Читать книгу In Jeopardy - Van Tassel Sutphen - Страница 4

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The letter which lay before me had been written in old-fashioned longhand on the business stationery of the law firm of Eldon & Crawford, their given address being Calverton, Maryland. For the third time I read over the missive, although certainly it was short and to the point, its meaning unmistakable. But judge for yourself.

Calverton, Maryland,

June 22, 1919.

My dear Sir,—The funeral services for the late Francis Hildebrand Graeme Esqre., of "Hildebrand Hundred," King William County, Maryland, will be held at S. Saviour's Church, Guildford Corners, Maryland, on Thursday, June 24, 1919, at three o'clock post meridian.

In view of the fact that you are a beneficiary under Mr. Graeme's will I am forwarding this communication by special delivery, in the hope that you may be able to attend the services and be present at the reading of the testament.

I am enclosing a time schedule of the Cape Charles route, and would suggest that you take the morning express from Baltimore. By giving notice to the conductor the train will be stopped at Crown Ferry, the nearest railway point to "Hildebrand Hundred." If you will advise me by telegraph of your coming I will see that a conveyance is in waiting. Trusting that you may find it possible to make the journey, and taking the liberty of placing our legal services at your disposal,

I remain, my dear sir,

Your obedient servant,

John Eldon.

Hugh Hildebrand, Esqre.

Yes, this was all perfectly plain and understandable. Francis Graeme, the distant cousin whom I had seen just once in my life, had died suddenly at his Maryland home; as a member of the family and a presumptive legatee it was my duty to offer the last respects in person. Yet there had been something more or less odd about the whole business. It had been the Civil War which had made a lasting breach between the Northern and Southern branches of the Hildebrand family; for more than a generation there had been no social intercourse whatever. Moreover, during that period, the name had shown a tendency to disappear for good and all, the usual fate of old families who live too close to the ancestral soil and dislike the noisy wheels of the world's progress. The late owner of the "Hundred" did not even bear the family patronymic, his Hildebrand descent being on the distaff side. I, in turn, am an orphan, without brothers or sisters; more than that I have no near relatives in the paternal connection; indeed I had never heard of any immediate bearers of my name until one day, some three months ago, when Francis Graeme called at my Philadelphia office, introduced himself, claimed me as kin, and carried me off to a luncheon which extended itself into dinner and then lasted to a midnight supper. It had been a case of liking at first sight, although Graeme was a man of forty-five or so, while I lacked three years of thirty. However, years—mere years—don't signify if people really "belong," and Graeme and I had lost no time in laying the foundations of a friendship that promised a more than ordinary degree of permanence. It had been arranged that I should come down to "Hildebrand Hundred" for a long visit, but one thing after another had happened to prevent; I had been presented with an actual law case, Graeme was called West for a month, one of my college class reunions had been scheduled for the first part of June; so it went. And now poor Graeme was dead and nothing could be as we had planned it during that long afternoon and night at the old University Club on Walnut Street. Strange, I had not heard that he was ill, but our correspondence had been most irregular, and most likely the attack had been a sudden one—heart disease or perhaps a stroke. Of course I must go down to Maryland, albeit the journey would be a depressing one; I might even find it a little awkward to appear at the house in the character of a new-found relative. I ought to explain that the family at the "Hundred" now consisted of Miss Lysbeth Graeme and her cousin, Miss Eunice Trevor. Of course I had never met either of them, but Graeme had spoken of both girls at our first and only meeting; he seemed especially fond of Lysbeth, or Betty, as he called her. Betty Graeme—rather an attractive name I think—was some half dozen years my junior, and any normal-minded young man would find the acquisition of a brand-new feminine cousin an interesting possibility. But that was before this distressing business of Francis Graeme's death, and I should feel more or less the intruder. It was evident, however, that Mr. Eldon's letter must have been sanctioned by Miss Graeme, and, I dare say, Graeme had spoken to his daughter of having made my acquaintance, and warmly, too; consequently, I should have to go and be decent, stay over night if that were unavoidable, and then slip away Friday morning with my legacy—perhaps a hundred dollars with which to procure the mourning-ring so dear to the hearts of mid-Victorian novelists.

