The King's General Part 9

The servants were more prompt about their business, but less willing. The grandchildren, who had run about the pa.s.sages in his absence, were closeted in their quarters with the doors well shut. The voices in the gallery were more subdued. It was indeed obvious that the master had returned. Alice and John and Joan found their way more often to the gatehouse, as if it had become in some sort a sanctuary. John looked hara.s.sed and preoccupied, and Joan whispered to me in confidence that his father found fault with his running of the estate and said he had no head for figures.

I could see that Joan was burning to enquire about my friends.h.i.+p with Richard Grenvile, which they must have thought strangely sudden, and I saw Alice look at me, though she said nothing, with a new warm glance of understanding. "I knew him well long ago when I was eighteen," I told them, but to plunge back into the whole history was not my wish. I think Mary had given them a hint or two in private. She herself said little of the visit, beyond remarking he had grown much stouter, a true sisterly remark, and then she showed me the letter he had left for Jonathan, which ended with these words: I here conclude, praying you to present once more my best respects to your good wife, being truly glad she is yours, for a more likely good wife was in former time hardly to be found, and I wish my fortune had been as good--but patience is a virtue, and so I am your ready servant and kinsman, Richard Grenvile.

Patience is a virtue.... I saw Mary glance at me as I read the lines.

"You do not intend, Honor," she said in a low voice, "to take up with him again?"

"In what way, Mary?"

"Why, wed with him, to be blunt. This letter is somewhat significant."

"Rest easy, sister. I shall never marry Richard Grenvile or any man."

"I should not be comfortable, nor Jonathan either, if Sir Richard should come here and give an impression of intimacy. He may be a fine soldier, but his reputation is anything but that."

"I know, Mary."

"Jo writes from Radford that they say hard things of him in Devon."

"I can well believe it."

"I know it is not my business, but it would sadden me much, it would greatly grieve us all, if--if you felt bound yourself to him in some way."

"Being a cripple, Mary, makes one strangely free of bonds."

She looked at me doubtfully and then said no more, but I think the bitterness was lost on her.

Presently Jonathan himself came up to pay his respects to me. He hoped I was comfortable, that I had everything I needed and did not find the place too noisy after the quiet of Lanrest.

"And you sleep well, I trust, and are not disturbed at all?"

His manner, when he asked this, was somewhat odd, a trifle evasive, which was strange for him who was so self-possessed a person.

"I am not a heavy sleeper," I told him; "a creaking board or a hooting owl is enough to waken me."

"I rather feared so," he said abruptly. "It was foolish of Mary to put you in this room, facing as it does a court on either side. You would have been better in the south front, next to our own apartment. Would you prefer this?"

"Indeed, no, I am very happy here."

I noticed that he stared hard at the picture on the door, hiding the crack, and once or twice seemed as if he would ask a question but could not bring himself to the point; then after chat upon no subject in particular he took his leave of me.

That night, between twelve and one, being wakeful, I sat up in bed to drink a gla.s.s of water. I did not light my candle, for the gla.s.s was within my reach. But as I replaced it on the table I became aware of a cold draught of air blowing beneath the door of the empty room. That same chill draught I had noticed once before.... I waited, motionless, for the sound of footsteps, but none came. And then, faint and hesitating, came a little scratching sound upon the panel of the door where I had hung the picture. Someone, then, was in the empty room, clad in his stockinged feet, with his hands upon the door....

The sound continued for five minutes, certainly not longer, and then ceased as suddenly as it had started, and once again the telltale draught of air was cut in a trice and all was as before.

A horrid suspicion formed then in my mind, which in the morning became certainty. When I was dressed and in my chair and Matty busy in the dressing room I wheeled myself to the door and lifted the picture from the nail. It was as I thought.

The crack had been filled in.... I knew then that my presence in the gatehouse had been a blunder on the part of my sister and that I caused annoyance to that unknown visitor who prowled by night in the adjoining chamber.

The secret was Jonathan Rashleigh's and not mine to know. Suspecting my prying eyes, he had given orders for my peephole to be covered.

