The household of Maxfield, worn-out by the excitement of the night,
slept, or rather lay in bed, till hard on midday.
The tutor, as he slowly turned on his side and caught sight of the
winter sun through the frost-bespangled window, felt profoundly
disinclined to rise. He shrank from the tasks that awaited him--the
task of witnessing the grief of the widow and the pale looks of the
orphan heir, the dismal negotiations with undertakers and clergymen and
lawyers, the stupid questions of the domestics, the sickly fragrance of
stephanotis in the house. Then, too, there was the awkward uncertainty
as to his own future. What effect would the tragedy of last night have
on that? Was it a notice to quit, or what? He should be sorry to go.
He liked the place, he liked his pupil, and further, he had nowhere else
to go. Altogether Mr Armstrong felt very reluctant to exchange his
easy bed for the chances and changes of the waking world. Besides,
lastly, the water in his bath, he could see, was frozen; and it was
hopeless on a day like this to expect that Raffles would bring him
sufficient hot, even to shave with.
However, the tutor had had some little practice before now in doing what
he did not like. With a sigh and a shiver, therefore, he flung aside
his blankets and proceeded to break the ice literally, and take his
bath. After that he felt decidedly better, and with the help of a
steady ten minutes grind at the dumb-bells, he succeeded in pulling
himself together.
He had reached this stage in his toilet when a knock came at the door.
"Come in, Raffles," said Mr Armstrong, beginning to see some prospect
of a shave after all.
It was not Raffles, but Dr Brandram, equipped for the road.
"I'm off, Armstrong," said he. "I'd ask you to come and drive me, only
I think you are wanted here. See the boy eats enough and doesn't mope.
You must amuse him if you can. You understand what I told you last
night was not for him. By the way,"--here the doctor held out a sealed
packet--"this was lying on the old man's table last night. It was
probably to give it to you that he sent for you in the afternoon, and
then forgot it. Well, good-bye. I shall come to-morrow if the roads
are passable. I only hope, for my sake, all this will not make any
difference to your remaining at Maxfield."
Mr Armstrong finished his toilet leisurely, and then proceeded to
examine the packet.
It was a large envelope, addressed, "Frank Armstrong, Esquire," in the
old man's quavering hand.
Within was another envelope, firmly sealed, on which the same hand had
written these words--
"_To be given unopened into the hands of Roger Ingleton, junior, on his
twentieth birthday_."
The effort of writing those few words had evidently been almost more
than the writer could accomplish, for towards the end the letters became
almost illegible, and the words were huddled in a heap at the corner of
the paper. The sealing, too, to judge from the straggling blots of wax
all over and the ineffective marks of the seal, must have been the
labour of a painful morning to the feeble, half-blind old man.
To the tutor, however, as he held the missive in his hand, and looked at
it with the reverence one feels for a token from the dead, it seemed to
make one or two things tolerably clear.
First, that the contents, whatever they were, were secret and important,
else the old man would never have taken upon himself a labour he could
so easily have devolved upon another. Secondly, that this old man,
rightly or wrongly, regarded Frank Armstrong as a man to be trusted, and
contemplated that a year hence he would occupy the same position with
regard to the heir of Maxfield as he did now.
Having arrived at which conclusions, the tutor returned the packet to
its outer envelope and locked the whole up in his desk. Which done, he
descended to the breakfast-room.
As he had expected, no one was there. What was worse, there was no sign
either of fire or breakfast. To a man who has not tasted food for about
twenty hours, such a discovery could not fail to be depressing, and Mr
Armstrong meekly decided to summon Raffles to his assistance. As he
passed down the passage, he could not forbear halting for a moment at
the door of a certain room, behind which he knew the mortal remains of
his dead employer lay. As he paused, not liking to enter, liking still
less to pass on, the sound of footsteps within startled him. It was not
difficult, after a moment's reflection, to guess to whom they belonged,
and the tutor softly tapped on the door.
The only answer was the abrupt halting of the footsteps. Mr Armstrong
entered and found his pupil.
Roger was standing in the ulster he had worn last night. His eyes were
black and heavy with weariness, his face was almost as white as the face
of him who lay on the couch, and as he turned to the open door his teeth
chattered with cold.
"I couldn't leave him alone," whispered he apologetically, as the tutor
laid a gentle hand on his arm.
"Of course--of course," replied Mr Armstrong. "I guessed it was you.
Would you rather be left alone?"
