Looking down, I encountered the eyes of Saracen. He was crouching at my
side, and as I turned toward him, his tail actually wagged. It was a
sight to call the color up to my cheek; not that I blushed at this sign
of good-will, astonishing as it was, considering my feeling toward dogs,
but at his being there at all without my knowing it. So palpable a proof
that no woman--I make no exceptions--can listen more than one minute to
the expressions of a man's sincere admiration without losing a little of
her watchfulness, was not to be disregarded by one as inexorable to her
own mistakes as to those of others. I saw myself the victim of vanity,
and while somewhat abashed by the discovery, I could not but realize
that this solitary proof of feminine weakness was not really to be
deplored in one who has not yet passed the line beyond which any such
display is ridiculous.
Lucetta met me at the door just as I had expected her to. Giving me a
short look, she spoke eagerly but with a latent anxiety, for which I was
more or less prepared.
"I am glad to see you looking so bright this morning," she declared. "We
are all feeling better now that the incubus of secrecy is removed.
But"--here she hesitated--"I would not like to think you told Mr. Trohm
what happened to us yesterday."
"Lucetta," said I, "there may be women of my age who delight in
gossiping about family affairs with comparative strangers, but I am not
that kind of woman. Mr. Trohm, friendly as he has proved himself and
worthy as he undoubtedly is of your confidence and trust, will have to
learn from some other person than myself anything which you may wish to
have withheld from him."
For reply she gave me an impulsive kiss. "I thought I could trust you,"
she cried. Then, with a dubious look, half daring, half shrinking, she
added:
"When you come to know and like us better, you will not care so much to
talk to neighbors. They never can understand us or do us justice, Mr.
Trohm, especially."
This was a remark I could not let pass.
"Why?" I demanded. "Why do you think Mr. Trohm cherishes such animosity
towards you? Has he ever----"
But Lucetta could exercise a repellent dignity when she chose. I did not
finish my sentence, though I must have looked the inquiry I thought
better not to put into words.
"Mr. Trohm is a man of blameless reputation," she avowed. "If he has
allowed himself to cherish suspicions in our regard, he has doubtless
had his reasons for it."
And with these quiet words she left me to my thoughts, and I must say to
my doubts, which were all the more painful that I saw no immediate
opportunity for clearing them up.
Late in the afternoon William burst in with news from the other end of
the lane.
"Such a lark!" he cried. "The investigation at Deacon Spear's house was
a mere farce, and I just made them repeat it with a few frills. They had
dug up my cellar, and I was determined they should dig up his. Oh, the
fun it was! The old fellow kicked, but I had my way. They couldn't
refuse me, you know; I hadn't refused them. So that man's cellar-bottom
has had a stir up. They didn't find anything, but it did me a lot of
good, and that's something. I do hate Deacon Spear--couldn't hate him
worse if he'd killed and buried ten men under his hearthstone."
"There is no harm in Deacon Spear," said Lucetta, quickly.
"Did they submit Mr. Trohm's house to a search also?" asked Loreen,
ashamed of William's heat and anxious to avert any further display of
it.
"Yes, they went through that too. I was with them. Glad I was too. I
say, girls, I could have laughed to see all the comforts that old
bachelor has about him. Never saw such fixings. Why, that house is as
neat and pretty from top to bottom as any old maid's. It's silly, of
course, for a man, and I'd rather live in an old rookery like this,
where I can walk from room to room in muddy boots if I want to, and
train my dogs and live in freedom like the man I am. Yet I couldn't help
thinking it mighty comfortable, too, for an old fellow like him who
likes such things and don't have chick or child to meddle. Why, he had
pincushions on all his bureaus, and they had pins in them."
The laugh with which he delivered this last sentence might have been
heard a quarter of a mile away. Lucetta looked at Loreen and Loreen
looked at me, but none of us joined in the mirth, which seemed to me
very ill-timed.
Suddenly Lucetta asked:
"Did they dig up Mr. Trohm's cellar?"
William stopped laughing long enough to say:
"His cellar? Why, it's cemented as hard as an oak floor. No, they didn't
polish their spades in his house, which was another source of
satisfaction to me. Deacon Spear hasn't even that to comfort him. Oh,
how I did enjoy that old fellow's face when they began to root up his
old fungi!"