I pondered then upon the possibility, which had entered my head earlier, that Jonathan's elder brother had not died of the smallpox some twenty years before but was still alive--in some horrid state of preservation, blind and dumb--living in animal fas.h.i.+on in a lair beneath the b.u.t.tress, and that the only persons to know of this were my brother-in-law and his steward Langdon and some stranger--a keeper, possibly--clad in a crimson cloak.

If it were indeed so, and my sister Mary and her stepchildren were in ignorance of the fact, while I, a stranger, had stumbled upon it, then I knew I must make some excuse and return home to Lanrest, for to live day by day with a secret of this kind upon my conscience was something I could not do. It was too sinister, too horrible.

I wondered if I should confide my fears to Richard when he next came, or whether, in his ruthless fas.h.i.+on, he would immediately give orders to his men to break open the room and force the b.u.t.tress, so bringing ruin, perhaps, to my brother-in-law and host.

Fortunately the problem was solved for me in a very different way, which I will now disclose. It will be remembered that on the day of Richard's first visit my G.o.dchild Joan had mischievously borrowed the key of the summerhouse, belonging to the steward, and allowed me to explore the interior. The flurry and excitement of receiving visitors had put all thoughts of the key from her little scatterbrained head, and it was not until two days after my brother-in-law's return that she remembered the key's existence.

She came to me with it in her hands in great perturbation, for, she said, John was already so much out of favour with his father for some neglect on the estate that she was loath now to tell him of her theft of the key for fear it should bring him into greater trouble.

As for herself, she had not the courage to take the key back to Langdon's house and confess the foolery. What was she then to do?

"You mean," I said, "what am I to do? For you wish to absolve yourself of all responsibility, isn't that so?"

"You are so clever, Honor," she pleaded, "and I so ignorant. Let me leave the key with you and so forget it. Baby Mary has a cough and poor John a touch of his ague; I really have so much on my mind."

"Very well then," I answered, "we will see what can be done."

I had some idea of taking Matty into my confidence and weaving a tale by which Matty would visit Mrs. Langdon and say how she had found the key thrown down on a path in the warren, which would be plausible enough, and while I turned this over in my mind I dangled the key between my fingers. It was of medium size, not larger, in fact, than the one in my own door. I compared the two and found them very similar. A sudden thought then struck me and, wheeling my chair into the pa.s.sage, I listened for a moment to discover who stirred about the house.

It was a little before nine o'clock, with the servants all at their dinner and the rest of the household either talking in the gallery or already retired to their rooms for the night. The moment seemed well chosen for a very daring gamble, which might, or might not, prove nothing to me. I turned down the pa.s.sage and halted outside the door of the locked chamber. I listened again, but no one stirred. Then very stealthily I pushed the key into the rusty lock. It fitted. It turned. And the door creaked open....

I was so carried away for a moment by the success of my own scheme that I was nonplussed. I sat in my chair, uncertain what to do. But that there was a link between this chamber and the summerhouse now seemed definite, for the key turned both locks.

The chance to examine the room might never come again, and for all my fear, I was devoured with horrid curiosity.

I edged my chair within the room and, kindling my candle, for it was of course in darkness with the windows barred, I looked about me. The chamber was simple enough. Two windows, one to the north and the other to the west, both with iron bars across them.

A bed in the far corner, a few pieces of heavy furniture, and the table and chair I had already seen from the crack. The walls were hung about with a heavy arras, rather old and worn in many parts. It was indeed a disappointing room, with little that seemed strange in its appointments. It had the faded, musty smell that always clings about disused apartments. I laid the candle on the table and wheeled myself to the corner that gave upon the b.u.t.tress. This, too, had arras hanging from the ceiling, which I lifted--and found nothing but bare stone behind it. I ran my hands over the surface but could find no join. The wall seemed smooth to my touch. But it was murky and I could not see, so I returned to the table to fetch my candle, first listening at the door to make certain that the servants were still at supper.

It was while I waited there, with an eye to the pa.s.sage that turned at right angles running beneath the belfry, that I felt a sudden breath of cold air on the back of my head.

