The House of Strange Secrets.

by A. Eric Bayly.

CHAPTER I

THE STRANGE AFFAIR ON THE LONELY MOOR

"Squire Carrington's carriage, this way, please," proclaimed this magnificent powdered footman wearing the Marquis of Moorland's livery.

His stentorian tones echoing from the porch, over which were suspended the n.o.bleman's arms, interrupted an edifying conversation between Squire Carrington's coachman and the individual who presided over another local dignitary's stables, both of whom, with their carriages, had taken refuge from the inclement weather beneath the stately ash trees which were the pride of their n.o.ble owner and his gardener (by the way, a far more important personage).

"Well, good e'ning to yer, Mr. Wilkes," remarked the Carrington coachman, flicking up his horses; "I'll tell yer some more about the ole man and 'is hexentricities next time I 'ave the pleasure of renooing our acquaintance." And wrapping his topcoat round him, so as to shield his valuable carcase from the drizzling rain, the venerable retainer in charge of Mr. Harold Carrington's spirited greys turned his horses'

heads and drew up the carriage--a coach of out-of-date pattern--at the front door, which had been held open for two gentlemen in evening dress who were effecting an early departure from the annual ball given by the Marquis to all the neighbouring gentry.

The elder of the two was an extremely tall, cadaverous, and grizzled man of perhaps sixty years of age. This was Squire Carrington himself, the owner of the manse, situate in the neighbouring village of Northden; while his companion was his only son, Laurence, a handsome young fellow of two-and-twenty, quite as tall as his father, but, unlike Mr.

Carrington, senior, well built and of athletic appearance.

The elder man paused for a moment in the porch.

To the casual observer he would have appeared to be b.u.t.toning his glove, but to the keen eye of Laurence it seemed that the cause of the older gentleman's sudden stop was to give himself an opportunity of peering nervously into the night before taking the few steps necessary to reach the carriage waiting outside. This scrutiny being evidently satisfactory, Mr. Carrington hurried forward, entered the vehicle, and ensconced himself in the far corner. Laurence followed, after taking a glance back at the capacious hall, brilliantly lighted with fairy lamps and thronged with vivacious ladies and laughing men on their way to or from the supper rooms.

The front door closed, shutting out the gay scene from the young man's gaze. The coachman whipped up his horses, and in a moment the carriage was bowling down the dark avenue, presently emerging into the rain and the high road beyond.

"Shame to leave so awfully early," muttered Laurence, leaning back on the comfortable cushions and lighting a cigarette.

"You know my reasons," answered Mr. Carrington. "I--well, I don't like to have the carriage out too late, and, besides, it's twelve o'clock already."

"Twelve o'clock, yes; just the best time, dad, you know it is! And why couldn't I have walked home or got a lift in the Everards' waggonette, as I suggested? Another of these absurd fears of yours, I suppose. My dear dad, what on earth would the people say if they learned that you, a J.P., magistrate, and all the rest of it, were actually frightened out of your life of burglars?"

"Laurence, you must not speak like that, nor take advantage of my little--er--weakness." And the old gentleman relapsed into a silence broken only by the patter of the rain on the carriage windows and the clatter of the horses' hoofs on the macadam road.

"Nice girl, that Miss Scott!" Laurence remarked, after a long pause; "not extraordinary pretty, but there's something awfully taking about her. Did you see her hair? Of course you didn't. But it was something worth seeing--a ma.s.s of golden tresses. I never saw anything like it.

And her smile! I danced five times with her--all waltzes; but I suppose that was not wrong, eh? She's clever, and no mistake, for a girl her age. I don't suppose she's more than nineteen."

"Born in 1867, that is twenty-five years old now," mumbled Mr.

Carrington half aloud.

"Twenty-five, Dad! How on earth do you know her age?" exclaimed the young man in tones of surprise.

"What--what? Did I speak? Oh, nothing. I was just then rather deep in my thoughts."

"'Pon my word," said Laurence, "I believe you're getting into your second dotage, Daddy."

The old gentleman did not reply. He seemed too occupied with his own meditations to take any notice of his son's further remarks either upon the festivities at the Marquis's house or the young lady who had attracted him to no small degree, and whose praises he continued to sing throughout the first part of the eight miles' drive to Northden.

Those who are acquainted with that part of the North Riding of Yorkshire in which the village mentioned lies will recollect that the road between Northden and the Marquis of Moorland's seat runs for some little distance along the east edge of the extensive moor, from which, at a prehistoric period, some ancestor of the august owner of the neighbouring country took his t.i.tle. The Carrington carriage was halfway across this stretch of heath--the most deserted part of the route--when the coachman suddenly became aware of the fact that some other vehicle or person was closely following in his rear. Turning round in his seat, he glared into the darkness behind, and fancied that he discerned the figure of a man on horseback riding immediately behind the carriage.

He thought nothing of this, deciding that the fellow-traveller was either a mounted postman riding home, or some country doctor who had been called out at a late hour to visit a patient in some distant part of his large district of practice.

For some reason or other, however, the coachman happened to glance back again a minute or two later, when he was astounded beyond measure to see that the supposed man on horseback was a cyclist, and that, with what the coachman set down as "confounded impidence," he was riding alongside the coach, and cautiously peering in through the steam-coated window at the occupants of the carriage!

Now, James Moggin was a servant who had no little respect for the person of his lord and master (though he did occasionally allude to him in conversing with particularly intimate acquaintances as the "ole man"), and this cyclist's action he considered a dastardly outrage upon the privacy of Mr. Carrington and his son. He therefore drew up suddenly, and seizing his whip, intended, in his own words, to give the misdemeanant "a 'elp on 'is way." But though he did not know it, by so doing he gave the inquisitive cyclist the opportunity he needed.

The dark figure on the machine, pedalling suddenly forward, made his way in front of the carriage, dismounted lightly, and threw down the cycle upon the ground in such a way that the horses could not proceed without stepping upon it. Moggin, perforce, drew up hurriedly, and bent forward in an endeavour to scrutinise the features of the strange bicyclist. In the darkness he was unable to perceive more than the mere outline of his form, but even that was sufficient to cause his feelings of surprise to give way to a sensation of horror. There was something strange, what he did not know, about the man who had so suddenly and silently compelled him to draw up in the dreariest part of the great bare moor. He shuddered, and noticed that the horses were both trembling.

Meanwhile let us return to the inmates of the carriage.

Laurence had vainly endeavoured to draw his father into conversation, but the old man seemed so engrossed in his meditations that his son eventually ceased from lamenting Mr. Carrington's peculiar behaviour, and gave himself up to the enjoyment of his cigarette and pleasant thoughts, in which the central figure was none other than Miss Selene Scott, his newly made acquaintance.

Of a sudden the old man sprang up in his seat, and clutched wildly at Laurence's arm.

"Good heavens!" he cried in accents demonstrative of mortal dread, "did you see that face at the window?"

"Don't be absurd, Dad," exclaimed Laurence somewhat angrily, "if you scream like that, old Moggin will be getting down to see if I'm murdering you. Gracious me," he added after a pause, "what's the fellow stopping for?"

The young man did not have to wait long for an answer to his last question. With startling suddenness the right-hand window of the vehicle was struck by something outside that could not be seen owing to the steam. A loud clatter of falling gla.s.s ensued, and for a moment a large jagged hole in the pane yawned at them. Then in this s.p.a.ce there appeared first a hideous-looking dark face, and then, when that portion of the intruder's anatomy was withdrawn, a long, bony hand gripping a c.o.c.ked revolver which was directed precisely at Squire Carrington's head.

The report of a shot rang out, and almost simultaneously the opposite window gla.s.s smashed amid a terrific din. Through the smoke that filled the carriage Laurence turned and looked at his father. With a low moan, the Squire had flung up his hands and fallen forward senseless upon the floor!

CHAPTER II

THE MAN THAT DISAPPEARED

Now, whatever his enemies (if he has any) may say against James Moggin, no one can deny the fact that, for a man of his age, his behaviour on the night when his carriage was "held up" on the North Moor was meritorious. On discovering that the "impident rascal" had deliberately broken one of the coach windows with the b.u.t.t of a pistol, the worthy coachman's rage knew no bounds. Leaving his well trained but trembling horses, and still clasping the whip in his hand, he scrambled down from the box and fell upon the cyclist in the rear.

To speak more accurately, the latter individual fell back into his arms, an action on his part caused by Mr. Laurence having risen in the carriage and aimed a powerful blow with his fist at the face that had a second time appeared at the cracked window.

Moggin, had he flung down his whip, might easily have held the a.s.sailant until the arrival of Laurence, who was fumbling with the catch that fastened the carriage door, and which had been in some way jammed by a piece of broken window gla.s.s. As it was, the audacious cyclist managed in the dark to wriggle himself out of the coachman's clutches and reach the spot where his bicycle lay.

Laurence alighted from the carriage with unbecoming haste, only in time to see the dusky figure of the highwayman throw his leg lightly over the saddle of his machine, and bound forward past the vehicle again with the dexterity of an accomplished rider. He noticed that his garments fluttered out behind him in a peculiar manner.

In his evening clothes and thin dancing "pumps," with the roads an inch thick in mud and puddles, young Carrington knew that pursuit was useless. Even if he requisitioned one of the terrified horses, he realised that the man would have disappeared from sight before the operation of unharnessing could be accomplished. One thing he did--that was to seize the whip from Moggin's hand, and, taking a couple of steps forward, cut sharply at the retreating form with the long lash. The blow went home, for the fellow gave utterance to a hoa.r.s.e cry of pain. Even in that exclamation, both Carrington and the coachman were conscious of something unnatural and horrible.

And thus it was that the mysterious creature on the bicycle disappeared into the blackness of the night.

Laurence waited until he had the dissatisfaction of witnessing the hasty departure of the unwelcome visitor; then he turned to the open-mouthed and shivering Moggin.

"Let us now see what has happened to your master," he said abruptly.

The two men hurried back to the carriage and carefully stepped inside.

Mr. Carrington was lying in precisely the same position as when Laurence had left him.