Colonel Frederick Tallboys, Mallender Tallboys, to give him his
complete name, held a high official appointment, and occupied suitable
quarters in St. George's Fort. He belonged to a distant branch of
the Mallender family, was head of a department, and the husband of a
wealthy and worshipping wife. All his life--now numbering over fifty
years--"Freddy" had been steady, hard-working, and far-seeing; passed
his examinations creditably,--if without distinction,--and from an
English regiment entered the good old Madras Staff Corps, and worked
his way up from adjutant to wing officer, till he had at last succeeded
in climbing into a comfortable berth in the secretariat.
His climb was possibly accelerated by an attractive personality,
a buoyant manner, and a remarkable skill in horsemanship. For
years "Freddy T." had been the most notable gentleman rider in the
Presidency; indeed, such was his fame, that it extended to Lucknow, the
Punjab, and had even oozed into far Cashmere; but now, this wise little
man had discarded his racing colours, and was resting on well-earned
laurels.
"Freddy T." was short, well-made, and remarkably dapper, with a pair
of twinkling grey eyes--eyes quick to notice a misplaced badge, a
woman's dress, or a breach of etiquette. He had a handsome nose, an
imposing moustache, was always admirably turned-out, and carried his
well-groomed upright person with considerable dignity. In spite of
certain insignificant foibles--a hot temper, and a vein of dogged
obstinacy, he was popular all over the Presidency. Most people had a
cordial word for "Freddy T.," who was known to be a smart officer, and
as influential and good-natured as he was straight, and safe! During
his years of expatriation, Tallboys had never lost his interest in
Mallender of Mallender--the head of his house; unfortunately, like
other old families, the race was now almost extinct. Geoffrey was the
last of the direct line, and failing him, and an aged and decrepit
cousin, this high official in Madras Fort was the next heir! But it
was not on this account that Colonel Tallboys' interest in the family
had been kept alight. As a raw youth from Bedford and Sandhurst, he
had visited at Mallender, and never forgotten the charm and kindness
of his lovely hostess; or how she had talked to, drawn out, and
encouraged, a callow, awkward boy; the wise and witty things she
said to him in those far-off days were still green in his memory;
for her he had broken the ice of his reserve, and imparted to Mollie
Mallender many opinions and aspirations that were withheld from his
own widowed mother,--a helpless, faded lady, who spent half her days
in bed, reading novelettes--the other half in bemoaning her health,
her fate, and her servants. But this exquisite Irish cousin with
her brilliant complexion, irresistible charm, eloquent dark eyes,
and impulsive manner, was a divinity to whom the stiff shy youth
immediately surrendered his heart and confidence. Cousin Mollie gave
him self-respect, wise advice, courage, and an everlasting reverence
for all womenkind--her sisters. In a secret pocket in his battered
dressing-case (known only to his bearer) there still reposed a little
gold pencil-case, her gift, and several old and well-worn letters. Mrs.
Mallender's influence was far-reaching, and radiated over two parishes;
her generosity, energy, and high spirits were infectious. The prim
old-fashioned "Court" became the centre of activity and gaiety. Edgar
Mallender himself,--inclined to be misanthropic and morose,--expanded
in such domestic sunshine, and took a prominent part in county
business, and the affairs of his tenants and property; ably maintaining
the family traditions, until the sudden death of his adorable wife.
After this crushing loss, he became a changed man, declaring that a
light had gone out, and left him for the rest of his life in outer
darkness. Gradually, he sank from the sight of his neighbours,
neglected his estates and his duties, and lived among his books, his
memories, and his servants, the life of an eccentric, and recluse.
* * * * *
The most ardent flatterer could not pretend that Colonel Tallboys
looked "good-natured" this morning, as he sat before his big office
table, gold spectacles on nose, reading a private letter; it was one
which Geoffrey Mallender had despatched the week before he left for
India, and as his relative perused it, his eyebrows knit, till they
almost met over the bridge of his well-shaped nose; obviously he became
every moment more and more astonished and annoyed. This missive said:
"I have decided to take up the question of my Uncle's disappearance,
and to thoroughly investigate the case."
"The boy's mad!" muttered Colonel Tallboys, as he hastily whirled over
a page.
"I am starting for Madras by the next mail, and hope to arrive a week
after you receive this."
"Why," glancing at the date, "it missed the mail. He may be here
to-day--Good Lord!"
"I will look you up at once," continued the writer, "and trust you
will give me a helping hand, as you know the Presidency so well."
"Stark staring mad!" exclaimed Colonel Tallboys, pushing away the
letter with a gesture of irritation. "Never heard of such an idea,
never. _Help!_" The words seemed to choke him. "Well, I must put all
this bother out of my head, and set to work," and he reached for
a large bundle of official documents, in which he became speedily
absorbed.
