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Page 66
"I ordered that none was to be admitted for a moment."
"It is always very hard to keep them out. They are cunning devils,
and take a perverse pleasure in adding to our difficulties. Little
they care how they defeat justice if they can only get 'copy' for
their infernal newspapers."
Inspector Frith spoke with some warmth; he had little for which to
thank the popular Press.
Within an hour the four departed, and it was understood that they
should not be disturbed until they themselves cared to reappear.
Mannering remained with Sir Walter and Lennox. He was dejected
and exceedingly anxious. But the others did not share his fears.
The younger, indeed, felt hopeful that definite results might
presently be recorded, and he went to his bed very thankful to get
there. But Sir Walter, now calm and refreshed by some hours of
sleep during the afternoon, designed to keep his own vigil.
"Poor May lies in my library to-night," he said, "and I shall watch
beside him. Mary also wishes to do so. It seems a proper respect
to pay the dead. The inquest takes place to-morrow, and he will be
buried in his parish. We must attend the funeral, Mary and I."
"If ever a man took his own life, that man did!" declared the doctor.
CHAPTER IX
THE NIGHT WATCH
Though a room had been prepared for Dr. Mannering, he did not
occupy it long. The early hours of night found him in a bad
temper, and suffering from considerable exacerbation of nerves.
He troubled little for himself, and still less concerning the
police, for he was human, and their indifference to his advice
annoyed him; but for Sir Walter he was perturbed, and did not like
the arrangements that he had planned. The doctor, however,
designed to go and come and keep an eye upon the old man, and he
hoped that the master of Chadlands would presently sleep, if only
in his study chair. For himself he suffered a somewhat unpleasant
experience toward midnight, but had himself to thank for it. He
rested for an hour in his bedroom, then went downstairs, to find
Mary and her father sitting quietly together in the great library.
They were both reading, while at the farther end, where a risen
moon already frosted the lofty windows above him, lay Septimus May
in his coffin. Mary had plucked a wealth of white hothouse flowers,
which stood in an old Venetian bowl at his feet.
Sir Walter was solicitous for the doctor.
"Not in bed!" he exclaimed. "This is too bad, Mannering. We shall
have you ill next. You have been on your feet for countless hours
and much lies before you to-morrow. Do be sensible, my dear fellow,
and take some rest--even if you cannot sleep."
"There is no sleep to-night for me. Lord knows how soon I may be
wanted by those fools playing with fire upstairs."
"We cannot interfere. For myself a great peace has descended upon
me, now that initiative and the need for controlling and directing
is taken out of my hands. I began to feel this when poor Hardcastle
arrived; but that composure was sadly shattered. I am even prepared
for the needful publicity now. I can face it. If I erred in the
matter of this devoted priest, I shall not question the judgment
of my fellow-men upon me."
"Fear nothing of that sort," answered Mannering. "Your fellow-man
has no right to judge you, and the law, with all its faults,
appreciates logic. Who can question your right to believe that this
is a matter outside human knowledge? Your wisdom may be questioned,
but not your right. Plenty would have felt the same. When the
mind of man finds itself groping in the dark, you will see that, in
the huge majority of cases, it falls back upon supernatural
explanations for mystery. This fact has made fortunes for not a
few who profit by the credulity of human nature. Faiths are
founded on it. May carried too many guns for you. He honestly
convinced you that his theory of his son's death was the correct
theory; and I, for one, though I deplore the fact that you came to
see with his eyes, and permitted him to do what he believed was
his duty, yet should be the last to think your action open to
judicial blame. No Christian judge, at any rate, would have the
least right to question you. In a word, there is no case yet
against anybody. The force responsible for these things is utterly
unknown, and if ill betides the men upstairs, that is only another
argument for you."
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