"No," said the lad wearily. "I thought by staying here I should get
some help--some--I don't know what, Armstrong. But instead, I'm half
asleep. I've been yawning and shivering, and forgotten who was here--
and--" Here his eyes filled with tears.
"Dear old fellow," said the tutor, "you are fagged out. Come and get a
little rest."
Roger sighed, partly to feel himself beaten, partly at the prospect of
rest.
"All right!" said he. "I'm ashamed you should see me so weak when I
wanted to be strong. Yes, I'll come--in one minute."
He walked over to the couch and knelt beside it. His worn-out body had
succumbed at last to the misery against which it had battled so long,
and for a moment he yielded himself to his sorrow. The tutor waited a
moment, and then walked quietly from the room.
For a quarter of an hour he paced restlessly in the cold passage
outside; then, as his pupil did not appear, he returned to the chamber
of death. Roger Ingleton, as he expected, had fallen asleep where he
knelt.
The wretched days between the death and the funeral dragged on in the
usual dismal fashion. Mrs Ingleton kept her room; the domestics took
the occasion to neglect their work, and Roger Ingleton, minor, passed
through all the stages from inconsolable misery to subdued cheerfulness.
Mr Armstrong alone went through no stages, but remained the same
unimpassioned individual he had been ever since he became a member of
the Maxfield household.
"Armstrong," said the boy, the day before the funeral, "do you know, I'm
the only male Ingleton left?"
"I didn't know it. Have you no uncles or cousins?"
"None on our side. Some distant cousins on, mother's side, but they're
abroad. We were going over the lot yesterday, mother and I; but we
couldn't scrape up a single relation to come to-morrow. We shall have
to get you and Brandram and fathers solicitor to come to the funeral, if
you don't mind."
"Of course I shall come," said Mr Armstrong.
"And, by the way, it seems rather queer, doesn't it, that I shall have
charge of all this big property, and, I suppose, be master of all the
people about the place."
"Naturally. Amongst your humble and obedient servants the present tutor
of Maxfield will need to be included."
"Oh, you!" said Roger, smiling; "yes, you'll need to look out how you
behave, you know, or I shall have to terminate our engagement. Isn't it
queer?"
Queer as it was, the tutor winced at the jest, and screwed his eye-glass
a little deeper into his eye.
"Seriously, though," said Roger, "I'm awfully glad I've got you here to
advise me. I want to do things well about the place, and keep square
with the tenants, and improve a great many things. I noticed a whole
lot of cottages to-day that want rebuilding. And I think I ought to
build a club-room for the young fellows in the village, and give a new
lifeboat to replace the `Vega,' What do you think?"
"I'll tell you this time to-morrow. Meanwhile what do you say to a ride
before dark? It would do you good."
They had a long trot through the lanes and along the shore, ending with
a canter over the downs, which landed the heir of Maxfield at home with
a glow in his cheeks and an appetite such as he had not known for a
week.
Next day the funeral took place in the family vault at the little
churchyard of Yeld. The villagers, as in duty bound, flocked to pay
their last respects to the old Squire, whose face for the last twenty
years they had scarcely seen, and of whose existence, save on rent-day,
many of them had been well-nigh ignorant.
Many an eye turned curiously to the slim, pale boy, as he stood alone,
the last of his house, at the open tomb; and many a speculation as to
his temper and prospects occupied minds which were supposed to be intent
on the solemn words of the Burial Service.
Roger himself, with that waywardness of the attention which afflicts us
even in the gravest acts of our life, found himself listening to the
words in a sort of dream, while his mind was occupied in reading over to
himself the names of his ancestors inscribed on the panels of the vault.
"John Ingleton of Maxfield Manor, who died ye ninth day of June, 1760,
aetat 74.
"Peter Ingleton of Maxfield Manor, his son, obiit March 6, 1794.
"Paul Ingleton, only son of above Peter; born January 1, 1790, died
September 20, 1844.
"Ruth, beloved wife of Roger Ingleton, Esquire, of Maxfield Manor, who
died on February 14, 1865, aged 37."
Now a new inscription would be added.
"Roger Ingleton, son of the above-named Paul Ingleton, who died January
10, 1885."
And when that was added, there would yet be space for another name
below.
Roger shuddered a little, and brought his mind back with an effort to
the solemn act which was taking place.
The clergyman's voice ceased, and the fatherless lad stooped to get a
last view of the flower-covered coffin. Then, with a heart lonelier
than he had ever known it before, he turned away.
The people fell back and made a silent lane for him to pass.
"Poor lad," said a country wife, as she looked after him, "pity knows,
he'll be this way again before long."
