Delsie

Chapter Thirteen

The widow passed a night undisturbed by any actual occurrence of a physical nature, but somewhat ruffled by the awareness of a burglar possessing a key, bent on breaking into her house. She expected to see her two ex-students bright and early in the morning, for she had asked in her note that they come at eight-thirty. At nine-thirty, there was still no sign of them, and at ten o’clock two squares of folded paper were given to her hand by Mrs. Bristcombe, just as deVigne came to the door with a man to change the locks. She opened them in his presence. She was shocked and dismayed at the two identical messages.

“My girls are not coming to me!” she exclaimed, frowning.

“Neither of them has accepted? That is strange, with work in such short supply in the village,” he replied.

“I made sure I was doing them a favor. Their families are not well off, and I offered them fifty pounds each, but only see what they have to say: ‘Under the circumstances, my parents do not feel they can allow me to come.’ Word for word-they have worked this answer out together. What can it mean? It must refer to Mr. Grayshott, but it is well known by now that he is dead. Is it that they object to working for me, their former teacher? Is that the feeling in the village, that I am not fit to be mistress of this establishment?” she asked her caller.

“Certainly not. Whatever it may mean, it cannot be that. Is there any use making the offer to a different set of girls? You must know many from your work.”

“No, these two were the likeliest-good, reliable girls, with whom I got on particularly well. They liked me, admired me. If they refuse, no one else will accept,” she told him, defeated. She was a little angry as well, for while they had refused her, she had an inkling that if the offer had come from deVigne, it would have been accepted fast enough.

“It is a pity, but I can spare you a couple for the time being. I’ll have my housekeeper send down two. Come, don’t despair, cousin. I’ll speak to Mrs. Forrester as soon as I get back to the Hall. I’ll go to the cellars now, and you continue with the search abovestairs. We’ve done this floor. It will be easier for you to examine the spare bedrooms without a couple of servants at your elbow for instructions every ten minutes. It is always so the first day.”

She accepted this small crumb of good from her disappointment, and went to check the spare bedrooms and later the attic, without finding a thing but dust, dirt, and one bent penny. DeVigne, returning to the saloon an hour later, with cobwebs clinging to his head and shoulders of his jacket, had the same non-news to impart. No canvas bags were found in the cellars.

“I was happy to see the state of the cellars, though,” he continued. “A vast deal of good wine set by, and two whole hogsheads of brandy untapped.”

“The brandy was to be your payment for the search,” she reminded him. “Only fancy his having such a quantity of it-two hogsheads.”

“I am well paid for my hour’s work, but you are not completely unrewarded either. You will no longer be reduced to wrinkling your nose in distaste while I sip brandy. There are shelves of excellent claret and Bordeaux wine there, and a couple of cases of sherry. I took the liberty of bringing up some sherry for you. Bristcombe is cleaning a bottle now.”

In a few moments, Bristcombe brought in the sherry, and the widow tasted it, proclaiming, on very limited experience, that it was unexceptionable.

“So it seems we have discovered the last of the bags of gold,” deVigne said, settling back on the settee. “Only twenty-five hundred guineas-hardly a sum to get excited over.” Mrs. Grayshott looked her disagreement with this speech. “I wonder where it came from.”

“I hope I never find out,” she replied with great feeling and proceeded to enumerate aloud various possible sources, each more criminal than the preceding.

“All that brandy he had below makes me wonder whether smuggling was not the source of the money,” deVigne mentioned, when her imagination had petered out. “Living here on the ocean’s doorstep, and with Andrew’s marine connections from the shipyards, it would have been easy enough for him to arrange it. He might have financed the importing and not taken an actual hand in the shipping, for he was no sailor. He was certainly in touch with the smugglers. Besides the two full hogsheads, there is one empty.”

“What a pair of dullards we are!” she agreed at once. “Of course that is what he was up to! Every circumstance points to it: his knowing the sailors hereabouts, our location, not half a mile from the ocean, his own propensity for brandy. It is clear as the nose on your face. The bags of guineas are the payment for the various shipments he had brought in. It is just as Sir Harold said-he was involved in an illegal business, and here am I, sitting with a cellarfull of smuggled brandy and a houseful of illegal money. This is the busiest season for it too-winter coming on, and no moon to speak of. They do the smuggling on moonless nights, do they not?”

