UNCLE REGINALD EXPLAINS.
WHEN Julian’s consciousness returned it was broad daylight. The instant
his eyes were open the thrilling events of the night came back to
him, and he started up in alarm, expecting to find himself still in
the power of the dreaded emigrant. But, although he saw enough to
astonish him beyond measure, there was nothing to terrify him. His
persevering and relentless enemy was nowhere to be seen. He was snugly
tucked up in bed in the same room to which he had been conducted by
Reginald Mortimer, his clothes were lying in order on a chair close
at hand, the curtains were thrown back, the windows and shutters all
open, and heaven’s bright sunlight was streaming in. And what was very
surprising, there was the door locked and bolted and secured by the
chair, just as he had left it.
“Can it be possible that those things never happened, and that Dick
Mortimer, with his lantern and revolver, the long, dark passage-way,
and the feeble old man who frightened him so terribly, were objects
that I saw only in my dreams?” exclaimed Julian.
As this thought passed through his mind he sprung from the couch,
and running to the opposite side of the room pulled up the hangings,
fully expecting to find there the opening through which his captor
had conducted him into the passage-way. But the wall was as solid as
ever—not one of the huge blocks of stone was out of place.
“If I dreamed _that_ I did not dream that I left these curtains all
down and the windows closed, did I?” Julian asked himself in deep
perplexity. “Somebody has certainly been in here while I was asleep,
and he didn’t come in through the door either. I’ve spent my last
night in this house. I didn’t hear any of those frightful sounds
Sanders heard the night he slept here, but I’ve seen enough. If I ever
get outside these walls I’ll not come back. What’s this?”
After hastily throwing on his clothes Julian stepped to the table to
help himself to a glass of water from the pitcher that some thoughtful
hand had placed there, when his eyes fell upon a paper, folded in the
form of a letter, and addressed to himself. With eager haste he opened
it, and after some trouble, for the spelling was defective and the
writing almost illegible, he deciphered the following:
“Have no fear. Watchful friends are near you, and no harm shall come to
you. Reginald Mortimer is your uncle. Treat him as such.”
Julian read these mysterious words over and over again, and finally
carried the paper to the window and examined it on all sides, in
the hope of finding something more—something to tell him who these
watchful friends were, and where the missive came from. Being
disappointed in these hopes he put the letter carefully away in his
pocket and resumed his toilet. He was a long time about it, for he
frequently stopped and stood at the window gazing out at the mountains
on the other side of the valley, or walked up and down the room with
his eyes fastened on the carpet. His mind was busy all the while, and
by the time he was ready to leave the room he had thought over his
situation and determined upon a plan of action. Just then the little
clock on the mantel struck the hour of 10.
“I am getting fashionable,” said Julian, who, remembering how carefully
Richard Mortimer was always dressed, and believing that Uncle Reginald,
as he had determined to call him, might be equally particular, stopped
to take another look at himself in the mirror before quitting the room.
It was a very handsome face and figure that the polished surface of
the glass reflected. A finely embroidered shirt with wide collar and
neck-tie, a closely fitting jacket of dark-blue cloth, black velvet
trousers, brown cloth leggings with green fringe, light shoes, and a
long crimson sash worn about the waist, completed an attire that set
off his slender, well-knit frame to the very best advantage. One could
scarcely recognize in him the half-starved ragamuffin whose daily duty
it had been to keep Mrs. Bowles supplied with back-logs and fore-sticks.
Having satisfied himself that he was presentable, Julian undid the
numerous fastenings of the door, smiling the while to think how
inefficient they had proved to keep out the intruders of whom he stood
so much in fear, and was about to pass out into the hall when the sound
of voices reached his ears. He paused and listened, his attention being
attracted by the mention of the name of one in whom he was now more
than ever interested.
“Wal, I don’t reckon we could help it, could we?” growled a voice which
the boy knew belonged to the trapper Sanders. “Me an’ my pardner ain’t
the men to let $5,000 slip through our fingers without doin’ our level
best to hang onto it, be sure?”