For an hour, he sat intent on his correspondence, glancing through
papers, and making pencil notes; suddenly there was a sound of steps,
and talking, he heard the door open, and a young and cheerful voice
saying:
"All right, thanks, give Colonel Tallboys my card."
It was Geoffrey. He sprang to his feet, tore off his glasses, and
turned to receive him.
"Hullo, Geoff!" shaking him warmly by the hand, "I'm glad to see you.
Do you know, I only got your letter an hour ago--and so you have come
out!"
"Yes, here I am."
Colonel Tallboys surveyed his kinsman with critical appraisement--in
his opinion, appearance ranked high. A well-bred, well set-up young
fellow, with the clear-cut Mallender nose, and his mother's dark eyes.
Yes. An excellent specimen of the average good-looking Englishman!
"I've not seen you for years. How long ago is it?"
"Not since you came down to Eton on the 4th of June, and gave me a
jolly good tip."
"Did I?--ha! ha! You have a long memory. Well, where are you staying?
Or did you come straight from the station?"
"No; I arrived last night. I'm at a pot-house that calls itself 'Hotel
St. George,' and reeks of rancid cocoanut oil. My driver introduced me."
"Good Lord, it's in Blacktown! I beg its pardon--Georgetown! Of course,
you come to us at once. I'll send over a fellow to pack, and bring your
kit. We are pretty full, as this is the season, but Fanny will find
you a corner."
"Oh, don't you bother about _me_," protested his cousin, "I'm only
going to stop in Madras for two or three days, just to see you, get the
hang of the country, and benefit of your experience--I expect you can
give me lots of tips, and I want to arrange about money and letters,
before I go off on my travels!"
"But, my dear boy," said Colonel Tallboys, sitting down as he spoke,
and pointing to a chair, "you don't mean to tell me, that you are
really _serious_ about this business? You are not in earnest, in
starting on such a wild-goose chase?"
"But of course I am, and in deadly earnest; that is what brought me out
here, in the middle of the hunting season."
The young fellow with his mother's eyes, and her impulsive and
warm-hearted nature, had also inherited his father's square jaw, and
(cold thought) possibly been cursed with Edgar's stubborn will,--and
curious strain of eccentricity!
For a few seconds Colonel Tallboys surveyed his visitor in grave
speculative silence. At last he said:
"Well, look here, Geoffrey; you may as well spend two or three weeks
with us, and see how the poor benighted Presidency enjoys itself? There
are a couple of balls, a big gymkhana, and the polo tournament coming
off. This is our cold weather."
"Is it?" and he laughed ironically. "Well, I'm glad you mentioned it!"
"Of course this is a particularly nasty day! Don't sample us by a
beastly long-shore wind. By the by, you play polo--your regiment had a
strong team. I used to see your name in matches. I'll find you ponies."
"It's most awfully good of you, Cousin Fred; polo and dances are all
right--but you know what I'm out for, and _they_ are not my job."
"No, but after a lapse of thirty years, a few weeks one way or the
other can't possibly matter, and Fanny and I would be mortally hurt
if you start off without paying us a visit. We want to get to know
you--and you want to get to know something of this blessed old country."
As the young man looked half persuaded he continued:
"Anyway, my dear fellow, you will never find your Uncle, and you may
take my word for it. I've not lived out here for twenty-nine years
without knowing what I am talking about. Now tell me something about
yourself, and Mallender, and your poor father."
"Oh, yes! Well, you see, he had been ailing the last five years--the
result of a bad fall from his horse--and he was greatly changed
latterly. He could not bear to see anyone, would lie all day staring
before him, and took no interest in any mortal thing!"
"No, not since your mother died, _that_ I can well understand. You
remember her, of course?"
The next moment Colonel Tallboys, who was proud of his tact, could have
kicked himself. Why, the boy was fifteen when she died! Geoffrey made
no reply, but he suddenly looked down, and his face seemed to quiver,
and go white.
"What a lovely face! yes, and a lovely soul! There never was anyone
like her." The speaker's voice sounded a little husky.
From the moment this sentence fell from his lips, Geoffrey entertained
another feeling,--a sudden warm glow of personal affection,--for his
dapper little kinsman, and instantly made up his mind to accept the
invitation to spend some weeks in his company.
"And what does the old place look like now?" resumed Colonel Tallboys
in a livelier key.
"It looks frightfully dilapidated. You see, the pater let things
slide--the grounds, and the gardens, and the shooting. He only occupied
a few rooms, and the rest of the house was given up to rats and damp;
the paper was peeling off the walls, the roof leaked like a sieve, and
drains required to be overhauled. I'm getting the house done up."
