The Vagrant Duke
"Yes, I'm against it!" translated Peter confidently.
The girl stopped in the middle of the road, put her hands on her hips and laughed up at the purpling sky. Her laugh was much like her singing – if angels in Paradise laugh (and why shouldn't they?). Then while he wondered what was so amusing she looked at him again.
"Up against it, you mean. You're English, aren't you?"
"Er – yes – I am."
"I thought so. There was one of you in the glass factory. He always muffed the easy ones."
"Oh, you work in a glass factory?"
"Winters. Manufacturin' whiskey and beer bottles. Now we're goin' dry, they'll be makin' pop and nursin' bottles, I guess."
"Do you help in the factory?"
"Yes, and in the office. I can shorthand and type a little."
"You must be glad when a summer comes."
"I am. In winter I can't turn around without breakin' something. They dock you for that – "
"And that's why you sing when you can't break anythin'?"
"I suppose so. I like the open. It isn't right to be cooped up."
They were getting along beautifully and Peter was even beginning to forget the weight of his heavy bag. She was a quaint creature and quite as unconscious of him as though he hadn't existed. He was just somebody to talk to. Peter ventured.
"Er – would you mind telling me your name?"
She looked at him and laughed friendly.
"You must have swallowed a catechism, Mr. Nichols. But everybody in Black Rock knows everybody else – more'n they want to, I guess. There's no reason I shouldn't tell you. I don't mind your knowin'. My name is Beth Cameron."
"Beth – ?"
"Yes, Bess – the minister had a lisp."
Peter didn't lack a sense of humor.
"Funny, isn't it?" she queried with a smile as he laughed, "bein' tied up for life to a name like that just because the parson couldn't talk straight."
"Beth," he repeated, "but I like it. It's like you. I hope you'll let me come to see you when I get settled."
"H-m," she said quizzically. "You don't believe in wastin' your time, do you?" And then, after a brief pause, "You know they call us Pineys back here in the barrens, but just the same we think a lot of ourselves and we're a little offish with city folks. You can't be too particular nowadays about the kind of people you go with."
Peter stared at her and grinned, his sense of the situation more keenly touched than she could be aware of.
"Particular, are you? I'm glad of that. All the more credit to me if you'll be my friend."
"I didn't say I was your friend."
"But you're going to be, aren't you? I know something about singing. I've studied music. Perhaps I could help you."
"You! You've studied? Lord of Love! You're not lyin', are you?"
He laughed. "No. I'm not lying. I was educated to be a musician."
She stared at him now with a new look in her eyes but said nothing. So Peter spoke again.
"Do you mean to say you've never thought of studying singing?"
"Oh, yes," she said slowly at last, "I've thought of it, just as I've thought of goin' in the movies and makin' a million dollars. Lots of good thinkin' does!"
"You've thought of the movies?"
"Yes, once. A girl went from the glass factory. She does extra ladies. She visited back here last winter. I didn't like what it did to her."
"Oh!" Peter was silent for a while, aware of the pellucid meaning of her "it." He was learning quite as much from what she didn't say as from what she did. But he evaded the line of thought suggested.
"You do get tired of Black Rock then?"
"I would if I had time. I'm pretty busy all day, and – see here – Mr. – er – Nichols. If I asked as many questions as you do, I'd know as much as Daniel Webster."
"I'm sorry," said Peter, "I beg your pardon."
They walked on in silence for a few moments, Peter puzzling his brain over the extraordinary creature that chance had thrown in his way. He could see that she was quite capable of looking out for herself and that if her smattering of sophistication had opened her eyes, it hadn't much harmed her.
He really wanted to ask her many more questions, but to tell the truth he was a little in awe of her dry humor which had a kind of primitive omniscience and of her laughter which he was now sure was more at, than with, him. But he had, in spite of her, peered for a moment into the hidden places of her mind and spirit.
It was this intrusion that she resented and he could hardly blame her, since they had met only eighteen minutes ago. She trotted along beside him as though quite unaware of the sudden silence or of the thoughts that might have been passing in his mind. It was Beth who broke the silence.
"Is your bag heavy?" she asked.
"Not at all," said Peter, mopping the perspiration from his forehead. "But aren't we nearly there?"
"Oh, yes. It's just a mile or so."
