A CREATURE OF IMPULSE
Up the broad avenue to the great house of Thorpe, Stephen Hurd slowly
made his way, his hands clasped behind him, his eyes fixed upon the
ground. But his appearance was not altogether the appearance of a man
overcome with grief. The events of the last few days had told upon him,
and his deep mourning had a sombre look. Yet there were thoughts working
even then in his brain which battled hard with his natural depression.
Strange things had happened--stranger things than he was able all at
once to digest. He could not see the end, but there were possibilities
upon which he scarcely dared to brood.
He was shown into the library and left alone for nearly twenty minutes.
Then Wilhelmina came, languid, and moving as though with tired feet. Yet
her manner was gentler and kinder than usual. She leaned back in one of
the vast easy-chairs, and murmured a few graceful words of sympathy.
"We were all so sorry for you, Mr. Hurd," she said. "It was a most
shocking affair."
"I thank you very much--madam," he replied, after a moment's pause. It
was better, perhaps, for the present, to assume that their relations
were to continue those of employer and employed.
"I do not know," she continued, "whether you care to speak about this
shocking affair. Perhaps you would prefer that we did not allude to it
for the present."
He shook his head.
"I am not sure," he answered, "that it is not rather a relief to have it
spoken of. One can't get it out of one's mind, of course."
"There is no news of the man--no fresh capture?"
"None," he answered. "They are dragging the slate quarry again to-day. I
believe there are some very deep holes where the body may have drifted."
"Do you believe that that is the case?" she asked; "or do you think that
he got clean away?"
"I cannot tell," he answered. "It seems impossible that he should have
escaped altogether without help."
"And that he could not have had, could he?" she asked.
He looked across at her thoughtfully, watching her face, curious to see
whether his words might have any effect.
"Only from one person," he said.
"Yes?"
"From Macheson, the fellow who came here to convert us all," he said
deliberately.
Beyond a slight elevation of the eyebrows, his scrutiny was in vain, for
she made no sign.
"He scarcely seems a likely person, does he, to aid a criminal?" she
asked in measured tones.
Stephen Hurd shrugged his shoulders.
"Perhaps not," he admitted, "but at any rate he sheltered him."
"As he doubtless would have done any passer-by on such a night," she
remarked. "By the bye, what has become of that young man?"
"He has left the neighbourhood," Hurd answered shortly.
"Left altogether?" she inquired.
"I imagine so," Hurd answered. "I had the shelter destroyed, and I gave
him to understand pretty clearly what your wishes were. There really
wasn't much else for him to do."
Her eyelids drooped over her half closed eyes. For a moment she was
silent.
"If you hear of him again," she said quietly, "be so good as to let me
know."
Her indifference seemed too complete to be assumed. Yet somehow or other
Hurd felt that she was displeased with him.
"I will do so," he said, "if I hear anything about him. It scarcely
seems likely."
Wilhelmina sat quite still. Her head, resting slightly upon the long
delicate fingers of her right hand, was turned away from the young man
who was daring to watch her. She was apparently gazing across the park,
down the magnificent avenue of elms which led to the village. So he was
gone--without a word! How else? On the whole she could not but approve!
And yet!--and yet!
She turned once more to Hurd.
"I read the account of the inquest on your father's death," she said,
speaking very slowly, with her usual drawl, yet with a softer note in
her voice, as though out of respect for the dead man. "Does it not seem
very strange that the money was left untouched?"
"Yes!" he answered. "Yet, after all, I don't know. You see, the governor
must have closed with the fellow and shown fight before he got that
knock on the head. If the thief was really only an ordinary tramp, he'd
be scared to death at what he'd done, and probably bolt for his life
without stopping to take anything with him."
"Isn't it rather surprising to have tramps--in Thorpe?" she asked.
"I have scarcely ever seen one," he answered.
Wilhelmina turned her head slightly, so that she was now directly facing
him. She looked him steadily in the eyes.
"Has it occurred to you, Mr. Hurd," she asked, "that this young man may
not have been a tramp at all, and that his visit to your father may have
been on other business than that of robbery?"
He hesitated for a moment.
"My father's connexions with the outside world," he said slowly, "were
so slight."
"Yet it has occurred to you?"
"Yes!" he admitted.
"And have you come to any conclusion?"
"None," he declared.
"You carried out my instructions with regard to the papers and documents
belonging to the estate?"
"Certainly, madam," he answered. "Within five minutes of receiving your
message, they were all locked up in the safe and the key handed to your
messenger."
"You did not go through them yourself?" she asked.
"I did not," he answered, lying with admirable steadiness. "I scarcely
felt that I was entitled to do so."
"So that you could not tell if any were missing?" she continued.
"I could not," he admitted.
"Your father never spoke, then, of any connexions with people--outside
Thorpe--likely to prove of a dangerous character?"
The young man smiled. "My father," he said, "had not been farther than
Loughborough for twenty years."
