Читать книгу A Queen's Error - Henry Curties - Страница 5

I turned the corner abruptly and found myself in a long, dreary street; looking in the semi-fog and drizzle more desolate than those dismal old-world streets of Bath I had passed through already in my aimless wandering; I turned sharply and came almost face to face with her.

She was standing on the upper step, and the door stood open; the house itself looked neglected and with the general appearance of having been shut up for years. The windows were grimed with dirt, and there was that little accumulation of dust, pieces of straw, and little scraps of paper, under the two steps which tells of long disuse.

She stood on the step, a figure slightly over the middle height, leaning one hand on a walking stick, and her face fascinated me.

It was the face of an old lady of perhaps seventy, hale and healthful, with fresh colour on the cheeks, and bands of perfectly white hair falling over the ears. But it was the expression which attracted me; it was peculiarly sweet and winning.

My halt could only have been momentary. I recollected myself and was passing on, when she spoke to me.

"Would you be so kind as to do me a favour, sir?" she asked.

The voice was as sweet and winning as her expression; though she spoke perfect English, yet there was the very slightest soupçon of a foreign accent. Of what country, I could not tell.

I stopped again as she spoke, and having perhaps among my friends a little reputation for politeness to the weaker sex, especially the older members of it—for I am not by way of being a Lothario, be it said—I answered her as politely as I could.

"In what way may I be of service to you?"

She brought her walking stick round in front of her and leant upon it with both hands as she made her request. She then appeared, in the fuller light of the yellow-flamed old-fashioned gas lamp opposite, to be much older than I first thought.

"I want you, if you will," she said, "to come into this house for a few minutes. I wish to ask a further favour of you which I shall then have an opportunity of explaining, but, on the other hand, the service I shall ask will not go unrewarded."

Prepossessing though her appearance and address were, yet I hesitated.

I took another long look at her open face, white hair, and very correct old lady's black hat secured by a veil tied under her chin. It was just such a hat as my own dear mother used to wear.

"You seem to hesitate," she remarked, noting, I suppose, my delay in answering her; "but I assure you you have nothing to fear."

I took a sudden resolve, despite the many tragedies I had read of in connection with empty houses; I would trust her.

There was something about her face which conveyed confidence.

"Very well," I replied, "if I can be of any use to you, I will come in."

"Thank you," she said, "then kindly follow me."

She turned and held the door for me to pass in; when I was inside she closed it, and we stood almost in complete darkness, except for the glimmering reflected light of the yellow street lamp opposite, which struggled in through the dirty pane of glass over the door.

"Now," she added, "I will get a light."

She passed me and went to the hall table on which stood one of those candlesticks in which the candle is protected by a glass chimney. She struck a match and lighted a candle. "Now if you please," she added, going on before me down the dark passage. I saw now from her tottering walk that she was much older and much more feeble than I had imagined. I followed her and saw signs of dust and neglect on every side; the house, I should say, had stood empty for many years. But as I followed the old lady one thing struck me, and that was, that instead of the common candle which I would have expected her to use under the circumstances, the one she carried in its glass protector was evidently of fine wax. She took me down a long passage, and we came to a flight of stairs leading to the kitchens, I imagined.

"We must go down here," she announced. "I am sorry to have to take you to the basement, but it cannot be helped." Again I had some slight misgivings, but I braced myself. I had made up my mind and I would go forward.

I followed her as she went laboriously step by step down the flight. At the bottom was the usual long basement passage, such as I expected to see, but with this difference, it was swept and evidently well kept.

The old lady led on to the extreme end of this passage towards the back of the house, then opened a door on the left hand and walked in. At her invitation I followed her and found her busily lighting more wax candles fixed in old-fashioned sconces on the walls. As each candle burned up I was astonished to find the sort of room it revealed to me.

It was a lady's boudoir beautifully furnished and filled with works of art; china, choice pictures, and old silver abounded on every side; on the hearth burned a bright fire; on the mantelpiece was a very handsome looking-glass framed in oak. My companion, having lit six candles, went to the windows to draw down the blinds. I interposed and saved her this exertion by doing it myself.

I then became aware that the house, like so many others in Bath, was built on the side of a hill, the front door being on a level with the street, whilst the lower back windows even commanded lovely views over the beautiful valley, the town, and the distant hills beyond.

Below me innumerable lights twinkled out in the streets through the misty air, while here and there brightly lit tram cars wound through the town or mounted the hills. Thick though the air was the sight was exceedingly pretty.

I could now understand how even a room situated as this was in the basement of a house could become habitable and pleasant. The voice of the old lady recalled me to myself as I pulled down the last blind.

"I am sorry to have to bring you down here," she said. "It is hardly the sort of room in which a lady usually receives visitors, but you will perhaps understand my liking for it when I tell you that I have lived here many years."

The information surprised me.

"Whatever induced you to do that?" I asked without thinking, then recollected that I had no right to ask the question. "You must excuse my question," I added, "but I fear you find it very lonely unless you have some one living with you?"

"I live here," she replied, "absolutely alone, and yet I am never lonely."

"You have some occupation?" I suggested.

"Yes," she replied, "I write for the newspapers."

This piece of information astounded me more than ever. I imagined it to be the last place from which "copy" would emanate for the present go-ahead public prints, and the old lady to be the last person who could supply it.

She saw my puzzled look, and came to my aid with further information.

"Not the newspapers of this country," she added, "the newspapers of—of foreign countries."

I was more satisfied with this answer; the requirements of most foreign journals had not appeared to me to be excessive.

