A MEETING AT MARK CANHAM'S
Rupert's leaving the Hold, however, had been a very innocent matter. The
evening sun was setting gloriously, and he thought he would stroll out
for a few minutes before going to his room. When he reached the lodge he
went in and flung himself down on the settle, opposite old Canham and
his pipe.
"How's Madam?" asked the old man. "What an accident it might have been!"
"So it might," assented Rupert, "Madam will be better after a night's
rest. Cris might have killed her. I wonder how he'd have felt then?"
When Rupert came to an anchor, no matter where, he was somewhat
unwilling to move from it. The settle was not a comfortable seat; rather
the contrary; but Rupert kept to it, talking and laughing with old
Canham. Ann was at the window, catching what remained of the fading
light for her sewing.
"Here's that strange gentleman again, father!" she suddenly exclaimed in
a whisper.
Old Canham turned his head, and Rupert turned his. The gentleman with
the beard was going by in the direction of Trevlyn Hold as if about to
make a call there.
"Ay, that's him," cried old Canham.
"What a queer-looking chap!" exclaimed Rupert. "Who is he?"
"I can't make out," was old Canham's reply. "Me and Ann have been
talking about him. He came strolling inside the gates this afternoon
with a red umberellar, looking here and looking there, and at last he
see us, and come up and asked what place this was; and when I told him
it was Trevlyn Hold, he said Trevlyn Hold was what he had been seeking
for, and he stood there talking a matter o' twenty minutes, leaning his
arms on the window-sill. He thought you was the Squire, Master Rupert.
He had a red umberellar," repeated old Canham, as if the fact were
remarkable.
Rupert glanced up in surprise. "Thought I was the Squire?"
"He came into this neighbourhood, he said, believing nothing less but
that you were the rightful Squire, and couldn't make out why you were
not: he had been away from England a many years, and had believed it all
the while. He said you were the true Squire, and you should be helped to
your right."
"Why! who can he be?" exclaimed Rupert, in excitement.
"Ah, that's it--who can he be?" returned old Canham. "Me and Ann have
been marvelling. He said that he used to be a friend of the dead heir,
Mr. Joe. Master Rupert, who knows but he may be somebody come to place
you in the Hold?"
Rupert was leaning forward on the settle, his elbow on his knee, his eye
fixed on old Canham.
"How could he do that?" he asked after a pause. "How could any one do
it?"
"It's not for us to say how, Master Rupert. If anybody in these parts
could have said, maybe you'd have been in it long before this. That
there stranger is a cute 'un, I know. White beards always is a sign of
wisdom."
Rupert laughed. "Look here, Mark. It is no good going over that ground
again. I have heard about my 'rights' until I am tired. The subject
vexes me; it makes me cross from its very hopelessness. I wish I had
been born without rights."
"This stranger, when he called you the heir of Trevlyn Hold, and I told
him you were not the heir, said I was right; you were not the heir, but
the owner," persisted old Canham.
"Then he knew nothing about it," returned Rupert. "It's _impossible_ that
Chattaway can be put out of Trevlyn Hold."
"Master Rupert, there has always been a feeling upon me that he will be
put out of it," resumed old Canham. "He came to it by wrong, and wrong
never lasts to the end without being righted. Who knows that the same
feeling ain't on Chattaway? He turned the colour o' my Sunday smock when
I told him of this stranger's having been here and what he'd said."
"Did you tell him?" quickly cried Rupert.
"I did, sir. I didn't mean to, but it come out incautious-like. I called
you the young heir to his face, and excused myself by saying the
stranger had been calling you so, and I spoke out the same without
thought. Then he wanted to know what stranger, and all about him. It was
when Madam was resting here after the accident. Chattaway rode by and
saw her, and got off his horse: it was the first he knew of the
accident. If what I said didn't frighten him, I never had a day's
rheumatiz in my life. His face went as white as Madam's."
"Chattaway go white!" scoffed Rupert. "What next? I tell you what it is,
Mark; you fancy things. Aunt Edith may have been white; she often is;
but not he. Chattaway knows that Trevlyn Hold is his, safe and sure.
