“Martin Court Bolland, a bright-faced boy, of an intelligence far greater than one looks for in rustic youth, has himself a somewhat romantic history. He is the adopted son of the sturdy yeoman whose name he bears. Mr. and Mrs. Bolland were called to London thirteen years ago to attend the funeral of the farmer’s brother. One evening while seeing the sights of the great metropolis they found themselves in Ludgate Hill. They were passing the end of St. Martin’s Court, when a young woman named Martineau——”
“Martin Court Bolland, a bright-faced boy, of an intelligence far greater than one looks for in rustic youth, has himself a somewhat romantic history. He is the adopted son of the sturdy yeoman whose name he bears. Mr. and Mrs. Bolland were called to London thirteen years ago to attend the funeral of the farmer’s brother. One evening while seeing the sights of the great metropolis they found themselves in Ludgate Hill. They were passing the end of St. Martin’s Court, when a young woman named Martineau——”
The colonel laid aside his cigar and twisted his body sideways, so that the light of the billiard-room lamps should fall clearly on the paper yet leave his face in the shade.
“—a young woman named Martineau threw herself, with a baby in her arms, from the fourth story of a house in the court, and was killed by the fall. The baby’s frock was caught by a projecting sign, and the child hung perilously in air. John Bolland, whose strong, stern face reveals a character difficult to surprise, impossible to daunt, jumped forward and caught the tiny mite as it dropped a second time. Mrs. Bolland still treasures a letter written by the infant’sunhappy mother, and prizes to the utmost the fine boy whom she and her husband adopted from that hour. The old couple are childless, though with Martin calling them ‘father’ and ‘mother,’ they would scoff at the statement. This, then, is the well-knit, fearless youngster who fought the squire’s son on that eventful night, and whose evidence is of the utmost importance in the police theory of crime, as opposed to accident.”
“—a young woman named Martineau threw herself, with a baby in her arms, from the fourth story of a house in the court, and was killed by the fall. The baby’s frock was caught by a projecting sign, and the child hung perilously in air. John Bolland, whose strong, stern face reveals a character difficult to surprise, impossible to daunt, jumped forward and caught the tiny mite as it dropped a second time. Mrs. Bolland still treasures a letter written by the infant’sunhappy mother, and prizes to the utmost the fine boy whom she and her husband adopted from that hour. The old couple are childless, though with Martin calling them ‘father’ and ‘mother,’ they would scoff at the statement. This, then, is the well-knit, fearless youngster who fought the squire’s son on that eventful night, and whose evidence is of the utmost importance in the police theory of crime, as opposed to accident.”
Colonel Grant went steadily through the neat sentences on which theMessengercorrespondent prided himself. He was a man of bronze; he showed no more emotion than a statue, though the facts staring from the printed page might well have produced external signs of the tempest which sprang into instant being in his soul.
He read each line of descriptive matter and report. For the sorrows of Betsy, the final daring of George Pickering, he had no eyes. It was the boy he sought in the living record: the boy who fought young Beckett-Smythe to rescue the thoughtless child—for so Angèle figured in the text; the boy who repudiated with scorn the solicitor’s suggestion that he formed part and parcel of the crowd of urchins gathered in the hotel yard; the farmer’s adopted son, who spoke so fearlessly and bore himself so well that the newspaper noted his intelligence, his bright looks.
At last Colonel Grant laid down the sheet and lighted a fresh cigar. He smoked for a few minutes, watching the pool players, and declining an invitation to join in the game. He seemed to be planning some line of action; soon he went to the library and unrolled a large scale map of England. He found Nottonby—Elmsdalewas too small a place to be denoted—and, after consulting a railway timetable, wrote a long telegram.
These things accomplished, he seized an opportunity to tell Lord Heronsdale that business of the utmost importance would take him away by the first train next morning.
Of course, his host was voluble in protestations, so the soldier explained matters.
“You asked me to-day,” he said, “why I turned my back on town thirteen years ago. I meant telling you at a more convenient season. Will it suffice now to say that a kindred reason tears me away from your moor?”
“Gad, I hope there is nothing wrong. Can I help?”
“Yes; by letting me go. You will be here until October. May I return?”
“My dear Grant——”
So they settled it that way.
About three o’clock on the second day after the colonel’s departure from Cairn-corrie he and an elderly man of unmistakably legal appearance walked from Elmsdale station to the village. The station master, forewarned, had procured a dogcart from the “Black Lion,” but the visitors preferred dispatching their portmanteaux in the vehicle, and they followed on foot.
Thus it happened—as odd things do happen in life—that the two men met a boy walking rapidly from the village, and some trick of expression in his face caused the colonel to halt him with a question:
“Can you tell me where the ‘Black Lion’ inn is?”
“Yes, sir. On the left, just beyond the bend in the road.”
“And the White House Farm?”
The village youth looked at the speaker with interest.
“On the right, sir; after you cross the green.”
“Ah!”
The two men stood and stared at Martin, who was dressed in a neat blue serge suit, obtained by post from York, the wildcat having ruined its predecessor. The older man, who reminded the boy of Mr. Stockwell, owing to the searching clearness of his gaze, said not a word; but the tall, sparsely-built soldier continued—for Martin civilly awaited his pleasure—
“Is your name, by any chance, Martin Court Bolland?”
The boy smiled.
“It is, sir,” he said.
“Are you—can you—that is, if you are not busy, you might show us the inn—and the farm?”
The gentleman seemed to have a slight difficulty in speaking, and his eyes dwelt on Martin with a queer look in them: but the answer came instantly:
“I’m sorry, sir; but I am going to the vicarage to tea, and you cannot possibly miss either place. The inn has a signpost by the side of the road, and the White House stands by itself on a small bank about a hundred and fifty yards farther down the village.”
The older gentleman broke in:
“That will be our best course, Colonel. We can easily find our way—alone.”
The hint in the words was intended for the ears that understood. Colonel Grant nodded, yet was loath to go.
“Is the vicar a friend of yours?” he said to Martin.
“Yes, sir. I like him very much.”
“Does a Mrs. Saumarez live here?”
“Oh, yes. She is at the vicarage now, I expect.”
