Читать книгу The Turn of the Tide - Fred M. White - Страница 5

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Not more than twenty years ago the village of Cray had been a sporting estate owned by the Langley family, of which Major Owen Langley had been the head at the beginning of the twentieth century. He had distinguished himself in the Boer War, from which he returned with every prospect of a successful career. But the unfortunate death of his wife in the hunting field had left him a comparatively young man with one little girl, and he had sent in his papers and devoted himself to the managing of his estate and the bringing up of his child, Patricia.

In those days, the brick and mortar octopus ever stretching out from the Metropolis in search of fresh land to devour had been checked in a south-easterly direction by the barrier of the Moat estate, and for some years this had been a sort of oasis in the dreary waste of jerry-building orgies. But eventually Major Owen Langley had found himself drawn into the vortex. His revenues were falling, and he was compelled to find fresh avenues for the upkeep of the family dignity. So he began mildly to speculate in building land, under the guidance of the last of the Veritys, who lived then in an old Manor House on the edge of the estate, and when Jasper Verity was no more, Mortimer Croot took his place and, under his guidance, Major Langley plunged still deeper.

And then, when Patricia was about seventeen, the crash came. It had come quite unexpectedly, like a bolt from the blue on that particular summer evening when Croot had walked over from the Manor House and had told Langley in plain words exactly where he stood. Patricia still remembered that evening, how she had sat in the drawing-room listening to voices in the library raised more and more in anger, until a door had banged somewhere, and then there was silence. She had heard her father pacing up and down the library, and then the sound of a heavy fall which struck a sort of chill to her heart. She seemed to feel the trouble in the air.

She found her father lying on the hearthrug, a mere fragment of humanity, the shell of a man, with the soul and sense dead within it. And so, from that day to this, Langley had remained. He had lost all power over his limbs, and most of the control over his speech. There were days when he could say certain things coherently, and when he could manage to drag himself from one chair to another. But these intervals were few and far between, and for the most part he passed his days in a sort of moody dream, though he seemed to recognize Patricia's devotion and loving kindness.

But that was all, and then Patricia began to gather what had happened. They were absolutely ruined; there was nothing left of the property, and even Croot's exertions had resulted only in saving a pittance of a hundred a year out of the wreck. And so it came about that the girl and her father found themselves eventually in a little cottage just by the lodge gates, and Croot and his adopted daughter became owner and tenant of the Moat House.

Patricia realized that it was absolutely imperative for her to do something, and she very bravely learnt typewriting and shorthand, and accepted Croot's offer of employment in the dingy old offices in Great Bower Street. And there she had been diligently working for the last two years.

Meanwhile, the Cray estate was altered beyond recognition. Where fields and covers had been, large houses, surrounded by their own grounds, stood. Where the big orchard had been was now the prosperous and sinfully-expensive centre for the Cray shops and banks. Only the Moat House itself remained, with its charming grounds, and there Croot had been established for years.

He still took more than a passing interest in the unfortunate man who occupied one of his cottages more as a matter of charity than anything else. On Major Langley's good days, Croot frequently looked in and did his best to cheer up the unhappy late owner of the Moat estate. But all to no purpose, for, strange to say, Langley seemed to have conceived a bitter dislike for the man whom most people regarded as his best friend. Not that Croot took this in bad part; he recognized the mental affliction that lay at the back of it all, and behaved accordingly. To Patricia herself, he was always the counsellor and guide. He paid her handsomely, far more handsomely than her services warranted, and she was not blind to the fact. Whatever her father might think in that dark mind of his, she was grateful enough.

She came home on the evening of Vera Croot's birthday, and smilingly entered the little sitting-room where her father was seated. It was quite a small room, with a pleasant outlook over the Moat House grounds, and there Langley would sit day after day, looking out as if seeing nothing, with Heaven knows what queer thoughts mustered in the back of his diseased mind. He sat now in a big arm-chair before the old-fashioned fire-place, with a shaded lamp on the little table in the centre of the room. It was customary for one of the servants to come there from the Moat House on most evenings and look after the afflicted man's comfort until such time as Pat came back from the City. Then she would get his evening meal, and afterwards play a sort of patience with him for an hour or two until one of the gardeners from the Moat House came along and helped to put the invalid to bed. Then, if Pat happened to be spending the evening out, the man in question would remain in the kitchen of the cottage until she returned.

