XXVI. SWEETWATER RETURNS
“You see me again, Miss Scott. I hope that yesterday’s intrusion has not prejudiced you against me.”
“I have no prejudices,” was her simple but firm reply. “I am only hurried and very anxious. The doctor is with Mr. Brotherson just now; but he has several other equally sick patients to visit and I dare not keep him here too long.”
“Then you will welcome my abruptness. Miss Scott, here is a letter from Mr. Challoner. It will explain my position. As you will see, his only desire is to establish the fact that his daughter did not commit suicide. She was all he had in the world, and the thought that she could, for any reason, take her own life is unbearable to him. Indeed, he will not believe she did so, evidence or no evidence. May I ask if you agree with him? You have seen Miss Challoner, I believe. Do you think she was the woman to plunge a dagger in her heart in a place as public as a hotel reception room?”
“No, Mr. Sweetwater. I’m a poor working girl, with very little education and almost no knowledge of the world and such ladies as she. But something tells me for all that, that she was too nice to do this. I saw her once and it made me want to be quiet and kind and beautiful like her. I never shall think she did anything so horrible. Nor will Mr. Brotherson ever believe it. He could not and live. You see, I am talking to you as if you knew him,—the kind of man he is and just how he feels towards Miss Challoner. He is—” Her voice trailed off and a look, uncommon and almost elevated, illumined her face. “I will not tell you what he is; you will know, if you ever see him.”
“If the favourable opinion of a whole town makes a good fellow, he ought to be of the best,” returned Sweetwater, with his most honest smile. “I hear but one story of him wherever I turn.”
“There is but one story to tell,” she smiled, and her head drooped softly, but with no air of self-consciousness.
Sweetwater watched her for a moment, and then remarked: “I’m going to take one thing for granted; that you are as anxious as we are to clear Miss Challoner’s memory.”
“O yes, O yes.”
“More than that, that you are ready and eager to help us. Your very looks show that.”
“You are right; I would do anything to help you. But what can a girl like me do? Nothing; nothing. I know too little. Mr. Challoner must see that when you tell him I’m only the daughter of a foreman.”
“And a friend of Mr. Brotherson,” supplemented Sweetwater.
“Yes,” she smiled, “he would want me to say so. But that’s his goodness. I don’t deserve the honour.”
“His friend and therefore his confidante,” Sweetwater continued. “He has talked to you about Miss Challoner?”
“He had to. There was nobody else to whom he could talk; and then, I had seen her and could understand.”
“Where did you see her?”
“In New York. I was there once with father, who took me to see her. I think she had asked Mr. Brotherson to send his little friend to her hotel if ever we came to New York.”
“That was some time ago?”
“We were there in June.”
“And you have corresponded ever since with Miss Challoner?”
“She has been good enough to write, and I have ventured at times to answer her.”
The suspicion which might have come to some men found no harbour in Sweetwater’s mind. This young girl was beautiful, there was no denying that, beautiful in a somewhat startling and quite unusual way; but there was nothing in her bearing, nothing in Miss Challoner’s letters to indicate that she had been a cause for jealousy in the New York lady’s mind. He, therefore, ignored this possibility, pursuing his inquiry along the direct lines he had already laid out for himself. Smiling a little, but in a very earnest fashion, he pointed to the letter she still held and quietly said:
“Remember that I’m not speaking for myself, Miss Scott, when I seem a little too persistent and inquiring. You have corresponded with Miss Challoner; you have been told the fact of her secret engagement to Mr. Brotherson and you have been witness to his conduct and manner for the whole time he has been separated from her. Do you, when you think of it carefully, recall anything in the whole story of this romance which would throw light upon the cruel tragedy which has so unexpectedly ended it? Anything, Miss Scott? Straws show which way the stream flows.”
She was vehement, instantly vehement, in her disclaimer.
“I can answer at once,” said she, “because I have thought of nothing else for all these weeks. Here all was well. Mr. Brotherson was hopeful and happy and believed in her happiness and willingness to wait for his success. And this success was coming so fast! Oh, how can we ever tell him! How can we ever answer his questions even, or keep him satisfied and calm until he is strong enough to hear the truth. I’ve had to acknowledge already that I have had no letter from her for weeks. She never wrote to him directly, you know, and she never sent him messages, but he knew that a letter to me, was also a letter to him and I can see that he is troubled by this long silence, though he says I was right not to let her know of his illness and that I must continue to keep her in ignorance of it till he is quite well again and can write to her himself. It is hard to hear him talk like this and not look sad or frightened.”
Sweetwater remembered Miss Challoner’s last letter, and wished he had it here to give her. In default of this, he said:
“Perhaps this not hearing may act in the way of a preparation for the shock which must come to him sooner or later. Let us hope so, Miss Scott.”
Her eyes filled.
