by George Moore
‘Bucharest! I wonder where that is?’ said one. ‘Algiers; I think I have heard the name, but for the moment I can’t remember.’
‘I wonder,’ said a young idler who always spent the afternoon on the platform, ‘what a man who goes to such places wants down in this little out-of-the-way hole?’
‘And isn’t he a toff!’ said a second idler. ‘Plenty of money, I should say.’
‘Never judge a book by the cover,’ said the station-master, a bluff, middle-aged man, with a pair of small, ferret-like eyes set in a rugged, red face. He stood with his legs apart, his heavily-booted feet set firmly on the ground, his hands thrust deeply in his pockets. ‘He may have money or he may not, but he do look unhealthy.’
‘Fellows that travel in foreign parts always has livers.’
‘Yes, I dare say,’ replied the station-master, testily; ‘but that is not telling us what he has come to Charmandean for. Didn’t you notice the way he spoke to us, and didn’t you notice how fast he walked? A man doesn’t walk fast in a place he has never been in before.’
All were moved by the profoundness of the observation. The porter and both idlers looked admiringly at the station-master. Why hadn’t they been struck by the suspicious circumstance of the stranger’s gait?
‘Then you think he has been here before?’
‘I don’t know; but when I see tramps walking about I say look out for your knives and forks, and when I see lords walking about villages I say look out for your politics or your daughters, or both.’
‘Come, I don’t think it is as bad as that,’ said the first idler, whose name was Jim Smith.
‘I don’t say it is, and I don’t say it isn’t, but he is not here for nothing, you may depend on that. Look at his portmanteau, it has been all over the world. He is not a farmer, nor a commercial traveller, nor a visitor to the Hall.’
‘How do you know?’ said one, Bob Birket by name, and the inseparable friend of Jim Smith.
The conversation was here interrupted by the reappearance of the stranger.
‘I find,’ he said, ‘that there is no hotel in Charmandean; can you tell me where I can put up?’
‘There is the “Bell and Horns”, Sir; they can let you have a bed there if it is only for the night.’
‘I shall stay here more than one night.’
Jim Smith and Bob Birket exchanged looks, and they noted the evident and increasing embarrassment of the stranger.
His glance wandered nervously from one to the other. ‘I should not care to lodge at the “Bell and Horns”. Does anyone let lodgings in Charmandean? But, I beg your pardon, I am intruding - wasting your time.’
The station-master looked at the stranger sharply, and was evidently unfavourably impressed, for he made no reply.
‘Farmer Jones, he that lives at the Grange,’ said Jim Smith, ‘might let you have a room, Sir. I know he did once before let a room to a gentleman who came here to fish. Perhaps you have come to fish, Sir. If so, the Grange would suit you very well - you’d be near the river.’
‘It is very kind of you. Thank you; no, I have not come to fish, but if you will kindly direct me to the Grange I shall feel obliged.’
‘You can’t miss it, Sir; it lies at the end of the village, facing the river.’
When the stranger had left the office, the station-master turned sharply on Jim Smith.
‘You are always in a great hurry, Smith. Couldn’t you see that I had my reasons for not sending him to Farmer Jones? I suppose you thought I had forgotten him.’
‘Why didn’t you wish to send him there?’
‘Your memory doesn’t seem to grow longer. I say just now that people didn’t walk fast in a place they’ve never been in before. He starts off as if he knew all about the place as well as we; then he comes back and asks if there is an hotel in the village. I say these are suspicious circumstances, and you have no right to send a man you know nothing about to lodge at Farmer Jones’s. Jones is an old man; he lives alone with his old wife in the Grange. I say it isn’t fair. Jones is a very unsuspecting man; he should have been warned; once he was warned - well, then it was his look-out, but he ought to have been warned.’
There was much that was resolute and emphatic in the station-master. Impossible not to see that his beadlike eyes, his well-planted feet, his hands thrust deep in his pockets, bespoke resoluteness and decision of character.
