The Greatest Works of Anna Katharine Green. Анна Грин
it deeper in the shawl she wore wrapped about her shoulders. Listening a minute, I thought I heard her mutter: “Twenty-eight, ten, but no more. I can count no more. Go away!”
But I’m nothing if not persistent. Feeling for her hands, which were hidden away somewhere under her shawl, I touched them with the coin and cried again:
“This and more for a small piece of work to-night. Come, you are strong; earn it.”
“What kind of work is it?” I asked innocently, or it must have appeared innocently, of Mr. Knollys, who was standing at my back.
He frowned, all the black devils in his heart coming into his look at once.
“How do I know! Ask Loreen; she’s the one who sent me. I don’t take account of what goes on in the kitchen.”
I begged his pardon, somewhat sarcastically I own, and made another attempt to attract the attention of the old crone, who had remained perfectly callous to my allurements.
“I thought you liked money,” I said. “For Lizzie, you know, for Lizzie.”
But she only muttered in lower and lower gutturals, “I can count no more”; and, disgusted at my failure, being one who accounts failure as little short of disgrace, I drew back and made my way toward the door, saying: “She’s in a different mood from what she was yesterday when she snatched a quarter from me at the first intimation it was hers. I don’t think you can get her to do any work to-night. Innocents take these freaks. Isn’t there some one else you can call in?”
The scowl that disfigured his none too handsome features was a fitting prelude to his words.
“You talk,” said he, “as if we had the whole village at our command. How did you succeed with the locksmith yesterday? Came, didn’t he? Well, that’s what we have to expect whenever we want any help.”
Whirling on his heel, he led the way out of the hut, whither I would have immediately followed him if I had not stopped to take another look at the room, which struck me, even upon a second scrutiny, as one of the best ordered and best kept I had ever entered. Even the strings and strings of dried fruits and vegetables, which hung in festoons from every beam of the roof, were free from dust and cobwebs, and though the dishes were few and the pans scarce, they were bright and speckless, giving to the shelf along which they were ranged a semblance of ornament.
“Wise enough to keep her house in order,” thought I, and actually found it hard to leave, so attractive to my eyes are absolute neatness and order.
William was pushing at his own gate when I joined him. He looked as if he wished I had spent the morning with Mother Jane, and was barely civil in our walk up to the house. I was not, therefore, surprised when he burst into a volley of oaths at the doorway and turned upon me almost as if he would forbid me the house, for tap, tap, tap, from some distant quarter came a distinct sound like that of nails being driven into a plank.
Chapter XXII.
The Third Night
Mother Jane must have changed her mind after we left her. For late in the evening I caught a glimpse of her burly figure in the kitchen as I went to give Hannah some instructions concerning certain little changes in the housekeeping arrangements which the girls and I had agreed were necessary to our mutual comfort.
I wished to address the old crone, but warned, by the ill-concealed defiance with which Hannah met my advances, that any such attempt on my part would be met by anything but her accustomed good-nature, I refrained from showing my interest in her strange visitor, or from even appearing conscious of her own secret anxieties and evident preoccupation.
Loreen and Lucetta exchanged a meaning look as I rejoined them in the sitting-room; but my volubility in regard to the domestic affair which had just taken me to the kitchen seemed to speedily reassure them, and when a few minutes later I said good-night and prepared to leave the room, it was with the conviction that I had relieved their mind at the expense of my own. Mother Jane in the kitchen at this late hour meant business. What that business was, I seemed to know only too well.
I had formed a plan for the night which required some courage. Recalling Lucetta’s expression of the morning, that I might expect a repetition of the former night’s experiences, I prepared to profit by the warning in a way she little meant. Satisfied that if there was any truth in the suspicions I had formed, there would be an act performed in this house to-night which, if seen by me, would forever settle the question agitating the whole countryside, I made up my mind that no locked door should interfere with my opportunity of doing so. How I effected this result I will presently relate.
Lucetta had accompanied me to my door with a lighted candle.
“I hear you had some trouble with matches last night,” said she. “You will find them all right now. Hannah must be blamed for some of this carelessness.” Then as I began some reassuring reply, she turned upon me with a look that was almost fond, and, throwing out her arms, cried entreatingly: “Won’t you give me a little kiss, Miss Butterworth? We have not given you the best of welcomes, but you are my mother’s old friend, and sometimes I feel a little lonely.”
I could easily believe that, and yet I found it hard to embrace her. Too many shadows swam between Althea’s children and myself. She saw my hesitancy (a hesitancy I could not but have shown even at the risk of losing her confidence), and, paling slightly, dropped her hands with a pitiful smile.
“You don’t like me,” she said. “I do not wonder, but I was in hopes you would for my mother’s sake. I have no claims myself.”
“You are an interesting girl, and you have, what your mother had not, a serious side to your nature that is anything but displeasing to me. But my kisses, Lucetta, are as rare as my tears. I had rather give you good advice, and that is a fact. Perhaps it is as strong a proof of affection as any ordinary caress would be.”
“Perhaps,” she assented, but she did not encourage me to give it to her notwithstanding. Instead of that, she drew back and bade me a gentle good-night, which for some reason made me sadder than I wished to be at a crisis demanding so much nerve. Then she walked quickly away, and I was left to face the night alone.
Knowing that I should be rather weakened than helped by the omission of any of the little acts of preparation with which I am accustomed to calm my spirits for the night, I went through them all, with just as much precision as if I had expected to spend the ensuing hours in rest. When all was done and only my cup of tea remained to be quaffed, I had a little struggle with myself, which ended in my not drinking it at all. Nothing, not even this comfortable solace for an unsatisfactory day, should stand in the way of my being the complete mistress of my wits this night. Had I known that this tea contained a soporific in the shape of a little harmless morphine, I would have found this act of self-denial much easier.
It was now eleven. Confident that nothing would be done while my light was burning, I blew it out, and, taking a candle and some matches in my hand, softly opened my door and, after a moment of intense listening, stepped out and closed it carefully behind me. Nothing could be stiller than the house or darker than the corridor.
“Am I watched or am I not watched?” I queried, and for an instant stood undecided. Then, seeing nothing and hearing nothing, I slipped down the hall to the door beyond mine and, opening it with all the care possible, stepped inside.
I knew the room. I had taken especial note of it in my visit of the morning. I knew that it was nearly empty and that there was a key in the lock which I could turn. I therefore felt more or less safe in it, especially as its window was undarkened by the branches that hung so thickly across my own casement, shutting me in, or seeming to shut me in, from all communication with the outside world and the unknown guardian which I had been assured constantly attended my summons.
That I might strengthen my spirits by one glimpse of this same outside world,