The Mystery of the Locks Part 7

"Betty, open the door leading into the hall."

The child did as she was directed, and, coming back, brought up a low chair, and rested her head on her grandmother's knee.

"Listen," Mrs. Wedge said again.

They were all perfectly quiet, and a timid step could be distinctly heard on the stair; it came up to the landing, and, after hesitating a moment, seemed to pa.s.s into the room into which no one was to look. The little girl s.h.i.+vered, and was lifted into her grandmother's lap, where she hid away in the folds of her dress.

Dorris was familiar with this step on the stair, for he had heard it frequently, and at night the thought had often occurred to him that some one was in the house, going quietly from one room to another. A great many times he had taken the light, and looked into every place from the cellar to the attic, but he found nothing, and discovered nothing, except that when in the attic he heard the strange, m.u.f.fled, and ghostly noises in the rooms he had just left.

"It is not a ghost to frighten you," Mrs. Wedge said, looking at her employer, "but the spirit of an unhappy woman come back from the grave.

Whenever the house is quiet, the step can always be heard on the stair, but I have never regarded it with horror, though I have been familiar with it for a great many years. I rather regard it as a visit from an old friend; and before you came I often sat alone in this room after dark, listening to the footsteps.

"Jerome Dudley, who built The Locks, was a young man of great intelligence, energy, and capacity; but his wife was lacking in these qualities. Perhaps I had better say that he thought so, for I never express an opinion of my own on the subject, since they were both my friends. I may say with propriety, however, that they were unsuited to each other, and that both knew and admitted it, and accepted their marriage as the blight of their lives. Differently situated, she would have been a useful woman; but she was worse than of no use to Jerome Dudley, as he was contemptible in many ways towards her in spite of his capacity for being a splendid man under different circ.u.mstances.

"The world is full of such marriages, I have been told; so I had sympathy for them both, and was as useful to them as I could be. When I came here as housekeeper, I knew at once that they were living a life of misery, for they occupied different rooms, and were never together except at six o'clock dinner.

"Mr. Dudley always went to his business in the morning before his wife was stirring, and did not return again until evening; and, after despatching his dinner, he either went back to his work, or into his own room, from which he did not emerge until morning. He was not a gloomy man, but he was dissatisfied with his wife, and felt that she was a drawback rather than a help to him.

"The management of the house was turned over to me completely, and when I presided at the table in the morning, he was always good-natured and respectful, (though he was always out of humor when his wife was in the same room with him) and frequently told me of his successes, and he had a great many, for he was a money-making man; but I am sure he never spoke of them to his wife. His household affairs he discussed only with me, and the fact that I remained in his service until I entered yours should be taken as evidence that I gave satisfaction."

Dorris bowed respectfully to Mrs. Wedge in a.s.sent, and she proceeded,--

"Mrs. Dudley spent her time in her own room in an indolent way that was common to her, doing nothing except to look after her little girl, who was never strong. The child was four years old when I came, and the father lavished all his affection upon it. He had the reputation of being a hard, exacting man in his business, and gave but few his confidence, which I think was largely due to his unsatisfactory home; and I have heard him say that but two creatures in all the world seemed to understand him--the child, and myself. It was a part of my duty to carry the child to its father's room every night before putting it to bed; and though I usually found him at a desk surrounded with business papers, he always had time to kiss its pretty lips if asleep, or romp with it if awake.

"While the mother cheerfully turned over the household affairs to me entirely, she was jealous of the child, and constantly worried and fretted with reference to it. The father believed that his daughter was not well cared for, in spite of the mother's great affection, for she humored it to its disadvantage; and I have sometimes thought that the child was sick a great deal more than was necessary. From being shut up in a close room too much, it was tender and delicate, and when the door was open, it always went romping into the hall until brought back again, which resulted in a cold and a spell of sickness. This annoyed Mr.

Dudley, and from remarks he occasionally made to me I knew he believed that if the little girl should die, the mother would be to blame.

