Читать книгу The Road to Mandalay - B. M. Croker - Страница 6

On hearing this announcement, Jane Tebbs gave a little lurch and leant against the wall in speechless horror; and yet in her heart she had been more than half expecting—we will not say hoping for—some tragedy. Then she made a rush to the store-room, where Miss Mitty, invested in a large blue apron, was methodically marking eggs.

"Sister, sister, come out!" she cried. "Mrs. Billing is here; she says

Mr. Shafto is dead; I told you that something had happened!"

"Dead!" repeated Mitty, staring blankly at her relative. Then she cast aside her apron and hurried into the hall. "Let us all go into the dining-room," she continued, leading the way. "What a shocking thing, Mrs. Billing!"—turning to her visitor. "Do tell us the particulars. I can hardly believe it! Why, I saw Mr. Shafto in Bricklands on Tuesday, and he looked as well as he ever did in his life."

"That was the day he heard the news," announced Mrs. Billing, selecting an arm-chair and casting off her feather boa.

"Bad news?" suggested Miss Jane.

"Very bad indeed—could not be worse. He heard he'd lost every penny he possessed in the wide world."

"Great patience!" ejaculated Miss Tebbs; "you don't say so; but how?"

"Well, you know he was always comfortably off; indeed, one might say rich."

"That's true! They keep five maids indoors, and a charwoman three times a week, two men and a boy in the garden, and two men in the stables," glibly enumerated Miss Jane. "All that is not done on small means, and I happen to know that Mr. Shafto himself paid everything monthly—which is more than we can say for his wife; even her bridge losses"; here she halted on the brink of scandal.

After hesitating for a second, Mrs. Billing continued:

"Well, it appears, from what my husband can gather, that Mr. Shafto trusted all his money and investments to a man who had managed his affairs for years, and in whom he had the most absolute confidence; he just drew his income regularly, lived his quiet life, and never troubled his head about business. It seems that for a considerable time this agent had been speculating with his clients' capital, and paying them the interest to the day. He staved off the reckoning by every possible device, and when he could no longer hide his wickedness, when liabilities poured in, and proceedings were instituted, he shot himself! Not much comfort in that for the families he has beggared. I believe he had a splendid establishment at Hampstead; greenhouses, pictures, motor-cars, and entertained like a prince. He squandered the handsome fortune that was left to Mr. Shafto, and all that Mr. Shafto could be sure of, about a hundred and fifty pounds a year, belongs to Douglas."

"Oh, my dear, never mind the money, but do tell us about poor Mr. Shafto," urged Jane. "What was the cause of his death? Suicide? This morning I thought I heard a shot!"

"No, no, no—heart failure," hastily interposed Mrs. Billing. "He was always troubled with a rickety heart, and on several occasions my husband attended him for rather dangerous fainting attacks; no doubt that was partly the reason why he lived so quietly, just taken up with his books, his garden, and, when he was at home, his boy. It appears that when Mr. Shafto heard of the smash, he went straight up to London, interviewed a lawyer, and learnt the worst. He returned in the afternoon, very tired and excited, broke the news to his wife, and had a serious fainting attack. My husband was sent for, but he found Mr. Shafto sinking. He died at midnight. He himself had wired for Douglas, who arrived just in time for the end. Poor boy! He feels it terribly."

"Yes," assented Miss Mitty, "Douglas and his father were such friends. The loss of money will make a sad difference to him. There will be no going into the Army now, no more hunting and cricket; he will have to take a clerkship. Did you see him?"

"Yes. He and my Freddy are great pals, so I know him pretty well. I declare he gave me a shock, he looked utterly heart-broken; and he said: 'It is so sudden, so frightfully sudden—about the pater; the money may come back somehow or other, but he is gone for ever; I'll never see him again. If he had only known me—or spoken to me!' And then he just laid his head upon his arms and sobbed like a girl."

"And Mrs. Shafto, how does she bear this double loss?" inquired Miss Jane magisterially.

"She had one fit of screaming hysterics after another. If you ask me, I believe it's the money that touches her most keenly; my husband begged me to go up this morning, and see if I could do anything. She has no intimate friends here, and I have sent to Mrs. Boomer and Mrs. Jake; they will be over from Bricklands immediately. The doctor has given a certificate, and has undertaken to see about the funeral, and sent the notice to the Times and Morning Post. From what old Hannah told me, it seems that Mr. Shafto and his family were not on terms; I believe the quarrel had something to do"—she paused and glanced from one to the other of her eager listeners—"with Mrs. Shafto, and I am not surprised. They did not approve of the marriage—it was a mistake."

"I'm afraid it was," agreed Miss Mitty briskly; "they never appeared a well-matched couple; he, so reserved and aristocratic, and she such a gabbling, fluffy, restless creature—crazy about bridge and dress. I wonder who she was?"

