“IF you go on like this,” said S. Gedge Antiques, after a
pause, full of drama, “you will have to have a cold compress put
on your head. Do you mean to tell me you have actually found the
signature?”
“Yes, sir,” said William, “right down in the corner about half an hour
ago.”
“Then why didn’t you say so instead of keeping it all to yourself?”
“Because it doesn’t seem half so important as the other things I’ve
found.”
“What other things?”
“The trees and the water and that----”
“We’ve heard more than enough about those. Here have you been rubbing
for that signature for the best part of a fortnight, and you pretend to
have found a Van Roon, and you keep it as close as the tomb.”
“I had found Van Roon, sir, long before I came upon his name.”
“Rubbish! What do you know of Van Roon?”
“There is a Van Roon in the treasure house in the Square,” said William
with his inward smile.
“There’s only one,” snapped S. Gedge Antiques, “in the treasure house
in the Square, as you call it, and it’s a very small one, too.”
“Ours is very small, sir. All Van Roons are small. And they are very
scarce.”
“They are so scarce, my friend, that you’ll never convince anybody that
ours is genuine.”
“There’s no need, sir, provided you know it is yourself.”
“But that’s just what I don’t know,” said the old man. “Anyhow you had
better go upstairs and fetch it. I’ll have a look at the signature of
Mynheer Van Roon.” And then Uncle Si scowled at his niece who, in a
state of growing excitement, had already begun to remove the bread and
cheese from the supper table.
While the young man went up to the attic, his master ruminated.
“Fellow’s cracked,” he declared, a hostile eye still fixed upon June.
“That’s his trouble. I’ll never be able to make anything of him. This
comes of Hobbemaising. Van Fiddlestick!”
“Uncle Si,” said June, in the voice of a dove, “if it is a Van Roon,
what is the value of it?”
“Heh?” growled Uncle Si, and his eye became that of a kite. “Never you
mind. Get on with the clearing of that table, and don’t interfere. I
never knew such creatures as women for minding other people’s business.
But I can tell you this, only a born fool would talk of Van Roon.”
A born fool came down the stairs at that moment, the picture in one
hand, a microscope in the other.
“It’s not a very good light, sir--” William’s voice trembled a
little--“but I think if you hold it up to the gas, you will be able to
see the signature right down in the corner. Just there, sir, along by
my thumb.”
The old man, glass in hand, brought a close scrutiny to bear upon the
spot along by William’s thumb. Then he shook his head.
“No, it is just as I thought. There doesn’t begin to be the sign of a
signature.”
“Don’t you see the upstroke of the R?”
“Don’t I see the leg of my grandmother!”
“Just there, sir. Round by the edge of my finger nail.”
S. Gedge Antiques solemnly exchanged his “selling” spectacles for his
“buying” ones, screwed up his eyes and grunted: “Why, that’s the tail
of a Q, you fool.” Again he took up the microscope and made prodigious
play with it. “That’s if it’s anything. Which I take leave to doubt.”
William, however, was not to be moved. And then Uncle Si’s manner had
a bad relapse. He began to bully. William, all the same, stuck to his
guns with a gentle persistence that June could only admire. This odd
but charming fellow would have Van Roon, or he would have none.
At last the old man laid the microscope on the supper table, and there
came into his cunning, greedy eyes what June called the “old crocodile”
look. “If you’ll take my advice, boy, you’ll turn that R into an A, and
you’ll make that upstroke a bit longer, so that it can stand for an H,
and you’ll touch up those blurs in the middle, so that ordinary common
people will really be able to see that it _is_ a Hobbema. Now what
do you say?”
William shook a silent, rather mournful, head.
“If you’ll do that, you shall have five pounds for it. That’s big money
for a daub for which you paid five shillings, but Mr. Thornton says
American buyers are in the market, and with Hobbemas in short supply,
they might fall for a thing like this. But of course the job must be
done well.”
William was still silent.
“Now what do you say, boy?” The Old Crocodile was unable to conceal his
eagerness. “Shall we say five pounds as it stands? We’ll leave out the
question of the signature. Mr. Thornton shall deal with that. Now what
do you say? Five pounds for it now?”
William did not speak. It was at the tip of June’s tongue to relieve
his embarrassment by claiming the picture as her own; but, luckily,
she remembered that to do so just now might have an effect opposite to
the one intended. Even as it was, she could not refrain from making a
“mouth” at William to tell him to stand firm.
He saw the “mouth,” but unfortunately so did Uncle Si. There were few
things escaped the old man when he happened to be wearing his “buying”
spectacles.