‘You can think what you like. I say his manners and his appearance are both suspicious.’
‘So do we. There is no doubt that he is a suspicious sort of character. But I don’t think he is a lord, for did you notice that although he wore a beautiful coat his trousers were shabby? I’ll find out what his little game is. I shouldn’t be surprised to find there was a woman in it.’
‘Or a burglary,’ said the station-master.
‘He doesn’t look much like a burglar. Anyhow, there isn’t much to rob at Farmer Jones’s.’
‘I don’t know so much about that.’
‘He can’t be after a girl and a robbery both at the same time.’
‘I don’t know too much about that. You haven’t been reading the papers lately.’
The conversation was presently interrupted by the arrival of a messenger from the farm house. He asked to have the gentleman’s portmanteau pointed out to him; he tossed it on his shoulder, and the idlers dispersed, for it was close on tea time. Several trains passed, rushed through the little station, through the fir trees, into the echoing hills. Along the river lands a gentle mist was drawn, and there the kine and a single figure of a girl were full of such dim beauty as Corot would have loved. The Grange stood a hundred yards beyond the last cottage, and its grey stones were defined upon the picturesque colour of the hillside.
This gaunt Grange had been built from the walls of a castle of eldertime, and now outside the cottage doorways the housewives sat sewing as their husbands smoked; and all were talking of the stranger. Having heard of his probable character, the young girls lowered their eyes, and those who had money at home felt for their keys. And it was noticed that he passed nearly half-an-hour in the church and churchyard.
‘Well, what do you think of him now?’ said the station-master, planting himself in the middle of the roadway in front of Bob Birket.
‘He’s a puzzler, and no mistake. There’s no doubt that he’s after something, but it is hard to say what.’
‘What does Farmer Jones say about it?’
‘He agrees with you. He wished he had never had anything to do with him.’
‘No, he didn’t say that,’ pleaded Jim Smith. ‘Here is Mr Jones.’
‘Well, Jones, what do you think of your new lodger?’
‘I don’t much like the looks of him, and my old missus is dead frightened. I don’t know that she’ll sleep in the house to-night.’
‘You needn’t have him there if you don’t like.’
‘Well, you see, I have taken his money. I have no good reason for turning of him out.’
The villagers drew aside, the stranger passed, and his scared face was noticed.
The harvest moon rose, a thin yellow crescent; and when the village crouched in the darkness the Grange loomed like a phantom above the hill-side, the light continuing to burn in the casement.
‘I wonder what he be doing - it is nearly midnight.’
‘Oh, Thomas, hasn’t he gone to bed yet? I told you not to let him have the room.’
‘Yes, after I had let it to him; you thought he was a very nice man at first.’
‘Oh, Thomas, how can you say so? You know how opposed I am to sleeping in a house with strangers. I shall not go to bed - no, no, you’ll not alter me - I shall not go to bed to-night. You must tell him to-morrow that we are not accustomed to such hours; it will be a good reason for getting rid of him. What can he be doing?’
‘Reading or writing, perhaps.’
‘Supposing we were to steal upstairs and listen.’
‘He’d hear you - the stairs creak d
readful. I might go though, I know where to tread. But supposing he were to spring out on me?’
‘Thomas, don’t go! I forbid you. We’ll sit up, and tomorrow he must go.’
Without answering her, Farmer Jones drew off his boots and went slowly up, treading where the stairs made least noise; the others listened with bated breath, expecting every moment to hear the stranger spring out and seize Jones by the throat.
‘What’s he doing?’ they asked eagerly, as the old man crept down the stair by the wall, his face blanched.
‘I dun no - I dun no. He is walking up and down the room; suddenly he stopped, and then I come away. I be afraid he was going to go for me.’
