The Coldstone

by Patricia Wentworth

  “I am not Watson,” said Anthony. “If I’ve got to be Watson, I won’t play—I shall go off into the other Adventure and be Sherlock all on my own.” After which he kissed her, and left a rich black smear on her cheek.

  “Let’s do this Adventure first. You know you said yourself that—” She hesitated and then came out with, “They weren’t breaking into the house and forging keys just to steal lumps of coal—especially now when coal’s about as dead as mutton. The only awful thing is—did they get in here, and are we too late?”

  Anthony shook his head.

  “What would they want with The Shepheard’s Kalendar if they’d found what they were after? I don’t think it was coal either, though it beats me how on earth they got on to old Philip and whatever he stowed away here in—whatever year the Armada was. No—I’ll tell you what I think. I think they knew there was some secret place—or perhaps they only guessed it. Anyhow they knew there was something hidden, and they knew it was in the old cellars, so they broke in and got away with an impression of the lock. Then they had to wait whilst they were getting a key made. But they must have hustled their man, because they evidently got their key before I managed to get mine. They’ve been into the old cellars, but they didn’t find anything, because even if they knew this place existed, they didn’t know how to get into it. So they buzzed off to town and annexed The Shepheard’s Kalendar. And how they knew about it, or how they managed to collect it, has me beat—but I expect you know.”

  Susan turned away.

  “We ought to be exploring,” she said.

  “There’s not very much to explore.”

  She looked round. The place was just a hole in the coal. There was a thick soft dust under their feet. The lamp filled the small space with its steady light, and except for themselves it was empty. She stared at the emptiness.

  “What could he have hidden?”

  “Anything—or nothing.”

  “I’m sure there’s something. I believe they did get in—I believe it’s been taken.”

  “Not by them, whoever they are. But of course someone—anyone—a Colstone, or a servant, or in fact anyone—may have strung those letters together like you did, and found whatever there was to find, any old time in the last three hundred and fifty years or so.”

  There was a dismal common sense about this. In a depressed silence Susan picked up the lamp and looked about her. All of a sudden she cried out, ran a couple of steps forward, and threw the light low down upon the wall. About a foot above the floor, just where the dust and chips of the excavation had been swept into a loose pile against it, there showed, deeply scratched, the sign of David’s Shield.

  Anthony began to push aside the loose rough pieces with his foot. Susan set down the lamp and shovelled with her hands. After about a minute he stubbed his toe, and she a finger, against hard metal, and in a moment more the lid of a blackened box came into view. It was about eighteen inches long by a foot wide. It had ornamental hinges which came right over the top of the box, and a large hasp. Box, hasp, and hinges were all as black as if they had been carved out of the coal around them, but when Anthony scratched with the point of his knife, a yellow line threw back the yellow light.

  Susan asked, “Is it brass?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “It’s yellow.”

  Anthony said nothing. He drew the point of his knife along the curve of an embossed leaf.

  “Brass is yellow,” said Susan.

  “So is gold,” said Anthony. They were both speaking in whispers.

  Anthony pulled at the hasp. It moved stiffly. And then, with a jerk, up came the lid. And the inside of it was a raw pale yellow, very strange to see in the midst of all that blackness. It had an ornamentation upon it of curving leaves and strange-headed birds beautifully engraved.

  They looked in silence. Anthony’s word seemed to hang on the silence—“Gold!”

  The box stood flush with the floor, dust of coal and pebbles of coal scraped back from it on three sides. The lifted golden lid caught all the light there was and reflected it upon the heaped-up contents of the box. There was more gold, and there was the undimmed sharp sparkle of a great red stone half buried under the gold. There was a string of pearls long dead and lustreless. And right across, from corner to corner, a golden band holding a dozen flat green stones into which the light sank down, as it sinks into deep green water.

  Over their heads in the dark cellar above them Mr. Garry O’Connell spoke. He said,

  “Good-bye, Susan.”

