The Riddle of the Mysterious Light. Hanshew Mary E.

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ I see what you mean," he said, with a smile of sudden understanding. "Old Hurdon's flowers. Fine, aren't they?"

      "Something more than fine from what I can see of 'em at this distance. They will be 'Pollacks' and 'Paul Crampels' them geraniums, if I know anything about it. Do a bit in that line myself at home."

      "I shouldn't have thought it," replied Overton, rather abruptly; then hastened to amend his blunder by adding discreetly, "I should have supposed that the business of Scotland Yard would leave you so little time. But possibly you have 'off days' and little opportunities of that kind."

      "Something of that sort. I've always sort of prided myself on my little bit, but it isn't a patch on that show, I can tell you. How would it be if we slipped over the wall and had a look at 'em a bit closer, Mr. Overton? You being who you are, the gardeners wouldn't say nothing, I reckon."

      "Yes, I suppose it will be all right if you like. That will be Mrs. Hurdon herself that's working in the garden. Come along."

      They swung over the low boundary wall into the Castle grounds, and walked directly toward the cottages, Mr. Overton flinging a reassuring, "That's all right, Johnston, the gentlemen are with me," to a protesting gardener who came running across the lawn.

      Cleek observed, however, that, although the gardener heard the land-steward's voice clearly enough, and went about his business at once, the woman in the radiant garden of the cottage did not so much as look up.

      "Old lady's something after the style of my mate here, ain't she – a bit deaf?" he observed.

      "Yes, a little. That is one reason why she never is worried by the ringing of the bells."

      "I see. And the old man – wot about him? He deaf, too?"

      "Oh, dear no. Ears as sharp as a badger's. He is a very strong-minded, practical, level-headed old chap, without a grain of superstition in him. He declares that he has never in all his life found soil so fertile or a garden that gives such good return for his work as that one, and he wouldn't give the place up if ghosts danced round the house all night in dozens."

      "Oh, so that's why they didn't get out and chuck the place when the mischief began, is it? I was wondering. One deaf and the other with his head screwed on the right way. Old gent must have a power o' confidence in his missus, Mr. Overton, to let her go messing about with his plants and him not there. Blowed if I'd let mine do it – no fear."

      "I don't fancy that Hurdon would either, if he could help it. He's as fussy a horticulturist as any," said Overton, with an amused laugh, "and, in an ordinary way, it would be as much as anybody's life was worth to touch a single one of his plants. Unfortunately, however, the old chap had a slight accident the day before yesterday. Fell down the stairs and strained his back. It will probably keep him laid up for the next five or six days; and, as his garden is his hobby, I suppose he has sent the old lady out to attend to it. I'm told, too, that she's as well up in garden matters as he."

      "Is she now?" commented Cleek with a casualness which masked an emotion of a totally different character; for he observed, as he drew nearer, that the good lady was in the act of inserting a blossoming begonia into a nice round hole which she had scooped out from one of the beds with her trowel, and that there was an empty flower pot and a full watering-can standing on the tiled path beside her.

      Nor did his observations cease there. His eye, seeing while it seemed not to see, detected dotted here and there about the crowded flower beds fuchsias and geraniums whose foliage was of that clear, rich, glossy green which betokens plants fresh bought from a greenhouse and whose general appearance indicated that they had never before been exposed to the rigours of the open and the dust from a near-by road.

      He looked round to see if there was any greenhouse attached to the cottage garden, or any glass frame of any sort from whose shelter these speckless plants might have come. There was none. The garden was simply a rectangle of brilliant bloom cut through the middle by a red-tiled footpath – a glowing, gorgeous spot of beauty, blazing in the sunshine.

      When he came close enough to lean over the low hedge with Mr. Overton, however, and to see what that hedge had hidden heretofore, he observed that just below him there was a little heap of broken pots and withered plants lying, waiting to be removed. Drooping fuchsias and yellowing geraniums they were with the original ball of earth from a florist's pots still clinging to their dry roots.

      Here it was that a flash of memory brought back to Mr. Narkom that moment on the stairs at the Carlton and a recollection of what had been said. If there were geraniums and fuchsias much would depend upon it, Cleek had murmured. And now here were geraniums and fuchsias in dozens!

      He twitched an inquiring glance at Cleek; but Cleek was looking at the dying plants, not at the thriving ones, and the curious one-sided smile peculiar to him was looping up his cheek.

      "Good afternoon, Mrs. Hurdon," called out the land-steward, leaning over both the low hedge and the stone wall it screened and shouting across the garden to the woman who had never once looked up during the whole period of their approach.

      She did now, however.

      "Oh, good afternoon, Mr. Overton, sir," she said, rising instantly and brushing down her gardening apron with conspicuous haste as she did so. She displayed as she got on her feet a figure of grenadier-like proportions. "And how will you be doing this fine weather, sir?"

      "Very well indeed, Mrs. Hurdon, thank you. And how is the good man coming on?"

      "Middling, sir, middling. The pain's a bit less, but he's uncommon stiff, poor dear. Can't bend to so much as pick up a pin!"

      "Poor old chap! Too bad he can't come out. I've a gentleman here who takes an interest in gardening, and I'm sure he and Mr. Hurdon would enjoy a few words on a subject so agreeable to both."

      "Ah! that he would, yes, indeed! Talk flowers to Joshua, Mr. Overton, sir, and he'll listen to you by the hour."

      "And here, evidently, is a kindred spirit. Mr. Headland was so struck with the beauty of your garden that nothing would do him but to come over and have a good look at it. You will be pleased to hear that he calls this as fine a display of the kind as he has ever seen."

      "Doo-ee, now? Well, I'm sure that's very nice of him. We do take a pride in our garden, sir, and that's a fact."

      During all this Cleek had said nothing – had not even so much as glanced at Mrs. Hurdon a second time after she rose to her feet. He seemed to be wholly absorbed in contemplating the beauty of the flowers, and, with his arms folded on the top of the wall, and his pipe in his mouth, was giving them his entire attention. It had occurred to him, however, that to be owned by one so erect, so broad-shouldered, and so seemingly virile, Mrs. Hurdon's voice was singularly thin and high-pitched, and had the quavering, cracked quality of eighty rather than that which usually goes with the appearance of fifty-five.

      "I'm struck most with them Paul Crampels of yours, ma'am," he declared, breaking silence suddenly, and looking up. "Never saw a finer lot in all my life. Would you mind telling me where your husband got them?"

      At the first word he knew, from the blank expression which came into her face, that what he had said was Choctaw to her – that she did not know a Paul Crampel from a Pollock, and hastened to land her still deeper into the mire by seeming to give a hint.

      "Them with the white and scarlet bells is the best I ever see."

      "Yes, they are fine, aren't they now?" she said, her face clearing, as, guided by his gesture, she looked in the direction of the plants bearing blooms of that description. СКАЧАТЬ