Mr. Scarborough's Family Part 23

Mr. Grey, who was not so blind as Augustus thought him, saw a great deal of this. Augustus suspected him as well as the squire. His mind went backward and forward on these suspicions. It was more probable that the squire should have contrived all this with the attorney's a.s.sistance than without it. The two, willing it together, might be very powerful.

But then Mr. Grey would hardly dare to do it. His father knew that he was dying; but Mr. Grey had no such easy mode of immediate escape if detected. And his father was endowed with a courage as peculiar as it was great. He did not think that Mr. Grey was so brave a man as his father. And then he could trace the payment of no large sum to Mr.

Grey,--such as would have been necessary as a bribe in such a case.

Augustus suspected Mr. Grey, on and off. But Mr. Grey was sure that Augustus suspected his own father. Now, of one thing Mr. Grey was certain:--Augustus was, in truth, the rightful heir. The squire had at first contrived to blind him,--him, Mr. Grey,--partly by his own acuteness, partly through the carelessness of himself and those in his office, partly by the subornation of witnesses who seemed to have been actually prepared for such an event. But there could be no subsequent blinding. Mr. Grey had a well-earned reputation for professional acuteness and honesty. He knew there was no need for such suspicions as those now entertained by the young man; but he knew also that they existed, and he hated the young man for entertaining them.

When he arrived at Tretton Park he first of all saw Mr. Septimus Jones, with whom he was not acquainted. "Mr. Scarborough will be here directly.

He is out somewhere about the stables," said Mr. Jones, in that tone of voice with which a guest at the house,--a guest for pleasure,--may address sometimes a guest who is a guest on business. In such a case the guest on pleasure cannot be a gentleman, and must suppose that the guest on business is not one either.

Mr. Grey, thinking that the Mr. Scarborough spoken of could not be the squire, put Mr. Jones right. "It is the elder Mr. Scarborough whom I wish to see. There is quite time enough. No doubt Miss Scarborough will be down presently."

"You are Mr. Grey, I believe?"

"That is my name."

"My friend, Augustus Scarborough, is particularly anxious to see you before you go to his father. The old man is in very failing health, you know."

"I am well acquainted with the state of Mr. Scarborough's health," said Mr. Grey, "and will leave it to himself to say when I shall see him.

Perhaps to-morrow will be best." Then he rung the bell; but the servant entered the room at the same moment and summoned him up to the squire's chamber. Mr. Scarborough also wished to see Mr. Grey before his son, and had been on the alert to watch for his coming.

On the landing he met Miss Scarborough. "He does seem to keep up his strength," said the lady. "Mr. Merton is living in the house now, and watches him very closely." Mr. Merton was a resident young doctor, whom Sir William Brodrick had sent down to see that all medical appliances were at hand as the sick man might require them. Then Mr. Grey was shown in, and found the squire rec.u.mbent on a sofa, with a store of books within his reach, and reading apparatuses of all descriptions, and every appliance which the ingenuity of the skilful can prepare for the relief of the sick and wealthy.

"This is very kind of you, Mr. Grey," said the squire, speaking in a cheery voice. "I wanted you to come very much, but I hardly thought that you would take the trouble. Augustus is here, you know."

"So I have heard from that gentleman down-stairs."

"Mr. Jones? I have never had the pleasure of seeing Mr. Jones. What sort of a gentleman is Mr. Jones to look at?"

"Very much like other gentlemen."

"I dare say. He has done me the honor to stay a good deal at my house lately. Augustus never comes without him. He is 'Fidus Achates,' I take it, to Augustus. Augustus has never asked whether he can be received. Of course it does not matter. When a man is the eldest son, and, so to say, the only one, he is apt to take liberties with his father's house. I am so sorry that in my position I cannot do the honors and receive him properly. He is a very estimable and modest young man, I believe?" As Mr. Grey had not come down to Tretton either to be a spy on Mr. Jones or to answer questions concerning him, he held his tongue. "Well, Mr. Grey, what do you think about it;--eh?" This was a comprehensive question, but Mr. Grey well understood its purport. What did he, Mr. Grey, think of the condition to which the affairs of Tretton had been brought, and those of Mr. Scarborough himself and of his two sons? What did he think of Mountjoy, who had disappeared and was still absent? What did he think of Augustus, who was not showing his grat.i.tude in the best way for all that had been done for him? And what did he think of the squire himself, who from his death-bed had so well contrived to have his own way in everything,--to do all manner of illegal things without paying any of the penalties to which illegality is generally subject? And having asked the question he paused for an answer.