"Hold thy tongue," said another; "thee'd look white and shaky if thee
was the only man of thy name left on earth--eh, Uncle Hodder?"
"Let un go," said the venerable proprietor of the tutor's borrowed horse
last week, "let 'un go. The Ingletons was all weaklings, but they held
out to nigh on threescore and ten years. All bar the best of them--
there was naught weak about him, yet he dropped off in blossom-time."
"Ay, ay, poor lad," said the elder of the women in a whisper, "pity of
the boy. He'd have taken the load on his shoulders to-day better than
yonder white child."
"Hold thy tongue and come and take thy look at the old Squire's last
lying-place."
Roger overheard none of their talk, but wandered on, lonely, but angry
with himself for feeling as unemotional as he did. He told the coachman
he would walk home, and started along the half-thawed lanes, hoping that
the five miles solitary walk would help to bring him into a frame of
mind more appropriate to the occasion.
But try as he would, his mind wandered; first to his mother; then to
Maxfield and the villagers; then to his pet schemes for a model village;
then to Armstrong and his studies; then to a certain pair of foils that
hung in his room; then to the possibility of a yacht next summer; then
to the county festivities next winter, with perhaps a ball at Maxfield;
then to his approaching majority, and all the delights of unfettered
manhood; then--
He had got so far at the end of a mile, when he heard steps tramping
through the mud behind him.
It was Mr Armstrong.
The boy's first impulse was to put on an air of dejection he was far
from feeling; but his honesty came to his rescue in time.
"Hullo, Armstrong! I'm so glad it's you. You'll never guess what I was
thinking about when I heard you?"
"About being elected M.P. for the county?" asked the tutor gravely.
"How did you guess that? I tried to think about other things, you know,
but--"
"Luckily you chose to be natural instead. Well, I hope you'll be
elected, when the time comes."
The two beguiled their walk in talk which, if not exactly what might
have been expected of mourners, at least served to restore the boy's
highly-strung mind to its proper tone, and to make the aspect of things
in general brighter for him than it had been when he started so dismally
from the graveyard.
"Now," said he, with a sigh, as they entered the house, "now comes the
awful business of reading the will. Pottinger is sure to make an
occasion of it. It would be worth your while to be present to hear him
perform."
"Thanks!" said the tutor; "I'll look to you for a full account of the
ceremony by and by. I'll accompany it to slow music upstairs."
But as it happened, Mr Armstrong was not permitted to escape, as he had
fondly hoped, to his piano. Raffles followed him presently to his room
and said--
"Please, sir, Mr Pottinger sends his compliments, and will be glad if
you will step down to the library, sir."
Mr Armstrong scowled.
"What does he want?" he muttered.
"He wants a gentleman or two to say 'ear, 'ear, I fancy," said the page,
with a grin.
Mr Armstrong gave a melancholy glance at his piano, and screwed his
glass in his eye aggressively.
"All right, Raffles; you can go."
"What does the old idiot want with me, I wonder," said he to himself,
"unless it's to give me a month's notice, and tell me I may clear out?
Heigho! I hope not."
With which pleasant misgivings, he strolled down-stairs.
In the library was assembled a small but select audience to do Mr
Pottinger, the Yeld attorney, honour. The widow was there, looking pale
but charming in her deep mourning and tasteful cap. Roger was there,
restless, impatient, and a little angry at all the fuss. Dr Brandram
and the Rector were there, resigned, as men who had been through
ceremonies of the kind before. And a deputation of dead-servants sat on
chairs near the door, gratified to be included in the party, and
mentally going over their services to the testator, and appraising them
in anticipation.
"We were waiting for you, Mr Armstrong," said the attorney severely, as
the tutor entered.
Mr Armstrong looked not at all well pleased to be thus accosted, and
walked to a seat in the bay-window behind Mr Pottinger.
The man of the law put on his glasses, took a sip of water from a
tumbler he had had brought in, blew his nose, and glancing round on his
audience with all the enjoyment of a man who feels himself master of the
situation, began to make a little speech.
There was first a little condescending preamble concerning the virtues
of the deceased, which every one but Roger listened to respectfully.
The son felt it as much as he could put up with to sit still and hear
it, and began to fidget ominously, and greatly to the disturbance of the
speaker. When Mr Pottinger, after a few reproachful pauses, left this
topic and began to discourse on his own relations with the late Squire,
it was the turn of Dr Brandram to become restless.
