Ariel Custer (16 page)

D
own by Copple’s Creek the weeds grew thick and rank, spangled themselves with golden, starry blossoms that in the evening made pale moons in groups and clusters, and lit the way along the limpid water by reflection. The old moon rose and shed its thin radiance, lying on its couch, throwing lacy lights on the old swimming hole through the fingers of the hemlocks.

Quite early in the evening, just after dark, a small, shadowy figure stole from the road and threaded a shy way up among the trees, over the ridge, and down among the purples and blacks of the wooded hills. Stealing stealthily on tired feet; cautiously, waiting now and then to listen; alert at the sound of a falling nut or a stirring bird, or a little black bat on wing. Veiled and neat and shy, she went steadily forward, feeling her way as if by some inner sense, because most of the woods were black as velvet, and only the tinkle of water far down in the ravine to guide. Going so, she came at last to the shallows and the stepping-stones just a little above the swimming hole then stepped softly down and paused. The night was still and soothing. When she looked up, the old moon seemed to smile with its thin, gray lips as if to say: “You and me—you and me, too, old friend!” and the stars gave a faraway twinkle as if they understood.

How long she stood there by the brink with the soft little swish of the water in the grass at her feet and the occasional “Tchug!” of a bullfrog under the dipping roots of the old tree by her side, she did not know. But as she stood she seemed to see in panorama against the cool, green dusk of the night all the scenes of her childhood, the faces of those she had loved, and all the things that had hurt her and oppressed her for months and years seemed to fall away like a burden and leave her light and happy. The longer she stood the more she seemed to feel herself in rhythm with the passing water, so still, so sweet, so cool, slipping, slipping by, and to feel its old-time power over her body and its call to her to come. If only she might be a boat and lie on its smooth surface rocking and floating, with her hands folded and her tired head resting back on the cool pillow. Her body felt so light she was sure it would float. A crazy thought, of course, but she toyed with it, so light she seemed, so good and cool the water would feel. The pull of the little stream was so strong that suddenly she sat down where she was and clutched at the bank as if some enemy were drawing her against her will. Then, feeling safer, she drew her veil away from her white, tired face and, dipping her hand in the water, passed it over her forehead. Her hot, hot forehead! Ah! How good it felt! How good it would feel to be wet all over! She stooped and dipped her arms in up to the elbow, pushing higher and higher the stiff, black, reluctant sleeves. Once she slipped as she stopped and one foot went into the water and found a footing on a broad wet stone. The water stole into her shoe and was cool and delightful. She stood up cautiously and stepped out ankle deep. There was something about the heat of the day and the lure of the stream like a drunken man in front of whiskey. The more she felt, the more she longed for its coolness. With a stealthy glance around she stepped farther and sat slowly down, her hands out on either side to steady her, her heart beating wild with a childish joy. The water lapped up to meet her poor hot limbs, touching with a soothing peace her fevered veins. How good it was! Of course she was getting her skirt wet, her good skirt! But then, it would dry by morning! And anyhow, what did it matter?

As the coolness stole upon her and her weariness and excitement increased, she fancied herself a child again playing by the creek. She lifted her dripping hands and dabbled her face again with their coolness; and then, following an irresistible impulse, she lay down. Ah! This was heaven, though it frightened her for a bit.

But the water was not deep enough here to cover her face. She lay back with her head on a big flat stone to let the coolness and peace steal upon her and the soft touches of the water take the ache from her tired joints. She could look up and see the stars, as if they were twinkling and chuckling with her over what a trick a staid woman like her was carrying through all alone in the night. There was one other in the whole world besides the stars that she knew would understand; perhaps sometime either in this world or the next she would tell, and they would laugh together.

Presently as she lay there rocking with the softly moving water, she found that by touching the tips of her fingers lightly to the stones on either side, she could make her body lift a tiny bit and float, and oh, it was so restful, like an air pillow she had tried once. A water bed, and it was like going to heaven “on downy beds of ease,” the way they used to sing in prayer meeting when she was a little girl, “while others fought to win the prize and sailed through bloody seas!” finished out the old hymn in her ears. Well, she had sailed enough red seas with no prizes at the end, either, and maybe it was all right for her to have this one bit of ease. She knew in the back of her mind it was crazy, but it was good and she did not feel ashamed of doing it.

Into the midst of her dreamy imaginings came a soft sound, hardly definable,
chug, chug, chug
, breaking into the lethargy that was stealing over her and bringing her alertly to a realization of her strange position.

The noise was distinct now, the quick padding of heavily tired wheels, an automobile going over rough ground and seemingly coming straight toward her. She rose from the water in horror with staring eyes across the stream, but the moon-faced blossoms, gazed back at her serenely. Perhaps she was dreaming.

