The Red Window

CHAPTER IV

A STRANGE ADVENTURE

Conniston and Bernard Gore were as much as possible in one another's company during the stay of the former in town. Thinking he would go out to the Cape sooner than he did, Bernard had impulsively got rid of his civilian clothes, and therefore had to keep constantly to his uniform. But in those days everyone was in khaki, as the war fever was in the air, so amongst the throng he passed comparatively unnoticed. At all events he managed to keep away from the fashionable world, and therefore saw neither Sir Simon nor Lucy. Beyond the fact that his grandfather was in town Bernard knew nothing, and was ignorant that the old man had taken up his abode in Crimea Square. So he told Durham when the lawyer questioned him.

The three old schoolfellows came together at Durham's house, which was situated on Camden Hill. Faithful to his intention to see Gore, the lawyer had sent a note asking Conniston where Bernard was to be found. Already Conniston had told Durham of his chance meeting in the Park, so when he received Durham's letter he insisted on taking Gore to dinner at the lawyer's house. Bernard was only too glad, and the three had a long talk over old times. The dinner was excellent, the wine was good, and although the young man's housekeeper was rather surprised that her precise master should dine with a couple of soldiers, she did her best to make them comfortable. When the meal was ended Durham carried off his guests to the library, where they sat around a sea-wood fire sipping coffee and smoking the excellent cigars of their host. Durham alone was in evening dress, as Gore kept to khaki, and Conniston, for the sake of company, retained his lancer uniform. Their host laughed as he contemplated the two.

"I feel inclined to go to the front myself," said he, handing Gore a glass of kümmel, "but the business would suffer."

"Leave it in charge of a clerk," said Conniston, in his hair-brained way. "You have no ties to keep you here. Your parents are dead – you aren't married, and – "

"I may be engaged for all you know."

"Bosh! There's a look about an engaged man you can't mistake. Look at Bernard there. He is – "

"Pax! Pax!" cried Gore, laughing. "Leave me alone, Conniston. But are you really engaged, Mark?"

"No," said Mark, rubbing his knees rather dismally. "I should like to be. A home-loving man like myself needs a wife to smile at him across the hearth."

"And just now you talked of going to the front," put in the young lord. "You don't know your own mind. But, I say, this is jolly. Back I go to barracks to-morrow and shall remember this comfortable room and this glimpse of civilized life."

"You were stupid to enlist," said Durham, sharply. "Had you come to me, we could have arranged matters better. You knew I'd see you through, Conniston. I have ample means."

"I don't want to be seen through," said Conniston, wilfully. "Besides, it's fun, this war. I'm crazy to go, and now that Bernard's coming along it will be like a picnic."

"Not much, I fear," said Bernard, "if all the tales we hear are true."

"Right," said Durham. "This won't be the military promenade the generality of people suppose it will be. The Boers are obstinate."

"So are we," argued Conniston; "but don't let us talk shop. We'll get heaps of that at the Cape. Mark, you wanted to see Bernard about some business. Shall I leave the room?"

"No, no!" said Gore, hastily. "Mark can say what he likes about my business before you, Conniston. I have nothing to conceal."

"Nothing?" asked Durham, looking meaningly at his friend.

Gore allowed an expression of surprise to flit across his expressive face. "What are you driving at, Mark?"

"Well," said Durham, slowly, "your grandfather came to see me the other day on business – "

"I can guess what the business was," put in Bernard, bitterly, and thinking that a new will had been made.

The lawyer smiled. "Quite so. But don't ask me to betray the secrets of my client. But Sir Simon knew you were in the Imperial Yeomanry, Bernard. He learned that from Beryl."

"Who is, no doubt, spying on me. It is thanks to Julius that I had the row with my grandfather. He – "

"You needn't trouble to explain," interrupted Durham. "I know. Sir Simon explained. But he also asked me if you knew he was in town."

"I told Bernard," said Conniston, "and you told me."

"Yes. But does Bernard know where Sir Simon is stopping?"

"No," said Gore, emphatically, "I don't."

"Neither do I. What are you getting at, Mark?"

"It's a queer thing," went on Durham, taking no notice of Conniston's question, "but afterwards – yesterday, in fact – Sir Simon wrote saying that he heard from Mrs. Gilroy of an Imperial Yeoman who had been visiting in the kitchen of Crimea Square – "

"What about Crimea Square?" asked Gore, quickly.

