The Mystery of the Sycamore

  CHAPTER II NORTH DOOR AND SOUTH DOOR

  For Samuel Appleby to pay a visit to Daniel Wheeler was of itself anastounding occurrence. The two men had not seen each other since the day,fifteen years ago, when Governor Appleby had pardoned the convictedWheeler, with a condition, which, though harsh, had been strictly adheredto.

  They had never been friends at heart, for they were diametrically opposedin their political views, and were not of similar tastes or pursuits. Butthey had been thrown much together, and when the time came for Wheeler tobe tried for forgery, Appleby lent no assistance to the case. However,through certain influences brought to bear, in connection with the factthat Mrs. Wheeler was related to the Applebys, the governor pardoned thecondemned man, with a conditional pardon.

  Separated ever since, a few letters had passed between the two men, butthey resulted in no change of conditions.

  As the big car ran southward through the Berkshire Hills, Appleby’sthoughts were all on the coming meeting, and the scenery of autumnfoliage that provoked wild exclamations of delight from Genevieve andassenting enthusiasm from Keefe left the other unmoved.

  An appreciative nod and grunt were all he vouchsafed to the girl’sgushing praises, and when at last they neared their destination he calledher attention to a tall old sycamore tree standing alone on a ridge notfar away.

  “That’s the tree that gives the Wheeler place its name,” he informed.“Sycamore Ridge is one of the most beautiful places in Connecticut.”

  “Oh, are we in Connecticut?” asked Miss Lane. “I didn’t know we hadcrossed the border. What a great old tree! Surely one of the historictrees of New England, isn’t it?”

  “Historic to the Wheelers,” was the grim reply, and then Mr. Applebyagain relapsed into silence and spoke no further word until they reachedthe Wheeler home.

  A finely curved sweep of driveway brought them to the house, and the carstopped at the south entrance.

  The door did not swing open in welcome, and Mr. Appleby ordered hischauffeur to ring the bell.

  This brought a servant in response, and the visiting trio entered thehouse.

  It was long and low, with many rooms on either side of the wide hall thatwent straight through from south to north. The first room to the rightwas a large living-room, and into this the guests were shown and were metby a grave-looking man, who neither smiled nor offered a hand as his calmgaze rested on Samuel Appleby.

  Indeed, the two men stared at one another, in undisguised curiosity. Eachseemed to search the other’s face for information as to his attitude andintent.

  “Well, Dan,” Appleby said, after the silent scrutiny, “you’ve changedsome, but you’re the same good-looking chap you always were.”

  Wheeler gave a start and pulled himself together.

  “Thank you. I suppose I should return the compliment.”

  “But you can’t conscientiously do it, eh?” Appleby laughed. “Never mind.Personal vanity is not my besetting sin. This is my secretary, Mr. Keefe,and my assistant, Miss Lane.”

  “Ah, yes, yes. How are you? How do you do? My wife and daughter will lookafter the young lady. Maida!”

  As if awaiting the call, a girl came quickly in from the hall followed byan older woman. Introductions followed, and if there was an air ofconstraint on the part of the host the ladies of the family showed none.Sunny-faced Maida Wheeler, with her laughing brown eyes and gold brownhair, greeted the visitors with charming cordiality, and her mother wasequally kind and courteous.

  Genevieve Lane’s wise and appraising eyes missed no point of appearanceor behavior.

  “Perfect darlings, both of them!” she commented to herself. “Whateverails the old guy, it hasn’t bitten them. Or else—wait a minute——”Genevieve was very observant—“perhaps they’re putting on a little. Istheir welcome a bit extra, to help things along?”

  Yet only a most meticulous critic could discern anything more than truehospitality in the attitude of Mrs. Wheeler or Maida. The latter tookGenevieve to the room prepared for her and chatted away in girlishfashion.

  “The place is so wonderful!” Genevieve exclaimed, carefully avoidingpersonal talk. “Don’t you just adore it?”

  “Oh, yes. I’ve loved Sycamore Ridge for nearly fifteen years.”

  “Have you lived here so long?” Genevieve was alert for information. Itwas fifteen years ago that the pardon had been granted.

  But as Maida merely assented and then changed the subject, Miss Lane wasfar too canny to ask further questions.

  With a promptness not entirely due to chance, the stenographer camedownstairs dressed for dinner some several minutes before the appointedhour. Assuming her right as a guest, she wandered about the rooms.