"Well, dad," she said cheerfully. "And what sort of a day have you had? Anybody been to see you?"

It happened to be one of Langley's best days, therefore he looked up with a smile as Pat entered. He spoke slowly and painfully, but his words were clear enough, and she could follow them.

"Oh, much the same as usual," he said. "The vicar came in this afternoon and, after he had gone, Lady Broadley appeared. I have not been at all lonely, my dear."

Then he seemed to lapse again into the old mood, and it was quite half an hour before he looked up again with something like the light of reason in his eyes. It was always like this, though there were sometimes days together when he never spoke at all.

"I am going out this evening," Pat said, speaking much as a mother speaks to a little child. "I think I told you that I was dining at the Moat House."

Something like a scowl deepened on the face of the invalid, and his pitifully-slack mouth quivered. Pat watched him apprehensively, because this was the ominous sign of one of those strange outbursts of rage of his, and they were usually followed by a period of utter exhaustion that filled Pat with anxiety.

"Don't you want me to go?" she asked. "I won't, if you would rather I stayed at home. But then, you see, it's Vera's birthday, and if I am not there, she will be cruelly disappointed. And you like Vera, don't you?"

"Oh, I like Vera well enough," the invalid said, in his slow, painful way. "She is a very nice girl, and I am glad that she is no relation to Croot really. She comes to see me nearly every day, and she always brings me something. No, my child, you must not disappoint Vera, though if I had my way—"

Langley broke off in some confusion and a glance in his daughter's direction which puzzled her exceedingly. She knew her father in his dark moods, she knew him in those dangerous bursts of rage of his, but she had never seen him with the light of a great cunning in his eyes before. The mere suggestion filled her with a sort of apprehension.

"I won't be late," she said. "And Sam will be here till I return. Mr. Croot said he would look in presently."

"I don't want him," Langley burst out with amazing energy. "Tell him I won't see him. I hate the fellow. If it hadn't been for him, we should be at the Moat House to-day."

The words came clearly enough, with a certain vigour behind them, but they were dragged out one by one, and curiously clipped at the end of each. Pat said nothing, wisely waiting for the petulant fit to pass away. She could not quite understand this phase of her father's mind. She could remember the day, and not very far remote either, when he and Croot had apparently been the best of friends. She could remember Croot warning the other more than once that some of his speculations were rash to the verge of danger. And when the crash had come, nobody could have been kinder and more considerate than Mortimer Croot. But for him she would never have obtained that position in the City, and many a little comfort enjoyed by the invalid would have been missing.

"All right," she said. "You shan't be worried unless you like. I will go up to the house and tell him not to come. I will say you are not very well this evening and don't want to be disturbed. I am sure he will understand."

Langley laid a shaking hand upon Pat's arm.

"You needn't do that," he mumbled. "I don't want you to do that. Let him come if he likes, it's all the same to me. If he thought for an instant that I—"

Again came the curious hesitation, and again came the look of cunning in Langley's faded eyes.

"Don't you mind me, my dear," he went on. "Put up with me, it won't be for much longer. I know I am a burden to everybody about me, and I dare say you think that I am not grateful. But you don't know everything, my dear, you don't know everything. Now you get me my tea, and then you can go and dress for your party. Ah, what a thing it is to be young! I was young myself once, and I have not yet forgotten it."

It was quite a long effort for Langley, with the words dragging slowly and painfully enough, until he seemed to fall back in his chair, utterly exhausted. Patricia turned away with the tears rising in her eyes, for there was something in the pathos of it that moved her strangely. It seemed sad that her father should speak of himself as an old man, considering that he had barely passed his forty-fifth birthday. There were times, it seemed to Pat, when he was getting better, and she had visions of him restored once more to health and strength, and battling with the world in an endeavour to repair his battered fortunes. Sometimes Pat hugged this delusion for a week at a time, until there came the inevitable relapse, when Owen Langley was worse than ever.