"Your grandfather is stopping there – in No. 32; old Jefferies' house."

"Oh! I knew nothing of that. Go on."

"Sir Simon," proceeded the lawyer, looking at Gore, "stated in his letter that the description of the soldier, as given by the maid, applied to you, Bernard."

Gore stared and looked puzzled, as did Conniston. "But I don't quite understand," said the former. "Do you mean that my grandfather thinks that I have been making love to some servant in Crimea Square?"

"In No. 32. Yes. That is what Sir Simon's letter intimated to me."

The other men looked at one another and burst out laughing. "What jolly rubbish!" said Lord Conniston. "Why, Bernard is the last person to do such a thing."

"It's all very well to laugh," said Durham, rather tartly, "but you see, Gore, Sir Simon may think that you went to the kitchen, not to make love to the maid, but to see how he was disposed towards you."

"But, Mark, I haven't been near the place."

"Are you sure?" asked Mark, sharply.

Bernard, always hot-tempered, jumped up. "I won't bear that from any man," he said. "You have no right to doubt my word, Durham."

"Don't fire up over nothing, Gore. It is in your own interest that I speak. I knew well enough that you wouldn't make love to this housemaid mentioned by Sir Simon – Jane Riordan is her name. But I fancied you might have gone to see if your grandfather – "

"I went to see nothing," replied Gore, dropping back into his chair with a disgusted air. "I don't sneak round in that way. When my grandfather kicked me out of the house, I said good-bye to Alice and came to London. I saw you, to get some money, and afterwards I enlisted. I never knew that Sir Simon was in town till Conniston told me. I never knew he lived in Crimea Square till you explained. My duties have kept me hard at work all the time. And even if they hadn't," said the young man, wrathfully, "I certainly wouldn't go making love to servants to gain information about my own people."

"Quite so," said Durham, smoothly. "Then why – "

"Drop the subject, Mark."

"Sit down and be quiet, Bernard," said Conniston, pulling him back into his seat, for he had again risen. "Mark has something to say."

"If you will let me say it," said Durham, with the air of a man severely tried by a recalcitrant witness.

"Go on, then," said Bernard, and flung himself into his chair in a rather sullen manner. His troubles had worn his nerves thin, and even from his old schoolfellow he was not prepared to take any scolding. All the same, he secretly saw that he was accusing Durham of taking a liberty where none was meant.

"It's this way," said the lawyer, when Gore was smoothed down for the time being. "We know that Beryl hates you."

"He wants the money."

"I know that." Durham smiled when he thought of the destroyed will; but he could hardly explain his smile. "Well, it is strange that the description given by the maid of this soldier – and a yeoman, mind you – should be like you. Have you a double?"

"Not that I know of."

"Then someone is impersonating you so as to arouse the wrath of your grandfather against you. Sir Simon is a proud old man, and the idea that you condescended to flirt with – "

"But I didn't, I tell you!" cried the exasperated Gore.

"No. We know that. But Sir Simon, judging from his letter, thinks so."

"He has no right to do that. My conduct never gave him any reason to think I would sink so low."

"My dear chap," said Conniston, with the air of a Socrates, "when anyone has his monkey up, he will believe anything."

"Conniston is quite right," said the lawyer, "though he expresses himself with his usual elegance. Sir Simon, with Beryl at his elbow, is inclined to believe the worst of you, Bernard, and probably thinks you have deteriorated sufficiently to permit your making use of even so humble an instrument as a housemaid."

"Bah!" said Gore, in a rage. "What right has he to – "

"Don't be so furious, my dear man. I am advising you for your own good, and not charging seven-and-six either."

This made Bernard laugh. "But it does make a fellow furious to hear his nearest – I won't say dearest – think so badly of one."

"One's relatives always think the worst," said Conniston, oracularly. "Miss Plantagenet thinks so badly of me that I'll never see that five thousand a year. Miss Malleson will have it, and you, Bernard, will live on it. Pax! Pax!" for Bernard gave him a punch on the shoulder.

"Dick, you're a silly ass! Go on, Durham."

