lime heaps lying for years about the gate, just as they had been
thrown down at the time when the building was begun. He preferred to
see one gate-post up and the other down. He had been known to build
a mill and fit it with expensive machinery, to construct a mill-dam
with the most approved modern sluices, and import the most advanced
American "notions" in the way of farm implements. Then one fine morning
he would arrive, and, when everything was almost complete, pay the
labourers their wages, discharge the engineers in the midst of fixing
a steam boiler or laying hot-water pipes for the most improved method
of preparing food for cattle. Thereafter he would write their masters
a cheque, and there was an end. Not an ounce of water would ever run
out of that granite-embanked mill-dam. Not a wheel of that beautiful
machinery would ever turn round. No horse wearing shoe-iron would ever
tread the asphalted floor of these sanitary stables. Year after year
the whole premises stood empty. The glass would early disappear from
the windows under a galling cross-fire from the catapults of all the
boys in the neighbourhood, with whom it was a point of honour to break
everything breakable about the various "follies" of General Theophilus
Ruff. Never did houses get the reputation of being haunted so quickly
as those buildings erected by him in all manner of unlikely places.
Even during the very week after the workmen had been unceremoniously
dismissed, and while the new gloss was yet on the handles of the doors
and the shop polish upon the machinery, the place began to be deserted
after dusk by every man, woman, and child in the neighbourhood.
Nay, more than this, the same mysterious blight was instantly
communicated to any property acquired by the General. For at this time
it was his habit to buy all that came into the market, without any
discrimination whatever. He had been known to buy the middle house of a
row of respectable tenements, turn out the occupants, look through the
windows one by one to see if they were all gone, then lock the door and
stalk solemnly away with the key in his pocket.
That very night the premises were haunted. The next day the boys began
to break the windows, from a safe distance, with their catapults,
frightening each other the while with the cry that the General was
coming. In six months the house was a mere melancholy wreck, in which
tramps camped at nights, and (if the police did not occasionally
interfere) pulled out the frames of the windows and the fittings of the
kitchen to burn over their fires.
It was no wonder that Cleg Kelly looked with much interest upon
Barnbogle House. And had he known its sinister repute, and the
character of his new master, he might never have set foot within
its doors. But he had never heard of Theophilus, as the General was
familiarly called by all the neighbourhood behind his back. The
minister of the U. P. denomination (the only one in the town which had
not been fostered by the General's money) explained on a sacramental
occasion that Theophilus meant a friend of God, but hastened to add
that this might be taken ironically, and that even the devil sometimes
appeared in the guise of an angel of light.
Nevertheless it was at the time thought a strange thing that the U. P.
cow died on the U. P. pasture, soon after the close of the service at
which this explanation was delivered from the U. P. pulpit.
This induced a carefulness of speech with regard to the General in the
pulpits of other denominations—except, perhaps, when the ministers had
probationers supplying for them. For probationers never have any cows.
When Cleg and he arrived at the house, the General bowed a moment, with
his back to his visitor, over the handle of the front door, whirled a
many-lettered combination, clicked a key, touched a knob, and lo! the
massive door swung noiselessly back.
When he invited Cleg to enter, Cleg put his foot over the threshold as
if he had been entering the Calton jail. But he had pledged himself,
and could not in honour draw back. Besides, Cleg had in him, as we
have seen, the spirit of the natural adventurer. He constantly did
things for the sake of seeing what would come of it, and embarked upon
perilous adventures only to see how the problem would work itself out.
The hall in which he found himself was of old panelled oak, with lights
which came from very high above. Oak furniture stood sparsely here and
there. The only remarkable things were a couple of plain white tablets
let into the wall at either side, like marble memorials in a church.
Through many passages and past the doors of innumerable rooms
Theophilus Ruff led our young hero. Bookcases filled with
solemn-looking books stood all along the corridors. Marble timepieces
squatted silently on the ledges. White statues held out cold glimmering
arms from dusky recesses. Here and there, on little round tables by
oriel windows, large-type family Bibles lay open, many of them having
bookmarks inserted here and there, some of discoloured ribbon, but many
of common pink and white string such as is used by country grocers to
tie up parcels of sugar.
