Silverthorns

The two took their way across the landing through the door, which Claudia had so thoughtfully propped open. And “Oh,” Jerry ejaculated, “I don’t know what I would have done if that door had been shut!”

The fire was by no means in a hopeless condition, and it was not the first time by any means that Claudia had skilfully doctored one. For she had taken her share in many days and nights too of nursing at home, when her father’s eyes were at their worst, or the younger children had measles or scarlet fever. And soon a bright blaze rewarded her efforts.

“How clever you are,” said Jerry admiringly. “I don’t believe Charlotte could do up a fire like that. I didn’t think – ”

“What?” said Claudia.

“I didn’t think such – such a grand girl as you would know how to do things like that.”

Claudia turned her laughing face, on which rested the glow of the fire, towards the boy, who was now comfortably ensconced in a big arm-chair with a blanket round him.

“You’ll have to alter your opinion of me, Gervais. I’m not ‘grand’ at all.”

“But I think you are; and I think you are very pretty. If you only saw now how the flames make your hair shine!” said the child dreamily. “And you are very, very kind. I shall tell Charlotte. I am not sure that she wouldn’t have laughed at me a little about the ghost. She thinks being frightened so babyish.”

“Perhaps she has never been tried,” said Claudia.

“What was it you heard, Gervais?”

“It was like sobbing and groaning in a muffled kind of way. It came from up-stairs, at least I fancied so; perhaps it was because I knew the haunted room is up-stairs – papa told me. At first I was rather sleepy, and I thought I was dreaming – I’ve had such queer dreams all night; perhaps it was with them giving me brandy, you know. And so I thought I was dreaming, and then when I woke up and heard it still, I thought it was the wind. But it seemed to come down the stair in the queerest way – really as if it was somebody, and almost into the room, as if it wanted me to get up and see what was the matter. And all of a sudden I seemed to remember where I was, and all that papa had told us came back into my mind, and I thought of the tower room up-stairs and the poor ghost crying all alone. Miss Meredon, I’m awfully sorry for the ghost, do you know! I used to think if ever I got a chance I’d speak to him, and ask him if I could do anything for him. But – ” and Jerry drew a deep breath.

“Only, Gervais, it couldn’t have been him after all; you see you’re not a relation of his.”

“No, but I didn’t know that. I’ll try to think that it was the wind, or the owls, or anything.”

“And that you were not quite well, and that made you more fanciful; you see you had been dreaming already in a fanciful way.”

“Yes,” said Jerry, though his tone was only half convinced.

“And now don’t you think you can manage to go to sleep? Get into bed, and I’ll sit here beside you. I will leave the candle alight, and I will make up the fire so that it shall last till morning. It is near morning now, I fancy.”

“Thank you, awfully,” said Jerry. “Yes, I’ll try to go to sleep. I don’t like you to have to sit up like that; as soon as I’m at all asleep, please go. I have a feeling that I won’t hear any more noises now. – Oh what a lot I shall have to tell Charlotte about how awfully good she is,” he said to himself. And he lay perfectly still and tried to breathe regularly so that Claudia should think he was asleep, and as sometimes happens, the simulation brought the reality. In ten minutes he was really and truly in a deep and peaceful slumber.

Then Claudia went quietly back to her own room. All was perfectly still up the stair leading to the tower, but a strange, puzzled, half-sad feeling crept over the girl.

“It really seems as if there were something in that old story,” she thought. “Why should that poor little fellow be so impressed by it? I can’t understand his father’s having heard it too. And Gervais said his father used to stay here as a boy. How could that have been? I wonder if it can have anything to do with Aunt Mildred’s prejudice against the Waldrons – for I am sure she is a little prejudiced against them.”

But Claudia was too tired and sleepy to pursue her reflections further, and her slumbers till the next morning were dreamless and undisturbed.

The little guest was fast asleep when Mrs Ball went to look after him.

