Читать книгу Murder Mysteries to Solve on Christmas Eve - Various Authors - Страница 7

Table of Contents

MORE than half a century had passed since Arundel Secretan had been found with the rapier in his heart, and the west wing had still remained tenanted by the rats and mice and the shade of the unfortunate gambler. Again the Yule-log stood without the door; there was a pleasant sound of laughter in the great hall, for the snow was falling thickly on the bare oaks and pines and dashing against the casement. Inside, all was light and warmth, a huge fire burning on the tiled hearth, rugs and skin-mats scattered about with all kinds of comfortable lounges, from a settee, borrowed from the drawing-room, to the beehive straw-chair, purloined for the moment from the kitchen. Holly and mistletoe gleamed everywhere, from ancient pictures and chain-mail, to the seventeenth-century clock ticking on the stairs. For some moments the merry party were silent, listening cosily to the snow beating on the lattice. Presently, Ada Secretan, sole daughter of the house, roused herself from the contemplation of the cheery blaze to give a fresh turn to the conversation.

'We are here for a whole fortnight,' she said. 'In my limited recollection, I distinctly remember being snow-bound here for fifteen days. Suppose this should happen again, my sisters, cousins, and aunts!'

A golden head shimmered in the light for a moment, and a low rapturous voice was heard to ejaculate the single monosyllable 'Jolly!' But the rest of the party became suddenly grave at the bare idea of such a calamity.

'Don't imagine it's slow,' came another mysterious voice out of the gloom, 'because it isn't. I was snowed up in Scotland for nearly a week, once. I never enjoyed myself so much in my life.'

'What did you do, Connie?' asked golden-head from her corner, sleepily.

'Heaps of things, my dear. First of all, we ransacked the place from top to bottom—such a deliciously quaint old house, with old cupboards in all sorts of queer places, and ghostly passages—oh! Then, of course, we had charades and theatricals.'

'We might have theatricals here, Ada,' suggested the girl addressed as Connie, though better known to the world of fashion as the Hon. Constance Lumley, 'if any of the gentlemen are equal to writing a farce.'

'I have been expecting this,' said a man's voice resignedly, apparently belonging to a pair of knickerbockers and homespun hose, half hidden in the beehive chair. 'Of course, you have all forgotten my existence utterly, and equally, of course. I am expected to volunteer my services as author and stage-manager.'

'Oh, Mr Warren, how delightful!' cried a grateful chorus. 'After writing for the London stage, it will be child's-play to make us a little play.'

'Amateurs are so easily satisfied!' continued the dramatist dryly, the hero of more than one successful comedy. 'All you have to do is to give them all leading parts, and there you are, you know!'

'And pretty dresses,' murmured golden-head, intensely interested.

'And pretty frocks, Miss Wynne.—What do you say to attempting something of the Rivals and School for Scandal type? It would save a vast amount of stagework; and surely, in a jolly old house like this, we might hunt up picturesque costumes enough.'

In spite of his affected cynicism, Frank Warren was by this time as much in love with his own scheme as the bevy of fair listeners. With a dexterity born of long practice, he sketched out rapidly the outline of a plot, which he submitted to his hearers, and which they accepted with fervent if subdued applause. Though the snow beat upon the casement, drifting higher round the laurel and barberry in the drive, there was no repining at the weather in the ancient hall, where the firelight fell fitfully upon a ring of fair flushed faces gathered round the oracle.

'Your brother is expected this evening, Miss Secretan?'—Ada nodded assent.—'And with myself, not forgetting our host and Colonel Lucas, will be enough. Of course, we shall not all be able to play in this piece; but those who don't, can take a part in the tableaux vivants afterwards.'

'Tableaux vivants, and a play afterwards!' exclaimed Miss Lumley, throwing herself back in a pretended ecstasy of admiration. 'Glorious!—Ada, my dear child, with all your picturesque ancestors and lovely ancestresses, you must have some splendid dresses somewhere.'

'Tradition says there are some in the west wing,' Ada Secretan replied; 'though, candidly, I have never had courage to go there and look for myself. The Haunted Chamber is there.'

'Do you boast a Haunted Chamber?' Warren asked with some curiosity.

As the outer shadows fell, the wind gathered strength in the pines; it grew dark inside in the early gloaming, till nothing but the firelight remained. It was the hour and season for a romantic legend, fresh to some of them, and they gathered closer round the ruddy blaze while Ada Secretan told the story. By the time she had finished, darkness had fallen, and the listeners were very silent. 'And all this happened,' concluded the narrator, 'not sixty years ago.'

'Was the west wing habitable then?' Warren asked presently. 'You can understand the interest I take in this pitiful story. For,' continued the speaker, in a higher key, 'Edgar Warren of the story is my ancestor. Indeed, I am the first Warren who has crossed this threshold since that fatal night.'

'The wing was falling into decay; but still it must have been a pleasant place in the summertime; and in it were the suite of rooms set aside for the eldest son of the house from time immemorial. Since that night, I don't think any of us have set foot in the wing.'

'It seems a pity to let such lovely old rooms lie idle,' mused Miss Wynne. 'Though I can understand how little your great-grandfather cared for them.'