"Well," said Durham, beginning in his invariable manner, "I fancy that Beryl is up to some trick. You have not been near the place; so someone made up to impersonate you is sneaking round. Of course, there is the other alternative, Mrs. Gilroy may be telling a lie!"

"She wouldn't," rejoined Gore, quickly. "She is on my side."

"So you told me. But your grandfather thinks otherwise. We were talking about you the other day."

"And Sir Simon said no good of me," was Bernard's remark. "But what is to be done?"

"Only one thing. Go and see your grandfather and have the matter sifted. If Mrs. Gilroy is lying you can make her prove the truth. If she tells the truth, you can see if Beryl has a hand in the matter."

Gore rose and began to pace the room. "I should like to see my grandfather," said he, "as I want to apologise for my behavior. But I am afraid if we come together there will be trouble."

"I daresay – if Beryl is at his elbow. Therefore, I do not advise you to call at Crimea Square. But when Sir Simon goes down to the Hall again, you can make it your business to see him and set matters right."

"I am afraid that is impossible," said Gore, gloomily, "unless I give up Alice, and that I won't do." He struck the table hard.

"Don't spoil the furniture, Bernard," said Conniston, lighting a cigarette. "You do what Mark says. Go down to Hurseton."

"I don't want to be known in this kit, and I have parted with my plain clothes," objected the other.

"You always were an impulsive beast," said Conniston, with the candour of a long friendship. "Well, then" – he rose and crossed to the writing-table – "I'll scrawl a note to Mrs. Moon telling her to put you up at Cove Castle. She can hold her tongue, and the castle is in so out-of-the-way a locality that no one will spot you there. You can then walk across to Hurseton – it's only ten miles – and see if that Red Window is alight."

"Your grandfather said something about the Red Window," said Durham, while Conniston scribbled the note in a kind of print, since Mrs. Moon was not particularly well educated. "What is it?"

Bernard explained the idea of Lucy, and how she was playing the part of his friend, to let him know how matters stood. "I am always startled by a red window now," he said, laughing at his own folly, "as it means so much to me. The other night I saw a chemist's sign and it made me sit up."

"It's an absurdly romantic idea," said Durham, with all the scorn of a lawyer for the quaint. "Why revive an old legendary idea when a simple letter – "

"Mrs. Gilroy and Julius would stop any letters," said Bernard, "that is, if she is hostile to me, which she may be. I am not sure of her attitude."

"What is the legend of the Red Window?" asked Durham.

"It's too long a story to tell," said Bernard, glancing at the clock, which pointed to a quarter to ten, "and I'm due at barracks. I'll tell you about it on another occasion. Meantime – "

"Meantime," said Durham, rising, "I advise you to drop red windows and legends and go down to see Sir Simon boldly. A short interview will put everything right."

"And might put everything wrong."

"No," said Durham, earnestly, "believe me, your grandfather will be more easy to deal with than you think. I am his solicitor and I dare not say much, but I advise you to see him as soon as you can. The sooner the better, since Beryl is a dangerous enemy to have."

"Well, Lucy is my friend."

"And Mrs. Gilroy your enemy along with Beryl."

"I'm not so sure of that," began Gore, when Conniston lounged towards him with a letter.

"You give that to Mrs. Moon," said he, "and she will put you up and hold her tongue and make things pleasant. But don't say I am in town, as I have not dated the letter."

"Does she think you are in America?" asked Bernard, putting the letter into his pocket, and promising to use it should occasion offer.

"Yes. She thinks a great deal of the West family," said Conniston, taking another glass of kümmel, "and she would howl if she heard I was a mere private. And I don't know but what she may not know. I saw that young brute of a Judas when I left you the other day, Bernard."

"Judas?" echoed Durham, who was unlocking the spirit-stand.

Conniston sat down and stretched out his legs. "He's Mrs. Moon's grandson. Jerry Moon is his name – but he's such a young scoundrel that I call him Judas as more appropriate. I got him a place with Taberley, the tobacconist, but he took money or something and was kicked out. The other day when I met him he was selling matches. I gave him half a sovereign to go back to his grandmother, so by this time I expect he's at Cove Castle telling her lies. I instructed him to hold his tongue about my soldiering."

"Why didn't you send him to me?" said Mark. "I would have frightened him, and made him hold his tongue."