The Weeping Ash (53 page)

Sweating and silent, the men continued to pull. At last Callow's feet appeared above the coping, and all who could reach him laid hold of his body. He was dragged backward over the edge, gasping, dark red in the face with effort and the effect of being upside down for so long, his temples bulging, his eyes bloodshot—but he still grimly grasped the handles of the tongs, and now, with triumph, drew into sight the damp swaddle bundle, wriggling and crying, that was little Thomas, horribly dirty and muddy but indubitably safe and alive. Fanny rushed forward and received the shrieking child in her arms, while Lord Egremont was exclaiming, “Well done! Capitally done, my good fellow!” and the other men were thumping Callow on the back and congratulating him as they untied his ropes. He stood smiling sheepishly, and Fanny, having ascertained that the child seemed unhurt, save for some bruises and scratches, handed Thomas over to Jemima and went forward to clasp Callow's hand and to thank him, over and over.

“And you too, Lord Egremont—oh, I shall remember this to my dying day! I cannot express—”

“Phoo, phoo, my dear,” he said, laughing good-naturedly. “Brats will always be getting into these scrapes, as I know full well! There was never a day when mine were not up a tree or locked in a stable or being fished out of some pond—and still it is so, indeed! Is the little fellow unhurt, ma'am?”

“Yes, I think so—but it is
very
strange,” Fanny said, frowning, puzzling over the contradictions of the affair. “He appears unhurt because he was so tightly swaddled around with cradle cloths—and that was how Callow was able to drag him up, I imagine—but that means he
could
not have fallen from his cradle. He must have been taken up and carried by somebody.”

There was a silent pause while Lord Egremont considered this anomaly. Most of the group, the excitement now being over, had begun to trickle away. Jem silently returned the ropes and tools to the shed. Goble had disappeared on his own concerns. Bet, Jemima, and Mrs. Strudwick carried little Thomas back to the house to wash him and tend him. Tess, at a word from Fanny, ran off to summon Dr. Chilgrove. The Petworth House servants escorted the unfortunate Callow away, presumably back to his place of incarceration. But Lord Egremont still stood scratching his head, his eyes on the heavy well cover which had been lowered back into place.

“Are you aware of any who might wish your husband ill, ma'am?” he asked abruptly, at length.

“Well,” faltered Fanny, “you must know, my lord, that his profession carries with it certain unpopularity—”

“Yes; but hardly to
this
degree!”

Fanny then recollected what had occurred earlier that afternoon, on the pleasant visit to Lady Montague, which had been quite driven from her mind by the accident.

“Curiously enough,” she said doubtfully, “I was warned—this very day, indeed—that Thomas has an enemy in the town—two enemies. One is—was—I believe—his children's former governess where they lived before—a Miss Fox—but this is only hearsay.”

From Lord Egremont's expression it was plain that he hardly considered an ex-governess capable of throwing a baby down a well.

“Some old maid at her last prayers! No, no, I do not believe a Miss Fox would do such a thing. Who was the other person, then, ma'am?”

“My informant did not know,” Fanny told him.

“Captain Paget is still in London, I understand?”

“Yes, sir—thank God! I must beg that you will not—will not refine too much upon this occurrence, sir, when talking to him. He will be so—so very angry—” Fanny's voice trembled as she thought of Thomas's probable reaction. His heir, his treasure, thus at risk! Whoever had done the deed certainly knew how to gauge Thomas's vulnerable spot to a nicety.

“Well—I will reflect on the matter,” Lord Egremont said at length. “And will talk to your husband on his return. Do not put yourself in a taking, my dear—I will not agitate him unduly! I know he tends to be a trifle sidy, as we say in these parts. But now—do not you be standing any longer in the rain, or you will be laid up like my Liz.”

Fanny felt that she ought to ask him in and offer him a glass of wine, but he walked off unceremoniously, giving her a friendly smile and nod.

“Oh, pray give dear Liz my love—my best love!” she called impulsively after him. He waved his hat in reply and disappeared around the bend in the lane.

