Man with the Dark Beard (9 page)

The boy turned his head restlessly about.

“I don't see why Hilary shouldn't marry Wilton at once. Then he could keep on the practice and I could live with them,” he said sulkily.

He was lying on his invalid couch in his favourite window looking out on the street. Sir Felix Skrine had been explaining to him the necessity for selling the house and the practice. For the purchase money would add considerably to the income of Hilary and her crippled brother.

Sir Felix had a worried look and there were two little vertical lines between his brows that were quite new, as he looked at Fee's discontented face.

“My dear Fee, I hardly know what to say,” he said gently. “Wilton has no money to buy the practice. And his engagement to Hilary, which you speak of as a recognized fact, was forbidden by your father, who dismissed Wilton on this very ground.”

“Dad would have come round,” said Fee positively. “He might be a bit cross at first, but he always let us do as we liked in the end. Dad would never –”

His voice broke and he drew out a rather grubby handkerchief and blew his nose vigorously.

“I am very sorry, Fee, but don't you see I am bound to respect the wishes he had plainly expressed? I cannot make up my mind that he would have changed his, and act accordingly.”

Skrine laid his hand sympathetically on the boy's shoulder.

Fee responded by pulling himself as far out of reach as the narrow confines of his couch would allow.

“And once the change from Park Road is made I feel sure you will be both healthier and happier,” Sir Felix went on. “You know that I have a house in Warwickshire, in a lovely part of the country. Scenery and air are alike delightful. Well, there is quite a good-sized cottage just outside my gates. It is empty and it has a nice garden. I am having both house and garden put in order and I feel that you and Hilary will be happy there.”

“I am sure I shan't!” Fee returned obstinately. “I hate the country.”

“I quite agree with you, Fee,” Miss Lavinia interposed, entering the room. “You and I are regular town mice. I should have thought you were too, Sir Felix. What are you doing – advocating these children living in the country?”

“Only for a time,” Sir Felix said easily, explaining the whereabouts of his cottage.

Miss Lavinia nodded her head with a certain amount of approval when he had finished.

“Well, it does not sound exciting. But the country is healthy, though as a rule it is as dull as ditch-water,” she conceded. “Yes, I think your cottage might do, Sir Felix. I will take Hilary down for a run to see it. Then, I shall just stay to settle them in, and be off to Algiers. I have had quite an exciting invitation from a friend of mine who got sick of trying to make both ends meet in England, went off to Algeria and married an Algerian or Turk or whatever they call the creatures. A Sheikh-like sort of person, you know. She has been ill lately, too much Sheikh, I suppose, and is craving to see a fellow countrywoman. It is an old-standing promise that I should pay her a visit some day; now she claims it. Most inconvenient, of course. But those old friends generally are. You say this cottage of yours is in Warwickshire, Sir Felix? About ten miles from anywhere, I suppose?”

“It is not so very far from Warwick,” Sir Felix said cheerfully. “And ten miles is nothing in these days of cars, you know, Miss Priestley.”

“It won't be much of a car that Hilary and Fee will be able to afford,” the lady rejoined.

“I always have a car down there, and it will be at their disposal,” Sir Felix rejoined easily. “The cottage is just outside the gates of my house, Heathcote, you know.”

Miss Lavinia pursed up her lips as though she intended to whistle.

“O–h! I see!” she ejaculated in a tone that spoke volumes.

Sir Felix smiled.

“I am seldom there nowadays. My work keeps me in town, of course. But I run down for a week-end when I can. My wife was very fond of Heathcote. It is really because of its association with her that I have kept it on. My first instinct was to get out of it as soon as possible; but I simply could not when I remembered how she loved it. Now I am very glad that I did not, for it enables me to offer the cottage to my dear friend's children.”

Miss Lavinia did not look particularly impressed.

“Well, as I said before, I will run down with Hilary and see what I think. I can get out of the Sheikh person if needs be. Lady Skrine did not die at Heathcote, did she?”

“No; she died in London – would come back when she began to be worse. She never believed in any doctor but John, you know. She is buried in Heathcote Churchyard, though. The loveliest churchyard in England, she always called it.”