Peter dropped his bag.
"That's what you said it was, back there."
"Did I? Well, maybe it isn't so far as that now. Let me carry your bag a while."
Thus taunted, he rose, took the bag in his left hand and followed.
"City folks aren't much on doin' for themselves, are they? The taxi system is very poor down here yet."
Her face was expressionless, but he knew that she was laughing at him. He knew also that his bag weighed more than any army pack. It seemed too that she was walking much faster than she had done before – also that there was malicious humor in the smile she now turned on him.
"Seems a pity to have such a long walk – with nothin' at the end of it."
"I don't mind it in the least," gasped Peter. "And if you don't object to my asking you just one more question," he went on grimly, "I'd like you to tell me what is frightening Mr. Jonathan K. McGuire?"
"Oh, McGuire. I don't know. Nobody does. He's been here a couple of weeks now, cooped up in the big house. Never comes out. They say he sees ghosts and things."
"Ghosts!"
She nodded. "He's hired some of the men around here to keep watch for them and they say some detectives are coming. You'll help too, I guess."
"That should be easy."
"Maybe. I don't know. My aunt works there. She's housekeeper. It's spooky, she says, but she can't afford to quit."
"But they haven't seen anything?" asked Peter incredulously.
"No. Not yet. I guess it might relieve 'em some if they did. It's only the things you don't see that scare you."
"It sounds like a great deal of nonsense about nothing," muttered Peter.
"All right. Wait until you get there before you do much talkin'."
"I will, but I'm not afraid of ghosts." And then, as an afterthought, "Are you?"
"Not in daylight. But from what Aunt Tillie says, it must be something more than a ghost that's frightenin' Jonathan K. McGuire."
"What does she think it is?"
"She doesn't know. Mr. McGuire won't say. He won't allow anybody around the house without a pass. Oh, he's scared all right and he's got most of Black Rock scared too. He was never like this before."
"Are you scared?" asked Peter.
"No. I don't think I am really. But it's spooky, and I don't care much for shootin'."
"What makes you think there will be shooting?"
"On account of the guns and pistols. Whatever the thing is he's afraid of, he's not goin' to let it come near him if he can help it. Aunt Tillie says that what with loaded rifles, shotguns and pistols lyin' loose in every room in the house, it's as much as your life is worth to do a bit of dustin'. And the men – Shad Wells, Jesse Brown, they all carry automatics. First thing they know they'll be killin' somebody," she finished with conviction.
"Who is Shad Wells – ?"
"My cousin, Shadrack E. Wells. He was triplets. The other two died."
"Shad," mused Peter.
"Sounds like a fish, doesn't it? But he isn't." And then more slowly, "Shad's all right. He's just a plain woodsman, but he doesn't know anything about making the trees grow," she put in with prim irony. "You'll be his boss, I guess. He won't care much about that."
"Why?"
"Because he's been runnin' things in a way. I hope you get along with him."
"So do I – "
"Because if you don't, Shad will eat you at one gobble."
"Oh!" said Peter with a smile. "But perhaps you exaggerate. Don't you think I might take two – er – gobbles?"
Beth looked him over, and then smiled encouragingly.
"Maybe," she said, "but your hands don't look over-strong."
Peter looked at his right hand curiously. It was not as brown as hers, but the fingers were long and sinewy.
"They are, though. When you practice five hours a day on the piano, your hands will do almost anything you want them to."
A silence which Peter improved by shifting his suitcase. The weight of it had ceased to be amusing. And he was about to ask her how much further Black Rock was when there was a commotion down the road ahead of them, as a dark object emerged from around the bend and amid a whirl of dust an automobile appeared.
"It's the 'Lizzie'," exclaimed Beth unemotionally.
And in a moment the taxi service of Black Rock was at Peter's disposal.
"Carburetor trouble," explained the soiled young man at the wheel briefly, without apology. And with a glance at Peter's bag —
"Are you the man for McGuire's on the six-thirty?"
Peter admitted that he was and the boy swung the door of the tonneau open.
"In here with me, Beth," he said to the girl invitingly.
In a moment, the small machine was whirled around and started in the direction from which it had come, bouncing Peter from side to side and enveloping him in dust. Jim Hagerman's "Lizzie" wasted no time, once it set about doing a thing, and in a few moments from the forest they emerged into a clearing where there were cows in a meadow, and a view of houses. At the second of these, a frame house with a portico covered with vines and a small yard with a geranium bed, all enclosed in a picket fence, the "Lizzie" suddenly stopped and Beth got down.
"Much obliged, Jim," he heard her say.
Almost before Peter had swept off his hat and the girl had nodded, the "Lizzie" was off again, through the village street, and so to a wooden bridge across a tea-colored stream, up a slight grade on the other side, where Jim Hagerman stopped his machine and pointed to a road.
"That's McGuire's – in the pines. They won't let me go no further."
"How much do I owe you?" asked Peter, getting down.
"It's paid for, Mister. Slam the door, will ye?" And in another moment Peter was left alone.
It was now after sunset, and the depths of the wood were bathed in shadow. Peter took the road indicated and in a moment reached two stone pillars where a man was standing. Beyond the man he had a glimpse of lawns, a well-kept driveway which curved toward the wood. The man at the gate was of about Peter's age but tall and angular, well tanned by exposure and gave an appearance of intelligence and capacity.
"I came to see Mr. McGuire," said Peter amiably.
"And what's your name?"
"Nichols. I'm the new forester from New York."
The young man at the gate smiled in a satirical way.
"Nichols. That was the name," he ruminated. And then with a shout to some one in the woods below, "Hey, Andy. Come take the gate."
All the while Peter felt the gaze of the young man going over him minutely and found himself wondering whether or not this was the person who was going to take him at a gobble.
It was. For when the other man came running Peter heard him call the gateman, "Shad."
"Are you Mr. Shad Wells?" asked Peter politely with the pleasant air of one who has made an agreeable discovery.
"That's my name. Who told you?"
"Miss Beth Cameron," replied Peter. "We came part of the way together."
"H-m! Come," he said laconically and led the way up the road toward the house. Peter didn't think he was very polite.
Had it not been for the precautions of his guide, Peter would have been willing quite easily to forget the tales that had been told him of Black Rock. The place was very prettily situated in the midst of a very fine growth of pines, spruce and maple. At one side ran the tea-colored stream, tumbling over an ancient dam to levels below, where it joined the old race below the ruin that had once been a mill. The McGuire house emerged in a moment from its woods and shrubbery, and stood revealed – a plain square Georgian dwelling of brick, to which had been added a long wing in a poor imitation of the same style and a garage and stables in no style at all on the slope beyond. It seemed a most prosaic place even in the gathering dusk and Peter seemed quite unable to visualize it as the center of a mystery such as had been described. And the laconic individual who had been born triplets was even less calculated to carry out such an illusion.
But just as they were crossing the lawn on the approach to the house, the earth beneath a clump of bushes vomited forth two men, like the fruit of the Dragon's Teeth, armed with rifles, who barred their way. Both men were grinning from ear to ear.
"All right, Jesse," said Shad with a laugh. "It's me and the new forester." He uttered the words with an undeniable accent of contempt.
The armed figures glanced at Peter and disappeared, and Peter and Mr. Shad Wells went up the steps of the house to a spacious portico. There was not a human being in sight and the heavy wooden blinds to the lower floor were tightly shut. Before his guide had even reached the door the sound of their footsteps had aroused some one within the house, the door was opened the length of its chain and a face appeared at the aperture.
"Who is it?" asked a male voice.
"Shad Wells and Mr. Nichols, the man from New York."
"Wait a minute," was the reply while the door was immediately shut again.
Peter glanced around him comparing this strange situation with another that he remembered, when a real terror had come, a tangible terror in the shape of a countryside gone mad with blood lust. He smiled toward the bush where the armed men lay concealed and toward the gate where the other armed man was standing. It was all so like a situation out of an opéra bouffe of Offenbach.
What he felt now in this strange situation was an intense curiosity to learn the meaning of it all, to meet the mysterious person around whom all these preparations centered. Peter had known fear many times, for fear was in the air for weeks along the Russian front, the fear of German shells, of poison gas, and of that worst poison of all – Russian treachery. But that fear was not like this fear, which was intimate, personal but intangible. He marked it in the scrutiny of the man who opened the door and of the aged woman who suddenly appeared beside him in the dim hallway and led him noiselessly up the stair to a lighted room upon the second floor. At the doorway the woman paused.
"Mr. Nichols, Mr. McGuire," she said, and Peter entered.
CHAPTER IV
THE JOB
The room was full of tobacco smoke, through which Peter dimly made out a table with an oil lamp, beside which were chairs, a sofa, and beyond, a steel safe between the windows. As Peter Nichols entered, a man advanced from a window at the side, the shutter of which was slightly ajar. It was evident that not content to leave his safety in the hands of those he had employed to preserve it, he had been watching too.
He was in his shirt sleeves, a man of medium height, compactly built, and well past the half century mark. The distinguishing features of his face were a short nose, a heavy thatch of brows, a square jaw which showed the need of the offices of a razor and his lips wore a short, square mustache somewhat stained by nicotine.
In point of eagerness the manner of his greeting of the newcomer left nothing to be desired. Peter's first impression was that Jonathan K. McGuire was quite able to look out for himself, which confirmed the impression that the inspection to which Peter had been subjected was nothing but a joke. But when his employer began speaking rather jerkily, Peter noticed that his hands were unsteady and that neither the muscles of his face nor of his body were under complete control. Normally, he would have seemed much as Sheldon, Senior, had described him – a hard-fisted man, a close bargainer who had won his way to his great wealth by the sheer force of a strong personality. There was little of softness in his face, little that was imaginative. This was not a man to be frightened at the Unseen or to see terrors that did not exist. Otherwise, to Peter he seemed commonplace to the last degree, of Irish extraction probably, the kind of person one meets daily on Broadway or on the Strand. In a fur coat he might have been taken for a banker; in tweeds, for a small tradesman; or in his shirt as Peter now saw him, the wristbands and collar somewhat soiled from perspiration, for a laboring man taking his rest after an arduous day. In other words, he was very much what his clothes would make of him, betraying his origins in a rather strident voice meant perhaps to conceal the true state of his mind.
"Glad to see you, Mr. Nichols. Thought you were never comin'," he jerked out.
"I walked most of the way from Pickerel River. Something went wrong, with the 'Lizzie.'"
"Oh – er – 'Lizzie'. The flivver! I couldn't send my own car. I've got only one down here and I might need it."
"It doesn't matter in the least – since I'm here."
"Sit down, Mr. Nichols," went on McGuire indicating a chair. "You've been well recommended by Mr. Sheldon. I talked to him yesterday over long distance. He told you what I wanted?"
"Something. Not much," said Peter with a view to getting all the information possible. "You wanted a forester – ?"
"Er – er – yes, that's it. A forester." And then he went on haltingly – "I've got about twenty thousand acres here – mostly scrub oak – pine and spruce. I've sold off a lot to the Government. A mess of it has been cut – there's been a lot of waste – and the fire season is coming around. That's the big job – the all-the-year job. You've had experience?"
"Yes – in Russia. I'm a trained woodsman."
"You're a good all-round man?"
"Exactly what – ?" began Peter.
"You know how to look after yourself – to look after other men, to take charge of a considerable number of people in my employ?"
"Yes. I'm used to dealing with men."
"It's a big job, Mr. Nichols – a ticklish kind of a job for a furriner – one with some – er – unusual features – that may call for – er – a lot of tact. And – er – courage."
It seemed to Peter that Jonathan K. McGuire was talking almost at random, that the general topic of forestry was less near his heart to-night than the one that was uppermost in Peter's mind, the mystery that surrounded his employer and the agencies invoked to protect him. It seemed as if he were loath to speak of them, as if he were holding Peter off at arm's length, so to say, until he had fully made up his mind that this and no other man was the one he wanted, for all the while he was examining the visitor with burning, beady, gray eyes, as though trying to peer into his mind.
"I'm not afraid of a forester's job, no matter how big it is, if I have men enough," said Peter, still curious.
"And you're a pretty good man in a pinch, I mean – " he put in jerkily, "you're not easy scared – don't lose your nerve."
"I'll take my chances on that," replied Peter calmly. "I'm used to commanding men, in emergencies – if that's what you mean."
"Yes. That's what I mean. Er – you're an Englishman, Mr. Sheldon says."