“Indeed. You might tell her you met a Colonel Grant, who knew her husband in South Africa. You will not forget the name, eh—Grant?”
“Of course not, sir.”
Martin surveyed the stranger with redoubled attention. A live colonel is a rare sight in a secluded village. The man, seizing any pretext to prolong the conversation, drew out a pocketbook.
“Here is my card,” he said. “You need not give it to Mrs. Saumarez. She will probably recognize my name.”
The boy glanced at the pasteboard. It read:
Lieut.-Col. Reginald Grant,“Indian Staff Corps.”
Now, it chanced that among Martin’s most valued belongings was a certain monthly publication entitled “Recent British Battles,” and he had read that identical name in the July number. As was his way, he remembered exactly the heroic deeds with which a gallant officer was credited, so he asked somewhat shyly:
“Are you Colonel Grant of Aliwal, sir?”
He pronounced the Indian word wrongly, with a short “a” instead of a long one, but never did misplaced accent convey sweeter sound to man’s ears. The soldier was positively startled.
“My dear boy,” he cried, “how can you possibly know me?”
“Everyone knows your name, sir. No fear of me forgetting it now.”
The honest admiration in those brown eyes was a new form of flattery; for the first time in his life Colonel Grant hungered for more.
“You have astonished me more than I can tell,” he said. “What have you read of the Aliwal campaign? All right, Dobson. We are in no hurry.” This to his companion, who ventured on a mild remonstrance.
“I have a book, sir, which tells you all about Aliwal”—this time Martin pronounced the word correctly; no wonder the newspaper commented on his intelligence—“and it has pictures, too. There is a grand picture of you, riding through the gate of the fort, sword in hand. Do you mind me saying, sir, that I am very pleased to have met you?”
The man averted his eyes. He dared not look at Martin. He made pretense to bite the end off a cigar. He was compelled to do something to keep his lips from trembling.
“I hope we shall meet often again, Martin,” he said slowly. “I’ll tell you more than the book does, though I have not read it. Run off to your friends at the vicarage. Good-by!”
He held out his hand, which the boy shook diffidently. There was no doubt whatever in Martin’s mind that Colonel Grant was an extraordinarily nice gentleman.
“My God, Dobson!” cried the soldier, turning again to look after the alert figure of the boy; “I have seen him, spoken to him—my own son! I would know him among a million.”
“He certainly bears a marked resemblance to your own photograph at the same age,” admitted the cautious solicitor.
“And what a fine youngster! By Jove, did you twig the way he caught on to the pronunciation of Aliwal? Bless that book! It shall be bound in the rarest leather, though I never rode through that gate—I ran, for dear life! I—I tell you what, Dobson, I’d sooner do it now than face these people, the Bollands, and explain my errand. I suppose they worship him.”
“The position differs from my expectations,” said the solicitor. “The boy does not talk like a farmer’s son. And he is going to tea at the vicarage with a lady of good social position. Can the Bollands be of higher grade than we are led to believe?”
“The newspaper is my only authority. Ah, here is the ‘Black Lion.’”
Mrs. Atkinson bustled forward to assure the gentlemen that she could accommodate them. Colonel Grant was allotted the room in which George Pickering died! It was the best in the hotel. He glanced for a moment through the window and took in the scene of the tragedy.
“That must be where the two young imps fought,” he murmured, with a smile, as he looked into the yard. “Gad! as Heronsdale says, I’d like to have seen the battle. And my boy whipped the other chap, who was bigger and older, the paper said.”
Soon the two men were climbing the slight acclivity on which stood the White House. The door stood hospitably open, as was ever the case about tea-time in fine weather. In the front kitchen was Martha, alone.
The colonel advanced.
“Is Mr. Bolland at home?” he asked, raising his hat.
“Noa, sir; he isn’t. But he’s on’y i’ t’ cow-byre. If it’s owt important——”
He followed her meaning sufficiently.
“Will you oblige me by sending for him? And—er—is Mrs. Bolland here?”
“I’m Mrs. Bolland, sir.”
“Oh, I beg your pardon. Of course, I did not know you.”
He thought he would find a much younger woman. Martha, in the close-fitting sunbonnet, with its wide flaps, her sleeves rolled up, and her outer skirt pinned behind to keep it clear of the dirt during unceasing visits to dairy and hen-roosts, looked even older than she was, her real age being fifty-five.
“Will you kindly be seated, gentlemen?” she said. She was sure they were county folk come about the stock. Her husband’s growing reputation as a breeder of prize cattle brought such visitors occasionally. She wondered why the taller stranger asked for her, but he said no more, taking a chair in silence.
She dispatched a maid to summon the master.
“Hev ye coom far?” she asked bluntly.
Colonel Grant looked around. His eyes were searching the roomy kitchen for tokens of its occupants’ ways.
“We traveled from Darlington to Elmsdale,” he said, “and walked here from the station.”
“My goodness, ye’ll be fair famished. Hev summat te eat. There’s plenty o’ tea an’ cakes; an’ if ye’d fancy some ham an’ eggs——”
“Pray do not trouble, Mrs. Bolland,” said the colonel when he had grasped the full extent of the invitation. “We wish to have a brief talk with you and your husband. Afterwards, if you ask us, we shall be most pleased to accept your hospitality.”
He spoke so genially, with such utter absence of affectation, that Martha rather liked him. Yet, what could she have to do with the business in hand? Anyhow, here came John, crossing the road with heavy strides.
The farmer paused just within the threshold. His huge frame filled the doorway. He wore spectacles for reading only, and his deep-sunken eyes rested steadily, first on Colonel Grant, then on the solicitor. Then they went back to the colonel and did not leave him again.
“Good day, gentlemen,” he said. “What can I deä for ye?”
The man who stormed forts on horseback—in pictures—quailed at the task before him. He nodded to the solicitor.
“Dobson,” he said, “you know all the circumstances. Oblige me by stating them fully.”
The solicitor, who seemed to expect this request, produced a bulky packet of papers and photographs. He prefaced his explanation by giving his companion’s name and rank, and introduced himself as a member of the firm of Dobson, Son and Smith, Solicitors, of Lincoln’s Inn Fields.