“It is the best thing he can do, poor child. It would be a shame to disturb him. He does look a delicate little creature, to be sure. One sees it even plainer by daylight,” she said, when she came to Claudia’s room to report. “But you’re looking tired yourself, Miss Meredon, this morning. It was rather an upset for you last night. He did look deathly when they brought him in.”

“Yes; he looked dreadful,” Claudia agreed. “How is her ladyship, Mrs Ball? It was an upset for her too.”

“I’ve not seen her, miss; but she was ringing to know if the letters hadn’t come. It will be a very dull Christmas here if my lady goes up to spend it in town. We were hoping with a young lady like you here, missy, it would have been a bit livelier. There are some nice families about, where there are young people, but my lady’s got so out of the way of seeing any one, but just her own old friends.”

“I’m afraid my being here wouldn’t have made Christmas any cheerier, Mrs Ball,” said Claudia. “I don’t much mind whether we spend it here or in London. I’m glad to be a companion to Aunt Mildred, at least I’m glad that she seems to like to have me.”

“That she does, missy,” said the old housekeeper heartily.

Lady Mildred still seemed anxious and pre-occupied when Claudia met her at breakfast; but she was gentle and less irritable than was usual with her when she was at all uneasy.

“I have no letter from Mr Miller, yet. I cannot understand it,” she said; “he promised to write at once, and explain what this business is that he wants to see me about. He said it was nothing pressing – ‘pressing’ is such an indefinite word. If it was nothing pressing what did he say he wanted to see me for, and ask so particularly if I was likely to be in town.”

“It is as if he wished to talk over something with you, perhaps to see you more than once, and not hurriedly,” said Claudia.

“Yes,” said Lady Mildred, “that is the feeling his letter gave me. The little boy seems better this morning Mrs Ball tells me,” she went on.

“Yes, she came to my room to tell me so,” Claudia replied; she was on the point of going on to tell her aunt about the disturbances of the night when something made her stop short. It would be scarcely fair to Gervais to do so, she reflected; at any rate while he was still in the house and might dislike being cross-questioned about the matter, as Lady Mildred would probably insist upon. Then she shrank a little from bringing up the old ghost-story just now, when her aunt was already evidently rather uneasy, for Claudia had detected a certain dislike to and avoidance of the subject on Lady Mildred’s part, even while she affected to treat it all as nonsense.

“I will say nothing about it just now,” the girl decided.

They had scarcely finished breakfast when wheels were heard on the gravel drive outside, and there came a ring at the bell.

“Mr Waldron, if you please, my lady,” Ball came in to announce with his usual urbane solemnity. “He begs to apologise for coming so early, but if he can go up-stairs to see the young gentleman, he hopes it will not in any way disturb your ladyship.”

Lady Mildred rose from the table.

“Show Mr Waldron into the morning room,” she said; and when the visitor entered the room he found her already there.

“I am ashamed – ” he began, his usual rather cold courtesy to Lady Mildred tempered by the sense of his obligation to her; but she interrupted him.

“Pray don’t thank me, Mr Waldron,” she said; “I have done nothing to be thanked for. Hospitality in such a case is an absolute matter of course. I am only thankful the accident proved no worse. I have a good account of your little son this morning. You would like to see him, no doubt?”

Mr Waldron bowed.

“At once if possible,” he said.

Lady Mildred rang the bell.

“He is a fine little fellow,” she said, with perhaps the shadow of an effort perceptible in her tone; “but evidently delicate. You will excuse me for saying that it seems to me very rash to let a boy like him be so far from home and on foot in such weather.”

Mr Waldron’s face flushed slightly. He did not like being taken to task especially about his care and management of his children, but he felt that there was room for Lady Mildred’s censure.

“You are right,” he said; “but ‘accidents will happen in the best-regulated families,’” he went on with a slight smile. “It was all a mistake, the other boys would never have let him start to walk back alone from the pond had they not felt sure he would meet the dog-cart. I can scarcely even now make out how he missed it.”

“He is not your eldest son, then,” said Lady Mildred. Mr Waldron’s face flushed again.