"'It would be better if she had no mother,' he was in the habit of saying. When children are properly managed, they become a comfort; but if a foolish sentiment is indulged in, the affections of the parents are needlessly lacerated, and they become a burden. I say this with charity, and I have become convinced of it during my long life. Little Dudley was managed by the mother with so much mistaken affection that she was always a care and a burden. Instead of going to bed at night, and sleeping peacefully until morning, as children should, she was always wakeful, fretful, and ill, and Mr. Dudley's rest was disturbed so much that I thought he had some excuse for his bad humor; for nothing is so certain as that all this was unnecessary. The child was under no restraint, and was constantly doing that which was not good for her, and though her mother protested, she did nothing else.

"Because the father complained of being disturbed at all hours of the night, the mother accused him of heartlessness and of a lack of affection, but he explained this to me by saying that he only protested because his child was not cared for as it should be; because that which was intended as a blessing became an irksome responsibility, and because he was in constant dread for its life.

"Whether the mother was to blame or not will perhaps never be known; but it is certain that the child died after a lingering illness, and the father was in a pitiful state from rage and grief. He did not speak to his wife during the illness, or after the death, which she must have accepted as an accusation that she was somehow responsible; for she soon took to her bed, and never left it alive except to wearily climb the stairs at twelve o'clock every night, to visit the child's deserted room,--the room next to this, and into which no one is permitted to look. Her bed was on the lower floor, in the room back of the parlor, and every night at twelve o'clock, which was the hour the child died, she wrapped the coverings about her, and went slowly up the stairs, clinging to the railing with pitiful weakness with one hand, and carrying the lamp with the other.

"I frequently tried to prevent her doing this; but she always begged so piteously that I could not resist the appeal. She imagined, poor soul, that she heard the child calling her, and she always asked me not to accompany her.

"One night she was gone such a long time that at last I followed, and found her dead, kneeling beside her child's empty crib, and the light out. Mr. Dudley was very much frightened and distressed; and I think the circ.u.mstance hastened his departure from Davy's Bend, which occurred a few weeks later. He has never been in the house since.

"It is said that once a year--on the third of May--at exactly twelve o'clock at night, a light appears in the lower room, which soon goes out, and appears in the hall. A great many people have told me that they have seen the light, and that it grows dimmer in the lower hall, and brighter in the upper, until it disappears in the room where the empty crib still stands, precisely as if it were carried by some one climbing the stair. It soon disappears from the upper room, and is seen no more until another year rolls round. I have never seen the light, but I have often heard the step. Sometimes it is silent for months together, but usually I hear it whenever I am in the main house at night. Just before there is a death in the town, or the occurrence of any serious accident, it goes up and down with unvarying persistency; but there is a long rest after the death or the accident foretold has occurred."

When Mrs. Wedge had ceased talking, there was perfect silence in the room again, and the footsteps were heard descending the stair.

Occasionally there was a painful pause, but they soon went on again, and were heard no more.

"Poor Helen," Mrs. Wedge said, wiping her eyes, "how reluctantly she leaves the little crib."

Mrs. Wedge soon followed the ghost of poor Helen down the stair, carrying Betty in her arms; and as Dorris stood on the landing lighting them down, he thought, as they pa.s.sed into the shadow in the lower hall, that poor Helen had found her child, and was leaving the house forever, content to remain in her grave at last.

CHAPTER VIII.

A REMARKABLE GIRL.

Annie Benton had said that she usually practised once a week in the church; and during the lonely days after his first meeting with her, Allan Dorris began to wonder when he should see her again. The sight of her, and the sound of her voice, and her magic music, had afforded him a strange pleasure, and he thought about her so much that his mind experienced relief from the thoughts that had made him restless and ill at ease. But he heard nothing of her, except from Mrs. Wedge, who was as loud in her praise as ever; though he looked for her as he rode about on his business affairs, and a few times he had walked by her father's house, after dark, and looked at its substantial exterior.

There was something about the girl which fascinated him. It may have been only the music, but certainly he longed for her appearance, and listened attentively for notice of her presence whenever he walked in his yard, which was his custom so much of late that he had worn paths under the trees; for had he secured all the business in Davy's Bend he would still have had a great deal of time on his hands.