“Fifteen years ago,” he went on, “Colonel Grant was a subaltern, a junior officer, in the Guards, stationed in London. A slight accident one day outside a railway station led him to make the acquaintance of a young lady. She was hurrying to catch a train, when she was knocked down by a frightened horse, and might have been injured seriously were it not for Lieutenant Grant’s prompt assistance. He escorted her to her lodgings, and discovered that she was what is known in London as a daily governess—in other words, a poor, well-educatedwoman striving to earn a respectable living. The horse had trampled on her foot, and she required proper attention and rest; a brief interview with her landlady enabled Mr. Grant to make the requisite arrangements, unknown to the young lady herself. He called a week later and found that she was quite recovered. She was a very beautiful girl, of a lively disposition, only twenty years of age, and working hard in her spare time to perfect herself as a musician. She had no idea of the social rank of her new friend, or perhaps matters might have turned out differently. As it was, they met frequently, became engaged, and were married. I have here a copy of the marriage certificate.”
He selected a long, narrow strip of blue paper from the documents he had placed before him on the kitchen table. He opened it and offered it to Bolland, as though he wished the farmer to examine it. John did not move. He was still looking intently at Colonel Grant.
Martha, all a-flutter, with an indefinite anxiety wrinkling the corners of her eyes, said quickly:
“What might t’ young leddy’s neäm be, sir?”
“Margaret Ingram. She was of a Gloucestershire family, but her parents were dead, and she had no near relatives.”
Martha cried, somewhat tartly:
“An’ what hez all this te deä wi’ us, sir?”
“Let be, wife. Bide i’ patience. T’ gentleman will tell us, neä doot.”
John’s voice was hard, almost dissonant. The solicitor gave him a rapid glance. That harsh tone boded ill for the smooth accomplishment of his mission. Martha wondered why her husband gazed so fixedly atthe other man who spoke not. But she toyed nervously with her apron and held her peace. Mr. Dobson resumed:
“The young couple could not start housekeeping openly. Lieutenant Grant depended solely on the allowance made to him by his father, whose ideas of family pride were so extreme that such a marriage must unquestionably have led to a rupture. Moreover, a campaign in northern India was then threatening. It broke out exactly a year and two months after the marriage. Mr. Grant’s regiment was ordered to the front, and when he sailed from Southampton he left his young wife and an infant, a boy, four months old, installed in a comfortable flat in Clarges Street, Piccadilly. It is important that the exact position of family affairs at this moment should be realized. General Grant, father of the young officer, had suffered from an apopletic stroke soon after his son’s marriage, and to acquaint him with it now meant risking his life. Young Grant’s action was known to and approved by several trustworthy friends. He and his wife were very happy, and Mrs. Grant was correspondingly depressed when the exigencies of the national service took her husband away from her. The parting between the young couple was a bitter trial, rendered all the more heartrending by reason of the concealment they had practiced. However, as matters had been allowed to drift thus far, no one will pretend that there was any special need to worry General Grant at the moment of his son’s departure for a campaign. Lieutenant Grant hoped to return with a step in rank. Then, whatever the consequences, there must be a full explanation. He had nota great deal of money, but sufficient for his wife’s needs. He left her two hundred pounds in notes and gold, and his bankers were empowered to pay her fifty pounds monthly. His own allowance from General Grant was seventy-five pounds a month, and it was with great difficulty that he maintained his position in such an expensive regiment as the Guards. The campaign eased the pressure, or he could not have kept it up for long.”
“Are all these details quite necessary, Dobson?” said the colonel, for the steady glare of the farmer, the growing pallor of poor Martha, around whose heart an icy hand was taking sure grip, were exceedingly irksome.
“They are if I am to do you justice,” replied the lawyer.
“Never mind me. Tell them of Margaret—and the boy.”
“I will pass over the verification of my statement,” went on Mr. Dobson, bending over the folded papers. “Seven months passed. Mrs. Grant expected soon to be delivered of another child. She heard regularly from her husband. His regiment was in the Khyber Pass, when one evening she was robbed of her small store of jewelry and a considerable sum of money by a trusted servant. The theft was reported in the papers, and General Grant read of his son’s wife being a resident in Clarges Street. He went to the flat next day, saw the poor girl, behaved in a way that can only be ascribed to the folly of an old man broken by disease, and cut off supplies at once. Within a week Mrs. Grant found herself in poverty, and her husband at least a month’s post distant. She did not lose herwits. She sold her furniture and raised money enough to support herself and her baby boy for some time. Of course, she was very much distressed, as General Grant wrote to her, called her an adventuress, and stated that he had disinherited his son on her account. This was only partly true. He tore up one will, but made no other, and forgot that there was a second copy in possession of my firm. Mrs. Grant then did a foolish thing. She concealed her troubles from her husband’s friends, who would have helped her. She took cheap lodgings in another part of London, and changed her name. This seems to be accounted for by the fact that General Grant, in his insane suspicions, set private detectives to watch her. Moreover, the bankers wrote her a curt letter which added to her miseries. She rented rooms in St. Martin’s Court, Ludgate Hill, and gave her name as Mrs. Martineau.”
Martha sprang at the solicitor with an eerie screech:
“Hev ye coom to steal oor bairn, the bonny lad we’ve reared i’ infancy an’ childhood? Leave this house! John—husband—will ye let ’em drive me mad?”
John took her in his arms.
“Martha,” he said, with a break in his voice that shook his hearers and stilled his wife’s cries; “dinnat mak’ oor burthen harder te bear. A man’s heart deviseth his way, but the Lord directeth his steps!”
Servants, men and women, came running at their mistress’s scream of terror. They stood, abashed, in the kitchen passage. None paid heed to them.
Colonel Grant rose and approached the trembling woman cowering at her husband’s side. Her old eyes were streaming now; she gazed at him with the pitifulanguish of a stricken animal. He took her wrinkled hand and bent low before her.
“Madam,” he said, “God forbid that my son should lose his mother a second time!”
He could say no other word. Even in her agony, Martha felt hot tears falling on her bare arm, and they were not her own.
“Eh, but it’s a sad errand ye’re on,” she sobbed.