"Er – yes," said Peter, "an Englishman," for this was the truth now more than ever before, and then repeated the story he had told in New York about his work in Russia. While Peter was talking, McGuire was pacing up and down the room with short nervous strides, nodding his head in understanding from time to time. When Peter paused he returned to his chair.
"You British are a pretty steady lot," said McGuire at last. "I think you'll do. I like the way you talk and I like your looks. Younger than I'd hoped maybe, but then you're strong – Mr. Sheldon says you're strong, Mr. Nichols."
"Oh, yes," said Peter, his curiosity now getting the better of him. "But it might be as well, Mr. McGuire, if you let me know just what, that is unusual, is to be required of me. I assume that you want me to take command of the men policing your grounds – and immediate property?"
"Er – yes. That will have to be put in shape at once – at once." He leaned suddenly forward in his chair, his hairy hands clutching at his knees, while he blurted out with a kind of relieved tension, "No one must come near the house at night. No one, you understand – "
"I understand, sir – " said Peter, waiting patiently for a revelation.
"There'll be no excuse if any one gets near the house without my permission," he snarled. And then almost sullenly again – "You understand?"
"Perfectly. That should not be difficult to – "
"It may be more difficult than you think," broke in McGuire, springing to his feet again, and jerking out his phrases with strange fury.
"Nothing is to be taken for granted. Nothing," he raged. Peter was silent for a moment, watching McGuire who had paced the length of the room and back.
"I understand, sir," he said at last. "But doesn't it seem to you that both I and the man under me could do our work with more intelligence if we knew just who or what is to be guarded against?" Mr. McGuire stopped beside him as though transfixed by the thought. Then his fingers clutched at the back of a chair to which he clung for a moment in silence, his brows beetling. And when he spoke all the breath of his body seemed concentrated in a hoarse whisper.
"You won't know that. You understand, I give the orders. You obey them. I am not a man who answers questions. Don't ask them."
"Oh, I beg your pardon. So long as this thing you fear is human – "
"Human! A ghost! Who said I was afraid? Sheldon? Let him think it. This is my business. There are many things of value in this house," and he glanced towards the safe. "I'm using the right of any man to protect what belongs to him."
"I see," said Peter.
The man's tension relaxed as he realized Peter's coolness.
"Call it a fancy if you like, Mr. Nichols – " he said with a shrug. "A man of my age may have fancies when he can afford to gratify 'em."
"That's your affair," said Peter easily. "I take it then that the systematic policing of the grounds is the first thing I am to consider."
"Exactly. The systematic policing of the grounds – the dividing of your men into shifts for day and night work – more at night than in the day. Three more men come to-morrow. They will all look to you for orders."
"And who is in charge now?"
"A man named Wells – a native – the foreman from one of the sawmills – but he – er – well, Mr. Nichols – I'm not satisfied. That's why I wanted a man from outside."
"I understand. And will you give the necessary orders to him?"
"Wells was up here to-day, I told him."
"How many men are on guard here at the house?"
"Ten and with the three coming – that makes thirteen – " McGuire halted – "thirteen – but you make the fourteenth," he added.
Peter nodded. "And you wish me to take charge at once?"
"At once. To-night. To-morrow you can look over the ground more carefully. You'll sleep in the old playhouse – the log cabin – down by the creek. They'll show you. It's connected with this house by 'phone. I'll talk to you again to-morrow; you'd better go down and get something to eat."
McGuire went to the door and called out "Tillie!"
And as a faint reply was heard, "Get Mr. Nichols some supper."
Peter rose and offered his hand.
"I'll try to justify your faith in me, sir. Much obliged."
"Good-night."
Peter went down the stairs with mingled feelings. If the words of Beth Cameron had created in his mind a notion that the mystery surrounding Black Rock was supernatural in character, the interview with Jonathan K. McGuire had dispelled it. That McGuire was a very much frightened man was certain, but it seemed equally certain to Peter that what he feared was no ghost or banshee but the imminence of some human attack upon his person or possessions. Here was a practical man, who bore in every feature of his strongly-marked face the tokens of a successful struggle in a hard career, the beginnings of which could not have been any too fortunate. A westerner whose broad hands and twisted fingers spoke eloquently of manual labor, a man who still possessed to all appearances considerable physical strength – a prey to the fear of some night danger which was too ominous even to be talked about.