Nightmare Farm

by Jack Mann

  For the moment in which he dropped to one knee, Gees forgot the iconoclasts and all else, saw only the simple, telling beauty of the altar and its pictured background. Before he could rise again, a shadow obscured the doorway through which he had entered, and he stood up hastily to face a stout, middle-aged cleric, with rather hard eyes that softened as he realised he had caught a stranger kneeling in his church.

  “You are very welcome here, sir,” he said.

  “And you,” Gees said, “are Mr. Perivale.”

  “I am,” the rector owned. “You are—staying in this district?”

  “For some while,” Gees answered. “I don’t know how long, though. Partly, I think, it depends on you.”

  “On me?” The rector stared at him, his eyes hardening again as he anticipated a request for charity of some sort. “Surely not!”

  Gees pointed momentarily toward the east window.

  “You may remember, sir, He said, about His little ones—it were better that a millstone had been hung round their necks, those who offend. I don’t remember the exact words, but that was the sense of it.”

  “Well?” the rector asked stiffly, and went on staring, possibly under the impression that he had to deal with a madman.

  “I want your help over one of them—May Norris,” Gees told him.

  “Norris’s daughter,” Perivale said, as if not quite so doubtful of the other’s sanity. “Well, sir, I don’t know who you are or what you are, or why you say you want my help, but I may tell you that I went to see the girl yesterday, and Norris refused me access to her—almost drove me away. So I don’t see that I can help.”

  “I don’t wonder at his doing that,” Gees said. “I saw her this morning, myself. Now—do you mind if we go outside, while I explain?”

  Perivale turned to the doorway. “By all means,” he said. “I should be glad—especially since you say you have seen the girl—I should be glad if you would explain.”

  CHAPTER 7

  ISABELLA

  IT WAS A VERY PUZZLED-LOOKING CLERGYMAN who, after hearing Gees’ statement of his case to its end, put question after question, and found pat replies rained on him with unvarying rapidity.

  “I must grant, Mr. Green, that cases such as you allege this to be are not altogether unknown in our history, but I have no proof that this is such a case, only your word for it. And you may be mistaken.”

  “And what do you lose, beyond a bare ten minutes of your time, if I am?” Gees retorted. “Could anything be simpler than what I ask?”

  “It may seem simple to you, a layman,” the rector said, “but even if you convince the father, and then I act as you say—and it fails to produce any result? In other words, if you are wrong?”

  “Then,” Gees answered thoughtfully, “I suppose I can only apologise to you, and devote whatever sum you choose to name to any charity you favour for the receipt of the cheque. Fifty pounds, call it?”

  “That sounds to me perilously like a bet,” Perivale objected.

  “Let’s wash it and every other suggestion—apart from my main request—out, then,” Gees said. “And if you refuse that request, then—at the risk of offending you, I’d say you’re going near qualifying for that millstone I mentioned before we began this discussion.”

  The rector’s eyes hardened again. “Are you attempting to define my duty for me, young man?” he demanded coldly.

  “No,” Gees said, and met his gaze squarely. “I’m telling you something that at the bottom of your heart you know yourself, and trying to be respectful, even if I don’t sound like it.”

  For nearly a minute Perivale gazed at him, sternly, and then quite suddenly he laughed with unaffected amusement.

  “I’ll do it, Mr. Green,” he said. “You know, you’re about the most impudent young man I’ve met for a long time, but I feel that you’re absolutely sincere and disinterested over this, and admit that you may be justified in your conclusions, though it is a unique case for modern times if you are. Now can I offer you a cup of tea at the rectory?”

  “That’s a splendid idea,” Gees admitted. “I’ve talked myself thirsty, and a spot of tea in return for my rudeness will be real coals of fire on my head.” Together with Perivale, he began walking toward the gate in the churchyard wall that gave access to the rectory grounds. “Now I think of it, would you mind telling me whether those two tombs that the brasses have been snatched off belong to the Hunter family?”

  “Oh, no,” Perivale answered. “They were both Aclands, a family that has died out long since from this part of the country. The Hunter family had an old-fashioned vault in the churchyard that was opened every time a member of the family died, and the coffin deposited on a shelf inside. But it was closed finally during last century—and this present squire’s father buried in the usual way in the churchyard.”

  “The vault being full up, I conclude,” Gees observed.