I looked swiftly over my shoulder and noticed that the arras on the wall beside the b.u.t.tress was blowing to and fro, as though a cavity had opened, letting through a blast of air; and even as I watched I saw, to my great horror, a hand appear from behind a slit in the arras and lift it to one side. There was no time to wheel my chair into the pa.s.sage, no time even to reach my hand out to the table and blow out the candle.

Someone came into the room with a crimson cloak about his shoulders and stood for a moment with the arras pushed aside and a great black hole in the wall behind him. He considered me a moment and then spoke.

"Close the door gently, Honor," he said, "and leave the candle. Since you are here it is best that we should have an explanation and no further mischief."

He advanced into the room, letting the arras drop behind him, and I saw then that the man was my brother-in-law, Jonathan Rashleigh.

12.

I felt like a child caught out in some misdemeanour and was hot with shame and sick embarra.s.sment. If he, then, was the stranger in the crimson cloak, walking his house in the small hours, it was not for me to question it; and to be discovered thus, prying in his secrets, with the key not only of this door but of his summerhouse as well, was surely something he could never pardon.

"Forgive me," I said, "I have acted very ill."

He did not answer at once, but first made certain that the door was closed. Then he lit further candles and, laying aside his cloak, drew a chair up to the table.

"It was you," he said, "who made a crack there in the panel? It was not there before you came to Menabilly."

His blunt question snowed me what a shrewd grasp he had of my gaping curiosity, and I confessed that I was indeed the culprit. "I will not attempt to defend myself," I said. "I know I had no right to tamper with your walls. There was some talk of ghosts, otherwise I would not have done it. And one night during last week I heard footsteps."

"Yes," he said. "I had not thought to find your chamber occupied. I heard you stir and guessed then what had happened. We are somewhat pushed for room, as you no doubt realise, otherwise you would not have been put into the gatehouse."

He waited a moment and then, looking closely at me, he said, "You have understood, then, that there is a secret entry to this chamber?"

"Yes."

"And the reason you are here this evening is that you wished to find whither it led?"

"I knew it must be within the b.u.t.tress."

"How did you come upon that key?"

This was the very devil, but there was nothing for it but to tell him the whole story, putting the blame heavily upon myself and saying little of Joan's share in the matter.

I said that I had looked about the summerhouse and admired the view, but as to my peering at his books and his father's will and lifting the heavy mat and finding the flagstone--nay, he would have to put me on the rack before I confessed to that.

He listened in silence, regarding me coldly all the while, and I knew what an interfering fool he must consider me.

"And what do you make of it now you know that the nightly intruder is none other than myself?" he questioned.

Here was a stumbling block. For I could make nothing of it. And I did not dare voice that secret, very fearful supposition that I kept hidden at the back of my mind.

"I cannot tell, Jonathan," I answered, "except that you use this entry for some purpose of your own and that your family know nothing of it."

At this he was silent, considering me slowly, and then after a long pause he said to me. "John has some knowledge of the subject, but no one else, except my steward Langdon. Indeed, the success of the royal cause we have at heart would gravely suffer should the truth become known."

This last surprised me. I did not see that his family secrets could be of any concern to His Majesty. But I said nothing.

"Since you already know something of the truth," he said, "I will acquaint you further, desiring you first to guard all knowledge of it to yourself."

I promised after a moment's hesitation, being uncertain what dire secret I might now be asked to share.

"You know," he said, "that at the beginning of hostilities I, with certain other gentlemen, was appointed by His Majesty's Council to collect and receive the plate given to the royal cause in Cornwall and arrange for it to be taken to the mint at Truro and there melted down?"

"I knew you were collector, Jonathan, no more than that."

"Last year another mint was erected at Exeter, under the supervision of my kinsman, Sir Richard Vyvyan, hence my constant business with that city. You will appreciate, Honor, that to receive a great quant.i.ty of very valuable plate and be responsible for its safety until it reaches the mint lies a heavy burden upon my shoulders."

"Yes, Jonathan."

"Spies abound, as you are well aware. Neighbours have long ears, and even a close friend can turn informer. If some member of the rebel army could but lay his hands upon the treasure that so frequently pa.s.ses into my keeping the Parliament would be ten times the richer and His Majesty ten times the poorer. Therefore, all cartage of the plate has to be done at night, when the roads are quiet. Also, it is necessary to have depots throughout the county, where the plate can be stored until the necessary transport can be arranged. You have followed me so far?"

