“I try to get out every day,” I answered. “But I’ve chiefly limited myself to the grounds.”
“Well, it’s a fine estate. The lake is altogether charming in summer. I quite envy you your fortune.”
He walked with a long swinging stride, his hands thrust deep into his overcoat pockets. It was difficult to accept the idea of so much physical strength being wasted in the mere business of saying prayers in a girls’ school. Here was a fellow who should have been captain of a ship or a soldier, a leader of forlorn hopes. I felt sure there must be a weakness of some sort in him. Quite possibly it would prove to be a mild estheticism that delighted in the savor of incense and the mournful cadence of choral vespers. He declined a cigar and this rather increased my suspicions.
The village hack, filled with young women, passed at a gallop, bound for the station, and we took off our hats.
“Christmas holidays,” explained the chaplain. “Practically all the students go home.”
“Lucky kids, to have a Christmas to go home to!”
“I suppose Mr. Pickering got away last night?” he observed, and my pulse quickened at the name.
“I haven’t seen him yet,” I answered guardedly.
“Then of course he hasn’t gone!” and these words, uttered in the big clergyman’s deep tones, seemed wholly plausible. There was, to be sure, nothing so unlikely as that Arthur Pickering, executor of my grandfather’s estate, would come to Glenarm without seeing me.
“Sister Theresa told me this morning he was here. He called on her and Miss Devereux last night. I haven’t seen him myself. I thought possibly I might run into him in the village. His car’s very likely on the station switch.”