During these weeks he sometimes accused himself of being in love with a girl he had seen but once, and laughed at the idea as absurd and preposterous; but this did not drive thoughts of Annie Benton out of his mind, for he stopped to listen at every turn for sounds of her presence.

After listening during the hours of the day when he was not occupied, he usually walked in the path for a while at night, hoping it might be possible that she had changed her hours, and would come to practise after the cares and duties of the day were over. He could see from his own window that the church was dark; but he had little to do, so he took a turn in the path down by the wall to convince himself that she was not playing softly, without a light, to give her fancy free rein. But he was always disappointed; and, after finding that his watching was hopeless, he went out at the iron gate in front, and walked along the roads until he recovered from his disappointment sufficiently to enter his own home.

This was his daily experience for several weeks after his first meeting with the girl, for even the Sunday services were neglected for that length of time on account of the pastor, who was away recruiting his health; when one afternoon he heard the tones of his old friend the organ again. Climbing up on the wall, and looking at the girl through the broken window, he imagined that she was not playing with the old earnestness, and certainly she frequently looked toward the door, as if expecting someone. Jumping down from the wall, he went around to the front door, which he found open, and entered the church. The girl heard his step on the threshold, and was looking toward him when he came in at the door leading from the vestibule.

"I seem to have known you a long time," he said, as he sat down near her, after exchanging the small civilities that were necessary under the circ.u.mstances, "and I have been waiting for you as anxiously as though you were my best friend. I have been very busy all my life, and I don't enjoy idleness, though I imagined when I was working hard that I would relish a season of rest. I have little to do here except to wait for you and listen to the music. Had you delayed your coming many days longer I should have called on you at your home. You are the only acquaintance I have in the town whose society I covet."

There was no mistaking that the girl had been expecting him, and that she was pleased that he came in so promptly. Her manner indicated it, and she was perfectly willing to neglect her practice for his company, which had not been the case before. She was better dressed, too; and surely she would have been disappointed had not Dorris made his appearance.

Annie Benton, like her father, improved on acquaintance. She was neither too tall nor too short, and, although he was not an expert in such matters, Dorris imagined that her figure would have been a study for a sculptor. A woman so well formed as to attract no particular comment on first acquaintance, he thought; but he remarked now, as he looked steadily at her, that there was a remarkable regularity in her features.

There are women who do not bear close inspection, but Annie Benton could not be appreciated without it. Her smile surprised every one, because of its beauty; but the observer soon forgot that in admiring her pretty teeth, and both these were forgotten when she spoke, as she did now to Dorris, tiring of being looked at; for her voice was musical, and thoroughly under control:

"I have dreaded to even pa.s.s The Locks at night ever since I can remember," she said with some hesitation, not knowing exactly how to treat the frankness with which he acknowledged the pleasure her presence afforded him, "and I don't wonder that anyone living in it alone is lonely. They say there is a ghost there, and a mysterious light, and a footstep on the stair; and I am almost afraid to talk about it."

Allan Dorris had a habit of losing himself in thought when in the midst of a conversation, and though he said he had been waiting patiently to hear the music, it did not arouse him, for the girl had tired of waiting for his reply, and gone to playing.

Now that he was in her presence he did not seem to realize the pleasure he expected when he walked under the trees and waited for her. Perhaps he was thinking of the footstep on the stair, which he had become so accustomed to that he thought no more of it than the chirping of a cricket; but more likely he was thinking that what he had in his mind to say to the girl, when alone, was not at all appropriate now that he was with her.

"An overture to 'Poor Helen,'" Dorris thought, when he looked up, and heard the music, after coming out of his reverie; for it was full of whispered sadness, and the girl certainly had that unfortunate lady in her mind when she began playing, for she had spoken of her tireless step on the stair; and when he walked back to the other end of the church, he thought of the pretty girl in white, at the instrument, as a spirit come back to warn him with music to be very careful of his future.

Where had the girl learned so much art? He had never heard better music, and though there was little order in it, a mournful harmony ran through it all that occasionally caused his flesh to creep. She was not playing from notes, either, but seemed to be amusing herself by making odd combinations with the stops; and so well did she understand the secret of the minors that her playing reminded him of a great orchestra he had once heard, and which had greatly impressed him.

