BACK AGAIN AT PARK NEWTON
General St. George’s health improved so rapidly that, contrary to his
first intention, he decided that he would return to England at once
and, if possible, get settled down somewhere by Christmas. As he was
running his eyes through the “Times” one day he saw, to his intense
astonishment, that Park Newton was advertised as to be let. By the next
post he sent a brief note to Kester, calling his attention to the
advertisement, and asking him the meaning of it. In due course he
received the following reply:
“ My Dear Uncle,—The advertisement to which you allude has no other
meaning than is visible on the surface of it. Park Newton is empty, and
empty it will remain as far as I am concerned. Why not, therefore, try
to find a tenant for it, and make at the same time a welcome addition
to my income? I know what you will say—that, as the head of the family,
it is my duty to live in the family home. That is very well from your
point of view, but to me the place is burdened with a memory so
terrible (which time can never efface or cause to fade from my mind)
that for me to live there is a sheer impossibility.
“But, apart from all this, I think you know me sufficiently well to
feel sure that to me a country life would soon become insupportable.
After the first freshness had worn off—after I had eaten some of my own
peaches and drunk some of my own buttermilk—after I had been duly
coached by my bailiff in the mysteries of subsoils and
top-dressings—and after going through all the dull round of bucolic
hospitality: I should be sure to cut the whole affair in disgust some
fine day, and not recover my peace of mind till after a little dinner
at the _Trois Frères_ and a stall at the _Gymnase_.
“So, my dear uncle, should you happen to hear of any eligible
individual who would be content to pass his days among the dull but
respectable commonplaces of English country life, pray try to secure
him as a tenant for Park Newton, and render grateful for ever—Your
affectionate nephew,
“Kester St. George.
“P.S. You say nothing in your note as to the state of your health. May
I take it in this case that no news is good news, and that you are
stronger and better than when I saw you last? I hope so with all my
heart.”
To this General St. George sent the following answer:
“Dear Nephew,—_I_ will become the tenant of Park Newton. If one member
of the family doesn’t choose to live there, all the more reason why
another should. No stranger shall call the old roof-tree his home while
I am alive. I am better in health, thank Heaven, and you will probably
see me in England before Christmas.—Yours,
“Lionel St. George.”
In taking this step General St. George was guided as much by Richard
Dering’s wishes as by his own inclinations in the matter. “Nothing
could have fallen out more opportunely for the purpose I have in view,”
Richard had said to him when the advertisement was first noticed.
“I can’t see in what way it will assist your views for you to immure
yourself at Park Newton,” said the General.
“I shall be there on the spot itself,” answered Richard; “and that
seems to me one of the first essentials.”
“You fairly puzzle me,” said the General, with a shake of the head. “I
can’t see what more you can do than you have done already. It seems to
me like groping in the dark.”
“You are right, uncle—it is like groping in the dark. And yet I feel as
sure as that I am standing here at the present moment that sooner or
later a ray of light will be vouchsafed to me from somewhere. As to
when and how it will come, I know nothing; but that it will come, if I
clothe my soul with patience, I never for one moment doubt.”
“My poor boy! But why not let well alone? You are wasting your life in
the chase of a phantom. Be content with what you have achieved
already.”
“Never—never—so help me Heaven! I will go on groping in the dark as you
call it, till in that dark I clutch my enemy’s hand—and drag out of it
into the full light of day the man on whose head lies the innocent
blood of Percy Osmond.”
“A waste of youth, of hope, of happiness,” said the old soldier sadly.
“For me there is neither youth, nor hope, nor happiness, till my task
is accomplished. Uncle, I have set myself to do this thing, and no
power on earth can move me from it.”
“I am heart and soul with you, boy, as you know full well already. But
at times it does seem to me as if you were following nothing better
than a deceptive will-o’-the-wisp, which, the further you follow it,
the further it will lead you astray.”
“No will-o’-the-wisp, uncle, but a steadfast-shining star; blood-red
like Mars, if you will, but a guide across the pathless waste which
leads to the goal to which I shall one day surely attain.”
Three weeks later General St. George and his nephew were settled at
Park Newton, while Mrs. Garside and Edith installed themselves in a
pretty little cottage, half a mile beyond the park gates, but on the
side opposite to Duxley.
Lionel Dering’s marriage was still kept a profound secret: and as
Edith, during the short time she had lived at Duxley, had never gone
out without a thick veil over her face, there was not much fear that
she would be recognized in her new home. Richard Dering rode over to
the Cottage every other day, and we may be sure that Jane Culpepper was
also a frequent visitor. Equally a matter of course was it that Tom
Bristow, by the merest chance in the world, should often call in during
the very time that Miss Culpepper was there: for Providence is kind to
lovers, and seems often to arrange meetings for them, without their
taking any trouble to do so on their own account.
Not a single day—nay, not a single hour had Kester St. George spent at
Park Newton since his accession to the property. He had been down to
Duxley on two occasions, and had taken up his quarters at the Royal
Hotel, where his steward had waited upon him for the transaction of
necessary business, and where the chief tenants of the estate had been
invited to a banquet at his expense. But not once had he set foot even
inside the park gates. He hated the place, the neighbourhood, the
people. London and Paris, according to his view, were the only places
fit for a man of fortune to live in, and it was from the latter place
that he despatched a letter to his uncle, half ironical in tone,
congratulating that veteran on his choice of the ancestral roof-tree
for his future home, and hoping that he might live for fifty years to
enjoy it. The General smiled grimly to himself as he read the letter
and tossed it over to Richard.
“Uncle, you must invite him here before we are many weeks older,” said
the latter.
“But he hates the place, and won’t come.”
“He hates the place undoubtedly, but he will come all the same if you
couch your invitation properly.”