  The south door, by which they had entered, was evidently the mainentrance, but the opposite, or north door, gave on to an even morebeautiful view, and she stepped out on the wide veranda and gazedadmiringly about. The low ridge nearby formed the western horizon, andthe giant sycamore, its straight branches outlined against the fadingsunset, was impressive and a little weird. She strolled on, and turnedthe corner the better to see the ridge. The veranda ran all round thehouse, and as she went on along the western side, she suddenly becameaware of a silent figure leaning against a pillar at the southwestcorner.

  “It is so quiet it frightens me,” she said to Daniel Wheeler, as sheneared him.

  “Do you feel that way, too?” he asked, looking at her a little absently.“It is the lull before the storm.”

  “Oh, that sunset doesn’t mean rain,” Genevieve exclaimed, smiling,“unless your Connecticut blue laws interpret weather signs differentlyfrom our Massachusetts prophets. We _are_ in Connecticut, aren’t we?”

  “Yes,” and Wheeler sighed unaccountably. “Yes, Miss Lane, we are. Thatsycamore is the finest tree in the state.”

  “I can well believe it. I never saw such a grandfather of a tree! It’sall full of little balls.”

  “Yes, buttonballs, they are called. But note its wonderful symmetry, itsmajestic appearance——”

  “And strength! It looks as if it would stand, there forever!”

  “Do you think so?” and the unmistakable note of disappointment in theman’s tone caused Genevieve to look up in astonishment. “Well, perhaps itwill,” he added quickly.

  “Oh, no, of course it won’t really! No tree stands forever. But it willbe here long after you and I are gone.”

  “Are you an authority on trees?” Wheeler spoke without a smile.

  “Hardly that; but I was brought up in the country, and I know somethingof them. Your daughter loves the country, too.”

  “Oh, yes—we all do.”

  The tone was courteous, but the whole air of the man was so melancholy,his cheerfulness so palpably assumed, that Genevieve felt sorry for him,as well as inordinately curious to know what was the matter.

  But her sympathy was the stronger impulse, and with a desire to entertainhim, she said, “Come for a few steps in the garden, Mr. Wheeler, won’tyou? Come and show me that quaint little summer-house near the frontdoor. It is the front door, isn’t it? It’s hard to tell.”

  “Yes, the north door _is_ the front door,” Wheeler said slowly, as ifrepeating a lesson. “The summer-house you mention is near the front door.But we won’t visit that now. Come this other way, and I’ll show you aJapanese tea-house, much more attractive.”

  But Genevieve Lane was sometimes under the spell of the Imp of thePerverse.

  “No, no,” she begged, smilingly, “let the Japanese contraption wait;please go to the little summer-house now. See, how it fairly twinkles inthe last gleams of the setting sun! What is the flower that rambles allover it? Oh, do let’s go there now! Come, please!”

  With no reason for her foolish insistence save a whim, Genevieve wasamazed to see the look of fury that came over her host’s face.

  “Appleby put you up to that!” he cried, in a voice of intense anger. “Hetold you to ask me
to go to that place!”

  “Why, Mr. Wheeler,” cried the girl, almost frightened, “Mr. Appleby didnothing of the sort! Why should he! I’m not asking anything wrong, am I?Why is it so dreadful to want to see an arbor instead of a tea-house? Youmust be crazy!”

  When Miss Lane was excited, she was quite apt to lose her head, and speakin thoughtless fashion.

  But Mr. Wheeler didn’t seem to notice her informality of speech. He onlystared at her as if he couldn’t quite make her out, and then he suddenlyseemed to lose interest in her or her wishes, and with a deep sigh, heturned away, and fell into the same brooding posture as when she hadfirst approached him.

  “Come to dinner, people,” called Maida’s pretty voice, as, withoutstretched hands she came toward them. “Why, dads, what are you lookingmiserable about? What have you done to him, Miss Lane?”

  “Maida, child, don’t speak like that! Miss Lane has been most kindlytalking to me, of—of the beauties of Sycamore Ridge.”

  “All right, then, and forgive me, Miss Lane. But you see, the sun risesand sets for me in one Daniel Wheeler, Esquire, and any shadow on hisface makes me apprehensive of its cause.”

  Only for an instant did Genevieve Lane’s sense of justice rise in revolt,then her common sense showed her the better way, and she smiledpleasantly and returned:

  “I don’t blame you, Miss Wheeler. If I had a father, I should feel justthe same way, I know. But don’t do any gory-lock-shaking my way. I assureyou I didn’t really scold him. I only kicked because he wouldn’t humor mywhim for visiting the summer-house with the blossoms trailing over it!Was that naughty of me?”

  But though Genevieve listened for the answer, none came.

  “Come on in to dinner, daddy, dear,” Maida repeated. “Come, Miss Lane,they’re waiting for us.”

  Dinner was a delightful occasion.

