The Tree of Knowledge Part 13

The rest of evening was over it all--over the tiny, ancient grey church far, far away towards the valley's mouth; over the peaceable red cows which lay meditatively here and there among the gra.s.s; over the sun-burnt group of laborers, who, their day's mowing done, were slowly making their way down to their hidden cottages, with fearless eyes of Devon blue turned on the strangers and their carriage.

"What splendid terra-cotta-colored people!" said Miss Allonby, following them with her appreciative gaze. Mr. Cranmer was unable to help laughing. "They are a delicate shade of the red-brown of the cliffs,"

said the girl, dreamily. "How full of color everything is!"

Her companion mentally echoed the remark: it was the concise expression of a thought which in him had been only vague. She was right,--it was the color, the strange glow of gra.s.s, and cliffs, and sea, which so impressed eyes accustomed only to the "pale, unripened beauties of the north."

"That is Poole Farm, right beneath us," he said. "It is not so near as it looks."

"Oh, if I were only there!" she burst out; and then was suddenly still, as if ashamed of her involuntary cry.

"Get on as fast you can, Joseph," said Mr. Cranmer, and felt himself unaccountably obliged to sit so as not to see the pale face beside him, nor to pity the evident force which she found it necessary to employ to avoid a complete break-down.

When at last they stopped at the farm-yard gate, and he had helped her out, and seen her tall, slight figure disappear swiftly within the house, he experienced a relaxation of mental tension which was, he told himself, greatly out of proportion to the occasion; and, strolling into the big kitchen, was sensible of a quite absurd throb of relief when he heard that Dr. Forbes hoped his patient was just a little better.

"It is strange how people vary," he reflected. "I have met two girls, one to-day, one yesterday, neither of whom is in the smallest degree like any girl I ever saw before."

By which it will be inferred that his acquaintance with modern developments of girlhood had been limited pretty much to one particular cla.s.s of society. The girl art-student he had never met in any of her varieties; and this opportunity of contemplating a new cla.s.s, of perusing a fresh chapter in his favorite branch of study, was by no means without its charm.

CHAPTER XI.

The clouds that gather round the setting sun Do take a sober coloring from an eye That hath kept watch o'er man's mortality; Another race hath been, and other palms are won.

Thanks to the human heart by which we live, Thanks to its tenderness, its joys and fears, To me the meanest flower that blows can give Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears.

WORDSWORTH.

The mellow coloring of the third evening which Claud Cranmer had spent at Poole Farm was inundating the valley with its warm floods of light.

He was leaning meditatively against the stile which led from the farm garden to the Waste, and his eyes were fixed on the stretch of summer sea which, like a crystal gate, barred the entrance to the Combe. His thoughts were busy with a two-fold anxiety--partly for the man who lay fighting for life in the farmhouse behind him, partly concerning the mystery which attended his fate.

Mr. d.i.c.kens of Scotland Yard had so far succeeded in discovering merely what everybody knew before, and was in a state of complete bewilderment which, he begged them to believe, was a most unusual circ.u.mstance in his professional career. The mystery of the pudding-basin and the blue dishcloth was as amazing and as incomprehensible to him as it was to William Clapp himself and his scared "missus."

The good people of the district were sensible of a speedy dwindling of courage and hope, when it became evident that the London detective could see no farther through a brick wall than they could.

They did long to have the stigma lifted from their district by the discovery that the murderer had been a stranger, an outlander, anybody but a native of Edge Combe; but, if Mr. d.i.c.kens had an opinion at all in the matter, it was that he was inclined to believe the crime perpetrated by some one who knew where to find his victim, and had probably walked out of the village purposely to give him his quietus. But why? What possible animus could any dweller in the valley have against the inoffensive young artist? The detective was privately certain that the entire motive for this affair must be looked for under the surface.

"It's probable," said he to Mr. Cranmer, "that the victim himself is the only person likely to tell us anything about it. If he has enemies, it is to be supposed that he knew it. Mrs. Clapp has told us that he burnt a letter he received. That letter may have contained a warning which he thought fit to disregard. I have tried to make Mrs. Clapp recall any particulars she may have noticed as to its appearance, handwriting, or post-mark. But she seems to have noticed nothing; these rustics are very un.o.bservant. I should like to ask Miss Allonby a few questions. She might be able to give us a clue."

But Miss Allonby, being summoned, could not help them in the least.

She came down from her brother's sick-room, with a tranquil composed manner, which encouraged Mr. d.i.c.kens to hope great things of her. She seated herself in one of the big kitchen chairs, and looked straight at him.

"You want to ask me something?" said she.

Claud spoke to her.

"Yes," he said, "we want to ask you certain personal questions which would be very rude if we had not a strong warrant for them. I am sure you are as anxious as we are that the mystery of your brother's accident should be cleared up?"

"Oh, yes," said Wyn.

"Well, Mr. d.i.c.kens thinks that the motive we have to search for was a good deal deeper than mere robbery; he wants to know if Mr. Allonby had enemies. Do you know of anyone who wished him ill?"

"No, certainly I don't," she replied at once. "Osmond is a most good-natured fellow, he never quarrels with a creature--he is too lazy to quarrel, I think. I don't know of a single enemy we have."

"Will you tell me your brother's motive in coming down here to Edge Combe?"

"Certainly. He came here to sketch. He had sold his landscapes at the Inst.i.tute very well, and a friend of the gentleman who bought them wanted two in the same style. Osmond thought a change to the country would do him good. An artist friend of ours recommended Edge Combe, and so he came here."

"Do you know the friend who recommended Edge Combe?"

A slight hint of extra color rose in the girl's cheeks.

"Yes, I know him; he is a Mr. Haldane, a student in the Academy Schools."

"On good terms with your brother?"

"Yes, of course; but he knows my sister Jacqueline better than he knows Osmond."

"Would he be likely to write to Mr. Allonby?"

"No, I hardly think so. He never has, that I know of. He sent the address of the inn on a postcard. Mrs. Clapp would know him--he stayed here several weeks last year."

The detective pondered.

"You are sure there was no quarrel--no jealousy--nothing that could----"

"What, between my brother and Mr. Haldane? The idea is quite absurd.

They are only very slightly acquainted, and Osmond is at least six years older than he is!"

"Will you tell me, on your honor, whether you yourself can account in any way at all for what has occurred? Had you any reason whatever to think it likely such a thing might happen? Or were you absolutely and utterly horrified and surprised by such news?"

"I was horrified and surprised beyond measure; so were my sisters. We are as much in the dark about the matter as you can possibly be. I can offer no guess or conjecture on the subject; it is quite inexplicable to me."

"And you would think it quite folly to connect it in any way with Mr.

Haldane?"

She laughed rather contemptuously.

"I'm afraid, even if he did cherish a secret grudge, Mr. Haldane is not rich enough to employ paid agents to do his murders for him; and, as he was at work in the R.A. schools when the crime was committed, it does seem to me unlikely, to say the least of it, that he had anything to do with the matter. What can make you think he had?"

"Merely," answered the detective, somewhat confused, "that in these cases sometimes everything hangs on what seems such a trifling bit of evidence; and as you said this gentleman recommended your brother to come to this particular place----"

"You thought he had an _arriere pensee_. I am afraid you are quite wrong. I cannot see how Mr. Haldane could possibly serve any ends of his own by compa.s.sing my brother's destruction," she said, evidently with ironical gravity. "Besides, I hardly think that either he or his agent would have troubled to carry away an empty basin as a momento of the deed."

"The people all declare that no stranger pa.s.sed through the village on that day," put in Claud.