“Nothing can prepare him,” said she. Then added, with a yearning accent, “I wish I were older or had more experience. I should not feel so helpless. But the gratitude I owe him will give me strength when I need it most. Only I wish the suffering might be mine rather than his.”
Unconscious of any self-betrayal, she lifted her eyes, startling Sweetwater by the beauty of her look. “I don’t think I’m so sorry for Oswald Brotherson,” he murmured to himself as he left her. “He’s a more fortunate man than he knows, however deeply he may feel the loss of his first sweetheart.”
That evening the disappointed Sweetwater took the train for New York. He had failed to advance the case in hand one whit, yet the countenance he showed Mr. Gryce at their first interview was not a wholly gloomy one.
“Fifty dollars to the bad!” was his first laconic greeting. “All I have learned is comprised in these two statements. The second O. B. is a fine fellow; and not intentionally the cause of our tragedy. He does not even know about it. He’s down with the fever at present and they haven’t told him. When he’s better we may hear something; but I doubt even that.”
“Tell me about it.”
Sweetwater complied; and such is the unconsciousness with which we often encounter the pivotal circumstance upon which our future or the future of our most cherished undertaking hangs, he omitted from his story, the sole discovery which was of any real importance in the unravelling of the mystery in which they were so deeply concerned. He said nothing of his walk in the woods or of what he saw there.
“A meagre haul,” he remarked at the close.
“But that’s as it should be, if you and I are right in our impressions and the clew to this mystery lies here in the character and daring of Orlando Brotherson. That’s why I’m not down in the mouth. Which goes to show what a grip my prejudices have on me.”
“As prejudiced as a bulldog.”
“Exactly. By the way, what news of the gentleman I’ve just mentioned? Is he as serene in my absence as when under my eye?”
“More so; he looks like a man on the verge of triumph. But I fear the triumph he anticipates has nothing to do with our affairs. All his time and thought is taken up with his invention.”
“You discourage me, sir. And now to see Mr. Challoner. Small comfort can I carry him.”
XXVII. THE IMAGE OF DREAD
In the comfortable little sitting-room of the Scott cottage Doris stood, looking eagerly from the window which gave upon the road. Behind her on the other side of the room, could be seen through a partly opened door, a neatly spread bed, with a hand lying quietly on the patched coverlet. It was a strong looking hand which, even when quiescent, conveyed the idea of purpose and vitality. As Doris said, the fingers never curled up languidly, but always with the hint of a clench. Several weeks had passed since the departure of Sweetwater and the invalid was fast gaining strength. To-morrow, he would be up.
Was Doris thinking of him? Undoubtedly, for her eyes often flashed his way; but her main attention was fixed upon the road, though no one was in sight at the moment. Some one had passed for whose return she looked; some one whom, if she had been asked to describe, she would have called a tall, fine-looking man of middle age, of a cultivated appearance seldom seen in this small manufacturing town; seldom seen, possibly, in any town. He had glanced up at the window as he went by, in a manner too marked not to excite her curiosity. Would he look up again when he came back? She was waiting there to see. Why, she did not know. She was not used to indulging in petty suppositions of this kind; her life was too busy, her anxieties too keen. The great dread looming ever before her,—the dread of that hour when she must speak,—left her very little heart for anything dissociated with this coming event. For a girl of seventeen she was unusually thoughtful. Life had been hard in this little cottage since her mother died, or rather she had felt its responsibilities keenly.
Life itself could not be hard where Oswald Brotherson lived; neither to man, nor woman. The cheer of some natures possesses a divine faculty. If it can help no other way, it does so by the aid of its own light. Such was the character of this man’s temperament. The cottage was a happy place; only—she never fathomed the depths of that only. If in these days she essayed at times to do so, she gave full credit to the Dread which rose ever before her—rose like a ghost! She, Doris, led by inscrutable Fate, was waiting to hurt him who hurt nobody; whose mere presence was a blessing.
But her interest had been caught to-day, caught by this stranger, and when during her eager watch the small messenger from the Works came to the door with the usual daily supply of books and magazines for the patient, she stepped out on the porch to speak to him and to point out the gentleman who was now rapidly returning from his stroll up the road.
“Who is that, Johnny?” she asked. “You know everybody who comes to town. What is the name of the gentleman you see coming?”
The boy looked, searched his memory, not without some show of misgiving.
“A queer name,” he admitted at last. “I never heard the likes of it here before. Shally something. Shally—Shally—”
“Challoner?”
“Yes, that’s it. How could you guess? He’s from New York. Nobody knows why he’s here. Don’t seem to have no business.”
“Well, never mind. Run on, Johnny. And don’t forget to come earlier to-morrow; Mr. Brotherson gets tired waiting.”
“Does he? I’ll come quick then; quick as I can run.” And he sped off at a pace which promised well for the morrow.
