The Markenmore Mystery. J. S. Fletcher
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nodded and drew out his watch.
“Not yet ten o’clock,” he muttered. He sat for a minute or two, evidently deep in thought, while Braxfield watched him with curiosity. “All right, Braxfield,” he said at last, looking up from the hearth. “Go and tell the two youngsters I’m here. Quietly mind!—impress upon them that my father is not to know anything.”
“Very good, sir,” assented Braxfield. “They may be with him—or one of them may be—but I’ll manage it. There’s a trained nurse in the house, Mr. Guy, so she’ll attend to Sir Anthony while they come down.”
Guy made no answer, and Braxfield went away through the silent house and upstairs to Harry Markenmore’s room. The room was lighted, but empty. Harry, said Braxfield to himself, would be with his father. He crossed the corridor and knocked gently at Valencia’s door. Valencia answered the summons at once and came out in a dressing-gown; something in the old butler’s face made her glance apprehensively at him. But Braxfield shook his head.
“It’s not that, Miss Valencia,” he hastened to say. “You—you mustn’t be alarmed—the fact is, Mr. Guy’s downstairs! He came just after you and Mr. Harry had come up, and he wants to see you, both. But—Sir Anthony’s not to know.”
Valencia’s face hardened. She had no recollection of any childish affection for her elder brother, and as far as she could remember she had never heard any good of him: certainly, for seven years, he had treated his family as if it had no existence. She looked doubtfully and hesitatingly at Braxfield.
“What does he want?” she asked.
“I can’t say, miss,” replied the old butler, “except that he says he’s come down to see you and Mr. Harry on special business and doesn’t want your father to know.”
Valencia glanced from Braxfield along the gloomy corridor. Innumerable doorways, admitting to cavernous chambers, were ranged there—two or three dozen of guests could have been put up in Markenmore Court, but she knew that not one of those rooms could be prepared in less than twenty-four hours; each was damp, cold, out of use.
“Where on earth are you going to put him, Braxfield?” she said. “There isn’t a bed in the place that’s fit to give him.”
“He’s not stopping, Miss Valencia,” answered Braxfield. “I—I don’t quite understand his movements, but he’s going, I believe, as soon as he’s seen you and Mr. Harry. He spoke of a very early morning train from Mitbourne.”
Valencia hesitated a moment: then she moved off in the direction of her father’s sick-room.
“Tell him we’ll both come down in a few minutes,” she whispered to Braxfield. “Where is he—in the morning-room?”
“No, miss—in the butler’s pantry,” answered Braxfield.
Valencia nodded and turned away, and Braxfield went back to the visitor.
“Coming in a minute or two, sir,” he answered. “Both!”
“I suppose they’ve changed,” remarked Guy unconcernedly.
“Oh, a good deal, sir,” said Braxfield. “Seven years, sir, is a long time—at their ages.”
“Let’s see,” continued Guy. “Harry’ll be—what is it?—twenty-three, and Valencia’s about twenty—nearly twenty. Um! Has my sister any love-affairs?”
“Not to my knowledge, sir,” replied Braxfield. “Miss Valencia, sir, is a young lady that hasn’t seemed to favour the society of gentlemen, so far, sir. Outdoor life, Mr. Guy, is what appeals to her, I think—gardening, games, walking, bit of rabbit-shooting, and so on. A very healthy young lady, sir. I hear them coming, sir—I’d better leave you.”
“Stop where you are, Braxfield,” said Guy quietly. “I want you there.”
He rose from his chair as his brother and sister entered the room, and remaining on the hearth-rug, nodded unconcernedly to both, as if he had seen them but a day before. But as they came up and shook hands with him, his nod of greeting changed to one of approval, and he smiled at his sister.
“How do you do, Harry—how do you do, Valencia!” he said. “Both changed a great deal! And you, Val—grown into a beauty, of course! All you ugly little girls do! Well—that’s right. I suppose, in the character of heavy-brother, I ought to express a pious hope that you’re as good as you’re good-looking!”
“Spare yourself the trouble!” retorted Valencia. She gave him a keen look as she took the chair that Guy had risen from. “I hope you are,” she said. “Though—I doubt it!”
Guy glanced at his brother, including Valencia in a side-glance.
“So—she’s got a tongue, this sister of ours, eh, Master Harry?” he said, with a half-amused, half-cynical laugh. “Never mind!—all the women of our family always have, I believe. Well—aren’t you glad to see me?”
“Why should we be?” demanded Valencia. “You’ve never been near us, and never once written to any of us, for seven years? You may be our brother—half-brother, rather—but you’re a stranger.”
Braxfield, standing diffidently between the table and the door, retreated into a far corner of the room, and Harry Markenmore turned on his sister.
“Don’t, Val,” he muttered. “Not quite that, you know.” He glanced at his elder brother, who was regarding Valencia from his position on the hearthrug with speculative, smiling eyes. “Valencia is a bit outspoken,” he said deprecatingly. “Of course, we’re glad to see you, Guy.”
“All right, Harry, my lad!” responded Guy. “Ill take it that you are—of course.”
“I don’t know why we should be,” asserted Valencia. “As I said—we’re strangers. Surely, you didn’t expect me to know you?”
“You’ll know me better, perhaps, my girl, in quite another way, before long,” answered Guy. “Come! there’s enough of these pleasant family exchanges. I came down especially to see you two,” he went on, seating himself. “I’d better go straight to business. Look here, both of you—in the ordinary course of things our father can’t last long, and I shall succeed to title and estates. Eh?”
“Yes,” said Harry.
“The title I can’t help,” continued Guy. “The estates I don’t want. I’ve made enough of my own, and I shall make more. I don’t know how things can be done, legally, but anyhow, as soon as I come into the property I intend to make it over, somehow or other—we’ll set the lawyers to work—to you two. You can look on it as your own, from this out. Understand?”
Harry started and looked at his sister. But Valencia was looking at Guy.
“Generous of you!” she said suddenly. “But—why do you come to tell us this, now?”
“Because I’m going off to America, on business—New York, two or three other places, in a day or two, and shan’t be back for quite a year—maybe more,” answered Guy. “And I wanted you to know, in case anything happens. If my father dies—well, Harry’ll just carry on, and when I come back we’ll do things legally. Markenmore is to be yours—I don’t want it. You hear?—and you hear, too, Braxfield?”
“I hear, sir,” answered the butler.
“There’s nothing of Markenmore that I want,” continued Guy, “except one thing—and I want that now. Harry,” he went on, pulling out a small key, “you know my old room? Run up there, unlock the right-hand drawer of the bureau in the corner, and bring me a green leather pocket-book that you’ll see there—that’s what I want. Good boy!” He glanced at Valencia when Harry had taken the key and gone, and saw that she was staring hard at his right hand. “Well?” he asked, with a light laugh. “What