Delphi collected works o.., p.399
Delphi Collected Works of Grant Allen, page 399
“Perhaps he’s out,” Fletcher suggested calmly.
“No, he isn’t,” the Colonel answered, “for I heard his voice in the drawing-room as we came in. You see, I’m master here, and I know the place well. This room is the library; then outside there’s the entrance hall, where we passed; and behind it, the drawing-room. To the right my wife’s boudoir; to the left the billiard-room.” He rose and walked about, examining the pictures and furniture. “Very little altered either,” he went on, gazing around. “The same old bookcases, the same old water-colors, the same old sermons in dusty calf, the same old view from the big front window. No flies on that view, Fletcher. One of the best in Devonshire. Time writes no wrinkles on its azure brow.” He assumed his grandiose air. “Devilish fine house,” he went on. “Always was a fine house. And my wife has just modernized and aestheticized it a trifle.”
“Good portrait, the young man in uniform,” Fletcher observed, glancing up at it.
“Good portrait? You think so?” the Colonel answered,’ gazing at it affectionately. “Well, it was considered very like at the time it was taken. It’s one of Watts’s earliest. I sat for that — let me see — it must be close on thirty years ago.”
“You sat for it?” the detective said incredulously, glancing from one to the other. “Why, that can’t be you.” He had graver doubts than ever of his employer’s sanity.
“It is, though,” the Colonel replied, holding his head on one side and admiring it unaffectedly. “I was an innocent young chap then, wasn’t I eh? before I blossomed out into the hoary old reprobate. I quite agree with you, I, do look a young milksop! We know what we are, as Ophelia says, but we know not what we may be. Hang it all, when I sat for that portrait, Fletcher, to give my wife before I married her, I didn’t think I should ever be kept waiting by a whipper-snapper of a sawbones in my own house till he found it convenient to himself to come to me. Disgraceful, I call it, to a retired officer! If the fellow don’t make haste, I’ll go and drag him.”
“I wouldn’t if I were you,” the private inquirer put in. “Legal methods are safest. ’Tis the great First Principle of private inquiry.”
“Legal methods!” the Colonel responded, in his largest style, swelling visibly before his eyes like bread when it rises. “Why, who’s got a legal right to be here if it isn’t me, I should like to know? Eh, eh? What do you make of it? This house is mine — and the park — and the manor.” He waved his hands about and moved over to the window. “Why, damn it all, there’s the whipper-snapper,” he cried, looking out at Hubert— “over there by the clump of evergreens, with that Italian girl of his. In my grounds, too! By George, what insolence!”
He opened the French window slightly, so that he could catch what was passing. Hubert was speaking rather low. “I must go in for a while, dear,” he said. “Somebody wants to see me. But mother will show you round the garden and grounds, and I’ll come out again as soon as I can and meet you.”
“Will you?” the Colonel ejaculated in an undertone. “Oh, will you really! Not if I know it, my young friend. Once I catch you, I keep you.”
He spoke in a thick but excited voice, which the detective didn’t quite like. It suggested an impartial mixture of drink and madness.
“It’s sweet everywhere here,” Fede answered. “Make haste and come back to me. I want you, Hubert. I want to see it all with you.”
“And in a few weeks it will be yours, Fede,” the young man continued, with a lover’s glance at her. “You will come back to it as its mistress.”
And he moved away rapidly.
“Oh, will she?” the Colonel murmured. “About that, Mr. Whipper-Snapper, there may be two opinions. I’m master in this’ house, and I’m not at present in need of a lady assistant. Though, to be sure, the young woman would suit me admirably.”
As he spoke, the door opened, and Hubert entered.
“Well?” he said slowly, surveying the Colonel up and down, with a side-glance at the detective. “You have ventured to come here?”
Colonel Egremont blustered a little, though he felt vaguely uncomfortable. “Yes,” he answered; “here I am, and here I mean to remain. Restitution of Conjugal Rights is my game. That’s just what they call it. I’ve come home as the master of Milworth Manor.”
“I beg your pardon,” Hubert answered, with chilly politeness, “you have done nothing of the kind. This is my mother’s house — neither yours nor mine — and without her permission you shall not remain in it.”