Lucetta turned away with a certain odd constraint I could not but
notice.
"It's a humiliating day for the lane," said she. "And what is worse,"
she suddenly added, "nothing will ever come of it. It will take more
than a band of police to reach the root of this matter."
I thought her manner odd, and, moving towards her, took her by the hand
with something of a relative's familiarity.
"What makes you say that? Mr. Gryce seems a very capable man."
"Yes, yes, but capability has nothing to do with it. Chance might and
pluck might, but wit and experience not. Otherwise the mystery would
have been settled long ago. I wish I----"
"Well?" Her hand was trembling violently.
"Nothing. I don't know why I have allowed myself to talk on this
subject. Loreen and I once made a compact never to give any opinion upon
it. You see how I have kept it."
She had drawn her hand away and suddenly had become quite composed. I
turned my attention toward Loreen, but she was looking out of the window
and showed no intention of further pursuing the conversation. William
had strolled out.
"Well," said I, "if ever a girl had reason for breaking such a compact
you are certainly that girl. I could never have been as silent as you
have been--that is, if I had any suspicions on so serious a subject.
Why, your own good name is impugned--yours and that of every other
person living in this lane."
"Miss Butterworth," she replied, "I have gone too far. Besides, you have
misunderstood me. I have no more knowledge than anybody else as to the
source of these terrible tragedies. I only know that an almost
superhuman cunning lies at the bottom of so many unaccountable
disappearances, a cunning so great that only a crazy person----"
"Ah," I murmured eagerly, "Mother Jane!"
She did not answer. Instantly I took a resolution.
"Lucetta," said I, "is Deacon Spear a rich man?"
Starting violently, she looked at me amazed.
"If he is, I should like to hazard the guess that he is the man who has
held you in such thraldom for years."
"And if he were?" said she.
"I could understand William's antipathy to him and also his suspicions."
She gave me a strange look, then without answering walked over and took
Loreen by the hand. "Hush!" I thought I heard her whisper. At all events
the two sisters were silent for more than a moment. Then Lucetta said:
"Deacon Spear is well off, but nothing will ever make me accuse living
man of crime so dreadful." And she walked away, drawing Loreen after
her. In another moment she was out of the room, leaving me in a state of
great excitement.
"This girl holds the secret to the whole situation," I inwardly decided.
"The belief that nothing more can be learned from her is a false one. I
must see Mr. Gryce. William's rodomontades are so much empty air, but
Lucetta's silence has a meaning we cannot afford to ignore."
So impressed was I by this, that I took the first opportunity which
presented itself of seeing the detective. This was early the next
morning. He and several of the townspeople had made their appearance at
Mother Jane's cottage, with spades and picks, and the sight had
naturally drawn us all down to the gate, where we stood watching
operations in a silence which would have been considered unnatural by
any one who did not realize the conflicting nature of the emotions
underlying it. William, to whom the death of his mother seemed to be a
great deliverance, had been inclined to be more or less jocular, but his
sallies meeting with no response, he had sauntered away to have it out
with his dogs, leaving me alone with the two girls and Hannah.
The latter seemed to be absorbed entirely by the aspect of Mother Jane,
who stood upon her doorstep in an attitude so menacing that it was
little short of tragic. Her hood, for the first time in the memory of
those present, had fallen away from her head, revealing a wealth of gray
hair which flew away from her head like a weird halo. Her features we
could not distinguish, but the emotion which inspired her, breathed in
every gesture of her uplifted arms and swaying body. It was wrath
personified, and yet an unreasoning wrath. One could see she was as much
dazed as outraged. Her lares and penates were being attacked, and she
had come from the heart of her solitude to defend them.
"I declare!" Hannah protested. "It is pitiful. She has nothing in the
world but that garden, and now they are going to root that up."
"Do you think that the sight of a little money would appease her?" I
inquired, anxious for an excuse to drop a word into the ear of Mr.
Gryce.
"Perhaps," said Hannah. "She dearly loves money, but it will not take
away her fright."
