Читать книгу The Coldstone - Dora Amy Elles - Страница 6

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An hour later he stepped across the village street to pay his respects to the Miss Colstones. The Ladies’ House had a little square paved garden in front of it; there was a low stone wall, and a high stone gate. The house itself crossed the back of the garden and sent out two wings that enclosed it. There was a square bed of scarlet geraniums in each corner of the paved place, and a round bed, with a large lavender bush and an incongruous edging of lobelia, in the middle. The path led up to the round bed, divided in two to encircle it, and then ran straight up to a worn grey step and a dark green door.

Anthony was shown into a white panelled room with a glass door open to a miniature lawn. On either side of the door there were casement windows very deeply recessed. He stood in the middle of the pale flowered carpet and looked about him. The furniture exhibited a pleasing mixture of periods. There were three gimcrack gilt Empire chairs, some dignified oak, a round table with a wreath of flowers inlaid upon its edge and a marvellous erection of wax fruit under a glass shade standing in the middle of it, flanked by photograph albums with gold clasps and edges. One of the albums was bound in crimson plush, and the other in faded red morocco. Over the fireplace a lady in a ruff looked sadly at her own long thin fingers, her hair drawn tightly back beneath a jewelled cap, her eyebrows raised in strained interrogation.

The door opened, and there came in a little lady, very point device, with pretty white hair rolled back over a cushion, and scraps of old lace at the neck and wrists of her mourning gown. She had a wisp of a white Shetland shawl about her shoulders. Her eyes were a clear pale blue, her cheeks round and pink, her mouth the cupid’s bow of a Victorian book of beauty. She had pretty little hands and pretty little feet, and a fluttered manner that was pretty too in its suggestion of timid welcome. The small outstretched hand trembled just perceptibly.

Anthony took it, and found it cold.

He said, “How do you do, Miss Colstone?”

“Oh, not Miss Colstone! Indeed I hope you will call us Cousin. And I am not Miss Colstone—I am Miss Arabel—your Cousin Arabel. Agatha is Miss Colstone, and—won’t you sit down?”

He chose one of the stronger chairs, moving it nearer to the frail gilt sofa with its faded brocade cushions which made Miss Arabel’s cashmere look so dead a black.

She gazed at him earnestly and said,

“You are not at all like dear Papa. Did you have a pleasant journey? We would have sent to meet you, but we have no carriage. Have you come alone?”

“I’m expecting a friend to-morrow.”

“That will be pleasant for you. It is a big house to be alone in.”

“I feel as if it would take me ages to find my way about in it. Do you know if there’s a plan of the house at all?”

“A plan?”

“Yes. I’d like to get it into my head.”

“I—don’t know.” She looked a little alarmed. “Oh, here is Agatha.”

Miss Agatha Colstone came in through the open door from the garden. She wore a wide straw hat tied under her ample chin with a bit of rusty black ribbon. Her skirt was short, her shoes very sensible. She held a garden fork. The hand she offered Anthony had obviously been weeding.

“There!” she said in a deep voice. “I’ve finished that border, thank goodness! So you’re young Anthony. Let me have a look at you. Who are you like?”

“He isn’t like poor Papa,” said Miss Arabel rather plaintively.

“Why should he be?”

“Must I be like someone?” said Anthony with a twinkle.

Miss Agatha fixed her rather prominent eyes upon him. They were brown and round like little bullseyes, but not unfriendly.

“H’m—I can’t see any likeness.”

Then she sat down, fanned herself with the fork, and began to ask him all the questions that Miss Arabel had already asked. For the second time, he had had a pleasant journey, and a friend was coming to stay with him. Then, with relief, to new ground. The friend’s name was West—about his own age—he hadn’t seen him for four years because he had been in India—they used to be great pals—he was a junior master at Marfield.

Miss Agatha was a vigorous questioner. She elicited in a swift competent manner that Anthony was twenty-six, disengaged, a golfer, a fair shot, six foot in his socks, and of no particular brand of politics. This appeared to shock her a good deal. Sir Jervis had obviously ranked politics with religion—and the greater of these was politics.

Anthony hastened to change the subject. He wanted to talk about Stonegate. But Miss Agatha did not.

“Your father died——”

“When I was three. I hardly remember him or my mother. Her people brought me up—an aunt and her husband. He farmed his own land. I think I’d have gone in for farming if he’d lived; but he died when I was sixteen. My aunt wanted me to go into the army. She said farming was no good without capital.”

“Quite right.”

