My Cousin Rachel Part 19

"Is that a word of warning, or of advice?" I asked.

"Of both," he said, "if you will take it the right way. And now, if you will excuse me, I must go dress for dinner."

I suppose this was his method to drive a wedge between me and Rachel, to drop a word, hardly venomous in itself, yet with sufficient sting to foul the air. If he suggested I should beware of her, what did he hint of me? Did he dismiss me with a shrug, as they sat together in the drawing room when I was absent, saying how inevitable it was for young Englishmen to be long of limb and lacking in brain, or would that be too easy an approach? He certainly had a store of personal remarks, always ready to his tongue, to cast aspersion.

"The trouble with very tall men," he said, on one occasion, "is the fatal tendency to stoop." (I was standing under the lintel of the doorway when he said this, bending my head to say a word to Seecombe.) "Also, the more muscular among them turn to fat."

"Ambrose was never fat," said Rachel swiftly.

"He did not take the exercise that this lad takes. It is the violent walking, riding and swimming that develops the wrong portions of the body. I have noticed it very often, and nearly always among Englishmen. Now, in Italy we are smaller boned, and lead more sedentary lives. Therefore we keep our figures. Our diet, too, is easier on the liver and the blood. Not so much heavy beef and mutton. As to pastry..." He gestured with his hands in deprecation. "This boy is forever eating pastry. I saw him demolish a whole pie for dinner yesterday."

"Do you hear that, Philip?" said Rachel. "Rainaldi considers that you eat too much. Seecombe, we shall have to cut down on Mr. Philip's food."

"Surely not, madam," said Seecombe, greatly shocked. "To eat less than he does would be injurious to health. We have to remember, madam, that in all probability Mr. Philip is still growing."

"Heaven forbid," murmured Rainaldi. "If he is growing still at twenty-four one would fear some serious glandular disturbance."

He sipped his brandy, which she permitted him to take into the drawing room, with a meditative air, his eyes upon me, until I felt for all the world that I was nearly seven foot, like poor dull-witted Jack Trevose who was hawked about Bodmin fair by his mother for the people to stare at him and give him pennies.

"I suppose," said Rainaldi, "that you do enjoy good health? No serious illness as a child that would account for growth?"

"I don't remember," I answered, "ever having been ill in my life."

"That in itself is bad," he said; "those who have never suffered from disease are the first to be struck down, when nature attacks them. Am I not right in saying so, Seecombe?"

"Very possibly, sir. I hardly know," said Seecombe; but as he went from the room I noticed him glance at me in doubt, as if I already sickened for the smallpox. "This brandy," said Rainaldi, "should have been kept for at least another thirty years. It will be drinkable when young Philip's children come of age. Do you remember, Rachel, that evening at the villa when you and Cosimo entertained the whole of Florence, or so it seemed, and he insisted that all of us should be in dominoes and masks, like a Venetian carnival? And your dear lamented mother behaved so badly with prince someone-or-other, I think it was Lorenzo Ammanati, wasn't it?"

"It could have been with anyone," said Rachel, "but it was not Lorenzo, he was too busy running after me."

"What nights of folly," mused Rainaldi. "We were all of us absurdly young, and entirely irresponsible. Far better to be staid and peaceful as we are today. I think they never give such parties here in England? The climate, of course, would be against it. But for that, young Philip here might find it amusing to dress himself up in mask and domino and search about the bushes for Miss Kendall."

"I am sure Louise would ask for nothing better," answered Rachel, and I saw her eye upon me and her mouth twitch.

I went out of the room and left them, and almost at once I heard them break into Italian, his voice interrogatory, and hers laughing in answer to his question, and I knew they were discussing me, and possibly Louise also, and the whole d.a.m.ned story of the rumors that were supposed to go about the countryside concerning some future betrothal between the pair of us. G.o.d! How much longer was he going to stay? How many more days and nights of this must I endure?

Eventually, on the last evening of his visit, my G.o.dfather, with Louise, came to dine. The evening pa.s.sed off well, or so it seemed. I saw Rainaldi putting himself to infinite trouble to be courteous to my G.o.dfather, and the three of them, he, Rainaldi, and Rachel, somehow formed themselves into a group for conversation, leaving Louise and me to entertain ourselves. Now and again I noticed Rainaldi look towards us, smiling with a sort of amiable indulgence, and once I even heard him say, sotto voce, to my G.o.dfather, "All my compliments upon your daughter and your G.o.dson. They make a very charming couple." Louise heard it too. The poor girl flushed crimson. And at once I began asking her when she was next due to visit London, which I hoped would ease her feelings, but for all I know it may have made it worse. After dinner the subject of London came up once again, and Rachel said, "I hope to visit London myself before very long. If we are there at the same time"-this to Louise-"you must show me all the sights, because I have never been there."