"It will if she has nothing to be frightened about," said I; and turning
to the girls, I asked them, somewhat mincingly for me, if they thought I
would make myself conspicuous if I crossed the road on this errand, and
when Loreen answered that that would not deter her if she had the money,
and Lucetta added that the sight of such misery was too painful for any
mere personal consideration, I took advantage of their complaisance, and
hastily made my way over to the group, who were debating as to the point
they would attack first.
"Gentlemen," said I, "good-morning. I am here on an errand of mercy.
Poor old Mother Jane is half imbecile and does not understand why you
invade her premises with these implements. Will you object if I endeavor
to distract her mind with a little piece of gold I happen to have in my
pocket? She may not deserve it, but it will make your task easier and
save us some possible concern."
Half of the men at once took off their hats. The other half nudged each
other's elbows, and whispered and grimaced like the fools they were. The
first half were gentlemen, though not all of them wore gentlemen's
clothes.
It was Mr. Gryce who spoke:
"Certainly, madam. Give the old woman anything you please, but--" And
here he stepped up to me and began to whisper; "You have something to
say. What is it?"
I answered in the same quick way: "The mine you thought exhausted has
possibilities in it yet. Question Lucetta. It may prove a more fruitful
task than turning up this soil."
The bow he made was more for the onlookers than for the suggestion I had
given him. Yet he was not ungrateful for the latter, as I, who was
beginning to understand him, could see.
"Be as generous as you please!" he cried aloud. "We would not disturb
the old crone if it were not for one of her well-known follies. Nothing
will take her over forty rods away from her home. Now what lies within
those forty rods? These men think we ought to see."
The shrug I gave answered both the apparent and the concealed question.
Satisfied that he would understand it so, I hurried away from him and
approached Mother Jane.
"See!" said I, astonished at the regularity of her features, now that I
had a good opportunity of observing them. "I have brought you money. Let
them dig up your turnips if they will."
She did not seem to perceive me. Her eyes were wild with dismay and her
lips trembling with a passion far beyond my power to comfort.
"Lizzie!" she cried. "Lizzie! She will come back and find no home. Oh,
my poor girl! My poor, poor girl!"
It was pitiable. I could not doubt her anguish or her sincerity. The
delirium of a broken heart cannot be simulated. And this heart was not
controlled by reason; that was equally apparent. Immediately my heart,
which goes out slowly, but none the less truly on that account, was
touched by something more than the surface sympathy of the moment. She
may have stolen, she may have done worse, she may even have been at the
bottom of the horrible crimes which have given its name to the lane we
were in, but her acts, if acts they were, were the result of a clouded
mind fixed forever upon the fancied needs of another, and not the
expression of personal turpitude or even of personal longing or avarice.
Therefore I could pity her, and I did.
Making another appeal, I pressed the coin hard into one of her hands
till the contact effected what my words had been unable to do, and she
finally looked down and saw what she was clutching. Then indeed her
aspect changed, and in a few minutes of slowly growing comprehension she
became so quiet and absorbed that she forgot to look at the men and even
forgot me, who was probably nothing more than a flitting shadow to her.
"A silk gown," she murmured. "It will buy Lizzie a silk gown. Oh! where
did it come from, the good, good gold, the beautiful gold; such a little
piece, yet enough to make her look fine, my Lizzie, my pretty, pretty
Lizzie?"
No numbers this time. The gift was too overpowering for her even to
remember that it must be hidden away.
I walked away while her delight was still voluble. Somehow it eased my
mind to have done her this little act of kindness, and I think it eased
the minds of the men too. At all events, every hat was off when I
repassed them on my way back to the Knollys gateway.
I had left both the girls there, but I found only one awaiting me.
Lucetta had gone in, and so had Hannah. On what errand I was soon to
know.
"What do you suppose that detective wants of Lucetta now?" asked Loreen
as I took my station again at her side. "While you were talking to
Mother Jane he stepped over here, and with a word or two induced Lucetta
to walk away with him toward the house. See, there they are in those
thick shrubs near the right wing. He seems to be pleading with her. Do
you think I ought to join them and find out what he is urging upon her
so earnestly? I don't like to seem intrusive, but Lucetta is easily
agitated, you know, and his business cannot be of an indifferent nature
after all he has discovered concerning our affairs."
