August weather. For some few months had elapsed since the time of the last chapter. Stilborough lay hot and dusty under the summer sun: the pavements shone white and glistening, the roads were parched. Before the frontage of the Turk's Head on the sunny side of Cross Street, was spread a thick layer of straw to deaden the sound of horses and vehicles. A gentleman, driving into the town a few days before, was taken ill there, and lay at the hotel in a dangerous state: his doctor expressed it as "between life and death." It was Squire Dobie, of Dobie Hall.
The Turk's Head was one of those good, old-fashioned, quiet inns, not much frequented by the general public, especially by the commercial public. Its custom was chiefly confined to the county families, and to that class of people called gentlefolk. It was, therefore, very rarely in a bustle, showing but little signs of life except on Thursdays, market-day, and it would sometimes be so empty that Stilborough might well wonder how Will Heyton, its many years landlord, contrived to pay his expenses. But Will Heyton had, in point of fact, made a very nice nest-egg at it, and did not much care now whether the inn was empty or full.
In the coffee-room on this hot August morning, at a small table by the right-hand window, sat a gentleman breakfasting. A tall, slender, well-dressed young man in slight mourning, of perhaps some six-and-twenty years. He was good-looking; with a pleasing, fair, and attractive face, blue eyes, and light wavy hair that took a tinge of gold in the sunlight. This gentleman had arrived at Stilborough the previous evening by a cross-country coach, had inquired for the best hotel, and been directed to the Turk's Head. It was late for breakfast, nearly eleven o'clock: and when the gentleman--whose name was inscribed on the hotel visitors' list as Mr. George North--came down he had said something in a particularly winning way about the goodness of the bed causing him to oversleep himself. Save for him, the coffee-room was void of guests.
"Is this a large town?" he inquired of the portly head waiter, who was partly attending on him, partly rubbing up the glasses and decanters that were ranged on the mahogany stand by the wall.
"Pretty well, sir. It's next in size to the chief county town, and is quite as much frequented."
"What are the names of the places near to it?"
"We have no places of note near to us, sir: only a few small villages that count for nothing."
"Well, what are their names?"
"There's Hamley, sir; and Eastwick; and Greylands; and----"
"Are any of these places on the sea?" interrupted the stranger, as he helped himself to a mutton chop.
"Greylands is, sir. It's a poor little place in itself, nothing hardly but fishermen's huts in it; but the sea is beautiful there.--Bangalore sauce, sir?"
"Well, I don't know," said the young man, looking first at the bottle of sauce, being handed to him, and then up at the waiter, a laughing doubt in his blue eyes. "Is it good?"
"It's very good indeed, sir, as sauce; and rare too; you'd not find it in any other inn at Stilborough. Not but what some tastes prefer mutton chops plain."
"I think I do," said the stranger, declining the sauce. "Thank you; it may be better to let well alone."
His breakfast over, Mr. George North sat back in his chair, and glanced through the sunbeams at the dusty road and the white pavement. The waiter placed on the table the last number of the Stilborough Herald; and nearly at the same moment there dashed up to the inn door a phaeton and pair. The gentleman who was driving handed the reins to the groom sitting beside him, alighted, and entered the hotel.
The sun, shining right in Mr. George North's eyes, had somewhat obscured his view outwards; but as the gentleman came in and stood upright in the coffee-room, he saw a tall stately man with a remarkably handsome face. While gazing at the face, a slight emotion came suddenly into his own. "What a likeness!" he inwardly murmured. "Can it be one of them?"
"How is Squire Dobie, Hobbs?" demanded Mr. Castlemaine of the old waiter--for the new-comer was the Master of Greylands. "Any better to-day?"
"Yes, sir; the doctor thinks there's a slight improvement. He has had a fairly good night."
"That's well. Is Mr. Atherly expected in to-day, do you know?"
"No, I don't, sir. Perhaps master knows. I'll inquire."
While the waiter was gone on this errand, Mr. Castlemaine strolled to the unoccupied window, and looked out on his waiting horses. Fine animals, somewhat restive this morning, and the pride of Mr. Castlemaine's stables. He glanced at the stranger, sitting at the not yet cleared breakfast table, and was taken at once with his bright face and looks. Mr. George North was then reading the newspaper. Hobbs did not return, and Mr. Castlemaine stamped a little with one foot as though he were impatient. A sudden thought struck the young man: he rose, and held out the newspaper.
"I beg your pardon, sir; I am perhaps, keeping this from you."
"Not at all, thank you," said Mr. Castlemaine.
"I am a stranger; therefore this local news cannot interest me," persisted Mr. George North, fancying courtesy alone might have prompted the refusal. "It is of no moment whether I read the gazette or not."
"I have already seen it: I am obliged to you all the same," replied Mr. Castlemaine in his pleasantest manner, with not a shade of hauteur about it. "Are you staying here?"
"At present I am. It may be that I shall stay but for a short while. I cannot say yet. We artists travel about from village to village, from country to country, finding subjects for our pencil. I have lately been in the Channel Islands."
"Master says he is not particularly expecting Mr. Atherly to-day, sir," interposed Hobbs, returning; "but he thinks it likely he may be coming in. He'll get here about one o'clock if he does come."
The Master of Greylands nodded in reply. "I suppose, Hobbs, Squire Dobie is not allowed to see anyone?"
"Not yet, sir."
Mr. Castlemaine left the room, saluting the stranger at the breakfast table. Hobbs followed, to attend him to the door.
