AT DOCTORS' COMMONS
But where had Mr. Chattaway been all that time? And how came he to be
seen by George Ryle and Maude hovering about his own ground at night,
when he was supposed to be miles away? The explanation can be given.
Mr. Chattaway found, as many of us do, that lets and hindrances intrude
themselves into the most simple plans. When he took the sudden
resolution that morning to run up to London from Barmester after Flood
the lawyer, he never supposed that his journey would be prolonged.
Nothing more easy, as it appeared, than to catch Flood at his hotel, get
a quarter-of-an-hour's conversation with him, take his advice, and
return home again. But a check intervened.
Upon arriving at the London terminus, Mr. Chattaway got into a cab, and
drove to the hotel ordinarily used by Mr. Flood. After a dispute with
the cab-driver he entered the hotel, and asked to see Mr. Flood.
"Mr. Flood?" repeated the waiter. "There's no gentleman of that name
staying here, sir."
"I mean Mr. Flood of Barmester," irritably rejoined the master of
Trevlyn Hold. "Perhaps you don't know him personally. He came up an hour
or two ago."
The waiter, a fresh one, was not acquainted with Mr. Flood. He went to
another waiter, and the latter came forward. But the man's information
was correct; Mr. Flood of Barmester had not arrived.
"He travelled by the eight-o'clock train," persisted Mr. Chattaway, as
if he found the denial difficult to reconcile with that fact. "He must
be in London."
"All I can say, sir, is that he has not come here," returned the
head-waiter.
Mr. Chattaway was considerably put out. In his impatience, the delay
seemed most irritating. He left the hotel, and bent his steps towards
Essex Street, where Mr. Flood's agents had their offices. Chattaway went
in hoping that the first object his eyes rested upon would be his
confidential adviser.
His eyes did not receive that satisfaction. Some clerks were in the
room, also one or two persons who seemed to be clients; but there was no
Mr. Flood, and the clerks could give no information concerning him. One
of the firm, a Mr. Newby, appeared and shook hands with Mr. Chattaway,
whom he had once or twice seen.
"Flood? Yes. We had a note from Flood yesterday morning, telling us to
get some accounts prepared, as he should be in town in the course of a
day or two. He has not come yet; up to-morrow perhaps."
"But he has come," reiterated Chattaway. "I have followed him up to
town, and want to see him upon a matter of importance."
"Oh, has he?" carelessly replied Mr. Newby, the indifferent manner
appearing almost like an insult to Chattaway's impatient frame of mind.
"He'll be in later, then."
"He is sure to come here?" inquired Mr. Chattaway.
"Quite sure. We shall have a good bit of business to transact with him
this time."
"Then, if you'll allow me, I'll wait here. I must see him, and I want to
get back to Barbrook as soon as possible."
Mr. Chattaway was told that he was welcome to wait, if it pleased him to
do so. A chair was handed him in the entrance room, where the clerks
were writing, and he took his seat in it: sat there until he was nearly
driven wild. The room was in a continual bustle; persons constantly
coming in and going out. For the first hour or so, to watch the swaying
door afforded Chattaway a sort of relief, for in every fresh visitor he
expected to see Mr. Flood. But this grew tedious at last, and the
ever-recurring disappointment told upon his temper.
Evening came, the hour for closing the office, and the country lawyer
had not made his appearance. "It is most extraordinary," remarked
Chattaway to Mr. Newby.
"He has been about some other business, and couldn't get to us to-day, I
suppose," rejoined Mr. Newby, in the most provokingly matter-of-fact
tone. "If he has come up for a week, as you say, he must have some
important affair on hand; in which case it may be a day or two before he
finds his way here."
A most unsatisfactory conclusion for Mr. Chattaway; but that gentleman
was obliged to put up with it, in the absence of any more tangible hope.
He went back to the hotel, and there found that Mr. Flood was still
amongst the non-arrivals.
It was bad enough, that day and night's disappointment and suspense; but
when it came to be extended over more days and nights, you may judge how
it was increased. Mr. Flood did not make his appearance. Chattaway, in a
state of fume, divided his time between the hotel, Essex Street, and
Euston Square station, in the wild hope of coming upon the lawyer. All
to no purpose. He telegraphed to Barmester, and received for reply that
Mr. Flood was in London, and so he redoubled his hauntings, and worked
himself into a fever.
