The Secret of Lonesome Cove/Chapter 21

Summer had waned from the coast and with it had passed the keenness of local interest in the strangest victim of Lonesome Cove. Even the indefatigable tongue of Elder Dennett had almost ceased to clack on the topic, by the fall of the first snow. Other subjects of absorbing interest supervened during the long winter: the wreck of the schooner yacht off Dead Men’s Eddy; the coming of the new Presbyterian minister at Martindale Center whose wife was reported to be a suffragette; the mysterious benefaction that had befallen old Mrs. Orcutt late in February, enabling her to leave her home next to Annalaka churchyard and take her asthma southward in search of a cure; the rumor that Hedgerow House was to be sold before summer.

“And young Blair’s body along with it, I expect,” remarked the Elder malevolently. “Seems to me, if I was a millionaire like Alexander Blair, I wouldn’t sell my own flesh and blood, dead or alive.”

Of Alexander Blair himself, nothing had been seen in the neighborhood since mid-July, nor of his daughter-in-law. Hedgerow House was in charge of Gansett Jim as caretaker. Professor Kent had left about the same time as the Blairs. But Francis Sedgwick had stuck to the Nook, studying first the cold grays and browns of November, and later the wonderful blazing whites and subtle blues of drift and shadow spread before him in winter’s endless panorama, with the same enthusiasm that he had devoted to October’s riot of color. Though the work prospered, the worker had paled. It was the opinion of Martindale Center and Annalaka alike that the “painter feller” was looking right peaky and piny, like one whose conscience ached. But Sedgwick had nothing worse than a heartache, and the fates were making medicine for that.

Wind-borne on the blast of a mid-March gale, Chester Kent dropped down at the door of the Nook one wild afternoon, without warning. As always, he was impeccably clad, though his stout boots showed the usage of recent hard wear. Leaving Austin that morning, with his light valise slung to his shoulder, he had footed the fifteen miles of soggy earth to Sedgwick’s place, in a luxurious tussle against the wind. Throwing open the door, he called his friend’s name.

Instantly the artist came loping down the stairs and had him by the shoulders.

“I’ve got a caller up above,” he said after the usual greetings and questionings were over.

“Yes? Have you gone in for local society?”

“Not exactly local. It’s Alexander Blair.”

“Hel-lo!” said Kent in surprise. “What brings him?”

“Why, he came down to Hedgerow House to look after certain books and papers, and ran over here to make his amende honorable in form. Chet, I hate being apologized to.”

“Of course. Every one does. Nevertheless, it’s good exercise for Mr. A. Blair, Esquire. Brings into action some muscles of his soul that might otherwise have atrophied from disuse.”

“He’s the grim-jawed, hard-bitted Blair of old. Just the same, he made his apology as handsomely as need be. I’ll bring him down here.”

The fabric magnate descended from the studio and greeted Kent briefly, then turned to his host. “You will excuse me if I ask Mr. Kent to step outside. I have some business with him.”

“Stay here,” said the artist. “I’ll go back to my studio.” Which he did.

“When a man once declines employment with me,” said Alexander Blair to Kent, “I never give him a second chance. That rule I am going to break. I need your assistance.”

“Honored, indeed!” murmured Kent.

“Will you accept the commission?”

“Not if it is like your former offer.”

“It is not. It is bona fide. Some one has been tampering with my son’s grave.”

“You mean the grave at Hedgerow House?”

“Yes. Gansett Jim reports that there are signs of recent digging. It looks as if ghouls had been at work there, with the idea of getting the body and holding it for ransom. They would have had a fine surprise if they had got the coffin out!”

“Because they’d have found no body in it, you mean?”

“Certainly. But suppose they discovered that there were no remains, nothing but a punctured sand-bag. Do you see the potentialities of blackmail?”

“No.”

“Then you are stupider than I ever took you for,” growled the magnate.

