The House of a Thousand Candles - Meredith Nicholson (top 50 books to read txt) 📗

too much force to have come so

far; and, moreover, I could hardly imagine even a rifle-ball’s

finding an unimpeded right of way through so

dense a strip of wood. I found it difficult to get rid of

the idea that some one had taken a pot-shot at me.

 

The woman’s mocking voice from the lake added to

my perplexity. It was not, I reflected, such a voice as

one might expect to hear from a country girl; nor could

I imagine any errand that would excuse a woman’s

presence abroad on an October night whose cool air inspired

first confidences with fire and lamp. There was

something haunting in that last cry across the water;

it kept repeating itself over and over in my ears. It

was a voice of quality, of breeding and charm.

 

“Good night, merry gentlemen!”

 

In Indiana, I reflected, rustics, young or old, men or

women, were probably not greatly given to salutations

of just this temper.

 

Bates now appeared.

 

“Beg pardon, sir; but your room’s ready whenever

you wish to retire.”

 

I looked about in search of a clock.

 

“There are no timepieces in the house, Mr. Glenarm.

Your grandfather was quite opposed to them. He had

a theory, sir, that they were conducive, as he said, to

idleness. He considered that a man should work by his

conscience, sir, and not by the clock—the one being

more exacting than the other.”

 

I smiled as I drew out my watch—as much at Bates’

solemn tones and grim lean visage as at his quotation

from my grandsire. But the fellow puzzled and annoyed

me. His unobtrusive black clothes, his smoothly-brushed

hair, his shaven face, awakened an antagonism

in me.

 

“Bates, if you didn’t fire that shot through the window,

who did—will you answer me that?”

 

“Yes, sir; if I didn’t do it, it’s quite a large question

who did. I’ll grant you that, sir.”

 

I stared at him. He met my gaze directly without

flinching; nor was there anything insolent in his tone

or attitude. He continued:

 

“I didn’t do it, sir. I was in the pantry when I heard

the crash in the refectory window. The bullet came

from out of doors, as I should judge, sir.”

 

The facts and conclusions were undoubtedly with

Bates, and I felt that I had not acquitted myself creditably

in my effort to fix the crime on him. My abuse of

him had been tactless, to say the least, and I now tried

another line of attack.

 

“Of course, Bates, I was merely joking. What’s your

own theory of the matter?”

 

“I have no theory, sir. Mr. Glenarm always warned

me against theories. He said—if you will pardon me—

there was great danger in the speculative mind.”

 

The man spoke with a slight Irish accent, which in

itself puzzled me. I have always been attentive to the

peculiarities of speech, and his was not the brogue of

the Irish servant class. Larry Donovan, who was English-born,

used on occasions an exaggerated Irish dialect

that was wholly different from the smooth liquid tones of

Bates. But more things than his speech were to puzzle

me in this man.

 

“The person in the canoe? How do you account for

her?” I asked.

 

“I haven’t accounted for her, sir. There’s no women

on these grounds, or any sort of person except ourselves.”

 

“But there are neighbors—farmers, people of some

kind must live along the lake.”

 

“A few, sir; and then there’s the school quite a bit

beyond your own west wall.”

 

His slight reference to my proprietorship, my own

wall, as he put it, pleased me.

 

“Oh, yes; there is a school—girls?—yes; Mr. Pickering

mentioned it. But the girls hardly paddle on the

lake at night, at this season—hunting ducks—should

you say, Bates?”

 

“I don’t believe they do any shooting, Mr. Glenarm.

It’s a pretty strict school, I judge, sir, from all accounts.”

 

“And the teachers—they are all women?”

 

“They’re the Sisters of St. Agatha, I believe they call

them. I sometimes see them walking abroad. They’re

very quiet neighbors, and they go away in the summer

usually, except Sister Theresa. The school’s her regular

home, sir. And there’s the little chapel quite near the

wall; the young minister lives there; and the gardener’s

the only other man on the grounds.”

 

So my immediate neighbors were Protestant nuns

and school-girls, with a chaplain and gardener thrown

in for variety. Still, the chaplain might be a social resource.

There was nothing in the terms of my grandfather’s

will to prevent my cultivating the acquaintance

of a clergyman. It even occurred to me that this might

be a part of the game: my soul was to be watched over

by a rural priest, while, there being nothing else to do,

I was to give my attention to the study of architecture.

Bates, my guard and housekeeper, was brushing the

hearth with deliberate care.

 

“Show me my cell,” I said, rising, “and I’ll go to

bed.”

 

He brought from somewhere a great brass candelabrum

that held a dozen lights, and explained:

 

“This was Mr. Glenarm’s habit. He always used this

one to go to bed with. I’m sure he’d wish you to have

it, sir.”

 

I thought I detected something like a quaver in the

man’s voice. My grandfather’s memory was dear to him.

I reflected, and I was moved to compassion for him.

 

“How long were you with Mr. Glenarm, Bates?” I

inquired, as I followed him into the hall.

 

“Five years, sir. He employed me the year you went

abroad. I remember very well his speaking of it. He

greatly admired you, sir.”

 

He led the way, holding the cluster of lights high for

my guidance up the broad stairway.

 

The hall above shared the generous lines of the whole

house, but the walls were white and hard to the eye.

Rough planks had been laid down for a floor, and beyond

the light of the candles lay a dark region that gave

out ghostly echoes as the loose boards rattled under our

feet.

 

“I hope you’ll not be too much disappointed, sir,”

said Bates, pausing a moment before opening a door.

“It’s all quite unfinished, but comfortable, I should say,

quite comfortable.”

 

“Open the door!”

 

He was not my host and I did not relish his apology.

I walked past him into a small sitting-room that was,

in a way, a miniature of the great library below. Open

shelves filled with books lined the apartment to the

ceiling on every hand, save where a small fireplace, a

cabinet and table were built into the walls. In the

center of the room was a long table with writing materials

set in nice order. I opened a handsome case and

found that it contained a set of draftsman’s instruments.

 

I groaned aloud.

 

“Mr. Glenarm preferred this room for working. The

tools were his very own, sir.”

 

“The devil they were!” I exclaimed irascibly. I

snatched a book from the nearest shelf and threw it

open on the table. It was The Tower: Its Early Use

for Purposes of Defense. London: 1816.

 

I closed it with a slam.

 

“The sleeping-room is beyond, sir. I hope—”

 

“Don’t you hope any more!” I growled; “and it

doesn’t make any difference whether I’m disappointed

or not.”

 

“Certainly not, sir!” he replied in a tone that made

me ashamed of myself.

 

The adjoining bedroom was small and meagerly furnished.

The walls were untinted and were relieved only

by prints of English cathedrals, French chateaux, and

like suggestions of the best things known to architecture.

The bed was the commonest iron type; and the

other articles of furniture were chosen with a strict regard

for utility. My trunks and bags had been carried

in, and Bates asked from the door f or my commands.

 

“Mr. Glenarm always breakfasted at seven-thirty, sir,

as near as he could hit it without a timepiece, and he

was quite punctual. His ways were a little odd, sir. He

used to prowl about at night a good deal, and there was

no following him.”

 

“I fancy I shan’t do much prowling,” I declared.

“And my grandfather’s breakfast hour will suit me exactly,

Bates.”

 

“If there’s nothing further, sir—”

 

“That’s all;—and Bates—”

 

“Yes, Mr. Glenarm.”

 

“Of course you understand that I didn’t really mean

to imply that you had fired that shot at me?”

 

“I beg you not to mention it, Mr. Glenarm.”

 

“But it was a little queer. If you should gain any

light on the subject, let me know.”

 

“Certainly, sir.”

 

“But I believe, Bates, that we’d better keep the shades

down at night. These duck hunters hereabouts are apparently

reckless. And you might attend to these now,

—and every evening hereafter.”

 

I wound my watch as he obeyed. I admit that in my

heart I still half-suspected the fellow of complicity with

the person who had fired at me through the dining-room

window. It was rather odd, I reflected, that the shades

should have been open, though I might account for this

by the fact that this curious unfinished establishment

was not subject to the usual laws governing orderly

housekeeping. Bates was evidently aware of my suspicions,

and he remarked, drawing down the last of the

plain green shades:

 

“Mr. Glenarm never drew them, sir. It was a saying

of his, if I may repeat his words, that he liked the open.

These are eastern windows, and he took a quiet pleasure

in letting the light waken him. It was one of his oddities,

sir.”

 

“To be sure. That’s all, Bates.”

 

He gravely bade me good night, and I followed him

to the outer door and watched his departing figure,

lighted by a single candle that he had produced from

his pocket.

 

I stood for several minutes listening to his step, tracing

it through the hall below—as far as my knowledge

of the house would permit. Then, in unknown regions,

I could hear the closing of doors and drawing of bolts.

Verily, my jailer was a person of painstaking habits.

 

I opened my traveling-case and distributed its contents

on the dressing-table. I had carried through all

my adventures a folding leather photograph-holder, containing

portraits of my father and mother and of John

Marshall Glenarm, my grandfather, and this I set up

on the mantel in the little sitting-room. I felt to-night

as never before how alone I was in the world, and a

need for companionship and sympathy stirred in me.

It was with a new and curious interest that I peered

into my grandfather’s shrewd old eyes. He used to come

and go fitfully at my father’s house; but my father had

displeased him in various ways that I need not recite,

and my father’s death had left me with an estrangement

which I had widened by my own acts.

 

Now that I had reached Glenarm, my mind reverted

to Pickering’s estimate of the value of my grandfather’s

estate. Although John Marshall Glenarm was an eccentric

man, he had been able to accumulate a large fortune;

and yet I had allowed the executor to tell me that

he had died comparatively poor. In so readily accepting

the terms of the will and burying myself in a region of

which I knew nothing, I had cut myself off from the

usual channels of counsel. If I left the place to return

to New York I should simply disinherit myself. At

Glenarm I was, and there I must remain to the end of

the year; I grew bitter against Pickering as I reflected

upon the ease with which he had got