A CONCLAVE
"Good heavens! What on earth can be the meaning of this?"
Dick was standing in his pyjamas at the window of Virginia's bedroom.
They were in a country house on the Yorkshire coast, to which they had
come for a few days on their way from Scotland. Letters had just been
brought up to them with their morning tea.
"What is it, Dick?" said Virginia from the bed. "Give it to me."
He hesitated for a moment, and then crossed the room to give her the
letter he had been reading. As he did so he looked through the other
envelopes he held in his hand. "Here is one from the Governor," he
said, "which may explain it."
The two letters ran as follows:
DEAR CAPTAIN CLINTON,
I suppose your father has told you of the conversation he and I had
together a few days ago, and of his refusal to entertain the request I
made of him, to which I had understood him to assent. This is just a
friendly note of advice to you to help him to see how absurd his
refusal is, and what it will entail, not only to him but to you and all
your family. I shall not take any steps for a day or two, so that you
may have time to bring him to reason. But if that cannot be done, I
shall take the steps of which I warned him.
Yours sincerely,
RACHEL AMBERLEY.
MY DEAR DICK,
I want you to come home at once. A very serious trouble has arisen
with regard to an action of poor Susan's, of which I have known for
some time, but which I was unable to talk to you about. I had thought
we should hear no more about it, but I am afraid it must now be known.
I wish to consult you about any steps that can be taken; but I fear
that none can. In any case I want you to hear the whole story. Your
mother sends her love, and wants you and Virginia here. She would like
me to tell you the story, but I feel I cannot write it. You must wait
until I see you.
Love to Virginia.
Your affectionate father,
EDWARD CLINTON.
Dick's face was grave enough when he looked up from this missive, and
handed it, without a word, to Virginia.
"Rachel Amberley!" she exclaimed.
"Yes--and Susan," said Dick. "Trouble indeed! Trouble and mystery! I
wish the Governor had told me what it is. Just like him to keep us on
tenterhooks for hours! We shall have to start early, Virginia."
Virginia was frightened. "But, Dick dear, what does it mean?" she
cried.
He went and stood at the window, looking out over the sea. His face
was very grave. "It means," he said slowly, "that Susan was concerned,
somehow, in that Amberley business; and she has found it out, and is
asking for money to keep it dark."
"But how could she have been concerned in it? Oh, how dreadful, Dick!"
"She was at Brummels at the time." He pieced his thoughts together
slowly. "Perhaps she knew, and took money to hold her tongue. She
wanted money almost as much as the other woman. She did something she
ought not to have done; the Governor says so. Something that she could
have been punished for, or this Amberley woman wouldn't have any
grounds to go on. _She_ has been punished, and can't be punished any
more--for that. She could for blackmail, though. She says the
Governor gave way to her. That would have been extraordinarily
foolish. He refused afterwards, though--seems to have told her to go
to the devil. I'm glad he did that. Lord, how he must have been
rushed! I wish I'd been there to lend him a hand."
"Oh, poor Mr. Clinton! But what can she do, Dick, this woman?"
"If Susan had known----!" He paused. "She can't have been in it...."
"Oh no, Dick!" Virginia said in a frightened whisper.
"No, the Amberley woman would have given her away. I don't think she
has found out anything. I think she has waited until she was free of
everything herself, and now proposes to let out what she knew all the
time about Susan, unless she is paid to keep it to herself. That would
be it, or something like it. Well, we shan't know, if we cudgel our
brains all day. I must go and dress; and you must get up. I'll tell
Finch to look up trains. Don't worry about it, Virginia."
They arrived at Kencote in the late afternoon. Joan was on the
platform. Her face was troubled. Virginia kissed her warmly. "What
is it, darling?" she asked.
"I don't know," said Joan, as they walked out of the station together.
"It is something about Ronald. He is not to come here yet. Oh, what
can it be?"
"It isn't anything about Ronald," Virginia said. "We know that much.
But it is some great trouble, and I suppose your father has asked him
not to come for the present."
"Yes," said Joan. "Mother said she would tell me more after they had
talked to you and Dick. Father has been indoors all day. I believe he
is ill. Oh, Virginia, I am sure something dreadful is going to happen."
They drove straight to the house, and Dick went in at once to his
father's room. The Squire was sitting in his chair, doing nothing. He
looked aged and grey.