“Wife, wife!” cried John huskily, “if thou faint in the day of adversity thy strength is small. Colonel Grant is a true man. It’s in his feäce. He weän’t rive Martin frae yer arms, an’ no man can tak’ him frae yer heart.”
Colonel Grant drew himself up. He caught Bolland’s shoulder.
“Bear with me,” he said. “I have suffered much. I lost my wife and two children, one unborn. They were torn from me as though by a destroying tempest. One is given back, after thirteen long years of mourning. Can you not spare me a place in his affections?”
“Ay, ay,” growled John. “We’re nobbut owd folk at t’ best, an’ t’ lad was leavin’ oor roof for school in a little while. We can sattle things like sensible people, if on’y Martha here will gie ower greetin’. It troubles me sair to hear her lamentin’. We’ve had no sike deed i’ thirty-fower years o’ married life.”
The man was covering his own distress by solicitude in his wife’s behalf. She knew it. She wiped her eyes defiantly with her apron and made pretense to smile, though she had received a shock she would remember to her dying day. Some outlet was necessary for her surcharged feelings. She whisked around on the crowd ofamazed domestics, dairymaids and farmhands, pressing on each other’s heels in the passage.
“What are ye gapin’ at?” she cried shrilly. “Is there nowt te deä? If tea’s overed, git on wi’ yer work, an’ be sharp aboot it, or I’ll side ye quick!”
The stampede that followed relieved the situation. The servants faded away under her fiery glance. Colonel Grant smiled.
“I am glad to see,” he said, “that you maintain discipline in your regiment.”
“They’re all ears an’ neä brains,” she said. “My, but I’m that upset I hardly ken what I’m sayin’. Mebbe ye’ll finish yer tale, sir. I’m grieved I med sike a dash at ye, but I couldn’t bide——”
“There, there,” said John, with his gruff soothing, “sit ye doon an’ listen quietly. I guessed their business t’ first minnit I set eyes on t’ colonel. Why, Martha, look at him. He hez Martin’s eyes and Martin’s mouth. Noo, ye’d hev dark-brown hair, I reckon, when ye were a lad, sir?”
For answer, Colonel Grant stooped to the lawyer’s papers and took from them a framed miniature.
“That is my portrait at the age of twelve,” he said, placing it before them.
“Eh, but that caps owt!” cried Martha. “It’s Martin hissel! Oh, my honey, how little did I think what was coomin’ when I set yer shirt an’ collar ready, an’ med ye tidy te gan te tea wi’ t’ fine folk at t’ vicarage. An’ noo ye’re a better bred ’un than ony of ’em. The Lord love ye! Here ye are, smilin’ at me. They may mak’ ye a colonel or a gin’ral, for owt I care: ye’ll nivver forgit yer poor old muther, will ye, my bairn!”
She kissed the miniature as if it were Martin’s own presentment. The men left her to sob again in silence. Soon she calmed herself sufficiently to ask:
“But why i’ t’ wulld did that poor lass throw herself an’ her little ’un inte t’ street?”
Mr. Dobson took up his story once more:
“She explained her action in a pathetic letter to her husband. She was ill, lonely, and poverty-stricken. She brooded for days on General Grant’s cruel words and still more cruel letter. They led her to believe that she was the unwitting cause of her husband’s ruin. She resolved to free him absolutely and at the same time preserve his name from notoriety. Therefore she wrote him a full account of her change of name, and told him that her children would die with her.”
“That was a mad thing te deä.”
“Exactly. The doctor who knew her best told her husband six months later that Mrs. Grant was, in his opinion, suffering from an unrecognized attack of puerperal fever. It was latent in her system, and developed with the trouble so suddenly brought upon her.”
“Yon was a wicked owd man——”
“The general was called to account by a higher power. Mrs. Grant wrote him also a statement of her intentions. Next morning he read of her death, and a second attack of apoplexy proved fatal. Her letter did not reach her husband until after a battle in which he was wounded. He cabled to us, and we made every inquiry, but it was remarkable how chance baffled our efforts. In the first instance, the policeman whom you encountered in Ludgate Hill and who knew you had adopted the child, had left the force and emigrated,owing to some unfortunate love affair. In the second, several newspapers reported the child as dead, though the records of the inquest soon corrected that error. Thirdly, someone named Bolland died in the hotel where you stayed and was buried at Highgate——”
“My brother,” put in John.
“Yes; we know now. But conceive the barrier thus placed in our path when the dates of the two events were compared long afterwards.”
The farmer looked puzzled. The solicitor went on:
“Of course, you wonder why there should have been any delay, but the Coroner’s notes were lost in a fire. Nevertheless, we advertised in dozens of newspapers.”
“We hardly ever see a paper, sir,” said Martha.
“Yet, the wonder is that some of your friends did not see it and tell you. Finally, a sharp-witted clerk of ours solved the Highgate Cemetery mystery, and the advertisements were repeated. Colonel Grant was back in India by that time trying hard to leave his bones there, by all accounts, and perhaps we did not spend as much money on this second quest as if he were at home to authorize the expenditure.”
“When was that, sir—t’ second lot o’ advertisements, I mean?” asked John.
“Quite a year after Mrs. Grant’s death.”
Bolland stroked his chin thoughtfully.
“I remember,” he said, “a man at Malton fair sayin’ summat aboot an inquiry for me. But yan o’ t’ hands rode twenty miles across counthry te tell me that Martin had gotten t’ measles, an’ I kem yam that neet.”
“Naturally, I can give you every proof of my statements,” said Mr. Dobson. “They are all here——”
“Mebbe ye’ll know this writin’,” interrupted Martha, laying down the miniature for the first time. She unlocked a drawer, took out a small tin box, and from its depths produced, among other articles, a crumbling sheet of note paper. On it was written:
“My name is not Martineau. I have killed myself and my boy. If he dies with his unhappy mother he will never know the miseries of this life.”
“My name is not Martineau. I have killed myself and my boy. If he dies with his unhappy mother he will never know the miseries of this life.”
It was unsigned, undated, a hurried scrawl in faded ink.
“Margaret’s handwriting,” said Colonel Grant, looking at the pathetic message with sorrow-laden eyes.