“No,” he said; “I have three older.”

“Oh, indeed,” said Lady Mildred, with a not altogether agreeable inflection in her voice; “then there is no fear of the Waldron family coming to an end.”

But the entrance of the footman prevented any necessity of the visitor’s replying.

“Show Mr Waldron up to the chintz room,” said Lady Mildred.

Jerry’s father started a little. Had they put the child there– in his own old quarters? It was a curious coincidence.

His mind was full of many thoughts as he followed the servant. He had never been at Silverthorns except once or twice for an interview of five minutes or so, on business matters, since the long ago days of his boyhood, and old memories crowded thickly upon him as he made his way along the well-remembered passages, and up the familiar stairs.

“To think that this was once home to me,” – he thought – “to think of my grandmother – more than mother as she was to me – having died in privation, almost in want, after being mistress here for a good part of her long life. Yes; it would have been hard in any case, but that, we could have borne uncomplainingly, had we not been treated with such unnecessary rigour and cruelty. It is very bitter to remember. I have done well to bring the children up in ignorance of it all.”

But these thoughts were to some extent driven from his mind when he entered the chintz room, and saw Jerry. He had not expected to find the boy looking so ill – he was sitting up in bed eating his breakfast, but he was very pale and uneasy-looking, and when his father stooped to kiss him, he flung his arms round him, and clutched him convulsively.

“You’ve come to take me home, papa,” he cried; “I’ll be ready directly. Oh, I shall be so glad to go home!”

“My poor Jerry,” said Mr Waldron; “why you talk as if you had been away for years. But they’ve been very kind to you here?”

“Oh, very,” said the boy, in a tone of the deepest conviction; “but, papa, I wouldn’t sleep here alone another night for anything. I can’t tell you all now; but it was like what you told us about. I heard the sobbing and sighing, I did indeed.”

Mr Waldron started a little, but imperceptibly to Jerry.

“I shouldn’t have told it,” he said regretfully; “of course I would never have dreamt of doing so had I foreseen this. It was only natural, Jerry, that you should think you heard those sounds, when your mind was full of the story, and you were besides not well – excited and feverish probably.”

“Yes, that was what Miss Meredon said, and – ”

“Does she know you were frightened?” interrupted Mr Waldron in surprise.

“Oh, yes; but I’ll tell you all at home. She tried to satisfy me, and she said one thing which almost did – that nobody ever hears these sounds except one of the family. But I’ve been thinking after all that can’t be, for you heard them and you aren’t one of the family, so why shouldn’t I?”

“It only proves that what one fanciful little boy thought he heard, another fanciful little boy may have – no, I won’t say thought he heard. I did hear them; but I believe it was perfectly possible they were caused by owls, and partly perhaps by some peculiar draught of air. This is very old, this part of the house. Did you know that?”

“Oh, yes; this is the very room you used to have. I remembered the name.”

“Yes,” said Mr Waldron, and he looked about him with feelings his little son could but very vaguely fathom. It was indeed the very room, as Jerry said; strangely little changed in the more than thirty years that had passed since he saw it. There was the queer cupboard in the wall where he kept his treasures, the old dark mahogany wash-handstand with the blue and white toilet-ware; yes, actually the very same; the faded chintz curtains which, in some far-off time when they had been the pride doubtless of some Silverthorns chatelaine, had given its name to the room; and to complete the resemblance, from where he sat, the glimpse through the window of the snow-covered drive and trees outside. For it was in winter that he and his grandmother had left Silverthorns, as seemed then, for ever.

But with a sigh he roused himself, and returned to the present.

“Jerry,” he said; “I have not brought a close carriage for you. We should have had to get one from the ‘George,’ and in the note last night something was said of the doctor seeing you this morning to say if you could come.”

“Oh, papa,” said Jerry; “I can’t stay.”

His father looked at him again. It did seem as if it would do the boy less harm to go than to stay.

“Very well,” he said; “I will try to arrange it.”