But she put these thoughts out of her mind now, and bustled cheerfully about the little room, preparing the tea. From time to time Langley looked at her with strangely understanding eyes, and the ghost of a smile playing about his lips. And she was very good to look at, with that brilliant dark beauty of hers, and the healthy glow on a face tinged like old ivory. It was as if the invalid were deriving comfort from some beautiful picture.

The meal was finished at length and tidied away, and a few minutes later Croot entered the room. He crossed the floor with that firm confident step of his, and a smile on his resolute lips. If he detected anything like austerity in Langley's glance, he did not show it as he held out his hand.

"I can't," Langley said querulously. "This is one of my very bad days. I can't lift my hand."

Croot smiled again, but Pat flushed a little guiltily. She knew things were not quite as bad as her father said, and in the light of what he had just told her she was feeling really uncomfortable. But Croot was absolutely at his ease.

"Oh, I quite understand," he said. "Don't you move on my account. I thought I would just run in and see how you were to-day. Do you remember what I was telling you the last time I was here? About that piece of land at the corner of Martin Lane? If you can't, don't worry."

"I remember," Langley said slowly. "It was the land we could not sell. It didn't rightly belong to me."

"That's right," Croot said encouragingly. "We thought it didn't belong to you, and we couldn't trace the title. And now, in dealing with the other land that once belonged to Martin himself, my lawyers have found something out. And if I am not greatly mistaken, we shall be able to convince any prospective purchaser that we are the rightful owners. No trouble about selling it either. What I mean is that with any luck I ought to be able to get you something like a thousand pounds for that plot of ground."

"Is that really so, Mr. Croot," Pat exclaimed. "What a godsend it would be. I hope you didn't have much trouble over it. You are a real good friend to us."

"Well, it was a bit complicated," Croot smiled cheerfully. "You know, Miss Pat, that when I get my teeth into a thing I don't often let go. There was something queer behind the business, but when the other people saw I was going to put my foot down, they were only too glad to come to terms. Oh, it's no trouble where the interests of my old friends are concerned. But I will try and make your father understand. Now, you run upstairs and dress, and we will walk up to the house together."

Croot, already in evening dress himself, smiled down in his blandest manner upon the grateful Pat. He seemed to be the very essence and embodiment of genial prosperity as he stood there, big and important, with his back to the fire. With a grateful word or two upon her lips Pat disappeared.

"I hope you can follow all I have been saying, Langley," Croot went on. "In investigating one set of deeds we came upon one from another set which had found its way into the parcel by accident. And that missing document is your title to the property in Martin's Lane. A sort of missing link, if you gather what I mean. Anyway, it's likely to be a lucky find, as far as you are concerned, and, unless I am greatly mistaken, you will be quite a thousand pounds better off in the course of a week or two. What are you going to do with it?"

"Keep it," Langley said with a burst of sudden energy. "Lock it up, hide it under my bed. No more investments for me. I wish to Heaven I had never heard the word mentioned."

He dropped back into his chair again, like the mere rag of a man, nor did he speak until Pat appeared. There was a smile on her lips, and a tinge of colour in her cheek as she stood there in her simple evening frock which she had made herself, but looking, as she always did, the essence of daintiness and refinement and good breeding. Even Langley smiled gently.

"I am quite ready for you, Mr. Croot," she said. "I shan't be very late, dad, and I will come into your room when I get back and make you comfortable for the night."

"We must be getting on," Croot said. "Nearly half-past seven already. Well, good night, Langley."

He passed out of the room with Pat by his side, and closed the door behind him. Then, as their footsteps died away, Langley sat up, alert and vigorous and, raising himself in his chair, stood on the hearthrug with his back to the fire.

"The damned swine," he muttered. "The smug oily scoundrel. Ah, well, I've waited a long time now, but my time is coming, and when it does, look to yourself, Mortimer Croot. Because you need not expect to get any sort of mercy from me."