A STRING OF GOLD BEADS
A moment later Bates entered with a fresh supply of
wood. I watched him narrowly for some sign of perturbation,
but he was not to be caught off guard. Possibly
he had not heard the shots in the wood; at any
rate, he tended the fire with his usual gravity, and after
brushing the hearth paused respectfully.
“Is there anything further, sir?”
“I believe not, Bates. Oh! here’s a hammer I picked
up out in the grounds a bit ago. I wish you’d see if it
belongs to the house.”
He examined the implement with care and shook his
head.
“It doesn’t belong here, I think, sir. But we sometimes
find tools left by the carpenters that worked on
the house. Shall I put this in the tool-chest, sir?”
“Never mind. I need such a thing now and then and
I’ll keep it handy.”
“Very good, Mr. Glenarm. It’s a bit sharper to-night,
but we’re likely to have sudden changes at this season.”
“I dare say.”
We were not getting anywhere; the fellow was certainly
an incomparable actor.
“You must find it pretty lonely here, Bates. Don’t
hesitate to go to the village when you like.”
“I thank you, Mr. Glenarm; but I am not much for
idling. I keep a few books by me for the evenings. Annandale
is not what you would exactly call a diverting
village.”
“I fancy not. But the caretaker over at the summer
resort has even a lonelier time, I suppose. That’s what
I’d call a pretty cheerless job,—watching summer cottages
in the winter.”
“That’s Morgan, sir. I meet him occasionally when
I go to the village; a very worthy person, I should call
him, on slight acquaintance.”
“No doubt of it, Bates. Any time through the winter
you want to have him in for a social glass, it’s all
right with me.”
He met my gaze without flinching, and lighted me
to the stair with our established ceremony. I voted him
an interesting knave and really admired the cool way
in which he carried off difficult situations. I had no
intention of being killed, and now that I had due warning
of danger, I resolved to protect myself from foes
without and within. Both Bates and Morgan, the caretaker,
were liars of high attainment. Morgan was,
moreover, a cheerful scoundrel, and experience taught
me long ago that a knave with humor is doubly dangerous.
Before going to bed I wrote a long letter to Larry
Donovan, giving him a full account of my arrival at
Glenarm House. The thought of Larry always cheered
me, and as the pages slipped from my pen I could feel
his sympathy and hear him chuckling over the lively beginning
of my year at Glenarm. The idea of being fired
upon by an unseen foe would, I knew, give Larry a real
lift of the spirit.
The next morning I walked into the village, mailed
my letter, visited the railway station with true rustic
instinct and watched the cutting out of a freight car for
Annandale with a pleasure I had not before taken in
that proceeding. The villagers stared at me blankly as
on my first visit. A group of idle laborers stopped talking
to watch me; and when I was a few yards past them
they laughed at a remark by one of the number which
I could not overhear. But I am not a particularly sensitive
person; I did not care what my Hoosier neighbors
said of me; all I asked was that they should refrain
from shooting at the back of my head through the windows
of my own house.
On this day I really began to work. I mapped out
a course of reading, set up a draftsman’s table I found
put away in a closet, and convinced myself that I was
beginning a year of devotion to architecture. Such was,
I felt, the only honest course. I should work every day
from eight until one, and my leisure I should give to
recreation and a search for the motives that lay behind
the crafts and assaults of my enemies.
When I plunged into the wood in the middle of the
afternoon it was with the definite purpose of returning
to the upper end of the lake for an interview with Morgan,
who had, so Bates informed me, a small house back
of the cottages.
I took the canoe I had chosen for my own use from
the boat-house and paddled up the lake. The air was
still warm, but the wind that blew out of the south
tasted of rain. I scanned the water and the borders of
the lake for signs of life,—more particularly, I may as
well admit, for a certain maroon-colored canoe and a
girl in a red tam-o’-shanter, but lake and summer cottages
were mine alone. I landed and began at once my
search for Morgan. There were many paths through
the woods back of the cottages, and I followed several
futilely before I at last found a small house snugly
bid away in a thicket of young maples.
The man I was looking for came to the door quickly
in response to my knock.
“Good afternoon, Morgan.”
“Good afternoon, Mr. Glenarm,” he said, taking the
pipe from his mouth the better to grin at me. He
showed no sign of surprise, and I was nettled by his cool
reception. There was, perhaps, a certain element of
recklessness in my visit to the house of a man who had
shown so singular an interest in my affairs, and his cool
greeting vexed me.
“Morgan—” I began.
“Won’t you come in and rest yourself, Mr. Glenarm?”
he interrupted. “I reckon you’re tired from your trip
over—”
“Thank you, no,” I snapped.
“Suit yourself, Mr. Glenarm.” He seemed to like my
name and gave it a disagreeable drawling emphasis.
“Morgan, you are an infernal blackguard. You have
tried twice to kill me—”
“We’ll call it that, if you like,”—and he grinned.
“But you’d better cut off one for this.”
He lifted the gray fedora hat from his head, and
poked his finger through a hole in the top.
“You’re a pretty fair shot, Mr. Glenarm. The fact
about me is,”—and he winked,—”the honest truth is,
I’m all out of practice. Why, sir, when I saw you paddling
out on the lake this afternoon I sighted you from
the casino half a dozen times with my gun, but I was
afraid to risk it.” He seemed to be shaken with inner
mirth. “If I’d missed, I wasn’t sure you’d be scared to
death!”
