The Return of Peter Grimm Part 33

He looked apologetically about as if to a.s.sure the possibly-present Peter Grimm that he had absolutely no intent of using so non-technical a word as "dead."

Peter Grimm acknowledged the compliment with a laugh.

"Oh, say it, Andrew! Say it!" he adjured. "There _is_ no 'death' and there are no 'dead,' as this world understands the words. So one term is as good as another. 'Dead' or 'pa.s.sed over.' It's all one. Neither phrase means anything. Don't be afraid of offending me."

"And Willem is like that?" asked Kathrien.

"I am sure of it," answered McPherson. "Now, Willem----"

"I think I'd better put the boy to bed!" hastily interposed Mrs.

Batholommey, coming between the doctor and his proposed "subject."

"Please!" rapped McPherson. "I propose to find out what ails Willem.

That is what I'm here for. And I'll thank you not to interfere, Mrs.

Batholommey. I never break in on your good husband's pulpit plat.i.tudes, and I'll ask you to show the same courtesy toward _me_. Now then, Willem----"

"Kathrien," expostulated Mrs. Batholommey, "you surely aren't going to permit----?"

A peremptory gesture from McPherson momentarily checked the pendulum of her tongue. Kathrien, too, was very evidently on the doctor's side.

"Willem," said McPherson quietly, "you said just now that Mr. Grimm was in this room. What made you think so?"

"The things he said to me," returned Willem, readily enough.

His simple reply had a galvanic effect on his three hearers.

"_Said_ to you?" bleated Mrs. Batholommey. "_Said_? Did you say 'said'?"

"Why, Willem!" gasped Kathrien.

"_Old_ Mr. Grimm?" insisted Dr. McPherson. "Willem, you're certain you mean _old_ Mr. Grimm? Not Frederik?"

"Why, yes," a.s.sented Willem with calm a.s.surance. "Old Mynheer Grimm."

And now, even Mrs. Batholommey's awed curiosity dulled her chronic conscience-pains into momentary rest. And, with Kathrien, she sat silent, eager, awaiting the doctor's next move.

"And," continued McPherson, "what did Mr. Grimm say to you? Think carefully before you answer."

"Oh," replied Willem, in the glorious vagueness of childhood, "lots and lots of things."

"Oh, really?" mocked Mrs. Batholommey, the disappointing answer freeing her from the grip of awe.

Again McPherson raised a warning hand that balked further comment from her. And he returned to the examination.

"Willem," said he, "how did Mr. Grimm look?"

"I didn't see him," answered the child.

"H'm!" sniffed Mrs. Batholommey.

"But, Willem," urged McPherson, "you must have seen _something_."

"I--I thought I saw his hat on the peg," hesitated the boy.

All eyes turned involuntarily and in some fear toward the hat-rack.

"No," went on Willem, looking at the vacant peg, "it's gone now."

"Doctor," remonstrated Mrs. Batholommey, impatiently, "this is so silly!

It----"

"I wonder," whispered Kathrien to McPherson over the boy's head, "I wonder if he really _did_--do you think----?"

She did not finish the sentence. A growing look of disappointment and troubled doubt on McPherson's grim face made her reluctant to voice the question that her mind had formed.

"Willem!" said the Dead Man earnestly, pointing towards the pieced-together picture as he spoke. "Look! Show it to her!"

"Look!" echoed Willem, pointing in turn to the photograph. "Look, Miss Kathrien! That's what I wanted to show you when you called to me to go to bed."

"Why!" exclaimed Kathrien, following the direction of the eager little finger. "It's his mother! It's Anne Marie!"

"His mother!" echoed Mrs. Batholommey, focussing her near-sighted eyes on the likeness. "Why, so it is! Well, of all things! I didn't know you'd heard from Anne Marie."

"We haven't," said Kathrien.

"Then how did the photograph get into the house?"

"I don't know," answered the girl. "I never saw the picture before. It is none we've had. How strange! We've all been waiting for news of Anne Marie. Even her own mother doesn't know where she is, and hasn't heard from her in years. Or--or maybe Marta has received the picture since I----"

"I'll ask her," said Mrs. Batholommey, all eagerness now that something tangible was before her.

She bustled off into the kitchen in search of the old housekeeper.

"If Marta didn't get it," mused Kathrien, her face strained with puzzling thoughts, "who _did_ have this picture? And why weren't the rest of us told? Every one knew how eager we were for news of Anne Marie. And who tore up the picture? Did you, Willem?"

"No!" declared the boy. "It _was_ lying here, torn. I mended it."

"But," persisted Kathrien, "there's been no one at this desk,--except Frederik.--Except Frederik," she repeated, half under her breath.

Mrs. Batholommey came back from her kitchen interview, bubbling with importance.

"No," she announced, "Marta hasn't heard a word from Anne Marie. And only a few minutes ago she asked Frederik if any message had come. And he said, no, there hadn't."

"I wonder," suggested Kathrien, "if there _was_ any message with the photograph."

"I remember," volunteered Mrs. Batholommey, "one of the letters that came for poor old Mr. Grimm was in a blue envelope and felt as if it had a photograph in it. I put it with some others in the desk and I told Frederik about it this evening."

Kathrien glanced over the desk and at the floor around it in search of further clues. She saw, in the jardiniere, the charred remnants of a letter and pointed it out to the others. She drew from the debris the unburned corner of a blue envelope.