Читать книгу The Yellow Room (Musaicum Vintage Mysteries) - Mary Roberts Rinehart - Страница 5

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She was still shivering as she got her bag from the entrance hall. She did not put on her hat. She left the front door open to let in more air, and stood outside looking about her.

There was no sign that George Smith had done much. Branches from the great pines littered the turnaround of the drive, and where the hill rose abruptly behind it the tool house appeared to be closed and locked. But the day was brilliantly bright, a bed of peonies by the grass terrace at the side of the house was beginning to show radiant pink and white blossoms, and a robin was sitting back on its tail and pulling vigorously at a worm. It was familiar and friendly, and she started briskly down the hill.

This was a mistake. She had not changed her shoes, and walking was not easy. The gravel had been raked into the center of the drive to avoid washing away in the winter rains and thaws, and the hard base underneath was rough. It was no use going to the garage, she knew. The cars had been put up for the winter. At the entrance gates, however, she hesitated. She could, she knew, telephone from the Richardson cottage, but she did not yet feel able to cope with the colonel and with his talk of Don. And the Ward place, separated from Crestview by a narrow dirt lane, was as far up the hill as Crestview itself.

In the end she decided to walk the mile to the market. It was easier going on the streets, and besides she had always liked the town. Its white houses, neat and orderly, its strong sense of self-respect, its New England dignity, all appealed to her. It looked friendly, too, in the morning sun, and her anxieties seemed foolish and slightly ridiculous.

It was still early. Here and there, it being Monday, washing was already hanging out in the yards, but she saw no one she knew until she limped into the market. Fortunately it was open, and behind the counter Harry Miller was putting on a fresh white coat.

He looked rather odd when he saw her.

“How are you, Miss Carol?” he said, as they shook hands. “I heard you were coming. Early, aren’t you, this morning?”

She smiled as she pulled up a stool and sat down.

“I had to walk,” she explained. “No car, no telephone, no groceries, and no sense. I forgot to change my shoes.”

“Sounds like a lot of misery,” said Harry, eying her.

“It was. It is. Harry, do you know anything about Lucy Norton? She’s not there, and even George Smith isn’t around. I don’t understand it.”

Harry hesitated.

“Well,” he said, “I guess you’ve run into a bit of hard luck, Miss Carol. Take George now. He’s in the hospital. Had his appendix out last Thursday. Doing all right though. Kind of proud of it by this time.”

“I’m sorry. He wasn’t much good, but he was somebody. I’ll go to see him as soon as I get things fixed a bit. What about Lucy?”

Harry still hesitated. He had always liked Carol. She was just folks like the rest, not like some he could mention. And that morning she was looking young and wind-blown and rather plaintive.

“About your telephone,” he said evasively. “I guess your mother didn’t pay any attention to the notice. You had to pay all winter even to keep one, and then you were lucky if you did.”

“I suppose Mother got one,” Carol said. “We didn’t expect to come, of course. What about Lucy Norton? Is she sick too?”

“Well, I suppose I’d better tell you,” he said, not too comfortably. “Lucy’s had an accident. She fell down the big staircase at your place and broke her leg. In the middle of the night, too. She might be lying there still if that William who takes down the winter stuff hadn’t come along. Seems like he wanted to borrow some coffee and the kitchen wing was locked. He went around to the front door and found it open. And found Lucy there. She’s at the hospital too. Doing all right, I hear.”

Carol looked startled.

“What on earth was Lucy doing on the stairs in the middle of the night? She always sleeps in the service wing.”

He grinned.

“Well, that’s a funny thing, Miss Carol. She says somebody was chasing her.”

Carol stared at him.

“Chasing her? It doesn’t sound like Lucy.”

“Does sound foolish, doesn’t it?” he said. “She’s a sensible woman too, like you say. But that’s what she claims. I only know what they’re saying around here. Seems like she says it was cold that night, and she’d got up to get a blanket from some closet or other. The light company hadn’t got around to turning on the electric current, so she took a candle. She got to the closet all right, but just as she was ready to open the door she says somebody reached out and knocked the candle out of her hand. Knocked her down too, and practically ran over her.”

“It sounds fantastic.”

“Doesn’t it? They’re calling it Lucy’s ghost around here. Anyhow she was so scared that she picked herself up and made for the stairs. It was black dark, you see, so she fell right down them. It’s a mercy she was found at all. Old William saw the front door wide open and went in, and Lucy Norton was at the foot of the stairs, about crazy with one thing and another. He got Dr. Harrison there and they took her to the hospital. She’s in a plaster cast now,” he added, almost with gusto.

Carol stared at him.

“It wasn’t a ghost if it opened the front door,” she said. “If the whole town knows about it, my maids will hear it sooner or later.” She remembered Freda with a sense of helplessness. “It was a tramp, of course. Who else could it be? Unless she dreamed the whole business.”

“Well, she sure enough broke her leg.”

The market was still empty. She was aware that Harry was watching her with a mixture of curiosity and the deference he reserved for his summer people. She rallied herself.

“I’m terribly sorry,” she said. “We’re all fond of her. I’ll see her as soon as I can. But a tramp—!”

“Anything missing from the place?” he inquired.

“I haven’t really looked. I don’t think so. We never leave much.”

He cleared his throat.

“Might as well tell you,” he said. “There was a light in that upper corner room of yours late that night. The one that looks this way. I was driving home, and I saw it myself. Looked like a candle, only Lucy says she wasn’t in there.”

“In the yellow room? Are you sure?”

“Sure as I’m standing here. About half past twelve it was.”

