The Anna Katharine Green Mystery Megapack

by Anna Katharine Green

  “Was that all?” he began, but evidently thought better than to finish, whilst William, with a nonchalance that surprised me, blunderingly avoided his eye, and, bounding into the buggy beside me, started up the horse and drove slowly off.

  “Ta, ta, Deacon,” he called back; “if you want to see fun, come up to our end of the lane; there’s precious little here.” And thus, with a laugh, terminated an interview which, all things considered, was the most exciting as well as the most humiliating I have ever taken part in.

  “William,” I began, but stopped. The two pigeons whose departure I had watched a little while before were coming back, and, as I spoke, fluttered up to the window before mentioned, where they alighted and began picking up the crumbs which I had seen scattered for them. “See!” I suddenly exclaimed, pointing them out to William. “Was I mistaken when I thought I saw a hand drop crumbs from that window?”

  The answer was a very grave one for him.

  “No,” said he, “for I have seen more than a hand, through the loophole I made in the hay. I saw a man’s leg stretched out as if he were lying on the floor with his head toward the window. It was but a glimpse I got, but the leg moved as I looked at it, and so I know that someone lies hid in that little nook up under the roof. Now it isn’t any one belonging to the lane, for I know where every one of us is or ought to be at this blessed moment; and it isn’t a detective, for I heard a sound like heavy sobbing as I crouched there. Then who is it? Silly Rufus, I say; and if that hay was all lifted, we would see sights that would make us ashamed of the apologies we uttered to the old sneak just now.”

  “I want to get home,” said I. “Drive fast! Your sisters ought to know this.”

  “The girls?” he cried. “Yes, it will be a triumph over them. They never would believe I had an atom of judgment. But we’ll show them, if William Knollys is altogether a fool.”

  We were now near to Mr. Trohm’s hospitable gateway. Coming from the excitements of my late interview, it was a relief to perceive the genial owner of this beautiful place wandering among his vines and testing the condition of his fruit by a careful touch here and there. As he heard our wheels he turned, and seeing who we were, threw up his hands in ill-restrained pleasure, and came buoyantly forward. There was nothing to do but to stop, so we stopped.

  “Why, William! Why, Miss Butterworth, what a pleasure!” Such was his amiable greeting. “I thought you were all busy at your end of the lane; but I see you have just come from town. Had an errand there, I suppose?”

  “Yes,” William grumbled, eying the luscious pear Mr. Trohm held in his hand.

  The look drew a smile from that gentleman.

  “Admiring the first fruits?” he observed. “Well, it is a handsome specimen,” he admitted, handing it to me with his own peculiar grace. “I beg you will take it, Miss Butterworth. You look tired; pardon me if I mention it.” (He is the only person I know who detects any signs of suffering or fatigue on my part.)

  “I am worried by the mysteries of this lane,” I ventured to remark. “I hate to see Mother Jane’s garden uprooted.”

  “Ah!” he acquiesced, with much evidence of good feeling, “it is a distressing thing to witness. I wish she might have been spared. William, there are other pears on the tree this came from. Tie up the horse, I pray, and gather a dozen or so of these for your sisters. They will never be in better condition for plucking than they are today.”

  William, whose mouth and eyes were both watering for a taste of the fine fruit thus offered, moved with alacrity to obey this invitation, while I, more startled than pleased—or, rather, as much startled as pleased—by the prospect of a momentary tête-à-tête with our agreeable neighbor, sat uneasily eying the luscious fruit in my hand, and wishing I was ten years younger, that the blush I felt slowly stealing up my cheek might seem more appropriate to the occasion.

  But Mr. Trohm appeared not to share my wish. He was evidently so satisfied with me as I was, that he found it difficult to speak at first, and when he did—But tut! tut! you have no desire to hear any such confidences as these, I am sure. A middle-aged gentleman’s expressions of admiration for a middle-aged lady may savor of romance to her, but hardly to the rest of the world, so I will pass this conversation by, with the single admission that it ended in a question to which I felt obliged to return a reluctant No.

  Mr. Trohm was just recovering from the disappointment of this, when William sauntered back with his hands and pockets full.

