"Miss Blair, sir," announced Glave next day just before noon, while I
was sitting alone in my room in Great Russell Street, smoking
vigorously, and utterly bewildered over the problem of the dead man's
pack of cards.
I sprang to my feet to welcome Mabel, who in her rich warm furs was
looking very dainty and charming.
"I suppose if Mrs. Percival knew I had come here alone, she'd give me a
sound lecture against visiting a man's rooms," she said, laughing after
I had greeted her and closed the door.
"Well," I said, "it's scarcely the first time you've honoured me with a
visit, is it? And surely you need not trouble very much about Mrs.
Percival."
"Oh, she really grows more straight-backed every day," Mabel pouted. "I
mustn't go here, and I mustn't go there, and she's afraid of me speaking
with this man, and the other man is not to be known, and so on. I'm
really growing rather sick of it, I can tell you," she declared, seating
herself in the chair I had just vacated, unloosing her heavy sable cape,
and stretching a neat ankle to the fire.
"But she's been an awfully good friend to you," I argued. "As far as I
can see, she's been the most easy-going of chaperons."
"The perfect chaperon is the one who can utterly and effectually efface
herself five minutes after entering the room," Mabel declared. "And I
will give Mrs. Percival her due, she's never clung on to me at dances,
and if she's found me sitting out in a dim corner she has always made it
a point to have an urgent call in an opposite direction. Yes," she
sighed, "I suppose I oughtn't to grumble when I recollect the snappy old
tabbies in whose hands some girls are. There's Lady Anetta Gordon, for
instance, and Vi Drummond, both pretty girls out last season, but whose
lives are rendered perfect tortures by those two ugly old hags who cart
them about. Why, they've both told me they dare not raise their eyes to
a man without a snappy lecture next day on polite manners and maiden
modesty."
"Well," I said frankly, standing on the hearthrug, and looking down at
her handsome figure: "I really don't think you have had much to complain
about up to the present. Your poor father was most indulgent, and I'm
sure Mrs. Percival, although she may seem rather harsh at times, is only
speaking for your own benefit."
"Oh, I know I'm a very wilful girl in your eyes," she exclaimed, with a
smile. "You always used to say so when I was at school."
"Well, to tell the truth, you were," I answered quite openly.
"Of course. You men never make allowance for a girl. You assume your
freedom with your first long trousers, while we unfortunate girls are
not allowed a single moment alone, either inside the house or out of it.
No matter whether we be as ugly as Mother Shipton or as beautiful as
Venus, we must all of us be tied up to some elder woman, who very often
is just as fond of a mild flirtation as the simpering young miss in her
charge. Forgive me for speaking so candidly, won't you, Mr. Greenwood,
but my opinion is that the modern methods of society are all sham and
humbug."
"You're not in a very polite mood to-day, it seems," I remarked, being
unable to restrain a smile.
"No, I'm not," she admitted. "Mrs. Percival is so very aggravating. I
want to go down to Mayvill this afternoon, and she won't let me go
alone."
"Why do you so particularly wish to go there alone?"
She flushed slightly, and appeared for a moment to be confused.
"Oh, well, I don't want to go alone very particularly, you know," she
tried to assure me. "It is the foolishness of not allowing me to travel
down there like any other girl that I object to. If a maid can take a
railway journey alone, why can't I?"
"Because you have the _convenances_ of society to respect--the domestic
servant need not."
"Then I prefer the lot of the domestic," she declared in a manner which
told me that something had annoyed her. For my own part I should have
regretted very much if Mrs. Percival had consented to her going down to
Herefordshire alone, while it also seemed apparent that she had some
secret reason of her own for not taking her elder companion with her.
What, I wondered, could it be?
I inquired the reason why she wished to go to Mayvill without even a
maid, but she made an excuse that she wanted to see the other four
hunters were being properly treated by the studs-man, and also to make a
search through her father's study to ascertain whether any important or
confidential papers remained there. She had the keys, and intended to
do this before that odious person, Dawson, assumed his office.
