The Leavenworth Case (Penguin Classics)

by Anna Katharine Green

  “As she has no servant, she will come to the door herself, so be ready,” said he as he knocked.

  I had barely time to observe that the curtains to the window at my left suddenly dropped, when a hasty step made itself heard within, and a quick hand threw open the door, and I saw before me the woman whom I had observed at the post office, and whose action with the letters had struck me as being peculiar. I recognized her at first glance, though she was differently dressed and had evidently passed through some worry or excitement that had altered the expression of her countenance and made her manner what it was not at that time, strained and a trifle uncertain. But I saw no reason for thinking that she remembered me. On the contrary, the look she directed toward me had nothing but inquiry in it, and when Mr. Monell pushed me forward with the remark: “A friend of mine; in fact, my lawyer from New York,” she dropped a hurried old-fashioned curtsey, whose only expression was a manifest desire to appear sensible of the honor conferred upon her, through the mist of a certain trouble that confused everything about her.

  “We have come to ask a favor, Mrs. Belden; but may we not come in?” said my client in a round, hearty voice, well calculated to recall a person’s thoughts into their proper channel. “I have heard many a time of your cozy home and would like an opportunity to see it.” And, with a blind disregard to the look of surprised resistance that rose involuntarily into her eyes, he stepped gallantly into the little room whose cheery red carpet and bright picture-hung walls showed invitingly through the half-open door at our left.

  Finding her premises thus invaded by a sort of French coup d’état, Mrs. Belden made the best of the situation and, pressing me to enter also, devoted herself to hospitality. As for Mr. Monell, he quite blossomed out in his endeavors to make himself agreeable; so much so, that I shortly found myself laughing at his sallies, though my heart was full of anxiety lest, after all, our efforts should fail of the success they certainly merited. Meanwhile, Mrs. Belden softened more and more, joining in the conversation with an ease hardly to be expected from one in her humble circumstances. Indeed, I soon saw that she was no common woman. There was a refinement in her speech and manner that, combined with her motherly presence and gentle air, was very pleasing. The last woman in the world I should ever have suspected of any underhanded proceeding, if I had not marked the peculiar look of hesitation that crossed her face when Mr. Monell broached the subject of my entertainment there.

  “I don’t know, sir; I would be glad, but,” and she turned a very scrutinizing look upon me, “the fact is, I have not taken lodgers of late, and I have got out of the way of the whole thing, and am afraid I cannot make him comfortable. In short, you will have to excuse me.”

  “But we can’t,” returned Mr. Monell. “What, entice a fellow into a room like this”—and he cast a hearty admiring glance round the apartment, which for all its simplicity, both its warm coloring and general air of cosiness amply merited, “and then turn a cold shoulder upon him when he humbly entreats the honor of staying one poor, little, pitiful night in the enjoyment of its attractions? No, no, Mrs. Belden, I know you too well for that. Lazarus himself couldn’t come to your door and be turned away, much less a good-hearted, clever-headed gentleman like my friend here.”

  “You are very good,” she began, an almost weak love of praise showing itself for a moment in her eyes, “but I have no room prepared: I have been house-cleaning and everything is topsy-turvy. Mrs. Wright, now, over the way——”

  “My young friend is going to stop here,” Mr. Monell broke in with frank positiveness. “If I cannot have him at my own house, and for certain reasons it seems that I cannot, I shall at least have the satisfaction of knowing he is in the charge of the best housekeeper in R——”

  “Yes,” I put in, but without too great a show of interest, “I should be sorry, once introduced here, to be obliged to go elsewhere.”

  The troubled eye wavered away from us to the door.

  “I was never called inhospitable,” she commenced, “but everything in such disorder——What time would you like to come?” she suddenly asked.

  “I was in hopes I might remain now,” replied I; “I have some letters to write and would ask nothing better than for leave to sit here and write them.”

  At the word letters I saw her hand go to her pocket in a movement which must have been involuntary, for her countenance did not change, and she made the quick reply:

  “Well, you may. If you can put up with what I can give you, why, it shall not be said that I refused you what Mr. Monell is pleased to call a favor.” And, complete in her reception as she had been in her resistance, she gave us a pleasant smile and, ignoring my thanks, bustled out with Mr. Monell to the buggy, where she received my bag and, what was doubtless more to her taste, the compliments he was now more than ever ready to bestow upon her.

  “I will see that some room is got ready for you in a very short space of time,” she said upon re-entering. “Meanwhile, make yourself at home here and, if you wish to write, why, I think you will find everything for the purpose in these drawers.” And, wheeling up a table to the easy chair in which I sat, she pointed to the small compartments beneath with an air of such manifest desire that I should make use of anything and everything she had, that I found myself wondering over my position with a sort of startled embarrassment that was not remote from shame.

  “Thank you,” said I; “I have materials of my own.” And I hastened to open my bag and bring out the writing-case which I always carried with me.

  “Then I will leave you,” said she; and with a quick bend and a short hurried look out of the window she hastily quitted the room.

  I could hear her steps cross the hall, go up two or three stairs, pause, go up the rest of the flight, pause again, and then pass on. I was left on the first floor alone.

