reilly returned shortly afterwards with a budget of information. when we had traversed the little wood and were out on the highway he told us certain facts that were interesting.
the village was called bringhurst, distant a mile and a quarter from caldecott. the place where we had emerged was called the glebe farm, and was occupied by an old man called page, who had as lodgers a gentleman named purvis and his niece. they often had visitors, two gentlemen who came over from kettering, and from their description one was bennett. purvis had lived there on and off for three weeks, but the young lady had only recently come.
reilly had learned all this at the little beerhouse at bringhurst. and he had learned something more, namely, that there was some village gossip regarding the young lady.
“gossip!” i demanded. “what is it?”
“well,” answered reilly, “the old innkeeper says that she’s been seen out walking late at night with that drunken scamp who sold purvis the parchment.”
“what!” i cried. “with old ben knutton, of rockingham?”
“that’s so.”
“then he knows her,” i exclaimed, quickly. “he’ll be able to tell me something. i must see him to-day. a pot or two of beer will make him talk.”
according to reilly the villagers of bringhurst had no suspicion of the reason purvis lived at the glebe farm, nor were they aware of the existence of the secret communication between the two villages. it was certain, however, that purvis and bennett knew of it, and for that reason the former had taken up his quarters there. the man page was probably unaware of the tunnel, for it led from beneath his barn with the entry well concealed. one fact, however, i had not overlooked. at the bottom of the steps which led up to the surface a wall had been recently broken down, showing that the tunnel had been closed up for years and had only recently been opened.
the men who had worked so assiduously during the night were probably within the farmhouse. at any rate, on our walk back to caldecott along the white highway through the village of great easton we saw nothing of them.
when we returned to the manor a ridiculous position presented itself. we were locked out! all windows and doors we had barred on the inside; therefore reilly, an adept at scaling walls, clambered up a rain-spout and effected an entrance by one of the upper windows.
we took counsel together and arrived at two conclusions, namely, that our rivals had by some means obtained possession of the secret of the underground passage, and, secondly, that they, like ourselves, were convinced that the treasure lay hidden upon the premises we occupied.
this caused our excitement to increase rather than diminish; but after lunch at the plough i strolled down to rockingham, while my companions returned to resume their investigations.
i found that ben knutton was at work. he was cleaning out a ditch on the edge of thoroughsale wood, and i was directed to the spot, about a mile away. i discovered the old fellow without much difficulty, and my appearance there was something of a surprise to him.
at my request he put down his spade and came to the stile whereon i seated myself.
“well, knutton,” i said, “i’ve come to have another little chat with you—a confidential chat, you understand. now look here, before we begin i’ve one thing to say, and that is if you answer all my questions truthfully there’s half a sovereign for you.”
“thankee, sir,” responded the bibulous old rascal, touching his hat. “what did you want to know, sir?”
“listen,” i said. “there’s a young lady staying over at mr. page’s at bringhurst. you know her?”
“yes, sir, i knows ’er. i’ve knowed ’er since she were a little girl.”
“then tell me all about her,” i said.
“well, there ain’t very much to tell,” responded the old man. “i don’t know who was ’er father. she came to my sister-in-law as a nurse-child from london when she was about two years old. they say ’er father and mother were rich people. but fanny stanion, my sister-in-law, who lived over at deenethorpe, brought her up, and got paid for it by a lawyer in oundle. you don’t know deenethorpe. it’s about five miles from here.”
“near deene?” i suggested, for i had been photographing in lady cardigan’s beautiful park.
“yes, close by,” was the labourer’s reply. “fanny had ’er with ’er nigh on twelve years and was like a mother to ’er, and often brought ’er over to rockingham to see us. then, when fanny died, she was sent back to london, an’ some lady, i believe, took charge of ’er and sent her to boardin’ school somewhere in devonshire. i ain’t seen little dolly these seven years till the other day when she came to my cottage. my! ain’t she grown to be a fine young ’ooman? i didn’t know ’er ag’in,” and the old man leaned upon the rail and laughed. men who work in the fields at all hours and in hot and cold weather age very early; the furrows grow deep on their faces and the skin is crossed and recrossed with multitudinous lines like a spider’s web, the spine gets bent from the long hours of stooping over the earth, and the heat and the damp and the frost all turn by turn enter into the bones, and stiffen and cramp them before old age is due.
“is nothing known regarding her parentage?” i asked. “have you never heard any story about her?”
“no, nothing. the lawyer in oundle who used to pay fanny monthly probably knew all about it, but he’s dead now. fanny had the child brought to her through answerin’ an advertisement in the stamford mercury. my poor wife used to be particular fond o’ little dolly.”
“and why did she call to see you? had she an object in doing so?”
“i suppose she wanted to visit the cottage ag’in,” was the old man’s answer. “but she’s growed such a fine london lady that i was quite taken aback when she told me she was dolly drummond.”
“drummond! why, that’s not her name,” i cried. “i mean miss bristowe.”
“you said the young lady who lives at mr. page’s, eh?”
“certainly. a tall, dark young lady.”
“that’s dolly drummond. there’s only one lady livin’ there. she’s with her uncle, mr. purvis.”
“do you know anything about him?”
“only that he’s ’er uncle—’er guardian, too, i fancy. she didn’t tell me much about him, and i haven’t seen him myself.”
“well,” i said; “you may be surprised to know that he’s the man to whom you sold that piece of parchment.”
“what!” cried the old man, glaring at me. “is he ’er uncle? why, then, that accounts for the questions she put to me.”
“what about?”
“about the old secret way from the glebe farm into the manor house at caldecott. my father knew about it, and told me of it, but nobody’s been able to find it yet.”
“and the young lady came to you for information?”
“she’s heard me mention it when she were a girl, so i suppose her curiosity was aroused and that was why she came to me for information.”
“more likely that the man purvis sent her. perhaps they’ve discovered what was written on that parchment, and are now making use of it. but i hear you’ve met her at night.”
“who told you so?” he asked, starting at my words.
“it is common gossip in bringhurst.”
the old fellow laughed heartily, and in his broad dialect said:?—
“they’ll be saying next that i’m the young lady’s father, and that i want it kept secret.”
“why did you meet her at such late hours?”
“because she wanted to talk to me about her youth. she seems very anxious to find out who were her parents, and for that reason i believe she’s down here.”
“isn’t it rather remarkable that purvis should be with her?”
“it is. i don’t like that man. i’m very sorry i didn’t show you the parchment afore i sold it to him, sir.”
with that latter sentiment i heartily coincided. had i not been forestalled, the treasure would have undoubtedly been ours long ago.
“but tell me more about miss drummond,” i urged.
“what is there to tell? when she was old enough fanny sent ’er to the national school at deenethorpe. but she wasn’t at all like the village children. she was always the lady, even when quite young.”
“your sister-in-law was well paid, i suppose?”
“yes. she was a widow, and only had the money from the lawyer to live upon. her husband was a wood-cutter, and was killed by a tree falling on him over in carlton purlieus. one time fanny fell ill, and we had little dolly with us at rockingham for nigh on a year.”
little wonder was it that she should have sought out the good-for-nothing old labourer who had in his younger and more sober days been as guardian to her.
“but i can’t understand why she should wish to meet you late at night,” i remarked.
“she didn’t wish her uncle to know of our meetin’, she said. besides, she had a lot to ask me about her earlier days, and a lot to tell me of how she had fared since she had left these parts.”
“did she make any mention of that story about the fortune of the knuttons?”
“well, sir, she did,” responded the old fellow, rather puzzled at what i had divined. “she told me how she remembered me telling her all about it when a girl, and how her aunt fanny, as she called her, used to prophesy that one day we should be very rich.”