  “I couldn’t tell you if it were or no—it was before my time,” the rector answered, and led the way through his well-kept garden toward the large, creeper-covered house before them. They entered, and Gees saw a long hall table crowded with a miscellany which included sundry caps, girls’ hats, coats and mufflers, a toy tailway engine, a couple of tennis racquets and half a dozen balls, a tangle of fishing line and the top joint of a rod—there was much else in the heap too, but Gees found himself looking over the rector’s shoulder into a large room, in which he saw a hedgehog curled up on the hearthrug, a terrier with his nose down on his paws regarding it, two kittens at play round a table leg, and a tortoise just emerging from under a sideboard. The rector faced about.

  “Hummm! Nobody in yet, apparently,” he said. “A family of seven, in addition to myself and my—er—my second wife, and I think we’ll have tea in my study, just you and I, shall we?”

  “Only five, surely,” Gees said, counting up the hedgehog, tortoise, dog, and kittens. “But I suppose the others were there and not visible.”

  Perivale’s frown indicated his lack of understanding, and then he laughed. “Seven children, not their pets,” he explained. “Terrors in the house, but I wouldn’t have one less for the world. Ah, Celia!” as a tall girl with grave grey eyes appeared in another doorway. “Has your stepmother come in yet, do you know?”

  “Not yet, father,” the girl answered, and glanced at Gees.

  “I see. This is Mr. Green—my eldest daughter, Mr. Green—and we will have tea in my study—just the two of us, if you’ll tell Bessie, my dear. And if your stepmother comes in, you might tell her where to find me. And Tony’s finger—did Bessie tie it up for him?”

  “I did, father,” the girl said. “It was rather a deep cut.”

  “Ah! Yes, well it may teach him to be more careful next time. If it were not for you, Celia, I don’t know what would happen to the rest of them—but come along, Mr. Green, I’m forgetting you.”

  “Not at all,” Gees assured him, and followed to a room just at the top of the staircase, looking out to the front of the house and furnished mainly with a flat-topped desk and pair of shabby but comfortable armchairs. The rector indicated one for his guest, and took the other.

  “About—your request,” he said. “I have acceded to it, whether wisely or no I have yet to find out, and would rather not discuss it any more, if you don’t mind, Mr. Green. Except—you did not come to Denlandham because of—of this girl, I take it?”

  “I think I can say I did not,” Gees answered deliberately. “I note you give the place its full name. Denlum, most of them call it.”

  “An obvious contraction, and pure laziness,” Perivale said.

  “As one might say of Nightmare Farm,” Gees remarked.

  The other man gave him a long, intent look. “Yes,” he said after a silence. “I suppose so. Knightsmere needs more saying.”

  “I wonder,” Gees asked, “if you ever met a Cumberland vicar named Amber, Mr. Perivale? His living is a small village—”

&nbs
p; “Amber of Odder?” Perivale interrupted. “Yes, a very old friend and a perfectly charming man. Why—do you know him?”

  “Got in touch with him over an affair not exactly like this which made me put my request to you, but something in the same category, and I’m pleased to say he is my friend, too—proud to say it, in fact.”

  A rather untidy girl brought in the tea tray and put it down on the desk. Perivale began pouring out, and ascertained Gees’ tastes in milk and sugar. There was food enough on the tray for a substantial meal.

  “Nothing at all to eat, thank you,” Gees answered a query. “I had a lunch at the inn that I’m not likely to forget in a hurry.”

  “Ah, well, if you won’t, you won’t, of course. Churchill is a good fellow, but his wife! I feel sorry for the man. And”—he stood up, looking past Gees at the doorway, and Gees stood up too and faced about—“come in, my dear, I’m so glad you’ve got back. This is Mr. Green—”

  He broke off as the woman in the doorway grasped at the lintel and even swayed a little as she stared at Gees. She was wearing a frock and hat that were obviously as costly as they were simple, and her dark beauty was set off by just the right amount of make-up, but for the moment she had gone pale as she stood there, and her eyes betrayed fear.

  “Why, what is wrong, Isabella dear?” Perivale asked anxiously.

  “Do you feel faint, or—” He advanced past Gees toward her.

  “No—no!” she insisted, recovering herself. “Perhaps for a moment—but it was only momentary. The stairs, perhaps—I ran up.”

  “Isabella!” The name completed Gees’ knowledge, or rather memory. Before turning to his present occupation, he had tried the police force as a career, and during the two years of his service had been chosen on one occasion to assist a certain Inspector Tott, with others, in raiding a disreputable night club. Among those rounded up had been a woman—this woman, beyond doubt—who had given her name as Isabella Carter, together with a false address. Gees had found her out as Isabella Curtis at the right address, and made her attend with the rest of the habitués for trial. And, as he had recognised her, so did she know him, in spite of this different setting and the passing of time.

  “Well, won’t you join us, my dear?” Perivale asked.