"What's the name of the young man in the coffee-room?" he asked, standing for a moment on the steps. "He seems to be a nice young fellow."
"North, sir. Mr. George North. He came in last night by the Swallow coach."
"He says he is an artist."
"Oh, does he, sir!" returned the waiter in an accent of mingled surprise and disappointment. "I'm sure I took him to be a gentleman."
Mr. Castlemaine smiled to himself at the words. Hobbs' ideas, he thought, were probably running on the artists who went about painting signboards.
"That accounts for his wanting to know the names of the parts about here," spoke the waiter. "He has been asking me. Them artists, sir, are rare ones for tramping about after bits of scenery."
The Master of Greylands went out to his carriage and took his seat. As he turned the horses' heads round to go back the way they came, Mr. George North, looking on from within, had for a moment the back of the phaeton pointed right towards him, with its distinguishing crest.
"The crest!" he exclaimed, under his breath. "Then it must be one of them! And I nearly knew it by the face. Shall I ask here which of them it is?--no, better not. Suppose I go out and take a look at the town?" he continued a few minutes later, waking up from a reverie.
Putting on his straw hat, which had a bit of black ribbon tied round it, and a good-sized brim, he went strolling hither and thither. It was not market day: but few people were abroad, and the streets looked almost deserted. People did not care to come abroad in the blazing sun, unless obliged. Altogether, there was not much for Mr. George North to see. Before an inn-door stood a kind of small yellow van, or omnibus--it was in fact something between the two--which was being laden to start. It made its journeys three times a week, and was called the two-horse van.
For want of something better to look at, Mr. George North stood watching the putting-to of the horses. On the sides of the van were inscribed the names of the places it called at; amidst them was Greylands. His eyes rested on the name and a sudden thought arose to him: Suppose I go over to Greylands by this yellow omnibus!
"Do you call at all these places to-day?" he asked of a man, who was evidently the driver.
"At every one of 'em, sir. And come back here through 'em again to-morrow."
"Have I time to go as far as the Turk's Head and back before you start?"
"Plenty of time, sir. We are not particular to a few minutes either way."
Mr. George North proceeded to the Turk's Head; not in the rather lazy fashion to which his movements seemed by nature inclined, but as fast as the sun allowed him. He there told the head waiter that he was going to make a little excursion into the country for the purpose of looking about him, and might not be back until evening, or even before the morrow.
"Inside or outside, sir?" questioned the driver when he got back.
"Oh, outside to-day. Can't I sit by you?"
He was welcome, the driver said, the seat not being taken; and Mr. George North mounted to the seat and put up his umbrella, which he had brought with him as a shelter against the sun. Two or three more passengers got up behind, and placed themselves amid the luggage; and there were several inside.
The two-horse van sped along very fairly; and in a short time reached the first village. After descending a hill, the glorious sea burst into view.
"What place do you call this?" asked the stranger.
"This is Greylands, sir."
"Greylands, is it? I think I'll get down here. Dear me, what a beautiful sea! How much do I pay you?"
"A shilling fare, sir. Anything you please for the driver. Thank you, sir; thank you," concluded the man pocketing the eighteen-pence given to him. "We shall stop in a minute, sir, at the Dolphin Inn."
On this hot day, which really seemed too hot for work, Mrs. Bent was stealing a few moments' idleness on the bench outside her window. John had been sitting there all the morning. The landlady was making free comments, after her wont, upon the doings, good and bad, of her neighbours; John gave an answering remark now and again, but she did not seem to wait for it.
There is not much to tell the reader of this short space of time that has elapsed without record. No very striking event had taken place in it; Greylands was much in the same condition as when we parted from it last. Poor Miss Hallet had been ill for some weeks, possibly the result of the fright, and was quite unable to look personally after the vagaries of Miss Jane: the Friar's Keep and its mysteries remained where they had been; Sister Mildred was ill again, and Mary Ursula had not plucked up courage since to penetrate anew the secret passage. Squire Dobie, red-hot at first to unravel the mystery of the disappearance of Basil's son, had finally given up the inquiry as hopeless; neither had Madame Guise advanced one jot in her discoveries touching the suspected iniquity of the Master of Greylands.
"Here comes the two-horse van," remarked Mrs. Bent.
The two-horse van drew up before the bench and close to Mr. and Mrs. Bent. Its way did not lie by that of the ordinary coach road, but straight on up the hill past the Nunnery. Whether it had parcels or passengers to descend, or whether it had not, it always halted at the Dolphin, to "give the horses a minute's breathing," as the driver said: and to give himself a minute's gossip with the landlord and landlady.
The gossip to-day lay chiefly on the score of the unusual heat, and on some refractory wheel of the van, which had persisted the previous day in dropping its spokes out. And the driver had mounted to his seat again, and the van was rattling off, before Mr. and Mrs. Bent remarked that the gentlemanly-looking man in the straw hat, who had got down, as they supposed, merely to stretch his legs, had not gone on with it.
He was standing with his back to them to look about him. At the pile of buildings rising on his left, the Grey Nunnery; at the cliff towards the right, with its nestling houses; at the dark-blue sea opposite, lying calm and lovely under its stagnant fishing boats. A long, lingering look of admiration at the latter, and he turned round to Mr. and Mrs. Bent, standing by the bench now, but not sitting, and lifted his straw bat as he addressed them.
"I beg your pardon. This seems to be a very nice place. What an expanse of sea!"