In spite of the special delivery stamp the letter had been delayed somewhere, and it was not handed over to me until early Thursday morning, the messenger awaking me out of an unusually sound sleep by the simple expedient of keeping his finger pressed firmly upon the electric push button of my tiny room-and-bath lodgings in the "Clarendon." When I had rubbed the Sandman's dust out of my eyes, and had taken in the general purport of the epistle, I glanced at the clock and saw that I had less than an hour in which to make my toilet, settle my business affairs and catch the train. Yet I made it easily enough, for, outside of bath and breakfast, I had only to telephone the friend with whom I shared a diminutive law office that I should not be back until Friday, and that our progressive match at golf would have to be postponed to that date. Happily or unhappily, as you choose to look at it, there were no clients to put off and no real business exigencies to consider. Come to think of it, I am not so sure that I was ever intended for the bench and bar, and certainly the world has not gone out of its way to avail itself of my store of legal knowledge. Mine was just the usual case of a young man reading law because, on leaving the university, nothing more tangible had presented itself. Moreover, the quarterly paid income from my mother's estate is sufficient for my modest needs and perhaps deprives me of any real incentive for hard work. Now the successful man is usually self-made, meaning that he has been forced to play the role of a creator and make something out of nothing. It makes me blush sometimes when I reflect what would happen if that quarterly cheque ever failed to turn up in the mail; had I anything of real value to offer the world in exchange for shelter, raiment, and what my newsboy calls three "squares" a day? Not that I am altogether a cumberer of the ground (as a golfer I have been well-trained and always take care to replace my divots), but there is no particular reason for my existence on this planet, and there are not many people who would either know or care that I was no longer of their number. Cynical? not at all; at least I had not intended to give that impression. But my two years' war service destroyed some illusion, even though I hadn't the luck to get across the water.

Finally, I may call myself a decent enough chap when compared to the ordinary run of men, and while I don't pretend to philanthropic activities I can say quite honestly that there is no man, or woman either, who may truthfully affirm being the worse off for having enjoyed the distinction of my personal acquaintance. At best, this is only a negative virtue, and there are times when I feel keenly that I ought to be adding something definite to the world's stock of material good or ethical treasure. I can't flatter myself that I possess anything more than the one talent, and my quarterly dividend makes a convenient napkin in which to enwrap it; the old allegory seems to fit my case precisely. I dare say that life for me has been a trifle too pleasant and well-ordered; people who live on Easy Street become more and more attached to their otium-cum-dig; I have visions of myself less than a score of years away: portly, tonsured, inclined to resent the existence of boys and dogs, fussily addicted to carrying about to dinner parties my own particular brand of pepper in a little, flat, silver box. Perhaps if I should fall in love, but pooh! I have been invoking that contingency so long and so unavailingly that it has lost a large portion of its pristine appeal. No, I can't see that there is anything better for me to do than to go on drawing my income, sitting religiously for at least six hours a day in my office, sticking at golf until I finally get the best of that hideous tendency to hook, and dining as usual on Mondays with the Mercers en famille; in short, whittling my individual peg to fit my allotted hole. I do think, however, that I'll tell Bob Mercer he can count upon me for one evening a week at his Julian Street settlement. Bob is the right sort of a cleric, and I know that he talks by the card when he insists that giving and getting are really interchangeable terms. But one always hates to make the effort and so prove the truth of the assertion; it is infinitely less trouble to let some other fellow get the true meaning and joy out of life while you content yourself with the corner seat at the club fireside and the comfortable certainty that the chef understands to a dot how you like your cutlets and asparagus tips. Just the same I will speak to Bob—and meanwhile I have awakened to the realization that it is ten minutes to nine and that only a taxi-driver with no reverence for the speed laws can deliver me at the Pennsylvania station in time for the southbound train. I do make it, with a quarter of a minute to spare, and now I remember that I have forgotten to send a wire to Mr. Eldon. I can telegraph him at Wilmington, but there is small chance of its being delivered in time; probably I shall have to rustle my own means of conveyance to "Hildebrand Hundred." I shall have full two hours between the arrival of my train at Crown Ferry and the time appointed for the funeral. That ought to be sufficient even if I have to walk.

