by Annie Haynes
She smiled as she saw his expression. “I feel that I must apologize to you for being myself,” she said as she sat down in a low chair by the fire. “But Rosamond has asked me to talk to you, Sir Oswald, to explain.”
Sir Oswald stirred restlessly.
“It seems to me that we have had enough explanations. I don’t want them, but I did want Elizabeth.”
“But I am sure you will not refuse to hear what she wishes you to know?” Lady Treadstone returned with a quiet air of dignity.
She made a very gracious and pleasant picture as she sat there, the silk folds of her gown falling round her, priceless old lace shrouding her neck and wrists, the firelight shining on the jewels in her hair, gleaming round her throat and arms. But there was sadness in her smile and in the glance of her eyes.
“First she sends you a message,” she went on slowly. “She bade me tell you that though you surprised the secret of her love from her this afternoon, you must forget it and her.”
“Forget it and her!” Sir Oswald repeated incredulously. His dark face looked haggard as he leaned forward, his eyes were restless and eager.
“Tell her that I shall think of it and her every moment of my life,” he said passionately. “What does she take me for? That she thinks I can forget at a word.”
“She thinks you are her very true and loyal friend,” said Lady Treadstone softly. “For anything else”—she spread out her hands—“she looks upon herself as one set apart, no closer ties are possible.”
“They are possible. They shall be possible,” affirmed Sir Oswald stoutly. He caught his breath quickly. “Won’t you be on my side, Lady Treadstone? Can’t you help me to persuade her to be my wife? To give me the right to defend her?”
Lady Treadstone looked back at him steadily.
“I am sure that I could not shake her determination, Sir Oswald, nor do I wish to. I believe her to be quite right. How could she marry you, or anyone, knowing that this charge of murder was hanging over her, that at any moment she might be arrested?”
That for one second before he answered Sir Oswald hesitated was obvious, and Lady Treadstone smiled slightly. He recovered himself instantly.
“I would take her abroad where no rascally detectives could find her,” he said stoutly. “I will take care of her.”
Lady Treadstone sighed.
“And what sort of a life would you lead, Sir Oswald? Haunted, a prey to a thousand fears. And what of your duties at the Priory, your mother and Maisie? No, Rosamond is right, she can never be your wife unless—”
Sir Oswald caught at the words. “Unless what?” he questioned eagerly.
“Unless the cloud is cleared away from her life,” Lady Treadstone said impressively. “Until the world knows that she had no share in her husband’s death, and the real murderer is found. Ah, Sir Oswald, it is a harder task than was ever set to knight-errant of old, but if you could do that—” she paused expressively.
Sir Oswald started.
“You have given me hope at last, Lady Treadstone,” he cried enthusiastically. “I will devote my life to clearing her name, and then—then I will come back to the Hold.”
“And I don’t think you will come in vain,” Lady Treadstone said soberly. “But there is much to do before that can happen, Sir Oswald.” She put up her handkerchief and wiped away a tear. “You don’t know how I have longed for someone to give me help and counsel,” she went on. “The whole story seems fraught with mystery. Often I lie awake all night thinking of it, trying to see some explanation. My poor Rosamond cannot bear to speak of Winter’s death. Until last night I had never heard from her the true story of that dreadful day as she knew it.”
Sir Oswald sat upright, a look of energy and purpose had come into his face, and his eyes were bright and determined.
“Please give me all the help you can, Lady Treadstone. Tell me everything you know.”
“I will, very gladly,” was Lady Treadstone’s response.
She leaned back in her chair and holding up her fan moved it to and fro in her delicate fingers as she spoke.