"I can tell you that!" was Mrs. Billing's unexpected reply. "Mr. Shafto was a Fellow of his College at Oxford, wealthy and distinguished—he had taken no end of honours. He was hooked—there is no other word for it—by the niece of a local book-seller! He was an important customer, and the girl always contrived to be there, when he came in and out, and was so sympathetic, and bright and lively, as well as being uncommonly pretty, that the poor man lost his head and, with very little pressure from the uncle, married her. It was all scrambled up in a hurry, before his friends could turn round, or interfere. Of course he had to resign his fellowship and his beautiful rooms overlooking the garden, and he took his bride abroad. His relations dropped him and he dropped his Oxford friends; then he went and settled in the north. He must have lived there for years; his next move was here."

"And have you always known this?" demanded Miss Mitty, her countenance expressing injury and jealousy. Fancy Mrs. Billing knowing this story all that time and keeping it to herself; how sly!

"Oh, only lately," replied the visitor in an apologetic key; "an old aunt of mine lives in Oxford, and I met her in town last Easter. Somehow the name of Shafto cropped up, and I heard the whole tale. I told my husband and he said I'd better hold my tongue, and so I have, until now, when it's of no consequence who knows—as of course 'Littlecote' must be given up, and the Shaftos will go away."

"Well, we have often wondered who she was? and how Shafto—who looked like a duke—came to marry her," said Miss Tebbs; "such an odd, flighty, uncertain sort of creature, always for strangers, instead of her home. That poor boy never saw much of his mother; I believe he was hustled off to a preparatory school when he was about seven, and when he happened to be here for his holidays it was his father who took him about. I am very sorry for Douglas, a handsome, cheery, nice fellow," she continued, "always with a pleasant word, even for an old woman like me. The rectory lads and the Tremenheeres just love him!"

"Luckily there are no girls at the rectory," remarked Miss Mitty.

"Douglas is but nineteen, and really only a boy," protested Mrs.

Billing.

"Well, this affair will make a man of him, or I'm greatly mistaken."

"More likely it will make him a slave," argued Jane; "he is bound to support his mother, and a hundred and fifty pounds a year won't go far with her! And now I dare say she will have her wish and be able to live in London. I suppose there will be an auction at 'Littlecote'?"

"Yes, of course," assented Mrs. Billing, "and that is sure to bring in a handsome sum—unless there are liabilities and debts. I've always admired that Crown Derby tea service—dark blue and gold."

"I know," rejoined Miss Tebbs, "a beautiful long set, and there's a nice little old Sheffield tea urn that we could do with! I expect the kitchen things will go pretty cheap; we want a new preserving pan."

"Talking of the kitchen, reminds me of food," remarked the visitor rising. "My husband will be back clamouring for his lunch and I must run," and in spite of her size, Mrs. Billing was out of the house in less than no time, pursued by a volley of questions to the very gate.

* * * * * *

During that afternoon there was an unusual amount of visiting and talking; the recent event had stirred the village to its depths, but beyond the facts disclosed by Mrs. Billing everything was surmise and regret; the personality of the late Edward Shafto, though slightly known, was much respected. "He was a gentleman"—the statement implied a left-handed compliment to his wife—"and his purse was ever open to the poor; it was said that he was a secret benefactor to various aged people, and to the local charities."

As the Misses Tebbs sat at supper the following night—a frugal meal of cocoa and bread and butter—Eliza tramped in, still wearing her hat; it had been her afternoon out. She seemed to be a little breathless, and was undoubtedly charged with some weighty intelligence.

"Well, Eliza, what is it?" eagerly inquired Miss Tebbs.

"I just thought I'd step over to 'Littlecote' this evening, and see

Hannah." Oh, priceless handmaiden!

"Yes—and what did she tell you?"

Eliza placed her hands on her hips—invariable preliminary to an important announcement. "She took me to see the corpse; he looked beautiful, just like a marble statue; and there in front of the dead, what do you think Hannah told me? That Mrs. Shafto had killed him!" She paused to contemplate the effect of this statement. "Yes, his heart was always weak, he couldn't stand no shocks, and when he come back wore out from London, and told her as how he was ruined, the screams of that woman was enough to bring the house down! Hannah ran in and there was he, lying back in a chair, and she standing over him with a face all worked up, and her hands clenched, shouting at him that it was all through his lunacy and laziness they were beggared—and she wished he was dead. I couldn't tell you all the awful things she said, but he fainted right away and never come to again. Now, what do you say to that?" and she surveyed her audience judicially.

The sisters remained dumb; for once, speech had failed them.

"As for caring," continued Eliza, "Mrs. Shafto doesn't feel no more than this table," rapping it with her bony knuckles; "all she minds is about the money—and already they say she has been routing among his papers, searching for his bank book. Oh! she is an awful woman, her heart is just a stone. As for poor Master Douglas, now there's real grief! He hasn't tasted a bite or sup, and he looks crushed. Everyone in the place will be sorry for him and for his father; but as far as Mrs. Shafto is concerned, when she's paid off the money she owes—the sooner the place can get shut of her the better!"