“When is it ye’re leavin’?
Is it the ocean’s heavin’
That sets your stummick grievin’,
To see what lies before?
What ails that nowt ’ll start ’ee?
We wait ye right and hearty,
Oh, Mounseer Buonaparte,
Upon S’thampton shore!
Chorus, gen’men, chorus!
We wait ye ri’ and hearty,
Oh, Mou’seer Buonaparte,
Upo’ S’thampton shore!”
He thumped the table, did that crapulous squireen, and all the others
joined in, as by honour expected--like school-boys beating the bounds
of time.
Truth to tell, the hour was late, the whisky-punch was low in the
bowl, and the three little moon-calves were very drunk. One of them,
moreover, was in process of insulting Captain Luvaine.
“You’re no’ good company, sir,” he had said, after staring at that
baneful person for some solemn moments. “I thick you no’ goo’ company,
and I--hic!--ta’ leaverer-telleso”;--and he nodded profoundly, with
the air of one who has solved a long-vexing problem.
“Well, sir,” said the captain, “you’re welcome to your opinion for
me.”
He had sat out the orgy; but with something a gloomy and preoccupied
air, and with a frequent manner of impatience to have it ended.
“Whas you say?” said the offender, cocking his head magisterially.
“Whas you say, sir?” Then he sang:
Jake gave Moll a push--
Derry-derry-down.
Moll fell into a bush--
Derry-down-derry.
“Is that to your taste, capt’n? or d’ye prefer somethig i’ the
psalmody fashion?”
Sir David and Mr. Tuke interfered. They had been moderate in their
cups; and the latter, at least, was seasoned.
“Oh, Charlie!” said the baronet, “get off to bed with you. You’re
drunk, man.”
“He’s got a face as sour as rennet, Davy. It’s cur-curdled the milk o’
human kideness in me.”
This was good for the manling. Mr. Tuke patted him on the back.
“There,” he said, “go and sleep it off. The captain gives you
good-night.”
“And a ring for the hog’s snout to-morrow!” thundered the soldier.
“Fie, sir--fie!” whispered the other. “’Tis but a tipsy boy”--and with
great ado, he and the baronet made a patch of the peace, and got the
squireens outside and on their horses, and saw them ride off swaying.
The wind drove with gusts of sleet at them, as they turned tail and
fled into the house once more; for the night had bellied up slurred
and stormy, and there was a melancholy sound in every keyhole of the
hall.
They found the soldier standing up grave and lowering; but his eyes
took an eager look upon their re-entrance, and he stepped up to his
host with an air of impatient apology.
“I was an ass to take offence at that pigwash,” said he--“the more so
as I _have_ been poor company, I confess; and you, sir” (he turned
suddenly upon Tuke), “have been the cause of it.”
“I!” exclaimed the visitor, in a voice vibrating all the harmonics of
surprise.
“You, sir. Blythewood,” said the soldier, turning upon the baronet, “I
make no apology for harping upon an old string in your presence. You
know my monomania, and the wrack it hath made of my peace. I have
waited but for those Jack-puddings to begone, to speak.”
Mr. Tuke could only stare in amazement; and “Fire away, old cock!”
quoth the master of the house.
Then he added: “You’ll take beds here, the two of you, or we shall
come to words.”
Both gentlemen protested; but the other would not listen, and he ended
by carrying his point.
“And now,” said Blythewood, “charge your piece--whatever it is--and
let fly at our friend; and so to t’other glass.”
Captain Luvaine’s eyes had a light of strange trouble in them, and he
gnawed his knuckles nervously.
“I startled you just now, Mr. Tuke,” he said. “’Twas some words you
let fall disturbed me, so that I dropped the book.”
“Believe me, sir, I was innocent of designs on your composure.”
“I know, I know--that is, of course--how could it be otherwise?”
“How, indeed? But I am all at sea.”
“They could not have been accidental. No, ’twas impossible. And
yet--you uttered the words, sir--‘the Lake of Wine’--there was no
mistake. I heard you.”
“And what then, Captain Luvaine? Do I deny it?”
“No, no. Only--oh, sir! the lady says ‘What mystery?’ and you answer
‘The Lake of Wine.’ Could that be an invention--a mere playful fancy?
’Tis out of reason.”
At the first reference to this strange title, Sir David had given a
low whistle; and he now came forward and took the soldier by the
sleeve.
“Harkee, Luvaine!” he said. “Here’s the yeast to work ye up like a pan
of bread. Did he say that? Then it’s a strange thing, by God. But,
steady, man. And, what d’ye say?--shall I, before more’s spoke, give
Mr. Tuke the history of your trouble?”
The other’s mouth was twitching in an agitated manner.
“Well,” he said, after a moment’s thought, “I’m like to lose command
of myself whenever that nightmare gets up. Speak, Davy, and I’ll sit
mum while I can.”
The baronet turned to his astonished neighbour.
“’Tis passing strange, upon my soul, that the words should be on your
lips,” said he; “for ’twas the name of a great ruby that was stole
from Luvaine’s father.”