"It's a very nice place indeed--for its size, sir," said John. "And you'd not get a better sea than that anywhere."
"The place is called Greylands, I am told."
"Yes, sir: Greylands."
"I am an artist," continued the stranger in his pleasing, open manner, a manner that was quite fascinating both Mr. and Mrs. Bent. "I should fancy there must be choice bits of landscape about here well worth my taking."
"And so there is, sir. Many of 'em."
"Will you give me lodging for a few hours?--allow me to call your inn my head-quarters, while I look about for myself a little?" he continued with a most winning smile.
"And glad to receive you, sir," put in Mrs. Bent before her husband had time to reply. "Oar house is open to all, and especially to one as pleasant-speaking as you, sir."
"By the way," he said, stopping to pause when stepping before them indoors, as though he were trying to recall something--"Greylands? Greylands? Yes, that must be the name. Do you chance to know if a French lady is living anywhere in this neighbourhood? A Madame Guise?"
"To be sure she is, sir. She is governess at Greylands Rest. Within a stone's throw--as may almost be said--of this house."
"Ah, indeed. I knew her and her husband, Monsieur Guise, in France. He was my very good friend. Dear me! how thirsty I am."
"Would you like to take anything, sir?"
"Yes, I should; but not beer, or any strong drink of that sort. Have you any lemonade?"
John Bent had; and went to fetch it. The stranger sat down near the open-window, and gazed across at the sea. Mrs. Bent was gazing at him; at his very nice-looking face, so fair and bright, and at the wavy hair, light and fine as silken threads of gold.
"Are you English, sir?" demanded free and curious Mrs. Bent.
"Why do you ask the question?" he returned with a smile, as he threw full on her the light of his laughing blue eyes.
"Well, sir--though I'm sure you are an Englishman person--and a rare good-looking one too--there's a tone in your voice that sounds foreign to me."
"I am English," he replied: "but I have lived very much abroad, in France and Italy and other countries: have roamed about from place to place. No doubt my accent has suffered. We can't be a vagabond, you see, madam, without betraying it."
Mrs. Bent shook her head at the epithet, which he spoke-with a laugh: few persons, to judge by looks, were less of a vagabond than he. John came in with the lemonade sparkling in a glass.
"Ah, that's good," said the traveller drinking it at a draught. "If your viands and wines generally are as good as that, Mr. Bent, your guests must be fortunate. I should like to call and see Madame Guise," he added rising. "I suppose I may venture to do so?"
"Why not, sir?"
"Are the people she is with dragons?" he asked, in his half laughing and wholly fascinating way. "Will they eat me up, think you? Some families do not admit visitors to their governess."
"You may call, and welcome, sir," said Mrs. Bent. "The family are of note hereabout, great gentlefolks--the Castlemaines. Madame Guise is made as comfortable there as if it were her own house and home."
"I'll venture then," said the stranger, taking his hat and umbrella. "Perhaps you will be good enough to direct the road to me."
John Bent took him out at the front door, and pointed out to him the way over the fields--which were far pleasanter and somewhat nearer than the road way: and Mr. North was soon at the gate of Greylands' Rest. Mrs. Castlemaine was seated under a shady clump of trees, doing some wool work. He raised his hat and bowed to her as he passed, but continued his way to the door. Miles opened it and asked his pleasure.
"I am told that Madame Guise lives here. May I be permitted to see her?"
"Yes, sir," replied the man, admitting him to the hall. "What name?"
"Mr. George North. I have not my cards with me."
"Mr. George North!" repeated Mrs. Castlemaine to herself, for she had been near enough to hear distinctly the conversation in the stillness of the summer's day. "What an exceedingly handsome young man! Quite a Saxon face. I wonder who he is!"
Miles conducted Mr. George North to the red parlour, where Madame Guise was sitting with Ethel. "A gentleman to see you, ma'am," was his mode of introduction: "Mr. George North."
"Mr. ---- who!" cried Madame, her manner hurried and startled.
"Mr. George North," repeated Miles; and ushered the gentleman in.
She turned her back upon the door, striving for courage and calmness in the one brief moment of preparation that she might dare to snatch. But that Ethel's attention was given to the stranger, she had not failed to see the agitation. Madame's pocket-handkerchief was clutched almost through in her nervous hand.
"How do you do, Madame Guise?"
She turned round then, meeting him in the middle of the room. Her face was white as death as she put out her hand to him. His own manner was unembarrassed, but his countenance at the moment looked strangely grave.
"Being in the neighbourhood I have ventured to call upon you, Madame Guise. I hope you have been well."
"Quite well, thank you," she said in a low tone, pointing to a chair, and sitting down herself. "I am so much surprised to see you."
"No doubt you are. How is the little girl?"
"She is at school with some good ladies, and she is quite happy there," replied Madame Guise, speaking rather more freely. "I thought you were in Italy, Mr. North."
"I left Italy some weeks ago. Since then I have been wandering onwards, from place to place, sketching this, sketching that, in my usual rather vagabond fashion, and have at length turned up in England."
The laughing light was coming back to his eyes again: he momentarily turned them on Ethel as he spoke. Madame Guise seemed to consider she might be under an obligation to introduce him.
"Mr. George North, my dear. Miss Ethel Reene, sir; one of my pupils."
