The House of Whispers

"Several people, I believe."

"And they're gossiping as usual, eh?" he remarked in a hard, dry tone. "Up here in the Highlands they are ridiculously superstitious. Who's been telling you about the Whispers, child?"

"Oh, I've learnt of them from several people," she replied evasively. "Mysterious voices were heard, they say, last night, and for several nights previously. It's also a local tradition that all those who hear the whispered warning die within forty days."

"Bosh, my dear! utter rubbish!" the old man laughed. "Who's been trying to frighten you?"

"Nobody, dad. I merely tell you what the country people say."

"Yes," he remarked, "I know. The story is a gruesome one, and in the Highlands a story is not attractive unless it has some fatality in it. Up here the belief in demonology and witchcraft has died very hard. Get down Penny's Traditions of Perth—first shelf to the left beyond the second window, right-hand corner. It will explain to you how very superstitious the people have ever been."

"I know all that, dad," persisted the girl; "but I'm interested in this extraordinary story of the Whispers. You, as an antiquary, have, no doubt, investigated all the legendary lore connected with Glencardine. The people declare that the Whispers are heard, and, I am told, believe some extraordinary theory regarding them."

"A theory!" he exclaimed quickly. "What theory? What has been discovered?"

"Nothing, as far as I know."

"No, and nothing ever will be discovered," he said.

"Why not, dad?" she asked. "Do you deny that strange noises are heard there when there is so much evidence in the affirmative?"

"I really don't know, my dear. I've never had the pleasure of hearing them myself, though I've been told of them ever since I bought the place."

"But there is a legend which is supposed to account for them, is there not, dad? Do tell me what you know," she urged. "I'm so very much interested in the old place and its bygone history."

"The less you know concerning the Whispers the better, my dear," he replied abruptly.

Her father's ominous words surprised her. Did he, too, believe in the fatal omen, though he was trying to mislead her and poke fun at the local superstition?

"But why shouldn't I know?" she protested. "This is the first time, dad, that you've tried to withhold from me any antiquarian knowledge that you possess. Besides, the story of Glencardine and its lords is intensely fascinating to me."

"So might be the Whispers, if ever you had the misfortune to hear them."

"Misfortune!" she gasped, turning pale. "Why do you say misfortune?"

But he laughed a strange, hollow laugh, and, endeavouring to turn his seriousness into humour, said, "Well, they might give you a turn, perhaps. They would make me start, I feel sure. From what I've been told, they seem to come from nowhere. It is practically an unseen spectre who has the rather unusual gift of speech."

It was on the tip of her tongue to explain how, on the previous night, she had actually listened to the Whispers. But she refrained. She recognised that, though he would not admit it, he was nevertheless superstitious of ill results following the hearing of those weird whisperings. So she made eager pretence of wishing to know the historical facts of the incident referred to by the gamekeeper.

"No," exclaimed the blind man softly but firmly, taking her hand and stroking her arm tenderly, as was his habit when he wished to persuade her. "No, Gabrielle dear," he said; "we will change the subject now. Do not bother your head about absurd country legends of that sort. There are so many concerning Glencardine and its lords that a whole volume might be filled with them."

"But I want to know all about this particular one, dad," she said.

"From me you will never know, my dear," was his answer, as his gray, serious face was upturned to hers. "You have never heard the Whispers, and I sincerely hope that you never will."

CHAPTER XIII

WHAT FLOCKART FORESAW

The following afternoon was glaring and breathless. Gabrielle had taken Stokes, with May Spencer (a girl friend visiting her mother), and driven the "sixteen" over to Connachan with a message from her mother—an invitation to Lady Murie and her party to luncheon and tennis on the following day. It was three o'clock, the hour when silence is upon a summer house-party in the country. Beneath the blazing sun Glencardine lay amid its rose-gardens, its cut beech-hedges, and its bowers of greenery. The palpitating heat was terrible—the hottest day that summer.

At the end of the long, handsome drawing-room, with its pale blue carpet and silk-covered furniture, Lady Heyburn was lolling lazily in her chair near the wide, bright steel grate, with her inseparable friend, James Flockart, standing before her.

The striped blinds outside the three long, open windows subdued the sun-glare, yet the very odour of the cut flowers in the room seemed oppressive, while without could be heard the busy hum of insect life.