“I believe so, to avoid the revenue men. It would account for the village girls not wanting to come to you, if this business is whispered of in the village.”

“Certainly that is it! I chose girls from the most respectable families I could think of, the very ones who would object, for half the village is in on it, of course. Well, at least we know the worst now.”

“We know nothing, though it seems a plausible conjecture,” deVigne revised.

“And the pixies in the orchard!” Delsie shrieked, then covered her mouth with her fingers as she realized the loudness of her voice. She tiptoed to the door and closed it quietly before returning to the sofa, her eyes sparkling with excitement. “The noises I heard in the orchard-it must have been the smugglers bringing the brandy into the orchard. I heard a horse or horses, or more likely donkeys, and men speaking in low voices. They were hiding brandy in the orchard!”

“You checked the orchard the next morning, did you not? You found nothing amiss there.”

“How can you say so? I found the bag of gold. The smugglers must leave Andrew’s share of the profit there for him to pick up.”

“Seems an odd place to leave it, but, as you found no brandy there, they cannot have been delivering it. They were removing it. It was stored nearby, hidden somewhere presumably.”

“Well then, removing it instead of delivering. It must certainly have been smugglers in any case. I am convinced of it.”

“You are convinced on very little evidence,” deVigne suggested.

“Every detail points to it. The bags of money-so many of them and all in the same form-payment for the various shipments. The noises in the orchard, the girls not coming to me, the brandy in the cellar, Andrew’s connection with the shipyards.”

“I grant you it sounds likely, and I hope you may be right.”

She stared. “You hope my husband was a smuggler? Thank you very much. It is an admirable addition to his other sterling qualities-his drunkenness, his insolvency, his dying within hours of my marrying him.”

“Don’t pretend you object to that last item!” he quizzed. “But I had a reason for hoping we have solved this mystery. If that was it, the business is finished. With Andrew dead, someone else will take it over, and you shan’t be bothered again. You have heard the last of the pixies in the garden. The lot delivered the night you moved to the Cottage must have been the one in progress when he died. It would take a few days, I suppose, for a ship to go to France and return, and wait its chance to unload safely. The shipment was already begun, and it was completed the night you arrived. The bag of money you found in the orchard was Andrew’s share of the profit.”

“I won’t keep money obtained in such a way.”

“Devote it to your favorite charity-underpaid schoolteachers,” he suggested.

“On the theory that charity begins at home, you are implying I ought to keep it?” He nodded his head. “I shan’t keep a penny.”

“I am less scrupulous. I intend to enjoy every drop of the illicit stuff you so kindly give me. Shall we have a look around the orchard and see if we can find where they have been hiding it? If we discover some sign, we can take it for confirmation that this web of suppositions we have been fabricating is true.”

“A good idea. We’ll look for more gold too.”

“A waste of time, as you mean to give it away,” he pointed out.

She got her pelisse and bonnet, and they went to investigate the orchard for a possible place of concealment. They found no further bags of gold, nor any spot that appeared suitable for hiding some considerable quantity of brandy. “They were surely not so brazen as to leave it sitting under the trees, in plain sight,” Delsie said uncertainly.

“I cannot think so. The Cottage is too close to the road. They usually use a much better hiding place-an abandoned building, an old barn, or an excavation where some building has burned down-something that offers a good hiding place. They would never stand it in a field and leave it. The deliveries might be a few nights in the doing, and to leave it exposed to the naked eye-no. That cannot be it.”

“Perhaps they took it through the orchard to the fields beyond,” Delsie mentioned, casting her eyes thence.

“They better not! If that is the case, they have been using my land for their work.” He walked through to the end of the orchard, where the rank grass was undisturbed. A wild, natural thicket had been allowed to spring up at the point that separated deVigne’s land from that set off for Louise and Andrew when the Cottage had been built, and there was no break in it. The unmolested state of the vegetation was proof that no regular traffic had come this way. Delsie followed after him. They exchanged a look that required no words.

“We can’t be wrong,” Delsie stated firmly as they retraced their steps to the orchard. “I am sure they bring the brandy here, to this orchard. But then what do they do with it? There are plenty of signs of traffic here, in the orchard, you see. The grass is all trampled down.”