My G.o.dfather p.r.i.c.ked up his ears at her remark.

"So you are thinking of leaving the country?" he said. "Well, you have certainly endured the rigors of a winter visit to us in Cornwall very well. You will find London more amusing." He turned to Rainaldi. "You will still be there?"

"I have business there for some weeks yet," replied Rainaldi, "but if Rachel decides to come up I shall very naturally put myself at her disposal. I am no stranger to your capital. I know it very well. I hope that you and your daughter will give us the pleasure of dining with us, when you are there."

"We shall be very happy to," said my G.o.dfather. "London in the spring can be delightful."

I could have hit the whole bunch of heads together for the calm a.s.sumption of their meeting, but Rainaldi's use of the word "us" maddened me the most. I could see his plan. Lure her to London, entertain her there while he conducted his other business, and then prevail upon her to return to Italy. And my G.o.dfather, for his own reasons, would further such a plan.

They little knew I had a plot to fox them all. So the evening pa.s.sed, with much expression of goodwill on every side, and with Rainaldi even drawing my G.o.dfather apart for the last twenty minutes or more, to drop more venom of some sort or other, I well imagined.

I did not return to the drawing room, after the Kendalls had gone. I went up to bed, leaving my door ajar so that I could hear Rachel and Rainaldi as they came upstairs. They were long in doing so. Midnight struck, and they were still below. I went and stood out on the landing, listening. The drawing room door was open a little, and I could hear the murmur of their voices. Resting my hand upon the banister, to bear my weight, I went halfway down the stairs in my bare feet. Memory flashed back to childhood. I had done this as a lad, when I knew Ambrose was below and had company for dinner. The same sense of guilt was with me now. The voices went on and on. But listening to Rachel and Rainaldi was of no purpose, for they spoke together in Italian. Now and again I caught mention of my name, Philip, and several times that of my G.o.dfather, Kendall. They were discussing me or him, or both of us. Rachel had an urgency to her voice that sounded strange, and he, Rainaldi, spoke as though he questioned her. I wondered, with sudden revulsion, if my G.o.dfather had told Rainaldi about his traveling friends from Florence, and if, in his turn, Rainaldi talked of this to Rachel. How useless had been my Harrow education, and the study of Latin and Greek. Here were two persons talking Italian in my own house, discussing perhaps matters that might be of great importance to me, and I could gather nothing from it, save the mention of my own name.

There fell a sudden silence. Neither of them spoke. I heard no movement. What if he had gone towards her, and had put his arms about her, and she kissed him now as she had kissed me on Christmas Eve? Such a wave of hatred for him came to me at the thought that I nearly lost all caution and went running down the stairs to fling the door open wide. Then I heard her voice once more, and the rustle of her gown, drawing nearer to the door. I saw the flicker of her lighted candle. The long session was over at last. They were coming up to bed. Like that child of long ago, I stole back to my room.

I heard Rachel pa.s.s along the corridor to her own suite of rooms, and he turn the other way to his. I would never know, in all probability, what they had discussed together all those hours, but at least this was his last night under my roof, and tomorrow I should sleep with an easy heart. I could hardly swallow my breakfast, the next morning, in haste to hurry him away. The wheels of the post chaise that was to carry him to London sounded on the drive, and Rachel, who I had thought must have said farewell the night before, came down, ready dressed for gardening, to bid him good-bye.

He took her hand, and kissed it. This time, for the sake of common courtesy to me, his host, he spoke his adieus in English. "So you will write me your plans?" he said to her. "Remember, when you are ready to come, I shall await you there, in London."

"I shall make no plans," she said, "before the first of April." And, looking over his shoulder, she smiled at me.

"Isn't that your cousin's birthday?" said Rainaldi, climbing into the post chaise. "I hope he enjoys it, and does not eat too large a pie." And then, looking from the window, said as a parting shot to me, "It must be odd to have a birthday on so singular a date. All Fools Day, is it not? But perhaps, at twenty-five, you will think yourself too old to be reminded of it." Then he was gone, the post chaise pa.s.sing down the drive to the park-gates. I looked across at Rachel.

"Perhaps," she said, "I should have asked him to return upon that day, for celebration?" Then, with the sudden smile that touched my heart, she took the primrose she had been wearing in her gown and put it in my b.u.t.tonhole. "You have been very good," she murmured, "for seven days. And I, neglectful of my duties. Are you glad we are alone again?" Without waiting for my answer she went off to the plantation after Tamlyn.