  The turning stone fell into its place with a thud.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

  They had been kneeling in front of the box, with the square opening in the roof a little behind them on the right. The stone fell with a thud and shut them in. There was just one horrid moment in which the realization of what had happened caught hold of them like cramp, and then Anthony sprang to his feet with an inarticulate sound of anger.

  “Who was that? Who the devil was that?”

  It was another moment before Susan could move. Something in her was quivering and crying breathlessly:

  “It can’t be true! It’s too horrid to be true! It’s like a bad dream. We shall wake up. Oh, please let us wake up quickly!”

  Then she began to get up, and as soon as she moved she knew that it wasn’t a dream at all. Garry had shut them in. And while she was thinking this, there was Anthony straining up towards the stone—pushing, straining, and making no more impression on the trap that had opened so easily to let them in than if he had been pitting himself against the impenetrable walls of coal. She began to say in a frightened whisper, “It’s no use—it’s no use—oh, darling, it’s no use!” and all at once Anthony let his arms fall.

  “It won’t budge. I can’t move it—I can’t get any purchase. The swine!”

  Susan came closer. He was panting with the effort he had made; his forehead was wet; the moisture began to trickle down into the coal dust which smeared his face. He had a most curiously disreputable appearance. His voice was hot with anger.

  “What fools we were to leave the cellar door open behind us—what damned fools!”

  “No—no—he’s got a key—he’d have got in anyhow—that’s why I was frightened.” Her voice shook pitifully, and Anthony caught her in his arms.

  “Darling—don’t! Don’t be frightened. Susan—darling—it’s just a beastly practical joke. He can’t keep us here, the swab!”

  Susan drew a faint, quivering breath.

  “You don’t know Garry.”

  “Oh, it’s Garry?”

  “Yes”—with another quivering breath.

  “Don’t you think you’d better tell me who Garry is? I’m a bit in the dark, and it seems to me—if it isn’t a practical joke, he’s trying to do us in. Why should you screen him? Susan—who is he?”

  Susan leaned against him.

  “He’s Garry O’Connell. He’s Camilla’s son.”

  “Your brother!” His voice was horrified.

  “No, no—Camilla was a widow. Garry was ten when she married my father. He—he’s always been rather troublesome—we’ve often never known where he was and what he was doing.”

  “What’s he doing here? What brings him into this?”

  “I think—I think he must have heard my father say something about Philip Colstone’s book and the story. Gran says my grandfather Philip was the only one of the family who ‘held with it.’ My father may have heard something from him. Garry was old enough to remember, but I never knew my father.” The colour rose to her cheeks, and she stamped her foot. “He tried to make me believe he’d come down here about some treasure his grandfather, old Major O’Connell, found when he and Sir Jervis were young men together in the Mutiny.”

  Anthony spoke quickly.

  “There’s something about it in the diary I found—Sir Jervis’ diary.”

  “It was all a delusion really, but Garry pretended that was what he was looking for. I thought that
was why he hated you—and—and because of me. He has always wanted me.”

  “He’s in love with you?”

  “Oh, I didn’t want him to be—I didn’t. He frightens me.”

  Anthony looked grim.

  “I suppose he’s trying to score us off. If it’s a practical joke, it’s a perfectly beastly one, and by gum, I’ll make him pay for it! I say, darling, don’t shake like that.”

  “I’m n-not,” said Susan very untruthfully; and then, “But it’s not a joke, Anthony—it’s not.”

  From overhead there came the sound of someone laughing. Then a voice said, “No, it’s certainly not a joke—for you.” The voice held a quality of cold enjoyment. It seemed to come from the trap over head. Looking up, they could see a crack at the edge of it; and through the crack came the voice of Mr. Garry O’Connell.