"No," I agreed, "and yet I think Lucetta will be strong enough to
sustain the conversation, judging from the very erect attitude she is
holding now. Perhaps he thinks she can tell him where to dig. They seem
a little at sea over there, and living, as you do, a few rods from
Mother Jane, he may imagine that Lucetta can direct him where to first
plant the spade."
"It's an insult," Loreen protested. "All these talks and visits are
insults. To be sure, this detective has some excuse, but----"
"Keep your eye on Lucetta," I interrupted. "She is shaking her head and
looking very positive. She will prove to him it is an insult. We need
not interfere, I think."
But Loreen had grown pensive and did not heed my suggestion. A look that
was almost wistful had supplanted the expression of indignant revolt
with which she had addressed me, and when next moment the two we had
been watching turned and came slowly toward us, it was with decided
energy she bounded forward and joined them.
"What is the matter now?" she asked. "What does Mr. Gryce want,
Lucetta?"
Mr. Gryce himself spoke.
"I simply want her," said he, "to assist me with a clue from her inmost
thoughts. When I was in your house," he explained with a praiseworthy
consideration for me and my relations to these girls for which I cannot
be too grateful, "I saw in this young lady something which convinced me
that, as a dweller in this lane, she was not without her suspicions as
to the secret cause of the fatal mysteries which I have been sent here
to clear up. To-day I have frankly accused her of this, and asked her to
confide in me. But she refuses to do so, Miss Loreen. Yet her face shows
even at this moment that my old eyes were not at fault in my reading of
her. She does suspect somebody, and it is not Mother Jane."
"How can you say that?" began Lucetta, but the eyes which Loreen that
moment turned upon her seemed to trouble her, for she did not attempt to
say any more--only looked equally obstinate and distressed.
"If Lucetta suspects any one," Loreen now steadily remarked, "then I
think she ought to tell you who it is."
"You do. Then perhaps you--" commenced Mr. Gryce--"can persuade her as
to her duty," he finished, as he saw her head rise in protest of what he
evidently had intended to demand.
"Lucetta will not yield to persuasion," was her quiet reply. "Nothing
short of conviction will move the sweetest-natured but the most
determined of all my mother's children. What she thinks is right, she
will do. I will not attempt to influence her."
Mr. Gryce, with one comprehensive survey of the two, hesitated no
longer. I saw the rising of the blood into his forehead, which always
precedes the beginning of one of his great moves, and, filled with a
sudden excitement, I awaited his next words as a tyro awaits the first
unfolding of the plan he has seen working in the brain of some famous
strategist.
"Miss Lucetta,"--his very tone was changed, changed in a way to make us
all start notwithstanding the preparation his momentary silence had
given us--"I have been thus pressing and perhaps rude in my appeal,
because of something which has come to my knowledge which cannot but
make you of all persons extremely anxious as to the meaning of this
terrible mystery. I am an old man, and you will not mind my bluntness. I
have been told--and your agitation convinces me there is truth in the
report--that you have a lover, a Mr. Ostrander----"
"Ah!" She had sunk as if crushed by one overwhelming blow to the earth.
The eyes, the lips, the whole pitiful face that was upturned to us,
remain in my memory to-day as the most terrible and yet the most moving
spectacle that has come into my by no means uneventful life. "What has
happened to him? Quick, quick, tell me!"
For answer Mr. Gryce drew out a telegram.
"From the master of the ship on which he was to sail," he explained. "It
asks if Mr. Ostrander left this town on Tuesday last, as no news has
been received of him."
"Loreen! Loreen! When he left us he passed down that way!" shrieked the
girl, rising like a spirit and pointing east toward Deacon Spear's. "He
is gone! He is lost! But his fate shall not remain a mystery. I will
dare its solution. I--I--To-night you will hear from me again."
And without another glance at any of us she turned and fled toward the
house.
XXXIV
CONDITIONS
But in another moment she was back, her eyes dilated and her whole
person exhaling a terrible purpose.