Challoner! There was but one Challoner in the world for Doris Scott,—Edith’s father. Was this he? It must be, or why this haunting sense of something half remembered as she caught a glimpse of his face. Edith’s father! and he was approaching, approaching rapidly, on his way back to town. Would he stop this time? As the possibility struck her, she trembled and drew back, entering the house, but pausing in the hall with her ear turned to the road. She had not closed the door; something within—a hope or a dread—had prevented that. Would he take it as an invitation to come in? No, no; she was not ready for such an encounter yet. He might speak Edith’s name; Oswald might hear and—with a gasp she recognised the closeness of his step; heard it lag, almost halt just where the path to the house ran into the roadside. But it passed on. He was not going to force an interview yet. She could hear him retreating further and further away. The event was not for this day, thank God! She would have one night at least in which to prepare herself.
With a sense of relief so great that she realised, for one shocked moment, the full extent of her fears, she hastened back into the sitting-room, with her collection of books and pamphlets. A low voice greeted her. It came from the adjoining room.
“Doris, come here, sweet child. I want you.”
How she would have bounded joyously at the summons, had not that Dread raised its bony finger in every call from that dearly loved voice. As it was, her feet moved slowly, lingering at the sound. But they carried her to his side at last, and once there, she smiled.
“See what an armful,” she cried in joyous greeting, as she held out the bundle she had brought. “You will be amused all day. Only, do not tire yourself.”
“I do not want the papers, Doris; not yet. There’s something else which must come first. Doris, I have decided to let you write to her. I’m so much better now, she will not feel alarmed. I must—must get a word from her. I’m starving for it. I lie here and can think of nothing else. A message—one little message of six short words would set me on my feet again. So get your paper and pen, dear child, and write her one of your prettiest letters.”
Had he loved her, he would have perceived the chill which shook her whole body, as he spoke. But his first thought, his penetrating thought, was not for her and he saw only the answering glance, the patient smile. She had not expected him to see more. She knew that she was quite safe from the divining look; otherwise, he would have known her secret long ago.
“I’m ready,” said she. But she did not lay down her bundle. She was not ready for her task, poor child. She quailed before it. She quailed so much that she feared to stir lest he should see that she had no command over her movements.
The man who watched without seeing wondered that she stood so still and spoke so briefly. But only for a moment. He thought he understood her hesitation, and a look of great earnestness replaced his former one of grave decision.
“I know that in doing this I am going beyond my sacred compact with Miss Challoner,” he said. “I never thought of illness,—at least, of illness on my part. I never dreamt that I, always so well, always so full of life, could know such feebleness as this, feebleness which is all of the body, Doris, leaving the mind free to dream and long. Talk of her, child. Tell me all over again just how she looked and spoke that day you saw her in New York.”
“Would it not be better for me to write my letter first? Papa will be coming soon and Truda can never cook your bird as you like it.”
Surprised now by something not quite natural in her manner, he caught at her hand and held her as she was moving away.
“You are tired,” said he. “I’ve wearied you with my commission and complaints. Forgive me, dear child, and—”
“You are mistaken,” she interrupted softly. “I am not tired; I only wished to do the important thing first. Shall I get my desk? Do you really wish me to write?”
“Yes,” said he, softly dropping her hand. “I wish you to write. It will ensure me good sleep, and sleep will make me strong. A few words, Doris; just a few words.”
She nodded; turning quickly away to hide her tears. His smile had gone to her very soul. It was always a beautiful one, his chief personal attraction, but at this moment it seemed to concentrate within it the unspoken fervours and the boundless expectations of a great love, and she who was the aim and cause of all this sweetness lay in unresponsive silence in a distant tomb!
But Doris’ own smile was not lacking in encouragement and beauty when she came back a few minutes later and sat down by his side to write. His melted before it, leaving his eyes very earnest as he watched her bending figure and the hard-worked little hand at its unaccustomed task.
“I must give her daily exercises,” he decided within himself. “That look of pain shows how difficult this work is for her. It must be made easy at any cost to my time. Such beauty calls for accomplishment. I must not neglect so plain a duty.”
Meantime, she was struggling to find words in face of that great Dread. She had written Dear Miss Challoner and was staring in horror at the soulless words. Only her sense of duty upheld her. Gladly would she have torn the sheet in two and rushed away. How could she add sentences to this hollow phrase, the mere employment of which seemed a sacrilege. Dear Miss Challoner. Oh, she was dear, but—
Unconsciously the young head drooped, and the pen slid from her hand.
“I cannot,” she murmured, “I cannot think what to say.”
“Shall I help you?” came softly from the bed. “I’ll try and not forget that it is Doris writing.”
“If you will be so good,” she answered, with renewed courage. “I can put the words down if you will only find them for me.”
“Write then. ‘Dear Miss Challoner!”