  “Ah!” that graceless scamp chuckled, with a suspicious look at our downcast faces, “been improving the opportunity, eh?”

  Mr. Trohm, who had fallen back against his old well-curb, surveyed his young neighbor for the first time with a look of anger. But it vanished almost as quickly as it appeared, and he contented himself with a low bow, in which I read real grief.

  This was too much for me, and I was about to open my lips with a kind phrase or two, when a flutter took place over our heads, and the two pigeons whose flight I had watched more than once during the last hour, flew down and settled upon Mr. Trohm’s arm and shoulders.

  “Oh!” I exclaimed, with a sudden shrinking that I hardly understood myself. And though I covered up the exclamation with as brisk a good-by as my inward perturbation would allow, that sight and the involuntary ejaculation I had uttered, were all I saw or heard during our hasty drive homeward.

  CHAPTER XXXVII

  I ASTONISH MR. GRYCE AND HE ASTONISHES ME

  But as we approached the group of curious people which now filled up the whole highway in front of Mother Jane’s cottage, I broke from the nightmare into which this last discovery had thrown me, and, turning to William, said with a resolute air:

  “You and your sisters are not of one mind regarding these disappearances. You ascribe them to Deacon Spear, but they—whom do they ascribe them to?”

  “I shouldn’t think it would take a woman of your wit to answer that question.”

  The rebuke was deserved. I had wit, but I had refused to exercise it; my blind partiality for a man of pleasing exterior and magnetic address had prevented the cool play of my usual judgment, due to the occasion and the trust which had been imposed in me by Mr. Gryce. Resolved that this should end, no matter at what cost to my feelings, I quietly said:

  “You allude to Mr. Trohm.”

  “That is the name,” he carelessly assented. “Girls, you know, let their prejudices run away with them. An old grudge—”

  “Yes,” I tentatively put in; “he persecuted your mother, and so they think him capable of any wickedness.”

  The growl which William gave was not one of dissent.

  “But I don’t care what they think,” said he, looking down at the heap of fruit which lay between us. “I’m Trohm’s friend, and don’t believe one word they choose to insinuate against him. What if he didn’t like what my mother did! We didn’t like it either, and—”

  “William,” I calmly remarked, “if your sisters knew that Silly Rufus had been found in Deacon Spear’s barn they would no longer do Mr. Trohm this injustice.”

  “No; that would settle them; that would give me a triumph which would last long after this matter was out of the way.”

  “Very well, then,” said I, “I am going to bring about this triumph. I am going to tell Mr. Gryce at once what we have discovered in Deacon Spear’s barn.”

  And without waiting for his ah, yes, or no, I jumped from the buggy and made my way to the detective’s side.

  His welcome was somewhat unexpected. “Ah, fresh news!” he exclaimed. “I see it in your eye. What have you chanced upon, madam, in your disinterested drive into town?”

  I thought I had eliminated all expression from my face, and that my words would bring a certain surprise with them. But it is useless to try to surprise Mr. Gryce.

  “You read me like a book,” said I; “I have something to add to the situation. Mr. Gryce, I have just come from the other end of the lane, where I found a clue which may shorten the suspen
se of this weary day, and possibly save Lucetta from the painful task she has undertaken in our interests. Mr. Chittenden’s ring—”

  I paused for the exclamation of encouragement he is accustomed to give on such occasions, and while I paused, prepared for my accustomed triumph. He did not fail me in the exclamation, nor did I miss my expected triumph.

  “Was not found by Mother Jane, or even brought to her in any ordinary way or by any ordinary messenger. It came to her on a pigeon’s neck, the pigeon you will find lying dead among the bushes in the Knollys yard.”

  He was amazed. He controlled himself, but he was very visibly amazed. His exclamations proved it.

  “Madam! Miss Butterworth! This ring—Mr. Chittenden’s ring, whose presence in her hut we thought an evidence of guilt, was brought to her by one of her pigeons?”

  “So she told me. I aroused her fury by showing her the empty husk in which it had been concealed. In her rage at its loss, she revealed the fact I have just mentioned. It is a curious one, sir, and one I am a little proud to have discovered.”