Mr. Grey had had no personal interview with the squire since the time at which it had been declared that Mountjoy was not the heir. Then some very severe words had been spoken. Mr. Grey had first sworn that he did not believe a word of what was said to him, and had refused to deal with the matter at all. If carried out Mr. Scarborough must take it to some other lawyer's office. There had, since that, been a correspondence as to much of which Mr. Scarborough had been forced to employ an amanuensis. Gradually Mr. Grey had a.s.sented, in the first instance on behalf of Mountjoy, and then on behalf of Augustus. But he had done so in the expectation that he should never again see the squire in this world. He, too, had been a.s.sured that the man would die, and had felt that it would be better that the management of things should then be in honest hands, such as his own, and in the hands of those who understood them, than be confided to those who did not not understand them, and who might probably not be honest.

But the squire had not died, and here he was again at Tretton as the squire's guest. "I think," said Mr. Grey, "that the less said about a good deal of it the better."

"That, of course, is sweeping condemnation, which, however, I expect.

Let that be all as though it had been expressed. You don't understand the inner man which rules me,--how it has struggled to free itself from conventionalities. Nor do I quite understand how your inner man has succ.u.mbed to them and encouraged them."

"I have encouraged an obedience to the laws of my country. Men generally find it safer to do so."

"Exactly, and men like to be safe. Perhaps a condition of danger has had its attractions for me. It is very stupid, but perhaps it is so. But let that go. The rope has been round my own neck and not round that of others. Perhaps I have thought of late that if danger should come I could run away from it all, by the help of the surgeon. They have become so skilful now that a man has no chance in that way. But what do you think of Mountjoy and Augustus?"

"I think that Mountjoy has been very ill-used."

"But I endeavored to do the best I could for him."

"And that Augustus has been worse used."

"But he, at any rate, has been put right quite in time. Had he been brought up as the eldest son he might have done as Mountjoy did." Then there came a little gleam of satisfaction across the squire's face as he felt the sufficiency of his answer. "But they are neither of them pleased."

"You cannot please men by going wrong, even in their own behalf."

"I'm not so sure of that. Were you to say that we cannot please men ever by doing right on their behalf you would perhaps be nearer the mark.

Where do you think that Mountjoy is?" A rumor, had reached Mr. Grey that Mountjoy had been seen at Monte Carlo, but it had been only a rumor. The same had, in truth, reached Mr. Scarborough, but he chose to keep his rumor to himself. Indeed, more than a rumor had reached him.

"I think that he will turn up safely," said the lawyer. "I think that if it were made worth his while he would turn up at once."

"Is it not better that he should be away?" Mr. Grey shrugged his shoulders. "What's the good of his coming back into a nest of hornets? I have always thought that he did very well to disappear. Where is he to live if he came back? Should he come here?"

"Not with his gambling debts unpaid at the club."

"That might have been settled. Though, indeed, his gambling was as a tub that has no bottom to it. There has been nothing for it but to throw him over altogether. And yet how very much the better he has been of the two! Poor Mountjoy!"

"Poor Mountjoy!"

"You see, if I hadn't disinherited him I should have had to go on paying for him till the whole estate would have been squandered even during my lifetime."

"You speak as though the law had given you the power of disinheriting him."

"So it did."

"But not the power of giving him the inheritance."

"I took that upon myself. There I was stronger than the law. Now I simply and humbly ask the law to come and help me. And the upshot is that Augustus takes upon himself to lecture me and to feel aggrieved. He is not angry with me for what I did about Mountjoy, but is quarrelling with me because I do not die. I have no idea of dying just to please him. I think it important that I should live just at present."

"But will you let him have the money to pay these creditors?"

"That is what I want to speak about. If I can see the list of the sums to be paid, and if you can a.s.sure yourself that by paying them I shall get back all the post-obit bonds which Mountjoy has given, and that the money can be at once raised upon a joint mortgage, to be executed by me and Augustus, I will do it. But the first thing must be to know the amount. I will join Augustus in nothing without your consent. He wants to a.s.sume the power himself. In fact, the one thing he desires is that I shall go. As long as I remain he shall do nothing except by my co-operation. I will see you and him to-morrow, and now you may go and eat your dinner. I cannot tell you how much obliged I am to you for coming." And then Mr. Grey left the room, went to his chamber, and in process of time made his way into the drawing-room.

CHAPTER XX.

MR. GREY'S OPINION OF THE SCARBOROUGH FAMILY.

Had Augustus been really anxious to see Mr. Grey before Mr. Grey went to his father, he would probably have managed to do so. He did not always tell Mr. Jones everything. "So the fellow has hurried up to the governor the moment he came into the house," he said.

"He's with him now."

"Of course he is. Never mind. I'll be even with him in the long-run."

Then he greeted the lawyer with a mock courtesy as soon as he saw him.

"I hope your journey has done you no harm, Mr. Grey."

"Not in the least."

"It's very kind of you, I am sure, to look after our poor concerns with so much interest. Jones, don't you think it is time they gave us some dinner? Mr. Grey, I'm sure, must want his dinner."