The Baronet's handsome wife looked cool and comfortable in her gown of white embroidered muslin, her head thrown back upon the silken cushion, and her eyes raised to those of the man, who was idly smoking a cigarette, at her side.

"The thing grows more and more inexplicable," he was saying to her in a low, strained voice. "All the inquiries I've caused to be made in London and in Paris have led to a negative result."

"We shall only know the truth when we get a peep of those papers in Henry's safe, my dear friend," was the woman's reply.

"And that's a pretty difficult job. You don't know where the old fellow keeps the key?"

"I only wish I did. Gabrielle knows, no doubt."

"Then you ought to compel her to divulge," he urged. "Once we get hold of that key for half-an-hour, we could learn a lot."

"A lot that would be useful to you, eh?" remarked the woman, with a meaning smile.

"And to you also," he said. "Couldn't we somehow watch and see where he hides the safe-key? He never has it upon him, you say."

"It isn't on his bunch."

"Then he must have a hiding-place for it, or it may be on his watch-chain," remarked the man decisively. "Get rid of all the guests as quickly as you can, Winnie. While they're about there's always a danger of eavesdroppers and of watchers."

"I've already announced that I'm going up to Inverness next week, so within the next day or two our friends will all leave."

"Good! Then the ground will be cleared for action," he remarked, blowing a cloud of smoke from his lips. "What's your decision regarding the girl?"

"The same as yours."

"But she hates me, you know," laughed the man in gray flannel.

"Yes; but she fears you at the same time, and with her you can do more by fear than by love."

"True. But she's got a spirit of her own, recollect."

"That must be broken."

"And what about Walter?"

"Oh, as soon as he finds out the truth he'll drop her, never fear. He's already rather fond of that tall, dark girl of Dundas's. You saw her at the ball. You recollect her?"

Flockart grunted. He was assisting this woman at his side to play a desperate game. This was not, however, the first occasion on which they had acted in conjunction in matters that were not altogether honourable. There had never been any question of affection between them. The pair regarded each other from a purely business standpoint. People might gossip as much as ever they liked; but the two always congratulated themselves that they had never committed the supreme folly of falling in love with each other. The woman had married Sir Henry merely in order to obtain money and position; and this man Flockart, who for years had been her most intimate associate, had ever remained behind her, to advise and to help her.

Perhaps had the Baronet not been afflicted he would have disapproved of this constant companionship, for he would, no doubt, have overheard in society certain tittle-tattle which, though utterly unfounded, would not have been exactly pleasant. But as he was blind and never went into society, he remained in blissful ignorance, wrapped up in his mysterious "business" and his hobbies.

Gabrielle, on her return from school, had at first accepted Flockart as her friend. It was he who took her for walks, who taught her to cast a fly, to shoot rooks, and to play the national winter game of Scotland—curling. He had in the first few months of her return home done everything in his power to attract the young girl's friendship, while at the same time her ladyship showed herself extraordinarily well disposed towards her.

Within a year, however, by reason of various remarks made by people in her presence, and on account of the cold disdain with which Lady Heyburn treated her afflicted father, vague suspicions were aroused within her, suspicions which gradually grew to hatred, until she clung to her father, and, as his eyes and ears, took up a position of open defiance towards her mother and her adventurous friend.

The situation each day grew more and more strained. Lady Heyburn was, even though of humble origin, a woman of unusual intelligence. In various quarters she had been snubbed and ridiculed, but she gradually managed in every case to get the better of her enemies. Many a man and many a woman had had bitter cause to repent their enmity towards her. They marvelled how their secrets became known to her.

They did not know the power behind her—the sinister power of that ingenious and unscrupulous man, James Flockart—the man who made it his business to know other people's secrets. Though for years he had been seized with a desire to get at the bottom of Sir Henry's private affairs, he had never succeeded. The old Baronet was essentially a recluse; he kept himself so much to himself, and was so careful that no eyes save those of his daughter should see the mysterious documents which came to him so regularly by registered post, that all Flockart's efforts and those of Lady Heyburn had been futile.

"I had another good look at the safe this morning," the man went on presently. "It is one of the best makes, and would resist anything, except, of course, the electric current."

