I drew aside my curtains before I went to bed and looked outfrom my window. It opened upon the grassy space which lay infront of the hall door. Beyond, two copses of trees moaned andswung in a rising wind. A half moon broke through the rifts ofracing clouds. In its cold light I saw beyond the trees a brokenfringe of rocks, and the long, low curve of the melancholy moor. Iclosed the curtain, feeling that my last impression was in keepingwith the rest.
And yet it was not quite the last. I found myself weary and yetwakeful, tossing restlessly from side to side, seeking for the sleepwhich would not come. Far away a chiming clock struck out thequarters of the hours, but otherwise a deathly silence lay upon theold house. And then suddenly, in the very dead of the night, therecame a sound to my ears, clear, resonant, and unmistakable. Itwas the sob of a woman, the muffled, strangling gasp of one whois torn by an uncontrollable sorrow. I sat up in bed and listenedintently. The noise could not have been far away and was certainlyin the house. For half an hour I waited with every nerve on thealert, but there came no other sound save the chiming clock andthe rustle of the ivy on the wall.
The Stapletons of Merripit House
The fresh beauty of the following morning did something toefface from our minds the grim and gray impression which hadbeen left upon both of us by our first experience of BaskervilleHall. As Sir Henry and I sat at breakfast the sunlight flooded inthrough the high mullioned windows, throwing watery patchesof colour from the coats of arms which covered them. The darkpanelling glowed like bronze in the golden rays, and it was hard torealize that this was indeed the chamber which had struck such agloom into our souls upon the evening before.
“I guess it is ourselves and not the house that we have to blame!”
said the baronet. “We were tired with our journey and chilled byour drive, so we took a gray view of the place. Now we are freshand well, so it is all cheerful once more.”
“And yet it was not entirely a question of imagination,” Ianswered. “Did you, for example, happen to hear someone, awoman I think, sobbing in the night?”
“That is curious, for I did when I was half asleep fancy that Iheard something of the sort. I waited quite a time, but there wasno more of it, so I concluded that it was all a dream.”
“I heard it distinctly, and I am sure that it was really the sob of awoman.”
“We must ask about this right away.” He rang the bell andasked Barrymore whether he could account for our experience. Itseemed to me that the pallid features of the butler turned a shadepaler still as he listened to his master’s question.
“There are only two women in the house, Sir Henry,” heanswered. “One is the scullery-maid, who sleeps in the other wing.
The other is my wife, and I can answer for it that the sound couldnot have come from her.”
And yet he lied as he said it, for it chanced that after breakfastI met Mrs. Barrymore in the long corridor with the sun full uponher face. She was a large, impassive, heavy-featured woman with astern set expression of mouth. But her telltale eyes were red andglanced at me from between swollen lids. It was she, then, whowept in the night, and if she did so her husband must know it. Yethe had taken the obvious risk of discovery in declaring that it wasnot so. Why had he done this? And why did she weep so bitterly?
Already round this pale-faced, handsome, black-bearded manthere was gathering an atmosphere of mystery and of gloom. Itwas he who had been the first to discover the body of Sir Charles,and we had only his word for all the circumstances which led upto the old man’s death. Was it possible that it was Barrymore afterall whom we had seen in the cab in Regent Street? The beardmight well have been the same. The cabman had described asomewhat shorter man, but such an impression might easily havebeen erroneous. How could I settle the point forever? Obviouslythe first thing to do was to see the Grimpen postmaster, and findwhether the test telegram had really been placed in Barrymore’sown hands. Be the answer what it might, I should at least havesomething to report to Sherlock Holmes.
Sir Henry had numerous papers to examine after breakfast, sothat the time was propitious for my excursion. It was a pleasantwalk of four miles along the edge of the moor, leading me at last toa small gray hamlet, in which two larger buildings, which provedto be the inn and the house of Dr. Mortimer, stood high above therest. The postmaster, who was also the village grocer, had a clearrecollection of the telegram.
“Certainly, sir,” said he, “I had the telegram delivered to Mr.
Barrymore exactly as directed.”
“Who delivered it?”
“My boy here. James, you delivered that telegram to Mr.
Barrymore at the Hall last week, did you not?”
“Yes, father, I delivered it.”
“Into his own hands?” I asked.
“Well, he was up in the loft at the time, so that I could not putit into his own hands, but I gave it into Mrs. Barrymore’s hands,and she promised to deliver it at once.”
“Did you see Mr. Barrymore?”
“No, sir; I tell you he was in the loft.”
“If you didn’t see him, how do you know he was in the loft?”
“Well, surely his own wife ought to know where he is,” said thepostmaster testily. “Didn’t he get the telegram? If there is anymistake it is for Mr. Barrymore himself to complain.”
It seemed hopeless to pursue the inquiry any farther, but itwas clear that in spite of Holmes’s ruse we had no proof thatBarrymore had not been in London all the time. Suppose thatit were so—suppose that the same man had been the last whohad seen Sir Charles alive, and the first to dog the new heir whenhe returned to England. What then? Was he the agent of othersor had he some sinister design of his own? What interest couldhe have in persecuting the Baskerville family? I thought of thestrange warning clipped out of the leading article of the Times.