Next day, the village was full of rumours concerning the stranger, and the events of the past evening were debated. Bob Birket and Jim Smith lingered about the Grange, in hopes of seeing him. He ventured forth once, but seeing he was watched, he retreated to his room; and, upon inquiry, they learned that he was writing letters. The station-master held out vague hopes that he might send these letters to the post, if so they would find out at least who were his correspondents.
It was a quarter to eight before he left the Grange and walked with his letters to the post. All eyes were on those letters, and a little boy came running with the news that he had posted five. To the surprise of everyone, instead of entering the Grange, he went towards the river.
‘Come on, Bob, let’s follow him! I’ll bet he’s going to meet a pal over yonder.’
It was now dusk, and by keeping along the lower ground they thought they would be able to escape observation. The difficulty was how to cross the little bridge without being seen.
‘Now then, take care, Bob, keep close along the wall or else you’ll crab it.’
From the bridge they saw the stranger pass round the edge of the shaw into the darkness that the branches threw over the long wet grass. Determined to surprise him at his work, evil or good, whatever it might be, they ran forward, and, entering the shaw from opposite sides, they groped for him in the wet stillness.
‘That’s where I last saw him,’ said Bob.
‘Well, I never!’ said Jim. ‘He must be hiding; he cannot have got round by the river; he wouldn’t have had time.’ At that moment they noticed a tanny smell, and a fox escaped from the rushes. This incident deepened the mystery; for how was it, as Bob Birket put it, that he, the stranger, had not started the fox? A little troubled by the turn their adventure had taken, the young men returned to the Grange, and to a group of five they told their story. As a possible explanation, Bob Birket suggested that he had committed suicide; but the sound of footsteps put an end to this theory, and the five villagers listened in awe to the stranger quietly ascending the stairs.
‘Well, he do come and go mysterious like. I didn’t hear the front door open, did you? Did you, Jim?’
‘No, I didn’t, but I’d give sixpence to know what his little game is. What can have brought him to Charmandean?’ said Bob.
The farmer and those whom the untoward lodger had made his guests, continued to debate in the parlour, interrupted at intervals by Mrs Jones regarding the various means they might adopt to rid themselves of their lodger. From time to time, one of the party would step outdoors, and return with the news that his light was still burning. At last the clock struck midnight.
‘Thomas, I can stand it no longer, you must go and speak to him. He had better leave the house. Go and see what he is doing. We may be burnt in our beds. Go and see what he is doing.’
Jones prepared to draw off his boots.
‘No, no, go upstairs boldly. You are in your own house, man. Our friends here will see that no harm comes to you.’
‘I bain’t afraid,’ muttered Jones.
‘He’ll try to kill my poor husband! Oh, Mr Smith, do go upstairs and see that all is right.’
‘I don’t know what he is about,’ said Jones, over the banisters, ‘but he is moving the furniture.’
‘He’ll set fire to the house - that’s what he’s about!’
‘I think that one of you had better come up.’
Jim Smith volunteered.
‘Listen! He is pulling the table across the room. He is blocking up the door. Are you sure? Certain! I can’t open it.’ The farmer called Bob Birket and the station-master, and they came clattering up.
‘Now, Bob,’ said Jim Smith, ‘one! two! three!’
But the door was a stout one, and they could not move it until they got a large beam of wood from the kitchen.
CHAPTER II
A MAN OF forty-five sat alone in his library; the clocks were striking eleven. He sat alone thinking; he sat alone with his misfortunes. It was one of those hours when all our feebleness, all our failures, and all our vain efforts, terrible as monsters passing through the shadowy depth of some ocean way, come upon us out of the gulf of the past.
Edwin Harrington passed his hand over a thin, bald brow; it was a thin, sad face, whereon was written a tale of disappointment and ill-health. But for many a year success and failure had seemed to him alike, and he had desired only quiet from bodily pain. But maladies had accumulated in him, and his doctor had lately told him he must put by all work; and that with change of scene and air his spirits might revive. Harrington felt the will wanting in him to leave London: for days he had not even quitted his library. But one day London grew more than ever intolerable, and he said:
‘Anything for a change, I can bear this no longer;’ and he referred again to the newspaper that described Charmandean as one of the most rural spots in England. ‘I will go there. I will only take a few things with me. I will stay there a week. The name is strangely pretty. I am a fool, no doubt, to allow the fascination of a name to lead me. But what matter? What does anything matter?’
