THE MANOR HOUSE.
The house occupied by Mr. Grey was very old. It had been the Manor
House, and was still called the Manor House, or the Manor, although it
had long ago ceased to be the property of the original owner's
descendants. For years before Mr. Grey bought it the house had been
uninhabited.
It bore a bad name--why, no one could tell. The fortunes of the lords of
the manor had gradually mouldered away, and the old house had been
allowed to fall into decay and dilapidation.
During the time it was shut up people spoke of it as a kind of phantom
house; some regarded it as a myth, and others treated it with a
superstitious respect as a thing which might exercise an evil influence
over those who fell under the shadow of its displeasure.
Sunken deeply from the road, surrounded by a wild tangle of rugged oaks,
its grounds girt with walls ten feet high, there were few points open to
the public from which a glimpse of it could be caught, and no spot from
which a full view could be obtained.
Boys had scaled the walls and penetrated into the tangled mazes of the
neglected undergrowth. But the briars and brambles and bushes were too
rough even for boys, and they came away soon.
No boy of Daneford--and there were high-hearted, brave, adventurous boys
there--could say he had penetrated as far as the house. Although those
who had once been boys of Daneford had faced the enemies of their
country in every clime, by day and by night, on land and sea, and
although the boys of that city, at the time spoken of, were made of as
stout stuff and inspired by as gallant hearts as the boys who had fought
and fallen in Spain, India, America, Belgium, Egypt, where you will, not
one of all of them would dare, alone and by night, to break through that
jungle, and penetrate to that house.
The soil of the Manor Park was low and full of rich juices, and fertile
with long rest, so the vegetation beneath the gnarled boughs of the
interlacing oaks could hold the moisture well when the sun was hot, and
from that ground to the sun they never saw clearly rose huge green and
red and yellow slimy weeds among the brambles and the shrubs.
From the nests of many generations of birds which had built in those
distorted trees seeds of all things that grow on this land had fallen,
and taken root and prospered in the rich ground of the sultry glens and
caverns formed by the scraggy arms and foliage of the oaks; year after
year this disorderly growth had burst up out of the fat, greasy soil in
unwholesome profusion, unclean luxury, and had rotted down again into
the over-lush earth. So that the spring-root and ground-fruit, and all
manner of green things, jostled and crushed one another, and the weaker
were strangled and eaten up by the stronger.
Thousands of birds yearly built in the trees of the Manor Park; for here
came no guns to kill or scare, no boys to pilfer the eggs or young ones;
and this republic of birds overhead was a source of great profit to the
soil below.
Often birds fell from the trees dead of cold in the winter nights, and
when the sun shone out the industrious mole came and buried them
decently, and their bones were of service to the soil.
The mole, too, was useful in another way, for he turned up the clay now
and then, here and there, and opened avenues into the earth for water
burdened with fructifying juices.
And here, too, was that ever-active sexton of the vegetable world, the
fungus. In the vast winds of the winters, when the oaks gored one
another, and tore off the fangs of their antlers, great boughs fell with
shrieks to the earth. Later the sexton fungus crept over to the
shattered limbs and lodged on them, and ate them up silently and slowly,
and then the fungus itself melted into the earth.
Here were worms of enormous growth, and frogs and toads, and snails and
lizards, and all other kinds of slimy insects and reptiles, and the boys
said snakes, but snakes were put forward in excuse of fear on the part
of the boys. There were no hares, no rabbits, no deer, no cows, no
sheep, no goats, nor any of the gentle creatures that put grass and
green things to uses profitable to man.
Here in those vaults of sickly twilight vegetable nature held high
saturnalia, undisturbed save by the seasons and worms and snails and
caterpillars and slugs. This was not a prosperous field, a prudent
grove, a stately wood, a discreet garden; it was a robber's cave of the
green world, in which the plunder of all the fields lay heaped without
design, for no good or useful end.
At night the darkness was thick and hot in these blind alleys and
inexplorable aisles. When the foot was put down something slipped
beneath it, a greasy branch, a viscous fruit, a reptile, or the fat
stalk of some large-leafed ground-plant.
The trunks of the trees and the branches of the shrubs were damp with
gelatinous dews. If there was a moon, something might always be seen
sliding silently through the grass or leaves and pulpy roots.
Strange and depressing odours of decay came stealthily upon the sense
now and then, and filled the mind with hints of unutterable fears. If in
the branches above a sleeping bird chirped or fluttered, it seemed as
though the last bird left was stealing away from the fearful place. The
fat reptiles that glided and slipped in the ghostly moonlight were
fleeing, and leaving you alone to behold some spectacle, encounter some
fate, too repulsive for the contemplation of reason.
Within this belt of rank vegetation and oaks the Manor House stood. The
house had a plain stone front with small narrow windows, three on each
side of the main door. At the rear was a large paved courtyard, with a
pump and horse-trough in the middle.
