“Why, surely, we’ll proceed to wait upon your grandfather, sir.”
“Unless my Uncle Charles plans otherwise.”
“Nay, we’ll ride thither this afternoon, sir, if you’re rested and well. But the runners shall go beside our coach, lest Mr. Charles Craike still desire that we shall not meet your grandfather.”
Chapter XV. The Doomed House
That afternoon I drove with Mr. Bradbury to my grandfather’s house, and the two thief-catchers rode beside us. The house stood at a distance of five miles from the little village that looked down upon the sea; from the inn window I had caught sight of Blunt’s brig already putting out. It was an ancient dwelling of the Craike family, that my grandfather, enriched by trade in the East, Mr. Bradbury now assured me, had set in repair for his habitation.
For all the outrage of my imprisonment, Mr. Bradbury would have me keep a secret from old Sir Gavin Masters my detention in the Stone House. Let it remain a secret, and let the scandal be hushed, he insisted, until we had had our interview with my grandfather. I had an uneasy suspicion that he believed the old man himself implicated in the plot against me, or at least feared his resentment at interference with a crew of smugglers, with whom he and his son were associated. Committing my cause to Mr. Bradbury, I pleaded exhaustion; left him to tell what tale he would to Sir Gavin, and kept my room until the hour of our departure from the inn. I contented myself with insistence that Roger Galt should have due credit for returning me to safety, and should not be held guilty of the sins of Charles Craike and his rogues. What tale Mr. Bradbury told, I knew not; as we drove away, he gave me to understand that Sir Gavin had relinquished the search after Roger; I assumed that the justice himself would not welcome an open breach with the smuggling fraternity—with whom, indeed, I took it from furtive whisperings and black looks at me, the folk at the inn—as, no doubt, the fisher-folk at the village—were in league.
But what was my grandfather’s share in the plot of my kin against me I conjectured bitterly. Mr. Bradbury observed that my uncle had established great influence over the old man; that, indeed, the one thought and acted habitually as the other. But he was bent still on my presentation to my grandfather, as if he hoped that Mr. Craike might take a liking to me, and my favour with him counteract the influence of my Uncle Charles. So, cleanly-clad, well-dressed once more, I sat by Mr. Bradbury in his coach, and proceeded with him to Craike House, as if none of the events of the Stone House had happened; indeed, my curiosity to learn what manner of man was my grandfather prevailed for the time over perplexity and dread.
We drove always within sound of the sea, though it was hid from our sight for the most; our way taking us over an old stone road; but at times, where the cliffs were broken, we saw the waters grey and leaden still for hanging clouds; the violence of the wind had abated, yet it blew keenly; always the tang of the sea was in my nostrils. Our road struck at last from the sea inland; we were driving soon through a deep wood; this was unbroken, ere we came to iron gates in an old brick wall. A woman, coming out of the gate-keeper’s cottage at the sound of coach and riders, stared at us through the bars, but at the sight of Mr. Bradbury’s head poking out of the window, and at his curt order, “Open the gates, woman. Mr. Bradbury to see Mr. Craike!” she unlocked and opened the gates, staring at us as we passed by. I saw her for a big woman, as nut-brown as a gipsy, and as vivid in her red shawl and green kirtle; a swath of orange-coloured stuff was about her black hair. We drove on, and the runners clattered after us. Looking back, I saw the woman run into the cottage, and reappear presently with a bearded fellow, rubbing his eyes sleepily; I saw the glint of big rings in his ears, his rig of wide blue breeches and red-striped shirt,—both remained staring after us, till the trees hid them from us. The coach rolled on through a park, ill-tended, overgrown, a very wilderness; green darkness dropped about us till we came in sight of Craike House.
It stood amid tall pine and fir trees—a sombre, dreary house; the ivy holding it in a green net, webbed across shuttered windows, climbing to the very leads, and gripping the chimney stacks. An ancient, crumbling house,—I had a notion that but for the ivy it must fall in ruins to the ground; a house of gloom from the dark ivy—the evil green ivy, with the black pines and fir trees all about it, with weeds and tangle of flowers before it, where once had been rose gardens; with nettles and lank green grass upon its lawns. We drove up, seeing no one; we pulled up before the flight of stone steps leading up to its door,—steps worn by rains of centuries, and by the feet of generations; steps guarded by stone dragons, wingless and earless from their years, their eyes blinded and their jaws stopped with green moss. Sombre and secret stood the house amid the black cloud of pine and fir trees; I saw the black clouds lower above it; I heard the winds cry out about it; the old trees strain and sigh, and toss their boughs like arms, in lamentation or in terror for the house,—the doomed house, where my kinsmen dwelt. Afar I heard the drumming of the sea against the rock-bound coast. I had a curious shapeless notion—prescience—that even as all the evil of the house—the ill-gotten fortunes of the house—came from the sea, out of the sea should retribution—vengeance—come.
Mr. Bradbury bade the runners and the coach-boy wait for us. Taking my arm, he climbed the steps with me to the door; its oak was bound with iron in fantastic pattern, and studded with copper nails; the knocker was of copper in the form of a satyr’s grinning face,—and all this copper was corroded, and the green stained the door as the evil green of the ivy stained the front of the house. Mr. Bradbury raised the knocker with difficulty; though it clashed heavily, it failed to bring response from the house; whispering to me, “I’d have thought Charles would have been keeping a sharper look out for our arrival than this,” he knocked double knocks, until the clank of a chain and the screech of bolts sounded within. The door opened, and an old man stood blinking out at us—an old man, his clean-shaven face shrivelled and brown, and his eyes palely blue; his white hair was powdered, and his suit of black on his bent and withered body as neat and precise as his linen.