“It was found on t’ poor leddy’s dressin’-table, fastened wi’ a hatpin. An’ these are t’ clothes Martin wore when he fell into John’s arms. Nay, sir,” she added, as Colonel Grant began examining the little frock, “she took good care, poor thing, that neäbody should find oot wheä she was. Ivvery mark hez bin picked off.”
“Martin is his feyther’s son, or I ken nowt aboot stock,” cried John Bolland, making a fine effort to dispel the depression which again possessed the little gathering at sight of these mournful mementoes of the dead past. “Coom, gentlemen, sit ye doon an’ hev some tea. Ye’ll not be for takkin’ Martin away by t’ next train. Martha, what’s t’ matter wi’ ye? I’ve nivver known folk be so lang i’ t’ hoose afore an’ not be asked if they had a mooth.”
“Ye’re on t’ wrang gait this time, John,” she retorted. “I axed ’em afore ye kem in. By this time,sure-ly, ye’ll be wantin’ soom ham an’ eggs?” she added to the visitors.
“By Jove! I believe I could eat some,” laughed the colonel.
Martha smiled once more. She liked Martin’s father. Each moment the first favorable impression was deepening. She was on the point of bustling away to the back kitchen, when they all heard the patter of feet, in desperate haste, approaching the front door. Elsie Herbert dashed in. She was hatless. Her long brown hair was floating in confusion over her shoulders and down her back. She was crying in great gulps and gasping for breath.
“Oh, Mr. Bolland!” she wailed. “Oh, Mrs. Bolland!—what shall I say? Martin is hurt. He fell off the swing. Angèle did it! I’ll kill her! I’ll tear her face with my hands! Oh, come, someone, and help father. He is trying to bring back Martin’s senses. What shall I do?—it was all on my account. Oh, dear! Oh, dear!”
And she sank fainting to the floor.
But Martin was not dead, nor even seriously injured. At first, the affair looked so ugly—its main features were so incomprehensible—that Mr. Herbert was startled into somewhat panic-stricken action. Here was Martin lying unconscious on the ground, with Elsie kneeling by his side, passionately beseeching him in one breath to speak to her, and in the next accusing Angèle Saumarez of murder.
The vicar was not blameworthy, in that he failed to grasp either the nature of the accusation or its seeming unreasonableness.
The single rope of the gymnastic swing erected in the garden for Elsie’s benefit had been cut deliberately with a sharp knife a few inches above the small bar on which the user’s weight was supported by both hands. Of the cutting there could be no manner of doubt. The jagged edges of the few strands left by a devilish ingenuity—so that the swing must need be in violent motion before the rope snapped—were clearly visible at the point of severance. But who had done this thing, and with what deadly object in view? And why did Elsie pitch on Angèle Saumarez so readily, glaring at her with such eyes of vengeance that the vicar was constrained to order, with the utmost sternness of which hewas capable, that the torrent of words should cease. Indeed, he dispatched her to acquaint the Bollands with tidings of the disaster as a haphazard pretext to get her out of the way. Apart from sensing the accident’s inexplicable motive, its history was simple enough.
Before tea was served, Martin and Elsie were using the swing alternately, vying with each other in the effort to touch with their toes the leaves of a tree nearly twenty feet distant from the vertical line of the rope. Angèle, of course, took no part in this contest; she contented herself with a sarcastic incredulity when Elsie vowed that she had accomplished the feat twice already.
Martin, stronger, but less skilled in the trick of the swing than the girl, strove hard to excel her. Yet he, too, fell short by a few inches time after time. At last, Elsie vowed that when she was rested after tea she would prove her words, and threw a pebble at the branch which she claimed to have reached a week ago.
Neither Mrs. Saumarez nor the vicar attached any weight to the somewhat emphatic argument between the two girls. It was a splendid contest between Martin and Elsie. It interested the elders for conflicting reasons.
To see the graceful girl propelling herself through the air in a curve of nearly forty feet at each pendulum stroke of the swing was a pleasing sight to her father, but it caused Mrs. Saumarez to regret again that her daughter had not been taught to think more of athletic exercises and less of dress.
While the young people were following their seniors to the drawing-room, Angèle said to Elsie:
“I think I could do that myself with a little practice.”
“You are not tall enough,” was the uncompromising answer, for Elsie’s temper was ruffled by the simpering unbelief with which the other treated her assurances.
“Not so tall, no; but I can bend back like this, and you cannot.”
Without a second’s hesitation Angèle twisted her head and shoulders around until her chin was in a line with her heels. Then she dropped lightly so that her hands rested on the grass of the lawn, straightening herself with equal ease. The contortion was performed so quickly that neither Mr. Herbert nor Mrs. Saumarez was aware of it. It was a display not suited to the conditions of ordinary costume, and it necessarily exhibited portions of the attire not usually in evidence.
Martin had eyes only for the girl’s acrobatic agility, but Elsie blushed.
“I don’t like that,” she said.
“I can stand on my head and walk on my hands,” cried Angèle instantly. “Martin, some day I’ll show you.”
Conscious though she was that these things were said to annoy her, Elsie remembered that Angèle was a guest.
“How did you learn?” she asked. “Were you taught in school?”
“School! Me! I have never been to school. Education is the curse of children’s lives. I never leave mamma. One day in Nice I saw a circus girl doing tricks of that sort. I practiced in my bedroom.”
“Does your mother wish that?”
“She doesn’t know.”
“I wonder you haven’t broken your neck,” said thepractical Martin, who felt his bones creaking at the mere notion of such twisting.
Angèle laughed.
“It is quite easy, when you are slim and elegant.”
Her vanity amused the boy.
“You speak as though Elsie were as stiff as a board,” he said. “If you had watched her carefully, Angèle, you would have seen that she is quite as supple as you, only in a different way. And she is strong, too. I dare say she could swing with one hand and carry you in the other, if she had a mind to try.”
This ready advocacy of a new-found divinity angered Angèle beyond measure. Possibly she meant no greater harm than the disconcerting of a rival; but she slipped out of the room when Mr. Herbert sent Elsie to the library to bring a portfolio of old prints which he wished to show Mrs. Saumarez. Although it was never definitely proved against Angèle, someone tampered with the rope before a move was made to the garden after tea. The cause, the effect, were equally clear; the human agent remained unknown.