The car seemed to have stopped beyond the clump of willows, and there were subdued voices, and the word “Now!” quite distinctly. Then the sound of a heavy body splashing into the water; a dull thud, an almost imperceptible gasp of nature, as if the clear little stream were resenting the entrance of the unknown, then the soft puff of the starting engine, backing, backing, and flying away in the distance. The water seemed to draw breath and move in relief upon its way again.

Back by the stepping-stones the little alert figure relaxed with a sigh into the water once more. It was comforting and friendly after her fright. She closed her eyes and wondered what had fallen into the stream, and a shudder passed over her. She drew down her veil and fastened it tight to keep out the starlight and bring back the pleasant dreams. Putting down her hands on the stony bottom again, she began lifting and rocking herself like a little child. She could feel the current moving by her, and when she let her body go, it drew her with it to arm’s length; then she pulled herself back again. She began to shift her hands and let her body go farther.

The ache in her back and limbs was all gone now, and her thirsty, fevered body was drinking up new life. She felt like the little boat she had imagined, as with her fingertips on the bottom she drifted farther and farther down the stream. By the gurgle all around her she knew she must have reached the miniature rapids now. She could feel the current stronger and sweeter, drawing her as if it loved her, saying, “Come with us and we will do you good.”

Her mind was keen and alert as she lay and listened to the wooing of the water. She must be nearing the tiny narrows, the only spot where a canoe could get through the rapids. It would be delicious to float through there and feel herself carried along without effort of her own. After that she would stop, pull herself back, and get out. It was late, and she must be getting dry before the morning. She had heard the old bell in the Mercer church tower sounding out two clear strokes shortly before the automobile had come. It would not be long till daylight. She must be getting dry. She must be getting back! Yes, there was the narrows, that big boulder, one on either side. She passed her little wet hands over them lightly and felt herself lifted and brought along in a bliss she had not known since childhood. So cool, so dark, so sweet! Just one minute more! A soft, deep cloud blew over the thready old moon. The hemlocks dipped and bowed, and the shadows were deep where the ferns dipped, and the old Mercer bell tolled One! Two! Three! It was time to get out!

E
mily Dillon’s lawyer had been away for a week on a fishing trip where he hadn’t got a letter nor seen a newspaper once, and when he came back to the city, he found everyone talking about the Dillon case, and wondering what would turn up next. Mothers kept their young daughters in after dark unless they were protected by some trusty mankind, and women avoided the upper trolley that necessitated a short walk through a lonely wood. One and all pitched upon this spot as the place where Emily Dillon had met her fate. The streams and ponds for miles around the vicinity were dragged, the woods faithfully searched where a body could possibly be hidden, and special police were sworn in to be on duty at lonely places and escort late travelers to their homes. It was a time of great excitement, but still the days went by and Emily Dillon’s body was not discovered.

Cautiously, after much inquiry and investigation, Miss Dillon’s lawyer set about an investigation of his own.

He went to see Harriet Granniss, who gave it as her opinion that Emily’s mind was affected. She said Emily had always been strange but had been growing steadily stranger. She liked to be by herself and never would tell where she was going when she went out; and she offered as evidence of her peculiarity the remarks she had made about the tomatoes just before leaving home.

He called on Ariel and found her delicate face wan with anxiety, and her great eyes gray with sorrow over her friend. He was deeply impressed with her exquisiteness and found himself wondering if the Judson Granniss who was interested in the little stone bungalow could possibly be good enough for a girl like this, the more especially as he was reported to be the son of the Granniss person whom he had just interviewed. He wondered if this girl knew she was named in Miss Dillon’s will as the legatee of the little stone bungalow, but decided not to ask. He tried to find Judson Granniss but learned at his boardinghouse that he had not been seen since the morning after the discovery of Emily Dillon’s disappearance.

He visited at least a dozen Dillon cousins and found as many opinions as to what had become of Emily, but they were one in saying that she had been a woman of unsocial nature, and in declaring their intention of searching this matter out thoroughly in case Emily really proved to be dead. They also united in declaring Harriet Granniss an interloper who had no right whatever to that house she was living in, her son a lazy loafer, the Boggs girl a hussy, and Ariel Custer a frail unknown, probably worse than them all. Never agreeing about anything in life before, they had now joined hands to fight this thing to a finish, to get hold of Emily’s estate, and by hook or crook to break that will somehow and get that house back into the family. Among them all there had been not one but Ariel Custer to shed a tear for the quiet little woman who had so mysteriously dropped out of their daily life. The lawyer went back to town disgusted, and determined to keep Miss Dillon’s will in the background as long as possible. It was of course not his place to bring it out until it had been proved beyond the possibility of a doubt that Emily Dillon was really dead.