This suggestion, evidently made as an excuse, struck me as one that
really should be acted upon without delay, yet it was so very plain that
she desired to go alone that at first I hesitated to offer to accompany
her. Our friendship was of such a close and intimate character that I
could of course offer to do so without overstepping the bounds of
propriety, nevertheless I resolved to first endeavour to learn the
reason of her strong desire to travel alone.
She was a clever woman, however, and had no intention of telling me.
She had a strong and secret desire to go down alone to that fine old
country house that was now her own, and did not desire that Mrs.
Percival should accompany her.
"If you are really going to search the library, Mabel, had I not better
accompany and help you?" I suggested presently. "That is, of course,
if you will permit me," I added apologetically.
For a moment she was silent, as though devising some means out of a
dilemma, then she answered--
"If you'll come, I'll of course be only too delighted. Indeed, you
really ought to assist me, for we might discover some key to the cipher
on the cards. My father was down there for three days about a fortnight
before his death."
"When shall we start?"
"At three-thirty from Paddington. Will that suit you? You shall come
and be my guest." And she laughed mischievously at such utter break-up
of the _convenances_ and the probable chagrin of the long-suffering Mrs.
Percival.
"Very well," I agreed; and ten minutes later I went down with her and
put her, smiling sweetly, into her smart victoria, the servants of which
were now in mourning.
You perceive that I was playing a very dangerous game? And so I was; as
you will afterwards see.
At the hour appointed I met her at Paddington, and putting aside her sad
thoughtfulness at her bereavement we travelled together down to Dunmore
Station, beyond Hereford. Here we entered the brougham awaiting us, and
after a drive of nearly three miles, descended before the splendid old
mansion which Burton Blair had bought two years before for the sake of
the shooting and fishing surrounding it.
Standing in its fine park half-way between King's Pyon and Dilwyn,
Mayvill Court was, and is still, one of the show places of the county.
It was an ideal ancestral hall. The grand old gabled house with its
lofty square towers, its Jacobean entrance, gateway and dovecote, and
the fantastically clipped box-trees and sun-dial of its quaint
old-fashioned garden, possessed a delightful charm which few other
ancient mansions could boast, and a still further interesting feature
lay in its perfectly unaltered state throughout, even to the minutest
detail. For close on three hundred years it had been held by its
original owners, the Baddesleys, until Blair had purchased it--
furniture, pictures, armour, everything just as it stood.
It was nearly nine o'clock when Mrs. Gibbons, the elderly housekeeper,
welcomed us, in tears at the death of her master, and we passed into the
great oak-panelled hall in which hung the sword and portrait of the
gallant cavalier. Captain Harry Baddesley, of whom there still was told
a romantic story. Narrowly escaping from the battle-field, the captain
spurred homewards, with some of Cromwell's soldiers close at his heels;
and his wife, a lady of great courage, had scarcely concealed him in the
secret chamber when the enemy arrived to search the house. Little
daunted, the lady assisted them and personally conducted them over the
mansion. As in so many instances, the secret room was entered from the
principal bedroom, and in inspecting the latter the Roundheads had their
suspicions aroused. So they decided to stay the night.
The hunted man's wife sent them an ample supper and some wine which had
been carefully drugged, with the result that the unwelcome visitors were
very soon soundly asleep, and the gallant captain, before the effects of
the wine had worn off, were far beyond their reach.
Since that day the old place had remained absolutely unchanged, with its
rows of dark, time-mellowed family portraits in the big hall, its
Jacobean furniture and its old helmets and pikes that had borne the
brunt of Naseby. The night was bitterly cold. In the great open hearth
huge logs were blazing, and as we stood there to warm ourselves after
our journey, Mrs. Gibbons, who had been apprised of our advent by
telegraph, announced that she had prepared supper for us as she knew we
could not arrive in time for dinner.
Both she and her husband expressed the deepest sympathy with Mabel in
her bereavement, and then having removed our coats we went on into the
small dining-room, where supper was served by Gibbons and the footman
with that old-fashioned stateliness characteristic of all in that fine
old-world mansion.