“Now, I’ll prove my words,” cried Elsie, darting across the lawn in front of the others.
“Here, it’s my turn,” shouted the boy gleefully. “I’ll race you.”
“Martin! Martin! I want you!” shrieked Angèle, running after him.
He paid no heed to her cries. Outstripping both girls in the race, he sprang at the swing, and was carried almost to the debated limit of the tree by the impetus of the rush. When he felt himself stopping he threw up his feet in a wild effort to touch the leaves so tantalizinglyout of reach, and in that instant the rope broke.
He turned completely over and fell with a heavy thud on the back of his bent head. The screaming of the girls brought the vicar from his prints in great alarm, and his agitation increased when he discovered that the boy could neither move nor speak.
Elsie was halfway to the White House before Martin regained his breath. Once vitality returned, however, he was quickly on his feet again.
“What happened?” he asked, craning his head awkwardly. “I thought someone fired a gun!”
“You frightened us nearly out of our wits,” cried the vicar. “And I was stupid enough to send Elsie flying to your people. Goodness knows what she will have said to them!”
Promptly the boy shook himself and tried to break into a run.
“I must—follow her,” he gasped. But not yet was the masterful spirit able to control relaxed muscles; he collapsed again.
Mrs. Saumarez cried aloud in a new fear, but the vicar, accustomed to the minor accidents of the cricket field and gymnasium, was cooler now.
“He’s all right—only needs a drink of water and a few minutes’ rest,” he explained.
He bade one of the maids go as quickly as possible to the Bollands’ farm and say that the mischief to Martin was a mere nothing, and then busied himself in more scientific fashion with restoring his patient’s animation.
Unfastening the boy’s collar and the neckband of his shirt, Mr. Herbert satisfied himself that the claviclewas uninjured. There was a slight abrasion of the scalp, which was sore to the touch. In a minute, or less, Martin was again protesting that there was little the matter with him. He would not be satisfied until the vicar allowed him to start once more for the village, though at a more sedate pace.
Then Mrs. Saumarez, in a voice of deep distress, asked Mr. Herbert if the rope had really been cut.
“Yes,” he said. “You can see yourself that there is no doubt about it.”
“But your daughter charged Angèle with this—this crime. My child denies it. She has no knife or implement of any sort in her pocket. I assure you I have satisfied myself on that point.”
“The affair is a mystery, Mrs. Saumarez. It must be cleared up. Thank God, Martin escaped! He might be lying here dead at this moment.”
“Are you sure it was not an accident?”
“What am I to say? Here is a stout hempen cord with nearly all its strands severed as if with a razor, and the other torn asunder. And, from what I can gather, it was Elsie, and not Martin, for whose benefit this diabolical outrage was planned.”
The vicar spoke warmly, but the significance of the incident was dawning slowly on his perplexed mind. Providence alone had ordained that neither the boy nor the girl had been gravely, perhaps fatally, injured.
Mrs. Saumarez was haggard. She seemed to have aged in those few minutes.
“Angèle!” she cried.
The girl, who was sobbing, came to her.
“Can it be possible,” said the distracted mother, “that you interfered with the swing? Why did you leave the drawing-room during tea?”
“I only went to stroke a cat, mamma. Indeed, I never touched the swing. Why should I? And I could not cut it with my fingers.”
“On second thoughts,” said the vicar coldly, “I think that the matter may be allowed to rest where it is. Of course, one of my servants may be the culprit, or a mischievous village youth who had been watching the children at play. But the two girls do not seem to get on well together, Mrs. Saumarez. I fear they are endowed with widely different temperaments.”
The hint could not be ignored. The lady smiled bitterly.
“It is well that I should have decided already to leave Elmsdale,” she said. “It is a charming place, but my visit has not been altogether fortunate.”
Mr. Herbert remembered the curious phrase in after years. He understood it then. At the moment he was candidly relieved when Mrs. Saumarez and Angèle took their departure. He jammed on a hat and hastened to the White House to learn what sort of sensation Elsie had created.
A week later he made a discovery. He had a curious hobby—he was his own bootmaker, and Elsie’s, having taught himself to be a craftsman in an art which might well claim higher rank than it holds. When next he rummaged among his implements for a shoemaker’s knife it was missing. It was found in the garden next spring, jammed to the top of the hilt into the soft mold beneath a rhododendron. The tools were kept ona bench in the conservatory; so Angèle might have accomplished her impish desire in a few seconds.
On reaching the White House he was mildly surprised at finding Martin propped against the knee of a tall, soldierly stranger, who was consoling the boy with a reminiscence of a far worse toss at polo, by which a hardsola topiwas flattened on the iron surface of an Indianmaidan. Elsie, white, but much interested, was sipping a glass of milk.
“Eh, Vicar,” cried Mrs. Bolland, in whose face Mr. Herbert saw signs of recent excitement, “your lass gev us a rare start. She landed here like a mad thing, screamed oot that Martin was dead, an’ dropped te t’ flure half dead herself.”
“The fault was mine, Mrs. Bolland. There was an accident. At first I thought Martin was badly hurt. I am, indeed, very sorry if Elsie alarmed you.”
His words were meant to reassure the others, but his eyes were fixed on the girl’s pallid face. John Bolland laughed in his dry way.
“Nay, Passon, dinnat fret aboot Elsie. She’s none t’ warse for a sudden stop. She was ower-excited. Where’s yon lass o’ Mrs. Saumarez’s?”
“Gone home with her mother. I hear they are leaving Elmsdale.”
“A good riddance!” said John heartily. He turned to Martin. “Ye’ll be winded again, I reckon?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Well, I left my ash stick i’ t’ low yard. Mebbe you an’ t’ young leddy will fetch it. There’s noa need te hurry.”
This was an oblique instruction to the boy to makehimself scarce for half an hour. With Elsie as a companion he needed no urging. They set off, happy as grigs.
“Noo, afore ye start te fill t’ vicar wi’ wunnerment,” cried Martha, “I want te ax t’ colonel a question.”
“What is it, Mrs. Bolland?”
Colonel Grant was smiling at the vicar’s puzzled air. These good people knew naught of formal introductions.
“How old is t’ lad?”
“He was fourteen years old on the sixth of last June.”