"To force it would be to put Henry on his guard," Lady Heyburn remarked, "If we are to know what secrets are there, and use our knowledge for our own benefit, we must open it with a key and relock it."

"Well, Winnie, we must do something. We must both have money—that's quite evident," he said. "That last five hundred you gave me will stave off ruin for a week or so. But after that we must certainly be well supplied, or else there may be revelations well—which will be as ugly for yourself as for me."

"I know," she exclaimed. "I fully realise the necessity of getting funds. The other affair, though we worked it so well, proved a miserable fiasco."

"And very nearly gave us away into the bargain," he declared. "I tell you frankly, Winnie, that if we can't pay a level five thousand in three weeks' time the truth will be out, and you know what that will mean."

He was watching her handsome face as he spoke, and he noticed how pale and drawn were her features as he referred to certain ugly truths that might leak out.

"Yes," she gasped, "I know, James. We'd both find ourselves under arrest. Such a contretemps is really too terrible to think of."

"But, my dear girl, it must be faced," he said, "if we don't get the money. Can't you work Sir Henry for a bit more, say another thousand. Make an excuse that you have bills to pay in London—dressmakers, jewellers, milliners—any good story will surely do. He gives you anything you ask for."

She shook her head and sighed. "I fear I've imposed upon his good-nature far too much already," she answered. "I know I'm extravagant; I'm sorry, but can't help it. Born in me, I suppose. A few months ago he found out that I'd been paying Mellish a hundred pounds each time to decorate Park Street with flowers for my Wednesday evenings, and he created an awful scene. He's getting horribly stingy of late."

"Yes; but the flowers were a bit expensive, weren't they?" he remarked.

"Not at all. Lady Fortrose, the wife of the soap-man, pays two hundred and fifty pounds for flowers for her house every Thursday in the season; and mine looked quite as good as hers. I think Mellish is much cheaper than anybody else. And, just because I went to a cheap man, Henry was horrible. He said all sorts of weird things about my reckless extravagance and the suffering poor—as though I had anything to do with them. The genuine poor are really people like you and me."

"I know," he said philosophically, lighting another cigarette. "But all this is beside the point. We want money, and money we must have in order to avoid exposure. You—"

"I was a fool to have had anything to do with that other little affair," she interrupted.

"It was not only myself who arranged it. Remember, it was you who suggested it, because it seemed so easy, and because you had an old score to pay off."

"The woman was sacrificed, and at the same time an enemy learnt our secret."

"I couldn't help it," he protested. "You let your woman's vindictiveness overstep your natural caution, my dear girl. If you'd taken my advice there would have been no suspicion."

Lady Heyburn was silent. She sat regarding the toe of her patent-leather shoe fixedly, in deep reflection. She was powerless to protest, she was so entirely in this man's hands. "Well," she asked at last, stirring uneasily in her chair, "and suppose we are not able to raise the money, what do you anticipate will be the result?"

"A rapid reprisal," was his answer. "People like them don't hesitate—they act."

"Yes, I see," she remarked in a blank voice. "They have nothing to lose, so they will bring pressure upon us."

"Just as we once tried to bring pressure upon them. It's all a matter of money. We pay the price arranged—a mere matter of business."

"But how are we to get money?"

"By getting a glance at what's in that safe," he replied. "Once we get to know this mysterious secret of Sir Henry's, I and my friends can get money easily enough. Leave it all to me."

"But how—"

"This matter you will please leave entirely to me, Winnie," he repeated with determination. "We are both in danger—great danger; and that being so, it is incumbent upon me to act boldly and fearlessly. I mean to get the key, and see what is within that safe."

"But the girl?" asked her ladyship.

"Within one week from to-day the girl will no longer trouble us," he said with an evil glance. "I do not intend that she shall remain a barrier against our good fortune any longer. Understand that, and remain perfectly calm, whatever may happen."

"But you surely don't intend—you surely will not—"

"I shall act as I think proper, and without any sentimental advice from you," he declared with a mock bow, but straightening himself instantly when at the door was heard a fumbling, and the gray-bearded man in blue spectacles, his thin white hand groping before him, slowly entered the room.

