Читать книгу The Golden Rose - Fred M. White - Страница 4

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It was growing so hot and close now, that Lethbridge could bear it no longer. He was uneasy in his mind, too, for during the past few days he could not rid himself of the idea that he was being spied upon. This was all the more inexplicable because he did not know a soul in the neighbourhood. Still, Manchester was a noted place for horticulturists and cultivators of the finer kinds of flowers, and perhaps his fame had preceded him. It had not occurred to him to take precautions to guard his secret until something had happened which gave him a rude awakening. Of course he knew that there was a distinct commercial side to his enterprise, and that the possession of anything novel in his line meant a considerable sum to the owner. It might have been a coincidence that a firm in America had simultaneously put upon the market a striped carnation which Lethbridge had discovered himself; on the other hand, it was possible that a seedling or too had been stolen, and that Lethbridge had been anticipated. For several evenings he had heard strange noises as if some one were prowling round his cottage. He had found footprints in the soil where no footprints should be. Strangely, enough, these marks had not been made by a man's tread. They were small and well-formed, and the heel marks were evidently those of a woman. Lethbridge was thinking about this now as he drew the hood over his electric light and carefully locked the greenhouse door behind him.

It was good to be in the open air again, though the night was close and stifling. It was pitch dark, too, with a low sky that seemed to be resting on the tops of the trees. Ever and again there came a growl of distant thunder, followed by the patter of great drops of rain. Lethbridge, as he stood there, fancied that he was not alone. He had the strange, uneasy sense that some one was close by him. He believed he could hear something fluttering in the clump of rhododendrons on the lawn. Was it because his nostrils were full of the scent of flowers, or did he really inhale the peculiarly subtle perfume that always envelops some women as with an invisible cloak? Who was it, he wondered, who was paying him the compliment of keeping in touch with him in this fashion? Whilst Lethbridge was asking this question the black curtain overhead was suddenly rent with a long, zigzag flash of purple and scarlet lightning, and for the fraction of a second the whole place blazed in the full light of day. Every twig and leaf of the rhododendron stood out hard and stiff, and Lethbridge could see something of a woman's skirt. The nebulous flame glinted on a pair of polished shoes. Then the thunder crashed deafeningly overhead, and the rain came down with a hiss and a roar as loud and terrifying as the advance of cavalry. A startled voice was upraised suddenly, and a moment later Lethbridge stood inside his cottage with a girl in white by his side.

"Who are you, and what are you doing here?" he demanded.

His voice was stern. The look on his face was forbidding. He was in no mood for politeness. The girl turned a piteous face towards him, and her big violet eyes filled with tears. She could have chosen no more serviceable weapon for disarming Lethbridge's anger. His heart smote him almost before the words were uttered. It was a beautiful face, too, so very like some of his favourite flowers. The features were rather small but exquisitely refined, and the colouring was subdued, something between old ivory and the faintest admixture of carmine. It was a good, trustworthy face, that did not at all suggest the clever and unscrupulous spy of fiction. The red lips were parted in pleading protest. The girl was young and slender, and her white dress seemed part and parcel of herself.

"I am very sorry," she stammered.

Lethbridge was muttering apologies himself by this time. He regretted he had been so precipitate. But, really, it was no night for a girl to be out alone and without any kind of protection from the weather.

"I don't know," the girl went on in the same appealing voice. "I came out because it was so hot. I was trying to make my way from the road into the fields, and I took the wrong direction. I was foolish not to tell you so at once, but when you opened the door so suddenly you startled me. But I will go now if you will tell me the way—"

"Impossible!" Lethbridge exclaimed. "Listen to the rain. I never heard such thunder. Have you far to go?"

"Oh dear, no," the girl replied. "Only to the foot of the hill. We live at the Chester Nurseries. I keep house for my uncle. At least, he is not my uncle really. I don't quite know what relationship there is between us. But he is getting old and feeble, and I look after him."

Lethbridge nodded moodily. His old suspicions were returning. He would have been more satisfied had this beautiful girl with the violet eyes and ivory and pink complexion had nothing to do with anybody interested in the propagation of flowers. Besides, her information fanned his fears. Was she deceiving him? He tried to get a glimpse of the high-heeled shoes, but the long white dress hid the view. The girl's intuition seemed to be quick, for her lips trembled and she glanced anxiously at Lethbridge.