“Like most things, it depends on the point of view. I don’t think that you are in any danger of blackmail. But, if I understand the matter, you want your mind relieved of anxiety on the point. Very well, I’ll take the case.”

“That is settled, then,” said the older man briskly. “Now, this being a strictly business deal, we will discuss terms.”

“Oh, there is no room for discussion as to my terms,” said Kent easily. “I make them and you accept them, that’s all.”

Alexander Blair’s eyebrows drew down in a heavy scowl.

“Do you know of an old lady named Orcutt in Annalaka?” pursued the scientist.

“No.”

“She owns the house just next to Annalaka churchyard, where your son was buried as Jane Doe. She is a very worthy old lady. But she suffers severely from asthma. In fact it keeps her awake most of the night. So some interested persons have subscribed money, and sent her south to a sanatorium. I’d like to get you interested in her case.”

“You wish me to subscribe?”

“Oh, more than that. I think it would be a good idea if you were to assume the entire expense of the proceedings.”

“You mean reimburse the subscribers?”

“Exactly.”

For a few seconds the millionaire studied Kent’s candid face. “Very well,” he agreed. “How much?”

“Sheriff Schlager can tell you. He is keeping the accounts. You see, it was necessary to get her out of the way. Her windows overlook the churchyard.”

“So you took occasion to indicate before.”

“Repetition of a really relevant point is excusable. She left, two weeks ago, very much mystified but pathetically thankful, poor old girl!”

“She has no monopoly on being mystified,” observed Mr. Blair, with pursed lips.

“Probably she never will understand. That’s where you have the advantage of her, for I think you’ll see quite clearly the reason for her trip, and the propriety of your footing the bills.”

“Go on.”

“When she was safely out of the way, and no longer overlooking Annalaka churchyard by night, from her window, Schlager, Adam Bain and I paid a visit to the place. Technically, what we did there amounts to grave robbery, I suppose. But we covered our tracks well, and I don’t think anybody will ever discover what has been done.”

“Well?” queried his hearer, with twitching jaw.

“What lay, nameless, in Annalaka churchyard,” said Kent gravely, “now rests in its own place at Hedgerow House. The marks found by Gansett Jim were made by us. So your alarm is groundless. But I wish that you might have heard the little prayer made by that simple country lawyer over your son’s grave. Once in a while I meet with a really, through-and-through good man like Adam Bain, and then I have to reconstruct my whole formula of the average cussedness of human nature.”

Alexander Blair’s clenched hands went to his temples in a singular gesture, and dropped again. “What interest did Schlager and Bain have in the matter?” he added in a low tone.

“Why, Schlager had done some dirty work for you, and wanted to even accounts with his own conscience. As for Bain, we needed a third man we could trust. I asked him and got him. It was no small risk for him. If you felt that his risk is worth some reward, you might—”

“Yes, yes!” interrupted the other eagerly. “Do you think a thousand—or perhaps more—”

Kent smiled. “By thinking hard I could think a thousand,” he said. “But not more, in this case. It wouldn’t be safe. Bain might not survive the shock. Thank you very much, Mr. Blair.”

“And now,” said the older man, “I am still in the dark as to your interest in the matter.”

“Mine? Why, for one thing, I dislike to leave any affair unfinished. I have the satisfaction of knowing now that this is forever settled and done with. Besides there was a promise—practically a promise—as near a promise as I often permit myself to go, in a world of accidents, errors, and uncertainties—made to Mrs. Blair. Is she back from Europe?”

“She is at Hedgerow House.” Blair communed with himself for a time, then said abruptly, “By the way, do you think your friend Mr. Sedgwick would come over to a pick-up dinner before we leave?”

Kent’s face lighted up. “Ask him,” said he heartily, “and see!”

“I will, as soon as I get home. Good day.” Blair hesitated. He seemed to have difficulty in going and embarrassment in staying. He coughed and cleared his throat, looked over Kent’s head and down at his feet; and finally got himself into words.