Nothing can take it from him--unless Squire Trevlyn came to life again,
and made a fresh will. He's not likely to do that, Mark."
"No; he's not likely to do that," assented the old man. "Once we're out
of this world, Master Rupert, we don't come back again. The injustice we
have left behind us can't be repaired that way."
Rupert rose. He went to the window, opened it, and leaned out whistling.
He was tired of the subject as touching himself; had long looked upon it
as an unprofitable theme. As he stood there enjoying the calmness of the
evening the tall man with the white beard came back again down the
avenue.
Mr. Daw, for he it was, had the red umbrella in his hand. He turned his
head to the window as he passed it, looked steadily at Rupert, paused,
went close up, and put his hand on Rupert's arm.
"You are Rupert Trevlyn?"
"Yes," replied Rupert.
"I should have known you anywhere from your resemblance to your father;
I should have known you had I met you in the crowded streets of London.
You are wonderfully like him."
"Where did you know my father?" inquired Rupert.
Instead of answering, the stranger opened the house-door and stepped
into the room. Ann curtseyed; old Canham rose and stood with his hat in
his hand--that white beard seemed to demand respect. He--the
stranger--took Rupert's hand in his.
"I have been up to the house to inquire for you: but they told me you
were not well, and had gone to rest."
"Did they?" said Rupert. "I had intended to lie down, but the evening
was so pleasant that I came out instead. You spoke of my father: did you
know him?"
"I knew him very well," said the stranger, taking the seat Ann had been
dusting before offering; a ceremony she apparently considered a mark of
respect. "Though my acquaintance with him was short, it was close. Do
you know who baptized you?"
"No," replied Rupert, rather astonished at the question.
"I did. I christened your sister Maude; I baptized you. You were to be
christened in England, your mother said, but she wished you baptized ere
the journey commenced, and I did it when you were only a day old. Ah,
poor thing! she hoped to make the journey with you when she should be
strong enough; but another journey claimed her--that of death! Before
you were two days old she died. It was I who wrote to announce your
birth to Squire Trevlyn; it was I who, by the next post, announced your
mother's death. It was I--my young friend, it was I--who buried your
father and your mother."
"You are a clergyman, then?" said Rupert, somewhat dubious about the
beard, and the very unclerical cut of the stranger altogether.
It may be that Mr. Daw noticed the doubtful glances, and entered upon an
explanation. How, when a working curate, he had married a young lady of
fortune, but of delicate health, and had gone abroad with her, throwing
up for the time his clerical preferment. The doctors had said that a
warm climate was essential to her; as they had said, if you remember, in
the case of Joe Trevlyn. It happened that both parties sought the same
place--the curate and his wife, Joe and Mrs. Trevlyn--and a close
friendship sprang up between them. A short time and Joe Trevlyn died; a
shorter time still, and his wife died. There was no English clergyman
near the spot, and Mr. Daw gave his services. He baptized the children;
he buried the parents. His own fate was a happier one, for his wife
lived. She lived, but did not grow strong. It may be said--you have
heard of such cases--that she only existed from day to day. She had so
existed all through those long years; from that time until within a few
months of this. "If you attempt to take her back to England, she will
not live a month," the local medical men had said; and perhaps they were
right. He had gone to the place for a few months' sojourn, and never
left it for over twenty years. It reads like a romance. His wife's
fortune had enabled him to live comfortably, and in a pecuniary point of
view there was no need to seek preferment or exercise his calling. He
would never seek it now. Habit and use are second nature, and the
Reverend William Daw had learnt to be an idle man; to love the country
of his adoption, his home in the Pyrenees; to believe that its genial
climate had become necessary to himself. His business in England
concluded (it was connected with his late wife's will), he was hastening
back to it. Had preferment been offered him, he would have doubted his
ability to fulfil its duties after so many years of leisure. The money
that was his wife's would be his for the remainder of his days; so on
that score he was at rest. In short, the Reverend William Daw had
degenerated into a useless man; one to whom all exertion had become a
trouble. He honestly confessed to it now, as he sat before Rupert
Trevlyn; told him he had been content to live wholly for the country of
his adoption, almost completely ignoring his own; had kept up no
correspondence with it. Of friends he could, as a young curate, boast
but few, and he had been at no pains to keep them. At first he had
believed that six or twelve months would be the limit of his absence
from England, and he was content to let friendships await his return.