“The Lake of Wine?”
“The Lake of Wine, sir. Ronald Luvaine was a dependent of Hastings in
John Company’s pay, and received the stone in reward of some
particular nice service.”
“A crimson token and an apt. Was it plucked from the withered bosom of
some starved Begum?”
“That’s no concern of ours,” said Sir David dryly. “The point is that
the gem was stole from Ronald Luvaine, that was my father’s friend,
and that he went crazy of it and died in a year or so.”
The soldier jumped to his feet with an insane look.
“And his son,” he cried, “that should have been a rich man, succeeded
to an empty legacy and a search of hate that shall be unending.”
He tossed one arm aloft, with a grandiose gesture. Mr. Tuke stared at
him, his brain full of bewilderment and wonder.
“Steady, Luvaine!” said Sir David once more; then proceeded to discuss
the other with admirable ingenuousness.
“It hath made a wreck of his life, as he says--this sense of wrong and
loss. We have been acquainted from boys--at least since I was one--and
the grievance hath enlarged upon him with the years. Not to this day
has he lighted upon any clue to the stone’s whereabouts, though the
cursed red stain of it has bitten into his life.”
“It hath corroded me!” cried the soldier, unabashed. He seemed to
think his conduct justified by the magnitude of his loss. “I have
wrought for a pittance when I should have ruffled it with the
highest.”
“But, how was it lost?” asked the listener, with some secret scorn for
such a bitterness of avarice as he could not conceive would demoralize
other than a contemptible nature.
“Proposals were made by a syndicate for its purchase,” put in Sir
David hastily. “The whole thing was a monstrous swindle, planned with
every elaboration. Ronald Luvaine was ill-advised enough to let the
stone out of his hands, and----”
“There was the last of it,” cried the captain madly--“and the plunge
for me into a hell of disappointment and misery.”
His jaw was shaking like a rabid dog’s.
“Not for a day since my dying father swore me to the curse of
vengeance,” he cried, “has the stone been out of my mind. Judge then
of my agitation when I hear you, a stranger, casually refer to it by
name as having some bearing on a mystery connected with your house.”
“But not with me,” said Mr. Tuke coldly. There was something nameless
in the man’s frenzy--an uncleanly savour of passion that was devoid of
all nobility.
“I can have no objection,” he went on, “to acquaint you of the
circumstances that inspired me to so unfortunate a reference.”
“If you please, sir,” said the soldier, in a tone that was almost a
menace.
Sir David saw the blood leap to his new neighbour’s face.
“Humour him, humour him,” he whispered, “in the Lord’s name!”
“Well, sir,” said Mr. Tuke, “if you will give me your attention, I
will endeavour to recall the matter for your behoof”--and he then and
there recounted those experiences of his at “Delsrop” that had
awakened his suspicions, ending up with the history of the interview
between Mr. Joseph Corby and the crazed girl.
To this description Sir David listened with some open-mouthed
astonishment, and Captain Luvaine with a black concentration of his
every faculty upon the minutest details.
As the speaker ended, he, the latter, blew out all his restraint in a
labouring sigh, and stared before him with eyebrows pulled together
like the strings of a purse.
“’Tis passing strange,” he muttered. “There can be but one Lake of
Wine. Whence does the fellow come, and wherefore?”
“That, sir, I know no more than you.”
“Blythewood,” said the soldier, turning suddenly on the baronet, “has
no tenant been in ‘Delsrop’ since the time of the gallows-bird?”
“None, Luvaine, till our friend here.”
The other addressed Mr. Tuke with icy civility.
“Perhaps I discuss what is yours with undue freedom, sir. My excuse
must be that ‘Delsrop’ is a tradition for desolation; and to us of the
neighbourhood it hath long been a thickset of mysteries. Here is
another, it seems, that I little thought to connect with the place. Is
it asking you too great a favour to acquaint me of developments,
should they occur?”
“By no means. I will undertake that you are informed of the progress
of any events that seem to touch upon a certain subject.”
The soldier bowed low, and walked to the door.
“Why, man--you are never going?” cried Sir David.
“You must hold me excused--yes. This strange recountal has vastly
disturbed me. I would seek counsel of my pillow.”
The door closed behind him. Mr. Tuke turned mutely to his host.
“Zounds!” whispered the latter to his silent inquiry. “The beggar is
half off his head with life-long brooding over his grievance. The loss
occurred in ’76, when I was a child--a brat of two or so. He was a
young man when his father died, and I had the story fifty times from
Ned here before I was out of my teens. His long face is one of my
first remembrances. The families were connected, and he played off the
privileges of cousinship upon me to the hilt, by Gad!”
“He spoke of me as a neighbour.”
“And that he is, in a way. He settled, when he retired from the
service, in Winchester, where his regiment used to lie. And there he
eats out his heart, like Sir Thingumbob in the Tower, planning what he
would have done if the old stone had rounded off his jointure. It was
valued at £70,000, if you can believe him.”
“A melancholy story. How the wind rises!--And who was the gallows-bird
he referred to?”