Within That Room! (7 page)

She was informed that it was Mr. Henry Carstairs, an analytical chemist of—“Where? Of Guildford? What address? Yes—address! No, no, not something you wear— Where does he live? Ah—oh—the Nortons, Cherry Tree Rd., Guildford. Thanks, Mr. Thwaite—”

Dick wrote the address down in his notebook, the book resting on Vera's shoulder.

“How did he know is was for sale, Mr. Thwaite? Oh, he didn't? He just guessed it might be when uncle died? I see. No, I may not sell. Just considering. Yes, thanks. Goodbye!”

Vera hung the instrument up.

“Did you get it?” she asked, and Dick nodded.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

DECISION

They squeezed out of the box and went into the hot morning sunshine again.

“Well, mastermind, what happens now? Nothing very extraordinary about the business, is there? Henry Carstairs knew my uncle had died and so offered £15,000 for the castle.”

“But why,” Dick mused, “should an analytical chemist want to buy a castle, complete with ghost?”

“Don't ask me. Maybe he has ideas about an institution, or something. Anyway, I don't see what's to prevent me selling the place.”

“You've changed round a lot since you said you wanted to carry on and see what the mystery was about.”

“That was before I'd had that awful experience.”

“Well, there's nothing to prevent you from selling the place. In fact, that is probably what Henry Carstairs wants you too do—he and the Falworths.”

Vera came to a stop, frowning. She gave Dick a very direct gaze.

“Where is the connection between the Falworths and Henry Carstairs?”

“Pure deduction. The Falworths love that place so much they are prepared to stay without salary. That, to me, makes them seem suspicious. If the Falworths want you out of that place and for some reason want to buy it themselves, do you think they'd be idiots enough to try to buy it under their own name? Even granting they have £15,000 to throw about, which I doubt. They'd be more likely to get somebody else to make the bid for them—somebody with plenty of money. And I think—without proof, I admit—that Carstairs may be working in league with the Falworths. It's odd that he alone should make an offer.”

“Why is it?” Vera sounded as though she were trying to be argumentative, though to do her justice she was not. “He lives in Guildford—quite near to you in Godalming. He must have seen the castle many a time and no doubt even knew my uncle. Probably when he heard of his death, through the local papers no doubt, he decided on an investment.”

“Unless the Falworths sent him news of the death, which accounts for him being so quick on the draw.”

“Well, all right, if you want it that way. Anyhow, I feel like selling.”

Dick halted and caught the girl's hand. She halted, too, then as he motioned to the grassy bank by the side of the makeshift road to Sunny Acres she draped herself gracefully beside him.

“Look, Vera, this is really none of my business.” He looked at her with intense seriousness. “You are perfectly entitled to do as you like with Sunny Acres, but surely you can see that if it is worth £15,000 of somebody's money, it is probably worth a good deal more.”

“Must it? I'm not very good at figures.”

“Then I'll try and explain....” Dick moved closer to her until he could smell the perfume wafting from her hair.

“It's a heck of a lot of money for a dump like that, even with the land round it. The evil spirit and legend alone knock about £5,000 off a price like that. I'll tell you what I think. I believe that this old castle you've inherited contains some mighty powerful money-making secret which the Falworths have stumbled upon, perhaps by accident; and they are using every means they can, short of actually killing you, to get you out! They want to uproot you legally, to make you go of your own accord. Once that is done and the property is signed away, they can expand, in league with the mysterious Henry Carstairs. You see?”

“Hmmm,” Vera sat on the grassy bank and gazed reflectively at the cumulus drifting over the blue heaven. Under such conditions it was hard to dwell upon the depredations of the Falworths.

“You see?” Dick insisted.

“Yes, Dick, I see. And it would give them a nasty shock if I told them I had decided not to sell, wouldn't it?”

“It would do more than that; it would bring matters to a head in earnest. Two things might happen: either they would quit and give the whole mysterious scheme the go-by—which seems most unlikely when I recall Mrs. Falworth's dogged jaw; or else they might go to the limit to scare the living daylights out of you, and me, too. But if we know what's coming we'll be prepared for it.”

“Just the same, Dick, I couldn't stand another experience like the one we had in that room. I'd sooner run for my life, and I admit it.”

“And let them lick you?”

“Not them. It!”

They were quiet again, the soft breeze playing caprices with Vera's golden curls. Dick frowned into the sunny distances and then began to count on his fingers.

“One—an analytical chemist; two, queer doings in the cellar; three, castle built over an ancient volcanic seam; four, rotten smell—by gosh, I wonder!”

“Wonder what?” Vera turned lazy blue eyes towards him.

“Just an idea that's struck me, Vera, we've got to see what goes on in that cellar! The locked one, I mean. Yes, I know it looked all right when I looked over it, but that may only have been because the machinery the Falworths are using is dismantled when they've done their work. Some time or other they are bound to resume their activities down there, and when they do we must see that they're doing.... Are you game?”