“I have already written that.”
“Why do you shudder?”
“I’m cold. I’ve been cold all day. But never mind that, Mr. Brotherson. Tell me how to begin my letter.”
“This way. ‘I’ve not been able to answer your kind letter, because I have had to play nurse for some three or four weeks to a very fretful and exacting patient.’ Have you written that?”
“No,” said Doris, bending over her desk till her curls fell in a tangle over her white cheeks. “I do not like to,” she protested at last, with an attempt at naivete which seemed real enough to him.
“Well, leave out the fretful if you must, but keep in the exacting. I have been exacting, you know.”
Silence, broken only by the scratching of the stubborn, illy-directed pen.
“It’s down,” she whispered. She said, afterward, that it was like writing with a ghost looking over one’s shoulder.
“Then add, ‘Mr. Brotherson has had a slight attack of fever, but he is getting well fast, and will soon—, Do I run on too quickly?”
“No, no, I can follow.”
“But not without losing breath; eh, Doris?”
As he laughed, she smiled. There was a heroism in that smile, Oswald Brotherson, of which you knew nothing.
“You might speak a little more slowly,” she admitted.
Quietly he repeated the last phrase. “‘But he is getting well fast and will soon be ready to take up the management of the Works which was given him just before he was taken ill.’ That will show her that I am working up,” he brightly remarked as Doris carefully penned the last word. “Of myself you need say nothing more, unless—” he paused and his face took on a wistful look which Doris dared not meet; “unless—but no, no, she must think it has been only a passing indisposition. If she knew I had been really ill, she would suffer, and perhaps act imprudently or suffer and not dare to act at all, which might be sadder for her still. Leave it where it is and begin about yourself. Write a good deal about yourself, so that she will see that you are not worried and that all is well with us here. Cannot you do that without assistance? Surely you can tell her about that last piece of embroidery you showed me. She will be glad to hear—why, Doris!”
“Oh, Mr. Brotherson,” the poor child burst out, “you must let me cry! I’m so glad to see you better and interested in all sorts of things. These are not tears of grief. I—I—but I’m forgetting what the doctor told me. You are growing excited, and I was to see that you were calm, always calm. I will take my desk away. I will write the rest in the other room, while you look at the magazines.”
“But bring your letter back for me to seal. I want to see it in its envelope. Oh, Doris, you are a good little girl!”
She shook her head, and hastened to hide herself from him in the other room; and it was a long time before she came back with the letter folded and in its envelope. When she did, her face was composed and her manner natural. She had quite made up her mind what her duty was and how she was going to perform it.
“Here is the letter,” said she, laying it in his outstretched hand. Then she turned her back. She knew, with a woman’s unerring instinct why he wished to handle it before it went. She felt that kiss he folded away in it, in every fibre of her aroused and sympathetic heart, but the hardest part of the ordeal was over and her eyes beamed softly when she turned again to take it from his hand and affix the stamp.
“You will mail it yourself?” he asked. “I should like to have you put it into the box with your own hand.”
“I will put it in to-night, after supper,” she promised him.
His smile of contentment assured her that this trial of her courage and self-control was not without one blessed result. He would rest for several days in the pleasure of what he had done or thought he had done. She need not cringe before that image of Dread for two, three days at least. Meanwhile, he would grow strong in body, and she, perhaps, in spirit. Only one precaution she must take. No hint of Mr. Challoner’s presence in town must reach him. He must be guarded from a knowledge of that fact as certainly as from the more serious one which lay behind it.
XXVIII. I HOPE NEVER TO SEE THAT MAN
That this would be a difficult thing to do, Doris was soon to realise. Mr. Challoner continued to pass the house twice a day and the time finally came when he ventured up the walk.
Doris was in the window and saw him coming. She slipped softly out and intercepted him before he had stepped upon the porch. She had caught up her hat as she passed through the hall, and was fitting it to her head as he looked up and saw her.
“Miss Scott?” he asked.
“Yes, Mr. Challoner.”
“You know me?” he went on, one foot on the step and one still on the walk.
Before replying she closed the door behind her. Then as she noted his surprise she carefully explained:
“Mr. Brotherson, our boarder, is just recovering from typhoid. He is still weak and acutely susceptible to the least noise. I was afraid that our voices might disturb him. Do you mind walking a little way up the road? That is, if your visit was intended for me.”
Her flush, the beauty which must have struck even him, but more than all else her youth, seemed to reconcile him to this unconventional request. Bowing, he took his foot from the step, saying, as she joined him:
“Yes, you are the one I wanted to see; that is, to-day. Later, I hope to have the privilege of a conversation with Mr. Brotherson.”
She gave him one quick look, trembling so that he offered her his arm with a fatherly air.