He approached him, threateningly. The Colonel drew back a step. “Take care,” he said, turning an appealing glance towards Fletcher. “I have brought my servant with me as my witness, and for my personal protection.”
Hubert eyed the man sternly. “Colonel Egremont,” he said, with calm disdain, “I shall not permit this intrusion. If you think you have any claim to urge against my mother, you can urge it by legal means. I refer you to her solicitor. But if you attempt to remain here, against her will, I shall call the servants to eject you forcibly.” He moved over towards the bell and placed one finger on the electric knob. “Will you go?” he asked, in a very quiet voice. “Or must I ring for them to remove you?”
The Colonel, taken aback, reflected to himself that, under these painful circumstances, a seeming compliance was best for all parties. He had calculated, indeed, on terrifying his wife by the mere fact of his presence at Milworth Manor. This cool reception took him completely by surprise. “Oh, I’ll go,” he answered, though with some faint undertone still of his accustomed bluff. “Go? certainly! By all means! A gentleman never obtrudes himself where his society isn’t wanted. You wish to hear from my solicitor — very natural course — then from my solicitor you shall hear — and shortly, shortly.”
He retreated as he spoke, one step at a time, and let his eyeglass drop; while Hubert followed him up in a threatening attitude. He moved on to the door, Fletcher bringing up the rear. In the hall, Hubert happened to come across a servant. “Reece,” he said, in his quietest voice, without a trace of flurry, “will you accompany this gentleman all the way to the gate — see him safely out — and tell them at the lodge not to let him come in again? If he attempts to re-enter, let them send for the police. He is to leave the grounds. You understand my instructions?” Reece bowed with the inflexibly unperturbed face of the well-trained man-servant. “Yes, sir; certainly, sir,” he answered, with promptitude. It the Colonel had been a dog, Reece could not have received the order with more perfect composure.
Colonel Egremont was taken aback. “Oh, for the matter of that, I go,” he said jauntily, putting on his soft felt hat, and assuming an ostentatiously nonchalant air, as though he rather enjoyed this mode of ejection. “I dislike unpleasantness. Never was a person for creating scenes. I prefer to efface myself. But I wish you to understand, young man,”
— he addressed the servant—” that I’m the master of this house; the lord of the Manor of Milworth: and when I come again, I expect you to obey me. Do you understand?” He tapped his chest. “I’m your master, sir — your master!”
“Yes, sir; certainly, sir,” Reece replied, with the same stolid indifference. It was no part of his duty to be rude to the intruder.
“Then why do you take me to the gate?” the Colonel exclaimed, as Hubert stood at the door to watch him retreat from it.
“Because them’s my orders,” Reece said, in the same official tone. “You may be my master — but I’m engaged by Mrs. Egremont.”
“And I’m her husband, fellow,” the Colonel cried, trying to stop, turn round, and face him.
Reece drove the obnoxious visitor before him down the avenue as he would have driven a cow or a flock of sheep. “Yes, sir; so I hear, sir,” he assented, never pausing for a moment. “And young Mr. Egremont’s orders is to see Mrs. Egremont’s husband safe off the premises; and I’m obeying them, sir; beg your pardon.”
There was no withstanding this stolid unimpressionable devotion to duty. If the last day had intervened, Reece would still have continued ejecting the Colonel, till force majeure compelled him to desist. The Colonel recognized that fact, and moved slowly before him. Coin of the realm interposed in vain. The Colonal walked on. An altercation with a servant? — impossible, he reflected. His gait was even more shaky now than it had been in Switzerland. He shuffled as he walked, scarcely lifting each foot half an inch above the ground, and planting it again in a curious uncertain groping fashion. He reeled at times like an over-driven ox. But he continued, uncomplaining, his head high in the air, his mien overbearing.
Reece accompanied him to the gate, and saw them duly out. “Good-morning, sir; beg your pardon, sir,” he said, with perfect politeness. He was a gentleman’s servant. That summed up the whole of his individuality. Then he turned, like the perfect machine that he was, to give his message at the lodge to the gardener’s wife who kept it. “If these gentlemen try to come back,” he said, with stolid precision, “you’ve to bar them out, Mrs. Michelmore. Them’s Mr. Hubert’s orders.”