  “Curious? It is more than curious; it is bizarre, and will rank, I am safe in prophesying, as one of the most remarkable facts that have ever adorned the annals of the police. Madam, when I say I envy you the honor of its discovery, you will appreciate my estimate of it—and you. But when did you find this out, and what explanation are you able to give of the presence of this ring on a pigeon’s neck?”

  “Sir, to your first question I need only reply that I was here two hours or so ago, and to the second that everything points to the fact that the ring was attached to the bird by the victim himself, as an appeal for succor to whoever might be fortunate enough to find it. Unhappily it fell into the wrong hands. That is the ill-luck which often befalls prisoners.”

  “Prisoners?”

  “Yes. Cannot you imagine a person shut up in an inaccessible place making some such attempt to communicate with his fellow-creatures?”

  “But what inaccessible place have we in—”

  “Wait,” said I. “You have been in Deacon Spear’s barn.”

  “Certainly, many times.” But the answer, glib as it was, showed shock. I began to gather courage.

  “Well,” said I, “there is a hiding-place in that barn which I dare declare you have not penetrated.”

  “Do you think so, madam?”

  “A little loft way up under the eaves, which can only be reached by clambering over the rafters. Didn’t Deacon Spear tell you there was such a place?”

  “No, but—”

  “William, then?” I inexorably pursued. “He says he pointed such a spot out to you, and that you pooh-poohed at it as inaccessible and not worth the searching.”

  “William is a—Madam, I beg your pardon, but William has just wit enough to make trouble.”

  “But there is such a place there,” I urged; “and, what is more, there is someone hidden in it now. I saw him myself.”

  “You saw him?”

  “Saw a part of him; in short, saw his hand. He was engaged in scattering crumbs for the pigeons.”

  “That does not look like starvation,” smiled Mr. Gryce, with the first hint of sarcasm he had allowed himself to make use of in this interview.

  “No,” said I; “but the time may not have come to inflict this penalty on Silly Rufus. He has been there but a few days, and—well, what have I said now?”

  “Nothing, ma’am, nothing. But what made you think the hand you saw belonged to Silly Rufus?”

  “Because he was the last person to disappear from this lane. The last—what am I saying? He wasn’t the last. Lucetta’s lover was the last. Mr. Gryce, could that hand have belonged to Mr. Ostrander?”

  I was intensely excited; so much so that Mr. Gryce made me a warning gesture.

  “Hush!” he whispered; “you are attracting attention. That hand was the hand of Mr. Ostrander; and the reason why I did not accept William Knollys’ suggestion to search the Deacon’s barn-loft was because I knew it had been chosen as a place of refuge by this missing lover of Lucetta.”

  CHAPTER XXXVIII

  A FEW WORDS

  Never have keener or more conflicting emotions been awakened in my breast than by these simple words. But alive to the necessity of hiding my feelings from those about me, I gave no token of my surprise, but rather turned a stonier face than common upon the man who had caused it.

  “Refuge?” I repeated. “He is there, then, of his own free will—or yours?” I sarcastically added, not being able to quite keep down this reproach as I remembered the deception practised upon Lucetta.

  “Mr. Ostrander, madam, has been spending the week with Deacon Spear—they are old friends, you know. That he should spend it quietly and, to a degree, in hiding, was as much his plan as mine. For while he found it impossible to leave Lucetta in the doubtful position in which she and her family at present stand, he did not wish to aggravate her misery by the thought that he was thus jeopardizing the position on which all his hopes of future advancement depended. He preferred to watch and wait in secret, seeing which, I did what I could to further his wishes. His usual lodging was with the family, but when the search was instituted, I suggested that he should remove himself to that eyrie back of the hay where you were sharp enough to detect him today.”

  “Don’t attempt any of your flatteries upon me,” I protested. “They will not make me forget that I have not been treated fairly. And Lucetta—oh! may I not tell Lucetta—”

  “And spoil our entire prospect of solving this mystery? No, madam, you may not tell Lucetta. When Fate has put such a card into our hands as I played with that telegram today, we would be flying in the face of Providence not to profit by it. Lucetta’s despair makes her bold; upon that boldness we depend to discover and bring to justice a great criminal.”