“Eh, but that’s grand.” She clapped her hands delightedly. “I guessed him tiv a week or two. We reckoned his birthday as a twel’month afore we found him, and that was June the eighteenth. And what’s his right neäm?”
“He was christened after me and after his mother’s family. His name is Reginald Ingram Grant.”
“May I ask who in the world you are talking about?” interposed the perplexed vicar.
“Wheä? Why, oor Martin!” cried Martha. “He’s a gentleman born, God bless him!”
“And, what is much more important, Mrs. Bolland, he is a gentleman bred,” said the colonel.
The scene in the kitchen of the White House had been too dramatic that some hint of it should not reach the village that night. Soon all Elmsdale knew that the mystery of Martin’s parentage had been solved, and great was the awe of the boy’s playmates when they heard that his father was a “real live colonel i’ t’ army.” A garbled version of the story came to Mr.Beckett-Smythe’s ears, and he called on Colonel Grant at the “Black Lion” next day.
He arrived in state, in a new Mercedes car, handled by a chauffeur replica of Fritz Bauer. Beckett-Smythe had hardly mastered his surprise at the colonel’s confirmation of that which he had regarded as “an incredible yarn” when Mrs. Saumarez drove up. She, too, recalling the message brought by Martin from her husband’s comrade-in-arms, came to verify the strange tale told by the Misses Walker. Angèle accompanied her, and the girl’s eyes shot lightning at Martin, who was on the point of guiding his father to the moor when Mr. Beckett-Smythe put in an appearance.
The lawyer had departed for London by the morning train; the three older people and the two youngsters gathered in the room thus set at liberty, Mrs. Atkinson having remodeled it into a sitting-room for the colonel’s use.
Mrs. Saumarez hailed the stranger effusively.
“It is delightful to run across anyone who knew my husband,” she said. “In this remote part of Yorkshire none seems to have ever heard of him. Believe me, Colonel Grant, it is positively a relief to meet a man who recognizes my name.”
She may have intended this for an oblique thrust at Beckett-Smythe, relations between the Hall and The Elms having been somewhat strained since the inquest. The Squire, a good fellow, who had no inkling of Angèle’s latest escapade, hastened to make amends.
“You two must want to chat over old times,” he said breezily. “Why not come and dine with me to-night? I have only one other guest—an Admiralty man. He’sprowling about the coast trying to select a suitable site for a wireless station.”
Now, Mrs. Saumarez would have declined the invitation had Beckett-Smythe stopped short at the first sentence. As it was, she accepted instantly.
“Do come, Colonel Grant,” she urged. “What between the Navy and the Intelligence Department it should be an interesting evening.... Oh, don’t look so surprised,” she went on, with an engaging smile. “I still read theGazette, you know.”
“And what of the kiddies?” said Beckett-Smythe. “They know my boys. Your chauffeur can bring them home at nine. By the way, the meal will be quite informal—come as you are.”
“What do you say, Martin?” said the colonel.
“I shall be very pleased, sir; but may I—ask—my mother first?”
The boy reddened. His new place in the world was only twenty-four hours old, and his ideas were not yet adjusted to an order of things so astounding that he thought every minute he would wake up and find he had been dreaming.
“Oh, certainly,” and a kindly hand fell on his shoulder. “I am glad you spoke of it. Mrs. Bolland is worthy of all the respect due to the best of mothers.”
“I’ll go with you, Martin,” announced Angèle suddenly.
Martin hesitated. He was doubtful of the reception Mrs. Bolland might give the minx who had nearly caused him to break his neck, and, for his own part, he wanted to avoid Angèle altogether. She was a disturbing influence. He feared her not at all as a spitfire.It was when she displayed her most engaging qualities that she was really dangerous, and he knew from experience that her mood had changed within the past five minutes. On alighting from the car she would like to have scratched his face. Now he would not be surprised if she elected to walk with him hand in hand through the village street.
His father came to the rescue.
“Let us all go and see Mrs. Bolland,” he said. “It is only a few yards.”
They went out into the roadway. Then Beckett-Smythe was struck by an afterthought.
“If you’ll excuse me, I’ll run along to the vicarage and ask Herbert and his daughter to join us,” he said.
Mrs. Saumarez bit her lip.
“I think I’ll leave Angèle at home,” she said in a low tone. “The child is delicate. During the past week I have insisted that she goes to bed at eight every evening.”
Colonel Grant understood why the lady did not want the two girls to meet, but it was borne in on him that she herself was determined not to miss that impromptu dinner party. In a vague way he wondered what her motive could be.
“Ah, that’s a pity,” he heard Beckett-Smythe say. “She can be well wrapped up, and the weather is mild.”
He moved a little ahead of the two. Martin, determined not to be left alone with Angèle, hastened to greet his friend, Fritz. The two chauffeurs were conversing in German. Apparently, they were examining the engine of the new car.
“Martin,” murmured Angèle, “don’t bother about Fritz. He’ll snap your head off. He’s furious because he lost a map the other day.”
But Martin pressed on. No longer could Angèle deceive him—“twiddle him around her little finger,” as she would put it.
“Hello, Fritz!” he cried. “What map did you lose? Not the one I marked for you?”
Fritz turned. The new chauffeur closed the bonnet of the engine.
“No,” he said, speaking slowly, and looking at Angèle. “It was a small road map. You haf not seen it, I dink.”
“Was it made of linen, with a red cover?”
“Yez,” and the man’s face became curiously stern.
“Oh, I saw you studying it one day at The Elms, but you didn’t have it on the moor.”
Fritz’s scowl changed to an expression of disappointment.
“I haf mislaid it,” he grunted, and again his glance dwelt on Angèle, who met his gaze with a bland indifference that seemed to gall him.
Colonel Grant drew near. He had been eyeing the two spick-and-span chauffeurs.
“Who is your friend, Martin?” he said. He was interested in everything the boy did and in everyone whom he knew.
“Oh, this is Fritz Bauer, Mrs. Saumarez’s chauffeur.... Fritz, this is Colonel Grant, of the Indian Army.”