'He cared a great deal more than people thought,' Ada replied. 'In spite of his apparent harshness and severity, he was very fond of his son, and bitterly disappointed by his dishonourable conduct. He did not live very long afterwards, when Alice Secretan died; and before his decease, he had the entrance to the west wing nailed up; and not a soul has ever set foot in the building since his death.'

'Well, that's a strange way of showing grief,' Warren exclaimed irreverently.—'And what about Clive, the young son and heir?'

'He was taken in good hands, and the estate carefully nursed during his long minority—a fortunate thing for us, as it turned out afterwards. He married at twenty-one that foreign-looking lady who hangs up over the staircase there; and broke his neck at twenty-three over some foolish wager, just in time to save everything from utter ruin; and,' concluded the fair narrator candidly, 'that is really the reason why the west wing has never been restored to its pristine glory.'

'In that case, Mr Secretan has no foolish—that is, no reverence for his ancestor's strange taste,' Warren remarked. 'If your grandfather had not been a friend of "the first gentleman in Europe," that part of Woodside would have been restored long ago! Would he mind some of us exploring it?'

The questioner, at someone's instigation, emptied a bucket of pine-knots on the sullen wood-ashes, and roused up a ruddy blaze, roaring and spluttering up the wide open chimney. Rugs and chairs were brought closer round, and a little gipsy table set in the midst. A solemn footman deposited a tray containing gleaming silver and fragile china on the wicker-stand, and vanished. For a time at least, the spell cast over them all by the legend was broken, and a babel of nimble tongues broke loose. Warren raised himself with a great show of reluctance from his shadowy retreat and stood waiting at Ada Secretan's right hand; for at these cosy afternoon teas they had voted the presence of servants a restraint, and the feeling in favour of self-help was unanimous and voluntary. Presently, when every fair one had been supplied according to her needs, the dramatist drew a chair closer to the youthful chatelaine's side, speaking in a low key. 'You don't know how your little romance has interested me,' said he, 'especially the recollection of my ancestor, Edgar Warren. Talk about having no poetry in real life, with a Haunted Chamber, and a mysterious mansion sealed and barred for nearly sixty years! Miss Secretan, I must have a ramble through these rooms, if I commit burglary to do it.'

'So far as that goes, I do not see why all of us should not go. It will certainly have the merit of being a novel Christmas amusement.'

'Then you really think Mr Secretan will consent?'

'Consent to what?' cried a voice behind, bringing with the owner a gust of cold moist air and a general sense of snow and discomfort.—'What is the last mad scheme I am to consent to, eh! pussy?'

Warren looked up with serio-comic disgust into Mr Secretan's face, or at least as much as could be seen of it under a shooting-cap with the flaps carefully tied under the ears, and a mackintosh from foot to collar. A little snow collected on his boots and gaiters melted in the warmer atmosphere, and trickled across the polished oak floor.

'You have been sitting over the fire, you lazy young people, till you are all of you half asleep. If you really won't have lamps, ring for some more wood, so that I can see where the mischievous ones are.'

Warren rang the bell, and politely offered to relieve his host of hat and coat; an offer declined at once, on the plea of more outdoor work to be done. As the latter still lingered, Warren hastened to press his request.

'Of course, if you like to run wild amongst the dust and black beetles, I have no objection,' said the cheery Squire. 'It will do the place no harm to have a little air let in. Only, don't get frightening any of my pretty visitors; I want nothing but Christmas roses here on Christmas morning.'

'The thing is done!' cried Warren theatrically, as the outer door banged behind the Squire. 'Most potent, grave, and reverend signiors, the mystic west wing is about to be reopened, after an interlude of sixty years——'

But any further declamation was checked by a violent ring at the hall bell; a throwing open of doors, and the entry of three people: one an elegant-looking girl, draped and shawled; the second, a tall military figure; and lastly, a young man in a rough tweed ulster—none other than Walter Secretan of Woodside Manor and Pump Court, Temple; and the before-mentioned Colonel Lucas, and Miss Edith Lucas, his daughter.

Warren stopped in the midst of his florid utterance, and would have come forward, but that he felt a hand laid upon his arm. Looking down, he saw an old man bearing some logs of wood, a bent decrepit man, with heavy overhanging brows, and dark, evil-looking eyes. Somewhat surprised, he would have asked the meaning of this strange conduct, save that the ancient servitor held up a warning hand, and said: 'Sixty years, you say—ay, sixty sorrowful, bitter years.—And you would come, another of your hated race, prying into family secrets.—Listen to me, sir; take an old man's advice, and keep away from yonder wing, or your life, perhaps more than that, will pay the forfeit.' And so saying, he was gone.

It was later in the evening before the astonished hearer found an opportunity of discovering the identity of his strange friend. Without disclosing what he had heard, he drew Walter Secretan out somewhat cautiously. That gentleman was tying his white cravat at the time, a matter just then of more importance to him than anything so mundane as a family servant. 'That? Oh, that old fellow was my great-grandfather's valet—Silas Brookes, who went on that mad excursion you have heard of. An excellent servant in his day, but getting a little imbecile, you understand.'

Warren did understand, and held his peace. But all the same he felt that the words he had heard were the outcome of neither imbecility nor madness. Was he hiding some dark secret, or was it merely rancorous hatred of a Warren that dictated the outburst of bitter spleen?