They went next through a great echoing kitchen, with all manner of
rusted machinery for roasting and turning cobwebbing the walls; by the
side of vast black cooking-ranges, past a glimmering and diminishing
array of brass pans and silver dish-covers upon the walls, Cleg
followed the General like his shadow.
"We shall have some dinner presently," said Theophilus Ruff. "I always
dine in the middle of the day ever since I began to keep house for
myself."
He spun another combination lock, clicked a key, and Cleg found himself
in a little brick addition, plastered like a swallow's nest against the
rear wall of Barnbogle House.
Here were a little table of scoured woodwork, and a cheap cooking-range
with a paraffin stove, which, like all its kind, leaked a little.
Upon a shelf under the window were tumbled roughly a cooking-pot, a
frying-pan, a skillet, a brander, two tin plates, and half-a-dozen
cheap knives and forks, all of the poorest and most ordinary
description, and most of them dirty in the extreme.
The General ushered Cleg into this place with some ceremony and
condescension, like a superior initiating a new and untried assistant
into the work of his department.
"I will show you how to light the stove," he said; "it is an
exceedingly convenient invention. I wish we had had them in the army in
my time. I will do the cooking myself on this occasion, in order that
you may see in what manner you may best assist me in the future.
"There are herring here," he said, waving his hand to a barrel which
showed through a sparred locker, "and a ham there beyond. Butter you
will find in that firkin on your left. It is the best Danish from
Kiel. The tinned beef on the shelves is to be kept for emergencies. It
is not to be touched. The butter I import myself, and dispose of what
I do not use to an Italian warehouseman in Netherby. I find that it
takes the place of lard also. Here is flour for sauces, and I always
bring home a four-pound loaf every second day, which I find to be
amply sufficient. I propose to continue the duty, and shall bring two
in future. If there is anything necessary for your health which you
do not find, I shall be happy to supply it. I think I have a suit of
clothes—not my own, but which I happen to possess. They can easily be
adapted for your use."
ADVENTURE LII.
THE THREE COFFINS IN THE STRONG-ROOM.
While the General was explaining all these things, he was at the same
time deftly handling the gridiron upon which he was cooking the four
red herrings which he had laid out. These, with bread and the aforesaid
best specially imported Danish butter, dug out of the keg with a scoop,
furnished their simple meal. General Theophilus made tea in a black
kettle, by the simple process of putting in a soup ladle filled with
tea and allowing the water in the kettle to come to the boil.
"The tea is of the best quality," he said, "though I am somewhat
prodigal of it, as you see. But a man must have some luxuries."
Yet all the time, while Cleg was partaking of the herrings, cutting
the bread, and drinking the tea, he was oppressed by the dark
overwhelming bulk of the house behind him, through which he had
been led. He instinctively felt it to be full of secrets, of unknown
echoing passages, doors that clicked and sprung, and of all untold and
unutterable mysteries.
All through their dinner time the General was most courteously polite,
handing the salt and helping the herrings with infinite address. And
when Cleg in his ignorance or his awkwardness committed a solecism, the
General only in the slightest degree emphasised the correctness of his
own demeanour, so that Cleg, if he chose, might benefit by the lesson
in deportment. Not that Cleg needed many, for had he not often taken
tea with Miss Celie Tennant, which in itself was a charmingly liberal
education?
When the meal was finished, Theophilus Ruff took Cleg into a little
room adjoining. Here there was a fixed wash-tub and a tiny boiler.
"I do my own washing, you see. Cleanliness is most important!" the
General explained. "I learned the art while campaigning in Afghanistan.
For the present, therefore, I shall continue to do the washing, though
I shall be glad of your assistance in the matter of drying and ironing!"
Cleg could hardly credit his ears—a General and the owner of all this
wealth, talking freely of doing his own washing. Cleg looked at the
beautiful linen sheets on the bed and marvelled still more. Then he
remembered what Theophilus had said about the presence of women.
"This is your bedroom," said the General, opening a still smaller
room, which contained nothing but a wash-stand and a small "scissors"
camp-bed. Upon a nail behind the doors hung a couple of suits of
clothes.
"These are yours," explained the General; "this room is also yours.
I shall not again enter it. I beg of you, therefore, that when you
have been visiting your friend the widow you will wear one of these
suits, either as it pleases you. But when you come into the rooms which
I share with you, or undertake any of the duties connected with your
position, you will take the trouble to change into the other."