He had pictured the conventional village basking in sunshine and shade; a village full of gardens where sunflowers flamed, creepers reddened, and where there were gables, and where there was an inn with nut brown beer, and a maid with nut brown eyes. But the railway line afforded only a view of a grey village, a marshy plain, a long hill, and some meadows where cattle grazed by the river. The little bleak station impressed him unpleasantly; and the rubicund station-master with eager black eyes set in a red, rugged face, and a manner of speaking that made, as it were, of each word a hook wherewith he could tear out some secret, jarred the nerves of this morbid man.
Harrington wondered why the station-master had watched him so suspiciously, and the looks of the slovenly idlers had filled him with alarm. He walked rapidly away, but he had not gone far when he stopped, and, looking round, he thought, ‘This is absurd. I had better - indeed, I must ask where I can put up.’ After a long pause, tremulous with irresolution, he succeeded in quelling his fears, and he braced himself to meet the stare of the idlers and the searching questions and glances of the station-master. As he ascended the steps he heard them talking of him, and was taken with an access of fear.
‘Bucharest, Algiers - so they know me - how can this be? I don’t remember.’
The morose village in grey stone and the dreary plain where the river gleamed like a knife whetted the edge of his fears, and as he proceeded down the jagged street towards the Grange, he more than once decided to return to town. He was, however, apprehensive the train service did not furnish the possibility, and was taken by the honest face of the farmer.
‘There being no proper hotel in the village,’ he said, ‘I was advised at the station to ask here if you could let me have a room for a week.’
‘We did once let a gentleman have a room who came here to fish. I suppose that’s what you be after too?’
‘No, I have not come here to fish,’ Harrington replied, a little nettled at what he deemed unnecessary curiosity. ‘Of course if you can’t -’
‘I didn’t say we couldn’t,’ said the farmer good humouredly; ‘on the contrary, I think we can if you don’t mind the old place.’
‘On the contrary, I am much interested; it seems to me a real
old place.’
‘They say it was lived in several hundred year ago by mighty rich folk. This way, please, Sir.’
Stopping to admire the great rafters and the hewn corner stones, Harrington followed the farmer up the rambling stair way.
‘We don’t often use this room; leastways we seldom sleeps in it; my wife uses it occasionally as a store room; but she’ll see the bed is well aired, trust her for that!’
The tapestries had long since rotted, but the latticed windows and some heavy oak furniture remained, and preserved the medieval character of the room. Harrington declared himself satisfied, and having partaken of supper he said he would stroll through the village and visit the church.
It was a fine September evening, the last rays glinted on the red tiles and the old grey stonework. Only a fragment of the original church remained, and the ruins of the transept and the nave extended through the grass of the graves. It was a fine symbol of the spirit of old time; and Harrington had forgotten all in contemplation of the arches and windows, and life was beginning to appear to him in a less hideous light, when turning, he met the prying stare of one of the men whom he had overhead talking of him at the railway station. Clearly he was being watched, and now, thoroughly annoyed, he left the church. He could see as he passed down the street that the ferret-eyed station-master was talking of him to Farmer Jones. Everywhere half averted faces and surreptitious glances.
‘What can they be saying about me? I wonder if they know me. Bucharest, Algiers - I could not quite distinguish what they said.’ And as his thoughts brooded, the mystery grew stranger and darker; it seemed to him that the farmer and his wife, who had spoken so pleasingly a couple of hours before, now eyed him with suspicion. Or was it his nerves - those cursed nerves! What a source of worry they were to him. To what mad act might they not prompt him.