It appeared absolutely necessary that he should consult Flood before
venturing back to home quarters, where he should inevitably meet that
dangerous enemy. But how see Flood?--where look for him? Barmester
telegraphed up that Mr. Flood was in London; the agents persisted in
asserting that they expected him hourly, at their office, and yet
Chattaway could not come upon him. He visited all the courts open in the
long vacation; prowled about the Temple, Lincoln's Inn, and other places
where lawyers congregated, in the delusive hope that he might by good
luck meet with him. All in vain; and Chattaway had been very nearly a
week from home, when his hopes were at length realised. There were other
lawyers whom he might have consulted--Mr. Newby himself, for
instance--but he shrank from laying bare his dread to a stranger.
He was walking slowly up Ludgate Hill, his hands in his pockets, his
brow knit, altogether in a disconsolate manner, some vague intention in
his mind of taking a peep inside Doctors' Commons, when, by the merest
accident, he happened to turn his eyes on the string of vehicles passing
up and down. In that same moment a cab, extricating itself from the long
line, whirled past him in the direction of Fleet Street; and its
occupant was Flood the lawyer.
All his listlessness was gone. Chattaway threw himself into the midst of
the traffic, and tore after the cab. Sober pedestrians thought he had
gone mad: but bent on their own business, had only time for a wondering
glance. Chattaway bore on his way, and succeeded in keeping the cab in
view. It soon stopped at an hotel, and by the time the lawyer had
alighted, a portmanteau in hand, and was paying the driver, Chattaway
was up with him, breathless, excited, grasping his arm as one demented.
"What on earth's the matter?" exclaimed Mr. Flood, in astonishment. "You
here, Chattaway? Do you want me?"
"I followed you to town by the next train a week ago; I have been
looking for you ever since," gasped Chattaway, unable to regain his
breath between racing and excitement. "Where have you been hiding
yourself? Your agents have been expecting you all this time."
"I dare say they have. I wrote to say I should be with them in a day or
two. I thought I should be, then."
"But where have you been?"
"Over in France. A client wrote to me from Paris----"
"France!" interrupted Mr. Chattaway in his anger, feeling the
announcement as a special and personal grievance. What right had his
legal adviser to be cooling his heels in France, when he was searching
for him in London?
"I meant to return without delay," continued Mr. Flood; "but when I
reached my client, I found the affair on which he wanted me was
complicated, and I had to wait the dilatoriness of French lawyers."
"You have been lingering over the seductions of Paris; nothing else,"
growled Chattaway.
The lawyer laughed pleasantly. "No, on my honour. I did go about to some
of the sights whilst waiting for my business; but they did not detain me
by one unnecessary hour. What is it that you want with me?"
They entered the hotel, and Chattaway took him into a private room,
unwashed and unrefreshed as the traveller was, and laid the case before
him: the sudden appearance of the mysterious stranger at Barbrook, his
open avowal that he had come to depose Chattaway from the Hold in favour
of Rupert Trevlyn.
"But who is he?" inquired Mr. Flood.
"A lawyer," was the reply--for you must remember that Chattaway could
only speak in accordance with the supposed facts; facts that had been
exaggerated to him. "I know nothing more about the man, except that he
avows he has come to Barbrook to deprive me of my property, and take up
the cause of Rupert Trevlyn. But he can't do it, you know, Flood. The
Hold is mine, and must remain mine."
"Of course he can't," acquiesced the lawyer. "Why need you put yourself
out about it?"
Mr. Chattaway was wiping the moisture from his face. He sat looking at
the lawyer.
"I can't deny that it has troubled me," he said: "that it is troubling
me still. What would my family do--my children--if we lost the Hold?"
It was the lawyer's turn to look. He could not make out Chattaway. No
power on earth, so far as his belief and knowledge went, could wrest
Trevlyn Hold from its present master. Why, then, these fears? Were they
born of nervousness? But Chattaway was not a nervous man.
"Trevlyn Hold is as much yours as this hat"--touching the one at his
elbow--"is mine," he resumed. "It came to you by legal bequest; you have
enjoyed it these twenty years, and to deprive you of it is beyond human
power. Unless," he added, after a pause, "unless indeed----"
"Unless what?" eagerly interrupted Chattaway, his heart thumping against
his side.
"Unless--it was only an idea that crossed me--there should prove to be a
flaw in Squire Trevlyn's will. But that's not probable."
"It's impossible," gasped Chattaway, his fears taking a new and
startling turn. "It's impossible that there could have been anything
defective in the will, Flood."
"It's next to impossible," acquiesced the lawyer; "though such mistakes
have been known. Who drew it up?"
"The Squire's solicitors, Peterby and Jones."