“I see that you understand my errand here,” he proceeded, with a grave smile, meant as she knew for her encouragement. “I am glad, because we can go at once to the point. Miss Scott,” he continued in a voice from which he no longer strove to keep back the evidences of deep feeling, “I have the strongest interest in your patient that one man can have in another, where there is no personal acquaintanceship. You who have every reason to understand my reasons for this, will accept the statement, I hope, as frankly as it is made.”
She nodded. Her eyes were full of tears, but she did not hesitate to raise them. She had the greatest desire to see the face of the man who could speak like this to-day, and yet of whose pride and sense of superiority his daughter had stood in such awe, that she had laid a seal upon the impulses of her heart, and imposed such tasks and weary waiting upon her lover. Doris forgot, in meeting his softened glance and tender, almost wistful, expression, the changes which can be made by a great grief, and only wondered why her sweet benefactress had not taken him into her confidence and thus, possibly, averted the doom which Doris felt had in some way grown out of this secrecy.
“Why should she have feared the disapproval of this man?” she inwardly queried, as she cast him a confiding look which pleased him greatly, as his tone now showed.
“When I lost my daughter, I lost everything,” he declared, as they walked slowly up the road. “Nothing excites my interest, save that which once excited hers. I am told that the deepest interest of her life lay here. I am also told that it was an interest quite worthy of her. I expect to find it so. I hope with all my heart to find it so, and that is why I have come to this town and expect to linger till Mr. Brotherson has recovered sufficiently to see me. I hope that this will be agreeable to him. I hope that I am not presuming too much in cherishing these expectations.”
Doris turned her candid eyes upon him.
“I cannot tell; I do not know,” said she. “Nobody knows, not even the doctor, what effect the news we so dread to give him will have upon Mr. Brotherson. You will have to wait—we all shall have to wait the results of that revelation. It cannot be kept from him much longer. When I return, I shall shrink from his first look, in the fear of seeing it betray this dreadful knowledge. Yet I have a faithful woman there to keep every one out of his room.”
“You have had much to carry for one so young,” was Mr. Challoner’s sympathetic remark. “You must let me help you when that awful moment comes. I am at the hotel and shall stay there till Mr. Brotherson is pronounced quite well. I have no other duty now in life but to sustain him through his trouble and then, with what aid he can give, search out and find the cause of my daughter’s death which I will never admit without the fullest proof, to have been one of suicide.”
Doris trembled.
“It was not suicide,” she declared, vehemently. “I have always felt sure that it was not; but to-day I KNOW.”
Her hand fell clenched on her breast and her eyes gleamed strangely. Mr. Challoner was himself greatly startled. What had happened—what could have happened since yesterday that she should emphasise that now?
“I’ve not told any one,” she went on, as he stopped short in the road, in his anxiety to understand her. “But I will tell you. Only, not here, not with all these people driving past; most of whom know me. Come to the house later—this evening, after Mr. Brotherson’s room is closed for the night. I have a little sitting-room on the other side of the hall where we can talk without being heard. Would you object to doing that? Am I asking too much of you?”
“No, not at all,” he assured her. “Expect me at eight. Will that be too early?”
“No, no. Oh, how those people stared! Let us hasten back or they may connect your name with what we want kept secret.”
He smiled at her fears, but gave in to her humour; he would see her soon again and possibly learn something which would amply repay him, both for his trouble and his patience.
But when evening came and she turned to face him in that little sitting-room where he had quietly followed her, he was conscious of a change in her manner which forbade these high hopes. The gleam was gone from her eyes; the tremulous eagerness from her mobile and sensitive mouth. She had been thinking in the hours which had passed, and had lost the confidence of that one impetuous moment. Her greeting betrayed embarrassment and she hesitated painfully before she spoke.
“I don’t know what you will think of me,” she ventured at last, motioning to a chair but not sitting herself. “You have had time to think over what I said and probably expect something real,—something you could tell people. But it isn’t like that. It’s a feeling—a belief. I’m so sure—”
“Sure of what, Miss Scott?”
She gave a glance at the door before stepping up nearer. He had not taken the chair she preferred.
“Sure that I have seen the face of the man who murdered her. It was in a dream,” she whisperingly completed, her great eyes misty with awe.
“A dream, Miss Scott?” He tried to hide his disappointment.
“Yes; I knew that it would sound foolish to you; it sounds foolish to me. But listen, sir. Listen to what I have to tell and then you can judge. I was very much agitated yesterday. I had to write a letter at Mr. Brotherson’s dictation—a letter to her. You can understand my horror and the effort I made to hide my emotion. I was quite unnerved. I could not sleep till morning, and then—and then—I saw—I hope I can describe it.”