Cleg touched the nearer suit of clothes gently with his hand. It was of
fine texture, though of a fashion somewhat antique, with wide lapels to
the coat and the vest very long. The General opened a drawer.
"Here," he said, "you will find collars, shirts, and stockings which,
though a little large for you, are such as you will rapidly grow into.
Consider them as your own. Assure yourself completely that the owner of
these has no further need for them."
Cleg thanked his benefactor frankly, but without subservience or
profusion.
"Now," said the General, turning rapidly upon Cleg, "I should like to
come to financial terms with you. I am willing to give you one pound
sterling or twenty shillings a week and your food. At the present
rate of the rupee in India, from which much of my income is derived,
I am not desirous of making it more. But in the event of any decided
appreciation in the price of silver, I should be willing to consider
your claims to a supplement."
"It's far ower muckle as it is," cried honest Cleg. "Man, I wad be glad
o' the half o't!"
The General waved his hand.
"My dear sir," he said, "you are as yet unaware of the intensely
peculiar services which your position here will require of you. You
may have to see strange things sometimes, and to learn to say nothing.
I desire, therefore, to remunerate you suitably in advance. What I
shall reveal to you is perfectly harmless, as I shall show you. But
still I am aware that there is a not unnatural prejudice against such
experiences, especially among the young. We will call it, therefore,
for the present a pound a week."
[Illustration: Along gloomy passages.]
Cleg nodded. He was willing to sleep in a vault amongst skulls and
crossbones, with a reliable up-to-time ghost thrown in, for a pound a
week.
"I will now show you my own bedroom," he said.
The General opened the locks of the doors leading into the house with
the same precise caution, and with some additional secrecy as well. But
even in this the General behaved with a gentlemanly reticence.
"You will observe," he said, "that I do not for the present make you
free of the passwords of the fortress. That in time will doubtless
come; but in the meantime you will consider me as the governor of the
castle, with discipline to maintain and my own secrets to keep.
"Your nerves are strong, I trust?" he added, as they passed along
gloomy passages through which the winds blew gustily as in some cave of
the winds.
"I'm no feared, gin that's what ye mean. I dinna ken aught aboot
nerves," said Cleg.
The General led him sideways down a flight of steps like one that goes
stealthily into a cellar.
They stopped before a door of massive iron painted red as a ship is
before she is launched, and with the boltheads neatly picked out in
white.
"You observe," said the General, "this door is entirely of my
own construction—aided, that is, by the most skilled smiths and
mechanicians. You notice that the rock upon which the house is built
is above our heads, and also that the door is really excavated in the
stone itself. The iron frame upon which the door closes is mortised
so deeply and completely into the solid rock all round, that to all
intents and purposes it is practically one piece with it."
The General pointed upwards to where a pale yellow gleam on the wall
showed through a range of open and glassless but triply barred windows.
"That," he said, "is _Cheiranthus Cheiri_, the common, yellow, or wild
wallflower—of a different species from that of the garden and, in my
opinion, a much finer plant. It is growing up there on the natural
rock. So that I sleep, as sayeth the Scripture, 'within the living
stone'!"
Cleg looked at the General. His eyes seemed to grow darker, his figure
became more erect. He continued every few minutes to refer to his watch.
"This lock," he said, patting the keyhole, "is a highly ingenious union
of a time-lock and the commoner letter combination lock. This morning I
set the wards to open at two in the afternoon. So that it is now almost
the time when we shall be able by the application of the key-word to
open the door."
He waited till the hands of the watch were opposite the hour.
"Now!" he said, and stepped forward with some show of eagerness.
The son of the burglar looked on with an interest which was almost
painful.
The General twirled the lock till he had brought five letters into
line upon the dial. Then he inserted a little key which hung at his
watch-chain. The massive red iron door, with its white-studded nails,
swung back softly of its own accord.
"A simple application of the principle of the water balance," he said,
"thus—I open the lock, the water runs out and the door opens. In
another five minutes the small cistern will fill of its own accord, and
its weight will automatically close the door."
Cleg hung back. He was not afraid, as he had said. But it seemed an
uncanny place to be shut up in with only a madman for company. For Cleg
had no doubt whatever that the General was out of his mind.
General Theophilus Ruff noticed his hesitancy.
