The haunted house
He was still struggling with the tying of his white tie (though he had
taken innumerable lessons in the art) when Mattie came in, looking
younger than she ought to have looked what with cosmetics and the rest,
and shaded lights. She gave him a powdery kiss to thank him once again;
and he was half-consoled when he came down late into the drawing-room
and found them all awaiting him to go in to dine.
During dinner, by Bo’s strict orders (for Bo knew a good deal more
about psychology than Lord Hambourne), John said not a word of the
ghost.
It was sound policy to give the old man rope, and a breathing space.
The greater would come the final shock of surprise; and surprise is the
essence of victory. John’s marching orders were not to say a word of
it till the women had gone. And even then to play delicately, and not
to force the pace.
She couldn’t prevent Lord Hambourne making a fool of himself and
speaking of The Thing once or twice. It was his damned profession to
make a fool of himself. Dons all do. She couldn’t prevent her father
asking a question or two about measurements—especially what size of
ruffs they wore in those days, and how they got their food to their
mouths over them, and whether they could see their feet.
But Hilda Maple had a growing instinct that the subject was dangerous,
and though she had fifty thousand pounds as good as in her pocket, that
same instinct bade her change this sort of conversation whenever it
arose, and, so long as the women remained, it played little part.
But when they were gone John fulfilled his orders, and over the wine
talked discreetly to his three guests.
He talked of apparitions, of Sussex tales, of the Fates of houses. He
flattered the Turtle Professor of Psychology by listening eagerly to
his appeals. He managed with great skill to distil some little poison
into Lord Mere de Beaurivage’s not heroic veins—principally by dropping
the subject once or twice rather obviously. He fought on two fronts,
for he knew very well that Lord Hambourne believed in no spirit,
creative or uncreative, finite or infinite, human or divine, and he had
to make Lord Mere de Beaurivage more and more uncomfortably familiar
with a spirit drawing more and more uncomfortably near.
The men were back in the drawing-room, and the first words they heard
as they entered was Isabeau saying:
“Well, it may be all talk, as you say, but I didn’t dare look in the
glass since I thought I saw _That_ looking over my shoulder.”
And Hilda Maple was answering almost angrily:
“Oh, that’s enough about the whole business, surely! I can’t make out
why anyone should take it seriously.”
Then, to stop that very nonsense, she bustled at making up four for
bridge. Lord Hambourne was her partner (it would never do to quarrel
with Lord Hellup); and as for Hellup, he was a good counter-weight for
Amathea, whose bridge was not experienced, though at whist she had
flattered herself all her life upon a pretty play, and boasted that at
cribbage she was unequalled.
Lord Mere de Bruvvish sat apart in a darker recess where burned a
second fire. He was fatigued by certain emotions. He needed repose.
He was still disappointed. The figure, £50,000, still returned to his
mind, and once, as the card-players, whom he would not interrupt by any
remark, brought out their short monologues, “I pass,” “Double,” “She
made it spades,” and the other brilliancies of the exercise, he had a
horrible brief recollection of a little Voice too near the ground,
wickedly evil, in the thick of the rhododendrons.
Bo kindly determined to bear him company in his loneliness.
“It’s an oddly quiet night, isn’t it, Lord Bruvvish?” said Bo, seating
herself beside him and talking dreamily. “It feels strange—this
quietness of the country. I don’t know....” But even as she spoke there
came a very faint, very distant, and not pleasant laugh—where from no
one could tell—except John Maple, who was watching the players with
intelligent interest.
“What ... what’s that?” said Lord de Beaurivage, gripping the arm of
the sofa and sitting up suddenly.
“What was what?” said Bo innocently.
“I thought ... I thought I ’eard something—something like someone
laughing, very faint like.”
“Did you?” said Isabeau. “Well, perhaps someone did. I don’t know....”
And once again, a little less remote, a little less evanescent, a
little more defined, came the sneering chuckle of something evil.
Lord Mere de Beaurivage was fairly sitting up. He brought out a big
silk handkerchief, wiped his forehead, and said:
“There, Miss Hellup! There! I could a-sworn....”
Then he pulled himself together. He was afraid he was making himself
ridiculous. But he badly needed human support.
Isabeau rose suddenly with a startled look.
“Where’s my little dawg?” she said. And as she said it she looked
round, and was able to exchange a sharp glance with her lover. “Oh!
Something’s happened, Lord Mere! Lovey-Lad never leaves me!”
She went off past John, murmuring to him as she did so, “Hooked!” And
then she said aloud and awfully to the company at large:
“I feel a presentiment! Something’s happening!”
John Maple left the bridge players, who only looked up for a moment
from their game, and sat down in the seat that Bo had vacated, next to
his guest.
“You mustn’t mind Miss Hellup, Lord Mere,” he said. “She’s not like
other girls—about spiritual things, I mean. I think sometimes she
almost _feels_ the other world.”
“Oh, ah!” answered the old man, his yellow eyes filled with uneasiness.
“She told me once that the only time she was in a place of great
evil—evil all round her—the first sign was given by her dog. Dogs see
things.”
“Do they? Well, I ’ave ’eard something like that,” gasped Lord Mere de
Beaurivage.
Even as he said it there came more distinctly than before the low wail
from the darkness, and the poor old gentleman was almost startled into
speaking; but still on John’s face there was no sign of recognition.