“Hm! Well, I haven't any taste in churchyards myself,” concluded Miss Lavinia. “But I will let you know what I think of the place, Sir Felix.”

The K.C. felt himself dismissed. He did not look particularly pleased as he went across the hall to the surgery. Here he found Basil Wilton studying the case book with a puzzled frown. His face did not lighten as he glanced up.

“Good morning, Sir Felix!”

“Good morning!” the K.C. responded curtly. “I looked in to tell you that the practice is sold to a Dr. Rifton, who will not require you as assistant; so that, if you can make it convenient –”

“I shall be glad to get away as soon as possible,” Wilton said in tones as curt as Skrine's own. “I have something else in view.”

“I am glad to hear that,” Skrine rejoined coldly. “One word more, Mr. Wilton. I understand that Dr. Bastow forbade any engagement between you and his daughter; that in fact he dismissed you as soon as you broached the subject to him. For the next year, until she comes of age, I stand to Miss Bastow
in loco parentis
. And I am sure you will recognize that it will be my desire to respect her father's wishes in every way. Therefore, I must ask you not to attempt to see Miss Bastow while she is in my charge.”

Wilton drew in his lips and his grey eyes looked defiant, but he did not reply, and after a moment Skrine went out of the room with a barely perceptible nod.

The next day was fine and warm with the delicious freshness of the first days of early summer. Just the day for a trip into the country, Miss Lavinia decided, and she insisted on taking Hilary to see the cottage of which Sir Felix had spoken.

Hilary was rather inclined to sympathize with Fee's dislike to leaving London. But since her father's death she had been too apathetic to raise any very serious objection to anything.

She sat in her corner of the railway carriage without speaking, or looking at the illustrated papers with which she had been liberally supplied by Sir Felix Skrine.

Her aunt made a few tentative remarks and then, receiving but monosyllabic answers, drew out a pocket-book and occupied herself in making some apparently abstruse calculations therein. Heathcote was reached after a quick run. The village stood some distance from the station, but Skrine's car met the train and they were very soon at their destination.

As they passed the cottages in the village street Hilary began, for the first time, to show some interest in their errand.

“I wonder what our cottage will be like,” she said, gazing from the black and white raftered homesteads standing back in the fields to the cottages fringing the roadside, with their thatched roofs and gay little gardens in front, just now bright with purple lilac and golden laburnum, pink and white may, looking like gigantic rose-bushes, and pink flowering currants.

In the middle of the village the church stood on a hill, a little back from the street, its rustic lich-gate at the end of a slanting road.

Hilary looked at it wistfully. Her godfather was right.

“It is one of the prettiest churchyards I have ever seen. I wish Dad had been buried here instead of in that great London cemetery.”

“Don't suppose he would care twopence where he was buried,” Miss Lavinia remarked unsympathetically. “I am sure I don't. In fact I have no fancy for being buried at all if you come to that.”

Hilary ignored the interruption.

“I should like to see Lady Skrine's grave before we go back.”

As she spoke, the car stopped. The cottage was, apparently, surrounded by a high hedge concealing a brick wall from sight. The man got down and, unlocking the high wooden gate, held it open invitingly.

“I'm afraid Fee won't like this,” Hilary sighed softly, and passed in. “He is so fond of looking at the passers-by. Still,” brightening up, “the garden will be so good for him, and in the summer we shall be able to wheel his chair to the gate.”

“Yes, I am sorry for the boy, taken from all his interests. But I suppose it had to be and he will get used to it as everybody else has to.”

The garden was a tangle of colour. Flowering trees concealed the wall from sight; the lawn, deliciously green and fresh, was quite the right size for tennis or croquet, as Hilary remarked. There was a rustic porch covered with sweet- briar and red ramblers which presently would be a riot of brilliance. The cottage itself was a quaint, raftered, irregularly roofed little building.

The chauffeur had handed the key to Hilary. It turned with some difficulty as though it had not been used for some time. They stepped into a wide, low hall, evidently extending the whole width of the house, since, opposite to them there was a glass door opening on to the back garden. Skrine had told Hilary that the house was partly furnished, but its aspect was rather a surprise to her. Here, in the hall, there were a couple of old chests and an oak settle that would have made an antiquary's mouth water. 