Fanny moved slowly toward the house. By now dusk was beginning to shroud the valley; a rare, rainy evening, for that splendid summer, was setting in, wet and windy. Shivering, huddling her cloak around her, Fanny recalled some of the remarks about the Hermitage that she had heard earlier.

“I allus did say this was a proper unked spot…” “
I
wouldn't live in 'er, not for a whole trug o' gold guineas.” Absurd, she had thought at the time; idle talk of villagers who enjoyed scaring themselves with follies. The Hermitage had always felt like a warm and welcoming house to her; she loved it, despite the adversities of her situation, and she felt that it had responded. But now, suddenly, passing the wind-tossed branches of the weeping ash, entering through the garden door, she sensed a different atmosphere—not, exactly, that the house was hostile, but that it was uneasy, mournful,
waiting for something to happen
. I am being fanciful, Fanny thought wearily, pushing back the damp hair from her forehead. I have had a fright and am thinking foolish nonsense, childish fancies; I will put on a warm gown and tidy myself to receive Dr. Chilgrove, and then I will feel better.

It was at that moment that Fanny heard, for the first time, the house give its shriek. She had wondered, earlier, what the man meant when he said, “Ye can hear the house give a skreek”; now, with her own ears, she heard it: an indescribably sad, eerie, keening wail.
Was
it the house, or the ash tree outside moaning in the wind? The sound was repeated twice, then no more. I
must
stop imagining things, Fanny repeated to herself, and went on toward her chamber.

* * *

Thomas returned to Petworth next day. As it chanced, he and Captain Holland stopped first at Petworth House, to report to Lord Egremont on the success of their trip and deposit a quantity of equipment in the tennis court, which had been adapted into a drill hall. Thomas, therefore, heard from Lord Egremont the story of his son's rescue from the well, and Fanny was spared the task of breaking the news to him. He arrived home in a predictably black mood, ready to castigate all the females of the household for not keeping better watch over the baby. Even Mrs. Baggot came in for her share of commination, but she retorted sharply that minding the baby was no part of her duty and so Captain Paget might please to remember. Fanny, overhearing the last part of the dialogue as she came downstairs with the doctor who had called in to inquire how the baby went on, was moved to hope that Thomas might consider what a very inessential part Mrs. Baggot played in the household and revise his decision to keep her on; but the nurse walked off composedly enough, only her high color betraying her vexation, and Thomas, with equally high color, came to put stringent questions to the doctor regarding his son's welfare.

Dr. Chilgrove was reassuring. No: thanks to the thickness of his wrappings, the baby seemed to have sustained remarkably little harm. One of his fists slightly scraped—a bruise or two—and a bit of grit in his eye, which the doctor had removed on the previous evening: these were all his injuries. No concussion, no fractures, and, so far as could be ascertained, no psychological damage.

“Are you
sure
, Doctor?” said Thomas menacingly. “If it should prove otherwise in time to come—when it might be too late to call in more expert advice—”

“Hush, my dear fellow! I will take my affidavit that the child hardly knew he was out of his crib! Infants of that age, you must know, are amazingly impervious to such mishaps; and your great boy is as robust as any I have seen—thanks to the excellent care and principles employed in his rearing,” he added with a bow toward Fanny, who interpreted this, correctly, as an attempt to shield her from Thomas's displeasure.

“That may be,” Thomas snapped nonetheless. “But if
you
”—to Fanny—“had taken him with you on the visit to Lady Mountague, instead of considering only your own selfish enjoyment, the accident would have been averted.”

“No—no—my dear Captain Paget,” said the doctor hastily, “I could not have sanctioned such an excursion—in fact I
did
not, did I, ma'am? Such a long carriage ride—on a warm day—folly, folly! Infants should be kept quiet, not jauntered about the countryside in carriages.” So saying, the doctor made his escape, before becoming further embroiled in domestic dissension.

“I am going to get to the bottom of this business—if I have to call in the Bow Street runners!” declared Thomas ominously, and he summoned all the members of his household into the dining room for an interrogation which soon had most of the females in hysterical tears. However none of his stormings or threats of dismissal could elicit any information regarding the baby's accident.

“Mayhap some piker or mumper or didicai came in and done it,” suggested one of the workmen hopefully.

“Fiddlestick, man! Why should one of the gypsies have a grudge against me?” said Thomas impatiently.

“More like 'tis the liddle maid your own darter as done it,” grunted Daintrey. This brought a chorus of agreement. “Arr! Dunnamany times I seen 'er a-tormenting the babby, time the nurse girl warn't there to frap 'er knuckles.”

“What? You
dare
to suggest that my own child could do such a thing?”

Thomas's wrath was terrible, but it could not modify the popular verdict, and at last, dismissing the servants and workmen to their duties, he turned on Fanny.

“What is this, Frances? You allow my own child to be accused to my face, without speaking a word in her defense?”

As always, his fury made Fanny feel physically sick, but she clenched her hands, digging her nails into her palms, and replied with as much calm as she could muster:

“It is true, Thomas, that Patty has a very jealous, teasing disposition where the baby is concerned, and I have a number of times been obliged to reprimand her quite sharply for disturbing him; but in the present instance I think the accusation is unmerited; I do not believe she is to blame.”

“Oh,
indee
d
? You are graciously pleased to believe that she is not to blame? And on what is this opinion based, may I ask?” Thomas inquired savagely.

“Come upstairs,” Fanny replied, “and we will try a simple test.”

“If I find that the child
is
responsible,” muttered Thomas, following, “I will thrash her until she—If she is responsible, God help her—and God help
you
, for allowing such a situation to develop!”

The baby was in his crib today, with Jemima keeping vigilant watch over him. Patty, whose nettle rash was still present, though abating, kept her bed in the adjoining room, listlessly snipping up lengths of colored silk with scissors which she had purloined from Fanny's workbag. Fanny, anticipating this moment, had purposely refrained from questioning the child about little Thomas's accident and had forbidden Jemima to do so; now she called her stepdaughter:

“Patty, come here to your papa and me a moment; we wish to see how strong you are.”

“Why?” demanded Patty suspiciously at once. However she could not resist a chance to demonstrate her capabilities, and soon came running through the door in her nightgown with a conceited smirk on her face. “What do you wish me to do?” she asked.

“Your papa,” said Fanny, forestalling Thomas, who was about to speak, “does not believe that you are strong enough to lift little Thomas out of his cot. Whereas I am sure that you can.”

“Of course I can!” said Patty proudly, and she ran to the cot and endeavored to hoist out the baby. However, owing to the height of the cot and the very considerable weight of little Thomas, this, in fact, proved quite beyond her power; she could not even raise him off the pillow. After several minutes she had to admit defeat, and Thomas obliged her to desist, saying shortly:

“That will do, child; do not upset the baby any further. Go back to bed. And, Patty,” he added grimly, “if ever I hear of you touching or tormenting little Thomas, I shall give you such a beating—with my belt!—that you will not be able to sit down for a week after. Do you understand?” Crestfallen and frightened, she ran back to her bed and hid under the covers.

Thomas said coldly to Fanny, “That was well thought of, Frances, and should suffice to give the lie to any calumniators who make such a suggestion in future. But it still leaves us with the question of who committed the crime. I can see I shall have to call in the constables.”

Here Bet, who had inquisitively followed upstairs, blurted out:

“But, Lord, Papa, don't you think it very likely that it was Miss Fox who did it? She was such a whining, sneaking, prying miserable creature—it is just the kind of thing she
would
do, I daresay!”

“
Miss Fox?
” Thomas's high color left him completely; he went perfectly white. “Are you clean out of your wits, girl? What should Miss Fox have to do with the matter?—Whom do you mean, in any case? What Miss Fox?”

“Why, you know who I mean, Papa, Miss Fox who used to be our governess. She has come to lodge in the town—we heard so yesterday when we was at Lady Mountague's—did we not, Stepmama?” Bet artlessly divulged, without, however, mentioning that it was her own sister's husband who had mentioned the matter. “So do you not think, Papa, that it is likely—”

But, with an inarticulate exclamation, Thomas had turned and plunged out of the room, leaving the females to stare at each other.