  “I—I think, if Mr. Green will excuse me, I’d rather go to my room, Arthur,” she answered. “Later, perhaps—I do feel slightly faint, now.”

  “Then by all means go to your room and rest,” her husband urged. “I’m quite sure Mr. Green will understand.”

  “Why, certainly,” Gees assented at once. “I’m sorry Mrs. Perivale has this—er—indisposition. Another time, perhaps, Mrs. Perivale.”

  “Yes—yes, certainly,” she trilled languorously. “Don’t worry over me, Arthur—I shall be quite all right in a few minutes.”

  And she left them. The rector motioned to Gees to resume his seat as a door slammed not far off, and again seated himself.

  “It’s a pity,” he said. “I should have liked her to have a talk with you. Sometimes I wonder—such a brilliant personality as she is, and a place like this, but—well, love will carry us through, under Providence. And if you think it strange for a middle-aged man with a family of seven to talk like a moonstruck boy, Mr. Green, I may tell you that it is less than a year since she crowned my life by marrying me—gave me a second lease of youth, I might say.”

  “I wish you every happiness in it,” Gees said gravely.

  “That’s very good of you—very good of you, Mr. Green. There were difficulties at first, of course, with the children—the obvious objection to a stepmother. But thanks to Celia, the one you saw, they are practically all smoothed away, now. A wonderful girl, my Celia.”

  Gees did not answer. He remembered the old, ill-fitting frock the girl had been wearing, and contrasted it with Isabella’s attire and appearance: a fourth part of what the woman must have spent on that one ensemble would have dressed the girl attractively and well.

  “Not that my wife is less wonderful,” Perivale went on. “She has been to Denlandham House again this afternoon—one of the maids is ill there. My wife is the greatest help to me, and the way she has settled to visiting in the parish and made herself a help to me, so soon after giving up her society life in London, is wonderful, and a constant surprise to me. You, I take it, are still a bachelor, Mr. Green?”

  “I have that disability—or advantage,” Gees answered.

  “Ah! Being outside the fold, you cannot realise the felicity within. Well, I can only hope you may find such happiness as has been given to me, when you do marry—and forgive my maundering over it like this. To cease the maundering—do you expect to be staying here long?”

  “I can’t tell, yet. But I rather think you’re anxious over Mrs. Perivale, and I really ought to get away and attend to what brought me to your village. So if you’ll excuse me, sir, and let me run away—”

  “You’re quite sure?” the rector asked, and Gees could tell that he was only too glad to accede to the suggestion, and go to his wife.

  “Quite. If I may rely on you to keep an eye out for a car at the churchyard gate about three to-morrow afternoon—or let me come and inform you if there is any alteration in the time, or anything?”

  “Why, certainly!” Perivale agreed with energy. “And I hope to have the pleasure of seeing you here again—you’re sure you won’t stay for just one more cup—another five minutes, say?”

  “Quite sure, thank you. And I, too, hope we shall meet again, after to-morrow and all it may bring.”

  He got away then, and went down the stairs alone. From inside the room of the hedgehog and tortoise sounded the clatter of cups and voices of a happy and noisy party of youngsters. Gees went out by way of the open front door, and gained the road without going through the churchyard, to return slowly and thoughtfully toward the inn.

  “Isabella Curtis, fined ten pounds and five guineas costs,” he murmured to himself. “As were the rest. Just an escapade, probably.”

  And, as he turned toward the inn, a fervent sentence: “I hope it was only that, for his sake.”

  Nicholas Churchill scratched his head to stimulate his brain.

  “Tallerfone, sir? There’s the post office, o’ course, an’ I reckon they got it at the rectory an’ up at the House, but—” He shook his head in conclusion, as if to say he knew of no others.

  Gees looked at his watch. “I’ll run over to Ludlow,” he said.

  “Back for sooper, sir?” Nicholas inquired.

  “I wouldn’t miss it for the world,” Gees told him.

  He went to the stable and ran the Rolls-Bentley out. There might be nearer points than Ludlow at which he could get undisturbed telephone communication, but he knew his way there. A quarter past four now—he wound the clock on the dash after turning into the road—and if Eve Madeleine left the office before five in his absence, he would tell her all about it when he got back to London. He drove carefully along the winding road, but made as good time as he could, and on the way marked down an unusually large roadside garage where a sign announced that it provided cars on hire. A well-kept old Daimler saloon appeared to be one of them, by the hackney carriage licence plate at its back.

  By ten minutes to five Gees had drawn up before the Feathers Hotel in the beautiful old town, and, entering, found he could get a trunk call to London and, apparently, anything else he might require. He made his call, and nodded approval as he heard Eve Madeleine’s voice.