"I shall see you again to-morrow, and tell you what is my intention,"
were the words with which Bennet had left Eversleigh, and they rang in
the ears of the solicitor like a knell. He knew he was in Bennet's
power, and as he thought of Harry and the character of the young man he
told himself it was useless to expect mercy or even consideration of any
kind.
"The day of reckoning," he moaned, "has indeed come."
He asked himself if there was any one to whom he could appeal for
assistance in his extremity; but he could think of no one, and even if
such a friend had existed, it would now be too late to appeal to him for
help, because Bennet knew enough--and more than enough--to send him to
prison.
This was in his mind when Gilbert, passing up the stairs on which he had
encountered Bennet, came into his father's room. For one moment he had a
wild notion to tell his son everything, but quickly decided against it.
"I met Harry Bennet just now," remarked Gilbert, "and he seemed in a bad
humour, to judge from the glance with which he favoured me. I suppose
you have been giving him a lecture?"
Giving Bennet a lecture!
The irony of the thing smote Francis Eversleigh. Again he wondered if he
should tell Gilbert everything, and put some of the burden on the strong
shoulders of his son; but no, he could not do it. And what could Gilbert
do to help him?
"Oh no," said Eversleigh, in reply to Gilbert's question; "I did not
lecture him. He wanted money at a moment's notice, and I told him he
must wait a little."
"I see," responded Gilbert, and the conversation passed to other topics.
When Francis Eversleigh went home to Ivydene that evening he believed it
more than probable that he was going to it for the last time for many
years, as he felt certain Bennet would have him arrested next day. After
a sleepless night of agony and remorse, he took a mute but infinitely
pathetic farewell of the place and the loved ones whose abode it was,
before leaving it.
"D'you think you are well enough to go to the office to-day?" asked his
wife, doubtfully.
"Yes, dear," he replied, with more than usual tenderness in his voice.
"I'm quite well, and perhaps since Mr. Silwood's death, I give in too
much to business worries; but there is nothing really the matter."
And he embraced her very fondly after he had said this, wondering in his
heart what she would think of him when she knew the truth, as she likely
would that very day.
Then he went to meet his fate.
His fate proved to be better and worse than he had expected.
The solicitor had scarcely arrived at 176, New Square, Lincoln's Inn,
when Bennet made his appearance.
"Well, Harry," said Eversleigh, timidly, on seeing him.
"I have thought this business over," Bennet declared, "and I have come
to a determination. I shall not prosecute you. I shall take no action in
the matter, but there's a condition."
Francis Eversleigh could hardly believe his ears when he heard Bennet's
words, "I shall not prosecute you."
Involuntarily he gave a great sigh of relief.
But then there was a condition, Bennet had said. What was it? He was
thunderstruck when he heard what it was.
"I am willing not to prosecute you," continued Bennet, coolly, "on one
condition, and on one condition alone. You have acknowledged your guilt,
but there is one way in which you may make good your--debt, let us call
it--to me."
"Yes?" asked Eversleigh, as Harry stopped for an instant.
"It is the case," said Harry, speaking sharply, "is it not, that your
son Gilbert is engaged to Miss Thornton?"
"Certainly," replied Eversleigh, in a puzzled tone.
"You have a great deal of influence with your son?"
"Naturally."
"You and he are on the best of terms--many fathers and sons are not--but
you and Gilbert are very good friends."
"Undoubtedly."
"If I prosecute you, you will be convicted and sentenced?"
Eversleigh did not answer.
"Your conviction," Bennet went on remorselessly, "will infallibly cover
Gilbert with disgrace, to say nothing of the other members of your
family; his career at the Bar will be blighted. Is that not the case?"
Dry-lipped Eversleigh heard, but he could not trust himself to answer.
"Gilbert will be ruined--you know that is so. Now, do you think, with
this hanging over him, he is a proper person to marry Miss Thornton? Of
course, he is not."
Eversleigh groaned.
"Harry, spare me!" he cried.
But Bennet had no idea of sparing him.
"Your son Gilbert must not marry Miss Thornton; you must prevent him
from doing so. Do you understand?"
"But this is monstrous, Harry," protested Eversleigh; "my influence over
Gilbert is not great enough for this."
"If that is so, then so much the worse for you. But not only must you
use your influence with Gilbert, you must also bring it to bear on Miss
Thornton. You must tell her that she must not marry Gilbert. Now, do you
understand?"
"I understand," returned Eversleigh, speaking for the first time during
the conversation with some firmness; "but what you wish is impossible.
Gilbert and Miss Thornton love each other. Gilbert is a man, he is not
a child, and Miss Thornton is a woman and not a child either. Is it
likely that anything I said to them would make them break off their
engagement?"
"Gilbert and Miss Thornton love each other!"
These words were gall and wormwood to Bennet.
