Chapter 3

"I don't believe Greenop's vulgar at all," he said. "Look how he stuffed those pheasants for father. I heard father say, `Greenop's an uncommonly clever fellow!' Father likes to talk to him, so he can't be vulgar."

Mary did not want another quarrel; she tried to soften her speech down.

"But you see I couldn't be _Mr_. Greenop," she said, "I could only be _Mrs_. Greenop, and sit in that dull little hole at the back of the shop and darn all day."

"Oh, well," Jackie acknowledged, "that might not be so pleasant; but," he added, "you might be his daughter, and help to feed the birds, and serve in the shop."

Mary tossed her head.

"What's the good of talking like that?" she said; "I'm _not_ his daughter, and I'm sure I don't want to be."

"But you're always fond of pretending things," persisted Jackie. "Supposing you _could_ change, whose daughter would you like to be?"

"Well," said Mary, after a little reflection, "if I could change I should like to be a countess, or a princess, or a Lady somebody. Lady Mary Vallance sounds rather nice, I think."

Just then the squire came out of the shop, and they soon started rapidly homewards.

"Mary," said Jackie, squeezing himself close up to her, when they were well on the way, and lowering his voice mysteriously, "I've got a secret to tell you."

Jackie's secrets were never very important, and Mary was not prepared to be interested in this one.

"Have you?" she said absently; "look at all those crows in that field."

"Oh, if you don't want to hear it--" said Jackie, drawing back with a hurt expression; "it's something to do with you, too."

"Well, what is it?" said Mary; "I'm listening."

"I haven't told Agatha, or Jennie, or Patrick," continued he in an injured voice.

"Why, it wouldn't be a secret if you had," said Mary. "Go on; I really want to hear it."

"It was yesterday," began Jackie, lowering his voice again; "I was sitting in the school-room window-seat reading, and Rice came in with a message for Fraulein. And then she stayed talking about lots of things, and then they began to talk about you." Jackie paused.

"That's not much of a secret," said Mary. "Is that all?"

"Of course not. It's only the beginning. They said a lot which I didn't hear, and then Rice told Fraulein a long story in a very low voice, and Fraulein held up her hands and called out `Himmel!' But the part I really did hear was the last bit."

"Well," said Mary, "what was it? I don't think anything of what you've told me yet."

"`These awful words fell upon my ears,'" said Jackie gloomily, quoting from a favourite ghost story: "`As brown as a berry, and her name's no more Mary Vallance than mine is!'"

"But I'm not as brown as a berry," said Mary. "You must have heard wrong. They couldn't have been talking about me at all."

"I know they were," said Jackie with decision, "for when Fraulein saw me she nodded at Rice and put her finger on her lip, and Rice said something about `buried in his book.' You see," added Jackie, "I didn't really _listen_, but I heard--because I couldn't help it."

Wensdale was now in sight, and five minutes afterwards the dog-cart stopped at the vicarage gate.

"Don't tell anyone else," whispered Mary hurriedly as she clambered down. "I'm going to ask mother about it."

She ran into the house feeling rather excited, but almost sure that Jackie was mistaken. He often made muddles. What was her astonishment, therefore, after pouring out the story breathlessly, when Mrs Vallance, instead of laughing at the idea, only looked very grave and kept silence.

"Of course I am Mary Vallance, ain't I, mother?" she repeated.

"You are our dear little adopted daughter," said Mrs Vallance; "but that is not really your name."

"What is it then?" asked Mary.

"I do not know. Some day I will tell you how you first came here, but not until you are older."

How mysterious it all was! Mary gazed thoughtfully out into the quiet road, at the ducks splashing about in the river; but she was not thinking of them, her head seemed to whirl. Presently she said:

"Do you know my real mother and father?"

"No," answered Mrs Vallance.

"Perhaps," continued Mary, after a pause, "they live in a big house like the Chelwoods, and have a garden and a park like theirs."

"Perhaps they have," said Mrs Vallance, "and perhaps they live in a little cottage like the blacksmith and his wife, and have no garden at all."