The chief building consisted of a ground-floor, on which were the
reception-rooms; a first floor of bedrooms; and a second floor, the
windows of which were dormar, intended for the servants of the
establishment.
The walls of the house were of great thickness and strength. On the
ground and first floors most of the doorways into the passages had
double doors. Owing to the great thickness of the walls, and the double
doors, and the massive floorings and partition walls, sounds, even the
loudest, travelled with great difficulty through that house.
In front of the house stretched a broad gravelled drive, which narrowed
into a gravelled road as it set off to the main road, a considerable
distance farther on. This carriage-road wound in and out through the
oaks of the Park. Between the gravelled open in front of the house and
the trees stretched a narrow band of shaven grass. This narrow band of
grass followed the carriage-road up to the lodge-gate.
Around the paved yard in the rear stood the coach-house, stables,
kitchen, laundry, scullery, larder, and other offices, and still farther
to the rear of the house, behind the yard, were the flower and kitchen
gardens. To the rear of all, surrounding all, and binding all in like
suffocating bondage, was the Park of gnarled oaks and rank lush
undergrowth and slimy soil.
In looking at the house you were not conscious of anything uncanny or
repulsive. At the left-hand end--that is, the end of the house nearest
to Daneford--there rose a tower, mounting only one storey above the
dormar floor.
Upon the top of this tower was a huge iron tank, corroded into a
skeleton of its former self. Looking at that weather-battered and rusted
tank, with the undergrowth in the Park behind you, the former resembled
the decay of the indomitable natives of America, who perished slowly in
opposing themselves to fate; the overripe prosperity of the latter
looked like the destruction of the Romans, who ate and drank and slept
their simplicity and their manhood away.
One peculiarity of this house was that no green plant or creeper could
get a living out of its dry walls. Neither on the house nor on the tower
had ever been seen one leaf native to the place. Here was another thing
in strong contrast to the teeming vegetation environing this house.
It was not while looking at the Manor you felt its unpleasant influence.
In sunshine nothing disturbed your peace while you contemplated its dry,
cold front. But when you had gone away; when you were sitting in your
own bright room; when you were walking along a lonely road; when you
awoke in the middle of the night, and heard the torrents of the storm
roar as they whirled round your window; then, if the thought of that
house came up before your mind, you shrank back from its image as from
an apparition of evil mission. In your mental vision the house itself
seemed scared and afeared.
The intense green life that dwelt beneath those oaks stood out in
startling contrast with the absolute nudity of those unapparelled
stones. The house seemed to shrink instinctively from any contact with
verdure, as though it felt assured of evil from moss or leaf or blade.
It appeared to dread that the oaks would creep up on it and overwhelm it
in their portentous shadows, beat it down with their giant arms.
That tower stood out in the imagination like an arm uplifted in appeal;
that shattered tank became a tattered flag of distress. The windows
looked like scared eyes, the broad doorway a mouth gaping with terror.
The whole building quivered with human horror, was silent with frozen
awe.
In the year 1856 Henry Walter Grey's father died, and the son became
sole proprietor of the Daneford Bank. Up to that time the son had lived,
with his wife, to whom he had then been married six years, in the
Bank-house as manager under his father. There were only a few years'
lease of his father's suburban residence, to run, and a likelihood arose
that the landlord would not renew, so young Grey had to look out for a
home, as he intended appointing a manager and living away from the
office.
At that time the Manor House was in the market, and Mr. Grey bought it
for, as he said, "a song, and a very poor song, too," considering the
extent of the Park, the value of the timber, and the spacious old house.
As a matter of fact, no one valued the dwelling at a penny beyond what
the sale of its stones would bring; for the impression of the seller was
that, owing to its uncanny aspect and bad name, no one would think of
buying it to live in.
All Daneford was taken by surprise when it heard that young Grey, Wat
Grey, Wat had bought the fearful Manor House in which no family had
lived for generations, and from which even the furniture and servants
had been long since withdrawn. Did he mean to take it down, build a new
house, and effect a wholesome clearance of those odious groves?
No, he had answered, with a light laugh, he harboured no intention of
knocking down the old house to please the neighbours; of course he was
going to repair the house, and when it was fully restored he would ask
his friends to come and try if beef and mutton tasted worse, or wine was
less cheering, under that roof because nervous people had been pleased
to frighten themselves into fits over the Park and the Manor House.
In a year the house had been put into thorough order, and even the tower
had not been wholly neglected, for one room of it, that on a level with
Mr. Grey's own bedroom, had been completely renovated into a kind of
extra dressing-room to Mr. Grey's bedroom, from which a short passage
led to it.
Nothing was done to the ground-floor of the tower; nothing was done to
the floor on a level with the dormar; nothing was done with the floor
above the dormar.
Nothing was done to the unsightly tank on the top of the tower.
With respect to the rooms of the tower, Mr. Grey said he had no need of
more than the one.
