If you had asked the first five people on the Littimer Estate what they thought of the lord of the soil you would have had a different answer from every one. One woman would have said that a kinder and better man never lived; her neighbour would have declared Lord Littimer to be as hard as the nether millstone. Farmer George would rate him a jolly good fellow, and tell how he would sit in the kitchen over a mug of ale; whilst Farmer John swore at his landlord as a hard-fisted, grasping miser devoid of the bowels of compa.s.sion.

At the end of an hour you would be utterly bewildered, not knowing what to believe, and prepared to set the whole village down as a lot of gossips who seemed to mind everything but its own business. And, perhaps, Lord Littimer might come riding through on his big black horse, small, lithe, brown as mahogany, and with an eye piercing as a diamond-drill. One day he looked almost boyishly young, there would be a smile on his tanned face. And then another day he would be bent in the saddle, huddled up, wizened, an old, old man, crushed with the weight of years and sorrow.

In sooth he was a man of moods and contradictions, changeable as an April sky, and none the less quick-tempered and hard because he knew that everybody was terribly afraid of him. And he had a tongue, too, a lashing, cutting tongue that burnt and blistered. Sometimes he would be quite meek and angry under the reproaches of the vicar, and yet the same day history records it that he got off his horse and administered a sound thrashing to the village poacher. Sometimes he got the best of the vicar, and sometimes that worthy man scored. They were good friends, these two, though the vicar never swerved in his fealty to Lady Littimer, whose cause he always championed. But n.o.body seemed to know anything about that dark scandal. They knew that there had been a dreadful scene at the castle seven years before, and that Lady Littimer and her son had left never to return. Lady Littimer was in a madhouse somewhere, they said, and the son was a wanderer on the face of the earth. And when Lord Littimer died every penny of the property, the castle included, would go to her ladyship's nephew, Mr. Reginald Henson.

In spite of the great cloud that hung over the family Lord Littimer did not seem to have changed. He was just a little more caustic than ever, his tongue a little sharper. The servants could have told a different story, a story of dark moods and days when the bitterness of the shadow of death lay on the face of their master. Few men could carry their grief better, and because Littimer carried his grief so well he suffered the more. We shall see what the sorrow was in time.

There are few more beautiful places in England than Littimer Castle.

The house stood on a kind of natural plateau with many woods behind, a trout stream ran clean past the big flight of steps leading to the hall, below were terrace after terrace of hanging gardens, and to the left a sloping, ragged drop of 200ft into the sea. To the right lay a magnificently-timbered park, with a herd of real wild deer--perhaps the only herd of this kind in the country. When the sun shone on the grey walls they looked as if they had been painted by some cunning hand, so softly were the greys and reds and blues blended.

Inside the place was a veritable art gallery. There were hundreds of pictures and engravings there. All round the grand staircase ran a long, deep corridor, filled with pictures. There were alcoves here fitted up as sitting-rooms, and in most of them some gem or another was hung. When the full flood of electric light was turned on at night the effect was almost dazzling. There were few pictures in the gallery without a history.

Lord Littimer had many hobbies, but not one that interested him like this. There were hundreds of rare birds shot by him in different parts of the world; the corridors and floors were covered by skins, the spoil of his rifle; here and there a stuffed bear pranced startlingly; but the pictures and prints were the great amus.e.m.e.nt of his lordship's lonely life.

He pa.s.sed along the corridor now towards the great oriel window at the end. A brilliant sunlight filled the place with shafts of golden and blue and purple as it came filtered through the stained gla.s.s. At a table in the window a girl sat working a typewriter. She might have pa.s.sed for beautiful, only her hair was banded down in hideously Puritan fashion on each side of her delicate, oval face, her eyes were shielded by spectacles. But they were lovely, steady, courageous blue eyes, as Littimer did not fail to observe. Also he had not failed to note that his new secretary could do very well without the gla.s.ses.

The typewriter and secretary business was a new whim of Littimer's. He wanted an a.s.sistant to catalogue and cla.s.sify his pictures and prints, and he had told the vicar so. He wanted a girl who wasn't a fool, a girl who could amuse him and wouldn't be afraid of him, and he thought he would have an American. To which the vicar responded that the whole thing was nonsense, but he had heard of a Boston girl in England who had a pa.s.sion for that kind of thing and who was looking for a situation of the kind in a genuine old house for a year or so. The vicar added that he had not seen the young lady, but he could obtain her address. A reply came in due course, a reply that so pleased the impetuous Earl that he engaged the applicant on the spot. And now she had been just two hours in the house.

"Well," Littimer cried, "and how have you been getting on?"

Miss Christabel Lee looked up, smilingly.

"I am getting on very well indeed," she said. "You see, I have made a study of this kind of thing all my lifetime, and most of your pictures are like old friends to me. Do you know, I fancy that you and I are going to manage very well together?"

"Oh, do you? They say I am pretty formidable at times."

"I shan't mind that a bit. You see, my father was a man with a villainous temper. But a woman can always get the better of a bad-tempered man unless he happens to be one of the lower cla.s.ses who uses his boots. If he is a gentleman you have him utterly at your mercy.

Have you a sharp tongue?"

"I flatter myself I can be pretty blistering on occasions," Littimer said, grimly.

"How delightful! So can I. You and I will have some famous battles later on. Only I warn you that I never lose my temper, which gives me a tremendous advantage. I haven't been very well lately, so you must be nice to me for a week or two."