“A couple of blockheads, I say!” replied the voice of Reginald
Mortimer, in angry, excited tones. “Two desperadoes like you and Tom to
allow a single man like Silas Roper to get the better of you. Go and
hide yourself. How did it happen?”
“Why we was a bringin’ him down here this mornin’ on hossback, me and
Tom was,” replied Sanders, “an’ the first thing we knowed he slipped
his hands out o’ his bonds, which we thought we had made hard an’ fast,
an’ afore we could say ‘Gen’ral Jackson’ with our mouths open, he
jerked Tom’s gun out o’ his hands, knocked him from his saddle as clean
as a whistle, an’ sent the ball into me.”
“Hurrah for Silas?” thought Julian, gleefully. “He has escaped. Now, if
there is any way in which he can assist me he will not fail to do it.”
“He was out o’ sight an’ hearin’ afore we could raise a finger to stop
him,” continued Sanders. “I guess my broken arm an’ Tom’s bloody head
is proof enough of what I say, hain’t it? We couldn’t help it.”
“Perhaps you did the best you could,” replied Reginald Mortimer in
a milder tone. “That Silas Roper is a match for any two men in the
mountains. Come into this room and let Pedro dress your wounds.”
“Nary time,” said Sanders emphatically. “I’ve had jest the wust luck
in the world ever since I had anything to do with you an’ your house,
an’ now I’m goin’ to cut you. I came here to tell you that, an’ I ain’t
never comin’ nigh you again. Let us out o’ here.”
“You will come whenever I choose to send for you,” said Mr. Mortimer
fiercely.
“Oh, if it comes to _that_ cap’n, in course we will,” replied Sanders,
dropping his angry, confident tone very suddenly. “We’re bound to obey
orders, but don’t ask nary one of us to come here agin. We’d a heap
sooner you’d send us out to steal hosses and rob miners.”
“Silence!” said Mr. Mortimer in a hoarse whisper. “Do you not know that
the very walls in this house have ears? You _must_ capture Silas Roper;
and I will give you the money I promised you whenever you deliver him
into my hands. He is about here, and he will remain in the vicinity as
long as I hold fast to this stool-pigeon.”
Uncle Reginald and the trappers passed through the door into the yard,
and Julian strolled along the hall, and not knowing where else to go,
entered the reception-room. While he was walking about with his hands
in his pocket, he was thinking over some portions of the conversation
to which he had just listened.
“Captain?” he repeated. “What is Uncle Reginald captain of? Steal
horses and rob miners! Silas told me that the mountains were full of
men engaged in that kind of business, and I wonder if this new relative
of mine is in any way connected with them! He must be; and he must
be their leader, too, for Sanders acknowledged that he was bound to
obey his orders. Good gracious! What sort of a place have I got into,
anyhow?”
While Julian, appalled by this new discovery he had made, was pacing
restlessly up and down the floor, Uncle Reginald hurried in. The scowl
on his forehead indicated that he was in a bad humor about something,
but it cleared away instantly when he discovered Julian, and advancing
with outstretched hand he greeted him in the most cordial manner.
“I hope you rested well after the fatigues and excitements of
yesterday,” said he with a friendly smile. “You look as if you had.
Breakfast is waiting, and while we are discussing it we will have a
social chat.”
The boy, making some satisfactory reply, returned his uncle’s smile
and the hearty pressure of his hand, and accompanied him toward the
breakfast-room, which was located at the farther end of the hall. He
glanced over the well-filled table as he took the chair pointed out
to him, and told himself that if this breakfast was a fair sample of
Uncle Reginald’s style of living he would never go hungry while he
remained under his roof. Corn bread, salt meat and buttermilk did not
constitute the substantial part of the repast as they invariably did in
the cabin of Jack Bowles. There were juicy venison steaks, hot muffins,
wheat bread, eggs, boiled and fried, toast and potatoes in abundance,
and also coffee and chocolate, which Pedro, who waited upon the table,
drew from a silver urn which stood on the sideboard. More than that,
the cloth was spotless, the dishes clean and white and the table was
altogether so nicely arranged, and looked so inviting, that Julian grew
hungry the moment his eyes rested upon it.