  Daniel Wheeler, at the head of his own table, was a charming host, andhis melancholy entirely disappeared as the talk ran along on subjectsgrave or gay, but of no personal import.

  Appleby, too, was entertaining, and the two men, with Mrs. Wheeler,carried on most of the conversation, the younger members of the partybeing by what seemed common consent left out of it.

  Genevieve looked about the dining-room, with a pleased interest. Shedearly loved beautiful appointments and was really imagining herselfmistress of just such a house, and visioning herself at the head of sucha table. The long room stretched from north to south, parallel with thehall, though not adjoining. The table was not in the centre, but towardthe southern end, and Mr. Wheeler, at the end near the windows, had Keefeand Miss Lane on either side of him.

  Appleby, as guest of honor, sat at Mrs. Wheeler’s right, and the wholeeffect was that of a formal dinner party, rather than a group of whichtwo were merely office employés.

  “It is one of the few remaining warm evenings,” said Mrs. Wheeler, as sherose from the table, “we will have our coffee on the veranda. Soon itwill be too cool for that.”

  “Which veranda?” asked Genevieve of Maida, as they went through the hall.“The north one, I hope.”

  “Your hopes must be dashed,” laughed the other, “for it will be the southone. Come along.”

  The two girls, followed by Keefe, took possession of a group of chairsnear Mrs. Wheeler, while the two older men sat apart, and soon becameengrossed in their own discussions.

  Nor was it long before Samuel Appleby and his host withdrew to a roomwhich opened on to that same south veranda, and which was, in fact, Mr.Wheeler’s den.

  “Well, Sam,” Keefe heard the other say, as he drew down the blind, “wemay as well have it out now. What are you here for?”

  Outwardly placid, but almost consumed with curiosity, Curt Keefe changedhis seat for one nearer the window of the den. He hoped to hear thediscussion going on inside, but was doomed to disappointment, for thoughthe murmuring of the voices was audible, the words were not distinct, andKeefe gathered only enough information to be sure that there was a heatedargument in progress and that neither party to it was inclined to give ina single point.

  Of course, he decided, the subject was the coming election campaign, butthe details of desired bargaining he could not gather.

  Moreover, often, just as he almost heard sentences of interest, thechatter of the girls or some remark of Mrs. Wheeler’s would drown thevoices of the men in the room.

  One time, indeed, he heard clearly: “When the Sycamore on the ridge goesinto Massachusetts——” but this was sheer nonsense, and he concluded hemust have misunderstood.

  Later, they all forgathered in the living-room and there was music andgeneral conversation.

  Genevieve Lane proved herself decidedly entertaining, and though SamuelAppleby looked a little amusedly at his stenographer, he smiled kindly ather as he noticed that she in no way overstepped the bounds of correctdemeanor.

  Genevieve was thinking of what Keefe had said to her: “If you do onlywhat is absolutely correct and say what is only absolutely correct, youcan do whatever you like.”

  She had called it nonsense at the time, but she was beginning to see thetruth of it. She was careful that her every word and act should becorrect, and she was most decidedly doing as she liked. She made goodwith Mrs. Wheeler and Maida with no trouble at all; but she felt,vaguely, that Mr. Wheeler didn’t like her. This she set about to remedy.

  Going to his side, as he chanced to sit for a moment alone, she smiledingratiatingly and said:

  “I wonder if you can imagine, sir, what it means to me to see the insideof a house like this?”

  “Bless my soul, what do you mean?” asked Wheeler, puzzled at the girl’smanner.

  “It’s like a glimpse of Fairyland,” she went on. “You see, I’m terriblyambitious—oh, fearfully so! And all my ambitions lead to just this sortof a home. Do you suppose I’ll ever achieve it, Mr. Wheeler?”

  Now the girl had truly wonderful magnetic charm, and even staid old DanWheeler was not insensible to the note of longing in her voice, thesimple, honest admission of her hopes.

  “Of course you will, little one,” he returned, kindly. “I’ve heard thatwhatever one wants, one gets, provided the wish is strong enough.” Hespoke directly to her, but his gaze wandered as if his thoughts were faraway.

  “Do you really believe that?” Genevieve’s big blue eyes begged anaffirmation.

  “I didn’t say I believed it—I said I have heard it.” He smiled sadly.“Not quite the same—so far as I’m concerned; but quite as assuring toyou. Of course, my belief wouldn’t endorse the possibility.”

  “It would for me,” declared Genevieve. “I’ve lots of confidence in otherpeople’s opinions——”

  “Anybody’s?”

  “Anybody whom I respect and believe in.”

  “Appleby, for instance?”

