All right, Styles?
Yes sir. Right in his head, sir.
Why should he not be, then?
Hes took to talkin to himself something awful. I wonder it dont disturb you. I dont know what to make of him, sir.
I dont know what business it is of yours, Styles.
Well, I takes an interest, Mr. Smith. It may be forward of me, but I cant help it. I feel sometimes as if I was mother and father to my young gentlemen. It all falls on me when things go wrong and the relations come. But Mr. Bellingham, sir. I want to know what it is that walks about his room sometimes when hes out and when the doors locked on the outside.
Eh! youre talking nonsense, Styles.
Maybe so, sir; but I heard it moren[8] once with my own ears.
Rubbish, Styles.
Very good, sir. Youll ring the bell if you want me.
Abercrombie Smith gave little heed to the gossip of the old man-servant, but a small incident occurred a few days later which left an unpleasant effect upon his mind, and brought the words of Styles forcibly to his memory.
Bellingham had come up to see him late one night, and was entertaining him with an interesting account of the rock tombs of Beni Hassan in Upper Egypt, when Smith, whose hearing was remarkably acute, distinctly heard the sound of a door opening on the landing below.
Theres some fellow gone in or out of your room, he remarked.
Bellingham sprang up and stood helpless for a moment, with the expression of a man who is half incredulous and half afraid.
I surely locked it. I am almost positive that I locked it, he stammered. No one could have opened it.
Why, I hear someone coming up the steps now, said Smith.
Bellingham rushed out through the door, slammed it loudly behind him, and hurried down the stairs. About half-way down Smith heard him stop, and thought he caught the sound of whispering. A moment later the door beneath him shut, a key creaked in a lock, and Bellingham, with beads of moisture upon his pale face, ascended the stairs once more, and re-entered the room.
Its all right, he said, throwing himself down in a chair. It was that fool of a dog. He had pushed the door open. I dont know how I came to forget to lock it.
I didnt know you kept a dog, said Smith, looking very thoughtfully at the disturbed face of his companion.
Yes, I havent had him long. I must get rid of him. Hes a great nuisance.
He must be, if you find it so hard to shut him up. I should have thought that shutting the door would have been enough, without locking it.
I want to prevent old Styles from letting him out. Hes of some value, you know, and it would be awkward to lose him.
I am a bit of a dog-fancier myself, said Smith, still gazing hard at his companion from the corner of his eyes. Perhaps youll let me have a look at it.
Certainly. But I am afraid it cannot be to-night; I have an appointment. Is that clock right? Then I am a quarter of an hour late already. Youll excuse me, I am sure.
He picked up his cap and hurried from the room. In spite of his appointment, Smith heard him re-enter his own chamber and lock his door upon the inside.
This interview left a disagreeable impression upon the medical students mind. Bellingham had lied to him, and lied so clumsily that it looked as if he had desperate reasons for concealing the truth. Smith knew that his neighbour had no dog. He knew, also, that the step which he had heard upon the stairs was not the step of an animal. But if it were not, then what could it be? There was old Styless statement about the room at times when the owner was absent. Could it be a woman? Smith rather inclined to the view. If so, it would mean disgrace and expulsion to Bellingham if it were discovered by the authorities, so that his anxiety and falsehoods might be accounted for. And yet it was inconceivable that an undergraduate could keep a woman in his rooms without being instantly detected. Be the explanation what it might, there was something ugly about it, and Smith determined, as he turned to his books, to discourage all further attempts at intimacy on the part of his soft-spoken and ill-favored neighbor.
But his work was destined to interruption that night. He had hardly caught up the broken threads when a firm, heavy footfall came three steps at a time from below, and Hastie, in blazer and flannels, burst into the room.
Have you heard about Long Norton? he asked.
Whats that?
Hes been attacked.
Attacked?
Yes, just as he was turning out of the High Street, and within a hundred yards of the gate of Olds.
But who
If you said what, you would be more grammatical. Norton swears that it was not human, and, indeed, from the scratches on his throat, I should be inclined to agree with him.
He passes that way every night, you know, about the same hour. Theres a tree that hangs low over the path the big elm from Rainys garden. Norton thinks the thing dropped on him out of the tree. Anyhow, he was nearly strangled by two arms, which, he says, were as strong and as thin as steel bands. He saw nothing; only those beastly arms that tightened and tightened on him. He yelled his head nearly off, and a couple of chaps came running, and the thing went over the wall like a cat. He never got a fair sight of it the whole time. It gave Norton a shake up, I can tell you. I tell him it has been as good as a change at the sea-side for him.
A garrotter, most likely, said Smith.
Very possibly. Norton says not; but we dont mind what he says. The garrotter had long nails, and was pretty smart at swinging himself over walls. By-the-way, your neighbour would be pleased if he heard about it. He had a grudge against Norton, and hes not a man, from what I know of him, to forget his little debts.
Hastie went off and Smith laid down his pipe and turned stolidly to his books once more. But with all the will in the world, he found it very hard to keep his mind upon his work. It would slip away to brood upon the man beneath him, and upon the little mystery which hung around his chambers. Then his thoughts turned to this singular attack of which Hastie had spoken, and to the grudge which Bellingham was said to owe the object of it. The two ideas would persist in rising together in his mind, as though there were some close and intimate connection between them. And yet the suspicion was so dim and vague that it could not be put down in words.
One afternoon, however, he was descending the stairs when, just as he was passing it, Bellinghams door flew open, and young Monkhouse Lee came out with his eyes sparkling and a dark flush of anger upon his olive cheeks. Close at his heels followed Bellingham, his fat, unhealthy face all quivering with malignant passion.
You fool! he hissed. Youll be sorry.
Very likely, cried the other. Mind what I say. Its off! I wont hear of it!
Youve promised, anyhow.
Oh, Ill keep that! I wont speak. But Id rather little Eva was in her grave. Once for all, its off. Shell do what I say. We dont want to see you again.
So much Smith could not avoid hearing, but he hurried on, for he had no wish to be involved in their dispute. There had been a serious breach between them, that was clear enough, and Lee was going to cause the engagement with his sister to be broken off. Smith thought of Hasties comparison of the toad and the dove, and was glad to think that the matter was at an end.
There was one little indulgence which Abercrombie Smith always allowed himself, however closely his work might press upon him. Twice a week, on the Tuesday and the Friday, it was his invariable custom to walk over to Farlingford, the residence of Dr. Plumptree Peterson, situated about a mile and a half out of Oxford. Peterson had been a close friend of Smiths elder brother Francis, and as he was a bachelor, fairly well-to-do, with a good cellar and a better library, his house was a pleasant goal for a man who was in need of a brisk walk. Twice a week, then, the medical student would swing out there along the dark country roads, and spend a pleasant hour in Petersons comfortable study, discussing, over a glass of old port, the the gossip of the varsity or the latest developments of medicine or of surgery.