IN WHICH I MEET MY COUSIN, SIR MAURICE VIBART
As I approached the smithy, late though the hour was (and George made
it a rule to have the fire going by six every morning), no sound of
hammer reached me, and coming into the place, I found it empty. Then I
remembered that to-day George was to drive over to Tonbridge, with
Prudence and the Ancient, to invest in certain household necessities,
for in a month's time they were to be married.
Hereupon I must needs contrast George's happy future with my dreary
one, and fall bitterly to cursing myself; and, sitting on the Ancient's
stool in the corner, I covered my face, and my thoughts were very black.
Now presently, as I sat thus, I became conscious of a very delicate
perfume in the air, and also, that some one had entered quietly. My
breath caught in my throat, but I did not at once look up, fearing to
dispel the hope that tingled within me. So I remained with my face
still covered until something touched me, and I saw that it was the
gold-mounted handle of a whip, wherefore I raised my head suddenly and
glanced up.
Then I beheld a radiant vision in polished riding-boots and speckless
moleskins, in handsome flowered waistcoat and perfect-fitting coat,
with snowy frills at throat and wrists; a tall, gallant figure, of a
graceful, easy bearing, who stood, a picture of cool, gentlemanly
insolence, tapping his boot lightly with his whip. But, as his eye met
mine, the tapping whip grew suddenly still; his languid expression
vanished, he came a quick step nearer and bent his face nearer my
own—a dark face, handsome in its way, pale and aquiline, with a
powerful jaw, and dominating eyes and mouth; a face (nay, a mask
rather) that smiled and smiled, but never showed the man beneath.
Now, glancing up at his brow, I saw there a small, newly healed scar.
"Is it possible?" said he, speaking in that softly modulated voice I
remembered to have heard once before. "Can it be possible that I
address my worthy cousin? That shirt! that utterly impossible coat and
belcher! And yet—the likeness is remarkable! Have I the—honor to
address Mr. Peter Vibart—late of Oxford?"
"The same, sir," I answered, rising.
"Then, most worthy cousin, I salute you," and he removed his hat,
bowing with an ironic grace. "Believe me, I have frequently desired to
see that paragon of all the virtues whose dutiful respect our revered
uncle rewarded with the proverbial shilling. Egad!" he went on,
examining me through his glass with a great show of interest, "had you
been any other than that same virtuous Cousin Peter whose graces and
perfections were forever being thrown at my head, I could have
sympathized with you, positively—if only on account of that most
obnoxious coat and belcher, and the grime and sootiness of things in
general. Poof!" he exclaimed, pressing his perfumed handkerchief to
his nostrils, "faugh! how damnably sulphur-and-brimstony you do keep
yourself, cousin—oh, gad!"
"You would certainly find it much clearer outside," said I, beginning
to blow up the fire.
"But then, Cousin Peter, outside one must become a target for the yokel
eye, and I detest being stared at by the uneducated, who, naturally,
lack appreciation. On the whole, I prefer the smoke, though it chokes
one most infernally. Where may one venture to sit here?" I tendered
him the stool, but he shook his head, and, crossing to the anvil,
flicked it daintily with his handkerchief and sat down, dangling his
leg.
"'Pon my soul!" said he, eyeing me languidly through his glass again,
"'pon my soul! you are damnably like me, you know, in features."
"Damnably!" I nodded.
He glanced at me sharply, and laughed.
"My man, a creature of the name of Parks," said he, swinging his
spurred boot to and fro, "led me to suppose that I should meet a person
here—a blacksmith fellow—"
"Your man Parks informed you correctly," I nodded; "what can I do for
you?"
"The devil!" exclaimed Sir Maurice, shaking his head; "but no—you are,
as I gather, somewhat eccentric, but even you would never take such a
desperate step as to—to—"
"—become a blacksmith fellow?" I put in.
"Precisely!"
"Alas, Sir Maurice, I blush to say that rather than become an
unprincipled adventurer living on my wits, or a mean-spirited hanger-on
fawning upon acquaintances for a livelihood, or doing anything rather
than soil my hands with honest toil, I became a blacksmith fellow some
four or five months ago."
"Really it is most distressing to observe to what depths Virtue may
drag a man!—you are a very monster of probity and rectitude!"
exclaimed Sir Maurice; "indeed I am astonished! you manifested not only
shocking bad judgment, but a most deplorable lack of thought (Virtue is
damnably selfish as a rule)—really, it is quite disconcerting to find
one's self first cousin to a blacksmith—"
"—fellow!" I added.
"Fellow!" nodded Sir Maurice. "Oh, the devil! to think of my worthy
cousin reduced to the necessity of laboring with hammer and saw—"
"Not a saw," I put in.
