HOW OLD SIR GEORGE HATED HIS FIRSTBORN--AND HOW HE MADE HIS WILL--AND
HOW THE EARTH SWALLOWED IT.
Now, old Sir George Rodney, grandfather of the present baronet, had two
sons, Geoffrey and George. Now, Geoffrey he loved, but George he hated.
And so great by years did this hatred grow that after a bit he sought
how he should leave the property away from his eldest-born, who was
George, and leave it to Geoffrey, the younger,--which was hardly fair;
for "what," says Aristotle, "is justice?--to give every man his own."
And surely George, being the elder, had first claim. The entail having
been broken during the last generation, he found this easy to
accomplish; and so after many days he made a will, by which the younger
son inherited all, to the exclusion of the elder.
But before this, when things had gone too far between father and son,
and harsh words never to be forgotten on either side had been uttered,
George, unable to bear longer the ignominy of his position (being of a
wild and passionate yet withal generous disposition), left his home, to
seek another and happier one in foreign lands.
Some said he had gone to India, others to Van Diemen's Land, but in
truth none knew, or cared to know, save Elspeth, the old nurse, who had
tended him and his father before him, and who in her heart nourished for
him an undying affection.
There were those who said she clung to him because of his wonderful
likeness to the picture of his grandfather in the south gallery, Sir
Launcelot by name, who in choicest ruffles and most elaborate _queue_,
smiled gayly down upon the passers-by.
For this master of the Towers (so the story ran) Elspeth, in her younger
days, had borne a love too deep for words, when she herself was soft and
rosy-cheeked, with a heart as tender and romantic as her eyes were blue,
and when her lips, were for all the world like "cherries ripe."
But this, it may be, was all village slander, and was never borne out by
anything. And Elspeth had married the gardener's son, and Sir Launcelot
had married an earl's daughter; and when the first baby was born at the
"big house," Elspeth came to the Towers and nursed him as she would have
nursed her own little bairn, but that Death, "dear, beauteous Death, the
jewel of the just, shining nowhere but in the dark," sought and claimed
her own little one two days after its birth.
After that she had never again left the family, serving it faithfully
while strength stayed with her, knowing all its secrets and all its old
legends, and many things, it may be, that the child she nursed at her
bosom never knew.
For him--strange as it may seem--she had ever but little love. But when
he married, and George, the eldest boy, was given into her arms, and as
he grew and developed and showed himself day by day to be the very
prototype of his grandsire, she "took to him," as the servants said, and
clung to him--and afterwards to his memory--until her dying day.
When the dark, wayward, handsome young man went away, her heart went
with him, and she alone perhaps knew anything of him after his
departure. To his father his absence was a relief; he did not disguise
it; and to his brother (who had married, and had then three children,
and had of late years grown estranged from him) the loss was not great.
Nor did the young madam,--as she was called,--the mother of our present
friends, lose any opportunity of fostering and keeping alive the ill
will and rancor that existed for him in his father's heart.
So the grudge, being well watered, grew and flourished, and at last, as
I said, the old man made a will one night, in the presence of the
gardener and his nephew, who witnessed it, leaving all he
possessed--save the title and some outside property, which he did not
possess--to his younger son. And, having made this will, he went to his
bed, and in the cold night, all alone, he died there, and was found in
the morning stiff and stark, with the gay spring sunshine pouring in
upon him, while the birds sang without as though to mock death's power,
and the flowers broke slowly into life.
But when they came to look for the will, lo! it was nowhere to be found.
Each drawer and desk and cabinet was searched to no avail. Never did the
lost document come to light.
Day after day they sought in vain; but there came a morning when news of
the lost George's demise came to them from Australia, and then the
search grew languid and the will was forgotten. And they hardly took
pains even to corroborate the tidings sent them from that far-off land
but, accepting the rightful heir's death as a happy fact, ascended the
throne, and reigned peacefully for many years.
And when Sir George died, Sir Nicholas, as we know, governed in his
stead, and "all went merry as a marriage-bell," until a small cloud came
out of the south, and grew and grew and waxed each day stronger, until
it covered all the land.
For again news came from Australia that the former tidings of George
Rodney's death had been false; that he had only died a twelvemonth
since; that he had married almost on first going out, and that his son
was coming home to dispute Sir Nicholas's right to house and home and
title.
And now where was the missing will? Almost all the old servants were
dead or scattered. The gardener and his nephew wore no more; even old
Elspeth was lying at rest in the cold churchyard, having ceased long
since to be even food for worms. Only her second nephew--who had lived
with her for years in the little cottage provided for her by the
Rodneys, when she was too old and infirm to do aught but sit and dream
of days gone by--was alive, and he, too, had gone to Australia on her
death and had not been heard of since.
It was all terrible,--this young man coming and the thought that, no
matter how they might try to disbelieve in his story, still it might be
true.
And then the young man came, and they saw that he was very dark, and
very morose, and very objectionable. But he seemed to have more money
than he quite know what to do with; and when he decided on taking a
shooting-box that then was vacant quite close to the Towers, their
indignation knew no bounds. And certainly it was execrable taste,
considering he came there with the avowed determination to supplant, as
lord and master, the present owner of the Towers, the turrets of which
he could see from his dining room windows.
But, as he had money, some of the county, after the first spasm, rather
acknowledged him, as at least a cousin, if not _the_ cousin. And because
he was somewhat unusual, and therefore amusing, and decidedly liberal,
and because there was no disgrace attaching to him, and no actual reason
why he should not be received, many houses opened their doors to him.
All which was bitter as wormwood to Lady Rodney.
Indeed, Sir Nicholas himself had been the very first to set the example.
In his curious, silent, methodical fashion, he had declared to his
mother (who literally detested the very mention of the Australian's
name, as she called him, looking upon him as a clean-born Indian might
look upon a Pariah) his intention of being civil to him all round, as he
was his father's brother's child; and as he had committed no sin, beyond
trying to gain his own rights, he would have him recognized, and treated
by every one, if not with cordiality, at least with common politeness.
But yet there were those who did not acknowledge the new-comer, in spite
of his wealth and the romantic story attaching to him, and the
possibility that he might yet be proved to be the rightful baronet and
the possessor of all the goodly lands that spread for miles around. Of
these the Duchess of Lauderdale was one; but then she was always slow to
acknowledge new blood, or people unhappy enough to have a history. And
Lady Lilias Eaton was another; but she was a young and earnest disciple
of aestheticism, and gave little thought to anything save Gothic windows,
lilies, and unleavened bread. There were also many of the older families
who looked askance upon Paul Rodney, or looked through him, when brought
into contact with him, in defiance of Sir Nicholas's support, which
perhaps was given to this undesirable cousin more in pride than
generosity.
And so matters stood when Mona came to the Towers.