第58章 THE TEMPTATION(28)

It was a clear, cold morning, and the old brick house, set midway of the autumn fields, appeared, as he approached it, to reflect the golden light that filled the east.Never had the place seemed to him more desirable than it did as he went slowly toward it along the desolate November roads.The somber colours of the landscape, the bared majesty of the old oaks where a few leaves still clung to the topmost boughs, the deserted garden filled with wan specters of summer flowers, were all in peculiar harmony with his own mood as with the stern gray walls wrapped in naked creepers.That peculiar sense of ownership was strongly with him as he ascended the broad steps and lifted the old brass knocker, which still bore the Blake coat of arms.

To his astonishment the door opened instantly and Fletcher himself appeared upon the threshold.At sight of Christopher he fell back as if from a blow in the chest, ripping out an oath with a big downward gesture of his closed fist.

"So you are mixed up in it, are you! Whar's the boy?" From the dusk of the hall his face shone dead white about the eyes.

"If you want to get anything out of me you'd better curb your tongue, Bill Fletcher," replied Christopher coolly, feeling an animal instinct to prolong the torture."If you think it's any satisfaction to me to have your young idiot thrown on my hands you were never more mistaken in your life.I've been up half the night with him, and the sooner you take him away the better I'll like it.""Oh, you leave him to me and I'll settle him," responded Fletcher, reaching for his hat."Jest show me whar he is and I'll git even with him befo' sundown.As for you, young man, I'll have the sheriff after you yit.""In the meantime, you'd better have the doctor.The boy's ill, Itell you.He came to me last evening, run to death and with a high fever.He slept in the barn, and this morning he is decidedly worse.If you come, bring Doctor Cairn with you, and Iwarn you now you've got to use a lot of caution.Your grandson is mortally afraid of you, and he threatens to run away if I let you know where he is.He wants me to sit at the door with a shotgun and keep you off."He delivered his blows straight out from the shoulder, lingering over each separate word that he might enjoy to the full its stupendous effect.

"This is your doing," repeated Fletcher hoarsely; "it's your doing, every blamed bit of it."Christopher laughed shortly."Well, I'm through with my errand,"he said, moving toward the steps and pausing with one hand on a great white column."The sooner you get him out of my barn the better riddance it will be.There's one thing certain, though, and that is that you don't lay eyes on him without the doctor.

He's downright ill, on my oath."

"Oh, it's the same old trick, and I see through it," exclaimed Fletcher furiously."It's pure shamming.""All the same, I've got my gun on hand, and you don't go into that barn alone." He hung for an instant upon the topmost step, then descended hurriedly and walked rapidly back along the broad white walk.It would be an hour, at least, before Fletcher could follow him with Doctor Cairn, and after he had returned to the barn and given Will a glass of new milk he fed and watered the horses and did the numberless small tasks about the house.He was at the woodpile, chopping some light wood splinters for Cynthia, when the sound of wheels reached him, and in a little while more the head of Fletcher's mare appeared around the porch.Doctor Cairn, a frousy, white-bearded old man, crippled from rheumatism, held out his hand to Christopher as he descended with some difficulty between the wheels of the buggy.

Christopher motioned to the barn, and then, taking the reins, fastened the horse to the branch of a young ailanthus tree which grew near the woodpile.As he watched the figures of the two men pass along the little path between the fringes of dead yarrow he drew an uneasy breath and dug his boot into the rotting mould upon the ground.The barn door opened and closed; there was a short silence, and then a sudden despairing cry as of a rabbit caught in the jaws of a hound.When he heard it he turned impulsively from the horse's head and went quickly along the path the men had taken.There was no definite intention in his mind, but as he reached the barn door it shot open and Fletcher put out a white face.

"The Doctor wants you, Mr.Christopher," he cried; "Will has gone clean mad!"Without a word, Christopher pushed by him and went into the great dusky room, where the boy was struggling like a madman to loosen the doctor's grasp.He was conscious at the moment that the air was filled with fine chaff and that he sucked it in when he breathed.

At his entrance Will lay quiet for a moment and looked at him with dazed, questioning eyes.

"Keep them out, Christopher!" he cried, in anguish.

Christopher crossed the room and laid his hand with a protecting gesture on the boy's head.

"Why, to be sure I will," he said heartily; "the devil himself won't dare to touch you when I am by, "