"Do not be afraid. I have the combinations all in the inside of my
watch scales, so that even if I were suddenly to die here, you would
still be able to make your way out."
The two stepped within, Cleg being ashamed to show any further feelings
of reluctance to trust his benefactor.
The General touched a match to a large lamp which stood on a pedestal.
The whole room, which had been pitchy dark a moment before, seemed now
fairly bursting with light.
"My bedroom!" said the General, circling the place with his hand, with
the air of one who makes an important introduction.
The walls were of red-painted iron throughout, the red of farm carts in
the district, and the bolts were again picked out with white. But the
furniture was the strange thing. There was nothing whatever in the room
save three coffins, each arranged squarely upon its own table.
The lids of the two at either side were hinged and closed. The centre
one stood open. The coffins were not large or fine ones, but, on the
contrary, common and covered with black cloth. The lid of the centre
one was off, and stood leaning against the wall at the coffin head.
Cleg could easily read the inscription, which was in white letters upon
a black painted plate:—
MAJOR-GENERAL THEOPHILUS RUFF,
E.I.C. BENGAL ARMY.
BORN JULY 21st, 18—.
DECEIVED JULY 21st, 18—.
UNDECEIVED JULY 21st, 18—.
DIED JULY 21st, 18—.
"It is not long now," he said, pointing to the latter date. "I have not
added the year, you observe. But it was revealed that all my days of
fate should culminate on the 21st of July. And so hitherto they have. I
do not think I shall see more than other four."
Then a new thought seemed to strike him. He turned to Cleg Kelly
sharply.
"Note the lettering on the coffins," he said; "I did it all with an
ordinary sharpened knitting needle. I bought a plain black tin plate
from the carpenter of the village, and he showed me how the paint
scrapes off. It is quite easy. But I have done it much more neatly than
could the carpenter himself. I have since attended quite a number of
male funerals in order to observe the quality of the lettering upon the
coffin. I do assure you it is, in general, disgracefully slipshod. The
man does not appear to take the least pains to improve. I have even
thought of offering to do the job for him."
Cleg was continuing to look about him, when a sudden noise behind him
caused him to leap to the side. The great red iron door had swung to
with a little well-oiled click.
The General smiled indulgently and reassuringly.
"It is only the water balance I told you of. It is now full; the little
wet-bob rises to the top, and the door swings to of its own accord."
Cleg continued to look about him. The room was about thirty feet square
and half as high. But there was no bedstead or any other furniture to
be seen.
The General noticed his perplexity.
"I observe," he said, smiling, "that you are looking for my bed. Here
it is," laying his hand on the central coffin. "Oblige me with your
hand. I usually depend upon a stick, but your shoulder is better."
The General balanced himself for a moment upon the edge of the coffin,
and let his head drop back upon the little white pad. Then he arranged
his shoulders into the fiddle-shaped swell, and deftly drew in his feet
after him.
"Now," he said, "damp the herbs in that pipe. Light a ribbon of the
prepared paper at the lamp, and put it in the bowl to smoulder."
Cleg hastened to obey. It was a large-headed East Indian pipe with a
flexible handle, and mouthpiece of fine pale amber.
"You observe," said the General, as he calmly and carefully adjusted
his pipe-stem over the edge of the coffin, "I do not use ordinary
tobacco, but a mixture of Indian hemp and _Datura stramonium_, or
thornapple, a common dunghill plant. With ordinary people the smoking
of these would produce madness; but in my case they produce only a
peculiar exaltation, and then a kind of ethereal coma, without at all
being followed by the evil effects of opium."
He beckoned Cleg to come nearer. Cleg did so, and took up his position
at the foot of the coffin with some reluctance.
"Now," he said, "I am about to take my siesta. Do you set the time
arrangement by carefully turning the hands of the small clock to
seven—the lower dial, if you please. Thank you. Now bring the letters
of the word FALSE to the face of the lock attachment, and you will be
able to open it by the use of this duplicate key. The same word will
(for this day only) enable you to open the outer door—from the inside,
that is, not again from the outside. The pass-word is changed every
day. I always write it on a paper inside my watch every morning."
As Cleg was leaving the room the face and neck of the General were
suddenly jerked up, so that he rose almost to a sitting position.
Cleg's muscles twitched, and with a sharp cry he leaped into the air.
