Transcriber's note: Unusual and inconsistent spelling is as printed.
[Illustration: "YOU MUST DROP INTO MY ARMS. SEE?"]
ANTHONY CRAGG'S
TENANT
BY
AGNES GIBERNE
AUTHOR OF
"GWENDOLINE," "THROUGH THE LINN," ETC.
WITH COLOURED ILLUSTRATIONS BY
LANCELOT SPEED
LONDON
THE RELIGIOUS TRACT SOCIETY
4 BOUVERIE STREET, and 65 ST. PAUL'S CHURCHYARD
CONTENTS
CHAPTER
I. First Appearance of Mr. Dale
II. An Unlooked-For Collapse
III. Mrs. Anthony Cragg
IV. A Rescue
V. Alone in the Wide World
VI. The Next Step
VII. Into a New Home
VIII. A Search Unauthorised
IX. What Mr. Peterson Had Said
X. Dot's Opinion
XI. In the Very Act
XII. Those Three Letters
XIII. What Had Gone Wrong
XIV. Little Dot—A Catastrophe
XV. A Heavy Fall
XVI. The Course of Events
XVII. A Secret Made Known
XVIII. A Dire Mistake
XIX. A Very Narrow Escape
XX. Made Clear
ANTHONY CRAGG'S TENANT
CHAPTER I
First Appearance
of Mr. Dale
"ANTHONY! I say, Anthony! you're wanted. Make haste, will you? Folks
can't dawdle round the whole day while you're pottering about
upstairs. What are you doing? Do you mean to come, or not?"
"All right, my dear," a man's voice said in the distance, not exerting
itself.
Mrs. Cragg tapped her smart parasol on the dusty floor. Although her
words held a commanding sound, she was addressing her husband, and not
a shop-boy. Mr. Cragg's better half had a reputation for smartness of
tongue.
Generally she liked to make her exit at the private door, from which
business was excluded; but for once she had gone round by the
warehouse, and had travelled down by the uncarpeted wooden staircase
at the back of the shop, to a door which led into a side street.
At this door she had stumbled on two people, waiting patiently for
attention—a tall man, wearing a shabby coat, and a girl.
Shabby people were objectionable in Mrs. Cragg's eyes. She counted
herself a fine lady, and loved gay clothes, which she looked upon as a
mark of gentility. Mrs. Cragg was not the first person in the world to
fall into that mistake.
At this moment she wore a gown of bright blue, while a large scarlet
wing stood forth aggressively in her green straw hat. She had a high
colour, beady black eyes, a profuse fringe of yellowish hair, and
marked features. Not everybody would admire this combination, but Mrs.
Cragg was wont to feel satisfied on looking into her mirror.
Six years earlier, when she had figured as the only and hard-worked
daughter of a third—rate and unsuccessful country attorney, with a
sickly wife and several boys, she had been rather a pretty girl. But
then she had worn no fuzzy fringe, nor had she dressed in blue and
green and scarlet, nor had she rattled and laughed in self-important
tones. These new developments had taken her husband by surprise, and
he was not yet used to the change.
"You needn't expect me to stop here, if you mean to be a whole week
getting from the top to the bottom of the stairs!" she cried. "I've
got something else to see to."
"There's no need. If you'll just ask the gentleman to step inside—"
"We can wait where we are. You need not trouble yourself. Perhaps we
have come to the wrong door?" suggested the tall man. "I daresay we
ought to have gone to the front entrance in High Street."
"It don't matter. May as well stop, now you are here," said Mrs.
Cragg. "He'll be down directly. He's always slow. That's his way."
She had meant to go out this side to save time, but, on second
thoughts, she turned back and met her husband.
"Well, I hope you've been long enough," was her greeting. "It's
somebody after that new house of yours; and if I was you I wouldn't
have anything to do with him. He's as shabby as shabby. Got on a coat
that shines like anything, and a pair of gloves that our cook wouldn't
look at. And I should think his trousers was made at a slop-shop.
If you let him have that house, you won't get any rent for it."
"It isn't always the finest-dressed folks that pay their bills the
quickest," replied Cragg, with a wisdom born of experience.
"He won't. You see if I'm not right." Mrs. Cragg liked to be always
in the right, and seldom admitted that she was not. Having once
committed herself to this particular view of the question, she was
certain not to regard the tall man in future with favourable eyes.
Cragg knew this, but he said nothing.