Littimer smiled and nodded. The grim lord of the castle was not accustomed to this kind of thing, and he was telling himself that he rather liked it.

"And now show me the Rembrandt," Miss Lee said, impatiently.

Littimer led the way to a distant alcove lighted from the side by a latticed window. There was only one picture in the excellent light there, and that was the famous Rembrandt engraving. Littimer's eyes lighted up quite lovingly as they rested upon it. The Florentine frame was hung so low that Miss Lee could bring her face on a level with it.

"This is the picture that was stolen from you?" she asked.

"Yes, that's the thing that there was all the fuss about. It made a great stir at the time. But I don't expect that it will happen again."

"Why not?" Miss Lee asked. "When an attempt of that sort is made it is usually followed by another, sometimes after the lapse of years. Anybody getting through that window could easily get the frame from its two nails and take out the paper."

"Do you think so?" Littimer asked, uneasily.

"I am certain of it. Take my advice and make it secure. The panels behind are hard wood--thick black oak. Lord Littimer, I am going to get four bra.s.s-headed stays and drive them through some of the open ornamental work into the panel so as to make the picture quite secure. It is an iron frame, I suppose."

"Wrought-iron, gilt," said Littimer. "Yes, one could easily drive four bra.s.s-headed stays through the open work and make the thing safe. I'll have it seen to."

But Miss Lee insisted that there was no time like the present. She had discovered that Littimer had an excellent carpenter's shop on the premises; indeed, she admitted to being no mean performer with the lathe herself. She flitted down the stairs light as thistledown.

"A charming girl!" Littimer said, cynically. "I wonder why she came to this dull hole? A quarrel with her young man, perhaps. If I were a young man myself I might--But women are all the same. I should be a happier man if I had never trusted one. If--"

The face darkened; a heavy scowl lined his brows as he paced up and down. Christabel came back presently with hammer and some bra.s.s-headed stays in her hand.

"Don't utterly destroy the frame," Littimer said, resignedly. "It is reputed to be Quentin Matsy's work, and I had it cut to its present fashion. I'll go to the end of the gallery till the execution's over."

"On the contrary," Miss Lee said, firmly, "you will stay where you are told."

A little to his own surprise Littimer remained. He saw the nails driven firmly in and finished off with a punch so that there might be no danger of hammering the exquisitely wrought frame. Miss Lee stood regarding her work with a suggestion of pride.

"There," she said, "I flatter myself a carpenter could have done no better."

"You don't know our typical carpenter," Littimer said. "Here is Tredwell with a telegram. For Miss Lee? I hope it isn't an intimation that some relative has died and left you a fortune. At least, if it is, you mustn't go until we've had one of those quarrels you promised me."

Christabel glanced at the telegram and slipped it into her pocket. There were just a few words in the telegram that would have been unintelligible to the ordinary understanding. The girl did not even comprehend, but Littimer's eyes were upon her, and the cipher had to keep for a time. Littimer walked away at an intimation that his steward desired to see him.

Instantly the girl's manner changed. She glanced at the Rembrandt with a shrewd smile that meant something beyond a mere act of prudence well done. Then she went down to the library and began an eager search for a certain book. She found it at length, the "David Copperfield" in the "Charles d.i.c.kens" edition of the great novelist's works. For the next hour or so she was flitting over the pages with the cipher telegram spread out before her. A little later and the few jumbled, meaningless words were coded out into a lengthy message. Christabel read them over a few times, then with the aid of a vesta she reduced the whole thing, telegram and all, to tinder, which she carefully crushed and flung out of the window.

She looked away down the terrace, she glanced at the dappled deer knee-deep in the bracken, she caught a glimpse of the smiling sea, and her face saddened for a moment.

"How lovely it all is," she murmured. "How exquisitely beautiful and how utterly sad! And to think that if I possessed the magician's wand for a moment I could make everything smile again. He is a good man--a better man than anybody takes him to be. Under his placid, cynical surface he conceals a deal of suffering. Well, we shall see."

She replaced the "Copperfield" on the shelf and turned to go again.

In the hall she met Lord Littimer dressed for riding. He smiled as she pa.s.sed.

"Au revoir till dinner-time," he said. "I've got to go and see a tenant.

Oh, yes, I shall certainly expect the pleasure of your company to dinner.

And now that the Rembrandt--"

"It is safe for the afternoon," Christabel laughed. "It is generally when the family are dining that the burglar has his busy time. A pleasant ride to you."

CHAPTER XXVI

AN UNEXPECTED GUEST

Lord Littimer returned, as he declared, with the spirits and appet.i.te of a schoolboy. All the same, he did not for one moment abandon his usual critical a.n.a.lysis. He rattled on gaily, but he was studying his guest all the same. She might have been the typical American lady student; but he was not blind to the fact that the plain muslin and lace frock she wore was made in Paris or that her manners and style must have been picked up in the best society. She sat there under the shaded lights and behind the bank of flowers like as to the manner born, and her accent was only sufficiently American to render her conversation piquant.

"You have always been used to this cla.s.s of life?" Littimer asked.

"There you are quite mistaken," Christabel said, coolly. "For the last few years my existence has been anything but a bed of roses. And your remark, my lord, savours slightly of impertinent curiosity. I might as well ask you why your family is not here."