Where had this simple country-girl learned so much of doubt, of despair, and of anguish? Allan Dorris thought that had _his_ fingers possessed the necessary skill, _his_ heart might have suggested such strains as he was hearing; but that a woman of twenty, who had never been out of her poor native town, could set such tales of horror and unrest and discontent to music, puzzled him. The world was full of hearts containing sorrowful symphonies such as he was now listening to, but they were usually in older b.r.e.a.s.t.s, and he thought there could be but one explanation--the organist was an unusual woman; the only flower in a community of rough weeds, scrub-oaks, and thistles, wind-sown by G.o.d in His mercy; a flower which did not realize its rarity, and was therefore modest in its innocence and purity. But her weird music; she must have thought a great deal because of her motherless and lonely childhood, for such strains as her deft fingers produced could not have been found in a light heart.

"There are few players equal to you," he said, standing by her side when she finally concluded, and looked around. "A great many players I have known had the habit of drowning the expert performance of the right hand with the clumsy drumming of the left; but you seem to understand that the left hand should modestly follow and a.s.sist, not lead, as is the habit of busy people. There are many people who have devoted a lifetime to study, surrounded with every advantage, who cannot equal you. I am an admirer of the grand organ, and have taken every occasion to hear it; but there is a natural genius about your playing that is very striking."

"No one has ever told me that before," she replied, turning her face from him. "I have never been complimented except by the respectful attention of the people; and father once said I could play almost as well as my mother. Your good opinion encourages me, for you have lived outside of Davy's Bend."

Well, yes, he _had_ lived outside of Davy's Bend, and this may have been the reason he now looked away from the girl and became lost to her presence. He did not do this rudely, but there was a pathetic thoughtfulness in his face which caused the girl to remain silent while he visited other scenes. Perhaps Allan Dorris is not the only man--let us imagine so, in charity--who has lived in other towns, and become thoughtful when the circ.u.mstance was mentioned.

"If there is genius in my playing, I did not know it, for it is not the result of training; it comes to me like my thoughts," the girl finally continued, when Dorris looked around. "When you were here before, you were kind enough to commend me, and say that a certain pa.s.sage gave evidence of great study and practice. I am obliged to you for your good opinion, but the strains really came to me in a moment, and while they pleased me, I never studied them."

The girl said this with so much simple earnestness that Allan Dorris felt sure that his good opinion of her playing would not cause her to practise less in the future, but rather with an increased determination for improvement.

"I think that your playing would attract the attention of the best musicians," he said. "The critics could point out defects, certainly, for a great many persons listen to music not to enjoy it, but to detect what they regard as faults or inaccuracies; but the masters would cheerfully forgive the faults, remembering their own hard experience, and enjoy the genius which seems to inspire you. I only wonder where you learned it."

"Not from competent teachers," she replied, as though she regretted to make the confession. "The best music I ever heard was that of the bands which visit the place at long intervals. I have seldom attended their entertainments, but my father has listened with me when they played on the outside, and we both enjoyed it. All that I know of style and expression I learned from them. I once heard a minstrel band play in front of the hall, on a wet evening, when there was no prospect of an audience, and there was such an air of mournfulness in it that I remember it yet. It is dreadful to imitate minstrel music in a church, but you have spoken so kindly of my playing that I will try it, if you care to listen."

They were both amused at the idea, and laughed over it; and after Dorris had signified his eagerness to hear it, and reached his favorite place to listen, the back pew, he reclined easily in it, and waited until the stops were arranged.

The music began with a crash, or burst, or something of that kind, and then ran off into an air for the baritone. This was the girl's favorite style of playing, and there was really a very marked resemblance to a band. There was an occasional exercise for the supposed cornets, but the music soon ran back into the old strain, as though the players could not get rid of the prospect of an empty house, and were permitting the baritone to express their joint regrets. The accompaniment in the treble was in such odd time, and expressed in such an odd way, that Dorris could not help laughing to himself, although he enjoyed it; but finally all the instruments joined in a race to get to the end, and the music ceased. He started up the aisle to congratulate the player, and when half way she said to him: