“one more! just one more well paying affair, and i promise to stop; really and truly to stop.”
“but, puss, why one more? you have earned the amount you set for yourself,—or very nearly,—and though my help is not great, in three months i can add enough—”
“no, you cannot, arthur. you are doing well; i appreciate it; in fact, i am just delighted to have you work for me in the way you do, but you cannot, in your present position, make enough in three months, or in six, to meet the situation as i see it. enough does not satisfy me. the measure must be full, heaped up, and running over. possible failure following promise must be provided for. never must i feel myself called upon to do this kind of thing again. besides, i have never got over the zabriskie tragedy. it haunts me continually. something new may help to put it out of my head. i feel guilty. i was responsible—”
“no, puss. i will not have it that you were responsible. some such end was bound to follow a complication like that. sooner or later he would have been driven to shoot himself—”
“but not her.”
“no, not her. but do you think she would have given those few minutes of perfect understanding with her blind husband for a few years more of miserable life?”
violet made no answer; she was too absorbed in her surprise. was this arthur? had a few weeks’ work and a close connection with the really serious things of life made this change in him? her face beamed at the thought, which seeing, but not understanding what underlay this evidence of joy, he bent and kissed her, saying with some of his old nonchalance:
“forget it, violet; only don’t let any one or anything lead you to interest yourself in another affair of the kind. if you do, i shall have to consult a certain friend of yours as to the best way of stopping this folly. i mention no names. oh! you need not look so frightened. only behave; that’s all.”
“he’s right,” she acknowledged to herself, as he sauntered away; “altogether right.”
yet because she wanted the extra money—
the scene invited alarm,—that is, for so young a girl as violet, surveying it from an automobile some time after the stroke of midnight. an unknown house at the end of a heavily shaded walk, in the open doorway of which could be seen the silhouette of a woman’s form leaning eagerly forward with arms outstretched in an appeal for help! it vanished while she looked, but the effect remained, holding her to her seat for one startled moment. this seemed strange, for she had anticipated adventure. one is not summoned from a private ball to ride a dozen miles into the country on an errand of investigation, without some expectation of encountering the mysterious and the tragic. but violet strange, for all her many experiences, was of a most susceptible nature, and for the instant in which that door stood open, with only the memory of that expectant figure to disturb the faintly lit vista of the hall beyond, she felt that grip upon the throat which comes from an indefinable fear which no words can explain and no plummet sound.
but this soon passed. with the setting of her foot to ground, conditions changed and her emotions took on a more normal character. the figure of a man now stood in the place held by the vanished woman; and it was not only that of one she knew but that of one whom she trusted—a friend whose very presence gave her courage. with this recognition came a better understanding of the situation, and it was with a beaming eye and unclouded features that she tripped up the walk to meet the expectant figure and outstretched hand of roger upjohn.
“you here!” she exclaimed, amid smiles and blushes, as he drew her into the hall.
he at once launched forth into explanations mingled with apologies for the presumption he had shown in putting her to this inconvenience. there was trouble in the house—great trouble. something had occurred for which an explanation must be found before morning, or the happiness and honour of more than one person now under this unhappy roof would be wrecked. he knew it was late—that she had been obliged to take a long and dreary ride alone, but her success with the problem which had once come near wrecking his own life had emboldened him to telephone to the office and—“but you are in ball-dress,” he cried in amazement. “did you think—”
“i came from a ball. word reached me between the dances. i did not go home. i had been bidden to hurry.”
he looked his appreciation, but when he spoke it was to say:
“this is the situation. miss digby—”
“the lady who is to be married tomorrow?”
“who hopes to be married tomorrow.”
“how, hopes?”
“who will be married tomorrow, if a certain article lost in this house tonight can be found before any of the persons who have been dining here leave for their homes.”
violet uttered an exclamation.
“then, mr. cornell,” she began—
“mr. cornell has our utmost confidence,” roger hastened to interpose. “but the article missing is one which he might reasonably desire to possess and which he alone of all present had the opportunity of securing. you can therefore see why he, with his pride—the pride off a man not rich, engaged to marry a woman who is—should declare that unless his innocence is established before daybreak, the doors of st. bartholomew will remain shut to-morrow.”
“but the article lost—what is it?”
“miss digby will give you the particulars. she is waiting to receive you,” he added with a gesture towards a half-open door at their right.
violet glanced that way, then cast her looks up and down the hall in which they stood.
“do you know that you have not told me in whose house i am? not hers, i know. she lives in the city.”
“and you are twelve miles from harlem. miss strange, you are in the van broecklyn mansion, famous enough you will acknowledge. have you never been here before?”
“i have been by here, but i recognized nothing in the dark. what an exciting place for an investigation!”
“and mr. van broecklyn? have you never met him?”
“once, when a child. he frightened me then.”
“and may frighten you now; though i doubt it. time has mellowed him. besides, i have prepared him for what might otherwise occasion him some astonishment. naturally he would not look for just the sort of lady investigator i am about to introduce to him.”
she smiled. violet strange was a very charming young woman, as well as a keen prober of odd mysteries.
the meeting between herself and miss digby was a sympathetic one. after the first inevitable shock which the latter felt at sight of the beauty and fashionable appearance of the mysterious little being who was to solve her difficulties, her glance, which, under other circumstances, might have lingered unduly upon the piquant features and exquisite dressing of the fairy-like figure before her, passed at once to violet’s eyes, in whose steady depths beamed an intelligence quite at odds with the coquettish dimples which so often misled the casual observer in his estimation of a character singularly subtle and well-poised.
as for the impression she herself made upon violet, it was the same she made upon everyone. no one could look long at florence digby and not recognize the loftiness of her spirit and the generous nature of her impulses. in person she was tall and as she leaned to take violet’s hand, the difference between them brought out the salient points in each, to the great admiration of the one onlooker.
meantime, for all her interest in the case in hand, violet could not help casting a hurried look about her, in gratification of the curiosity incited by her entrance into a house signalized from its foundation by such a series of tragic events. the result was disappointing. the walls were plain, the furniture simple. nothing suggestive in either, unless it was the fact that nothing was new, nothing modern. as it looked in the days of burr and hamilton so it looked to-day, even to the rather startling detail of candles which did duty on every side in place of gas.
as violet recalled the reason for this, the fascination of the past seized upon her imagination. there was no knowing where this might have carried her, had not the feverish gleam in miss digby’s eyes warned her that the present held its own excitement. instantly, she was all attention and listening with undivided mind to that lady’s disclosures.
they were brief and to the following effect:
the dinner which had brought some half-dozen people together in this house had been given in celebration of her impending marriage. but it was also in a way meant as a compliment to one of the other guests, a mr. spielhagen, who, during the week, had succeeded in demonstrating to a few experts the value of a discovery he had made which would transform a great industry.
in speaking of this discovery, miss digby did not go into particulars, the whole matter being far beyond her understanding; but in stating its value she openly acknowledged that it was in the line of mr. cornell’s own work, and one which involved calculations and a formula which, if prematurely disclosed, would invalidate the contract mr. spielhagen hoped to make, and thus destroy his present hopes.
of this formula but two copies existed. one was locked up in a safe deposit vault in boston, the other he had brought into the house on his person, and it was the latter which was now missing, having been abstracted during the evening from a manuscript of sixteen or more sheets, under circumstances which she would now endeavour to relate.
mr. van broecklyn, their host, had in his melancholy life but one interest which could be at all absorbing. this was for explosives. as consequence, much of the talk at the dinner-table had been on mr. spielhagen’s discovery, and possible changes it might introduce into this especial industry. as these, worked out from a formula kept secret from the trade, could not but affect greatly mr. cornell’s interests, she found herself listening intently, when mr. van broecklyn, with an apology for his interference, ventured to remark that if mr. spielhagen had made a valuable discovery in this line, so had he, and one which he had substantiated by many experiments. it was not a marketable one, such as mr. spielhagen’s was, but in his work upon the same, and in the tests which he had been led to make, he had discovered certain instances he would gladly name, which demanded exceptional procedure to be successful. if mr. spielhagen’s method did not allow for these exceptions, nor make suitable provision for them, then mr. spielhagen’s method would fail more times than it would succeed. did it so allow and so provide? it would relieve him greatly to learn that it did.
the answer came quickly. yes, it did. but later and after some further conversation, mr. spielhagen’s confidence seemed to wane, and before they left the dinner-table, he openly declared his intention of looking over his manuscript again that very night, in order to be sure that the formula therein contained duly covered all the exceptions mentioned by mr. van broecklyn.
if mr. cornell’s countenance showed any change at this moment, she for one had not noticed it; but the bitterness with which he remarked upon the other’s good fortune in having discovered this formula of whose entire success he had no doubt, was apparent to everybody, and naturally gave point to the circumstances which a short time afterward associated him with the disappearance of the same.
the ladies (there were two others besides herself) having withdrawn in a body to the music-room, the gentlemen all proceeded to the library to smoke. here, conversation loosed from the one topic which had hitherto engrossed it, was proceeding briskly, when mr. spielhagen, with nervous gesture, impulsively looked about him and said:
“i cannot rest till i have run through my thesis again. where can i find a quiet spot? i won’t be long; i read very rapidly.”
it was for mr. van broecklyn to answer, but no word coming from him, every eye turned his way, only to find him sunk in one of those fits of abstraction so well known to his friends, and from which no one who has this strange man’s peace of mind at heart ever presumes to rouse him.
what was to be done? these moods of their singular host sometimes lasted half an hour, and mr. spielhagen had not the appearance of a man of patience. indeed he presently gave proof of the great uneasiness he was labouring under, for noticing a door standing ajar on the other side of the room, he remarked to those around him:
“a den! and lighted! do you see any objection to my shutting myself in there for a few minutes?”
no one venturing to reply, he rose, and giving a slight push to the door, disclosed a small room exquisitely panelled and brightly lighted, but without one article of furniture in it, not even a chair.
“the very place,” quoth mr. spielhagen, and lifting a light cane-bottomed chair from the many standing about, he carried it inside and shut the door behind him.
several minutes passed during which the man who had served at table entered with a tray on which were several small glasses evidently containing some choice liqueur. finding his master fixed in one of his strange moods, he set the tray down and, pointing to one of the glasses, said:
“that is for mr. van broecklyn. it contains his usual quieting powder.” and urging the gentlemen to help themselves, he quietly left the room. mr. upjohn lifted the glass nearest him, and mr. cornell seemed about to do the same when he suddenly reached forward and catching up one farther off started for the room in which mr. spielhagen had so deliberately secluded himself.
why he did all this—why, above all things, he should reach across the tray for a glass instead of taking the one under his hand, he can no more explain than why he has followed many another unhappy impulse. nor did he understand the nervous start given by mr. spielhagen at his entrance, or the stare with which that gentleman took the glass from his hand and mechanically drank its contents, till he saw how his hand had stretched itself across the sheet of paper he was reading, in an open attempt to hide the lines visible between his fingers. then indeed the intruder flushed and withdrew in great embarrassment, fully conscious of his indiscretion but not deeply disturbed till mr. van broecklyn, suddenly arousing and glancing down at the tray placed very near his hand remarked in some surprise: “dobbs seems to have forgotten me.” then indeed, the unfortunate mr. cornell realized what he had done. it was the glass intended for his host which he had caught up and carried into the other room—the glass which he had been told contained a drug. of what folly he had been guilty, and how tame would be any effort at excuse!
attempting none, he rose and with a hurried glance at mr. upjohn who flushed in sympathy at his distress, he crossed to the door he had lately closed upon mr. spielhagen. but feeling his shoulder touched as his hand pressed the knob, he turned to meet the eye of mr. van broecklyn fixed upon him with an expression which utterly confounded him.
“where are you going?” that gentleman asked.
the questioning tone, the severe look, expressive at once of displeasure and astonishment, were most disconcerting, but mr. cornell managed to stammer forth:
“mr. spielhagen is in here consulting his thesis. when your man brought in the cordial, i was awkward enough to catch up your glass and carry it in to. mr. spielhagen. he drank it and i—i am anxious to see if it did him any harm.”
as he uttered the last word he felt mr. van broecklyn’s hand slip from his shoulder, but no word accompanied the action, nor did his host make the least move to follow him into the room.
this was a matter of great regret to him later, as it left him for a moment out of the range of every eye, during which he says he simply stood in a state of shock at seeing mr. spielhagen still sitting there, manuscript in hand, but with head fallen forward and eyes closed; dead, asleep or—he hardly knew what; the sight so paralysed him.
whether or not this was the exact truth and the whole truth, mr. cornell certainly looked very unlike himself as he stepped back into mr. van broecklyn’s presence; and he was only partially reassured when that gentleman protested that there was no real harm in the drug, and that mr. spielhagen would be all right if left to wake naturally and without shock. however, as his present attitude was one of great discomfort, they decided to carry him back and lay him on the library lounge. but before doing this, mr. upjohn drew from his flaccid grasp, the precious manuscript, and carrying it into the larger room placed it on a remote table, where it remained undisturbed till mr. spielhagen, suddenly coming to himself at the end of some fifteen minutes, missed the sheets from his hand, and bounding up, crossed the room to repossess himself of them.
his face, as he lifted them up and rapidly ran through them with ever-accumulating anxiety, told them what they had to expect.
the page containing the formula was gone!
violet now saw her problem.
ii
there was no doubt about the loss i have mentioned; all could see that page 13 was not there. in vain a second handling of every sheet, the one so numbered was not to be found. page 14 met the eye on the top of the pile, and page 12 finished it off at the bottom, but no page 13 in between, or anywhere else.
where had it vanished, and through whose agency had this misadventure occurred? no one could say, or, at least, no one there made any attempt to do so, though everybody started to look for it.
but where look? the adjoining small room offered no facilities for hiding a cigar-end, much less a square of shining white paper. bare walls, a bare floor, and a single chair for furniture, comprised all that was to be seen in this direction. nor could the room in which they then stood be thought to hold it, unless it was on the person of some one of them. could this be the explanation of the mystery? no man looked his doubts; but mr. cornell, possibly divining the general feeling, stepped up to mr. van broecklyn and in a cool voice, but with the red burning hotly on either cheek, said, so as to be heard by everyone present:
“i demand to be searched—at once and thoroughly.”
a moment’s silence, then the common cry:
“we will all be searched.”
“is mr. spielhagen sure that the missing page was with the others when he sat down in the adjoining room to read his thesis?” asked their perturbed host.
“very sure,” came the emphatic reply. “indeed, i was just going through the formula itself when i fell asleep.”
“you are ready to assert this?”
“i am ready to swear it.”
mr. cornell repeated his request.
“i demand that you make a thorough search of my person. i must be cleared, and instantly, of every suspicion,” he gravely asserted, “or how can i marry miss digby to-morrow.”
after that there was no further hesitation. one and all subjected themselves to the ordeal suggested; even mr. spielhagen. but this effort was as futile as the rest. the lost page was not found.
what were they to think? what were they to do?
there seemed to be nothing left to do, and yet some further attempt must be made towards the recovery of this important formula. mr. cornell’s marriage and mr. spielhagen’s business success both depended upon its being in the latter’s hands before six in the morning, when he was engaged to hand it over to a certain manufacturer sailing for europe on an early steamer.
five hours!
had mr. van broecklyn a suggestion to offer? no, he was as much at sea as the rest.
simultaneously look crossed look. blankness was on every face.
“let us call the ladies,” suggested one.
it was done, and however great the tension had been before, it was even greater when miss digby stepped upon the scene. but she was not a woman to be shaken from her poise even by a crisis of this importance. when the dilemma had been presented to her and the full situation grasped, she looked first at mr. cornell and then at mr. spielhagen, and quietly said:
“there is but one explanation possible of this matter. mr. spielhagen will excuse me, but he is evidently mistaken in thinking that he saw the lost page among the rest. the condition into which he was thrown by the unaccustomed drug he had drank, made him liable to hallucinations. i have not the least doubt he thought he had been studying the formula at the time he dropped off to sleep. i have every confidence in the gentleman’s candour. but so have i in that of mr. cornell,” she supplemented, with a smile.
an exclamation from mr. van broecklyn and a subdued murmur from all but mr. spielhagen testified to the effect of this suggestion, and there is no saying what might have been the result if mr. cornell had not hurriedly put in this extraordinary and most unexpected protest:
“miss digby has my gratitude,” said he, “for a confidence which i hope to prove to be deserved. but i must say this for mr. spielhagen. he was correct in stating that he was engaged in looking over his formula when i stepped into his presence with the glass of cordial. if you were not in a position to see the hurried way in which his hand instinctively spread itself over the page he was reading, i was; and if that does not seem conclusive to you, then i feel bound to state that in unconsciously following this movement of his, i plainly saw the number written on the top of the page, and that number was—13.”
a loud exclamation, this time from spielhagen himself, announced his gratitude and corresponding change of attitude toward the speaker.
“wherever that damned page has gone,” he protested, advancing towards cornell with outstretched hand, “you have nothing to do with its disappearance.”
instantly all constraint fled, and every countenance took on a relieved expression. but the problem remained.
suddenly those very words passed some one’s lips, and with their utterance mr. upjohn remembered how at an extraordinary crisis in his own life he had been helped and an equally difficult problem settled, by a little lady secretly attached to a private detective agency. if she could only be found and hurried here before morning, all might yet be well. he would make the effort. such wild schemes sometimes work. he telephoned to the office and—
was there anything else miss strange would like to know?
iii
miss strange, thus appealed to, asked where the gentlemen were now.
she was told that they were still all together in the library; the ladies had been sent home.
“then let us go to them,” said violet, hiding under a smile her great fear that here was an affair which might very easily spell for her that dismal word, failure.
so great was that fear that under all ordinary circumstances she would have had no thought for anything else in the short interim between this stating of the problem and her speedy entrance among the persons involved. but the circumstances of this case were so far from ordinary, or rather let me put it in this way, the setting of the case was so very extraordinary, that she scarcely thought of the problem before her, in her great interest in the house through whose rambling halls she was being so carefully guided. so much that was tragic and heartrending had occurred here. the van broecklyn name, the van broecklyn history, above all the van broecklyn tradition, which made the house unique in the country’s annals (of which more hereafter), all made an appeal to her imagination, and centred her thoughts on what she saw about her. there was door which no man ever opened—had never opened since revolutionary times—should she see it? should she know it if she did see it? then mr. van broecklyn himself! just to meet him, under any conditions and in any place, was an event. but to meet him here, under the pall of his own mystery! no wonder she had no words for her companions, or that her thoughts clung to this anticipation in wonder and almost fearsome delight.
his story was a well-known one. a bachelor and a misanthrope, he lived absolutely alone save for a large entourage of servants, all men and elderly ones at that. he never visited. though he now and then, as on this occasion, entertained certain persons under his roof, he declined every invitation for himself, avoiding even, with equal strictness, all evening amusements of whatever kind, which would detain him in the city after ten at night. perhaps this was to ensure no break in his rule of life never to sleep out of his own bed. though he was a man well over fifty he had not spent, according to his own statement, but two nights out of his own bed since his return from europe in early boyhood, and those were in obedience to a judicial summons which took him to boston.
this was his main eccentricity, but he had another which is apparent enough from what has already been said. he avoided women. if thrown in with them during his short visits into town, he was invariably polite and at times companionable, but he never sought them out, nor had gossip, contrary to its usual habit, ever linked his name with one of the sex.
yet he was a man of more than ordinary attraction. his features were fine and his figure impressive. he might have been the cynosure of all eyes had he chosen to enter crowded drawing-rooms, or even to frequent public assemblages, but having turned his back upon everything of the kind in his youth, he had found it impossible to alter his habits with advancing years; nor was he now expected to. the position he had taken was respected. leonard van broecklyn was no longer criticized.
was there any explanation for this strangely self-centred life? those who knew him best seemed to think so. in the first place he had sprung from an unfortunate stock. events of unusual and tragic nature had marked the family of both parents. nor had his parents themselves been exempt from this seeming fatality. antagonistic in tastes and temperament, they had dragged on an unhappy existence in the old home, till both natures rebelled, and a separation ensued which not only disunited their lives but sent them to opposite sides of the globe never to return again. at least, that was the inference drawn from the peculiar circumstances attending the event. on the morning of one never-to-be-forgotten day, john van broecklyn, the grandfather of the present representative of the family, found the following note from his son lying on the library table:
“father:
“life in this house, or any house, with her is no longer endurable. one of us must go. the mother should not be separated from her child. therefore it is i whom you will never see again. forget me, but be considerate of her and the boy.
“william.”
six hours later another note was found, this time from the wife:
“father:
“tied to a rotting corpse what does one do? lop off one’s arm if necessary to rid one of the contact. as all love between your son and myself is dead, i can no longer live within the sound of his voice. as this is his home, he is the one to remain in it. may our child reap the benefit of his mother’s loss and his father’s affection.
“rhoda.”
both were gone, and gone forever. simultaneous in their departure, they preserved each his own silence and sent no word back. if the one went east and the other west, they may have met on the other side of the globe, but never again in the home which sheltered their boy. for him and for his grandfather they had sunk from sight in the great sea of humanity, leaving them stranded on an isolated and mournful shore. the grand-father steeled himself to the double loss, for the child’s sake; but the boy of eleven succumbed. few of the world’s great sufferers, of whatever age or condition, have mourned as this child mourned, or shown the effects of his grief so deeply or so long. not till he had passed his majority did the line, carved in one day in his baby forehead, lose any of its intensity; and there are those who declare that even later than that, the midnight stillness of the house was disturbed from time to time by his muffled shriek of “mother! mother!”, sending the servants from the house, and adding one more horror to the many which clung about this accursed mansion.
of this cry violet had heard, and it was that and the door—but i have already told you about the door which she was still looking for, when her two companions suddenly halted, and she found herself on the threshold of the library, in full view of mr. van broecklyn and his two guests.
slight and fairy-like in figure, with an air of modest reserve more in keeping with her youth and dainty dimpling beauty than with her errand, her appearance produced an astonishment none of which the gentlemen were able to disguise. this the clever detective, with a genius for social problems and odd elusive cases! this darling of the ball-room in satin and pearls! mr. spielhagen glanced at mr. cornell, and mr. cornell at mr. spielhagen, and both at mr. upjohn, in very evident distrust. as for violet, she had eyes only for mr. van broecklyn who stood before her in a surprise equal to that of the others but with more restraint in its expression.
she was not disappointed in him. she had expected to see a man, reserved almost to the point of austerity. and she found his first look even more awe-compelling than her imagination had pictured; so much so indeed, that her resolution faltered, and she took a quick step backward; which seeing, he smiled and her heart and hopes grew warm again. that he could smile, and smile with absolute sweetness, was her great comfort when later—but i am introducing you too hurriedly to the catastrophe. there is much to be told first.
i pass over the preliminaries, and come at once to the moment when violet, having listened to a repetition of the full facts, stood with downcast eyes before these gentlemen, complaining in some alarm to herself: “they expect me to tell them now and without further search or parley just where this missing page is. i shall have to balk that expectation without losing their confidence. but how?”
summoning up her courage and meeting each inquiring eye with a look which seemed to carry a different message to each, she remarked very quietly:
“this is not a matter to guess at. i must have time and i must look a little deeper into the facts just given me. i presume that the table i see over there is the one upon which mr. upjohn laid the manuscript during mr. spielhagen’s unconsciousness.”
all nodded.
“is it—i mean the table—in the same condition it was then? has nothing been taken from it except the manuscript?”
“nothing.”
“then the missing page is not there,” she smiled, pointing to its bare top. a pause, during which she stood with her gaze fixed on the floor before her. she was thinking and thinking hard.
suddenly she came to a decision. addressing mr. upjohn she asked if he were quite sure that in taking the manuscript from mr. spielhagen’s hand he had neither disarranged nor dropped one of its pages.
the answer was unequivocal.
“then,” she declared, with quiet assurance and a steady meeting with her own of every eye, “as the thirteenth page was not found among the others when they were taken from this table, nor on the persons of either mr. cornell or mr. spielhagen, it is still in that inner room.”
“impossible!” came from every lip, each in a different tone. “that room is absolutely empty.”
“may i have a look at its emptiness?” she asked, with a naive glance at mr. van broecklyn.
“there is positively nothing in the room but the chair mr. spielhagen sat on,” objected that gentleman with a noticeable air of reluctance.
“still, may i not have a look at it?” she persisted, with that disarming smile she kept for great occasions.
mr. van broecklyn bowed. he could not refuse a request so urged, but his step was slow and his manner next to ungracious as he led the way to the door of the adjoining room and threw it open.
just what she had been told to expect! bare walls and floors and an empty chair! yet she did not instantly withdraw, but stood silently contemplating the panelled wainscoting surrounding her, as though she suspected it of containing some secret hiding-place not apparent to the eye.
mr. van broecklyn, noting this, hastened to say:
“the walls are sound, miss strange. they contain no hidden cupboards.”
“and that door?” she asked, pointing to a portion of the wainscoting so exactly like the rest that only the most experienced eye could detect the line of deeper colour which marked an opening.
for an instant mr. van broecklyn stood rigid, then the immovable pallor, which was one of his chief characteristics, gave way to a deep flush as he explained:
“there was a door there once; but it has been permanently closed. with cement,” he forced himself to add, his countenance losing its evanescent colour till it shone ghastly again in the strong light.
with difficulty violet preserved her show of composure. “the door!” she murmured to herself. “i have found it. the great historic door!” but her tone was light as she ventured to say:
“then it can no longer be opened by your hand or any other?”
“it could not be opened with an axe.”
violet sighed in the midst of her triumph. her curiosity had been satisfied, but the problem she had been set to solve looked inexplicable. but she was not one to yield easily to discouragement. marking the disappointment approaching to disdain in every eye but mr. upjohn’s, she drew herself up—(she had not far to draw) and made this final proposal.
“a sheet of paper,” she remarked, “of the size of this one cannot be spirited away, or dissolved into thin air. it exists; it is here; and all we want is some happy thought in order to find it. i acknowledge that that happy thought has not come to me yet, but sometimes i get it in what may seem to you a very odd way. forgetting myself, i try to assume the individuality of the person who has worked the mystery. if i can think with his thoughts, i possibly may follow him in his actions. in this case i should like to make believe for a few moments that i am mr. spielhagen” (with what a delicious smile she said this) “i should like to hold his thesis in my hand and be interrupted in my reading by mr. cornell offering his glass of cordial; then i should like to nod and slip off mentally into a deep sleep. possibly in that sleep the dream may come which will clarify the whole situation. will you humour me so far?”
a ridiculous concession, but finally she had her way; the farce was enacted and they left her as she had requested them to do, alone with her dreams in the small room.
suddenly they heard her cry out, and in another moment she appeared before them, the picture of excitement.
“is this chair standing exactly as it did when mr. spielhagen occupied it?” she asked.
“no,” said mr. upjohn, “it faced the other way.”
she stepped back and twirled the chair about with her disengaged hand.
“so?”
mr. upjohn and mr. spielhagen both nodded, so did the others when she glanced at them.
with a sign of ill-concealed satisfaction, she drew their attention to herself; then eagerly cried:
“gentlemen, look here!”
seating herself, she allowed her whole body to relax till she presented the picture of one calmly asleep. then, as they continued to gaze at with fascinated eyes, not knowing what to expect, they saw something white escape from her lap and slide across the floor till it touched and was stayed by the wainscot. it was the top page of the manuscript she held, and as some inkling of the truth reached their astonished minds, she sprang impetuously to her feet and, pointing to the fallen sheet, cried:
“do you understand now? look where it lies and then look here!”
she had bounded towards the wall and was now on her knees pointing to the bottom of the wainscot, just a few inches to the left of the fallen page.
“a crack!” she cried, “under what was once the door. it’s a very thin one, hardly perceptible to the eye. but see!” here she laid her finger on the fallen paper and drawing it towards her, pushed it carefully against the lower edge of the wainscot. half of it at once disappeared.
“i could easily slip it all through,” she assured them, withdrawing the sheet and leaping to her feet in triumph. “you know now where the missing page lies, mr. spielhagen. all that remains is for mr. van broecklyn to get it for you.”
iv
the cries of mingled astonishment and relief which greeted this simple elucidation of the mystery were broken by a curiously choked, almost unintelligible, cry. it came from the man thus appealed to, who, unnoticed by them all, had started at her first word and gradually, as action followed action, withdrawn himself till he now stood alone and in an attitude almost of defiance behind the large table in the centre of the library.
“i am sorry,” he began, with a brusqueness which gradually toned down into a forced urbanity as he beheld every eye fixed upon him in amazement, “that circumstances forbid my being of assistance to you in this unfortunate matter. if the paper lies where you say, and i see no other explanation of its loss, i am afraid it will have to remain there for this night at least. the cement in which that door is embedded is thick as any wall; it would take men with pickaxes, possibly with dynamite, to make a breach there wide enough for any one to reach in. and we are far from any such help.”
in the midst of the consternation caused by these words, the clock on the mantel behind his back rang out the hour. it was but a double stroke, but that meant two hours after midnight and had the effect of a knell in the hearts of those most interested.
“but i am expected to give that formula into the hands of our manager before six o’clock in the morning. the steamer sails at a quarter after.”
“can’t you reproduce a copy of it from memory?” some one asked; “and insert it in its proper place among the pages you hold there?”
“the paper would not be the same. that would lead to questions and the truth would come out. as the chief value of the process contained in that formula lies in its secrecy, no explanation i could give would relieve me from the suspicions which an acknowledgment of the existence of a third copy, however well hidden, would entail. i should lose my great opportunity.”
mr. cornell’s state of mind can be imagined. in an access of mingled regret and despair, he cast a glance at violet, who, with a nod of understanding, left the little room in which they still stood, and approached mr. van broecklyn.
lifting up her head,—for he was very tall,—and instinctively rising on her toes the nearer to reach his ear, she asked in a cautious whisper:
“is there no other way of reaching that place?”
she acknowledged afterwards, that for one moment her heart stood still from fear, such a change took place in his face, though she says he did not move a muscle. then, just when she was expecting from him some harsh or forbidding word, he wheeled abruptly away from her and crossing to a window at his side, lifted the shade and looked out. when he returned, he was his usual self so far as she could see.
“there is a way,” he now confided to her in a tone as low as her own, “but it can only be taken by a child.”
“not by me?” she asked, smiling down at her own childish proportions.
for an instant he seemed taken aback, then she saw his hand begin to tremble and his lips twitch. somehow—she knew not why—she began to pity him, and asked herself as she felt rather than saw the struggle in his mind, that here was a trouble which if once understood would greatly dwarf that of the two men in the room behind them.
“i am discreet,” she whisperingly declared. “i have heard the history of that door—how it was against the tradition of the family to have it opened. there must have been some very dreadful reason. but old superstitions do not affect me, and if you will allow me to take the way you mention, i will follow your bidding exactly, and will not trouble myself about anything but the recovery of this paper, which must lie only a little way inside that blocked-up door.”
was his look one of rebuke at her presumption, or just the constrained expression of a perturbed mind? probably, the latter, for while she watched him for some understanding of his mood, he reached out his hand and touched one of the satin folds crossing her shoulder.
“you would soil this irretrievably,” said he.
“there is stuff in the stores for another,” she smiled. slowly his touch deepened into pressure. watching him she saw the crust of some old fear or dominant superstition melt under her eyes, and was quite prepared, when he remarked, with what for him was a lightsome air:
“i will buy the stuff, if you will dare the darkness and intricacies of our old cellar. i can give you no light. you will have to feel your way according to my direction.”
“i am ready to dare anything.”
he left her abruptly.
“i will warn miss digby,” he called back. “she shall go with you as far as the cellar.”
v
violet in her short career as an investigator of mysteries had been in many a situation calling for more than womanly nerve and courage. but never—or so it seemed to her at the time—had she experienced a greater depression of spirit than when she stood with miss digby before a small door at the extreme end of the cellar, and understood that here was her road—a road which once entered, she must take alone.
first, it was such a small door! no child older than eleven could possibly squeeze through it. but she was of the size of a child of eleven and might possibly manage that difficulty.
secondly: there are always some unforeseen possibilities in every situation, and though she had listened carefully to mr. van broecklyn’s directions and was sure that she knew them by heart, she wished she had kissed her father more tenderly in leaving him that night for the ball, and that she had not pouted so undutifully at some harsh stricture he had made. did this mean fear? she despised the feeling if it did.
thirdly: she hated darkness. she knew this when she offered herself for this undertaking; but she was in a bright room at the moment and only imagined what she must now face as a reality. but one jet had been lit in the cellar and that near the entrance. mr. van broecklyn seemed not to need light, even in his unfastening of the small door which violet was sure had been protected by more than one lock.
doubt, shadow, and a solitary climb between unknown walls, with only a streak of light for her goal, and the clinging pressure of florence digby’s hand on her own for solace—surely the prospect was one to tax the courage of her young heart to its limit. but she had promised, and she would fulfill. so with a brave smile she stooped to the little door, and in another moment had started her journey.
for journey the shortest distance may seem when every inch means a heart-throb and one grows old in traversing a foot. at first the way was easy; she had but to crawl up a slight incline with the comforting consciousness that two people were within reach of her voice, almost within sound of her beating heart. but presently she came to a turn, beyond which her fingers failed to reach any wall on her left. then came a step up which she stumbled, and farther on a short flight, each tread of which she had been told to test before she ventured to climb it, lest the decay of innumerable years should have weakened the wood too much to bear her weight. one, two, three, four, five steps! then a landing with an open space beyond. half of her journey was done. here she felt she could give a minute to drawing her breath naturally, if the air, unchanged in years, would allow her to do so. besides, here she had been enjoined to do a certain thing and to do it according to instructions. three matches had been given her and a little night candle. denied all light up to now, it was at this point she was to light her candle and place it on the floor, so that in returning she should not miss the staircase and get a fall. she had promised to do this, and was only too happy to see a spark of light scintillate into life in the immeasurable darkness.
she was now in a great room long closed to the world, where once officers in colonial wars had feasted, and more than one council had been held. a room, too, which had seen more than one tragic happening, as its almost unparalleled isolation proclaimed. so much mr. van broecklyn had told her; but she was warned to be careful in traversing it and not upon any pretext to swerve aside from the right-hand wall till she came to a huge mantelpiece. this passed, and a sharp corner turned, she ought to see somewhere in the dim spaces before her a streak of vivid light shining through the crack at the bottom of the blocked-up door. the paper should be somewhere near this streak.
all simple, all easy of accomplishment, if only that streak of light were all she was likely to see or think of. if the horror which was gripping her throat should not take shape! if things would remain shrouded in impenetrable darkness, and not force themselves in shadowy suggestion upon her excited fancy! but the blackness of the passage-way through which she had just struggled was not to be found here. whether it was the effect of that small flame flickering at the top of the staircase behind her, or of some change in her own powers of seeing, surely there was a difference in her present outlook. tall shapes were becoming visible—the air was no longer blank—she could see—then suddenly she saw why. in the wall high up on her right was a window. it was small and all but invisible, being covered on the outside with vines, and on the inside with the cobwebs of a century. but some small gleams from the star-light night came through, making phantasms out of ordinary things, which unseen were horrible enough, and half seen choked her heart with terror.
“i cannot bear it,” she whispered to herself even while creeping forward, her hand upon the wall. “i will close my eyes” was her next thought. “i will make my own darkness,” and with a spasmodic forcing of her lids together, she continued to creep on, passing the mantelpiece, where she knocked against something which fell with an awful clatter.
this sound, followed as it was by that of smothered voices from the excited group awaiting the result of her experiment from behind the impenetrable wall she should be nearing now if she had followed her instructions aright, freed her instantly from her fancies; and opening her eyes once more, she cast a look ahead, and to her delight, saw but a few steps away, the thin streak of bright light which marked the end of her journey.
it took her but a moment after that to find the missing page, and picking it up in haste from the dusty floor, she turned herself quickly about and joyfully began to retrace her steps. why then, was it that in the course of a few minutes more her voice suddenly broke into a wild, unearthly shriek, which ringing with terror burst the bounds of that dungeon-like room, and sank, a barbed shaft, into the breasts of those awaiting the result of her doubtful adventure, at either end of this dread no-thoroughfare.
what had happened?
if they had thought to look out, they would have seen that the moon—held in check by a bank of cloud occupying half the heavens—had suddenly burst its bounds and was sending long bars of revealing light into every uncurtained window.
vi
florence digby, in her short and sheltered life, had possibly never known any very great or deep emotion. but she touched the bottom of extreme terror at that moment, as with her ears still thrilling with violet’s piercing cry, she turned to look at mr. van broecklyn, and beheld the instantaneous wreck it had made of this seemingly strong man. not till he came to lie in his coffin would he show a more ghastly countenance; and trembling herself almost to the point of falling, caught him by the arm and sought to read his face what had happened. something disastrous she was sure; something which he had feared and was partially prepared for, yet which in happening had crushed him. was it a pitfall into which the poor little lady had fallen? if so—but he is speaking—mumbling low words to himself. some of them she can hear. he is reproaching himself—repeating over and over that he should never have taken such a chance; that he should have remembered her youth—the weakness of a young girl’s nerve. he had been mad, and now—and now—
with the repetition of this word his murmuring ceased. all his energies were now absorbed in listening at the low door separating him from what he was agonizing to know—a door impossible to enter, impossible to enlarge—a barrier to all help—an opening whereby sound might pass but nothing else, save her own small body, now lying—where?
“is she hurt?” faltered florence, stooping, herself, to listen. “can you hear anything—anything?”
for an instant he did not answer; every faculty was absorbed in the one sense; then slowly and in gasps he began to mutter:
“i think—i hear—something. her step—no, no, no step. all is as quiet as death; not a sound, not a breath—she has fainted. o god! o god! why this calamity on top of all!”
he had sprung to his feet at the utterance this invocation, but next moment was down on knees again, listening—listening.
never was silence more profound; they were hearkening for murmurs from a tomb. florence began to sense the full horror of it all, and was swaying helplessly when mr. van broecklyn impulsively lifted his hand in an admonitory hush! and through the daze of her faculties a small far sound began to make itself heard, growing louder as she waited, then becoming faint again, then altogether ceasing only to renew itself once more, till it resolved into an approaching step, faltering in its course, but coming ever nearer and nearer.
“she’s safe! she’s not hurt!” sprang from florence’s lips in inexpressible relief; and expecting mr. van broecklyn to show an equal joy, she turned towards him, with the cheerful cry,
“now if she has been so fortunate as to that missing page, we shall all be repaid for our fright.”
a movement on his part, a shifting of position which brought him finally to his feet, but he gave no other proof of having heard her, nor did his countenance mirror her relief. “it is as if he dreaded, instead of hailed, her return,” was florence’s inward comment as she watched him involuntarily recoil at each fresh token of violet’s advance.
yet because this seemed so very unnatural, she persisted in her efforts to lighten the situation, and when he made no attempt to encourage violet in her approach, she herself stooped and called out a cheerful welcome which must have rung sweetly in the poor little detective’s ears.
a sorry sight was violet, when, helped by florence, she finally crawled into view through the narrow opening and stood once again on the cellar floor. pale, trembling, and soiled with the dust of years, she presented a helpless figure enough, till the joy in florence’s face recalled some of her spirit, and, glancing down at her hand in which a sheet of paper was visible, she asked for mr. spielhagen.
“i’ve got the formula,” she said. “if you will bring him, i will hand it over to him here.”
not a word of her adventure; nor so much as one glance at mr. van broecklyn, standing far back in the shadows.
nor was she more communicative, when, the formula restored and everything made right with mr. spielhagen, they all came together again in the library for a final word. “i was frightened by the silence and the darkness, and so cried out,” she explained in answer to their questions. “any one would have done so who found himself alone in so musty a place,” she added, with an attempt at lightsomeness which deepened the pallor on mr. van broecklyn’s cheek, already sufficiently noticeable to have been remarked upon by more than one.
“no ghosts?” laughed mr. cornell, too happy in the return of his hopes to be fully sensible of the feelings of those about him. “no whispers from impalpable lips or touches from spectre hands? nothing to explain the mystery of that room long shut up that even mr. van broecklyn declares himself ignorant of its secret?”
“nothing,” returned violet, showing her dimples in full force now.
“if miss strange had any such experiences—if she has anything to tell worthy of so marked a curiosity, she will tell it now,” came from the gentleman just alluded to, in tones so stern and strange that all show of frivolity ceased on the instant. “have you anything to tell, miss strange?”
greatly startled, she regarded him with widening eyes for a moment, then with a move towards the door, remarked, with a general look about her:
“mr. van broecklyn knows his own house, and doubtless can relate its histories if he will. i am a busy little body who having finished my work am now ready to return home, there to wait for the next problem which an indulgent fate may offer me.”
she was near the threshold—she was about to take her leave, when suddenly she felt two hands fall on her shoulder, and turning, met the eyes of mr. van broecklyn burning into her own.
“you saw!” dropped in an almost inaudible whisper from his lips.
the shiver which shook her answered him better than any word.
with an exclamation of despair, he withdrew his hands, and facing the others now standing together in a startled group, he said, as soon as he could recover some of his self-possession:
“i must ask for another hour of your company. i can no longer keep my sorrow to myself. a dividing line has just been drawn across my life, and i must have the sympathy of someone who knows my past, or i shall go mad in my self-imposed solitude. come back, miss strange. you of all others have the prior right to hear.”
vii
“i shall have to begin,” said he, when they were all seated and ready to listen, “by giving you some idea, not so much of the family tradition, as of the effect of this tradition upon all who bore the name of van broecklyn. this is not the only house, even in america, which contains a room shut away from intrusion. in england there are many. but there is this difference between most of them and ours. no bars or locks forcibly held shut the door we were forbidden to open. the command was enough; that and the superstitious fear which such a command, attended by a long and unquestioning obedience, was likely to engender.
“i know no more than you do why some early ancestor laid his ban upon this room. but from my earliest years i was given to understand that there was one latch in the house which was never to be lifted; that any fault would be forgiven sooner than that; that the honour of the whole family stood in the way of disobedience, and that i was to preserve that honour to my dying day. you will say that all this is fantastic, and wonder that sane people in these modern times should subject themselves to such a ridiculous restriction, especially when no good reason was alleged, and the very source of the tradition from which it sprung forgotten. you are right; but if you look long into human nature, you will see that the bonds which hold the firmest are not material ones—that an idea will make a man and mould a character—that it lies at the source of all heroisms and is to be courted or feared as the case may be.
“for me it possessed a power proportionate to my loneliness. i don’t think there was ever a more lonely child. my father and mother were so unhappy in each other’s companionship that one or other of them was almost always away. but i saw little of either even when they were at home. the constraint in their attitude towards each other affected their conduct towards me. i have asked myself more than once if either of them had any real affection for me. to my father i spoke of her; to her of him; and never pleasurably. this i am forced to say, or you cannot understand my story. would to god i could tell another tale! would to god i had such memories as other men have of a father’s clasp, a mother’s kiss—but no! my grief, already profound, might have become abysmal. perhaps it is best as it is; only, i might have been a different child, and made for myself a different fate—who knows.
“as it was, i was thrown almost entirely upon my own resources for any amusement. this led me to a discovery i made one day. in a far part of the cellar behind some heavy casks, i found a little door. it was so low—so exactly fitted to my small body, that i had the greatest desire to enter it. but i could not get around the casks. at last an expedient occurred to me. we had an old servant who came nearer loving me than any one else. one day when i chanced to be alone in the cellar, i took out my ball and began throwing it about. finally it landed behind the casks, and i ran with a beseeching cry to michael, to move them.
“it was a task requiring no little strength and address, but he managed, after a few herculean efforts, to shift them aside and i saw with delight, my way opened to that mysterious little door. but i did not approach it then; some instinct deterred me. but when the opportunity came for me to venture there alone, i did so, in the most adventurous spirit, and began my operations by sliding behind the casks and testing the handle of the little door. it turned, and after a pull or two the door yielded. with my heart in my mouth, i stooped and peered in. i could see nothing—a black hole and nothing more. this caused me a moment’s hesitation. i was afraid of the dark—had always been. but curiosity and the spirit of adventure triumphed. saying to myself that i was robinson crusoe exploring the cave, i crawled in, only to find that i had gained nothing. it was as dark inside as it had looked to be from without.
“there was no fun in this, so i crawled back, and when i tried the experiment again, it was with a bit of candle in my hand, and a surreptitious match or two. what i saw, when with a very trembling little hand i had lighted one of the matches, would have been disappointing to most boys, but not to me. the litter and old boards i saw in odd corners about me were full of possibilities, while in the dimness beyond i seemed to perceive a sort of staircase which might lead—i do not think i made any attempt to answer that question even in my own mind, but when, after some hesitation and a sense of great daring, i finally crept up those steps, i remember very well my sensation at finding myself in front of a narrow closed door. it suggested too vividly the one in grandfather’s little room—the door in the wainscot which we were never to open. i had my first real trembling fit here, and at once fascinated and repelled by this obstruction i stumbled and lost my candle, which, going out in the fall, left me in total darkness and a very frightened state of mind. for my imagination which had been greatly stirred by my own vague thoughts of the forbidden room, immediately began to people the space about me with ghoulish figures. how should i escape them, how ever reach my own little room again undetected and in safety?
“but these terrors, deep as they were, were nothing to the real fright which seized me when, the darkness finally braved, and the way found back into the bright, wide-open halls of the house, i became conscious of having dropped something besides the candle. my match-box was gone—not my match-box, but my grandfather’s which i had found lying on his table and carried off on this adventure, in all the confidence of irresponsible youth. to make use of it for a little while, trusting to his not missing it in the confusion i had noticed about the house that morning, was one thing; to lose it was another. it was no common box. made of gold and cherished for some special reason well known to himself, i had often hear him say that some day i would appreciate its value, and be glad to own it. and i had left it in that hole and at any minute he might miss it—possibly ask for it! the day was one of torment. my mother was away or shut up in her room. my father—i don’t know just what thoughts i had about him. he was not to be seen either, and the servants cast strange looks at me when i spoke his name. but i little realized the blow which had just fallen upon the house in his definite departure, and only thought of my own trouble, and of how i should meet my grandfather’s eye when the hour came for him to draw me to his knee for his usual good-night.
“that i was spared this ordeal for the first time this very night first comforted me, then added to my distress. he had discovered his loss and was angry. on the morrow he would ask me for the box and i would have to lie, for never could i find the courage to tell him where i had been. such an act of presumption he would never forgive, or so i thought as i lay and shivered in my little bed. that his coldness, his neglect, sprang from the discovery just made that my mother as well as my father had just fled the house forever was as little known to me as the morning calamity. i had been given my usual tendance and was tucked safely into bed; but the gloom, the silence which presently settled upon the house had a very different explanation in my mind from the real one. my sin (for such it loomed large in my mind by this time) coloured the whole situation and accounted for every event.
“at what hour i slipped from my bed on to the cold floor, i shall never know. to me it seemed to be in the dead of night; but i doubt if it were more than ten. so slowly creep away the moments to a wakeful child. i had made a great resolve. awful as the prospect seemed to me,—frightened as i was by the very thought,—i had determined in my small mind to go down into the cellar, and into that midnight hole again, in search of the lost box. i would take a candle and matches, this time from my own mantel-shelf, and if everyone was asleep, as appeared from the deathly quiet of the house, i would be able to go and come without anybody ever being the wiser.
“dressing in the dark, i found my matches and my candle and, putting them in one of my pockets, softly opened my door and looked out. nobody was stirring; every light was out except a solitary one in the lower hall. that this still burned conveyed no meaning to my mind. how could i know that the house was so still and the rooms dark because everyone was out searching for some clue to my mother’s flight? if i had looked at the clock—but i did not; i was too intent upon my errand, too filled with the fever of my desperate undertaking, to be affected by anything not bearing directly upon it.
“of the terror caused by my own shadow on the wall as i made the turn in the hall below, i have as keen a recollection today as though it happened yesterday. but that did not deter me; nothing deterred me, till safe in the cellar i crouched down behind the casks to get my breath again before entering the hole beyond.
“i had made some noise in feeling my way around these casks, and i trembled lest these sounds had been heard upstairs! but this fear soon gave place to one far greater. other sounds were making themselves heard. a din of small skurrying feet above, below, on every side of me! rats! rats in the wall! rats on the cellar bottom! how i ever stirred from the spot i do not know, but when i did stir, it was to go forward, and enter the uncanny hole.
“i had intended to light my candle when i got inside; but for some reason i went stumbling along in the dark, following the wall till i got to the steps where i had dropped the box. here a light was necessary, but my hand did not go to my pocket. i thought it better to climb the steps first, and softly one foot found the tread and then another. i had only three more to climb and then my right hand, now feeling its way along the wall, would be free to strike a match. i climbed the three steps and was steadying myself against the door for a final plunge, when something happened—something so strange, so unexpected, and so incredible that i wonder i did not shriek aloud in my terror. the door was moving under my hand. it was slowly opening inward. i could feel the chill made by the widening crack. moment by moment this chill increased; the gap was growing—a presence was there—a presence before which i sank in a small heap upon the landing. would it advance? had it feet—hands? was it a presence which could be felt?
“whatever it was, it made no attempt to pass, and presently i lifted my head only to quake anew at the sound of a voice—a human voice—my mother’s voice—so near me that by putting out my arms i might have touched her.
“she was speaking to my father. i knew from the tone. she was saying words which, little understood as they were, made such a havoc in my youthful mind that i have never forgotten the effect.
“‘i have come!’ she said. ‘they think i have fled the house and are looking far and wide for me. we shall not be disturbed. who would think looking of here for either you or me.’
“here! the word sank like a plummet in my breast. i had known for some few minutes that i was on the threshold of the forbidden room; but they were in it. i can scarcely make you understand the tumult which this awoke in my brain. somehow, i had never thought that any such braving of the house’s law would be possible.