"Oh, I shouldn't like that at all," said Mary quickly; then she suddenly threw her arms round Mrs Vallance's neck and kissed her.

"Whoever they are," she said, "I love you and father best, and always shall."

She asked a great many more questions, but Mrs Vallance seemed determined to answer nothing but "yes" and "no." It was very disappointing to know so much and yet so little, and it seemed impossible to wait patiently till she was older to hear more. At last Mrs Vallance forbade the subject:

"I don't want you to talk of this any more now, Mary," she said. "When the proper time comes, you shall hear all I have to tell; what I want you to remember is this: _Whoever_ you are, and whatever sort of people you belong to, you cannot alter it; but you may have a great deal to do with _what_ you are. We can all make our characters noble by goodness, however poor our stations are; but if we are proud and vain, and despise others, nothing can save us from becoming vulgar and low, even if we belong to very high rank indeed. That is all you have to think of."

Excellent advice; but though Mary heard all the words, they did not sink into her mind any more than the water on the ducks' backs in the river outside; they rolled off it at once, and only the wonderful, wonderful fact remained, that she was not Mary Vallance. Who was she, then? And, above all, what could Rice have meant by "brown as a berry?" Who was brown as a berry? Certainly not Mary herself; she was quite used to hearing that she was "as white as snow" and "as fair as a lily"--it was Agatha Chelwood who had a brown skin. Altogether it was very mysterious and deeply interesting; soon she began to make up long stories about herself, in which it was always discovered at last that she belonged to very rich people with grand titles. This was what people had meant when they whispered that she was "no common child." Mary's foolish head was in a whirl of excitement, and filled from morning to night with visions of grandeur. If the little clog could only have spoken! Mute, yet full of expression it stood there, while Mary dreamed in her little white bed of palaces and princesses.

"I was not made," it would have said, "for foot of princess or lady, or to tread on soft carpets and take dainty steps; I am a hardworking shoe made by rough hands, though the heart they belonged to was kind and gentle; I have nothing to do with luxury and idleness."

But no one understood this silent language. The clog was admired, and wondered at, and called "a quaint little shoe," and its history remained unknown.

Mary longed now to tell Jackie her mighty secret, which began to weigh too heavily to keep to herself; but when he did come to the vicarage again, he was not nearly so much impressed by it as she had hoped. This was partly, perhaps, because his mind was full of a certain project which he wished her to join, and she had scarcely bound him by a solemn promise not to breathe a word to the other children of what she had told him, than he began eagerly:

"We're going to spend the day at Maskells to-morrow--the _whole_ day. Will Mrs Vallance let you go too?"

"Come and ask her," said Mary; and Jackie, rather breathless, for he had run the whole way from the White House, proceeded with his request:

"The donkey-cart's going," he said, "and the three little ones, and Rice, and Fraulein, and all of us, and we're going quite early because it's so hot, and we shall stop to tea, and make a fire, of course, and mother hopes you'll let Mary go."

"Well, I can't say no," said Mrs Vallance, smiling at Jackie's heated face; "but I'm not very fond of Maskells, there are so many dangerous places in it."

"Oh, you mean the forbidden rooms," said Jackie; "we don't go into those now. There are three of them, where the floor's given way, you know, with great holes in them. Maskells is _such_ a jolly place," he added pleadingly; "we don't like any other half so well."

"You say Fraulein is going?" said Mrs Vallance.

"Yes, and Rice, too; but they won't be in the way, because Fraulein's going to sketch, and Rice will have to be with the little ones."

"I hope they _will_ be in the way," replied Mrs Vallance, "and prevent you heedless children climbing about in unsafe places and breaking your limbs."

"Then Mary may go? And we start _punctually_ at nine, so she mustn't be late."

Consent once given, Jackie took his departure, and his stout knickerbockered legs were soon out of sight.

Mary was delighted, for Maskells was the most charming place possible to spend a day in, and the prospect of going there made her forget for a time the one subject which had lately filled her mind--herself.