CHAPTER XIV

CONCERNS THE CURSE OF THE CARDINAL

Gabrielle and Walter were seated together under one of the big oaks at the edge of the tennis-lawn at Connachan. With May Spencer and Lady Murie they had been playing; but his mother and the young girl had gone into the house for tea, leaving the lovers alone.

"What's the matter with you to-day, darling?" he had asked as soon as they were out of hearing. "You don't seem yourself, somehow."

She started quickly, and, pulling herself up, tried to smile, assuring him that there was really nothing amiss.

"I do wish you'd tell me what it is that's troubling you so," he said. "Ever since I returned from abroad you've not been yourself. It's no use denying it, you know."

"I haven't felt well, perhaps. I think it must be the weather," she assured him.

But he, viewing the facts in the light of what he had noticed at their almost daily clandestine meetings, knew that she was concealing something from him.

Before his departure on that journey to Japan she had always been so very frank and open. Nowadays, however, she seemed to have entirely changed. Her love for him was just the same—that he knew; it was her unusual manner, so full of fear and vague apprehension, which caused him so many hours of grave reflection.

With her woman's cleverness, she succeeded in changing the topic of conversation, and presently they rose to join his mother at the tea-table in the drawing-room.

Half-an-hour later, while they were idling in the hall together, she suddenly exclaimed, "Walter, you're great on Scottish history, so I want some information from you. I'm studying the legends and traditions of our place, Glencardine. What do you happen to know about them?"

"Well," he laughed, "there are dozens of weird tales about the old castle. I remember reading quite a lot of extraordinary stories in some book or other about three years ago. I found it in the library here."

"Oh! do tell me all about it," she urged instantly. "Weird legends always fascinate me. Of course I know just the outlines of its history. It's the tales told by the country-folk in which I'm so deeply interested."

"You mean the apparition of the Lady in Green, and all that?"

"Yes; and the Whispers."

He started quickly at her words, and asked, "What do you know about them, dear? I hope you haven't heard them?"

She smiled, with a frantic effort at unconcern, saying, "And what harm, pray, would they have done me, even if I had?"

"Well," he said, "they are only heard by those whose days are numbered; at least, so say the folk about here."

"Of course, it's only a fable," she laughed. "The people of the Ochils are so very superstitious."

"I believe the fatal result of listening to those mysterious Whispers has been proved in more than one instance," remarked the young man quite seriously. "For myself, I do not believe in any supernatural agency. I merely tell you what the people hereabouts believe. Nobody from this neighbourhood could ever be induced to visit your ruins on a moonlit night."

"That's just why I want to know the origin of the unexplained phenomenon."

"How can I tell you?"

"But you know—I mean you've heard the legend, haven't you?"

"Yes," was his reply. "The story of the Whispers of Glencardine is well known all through Perthshire. Hasn't your father ever told you?"

"He refuses."

"Because, no doubt, he fears that you might perhaps take it into your head to go there one night and try to listen for them," her lover said. "Do not court misfortune, dearest. Take my advice, and give the place a very wide berth. There is, without a doubt, some uncanny agency there."

The girl laughed outright. "I do declare, Walter, that you believe in these foolish traditions," she said.

"Well, I'm a Scot, you see, darling, and a little superstition is perhaps permissible, especially in connection with such a mystery as the strange disappearance of Cardinal Setoun."

"Then, tell me the real story as you know it," she urged. "I'm much interested. I only heard about the Whispers quite recently."