"Yes, Jonathan, and with interest."

"Very well then. These depots must be secret. As few people as possible must know their whereabouts. It is therefore imperative that the houses or buildings that serve as depots should contain hiding places known only to their owners. Menabilly, as you have already discovered, has such a hiding place."

I found myself getting hot under the skin, not at the implied sarcasm of his words, but because his revelation was so very different from what I--with excess of imagination--had supposed.

"The b.u.t.tress against the far corner of this room," he continued, "is hollow in the centre. A flight of narrow steps leads to a small room, built in the thickness of the wall and beneath the courtyard, where it is possible for a man to stand and sit, though it is but five feet square. This room is connected with a pa.s.sage, or rather tunnel, which runs under the house and so beneath the causeway to an outlet in the summerhouse.

"It is in this small b.u.t.tress room that I have been accustomed, during the past year, to hide the plate. You understand me?"

I nodded, gripped by his story and deeply interested.

"When bringing the plate to this depot, or taking it away, we work by night, my steward, John Langdon, and I. The wagons wait down at Pridmouth, and we bring the plate from the b.u.t.tress room, along the tunnel to the summerhouse, and so down to the cove in one of my handcarts, from where it is placed in the wagons. The men who conduct the procession from here to Exeter are all trustworthy, but none of them, naturally, know where abouts at Menabilly I have kept the plate hidden. That is not their business. No one knows that but myself and Langdon, and now you, Honor, who--I regret to say--have really no right at all to share the secret."

I said nothing, for there was no possible defence.

"John knows the plate has been concealed in the house but has never enquired where. He is, as yet, ignorant of the room beneath the b.u.t.tress, likewise the tunnel to the summerhouse."

Here I risked offence by interrupting him.

"It was providential," I said, "that Menabilly possessed so excellent a hiding place."

"Very providential," he agreed. "Had it not been so, I could hardly have set about the business. You wonder, no doubt, why the house should have been so constructed?"

I confessed to some small wonder on the subject.

"My father," he said briefly, "had certain--how shall I put it?--s.h.i.+pping transactions which necessitated privacy. The tunnel was, therefore, useful in many ways."

In other words, I said to myself, your father, dear Jonathan, was nothing more or less than a pirate of the first order, whatever his standing and reputation in Fowey and the county.

"It happened, also," he said in a lower tone, "that my unfortunate elder brother was not in full possession of his faculties. This was his chamber from the time the house was built, in I600, until his death, poor fellow, twenty-four years later. At times he was violent, hence the reason for the little cell beneath the b.u.t.tress, where lack of air and close confinement soon rendered him unconscious and easy then to handle."

He spoke naturally and without restraint, but the picture that his words conjured turned me sick. I saw the wretched, s.h.i.+vering maniac choking for air in the dark room beneath the b.u.t.tress, with the four walls closing in upon him. And now this same room stacked with silver plate like a treasure house in a fairy tale.

Jonathan must have seen my change of face, for he looked kindly at me and rose from his chair.

"I know," he said, "it is not a pretty story. It was a relief to me, I must admit, when the smallpox that carried off my father took my brother too. It was not a happy business, caring for him, with young children in the house. You have heard, no doubt, the malicious tales that Robert Bennett spread abroad?"

I mentioned vaguely that some rumour had pa.s.sed me by.

"He took the disease some five days after my father," said Jonathan. "Why he should have taken it, and my wife and I escaped, we shall never know. But so he did, and, becoming violent at the same time with one of his periodic fits, he stood not a chance. It was over very quickly."

There were sounds now of the servants moving from the kitchens.

"You will return now to your apartment," he said, "and I will go back the way I came. You may give me John Langdon's key. If in future you hear me come to this apartment you will understand what I am about. I keep accounts here of the plate temporarily in my possession which I refer to from time to time. I need hardly tell you that not a word of what has this night pa.s.sed between us must be spoken about to any other person."

"I give you my solemn promise, Jonathan."