“You’ve been here a few times yourself, and I saw Bristcombe in here the other day as well, the day we went shopping in Questnow.”

“The day I found the first bag of gold! He was out looking for it. It was only Bobbie’s waking me so early that morning that led me to it before him. Bristcombe and I did not hold a dance in the orchard, however, and it would take heavy traffic to account for this degree of wear on the grass. It was smugglers and donkeys that did it.”

They both looked around at the thirty trees, two of which were noticeably smaller than others. “Mrs. Bristcombe told Bobbie these two are the pixie trees,” Delsie said, pointing to the runted ones. “As the pixies are smugglers, these two trees must have something to do with it. She said they were worth more than all the others put together.”

“That rather looks as though your housekeeper and non-butler are in on it.”

“It doesn’t surprise me in the least. I knew them for a pair of renegades the minute I set foot in the house. And the old she-devil so kindly making up the guest room for me on the far side of the house, away from the orchard.”

“Calling you ‘miss’ into the bargain,” he reminded her with a quizzing look. “Thoughtful of her; she didn’t want your rest disturbed.”

“I begin to wonder if your aren’t in league with them. Telling me I should not turn them off.”

“Only suggesting! It cannot have escaped your notice I never tell you anything, since you informed me you like to run your own ship. And I would hardly be cadging Andrew’s brandy from you if I had easy access to a cargo of my own.”

“Yes, you would, to blow smoke in my eyes.”

“You have a nasty, suspecting disposition, Mrs. Grayshott,” he informed her with a polite bow.

“I have need of it to deal with this position you have got me into.”

“I am very sorry I forced you into marriage with a law-breaker against your will and better judgment, but really, the matter is finished now. Can’t you try to forget it and settle into your new life with some small degree of pleasure?”

“There will be no pleasure till I have got this place cleaned up and have heard from Andrew’s creditors how much money I owe them. They will be pounding at my door today, I expect, when that notice you inserted in the papers is printed. Should I get money from the bank to pay them, or give them cheques?”

“Cheques will do. There is no need for you to go into town. Do you know, cousin, I have made a strange observation with regard to your marriage,” he said with a smile.

“If you have made only one, you cannot have given the matter much thought!” she answered tartly. “I dread to think the observations that are made in other quarters.”

“One subtle observation, that I doubt has been remarked elsewhere. Since we have leapt, the last few days, to the unfounded conclusion your late husband was a criminal, you appear to have grown fonder of him.”

“I hate the very mention of his name,” she objected.

“I wonder then what accounts for your calling him ‘Andrew’ now, when he used invariably to be referred to as ‘Mr. Grayshott.’”

“That doesn’t mean anything. Merely it is easier to say one word than two, and everyone else in the family calls him Andrew, so I have slipped into the habit without realizing it,”

“DeVigne is actually two words as well,” he pointed out. “The family call me Max, yet I noticed you have not slipped into the habit of calling me Max.”

She waited for him to suggest she do so, but as he did not, she merely agreed it was odd, and inquired when he would remove the incriminating barrels of brandy from the cellars, carefully adding the words “deVigne” in mid-sentence.

“I’ll have the girls who are to help you sent down in a gig, and it can carry the brandy back to the Hall,” he replied. “Shall I likewise remove the incriminating money from the vault, and put it in the bank?”

“If you would be so kind,” she answered promptly, disliking to accept so many favors from him, but assuaging her conscience that if it weren’t for him, she would not be in such a pickle.

The girls arrived before luncheon, the brandy was removed, and Mrs. Grayshott got down at last to the job of cleaning up her home. One girl was assigned to the master bedroom to do what she could with the havoc concealed behind that locked door, and the other was armed with beeswax, turpentine, and a quantity of cloths and brushes, to try to remove several years’ accumulation of dirt from the heavy furnishings of the saloon and dining room. They were young, cheerful, hard-working girls. Already by late afternoon the downstairs was looking better, with the furniture beginning to emit a dull glow, and the musty odor of a closed house somewhat lightened by the domestic smell of cleaning products. Through the front window, Delsie saw her husband’s carriages and horses being led out of the stable and up the lane to the Hall, and wondered how soon she might be expected to be in possession of her own carriage.

She wondered also, when she viewed her dining room, whether it might not be time for her to hold her first dinner party for the family. The only problem was to discover whether Mrs. Bristcombe, with the help of the two girls, was capable of putting on a full meal. Her luncheons and breakfasts did not lead one to suspect much in the way of culinary skills, though Bobbie had mentioned having better fare at dinner. Oh, dear, and the kitchen a shambles! That must be attended to before she invited company.

Dinner that evening was held at the Hall, at which time deVigne told Mrs. Grayshott that he had put her husband’s horses and equipment up for auction. The agent had mentioned a possible nine hundred pounds for the whole, which would provide her with a decent carriage and team for her own use. “I shall attend the auction and try if I can find a suitable turnout for you, if you trust my judgment. It would be ineligible for a lady to attend the auction.”

She agreed to this, specifying only that he must not spend a penny more than Andrew’s carriage and horses brought.

“Did you have any debtors at your door this afternoon, cousin?” he asked next. The notice had appeared in the afternoon paper, informing creditors to apply to her for payment.

“No, not yet, there has hardly been time. By tomorrow they should begin coming. I shall stay home to be ready to receive them.”

“Couldn’t you do that, Max?” Jane asked. “It will be unpleasant for Delsie to have to deal with the local merchants.”

He looked a question at her, but she firmly denied requiring help. This much, at least, she could do herself. “I have been dealing with them for years. They won’t try to pull the wool over my eyes,” she pointed out.

“I had thought you might have the dressmaker in tomorrow to get started on your and Bobbie’s gowns,” Jane mentioned. “I wanted to go to the Cottage and discuss it with you today, but my joints don’t let me about as much as I would like in this cold, miserable weather. We shall arrange it very soon.”

“I shall write Miss Pritchard in the village a note, asking her to come to me soon,” Delsie said, every bit as eager as Lady Jane to see her new gowns made up.

Over dinner, they discussed the various circumstances that led them to believe Andrew had been smuggling. “A scandal and a disgrace,” Sir Harold decreed. “Just the very sort of thing he would have got himself into. His Uncle Clancy over in Merton the same, only of course it is mainly silk he brings in. The ship he bought from Andrew was not large enough for brandy. I wonder it didn’t occur to me sooner.”

“Where did you hear this story, Harold?” his wife asked.

“Everyone says so,” he answered comprehensively, for he had no idea where he had picked up this rumor, though he had a fellow scholar in Merton whom he saw once a week to discuss philosophy.

“Strange we never heard a whisper of it, if it is true,” Jane objected. “How is it possible the servants haven’t been running to us with the story? It must have been done with the greatest secrecy.”

“The Cottage is in an ideal spot for it,” deVigne pointed out. “Well set off from any other houses, and close to the beach. No one would have expected a gentleman of Andrew’s background to lend himself to smuggling. With a really good place of concealment for the goods, he might have done it without too much trouble. He was at pains to be as unsociable as a bear. No one was encouraged to call, including ourselves. What stymies us is where he has been hiding it.”

“Taking it right into his own cellars,” Sir Harold said.

“That is taking more risk than was necessary. There would have been no possibility of avoiding the charge if he was really so foolish as that,” deVigne pointed out. “I cannot believe he took it into his own house.”

“The men I heard in the orchard did not come near the house itself,” Delsie said. “If they were removing the last load, as deVigne thinks, they were removing it from the orchard. I would have heard the commotion if they had been bringing it up from the cellars-the doors opening and so on. This last lot, at least, wasn’t in the house.”

“Right in the cellar,” Sir Harold persisted.

“No, Andrew was a scoundrel, but he wasn’t a fool,” deVigne objected.

“If he was smuggling for three years without anyone tumbling to it, he was sharp as a tack,” Jane declared, with a hint of admiration.

“It was a dashed rackety thing to do, but as I pointed out to Mrs. Grayshott, I almost hope that is the explanation for the bags of guineas, for at least it is over now,” deVigne said. “With Andrew dead, there will be no more smuggling, and she won’t be bothered with anyone in the orchard, or with unwanted bags of guineas.”

“I hope you may be right,” Delsie said.

That night she again had a visit from the pixies.