Quill's Window

by George Barr McCutcheon

II — Shortly afterward he took his departure. There was a frown of annoyance on his brow as he strode briskly up the lane in the direction of the crossroads, half a mile or more above the village. As usual, he thought aloud.

"There's no way of finding out just how things stand between them. The old lady doesn't know anything, that's a cinch. If she really knew she would have let it out to me. I'll never get a better chance to pump her than I had today. She doesn't know. You can see she hopes her son will get her. That's as plain as the nose on your face. But she doesn't know anything. Is that a good sign or a bad one? I wish I knew. Alix isn't the sort to forget. Maybe Strong has gotten over it and not she. It's darned aggravating, that's what it is. There must be some good reason why she's never married. I wonder if she's still keen about him. This talk of Charlie Webster's may be plain bunk. If she hates him,—why? That's the question. WHY does she hate him? There must be some reason beside that debt he owed to old Windom. Gad, I wish I could have seen that letter he wrote her when he sent the cheque. Well, anyhow, it's up to me to get busy. That's sure!"

His walk took him past the Windomville Cemetery and up the gravel turnpike leading to the city. Alix had traversed this road an hour or so earlier. Swinging around a bend in the highway, he came in view of the abandoned farmhouse half a mile ahead.

It was a familiar object by this time, for he had passed it many times, not only on his solitary walks but on several occasions with Alix. The desolate house, with its weed-grown yard, its dilapidated paling fence, its atmosphere of decay, had always possessed a certain fascination for him. He secretly confessed to a queer little sensation as of awe whenever he looked upon the empty, green-shuttered house. It suggested death. More than once he had paused in the road below the rickety gate to gaze intently at the closed windows, or to scrutinize the tangled mass of weeds and rose bushes that almost hid the porch and its approach from view. He was never without the strange feeling that the body of Edward Crown might still be lying at the foot of the hidden steps.

Now he approached the place with a new and deeper interest. Strangely enough, it had been shorn within the hour of much that was grim and terrifying. It was no longer a house to inspire dread and uneasiness. Two young and venturesome spirits had invaded its silent precincts, there to dream in safety and seclusion, unhaunted by its spectres, undisturbed by its secret. In one of its darkened rooms they had set up a "workshop," a "playhouse." A glaze came over his eyes as he wondered what had transpired in that room during the surreptitious six weeks' tenancy. Had David Strong kissed her? Had she kissed David Strong? Were promises made and futures planned? His throat was tight with the swell of jealousy.

He stopped at the gate. After a moment's hesitation he lifted the rusty latch and jerked the gate open far enough to allow him to squeeze through. Then he paused to sweep the landscape with an inquiring eye. Far up the pike a load of fodder moved slowly. There were cattle in the pasture near at hand, but no human being to observe his actions. In a distant upland field men were moving among a multitude of corn-shocks, trailing the horses and wagons that belonged to Alix Crown. Crows cawed in the trees on the eastern edge of the strip of meadowland, and on high soared two or three big birds,—hawks or buzzards, he knew not which,—circling slowly in the arc of the steel blue sky.

Confident that he was unobserved, he made his way up the half-buried walk to the porch, and, deliberately mounting the steps, tried the door-knob. As he expected, the door was locked. After another searching look in all directions, he started off through the tangle of weeds and burdocks to circle the house. He passed through what once must have been the tennis-court of Alix the First,—now a weedy patch,—and came to the back door. Below him lay the deserted stables and outbuildings, facing the barnyard in which a few worn-out farm implements were to be seen, weather-beaten skeletons of a past generation.

There was no sign of human life. A lean and threadbare scarecrow flapped his ragged coat-sleeves in the wind that swept across the barren garden patch farther up the slope,—this was the nearest approach to human life that came within the range of vision. And as if to invite jovial companionship, this pathetic gentleman wore his ancient straw hat cocked rakishly over what would have been his left ear if he had had any ears at all.

While standing before the gate, Courtney had come to a sudden, amazing decision. He resolved to enter and explore the house if it were possible to do so. He remembered that Mrs. Strong, in pursuing the subject, had declared that Alix and David were not even permitted to return to the house for their literary products; moreover, she doubted very much whether the former had taken the trouble to recover them after she became sole possessor of the property. If they were still there, with other tangible proofs of an adolescent intimacy, he saw no reason why he should not lay eyes,—or even hands,—upon them. He saw no wrong in the undertaking. It was a justifiable adventure, viewed from the standpoint of a lover whose claim was in doubt.

The back door was locked and the window shutters securely nailed. Entrance to the cellar was barred by heavy scantlings fastened across the sloping hatch. In the barnyard he found a stout single-tree. With this he succeeded in prying off the two scantlings. The staple holding the padlock was easily withdrawn from one of the rotten boards.