CHAPTER III.
THE BAREFOOT VISITOR.
When Mr. Orban came home to dinner he brought with him anotherexcitement--the mail letters that Hadji ought to have brought withthe parcel the day before.
To Bob Cochrane, whose parents were Australian born and bred, thismeant nothing; but he was so intimate with the Orbans that heunderstood their feelings on the subject. He sat silently puffingat his pipe while Mr. and Mrs. Orban read their letters. Eustace,Nesta, and Peter had seized on some packets which they knew tocontain English papers and magazines.
Suddenly Mrs. Orban gave a curious exclamation, and all eyes wereturned questioningly upon her.
"Mother, mother, what is it?" cried Nesta, noting the colourflooding her mother's usually pale face.
"Any news, darling?" asked Mr. Orban.
"I should just think it is news," said Mrs. Orban unsteadily."Listen to this, Jack: 'Dorothy has been so very slow in herrecovery from the terrible bout of typhoid she had in spring thatthe doctor advises a long sea voyage at once, and we have decidedto send her out to you by the first boat available. We go up toLondon to-morrow to get her outfit.'"
"Aunt Dorothy!" yelled the children. "Aunt Dorothy coming here!"
It was a most surprising piece of news, almost incredibly so. Thechildren had never seen any of their parents' people, as none ofthem had been over to Queensland. They knew them only by name andthe oft-repeated tales of childhood, which were their favouritestories of all Mr. and Mrs. Orban told.
This was their mother's unmarried sister, Dorothy Chase, who livedwith her father and mother in Herefordshire, in the "old home" thechildren knew so well by hearsay, and longed so much to see. Someone coming out from England was next best to going home, and thenews produced the wildest commotion of questions and suggestions.
"When will she come, mother? When can she be here?" came in chorus.
"Well, I am sure I don't know," Mrs. Orban said; "but it seems tome she will not be very far behind this letter."
"Not more than a fortnight, I should think," said Mr. Orban. "Yousee they are hurrying her off."
"O mummie, this is exciting!" Nesta exclaimed. "Do tell us how oldAunt Dorothy is!"
"Just twenty-three. She was a little child when I last saw her, andI can never picture her grown up."
"Twenty-three is a decent age for girls," said Eustace.
"Out of a vast and varied experience speaks Sir Eustace," laughedBob--and Eustace reddened.
"Twenty-three," said Mr. Orban. "Fancy little Dot twenty-three!There'll be a big change in her."
"There must be a big change in every one, Jack," Mrs. Orban sighed."What wouldn't I give to see them all!"
"The next thing we shall hear," remarked Bob solemnly, "is that youwill be clearing out to England--the whole lot of you. I don'tthink I like the idea of Miss Dorothy coming at all. She willbewitch you, and off you will all go."
"No such luck," cried Nesta impulsively.
"Alas! an impossibility," said Mrs. Orban.
Mr. Orban said nothing, but looked very grave.
These few words, however, could only shadow the great excitement amoment. Mrs. Orban returned to her letter, and read interestinglittle scraps from time to time, such as "'I am cudgelling mybrains in the hurry to think of everything I can send you--it issuch a grand opportunity--I wish I had time to get a list of wantsfrom you--but I dare say nothing will come amiss. Frocks for thegirls and yourself, of course--'"
"Darling gran!" cried Nesta.
"Then I needn't get the duster stuff," said Mr. Orban.
"No, none of the clothes," said Mrs. Orban. "I know what grannie iswhen she gets a chance to send a box."
Nesta and Peter went off in high spirits with Bob later in the day,Nesta exacting many promises that should Aunt Dorothy by somemiracle appear before she was expected, Mrs. Orban would send forthe children back.
Eustace let the party go without a pang; he was actually glad notto be going. So taken up was he with the new idea that he evenforgot his fear lest he had made a bad impression on the great Bob.
There was so much to be thought of in the preparations for MissChase's arrival that even Mr. Orban's departure two mornings laterleft no one depressed. Up to the last Mrs. Orban was wonderingwhether there was anything she could think of that could be broughtfrom Brisbane for their visitor's greater comfort.
