Amazing Grace Part 35

Then I remembered Robinson Crusoe and took heart, straining my eyes in hope of a sail, but nowhere was there a human face to be seen, nor sign of life. Not even a freight car stood drearily on a side-track--and, as you know, you have to be very far away from the center of things not to find a freight car! None was here, however, for there wasn't a side-track for it to stand upon--the main line running in two s.h.i.+ning threads far away toward Ireland.

The only moving bodies visible were a paper sack being blown gently down the track, a blue fly buzzing around a blackened banana peeling and a rook cawing overhead. I looked up at the rook and smiled philosophically.

"I antic.i.p.ated a 'coo,' then apprehended a 'croak'--what I get is a happy compromise, a 'caw,'" I said, and I find that things usually turn out this way in the great journey of life. Nothing is ever so good, nor so bad, as you think it's going to be when you're standing at the ticket window. The great antic.i.p.ator is also a great apprehender--therefore realization is bound to be a relief.

Then, as if in reward of my optimism, I began to scent the odor of escaping coffee.

"It _is_ inhabited!" I cried.

Springing up, I darted around to the other side of the station, and there, in a clump of trees, lying snug and humane-looking in the morning light, was a tiny cottage. I waited, and presently there issued from the doorway a man--wiping his mouth reminiscently.

He espied me at once and came up, cap in hand.

"Was you wanting something, miss?" he asked.

"A train," I replied, trying to sound inconsequential with the lordliness that comes of intense disgust. "I have a ticket to Bannerley--and I have friends there _waiting_!"

The man dared to smile.

"Since the coal strike that's mostly what folks does, miss," he explained.

There was a moment of strained silence, which was broken by the appearance of a young boy--an eerie creature who had seemed to glide straight out of the eastern horizon on a bicycle. The station-master turned to him.

"Take this here parcel up to Lord Erskine--and be quicker than you was yesterday!" he said.

The boy's face and mine changed simultaneously, his brightening, mine paling.

"Lord Erskine!" I cried, a little ghostly feeling of fear stealing over me--for my American instincts failed to grasp the rapidity with which dead men's shoes can be s.n.a.t.c.hed off and fitted with new rubber heels in England--"Lord Erskine is dead."

The little messenger boy looked at me pityingly.

"'E _wuz_," he explained, "but 'e ain't now!"

"And--and do you mean to tell me that this is the station for Colmere Abbey?" I demanded, turning again to the man.

"Yes, miss."

He tried hard not to look supercilious, but there, six feet above my head, was the name "Colmere" in faded yellow letters against the black background of the sign-board. And I had always believed in psychic warnings!

"I--I hadn't thought to look at the sign-board," I endeavored to explain. "It seems that it doesn't matter what your station is, for you're as far away from your destination at one place as at another--during the coal strike! You think I can't get a train to Bannerley until----"

"Perhaps to-night--perhaps not until to-morrow morning," he answered with cruel frankness, and I knew from heresay that trains did occasionally wander, comet-fas.h.i.+on, out of their orbit, and come through stations at unexpected moments. "Still, there's a railroad hotel about a mile down the track."

"A railroad hotel?"

"Where the men get their meals--the guards and porters!"

My spirits sank.

"That old kill-joy at Paddington knew what he was talking about!" I said to myself--then aloud: "But, couldn't I get a carriage, or a----"

He shook his head.

"We mostly uses bicycles around here--when we don't walk," he explained.

"But I must get to Bannerley!" I burst out in desperation. "And I am a first-rate walker! How far is it?"

I was beginning to realize that the adventure might make good copy, headed: "Wonderful Pedestrian Journey through Historic Lancas.h.i.+re."

Many a slighter incident has called forth heavier head-lines.

"Walk?"

"Certainly--then take up the matter with the railroad company in Glasgow, just before I sail for home!"

My terrible manner caused him to look me over, quickly.

"Was you wanting to get to the village--or the hall?" he asked, evidently impressed by my severity, and my heart softened.

"To the hall," I answered. "Mrs. Montgomery is expecting me."

He tried hard not to show that he was impressed, but he failed.

Evidently Mrs. Montgomery was a great personage, and I took on a tinge of reflected glory not to be entirely ignored.

"The hall is a mile from the village--and the village is three miles from here," he explained gently. "Of course, there's short cuts, if a body knows 'em--but for a lady like you----"

The click of the telegraph instrument clamored for his attention, so he reluctantly left me. I remained outside, listening to the caw of the rook. Presently he came out again.

"There will be a train through here pretty soon--but it's coming from the direction of Bannerley instead of going toward there--still----"

"Still, it will give us occasion to hope for better things later on,"

I answered cheerfully. "And it has occurred to me that I might while away a portion of the morning by walking up to the gates of Colmere Abbey. That boy went in this direction, didn't he?"

"Not a quarter of a mile, miss--down in this direction," he a.s.sured me. "Just follow this road, and you'll find the lodge in a clump of trees."

The "May" hedges were glistening with the early sunbeams, and as I walked down the railroad track the distance seemed quite a good deal short of the quarter of a mile mentioned. I found the clump of trees indicated--then a small gray building. My heart bounded, and I rubbed my eyes to make sure that I was awake.

"Is this the entrance to Colmere Abbey?" I asked of the boy on the bicycle, who was turning out of the gate at that moment.

"This is one of the lodges--but not the grand one, madam!" he answered anxiously.

"Oh, indeed? But one can get to the park through this gate?" I persisted.

"Oh, yes, madam."

He showed an inclination to act as my esquire, but I got rid of him by promising him sixpence if he would take care of my bag until I returned to the station--then I crossed the greasy railroad track and entered the shade of the trees. It was far from being my ideal entree into the old house of my heart's desire, but it was something of an adventure--until I reached the gates. There I was halted.

"Yes, miss--if you please?"

It was an acid voice, and I looked at the doorway of the house, out of which an old woman was issuing. She was garbed in profound black.