Mr. George North rose from his chair and bowed elaborately: Ethel bowed slightly, smiled, and blushed. She was very much taken with the young man: and perhaps, if the truth were known, he was with her. Certain it was, that she was looking very pretty in her summer dress of white muslin, with the silver-grey ribbons in her hair.
"Did you come straight to England from Italy?" asked Madame Guise.
"My fashion of coming was not straight but very crooked," he answered. "I took the Channel Islands in my way."
"The Channel Islands!"
"Jersey and Guernsey and Sark. Though I am not quite sure how I got there," he added in his very charming manner, and with another glance and half smile at Ethel; who blushed again vividly as she met it, and for no earthly reason.
"But you could not fly over to them in your sleep," debated Madame Guise, taking his words literally.
"I suppose not. I was at St. Malo one day, and I presume I must have gone from thence in a boat. One of these days, when my fortune's made, I intend to take up my abode for a few months at Sark. The climate is lovely; the scenery beautiful."
"How did you know I was here?" asked Madame Guise.
"I saw--I saw Madame de Rhone in France," he replied, making a slight break, as put. "She told me you had come to England and were living with an English family at a place called Greylands," he continued. "Finding myself to-day at Greylands, I could but try to find you out."
"You are very good," murmured Madame, whose hands were again beginning to show signs of trembling.
Ethel rose to leave the room. It occurred to her that Madame might like to be alone with her friend, and she had stayed long enough for good manners. At that same moment, however, Mrs. Castlemaine came in by the open glassdoors, so Ethel's considerate thought was foiled. Mrs. Castlemaine bowed slightly as she looked at the stranger.
"Mr. North, madam; a friend of my late husband's," spoke Madame Guise, quite unable to prevent her voice from betraying agitation. "He was at Greylands to-day and has found me out."
"We are very pleased to see Mr. North," said Mrs. Castlemaine, turning to him with her most gracious tones, for the good looks and easy manners of the stranger had favourably impressed her. "Are you staying at Greylands?"
".I am travelling about, madam, from place to place, taking sketches. I have recently come from Hampshire previous to that, I was in the Channel Islands. Last night I slept at Stilborough, and came to Greylands this morning by a conveyance that I heard called the 'two-horse van' in search of objects for my pencil."
He mentioned the "two-horse van" so quaintly that Mrs. Castlemaine burst into a laugh. "I think you must have been jolted," she said, and Mr. North bowed.
"Remembering to have been told that Madame Guise, the wife of my late dear friend, Monsieur Guise was residing with a family at a place called Greylands, I made inquiries for the address at the inn here, and presumed to call."
He bowed again slightly with somewhat of deprecation to Mrs. Castlemaine as he spoke. She assured him he was quite welcome; that it was no presumption.
"Are you an artist by profession, Mr. North?--Or do you take sketches for pleasure?" she asked presently, as the conversation proceeded.
"Something of both, madam. I cannot say that I am dependent on my pencil. I once painted what my friends were pleased to call a good picture, and it was exhibited and bought--in Paris."
"A watercolour?"
"Yes, a watercolour."
"I hope you got a good price for it."
"Five thousand francs."
"How much is that in English money?" asked Mrs. Castlemaine, after an electrified pause, for at the first moment her ideas had run to five thousand pounds.
"Two hundred pounds. It was a scene taken in the Alpes-Maritimes."
"You have been much abroad, Mr. North?"
"Oh, very much. I have latterly been staying for more than a year in Italy."
"How you must have enjoyed it?"
"For the time of sojourn I did. But it will always lay on my mind in a heavy weight of repentance."
"But why?" exclaimed Mrs. Castlemaine.
"Because----" and there he made a pause. "In my unpardonable thoughtlessness, madam, I, roving about from spot to spot, omitted sometimes to give any family any address where news from them might find me."
"And you had cause to repent not doing it?"
"Bitter cause," he answered, awrungexpression resting for an instant on his face. "My father died during that time; and--there were other matters wanting me. My life, so far as that past portion of it goes, will be one of unavailing repentance."
It almost seemed--at least the fancy struck Ethel--that Mr. North gave this little bit of unusual confidence--unusual in a stranger--for the benefit of Madame Guise. Certain it was, that he looked at her two or three times as he spoke; and on her face there shone a strangely sad and regretful light.
In about half an hour he rose to depart. Mrs. Castlemaine offered luncheon, but he declined it. He had been a lazy lie-abed that morning, he said with a laughing smile, and it seemed but now almost that he had taken his breakfast at the Turk's Head. The impression he left behind him was not so much of a stranger, as of an acquaintance they had known, so pleasant and easy had been the intercourse during the interview; and an acquaintance they were sorry to part with.
Madame Guise went with him across the lawn. Mrs. Castlemaine would have gone too, but that Ethel stopped her.
"Mamma, don't," she whispered: "they may be glad to have a few moments alone. I fancy Madame Guise cannot have seen him since before her husband died: she seemed quite agitated when he came in."
"True," said Mrs. Castlemaine, for once recognising reason in words of Ethel's. "What a gentlemanly young fellow he seems--in spite of that wide straw hat."
He had put the straw hat on, and seemed to be looking at the different flower beds in his progress; Madame Guise pointing to one and another with her finger. Had Mrs. Castlemaine caught but a word of the private conversation being carried on under the semblance of admiring the flowers, she might have stolen out to listen in the gratification of her curiosity. Which would not have served her, for they spoke in French.
"How you startled me, George!" cried Madame Guise, as their heads were both bent over a rose-tree. "I thought I should have fainted. It might have made me discover all. Let us walk on!"