"She will be used to such a different life," Mrs. Orban said. "I dohope she won't mind roughing it."
"Not she," said Mr. Orban heartily. "She will like it all thebetter if we make no changes for her, but just let her see life aswe live it. After all, it is only for a time with her."
* * * * *
"Well, my darling old man," said Mrs. Orban gaily that evening, asshe and Eustace sat alone at late dinner, "how does it feel to be'man of the house'? Do you feel a great burden of responsibility asmummie's guardian and protector?"
"I don't know, mummie," said Eustace.
He was looking very grave, for now that the lamps were lighted andit was dusk outside everything felt different again.
The veranda ran round the entire house; only on one side was therea flight of steps down to the ground. The drawing-room opened outon to the other side of the house, facing the sea. It was here Mrs.Orban and Eustace went after dinner, for the day had beenexhaustingly hot, and now a slight breeze blew landwards.
But for the rustling of leaves and a distant murmur from theplantation, the night was very still. As she meant to go to bed soearly, Mrs. Orban did not have lamps brought out on to the veranda;she and Eustace sat close together in the gloom, their only light afaint golden streak from the drawing-room.
Becky had been in bed a long time, and was fast asleep. For a whilethey could hear the servants clearing away the dinner; then therewas silence even in that quarter, and they knew that Mary and Katehad gone to bed.
"We ought to be going too, I think, my man," Mrs. Orban saidsoftly.
Eustace slipped down on to a stool at her feet and rested his headagainst her knee.
"O mummie," he pleaded, "not just yet. Couldn't you tell me a storyfirst?"
"I could, of course," Mrs. Orban admitted slowly, "but the questionis, Ought I to? It is getting late for you."
"But it is awfully early for you," Eustace argued. "I don't believeyou will sleep if you go now. You always say you can't if you go tobed too soon. You see, we needn't get up quite so early, as fatherisn't here to go out to the plantation."
"That is true," said Mrs. Orban with a laugh. "I really think weshall have to make a barrister of you, Eustace, you plead a causeso eloquently. But what kind of story shall I tell you?"
"Oh, one of the old home stories, please," he said instantly. "Ishould like to know all I can about it before Aunt Dorothy comes."
"I wonder if there are any I have not told you," Mrs. Orban saidthoughtfully.
"There must be hundreds," Eustace said. "I always think Maze Courtmust have stories without end."
"We used to think so, I remember," said his mother; "but I supposethat is always the case with a house when one family has possessedand occupied it for so many generations."
"It is a sixteenth-century house, isn't it?" Eustace asked.
"Seventeenth century," was the answer, "built in 1688 by EustaceChase, a loyal subject of the king. His father lost everything forthe cause, and the young man was rewarded for following theRoyalist fortunes--or rather misfortunes--soon after the king cameto his own again."
Eustace gave a huge sigh.
"I do like belonging to people like that," he said withsatisfaction.
There was a long silence.
"Mummie--the story," prompted Eustace at last.
"I was just hunting my memory for one," said his mother. "Did youever hear how we lost Aunt Dorothy?"
Eustace shook his head and settled himself comfortably to listen,so Mrs. Orban went on:--
"One summer we gave a large party for young people. It happens thats
everal of us have birthdays in the summer, and this was a sort ofcombined birthday treat. So we invited friends varying in age fromfive, suitable for Dorothy, to seventeen or eighteen, and a verymerry party it promised to be. The day began gloriously, but fatherprophesied it was going to be too hot to be perfect; and he wasright. About the middle of the afternoon thunder-clouds gatheredquickly, and by tea-time there was a raging storm; but it was asshort as it was sharp, and all over in an hour. There was noquestion as to going out again, the ground was too sopping wetafter the rain to dream of such a thing, so it was proposed that weshould have a good game of hide-and-seek all over the house. I wishI could tell you what a lovely place home is for hide-and-seek.There are so many rooms with doors between that you can almost gothe round of the house on any landing without coming out into thepassage more than twice or three times. Then there are severalstaircases, and lastly the turret, which was always used for'home,' because it was a regular trap for hiding in. Once found,you could never get away from there."