  CHAPTER 2

  A Weird Experience

  Flat burglary as ever was committed.

  —MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING.

  The first thing I did was to inspect the room in which I was.

  It was a pleasant apartment, as I have said before, square, sunny, and well furnished, impressing one as he entered with a general air of welcome and home likeness. On the floor was a crimson carpet, on the walls several pictures, at the windows cheerful curtains of white, tastefully ornamented with ferns and autumn leaves, in one corner an old melodeon, and in the center of the room a table draped with a bright cloth, on which were various little knick-knacks which, without being rich or expensive, were both pretty and, to a certain extent, ornamental. But it was not these things, which I had seen repeated in so many other country homes, that especially attracted my attention, or drew me forward in the slow march which I undertook around the room. It was something underneath all these, the evidences which I found, or sought to find, not only in the general aspect of the whole, but in each trivial object itself, of the character, disposition, and history of the woman with whom I now had to deal. It was for this reason I studied the daguerreotypes on the mantelpiece, the books on the shelf, and the music on the rack; for this and the still further purpose of noting if any indications were to be found of there being in the house any such person as Hannah.

  First, then, for the little library, which I was pleased to see occupied one corner of the room. Composed of a few well-chosen books, poetical, historical, and narrative, it was of itself sufficient to account for the evidences of latent culture observable in Mrs. Belden’s conversation. Taking out a well-worn copy of Byron, I opened it. There were many passages marked, and replacing the book with a mental comment upon her evident impressibility to the softer emotions, I turned toward the melodeon that fronted me from the opposite wall. It was closed, but on its neatly covered top lay one or two hymn-books, a basket of russet apples, and a piece of half-completed knitting-work.

  I took up the latter, but was forced to lay it down again without coming to the remotest idea of what it was intended to be. Proceeding on, I next stopped before a window ope
ning upon the small yard that ran about the house, and separated it from the one adjoining. Looking out, I thought of the many glances of curiosity, dismay, anger, joy, sorrow, disappointment that had pierced their way from that spot to the street beyond since the building was tenanted, and that especial window set apart for the rocking-chair and worktable, when suddenly I espied, written on the glass with a diamond-point, a row of letters which, as nearly as I could make out, were meant for some word or words, but which utterly failed in sense or apparent connection. Passing it by as the work of some schoolgirl, I glanced down at the workbasket standing on a table at my side. It was full of various kinds of work, among which I spied a pair of stockings, which were much too small, as well as in too great a state of disrepair, to belong to Mrs. Belden, or so I thought; and drawing them carefully out, I examined them to see if I could find any name marked on them. Do not start when I say that I saw the letter H plainly printed upon them. Thrusting them back, I drew a deep breath of relief, gazing, as I did so, out of the window, when those letters again attracted my attention.

  Gnirevalc Yram

  What could they mean? Idly I began to read them backward, when—But try for yourself, reader, and judge what my surprise must have been at the result! Elated at the discovery thus made, I sat down to write my letters. I had barely finished them, when Mrs. Belden came in with the announcement that supper was ready. “As for your room,” said she, “I have prepared my own for your use, thinking it would be more convenient for you to be on the first floor.” And throwing open a door at my side, she displayed a small but comfortable room, in which I could dimly see a bed, an immense bureau, and a shadowy looking-glass in a dark old-fashioned frame.

  “I live in very primitive fashion,” resumed she, leading the way into the dining room, “but I mean to be comfortable, and make others so.”

  “I should say that you amply succeeded,” I rejoined with an appreciative glance at her well-spread board.

  She smiled, and I felt that I had paved the way to her good graces, in a way that would yet redound to my advantage.

  Shall I ever forget that supper! its dainties, its pleasant freedom, its mysterious, pervading atmosphere of unreality, and the constant sense which every bountiful dish she pressed upon me brought of the shame of eating this woman’s food, with such feelings of suspicion in my heart! Shall I ever forget the emotion I experienced, when I first perceived she had something on her mind, which she longed, yet hesitated to give utterance to! Or how she started when a cat jumped down from the sloping roof of the kitchen on to the grass-plot at the back of the house, or how my heart throbbed when I heard, or thought I heard, a board creak overhead! We were in a little room, long and narrow, which seemed, curiously enough, to run cross-wise of the house, opening on one side into the parlor, whose gloomy, half-lighted interior did not add much to the cheerfulness of the hour, and on the other into the small bedroom, which had been allotted to my use.

  “You live in this house alone, without fear?” I asked, as Mrs. Belden, contrary to my desire, put another bit of cold chicken on my plate. “Have you no marauders in this town, no tramps, of whom a solitary woman like you might reasonably be afraid?”

  “No one will hurt me,” said she, “and no one ever came here for food or shelter, but got it.”

  “I should think, then, that living, as you do, upon a railroad, you would be constantly overrun with worthless beings, whose only trade is to take all they can get, without giving a return.”

  “I cannot turn them away,” she said; “it is the only luxury I have, to feed the poor.”

  “But the idle, restless ones, who neither will work, nor let others work——”

  “Are still the poor.”

