Uncanny Tales Part 11

I threw off what I believed to be my ridiculous mistrust, and it was not difficult to do so in my extreme annoyance.

"I cannot understand it," I said. "It is really too bad. Everything depends upon 7 and 13. I must telegraph at once for inquiries to be inst.i.tuted at the post-office."

"But your people must have duplicates," said f.a.gg eagerly. "These can be forwarded at once."

"I hope so," I said, though feeling strangely confused and worried.

"They must send them direct _here_," he went on.

I did not at once answer. I was gathering my papers together.

"And in the meantime," he proceeded, touching my bag, "you had better leave _these_ here. We will lock them up in the safe at once. It is better than carrying them about London."

It certainly seemed so. I half laid down the bag on the table, but at that moment from the outer room a most peculiar sound caught my ears--a faint cackling cough! I _think_ I concealed my start. I turned away as if considering f.a.gg's suggestion, which, to confess the truth, I had been on the very point of agreeing to. For it would have been a great relief to me to know that the papers were in safe custody. But now a flash of lurid light seemed to have transformed everything.

"I thank you," I replied. "I should be glad to be free from the responsibility of the charge, but I dare not let these out of my own hands till the agreement is formally signed."

The younger man's face darkened. He a.s.sumed a bullying tone.

"I don't know how it strikes _you_, Mr. Bluestone," he said, "but it seems to me that this young gentleman is going rather too far. Do you think your employers will be pleased to hear of your insulting us, sir?"

But the elder man smiled condescendingly, though with a touch of superciliousness. It was very well done. He waved his hand.

"Stay, my dear Mr. f.a.gg; we can well afford to make allowance. You will telegraph at once, no doubt, Herr Schmidt, and--let me see--yes, we shall receive the duplicates of Nos. 7 and 13 by first post on Thursday morning."

I bowed.

"Exactly," I replied, as I lifted the now locked bag. "And you may expect me at the same hour on Thursday morning."

Then I took my departure, accompanied to the door by the urbane individual who had received me.

The telegram which I at once despatched was not couched precisely as he would have dictated, I allow. And he would have been considerably surprised at my sending off another, later in the day, to Bluestone & f.a.gg's telegraphic address, in these words:---

"Unavoidably detained till Thursday morning.--SCHMIDT."

This was _after_ the arrival of a wire from home in answer to mine.

By Thursday morning I had had time to receive a letter from Herr Wilhelm, and to secure the services of a certain noted detective, accompanied by whom I presented myself at the appointed hour at 909. But my companion's services were not required. The birds had flown, warned by the same traitor in our camp through whom the first hints of the new patent had leaked out. With him it was easy to deal, poor wretch! but the clever rogues who had employed him and personated the members of the honourable firm of Bluestone & f.a.gg were never traced.

The negotiation was successfully carried out. The experience I had gone through left me a wiser man. It is to be hoped, too, that the owners of 909 Blackfriars Street were more cautious in the future as to whom they let their premises to when temporarily vacant. The re-painting of the doorway, etc., at the tenant's own expense had already roused some slight suspicion.

It is needless to add that Nos. 7 and 13 had been duly received on the second-floor.

I have never known the true history of that extraordinary night. Was it all a dream, or a prophetic vision of warning? Or was it in any sense true? _Had_ I, in some inexplicable way, left my own town earlier than I intended, and really travelled in a slow train?

Or had the man with a cough, for his own nefarious purposes, mesmerised or hypnotised me, and to some extent succeeded?

I cannot say. Sometimes, even, I ask myself if I am quite sure that there ever was such a person as "the man with the cough"!

"HALF-WAY BETWEEN THE STILES."

(A RIGHT-OF-WAY INCIDENT.)

By the road, Scarby village is good three miles from Colletwood, the nearest town and railway station. But there is a short cut over the hills for foot pa.s.sengers. _Over_ the hills they call it, but _between_ the hills would be more correct, for there is a sort of tableland once you have climbed a short, steep bit up from the town, which extends nearly to Scarby, sloping gradually down to the village.