Instantly the two young Germans straightened as though some mechanism had stiffened their spines andthrown back their heads. The newcomer’s heels clicked and his right hand was raised in a salute. Fritz, better schooled than his comrade by longer residence in England, barely prevented his heels from clicking, and managed to convert the salute into a raising of his cap. There could be no doubt that he was flustered, because he said not a word, and the open-air tan of his cheeks assumed a deeper tint.
Apparently, Colonel Grant saw nothing of this, or, if he noticed the man’s confusion, attributed it to nervousness.
“Two Mercedes cars in one small village!” he exclaimed laughingly. “You Germans are certainly conquering England by peaceful penetration.”
Mrs. Saumarez elected, after all, not to visit the White House that afternoon, so Angèle, having said good-by to the colonel and Martin in her prettiest manner, was whisked off in the car.
“By the way, Martin,” said his father as the two walked to the farm. “Mrs. Saumarez is German by birth. Have you ever heard anything about her family?”
Martin had a good memory.
“Yes, sir,” he said. “She is a baroness—the Baroness Irma von Edelstein.”
The colonel was surprised at this glib answer.
“Who told you?” he inquired.
“Angèle, sir. But Mrs. Saumarez did not wish people to use her title. She was vexed with Angèle for even mentioning it.”
Mrs. Saumarez sent her car to bring Colonel Grant and his son to the Hall. She was slightly ruffled whenFritz told her that they had gone already, Mr. Beckett-Smythe having collected his guests from both the inn and the vicarage.
She might have been positively indignant if she had overheard Grant’s comments to the Admiralty official while the two strolled on the lawn before dinner.
“A couple of Prussian officers, if ever I saw the genuine article,” said the colonel. “Real junkers—smart-looking fellows, too. Mrs. Saumarez is the widow of a British officer—a fine chap, but poor as a church mouse—and she belongs to a wealthy German family.Verbum sap.”
“Nuff said,” grinned the sailor. “But what is one to do? No sooner is this outfit erected but it’ll be added to the display of local picture postcards, and the next German bigwig who visits this part of the country will be invited to amuse himself by ringing up Bremen.”
At any rate, Mrs. Saumarez was told that night that the Yorkshire coast was too highly magnetized to suit a wireless station. The sailor thought an inland town like York would provide an ideal site.
“You see,” he explained politely, “when the German High Seas Fleet defeats the British Navy it can shell our coast towns all to smithereens.”
She smiled.
“You fighting men invariably talk of war with Germany as an assured thing,” she said. “Yet I, who know Germany, and have relatives there, am convinced that the notion is absurd.”
“The Emperor has been twenty years on the throne and has never drawn sword except on parade,” put in thevicar. “There may have been danger once or twice in his hot youth, but he has grown to like England, and I cannot conceive him plunging a great and thriving country into the morass of a doubtful campaign.”
“Ninety-nine per cent of Englishmen like to think that way,” said the Admiralty man. “In a multitude of counselors there is wisdom, so let’s hope they’re right.”
When the young folk got together on the terrace, Frank Beckett-Smythe asked Martin why his neck was stiff.
“I took a toss off Elsie’s swing yesterday,” was the airy answer. Not a word did he or Elsie say as to Angèle, and the Beckett-Smythes knew better than to introduce her name.
Mrs. Saumarez left for the South rather hurriedly. She paid no farewell visits. She and Angèle traveled in the car; Françoise followed with the baggage. The Misses Walker were consoled for the loss of a valued lodger by receiving a less exacting one in the person of Martin’s father.
The boy himself, when his mental poise was adjusted to the phenomenal change in his life, soon grew accustomed to a new environment. Mr. Herbert undertook to direct his studies in preparation for a public school, and Martha Bolland became reconciled gradually to seeing him once or twice daily, instead of all day, for he, too, lived at The Elms.
Officially, as it were, he adopted his new name, but to the small world of Elmsdale he would ever be “Martin.” Even his father fell into the habit.
The colonel drove him to the adjourned petty sessions at Nottonby when Betsy’s case came on for hearing. Mr. Stockwell abandoned his critical attitude and concurred with the police that there was no need to bring Angèle Saumarez from London to attend the trial. Mrs. Saumarez gave no thought to the fact that the girl might be needed to give evidence, but the authorities decided that there were witnesses in plenty as to the outcry raised in the garden after Pickering was wounded.
It was November before Betsy appeared at the county assizes. When she entered the dock, those who knew her were astonished by the improvement in her appearance. It was probable that the enforced rest, the regular exercise, the judicious diet of the prison had exercised a beneficial effect on her health.
Her demeanor was calm as ever, and the able barrister who defended her did not scruple to suggest that it would create a better effect with the jury if she adopted a less unemotional attitude.
Her reply silenced him.
“Do you think,” she said, “that I will be permitted to atone for my wrongdoing by punishment? No. I live because my husband wished me to live. I will be called to account, but not by an earthly judge or jury.”
She was right. The assize judge held the scales of justice impartially between the sworn testimony of George Pickering and Betsy’s witnesses, on the one hand, and the evidence of Martin and the groom, backed by the scientists, on the other.
The jury gave her the benefit of the doubt and acquitted her, but it was noticed by many that his lordshipcontented himself with ordering her discharge from custody. He passed no opinion on the verdict.
So Betsy was installed as mistress of Wetherby Lodge, the trustees having decided that she was well fitted to manage the estate.
Tongues wagged in Elmsdale when Mr. Stockwell drove thither one day and solemnly handed over to Martin the sword and the double-barreled gun, and to John Bolland the pedigree cow bequeathed by George Pickering.
The farmer eyed the animal grimly.
“’Tis an unfortunate beast,” he said. “Mebbe if I hadn’t sold her te poor George he might nivver hae coom te Elmsdale just then.”
“Do not think that,” the solicitor assured him. “Pickering would most certainly have visited the fair. I know, as a matter of fact, that he wished to purchase one of your brood mares.”
“Ay, ay. She went te Jarmany. Well, if I’m spared, I’ll send a good calf to Wetherby.”
The lawyer and he shook hands on the compact. Yet Pickering’s odd bequest was destined to work out in a way that would have amazed the donor, could he but know it.
Martin was at Winchester—his father’s old school—when he received a letter in Bolland’s laborious handwriting. It read: