Henry Wood - Verner's Pride

"Was it the result of accident?"

Tynn shook his head.

"It's to be feared it was not, sir. There was a dreadful quarrel heard, it seems, near to the pond, just before it happened. My master is inquiring into it now, sir, in his study. Mr. Bitterworth and some more are there."

Giving his hat to the butler, Lionel Verner opened the study door, and entered. It was at that precise moment when John Massingbird had gone out for Mrs. Roy; so that, as may be said, there was a lull in the proceedings.

Mr. Verner looked glad when Lionel appeared. The ageing man, enfeebled with sickness, had grown to lean on the strong young intellect. As much as it was in Mr. Verner's nature to love anything, he loved Lionel. He beckoned him to a chair beside himself.

"Yes, sir, in an instant," nodded Lionel. "Matthew," he whispered, laying his hand kindly on the old man's shoulder as he passed, and bending down to him with his sympathising eyes, his pleasant voice, "I am grieved for this as if it had been my own sister. Believe me."

"I know it; I know you, Mr. Lionel," was the faint answer. "Don't unman me, sir, afore 'em here; leave me to myself."

With a pressure of his hand on the shoulder ere he quitted it, Lionel turned to Frederick Massingbird, asking of him particulars in an undertone.

"I don't know them myself," replied Frederick, his accent a haughty one. "There seems to be nothing but uncertainty and mystery. Mr. Verner ought not to have inquired into it in this semi-public way. Very disagreeable things have been said, I assure you. There was not the least necessity for allowing such absurdities to go forth, as suspicions, to the public. You have not been running from the Willow Pond at a strapping pace, I suppose, to-night?".

"That I certainly have not," replied Lionel.

"Neither has John, I am sure," returned Frederick resentfully. "It is not likely. And yet that boy of Mother Duff's—"

The words were interrupted. The door had opened, and John Massingbird appeared, marshalling in Dinah Roy. Dinah looked fit to die, with her ashy face and her trembling frame.

"Why, what is the matter?" exclaimed Mr. Verner.

The woman burst into tears.

"Oh, sir, I don't know nothing of it; I protest I don't," she uttered. "I declare that I never set eyes on Rachel Frost this blessed night."

"But you were near the spot at the time?"

"Oh, bad luck to me, I was!" she answered, wringing her hands. "But I know no more how she got into the water nor a child unborn."

"Where's the necessity for being put out about it, my good woman?" spoke up Mr. Bitterworth. "If you know nothing, you can't tell it. But you must state what you do know—why you were there, what startled you, and such like. Perhaps—if she were to have a chair?" he suggested to Mr. Verner in a whisper. "She looks too shaky to stand."

"Ay," acquiesced Mr. Verner. "Somebody bring forward a chair. Sit down, Mrs. Roy."

Mrs. Roy obeyed. One of those harmless, well-meaning, timid women, who seem not to possess ten ideas of their own, and are content to submit to others, she had often been seen in a shaky state from very trifling causes. But she had never been seen like this. The perspiration was pouring off her pinched face, and her blue check apron was incessantly raised to wipe it.

"What errand had you near the Willow Pond this evening?" asked Mr. Verner.

"I didn't see anything," she gasped, "I don't know anything. As true as I sit here, sir, I never saw Rachel Frost this blessed evening."

"I am not asking you about Rachel Frost. Were you near the spot?"

"Yes. But—"

"Then you can say what errand you had there; what business took you to it," continued Mr. Verner.

"It was no harm took me, sir. I went to get a dish o' tea with Martha Broom. Many's the time she have asked me since Christmas; and my husband, he was out with the Dawsons and all that bother; and Luke, he's gone, and there was nothing to keep me at home. I changed my gownd and I went."

"What time was that?"

"'Twas the middle o' the afternoon, sir. The clock had gone three."

"Did you stay tea there?"

"In course, sir, I did. Broom, he was out, and she was at home by herself a-rinsing out some things. But she soon put 'em away, and we sat down and had our teas together. We was a-talking about—"

"Never mind that," said Mr. Verner. "It was in coming home, I conclude, that you were met by young Broom."

Mrs. Roy raised her apron again, and passed it over her face but not a word spoke she in answer.

"What time did you leave Broom's cottage to return home?"

"I can't be sure, sir, what time it was. Broom's haven't got no clock; they tells the time by the sun."

"Was it dark?"

"Oh, yes, it was dark, sir, except for the moon. That had been up a good bit, for I hadn't hurried myself."

"And what did you see or hear, when you got near the Willow Pond?"

The question sent Mrs. Roy into fresh tears; into fresh tremor.

"I never saw nothing," she reiterated. "The last time I set eyes on Rachel Frost was at church on Sunday."

"What is the matter with you?" cried Mr. Verner, with asperity. "Do you mean to deny that anything had occurred to put you in a state of agitation, when you were met by young Broom?"

Mrs. Roy only moaned.

"Did you hear people quarrelling?" he persisted.

"I heard people quarrelling," she sobbed. "I did. But I never saw, no more than the dead, who it was."

"Whose voices were they?"

"How can I tell, sir? I wasn't near enough. There were two voices, a man's and a woman's; but I couldn't catch a single word, and it did not last long. I declare, if it were the last word I had to speak, that I heard no more of the quarrel than that, and I wasn't no nearer to it."

She really did seem to speak the truth, in spite of her shrinking fear, which was evident to all. Mr. Verner inquired, with incredulity equally evident, whether that was sufficient to put her into the state of tremor spoken of by young Broom.

Mrs. Roy hung her head.

"I'm timid at quarrels, 'specially if it's at night," she faintly answered.

"And was it just the hearing of that quarrel that made you sink down on your knees, and clasp hold of a tree?" continued Mr. Verner. Upon which Mrs. Roy let fall her head on her hands, and sobbed piteously.

Robin Frost interrupted, sarcasm in his tone—"There's a tale going on, outside, that you saw a ghost, and it was that as frighted you," he said to her. "Perhaps, sir"—turning to Mr. Verner—"you'll ask her whose ghost it was."

This appeared to put the finishing touch to Mrs. Roy's discomfiture. Nothing could be made of her for a few minutes. Presently, her agitation somewhat subsided; she lifted her head, and spoke as with a desperate effort.

"It's true," she said. "I'll make a clean breast of it. I did see a ghost, and it was that as upset me so. It wasn't the quarrelling frighted me: I thought nothing of that."

"What do you mean by saying you saw a ghost?" sharply reproved Mr. Verner.

"It was a ghost, sir," she answered, apparently picking up a little courage, now the subject was fairly entered upon.

A pause ensued. Mr. Verner may have been at a loss what to say next. When deliberately assured by any timorous spirit that they have "seen a ghost," it is waste of time to enter an opposing argument.

"Where did you see the ghost?" he asked.

"I had stopped still, listening to the quarrelling, sir. But that soon came to an end, for I heard no more, and I went on a few steps, and then I stopped to listen again. Just as I turned my head towards the grove, where the quarrelling had seemed to be, I saw something a few paces from me that made my flesh creep. A tall, white thing it looked, whiter than the moonlight. I knew it could be nothing but a ghost, and my knees sunk down from under me, and I laid hold o' the trunk o' the tree."