"That will cost you a pretty penny!"
"Yes, I'm afraid so--it will mop up all my bit of capital."
"And so you chucked the service at seven-and-twenty! How was that?"
"Well, you see, my father made a point of it; the regiment was ordered
to Egypt, and I could not get much leave, and anyway, I was all he had;
but I don't mind telling you, Cousin Fred, that it was a wrench--I was
most desperately sorry to go. Those bugles this morning in the Fort
gave me--er--a horrible lump in my throat. Now I want to talk to you,
if I am not taking up too much of your time."
"My time is my own," rejoined the little man rather grandly, "and
anyway, it's not every day I have a call from _you_, Geoff."
"Then look here," tilting his chair nearer, "it's about this
business--I want to know your opinion about Uncle Geoffrey."
"My opinion is, that he is dead--dead as a door-nail this thirty
years," replied Colonel Tallboys with prompt decision.
"He certainly was not dead twenty-nine years ago, and supposing for the
sake of argument he was still alive--I ask you just to look at the case
from that point of view?"
"Possibly, but improbably, he got into some big scrape--and found it
necessary to disappear."
"But by all accounts, he was straight as a die--no debts--no scandals,"
argued the young man.
"He is most certainly dead this many a day--or----" and the little
Colonel pursed up his lips, and stonily contemplated the opposite wall.
"Or?" repeated Mallender eagerly.
"Oh, I could tell you queer stories. If Geoffrey is alive, I can solve
the puzzle in six letters--'_a woman_.'"
"What--a black woman! Oh, rats! you're not serious? though I've been
to Brown and Co., and they hinted at the same thing."
"You did not get much change out of them, did you?"
"No, but I gathered that the man who impersonates my Uncle moves about
within a radius of three hundred miles, more or less--and if he is to
be found, I mean to have a good try. I told the old boys quite plainly,
and they did not like it, no, not a little bit. I left them with their
hackles up." He paused abruptly, for Colonel Tallboys--who had been
lounging in his chair, nursing a remarkably neat foot and ankle--now
sat erect, stiff as a ramrod; his face had assumed an entirely
different aspect, it wore the expression of the President of a district
court martial, who listens to some vital and unexpected evidence.
"I give you my solemn word of honour, Geoffrey, that I have not the
vaguest idea of what you are talking about--a man who impersonates your
Uncle--did you say?"
"Oh, of course I forgot that you had not heard anything. My father
never told me, till a few weeks before he died."
"Yes, yes, yes, go on," urged his listener impatiently.
"You will see all about it in this," now producing a pocket-book, from
which he carefully extracted a thin flimsy letter. "Our lawyers at home
know of this, so do Brown and Co., but no one else."
Colonel Tallboys resumed his spectacles, and slowly read and re-read
the contents of a single sheet of paper. Here was the second startling
episode, which had come before him that morning. As he studied the
faded lines, he was thinking hard, and swiftly making up his mind. So
Geoffrey the elder was alive, and Geoffrey the younger, in spite of his
mandate, had come out to search for him--and thereby risk the loss of
the whole of his income. Of course, such madness must be put a stop to:
he would look after Mollie Mallender's boy, and save him from himself.
With the alertness of a mental gymnast, his active and well-trained
brain was already weaving schemes, and like a character in ancient
melodrama he promptly decided to "dissemble."
"By Jove! so your Uncle is actually alive, and in India! I am
completely bowled out--what an amazing thing!" As he tenderly refolded
the frail letter he added: "Bazaar paper, and bazaar ink. I say! if you
hunt him down, you forfeit four thousand a year, eh? It's rather a wild
enterprise!"
"It would be if my Uncle were alive, but I believe this travelling
criminal is the man who has made away with him."
"So you are determined to run your head against a brick wall--obstinacy
is a family trait."
"If you call my father's last wish a brick wall, I am here to deal with
it," and he sat back, as if to study the effect of his announcement.
"Oh, well, well, poor fellow," mumbled Colonel Tallboys, "no doubt he
was in a weak state."
"Bodily, yes; but his mind was stronger than it had been for a long
time. He had a vivid dream about his brother." Geoffrey paused and
coloured, noticing his listener's expression of amused, but tolerant,
disdain. "I say! you are not laughing, are you?"
"No, my dear boy--go on, go on."