“In what terms would you like me to couch it?”
“Pardon me for saying so, but you have only got to hint that you feel
you are growing old, and that you have serious thoughts of making your
will before long, and then press him to come and see you.”
“And you think the bait will tempt him?”
“I am sure of it. Your property would make a nice addition to his
income. He would be the most dutiful and affectionate of nephews as
long as you lived; he would bury you with every outward semblance of
regret; and a month later there would be another horse in his stable at
Newmarket.”
“Faith, I believe you’re right, Dick! But not a single penny of my
money will ever go to Kester St. George. All the same I’ll write the
letter in the way you wish it to be written, when you tell me that the
time for sending it has come.”
“We will let Christmas get quietly over, and then we will talk about it
again.”
But still the General was puzzled. “I’m bothered if I can comprehend
why you want to invite Kester to Park Newton,” he said. “You hate the
man, and yet you want me to ask him to come and stop under the same
roof with you, where you must, out of common courtesy, meet him once or
twice a day all the time he is here.”
“The coming of Kester St. George to Park Newton may help us to another
link in the chain of evidence which Bristow and I together are trying
to forge out of the very poor materials at our command. It may prove in
the end to be nothing better than a chain of sand—or it may prove
strong enough to drag a murderer to his doom.”
The General shuddered slightly. “Your words are very strong, my boy,”
he said. “I have seen so many tragedies in the course of the sixty
years I have lived in this world that I have no desire ever to see
another—least of all among those of my own kith and kin.”
Richard did not answer at once. He rose from his chair, went to the
window, and stood gazing out across the frosty landscape. At length he
spoke gravely, almost sadly.
“My hand is put to the plough, uncle, and I cannot—I dare not draw
back.”
“No doubt you are right and I am wrong,” said the General, meekly. “But
I sometimes tremble when I look into the future, and ask myself what
all these disguises and plottings have for their aim and object.”
“They have but one aim and one object,” said Richard, sternly, “both of
which are comprised in one word—and that word is Retribution.”
“‘Vengeance is mine: I will repay, saith the Lord,’” answered the old
soldier, in a reverent whisper.
A deep sigh came from the bosom of the younger man. Again he paused
before answering. “Oh, uncle! is there no pity, no thought for me?” he
said. “Think of what I have suffered, of all that I have undergone!
Name, wealth, position, lost to me for ever unless I can prove I am not
the murderer that the world believes me to be. My very identity gone.
Obliged to die and be buried, and assume the name and identity of
another man; or live the life of a hunted animal, with a price set on
my head, and with the ever-present shadow of a shameful death eating
the life out of me inch by inch. Oh, think of all, and pity me!”
“I have thought of it all, day and night, night and day, for months.
You know that I pity you from the bottom of my soul.”
“Had it not been for you, and Edith, and Bristow—God bless him!—I
should have shot myself long ago.”
“Don’t talk in that way, Dick—don’t talk in that way!”
“Unless—unless I had taught myself to live for the sake of
retribution,” went on the other as if he had not heard his uncle’s
words. “And retribution _is_ not vengeance; it is simple
repayment—simple justice.” He paused like one deep in thought.
“Do you know, uncle,” he resumed with a startling change of tone—“do
you know that a night hardly ever passes without my being visited by
Percy Osmond? His cold hand touches mine and I awake to see him
standing close beside me. He never speaks, he only looks at me. But oh!
that look—so pleading, so reproachful, so soul-imploring! Awake and
asleep it haunts me ever. It is a look that says, ‘How much longer
shall I lie in my bloodstained shroud, and justice not be done upon my
murderer?’ It is a look that says, Another day gone by and nothing
done—nothing discovered.’ Then he fades gradually, and I see no more of
him till next night; but my hand remains numb and cold for more than an
hour after he has left me.”
The General was staring at Richard as if he could hardly believe the
evidence of his ears. “Come,” he said very gently, “let us take a turn
in the garden. The air of this room is oppressive. Give me your arm,
boy. This English winter finds out the weak places in an old man’s
joints.”
As they paced the garden arm in arm, Richard (or Lionel—for Lionel it
was, as the reader will long ago have surmised) went back to the topic
he had last been talking about. “Were I to tell to a physician what I
have just told you,” he said, “he would simply put me down as the
victim of a mental hallucination; he would tell me that I was suffering
from a by no means uncommon form of cerebral excitement. So be it. I
suppose I am the victim of a mental hallucination: but call it by what
name you will, to me it is a most serious and terrible reality—a
visitation that no medicines, no society, no change of scene, can alter
or rid me of; that one thing alone can rid me of. When I have
accomplished the bitter task that is appointed me to do, then, and then
only, will this burden be lifted off my soul: then, and not till then,
will Percy Osmond cease to visit me.”
Again he sighed deeply. The General pressed the arm that held his a
little more tightly, but did not speak. The case was beyond his simple
skill. He was powerless to comfort or console the bruised spirit by his
side. In silence they finished their walk.
But comfort and consolation were not altogether denied to Lionel
Dering. Edith, and she alone, had power to charm away the cloud from
off his brow, the shadow from off his heart. For the time being, all
his troubles and anxieties were forgotten. For a little while, when
with her, he would seem like the Lionel Dering of other days: buoyant,
hopeful, full of energy, and glad with the promise of the happy future
before him. But when he had kissed her and said good-night, long before
he reached Park Newton, the cloud would be back again as deep as
before. The burden which, as he firmly believed, had been laid upon his
shoulders seemed to grow heavier from day to day. “Oh that I could cast
it from me!” he would often say to himself with a sort of anguish. “Why
did I not go to the other side of the world at first? There peace and
obscurity would have been mine. But it is too late now—too late!”