The Millionaire Baby. Green Anna Katharine
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been forbidden to go to the river, but must have taken the first opportunity when no eye was on her to do so; and – and – Mrs. Ocumpaugh shows a bit of string which she found last night in the bushes alongside the tracks when she ran down, as I have said, at some imaginary shout from the boats – a string which she declares she saw rolled up in Gwendolen's hand when she went into the bungalow to look at her. Of course, it may not be the same, but Mrs. Ocumpaugh thinks it is, and – "
"Do you think it possible, after all, that the child did stray down to the water?"
"No," was the vehement disclaimer. "Gwendolen's feet were excessively tender. She could not have taken three steps in only one shoe. I should have heard her cry out."
"What if she went in some one's arms?"
"A stranger's? She had a decided instinct against strangers. Never could any one she did not know and like have carried her so far as that without her waking. Then those men on the track, – they would have seen her. No, Mr. Trevitt, it was not in that direction she went."
The force of her emphasis convinced me that she had an opinion of her own in regard to this matter. Was it one she was ready to impart?
"In what direction, then?" I asked, with a gentleness I hoped would prove effective.
Her impulse was toward a frank reply. I saw her lips part and her eyes take on the look which precedes a direct avowal, but, as chance would have it, we came at that moment upon the thicket inclosing the bungalow, and the sight of its picturesque walls, showing brown through the verdure of the surrounding shrubbery, seemed to act as a check upon her, for, with a quick look and a certain dry accent quite new in her speech, she suddenly inquired if I did not want to see the place from which Gwendolen had disappeared.
Naturally I answered in the affirmative and followed her as she turned aside into the circular path which embraces this hidden retreat; but I had rather have heard her answer to my question, than to have gone anywhere or seen anything at that moment. Yet, when in full view of the bungalow's open door, she stopped to point out to me the nearness of the place to that opening in the hedge we had just been making for, and when she even went so far as to indicate the tangled little path by which that opening could be reached directly from the farther end of the bungalow, I considered that my question had been answered, though in another way than I anticipated, even before I noted the slight flush which rose to her cheek under my earnest scrutiny.
As it is important for the exact location of the bungalow to be understood, I subjoin a diagram of this part of the grounds:
As I took this all in, I ventured to ask some particulars of the family living so near the Ocumpaughs.
"Who occupies that house?" I asked, pointing to the sloping roofs and ornamental chimneys arising just beyond us over the hedge-rows.
"Oh, that is Mrs. Carew's home. She is a widow and Mrs. Ocumpaugh's dearest friend. How she loved Gwendolen! How we all loved her! And now, that wretch– "
She burst into tears. They were genuine ones; so was her grief.
I waited till she was calm again, then I inquired very softly:
"What wretch?"
"You have not been inside," she suggested, pointing sharply to the bungalow.
I took the implied rebuke and entered the door she indicated. A man was sitting within, but he rose and went out when he saw us. He wore a policeman's badge and evidently recognized her or possibly myself. I noted, however, that he did not go far from the doorway.
"It is only a den," remarked Miss Graham.
I looked about me. She had described it perfectly: a place to lounge in on an August day like the present. Walls of Georgia pine across one of which hung a series of long dark rugs; a long, low window looking toward the house, and a few articles of bamboo furniture describe the place. Among the latter was a couch. It was drawn up underneath the window, on the other side of which ran the bench where my companion declared she had been sitting while listening to the music.
"Wouldn't you think my attention would have been caught by the sound of any one moving about here?" she cried, pointing to the couch and then to the window. "But the window was closed and the door, as you see, is round the corner from the bench."
"A person with a very stealthy step, apparently."
"Very," she admitted. "Oh, how can I ever forgive myself! how can I ever, ever forgive myself!"
As she stood wringing her hands in sight of that empty couch, I cast a scrutinizing glance about me, which led me to remark:
"This interior looks new; much newer than the outside. It has quite a modern air."
"Yes, the bungalow is old, very old; but this room, or den, or whatever you might call it, was all remodeled and fitted up as you see it now when the new house went up. It had long been abandoned as a place of retreat, and had fallen into such decay that it was a perfect eyesore to all who saw it. Now it is likely to be abandoned again, and for what a reason! Oh, the dreadful place! How I hate it, now Gwendolen is gone!"
"One moment. I notice another thing. This room does not occupy the whole of the bungalow."
Either she did not hear me or thought it unnecessary to reply; and perceiving that her grief had now given way to an impatience to be gone, I did not press the matter, but led the way myself to the door. As we entered the little path which runs directly to that outlet in the hedge marked E, I ventured to speak again:
"You have reasons, or so it appears, for believing that the child was carried off through this very path?"
The reply was impetuous:
"How else could she have been spirited away so quickly? Besides, – " here her eye stole back at me over her shoulder, – "I have since remembered that as I ran out of the bungalow in my fright at finding the child gone, I heard the sound of wheels on Mrs. Carew's driveway. It did not mean much to me then, for I expected to find the child somewhere about the grounds; but now, when I come to think, it means everything, for a child's cry mingled with it (or I imagined that it did) and that child – "
"But," I forcibly interposed, "the police should know this."
"They do; and so does Mrs. Ocumpaugh; but she has only the one idea, and nothing can move her."
I remembered the wagon with the crying child inside which had been seen on the roads the previous evening, and my heart fell a little in spite of myself.
"Couldn't Mrs. Carew tell us something about this?" I asked, with a gesture toward the house we were now passing.
"No. Mrs. Carew went to New York that morning and had only just returned when we missed Gwendolen. She had been for her little nephew, who has lately been made an orphan, and she was too busy making him feel at home to notice if a carriage had passed through her grounds."
"Her servants then?"
"She had none. All had been sent away. The house was quite empty."
I thought this rather odd, but having at this moment reached the long flight of steps leading down the embankment, I made no reply till we reached the foot. Then I observed:
"I thought Mrs. Carew was very intimate with Mrs. Ocumpaugh."
"She is; they are more like sisters than mere friends."
"Yet she goes to New York the very day her friend gives a musicale."
"Oh, she had good reasons for that. Mrs. Carew is planning to sail this week for Europe, and this was her only opportunity for getting her little nephew, who is to go with her. But I don't know as she will sail, now. She is wild with grief over Gwendolen's loss, and will not feel like leaving Mrs. Ocumpaugh till she knows whether we shall ever see the dear child again. But, I shall miss my train."
Here her step visibly hastened.
As it was really very nearly due, I had not the heart to detain her. But as I followed in her wake I noticed that for all her hurry a curious hesitancy crept into her step at times, and I should not have been surprised at any moment to see her stop and confront me on one of the two remaining long flights of steps leading down the