“Rosamond has told you the story of her most unhappy marriage, I know,” she said slowly. “I will leave that, except to say that I shall always blame myself for my share in it, for consenting to marry Lord Treadstone, the lover of my girlish days, without insisting on making his daughter’s acquaintance first. He thought it best so, the girl had been so spoiled, she would resent the marriage less if she knew nothing of it until it was an accomplished fact. The event proved how utterly he was wrong, and Rosamond in her anger spoiled her own life and broke her father’s heart. For he was never the same afterwards; he had been very proud of her beauty and high-spiritedness, and the news of her elopement was the most horrible blow to him. As for her, poor unhappy girl, one can imagine what her life must have been with a man like Winter—a man, moreover, who cared nothing for her, who only thought of marrying Lord Treadstone’s heiress.”
She stopped a moment and looked into the flames with reflective eyes.
Sir Oswald did not speak, but the lines of his mouth were stern beneath his drooping dark moustache; his right hand clenched and unclenched itself nervously.
Presently Lady Treadstone went on:
“Winter soon found that he had made a mistake. Rosamond had no money of her own; there had been some flaw in her mother’s marriage settlement, and her father refused to help her while she remained with her husband, and unhappy as she was the girl was far too proud to confess her mistake. Winter lost money over his farming, over his attempt at horse training, drifted from one thing to another until finally he became gamekeeper at Carlyn Hall. Then the final tragedy began. Rosamond had had one child; it died the year before they went to Carlyn, and she was more miserable and more embittered than ever. She had no friends, and it was impossible for her to associate intimately with the village women. Then Frank Carlyn came to the cottage one day. He was kind and sympathetic; he spoke to her as if she had been of his own class, he offered to lend her books. He came again and talked them over with her. Rosamond has told me, and I fully believe her, that there was nothing, not even friendship between them; but his visits to the cottage were noticed, and comments upon them reached Winter’s ears. He was furious; coming home the worse for drink, he abused Rosamond in the coarsest terms; from words he went on to blows.”
Sir Oswald drew a long breath.
“Brute! I wish I had had the good luck to be the man that shot him.”
“Ah!” He could see that Lady Treads tone was deeply moved, her voice trembled as she went on. “In the midst of it Frank Carlyn appeared on the scene; he, of course, espoused Rosamond’s part, and further infuriated Winter, who assailed him with the vilest accusations and threats. The quarrel was hot and furious; terrified, Rosamond rushed away into the wood; how long she remained there, crouching and sobbing, she never knew, but when at last she made her way back to the cottage all was quiet—too quiet. Of Carlyn there was no sign, but Winter lay in front of the cottage dead. Then Rosamond made the second great mistake of her life. She felt convinced that Carlyn had killed her husband; she knew that if she stayed to face the inevitable inquiry the fact that she was Lord Treadstone’s daughter was certain to leak out. It never occurred to her that she might be accused of the murder, and she thought that by running away she would avoid bringing this terrible disgrace upon the father she still loved. She had always kept up with one friend of her past life, Elizabeth Martin, the vicar’s daughter, and in her despair she turned to her for refuge. Miss Martin was just then living in rooms in London; she took Rosamond in and mothered her; she tried to persuade her to declare herself. In vain; Rosamond was terrified when she found herself accused of the murder in the papers, and nothing could be done with her. When illness overtook Miss Martin she had just obtained the post of governess to Maisie, and on her death-bed the scheme whereby Rosamond took her place was evolved by her. The rest you know, Sir Oswald.”
“Some of it!” Sir Oswald
qualified. His deep-set eyes were bright and eager. “But there is one important point that I want clearing up. Who do you, who does Rosamond, think killed her husband?” Lady Treadstone sighed again.
“Rosamond has never doubted that Frank Carlyn fired the fatal shot in a rage,” she said slowly. “And she blames herself cruelly for her share in the matter, for her folly, as she calls it, in talking to Carlyn and reading his books, and thereby rousing Winter’s anger.”
Sir Oswald leaned back in his chair.
“Frank Carlyn never did it,” he said conclusively. “Though I haven’t seen much of him of late years I knew him well as a boy; he was frank, generous and open-hearted, passionate too, I grant. He might have shot Winter in a rage. But as for concealing the fact and letting a woman be accused of his crime and hunted high and low—why, the idea is impossible, unthinkable.”