"You see!" repeated Mrs. Cragg, "I know a man that can't be depended
on when I come across him. He's as poor as a church-mouse, and he
wants to get a house rent-free. If you take my advice, you'll pack him
off in a hurry."
Cragg was not in the habit of taking a woman's advice in matters of
business, though he obtained plenty of it, gratis, from his wife.
Her opinion, given lavishly and unasked on all occasions, lost value
from its abundance.
Mrs. Cragg passed on, and Mr. Cragg finished the descent of the
stairs, with the air of a man who prided himself on being never in a
hurry.
"Good morning. This way, please," he said, and he led the strangers
to a room behind the warehouse.
Cragg was a vendor of new and secondhand furniture, and indeed of
everything required in house-plenishing. The main warehouse, or shop,
which opened on the High Street, was full of furniture of all kinds,
piled together, with lanes amid the piles. This lesser room in its
rear held rolls of carpets and heaps of rugs. One chair stood in the
middle, and upon it the newcomer slowly lowered himself, with a sigh
of relief, as if he had had enough walking. The girl leant against
him, drooping her head, as she had done all along, so that the
wide-brimmed hat hid her face. From her height Cragg supposed her
to be about thirteen years old, but he did not pay much attention
to that matter.
With a business-like air of expectancy he stood waiting. He was much
older than his wife, nearer fifty than forty, while she was still
under thirty. He had a sensible face, with horizontal lines of care
on the forehead, and absent eyes. People talking to Mr. Cragg often
fancied that his thoughts were elsewhere; yet he generally heard what
was said.
"I am a stranger in Putworth," was the first remark. "My name is Dale;
and I am told that you have a house to let."
"Yes. About the only vacant house just now in Putworth."
"So I hear. One that you have just built. I went to the postmaster,
and he advised me to come to you. My daughter and I arrived yesterday
afternoon. We want to find a quiet home, somewhere on this line of
rail. Easier to move my furniture than if we go elsewhere. I may want
one or two things from you—possibly"—glancing round—"though we have
nearly enough; very nearly enough."
"Putworth is a healthy place. You have not seen the house yet,
of course?"
"The outside of it. We walked round yesterday evening for a look.
Too late to do anything. It seemed to be just what I want."
"Extremely well situated."
"Well, yes. That meadow in front looks damp, and the surroundings
are not pretty. Still, one can't have everything."
"Not pretty!" Cragg bristled up in a mild fashion. "There's green
grass and a stream of water. What more can you want? And the meadow's
drained."
Mr. Dale did not enlarge on his desires. A faint smile worked its way
to his lips. He merely said: "What rent?"
Cragg looked him over carefully. He wanted a good rent, but also
he wanted not to lose a tenant. Not that he was by nature grasping;
but business was slack in Putworth, and Cragg had an extravagant wife.
Her extravagant ways had grown upon her gradually, and Cragg had
hardly yet begun trying to check her. Yet he knew that there was need,
for embarrassments were increasing upon him, unknown to his friends.
At the same time he had a stronger motive to make money and to save
than ever in past years.
This motive was consideration for his daughter rather than his wife.
He had not ceased to feel affection for his wife, though he found her
a growing trial; but his very heart-strings were wound around the
child. Each moment that he could spare from business was devoted
to Dot.
The building of a new house had been a sudden notion, no long time
back, awakened by the sight of a slip of waste land, outside the town,
put up for sale. The price asked had been merely nominal,—
"dirt-cheap," he said to himself, though not to the seller,—and having
a passion for bricks and mortar, he had been unable to resist the
temptation; even though that passion had already landed him in
difficulties. It was by no means the first speculation of the kind
on which he had ventured.
Bricks and mortar are expensive, no matter how cheaply they may be put
together. Now that the house was ready for an occupant, even to the
extent of being painted and papered, which some said he should have
delayed till he had found a tenant, he was naturally anxious to get it
off his hands as early as might be.
"Depends on the length of lease," he made answer cautiously.
"I don't want a lease. I want a house by the year,—yours, if it suits.
Not much doubt that it will. I have had a lot of trouble, and I want
a quiet corner to rest in. May as well say at once that I can't give
more than twenty pounds. That's enough for a poor man to pay. Will it
do?"
Cragg knew that he was not likely to obtain a larger sum. The house
had been run up very cheaply, and it lacked modern conveniences.
He had recently let another house, of very much the same size, only in
a prettier position, for eighteen pounds; but that was on a lease.