But he did not return; and the lapsed correspondence was too pleasant to
his indolent tastes to be reopened. He told all this quietly now to
Rupert Trevlyn, and said that to it he owed his ignorance of the
deposition of Rupert from Trevlyn Hold. Mr. Freeman was one of his few
old college friends, and he might have heard all about it years ago had
he only written to him.
"I cannot understand how Mr. Chattaway should have succeeded," he cried,
bending his dark eyes upon Rupert. "I can scarcely believe the fact now;
it has amazed me, as one may say. Had there been no direct male heir;
had your father left only Maude, for instance, I could have understood
its being left away from her, although it would have been unjust."
"The property is not entailed," said Rupert.
"I am aware of that. During the last few months of your father's life,
we were like brothers, and I knew all particulars as well as he did. He
had married in disobedience to his father's will, but he never for a
moment glanced at the possibility of disinheritance. I cannot understand
why Squire Trevlyn should have willed the estate from his son's
children."
"He only knew of Maude--as they say."
"Still less can I understand how Mr. Chattaway can keep it. Were an
estate willed to me, away from those who had a greater right to it, I
should never retain it. I could not reconcile it to my conscience to do
so. How can Mr. Chattaway?"
Rupert laughed--he believed that conscience and Mr. Chattaway had not a
great deal to do with each other. "It is not much Mr. Chattaway would
give up voluntarily," he observed. "Were my grandfather alive, Chattaway
would not resign Trevlyn Hold to him, unless forced to it."
Old Canham could contain himself no longer. The conversation did not
appear to be coming to the point. "Be you going to help young Master
Rupert to regain his rights, sir?" he eagerly asked.
"I would--if I knew how to do it," said Mr. Daw. "I shall certainly
represent to Mr. Chattaway the injustice--the wicked injustice--of the
present state of things. When I wrote to the Squire on the occasion of
your birth and Mrs. Trevlyn's death," looking at Rupert, "the answers to
me were signed 'J. Chattaway,'--the writer being no doubt this same Mr.
Chattaway. He wrote again, after Squire Trevlyn's death, requesting me
to despatch the nurse and children to England."
"Oh, yes," said Rupert carelessly, "it was safe enough for us to come
then. Squire Trevlyn dead, and the estate willed to Chattaway, there was
no longer danger from me. If my grandfather had got to know that I was
in existence, there would have been good-bye to Chattaway's ambition. At
least people say so; _I_ don't know."
The indifferent tone forcibly struck Mr. Daw. "Don't _you_ feel the
injustice?" he asked. "Don't you care that Trevlyn Hold should be
yours?"
"I have grown up seeing the estate Chattaway's, and I suppose I don't
feel it as I ought to. Of course, I should like it to be mine, but as it
never can be mine, it is as well not to think about it. Have you heard
of the Trevlyn temper?" he continued, a merry smile dancing in his eyes
as he threw them on the stranger.
"I have."
"They tell me I have inherited it, as I suppose a true Trevlyn ought to
do. Were I to think too much of the injustice, it might rouse the
temper; and it would answer no end, you know."
"Yes, I have heard of the Trevlyn temper," repeated the stranger. "I
have heard what it did for the first heir, Rupert Trevlyn."
"But it did not do it for him," passionately returned Rupert. "I never
heard until the other day--not so many hours ago--of the slur that was
cast upon his name. It was not he who shot the man; he had no hand in
it: it was proved so later. Ask old Canham."
"Well, well," said the stranger, "it's all past and done with. Poor Joe
reposed every confidence in me; treating me as a brother. It was a
singular coincidence that the Squire's sons should both die abroad. I
hope," he added, looking kindly at Rupert, "that yours will be a long
life. Are you--are you strong?"