“So I have sometimes argued,” Lady Treadstone assented, shutting up her fan and letting it drop in her lap. “But if he did not, who did? There does not seem to be room for a third person in Rosamond’s story.”
“Room or not, there is one,” Sir Oswald declared vigorously; he paused a moment, then he broke out again energetically, “I’ll go down to Carlyn at once. I have been told sometimes that I have the detective instinct. I’ll see if I can’t make use of it for once.”
Lady Treadstone did not look very hopeful. It seemed to her that not much could be expected of amateur help. She would have preferred to hear that Sir Oswald was going to engage a capable private detective. Still, she did not argue; time, she reflected, would probably show him the wiser course.
She got up now and standing for a moment on the fur rug, looked down at the young man with her faint, troubled smile.
“I think your cousin wants to see you! I will send him in now that I have accomplished my errand. If I have somewhat exceeded my instructions—well, I hope I shall not find it difficult to win Rosamond’s forgiveness.”
Sir Oswald caught her hand as she passed and pressed his lips to it.
“You have at least gained my eternal gratitude,” he said fervently. “You have given me something to hope and work for. I will find this cowardly scoundrel, Lady Treadstone.”
“I hope so,” she said wistfully, as she opened the door. She waited a minute, as if about to speak, then changing her mind she closed the door behind her. In the hall she hesitated; she could hear voices, Garth Davenant’s and her step-daughter’s.
In the clear light given off by the wax candles in their tall silver sconces, her face looked white and strangely troubled.
“The third person,” she whispered to herself. “Yes, of course he must be found. There must have been one—of course, there must have been one—but I must not think of that, or I shall go mad.”
Chapter Twenty-One
THE CARLYN ARMS was the best inn in Carlyn village. It was a quaint black and white timbered, many gabled building, but its interior looked homely and pleasant. Through the big bow window in the bar there was a wonderful view of the country with a glimpse of the blue outlines of the Welsh hills in the distance.
Sir Oswald Davenant, coming out of the station, found himself nearly opposite this attractive hostelry, and after a moment’s hesitation he walked in.
He had come down to Carlyn in pursuit of his resolve to clear Rosamond Treadstone of any share in the murder of John Winter, but, born detective though he had called himself, now that he was actually on the spot he felt at a loss how to set about his work. Rosamond’s story gave him no help, and for the first time, as he stood on the threshold of the “Carlyn Arms’’ and was confronted by a tall, young woman with a white face and tragic dark eyes, he felt inclined to despair.
He asked if he could have a room and lunch. Later on he was going to walk up to the Hall, but first he thought he would try whether it was possible to learn anything from local gossip.
At first it seemed unlikely that he would be successful. The young woman who waited upon him was singularly silent. She replied to his attempts at conversation in monosyllables, but with the advent of lunch the landlord arrived upon the scene and everything altered. He was only too anxious to talk to his customer, while the young woman busied herself among the glasses at the bar.
Sir Oswald began with the usual chat about the weather and the prospects of the crops, then by an easy transition he passed to the murder in the Home Wood.
The landlord pursed up his lips and shook his head.
“Ay, that was a bad job,” he said solemnly. “A bad job.”
“I suppose you knew them both?” Sir Oswald hazarded. “Winter and his wife, I mean.”
“I knew Jack Winter well enough,” the landlord assented. “He was here oftener than I wanted, or than was for his own good. But as for his wife, well, there was nobody about here that could be said to know her. As for me, I don’t know that I ever set eyes on her. Now, Esther, my girl, there’s plenty for you to do there.”
But the dark-eyed, young woman had already vanished, and the door behind the bar was closed firmly.
There was a queer look in the landlord’s eyes as he glanced after her.
“She can’t stand any talk about the murder,” he said with a nod of his head at the bar. “Always flies out when it is mentioned.”