The days passed, and some of the cousins began to get excited. Harriet Granniss drove around in Emily’s car, piloted by the Boggs girl, who was greatly in evidence and carried her head high. Harriet must have known what they were saying about her—she was sharp enough to understand that such things would be said under the circumstances—but she believed in keeping up a good appearance, so she went to prayer meeting as usual and gave a large donation to the missionary society. The cousins thought such conduct was scandalous; it was time something was done and that woman turned out of the house that never had belonged to her anyway. One elderly Dillon spinster tried to have the house searched and went so far as to suggest that perhaps Mrs. Granniss had their cousin hidden somewhere, locked up, and tortured. Such things had been. In short, they took a wider interest in Emily Dillon gone, disappeared, dead perhaps, than they had ever taken when she was alive. And always with a tidy eye to the property, for it began to appear little by little that Emily Dillon had wide holdings here and there. A little farm well rented and growing in value, some shares in a gold mine out west, a row of stores in a busy part of the city, another of small city homes always filled, a house here, and a bungalow there, and no telling where the rent had been deposited. Bolton bank might not be the only one, it was hinted. Now that the matter had come out in the papers, there came letters from hospitals and homes for orphaned children telling of her quiet deeds and expressing anxiety and a willingness to help in searching for her body. The whole vicinity seemed to be suddenly interested in the little quiet woman who was gone so mysteriously.

Jud Granniss came back with deep lines on his face and eyes that seemed not to have slept for days. He had been tramping the woods all over the county, looking in the most unheard-of places, but all to no avail. He found the letter from the lawyer awaiting him that had been written about the little bungalow at Miss Dillon’s request. It had been missent to Glendale instead of Glenside and so had not reached him sooner. In great trouble he took it at once to Ariel Custer. Together they wept over and worried about that letter.

“It was great of her,” said Jud, struggling with the huskiness of his voice, “but, Ariel, I’m afraid it’s going to make a lot of trouble for us—if—she—doesn’t come back!”

“Why! How could it, Jud?” asked Ariel, startled.

“Don’t you see? They might think we had used undue influence to make her write that letter. I think I’ll go right down to that lawyer’s office and explain to him that we can’t afford to take the house now. We can’t think of getting married anyhow till this matter is all cleared up.”

“Of course!” said Ariel decidedly. “Oh dear! Jud, why weren’t we content just as we were until the right time came? To think how happy we were that day down by the creek, and now here is all this trouble!”

“Maybe we haven’t seen the worst of it yet,” said Jud with a worried look. “Ariel, don’t you talk! You just go about your business, and don’t mention Miss Dillon. If you’re asked any questions, tell the truth, of course; but oh, Ariel! I can’t get over it to think I got you into all this mess!”

“Why, there isn’t any mess for us, dear,” said Ariel, fluttering the palm of her little hand over the lapel of his coat in a way she had. “Why, there’s nothing except our sorrow over dear Miss Emily.”

“Well, I hope so,” said Jud, only half comforted, “but don’t you talk and don’t you worry, even if I don’t come over often. Pray, Ariel, pray.”

After he had kissed her good-bye and gone away in the darkness, Ariel stood a long time on the little front porch hugging to herself those last words of his. To think that he should have told her to pray instead of swearing as he used to do at a God who let this trouble come upon them! It was worthwhile passing through some trouble just to hear him say that and to know there was real trust behind it. Jud was being tested and was keeping his vow.

A few days later Si Hawkins and Ephraim Sears were down at Copple’s Creek quite early in the morning fishing near the old swimming hole. It was four weeks since the news had drifted to Mercer of the disappearance of Emily Dillon, and nothing had as yet been heard to give the slightest clue to what had happened to her. The two men discussed it as they sat in the hazy sunshine and fished.

“Strange,” said Ephraim with a quid in the corner of his cheek. “You’d think they’da found her by this ef she was off her head.”

“Wal, she certainly did look nutty that day, wading in the creek, her a grown woman! Pretty little feet she had, too. Ef
‘twas
her. You know I didn’t get a good look at her face rightly ‘fore you made me come away.”

“It was her all right; I knowed her even when she was walkin’ the bridge. You can’t cheat me, an’ I got a real good look in her eye when we was down behind the rushes.”

It was a few minutes after that they found the body. One of the lines caught in the clothing, and they pulled together and finally succeeded in dragging it to shore. But the body had been in the water a long time, and the face was covered by a heavy veil, tied close and sodden to the flesh.

