Chapter 1

“Thomas!” … “Yes, m’lord.”

Thomas the footman waited, a look of concentrated interest on his
unprepossessing face, whilst the pale man behind the big library desk
sorted out a small pile of treasury notes. The battered steel box from
which they were taken was full to the brim with bank and treasury
notes of all denominations in hopeless confusion.

“Thomas!” absently.

“Yes, m’lord.”

“Put this money in that envelope--not that one, you fool, the gray
one. Is it addressed?”

“Yes, m’lord. ‘Herr Lubitz, Frankfurterstrasse 35, Leipsic,’ m’lord.”

“Lick it down, take it to the post office and register it. Is Mr.
Richard in his study?”

“No, m’lord, he went out an hour ago.”

Harry Alford, eighteenth Earl of Chelford, sighed. He was on the right
side of thirty, thin of face and pale as students are, his jet-black
hair emphasizing the pallor of his skin. The library in which he
worked was a high-roofed building, the walls bisected by a gallery
that ran round three sides of the room and was reached by a circular
iron staircase in one corner of the apartment. From the roof to the
floor every inch of wall space was covered with bookshelves with this
notable exception. Over the great stone fireplace was a full-length
painting of a beautiful woman. None who had seen his lordship could
make any mistake as to the relationship which existed between himself
and that wild-eyed beauty. It was his mother; she had the same
delicate features, the same raven hair and dark, fathomless eyes. Lady
Chelford had been the most famous débutante of her time, and her
tragic end had been the sensation of the early ’nineties. There was no
other picture in the room.

His eyes strayed to the portrait now. To Harry Alford, Fossaway Manor,
for all its beauty and charm, was a poor casket for such a jewel.

The footman in his sober black livery, his hair powdered white,
lingered.

“Is that all, m’lord?”

“That is all,” said his lordship gravely. Yet when the man had moved
noiselessly to the door--

“Thomas!”

“Yes, m’lord.”

“I heard something by accident as you passed my window this morning
with Filling the groom--er----?”

“He was telling me about the Black Abbot, m’lord.”

The pale face twitched spasmodically. Even in broad daylight, with the
sun streaming through the stained windows and marking the parquet with
arabesques of crimson and blue and amethyst, the very mention of the
Black Abbot set his heart beating faster.

“Any man in my employ who discusses the Black Abbot will be instantly
dismissed. Will you tell your fellow servants that, Thomas? A ghost!
Great God! Are you all mad?”

His face was red now, little veins swelled at his temples, and under
the stream of anger his dark eyes seemed to recede into his head.

“Not a word! You understand? It is a lie! A mischievous wicked lie to
say that Fossaway is haunted! It is a trick played by some of the
louts about the place. That will do!”

He waved the bowing man from his presence and resumed his study of the
black-lettered book that had arrived from Germany that morning.

Once outside the library door, Thomas could afford to twist his sallow
features to a grin. Only for a second, and then he became serious
again. There must be nearly a thousand pounds in that cash box and
Thomas had once served a three-year sentence for a tenth of that sum.
Even Mr. Richard Alford, who knew most things, was unaware of this
interesting fact.

Thomas had a letter to write, for he maintained a lucrative
correspondence with one who had an especial interest in Fossaway
Manor, but first he had to report the gist of the conversation to Mr.
Glover, the butler.

“I don’t care what his lordship says (and why he should tell a footman
and not me, I don’t know) there’s a ghost and all sorts of people have
seen it! I wouldn’t walk down Elm Drive alone at night for fifty
million pounds!”

This portly man shook a head that the years had silvered.

“And his lordship believes it too. I wish he was married, that’s what
I wish. He’ll be more sensible then!”

“And we’ll get rid of Mr. Blooming Alford--eh, Mr. Glover?”

The butler sniffed.

“There’s them that likes him and them that don’t,” said the oracle.
“We’ve never had a cross word, Thomas---- There’s somebody at the
door.”