Hubert meanwhile had rejoined his mother. She was trembling with anxiety. “Well, what have you done?” she whispered.
Hubert laid one hand on her shoulder with an affectionate gesture. “Sent him off,” he answered, low. “He’s madder and more ill, I think, than ever. He won’t come back, I believe. He’s just at the last gasp, and I’ve referred him to our lawyer.” He turned to his future wife. “There, Fede,” he added aloud, “did you ever see anything prettier and wilder in its way than that bed of yellow flags by the bridge and the river?”
CHAPTER XIX.
VICTORY.
OUTSIDE the gate, Colonel Egremont called a halt to consider the situation. Though full of self-importance still, he was taken by surprise, and even a trifle humiliated. This summary ejectment entirely upset his preconceived ideas. He had expected consternation; he found quiet resolve. That young whipper-snapper had shown no disposition to parley with him. The Colonel had come down to his wife’s estate in a heroic not to say thrasonic mood, regarding himself already as the master of Milworth; and he had been ignominiously expelled, like a driven dog, by a single manservant. He glanced askance at Fletcher. “Rum job,” he mused tentatively.
“Very rum job,” the detective assented, with a distinctive flavor of distrust towards his employer.
Colonel Egremont paused, and drew a small leather-covered flask from his pocket. He seated himself with difficulty on a fence close by. He had some trouble to balance himself, and even when he succeeded, his equilibrium was most unstable. “I’m run down, Fletcher,” he said, with a glance at the flask. “Want winding up a bit. And here’s the watch-key!” He poured himself out a small glass of brandy, and drank it off in meditative abstraction.
“What’s the next move?” the detective asked. This odd situation piqued his curiosity.
Colonel Egremont passed him the glass with a polite gesture of invitation. “Have a windup?” he asked. “What; no? Blue ribbon? I hope not. Ah, don’t want a drink just now? Then we’ll proceed to business.”
He steadied himself on the fence with considerable difficulty. Turning round towards his satellite, he began again slowly. “Fletcher,” he inquired, in an impressive voice, “do you know anything about divorce?”
The detective smiled a contemptuous smile. “Do I know anything about it?” he repeated, with sarcastic emphasis. “Do I - know my own business? Divorce is bread and butter to me — board, lodging and washing. Why, I’ve supported a wife and family on divorce — four strapping little youngsters, as fine as they make ’em.”
“Well, wherever there’s an intrigue—” the Colonel began, in a tentative voice.
“In my experience,” Fletcher broke in, “there is always an intrigue.” And he spoke with confidence.
“There will probably be letters,” the Colonel went on, without noticing the interruption.
“In my experience,” the private inquirer repeated pointedly, “there are always letters.” Colonel Egremont hesitated. With the natural secretiveness of the half-insane, he did not wish to blurt out more of his case than necessary. “But if an intrigue happened long since,” he said; “many years ago, for instance — say twenty or more — would the letters be kept, or would the possessors burn them?” The detective answered with the certainty given by long habituation to the ways of human nature. “A man lets ’em lie about, or loses ’em, or burns ’em; a woman keeps ’em.”
“Always keeps them, Fletcher?”
“Invariably keeps ’em.”
“For twenty-four years?”
“For the term of her natural life. Till she dies, or somebody else gets ’em.”
The Colonel let himself down with difficulty from his perch. His control of his limbs was evidently precarious. He braced himself up for a supreme effort. “Then come along,” he said shortly. “I’m going for those letters!” The detective paused and hung back. “To the house again?” he inquired, with apparent unwillingness.
“Not by the front way,” Colonel Egremont answered. “I shall take another. Remember, I’m master here, Fletcher; I know the estate and all the ways of it. We’ll stroll in by the shrubbery and the library window, without passing the lodge, or ringing the bell, or trying the front door. There’s a side path yonder. Why, man, I could find the road anywhere about here in the dark. It’s the same as twenty years ago, only just grown up a bit.” Fletcher drew back once more. “I don’t quite like the look of it,” he said; “it’s too near a shave of burglary.”
