CHAPTER III

The Old Coat

THE next morning broke gloriously fine, and the brilliant sunshine put fresh vigour into Dick Bronson. He had spent a rather unrestful night, his slumber being often broken by hideous dreams.

He had even got off the settle and hobbled out into the sunshine, searching for some place where he might wash his face, before Nell descended the shaky ladder from her loft.

Doss Umpey was also up and out betimes, looking after his horse, which was stabled in a lean-to behind the wooden house. A sorry beast it was, with knock-knees, and a general air of being worn out, but it had energy enough to try to bite the old man when he endeavoured to put the bit in its mouth.

“Nell, Nell, come here; I want you,” the old man called, in querulous tones. And presently Nell came running round the corner of the house, in response to his call, looking jaded from her night of watching, but with an evident intention to be cheerful, and to keep the peace if she could.

“It is this old hoss again. I can’t think what has come to the creature; it shows its teeth every time I get near it,” he said, handing the bridle to Nell with an air of resignation.

“Want to bite, do you, Blossom? Oh, fie! you must not give way to tempers like these. Don’t you know that bits and bridles mean apples and bread to horses that are good?” she inquired, in coaxing tones, as she drew one hand out of her pocket, gave the horse a glimpse of something eatable in her palm, then dived it out of sight again.

Blossom became instantly docile, opened its mouth for the insertion of the bit, but without showing any desire to bite, then began nosing round Nell’s pockets, in anticipation of the coveted reward.

“You old varmint!” began Doss Umpey, with the evident intention of bestowing a kick on the obstinate old horse; but Nell stopped him with a quick gesture.

“No, you are not to kick the poor old thing. If you do, I will take the bit out of its mouth again and go away, then you will have to manage as best you can,” she said, in a decided tone. And because he knew she would be as good as her word, he desisted from hostilities, and instead proceeded to strap a ragged saddle on to the lean old horse.

Nell gave her guest the best breakfast that she could contrive, but her resources were painfully limited. However, even dandelion coffee, maize-bread, and stringy bacon are better than nothing. So, with yesterday’s starvation fresh in his memory, Dick Bronson ate what was set before him, and was thankful.

Then he pressed payment upon Nell, but she would not take it, even turning away with an air of offence when he endeavoured to persuade her that he would rather pay than be indebted to her for hospitality.

“If you are so anxious to pay for what is done for you, give granfer a little money, but only a little, please, for taking you over to Button End,” she said, with a touch of disdain.

“Of course I shall do that. But I should like to compensate you also, for all the trouble I have been,” he said eagerly.

“There is no need; I like trouble,” she answered. And then, as Doss Umpey at this moment led Blossom up to the door, Dick had to go out and mount, with the burden of his indebtedness hanging heavily upon him.

“You’ll be coming home by sundown to-day, granfer?” Nell asked, a little anxiously.

“Mos’ likely,” he answered, busying himself with the off stirrup, and not looking at her.

“You must,” she said sharply. “Pip is very bad this morning, and so stiff he can hardly wag his tail. I don’t mind being left alone when the dog is all right, but it is another matter now he can’t even growl at anything.”

“All right,” the old man replied, with a touch of impatience, and then asked the stranger if he were ready to mount.

“I can’t ride that poor old bag of bones; I shall break its back!” exclaimed Dick.

“Blossom is ever so strong. You need not be afraid,” Nell said, with a reassuring smile.

At this Dick tried to mount, but he was weak and stiff from his painful experience, and was, moreover, harassed by the active attempts of Blossom to bite him.

“Wait a minute. If you will stand on that bench by the door, I will lead Blossom up, and you can get on. The horse will think it is a sack of meal and won’t take any notice,” Nell said, briskly coming to the rescue in her usual prompt fashion.

Dick did as he was bidden, but laughing in an embarrassed fashion, for it was rather mortifying to have to be mistaken for a bag of meal.