"He said he saw him beckoning to him with one hand, whilst he held the
other over his eyes--it was always the same dream--he dreamt it many
times, and he felt, when he was helpless and dying, that he had made a
mistake in not setting this letter aside, and coming straight out here;
but, you see, he was in love with my mother, and there was the money,
and other things, and so he stayed at home; but the affair preyed on
his conscience more and more every year; till at last it became an
obsession. Latterly, he could talk of nothing else; he said he was
a miserable coward, who had deserted his only brother, and that my
mother's death was his punishment; he worked himself up into a fearful
state of excitement, and made me swear to undertake a duty in which he
had failed."
"But God bless me, Geoffrey! there is this letter in black and white,
forbidding any search--as plain as plain can be."
"Yes, but my father thought the letter was a forgery."
"What do Brown and Brown say?"
"They declare the letter to be genuine."
"Ah, and I agree with them! Your father's mind was undoubtedly unhinged
by a long illness."
"But mine is not, Cousin Fred. At first, I must confess, I was rather
reluctant to come out,--though, of course, I intended to keep my word;
but by degrees, when I was all alone at Mallender, the idea grew upon
me; _I_ had no dreams, but I had the picture of Uncle Geoffrey always
facing me in the dining-room--an oil-painting in uniform, done before
he left England--and it seemed to me that he not only took his meals
with me, but rode, and walked, and sat with me as well; and I knew I'd
never shake off the delusion--if it was a delusion--till I had left no
stone unturned out here--and here I am! I see you think I'm _crazy_?
Stark mad. Eh?"
"And have you any plans?" asked his cousin abruptly.
"Not anything very definite. I know that my Uncle or his double is in
this Presidency--within about three hundred miles of Madras City."
"Then what is your scheme? your proposed campaign? Surely you won't
advertise in the press, and have every filthy European loafer claiming
a beloved nephew, and howling on his neck?"
"Certainly not," replied Mallender, who looked a little nettled; "I
consulted a firm of smart lawyers, as our own old stick-in-the-muds
were dead against my trip, and they put me on to a private enquiry firm
of the name of Jaffer, who live in the City of Hyderabad in the Deccan."
"By George, they must do a great business! The city is full of the bad
characters of every nation, people, and tongue. Well, go on."
"And Jaffer and Co. believe they can help me; and say that a good many
men disappear in India much in the same way; but, of course, they don't
know it is not my Uncle I expect to find--I'm afraid you look upon me
as a lunatic?"
"No, no. I see that you feel the claims of kinship as keenly as I do
myself; but you are wrong in starting on this crazy quest. If your
Uncle is alive--I believe he has gone _native_. Take my advice," and he
looked full into Mallender's grave face, "let sleeping dogs lie."
"Not this sleeping dog!" rejoined the young man, with unexpected
energy. "The clever brute who murdered my Uncle draws his money and
forges his name!"
"Well, well, Geoffrey, the weather is far too muggy for argument, we
must agree to differ. One thing is certain; you cannot go up-country as
ignorant as a new-born Europe babe; you must give us a couple of months
at least--till we start for the Neilgherries."
"It's most awfully kind of you; and I'd like to stay with you for a few
weeks and learn a little experience."
"Then that's settled," said Colonel Tallboys aloud. To himself: "Fan
will easily keep this headstrong fellow amused, perhaps entangle him in
a matrimonial engagement, and drive this lunacy out of his head."
"Just one word more, my dear boy. For God's sake, don't let a soul know
of your _real_ reason for your trip to this country. If it ever got
out, you'd be the laughing-stock of all Madras!"
At this painful announcement Geoffrey coloured up to his crisp brown
hair.
"Come now," he continued, "put it before yourself impartially. What
would _you_ think of a fellow coming to India to hunt for a lost
relative, when he had been expressly warned that if he made a search he
would lose four thousand a year?"
"Yes, I admit that it sounds fairly mad; so I'll keep all particulars
dark; but mad or not, nothing shall stop me--or choke me off!" declared
Mallender with vehement sincerity.
"All right, all right, meanwhile we will give out that you are
interested in coffee in Mysore, or gold mines--yes, that is best--it's
more _vague_," added Colonel Tallboys, with a grin. "And now, the first
thing to do is to find you a first-class boy."
"Boy?"
"A servant--a full-grown man; anything up to eighty years of age is a
boy here. I know of one, Anthony, he speaks Telagu, Canarese, Tamil,
English, and at a pinch French! He will cook for you, valet you, wait
on you, and generally run you, and do for you--he is just out of a
place--his master went home last mail."
"But I only want a smart, honest chap that can rough it a bit,"
protested the new-comer.
"Oh, Anthony has often been in camp, and on shooting trips; he is a
capital servant. My bearer will get hold of him at once, and now I'll
'phone for the car, and take you to the Club for tiffin--there you
shall taste for the first time in your life the real, true, and only
prawn curry."