"Then it's all right, you may be sure. Peterby and Jones are not men
likely to insert errors in their deeds. I should not trouble myself
about the matter."
Mr. Chattaway sat in silence, revolving many things. How he wished he
_could_ take the advice and not "trouble himself" about the matter!
"What made you think there might be a flaw in the will?" he presently
asked.
"Nay, I did not think there was: only that it was just possible there
might be. When a case is offered to me for consideration, it is my habit
to glance at it in all its bearings. You tell me a stranger has made his
appearance at Barbrook, avowing an intention of displacing you from
Trevlyn Hold."
"Well?"
"Well, then, whilst you were speaking, I began to grasp that case, turn
it about in my mind; and I see that there is no possible way by which
you can be displaced, so far as I know and believe. You enjoy it in
accordance with Squire Trevlyn's will, and so long as that will remains
in force, you are safe--provided the will has no flaw in it."
Mr. Chattaway sat biting his lips. Never for a moment in the wildest
flight of fear had he glanced at the possibility of a flaw in the will.
The idea now suggested by Mr. Flood was perhaps the most alarming that
could have been presented to him.
"If there were any flaw in the will," he began--and the very mention of
the cruel words almost rent his heart in two--"could you detect it, by
reading the will over?"
"Yes," replied Flood.
"Then let us go at once, and set this awful uncertainty at rest."
He had risen from his seat so eagerly and hastily that Mr. Flood
scarcely understood.
"Go where?" he asked.
"To Doctors' Commons. We can see it there by paying a shilling."
"Oh--ay, I'll go if you like. But I must have a wash first, and some
refreshment. I have had neither since leaving Paris, and the
crossing--ugh! I don't want to think of it."
Mr. Chattaway controlled his impatience in the best manner he was able.
At length they were fairly on their way--to the very spot for which
Chattaway had been making once before that morning.
Difficulties surmounted, Flood was soon deep in the perusal of Squire
Trevlyn's will. He read it over slowly and thoughtfully, eyes and head
bent, all his attention absorbed in the task. At its conclusion, he
turned and looked full at Mr. Chattaway.
"You are perfectly safe," he said. "The will is right and legal in every
point."
The relief brought a glow into Chattaway's dusky face. "I thought it
strange if it could be wrong," he cried, drawing a deep breath.
"It is only the codicil, you see, which affects you," continued Mr.
Flood, pointing to the deed before them. "The will appears to have been
made years before the codicil, and leaves the estate to the eldest son
Rupert, and failing him, to Joseph. Rupert died; Joe died; and then the
codicil was drawn up, willing it to you. You come in, you see, _after_
the two sons; contingent on their death; no mention whatever is made of
the child Rupert."
Chattaway coughed. He did not deem it necessary to repeat that Squire
Trevlyn had never known the child Rupert was in existence: but Flood
was, no doubt, aware of that fact.
"It's a good thing for you Joe Trevlyn died before his father,"
carelessly remarked Mr. Flood, as he glanced again at the will.
"Why?" cried Chattaway.
"Because, had he not, this codicil would be valueless. It is----"
"But he was dead, and it gives the estate to me," fiercely interrupted
Chattaway, going into a white heat again.
"Yes, yes. But it was a good thing, I say, for you. Had Joe been alive,
he would have come in, in spite of this codicil; and he could have
bequeathed the property to his boy after him."
"Do you suppose I don't know all that?" retorted Chattaway. "It was only
in consequence of Joe Trevlyn's death that the estate was willed to me.
Had he lived, I never should have had it, or expected it."
The peevish tone betrayed how sore was the subject altogether, and Mr.
Flood smiled. "You need not be snappy over it, Chattaway," he said;
"there's no cause for that. And now you may go back to the Hold in
peace, without having your sleep disturbed by dreams of ejection. And if
that unknown friend of yours should happen to mention in your hearing
his kind intention of deposing you for Rupert Trevlyn, tell him, with my
compliments, to come up here and read Squire Trevlyn's will."
Partially reassured, Mr. Chattaway lost little time in taking his
departure from London. He quitted it that same afternoon, and arrived at
Barbrook just after dark, whence he started for the Hold.
But he did not proceed to it as most other travellers in his rank of
life would have done. He did not call a fly and drive to it; he
preferred to go on foot. He did not even walk openly along the broad
highway, but turned into by-paths, where he might be pretty sure of not
meeting a soul, and stole cautiously along, peering on all sides, as if
looking out for something he either longed or dreaded to see.