“Niece, you cut off to bed,” he said sternly. “And you must learn not
to butt in, or one of these days you’ll bite granite.”
June showed no desire to obey, but Uncle Si, with a look set and dour,
shuffled as far as the parlour door and opened it. “No more of it, my
girl.” The voice was full of menace.
One further instant June hesitated. The picture had been given to her,
and the right and proper course was to claim it. But this daughter of
the midlands was afraid of a false move. The revelation sprang to the
tip of her tongue, yet a mysterious power seemed to hold it back. She
may have expected help from William, but he, alas, seemed too much
occupied in proving his case to be able to give a moment’s thought to
the picture’s ownership.
“Off to bed with you.” The old man’s voice was now savage. “Or--!”
There was a world of meaning in the strangled threat.
June climbed up to her attic with the best grace she could, her
thunderbolt unlaunched. As slowly she undressed by the uncertain light
of one poor candle, she felt very unhappy. Not only was there something
unpleasant, one might almost say wicked, about Uncle Si, but his manner
held a power of menace which fed her growing fear.
What _was_ there to be afraid of? As she blew out the candle and
leapt into the meagre, rickety bed which had lumps in the middle, that
was the question she put to a rather stricken conscience. To ask the
question was not to answer it; a fact she learnt after she had said
her prayers in which Uncle Si was dutifully included. Perhaps the root
of the mischief was that the old man was so horridly deceitful. While
he held the picture up to the light, and he gazed at it through the
microscope, she fancied that she had seen the devil peeping out of
him. In a vivid flash she had caught the living image of the Hoodoo.
And June was as certain as that her pillow was hard, that cost what it
might he had made up his mind to get possession of the treasure.
At the same time, she lacked the knowledge to enter fully into the
niceties of the case. The picture might be a thing of great value; on
the other hand it might not. She was not in a position to know; yet she
was quite sure that William in spite of his cleverness was in some ways
a perfect gaby, and that his master was out to take advantage of the
fact.
As she sought in vain for a soft place in her comfortless bed, she was
inclined to admire her own astuteness in persuading William to bestow
the picture upon herself. It was for the Sawney’s own sake, that at
least was how she chose to view the transaction now. But a sense of
vague triumph was dashed by the thought lurking at the back of her
mind. Uncle Si was bound to get the picture from the feckless William
somehow; indeed the young man, being as clay in the hands of his
master, she was soon besieged with a fear that he had parted with it
already.
The slow passing of the tardy minutes gave form and pressure to this
spectre. With an excitement that grew and grew she listened intently
for William ascending to the room next door. Soon or late she would
hear his feet on the carpetless stairs; but to one burning with
impatience it seemed that an age had to pass.
At last came the sounds for which she was so expectantly listening.
The door of the next room was softly closed. What had happened? Was
the picture still in his keeping? To lie all night with that question
unanswered was more than she could bear. Suddenly she jumped out
of bed, flung a macintosh over her white nightdress, so that the
proprieties might be observed, thrust her feet into slippers and then
knocked upon William’s door.
It was opened at once.
“Why, Miss June!” Astonishment was in the tone. “Are you ill?”
“The picture?” said June, in quick whisper, so that Uncle Si should not
hear. “You haven’t left it downstairs, I hope?”
Laughing gently, William half turned from the threshold and pointed to
a small table in the middle of the room, on which lay the treasure
with a bit of candle burning beside it.
A deep sigh expressed June’s relief. “Please give it to me. I will lock
it up in my box for safety.”
He smiled at her eagerness, and declared that it was quite all
right where it was. Besides, another week’s work was needed to give
the last touches to the delicate process of cleaning. June, whose
careful bringing-up would not allow her to enter the room in such
circumstances, tried from its threshold to make clear that the picture
was already clean enough for her. But William was not to be moved. Many
exquisite details yet called for the labours of a true lover.
“Well, you must promise,” whispered June finally, “to take
_enormous_ care of it. You must promise not to let it out of your
sight for a single moment.”
William hesitated to give this pledge. It appeared that his master
wanted to show the picture to a friend; a fact which did but serve to
confirm June in her suspicions. But she had the wisdom not to put them
into words. She was content to affirm once more that the picture was
now hers and that she would not trust _anyone_ with a thing of
such value.
“But I’d trust the master with my life,” said William softly.
June felt that she would like to beat him for his innocence, as her
manner plainly showed. In some things he was almost too simple to live.
Suddenly she gave him a stern good-night, and abruptly closed the door.
But it was long after Saint Martin’s Church had struck the hour of two
that sleep visited her pillow.