The question was put hesitatingly. He had heard from Nora that Rupert
was not strong; and now that he saw him he was painfully struck with his
delicate appearance. Rupert answered bravely.
"I should be very well if it were not for that confounded Blackstone
walk night and morning. It's that knocks me up."
"Chattaway had no call to put him to it, sir," interrupted Mark Canham
again. "It's not work for a Trevlyn."
"Not for the heir of Trevlyn Hold," acquiesced the stranger. "But I must
be going. I have not seen my friend Freeman yet, and should like to be
at the railway station when he arrives. What time shall I see you in the
morning?" he added, to Rupert. "And what time can I see Mr. Chattaway?"
"You can see me at any time," replied Rupert. "But I can't answer for
him. He breakfasts early, and generally goes out afterwards."
Had the Reverend William Daw been able to glance through a few trunks of
trees, he might have seen Mr. Chattaway then. For there, hidden amidst
the trees of the avenue, only a few paces from the lodge, was he.
Mr. Chattaway was pretty nearly beside himself that night. When he found
that Rupert Trevlyn was not in the house, vague fears, to which he did
not wait to give a more tangible name, rushed over his imagination. Had
Rupert stolen from the house to meet this dangerous stranger
clandestinely? He--Chattaway--scarcely knowing what he did, seized his
hat and followed the stranger down the avenue, when he left the Hold
after his fruitless visit.
Not to follow him openly and say, "What is your business with Rupert
Trevlyn?" Cords would not have dragged Mr. Chattaway into that dreaded
presence until he was sure of his ground.
He stole down with a fleet foot on the soft grass beside the avenue, and
close upon the lodge he overtook the stranger. Mr. Chattaway glided into
the trees.
Peeping from his hiding-place, he saw the stranger pause before the
lodge window: heard him accost Rupert Trevlyn; watched him enter. And
there he had been since,--altogether in an agony both of mind and body.
Do as he would, he could not hear their conversation. The sound of
voices came upon him through the open window, but not the words spoken:
and nearer he dared not go.
Hark! they were coming out. Chattaway's eyes glared and his teeth were
set, as he cautiously looked round. The man's ugly red umbrella was in
one hand; the other was laid on Rupert's shoulder. "Will you walk with
me a little way?" he heard the stranger say.
"No, not this evening," was Rupert's reply. "I must go back to the
Hold."
But he, Rupert, turned to walk with him to the gate, and Mr. Chattaway
took the opportunity to hasten back toward the Hold. When Rupert, after
shaking hands with the stranger and calling out a good evening to the
inmates of the lodge as he passed, went up the avenue, he met the master
of Trevlyn Hold pacing leisurely down it, as if he had come out for a
stroll.
"Halloa!" he cried, with something of theatrical amazement. "I thought
you were in bed!"
"I came out instead," replied Rupert. "The evening was so fine."
"Who was that queer-looking man just gone out at the gates?" asked Mr.
Chattaway, with well-assumed indifference.
Rupert answered readily. His disposition was naturally open to a fault,
and he saw no reason for concealing what he knew of the stranger. He was
not aware that Chattaway had ever seen him until this moment.
"It is some one who has come on a visit to the parsonage: a clergyman.
It's a curious name, though--Daw."
"Daw? Daw?" repeated Mr. Chattaway, biting his lips to get some colour
into them. "Where have I heard that name--in connection with a
clergyman?"
"He said he had some correspondence with you years ago: at the time my
mother died, and I was born. He knew my father and mother well: has been
telling me this at old Canham's."
All that past time, its events, its correspondence, flashed over Mr.
Chattaway's memory--flashed over it with a strange dread. "What has he
come here for?" he asked quickly.
"I don't know," replied Rupert. "He said----Whatever's this?"
A tremendous shouting from people who appeared, dragging something
behind them. Both turned simultaneously--the master of Trevlyn Hold in
awful fear. Could it be the stranger coming back with constables at his
heels, to wrest the Hold from him? And if, my reader, you deem these
fears exaggerated, you know very little of this kind of terror.
It was nothing but a procession of those idlers you saw in the road,
dragging home the unlucky dog-cart: Mr. Cris at their head.