"We will say, chisel, then—a Vibart with hammer and chisel—deuce take
me! Most distressing! and, you will pardon my saying so, you do not
seem to thrive on hammers and chisels; no one could say you looked
blooming, or even flourishing like the young bay tree (which is, I
fancy, an Eastern expression)."
"Sir," said I, "may I remind you that I have work to do?"
"A deuced interesting place though, this," he smiled, staring round
imperturbably through his glass; "so—er—so devilish grimy and smutty
and gritty—quite a number of horseshoes, too. D'ye know, cousin, I
never before remarked what a number of holes there are in a
horseshoe—but live and learn!" Here he paused to inhale a pinch of
snuff, very daintily, from a jewelled box. "It is a strange thing," he
pursued, as he dusted his fingers on his handkerchief, "a very strange
thing that, being cousins, we have never met till now—especially as I
have heard so very much about you."
"Pray," said I, "pray how should you hear about one so very
insignificant as myself?"
"Oh, I have heard of good Cousin Peter since I was an imp of a boy!" he
smiled. "Cousin Peter was my chart whereby to steer through the shoals
of boyish mischief into the haven of our Uncle George's good graces.
Oh, I have heard over much of you, cousin, from dear, kind,
well-meaning relatives and friends—damn 'em! They rang your praises in
my ears, morning, noon, and night. And why?—simply that I might come
to surpass you in virtue, learning, wit, and appearance, and so win our
Uncle George's regard, and, incidentally, his legacy. But I was a
young demon, romping with the grooms in the stable, while you were a
young angel in nankeens, passing studious hours with your books. When
I was a scapegrace at Harrow, you were winning golden opinions at Eton;
when you were an 'honors' man at Oxford, I was 'rusticated' at
Cambridge. Naturally enough, perhaps, I grew sick of the name of Peter
(and, indeed, it smacks damnably of fish, don't you think?)—you, or
your name, crossed me at every turn. If it wasn't for Cousin Peter, I
was heir to ten thousand a year; but good Cousin Peter was so fond of
Uncle George, and Uncle George was so fond of good Cousin Peter, that
Maurice might go hang for a graceless dog and be damned to him!"
"You have my deepest sympathy and apologies!" said I.
"Still, I have sometimes been curious to meet worthy Cousin Peter, and
it is rather surprising that I have never done so."
"On the contrary—" I began, but his laugh stopped me.
"Ah, to be sure!" he nodded, "our ways have lain widely separate
hitherto—you, a scholar, treading the difficult path of learning;
I—oh, egad! a terrible fellow! a mauvais sujet! a sad, sad dog! But
after all, cousin, when one comes to look at you to-day, you might
stand for a terrible example of Virtue run riot—a distressing
spectacle of dutiful respect and good precedent cut off with a
shilling. Really, it is horrifying to observe to what depths Virtue
may plunge an otherwise well-balanced individual. Little dreamed those
dear, kind, well-meaning relatives and friends—damn 'em! that while
the wilful Maurice lived on, continually getting into hot water and out
again, up to his eyes in debt, and pretty well esteemed, the virtuous
pattern Peter would descend to a hammer and saw—I should say,
chisel—in a very grimy place where he is, it seems, the presiding
genius. Indeed, this first meeting of ours, under these circumstances,
is somewhat dramatic, as it should be."
"And yet, we have met before," said I, "and the circumstances were then
even more dramatic, perhaps,—we met in a tempest, sir."
"Ha!" he exclaimed, dwelling on the word, and speaking very slowly, "a
tempest, cousin?"
"There was much wind and rain, and it was very dark."
"Dark, cousin?"
"But I saw your face very plainly as you lay on your back, sir, by the
aid of a Postilion's lanthorn, and was greatly struck by our mutual
resemblance." Sir Maurice raised his glass and looked at me, and, as
he looked, smiled, but he could not hide the sudden, passionate quiver
of his thin nostrils, or the gleam of the eyes beneath their languid
lids. He rose slowly and paced to the door; when he came back again,
he was laughing softly, but still he could not hide the quiver of his
nostrils, or the gleam of the eyes beneath their languid lids.
"So—it was—you?" he murmured, with a pause between the words. "Oh,
was ever anything so damnably contrary! To think that I should hunt
her into your very arms! To think that of all men in the world it
should be you to play the squire of dames!" And he laughed again, but,
as he did so, the stout riding-whip snapped in his hands like a straw.
He glanced down at the broken pieces, and from them to me. "You see, I
am rather strong in the hands, cousin," said he, shaking his head, "but
I was not—quite strong enough, last time we met, though, to be sure,
as you say, it was very dark. Had I known it was worthy Cousin Peter's
throat I grasped, I think I might have squeezed it just—a
little—tighter."