"Well, Dick," he said, looking up, without a smile. "This is a black
home-coming. Ask your mother and Virginia to come in. Virginia must
know. I'll tell you the story at once."
He told his story, without the circumlocutions he had used to Mrs.
Clinton. His voice was tired as he told it, and his narrative was
almost bald. "There it is," he ended up. "I don't know whether I'm
right or not. Your dear mother says I am. I hope I am. It means
untold misery and disgrace. But I shan't pay her a penny, directly or
indirectly."
Virginia looked anxiously at Dick, who had been sitting with downcast
eyes, and now looked up at his father.
"You needn't worry yourself about that, father," he said.
The Squire's face brightened a little.
"You mean that you think I'm right," he said. "I suppose I am. But I
can't be certain of it."
"I can," said Dick. "She can disguise it as she likes; but it's
blackmail. We don't pay blackmail."
There were visible signs of relief at this uncompromising statement.
The Squire began to argue against it, not because he was not glad it
had been made, but to justify his doubts.
"I know it's a difficult case," said Dick. "It's a most
extraordinarily difficult case. The only way through it is to act on a
broad principle, and stick to it through thick and thin. That's what
you've done, and I'm very glad of it. You couldn't have done anything
else, really, though you may think you could. Under no circumstances
do we pay money to anybody to keep anything dark."
"Money _was_ paid," said the Squire.
"I had no idea whatever," said Virginia, with frightened eyes.
"Oh, of course not," said Dick. "It wasn't your fault."
His face was clouded. "I can't blame Humphrey," the Squire said, with
his eyes on him.
Dick made no reply.
"He came on purpose to ask you," said Virginia. "He didn't try to keep
it from you."
"He did keep it from me," said Dick. "I ought to have known."
"What should you have done?" asked the Squire.
Dick did not answer. Mrs. Clinton broke in. "Let us leave that
alone," she said. "Humphrey had poor Susan to consider. We have no
right to blame him for what he did."
"I say nothing about that, for the present," said Dick. "I must think
it over. If I had been there he would not have got the money."
"He wouldn't have told you why he wanted it," Virginia said. "I think
you would have paid it--to Gotch--as I did."
"You see how difficult it all is, Dick," said Mrs. Clinton. "At every
moment there have been difficulties. Do not think harshly of poor
Humphrey."
"He is out of it," said Dick, "at the other side of the world. See
what comes of his actions. We couldn't be touched if it were not for
that--in any way that will harm us. Susan is dead. Nobody else had
done anything they could have been accused of, or made sorry for, up
till that time."
"Susan had," said Mrs. Clinton. "She was alive then; and she was
Humphrey's wife. And wouldn't it have been terrible for us then if she
had been punished?"
Dick's face was hard.
"Dick, supposing it had been me!" said Virginia.
"Oh, my dear!" he exclaimed impatiently.
"No, but you must think of it in that way. He stood by her. He
_couldn't_ let that happen to her."
"Well," said Dick unwillingly, "when you've said that at every stage it
has been a difficult question, perhaps you have said all that can be
said. The trouble is that it is that payment to Gotch that is coming
home to us. That's why, even if father had thought it right,
otherwise, to pay her this money now, it would have been the most
foolish thing he could have done. He would have been endorsing that
transaction. As it is, he can say quite truly that he refused to do
it, and we, who did do it, had no idea what it was done for."
"Yes, I see that," said the Squire, "and I never thought of it before.
The two things would have hung together."
"She would have made further demands," said Dick. "We should have been
under her thumb."
"She said she would satisfy me of that," said the Squire.
"She may have said so. She would have been too clever for you. She
would have drawn us in, until we should have had to do something
downright dishonourable--that there couldn't have been any doubt
about--or defy her and take the consequences, as we've got to do now.
We should have been living under the sword, perhaps for years, never
knowing when it was going to fall, shelling out money all the time.
Oh, it doesn't do to think about! And no better off at the end of it
than we are now."
"It's true," said the Squire. "I wish I'd had you to show it all so
clearly to me while I was going through that awful time, making up my
mind. Oh, Lord!" He wiped his brow, damp with the horror of thinking
of it.
"You made up your mind without seeing clearly," said Mrs. Clinton.
"You did what was right because it was right."
"And now we've got to take our punishment for it," said the poor
Squire, with a wry smile.