The General waved the hand which was not employed in managing the
pipe-stem, upon which his eyes were steadily fixed.
"I beg your pardon most heartily," he said, "I should have warned you
of this. The fact is, I have an automatic attachment, which I have
applied beneath the pillow, by which at certain intervals my head is
raised. For, though so remarkably spare of person, I have several
times in the East been threatened with apoplexy; and, indeed, I suffer
constantly from asthma, for which I find the _Datura stramonium_ most
useful."
And as Cleg whirled the combination circles in imitation of the
General, he prayed that he might never again have to enter that ghastly
chamber. Yet it was his fortune to abide with the General four years
as his body servant, and to enter the strong-room of Barnbogle nearly
every day.
ADVENTURE LIII.
A STORMY MORNING AT LOCH SPELLANDERIE.
It had been a stormy morning at Loch Spellanderie. It was not wholly
that the winds howled gustily up the loch, or that the tiny breakers
lashed the shore in mimic fury. Mistress McWalter had ofttimes been a
deceived woman, but never before had she taken to her bosom so complete
a viper as Vara Kavannah. She had, indeed, been telling her so for
well-nigh four years. Even Kit Kennedy had become for once almost an
angel of light when compared with her. The reason of the sudden riot
was that Cleg Kelly had been discovered talking to Vara by the orchard
dyke the night before.
"Ye brazen-faced besom—ye toon's madam," cried Mrs. McWalter, "I'll
learn you to bring your ragged, unkempt, stravagin' followers
here!—Guidman, gin ye were worth your salt, as ye are not, ye wad tak'
speech in hand, and order sic a randy instantly frae 'boot the hoose!"
It was early in the morning. Mrs. McWalter was still in bed, and her
husband was pretending to be asleep. But she was well acquainted with
his guile.
"Ye needna pretend ye are sleepin', John, for brawly do I ken that ye
hear every word."
Vara, grown by this time into a tall, handsome girl, was already
brushing out the kitchen and lighting the fire. Kit Kennedy was
whistling cheerfully about the stable. Mistress McWalter always
assisted at reveille in the house of Loch Spellanderie. Her voice
was so sharp and shrill that it could easily reach every corner of
the house from her bed. And upon occasion, when she felt that she
was generally doing herself justice, it had been known to sweep the
cart-shed, and even beat upon the walls of the barn with considerable
effect. But that was, of course, when the front door of the
dwelling-house was open.
While thus lying comfortably upon her back, Mistress McWalter could
keep up a steady and destructive criticism of life in a high-pitched
falsetto, as it was represented below in the sweeps of Vara's brush and
the patter of Kit Kennedy's clogs upon the stone floor.
"What are ye doin' near the dresser, ye sly, ill-contrivin' limmer,"
she cried; "hae I no telled ye a thousand times, that if I catch ye
takkin' as muckle as a sup o' the milk that was skimmed yestreen for
the bairns' breakfast this mornin', I will hae the polissman at ye?
But the jail wad be no surprise to the likes o' you. Na, I'm guessin'
ye hae been weel acquant wi' the poliss a' your days. Tak' up the
water-cans and gang your ways to the well for water. Then haste ye fast
back and put on the muckle pot and the porridge pot, baith o' them. Or,
my certes, I'll come at ye wi' a stick, ye careless, trapesin' slut,
ye!"
Vara was not slow in obeying this command. To go to the well meant,
at the least, to be for five minutes out of the hearing of the
all-compassing tongue of Mistress McWalter, and out of the shrill
ding-dong of her vocabulary. It was not much, but still it was
something.
The girl took the blue cans readily, and went towards the door.
"Gang some deal quaiter," cried Mistress McWalter, "or, by my faith,
I'll thresh ye like a sheaf o' corn when I rise to ye, ye misleared
gamester frae the streets! Dinna wauken a' the puir tired bairns, for
they were honestly gotten and weel brocht up. And shut the door after
ye, when ye gang oot. Ye want us a' to get our deaths o' cauld, nae
doot!"
The anger that burned in Vara's breast was healthy and natural, and
it would have done her a world of good if she had been able to allow
herself the safety valve of intemperate speech. But she only said to
herself, "I'll thole awhile yet for Boy Hugh's and wee Gavin' sake,
till they can fend for themselves. I need the siller she pays me."