Maskells was a deserted house standing near the high-road between the White House and Dorminster; it had once been a place of some consequence, and still had pleasant meadows round it, sloping down to a river at the back; but the garden and orchard were tangled and neglected--much more interesting, the children thought, than if they had been properly cared for.

The house had two projecting wings, and quaint latticed windows; outside, it had the appearance of being in tolerable repair, but there was in truth scarcely a whole room in it, floors and ceilings had given way, and great rifts and gaps yawned in them. The rotten old staircases were all the more dangerous because they still looked firm enough to bear a light weight, and though Jackie had once crawled up to the top of one, out on to the roof, the attempt was never repeated. He had remained there for half an hour clinging on to the side of a tall chimney, unable to move, until a farmer had fetched a ladder and got him down. Since then staircases and upper rooms had been forbidden, and the children had to content themselves with playing on the ground floor and in the outhouses. There was a mystery hanging about the old place which added to its attractions, for they had heard that it had fallen into this decay and been uninhabited so long because it was "in Chancery." A mysterious expression, which might mean anything, and was more than enough to clothe it with all the terrors which belong to the unknown.

When dusk came on, and the owls and bats flapped their wings in shadowy corners, it was desirable to cling closely together and feel afraid in company--a tremor was excusable in the boldest. Patrick, indeed, always declared he had once seen a ghost in Maskells. Pressed for details, he had been unable to give any clear account of it, and was a good deal laughed at, especially by Mary; but it was dimly felt by all that there might be truth in it--anything was possible for a place "in Chancery."

Mary liked to imagine things about Maskells; it would do for the Tower of London with dungeons in it, or for Lochleven with Mary Queen of Scots escaping by night, or for a besieged castle, and hundreds of other fancies. She invented games founded on those scenes which were popular at first, but as she always took the leading parts herself, the other children soon tired of them.

"Don't let's pretend anything else," Jennie would say, who had a practical mind; "let's have a game of hide-and-seek."

And certainly no place could have been better fitted than Maskells for the purpose.

STORY ONE, CHAPTER 3.

THE ADVENTURE.

Mary did not fail to start in good time for the White House on the morning after Jackie's invitation, and reached the gates leading into the stable-yard just as the clock was striking nine. The donkey-cart was standing there ready, and the four elder children were busily engaged round it stowing away large parcels to the best advantage, and thrusting in a variety of small ones. There was an anxious look on all their faces, for they had so many things to remember and the cart was small. Rice, the old nurse, stood by with the youngest child in her arms; she was to ride in the cart with her three charges, who were too small to walk so far, but it seemed more than doubtful at present if there would be room by the time the packing was finished. Taught by experience, however, she wisely forebore to interfere with the arrangements and waited patiently.

"Have you got everything?" asked Mary as she entered.

There was not much more visible of Jackie than his boots, for he was making great exertions head-foremost in the cart, but he answered in a muffled voice:

"I think so. Read the list, Agatha."

"Potatoes and apples to roast--" began Agatha.

"There, now!" said Jackie, and the next minute he was plunging in at the kitchen door.

"I _knew_ you'd forget something," said Mary triumphantly. "What a good idea it was of mine to have a list!"

Jackie soon came back with a knobbly-looking canvas bag in his hand, and followed by Fraulein Schnipp the German governess.

"I say," he said, "we've forgotten Fraulein's camp-stool and sketching things; and she says she can't go without them."

"Well," said Jennie in a low tone, "I don't believe you can get them in. I should think she might carry them herself."

"Don't," said Patrick with a nudge of his elbow; "you'll make her cry."

It was a puzzling habit that Fraulein had, to weep silently at unexpected moments, and say her feelings were hurt. This was so distressing that the children were always anxious to avoid it if possible. She stood looking on now with a pleased smile, grasping her camp-stool, and understanding very little of the chatter going on round her. Fraulein was very good-natured looking, with large soft blue eyes and a quantity of frizzy fair hair.