"That is what we'd better talk about," said Dick. "The other is all
over. We can talk about that later."
"Herbert Birkett is coming down to-morrow," said the Squire. "I wrote
and told him he must, and he sent me a wire. He is playing golf at
North Berwick. It is her threat of an action for conspiracy that I
want to ask him about."
"That's bluff," said Dick. "Who conspired to do what? Humphrey is out
of the country. He had better stay there. She can't get at him.
Everybody else is blameless. You refused, and you were the only one
besides him who knew anything about it."
"I can't prove that, and she won't stick at lies."
"That's true enough. But you _can_ prove it. She will have to get the
Gotches over to prove anything at all, and his evidence will clear you.
Besides, you refused her the second time."
"I _can't_ prove that. There were only she and I."
"By Jove!" Dick felt in his breast pocket. "She's given herself away
there. I've got a letter from her. She says you refused. She isn't
as clever as I thought she was."
"It's all bluff," said Dick contemptuously, when the letter had been
read. "I don't think she could get the Gotches over, for one thing.
And supposing she did succeed in bringing it before a court, you could
tell your story in the most public way. Nobody would have a word of
blame for you, or for any of us. I'm not certain it wouldn't be the
best possible thing that could happen for us."
"I shouldn't like it to come to that," said the Squire.
"Well, I don't think it will. We've got other things to face--perhaps
worse things. I shan't answer her letter, though I'll take good care
to keep it. When she sees that nothing is coming she'll begin to
spread reports. That's when we shall have to be on the lookout."
"We have done nothing wrong," said Mrs. Clinton. "She will only be
attacking poor Susan; and anybody whose opinion of us we should value
will think that a wicked thing to do, now that Susan is dead."
"But ought we not to defend Susan's memory?" Virginia asked.
All three of them were silent. Dick was the first to speak.
"We have to think straight about it," he said. "You can't defend
Susan, alive or dead. It was shielding her that has put us in the
wrong, where we are in the wrong. All that we can do is not to admit
anything, not to deny anything; let people think what they will. Keep
quiet. That's a good deal to do, for if we liked to take the offensive
we could clear ourselves once and for all."
"How could we do that?"
"Have her up for slander."
"But what she will say about Susan will be true."
"Do you think she will stick to that? No, she will try to blacken us
in every way she can. She'll tell lies about us. It's no good saying
people won't believe them. They _will_ believe them, if we don't
defend ourselves. We may have to have her up for slander, after all."
"What can she get out of it all?" asked Virginia in a voice of pain.
"It will be horrible. Every right-thinking person must abhor her."
"She will have a right to try and clear herself," said Mrs. Clinton.
"It is true that she was accused of doing what Susan really did, and
the accusation has never been cleared up."
"That _is_ true," said Dick, "and if she confines herself to truth, we
have no right to try and stop her. Under all the circumstances--her
trying to get money for her silence, and so on--I don't see that we are
under the smallest obligation--of honour or anything else--to help her.
If we come out into the open we shan't be able to keep Susan's guilt
dark. That's why I think she will drag us into attacking her. We
shall see what Herbert Birkett says. All we have to do in the meantime
is to live on quietly here as usual, and wait for what comes."
"There are the others to be thought of," said Mrs. Clinton. "Jim and
Cicely, Walter and Muriel, Frank, all of them. They must be prepared."
"Yes," said Dick unwillingly. "They are bound to hear of it. We must
tell them. Get them down here as soon as possible. I will go over and
tell Jim and Cicely to-morrow."
The Squire had been sitting in a blessed state of quiescence. He had
done his part. Dick had a clearer head than he. In his bruised state,
he was only too ready to let Dick take the lead in whatever had to be
done.
"There is my poor little Joan to think of," he said. "Young
Inverell--I have put him off. Joan must be told why."
"I will tell her," Mrs. Clinton said. "Poor child, it is hardest for
her, just now. But he will not give her up--I am sure of it."
"I don't know," said the Squire. "If the whole country is going to
ring with our name---- His stands high. But I won't have him here
until the worst has happened that can happen; and then only if he comes
of his own accord. We stand on what honour is left to us. It won't be
much. We've been talking as if we could all clear ourselves at Susan's
expense, if everything comes out. We can't. She was one of us, poor
girl. We suffer for her sins."