"What have I said to offend you?" she asked.

"I don't know," Lethbridge laughed vexedly. "Perhaps I am unduly suspicious. I am new to this quarter, and I thought I should be safe here. I get my living, or rather I try to get my living, by raising new flowers. I was robbed once of a most valuable plant, and two years' work was lost. Since then, well, really, it is very awkward—"

But the girl was not heeding him. Lethbridge began to stammer and hesitate, for it was borne in upon him that he was accusing his pretty visitor of being a thief; hanging about the house with an eye upon this floral treasures. Fortunately, the girl did not seem to comprehend.

"That is very strange," she exclaimed. "My uncle does exactly the same thing. He spends all his time in his greenhouses. He lives in the hope of making a fortune by giving the world new flowers. He lives for nothing else, and has spent hundreds of pounds which he cannot afford on his hobby. This must be so, because when I first came to him we lived in a lovely house, and I had everything I could desire. Now my uncle is irritated if I ask him for a sovereign. I want him to take a partner, but he won't hear of it. Once he was robbed and his confidence abused by one in whom he trusted, since then he avoids man's society whenever he can."

"That is a curious coincidence," he murmured. "What is your uncle's name?"

"Jasper Payn; he used to live at a place called Beckenham Hall. My name is Mary Grover. As I said before, I call Mr. Payn my uncle, but he is only very distantly related to me."

Lethbridge nodded in an absentminded fashion. He was not half so surprised at this stupendous statement as he had expected. It was all part of the cruel fate that had been pursuing him for years. No doubt the girl had heard of him. No doubt Jasper Payn had told her the whole story. He began to remember that Payn had had some relations called Grover whom no one had ever seen. Possibly he had sent for this girl when John Lethbridge had left him. It was Lethbridge's duty at once to proclaim his kinmanship with Payn, but just at the moment he hesitated. The girl fascinated him, attracted him in some subtle manner, and, besides, Lethbridge had not passed an hour in woman's company for the last three years. He could not very well turn the girl out into the drenching, blinding storm. It would be embarrassing to her if he told her his name, and left her to draw her own conclusions. No doubt she had been taught to look upon him as an ungrateful thief. He pictured to himself the expression on her charming face if he told the truth. He temporised, as many a better man than he might have done in similar circumstances.

"There is an unfortunate parallel between your uncle and myself," he said. "We have both suffered at the hands of false friends. We are both engaged in the same unusual occupation. I suppose you are interested in the hybridisation of flowers?"

"I should love it," the girl exclaimed, "if I were allowed to. I am passionately fond of flowers, but know nothing of the mysteries behind them. My uncle does not think that a girl has brains enough to understand such things. All I know is that at certain times of the year no bee must be allowed in the greenhouses. I wonder why."

"That is easily explained," Lethbridge smiled. "Bees have their uses from our point of view, and by carrying the pollen from one flower to another have frequently been the means of producing fresh hybrids. But that is mere luck on the part of the nurseryman. You can imagine what damage a few bees would do if a greenhouse when one's novelties were coming into bloom. But I am talking rather over your head. I am afraid."

"Perhaps so," the girl said dubiously. "There are certain things I should like to know. I wonder if you would mind allowing me some of your flowers. I dare not look into our greenhouses unless I go in with my uncle."

Again Lethbridge paused. Again he was weighed down by haunting suspicion. The girl was beautiful to look upon. She seemed fair and innocent. But Lethbridge remembered that he had promised never to trust a human being again. He was, perhaps, weaker than he thought, for a moment later he was leading the way into the stifling heat of the greenhouse where the great white flare of the electric light was playing full upon the trays of seedlings.

"I never thought to show anybody these," he said. "I am trusting you, a stranger, with my most cherished secrets. Look at that carnation in the corner there, you can see that already two of the buds are shaping into bloom. When they come out in a few days I shall be bitterly disappointed if they are not a perfect blue. Just try to imagine a blue carnation. But you can't imagine the years of care and toil and hope deferred which have led up to the perfection of that little flower. Did you ever see a carnation with alternate yellow and crimson stripes?"

"We have some," the girl said. "I understood that only three people in the kingdom possessed them. Do you grow them?"