At last the packing was done; camp-stool, sketching-books, and three small children on the top of everything. Rice would have to walk by the side of the cart. It really was a wonderfully hot day, and there was scarcely any shade; the donkey went even slower than usual, and by the time they reached Maskells the whole party was rather exhausted-- Fraulein more so than anyone, and she sank at once on the ground under some beech-trees opposite the house. It was in this spot that the cart was always unpacked, the cloth laid, and dinner spread. Later on in the day a fire was made here to boil the kettle for tea, but until then the children were free to roam about and do as they liked.

As Jackie had said, Fraulein was anxious to make a sketch of the old house, and after dinner was over and she had a little recovered from her fatigue she planted her camp-stool conveniently and set to work. The children knew now that neither she nor Rice would be "in the way" that afternoon; they were both comfortably settled and would not be likely to stir for hours.

But it was almost too hot to play, and the games went on languidly until four o'clock, when it began to get cooler, and there were pleasant shadows round about.

"We ought to begin to pick up wood," said the careful Agatha, "or the fire won't be ready for tea-time."

"Well, we'll just have one game of hide-and-seek first," said Jackie; and so it was agreed.

Agatha hid first, but she was soon found, for she was not fond of venturing far into the dark corners round Maskells; then it was Jackie's turn, and then it came to Mary.

Determined to distinguish herself, and find a more difficult place than the others, she wandered round to the side of the house which looked upon the neglected orchard, and was furthest away from where Fraulein and Rice were sitting. She would not cry "Whoop!" for a long while, she thought, till she had found a very good place indeed. As she pushed her way among the low boughs of the apple-trees, and through the tall tangled grass which reached nearly to her waist, she felt very bold and adventurous, for the children seldom ventured on this side--it was unknown ground. Certainly the house looked far more mournful and ruinous here than it did in front. Wooden shutters were fastened outside most of the windows, and one of them had swung back and gave a dismal creak now and then on its rusty hinges. Trailing masses of convolvulus and ivy and Virginian creeper were hanging about everywhere, and the walls were covered so thickly that for some time Mary looked in vain for an entrance. But at last she saw a little low-arched door. How inviting it looked! No doubt it would be locked; but at least she would try it, and if she could get in it would be a splendid hiding-place. The others would never, never find her. She lifted the iron ring which hung from the lock, gave a little twist and a push, and was surprised to find that it yielded easily. Before her was an almost entirely dark room with a low vaulted ceiling; through the cracks in the closed shutters came faint streaks of light, and she could just see that at the end of it there was another door like the one she had entered.

Mary's heart beat fast with excitement. What was on the other side of that door? Hidden treasure, perhaps, or a dungeon where some captive had been pining for years! Here was an adventure, indeed! Everything else was now completely forgotten. She had no doubt that she was on the very edge of some great discovery; and though she did wish for a second that Jackie was there too, she decided directly afterwards that there was more honour and glory in being quite alone.

So she went boldly up to the door with a fast-beating heart and turned the handle. Wonderful! It opened at once, and straight in front of her there rose a short steep flight of stone steps, with another door, partly open, at the top. But here she stopped uncertainly, and for the first time fear was mingled with curiosity, for plainly to be heard through that half-open door came the sound of voices. It was unpleasant to remember Patrick's ghost just then. Was this where it lived? If so, she thought she would go back. Yet it would be a pity, now that she had got so far, and something urged her strongly to go and peep into the room above. Mary had many faults but she was no coward, and besides this, her proud spirit made her ashamed to run away, so after a little hesitation she crept softly up the stone steps. She hardly dared to breathe lest she should be heard, and as she went the voices became clearer and clearer: they certainly sounded just like a man and woman talking. When she reached the top she paused a minute to gather courage, and then peeped cautiously round the door.

It was a large room--one of those which Jackie had called forbidden rooms--for there was quite a big hole in one corner where the floor had given way. There was a wide open fireplace with a high carved stone mantel-piece, and on the hearth a fire of sticks crackled away under a black pipkin which stood on legs; from this there came a strange and savoury smell. A woman was crouching on the ground in front of it with her back to the door, and a tall dark man leant against the mantel-piece and fed the fire with some dry boughs which he broke into pieces. Here were no ghosts at any rate. There was something reassuring in the sight of the fire and the black pot and the smell of food; but what were they doing here, and who were they? It was perhaps some dark affair connected with "Chancery."