The sight of Gilbert the previous afternoon had revived his dormant
desire for revenge, and after much thought he had come to the conclusion
to tell Francis Eversleigh that the price of his silence with regard to
the fraudulent sale of Beauclerk Mansions was that the solicitor must
use pressure to get the match broken off, and not only that, but also to
induce the girl to marry him. It was rather a mad scheme, and if Bennet
had really considered it fully he would probably have decided against
suggesting it. It never struck him that he was conniving at fraud; if it
had, he would not have been deterred. He was a headstrong, reckless man,
determined to get his own way, rightly or wrongly, and to get it
whatever happened.
"Wait," he said; "I have not finished yet. You must break off the match.
How it is to be done I leave to you. You will find some means of doing
it. The main point is that it be done. There must be no misunderstanding
on that head. But there is more to be said: you must not only break off
the match, but you must forward my suit with Miss Thornton."
"Your suit with Miss Thornton!" cried Eversleigh.
"Yes; perhaps you were not aware that I proposed to her, but I was too
late. She had already accepted your son. You never heard that she
rejected me?"
"I did not know it."
Eversleigh's thoughts went back to that day--the awful, fateful day in
which Silwood had confessed his embezzlements--on which he had given
Gilbert a hint of Bennet's advances to Kitty, and how, at the time he
had given it, life stretched before him bright and fair. He shuddered as
he recalled all that had happened since.
Bennet, watching him intently, saw the shudder that shook the frame of
the solicitor, and, not knowing what was passing through the other's
mind, misinterpreted it.
"The idea of my proposing to Miss Thornton makes you shudder, is that
it?" he asked fiercely and angrily. "It becomes you well--you, the
cheat, the embezzler, the swindler."
Eversleigh looked at Bennet helplessly.
"You disapprove of me, you dare to disapprove of me for her!" Bennet
continued. "Surely I am as good as your son!" he exclaimed with
violence, "the son of a thief!"
"Gilbert is as honest as the day," said Eversleigh, stung into speech.
"I know nothing about that," cried Bennet, scornfully. "But this is all
beside the mark. Gilbert is nothing to me; why should I consider him? He
stands between me and Kitty Thornton, and it will be your part to remove
him from my path."
"How am I to do it? How am I to do it?" wailed Eversleigh.
Bennet regarded him with contempt.
"That lies with you," he said pitilessly. "I have already made that
quite clear. And you must speak to Miss Thornton and tell her--oh, tell
her anything, but tell her that she must marry me."
"Suppose I did tell her that, do you imagine that it would weigh with
her, if it was not backed by some very strong, some overwhelming
reason?" asked Eversleigh, struggling to speak calmly with the young
man. "And what reason can I give? I cannot perform impossibilities.
Surely you must admit that?"
"I admit nothing," snarled Bennet viciously.
The two men looked at each other; Eversleigh's face bore a hopeless and
beaten expression, Bennet's was savage and implacable.
For a space there was silence between them.
On Bennet Eversleigh's last words had made a certain impression, and he
was asking himself if, after all, his scheme would not work: he felt not
the least pity or compassion; but what if he had indeed set Eversleigh a
task beyond his powers to accomplish? As he conversed with Eversleigh,
he saw that what in his own home the previous evening had seemed a
simple enough thing, was not simple at all. He saw that if Eversleigh,
at his bidding, told the lovers that the match must be broken off, it
did not at all follow they would consent--unless they were told that in
this way, and this only, Eversleigh would be delivered from some great
and imminent danger. "Well," he thought, "that is what Eversleigh must
do, and for the same reason Kitty must be brought to consent to marry
me."
"You will speak to your son and Miss Thornton to-night?" Bennet said
aloud.
"To-night!"
"Why not? The sooner the better, surely!"
"Harry," said Eversleigh, making a last effort, "just consider the
position."
"What else am I doing?" Bennet broke out rudely.
"Have patience a moment, if not for my sake, then for your own. You wish
me to tell Gilbert, whom by the way I shall not see to-night, that he
must have his engagement with Miss Thornton cancelled. Gilbert knows
perfectly that his marriage with Miss Thornton is the thing next my
heart, and he will require from me an explanation. Am I to tell him the
truth? And it is the same in Miss Thornton's case. Am I to tell her the
truth also?"
"Certainly. Why not, pray?" asked Bennet, ruthlessly.
"I do not believe Gilbert will consent."
"He will, fast enough, to save you; for in saving you is he not saving
himself and his career?"
"But Miss Thornton," argued Eversleigh, "is not my child. She is of age.
She is her own mistress. I have no power over her. How can I compel her
to marry you?"
Bennet stood in sullen silence.
"She would marry me to save you from a convict's cell," he said at last.
"But as I understand you to mean that you will not speak to her on this
matter, I tell you what I'll do. I shall go to her myself, and tell her
all I know. If she consents to marry me, then I shall spare you; if she
refuses--you can guess for yourself what will take place. And this is my
last word," added Bennet, and stalked out of the room.