“Of course. As long as you'll stand by me, I'll stick to it.”

“Right! We're going straight back to Sunny Acres and watch Mrs. Falworth's face when you tell her you're not selling.”

Mrs. Falworth, however, was too accomplished in the art of schooling her emotions to seem disturbed when Vera made her announcement during lunch. The housekeeper took the statement in absolute calm. The only change visible was slight clenching of her fingers and the creeping of a hard glitter into her dark eyes.

“I suppose, miss, it is useless for me to tell you that by your decision you have signed your own death warrant?” she asked coldly.

“Quite!” Vera answered. “And if you wish to leave, the opportunity is still open.”

“I prefer to remain faithful to my duty, madam.”

“Do you think we are so young that we're plain crazy, Mrs. Falworth?” Dick asked her bluntly. “You are in this castle because it suits you to be in it, and all that bunk about duty doesn't mean a thing. You are here for some vital, impelling reason, and you don't care what you do or whom you hurt so long as you make your plans work out right!”

“I am afraid, sir, I do not understand.”

Mrs. Falworth stood quite still, her smoldering eyes fixed on Dick's face.

“You will,” he promised. “That is, if you keep on behaving as you have been doing. This property is not going to be sold, and you can make up your mind to the fact that before we're finished it will have given up every secret it possesses. Every corner, every room, will be cleaned out, and the myth of this legend and the evil spirit will be exploded. As a commencement we intend to resume our investigation of the horror-room this evening.”

“You have courage,” the woman admitted. “Both of you.”

“According to my study of this place,” Dick went on, “from
The History of Sunny Acres
, the ghost—”

“You have read that book?” the housekeeper interrupted.

“Yes.” Dick's eyes met hers again. “I took it out of the library last night, and I found it most interesting, not to say mysterious. One plate has been torn out—a plan of the castle and a map of the surrounding district. I presume you don't know anything about it?”

“Why should I?” But there was a definite hint of consternation in her face.

“Anyway, to go back to the ghost. It says it has been known to appear on the 20
th
and 22
nd
of June as well as on the 21
st
. This evening being the 20
th
it is a good chance to see if it proves to be accommodating.”

“I see. And if it should appear, sir, what do you intend to do?”

“Find out what makes it tick!” Dick retorted. “There has to be a reason, and I mean to find it.”

“As you wish,” the woman shrugged; then as though there were no such things as ghosts she asked, “Would you care for some more coffee, sir?”

Dick nodded, and glanced across at Vera. She was looking at the housekeeper intently, studying her every expression. It was quite clear that she was having a hard struggle to keep herself in check.

The lunch ended without any further exchange of words. To Vera and Dick there seemed to be nothing else on hand at the moment except another walk in the fresh air—but instead of wandering aimlessly they turned it to advantage. At three o'clock they called on Dr. Gillingham in Waylock Dean's main street. He was a small, composed man with a very high forehead and shrewd gray eyes. About him there hung that elusive odor of iodine and ether inseparable from a physician.

“Sorry to bother you, doctor,” Dick apologised, as Dr. Gillingham came into the waiting room in his white smock. “It happens to be rather important though.”

“No bother at all,” Dr. Gillingham reassured him. “These are not surgery hours, you know. What's the trouble?”

“I'm Vera Grantham,” Vera explained, as she shook hands. “My uncle was Cyrus Merriforth—”

“Oh, indeed! Yes, Cyrus of Sunny Acres. Quite a character, too! He mentioned you to me once or twice. Seemed to have quite a high opinion of your gallantry while in the A.T.S.”

“Oh—it was nothing.... Suppose we forget all about me. It's my uncle I want to speak to you about. What did he die of?”

“Heart failure.”

“I suppose,” Vera ventured, “there couldn't be any possibility of a mistake?”

“Oh!” Dr. Gillingham seemed amused. “I value my reputation, Miss Grantham. Your uncle's heart had not been too strong for some time, dating from his unpleasant experience with the Sunny Acres' ghost.”

“That's what we want to get at,” Dick broke in. “Miss Grantham and I are up against that phantom in earnest—or at any rate the evil power it seems to radiate. Do you think it is possible that Mr. Merriforth would still be alive but for that terrible experience he had?”

“I would say there is little doubt of it,” Dr. Gillingham answered with conviction. “I knew him well. He came to me regularly for examination before starting on his expeditions abroad. He was a hard, sinewy man with a heart as strong as an ox's. Then one evening last summer I received an urgent call from Mrs. Falworth, his housekeeper. To my amazement I found him raving with delirium, suffering from a high fever, and his heart in a very dangerous state. We got him back to a fair state of health, but he was never quote the same man again. When I heard of his sudden death, I was not surprised.”

“What,” Vera asked, “do you think of Mrs. Falworth?”

“I imagine that she is a most efficient housekeeper. Your uncle had nothing bud praise for her. She is, I admit, a somber and forbidding person, but after ten years in Sunny Acres one can hardly expect much else.”

“I suppose,” Dick persisted, “Uncle Cyrus didn't call in the police after his adventure with the psychic world?”

CHAPTER TWELVE

FLASHING GLIMPSE

De. Gillingham looked surprised. “The police? What reason would he have for that? Merriforth knew that Sunny Acres possesses a ghost. He put down his own misfortune to his curiosity. No thought of police ever entered his mind.”

“A pity,” Dick said. “You see, I believe that Mr. Merriforth was murdered! Cleverly, inhumanly—and if one can put it this way, legally. No charge could be brought against anybody, because the whole plot is more or less foolproof. But I am convinced that his death was—engineered.”

Dr. Gillingham registered an expression of shocked surprise, for a moment, then he fell to thought. Finally he spoke.

“You're making a dangerous statement, Mr. Wilmott, and for your own sake I shouldn't let it go any further. Sunny Acres has had a ghost for fifty years. The whole district knows about it—the simian ears, the demon's head, the curved tail—”

“I know, but the evil influence directly responsible for the death of Merriforth never existed prior to the time he encountered it! Formerly, the ghost produced no dangerous results beyond just appearing. I believe that the terror angle is created, and I am helping Miss Grantham to try to find the truth. We ourselves have just barely managed to escape a similar onslaught.”

“How very strange! Well, maybe there was some chicanery connected with Merriforth's death—I cannot say. Legally he died from heart failure, and there my responsibility ends.”

From his manner the interview was obviously at a close.

“You've been very kind, doctor,” Vera said gratefully. “We just wanted to make sure how my uncle died. Later on maybe we'll be able to tell you
why
he died. Thanks again.”

She shook the doctor's hand and Dick followed suit. Soon they were out in the sunlight again, walking thoughtfully along the street.

“Yes, it's clever,” Dick reflected, “very clever! We can't prove that your uncle was murdered, Vera, and if you or I die the same way no one could prove that to be murder either! It would all be put down to psychic phenomena.”

“I should go easy on calling it murder,” Vera said, “until we've got some proof that the malign influence is caused by material means.... Just what good did it do to eliminate uncle anyway?”

Dick said: “I can only assume that the Falworths got rid of your uncle under the impression that his death would release the castle for sale if the executors of the will were agreeable. Then they discovered that you had inherited it—or maybe they knew of it already if your uncle had mentioned you to them—so they figured that you would be more concerned with selling the castle than living in it. When they found otherwise, they tried to get rid of you in the same way they had got rid of your uncle.”

“Yes, it all fits in,” Vera agreed, “even though you seem to be taking a lot for granted. But why, Dick? What has that castle got to warrant murdering the owners?”

“That,” Dick said, “is the problem we have to solve. But once let me get the evidence I want, and I'll pay that woman Falworth out for everything! I don't forget how your brain and nerves went in that room, how you clutched at the dust in an effort to crawl out. Nobody's going to do that to you and get away with it!”

They both became quiet for a moment. In the bright sunlight of Waylock Dean, the terror of that room in Sunny Acres seemed like something of a distant world—but for a moment Dick had brought it all back in all its venomous nakedness. Through his apparent levity Vera could sense the deep, warm regard he had for her, his outraged horror at the nameless thing that had struck her down.

“You realize that we shall go with our lives in our hands again this evening, don't you?” Vera asked.

“I know—but we'll not be such fools this time. A mere glimpse of the ghost is all we want. We won't go straight into the middle of the room and stand looking round. If the ghost is there this evening, it will certainly be there tomorrow evening, and by then we will have devised some scheme or other....”

Dick broke off, laughing suddenly as they wandered along the road towards sunny Acres. Abruptly his emotions seemed to have performed an about-turn.

“To heck with the ghost!” he said. “I'm sick and tired of it—for the moment, anyway. There are other things I want to know.”

“Such as?”

“About you, for instance. All I know about you is that you come from Manchester, own a castle with a spook, and are mighty independent. What other information have you got?”

They settled under the shadow of a giant oak and Vera said:

“My parents are dead, the Blitz took care of that.”

“Oh! I'm sorry, Vera. I'm in the same boat. The Southampton air raids got my people.... Well, anything else? Is there any genuine boy friend hanging about who is keeping me out?”

“No,” Vera answered. “I'm quite truthful about that, Dick. You are the only boy with whom I've ever had such close acquaintance—and for a first attempt, it's pretty satisfactory. I'm the kind of girl, though, who likes to weigh things up, and for that reason I prefer you on...on approbation, so to speak.”

“All right—but don't forget that it works both ways. All the time you are summing me up, I'm returning the compliment. I'm not looking for an angel, because I know they don't exist—but I was looking for a girl who behaves like a girl without making an idiot of herself. Far as I can see, I've found her!”

Vera glanced at her watch and switched the conversation.

“I think it's about time we started back,” she decided. “Just in case your feelings run away with you....”

Dick smiled and got to his feet, held down his hand to help her up.

* * * * * * *

It was nearly five o'clock when they reached Sunny Acres again, and they decided to stroll around the grounds. The further they moved into the unkempt jungle of weeds and massive trees, the more they could appreciate Sunny Acres' imposing outline.

“All else apart, Vera, you've got a nice property here.” Dick commented, surveying the gray battlements and stained-glass windows. “These grounds, too, properly cultivated, could be made very beautiful. I've got plenty of ideas about landscape gardening which I could turn to account.”

“You are expecting to be around a lot!” Vera murmured, slanting a provocative blue eye.

“I hope to earn the right—as the fruits of the victory we shall achieve!” Dick said. Then he ceased his banter while he studied the castle.

“Let's see now. Which is the haunted room?”

They surveyed the east wing of the great place from the driveway.

“That empty west wing takes up a good deal of space too,” Dick mused. “As you remarked, the place would make a first-class institution of some sort. Say, isn't that the ghost room?”

He pointed up to a recess in the castle's outlines, where a massive stained-glass window lay in the shadows of the watch tower opposite to it, a parapet running round the outjutting section of stonework. It was this watchtower, they remembered, that contained the bathrooms.

“Yes,” Vera assented, “that's it. And precious little it tells us. Ivy all the way up the wall and a sheer drop of about thirty feet to the drive.”

“Yes. In the shadow, too—at present. Wonder if that means anything?”

“Such as?”

“I don't know—but June 21 is the longest day in the year, and the 20
th
and 22
nd
are only slightly different. It might mean something.”

Vera thought it out but arrived at no conclusion. She sighed.

“The ideas you get!” Vera said. “After dinner we'll see if we really can discover something about that confounded room.”

They went inside and once upstairs separated to their respective rooms. When they met again in the dining hall, Mrs. Falworth was present as usual, and this time she had no comments to make. What few remarks she did pass were directed entirely to matters of cuisine and nothing more. Nor did Vera or Dick give her any encouragement by indulging in vital conversation. Altogether the meal passed in uncommon quietness, and the moment it was over Vera and Dick glanced at the big timepiece ticking solemnly on the heavy stone mantelshelf. It was exactly a quarter to eight.

“Time for a smoke,” Dick said, “and then to the evening's business.”

He got up from the table and Vera did likewise. Together they strolled across the hall to the drawing room and sat down in easy chairs to enjoy their cigarettes.

“I rather think,” Dick said presently, “that we have got the dragon on toast. She must know by now that we're on to her game, whatever it is, and she is probably racking her brains to think of a way out.”

“Or else trying to think of some way to put us out of commission more quickly,” Vera murmured. “I don't trust a dead silence; it makes me uneasy.”

She got to her feet suddenly, as though she felt an impelling urge to keep moving.

She said: “There is no surer way of fraying the nerves than sitting here. Let's go and get the business done with.”

Dick got up and followed her and just as the grandfather clock in the hall was striking eight o'clock, they were outside the door of that deadly room once more. Propped against the frame in readiness was the screwdriver.

“We're nearly half an hour too soon,” Dick remarked, “so let's hope the ghost will be ahead of time. We'll take a look, anyway.”

He tried to sound cheerful by whistling, then, realizing he was only being unconvincing, he gave it up and instead applied all his energies to withdrawing the one solidly driven screw. It came out at last and a crack of light appeared down the side of the door as it swung inward slightly.

“Go on,” Vera urged. “A flashing glimpse—no more.”

He nodded and held the doorknob tightly, leaned his body inward with arm out-thrust. The door creaked to its limit. They had time to gaze into that empty space, to note that some sunshine was pouring through one corner of the great stained-glass window—then the door had shut again.

“Whew,” Dick whispered, drawing the back of his hand across his moist forehead, “That took a bit of nerve—like taking the fuse out of a time bomb. And there's nothing in there—no ghost—as far as I could see.”

“Not time yet, perhaps,” Vera said. “Have to wait a bit. Did you notice any queer sensations? I didn't.”

“We were probably too quick for that.”

They waited through the most wearying, nerve-racking twenty-five minutes they had ever known. And not once during this period did either Mr. or Mrs. Falworth appear. Apparently, they had decided to give up their protests and let things take their course.

“Half-past eight,” Vera said at last in a hushed voice, looking at her watch. “Here we go!”