  “Oh, yes, indeed! I’d trust Mr. Appleby’s opinions on any subject. Let’sgo over there and tell him so.”

  Samuel Appleby was sitting at the other end, the north end of the longroom. “No,” said Wheeler, “I’m too comfortable here to move—ask him tocome here.”

  Genevieve looked at him a little astonished. It was out of order, shethought, for a host to speak thus. She pressed the point, saying therewas a picture at the other end of the room she wished to examine.

  “Run along, then,” said Wheeler, coolly. “Here, Maida, show Miss Lanethat etching and tell her the interesting details about it.”

  The girls went away, and soon after Keefe drifted round to Wheeler’sside.

  “You know young Sam Appleby?” he asked, casually.

  “No,” Wheeler said, shortly but not sharply. “I daresay he’s a mostestimable chap.”

  “He’s all of that. He’s a true chip of the old block. Both goodgubernatorial timber, as I’m sure you agree.”

  “What makes you so sure, Mr. Keefe?”

  Curt Keefe looked straight at him. “Well,” he laughed, “I’m quite readyto admit that the wish was father to the thought.”

&
nbsp; “Why do you call that an admission?”

  “Oh,” Keefe readily returned, “it is usually looked upon as a confessionthat one has no reason for a thought other than a wish.”

  “And why is it your wish?”

  “Because it is the wish of my employer,” said Keefe, seriously. “I knowof no reason, Mr. Wheeler, why I shouldn’t say that I hope and trust youwill use your influence to further the cause of young Appleby.”

  “What makes you think I can do so?”

  “While I am not entirely in Mr. Appleby’s confidence, he has told me thatthe campaign would be greatly aided by your willingness to help, and so Ican’t help hoping you will exercise it.”

  “Appleby has told you so much, has he? No more?”

  “No more, I think, regarding yourself, sir. I know, naturally, thedetails of the campaign so far as it is yet mapped out.”

  “And you know why I do not want to lend my aid?”

  “I know you are not in accordance with the principles of the Applebypolitics——”

  “That I am not! Nor shall I ever be. Nor shall I ever pretend to be——”

  “Pretend? Of course not. But could you not be persuaded?”

  “By what means?”

  “I don’t know, Mr. Wheeler,” and Keefe looked at him frankly. “I trulydon’t know by what means. But I do know that Mr. Appleby is here topresent to you an argument by which he hopes to persuade you to helpyoung Sam along—and I earnestly desire to add any word of mine that mayhelp influence your decision. That is why I want to tell you of the goodtraits of Sam Appleby, junior. It may be I can give you a clearer lighton his character than his father could do——that is, I might present it asthe opinion of a friend——”

  “And not exaggerate his virtues as a father might do? I see. Well, Mr.Keefe, I appreciate your attitude, but let me tell you this: whatever Ido or don’t do regarding this coming campaign of young Appleby will beentirely irrespective of the character or personality of that young man.It will all depend on the senior Appleby’s arrangements with me, and myability to change his views on some of the more important planks in hisplatform. If he directed you to speak to me as you have done, you mayreturn that to him as my answer.”

  “You, doubtless, said the same to him, sir?”

  “Of course I did. I make no secret of my position in this matter. SamuelAppleby has a hold over me—I admit that—but it is not strong enough tomake me forget my ideas of right and wrong to the public. No influence ofa personal nature should weigh against any man’s duty to the state, and Iwill never agree to pretend to any dissimulation in order to bring abouta happier life for myself.”

  “But need you subscribe to the objectionable points to use your influencefor young Sam?”

  “Tacitly, of course. And I do not choose even to appear to agree toprinciples abhorrent to my sense of justice and honesty, thereby secretlygaining something for myself.”

  “Meaning your full pardon?”

  Wheeler turned a look of surprise on the speaker.

  “I thought you said you hadn’t Appleby’s full confidence,” he said.

  “Nor have I. I do know—as do many men—that you were pardoned with acondition, but the condition I do not know. It can’t be very galling.”And Keefe looked about on the pleasant surroundings.

  “You think not? That’s because you don’t know the terms. And yet, gallingthough they are, hateful though it makes my life, and the lives of mywife and daughter, we would all rather bear it than to deviate one iotafrom the path of strict right.”

  “I must admire you for that, as must any honorable man. But are there notdegrees or shadings of right and wrong——”

  “Mr. Keefe, as an old man, I take the privilege of advising you for yourown good. All through your life I beg you remember this: Anyone whoadmits degrees or shadings of right or wrong—is already wrong. Don’t beoffended; you didn’t claim those things, you merely asked the question.But, remember what I said about it.”