work done on the
estate.
She paused, and looked around. A man who had seen her from the window of
the workshops behind, came out and respectfully lifted his hat to her.
It was the first time she had been seen walking outside the house since
her father’s death.
‘Strooden, could the Old House be made a decent residence of, without
much trouble?’ she inquired.
The mechanic considered, and spoke as each consideration completed
itself.
‘You don’t forget, ma’am, that two-thirds of the place is already pulled
down, or gone to ruin?’
‘Yes; I know.’
‘And that what’s left may almost as well be, ma’am.’
‘Why may it?’
‘’Twas so cut up inside when they made it into cottages, that the whole
carcase is full of cracks.’
‘Still by pulling down the inserted partitions, and adding a little
outside, it could be made to answer the purpose of an ordinary six or
eight-roomed house?’
‘Yes, ma’am.’
‘About what would it cost?’ was the question which had invariably come
next in every communication of this kind to which the superintending
workman had been a party during his whole experience. To his surprise,
Miss Aldclyffe did not put it. The man thought her object in altering an
old house must have been an unusually absorbing one not to prompt what
was so instinctive in owners as hardly to require any prompting at all.
‘Thank you: that’s sufficient, Strooden,’ she said. ‘You will understand
that it is not unlikely some alteration may be made here in a short
time, with reference to the management of the affairs.’
Strooden said ‘Yes,’ in a complex voice, and looked uneasy.
‘During the life of Captain Aldclyffe, with you as the foreman of works,
and he himself as his own steward, everything worked well. But now
it may be necessary to have a steward, whose management will encroach
further upon things which have hitherto been left in your hands than did
your late master’s. What I mean is, that he will directly and in detail
superintend all.’
‘Then--I shall not be wanted, ma’am?’ he faltered.
‘O yes; if you like to stay on as foreman in the yard and workshops
only. I should be sorry to lose you. However, you had better consider. I
will send for you in a few days.’
Leaving him to suspense, and all the ills that came in its
train--distracted application to his duties, and an undefined number
of sleepless nights and untasted dinners, Miss Aldclyffe looked at her
watch and returned to the House. She was about to keep an appointment
with her solicitor, Mr. Nyttleton, who had been to Budmouth, and was
coming to Knapwater on his way back to London.