Grasping at a near-by chair, she leaned on it for support, closing her eyes to all but that inner vision. A breathless moment followed, then she murmured in strained monotonous tones:
“I see it again—just as I saw it in the early morning—but even more plainly, if that is possible. A hall—(I should call it a hall, though I don’t remember seeing any place like it before), with a little staircase at the side, up which there comes a man, who stops just at the top and looks intently my way. There is fierceness in his face—a look which means no good to anybody—and as his hand goes to his overcoat pocket, drawing out something which I cannot describe, but which he handles as if it were a pistol, I feel a horrible fear, and—and—” The child was staggering, and the hand which was free had sought her heart where it lay clenched, the knuckles showing white in the dim light.
Mr. Challoner watched her with dilated eyes, the spell under which she spoke falling in some degree upon him. Had she finished? Was this all? No; she is speaking again, but very low, almost in a whisper.
“There is music—a crash—but I plainly see his other hand approach the object he is holding. He takes something from the end—the object is pointed my way—I am looking into—into—what? I do not know. I cannot even see him now. The space where he stood is empty. Everything fades, and I wake with a loud cry in my ears and a sense of death here.” She had lifted her hand and struck at her heart, opening her eyes as she did so. “Yet it was not I who had been shot,” she added softly.
Mr. Challoner shuddered. This was like the reopening of his daughter’s grave. But he had entered upon the scene with a full appreciation of the ordeal awaiting him and he did not lose his calmness, or the control of his judgment.
“Be seated, Miss Scott,” he entreated, taking a chair himself. “You have described the spot and some of the circumstances of my daughter’s death as accurately as if you had been there. But you have doubtless read a full account of those details in the papers; possibly seen pictures which would make the place quite real to you. The mind is a strange storehouse. We do not always know what lies hidden within it.”
“That’s true,” she admitted. “But the man! I had never seen the man, or any picture of him, and his face was clearest of all. I should know it if I saw it anywhere. It is imprinted on my memory as plainly as yours. Oh, I hope never to see that man!”
Mr. Challoner sighed; he had really anticipated something from the interview. The disappointment was keen. A moment of expectation; the thrill which comes to us all under the shadow of the supernatural, and then—this! a young and imaginative girl’s dream, convincing to herself but supplying nothing which had not already been supplied both by the facts and his own imagination! A man had stood at the staircase, and this man had raised his arm. She said that she had seen something like a pistol in his hand, but his daughter had not been shot. This he thought it well to point out to her.
Leaning toward her that he might get her full attention, he waited till her eyes met his, then quietly asked:
“Have you ever named this man to yourself?”
She started and dropped her eyes.
“I do not dare to,” said she.
“Why?”
“Because I’ve read in the papers that the man who stood there had the same name as—”
“Tell me, Miss Scott.”
“As Mr. Brotherson’s brother.”
“But you do not think it was his brother?”
“I do not know.”
“You’ve never seen his brother?”
“Never.”
“Nor his picture?”
“No, Mr. Brotherson has none.”
“Aren’t they friends? Does he never mention Orlando?”
“Very, very rarely. But I’ve no reason to think they are not on good terms. I know they correspond.”
“Miss Scott?”
“Yes, Mr. Challoner.”
“You must not rely too much upon your dream.”
Her eyes flashed to his and then fell again.
“Dreams are not revelations; they are the reproduction of what already lies hidden in the mind. I can prove that your dream is such.”
“How?” She looked startled.
“You speak of seeing something being leveled at you which made you think of a pistol.”
“Yes, I was looking directly into it.”
“But my daughter was not shot. She died from a stab.”
Doris’ lovely face, with its tender lines and girlish curves, took on a strange look of conviction which deepened, rather than melted under his indulgent, but penetrating gaze.
“I know that you think so;—but my dream says no. I saw this object. It was pointed directly towards me—above all, I saw his face. It was the face of one whose finger is on the trigger and who means death; and I believe my dream.”
Well, it was useless to reason further. Gentle in all else, she was immovable so far as this idea was concerned and, seeing this, he let the matter go and prepared to take his leave.
She seemed to be quite ready for this. Anxiety about her patient had regained its place in her mind and her glance sped constantly toward the door. Taking her hand in his, he said some kind words, then crossed to the door and opened it. Instantly her finger flew to her lips and, obedient to its silent injunction, he took up his hat in silence, and was proceeding down the hall, when the bell rang, startling them both and causing him to step quickly back.
“Who is it?” she asked. “Father’s in and visitors seldom come so late.”
“Shall I see?”
She nodded, looking strangely troubled as the door swung open, revealing the tall, strong figure of a man facing them from the porch.
“A stranger,” formed itself upon her lips, and she was moving forward, when the man suddenly stepped into the glare of the light, and she stopped, with a murmur of dismay which pierced Mr. Challoner’s heart and prepared him for the words which now fell shudderingly from her lips:
“It is he! it is he! I said that I should know him wherever I saw him.” Then with a quiet turn towards the intruder, “Oh, why, why, did you come here!”