"This is not the occasion for dwelling on the gratification I received
from--"
Here the doctor deliberately rose and walked across the room for a
footstool, which, as deliberately, he walked back with and laid at the
feet of Mrs Ingleton. "Beg pardon--go on," said he, meeting the
astonished eye of the attorney.
"The gratification I received from the kind expressions--"
Here a large coal inconsiderately fell out of the fire with a loud
clamour. Raffles, with considerable commotion, came from his seat and
proceeded to restore it to its lost estate.
Mr Pottinger took his glasses from his nose and regarded the
performance with such abject distress, that Roger, catching sight of his
face, involuntarily smiled. "Really," exclaimed the now thoroughly
offended friend of the family, "really, my boy, on an occasion such as
this--"
Here the Rector, to every one's relief, came gallantly to the rescue.
"This is very tedious, Mr Pottinger," said he. "The friends here, I am
sure, will prefer that you should omit all these useless preliminaries,
and come to the business at once. Let me read the document for you; my
eyes are younger than yours."
At this terrific act of insubordination, and the almost blasphemous
suggestion which capped it, the lawyer fell back in his chair and broke
out into a profuse perspiration, gazing at the Rector as he would at
some suddenly intruding wild animal. Then, with a gasp, taking in the
peril of the whole situation, he hastily took up the will and plunged
into it.
It was a long, tedious document, hard to understand; and when it was
ended, no one exactly grasped its purport.
Then came the moment of Mr Pottinger's revenge. The party was at his
mercy after all.
"What does it all amount to?" said the doctor, interpreting the
perplexed looks of the company.
"I had better perhaps explain it in simple words," said the attorney
condescendingly, "if you will give me your attention."
You might have heard a pin drop now.
"Briefly, the provisions of our dear friend's will are these. Proper
provision is made for the support in comfort of the widow during her
life. Legacies are also left, as you have heard, to certain friends,
servants, and charities. The whole of the remaining property, which it
is my impression will be found to be very considerable, is left in trust
for the testator's only son, Roger, our young friend here, who is to
receive it absolutely on reaching the age of twenty-one. The conditions
of the trust are a trifle peculiar. There are three trustees, who are
also guardians of the heir. The first is Mrs Ingleton, the widow; the
second is Edward Oliphant, Esquire, of Her Majesty's Indian Army, second
cousin, I understand, of Mrs Ingleton, and, in the event (which I trust
is not likely) of the death of our young friend here, heir-presumptive
to the property. His trusteeship is dependent on his coming to this
country and assuming the duties of guardian to the heir, and provision
is made accordingly. The third trustee and guardian is Mr Frank
Armstrong, who is entitled to act so long as he holds his present post
of tutor to the heir, which post he will retain only during Mrs
Ingleton's pleasure. It is also provided that, in the event of any
difference of opinion among the trustees, Mrs Ingleton (as is most
proper) shall be permitted to decide; and lastly--a curious eccentricity
on our dear friend's part, which was perhaps hardly necessary to
insert--in the event of Roger Ingleton, previous to his attaining his
majority, becoming a felon, a lunatic, or marrying, he is to be regarded
as dead, and the property thereby passes to the next heir, Captain
Oliphant. I think we may congratulate ourselves on what is really a
very simple will, and which, provided the trustees named consent to act,
presents very little difficulty. I have telegraphed already to Captain
Oliphant. Mr Armstrong, will you do me the favour, at your
convenience, of intimating to me your consent or otherwise?"
Mr Armstrong made no response. It was indeed doubtful whether he had
heard the question. For at that precise moment, gazing about him in
bewilderment at the unexpected responsibility thus thrown upon him, his
eyes became suddenly riveted by a picture. It was a portrait, partly
concealed behind the curtain of the window in which he sat, but unveiled
sufficiently to disclose the face of a fair-haired boy, younger by some
years than Roger, with clear blue eyes and strong compressed mouth,
somewhat sullen in temper, but with an air of recklessness and
determination which, even in the portrait, fascinated the beholder. Mr
Armstrong, although he had frequently been in his late employer's study,
had never noticed this picture before. Now, as he caught sight of it
and suddenly met the flash of those wild bright eyes, he experienced
something like a shock. He could not help recalling Dr Brandram's sad
story the other day. Something seemed mysteriously to connect this
portrait and the story together in his mind. Strange that at such a
moment, when the fate of the younger son was being decided, his guardian
should thus come suddenly face to face with the elder!
Mr Armstrong was not a superstitious man, but he felt decidedly glad
when a general break up of the party allowed him to get out of range of
these not altogether friendly eyes, and escape to the seclusion of his
own room.