There was a light in Stonehanger House. It had flashed out suddenly in one of the side windows, as though the black house had raised an eyelid and looked out on the world with a sinister, yellow eye.
The light disappeared from the window, and left the eastern side of the house a mere dark surface. At the same moment a gust of wind came over the hill from the sea. The stunted trees shook their fists at the house, cursing it and bidding it beware.
Then a door opened, and the light came out into the paved yard at the back of Stonehanger. It flickered across toward the stable whose stone roof was brushed by the boughs of a clump of firs. There was the sound of some one hammering at a door, a hollow sound like blows struck with the hilt of a sword upon the panelling covering some secret hiding-place.
The light approached the road, shooting yellow rays among the overgrown laurels and hollies of the shrubbery inside the stone wall. There was a gate here, with an arched stone bridge leading over the ditch to the road. The gate was thrust open and the lantern held out at the end of a white forearm. Ten yards away Jasper Benham lay flat on his back, one arm flung out, the other twisted as though it were broken. The lantern swayed uncertainly at the gate and then came down into the road. It showed the white face and the slight figure of a girl, a red cloak flung over her shoulders, her dress open at the throat.
She stood and looked at the figure in the road as though she were shrewdly afraid, and ready to reason with herself for being so.
"Don't be a coward, Nance. You won't help any one by being afraid."
She spoke the words aloud, in a mood to be reassured by the sound of her own voice.
"Can't you see that the man has a soldier's coat? The French may have landed at last. You heard horses go by, and the sound of a pistol-shot."
She moved forward and, holding the lantern shoulder-high, bent over the man in the road. It was a pure coincidence that Benham opened his eyes at the same moment, and blinked at the light that was within two feet of his face.
"Hallo!—O—my head!"
He stirred, turned on one elbow, and fell back with a savage start of pain.
"Damnation, what's this? What have they done to my arm? Who—? I say—I beg your pardon——!"
Sudden sanity came into his eyes, and he lay and stared at the girl's face. It seemed that these two were fascinated momentarily by each other's eyes. Benham moistened his lips, and made an effort to explain himself.
"I must have had a crack on the head. Of course, what am I thinking of! The scoundrel shot at me from behind a tree. Where's Dick? Can you see anything of a horse?"
She looked up and down the lane, and her eyes returned slowly to his face. They were very solemn eyes, big and dark, like the eyes of a southern woman.
"I can't see any horse. Have the French landed——?"
"The French?"
"Yes."
"Nothing so respectable. I was chasing horse-thieves, and one of them shot me from behind that yew-tree. I'm Benham of Rush Heath."
Her solemnity took the colour of compassion.
"I'm sorry. And your poor arm there! No, don't move. I'm Nance Durrell, and this is Stonehanger Lane."
"Durrell! H'm. That fellow's bullet must have broken my right arm."
"I heard horses galloping, and the sound of a pistol-shot. You see, I was watching for father. And I couldn't wake David; he's stone deaf."
"You live here then?"
"Yes, at Stonehanger. Don't you know?"
Jasper looked discomfited by his ignorance.
"It's my head; this tumble has knocked my wits to pieces. I wonder if I can get up."
She put the lantern down, and they regarded each other with great seriousness.
"I don't know. There's your arm! And it has been bleeding."
"Has it?"
"Sssh—it must hurt!"
"Well, I can't lie here in the road, can I?"
"No."
"I must get up—and home—somehow."
She looked at him as though considering what was best to do.
"I know. You ought to have your arm fastened to your side. I had my arm broken once. I'll go in and get a scarf."
She picked up the lantern and disappeared through the gate with beams of light swinging about her in the darkness. As for Jasper Benham, his head had cleared sufficiently to admit some measure of astonished curiosity. Who were the Durrells, and how had they come to Stonehanger House, and how was it he could not remember ever having heard the name?
"Nance Durrell—Nance Durrell."
He repeated it to himself as he lay under the shadow of the yew-tree, as though the uttering of the name might help him to realise that he was not dreaming in his bed at Rush Heath. No; the ground was solid, the yew bough above him was solid, the pain in his arm was very real. And the girl who called herself Nance Durrell? He found himself waiting impatiently for her return, and watching the foliage of the shrubs for the shine of her lantern.
She was back again in the road, carrying a red scarf in one hand.
"I had to hunt for it, or I should not have been so long."
She put the lantern down, and knelt beside him, her lips parted, her eyes full of her purpose. It struck Benham of a sudden that she must have led a free and rather lonely life. She seemed ready to rely upon herself, to meet responsibilities with the frank self-reliance of a girl who has had to trust to her own hands.
"Do you think you can sit up?"
"Of course I can."
"Wait; I'll help you. Hold your arm with your other hand."
She drew herself behind him, and put her hands under his shoulders.
"Now."
He was up, with her hands still holding him, and her breath touching his cheek.
"Can you bear it?"
"Yes."
"Draw the arm across—so."
"Phew—confound it! I'm sorry; it's nothing."
"I know how it must hurt."
The frank impulse toward sympathy in her voice sent a start of emotion through him. He set his teeth as she bound the broken arm to his side with the red scarf. There was a kind of pleasure in the pain.
"What gentle hands you have."
"Have I? There! How does that feel?"
"Splendid."
"Now I'll help you up."
Whatever a man's pluck may be it cannot raise him above nature, or make him independent of the ills of the flesh. Jasper Benham scrambled to his feet to be smothered by a sudden fog of faintness that blotted out the moonlight and set him groping with his hands.