"O mummie," breathed Eustace softly, "how it does make me want togo and see it all."
"I am glad it does, sonny," Mrs. Orban said. "I want you to want togo--I always pray some day you will. It is a home to be proud of."
"Go on, please," said Eustace in the little pause that followed.
"I don't think people ever get tired of hide-and-seek," Mrs. Orbancontinued. "It is the one game that seems to suit all ages--I meanamong young people. We played on and on till dusk, and then thegame was only stopped by people coming for or sending to fetchtheir children home. Just in the middle of the first 'good-byes,'mother, who had been entertaining grown-ups most of the afternoon,came and asked for Dorothy. No one knew where she was. 'Who hadseen her last?' It was impossible to find out, but apparently shehad not been seen by any one for a long time. Dorothy at five yearsold was a very independent little person, and resented beingobviously looked after. She always liked to hide by herself, forinstance. Well, then, there began a game of hide-and-seek in realearnest, and it became more and more serious every minute, whenwhite-faced groups met in the hall declaring that every corner hadbeen searched, and still there was no trace of Dorothy."
"Didn't grannie nearly go mad?" asked Eustace feelingly. He wellknew what the loss of Becky would mean to his mother.
"Very nearly," was the answer; "but I think your grandfather waseven worse. All the tiny children were taken home, but many of theelder boys and girls begged to be allowed to stay and help, and nowthe hunt began outside with lanterns among outhouses and stables.The echoes rang with Dorothy's name, but in vain; the hunt wasuseless, and some of us straggled back into the house and begancalling and looking all over the same ground again. I cannot tellyou what terrible thoughts had got into our heads by that time. Weremembered the story of the lady who hid herself in the old springchest and could not get out--"
"The Mistletoe Bough lady," breathed Eustace.
"Yes; and we hunted every box, chest, and cupboard in the house,but Dorothy was in none of them. She seemed literally to have beenspirited away. It became so late that at last all the otherchildren were taken home, and we were left just ourselves--a verymiserable family."
Eustace sat up suddenly and held his breath, his face blanched, hiseyes alert.
"At last, close on midnight," Mrs. Orban went on in a low voice.
"Mother, mother," Eustace said in a sharp whisper, kneeling andputting an arm protectingly round her, "did you hear something?"
"Yes, darling," Mrs. Orban continued, "close on midnight--"
"No, no," Eustace said, "not then--now--this minute, as you werespeaking!"
Mrs. Orban started perceptibly.
"No, darling," she answered. "Why? Did you?"
There was an instant's tense silence.
"It is some one coming round the veranda--barefoot," Eustacewhispered.
"One of the maids, perhaps," said Mrs. Orban, but her voicequivered.
"They would come through the house," said the boy. "This fellow hascome up the veranda steps. I heard them creak."
A lifetime in great solitude sharpens the hearing to the mostextraordinary extent. Children born and brought up in the wildsoften have this sense more keenly developed than any other. TheOrban children seemed to hear without listening--sounds which, evenwhen she was told of them, Mrs. Orban, with her English training,did not catch till several minutes later.
But now the pad-pad-pad of bare feet was unmistakable--apad-pad-pad, then a halt, as if the visitor stopped to listen.
Below in the scrub--that wild thick undergrowth among trees,harbouring so many strange creatures--there were hoarse cries, andnow and then the howl of a dingo, so horribly suggestive of a humanbeing in an agony of pain.
The pair on the veranda clung together for an instant--one only.
"I must go to Becky," whispered Mrs. Orban, recovering herself.
But Eustace held her down.
"Oh, don't--don't for one moment," he implored; "wait and see whatit is."
"Pad-pad-pad" came the steps, nearer and nearer. A shadow fellaslant the corner of the veranda--the shadow of a man thrown by thelight from the drawing-room side window.
The shadow of a man fell aslant the corner of theveranda.]