With respect to the tank, he said he would in no way try to diminish the
unprepossessing aspect of the exterior of the house; he would rely upon
the interior, the good cheer and the welcome beneath the roof, to
countervail the ill-omened outer walls.
There was another reason, too, Mr. Grey said, why he had made up his
mind to alter nothing in the surrounding grounds or outward aspect of
the house--he wanted to see whether that house was going to beat him, or
he was going to beat that house.
So when all was in order, he set about house-warming on a prodigious
scale--a scale that was a revelation to the people of Daneford.
He filled all the bedrooms with guests, and had a couple of dozen men to
dine with him every day for a fortnight.
He told his servants, as long as they did their work punctually and
satisfactorily, they might have friends to see them, and might make
their friends welcome to the best things in the servants' hall every day
for a fortnight.
There were bonfires in the courtyard, and fiddlers and dancing. A barrel
of beer was placed on the horse-trough, and mugs and cans appeared in
glittering rows on a table beside the cask, and painted on the butt-end
of the cask the words, "Help yourself."
When he lived in town his establishment had consisted of three servants.
For the fĂȘte a dozen additional servants were engaged and a French cook.
There were a lodge and gate to the Manor Park, but there was no
lodge-man or woman; and during the festivities the gate always stood
open until midnight, and all passersby were free to come in and join the
dancers and partake of the ale.
One day he had all the clerks of his own bank to dine with him; and
while they were over their wine and cigars he informed them their
salaries were from that hour advanced twenty per cent.
He was then a simple member of the Chamber of Commerce; he had not yet
been elected chairman. He entertained the whole Chamber another evening,
and then told the members he had that day written to their secretary,
declaring his resolution not to charge interest on the money advanced by
his bank--three thousand pounds--for the completion of the new building
in course of construction by the Chamber.
A third evening he asked all the members of the Harbour Board, and told
them that he had made up his mind to abandon the old claim for interest
on their overdraughts set up by his father.
Then he gave a Commercial Club evening, to which were bidden all his
friends and acquaintances, who were also members of the club. After
roast beef came two large silver dishes, on one of which was, plainly
enough, plum-pudding; on the other, something that was plainly not
plum-pudding. The host nodded to the servants, and both dishes burst
into flame; the dish that contained the plum-pudding standing opposite
the treasurer of the club, at the foot of the table; the thing that was
not plum-pudding standing opposite the banker. Whatever had been before
him was, when the brandy ceased to burn, all consumed, except a little
black matter that floated about on the surface of the fluid in the dish.
"Everyone must have some of my new sauce. I invented it myself, and I
will take it as a favour if all will taste it with the pudding."
All partook of it and praised it highly, and many said they had never
tasted its like before, and several began elaborate analyses of it, and
minute comparisons between it and a hundred of well-known sauces.
After a while he said: "The roast beef and plum-pudding of Old England
for ever!" Then pointing to the dish containing the floating black
matter before him, "And the ashes of my mortgage on the club property
once!"
The Boat Club were his guests another evening, and a large gold
loving-cup was brought in and carried about with a rich compound of dark
wines and stimulating spices, and out of this all were to drink. When
all had tasted and toasted in the common cup the object of their common
solicitude, the last man after drinking called out that there was
something which rattled and jingled and slid about in the bottom of the
cup. The master of the house seemed more inquisitive than any of the
others, bade the finder spill out the contents of the cup on a salver,
and, behold, one hundred and five new sovereigns fresh from the Mint!
Upon this discovery the host rose and said that love was the rarest of
alchemy, and that the touch of a score of loyal lips, all having the one
interest at heart, had changed the liquor into gold for the good of the
club, and that the gold and the cup must go together to the club.
When he had the organisers and directors of the Poor's Christmas Coal
Fund to dinner, each member found, folded up in his napkin, twenty
orders, each order for five shillings' worth of coal.
Such generous and kindly deeds, and such cordial hospitality, could not
but endear him to the people of Daneford; and by reason of his knowing
so many men intimately, and each one of these men being more or less
proud of the acquaintance, they all called him "Wat," to show how very
intimate they were with him, and to show that in the best commercial set
in Daneford there was no one else known by the name of Wat. They called
him Wat in preference to Henry or Harry, because there is not perhaps
among all the Christian names one which admits of such an intimately
familiar contraction as Walter.
But all the banqueting and largess did not disenchant the ominous
mansion.
Those who had been at the prodigal house-warming always remembered the
exterior aspect of the house when the revels were at their height as
even worse than the ordinary appearance; for the small red windows in
the thick dark walls looked at night like the eyes of a desperate man
who had drank deeply to keep up his courage in some supreme ordeal. And
by day ever afterwards, to those who had been in the house at the
festival, it seemed as though the house looked more aghast than ever,
like the face of one who, having slept off the artificial courage, had
awaked to reduced resources and increased dangers.