The ride over the Cape Charles route is not particularly interesting; moreover, it was infernally dusty, and the food provided by the buffet on the Pullman seemed extraordinarily unappetizing. Where on earth does the company procure such tasteless provender? Everything tastes so desiccated and deodorized, the mere shadow of really substantial viands, a veritable feast of Barmecide. There was the usual delay owing to a freight wreck, and my two hours of leeway had shrunken to a scant sixty minutes by the time I had alighted at the little flag station of Crown Ferry.

Not a very inviting place, this shabby way station set in a wilderness of jack-pine and hackberry trees. There was not a soul in sight, outside of the depressed looking individual who served as general utility man and who apparently resented the intrusion of a stranger upon his lonely domain. To my inquiry concerning the possibility of obtaining some sort of conveyance, he returned a monosyllabic "Nope," and he showed not the smallest inclination to give me any real assistance in finding my way to "Hildebrand Hundred"; he pointed out the general direction, with a lean, tobacco-stained finger, and let it go at that.

There was no house in sight, nothing but the two rutted tracks of a sandy country road leading off toward the west and bifurcating itself a couple of hundred yards away from the station—"deepo" in the vernacular. I understood, from the scant information vouchsafed me, that I was to take the left-hand fork, and after prevailing upon the agent, in consideration of two of my choice cigars, to take temporary charge of my kit-bag, I started off on my three-mile tramp.

Once through the belt of scrubby woodland, the appearance of the country began to change for the better, and the further I traveled from the coast line the more rolling and diversified it became. The sand gave place to loam, an improvement in which the highway shared, the fields were neatly fenced, and, with the added attractions of oak and hickory groves, the landscape began to appeal; this was good farming land and a pleasant place of rural residence.

I passed several farm houses, but since the day was unusually cool for the month of June and as I rather enjoyed the exercise of walking, I concluded not to bother about hiring a trap. A farmer whom I encountered, at a cross-roads where there was a little cluster of half a dozen houses, informed me that S. Saviour's Church was distant about a mile; but already it was half after two o'clock and I realized that I should not have time to present myself at the house before the funeral cortège started. The obvious procedure was for me to wait at the church until the party from "Hildebrand Hundred" had arrived; I could then introduce myself to Mr. Eldon and be assigned to my proper position among the mourners.

"Or if you like," continued my new acquaintance, "you can save more'n half way to the church by cuttin' across the Thaneford property. You go in by that stile yander," and he pointed a hundred yards down the road.

I felt a trifle doubtful about the propriety of taking a short cut across private grounds, and said as much. "You are quite sure that Mr. Thaneford doesn't object?" I asked.

"Of co'se he objects," declared my rural friend, who now informed me that his name was Greenough and that he was the newly elected sheriff of the county. "He objects powerful. But the Co'te has decided that it's a public right-of-way. And when the law gives a man his rights he's bound to maintain them."

"Why the right-of-way?" I asked.

"The Thaneford property was a royal grant," explained Sheriff Greenough, "but S. Saviour's had been built before that, and the folks here in Guildford Corners retained right of access to their parish church. By the road it's full a mile."

"A relic of the established church of colonial days," I remarked. "Nowadays no one is obliged to attend S. Saviour's."

"No," admitted the Sheriff, "and I'm a Baptis' myself. But we keep our rights, for nobody knows when we may want to use 'em."

Since Mr. Thaneford was apparently unreconciled to the exercise of ancient ecclesiastical privilege, I was about to say that I, as a stranger, did not propose to become a party to the controversy; but a glance at my watch showed me that I would have to take the short cut if I hoped to reach the church by three o'clock.

"Mr. Graeme's funeral?" inquired Greenough. "Well, he was a good man and a good neighbor. I'd be there myself if I hadn't business at the Co'te-house to look after. Yes, sir, straight ahead and you can't miss the path. Glad to have obliged you, sir; good evening."

Beyond the stile the path ran across a piece of meadow land; thence through a hardwood grove, rising gently to a little plateau upon which the mansion was situated. The house was of the Georgian period with the usual pretentious portico; it seemed badly out of repair and was surrounded by unkempt lawns, paddocks, and gardens. I saw that the path would lead me within a comparatively short distance of the house, and I rather sympathized with the owner's resentment at the invasion of his privacy under cover of law. Yet I must go on, and I quickened my pace so as to get out of sight of the house as quickly as possible.

