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The Queen's Scarlet, a novel by George Manville Fenn |
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Chapter 23. Haunted |
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_ CHAPTER TWENTY THREE. HAUNTED For nearly a minute Dick did not stir, but stood staring, with eyes wide open, lips apart, and the piccolo held still on a level with his chin. Then, as the figure of the officer was hidden by the marching men, the young musician uttered a low, hoarse sound--the pent-up breath escaping from his lungs. The while the buildings opposite, the crowd of people in doorways and at windows, even the marching men steadily tramping by, seemed to undulate, rise, and then slowly glide round and round, till he gave a violent start; for a hand had grasped his arm, and he turned to gaze at the clarionet-player who was supporting him. "What is it? A bit faint?" "I--I don't know," faltered Dick. "I do. That's it. You've been blowing a bit too hard. Don't play any more. We've just done." A minute or two gave the lad time to try and recover himself. "Yes, that's it," said the clarionet-player; "you got excited, and played too hard. I remember being once like that; I shivered just as you are shivering now. Doctor said it was only nerves." "Only nerves!" said Dick, in a low tone, involuntarily repeating the man's words. "Yes, that's it. Keep cool, and you'll soon come right. Feel faint now?" "No, the giddiness has gone off." "That's right." The bandsman ceased speaking, for he had to take his part again, as the rear of the new regiment marched past with the mounted officers. Then followed an ambulance waggon, the water-tub, two or three baggage waggons, and half a dozen men who had fallen out on the march, all of whom Dick saw as if it were part of a dream, which lasted, in a confused way, as he and his companion joined their own regiment, took their place at the head, and returned to their own quarters. "Getting all right, again?" said the clarionet-player, as they stood together in the barrack yard waiting to be dismissed. "What is it? What's the matter?" asked Wilkins, sourly. "Smithson sick, sir," was the reply. The bandmaster looked at his principal flute curiously, but said nothing. The next minute they were dismissed, and Dick longed in vain for a place where he could be alone, the only approach to it being the open window, where, after the customary change of uniform and wash and clean, he sat gazing out at the sky, but seeing no bright silvery clouds--nothing but the face of that young officer and the old ruins down by the flooded river; for it seemed to Dick Smithson that--in spite of what had been written about midnight and the witching hour--he had seen a ghost, and in the broad daylight, too. He tried to cast the idea from him again and again, but that face would return, wonderful in its resemblance, and at last a painful, feverish fit came on; for the countenance he had that day gazed upon, and which had impressed him so painfully, brought up all the old life which he had tried so hard and successfully to forget. "It's like a punishment to me, for trying to forget that which I ought always to bear in mind," he said at last, with a sigh. "How horrible! and how strange that two people could be so much alike!" Dick played with the band in the mess-room that evening, and one or two of his comrades told him he looked ill; but he laughed it off, and tried to make them believe that the little fit of weariness was a mere nothing. But his face told a different tale, and that night, when he went to his bed, sleep refused to come; and to the accompaniment of his comrades' heavy breathing--that being the most charitable term that can be applied to it--he once more went over his old life at Mr Draycott's, from his first entering the great coach's establishment up to the morning he had left. At last sleep came--a miserable, feverish slumber, from which he was aroused by the _reveille_. "There," he said to himself. "I shall be all right now," as he took his dripping head out of the bowl of cold water, and felt refreshed by the scrub he gave himself; but somehow he did not feel right. His head burned, and he was glad to get out in the open air, in the hope that a little exercise would clear his brain and drive away the cobweb-like fancies which seemed to interfere with its working. Vain hope! The thoughts only came the faster, and at last he began to ask himself whether he was going to be ill. "Mark's dead!" he found himself saying mentally; "and there are no such things as ghosts--education killed the last of them years ago. But it does seem horrible to come suddenly face to face with a fellow so like poor Mark that I should have felt ready to declare it was he. Nature does make people different; and yet that officer is as like him as can be. Of course, he would have grown set and more manly. And--oh! but it's impossible! He's dead! he's dead!" He had gone back into the band-room, where, as of old, some twenty men were blowing hard, each working up the parts of new pieces, and utterly regardless, as well as unconscious, of his neighbour--use having given the bandsmen the ability to practice away deaf to the noise produced by others. Here he sat down in his own corner, and began to look over his music, expecting that before long Wilkins would be there to try over a few pieces in proper harmony instead of discord. But the crotchets and quavers became people, and the staves the roads along which they passed; and, the more he tried, the more excited he grew. For a few minutes he enjoyed a rest, for his eyes suddenly rested upon Brumpton, who, looking wonderfully fat, shiny, and happy, sat back, with his jacket unbuttoned, pumping away at the huge brass instrument, whose coils he nursed at his breast while he boomed and burred and brought forth bass notes of the deepest and richest quality. Then Brumpton's smooth, round face grew dim, and in its place there was the haughty, self-satisfied young officer, proud of his regimentals and scornfully gazing at the young bandsman as he passed. Dick could bear it no longer; he felt that he must get back into the open air, and to some place where he could be in peace while he made up his mind what to do. The next minute his mind did not want making up. He had come to a determination; for, feeling that he would never be able to rest until he had got rid of the idea of the officer he had met being his cousin Mark, he set off with the intention of questioning some of the men of the incoming regiment about their officers. He started, and had just got outside the door of the band-room, when he ran against Wilkins, who turned upon him sharply-- "Now, sir! don't run away; I am going to try over that grand march." "Back directly, sir!" cried Dick; and, to the bandmaster's indignation, he was off as hard as he could go towards the barrack gates. _ |
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