On the high wooden mantelpiece there were tall brass candlesticks. The rugs before the fireplace were old and ragged, but Miss Lavinia calculated rapidly that, with the expenditure of a few pounds on cushions and curtains and a few rugs which could be brought from Park Road, a very charming and habitable lounge would be made.

Hilary opened the door nearest to the front. Then she gave a little gasp of amazement, for a little old woman who had been sitting by the window got up and came towards her. She was a pleasant-faced, robin-breasted little person, and she dropped a funny, old-fashioned curtsy as Hilary looked at her.

“Miss Bastow – I am Miller, Sir Felix's old nurse, miss. Sir Felix bade me be here to meet you and show you round, and do anything I could for you. I should have had the door open, but Sir Felix gave the key to the chauffeur and I had to come in at the back. I hope you will excuse me, miss. I have a bit of lunch ready in the dining-room, those being Sir Felix's orders.”

Miss Lavinia entered in time to catch the last sentence.

“Really now, I call that very sensible of Sir Felix,” she cried heartily. “I hate those snacks in the train – always seem to leave me more hungry than when I began. Where is this lunch?”

“This way, ma'am.”

Miller took them across the hall to a room looking on to the garden at the back. Here they found a dainty lunch awaiting them –a chicken, a delicious-looking salad, a slice of Stilton, a big dish of hothouse fruit, grapes and peaches, a bottle of Burgundy.

“Enough to make one's mouth water,” Miss Lavinia remarked as she took the chair opposite Hilary's. “Come, don't say you can't eat,” as Hilary made no attempt to take up her knife and fork.

“But indeed I can't,” Hilary said, leaning back in her chair. “I made a good lunch in the train, Aunt Lavinia, whatever you did.”

“Well, I have no scruples about a second when I can get it,” Miss Lavinia said, attacking the chicken. “This house has been empty for some time, I take it, Mrs. Miller?”

“Three months, ma'am. A Mrs. Dawson and her sister, Mrs. Clowes, lived here till Mrs. Dawson died, then Mrs. Clowes didn't care about living here alone. I did hear that she had gone abroad.”

“Sensible person!” commended Miss Lavinia between her mouthfuls. “How any sane person can live in England all the year round I don't know! What sort of society do you get here, Mrs. Miller? I hope Miss Bastow will be able to make some friends.”

Mrs. Miller looked a little dubious.

“Well, there is old Dr. Grafton, ma'am. He has a daughter, but she is married, so she is only here sometimes. Then there is the vicar; he is getting on in years and has to keep –”

“A curate,” finished Miss Lavinia with an air of triumph. “Well, that is better than nothing. What is he like, Mrs. Miller – the curate, I mean?”

Mrs. Miller hesitated. “Well, he is very bald-headed, ma'am, and wears spectacles. He keeps silkworms –”

“Good gracious! What for?”

“Well, I don't know, ma'am – I suppose as pets.”

“Pets! Why, even my archdeacon never got lower than cats. He sounds pretty deadly, but with a car one can get more variety than was possible in my young days,” concluded Miss Lavinia.

There was really little to be done in the house: the decorations were comparatively fresh, and the house itself and the furniture were alike pretty in a quaint, old-world fashion.

Miss Lavinia decided that Hilary and Fee would need to bring little down but their own personal belongings. They had finished their inspection a good half-hour before it was time to start back to the station, and Miss Lavinia raised no objection when Hilary suggested going across to the churchyard to look at Lady Skrine's grave.

The churchyard was, as Sir Felix had said, very beautiful.

Passing through the lich-gate, the churchyard slanted up to the church itself, an old Norman structure that had been used as a stronghold by Cromwell's soldiers, and still bore traces of their tenancy in the bare places on the roof, from which the lead had been stripped to make bullets, the rusty hooks that had been driven into the old walls, to which the impious soldiers had tethered their horses, and the great stone on which tradition said they had sharpened their swords.

Lady Skrine's tomb was on the west side. A tall white cross was inscribed: