Best Short Stories Omnibus - Volume 3

Chapter Six

Chapter Six

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“I never told her one single word about old Mrs. Jones; there seemed a spell on me,” said Mrs. Tippens, using the approved formula of her class, when speaking, subsequently, concerning the events which rendered Miss Tippens' visit memorable. “That very first day as ever was she said, with that still sort of laugh of hers, d**k had warned her not to come if she felt anyways shy of ghosts. 'I have always had rather a wish to see a ghost,' she went on, making my very blood run cold with the light way she talked, and maybe old Mrs. Jones listening to her for aught I could tell. 'What sort of a ghost is it you keep here, Lucy?'

“'There has been a lot of chatter about the house,' I made answer, 'but I don't say anything on the subject indoors for fear of the children being frightened. People pretend there is something not right in the place, but nothing has come d**k's way or mine either'; and then I began talking of something else and Anne took the hint; she was a wonderfully wise, prudent sort of girl, as girls have to be who get into high families and want to keep their situations.”

The day following Miss Tippens' arrival was devoted to showing her some of the London sights. She had been in London before, but only for a short time when “the family” came up to town, and she being kept hard at work under the eye of an exceedingly strict housekeeper was unable to see any of the wonders of the metropolis, except Kensal Green Cemetery, concerning which cheerful place she spoke with a good deal of enthusiasm. As a foretaste of the delights to come, Mrs. Tippens took her to the Abbey, showed her the exterior of the Houses of Parliament, the National Gallery, Northumberland House, the fountains in Trafalgar Square, Covent Garden, Somerset House, Temple Bar, St. Paul's, and the Monument. By the time they had arrived at Fish Street Hill, Anne Jane was tired out, and declining to climb Pope's “tall bully,” asked Mrs. Tippens if they were very far from home, “because,” she added, “I don't think I can walk much more.”

“Dear me!” cried Mrs. Tippens, “I ought to have remembered you were not over strong; why, you look fit to drop. We'll go down to the pier and take the boat straight back, and you can rest all day to-morrow, for I shan't be able to stir out, as our first-floors are leaving, and I must see about getting the rooms fit for anyone to see.”

“You'll sleep without rocking to-night, young woman,” observed Mr. Tippens, as they all sat together over an early supper.

“I always sleep wonderfully sound,” replied Miss Tippens, stating the fact as if some peculiar merit attached to it.

“And you'd better lie in in the morning, and I'll bring you a cup of tea,” said Mrs. Tippens, kindly hospitable.

“Ay, make her stop a-bed,” exclaimed Mr. Tippens. “I'll be bound she gets none too much sleep in service. I'd like well to see a bit of colour in your cheeks before you leave us.”

Next morning Mrs. Tippens took a tray, on which was set out a nice little breakfast, into her visiter's bedchamber. Anne Jane did not look much the better for her night's rest and morning's sleep.

“I woke at five,” she said, “and then went off again, and never roused till you came in, and yet I feel as tired as possible. I am not much accustomed to walking, and we did walk a long way yesterday.”

“Yes, we went too far,” agreed Mrs. Tippens, and then she sat down beside her guest's pillow, and tucked the sheet under the tray to keep it steady, and hoped she would relish her breakfast, which, Anne declared “she was sure to do, if only because they were so kind to her.”

“We would like to be kind to you,” said Mrs. Tippens; adding, so that no more might be said on the subject, “and you slept well?”

“Yes; but isn't it funny, all the earlier part of the night I was dreaming about a woman being murdered. It was talking about old times, and wandering about those ancient places and tombs and monuments, I suppose, made me think of such things. I was quite glad to see the sun shining in at the window when I woke, for oh, the dream did appear just like reality!” And the dreamer paused to drink a little tea, and take a bit of bread and butter, and munch a few leaves of water cress, and taste the delicate slices of ham d**k himself had cut, what he called “Vauxhall fashion,” to tempt her cousin's poor appetite, while Mrs. Tippens sat silent, afraid, she could not tell why, of what might be coming.

“Dreams are strange things,” proceeded Miss Tippens, after the fashion of a person originating an entirely novel idea, “and mine was a strange dream.”

“Your tea will be stone cold, dear,” interposed Mrs. Tippens. It was but deferring the evil hour, she felt, yet every moment of delay seemed a moment gained.

“I don't like it very warm,” answered the other, “and I want to tell you my dream. I thought I was in a room I had never seen before, with three windows to the street, and one long, narrow window that looked out I didn't know on what. The room was wainscotted about two yards from the floor, well furnished with chairs and tables; I could feel a thick carpet under my feet, and see a glass over the chimney-piece, in which a woman was looking at herself. Oh! Luce, she was the strangest woman I ever beheld, so little, she was forced to stand on a footstool to see herself in the glass; she had a brown face and grey hair, and her dress was unfastened, and a necklace, that sparkled and glittered, clasped her neck, and she pinned a brooch, that shone like fire, in the front of her under bodice; and on a little table beside her lay an open jewel case, in which there were precious stones gleaming like green and yellow stars.”

“Do eat your breakfast, Anne, and never mind the dream; you can tell it to me afterwards.”

“There isn't much more to tell,” answered Anne. “All at once she saw in the glass the door open, and a man come in. With a stifled scream she jumped down from the stool, seized the case, and tried to close her dress up round her throat, and hide the necklace; but he was too quick for her. He said something, I could not hear what; and then, as she cowered down, he caught her and wrenched the case out of her hand, and made a snatch at the necklace just as she flew upon him, with all her fingers bent and uttering the most terrible cries that ever came out of a woman's lips—I think I hear them now; then, in a minute she fell back, and I could see she was only kept from dropping on the floor by the tight grip he had on the necklace. I seemed to know she was being choked, and I tried to call out, but I could not utter a sound. I strove to rush at the man, but my feet felt rooted where I stood; then there came a great darkness like the darkness of a winter's night.”

“Let me get you another cup of tea, dear,” said Mrs. Tippens, in a voice which shook a little in spite of all her efforts to steady it; “you've let this stand so long it is not fit to drink.”

“It is just as I like my tea, thank you,” answered Miss Tippens, cheerfully, as she devoted herself to the good things provided. “What do you think of my dream?”

“That I shouldn't have liked to dream it,” replied Mrs. Tippens. “Do let me pour you out some more tea, and then I must run away, for the first-floor lodgers will be wanting me.” Which was a feint on the part of Mrs. Tippens, who felt she could not bear to hear anything more at the moment about the little woman with the brown face and the grey hair, whose portrait she recognised too surely as that of old Mrs. Jones.

“Though why she can't let us, who never did her any harm, alone, I can't imagine,” considered Mrs. Tippens. “This is a dreadful house—true enough, there has been murder done in it, and the blood is crying aloud for vengeance. I wonder where that wicked wretch put her. Oh! Mrs Jones, if you'd only tell us where your poor bones are mouldering, I am sure d**k would have them decently buried, let the cost be what it might.”

The first-floor lodgers were gone, and the rooms scrubbed out before Anne Jane, having dressed and settled up her own bedchamber, made her appearance in her cousin's parlour; but when she suggested that they might go upstairs and have a look at the apartments just vacated, Mrs. Tippens made the excuse that they were not exactly in order.

“The charwoman is up there still,” she exclaimed; “she's making half-a-day.”

“What a wonderfully nice house for d**k to have got,” continued Miss Tippens.

“Yes,” answered d**k's wife faintly. There was nothing to be objected to in the size of the house, if only Mrs. Jones could have been kept out of it!

“If you don't mind my leaving you, Anne, for half an hour, I think I'll just run out and get a few things we want,” she said. “Supposing anyone should come after the first-floor, Mrs. Burdock can show it.” Which would have been all very well, had not Mrs. Burdock, ten minutes after Mrs. Tippens' departure, put her head into the parlour to say that she should like to go home to see to her children's dinners, and, if it made no difference, she would come back in the afternoon and wipe over the windows and blacklead the grates. “The rooms are quite clean and sweet,” she added, “if anybody by chance do come to look at them.”

The children were out in the yard playing, the meat was cooking beautifully in the oven, the fruit pudding was boiling gently on the trivet, the potatoes were in the saucepan, ready to be put on the fire at a certain time which Mrs. Tippens had indicated; the street was simmering in the noontide heat of a summer's day, and Anne Jane, making a frock for the baby asleep in its cradle, was thinking Lucy's lines had fallen into very pleasant places, when there came at the front door a knock, which she instinctively understood meant lodgers.

They were two young gentlemen, attracted by the neat appearance of the house, by the snowy curtains in Mrs. Tippens' room, the bird-cage hanging in the window, the flowers in bloom, ranged in pots on the sill.

“Could we see the rooms you have to let?” asked the elder, who acted as spokesman.

“Certainly, sir; will you be pleased to walk in?” answered Anne Jane in her best manner; and motioning to the strangers to precede her, she followed them up to the first floor, where she flung wide the door of the principal apartment.

“By Jove!” exclaimed both men, almost simultaneously, “who'd have thought there was such a jolly room in this old house?” and they walked over to one of the windows and looked out into the street, and then turned towards the fireplace, and then—

“Hello! What's the matter?” cried the first speaker, hurrying towards the door, against the lintel of which Mr. Tippens' cousin was leaning, looking more like a corpse than a living woman. “Here, hand over that chair, Hal, I believe she is going to faint.”

“No,” she gasped; “no—no—I—shall be better—directly.”

At that moment Mrs. Tippens, who had heard from a neighbour some gentlemen were gone to look at her rooms, put her key in the lock and came hurrying upstairs. The first glance told her what had happened.

“My cousin is not very strong, sir,” she said, in a voice she tried to keep steady, though she was trembling in every limb. “I'll just take her into the parlour, and be with you in a moment, if you please.”

“Let me help you,” entreated the younger man. “Take my arm, do.—Is she subject to attacks of this sort?” he went on, speaking in a lower tone.

“Not that I know of,” was the reply. “Perhaps, sir,” suggested Mrs. Tippens, “you would not mind looking over the rooms by yourselves. There is no one in but the children; I scarcely like leaving my cousin alone.”

“Is there anything you want—anything I can run out and get for you?” asked the young fellow pleasantly. “Do you think that a little brandy—”

“I have some in the house, thank you, sir,” answered Mrs. Tippens; and so at last she got rid of him, and stood looking at Anne Jane, who, leaning back in Mr. Tippens' own particular armchair, looked up at her and murmured, “The room.”

“Yes, dear.”

“It was the room of my dream.”

“I thought as much.”

“Did he kill her there?”

“Who's to tell? Nobody knows whether she is alive or dead, for that matter.”

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