And on each side of this tableland the hills rise again, north and south, much higher to the north than to the south. So this flat stretch, though at some considerable height, is neither bleak nor exposed, being sheltered on the colder side, and fairly open to the sunshine south and west.

It is a pleasant place, and so it must have been considered in the old days; for a large monastery stood there once, of which the ruins are still to be seen, and of which the memory is still preserved in the name--"Monksholdings".

Pleasant, but a trifle inconvenient, as the only carriage-road makes a great round from Colletwood, winding along the base of the hill on the north side till it reaches the village, then up again by the gradual slope, half a mile or so--a drive in all of three to four miles, whereas, as the bird flies or the pedestrian walks, the distance from the town is barely a quarter of that.

In the old days there was probably no road at all, the hill-path doubtless serving all requirements. Naturally enough, therefore, it came to be looked upon as entirely public property, and people forgot--if, indeed, any one had ever thought of it--that though the monastery was a ruin, the once carefully kept land round about the old dwelling-place of Monksholdings was still private property.

And the sensation was great when suddenly the news reached the neighbourhood that this "unique estate," as the agents called it, was sold--sold by the old Duke of Scarshire, who scarcely remembered that he owned it, to a man who meant to live on it, to build a house which should be a home for several months of the year for himself and his family.

There was considerable growling and grumbling; and this rose to its height when a rumour got about that the hill-path--such part of it, that is to say, as lay within the actual demesne--was to be closed--_must_ be closed, if the site already chosen for the new house was to be retained; for the house would actually stand upon the old foot-track, and there could be no two opinions that this position had been well and wisely selected.

Things grew warlike, boding no agreeable reception for the newcomers--a Mr. Raynald and his family, newcomers to England, it was said, as well as to Scarshire. Every one plunged into questions of right-of-way; the local legalities raised and discussed knotty points; Colletwood and Scarby were aflame. But it all ended, flatly enough, in a compromise!

Mr. Raynald turned out to be one of the most reasonable and courteous of men. He came, saw, and--conquered. The goodwill of his future neighbours was won e'er he knew he had risked its loss. Henceforward congratulations, reciprocated and repeated, on the charming additions to Scarby society were the order of the day, and the _detour_, skirting the south boundary of the Monksholdings grounds, which the footpath was now inveigled into making, was voted "a great improvement".

And in due time the mansion rose.

"A great improvement" also, to the aspect of the surrounding landscape.

It was in perfectly good taste--unpretentious and quietly picturesque.

It might have been there always for any jarring protest to the contrary.

And just half-way along the old foot-track, that is to say, between the two stiles which let the traveller to or from Scarby in or out of the Monksholdings demesne, stood Sybil Raynald's grand piano!

The stiles remained as an interesting survival; but they were made use of by no one not bound for the house itself. And beside each was a gate--a good oaken gate, that suited the place, as did everything about it; and beside each gate a quaint miniature dwelling, one of which came to be known as the east, and the other as the west, Monksholdings lodge.

The first time the Raynalds came down to their new home they made but a short stay there. It was already late in the season, and though the preceding summer had been a magnificent one for drying fresh walls and plaster, it would scarcely have done to risk damp or chilly weather in so recently-built a house.

They stayed long enough to confirm the favourable impression the head of the family had already made, and to lead themselves to look forward with pleasure to a less curtailed stay in Scarshire.

The last morning of their visit, Sybil, the eldest daughter, up and about betimes, turned to her father, when she had taken her place beside him at the breakfast-table, with a suspicion of annoyance on her usually cheerful face.

"Papa," she said, "I have seen that old man _again_, leaning on the stile by the Scarby lodge and looking in--along the drive--_so_ queerly.

I don't quite like it. It gave me rather a ghosty feeling; or else he is out of his mind."

Her brother, Mark by name, began to laugh, after the manner of brothers.

"How very oddly you express yourself!" he said. "I should like to experience 'a ghosty feeling'. A ghost is just what this place wants to make it perfect. But it should be the spirit of one of the original monks."