Lord Mere remembered how the doctor had talked to him about blood
pressure and all sorts of other things a few months before, and warned
him that if he heard voices or saw pictures just as he was falling
asleep he was not to be alarmed. But far off at the bridge table he
caught what was being said. It was Lady Mere de Beaurivage asking Lord
Hellup what had troubled Isabeau.
“She got anxious about her dog. She thinks he’s got a terror. He does
sometimes. She thinks he’s seeing something.”
The inevitable Hambourne broke in where he was least wanted.
“Animals often feel those influences first,” he said, and then in a
suddenly louder voice, “we inv-v-v-estig-g-gated a house w-w-w-once in
the m-m-m-ost d-d-disg-g-gusting m-m-m-urder....”
“Lord Hambourne,” said Mrs. Maple sharply, “you’ve made me forget. Was
it a spade?” But Lord Hambourne went on in his stride:
“A _p-p-partic-c-cularly_ d-d-isg-g-usting m-m-m-urder.”
“Really, Lord Hambourne,” said his hostess, too brusquely. “I can’t
play if you talk like this. I can’t do two things at once.”
Lady de Beaurivage was dummy. She heard her husband calling in a
whisper to her: “Mattie!”
“What’s the matter,” she said, going up to him.
“Mattie, you didn’t hear nothing—not voices like?”
“Lor, Bruvvish, don’t be so sudden! You guv me a cold shock all down my
back, you did!”
“Don’t say you seen nothing, Mattie? You’ve not _seen_ nothing?”
“No. But I ’ad a sort of creeping-like looking in the glass just now.”
“Don’t, Mattie, don’t! I can’t a-bear it. Not now. I’ll slip away to
bed soon. I can’t a-bear it.”
Then came Hilda Maple’s voice calling to her: “Amathea, dear, another
deal,” and Amathea returned reluctantly to the cards.
John and the old gentleman sat together in silence looking into the
fire. The elder man heard, or thought he had heard ... well ... what?
He was fighting against the influence. He tried silence, and then an
attempt to speak of other things; when again he heard, or thought he
heard, a Voice, so slight as to be disembodied—a nothingness upon the
air—yet deep and full and of an intolerable sadness. Even as he thought
he heard that voice he saw John start and look into the darker corner,
where the firelight could not play, and where a bookshelf came up
towards the drawn curtains of the window. Lord Mere gave a paralysed
glance, put his hand graspingly on John Maple’s arm, squinted to the
left into that same dark place, and whispered rather than said:
“Did yer ’ear anything, Mr. Miple?”
John did not answer at once; when he did he said:
“Perhaps, Lord Mere....” Then he looked down. “I really don’t know.
It’s better not to let oneself think too much of such things....”
They talked just so long as gave the old man time to think himself
recovered; when once again, but more certainly, though still distant
and of a phantom sort, the sound came.
“Oh, Mr. Miple, I ’eard it pline! It said, ‘The Night,’ Mr. Miple!
S’elp me, it did!”
There was terror in the eyes now, and he was gripping John Maple’s arm
convulsively. John Maple tossed his head slightly as though trying to
be rid of some bad influence.
“Yes, sir,” he said. “Yes. Shall we move?”
Then suddenly Isabeau’s voice was heard from the landing as she ran
downstairs, tragically loud:
“Oh, poor Lovey-Lad! Poor little pup!” she cried.
The unfortunate bridge players, interrupted again, looked up.
“You f-found him?” stammered Lord Hambourne.
“Oh, yes. He was whining and shaking so, I couldn’t bear it. And all
huddled up on the landing, and bristling. He’s there yet. I couldn’t
fix him so’s to get him to come. I tried to carry him, but he was just
crazy. Snapped at me—for the first time in his life—poor li’l fellow!”
Then she lowered her voice, and leaning against the banister at the
end of her descent, she said hysterically: “It’s something in this
room!”
Lord Mere de Bruvvish fell back in his chair again like a man stunned.
He gasped; he clutched the padded arms on which his hands lay, leaned
back, his breath coming and going as though he had just taken violent
exercise. His head was thrown back, and his eyes were shut. Then he
called quite loudly:
“Mattie!”
The bridge party looked round: that excellent wife broke off in the
middle of a hand; she rushed—if such a form can be said to rush—across
the room, and knelt by the chair.
“What’s the matter, George?” she said. “What’s the matter?”
“I’m orl right. I shall be orl right. I come over queer,” he said. “I
ought not to have called yer. Go back, dear; go back.”
“’Ow was ’e took?” said the worthy woman to John Maple.
“It’s nothing. I’m sure it’s nothing, Lady Mere,” said John, on his
feet. “It was something.... The night ... and this talk of ghosts has
made him nervous.”
“Mattie,” said the poor man in a low voice, “Mattie, I must go to bed.
You’ll excuse me, ma’am,” he added, turning to his hostess, “but I’m
that tired. I’m not as young as I was.”
Mattie accompanied him affectionately to the hall, gave him his
candle, and looked at him anxiously.
“Ye’re tired, dear,” she said, “you’re right when you sye you’re tired.”
“I’ll be orl right, Mattie,” he said. “Never mind me. You’ll find me
asleep. I’m orl right.”
But she watched him anxiously, gazing up after him as his unwieldy,
lumbering form went painfully up the stairs, candle in hand. He looked
back at her and smiled. She was a good wife, and as she went back to
the group in the drawing-room she wondered whether she ought not to go
and see to him; she was beginning to share his fears.
Mrs. Maple was rattled, and she could not hide it.
“Well,” she said, “so far as it’s possible to count in the middle of
all this, I make it 364.”