Mary felt frightened. She could not see the woman's face, but the man looked so evil and dark, and had such bright black eyes! She drew back her head and prepared to creep softly down the steps and make her way out. Now that she had seen these ghosts she would have plenty to tell Jackie and the others, and they would all think her very brave. She began to feel anxious to be with them again.

Just then the woman spoke.

"Bennie's late," she said. "Supper's most ready."

"He's havin' a look round," answered the man, "against to-night."

"What's the old chap's name?" continued the woman.

"Chelwood," said the man. "He's a JP."

"What's that?"

"A bloke wot sits in court and sends yer to prison," answered the man.

Mary listened with all her ears and her eyes starting with horror. Here was some dreadful plot--they were going to murder Squire Chelwood, perhaps! Should she run at once and give the alarm, or wait to hear more? While she hesitated the woman spoke again.

"I suppose it's best to begin there?"

"There's nowhere else, not to speak of," answered the man, "'cept the parson's."

The woman gave a low laugh. "I wonder how he liked the present you made him this time seven years back," she said.

She got up as she spoke to lift the lid of the pot and stir its contents; and Mary, afraid of being discovered, turned to go, trembling with excitement. Treading with great care, and feeling her way with one hand on the wall, she was almost half-way down when there fell on her ear a sound which brought her to a sudden stand-still. Towards her, coming through the empty room at the bottom of the stairs, there were footsteps plainly to be heard! Without doubt it was "Bennie" returning. The thought darted through Mary's mind, leaving her cold with terror. What could she do? To go backwards or forwards was equally dreadful-- she was caught in a kind of trap. Oh for Jackie, Fraulein, Rice, who were so near, and yet powerless to help her! All her courage gone, she sank down on the stone step, covered her face with her hands, and waited. The footsteps came nearer. In another minute the door at the foot of the stairs swung back, and a youth of eighteen or twenty came quickly up, almost stumbling over Mary in the dim light.

"Hullo!" he exclaimed, "it's a child!" He put his fingers in his mouth and gave a low strange whistle, and in a moment the gypsy and his wife came out of the room above.

"Here's a shine!" said Bennie.

He pointed to Mary, who still crouched motionless on the step with her hair falling over her shoulders. They all stood staring at her in surprise.

"Belongs to a party outside, I bet," said Bennie. "There's a lot of 'em t'other side of the house. Seed 'em as I wur comin' back."

"Did they see you?" asked the man.

"No fear," answered Bennie shortly. "Got over the wall."

They muttered hoarsely together over Mary's head, using a strange language which she could not understand; but she made out that they were annoyed, and that they could not agree what should be done. At last the woman stooped down to her.

"Where do you come from, my pretty?" she said in a wheedling tone.

Mary did not answer, but still kept her face hidden.

"Come alonger me, darling," continued the woman. She took Mary's arm, and half-dragged, half-led her into the room above. The child's hat had fallen off, and the light streamed down upon her bright yellow hair and her frightened brown eyes, as she raised them timidly to the dark faces round her. The woman started and gave a quick significant glance at her husband.

"You live at the parson's house in Wensdale, don't yer, dearie?" she said coaxingly.

"Yes," said Mary. She wondered how the woman knew.

"But you're not the parson's child," continued the woman. "Give me your hand." She bent, muttering over it: "No, no, not the parson's child-- you belong to dark people, for all so white and fair you are."

Was the woman a witch? Mary gazed at her with eyes wide with fear, and the man and boy stood by with a cunning grin on their faces.

"Seven years ago," the woman went on in a sing-song tone, "you was lost. Seven years ago you was found. Seven years you've lived with strangers, and now you've come to yer own people."

What did she mean? These dirty, dark, evil-looking tramps her own people! Mary took courage and drew herself haughtily upright.