She gave her order finally, and went out with her head whirling. But there was no time to see Lucy Norton then, or George either. She went to the office of the telephone company, only to find that there was less than no hope. As usual, she was told there was a war on and, in effect, what was she, a patriot or not? She was able to have the electric current turned on, and at the service station to find someone to put her small car in running order.

It seemed to her that everyone she saw looked at her with more than normal interest. Lucy’s story had evidently spread and probably grown.

This was verified when she met the village chief of police at the corner. His name was Floyd, a big man with a sagging belt which carried the automatic he invariably wore as a badge of office, and with small shrewd deep-set eyes. He grinned as he shook hands with her.

“Glad you’re back,” he said. “We’d heard you weren’t coming.”

“Mother thought Gregory would like it.”

“Bit quiet for him, I’d think. Unless Lucy Norton’s ghost gets after him.”

He laughed, his big body shaking. She had known him all her life, and the very fact that he could laugh was a relief. She found herself smiling.

“If there was anyone it may have been a tramp. Harry Miller says William found the front door of the house open.”

He laughed again.

“No tramps around here, Miss Carol. Ten miles from a railroad! What would they be doing here? They’d starve to death.”

She left him still grinning, and went on her way. She ordered coal, she bought some candy at the drugstore as a peace offering for the two recalcitrant girls, and at last she got a local taxi, picked up part of her order at the market, and drove home. She did not go to the house at once, however. She sent the taxi on with the groceries, and herself got out at the garage and unlocked the doors. The cars were there, mounted on blocks, her small car, her mother’s limousine, and Gregory’s old abandoned roadster. They looked strange under their dust sheets, but nothing had been disturbed.

She left the door open for the men from the service station, and went back to the drive, to find there what she had dreaded for so long.

Colonel Richardson was waiting for her. He was standing in the roadway, his tall figure erect, the wind blowing his heavy white hair. A veteran of two wars, he was colonel to every one, and—except for his obsession about his son—universally beloved. With his smile Carol’s apprehensions left her.

“Hello,” he said genially. “Come and greet an old man. I didn’t know you were coming so soon.”

She went over and kissed him, and he patted her shoulder.

“Look as though you could stand some good Maine air,” he said, surveying her. “I only heard about Lucy Norton yesterday. Too bad. She’s a fine woman. How are you getting along?”

“We’ll manage. No telephone of course, and no cars or lights yet. Otherwise we’re all right. How are you?”

“Fine. I find the waiting hard, of course, but I have to remember that I am not alone in that. Can I do anything now?”

She told him she could get along, and watched him going down the drive, swinging the stick he always carried, but with his back straight and his head held high. She looked after him, distressed for them both, that he should believe and she could not, that to him Don was still a living force and to her he was becoming only a memory. She was deeply depressed when she got back to the house.

She found Maggie at the stove, with a kettle boiling and her face smeared with soot.

“I got the furnace started,” she said cheerfully. “Otherwise those fools of girls would still be hugging this fire. And I started Freda at your room. Soon as she’s made the bed—”

Carol dumped her groceries on the table.

“Lucy Norton’s broken her leg, Maggie. She’s in the hospital.”

Maggie turned, her face shocked.

“The poor thing! How did it happen?”

“Here in this house.” Carol sat down and kicked off her pumps. “She fell down the stairs. There’s a silly story going around that she found someone upstairs and tried to get away.”

“When was all this?” Maggie, practical as ever, was opening the new pound of coffee.

“Last Friday night or early Saturday morning. The lights were off, of course.” She looked at her feet. They were hurting, and she picked up one and began to rub it thoughtfully. “George is there too. He’s had his appendix out.”

“For God’s sake!” said Maggie, her poise finally forsaking her. “Something scared him too?”

There was no time to answer.

There was a wild scream from somewhere upstairs, and a minute later Freda half ran, half fell down the back staircase, and promptly fainted on the kitchen floor.

Later Carol was to remember that faint of Freda’s as the beginning of the nightmare, to see herself bending over the girl, whose small face was ashy gray and the palm of one hand oddly blackened, of trying to prevent Nora from dousing her with a pan of water from the sink, and of catching Maggie’s eye as she straightened.

“Something’s scared her too,” said Maggie ominously. “Too much scaring around here, to my way of thinking.”

Nora was still clutching the pan.

“Maybe she saw a mouse,” she said. “She’s deathly afraid of mice.”

“We’d better leave her flat,” Carol said. “Go up and get her a blanket, Nora. The floor’s cold. You’ll find them in the linen closet.”

She bent over and felt the girl’s pulse. It was rapid but strong, and a little color was coming back into her face. Carol herself felt rather dizzy. She stepped into her pumps and looked at Maggie.

“What’s that on her hand?”

Maggie bent over and looked.

“Seems like soot,” she said. “Maybe she was lighting your fire. I’d better go and look. The place could burn up while we’re standing here.”

She did not go, however. Freda was stirring. She opened pale-blue eyes and looked around her uncertainly.

“What happened?” she said. “I must have fainted or something.”

“If you didn’t you gave a good imitation of it,” said Maggie dryly. “You scared the insides out of us. Better lie still for a while. You’re all right.”

Freda was far from all right. With returning consciousness came memory, and without warning she burst into loud hysterical crying.

“I want to go home,” she said between wails. “I never did want to come here.”

“Shut up,” Maggie said grimly. “Noise isn’t going to help you. What scared you?”

Freda did not answer, and it was a part of the nightmare that Nora chose that moment to return. She came rather quietly down the back stairs and stopped, bracing herself against the frame of the kitchen door as if she needed support. There was no color in her face, but her voice was steady.

“There’s somebody dead in the linen closet,” she said, and shivered. “There’s been a fire there too.”