When the mounting was accomplished, Doss Umpey led the horse away by the opposite trail to that by which Dick had arrived on the previous day.

Dick took off his hat to Nell with the utmost courtesy of which he was capable, and she waved her hand in return, colouring high with pleasure.

“No one ever treated me so nicely before,” she murmured. Then she stood watching until the man on horseback, with the shambling figure of Doss Umpey at his side, passed out of sight.

Never had a day seemed so long to Nell as that one. Her usual avocations had no power to beguile her, and when, secure in her solitude, she brought her beloved books downstairs, she found that even reading had lost a great deal of its charm.

She was actively anxious, too, about the dog, for the poor creature seemed to grow worse as the hours went on, and in the afternoon Nell began to realize that Pip had fought his last fight, and was preparing to make his exit from a world of strife.

The knowledge moved her to real grief, for the dog, though savage and surly to other people, had been her friend and companion, the only playmate she possessed. Many and many were the solitary days they had spent together, and there had been not a few nights when the fierce deerhound had been her only companion at the Lone House on Blue Bird Ridge.

If Pip were dying, then she would not leave him alone; so, bringing some sewing, she came to sit on a little stool near the fire, where the languid eyes of the poor animal could see her to the last.

The afternoon was gorgeously fine, and Nell would have taken her work into the sunshine but for the dog. As it was, she sat in the dark cheerless room by the fire, administering broth at intervals to her dumb patient, and talking to it in a low crooning tone, which seemed to soothe the poor creature.

Her sewing was of a very uninteresting character, and consisted in mending up the worst rents in an old coat of her grandfather’s, a garment so patched and worn that it would have been difficult for an outsider to tell of what it was originally made.

Nell sighed a little over her task, but kept steadily on until, mending a great rent in the lining, her fingers encountered some stiff letter paper.

Thrusting her hand into the pocket she found there was a hole at the bottom which had let quite a store of articles through, these being caught between the lining and the cloth at the bottom of the coat.

She drew them out one by one, a nail, a screw, half a pocket-comb, a small key, and a letter which had been through the post, and was directed to her grandfather in his proper name, Mr. Theodosius Humphrey, The Lone House, Blue Bird Ridge, Lewisville, and the date was just ten days old.

“Why, granfer must have got the letter the last time he went over to Button End,” she remarked, talking aloud, as is the common way of lonely people. “Yet when I asked him if there was any mail for us he said no directly. I remember, though, how cross he was that night, and how low down in his spirits he has been ever since.”

She studied the outside of the letter for some time, admired the firmness of the handwriting, but did not attempt to read the contents. Then she took up the key, and looked at it critically. It was small and bright as if from being constantly carried, and a sudden idea occurred to her.

“Why, I do believe it is the key of my box. Granfer said he had lost it somehow, and of course he would not know it had slipped right through there. I will go and see if it fits, then I can open the box myself.”

Throwing down her work, with the needle still sticking in the rent, Nell was about to move with hasty steps across the floor, but paused first to look at Pip.

The dog’s eyes were closed now, and it was breathing regularly; so, with the hope that it was sleeping, she stole softly away to try the key in the lock of her box.

It fitted easily, and turned without any trouble; then, with a palpitating heart, she lifted the lid and peered inside.

There seemed to be only a few things in it, although she had supposed it would be quite full. A feeling of apprehension seized her then, and, dragging the box across the floor nearer to the open door, she knelt down beside it, sorting out the contents.

A dark blue merino dress, made in the fashion of fifteen years before; a black silk cape, the worse for wear, trimmed with beaded gimp; a black bonnet, with dark blue ribbon strings, and a bunch of pink roses under the coal-scuttle front;—these, with an armful of nondescript underwear, were all the box contained, saving a big stone wrapped in paper that lay at the bottom, and made it seem heavy.

Just at first indignation kept Nell’s grief in check. There had been good clothing in the box, she knew, and her mother’s little stock of jewelry, with a few odd remnants from her childhood’s home, of little worth to any one else, but of priceless value to her.

Feeling dazed and bewildered by the shock, Nell sat on the floor, with the heap of clothing in her lap, staring stupidly into the empty box. Then a fragment of paper with writing on it caught her attention, and, leaning forward, she picked it up.

The piece had been torn from a letter, and only a part of the sentence remained.

“Unless the money is paid within a week, I will give information, which will lead to your speedy arrest, and you will——”

Nell stood straight up, letting the lapful of garments drop unheeded on the floor.

She had seen that handwriting before, but where?

It was a habit of hers to stand up when any problem hard to solve forced itself upon her attention.

As she stood erect, staring straight before her, she saw the letter which a little while before she had found in the lining of her grandfather’s old coat, and at once she remembered that the writing on the envelope was identical with that on the slip she held in her hand.

With a bound she reached the table, and, seizing the envelope, dragged out the enclosure it contained.

She had felt no interest in it before, and no desire to pry into business which did not concern her. Now, however, all this was altered, and she deemed it her right to know what the letter contained.

Like the slip of paper in the box, it was curt and threatening, with no beginning in the usual way, but signed at the bottom with a great flourish.

“If I receive no money from you within a week, I will send some one to look you up. If you do not pay then, well, I will let the police know, and then you will soon see the inside of a prison, which may bring you to your senses and make you keep up your payments better.

“R. D. BRUNSEN.”

Nell gasped in her astonishment, for the man who had arrived at the Lone House yesterday in such a condition of exhaustion, had told her that his name was Bronson, Dick Bronson.

Was it possible that he had come to spy on her grandfather? Of course the story that he was travelling through the great forest on a pleasure jaunt might have been a fiction, only, somehow, her late visitor had struck her as being truthful and honest in his statements, and it was very disappointing to find herself mistaken in him. The names Bronson and Brunsen were so much alike that they might be the same, the difference lying only in pronunciation, for Mr. Bronson had only told her his name, he had not spelled it for her.

A long time she stood pondering over the matter, but quite unable to arrive at any definite conclusion concerning it. Then, warned by the slanting rays of the sun, she set to work preparing supper, in readiness for her grandfather’s return.

The letter she put in a prominent position on the supper-table. He would be sure to ask her where she had found it, then she would tell him all about it, and ask him why he had tampered with her property, which was contained in the box.

The sunset faded out in splendours of crimson and gold; then a cold wind stole across the ridge, rustling the millions of crisping leaves on the great forest trees, and night came brooding down.

Never during the years of her life at the Lone House had Nell felt so solitary as on this night. Hitherto, when her grandfather had remained away, she had had Pip for companionship and defence. But now the dog was breathing its last, no longer able to recognize her when she stooped to pat it, or to wag its tail in response to her voice.

The night was weird in its silence; she had no watch or clock to beguile her with its ticking, or to let her know how the slow hours were passing.

To-night she did not go upstairs to her loft, because she could not leave the dog. So, keeping the fire burning for the sake of companionship, she wrapped herself in the coat she had been mending, and lay down on the settle to rest.

But she had kept vigil on the previous night, from a fanciful dread lest harm should befall the stranger guest beneath their roof. She knew her grandfather’s disposition well, and that the old man would be quite capable of turning the stranger out in the night if the idea came into his head, so she had kept awake, in order to frustrate any design of the kind.

On this second night she also decided to keep watch, to see that Pip wanted for nothing. But healthy girls of seventeen cannot keep awake always.

Very soon the Lone House grew more silent still, the fire sank to a bed of red coals, which turned by slow degrees to white ashes. The laboured respiration of the dog grew intermittent and feeble, finally ceasing entirely. But Nell slumbered on in blissful unconsciousness until the morning sun threw broad beams of light across the uncleared supper-table, the spent fire, and the dead dog; then, with a little cry, she started into wakefulness.