"The historical facts, so far as I can recollect reading them in the book in question," he said, "are to the effect that the Most Reverend James Cardinal Setoun, Archbishop of St. Andrews, Chancellor of the Kingdom, was in the middle of the sixteenth century directing all his energies towards consolidating the Romish power in Scotland, and not hesitating to resort to any crime which seemed likely to accomplish his purpose. Many were the foul assassinations and terrible tortures upon innocent persons performed at his orders. One person who fell into the hands of this infamous cleric was Margaret, the second daughter of Charles, Lord Glencardine, a beautiful girl of nineteen. Because she would not betray her lover, she was so cruelly tortured in the Cardinal's palace that she expired, after suffering fearful agony, and her body was sent back to Glencardine with an insulting message to her father, who at once swore to be avenged. The king had so far resigned the conduct of the kingdom into the hands of his Eminence that nothing save armed force could oppose him. Setoun knew that a union between Henry VIII. and James V. would be followed by the downfall of the papal power in Scotland, and therefore he laid a skilful plot. Whilst advising James to resist the dictation of his uncle, he privately accused those of the Scottish nobles who had joined the Reformers of meditated treason against His Majesty. This placed the king in a serious dilemma, for he could not proceed against Henry without the assistance of those very nobles accused as traitors. The wily Cardinal had hoped that James would, in self-defence, seek an alliance with France and Spain; but he was mistaken. You know, of course, how the forces of the kingdom were assembled and sent against the Duke of Norfolk. The invader was thus repelled, and the Cardinal then endeavoured to organise a new expedition under Romish leaders. This also failing, his Eminence endeavoured to dictate to the country through the Earl of Arran, the Governor of Scotland. By a clever ruse he pretended friendship with Erskine of Dun, and endeavoured to use him for his own ends. Curiously enough, over yonder"—and he pointed to a yellow parchment in a black ebony frame hanging upon the panelled wall of the hall—"over there is one of the Cardinal's letters to Erskine, which shows the infamous cleric's smooth, insinuating style when it suited his purpose. I'll go and get it for you to read."

The young man rose, and, taking it down, brought it to her. She saw that the parchment, about eight inches long by four wide, was covered with writing in brown ink, half-faded, while attached was a formidable oval red seal which bore a coat of arms surmounting the Cardinal's hat.

With difficulty they made out this interesting letter to read as follows:

"RYCHT HONOURABLE AND TRAIST COUSING,—I commend me hartlie to you, nocht doutting bot my lord governour hes written specialye to you at this tyme to keep the diet with his lordship in Edinburgh the first day of November nixt to cum, quhilk I dout nocht bot ye will kepe, and I know perfitlie your guid will and mynd euer inclinit to serue my lord governour, and how ye are nocht onnely determinit to serue his lordship, at this tyme be yourself bot als your gret wais and solistatioun maid with mony your gret freyndis to do the samin, quhilk I assuris you sall cum bayth to your hier honour and the vele of you and your houss and freyndis, quhilk ye salbe sure I sall procure and fortyfie euir at my power, as I have shewin in mair speciale my mynd heirintil to your cousin of Brechin, Knycht: Praing your effectuously to kepe trist, and to be heir in Sanct Androwis at me this nixt Wedinsday, that we may depairt all togydder by Thurisday nixt to cum, towart my lord governour, and bring your frendis and servandis with you accordantly, and as my lord governour hais speciale confidence in you at this tyme; and be sure the plesour I can do you salbe evir reddy at my power as knawis God, quha preserve you eternall.

"At Sanct Androwis, the 25th day of October (1544). J. CARDINALL OFF SANCT ANDROWIS.

"To the rycht honourable and our rycht traist cousing the lard of Dvn."

"Most interesting!" declared the young girl, holding the frame in her hands.

"It's doubly interesting, because it is believed that Erskine's brother Henry, finding himself befooled by the crafty Cardinal, united with Lord Glencardine to kill him and dispose of his body secretly, thus ridding Scotland of one of her worst enemies," Walter went on. "For the past five years stories had been continually leaking out of Setoun's inhuman cruelty, his unscrupulous, fiendish tortures inflicted upon all those who displeased him, and how certain persons who stood in his way had died mysteriously or disappeared, no one knew whither. Hence it was that, at Erskine's suggestion, Wemyss of Strathblane went over to Glencardine, and with Charles, Lord Glencardine, conspired to invite the Cardinal there, on pretence of taking counsel against the Protestants, but instead to take his life. The conspirators were, it is said, joined by the Earl of Kintyre and by Mary, the sixteen-year-old daughter of Lord Charles, and sister of the poor girl so brutally done to death by his Eminence. On several successive nights the best means of getting rid of Setoun were considered and discussed, and it is declared that the Whispers now heard sometimes at Glencardine are the secret deliberations of those sworn to kill the infamous Cardinal. Mary, the daughter of the house, was allowed to decide in what manner her sister's death should be avenged, and at her suggestion it was resolved that the inhuman head of the Roman Church should, before his life was taken, be put to the same fiendish tortures as those to which her sister had been subjected in his palace."