When Pedro had supplied the wants of his master and his guests, he
retired, and the two were left alone.
“Well, Julian,” said Uncle Reginald in a cheery voice, “do you feel
inclined for a gallop on a swift horse this morning? I have some
business that will occupy my attention until dinner, and if you in the
meantime wish to amuse yourself in that way, there is a very fine filly
in the stable which I purchased expressly for you, and which I hope
will supply the place of the horse you lost last night.”
“You must have been expecting me,” said the boy.
“Certainly. I have been looking for you every day for the last two
months; and as this introduces the subject which I know you are
impatient to talk about, I will now make the explanation I promised
you. In the first place, do you know that last night you slept in your
old home for the first time in eight years? You were born in this
house, and every thing in and about it—money, horses, cattle and gold
diggings—will come into your undisputed possession the moment you are
twenty-one years old. It is a fact. You are by no means the pauper you
have always supposed yourself to be.”
Julian dropped his knife and fork, and settling back in his chair
looked the astonishment he could not express in words. He gazed
earnestly at his uncle, and then ran his eyes around the room as if he
were trying to make an estimate of the value of his possessions from
the few articles he saw about him.
“It is the truth, every word of it,” repeated Reginald Mortimer. “It
is all yours, and it is a property worth having, I assure you. Your
father, who was my brother, is dead, and so is your brother Frederick.
I am your guardian, and stand ready to surrender your patrimony to you
whenever you are competent to take charge of it. I assumed control of
your father’s affairs immediately after his death. At that time you
were eight years old and your brother nine. Fred died, and shortly
afterward you were stolen away by some one, who, as I this morning
learned from Sanders, who told me all about it, took you off to
Missouri and left you there with one Jack Bowles. For eight years I
made every effort to find you, and I have at last succeeded. I do not
intend that you shall be separated from me any more.”
“Well,” said Julian, when his uncle paused.
“Well, that’s all.”
“_All!_” echoed the boy. “Am I to learn no more of my history than this
brief outline? Do you not know who it was who stole me away?”
“I haven’t the slightest idea.”
“Or what he stole me away for?”
“Why, of course your property had something to do with it, but just
what I can’t tell.”
Julian, who had settled into an easy position in his arm-chair
with the expectation of hearing something exciting about himself,
straightened up, and with an expression of great disappointment on his
face, resumed his toast and coffee. He wanted to hear more, and he was
satisfied from his uncle’s manner that he could tell him more if he
felt so inclined; but it was plain that he did not, for his next words
related to another subject.
“I hope you are now convinced that the fears to which you last night
gave way were entirely groundless,” said Mr. Mortimer. “I shall
endeavor by every means in my power to make your life here a pleasant
one. I have been very lonely and I want you to cheer me. I want you
to feel that you are one of the family, that you have a right to be
here, and that you are at liberty to go and come whenever it suits your
fancy. You shall have the best horse in the stable, a pack of hounds,
a servant to wait on you, and live like a gentleman. There is a fort
about two miles distant. Some of the officers have their families with
them, and among them are several boys about your own age. Whenever you
want company, bring them up here. They will find enough to interest
them.”
“Perhaps they would also find some things they would not care to see,”
said Julian, thinking of his recent adventure with the emigrant.
“What do you mean?”
“Why, some of those strange people who go about of nights making such
unearthly noises.”
“That sounds just like Sanders,” exclaimed Uncle Reginald impatiently.
“Julian, I hope you are a boy of too much good sense to pay the least
attention to any thing that low, ignorant fellow may say to you. There
isn’t a word of truth in it.”
“Nor about the secret passage-ways that run all through the house?”
