Chapter XVI

_Ad Interim_

I never sent for Warriner to come and discuss Eunice Trevor's

astonishing communication. Why? Well, what would have been the use?

After all, the woman had told us little or nothing which we had not

known already; certainly, there was no definite information in her

statement upon which to base a working hypothesis. Granted that there

was a guilty secret, it lay hidden for all time in S. Saviour's

churchyard. Both Eunice Trevor and John Thaneford may have been innocent

of any actual participation in the tragedy of Francis Graeme's death,

but it was by no means clear that they could not have taken steps to

prevent it. The coroner's jury had given their verdict, the magistrate

had found no case against the one suspected person, Dave Campion, and

there was really no valid warrant for reopening the inquiry. Besides,

this was a purely family affair, and Chalmers Warriner was an outsider.

I dare say it was despicably small-minded of me, but Betty was now my

wife, and both she and Warriner ought to realize that the intimacy

between them could not be continued on the old free footing. Jealous.

Well perhaps, I was uneasily conscious of an unworthy feeling in the

matter. But I was master of "Hildebrand Hundred," and surely I had the

right to determine what friendships were desirable and what were not.

Warriner was a man of mature age, Betty was young and impulsive; it was

my bounden duty to guard her from every sidelong look, from every

whispered word. Not that I ever discussed the question with her; I

merely took my stand and it was her wifely obligation to yield to my

judgment. So far as I could tell, she never even noticed that Warriner

no longer came to the "Hundred" in the old informal way. And that was as

it should be.

But the issues raised by Eunice Trevor's statement were not to be set

aside so easily. It was annoying, but Betty persisted in taking the dead

woman's warning both literally and seriously; she actually begged me to

formally abandon the "Hundred" to John Thaneford, as the legal

next-of-kin, and perhaps leave Maryland altogether.

This I could not consent to do; I was too proud, or perhaps too

stubborn, to be frightened by the vaporings of a highly wrought and

undoubtedly neurotic imagination. There was not the shadow of a proof

that Francis Graeme's death had been due to premeditated violence, and

as for the alleged tragedies in the dim past, I neither knew nor cared

anything about them. What if five men had died, under unexplained

circumstances, in that particular room? All this was ancient history

running back over a period of sixty odd years, and there are many

coincidences in life. There is no greater tyranny than that of

superstition, and once in bondage to its shadowy overlordship orderly

existence becomes impossible.

But my decision had been finally influenced by a still stronger

consideration. As I have said a little further back, I had unconsciously

become attached to the "Hundred" by ties that I now found it impossible

to break. This was my home and the home of my fathers before me; I now

found myself an integral part of the ancestral homestead, my life had

rooted deeply into the very soil, with its sacred dust my own corporeal

remains must finally be mingled; no, I could not suffer "Hildebrand

Hundred" to pass out of my hands, and I would hold it against every

enemy visible and invisible. Even granting that something deadly and

menacing did lurk in the dim corners of that great room with its painted

windows and booklined walls, was I not man enough to grapple with the

Terror on its own chosen ground? Better to die even as my Hildebrand

forebears had died, alone and unafraid, than to drag out a coward's

existence in some wretched backwater of life. Yes, I had decided; I

would stay on at the "Hundred," _coute qui coute_.

It was not so easy to maintain my resolve in the face of Betty's quiet

but determined opposition. I could make every allowance for the

successive shocks to her delicately organized nervous system, and mere

prayers and tears I was ready to cope with. But there was an invincible

spirit in her attitude that I could not shake. "It is a part of my inner

sense," she would reiterate with gentle obstinacy, and how can one argue

rationally with feminine intuitions!

In the end we compromised--as always. It was agreed that we should

continue to live on at the "Hundred," but the library should be

permanently and effectually closed. Betty even proposed that a brick

wall should be built at the end of the passage entirely blocking the

entrance, but to this heroic measure I steadfastly refused to assent; it

was enough of a nuisance to lose the use of the best room in the house,

and to be obliged to transfer the working part of the library to the new

living room. So we compromised again by locking the door and keeping all

the keys in my immediate possession. In addition, I had to promise that

I would not enter the room unless my wife was told of my intention and

invited to accompany me. "At least we'll die together," said Betty,

trying to smile through her tears. What could I do but kiss them away,

and give the required assurance.

In October of that same year our son was born. Of course Betty insisted

that he should be christened Hugh, and while I have always thought the

name an ugly one and should have preferred Lawrence, after the first

American Hildebrand, it would have been most ungracious to have entered

any demurrer. But when Betty furthermore suggested that Chalmers

Warriner be invited to stand as godfather I made plausible objections in

favor of Doctor Marcy. I fancied that she seemed unaccountably

disappointed, but she yielded when she realized that my preference was a

decided one. However, Warriner was present at the ceremony in S.

Saviour's, and endowed the baby with a magnificent silver mug. That

particular gift should have been the prerogative of the titular

godfather, but Doctor Marcy did not seem inclined to stand upon his

rights, and I could not act the churl in so small a matter. And so this

epochal phase of my life had come to a triumphant close; possessed of

"Hildebrand Hundred," a son to inherit my name, and the best wife in the

world. What more could heart of man desire!