"I can't help it—but——"
She understood what ailed him, and was practical in her compassion.
"You're faint."
Her hands steadied him.
"Put your head down—just for a moment."
He felt the grip of her strong young hands, and the thrill of it may have helped his heart.
"That's better."
"Are you sure?"
"Yes."
She picked up the lantern and, holding it high, looked at him with frank concern.
"You can't get back to Rush Heath to-night."
"I am afraid that's the truth."
"You must come in here. I'll wake David somehow. He can go over to Rush Heath as soon as it is light, and tell them to send a cart."
"What a friend you are."
She stood there in sudden forceful contrast to all the things feminine that he had ever known. There was a sweet and brave directness about her that challenged his manhood. Simple, chivalrous homage; some women win such service with a word or a look. He bowed to her, and his heart bowed with his body.
"You are very good to me."
"Good! What else could one do!"
Everything about the grey, upland house seemed fashioned out of stone. The paths and yard were paved with rough stones from the quarry; the hall and passages floored with flagstones. Jasper Benham found himself lying on a long couch under the window in a room that might have been part of an old religious house. It was walled and vaulted with stone, and the fireplace was a great yawning recess with carved pillars on each side of it.
Nance Durrell had gone to wake David Barfoot, the servant, who slept in a room by the stable. Benham lay back with his head on the round squab, and looked about him with the consenting curiosity of a man who dreams. Who were the Durrells, and how had they come to Stonehanger, this grey house, that for thirty years had been spoken of as a house of horror? Benham was not an imaginative man, but this grey room with the huge yawn of its fireplace filled him with a vague sense of eeriness and mystery.
He heard footsteps crossing the paved hall. Nance reappeared with an armful of wood. Her big, brown eyes ran over with laughter, the mischievous and sparkling laughter of perfect health.
"I have managed to wake David. We make him leave his window open, because there is only one way of waking him."
"Throwing stones——?"
"I could only find the stable bucket—and I'm afraid I dropped it on David's head."
She put her wood down and, kneeling, stirred the heap of grey ash in the fireplace. Her breath roused it to redness, and the twigs that she threw on crackled with flame. Benham watched her as though the kindling of that fire was one of the most wonderful things that he had ever seen. The burning wood threw a warmth upon her, and made her black hair gleam.
"Don't you love making a fire?"
"Yes, when it is not at six o'clock on a winter morning."
"Oh, I love that, too. It is so glorious to get warm."
To Benham the whole adventure had been incredibly delightful. Only by degrees did he become conscious of himself, of his bare legs, and the general precipitation of his dress. But somehow these things did not seem to matter. The girl had picked up the incidents of the night as naturally as she would have gathered wind-blown apples out of the grass.
"There's David."
Sounds came from some far-off corner of the house. Nance disappeared, to return with a skillet full of milk, a cup, and some bread and cheese on a plate.
"I am going to heat this milk for you."
"You are taking too much trouble."
"I should have to sit up—anyway. Father may return to-night. He was coming by the night coach, and meant to walk from Battle."
Jasper was seized with a desire to ask questions, but his finer instincts smothered the desire. And in another minute she was holding out the cup of milk to him with that solemn and intent look in her eyes.
"You must get some sleep now. I shall have to keep awake by the fire, and listen."
"For Mr. Durrell? He will have a long tramp from Battle."
"Yes. David never hears anything."
"A useful man on occasions."
"Does the arm hurt you much?"
"No, nothing to speak of."
She brought a rug from somewhere and threw it over him, and took the cup when he had finished the milk.
"I will put out the lantern. The firelight will do for me."
She drew an arm-chair before the hearth, took some logs from the oak log-box and piled them against the fire-back. Benham lay and watched her out of the corners of his eyes. She sat herself down with the firelight playing upon her black dress, and touching her throat and face. Perhaps she had outwatched her own wakefulness, for presently she fell asleep, her head resting against the chair back, her face turned toward the window.
Jasper Benham could not sleep. The aching of his broken arm, and a feeling of restlessness kept him awake. Moreover, he was very conscious of the nearness of the girl sleeping in the chair; and the alluring strangeness of her white face seemed sharpened by his own pain. He became feverish and nervously alert, unable to master the thoughts and conjectures that made a whirligig of his brain. He began to question the history of Stonehanger as a sick man busies himself with patterns on a wall. Was it true that Inchbold had killed his wife here fifty years ago? Was it true that two men had fought a duel to the death in this very room? What of the tales told of the haunting horror of the house, a horror that had emptied it and kept it empty for twenty years? Nance Durrell, sleeping before the fire, seemed to contradict all this. The ebbing and flowing of her breath between the red lips of youth might exorcise such ghost tales.
But Benham was very restless. The flicker of the firelight through the vaulted room made a grim, fantastic shadow-play. There was a listening silence about the house that made wakeful ears tingle with imaginary sounds. Sometimes a log settled, and sent up a scattering of sparks. More than once a gust of wind rattled the windows.
Suddenly Benham turned his head. He had heard, or thought he had heard, the ring of a horse's hoofs upon the stones of the court-yard. He wondered for the moment whether he ought to wake Nance Durrell.
Benham's eyes were turned toward the fire. He did not see something white glide up toward the window. A face seemed to flatten itself against the panes, and to be distorted by the crinkles in the glass. It remained there for a few seconds, and then melted back into the night.