“and what else?”
“she made me point out the route which i believed was taken by the old subterranean passage. that’s why we walked through the fields and were seen together.”
“well,” i said at last, “i want you to do something for me, knutton, and if you carry it through successfully i’ll give you a sovereign instead of half a sovereign. i want you to go over to the glebe farm this afternoon and take a letter to her. it must be given to her in secret, remember. ask for a reply, merely yes or no. you understand?”
“oh, i’ll take the letter, sir, an’ be glad to do it,” the old labourer cried eagerly.
“very well, we’ll go back together to your cottage and i’ll write it. then you take it, and i’ll wait at the sonde arms until you return with the reply. you must be careful, however, that this man purvis doesn’t see you, or you may make it awkward for miss drummond in a variety of ways.”
“trust me, sir,” was his response. “i knows my way about the glebe farm. i worked there on and off for three years.”
“then you know the big barn. underneath it is a door leading to some steps. do you know them?”
“know them, why, o’ course i do. the steps lead nowhere. there was once a well at the bottom, they say, but it’s been bricked up because it used to over-flow up to the barn door.”
it was evident that the entrance had been unsuspected, and that the subterranean communication had only very recently been opened.
the old fellow shouldered his spade and with bent back walked beside me into rockingham, where, upon a leaf from my note-book, i wrote an urgent line to the woman whose great beauty and sweet grace had enchanted me. i prayed of her to do me a favour and give me an appointment at a spot on the high road between great easton and caldecott which i had noticed that morning—a place where, according to the sign-post, the road to market harborough joined that to wellingborough. i sealed the note and, having watched the old fellow down the road, turned into the sonde arms to smoke and kill time until his return.
what he had told me added a further touch of romance to that pale-faced, troubled woman who had so strangely entered my life. impatient and fidgety i lounged in the inn, smoking and trying to read the newspaper, until at last ben, after an absence of an hour and a half, returned.
“i managed to send a message in to her by old sam lucas, the shepherd, and she came out and met me behind the barn. she read your letter, sir, and turned a little red. she seemed to hesitate like, and then asked me if i knowed you. when i told her i did, she said i was to say she’d meet you at eight o’clock to-night at the place you mentioned.”
my heart leaped for joy.
i slipped the coin agreed upon into the old fellow’s horny palm, and with injunctions to secrecy left the place and hurried along the road, over the level crossing, into caldecott, where i told my companions of my tryst.
during my absence they had taken up the flooring of one of the downstairs rooms, but the search had been in vain, and they were now working in their shirt-sleeves replacing the boards.
“we shall have another visit from them swabs to-night, doctor,” seal said, as he mopped the perspiration from his sea-bronzed face. “there’ll be some fun in this house before morning, that’s my firm belief.”
by “fun,” the skipper meant fighting, for if he met black bennett we knew there would be blows—and hard ones too.
punctually at eight o’clock i halted beneath the weather-worn sign-post. the crimson after-glow had faded and the still evening was far advanced. away in the west the red glow still showed from behind the hills, but in the east crept up the dark night-clouds. the hour struck from the church towers of several villages, and away in the far distance the curfew commenced to toll solemnly, just as it has ever done since the far-back norman days.
with eyes and ears on the alert, i stood awaiting her coming.
she was late—as a woman always is—but at last i saw the flutter of a light dress approaching in the twilight, and went eagerly forward to meet her.
in the fading light i saw her face. to me it looked more beautiful than before, because the cheeks were slightly flushed as i raised my hat to greet her.
i took her hand, and it trembled in my grasp. she looked for a single instant into my face, then dropped her eyes without uttering a word. by that sign i felt convinced that the satisfaction of our clandestine meeting was mutual.
ah! how deeply i loved her! so deeply, indeed, that in the first moments of our meeting i was tongue-tied.
surely ours was a strange wooing; but, as will be seen, its dénouement was far stranger.
