Mrs Waldron, scenting squabbles ahead, came to the rescue.
“Tell us your adventures, Jerry. Is it a fine evening? Where is your father?”
“He’ll be in in a moment,” Jerry replied. “He went round to the stables; I think he had something to say to Sam. Yes, mamma, we had a very nice drive. It was beautiful moonlight out at Silverthorns, but coming back it clouded over.”
“Silverthorns!” Noble repeated. “Have you been out there too? Why, we’ve all been there – how funny! I thought mamma said you had gone to Gretham. I say, isn’t Silverthorns awfully pretty?”
As he said the words the door opened, and Charlotte and her father came in together. They had met in the hall. Mr Waldron answered Noble’s question, which had indeed been addressed to no one in particular.
“It is a beautiful old place,” he said. “But ‘east or west, home is best.’ I like to come in and see you all together with your mother, boys. And what a capital fire you’ve made up!” He went towards it as he spoke, Charlotte half mechanically following him. “It is chilly out of doors. Gipsy, your hands are quite cold.” He drew her close to the fire and laid one arm on her shoulder. She understood the little caress, but some undefined feeling of contradiction prevented her responding to it.
“I’m not particularly cold, papa, thank you,” she said drily.
Mrs Waldron looked up quietly at the sound of Charlotte’s voice. She knew instinctively that all was not in tune, but she also knew it would not do to draw attention to this, and she was on the point of hazarding some other remark when Jerry broke in. Jerry somehow always seemed to know what other people were feeling.
“Papa,” he said, “were you in earnest when you said there was a haunted room at Silverthorns?”
Every one pricked up his or her ears at this question.
“I was in earnest so far that I know there is a room there that is said to be haunted,” he replied.
“And how?” asked Charlotte. “If any one slept there would they be found dead in the morning, or something dreadful like that?”
“No, no, not so bad as that, though no one ever does sleep there. It’s an old story in the family. I heard it when I was a boy.”
“Don’t you think it’s very wrong to tell stories like that to frighten children?” said Charlotte severely.
“And pray who’s begging for it at the present moment?” said Mr Waldron, amused at her tone.
“Papa! we’re not children. It isn’t like as if it were Amy and Marion,” she said, laughing a little. “Do tell us.”
“Really, my dear, there’s nothing to tell. It is believed that some long ago Osbert, a selfish and cruel man by all accounts, haunts the room in hopes of getting some one to listen to his repentance, and to promise to make amends for his ill-deeds. He treated the poor people about very harshly; and not them only, he was very unkind to his daughter, because he was angry with her for not being a son, and left her absolutely penniless, so that the poor thing, being delicate and no longer young, died in great privation. And he left the property, which was not entailed, to a very distant cousin, hardly to be counted as a cousin except that he had the same name. The legend is that his ghost will never be at peace till Silverthorns comes to be the property of the descendant of some female Osbert.”
“Do you know I never heard that story before? It is curious,” said Mrs Waldron thoughtfully.
“But it’s come all right now. Lady Mildred’s a woman,” said Ted, in his usual hasty way.
“On the contrary, it’s very far wrong,” said his father. “Lady Mildred is not an Osbert at all. Silverthorns was left her by Mr Osbert to do what she likes with, some people say. If she leaves it away, quite out of the Osbert line, it will be a hard punishment for the poor ghost, supposing he knows anything about it, as his regard for the family name went so far as to make him treat his own child unjustly.”
“Is it certain that Lady Mildred has the power of doing what she likes with it?” asked Mrs Waldron.
“I’m sure I can’t say. I suppose any one who cares to know can see Mr Osbert’s will by paying a shilling,” said Mr Waldron lightly. “Though, by the bye, I have a vague remembrance of hearing that the will was worded rather peculiarly, so that it did not tell as much as wills generally do. It referred to some other directions, or something of that kind. General Osbert and his family doubtless know all they can. It is not an enormous fortune after all. Lady Mildred has a small income of her own, and she spends a great deal on the place. It will be much better worth having after her reign than before it.”
“Any way she won’t leave it to me, so I don’t much care what she does with it,” said Ted, rising from his seat, and stretching his long lanky arms over his head.
“No, that she won’t,” said Mr Waldron, with rather unnecessary emphasis.
“My dear Ted,” said his mother, “if you are so sleepy as all that you had better go to bed. I’m not very rigorous, as you know, but I don’t like people yawning and stretching themselves in the drawing-room.”
“All right, mother. I will go to bed,” Ted replied. “Arthur and Noble, you’d better come too.”
“Thank you for nothing,” said Noble, who as usual was buried in a book. “I’m going to finish this chapter first. I’m not like some people I know, who have candles and matches at the side of their beds, in spite of all mother says.”
Mrs Waldron turned to Ted uneasily.
“Is that true, Ted,” she said, “after all your promises?”
Ted looked rather foolish.
“Mother,” he said, “it’s only when I’m behind with my lessons, and I think that I’ll wake early and give them a look over in the morning. It isn’t like reading for my own pleasure.”
Another laugh greeted this remark, Ted “reading for his own pleasure” would have been something new.
“But indeed, mother, you needn’t worry about it,” said Arthur consolingly. “I advise you to let Ted’s candle and matches remain peaceably at the side of his bed if it pleases him. There they will stay, none the worse, you may be sure. It satisfies his conscience and does no harm, for there is not the least fear of his ever waking early.”
Ted looked annoyed. It is not easy to take chaff pleasantly in public, especially in the public of one’s own assembled family.
“I don’t see why you need all set on me like that,” he muttered. “I think Noble might have held his tongue.”
“So do I,” said Charlotte, half under her breath. Then she too got up. “I’m going to bed. Good night, mamma,” and she stooped to kiss her mother; and in a few minutes, Noble having shut up his book resolutely at the end of the chapter, all the brothers had left the room, and the husband and wife were alone.
Mrs Waldron leant her pretty head on the arm of the sofa for a minute or two without speaking. She was tired, as she well might be, and somehow on Saturday night she felt as if she might allow herself to own to it. Mr Waldron looked at her with a rather melancholy expression on his own face.
“Yes,” he said aloud, though in reality speaking to himself, “we pay pretty dear for our power of sympathising.”
“What did you say?” asked his wife, looking up.
“Nothing, dear. I was only thinking of some talk I had with Charlotte – I was trying to show her the advantages of poverty,” he said, smiling.
“Poverty!” repeated his wife; “but nothing like poverty comes near her, or any of them, – at least it is not as bad as that.”
“No, no.