THE FIGURE IN THE MOONLIGHT
At last he was free from the horrors of that strange house--Durley
Dene--and Laurence Carrington felt that for the moment he could breathe
again. Then he remembered the cause of his hasty departure from Doctor
Meadows' handsome sitting-room.
Running like mad down the dark drive and up the avenue that led to his
home, he at length reached the front door of the Manse, opened it with
his latch-key, and passed through at the height of his speed.
No one was about. The passages were deserted. But from upstairs came the
sound of loud weeping. He leaped up the staircase, never stopping until
he reached the Squire's bedroom, the door of which was open.
On the floor just inside the room sat Mrs. Knox crying loudly. A female
servant stood by her in an equally hysterical state.
Laurence brushed past them, entered the room, and approached the
old-fashioned bed, round which stood the butler, the housekeeper, and
Lena.
On the bed, fully dressed, lay the body of his father, the Squire,
stretched out in death. The face was a ghastly colour--a slaty shade of
blue. The veins in it stood out like strips of whalebone. The chest
protruded in an unnatural manner. The eyes were yet half opened. The
fingers clutched tightly at the bedclothes. There was no sign that any
breath remained in the old gentleman's body.
"Have you sent for Bathurst?" Laurence asked hoarsely, addressing the
butler.
"Yes, sir, I sent Head for the doctor and expect him every moment, but
I'm afeard it's all up with the master. He was dead when I found him."
"Silence! He is not dead--he cannot be dead." And Laurence threw himself
on his knees beside the bed, and laid his hand gently over his father's
heart. But there was no perceptible movement.
The doctor, a big, powerful-looking man in a tweed suit, entered the
room a moment later.
"This is indeed terrible," he said to Laurence as he made his way to the
bedside. Then he leant down and ripped open the Squire's shirt at the
neck, and in his turn felt for any movement of the heart. He shook his
head ominously as he drew his hand away, and searching in his pocket
produced a small mirror, which he held for a moment before the prostrate
man's mouth.
"No, he's not dead," he said quietly, after a short pause, "but in a
very bad way indeed." Next he commenced giving his orders in an
imperative tone to the servants who were waiting in the doorway. One of
the first was that Mrs. Knox and the hysterical housemaid should be at
once removed. Laurence whispered to Lena to take her aunt away, for the
poor woman was incapable of understanding what was said to her.
The girl seized his hand and pressed it as she went to do as he had
asked her. "Thank God," she murmured, "that you are safe," and the young
man knew that this was something of an answer to the question he had put
a few brief hours before.
Dr. Bathurst was an able physician. He had all his wits about him and
did not lose them at the critical moment. Silently the butler and
housekeeper, as well as Laurence, carried out his instructions. In a few
moments the Squire's evening clothes had been removed and he had been
placed between the sheets. Then the struggle between death and medical
skill began, and so bravely did the doctor fight for the life of his
patient that after two long hours of watching and unceasing attendance
he was able to turn to Laurence, who had stood by his side throughout
the vigil, and say, "He will live."
Then, at Bathurst's request, young Carrington left the sick-room to
inform those who were waiting outside that the crisis was past.
"What had happened?" Laurence had asked himself time after time as he
stood by the bedside. It must surely be that the second attempt on the
helpless old man's life had been made by his terrible foe--the attempt
that he had been dreading since that night on the moor.
Lena met him in the passage. She had prevailed upon her aunt to go to
bed, and now was returning for news.
"Oh, isn't it awful to think of the fiend who has done this!" she cried,
after learning that the Squire might yet live. "To think that your
father is encompassed by a fearful, lurking danger, more horrible than
that of the battle-field. What has he done? What does it all mean?"
But Laurence could not answer the question any better than she was able
to. Had he not been striving ever since the attack on the carriage to
discover what his father's secret was and why he stood in such mortal
danger? But he had failed. He was no nearer the solution of the mystery
after his visit to Durley Dene than he had been before.
"How did it happen? Do you know?" he asked. They had moved along the
unlighted corridor until an open landing window, looking upon the lawn
at the rear of the house, was reached.
"I know practically nothing at all about the sad event. The Squire went
up to bed about an hour after you left, complaining of a headache. He
had not been gone long when Kingsford appeared in a great state of
alarm, excitedly exclaiming that he had entered Mr. Carrington's bedroom
to assist him in undressing and had found what he believed to be your
father's murdered corpse lying on the floor."
"On the floor! Then we might have known he was not dead, for he was
clutching the sheets of the bed."
"Yes, he was laid on the bed directly I could get the butler to help me.
Then I scribbled that note to you and sent Kingsford with it, much to
his surprise on learning where you were. The rest you know. But you--you
escaped, then?"
"Yes, indeed, but I know no more than I did before I started."
"And Major Farnell?"
"Is a gentleman--a man of mystery. His real name is Meadows, or at least
he says it is. He has a villain of a servant, who tried to frighten me,
and, lastly, he has a secret. But whether he is the real enemy of my
poor father I do not know. His certainly was not the hand that was
raised against the Squire to-day, for I was with him when this second
attack must have been made."
"And the servant, was he in the room the whole time?" asked Lena,
breathlessly.
"Great goodness, no! Why, who knows but that he is the man who wages
such warfare against my father? And Meadows' secret is his knowledge of
his man's mysterious connection with poor old dad! You're right; it must
be so, Miss Scott. But," he lowered his voice to a whisper, "I have
returned from Durley Dene, and once again I ask you the question to
which you postponed your answer this morning."
"Hush!" replied the girl. "I cannot answer now, when death has come so
near to the house, and this dreadful mystery is yet unsolved. But----"
His hand stole softly to hers, which lay upon the window-sill.
"But the fact that you have not said 'no' shows me that my chance is not
quite hopeless, is that it?" he asked tenderly.
"Yes," she replied in so low a whisper that had he been any farther from
her he would not have caught the welcome sound.
For a few moments neither spoke, then the girl withdrew her hand gently
and whispered, "You must go back now and see how the dear old man is."
Suddenly she stopped short as she gazed out of the window upon the
shadowy little panorama below. Laurence felt her fingers clutch his arm
as she exclaimed, under her breath--
"Look! there's a man creeping along the side of the yard. There, beyond
the lawn, just a few feet from the wall."
Laurence stared out into the semi-darkness in the direction towards
which his companion was pointing.
She was right. There was somebody moving along towards the palisade on
the boundary between the Manse and Durley Dene. It was a man, groping
and crouching in the shadows, evidently fearing lest he should be seen
from the house. At first it was too dark for the young man to recognise
who the midnight prowler was. But after a time, either when his eyes
became accustomed to the dark or because the moon peeped out for a
moment from behind her curtain of black clouds, he was able to see more
plainly, and as the doubled-up figure paused before disappearing through
the bushes into the grounds of Durley Dene, Laurence had been able to
catch a glimpse of the features of the nocturnal visitor.
To his amazement he saw that the trespasser was none other than Doctor
Meadows, alias Major Jones-Farnell!