“Kent,” he blurted, “I realize now why you won’t take my money. I can always buy brains; but I can’t buy the bigger better thing. It isn’t in the market. Thank you!” He caught the scientist’s hand in a swift hard grip, and strode off down the road.

Chester Kent went back into the house with a glow at his heart. He shouted up-stairs to Sedgwick, “Go on with your work, Frank. I want to loaf and invite my soul for an hour. Where’s your reading matter?”

“Shelf in the corner,” answered the artist. “You’ll find a few things in your line,—Darwin’s Origin of Species, Le Conte’s—”

“The devil take Darwin!” cried Kent impiously. “I want Bab Ballads, or Through the Looking-Glass, or something like that, really fit for an aspiring intellect. Never mind. I’ll forage for myself.”

Three minutes later he was stretched luxuriously on the divan, with the window-shade pulled down and the big electric chandelier glowing, immersed in the joyous nonsense of Rhyme and Reason. The wind alternately shouted profane protests at the window because it couldn’t get in, and then fell silent, waiting for an answer. In one of these lulls Kent heard footsteps outside.

He dropped his book. The footsteps approached the window. Then the gale rose again, and the loose end of a garment flapped softly against the glass. He half rose, listening. There was silence outside.

“Have I fallen into another mystery?” groaned Kent. “Is there no rest for the weary?”

The footsteps mounted the side porch. Kent awaited a knock. None came.

“Odd!” he observed to his pillow. “Few people find the outside of a door so fascinating that they stand for two minutes in a wet gale admiring it.”

Tiptoeing to the door, he threw it open. There was a startled cry from without and an equally startled grunt from within. Chester Kent and Marjorie Blair stood face to face.

“I—I—I beg your pardon,” gibbered Kent, whelmed instantly in a morass of embarrassment. “I—I didn’t mean to frighten you.”

Feminine-wise she built up her self-possession on the ruins of his. “I wonder,” she said with a smile, “whether I’m the worse-frightened one of us.”

“You see,” he said lamely, “it was so sudden, your—your coming that way. I didn’t expect you.”

“And for that reason you intend to bar me from the house? It’s quite disgustingly wet out here.”

With a muttered apology Kent stepped aside, and she entered. Even amid his ill-ease he could not but note how the girlish loveliness had ripened and warmed, yet without forfeiting anything of that quaint appealing wistfulness which made her charm unique. But there glinted now in her deep eyes an elfish spirit of mischief, partly inspired by the confusion of the helpless male creature before her, partly the reaction from the mingled dread and desire of the prospective meeting with Sedgwick; for she had come on a sudden uncontrollable impulse to see him, and would have turned and fled at the last minute had not Kent surprised her. Perhaps there was a little flavor of revenge for this, too, in her attitude toward him.

“What a surprise to find you here, Mrs. Kent!” she remarked sweetly. “Or are you calling yourself Mr. Blair nowadays? And how is your poor ear?”

Chester Kent immediately seized that unoffending member and clung to it with much the lost and anguished expression of the pale martyr in the once popular Rock of Ages chromo. His tormentor considered him with malicious eyes.

“Did any woman ever say ‘Boo!’ to him suddenly, I wonder?” she mused aloud.

Like a saving grace, there came into Kent’s mind a fragment of The Hunting of the Snark, in which he had just been reveling. Said he gravely:

She caught up the stanza:

“So you know Lewis Carroll. How really human of you!”

“It is better to be humane than human,” murmured Kent, relinquishing his aural grip as he began to touch bottom.

“Is that a plea? Very well. I shall be very gentle and soothing. But, oh,” she burst out irrepressibly, “may the kindly fates give me to be among those present when you fall in love!”

Kent favored her with an elaborate bow. “Your presence would be the one essential.”

“Really,” she approved, “you’re progressing. I begin to feel repaid for my visit, already.”