Twenty pounds for this, taken by the year, would be as much as he had
any right to demand. Yet, with the instincts of a business man,
he hesitated. It would not do to snatch at the proposal.
"Perhaps you would like to come and see the place."
"Yes, I should. But I must know your terms first. We don't want a long
trudge for nothing, do we, Pattie?"
The girl lifted her face in response, and a thrill of surprise shot
through Cragg, seasoned though he was in varieties of faces. Hers was
not a common countenance. It could hardly be called beautiful in the
full sense, but it was full of goodness and purity; the features were
small and colourless; the eyes were of a deep and wistful blue;
the sensitive lips were sad. She looked older than Cragg had expected.
"Do we, Pattie?" repeated her father; and she said softly:
"No, daddy."
"So if you want more than that, we'll give up at once, and go
elsewhere. I've been doubting between this and the next village."
"Well—I don't know—" began Cragg.
Then he stopped. Those blue eyes came to his, full of a nameless
beseeching sorrow, and a faint flush of unshed tears passed over them.
Cragg's business instincts went down before a stronger impulse of
fatherly pity. Pattie's look made him think of Dot.
"Yes, that will do. Twenty pounds, taken by the year."
"Oh, thank you," breathed Pattie; "I'm so glad."
Then they started for the house, which was a good twenty minutes' walk
distant. Cragg's suggestion of a cab was negatived. There was no need,
Mr. Dale said; they would enjoy the walk.
Tokens of enjoyment were few; but they managed to get along, though at
a lagging pace. Mr. Dale talked fitfully, remarking how the town was
grown since his boyhood. Mr. Cragg observed that he could not recall
any one of the name of Dale. Mr. Dale said, "No,"—he had been for
three years at the big boys' school, and he would not be known to the
inhabitants, unless by the former owner of the "tuck shop."
The house stood forlornly alone upon a patch of rough ground, which
might in the course of time grow into a garden. At present it lacked
soil, plants, and shrubs; in fact, it was no more than a stony little
enclosure, surrounding an ugly small house. There were two rooms on
the ground floor, with a kitchen behind, and three rooms overhead.
"Precisely the right size," Mr. Dale said.
Flat fields lay on one side, and on the other, beyond a space of
untilled earth, lay a stiff row of red cottages. In front flowed a
muddy stream, with flags along its edge, and behind were six or seven
prim Lombardy poplars.
Mr. Dale was resolute in refusing to undertake "outside repairs," and
for a minute Cragg felt disposed to show fight. But again those eyes
came beseechingly to his; again he thought of Dot; and again he was
vanquished,—he could not have told why.
The whole affair was quickly settled, and Mr. Dale strolled back
to the inn with his daughter, Cragg going ahead at a brisker pace.
"That's a nice man, Pattie. A good sort of man, I'm sure. One is glad
to have a pleasant landlord. It was quite an instinct that brought
me here, wanting to see again the place where I was at school. All
schoolboys are not happy, I suppose; but I was—happier than I have
been since. Cheer up, little girl. We shall get on all right—now—
I don't doubt."
A slight sob shook the girl's slender frame, but she allowed no sound
of it to escape, and when she looked up there was a smile on her lips.
"Mr. Peterson won't be likely to find us out in Putworth, daddy."
"No, child, no."
"He won't think of looking for us in such a place."
"No, no, of course not. Why should he?"
"And since you've grown your little beard, you do look so different.
I wish you needn't. I like you to look as you used. But even if Mr.
Peterson did see you, I shouldn't think he would know you."
"We needn't talk about Mr. Peterson, Pattie. We'll try to forget
all that."
"Only, I do wonder sometimes why he should be unkind to a nice dear
daddy like you."
"People have their reasons for action, my dear; and one can't expect
always to understand. So many mistakes, you know, and harsh judgments.
But the comfort is that my Pattie knows her old father."
"I should think I did!" Two tears fell.
"And now we have to consider what to do. A good many things to be
seen to—and the house cannot be ready to take us in till—how long did
he say? A week was it? I must have another talk with Mr. Cragg, and
settle all minor points. But we will go back to the farm for a week.
You can write and tell them so; tell them to expect us to-morrow.
Dear me, I like that man, Cragg, very much. Shouldn't wonder if he
would help us to find a servant; some nice respectable body, who will
do for us."
"If only we could have kept Susan! She would have liked so much
to come."
"No, my dear." Mr. Dale spoke nervously. "I think we arranged all
that."