“i heard my father’s answer, but it conveyed no meaning to me. i also realized that he spoke from a distance,—that he was at one end of the room while we were at the other. i was presently to have this idea confirmed, for while i was striving with all my might and main to subdue my very heart-throbs so that she would not hear me or suspect my presence, the darkness—i should rather say the blackness of the place yielded to a flash of lightning—heat lightning, all glare and no sound—and i caught an instantaneous vision of my father’s figure standing with gleaming things about him, which affected me at the moment as supernatural, but which, in later years, i decided to have been weapons hanging on a wall.
“she saw him too, for she gave a quick laugh and said they would not need any candles; and then, there was another flash and i saw something in his hand and something in hers, and though i did not yet understand, i felt myself turning deathly sick and gave a choking gasp which was lost in the rush she made into the centre of the room, and the keenness of her swift low cry.
“‘garde-toi! for only one of us will ever leave this room alive!’
“a duel! a duel to the death between this husband and wife—this father and mother—in this hole of dead tragedies and within the sight and hearing of their child! has satan ever devised a scheme more hideous for ruining the life of an eleven-year-old boy!
“not that i took it all in at once. i was too innocent and much too dazed to comprehend such hatred, much less the passions which engender it. i only knew that something horrible—something beyond the conception of my childish mind—was going to take place in the darkness before me; and the terror of it made me speechless; would to god it had made me deaf and blind and dead!
“she had dashed from her corner and he had slid away from his, as the next fantastic glare which lit up the room showed me. it also showed the weapons in their hands, and for a moment i felt reassured when i saw that these were swords, for i had seen them before with foils in their hands practising for exercise, as they said, in the great garret. but the swords had buttons on them, and this time the tips were sharp and shone in the keen light.
“an exclamation from her and a growl of rage from him were followed by movements i could scarcely hear, but which were terrifying from their very quiet. then the sound of a clash. the swords had crossed.
“had the lightning flashed forth then, the end of one of them might have occurred. but the darkness remained undisturbed, and when the glare relit the great room again, they were already far apart. this called out a word from him; the one sentence he spoke—i can never forget it:
“‘rhoda, there is blood on your sleeve; i have wounded you. shall we call it off and fly, as the poor creatures in there think we have, to the opposite ends of the earth?’
“i almost spoke; i almost added my childish plea to his for them to stop—to remember me and stop. but not a muscle in my throat responded to my agonized effort. her cold, clear ‘no!’ fell before my tongue was loosed or my heart freed from the ponderous weight crushing it.
“‘i have vowed and i keep my promises,’ she went on in a tone quite strange to me. ‘what would either’s life be worth with the other alive and happy in this world.’
“he made no answer; and those subtle movements—shadows of movements i might almost call them—recommenced. then there came a sudden cry, shrill and poignant—had grandfather been in his room he would surely have heard it—and the flash coming almost simultaneously with its utterance, i saw what has haunted my sleep from that day to this, my father pinned against the wall, sword still in hand, and before him my mother, fiercely triumphant, her staring eyes fixed on his and—
“nature could bear no more; the band loosened from my throat; the oppression lifted from my breast long enough for me to give one wild wail and she turned, saw (heaven sent its flashes quickly at this moment) and recognizing my childish form, all the horror of her deed (or so i have fondly hoped) rose within her, and she gave a start and fell full upon the point upturned to receive her.
“a groan; then a gasping sigh from him, and silence settled upon the room and upon my heart, and so far as i knew upon the whole created world.
“that is my story, friends. do you wonder that i have never been or lived like other men?”
after a few moments of sympathetic silence, mr. van broecklyn went on, to say:
“i don’t think i ever had a moment’s doubt that my parents both lay dead on the floor of that great room. when i came to myself—which may have been soon, and may not have been for a long while—the lightning had ceased to flash, leaving the darkness stretching like a blank pall between me and that spot in which were concentrated all the terrors of which my imagination was capable. i dared not enter it. i dared not take one step that way. my instinct was to fly and hide my trembling body again in my own bed; and associated with this, in fact dominating it and making me old before my time, was another—never to tell; never to let any one, least of all my grandfather—know what that forbidden room now contained. i felt in an irresistible sort of way that my father’s and mother’s honour was at stake. besides, terror held me back; i felt that i should die if i spoke. childhood has such terrors and such heroisms. silence often covers in such, abysses of thought and feeling which astonish us in later years. there is no suffering like a child’s, terrified by a secret which it dare not for some reason disclose.
“events aided me. when, in desperation to see once more the light and all the things which linked me to life—my little bed, the toys on the window-sill, my squirrel in its cage—i forced myself to retraverse the empty house, expecting at every turn to hear my father’s voice or come upon the image of my mother—yes, such was the confusion of my mind, though i knew well enough even then that they were dead and that i should never hear the one or see the other. i was so benumbed with the cold in my half-dressed condition, that i woke in a fever next morning after a terrible dream which forced from my lips the cry of ‘mother! mother!’—only that.
“i was cautious even in delirium. this delirium and my flushed cheeks and shining eyes led them to be very careful of me. i was told that my mother was away from home; and when after two days of search they were quite sure that all effort to find either her or my father were likely to prove fruitless, that she had gone to europe where we would follow her as soon as i was well. this promise, offering as it did, a prospect of immediate release from the terrors which were consuming me, had an extraordinary effect upon me. i got up out of my bed saying that i was well now and ready to start on the instant. the doctor, finding my pulse equable, and my whole condition wonder fully improved, and attributing it, as was natural, to my hope of soon joining my mother, advised my whim to be humoured and this hope kept active till travel and intercourse with children should give me strength and prepare me for the bitter truth ultimately awaiting me. they listened to him and in twenty-four hours our preparations were made. we saw the house closed—with what emotions surging in one small breast, i leave you to imagine—and then started on our long tour. for five years we wandered over the continent of europe, my grandfather finding distraction, as well as myself, in foreign scenes and associations.
“but return was inevitable. what i suffered on reentering this house, god and my sleepless pillow alone know. had any discovery been made in our absence; or would it be made now that renovation and repairs of all kinds were necessary? time finally answered me. my secret was safe and likely to continue so, and this fact once settled, life became endurable, if not cheerful. since then i have spent only two nights out of this house, and they were unavoidable. when my grandfather died i had the wainscot door cemented in. it was done from this side and the cement painted to match the wood. no one opened the door nor have i ever crossed its threshold. sometimes i think i have been foolish; and sometimes i know that i have been very wise. my reason has stood firm; how do i know that it would have done so if i had subjected myself to the possible discovery that one or both of them might have been saved if i had disclosed instead of concealed my adventure.”
a pause during which white horror had shone on every face; then with a final glance at violet, he said:
“what sequel do you see to this story, miss strange? i can tell the past, i leave you to picture the future.”
rising, she let her eye travel from face to face till it rested on the one awaiting it, when she answered dreamily:
“if some morning in the news column there should appear an account of the ancient and historic home of the van broecklyns having burned to the ground in the night, the whole country would mourn, and the city feel defrauded of one of its treasures. but there are five persons who would see in it the sequel which you ask for.”
when this happened, as it did happen, some few weeks later, the astonishing discovery was made that no insurance had been put upon this house. why was it that after such a loss mr. van broecklyn seemed to renew his youth? it was a constant source of comment among his friends.
end of problem viii