"Well, I suppose I ought to have written first. But I thought I should be introduced to you alone--your being here as the governess."
"How are they all at Gap?--Look at these carnations.--How is Emma? Did you get my letter through her?"
"I got it when I reached Gap. They are all well. She gave me your letter and what news she could. I cannot understand it, Charlotte.Whereis Anthony?"
"Dead. Murdered. As I truly and fully believe."
Mr. North lifted his hat and passed his white handkerchief across his brow, very perplexed and stern just then.
"When can I see you alone, Charlotte?"
"This evening. As soon as dusk sets in, I will meet you in Chapel Lane:" and she directed him where to find it. "You stay at the lower end near that great building almost in ruins, the Friar's Keep, and I will come to you. Are you here at last to help me unravel the treachery, George?"
"I will try to do it."
"But why have you been so tardy?--why did you go to--what did you say--those Channel Islands?"
"I had an artist friend with me whowouldgo over there. I did not care to show too much eagerness to come on to England--he might have suspected I had a motive. And it seems to me, Charlotte, that this investigation will be a most delicate business; one that a breath of suspicion, as to who I am, might defeat."
"And oh, why did you linger so long in Italy, George?" she asked in a low tone of painful wailing. "And to have neglected for months to let us get an address that would certainly find you! Had you been at Gap when the father died, the probability is that Anthony and you would have made the journey here in company. Surely Mr. James Castlemaine had not dared to kill him then!"
"Hush!" he answered in a voice more bitterly painful than her own. "You heard what I said just now in the salon: the regret, the self-reproach will only cease with my life. Until this evening then, Charlotte!"
"Until this evening."
"Who is that charming demoiselle?" he asked, as they shook hands in parting. "What relation is she to the house?"
"No real relation of it at all. She is Miss Reene; Mrs. Castlemaine's stepdaughter. Mrs. Castlemaine was a widow when she married into the family."
Mr. George North closed the gate behind him; took off his hat to Madame with the peculiar action of a Frenchman, and walked away.
If there existed one man eminently open by nature, more truthful, devoid of guile, and less capable of deceit than his fellows, it was certainly George North. And yet he was acting a deceitful part now; inasmuch as that he had made his appearance in England and introduced himself at Greylands' Rest, under what might be called a partially false name. For the name "George North" had but been given him in baptism: the other, the chief one, was Castlemaine. He was the son of Basil Castlemaine, and the younger brother of the most unfortunate Anthony.
Four children had been born to Basil Castlemaine and his wife. They were named as follows: Anthony, Mary Ursula, George North, and Emma. The elder daughter died young: the wife died just as her other children had grown up. Anthony married Charlotte Guise; Emma married Monsieur de Rhone, a gentleman who was now the chief partner in the Silk Mills, with which Basil Castlemaine had been connected. The two young Castlemaines, Anthony and George, had both declined to engage in commerce. Their father pointed to them that a share in the Silk Mills was open to each, and no doubt a good fortune at the end of a few years' connection with the business; beyond that, he did not particularly urge the step on either of them. His sons would both inherit a modest competency under his will. Anthony would also succeed (as Basil fully believed) to his forefather's patrimony in England, Greylands' Rest, which would necessitate his residence there; and George, at the age of twenty-four, came into a fairly good fortune left to him by his uncle and godfather, Mr. North. Therefore, both of them were considered by the father to be provided for, and if they preferred to eschew commerce, they were welcome to do so. George had shown very considerable talent for drawing and painting; it had been well cultivated; and though he did not intend to make it exactly his profession, for he needed it not, he did hope to become famous as a watercolour painter. Some time after attaining the age of twenty-four, and taking possession of his bequeathed fortune, he had resolved on making a lengthened sojourn in Italy; not to stay in one part of it, but to move about as inclination dictated. And this he did.
From time to time he wrote home, saying where he then was; but rarely where he would be later, simply because he did not know himself. Two or three letters reached him in return, containing the information that all was well.
All being well seems to the young to mean always to be well; as it did to George Castlemaine: his mind was at rest, and for several months there ensued a gap of silence. It is true he wrote home; but, as to tidings from home reaching him in return, he did not afford a chance for it. He crossed to Sicily, to Corsica; he went to the Ionian Isles: it is hard to say where he did not go. When tidings from home at length reached him, he found that his family, whom he had been picturing as unchanged and happy, was totally dispersed. His father was dead. Anthony had gone over to England to see after his patrimony; and, not returning as he ought to have done, his wife and child had followed him. Emma de Rhone, who conveyed all this in writing, to her brother, confessed she did not understand what could have become of Anthony; but that she did not think he could have lost himself, though of course England was a large place, and he, being strange, might have a difficulty in making his way about it. To this portion of the letter George gave no heed; at a happier time he would have laughed at the notion of Anthony's being lost; his whole heart was absorbed in the grief for his father and in self-reproach for his own supine carelessness.