XXIX. DO YOU KNOW MY BROTHER
Her hands were thrust out to repel, her features were fixed; her beauty something wonderful. Orlando Brotherson, thus met, stared for a moment at the vision before him, then slowly and with effort withdrawing his gaze, he sought the face of Mr. Challoner with the first sign of open disturbance that gentleman had ever seen in him.
“Ah,” said he, “my welcome is readily understood. I see you far from home, sir.” And with an ironical bow he turned again to Doris, who had dropped her hands, but in whose cheeks the pallor still lingered in a way to check the easy flow of words with which he might have sought to carry off the situation. “Am I in Oswald Brotherson’s house?” he asked. “I was directed here. But possibly there may be some mistake.”
“It is here he lives,” said she; moving back automatically till she stood again by the threshold of the small room in which she had received Mr. Challoner. “Do you wish to see him to-night? If so, I fear it is impossible. He has been very ill and is not allowed to receive visits from strangers.”
“I am not a stranger,” announced the newcomer, with a smile few could see unmoved, it offered such a contrast to his stern and dominating figure. “I thought I heard some words of recognition which would prove your knowledge of that fact.”
She did not answer. Her lips had parted, but her thought or at least the expression of her thought hung suspended in the terror of this meeting for which she was not at all prepared. He seemed to note this terror, whether or not he understood its cause, and smiled again, as he added:
“Mr. Brotherson must have spoken of his brother Orlando. I am he, Miss Scott. Will you let me come in now?”
Her eyes sought those of Mr. Challoner, who quietly nodded. Immediately she stepped from before the door which her figure had guarded and, motioning him to enter, she begged Mr. Challoner, with an imploring look, to sustain her in the interview she saw before her. He had no desire for this encounter, especially as Mr. Brotherson’s glance in his direction had been anything but conciliatory. He was quite convinced that nothing was to be gained by it, but he could not resist her appeal, and followed them into the little room whose limited dimensions made the tall Orlando look bigger and stronger and more lordly in his self-confidence than ever.
“I am sorry it is so late,” she began, contemplating his intrusive figure with forced composure. “We have to be very quiet in the evenings so as not to disturb your brother’s first sleep which is of great importance to him.”
“Then I’m not to see him to-night?”
“I pray you to wait. He’s—he’s been a very sick man.”
“Dangerously so?”
“Yes.”
Orlando continued to regard her with a peculiar awakening gaze, showing, Mr. Challoner thought, more interest in her than in his brother, and when he spoke it was mechanically and as if in sole obedience to the proprieties of the occasion.
“I did not know he was ill till very lately. His last letter was a cheerful one, and I supposed that all was right till chance revealed the truth. I came on at once. I was intending to come anyway. I have business here, as you probably know, Miss Scott.”
She shook her head. “I know very little about business,” said she.
“My brother has not told you why he expected me?”
“He has not even told me that he expected you.”
“No?” The word was highly expressive; there was surprise in it and a touch of wonder, but more than all, satisfaction. “Oswald was always close-mouthed,” he declared. “It’s a good fault; I’m obliged to the boy.”
These last words were uttered with a lightness which imposed upon his two highly agitated hearers, causing Mr. Challoner to frown and Doris to shrink back in indignation at the man who could indulge in a sportive suggestion in presence of such fears, if not of such memories, as the situation evoked. But to one who knew the strong and self-contained man—to Sweetwater possibly, had he been present,—there was in this very attempt—in his quiet manner and in the strange and fitful flash of his ordinarily quick eye, that which showed he was labouring—and had been labouring almost from his first entrance, under an excitement of thought and feeling which in one of his powerfully organised nature must end and that soon in an outburst of mysterious passion which would carry everything before it. But he did not mean that it should happen here. He was too accustomed to self-command to forget himself in this presence. He would hold these rampant dogs in leash till the hour of solitude; then—a glittering smile twisted his lips as he continued to gaze, first at the girl who had just entered his life, and then at the man he had every reason to distrust, and with that firm restraint upon himself still in full force, remarked, with a courteous inclination:
“The hour is late for further conversation. I have a room at the hotel and will return to it at once. In the morning I hope to see my brother.”
He was going, Doris not knowing what to say, Mr. Challoner not desirous of detaining him, when there came the sound of a little tinkle from the other side of the hall, blanching the young girl’s cheeks and causing Orlando Brotherson’s brows to rise in peculiar satisfaction.
“My brother?” he asked.
“Yes,” came in faltering reply. “He has heard our voices; I must go to him.”
“Say that Orlando wishes him a good night,” smiled her heart’s enemy, with a bow of infinite grace.
She shuddered, and was hastening from the room when her glance fell on Mr. Challoner. He was pale and looked greatly disturbed. The prospect of being left alone with a man whom she had herself denounced to him as his daughter’s murderer, might prove a tax to his strength to which she had no right to subject him. Pausing with an appealing air, she made him a slight gesture which he at once understood.