  Anthony pushed Susan away and put out all his strength against the stone. The crack immediately disappeared. He strained once more against an immovable weight. After a while he gave it up. Then, as he stood away, the crack appeared again. Garry O’Connell addressed Susan this time:

  “As there are things I’m wanting to say, will you keep that blockhead from interrupting. It’s not the slightest use, because I’ve got my weight on the stone, and I’ve only to shift it the least thing in the world and you’re just as much shut in as if you’d one of the Pyramids on top of you. And what’s the sense of pushing up against a block of stone like this? If I wasn’t here at all, he’d never be able to move it.”

  Susan steadied herself against the black wall.

  “Let us out at once!” she said.

  Garry O’Connell’s voice changed. It sounded bitter cold as he said,

  “Didn’t you hear me say—good-bye?”

  Susan wasn’t trembling now. She put a hand quickly on Anthony’s mouth and said in everyday tones,

  “That is a very stupid joke.”

  “And do you think I’m believing that you think it’s a joke?”

  Anthony pushed Susan’s hand away. He was very angry, but for Susan’s sake he would hold his tongue.

  “Let us out at once, Garry!” said Susan.

  The crack opened a little wider.

  “You can come out if you like,” said Garry. “You can come out any time that you will—if you’ll come on my terms, and if you’ll tell me whether there’s any oath in heaven or earth that I’ll take from you or trust you by.”

  Susan stopped leaning against the wall. She stood up straight and came a step forward. There was only a voice for her to speak to, but she turned her face up to the inch-wide opening. Her own voice was steady.

  “If you let us out at once, we’ll both hold our tongues,” she said—“and that’s more than you’ve the right to expect.”

  Garry laughed.

  “And I’m to say thank you and send you a wedding present! I suppose he is marrying you!”

  Anthony broke his silence at the sneer, but before his anger had taken words to itself Susan was gripping his arm. He choked on what he was going to say, and was furiously silent.

  “Garry,” said Susan, “you’re making a most awful ass of yourself. Come off it and let us out!”

  “You can come out, as I said before.”

  “Then I’ll come.”

  “On terms, my dear. And you’ll have to find that oath I spoke about—something that’ll hold you, and damn you deeper than the devil himself if you break it. And there isn’t any oath in the world that I can think of that I’d trust to shut your mouth if I let you go now. So you must stay, Susan, you must stay—and if there’s air enough, you’ll starve, and if there isn’t, you’ll suffocate, and whether you take the long way out or the short, it’ll be all the same a hundred years hence.”

  “Not for you,” said Susan. Then she stamped her foot. “If you think you’re frightening me, you’re not. Do you suppose no one will look for us?”

  “Why should they? Who knows you’re here?”

  Susan’s heart struck against her side with a sickening throb. Who knew that they were here? No one knew that they were here. No one in the whole world knew that they were here.

  Garry went on speaking:

  “I’d be hating to think you were buoyed up with false hopes. If it’s the car you’re thinking of, it’ll not be found here.” His voice darkened in an indescribable manner.

  Susan, still holding Anthony by the arm, pressed close against him, whilst a shudder ran over her.

  “That car will be traced,” said Anthony. “We came through Wrane, and as soon as we’re known to be missing you’ll find there are people all up and down the road who will remember passing us.”

  From first to last Garry O’Connell took no notice of Anthony. He continued to speak to Susan as if they were alone. In his own mind they were alone—isolated in a cold space where every kindly thought he had ever had for her was frozen and dead, and other thoughts, like wolves without pity or mercy, ringed them round, waiting to rush in and make an end. His lips moved stiffly and his voice came low:

  “There’s no way out,” he said. “There’s no way out for you or for me, for if you took an oath on your soul, I’d not believe you. And if you swore you loved me—and put your hand in mine at the very altar itself and swore, I’d not believe that either. I’d believe what I saw in your eyes this day—and it’s because of that we’ve come to the end.”