This time Kent looked her in the eye. “You’re not very demanding in the matter of returns for your trouble,” he remarked. “To come through all this wind and rain and then be content merely to contemplate the outside of a door—that argues an humble spirit. To be sure, however, it’s a very good door; one of the most interesting features of our local architecture, and may lead to—all sorts of things.”

It was her turn to grow red.

“You haven’t asked me about Sedgwick,” he continued.

“Is he well?” she inquired formally, but with quickened breath.

“He is more than that. He is cured—and a man. A man,” he added meaningly, “for any woman to be proud of.”

There was a step on the floor above. Marjorie Blair’s hand went to her heart.

“I didn’t know he was here,” she panted affrightedly. “I came just to—look at the place. Then I saw the light, and I wanted so to come in; but I didn’t dare. I can’t see him now! I must go! Don’t tell—”

Chester Kent raised his voice. “Frank!” he called. “Come down here! Quick!”

Not twice in his life had Sedgwick heard that tone in his friend’s voice. The bungalow shook to his long tread across the floor. The studio door opened and flew shut behind him. He took the stairs at a leap, and on the landing stopped dead.

“Marjorie!” he whispered.

She shrank back a little from the light in his eyes.

“What do you do here?” he said very low.

Still she did not speak, but stood, tremulous, her face half panic, half passion.

Unobtrusively Kent slid along the wall, like a shadow, and vanished into the night.

“Where have you been?” Sedgwick asked the woman of his love.

“Everywhere. Nowhere. What does it matter?” she faltered. “I’ve come back.”

He went forward and took her hands in his; cold little hands that clung as they touched.

“Why did you never write me?” he asked gently.

“I don’t know. I couldn’t. Don’t ask me to explain. It was just that I—I felt I must come back to you as I had come to you first, unexpected and without a word. Can you understand?”

“No,” he said.

“No; I suppose not. A man couldn’t.”

“Good God!” he burst out. “Do you realize what it is to live in such a hell of uncertainty and longing as I’ve lived in since you left; to wait, and hope, and lose hope, and hope and wait again for a word that never comes; to eat your heart out with waiting?”

A slow wonderful smile trembled on her lips. “My dear,” she said; “I have waited for you all my life.”

Suddenly her arms were around him; her cheek was pressed to his own; the breath of her whisper was at his ear.

“Oh, forgive me! I will make it up to you, my dear; my dearest!”

Out in the wind and the rain Chester Kent drew in the deep breath of satisfied and rounded achievement. He had beheld, against the wide window-shade two shadows, which, standing motionless for a moment, a few feet apart, had drawn slowly together as by some irresistible magnetism, and suddenly merged into one. The unintentional eavesdropper nodded, in grave gratulation to the house, then turned away.

“Finished!” he said. “''C’est conclu. Finis. Telos. Das Ende.'' And any or all other words of whatever language, meaning a sound conclusion!”

Half an hour later he entered, with due preliminary stamping of mud from clogged feet. Instantly Marjorie went over to him.

“Why, you’re wet as a rag!” she cried with a sweetly unconscious assumption of proprietary interest. “You must go and change at once!” she added, patting his shoulder.

Kent reached for his ear, changed his mind midway, and scratched his nose. “All right,” he said meekly. Over his rather stern-set face there came a singularly winning smile. “You two—” he said: “that’s as it should be. That’s worth everything.”

“No other congratulations will ever sound so good as that, Chet,” said Sedgwick in a low voice; “or so unselfish. You’ve had all the heat and toil of the great game, and I have all the happiness.”

“Not quite all, I fancy,” returned Kent, smiling at Marjorie.

She took his wet hand between her own. “But it doesn’t seem quite fair,” she protested. “Frank and I have found each other. But you, who have fought our battle for us so splendidly, what reward do you have?”

Chester Kent shook his head. “My dear,” he said gently, “the great game isn’t played for prizes.”

THE END