“I was wondering——” He broke off. He didn’t want to embark on plans. The word sent him back to the question he had asked Miss Arabel. “I suppose there are plans somewhere—of the house and everything? I want to know my way about. And perhaps you can tell me what’s my best way up to the field where the Stones are. I thought I’d walk up and have a look. Fancy—I asked Mrs. Hutchins about them, and she couldn’t tell me how many there were. She said she’d never even been to have a look at them. Isn’t it amazing?”

Miss Agatha had been fidgeting with the dusty fork, to the detriment of her black serge skirt. When Anthony said “Amazing,” she dropped the fork and stooped frowning to pick it up again. Miss Arabel said “Oh!” in a helpless, fluttered sort of way.

“She couldn’t even tell me how many stones there were,” pursued Anthony cheerfully. “And by the way, of course you can tell me all about them. I’m fearfully interested. How many are there?”

There was one of those silences that follow the worst kind of faux pas. He had dropped a brick—most undoubtedly he had dropped a brick. He would have liked to drop a few more, noisily, with a crash; to heave, say, the plush photograph album through the left-hand casement window; or to catch Miss Arabel round the waist and swing her across the room to the latest tango.

He smiled charmingly at Miss Agatha’s blank frown and repeated his question.

“How many are there?”

“I don’t know,” said Miss Agatha. Her voice was deep and reluctant, heavy with things unsaid.

She got up, moved to the window, and pitched her weeding fork out on to the lawn. Then she came back, untying the strings of her hat. Miss Arabel sat quite still. She looked frightened. Her plump little hands clasped one another in her black cashmere lap.

Agatha Colstone removed her hat and began to fan herself with it—it certainly made a better fan than the fork. She sat on the edge of a solid mahogany chair with claw-and-ball feet. Her iron grey hair was drawn almost as tightly away from her face as that of the lady with the ruff. The back of her head was covered with flat rigid plaits. She looked angry and nervous. She said, in a loud voice that shook a little,

“We don’t talk about the Stones.”

Anthony felt better. The brick had at least broken the awful hush.

“Why don’t you talk about them?” He nerved himself and added, “Cousin Agatha?”

Miss Arabel made a little fluttered movement. She said, “Poor Papa——” and then stopped as if that explained everything.

“I don’t understand,” said Anthony. He understood very well that the old ladies were trying to hush him up; but he felt very resolute about not being hushed. He looked at Miss Agatha with a sparkle in his eyes.

“What’s the matter with the Stones? Don’t you think I’d better know and have done with it? After all, if I’m going to live here——”

Miss Agatha let her hat fall on to the floor. She spoke in a slow, considering manner:

“I cannot tell you how many stones there are, because, like Mrs. Hutchins, I have never been to look at them. Everyone does not take the same interest in these things that you seem to. And if you wish for an additional reason, I can give it you very simply. The village people have some foolish superstitions connected with the Stones, and my father did not wish us to become associated with them in any way.” She shut her mouth firmly.

Miss Arabel said, “Dear Papa——” and then stopped again because Miss Agatha turned a forbidding eye upon her.

Anthony felt pleasantly stimulated. He had drawn her to the extent of admitting that there were superstitions in connection with the Stones. He wanted very badly to know what they were. He thought he would ask, and risk a snubbing.

“What sort of superstitions? It sounds awfully interesting.”

“I am afraid I can’t tell you, Anthony.” She rose to her feet. “And now, I think, we will change the subject. Perhaps you would care to see the garden. I hope Mrs. Hutchins is making you comfortable. She is a valuable servant, and so is Lane.”

They passed out on to the sunny lawn.

When Anthony had taken his leave, Miss Agatha waited until she heard the front door shut. Then she turned to Miss Arabel and said,

“Well?”

“He is very agreeable, Agatha.”

Miss Agatha said “H’m!”

“And very good-looking.”

Miss Agatha said “H’m!” again.

There was a pause. Then Miss Agatha spoke in a forced, jerky voice:

“Susan Bowyer has got that girl here again.”

A faint colour came into Miss Arabel’s face.

“That girl Susan?”

“Yes.”

“It is very awkward, Agatha,” said Miss Arabel. “What will people say?”

Miss Agatha drew herself up.

“What can they say? She’s Robert’s grand-daughter—Robert Bowyer’s grand-daughter—she’s Susan Bowyer. There isn’t anything that anyone can say. Why shouldn’t Susan have her son Robert’s granddaughter to stay with her?”

“It is very awkward,” said Miss Arabel.