  I felt myself turn pale; for that very reason, perhaps, I assumed a still sterner air, and composedly said:

  “If Mr. Ostrander is in hiding at the Deacon’s, and he and his host are both in your confidence, then the only man whom you can designate in your thoughts by this dreadful title must be Mr. Trohm.”

  I had perhaps hoped he would recoil at this or give some other evidence of his amazement at an assumption which to me seemed preposterous. But he did not, and I saw, with what feelings may be imagined, that this conclusion, which was half bravado with me, had been accepted by him long enough for no emotion to follow its utterance.

  “Oh!” I exclaimed, “how can you reconcile such a suspicion with the attitude you have always preserved towards Mr. Trohm?”

  “Madam,” said he, “do not criticise my attitude without taking into account existing appearances. They are undoubtedly in Mr. Trohm’s favor.”

  “I am glad to hear you say so,” said I, “I am glad to hear you say so. Why, it was in response to his appeal that you came to X. at all.”

  Mr. Gryce’s smile conveyed a reproach which I could not but acknowledge I amply merited. Had he spent evening after evening at my house, entertaining me with tales of the devices and the many inconsistencies of criminals, to be met now by such a puerile disclaimer as this? But beyond that smile he said nothing; on the contrary, he continued as if I had not spoken at all.

  “But appearances,” he declared, “will not stand before the insight of a girl like Lucetta. She has marked the man as guilty, and we will give her the opportunity of proving the correctness of her instinct.”

  “But Mr. Trohm’s house has been searched, and you have found nothing—nothing,” I argued somewhat feebly.

  “That is the reason we find ourselves forced to yield our judgment to Lucetta’s intuitions,” was his quick reply. And smiling upon me with his blandest air, he obligingly added: “Miss Butterworth is a woman of too much character not to abide the event with all her accustomed composure.” And with this final suggestion, I was as yet too crushed to resent, he dismissed me to an afternoon of unparalleled suspense and many contradictory emotions.

  CHAPTER XXXIX


  UNDER A CRIMSON SKY

  When, in the course of events, the current of my thoughts receive a decided check and I find myself forced to change former conclusions or habituate myself to new ideas and a fresh standpoint, I do it, as I do everything else, with determination and a total disregard of my own previous predilections. Before the afternoon was well over I was ready for any revelations which might follow Lucetta’s contemplated action, merely reserving a vague hope that my judgment would yet be found superior to her instinct.

  At five o’clock the diggers began to go home. Nothing had been found under the soil of Mother Jane’s garden, and the excitement of search which had animated them early in the day had given place to a dull resentment mainly directed towards the Knollys family, if one could judge of these men’s feelings by the heavy scowls and significant gestures with which they passed our broken-down gateway.

  By six the last man had filed by, leaving Mr. Gryce free for the work which lay before him.

  I had retired long before this to my room, where I awaited the hour set by Lucetta with a feverish impatience quite new to me. As none of us could eat, the supper table had not been laid, and though I had no means of knowing what was in store for us, the sombre silence and oppression under which the whole house lay seemed a portent that was by no means encouraging.

  Suddenly I heard a knock at my door. Rising hastily, I opened it. Loreen stood before me, with parted lips and terror in all her looks.

  “Come!” she cried. “Come and see what I have found in Lucetta’s room.”

  “Then she’s gone?” I cried.

  “Yes, she’s gone, but come and see what she has left behind her.”

  Hastening after Loreen, who was by this time half-way down the hall, I soon found myself on the threshold of the room I knew to be Lucetta’s.

  “She made me promise,” cried Loreen, halting to look back at me, “that I would let her go alone, and that I would not enter the highway till an hour after her departure. But with these evidences of the extent of her dread before us, how can we stay in this house?” And dragging me to a table, she showed me lying on its top a folded paper and two letters. The folded paper was Lucetta’s Will, and the letters were directed severally to Loreen and to myself with the injunction that they were not to be read till she had been gone six hours.