A powerfully built young man came around the corner of what, in its day, must have been a very considerable glass-house, and confronted me. Not a pleasant face, with its prominent cheekbones and black V of eyebrows furrowing the low, heavy forehead. "What are you doing on this property?" he demanded with a truculency that made me dislike him instantly and completely.

"It's a public right-of-way," I retorted.

"We don't admit that," he said hotly. "The case has been appealed; if necessary, we'll carry it to Washington."

Well what was I to do? I had no desire to get into a dispute with this rustic boor, and yet it was imperative for me to go on if I were to reach the church in time for the service. Much as I disliked the man I must put myself in the position of asking a favor from him.

"I presume that I am addressing Mr. Thaneford?" I began inquiringly.

"I'm John Thaneford—what then?"

"As you see, I am a stranger here. At the Corners I was told that I could take this short cut and so save time and distance in reaching the church."

"Oh, S. Saviour's!"

"Yes. I am a relative of the late Mr. Francis Graeme and came this morning from Philadelphia to attend the funeral."

John Thaneford looked up sharply, the V of eyebrows narrowing. "I didn't know Graeme had any kin in Philadelphia," he said suspiciously. "Or, for that matter, anywhere."

"That may be true so far as the Graeme side of the family is concerned," I rejoined. "My name is Hildebrand."

"Hildebrand!" He stared at me even more intently than before, and I fancied that there was a subtle note of dismay in the ejaculation. I determined to follow up the advantage, if advantage it was.

"Hugh Hildebrand, to be precise," I continued, eyeing him steadily. "We are of the Northern branch, and since the Civil War there has been little or no intercourse with the family of the 'Hundred.'"

"Yet you come to Francis Graeme's funeral. Why?"

My temper flashed up. "And what damned business is that of yours, Mr. John Thaneford!" I snapped out. "Am I to pass or not?"

For an instant he glowered, and I saw the pupils of his coal-black eyes contract to a pin point. Then he took an evident pull upon himself; he spoke with a marked change of demeanor, almost courteously.

"I'm afraid I've been acting rather rudely," he said, and stepped aside out of the path. "But these country bullies have been most annoying of late, insisting upon their so-called rights out of mere, petty spite. It's part of their creed, you know, to hate a gentleman." I nodded. I could see now that John Thaneford was by no means the rustic lout of my first impressions. Not that I liked him any the better, but at least we spoke the same language.

"It's a silly fiction," he went on, "this alleged necessity of access to the parish church. Nowadays, everybody at the Corners goes to the Baptist or Methodist meeting-house, and S. Saviour's congregation is gathered chiefly in the churchyard. Outside the Graeme and Thaneford families there ar'n't more than a dozen regular parishioners, and the church is only opened for service once a month."

By this time we were walking side by side in the direction of the house. For some inscrutable reason Mr. John Thaneford had made up his mind to be decently polite; indeed the effort was plainly apparent. Consequently, I could do no less than fall in with his new mood.

"I suppose S. Saviour's is a colonial foundation," I remarked.

"Yes, even to the inevitable Queen Anne Communion plate. But the countryside has changed and the bigger estates have been cut up into small holdings. That always brings in a different set of people. And the old and the new don't mix well."

"Precisely. And so there are empty pews at S. Saviour's."

"More of them every year. A young chap comes over from Lynn the first Sunday in the month and holds service; so I'm told, at least. Otherwise, the church is only opened for weddings, christenings, and funerals; and the latter outnumber both the former. What's the answer?" He laughed cynically.

"It's a pity," I said regretfully. "I always hate to see the old order displaced. But surely if someone took the lead—well, why not yourself?"

"I haven't been inside the building since I used to get whaled for not knowing my catechism. And I've small use for parsons," he continued, dourly.

We walked on in silence, that hostile silence which sooner or later is sure to declare itself between two natures essentially antagonistic. Since John Thaneford and I could not be friends, nor even remain indifferent, we should never have met at all. But the fact had been accomplished and we should have to put up with it; I fell to wondering if he, too, sensed the vague presentiment of future clash and struggle; in the meantime I was uncomfortable; I wanted to get away.