  Susan shuddered again under the bleak, cruel misery of his voice. She remembered Garry teaching her to ride, Garry running upstairs three steps at a time with a laughing, screaming child on his shoulder, her hands deep in his hair, and Camilla scolding them both. She remembered a hurt finger, and Garry kissing the place to make it well. But that was before the change. She was Susan to him then, not something he must have and would smash rather than give it up—something to be held, possessed, and broken. She felt a mingled rush of pity, terror, anger. She said gently, “Garry—” And there was a long, long silence.

  Perhaps he struggled. Perhaps he only looked into the eyes of the wolves and saw them closing in. Susan waited, her hand upon Anthony’s wrist, her face raised, colourless, eager, her eyes darkly blue, her left hand at her breast. After a long time there was a sound. She thought it was a groan, but instantly upon it came Garry’s voice, quiet and bitter:

  “You may be interested to know that the car will be found at the foot of Crayling Cliff. It will be plain to everyone that a regrettable accident has occurred, and the tide will have come up and gone down again, and I’m afraid that Mr. Colstone’s body will never be recovered.”

  “I see—” said Susan. She spoke quite softly. “I see. And will my body never be recovered either?”

  This time she did hear a groan.

  “Will you leave him and swear—and swear—Ah, what’s the use of it now? Aren’t you dead already, the way you could look at me when I touched you? Could I lose you more than that if you were ten times dead? And could you be gone any farther away from me than when I had you in my arms, and all the ice of hell between us?”

  Anthony held Susan close. With his lips at her ear he said, “He’s mad,” and she made some answering movement, but whether it meant “Yes” or “No” he could not tell. He released her abruptly and measured the distance to that crack above their heads. If he had anything to wedge it with.… His coat would do at a pinch, but if they had an iron bar.… They hadn’t, so what was the good of wishing for it? He had his coat off and spoke again, soundlessly against her ear:

  “Get him to lift the stone a little more—somehow—anyhow.”

  She nodded, looked up again, and called his name:

  “Garry—are you there? I want to see you. I can’t talk to you like this.”

  Silence.

  “Garry—don’t you remember—when you used—to carry me upstairs?”

  Silence.

  Anthony felt her shiver. She looked half round at him and made a helpless gesture. He put his face against hers.

  “Go on,” he breathed.


  “Garry—won’t you just look at me?”

  The stone moved, tilted. Anthony stepped back and braced himself. The opening was an inch wide—an inch and a half—two inches—The longer he waited, the better he could wedge the stone, but it was moving so slowly, so horribly slowly. And then, in a single flash of time, there was a square, all dark, and Garry’s face looking out of the darkness. The lamplight struck on it, showed it ghastly. And then in the same instant it was gone, and even as Anthony thrust upward with all his strength, the stone fell.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  Just for a moment Susan stood quite still. She saw Anthony’s hand with the coat wrapped round it strike the stone, and she heard him call out. And then a most terrible wave of panic swept over her. Garry had gone away, and these four black walls and the fallen stone were between them and all the world they knew. It was a cold and dreadful thought. The colour went out of her face and the courage out of her heart. The place was full of mist.

  She went unsteadily to the wall and sank down beside it. Garry—Garry had done this—Garry had gone away and left them here—he wouldn’t come back—no one would come, because no one would know. She put her face in her hands and bowed her head upon her knees. There was a rushing sound in her ears like water—black water—carrying her away. Very dimly she thought that she was fainting, and after that she did not think at all.

  It seemed like a long time afterwards that she heard Anthony’s voice. She heard his voice before she felt that his arms were round her. His voice was very near—very near, and sharp with distress.

  “Susan—darling—my darling! Susan! Susan!”

  Susan opened her eyes. Her cheek was against the rough cloth of Anthony’s coat, and she must have been crying, because her face was wet. And Anthony was kissing her, and his face was wet too. She opened her eyes, and the mist was gone. There were only the four black walls and the open golden box filled up with its useless treasure—and she and Anthony like creatures in a trap.