For a novel diversion I heartily recommend a meeting
with the assassin who has, only a few days or hours
before, tried to murder you. I know of nothing in the
way of social adventure that is quite equal to it. Morgan
was a fellow of intelligence and, whatever lay back
of his designs against me, he was clearly a foe to reckon
with. He stood in the doorway calmly awaiting my
next move. I struck a match on my box and lighted a
cigarette.
“Morgan, I hope you understand that I am not responsible
for any injury my grandfather may have inflicted
on you. I hadn’t seen him for several years before
he died. I was never at Glenarm before in my
life, so it’s a little rough for you to visit your displeasure
on me.”
He smiled tolerantly as I spoke. I knew—and he
knew that I did—that no ill feeling against my grandfather
lay back of his interest in my affairs.
“You’re not quite the man your grandfather was, Mr.
Glenarm. You’ll excuse my bluntness, but I take it
that you’re a frank man. He was a very keen person,
and, I’m afraid,”—he chuckled with evident satisfaction
to himself,—”I’m really afraid, Mr. Glenarm, that
you’re not!”
“There you have it, Morgan! I fully agree with you!
I’m as dull as an oyster; that’s the reason I’ve called on
you for enlightenment. Consider that I’m here under a
flag of truce, and let’s see if we can’t come to an agreement.”
“It’s too late, Mr. Glenarm; too late. There was a
time when we might have done some business; but that’s
past now. You seem like a pretty decent fellow, too,
and I’m sorry I didn’t see you sooner; but better luck
next time.”
He stroked his yellow beard reflectively and shook his
head a little sadly. He was not a bad-looking fellow;
and he expressed himself well enough with a broad western
accent.
“Well,” I said, seeing that I should only make myself
ridiculous by trying to learn anything from him, “I
hope our little spats through windows and on walls won’t
interfere with our pleasant social relations. And I don’t
hesitate to tell you,”—I was exerting myself to keep
down my anger,—”that if I catch you on my grounds
again I’ll fill you with lead and sink you in the lake.”
“Thank you, sir,” he said, with so perfect an imitation
of Bates’ voice and manner that I smiled in spite
of myself.
“And now, if you’ll promise not to fire into my back
I’ll wish you good day. Otherwise—”
He snatched off his hat and bowed profoundly. “It’ll
suit me much better to continue handling the case on
your grounds,” he said, as though he referred to a
business matter. “Killing a man on your own property
requires some explaining—you may have noticed it?”
“Yes; I commit most of my murders away from
home,” I said. “I formed the habit early in life. Good
day, Morgan.”
As I turned away he closed his door with a slam,—a
delicate way of assuring me that he was acting in good
faith, and not preparing to puncture my back with a
rifle-ball. I regained the lake-shore, feeling no great
discouragement over the lean results of my interview,
but rather a fresh zest for the game, whatever the
game might be. Morgan was not an enemy to trifle
with; he was, on the other hand, a clever and daring
foe; and the promptness with which he began war on
me the night of my arrival at Glenarm House, indicated
that there was method in his hostility.
The sun was going his ruddy way beyond St. Agatha’s
as I drove my canoe into a little cove near which the
girl in the tam-o’-shanter had disappeared the day before.
The shore was high here and at the crest was a
long curved bench of stone reached by half a dozen
steps, from which one might enjoy a wide view of the
country, both across the lake and directly inland. The
bench was a pretty bit of work, boldly reminiscential of
Alma Tadema, and as clearly the creation of John
Marshall Glenarm as though his name had been carved
upon it.
It was assuredly a spot for a pipe and a mood, and
as the shadows crept through the wood before me and
the water, stirred by the rising wind, began to beat below,
I invoked the one and yielded to the other. Something
in the withered grass at my feet caught my eye.
I bent and picked up a string of gold beads, dropped
there, no doubt, by some girl from the school or a careless
member of the summer colony. I counted the separate
beads—they were round and there were fifty of
them. The proper length for one turn about a girl’s
throat, perhaps; not more than that! I lifted my eyes
and looked off toward St. Agatha’s.
“Child of the red tam-o’-shanter, I’m very sorry I
was rude to you yesterday, for I liked your steady stroke
with the paddle; and I admired, even more, the way you
spurned me when you saw that among all the cads in
the world I am number one in Class A. And these
golden bubbles (O girl of the red tam-o’-shanter!), if
they are not yours you shall help me find the owner, for
we are neighbors, you and I, and there must be peace
between our houses.”
With this foolishness I rose, thrust the beads into my
pocket, and paddled home in the waning glory of the
sunset.
That night, as I was going quite late to bed, bearing
a candle to light me through the dark hall to my room,
I heard a curious sound, as of some one walking stealthily
through the house. At first I thought Bates was still
abroad, but I waited, listening for several minutes, without
being able to mark the exact direction of the sound
or to identify it with him. I went on to the door of my
room, and still a muffled step seemed to follow me,—first
it had come from below, then it was much like some one
going up stairs,—but where? In my own room I still
heard steps, light, slow, but distinct. Again there was a
stumble and a hurried recovery,—ghosts, I reflected, do
not fall down stairs!
The sound died away, seemingly in some remote part
of the house, and though I prowled about for an hour
it did not recur that night.