“It’s her, all right,” said Ephraim Sears in a grim old voice. “I sorta had a hunch sompin’ happened to her that day. She musta been nutty! Si, you sure that was the thirteenth? The paper said she disappeared the fourteenth.”

“Oh, well, papers mostly make mistakes,” declared Si. “Say, we better git the coroner.”

The inquest was held that night in the Mercer morgue, and all Glenside heard by wireless-heartless before nine o’clock that Emily Dillon’s body had been found.

“The body was badly disfigured,” reported an important old man who had kept the telephone wires hot with curiosity, “but they identified her by her clothing and by the money that was found on her person. It was folded each bill by itself the way they say she always folded her money. There was two fives and some ones in a little pocket in her skirt. Oh yes, there’s no doubt but it was suicide. ’Cause if anybody had killed her, why wouldn’t they have took her money?”

Later in the day other facts leaked out, some of which appeared in the paper. Emily Dillon had left packages in one of the Bolton stores to be called for, and the girl who had called for them wore a long gray veil and came in a car driven by a tall young man with black hair. The face of the corpse had been covered completely by a long gray veil, wound around the neck twice and firmly fastened around the left arm. The whole county began to sit up and take notice. It was whispered that the head had been badly bruised, although some declared that there had been no marks of strangulation. There was a paragraph in the paper saying that one noted doctor, present at the inquest, declared the woman had been smothered.

Excitement rose high when Emily Dillon’s will was read and it was found that she had left the bulk of her property to Jud Granniss. And the little bungalow that everybody had supposed was the property of S. S. Packard had been left—of all people—to Ariel Custer!

Harriet Granniss shut her lips hard and narrowed her eyes as if she saw a new clue, and the town looked at one another aghast. Ariel Custer! Hmmmm! Why, yes, Ariel Custer went with Jud Granniss. And the Dillon house now belonged to Jud’s mother! Jud and his mother were at outs! Or were they? Wasn’t that perhaps a ruse? Wasn’t it perhaps—but no—why, it
couldn’t
be—but of course if there were anything, it would be found out—Why didn’t somebody do something?

Then the paper stated that a new witness had been found who declared that Emily Dillon had been seen several days before drowning, if drowning it was, walking alone across the old Copple’s bridge near Mercer and wading barefoot in the creek near the old farm that had been her childhood’s home.

People said: “Ah! Poor thing! Then it
was
suicide!”

Later in the day the news came out that Ephraim Sears of the old Mercer farm had heard an automobile going rapidly across the lower meadow down toward the creek at two o’clock in the morning. He had listened until it returned a few minutes later and then had gone to sleep and forgotten it, although it had seemed a strange place for a car to go in the dark night where there was no regular road. Tracks of a car turning had been found in the wet clay of the bank. Then people began to look at one another harder than ever and to whisper words.

A car! Harriet Granniss has a car! Jud Granniss drove it! Ariel! Jud! The car! A gray veil! Hmmm.

The old swimming hole was dragged for further clue but brought forth nothing more important than a dead dog in a bag loaded with bricks to make it sink.

The next morning it was stated that there were complications, and the body was to be exhumed and a second postmortem to take place to settle whether or not the woman had been poisoned. Excitement ran high.

They gathered together, everybody who had any connection with the matter. They called in several great specialists, both of medicine and justice, and a great many unpleasant questions were asked and answered. Harriet Granniss was there with her rampant feathers, her aggressive mouth, and her belligerent eyes, calm and defiant. Judson Granniss was there, looking years older, with lines of care and responsibility graven about his nice strong mouth and chin, and a protective look in his eyes when he glanced at Ariel. Ariel Custer was there, her gray-green eyes wide with apprehension, and her lips set bravely to face and answer anything that might come. The Boggs girl was there, sitting insolently beside Harriet Granniss, occasionally giving an indolent chew to the gum she always kept ready. All the Dillon cousins were there with their lorgnettes and their spectacles and their eyeglasses, and their dried-up or their pompous looks, as the case might be. And every last one of them from the least unto the greatest looked defiantly askance at Harriet Granniss the interloper, Miss Boggs the upstart, Judson Granniss who dared to be son to Harriet, and Ariel the unknown. If they had been foul vermin, the Dillon skirts could not have been more carefully withdrawn, or the Dillon noses held higher, and one was even heard to say, speaking of their deceased but unmourned relative and the house he had willed away out of the family, “Poor Jacob! He wasn’t himself when he did it, of course!” Through it all Harriet Granniss sat with her head held high and her Congregational-missionary-porch-meeting air of virtuous endurance.