The Keeper of Secrets Read Online Free

Jem, still toiling in the stables, Augean in their condition. It was only right that for once I should serve him. How might I do so without causing him embarrassment? At last it occurred to me that we could sit together in the yard, perhaps on a convenient hay-bale, andhave a truly rustic picnic. I carried a basket outside and summoned him. Awkwardly, first sluicing himself under the pump, he pulled over three bales – it was clear that the third would make a good table. From the embarrassed way he rubbed his hands on the straw, he felt unequal to the task of being our ad hoc butler, so I myself placed the cloth on the spare bale and laid out the basket’s contents on it. Mrs Beckles had provided a good jug of ale, a selection of cold meats and two handsome pies. There was cutlery aplenty in the kitchen, stowed so dexterously by Mrs Beckles, but I knew not where. Without a word, Jem produced a haft-knife, and cut two huge slices of mutton pie.
    My appetite assuaged, for food if not for conversation, Jem being ever taciturn, and now completely silent, except for two or three brief utterances on the subject of the horses, I had the rest of my day to fill. Mrs Beckles’ kind ministrations had not extended to my study. My books – quite rightly – awaited my attention.
    Installing the last volume in the handsome new bookcase, I felt at last that I might be at home here, my old friends with their worn spines but perennially fresh interiors about me. But I was so filthy the only option open to me was the pump Jem had used earlier. So I was dripping wet when I heard a distant ring on my new doorbell. Of course, there was no servant to respond, and I was loath to miss a visitor. Pulling on my shirt, I almost ran through the house.
    ‘Hello? Hello there?’ Whoever it was did not wait, but stepped inside, his broad frame making a silhouette against the bright afternoon sun.
    Still in my shirt-sleeves, I stepped forward, handoutstretched. If my guest did not stand upon ceremony, neither would I.
    ‘Edmund Hansard at your service, sir,’ he greeted me, pulling off a shapeless hat to reveal an old-fashioned wig atop the face of a man in his early fifties.
    ‘Tobias Campion at yours,’ I responded with a slight bow. My hand was enveloped in his.
    ‘I have the advantage of you,’ he laughed, bright blue eyes a-twinkle . ‘I know that you are the new parson, but you cannot know that I am the doctor. And I come not to treat any ills – for you look a healthy enough young man – but to bid you come and share my board this evening. Aye, and bring your man too. I have no doubt my servants will look after him.’
    ‘This is most kind—’ I began.
    ‘Did I not read somewhere that you should do unto others as you would they do unto you? Well, man, someone must needs feed and water you. I keep a plain table, mind you. And country hours. Would six be too early for you? You’ll find me at Langley House, out on the Leamington Road. Till six, then. No need to dress.’
    ‘Till six,’ I agreed.
    He left without further ado, leaving, as Mrs Beckles had done, a house feeling the lack of his presence.
     
    ‘Langley House,’ I repeated to Jem, as we trotted side by side through the village, the westering sun bathing it in a golden glow.
    On the green a few very young boys, no more than five or six years old, played with a bat and ball. Beyond the green was a duck pond, with St Jude’s the far side of the graveyardto my left. The Silent Woman, so old that Shakespeare might have drunk there, sank down on its knees opposite. On the outskirts of the village a coaching inn was being built, to celebrate the arrival of a turnpike road, no doubt. It would be the only building of note, St Jude’s apart. The rest of the village comprised picturesque thatched cottages, haphazardly arranged in a verdant innocence so beloved of our poets.
    We were heading in the opposite direction from Moreton Priory, into neat and I hoped prosperous farmland.