He did not hurry home: there was nothing to go for now: and it was summer weather when George once more re-entered Gap. To his intense astonishment, his concern, his perplexity, he found that Anthony really was lost: at least, that his wife seemed nimble to discover traces of him. Emma de Rhone handed him a thick letter of several sheets, which had come enclosed to her for him from Charlotte many weeks before, and had been waiting for him. When George Castlemaine broke the seal, he found it to contain a detailed account of Anthony's disappearance and the circumstances connected with it, together with her suspicions of James Castlemaine, and her residence in that gentleman's house. In short, she told him all; and she begged him to come over and see into it for himself; but to come as a stranger, en cachette, and not to declare himself to be connected with her, or as a Castlemaine. She also warned him not to tell Emma or M. de Rhone of her worst fears about Anthony, lest they should be undertaking the investigation themselves: which might ruin all hopes of discovery, for Mr. Castlemaine was not one to be approached in that way. And the result of this was that George Castlemaine was now here as George North. He had deemed it well to obey Charlotte's behest, and come; at the same time he did not put great faith in the tale. It puzzled him extremely: and he could but recall that his brother's wife was given to be a little fanciful--romantic, in short.
Not a breath of air was stirring. The summer night seemed well-nigh as hot as the day had been. There lay a mist on the fields behind the hedge on either side Chapel Lane as Charlotte Guise hastened lightly down it. In her impatience she had come out full early to keep the appointment, and when she reached the end of the lane, George North--as for convenience' sake we must continue to call him--was but then approaching it.
"You found it readily, George?" she whispered. "Quite so. It is in a straight line from the inn."
"Are you going back to Stilborough to-night?"
"No. I shall sleep at the Dolphin, and go back to-morrow."
He offered his sister-in-law his arm. She took it; but the next moment relinquished it again. "It may be better not, George," she said. "It is not very likely that we shall meet people, but it's not impossible: and, to see me walking thus familiarly with a stranger would excite comment."
They turned to go up the hill. It was safer than Chapel Lane, as Charlotte observed; for there was no knowing but Mr. Harry Castlemaine might be going through the lane to the Commodore's, whose company both father and son seemed to favour. Mr. Castlemaine was at Stilborough: had driven over in the morning, and was no doubt staying there to dine.
"This seems to be a lonely road," remarked Mr. North, as they went on side by side.
"It is very lonely. We rarely meet any one but the preventive-men: and not often even one of them."
Almost in silence they continued their way until opposite the coastguard-station: a short line of white dwellings lying at right angles with the road on the left hand. Turning off to the right, across the waste land on the other side the road, they soon were on the edge of the cliff, with the sea lying below.
"We may walk and talk here in safety," said Charlotte. "There is never more than one man on duty: his beat is a long one, all down there"--pointing along the line of coast in the opposite direction to that of Greylands--"and we shall see him, should he approach, long before he could reach us. Besides, they are harmless and unsuspicious, these coastguardsmen; they only look out for ships and smugglers."
"We do not get a very good view of the sea from here: that high cliff on the right is an impediment," remarked Mr. North. "What a height it is!"
"It shoots up suddenly, close on this side the Friar's Keep, and shoots down nearly as suddenly to where we are now. Ethel Reene climbs it occasionally, and sits there; but I think nobody else does."
"Not the preventive-men?"
"By day sometimes. Never by night; it would be too dangerous. Their beat commences here."
"And now, Charlotte, about this most unhappy business?" said Mr. North, as they began to pace backwards and forwards on the green brow of the coast, level there. "Where are we to look for Anthony? It cannot be that he islost."
"But he is lost, George. He went into the Friar's Keep that unhappy night in February; and he was never seen to come out again. He never did come out again, as most people here believe; I, for one. What other word is there for it butlost?"
"It sounds like a fable," said George North. "Like a tale out of those romance books you used to read, Charlotte."
"I thought so when I came here first and heard it."
"Did that account you sent me contain all the details?
"I think it did. One cannot give quite so elaborate a history in writing a letter as by word of mouth. Little particulars are apt to be dropped out."
"You had better go over it to me now, Charlotte: all you know from the beginning. Omit not the smallest detail."
Madame Guise obeyed at once. The opening her mouth to impart this dreadful story, dreadful and more dreadful to her day by day, was something like the relief afforded to a parched traveller in an African desert, when he comes upon the well of water he has been fainting for, and slakes his thirst. Not to one single human being had Charlotte Guise been able to pour forth by word of mouth this strange story all through these months since she heard it: the need to do it, the pain, the yearning for sympathy and counsel, had been consuming her all the while as with a fever heat.
She told the whole. The arrival of Anthony at the Dolphin Inn, and his presenting himself to his family--as heard from John Bent. The ill-reception of him by Mr. Castlemaine when he spoke of a claim to Greylands' Rest; the refusal of Mr. Castlemaine to see him subsequently, and their hostile encounter in the field; the strolling out by moonlight that same night of Anthony and the landlord; their watching (quite by chance) the entrance of Mr. Castlemaine into the Friar's Keep, and the hasty following in of Anthony, to have it out, as he impulsively said, under the moonbeams; and the total disappearance of Anthony from that hour. She told all in detail, George North listening without interruption.
"And it is supposed that the cry, following on the shot that was almost immediately heard, was my poor brother's cry?" spoke George, the first words with which he broke the silence.
"I feel sure it was his cry, George."
"And Mr. James Castlemaine denies that he was there?"
"He denies it entirely. He says he was at home at the time and in bed."
"Suppose that it was Anthony who cried; that he was killed by the shot: would it be easy to throw him into the sea out of sight?"
"Not from the Keep. They say there is no opening to the sea. Mr. Castlemaine may have dragged him across the chapel ruins and filing him from thence."
"But could he have done that without being seen? John Bent, you say, was outside the gates, waiting for Anthony."