"The original right-of-way turns here," said Thaneford suddenly, "but I can take you across the lawn, and thence it is only a step, through a fir plantation, to the churchyard. Besides, I want you to meet my father; he will be interested in knowing you since the Hildebrands and the Thanefords have been neighbors for seven generations; yes and kin, too, as we reckon such things down here. My mother was a sister of old Richard Hildebrand, and that makes me a second or third cousin of this Francis Graeme, who inherited the family property, although he did not bear the family name. If it were a question of direct descent either you or I might have put in a better claim to the 'Hundred.'" He looked at me slantingly as though to assure himself that the idea had not already presented itself to my mind. I murmured an unintelligible assent; what was coming now?

"And it follows logically that we two are kin. How does that strike you, Cousin Hugh Hildebrand," he added coolly.

"Better than being thrown out as a trespasser," I answered with the most convincing imitation of a smile that I could conjure up. "But I think I ought to be getting along; it's ten minutes to three."

"Remember that you are now south of Mason and Dixon's line," he rejoined, "and time is made only for slaves. But come along," and he led me, inwardly protesting, across the weedy expanse of what had once been a handsome piece of ornamental grass to where an old man sat in a big arm-chair under the shade of the most beautiful white oak that I had ever beheld in my life, an almost perfectly symmetrical ball of limbs and foliage. Then I looked at Fielding Thaneford and straightway forgot about the wonders of inanimate nature.

Certainly a very old man, and yet his skin was of a remarkable texture and quality, apparently as fine and softly pink as that of a baby. The resemblance to an infant was intensified by one distinguishing characteristic of the massive head and features—the total absence of any hirsute adornment; there was not a vestige of hair, beard, eyelashes, or eyebrows, and the effect was singularly repulsive. Yet he did not seem to be afflicted with the ordinary infirmities of senility, for he turned at the slight noise of our approaching footsteps and the eye that scanned me was of a cold, bright blue, indicative of a keen and finely coordinated intelligence.

"Father," said John Thaneford in his hatefully false voice of assumed cordiality, "this is our cousin, Hugh Hildebrand, of Philadelphia."

I fancied that the placid figure in the great chair stiffened slightly at the sound of my name. But otherwise he made no movement or sign, continuing to gaze upon me with those unflinching eyes, as horrible in their total lack of lashes as the optics of a vulture.

"He is here to be present at the funeral of Cousin Francis Graeme." Again that coldly devouring gaze passed over me; involuntarily I shivered and stepped back. What was the impression that was being made upon me? Not of malignancy certainly, nor even of ordinary cold-bloodedness; there was something too detached about this singular personality to suggest any kind of commonplace, healthy passion; if the crater had ever existed it had long since cooled to slag and ashes. There was but one fitting adjective—inhuman. Whatever spirit it was that still held its abode behind that fresh, childlike masque it endured altogether of its own volition and outside the sphere of those blessed, understandable things of our common life. In the world but not of it, if one may use that divine metaphor in its inverted sense. The babe possesses innocence in that it has never come into contact with sin and death, and a man may finally withdraw himself from the defilements of this naughty world and become again as a little child. Yet without repentance and so without grace. Lucifer himself could never assume the role of penitent, but he may easily take front rank as an ethical philosopher. And so Fielding Thaneford and I looked upon one another. Either might have put out a touching hand, and yet a thousand leagues could not have spanned the abyss that separated us. And in that selfsame moment the bell of S. Saviour's began to toll for the passing of him who had been master of "Hildebrand Hundred," and kin, through the blood tie, to one and all of us who waited and listened.

Fielding Thaneford had turned his eyes away, and they were fixed on the road winding far below the plateau on which stood "Thane Court"; in the distance appeared a stately moving cortège, the hearses and the carriages containing the mourners; there was a flutter of sable draperies and of funeral plumes; the old man looked, but remained immobile and impassive. With a nod of acknowledgment and farewell to John Thaneford I made my own way down the slope and into the shadow of the plantation of firs. There still remained the faint traces of a path, and presently it led me to the brick wall surrounding the churchyard, a wall built after the curious serpentine pattern generally ascribed to the inventive genius of Thomas Jefferson, and still to be seen at the University of Virginia. A door, painted a dull, faded green, had evidently been the private approach of the Thaneford family in days gone by, but now it was secured by a huge, rusty padlock, and I was obliged to skirt the wall and so reach the open lawn upon which the church faced.