“Why should she do that?” Sir Oswald questioned without much interest.
The landlord winked as he removed one of the dishes.
“Well, I have my own notions as to that, sir. Esther Retford was the only woman about here that knew Mrs. Winter. Her brother, Jim Retford, was the one that found the body. It sent him into a fit and he has never been the same since, poor lad, always subject to these attacks he is, and they call him ‘Softy Retford.’ Esther would tell you that is what upsets her, but I have my own opinions.”
“It is enough to make her fight shy of the subject though,” Sir Oswald remarked. “But what is your theory, landlord?”
“Well, I don’t know that I should go so far as to call it that, sir,” the man said doubtfully. “But—well, there’s a boy at Retford’s cottage that is the very spit of Jack Winter. They give out that it is the child of a married sister come down for a change of air. All I know is that Jack Winter won’t ever be dead while that child is alive.”
Sir Oswald drew a deep breath. “Oh, that was it, was it? I didn’t know Winter was that sort of a man.”
“He was pretty much all sorts that was bad,” the landlord returned emphatically. “A real rotten lot was Winter, sir. And it’s often been in my mind that it was over Esther Retford, him and his wife quarrelled and she shot him; it would have all come out if there had been a trial, but now we shall never know.”
Sir Oswald’s face darkened. He hated to hear this careless talk of Rosamond. He hated to remember that she had ever been another man’s wife, the very thought that she had belonged to a low common boor such as Winter was agony to him. Yet he knew that he must brace himself, must prepared to hear her discussed, criticized, blamed even, in silence, if by any means he was to help her.
Meanwhile the landlord went on with his story, pleased with the interest it was exciting:
“The day before the murder Esther Retford went away suddenly, ran away, folks called it, then there had been some talk about her and Winter in the village—none too kind talk—and folks put two and two together. Then some six months ago Esther came back, and a month or two after that they brought this boy to the cottage. Old Retford preached us a nice tale about him, but we are not quite blind at Carlyn.”
“I am sure you are not,” agreed Sir Oswald, who was not ignorant of village ways. “But how do you come to have the young woman here, landlord?”
“Well, my wife is ill, sir, and she always liked Esther, and we have to have help of some kind, and the wife she said it would give the girl a chance, and she is cheap, and it don’t do for any of us to be reckoning up other folk’s past mistakes,” concluded the worthy man charitably.
Sir Oswald smiled a little as he got
up, wondering whether charity or the fact that her services were cheap had most to do with procuring Esther Retford her situation. But her story, sordid and pitiful though it was, did not seem likely to help him much in his quest. He determined to walk up to the Hall and see whether he would be more successful with Frank Carlyn. He asked the way to the Home Wood, and set off at a brisk pace towards it catching one more glimpse of Esther Retford’s white face as he left the inn.
It haunted his thoughts as he walked along. This was another ruined life to be laid to Winter’s account. But as he entered the Home Wood he forgot everything but Rosamond; he pictured her moving about among its glades and mossy paths, a tall, gracious figure in her simple gowns with her crown of golden hair wound about her head.
Spring was later at Carlyn than at Porthcawel. The young larches in the Home Wood were just bursting into leaf, at their feet the wild hyacinths were fading away, mistily blue, while the rhododendrons and the gorse were in bud which later on would make the country-side one golden glory.
Sir Oswald came soon to the clearing in which the gamekeeper’s cottage stood. He waited a moment and looked at it, its miniature gables and the creepers climbing its walls, and involuntarily he raised his hat and stood bareheaded. So it was here she had lived and suffered, the lady of his love. Here the martyrdom of her married life, the tragedy of its close, had been enacted.
It was evident that no one was living there now: the little garden was choked with weeds, long strands of ivy were drooping over the windows. The path where John Winter had lain dead was scarcely distinguishable from the tangled flowerbeds on either side. Sir Oswald gazed at it all as though he would wring the past secret from it.