"But John Bent was not there all the time. When he got tired of waiting he went home, thinking Anthony might have come out without his seeing him--but not in his heart believing it possible that he had. Finding Anthony had not returned to the inn, John Bent went again and searched the Keep with Mr. Nettleby, the superintendent of these coastguardsmen."
"And they did not find any trace of him?"
"Not any."
"Or of any struggle, or other ill work?"
"I believe not. Oh, it is most strange!"
"Who locked the gate--as you describe: and then opened it again?" questioned Mr. North after a moment's pause.
"Ah, I know not. Nobody can conjecture."
"Have you searched well in this Keep yourself?"
"Oh, George, I have not dared to do it! It has a revenant."
"Awhat!" exclaimed Mr. North.
"A revenant. I have seen it, and was nearly frightened to death."
"Charlotte!"
"I know you strong men ridicule such things," said poor Madame Guise, meekly. "Anthony would have laughed just as you do. It's true, though. The Friar's Keep is haunted by a dead monk: he appears dressed in his cowl and grey habit, the same that he used to wear in life. He passes the window sometimes with a lamp in his hand."
"Since when has this revenant taken to appear?" inquired George North, after a short period of reflection. "Since Anthony's disappearance?"
"Oh, for a long, long while before it. I believe the monk died something like two hundred years ago. Why? Were you thinking, George, that it might be the revenant of poor Anthony?"
Mr. George North drew in his disbelieving lips. At a moment like the present he would not increase her pain by showing his mockery of revenants.
"What I was thinking was this, Charlotte. Whether, if poor Anthony be really no more, his destroyers may have cause to wish the Friar's Keep to remain unexplored, lest traces of him might be found, and so have improvised a revenant, as you call it, to scare people away."
"The revenant has haunted the place for years and years, George. It has been often seen."
"Then that puts an end to my theory."
"I might have had courage to search the Keep by day for the dead, as we all believe, do not come abroad then--but that I have not dared to risk being seen there," resumed Madame Guise. "Were I to be seen going into the Friar's Keep, a place that every one shuns, it might be suspected that I had a motive, and Mr. Castlemaine would question me. Besides, my young pupil is mostly with me by day: it is only in the evening that I have unquestioned liberty."
"I wonder you reconciled yourself to go into the house as governess, Charlotte."
"For Anthony's sake," she said imploringly. "What would I not do for his sake? And then, you see, George, while Anthony does not come forward to give orders at Gap, and there is no proof that he is dead, I cannot draw money. My own income is but small."
"Why, my dear Charlotte, what are you talking of? You could have had any amount of money you pleased from me. I----"
"You forget, George: you were travelling, and could not be written to."
"Well, there was Emma," returned Mr. George, half confounded when thus confuted by his own sins.
"I did not want to give too much confidence to Emma and her husband: I have told you why. And I would have gone into Mr. Castlemaine's house, George, the opportunity offering, though I had been the richest woman in the world. But for being there, I should not have known that Mr. Castlemaine holds secret possession of Anthony's diamond ring.Youremember that ring, George."
"I remember I used jokingly to say I would steal it from him--it was so beautiful. The possession of the ring is the most damaging proof of all against my Uncle James. And yet not a certain proof."
"Not a certain proof!"
"No: for it is possible that he may have picked it up in the Friar's Keep."
"Then why should he not have shown the ring? An innocent man would have done so at once, and--here comes the preventive-man," broke off Madame Guise, her quick sight detecting the officer at some distance. "Let us go down the bill again, George."
They crossed the waste land to the road, and went towards the hill. George North was lost in thought.
"There is something about it almost incomprehensible," he said aloud: "and for my own part, Charlotte, I must avow that I cannot yet believe the Uncle James to be guilty. The Castlemaines are recognised in their own land here as mirrors of honour. I have heard my father say so many a time. And this is so dreadful a crime to suspect anybody of! I think I saw the uncle to-day."
"Where?" she asked. And Mr. North explained the appearance of the gentleman that morning at the Turk's Head, whose carriage bore the Castlemaine crest. "Oh, yes, that was Mr. Castlemaine," she said, recognising him by the description.
"Well, he does not look like a man who would do a dreadful deed, Charlotte. He has a very attractive, handsome face: and I think a good face. Shall I tell you why I have more particularly faith in his innocence?--Because he is so like my father."
"And I have never doubted his guilt. You must admit, George, that appearances are strongly against him."
"Undoubtedly they are. And a sad thing it is to have to say it of one of the family. Do you see much of the younger brother--the Uncle Peter?"
"But he is dead," returned Charlotte.
"The Uncle Peter dead!"
"He died the very night that Anthony was lost: the mourning you saw Mrs. Castlemaine wearing was for him; Ethel and the little girl have gone into slighter mourning. And Madame Guise proceeded to give a brief history of Mr. Peter Castlemaine's death and the circumstances surrounding it, with the entrance of Mary Ursula to the Grey Nunnery. He listened in silence; just remarking that he had wondered in the morning which of his two uncles it was that he saw, and had felt half inclined to inquire of the waiter, but prudence kept him from it.
"This is the Friar's Keep," she said as they came to it, and her voice instinctively took a tone of awe. "Do you see those two middle windows, George? It is within them that people see the revenant of the Grey Monk."
"I wish he would show himself now!" heartily spoke George, throwing his eyes on the windows. At which wish his sister-in-law drew close enough to touch him.