"Do not look at me, do not notice me!" she cried, but in a voice so
hoarse no one but Mr. Gryce could fully understand her. "I am for no
one's eyes but God's. Pray that he may have mercy upon me." Then as she
saw us all instinctively fall back, she controlled herself, and,
pointing toward Mother Jane's cottage, said more distinctly: "As for
those men, let them dig. Let them dig the whole day long. Secrecy must
be kept, a secrecy so absolute that not even the birds of the air must
see that our thoughts range beyond the forty rods surrounding Mother
Jane's cottage."
She turned and would have fled away for the second time, but Mr. Gryce
stopped her. "You have set yourself a task beyond your strength. Can you
perform it?"
"I can perform it," she said. "If Loreen does not talk, and I am allowed
to spend the day in solitude."
I had never seen Mr. Gryce so agitated--no, not when he left Olive
Randolph's bedside after an hour of vain pleading. "But to wait all day!
Is it necessary for you to wait all day?"
"It is necessary." She spoke like an automaton. "To-night at twilight,
when the sun is setting, meet me at the great tree just where the road
turns. Not a minute sooner, not an hour later. I will be calmer then."
And waiting now for nothing, not for a word from Loreen nor a detaining
touch from Mr. Gryce, she flew away for the second time. This time
Loreen followed her.
"Well, that is the hardest thing I ever had to do," said Mr. Gryce,
wiping his forehead and speaking in a tone of real grief and anxiety.
"Do you think her delicate frame can stand it? Will she survive this day
and carry through whatever it is she has set herself to accomplish?"
"She has no organic disease," said I, "but she loved that young man very
much, and the day will be a terrible one to her."
Mr. Gryce sighed.
"I wish I had not been obliged to resort to such means," said he, "but
women like that only work under excitement, and she does know the secret
of this affair."
"Do you mean," I demanded, almost aghast, "that you have deceived her
with a false telegram; that that slip of paper you hold----"
"Read it," he cried, holding it out toward me.
I did read it. Alas, there was no deception in it. It read as he said.
"However--" I began.
But he had pocketed the telegram and was several steps away before I had
finished my sentence.
"I am going to start these men up," said he. "You will breathe no word
to Miss Lucetta of my sympathy nor let your own interests slack in the
investigations which are going on under our noses."
And with a quick, sharp bow, he made his way to the gate, whither I
followed him in time to see him set his foot upon a patch of sage.
"You will begin at this place," he cried, "and work east; and,
gentlemen, something tells me that we shall be successful."
With almost a simultaneous sound a dozen spades and picks struck the
ground. The digging up of Mother Jane's garden had begun in earnest.
XXXV
THE DOVE
I remained at the gate. I had been bidden to show my interest in what
was going on in Mother Jane's garden, and this was the way I did it. But
my thoughts were not with the diggers. I knew, as well then as later,
that they would find nothing worth the trouble they were taking; and,
having made up my mind to this, I was free to follow the lead of my own
thoughts.
They were not happy ones; I was neither satisfied with myself nor with
the prospect of the long day of cruel suspense that awaited us. When I
undertook to come to X., it was with the latent expectation of making
myself useful in ferreting out its mystery. And how had I succeeded? I
had been the means through which one of its secrets had been discovered,
but not _the_ secret; and while Mr. Gryce was good enough, or wise
enough, to show no diminution in his respect for me, I knew that I had
sunk a peg in his estimation from the consciousness I had of having sunk
two, if not three pegs, in my own.
This was a galling thought to me. But it was not the only one which
disturbed me. Happily or unhappily, I have as much heart as pride, and
Lucetta's despair, and the desperate resolve to which it had led, had
made an impression upon me which I could not shake off.
Whether she knew the criminal or only suspected him; whether in the heat
of her sudden anguish she had promised more or less than she could
perform, the fact remained that we (by whom I mean first and above all,
Mr. Gryce, the ablest detective on the New York force, and myself, who,
if no detective, am at least a factor of more or less importance in an
inquiry like this) were awaiting the action of a weak and suffering girl
to discover what our own experience should be able to obtain for us
unassisted.