“Now, you look here, young man,” the Colonel broke out, in his most paternal tone; “there’s nothing to be afraid of. I’m master here, and I mean to be respected. I’m the lady’s husband, and you saw they admitted it. A man may visit his own wife’s house, mayn’t he? If he can’t, what’s the law for, and restitution of conjugal rights, I ask you? I don’t want you to help me. I don’t ask you to come in. I only ask you to watch outside and let me know if anybody else is coming. When they turn up, you can cough; and I’ll promise to see you safely through with it.”
“What I want to know,” the detective said doggedly, is, what’s this job? Is it divorce or isn’t it? Do you suspect your wife, or do you want her money?”
The Colonel temporized. “I suspect my wife,” he answered, “of hopeless respectability. Though, of course, when a man’s been away from home for twenty-four years, why, hang it all, somethings likely to have happened in the interval, isn’t it?”
“Oh, if that’s your game,” Fletcher answered, “that’s all right. The usual line of business. But why didn’t you say so?”
“Because,” the Colonel answered with dignity, “I’m the master of this house, and I’m not going to be questioned by anybody with impunity.” As he said it, he drew himself up and strutted.
“Going mad!” the detective thought to himself. “I’ve seen them that way before. But anyhow, I’m down here, and I’d better help him through with it. It may be the regular private inquiry business, who knows? If he pays me, well and good; if he goes mad, I can take the other side, and get it out of the family in the end for watching him. I can see there ain’t much love lost between ’em, anyhow.”
They put themselves in motion again. The Colonel walked round by the back of the shrubbery, along the high-road, not skulking as he went, but more erect than usual. He strutted as he walked, though with his feet dragging painfully and at times almost tripping him. When they had come abreast of the house, under the high brick wall, he opened a small sidegate with an air of authority. His mien was pompous. The detective followed him. They went by a mossy path, damp and matted underfoot, and completely over-arched by horse-chestnut and lilac bushes. Still walking very erect, the Colonel approached the library window, which he had left halfopen when they quitted it an hour before. He stalked in with some remnant of a military tread, in spite of his paralysis. Still Fletcher followed him. The Colonel’s manner grew more grandiose at each step; he entered the drawing-room, and looked haughtily about him. Then he drew out his flask again.
“What are you up to?” the detective asked, in a warning voice.
“Only just going to oil the machinery a bit,” Colonel Egremont replied with a wink; and he proceeded to oil it; after which, he reflected that winking was undignified, and drew himself up still more stiffly than ever.
The detective looked alarmed. “Well, the sooner you get to work now,” he said, “the better. If it’s letters you want, do you know where to find them?”
“Yes,” the Colonel mused slowly, like one talking in his sleep. “In my wife’s boudoir There was an escritoire there — if they haven’t modernized and aestheticized it out of existence — in which she used always to keep her most private correspondence. It may be there still;... and again it may not.”
He doddered as he talked, but his smile was a smile of ineffable cunning. He moved towards the door. “If anyone comes,” he said, turning round, “cough! I’ll manage everything.”
“Look here,” Fletcher said again, “are you going to open this escritoire, or are you not? For if you do, that’s burglary.”
The Colonel waved his hand. “I tell you,” he answered, with some impatience, “I’m well within my rights. I’m master in this house, and I can do what I like in it. I shall find that woman out. Yes, I’m going to open it.”
“Well, have you anything to open it with, then?” the cautious detective inquired, more practically. He spoke in a whisper.
Colonel Egremont produced a small skeleton key. “I have this,” he answered.
“Good!” the detective replied, with a satisfied nod. “Not such a fool as he looks! D. T., no doubt: but still the lady may have letters for all that. — Well, you’d better make haste. I don’t half like the hang of it.”
The Colonel nodded and disappeared. Fletcher gazed after him with a dubious glance. “He’s the oddest client I ever had,” he murmured to himself. “I don’t know what to think of him. If he’s a burglar, he’s made me an accessory before the fact; if he’s not a burglar, he comes about as near being a lunatic as any one I ever had the pleasure of serving. He’s a mystery, that’s what he is. Anyhow, I’ve got to keep an eye on him. After all, Number One stands first on the register!”