Gibbons and his wife, old retainers of the former owners, were, I think,
somewhat surprised that I had accompanied their young mistress alone,
nevertheless Mabel had explained to them how she wished to make a search
of her father's effects in the library, and that for that reason she had
invited me to accompany her. Yet I must confess that I, on my part, had
not yet formed any conclusion as to the real reason of her visit. That
there was some ulterior motive in it I felt certain, but what it was I
could not even guess.
After supper Mrs. Gibbons took my pretty companion to her room, while
Gibbons showed me the one prepared for me, a long big chamber on the
first floor, from the windows of which I had a wide view over the
undulating lawns to Wormsley Hill and Sarnesfield. I had occupied the
room on several occasions, and knew it well, with its great old carved
four-poster bed, antique hangings, Jacobean chests and polished oaken
ceiling.
After a wash I rejoined my dainty little hostess in the library--a big,
long, old room, where a fire burned brightly and the lamps were softly
shaded with yellow silk. Over the fireplace were carved in stone the
three water-bougets of the Baddesleys, with the date 1601, while the
whole room from end to end was lined with brown-backed books that had
probably not been disturbed for half-a-century.
After Mabel had allowed me a cigarette and told Gibbons that she did not
wish to be disturbed for an hour or so, she rose and turned the key
behind the servants, so that we might carry out the work of
investigation without interruption.
"Now," she said, turning her fine eyes upon me with an excitement she
could not suppress as she walked to the big writing-table and took her
father's keys from her pocket, "I wonder whether we shall discover
anything of interest. I suppose," she added, "it is really Mr.
Leighton's duty to do this. But I prefer that you and I should look
into my father's affairs prior to the inquisitive lawyer's arrival."
It almost seemed as if she half-expected to discover something which she
desired to conceal from the solicitor.
The dead man's writing-table was a ponderous old-fashioned one of carved
oak, and as she unlocked the first drawer and turned out its contents, I
drew up chairs and settled with her in order to make a methodical and
thorough examination. The papers, we found, were mostly letters from
friends, and correspondence from solicitors and brokers regarding his
investments in various quarters. From some which I read I gathered what
enormous profits he had made over certain deals in Kaffirs, while in
certain other correspondence were allusions to matters which, to me,
were very puzzling.
Mabel's eager attitude was that of one in search of some document or
other which she believed to be there. She scarcely troubled to read any
of the letters, merely scanning them swiftly and casting them aside.
Thus we examined the contents of one drawer after another until I saw
beneath her hand a blue foolscap envelope sealed with black wax, and
bearing the superscription in her father's handwriting:--
"To be opened by Mabel after my death.--Burton Blair."
"Ah!" she gasped in breathless haste. "I wonder what this contains?"
And she eagerly broke the seals, and drew forth a sheet of foolscap
closely written, to which some other papers were attached by means of a
brass fastener.
From the envelope, too, something fell, and I picked it up, finding to
my surprise that it was a snap-shot photograph much worn and tattered,
but preserved by being mounted upon a piece of linen. It was a
half-faded view of a country crossroads in a flat and rather dismal
country, with a small lonely house, probably once an old toll-house,
with high chimneys standing on the edge of the highway, a small strip of
flower-garden railed off at the side. Before the door was a rustic
porch covered by climbing roses, and out on the roadside an old Windsor
armchair that had apparently just been vacated.
While I was examining the view beneath the lamp-light, the dead man's
daughter was reading swiftly through those close lines her father had
penned.
Suddenly she uttered a loud cry as though horrified by some discovery,
and, startled, I turned to glance at her. Her countenance had changed;
she was blanched to the lips.
"No!" she gasped hoarsely. "I--I can't believe it--I won't!"
Again she glanced at the paper to re-read those fateful lines.
"What is it?" I inquired anxiously. "May I not know?" And I crossed
to where she stood.
"No," she answered firmly, placing the paper behind her. "No! Not even
you may know this!" And with a sudden movement she tore the paper to
pieces in her hands, and ere I could rescue it, she had cast the
fragments into the fire.
The flames leapt up, and next instant the dead man's confession--if such
it were--was consumed and lost for ever, while his daughter stood,
haggard, rigid and white as death.