  Mentally remarking, here is the woman to shield an unfortunate who has somehow become entangled in the meshes of a great crime, I drew back from the table. As I did so, the thought crossed me, that in case there was any such person in the house as Hannah, she would take the opportunity of going upstairs with something for her to eat; and I cast a calculating glance at the plates of bread and cold chicken before me, in the hope of being able to tell if anything should be hereafter subtracted from them.

  “I will smoke my cigar on the veranda,” said I; “after which I hope you will be at leisure to sit down with me for a short chat.”

  “Thank you,” returned she, almost eagerly, the desire of making some avowal showing itself plainer than ever in her manner. “But do not go out on the veranda, unless you wish. I have no morbid dread of smoke, if I am a housekeeper.”

  “I prefer the veranda,” said I; “a whiff of fresh air is just what I want.”

  The truth was, I was becoming anxious about Q. I felt that the least token of his presence in town would be very encouraging. But it seemed that I was not to be afforded even that small satisfaction. In vain I tramped the veranda from end to end; I neither saw nor heard the short, quick laugh I half-expected to fall upon my ears from some unknown quarter. If Q was anywhere near, he was lying very low.

  Once again seated with Mrs. Belden (who I know came downstairs with an empty plate, for going into the kitchen for a drink, I caught her in the act of setting it down on the table) I made up my mind to wait a reasonable length of time for what she had to say, and then, if she did not speak, make an endeavor on my own part to get at her secret.

  But the avowal was nearer than I expected, and different, and brought its own train of consequences with it.

  “You are a lawyer, I believe,” she began, taking down her knitting work, with a forced display of industry.

  “Yes,” said I, “that is my profession.”

  She remained for a moment silent, creating great havoc in her work I am sure, from the glance of surprise and vexation she afterward threw it. Then in a hesitating voice, remarked:

  “Perhaps you may be willing, then, to give me some advice. The truth is, I am in a very curious predicament; one from which I don’t know how to escape, and yet which demands immediate action. I should like to tell you about it, may I?”

  “You may; I shall be only too happy to give you any advice in my power.”

  She drew in her breath with a sort of vague relief, though her forehead did not lose its frown.

  “It can all be said in a few words. I have in my possession a packet of papers which were entrusted to me by two ladies, with the understanding that I should neither return nor destroy them, without the full cognizance and expressed desire of both parties, given in person or writing. That they were to remain in my hands till then, and that nothing or nobody should extort them from me.”

  “That is easily understood,” said I, for she stopped.

  “But now comes word from one of the ladies, the one, too, most interested in the matter, that for certain reasons, the immediate destruction of those papers is necessary to her peace and safety.”

  “And do you want to know what your duty is in that case?”

  “Yes,” replied she tremulously.

  I rose, I could not help it, a flood of conjectures rushing in tumult over me.

  “It is to hold on to the papers like grim death, till released from your guardianship, by the means to which you have pledged yourself.”

  “Is that your opinion, as a lawyer?”

  “Yes, and as a man. Once pledged in that way, you have no choice. It would be a betrayal of trust, to yield to the solicitations of one party, what you have undertaken to return to both. The fact that grief or loss might follow your retention of these papers does not release you from your bond. You have nothing to do with that; besides, you are by no means sure that the representations of the so-called interested party are true. You might be doing a greater wrong by destroying in this way what is manifestly considered of value to them both, than by preserving the papers intact, according to compact.”

  “But the circumstances? Circumstances alter cases, and in short, it seems to me that the wishes of the one most interested ought to be regarded, especially as there is
an estrangement between these ladies, which may hinder the other’s consent from ever being obtained.”

  “No,” said I, “two wrongs never make a right; nor are we at liberty to do an act of justice, at the expense of an injustice. The papers must be preserved, Mrs. Belden.”

  Her head sank very despondingly; evidently it had been her wish to please the interested party. “Law is very hard,” she said, “very hard.”

  “This is not only law, but plain duty,” I remarked. “Suppose a case different, suppose the honor and happiness of the other party depended upon the preservation of the papers, where would your duty be then?”

  “But——”

  “A contract is a contract,” said I, “and cannot be tampered with. Having accepted the trust and given your word, you are obliged to fulfill to the letter all its conditions. It would be a breach of trust for you to return or destroy the papers without the mutual consent necessary.”

  An expression of great gloom settled slowly over her features. “I suppose you are right,” said she and became silent.

  Watching her, I thought to myself: “If I were Mr. Gryce or even Q, I would never leave this seat till I had probed this matter to the bottom, learned who the parties are, and where those precious papers are hidden, that seem to be of so much importance.” But being neither, I could only keep her talking upon the subject until she should let fall some word that might serve as a guide to my further enlightenment; I therefore turned with the intention of asking her some question, when my attention was attracted by the figure of a woman coming out of the back door of the neighboring house, who for general dilapidation, and uncouthness of bearing, was a perfect type of the style of tramp of whom we had been talking at the supper-table. Gnawing a crust which she threw away as she reached the street, she trudged down the path, her scanty dress, piteous in its rags and soil, flapping in the keen spring wind, and revealing ragged shoes red with the mud of the highway.