"I too am a brother of the pen," I answered, "I write books of sorts."

The old lady broke into a very sweet smile which lighted up her charming old face.

"Permit me to shake hands," she suggested, "with a fellow-sufferer in the cause of Literature."

I took her hand and noted its soft elegance, old though she was.

She crossed to a carved cupboard which was fixed in the wall, and took from it a tiny Venetian decanter, two little glasses, and a silver cigarette case.

"We must celebrate this meeting," she suggested with another smile, "as disciples of the pen."

She filled the two little glasses with what afterwards proved to be yellow Chartreuse, and held one glass towards me.

"Pray take this," she suggested, "it will be good for you after being out in the damp air."

I took the tiny glass of yellow liqueur in which the candlelight sparkled, and sipped it; it was superb.

"Now," she continued, indicating an armchair on the farther side of the fireplace, "sit and let us talk."

I took the chair, and she opened the silver box of cigarettes and pushed them towards me.

"I presume you smoke?" she suggested. "I smoke myself habitually; I find it a great resource and comfort. I lived for a long time in a country where all the ladies smoked."

I took a cigarette, lit a match, and handed her a light; she lit her cigarette with a grace born of long habit.

"Now," she said, as I puffed contentedly, "I can tell you what I have to say in comfort."

I certainly thought I had made a good exchange from the raw air of the street to this comfortable fireside.

"It will not interest you now," she continued, "to hear the reasons which have moved me to live here so long as I have done; that is a story which would take too long to tell you. All the preamble I wish to make to my remark is this; that the favour I shall ask of you is one that you can fulfil without the slightest injury to your honour. On the contrary it will be an act of kindness and humanity which no one in the world could object to."

"I feel sure of that," I interposed with a bow, "you need not say another word on that point."

I was really quite falling in love with the old lady, and her old-world courtesy of manner.

"I will then come straight to the point," she proceeded, taking a curious key from her pocket; it was a key with a finely-wrought handle in which was the letter C.

"I want you to open a secret drawer in this room, which, since its hiding-place was contrived, has been known only to me and to one other, the workman who made it, a Belgian long since dead. Please take this key."

I took it.

"Now," she continued, "cast your eyes round this room, and see if you can detect where the secret safe is hidden."

I looked round the room as she wished, and could see nothing which gave me the slightest clue to it.

"No," I said, "I can see nothing which has any resemblance to a safe."

She laughed, and, rising from her seat, turned to the fireplace and touched a carved rose in the frame of the handsome over-mantel; immediately the looking-glass moved up by itself in its frame, disclosing, apparently, the bare wall.

"Please watch me," proceeded the old lady.

She placed her finger on a certain part of the pattern of the wall paper beneath, and the whole of that part of the pattern swung forward; behind was a safe, apparently of steel, evidently a piece of foreign workmanship.

"Please place the key in the lock, and turn it," she asked, "but do not open the safe."

I regarded her proceedings with much interest, and rose from my chair and did as she asked.

"Thank you," she said, when she heard the lock click and the bolts shoot back, "now will you lock it again?"

I did so.

"Now please put the key in your pocket, and take care of it for me. I give you full authority to open that safe again in case of necessity."

"What necessity?" I asked.

"You will discover that in due course," she answered.

This was about the last thing I should have expected her to ask, but nevertheless I did as she told me and put the key in my pocket.

"Please notice how I close it again," was her next request.

She pushed back the displaced square of the wall paper pattern, which was simply the door of a cupboard. It closed with a snap and fitted so exactly into the pattern of the paper that it was impossible to detect it.

Then with a glance towards me to see that I was paying attention, she touched a carved rose on the frame of the over-mantel on the opposite side to that which had caused the looking-glass to move, and at once the latter slowly slid down again into its place.

I stood gazing at her as this was accomplished, and she noted the look of inquiry on my face.

"There is only one thing now I have to ask you," she said, "and then I will detain you no longer. Will you oblige me by coming to see me here at five o'clock to-morrow?"

I considered for a moment or two, and then recollected that there was nothing in my engagements for the next day to prevent my complying with the old lady's request. My life for the last week had been occupied in taking the baths and the waters at regular intervals, with the daily diversion of the Pump Room concert at three.

"Yes," I answered, "I shall be very pleased to come and see you again at five to-morrow."

Although up to now I looked upon her proceedings as simply the whims of an eccentric old lady, yet I felt some considerable interest in them.

"Then let me fill your glass again with liqueur?" she suggested.

Alluring as the offer was I declined it.

I buttoned up my overcoat and prepared to depart, accepting, however, the offer of another cigarette.

The old lady insisted upon accompanying me to the door, and went on in front with a candle, despite my remonstrances, to show me the way upstairs.

She had one foot on the stair when she stopped.

"Do you mind telling me your name?" she asked.

I handed her my card, and she put up her glasses.

"'William Anstruther,'" she read. "That is a coincidence." "I had nearly forgotten one thing," she continued. "I must give you a duplicate latch-key to let yourself in with. I have a habit of falling asleep in the afternoon, and you might ring the bell for half an hour and I should not hear you."

She went back into the room we had left and returned in a few moments with the latch-key, which she gave me.

Despite my endeavours to persuade her, she went with me to the front door, and I felt a deep pity for her when I left, thinking that she was to spend the night alone in that dismal old house.

"Au revoir until five to-morrow," I said cheerfully, as I bowed and left her.

She smiled benignantly upon me.

"Au revoir," she answered.

When the door had closed and it was too late to call her back, I recollected one piece of forgetfulness on my part; I had never thought to ask her name!