"Sir," said I, shaking my head, "I really don't think you could have
done it."
"Yes," he sighed, tossing his broken whip into a corner. "Yes, I think
so—you see, I mistook you for merely an interfering country bumpkin—"
"Yes," I nodded, "while I, on the other hand, took you for a fine
gentleman nobly intent on the ruin of an unfortunate, friendless girl,
whose poverty would seem to make her an easy victim—"
"In which it appears you were as much mistaken as I, Cousin Peter."
Here he glanced at me with a sudden keenness.
"Indeed?"
"Why, surely," said he, "surely you must know—" He paused to flick a
speck of soot from his knee, and then continued: "Did she tell you
nothing of—herself?"
"Very little beside her name."
"Ah! she told you her name, then?"
"Yes, she told me her name."
"Well, cousin?"
"Well, sir?" We had both risen, and now fronted each other across the
anvil, Sir Maurice debonair and smiling, while I stood frowning and
gloomy.
"Come," said I at last, "let us understand each other once for all.
You tell me that you have always looked upon me as your rival for our
uncle's good graces—I never was. You have deceived yourself into
believing that because I was his ward that alone augmented my chances
of becoming the heir; it never did. He saw me as seldom as possible,
and, if he ever troubled his head about either of us, it would seem
that he favored you. I tell you I never was your rival in the past,
and never shall be in the future."
"Meaning, cousin?"
"Meaning, sir, in regard to either the legacy or the Lady Sophia
Sefton. I was never fond enough of money, to marry for it. I have
never seen this lady, nor do I propose to, thus, so far as I am
concerned, you are free to win her and the fortune as soon as you will;
I, as you see, prefer horseshoes."
"And what," said Sir Maurice, flicking a speck of soot from his cuff,
and immediately looking at me again, "what of Charmian?"
"I don't know," I answered, "nor should I be likely to tell you, if I
did; wherever she may be she is safe, I trust, and beyond your reach—"
"No," he broke in, "she will never be beyond my reach until she is
dead—or I am—perhaps not even then, and I shall find her again,
sooner or later, depend upon it—yes, you may depend upon that!"
"Cousin Maurice," said I, reaching out my hand to him, "wherever she
may be, she is alone and unprotected—pursue her no farther. Go back to
London, marry your Lady Sefton, inherit your fortune, but leave
Charmian Brown in peace."
"And pray," said he, frowning suddenly, "whence this solicitude on
her behalf? What is she to you—this Charmian Brown?"
"Nothing," I answered hurriedly, "nothing at all, God knows—nor ever
can be—" Sir Maurice leaned suddenly forward, and, catching me by the
shoulder, peered into my face.
"By Heaven!" he exclaimed, "the fellow—actually loves her!"
"Well?" said I, meeting his look, "why not? Yes, I love her." A very
fury of rage seemed suddenly to possess him, the languid, smiling
gentleman became a devil with vicious eyes and evil, snarling mouth,
whose fingers sank into my flesh as he swung me back and forth in a
powerful grip.
"You love her?—you?—you?" he panted.
"Yes," I answered, flinging him off so that he staggered; "yes—yes!
I—who fought for her once, and am willing—most willing, to do so
again, now or at any other time, for, though I hold no hope of winning
her—ever—yet I can serve her still, and protect her from the
pollution of your presence," and I clenched my fists.
He stood poised as though about to spring at me, and I saw his knuckles
gleam whiter than the laces above them, but, all at once, he laughed
lightly, easily as ever.
"A very perfect, gentle knight!" he murmured, "sans peur et sans
reproche—though somewhat grimy and in a leather apron. Chivalry
kneeling amid hammers and horseshoes, worshiping Her with a reverence
distant and lowly! How like you, worthy cousin, how very like you, and
how affecting! But"—and here his nostrils quivered again—"but I
tell you—she is mine—mine, and always has been, and no man living
shall come between us—no, by God!"
"That," said I, "that remains to be seen!"
"Ha?"
"Though, indeed, I think she is safe from you while I live."
"But then, Cousin Peter, life is a very uncertain thing at best," he
returned, glancing at me beneath his drooping lids.
"Yes," I nodded, "it is sometimes a blessing to remember that."
Sir Maurice strolled to the door, and, being there, paused, and looked
back over his shoulder.
"I go to find Charmian," said he, "and I shall find her—sooner or
later, and, when I do, should you take it upon yourself to—come
between us again, or presume to interfere again, I shall—kill you,
worthy cousin, without the least compunction. If you think this
sufficient warning—act upon it, if not—" He shrugged his shoulders
significantly. "Farewell, good and worthy Cousin Peter, farewell!—or
shall we say—'au revoir'?"