It was spacious enough in all conscience, occupying the whole depth of the house, and having at either end a great bay window, as large as many modern rooms; in which some few panes of stained glass, emblazoned with fragments of armorial bearings, though cracked, and patched, and shattered, yet remained; attesting, by their presence, that the former owner had made the very light subservient to his state, and pressed the sun itself into his list of flatterers; bidding it, when it shone into his chamber, reflect the badges of his ancient family, and take new hues and colours from their pride.
But those were old days, and now every little ray came and went as it would; telling the plain, bare, searching truth. Although the best room of the inn, it had the melancholy aspect of grandeur in decay, and was much too vast for comfort. Rich rustling hangings, waving on the walls; and, better far, the rustling of youth and beauty's dress; the light of women's eyes, outshining the tapers and their own rich jewels; the sound of gentle tongues, and music, and the tread of maiden feet, had once been there, and filled it with delight. But they were gone, and with them all its gladness. It was no longer a home; children were never born and bred there; the fireside had become mercenary—a something to be bought and sold—a very courtezan: let who would die, or sit beside, or leave it, it was still the same—it missed nobody, cared for nobody, had equal warmth and smiles for all. God help the man whose heart ever changes with the world, as an old mansion when it becomes an inn!
No effort had been made to furnish this chilly waste, but before the broad chimney a colony of chairs and tables had been planted on a square of carpet, flanked by a ghostly screen, enriched with figures, grinning and grotesque. After lighting with his own hands the faggots which were heaped upon the hearth, old John withdrew to hold grave council with his cook, touching the stranger's entertainment; while the guest himself, seeing small comfort in the yet unkindled wood, opened a lattice in the distant window, and basked in a sickly gleam of cold March sun.
Leaving the window now and then, to rake the crackling logs together, or pace the echoing room from end to end, he closed it when the fire was quite burnt up, and having wheeled the easiest chair into the warmest corner, summoned John Willet.
“Sir,” said John.
He wanted pen, ink, and paper. There was an old standish on the mantelshelf containing a dusty apology for all three. Having set this before him, the landlord was retiring, when he motioned him to stay.
“There's a house not far from here,” said the guest when he had written a few lines, “which you call the Warren , I believe?”
As this was said in the tone of one who knew the fact, and asked the question as a thing of course, John contented himself with nodding his head in the affirmative; at the same time taking one hand out of his pockets to cough behind, and then putting it in again.
“I want this note'—said the guest, glancing on what he had written, and folding it, “conveyed there without loss of time, and an answer brought back here. Have you a messenger at hand?”
John was thoughtful for a minute or thereabouts, and then said Yes.
“Let me see him,” said the guest.
This was disconcerting; for Joe being out, and Hugh engaged in rubbing down the chestnut cob, he designed sending on the errand, Barnaby, who had just then arrived in one of his rambles, and who, so that he thought himself employed on a grave and serious business, would go anywhere.
“Why the truth is,” said John after a long pause, “that the person who'd go quickest, is a sort of natural, as one may say, sir; and though quick of foot, and as much to be trusted as the post itself, he's not good at talking, being touched and flighty, sir.”
“You don't,” said the guest, raising his eyes to John's fat face, “you don't mean—what's the fellow's name—you don't mean Barnaby?”
“Yes, I do,” returned the landlord, his features turning quite expressive with surprise.
“How comes he to be here?” inquired the guest, leaning back in his chair; speaking in the bland, even tone, from which he never varied; and with the same soft, courteous, never-changing smile upon his face. “I saw him in London last night.”
“He's, for ever, here one hour, and there the next,” returned old John, after the usual pause to get the question in his mind. “Sometimes he walks, and sometimes runs. He's known along the road by everybody, and sometimes comes here in a cart or chaise, and sometimes riding double. He comes and goes, through wind, rain, snow, and hail, and on the darkest nights. Nothing hurts HIM.”
“He goes often to the Warren , does he not?” said the guest carelessly. “I seem to remember his mother telling me something to that effect yesterday. But I was not attending to the good woman much.”
“You're right, sir,” John made answer, “he does. His father, sir, was murdered in that house.”
“So I have heard,” returned the guest, taking a gold toothpick from his pocket with the same sweet smile. “A very disagreeable circumstance for the family.”
“Very,” said John with a puzzled look, as if it occurred to him, dimly and afar off, that this might by possibility be a cool way of treating the subject.
“All the circumstances after a murder,” said the guest soliloquising, “must be dreadfully unpleasant—so much bustle and disturbance—no repose—a constant dwelling upon one subject—and the running in and out, and up and down stairs, intolerable. I wouldn't have such a thing happen to anybody I was nearly interested in, on any account. “Twould be enough to wear one's life out. —You were going to say, friend—” he added, turning to John again.
“Only that Mrs Rudge lives on a little pension from the family, and that Barnaby's as free of the house as any cat or dog about it,” answered John. “Shall he do your errand, sir?”
“Oh yes,” replied the guest. “Oh certainly. Let him do it by all means. Please to bring him here that I may charge him to be quick. If he objects to come you may tell him it's Mr Chester. He will remember my name, I dare say.”
John was so very much astonished to find who his visitor was, that he could express no astonishment at all, by looks or otherwise, but left the room as if he were in the most placid and imperturbable of all possible conditions. It has been reported that when he got downstairs, he looked steadily at the boiler for ten minutes by the clock, and all that time never once left off shaking his head; for which statement there would seem to be some ground of truth and feasibility, inasmuch as that interval of time did certainly elapse, before he returned with Barnaby to the guest's apartment.
“Come hither, lad,” said Mr Chester. “You know Mr Geoffrey Haredale?”
Barnaby laughed, and looked at the landlord as though he would say, “You hear him?” John, who was greatly shocked at this breach of decorum, clapped his finger to his nose, and shook his head in mute remonstrance.
“He knows him, sir,” said John, frowning aside at Barnaby, “as well as you or I do.”
“I haven't the pleasure of much acquaintance with the gentleman,” returned his guest. “YOU may have. Limit the comparison to yourself, my friend.”
Although this was said with the same easy affability, and the same smile, John felt himself put down, and laying the indignity at Barnaby's door, determined to kick his raven, on the very first opportunity.
“Give that,” said the guest, who had by this time sealed the note, and who beckoned his messenger towards him as he spoke, “into Mr Haredale's own hands. Wait for an answer, and bring it back to me here. If you should find that Mr Haredale is engaged just now, tell him—can he remember a message, landlord?”
“When he chooses, sir,” replied John. “He won't forget this one.”
“How are you sure of that?”
John merely pointed to him as he stood with his head bent forward, and his earnest gaze fixed closely on his questioner's face; and nodded sagely.