“Not a particle. It is all moonshine.”
“Or about the old man who lives in the cellar?”
“All the veriest nonsense in the world.”
“Or about your missing things?”
“Why, as to that, I have missed some things, that’s a fact, but I know
where they went. Pedro took them. He is a great rascal.”
“Why do you not discharge him if he is a thief?”
“Because servants are not so easily procured in this wilderness. More
than that, he is a valuable fellow in spite of his faults—understands
all my ways, and knows just how I want every thing done. You will stay
with me?”
“Certainly, sir. I have not seen so much of the comforts of a home that
I can afford to throw them away as soon as they are offered to me.
Beside, I want to see the bottom of this mystery.”
“What mystery? Well, perhaps it does seem a little strange that I, a
man whom you never remember to have seen before, should claim you as a
nephew, and tell you that I hold in my hands a valuable property which
is all your own, but it is nevertheless true.”
“And there are other things that seem strange to me,” continued Julian.
“One of them is that you can live here unmolested, as you evidently do,
while peaceable emigrants are butchered at your very doors.”
“That is also easily explained. In the first place, that wagon train
was quite a lengthy step from my door when it was attacked—about forty
miles. In the next, there is a fort and a regiment of soldiers almost
within call of me. I have twenty-five herdsmen in the valley, and at
the very first sign of a war-party they would come flocking into the
house, which could withstand the assault of all the Indians on the
plains. Now, if you have finished your breakfast, and are ready for
your ride, I will show you your horse.”
If Julian had given utterance to the thoughts that were passing
through his mind, he would have told his uncle that he was not quite
ready for his ride. There were other questions that he would like to
have had answered. He wanted to know what sort of an organisation it
was of which his uncle was captain; why he was so much interested in
Silas Roper that he was willing to give $5,000 for his apprehension;
if he knew that his cousin, Richard Mortimer, instead of being at
Fort Stoughton hunting buffaloes, was prowling about somewhere in the
immediate neighborhood, and that he had twice visited the rancho the
night before. He wanted to know which of the two men who claimed to
be his guardian was so in reality; how Uncle Reginald had found out
that he was hidden in the wilds of Missouri; why, since he was so very
anxious to find him, he had sent the trapper after him instead of going
himself; and why Sanders had deserted him so suddenly when Silas Roper
made his appearance in the streets of St. Joseph. He wanted to know who
Silas Roper was; how he had learned so much about himself; and what
Uncle Reginald meant when he said that the guide would not leave the
vicinity of the rancho as long as the “stool-pigeon” was there. These
and other questions had Julian intended to propound to his uncle; but
the abruptness with which all the topics upon which he most wished to
converse were dismissed, satisfied him that it would be a useless waste
of time, and that his relative did not intend to enlighten him any
further than he saw fit. Julian would have been glad of an opportunity
to talk to one of those “watchful friends” spoken of in the note. He
had a great deal to say to him.
“Romez, bring out Snowdrop.”
It was his uncle who spoke, and the sound of his voice aroused Julian
from his reverie. They had now reached the stables—which were built
under the same roof with the house and surrounded by the same wall—and
were standing in front of the door.
The Mexican hostler to whom the order was addressed disappeared in
the stable, and in a few minutes came out again, leading a beautiful
snow-white mare, saddled and bridled.
Julian looked at her with delight, and declared that he had never seen
a finer animal. She was very showy, and pranced about as if impatient
to exhibit her mettle.
“I did not care to ride at first, but I do now,” said Julian. “I will
be ready as soon as I get my rifle and revolver. But I must have some
ammunition.”
“Pedro will supply you,” replied Uncle Reginald. “Go to him for
everything you want.”
It was but the work of a few minutes to run to his room, throw his
rifle and accouterments over his shoulder, buckle his revolver about
his waist and return to Pedro for the powder and lead. He was out again
almost as soon as he went in, and vaulting into the saddle he bade his
uncle good-by and rode at a full gallop out of the gate.