The Loudwater Mystery | Page 7

out. Then he
went, still scowling, to the stables.
Mr. Manley had already finished his lunch. Halfway through his
after-lunch pipe he rose, took his hat and stick, and set out to pay a visit
to Mrs. Truslove.
As he came out of the park gates he came upon the Rev. George
Stebbing, the locum tenens in charge of the parish, for the vicar was
away on a holiday, enjoying a respite from his perpetual struggle with
the patron of the living, Lord Loudwater.
They fell into step and for a while discussed the local weather and local
affairs. Then Mr. Manley, who had been gifted by Heaven with a lively
imagination wholly untrammelled by any straining passion for
exactitude, entertained Mr. Stebbing with a vivid account of his
experiences as leader of the first Great Push. Mr. Manley was one of
the many rather stout, soft men who in different parts of Great Britain

will till their dying days entertain acquaintances with vivid accounts of
their experiences as leaders of the Great Pushes. Like that of most of
them, his war experience, before his weak heart had procured him his
discharge from the army, had consisted wholly of office work in
England. His account of his strenuous fighting lacked nothing of fire or
picturesqueness on that account. He was too modest to say in so many
words that but for his martial qualities there would have been no Great
Push at all, and that any success it had had was due to those martial
qualities, but that was the impression he left on Mr. Stebbing's simple
and rather plastic mind. When therefore they parted at the crossroads,
Mr. Manley went on his way in a pleasant content at having once more
made himself valued; and Mr. Stebbing went on his way feeling
thankful that he had been brought into friendly contact with a really
able hero. Both of them were the happier for their chance meeting.
Mr. Manley found Helena Truslove in her drawing-room, and when the
door closed behind the maid who had ushered him into it, he embraced
her with affectionate warmth. Then he held her out at arm's-length, and
for the several hundredth time admired her handsome, clear-skinned,
high-coloured, gipsy face, her black, rather wild eyes, and the black
hair wreathed round her head in so heavy a mass.
"It has been an awful long time between the kisses," he said.
She sighed a sigh of content and laughed softly. Then she said: "I
sometimes think that you must have had a great deal of practice."
"No," said Mr. Manley firmly. "I have never had occasion to be in love
before."
He put her back into the chair from which he had lifted her, sat down
facing her, and gazed at her with adoring eyes. He was truly very much
in love with her.
They were excellent complements the one of the other. If Mr. Manley
had the brains for two--indeed, he had the brains for half a dozen--she
had the character for two. Her chin was very unlike the chin of an eagle.
She was not, indeed, lacking in brains. Her brow forbade the

supposition. But hers was rather the practical intelligence, his the
creative. That she had the force of character, on occasion the fierceness,
which he lacked, was no small source of her attraction for him.
"And how was the hog this morning?" she said, ready to be soothing.
"The hog" was their pet name for Lord Loudwater.
"Beastly. He's an utterly loathsome fellow," said Mr. Manley with
conviction.
"Oh, no; not utterly--at any rate, not if you're independent of him," she
protested.
"Does he ever come into contact with any one who is not dependent on
him? I believe he shuns them like the pest."
"Not into close contact," she said--"at any rate, nowadays. But I've
known him to do good-natured things; and then he's very fond of his
horses."
"That makes the way he treats every human being who is in any way
dependent on him all the more disgusting," said Mr. Manley firmly.
"Oh, I don't know. It's something to be fond of animals," she said
tolerantly.
"This morning he had a devil of a row with Hutchings, the butler, you
know, and discharged him."
"That was a silly thing to do. Hutchings is not at all a good person to
have a row with," she said quickly. "I should say that he was a far more
dangerous brute than Loudwater and much more intelligent. Still, I
don't know what he could do. What was the row about?"
"Some woman sent Loudwater an anonymous letter accusing Hutchings
of having received commissions from the wine merchants."
"That would be Elizabeth Twitcher's mother. Elizabeth and Hutchings

were engaged, and about ten days ago he jilted