There was a short silence. Wilhelmina, deliberately, and without any
attempt at concealment, was meditatively watching the young man,
studying his features with a half-contemptuous and yet searching
interest. Perhaps the slightly curving lips, the hard intentness of her
gaze, suggested that he was disbelieved. He lost colour and fidgeted
about. It was a scrutiny not easy to bear, and he felt that it was going
against him. Already she had written him down a liar.
She spoke to him at last. If the silence had not ended soon, he would
have made some blundering attempt to retrieve his position. She spoke
just in time to avert such ignominy.
"Mr. Hurd," she said, "the question of your father's successor is one
that has doubtless occurred to you as it has to me. I trust that you
will, at any rate, remain here. As to whether I can offer you your
father's position in its entirety, I am not for the present assured."
He glanced up at her furtively. He was certain now that he had played
his cards ill. She had read through him easily. He cursed himself for a
lout.
"You see," she continued, "the post is one of great responsibility,
because it entails the management of the whole estates. It is necessary
for me to feel absolute confidence in the person who undertakes it. I
have not known you very long, Mr. Hurd."
He bowed. He could not trust himself to words.
"I have instructed them to send some one down from my solicitor's office
for a week or so," she continued, "to assist you. In the meantime, I
must think the matter over."
"I am very much obliged to you, madam," he said. "You will find me, I
think, quite as trustworthy and devoted to your interests as my father."
She smiled slightly. She recognized exactly his quandary, and it amused
her. The slightest suggestion of menace in his manner would be to give
the lie to himself.
"I am coming down this afternoon," she said, "to go through the safes.
Please be there in case I want you. You will not forget, in case you
should hear anything of Mr. Macheson, that I desire to be informed."
He took his leave humiliated and angry. He had started the game with a
wrong move--retrievable, perhaps, but annoying. Wilhelmina passed into
the library, where Lady Peggy, in a wonderful morning robe, was leaning
back in an easy-chair dictating letters to Captain Austin.
"You dear woman!" she exclaimed, "don't interrupt us, will you? I have
found an ideal secretary, writes everything I tell him, and spells quite
decently considering his profession. My conscience is getting lighter
every moment."
"And my heart heavier," Austin grumbled. "A most flirtatious
correspondence yours."
She laughed softly.
"My next shall be to my dressmaker," she declared. "Such a charming
woman, and so trustful. Behave yourself nicely, and you shall go with me
to call on her next week, and see her mannikins. By the bye, Wilhelmina,
am I hostess or are you?"
"You, by all means," Wilhelmina answered. "I shall go to-morrow or the
next day. Is any one coming to lunch?"
"His Grace, I fancy--no one else."
Wilhelmina yawned.
"Where is Gilbert?" she asked.
"Asleep on the lawn last time I saw him."
"No one shooting, then?"
"We're going to beat up the home turnips after lunch," Captain Austin
answered. "It's rather an off day with us. Gilbert is nursing his
leg--fancies he has rheumatism coming."
She strolled out into the garden, but she avoided the spot where Gilbert
Deyes lounged in an easy-chair, reading the paper and smoking
cigarettes, with his leg carefully arranged on a garden chair in front
of him. She took the winding path which skirted the kitchen gardens and
led to the green lane, along which the carts passed to the home farm.
She felt that what she was doing was in the nature of an experiment,
she was yielding again to that most astonishing impulse which once
before had taken her so completely by surprise. She passed out of the
gate and along the lane. She began to climb the hill. About the success
of her experiment she no longer had any doubt. Her heart was beating
with pleasant insistence, a feeling of suppressed excitement sent the
blood gliding through her veins with delicious softness. All the time
she mocked at herself--that this should be Wilhelmina Thorpe-Hatton, to
whom the most distinguished men, not only in one capital, but in Europe,
had paid court, whom the most ardent wooer had failed to move, who had
found, indeed, in all the professions of love-making something
insufferably tedious. She was at once amused and annoyed at herself, but
an instinctive habit of truthfulness forbade even self-deception. Her
cheeks were aflame, and her heart was beating like a girl's as she
reached the spinney. She recognized the fact that she was experiencing a
new and delightful pleasure, an emotion as unexpected and ridiculous as
it was inexplicable. But she hugged it to herself. It pleased her
immensely to feel that the impossible had happened. What all this army
of men, experienced in the wiles of love-making, had failed to do, a
crazy boy had accomplished without an effort. Absolutely bizarre, of
course, but not so wonderful after all! She was so secure against any
ordinary assault. She felt herself like the heroine of one of Gautier's
novels. If he had been there himself, she would have taken him into her
arms with all the passionate simplicity of a child.
But he was not there. On the contrary, the place was looking forlorn and
deserted. The shelter had been razed to the ground--she felt that she
hated Stephen Hurd as she contemplated its ruin--the hedge was broken
down by the inrush of people a few days ago. In the absence of any
sunshine, the country around seemed bleak and colourless. She leaned
over the gate and half closed her eyes. Memory came more easily like
that!