“I will accompany you into the hall,” said he. “Then if anything is wrong, you have but to speak my name.”
But Orlando Brotherson, displeased by this move, took a step which brought him between the two.
“You can hear her from here if she chooses to speak. There’s a point to be settled between us before either of us leaves this house, and this opportunity is as good as another. Go to my brother, Miss Scott; we will await your return.”
A flash from the proud banker’s eye; but no demur, rather a gesture of consent. Doris, with a look of deep anxiety, sped away, and the two men stood face to face.
It was one of those moments which men recognise as memorable. What had the one to say or the other to hear, worthy of this preamble and the more than doubtful relation in which they stood each to each? Mr. Challoner had more time than he expected in which to wonder and gird himself for whatever suffering or shock awaited him. For, Orlando Brotherson, unlike his usual self, kept him waiting while he collected his own wits, which, strange to say, seemed to have vanished with the girl.
But the question finally came.
“Mr. Challoner, do you know my brother?”
“I have never seen him.”
“Do you know him? Does he know you?”
“Not at all. We are strangers.”
It was said honestly. They did not know each other. Mr. Challoner was quite correct in his statement.
But the other had his doubts. Why shouldn’t he have? The coincidence of finding this mourner if not avenger of Edith Challoner, in his own direct radius again, at a spot so distant, so obscure and so disconnected with any apparent business reason, was certainly startling enough unless the tie could be found in his brother’s name and close relationship to himself.
He, therefore, allowed himself to press the question:
“Men sometimes correspond who do not know each other. You knew that a Brotherson lived here?”
“Yes.”
“And hoped to learn something about me?”
“No; my interest was solely with your brother.”
“With my brother? With Oswald? What interest can you have in him apart from me? Oswald is—”
Suddenly a thought came—an unimaginable one; one with power to blanch even his hardy cheek and shake a soul unassailable by all small emotions.
“Oswald Brotherson!” he repeated; adding in unintelligible tones to himself—“O. B. The same initials! They are following up these initials. Poor Oswald.” Then aloud: “It hardly becomes me, perhaps, to question your motives in this attempt at making my brother’s acquaintance. I think I can guess them; but your labour will be wasted. Oswald’s interests do not extend beyond this town; they hardly extend to me. We are strangers, almost. You will learn nothing from him on the subject which naturally engrosses you.”
Mr. Challoner simply bowed. “I do not feel called upon,” said he, “to explain my reasons for wishing to know your brother. I will simply satisfy you upon a point which may well rouse your curiosity. You remember that—that my daughter’s last act was the writing of a letter to a little protegee of hers. Miss Scott was that protegee. In seeking her, I came upon him. Do you require me to say more on this subject? Wait till I have seen Mr. Oswald Brotherson and then perhaps I can do so.”
Receiving no answer to this, Mr. Challoner turned again to the man who was the object of his deepest suspicions, to find him still in the daze of that unimaginable thought, battling with it, scoffing at it, succumbing to it and all without a word. Mr. Challoner was without clew to this struggle, but the might of it and the mystery of it, drove him in extreme agitation from the room. Though proof was lacking, though proof might never come, nothing could ever alter his belief from this moment on that Doris was right in her estimate of this man’s guilt, however unsubstantial her reasoning might appear.
How far he might have been carried by this new conviction; whether he would have left the house without seeing Doris again or exchanging another word with the man whose very presence stifled him, he had no opportunity to show, for before he had taken another step, he encountered the hurrying figure of Doris, who was returning to her guests with an air of marked relief.
“He does not know that you are here,” she whispered to Mr. Challoner, as she passed him. Then, as she again confronted Orlando who hastened to dismiss his trouble at her approach, she said quite gaily, “Mr. Brotherson heard your voice, and is glad to know that you’re here. He bade me give you this key and say that you would have found things in better shape if he had been in condition to superintend the removal of the boxes to the place he had prepared for you before he became ill. I was the one to do that,” she added, controlling her aversion with manifest effort. “When Mr. Brotherson came to himself he asked if I had heard about any large boxes having arrived at the station shipped to his name. I said that several notices of such had come to the house. At which he requested me to see that they were carried at once to the strange looking shed he had had put up for him in the woods. I thought that they were for him, and I saw to the thing myself. Two or three others have come since and been taken to the same place. I think you will find nothing broken or disturbed; Mr. Brotherson’s wishes are usually respected.”
“That is fortunate for me,” was the courteous reply.
But Orlando Brotherson was not himself, not at all himself as he bowed a formal adieu and withdrew past the drawn-up sentinel-like figure of Mr. Challoner, without a motion on his part or on the part of that gentleman to lighten an exit which had something in it of doom and dread presage.