Thomas hurried to the hall entrance and opened the big door. A girl
was standing under the portico. She was pretty in a bold way, red of
lips and bright of eye and dressed expensively.

Thomas gave her a grin of recognition.

“Good-morning, Miss Wenner--this is a bit of a surprise!”

“Is his lordship in, Thomas?”

The footman pursed his lips dubiously.

“He _is_ in, miss, but I’m afraid I can’t take you in to him. Don’t
blame me, miss, it’s Mr. Alford’s orders.”

“Mr. Alford!” she sneered. “Do you mean to tell me that I’ve come all
the way from London and can’t see Lord Chelford?”

But Thomas kept his hand on the door. He liked the girl who, when she
had been his lordship’s secretary, had never given herself airs (the
unpardonable sin of the servants’ hall) and who always had a smile for
the meanest of the domestic staff. He would gladly have admitted her
and felt that his lordship would have been pleased to see her, but in
the background somewhere hovered Dick Alford, a man of curt speech,
who was not only capable of showing him the door but kicking him
through it.

“I’m very sorry, miss, but orders is orders, as you know.”

“I see!” she nodded ominously. “I’m to be turned away from what might
have been my own door, Thomas.”

He tried to look his sympathy and succeeded in assuming an expression
of imbecility. She smiled at him, shook hands with him graciously, and
turned away from the portico.

“Miss Wenner,” reported Thomas, “her that Alford fired because he
thought his lordship was getting sweet on her----”

The library bell rang at that moment and Thomas hastened to answer the
call. “Who was that lady? I saw her through the window.”

“Miss Wenner, m’lord.”

A cloud passed over Harry Alford’s face.

“Did you--ask her to come in?”

“No, m’lord, Mr. Alford gave orders----”

“Of course… yes. I had forgotten. Perhaps it is just as well. Thank
you.”

He pulled down the green shade over his eyes, for even in the day he
worked by artificial light, such was the gloom in the library, and
resumed his study of the book.

Yet his mind was not wholly concentrated on the work. Once he rose and
walked up and down the library, his hands clasped before him, his chin
on his breast. He stopped before the picture of his mother, sighed,
and walked back to the writing table. There was a press paragraph
which he had cut out of a London newspaper and this he read for the
third time, not ill pleased with the unaccustomed experience of
finding himself the subject of newspaper comment, and yet irritated by
the subject on which the paragraph was based.

Chelfordbury, a sleepy Sussex village, is engaged in the thrilling
sport of ghost-hunting. The Black Abbot of Fossaway has, after a
period of quiescence, again made his appearance. The legend is that
seven hundred years ago, the Abbot of Chelfordbury was assassinated by
order of the Second Earl of Chelford. Since then, from time to time,
his “ghost” has been seen. During the past few years horrific stories
of an Unseen Being that shrieked and howled demoniacally have been
current in the county, but the noisy spook was not actually seen until
last week.

Fossaway Manor has other romances besides ghosts. Four hundred years
ago, a great treasure of gold was, according to legend, hidden
somewhere on the estate; so effectually, in fact, that it has never
been discovered since, although successive Earls of Chelford have
searched diligently for the ancestral hoard.

The present Earl of Chelford, who, by the way, is engaged to be
married to Miss Leslie Gwyn, the only sister of Mr. Arthur Gwyn, the
well-known solicitor, informed our local representative that he had no
doubt that the apparition of the Black Abbot was a practical joke in
very doubtful taste on the part of the foolish youth of the
neighbourhood.

He made as though to tear the paper but thought better of it and put
the cutting under a paper weight.

That reference to the practical jokers of the village was reassuring
and might be a comfort when the night came and he needed
encouragement.

For Lord Chelford believed in the Black Abbot as religiously as he
proclaimed his scepticism.

His restless hand moved to the bell-push on his table.

“Has Mr. Richard returned?”

“No, m’lord.”

Lord Chelford struck the table pettishly with his palm.

“Where on earth does he get to in the mornings?” he asked querulously.

Thomas, very wisely, pretended not to hear.