"Here's the gate," she said, halting as they came to it. "Was it not astrangething, George, that it should be locked that night!"
"If it really was locked; and is never locked at other times," replied George North, who quite seemed, what with one implied doubt and another, to be going in for some of the scepticism of his uncle, the Master of Greylands. Opening the gate, he walked in. Charlotte followed. They looked inside the Gothic door to the dark still cloisters of the Keep; they stood for some moments gazing out over the sea, so expansive to the eye from this place: but Charlotte did not care to linger there with him, lest they should be seen.
"And it was to this place of ruins Anthony came, and passed into those unearthly-looking cloisters!" he exclaimed as they were going out. "That dark, still enceinte put me in mind of nothing so much as a dead-house."
Charlotte shivered. "It is there," she said, "that we must search for traces of Anthony----"
"I suppose there is a staircase, or something of that kind, that leads to the upper rooms of the Keep?" he interrupted.
"Oh, yes: a stone staircase."
"Have you been up to the rooms?"
"I!" she exclaimed, as if he might have spared the question. "Why, it is in those upper rooms that the revenant is seen. Part of them are in ruins. Mr. Castlemaine and some men of the law he called to his aid from Stilborough went over it all after Anthony's loss, and found no traces of him. But what I think is this, George: that a search conducted by Mr. Castlemaine would not be a minute or true one: the Master of Greylands' will is law in the place: he is bowed down to like a king. How shall you manage to account plausibly for taking up your abode at Greylands, so that no suspicion may attach to you?"
"I shall be here for the purpose of sketching, you understand. An obscure travelling artist excites neither notice nor suspicion, Charlotte," he added in a half-laughing tone. "By the way--there's no danger, I hope, that the little one, Marie Greylands, will remember Uncle George?"
"Not the least; not the slightest. You left her too long ago for that. But, take you notice, George, that here she is only Marie. It would not do to let her other name, Greylands, slip out."
"I will take care," replied George North.
"I think you Will. I think you have altered, George. You are more thoughtful in mood, more sober in manner than you used to be."
"Ay," he answered. "That carelessness and its sad fruits altered me, Charlotte. It left me a lesson that will last me my lifetime."
They were opposite the entrance of the Grey Nunnery: and, in the selfsame moment, its doors opened and Ethel Reene came forth, attended by Sister Ann. The sight seemed to startle Madame Guise.
"Dear me!--but it is I who am careless to-night," she said, below her breath. "Talking with you, George, has made me forget all; even time."
In fact, Madame was to have called at the Nunnery quite an hour ago for Ethel: who had been to spend the evening there with Miss Castlemaine. Madame went forward with her apologies: saying that she had met her husband's old friend, Mr. North, and had stayed talking with him of by-gone days, forgetful of the passing moments.
"I will take charge of Miss Reene now, Sister Ann; I am so sorry you should have to put your things on," she added.
"Nay, but I am not sorry," returned Sister Ann candidly. "It is pleasant to us to get the change of a walk. Your little one has been very happy this evening, Madame Guise; playing at bo-peep and eating the grapes Miss Reene brought her."
Sister Ann retired indoors. Madame Guise and Ethel took the front way round by the Dolphin to Greylands' Rest, Mr. George North attending them. The shortest way was across the field path; though it involved a stile, Madame took it. Mr. North talked to Ethel, and made himself very agreeable--as none could do better than he: and Miss Ethel rejoiced that it was night instead of day, for she found herself blushing repeatedly at nothing, just as she had done during his visit in the morning. What could have come to her? she mentally asked; she had never been absurd before: and she felt quite angry with herself. The conversation was held in French, Madame having unconsciously resumed that language with Mr. North when they left Sister Ann.
"There are many delightful bits of scenery in this little place," said Mr. North: "I have been looking about me this afternoon. Perhaps I may bring myself and my pencils here for a short sojourn: I should much like to take some sketches."
"Yes, they are very nice views," said Ethel, blushing again. She was walking arm in arm with the governess, and Mr. North strolled along at Ethel's elbow.
"How very well you speak French!" he exclaimed. "Almost as well as we French people ourselves. There's but a slight accent."
A deeper and quite unnecessary blush at this. "But I thought you were English, monsieur."
"Well, so I am, mademoiselle. But when you come to sojourn a long while in a country, you get to identify yourself with its inhabitants,--that is to say, with their nationality."
"And you have been for a long time in France?"
"Yes."
They had come to the stile now. Mr. North got over it and assisted Madame Guise. Ethel mounted instantly, and was jumping down alone: but he turned and caught her. In the hurry she tripped, and somewhat crushed her hat against his shoulder. He made fifty thousand apologies, just as though it had been his fault; and there was much laughing. Mr. North quite forgot to release her hand until they had gone on some paces; and Ethel's blush at this was as hot as the summer's night.
At the entrance gate, where he had taken leave of Madame Guise in the morning, he took leave of them now; shaking the hand of Madame and asking whether he might be permitted to shake Ethel's, as it was the mode in England. The blushes were worst of all then: and Ethel's private conviction was that the whole world had never contained so attractive an individual as Mr. George North.
Mr. George North had all but regained the door of the Dolphin Inn, where he had dined and would lodge for the night, when a carriage and pair, with its bright lamps lighted, came spanking round the corner at a quick pace, the groom driving. George North, drawing aside as it passed him, recognized the handsome phaeton he had seen in the morning at the Turk's Head. The Master of Greylands was returning from Stilborough.