21.

The remaining weeks of March pa.s.sed very swiftly. Each day that came I felt a greater confidence in the future, and grew more light of heart. Rachel seemed to sense my mood, and shared it with me.

"I have never," she said, "seen anyone so absurd about a birthday. You are like a child, who finds the world magic when he wakes. Does it mean so much to you to be free of poor Mr. Kendall and his care? I am sure you could not have a guardian more kind. What plan, anyway, do you intend to make for the day itself?"

"No plan at all," I answered, "except that you have to remember what you said to me the other day. The celebrator of a birthday must be granted every wish."

"Only up to the age of ten years old," she said, "never afterwards."

"That is not fair," I said; "you made no stipulation about age."

"If we are to picnic by the sea, or sail a boat," she told me, "I will not come with you. It is too early in the year to sit upon a beach, and as for climbing in a boat, I know even less about that than I do about a horse. You must take Louise instead."

"I will not take Louise," I said, "and we will go nowhere not fitting to your dignity." In point of fact, I had not thought about the events of the day itself, I only planned that she should have the doc.u.ment upon her breakfast tray, and the rest I would leave to chance. When the day of the thirty-first of March came, however, I knew that there was something else I wished to do. I remembered the jewels in the bank, and thought what a fool I was not to have recollected them before. So I had two encounters before me, on that day. One with Mr. Couch, and the other with my G.o.dfather.

I made certain first of Mr. Couch. I thought the packages might be too bulky to carry upon Gypsy, and I did not wish to order the carriage for fear Rachel might hear of it and express a desire to come into town upon some errand. Besides, it was an unusual thing for me to do, to go anywhere by carriage. So on some unnecessary pretext I walked into town, and had the groom fetch me in the dogcart. As ill-luck had it, the whole neighborhood appeared to be on shopping bent upon that morning, and as a person must either dodge into a doorway or fall into the harbor if he wishes to avoid his neighbor in our port, I was forever skulking behind corners so that I might not come face to face with Mrs. Pascoe and her brood of daughters. My very furtiveness must have drawn all eyes upon me, and word gone about the place that Mr. Ashley was behaving in singular fashion, running in one door of the fishmarket and out the other, and bobbing into the Rose and Crown before eleven in the morning, just as the vicar's lady from the neighboring parish came walking down the street. No doubt it would be spread abroad that Mr. Ashley drank.

I got myself inside sanctuary at last, within the safe walls of the bank. Mr. Couch received me as pleasantly as he had done before.

"This time," I told him, "I have come to take all away." He looked at me in pained surprise.

"You are not, Mr. Ashley," he said, "intending to remove your banking account to another establishment?"

"No," I said, "I was speaking about the family jewels. Tomorrow I shall be twenty-five, and they become my legal property. I wish to have them in my custody when I awake upon my birthday."

He must have thought me an eccentric, or at best a little odd.

"You mean," he answered, "you wish to indulge yourself in a whim for the day only? You did something of the sort, did you not, on Christmas Eve. Mr. Kendall, your guardian, brought the collar back immediately."

"Not a whim, Mr. Couch," I said. "I want the jewels at home, in my possession. I do not know how I can make it still more clear."

"I understand," he said. "Well, I trust that you have a safe in the house, or at least some place of security where you can keep them."

"That, Mr. Couch," I said, "is really my affair. I would be much obliged if you would fetch the jewels right away. Not only the collar this time. The whole collection."

I might have been robbing him of his own possessions.

"Very good," he said reluctantly, "it will take a little time to fetch them from the vaults, and wrap them with even greater care. If you have any other business in the town..."

"I have none," I interrupted. "I will wait here, and take them with me." He saw there was no use in delay and, sending word to his clerk, instructed the packages to be brought. I had a carrier for the purpose, which was luckily just large enough to take the whole-as a matter of fact it was a wicker basket that we used at home for carting cabbages, and Mr. Couch winced as he put the precious boxes into it, one by one.

"It would have been far better, Mr. Ashley," he said, "had I sent the packages to the house, in proper fashion. We have a brougham, you know, belonging to the bank, more suitable for the purpose."

Yes, I thought, and what a clatter of tongues there would have been then. The bank brougham, driving to Mr. Ashley's residence, with a top-hatted manager within. Far better the vegetable basket in a dogcart.

"That is all right, Mr. Couch," I said, "I can manage very well."

I staggered from the bank in triumph, bearing the basket upon my shoulder, and ran full tilt into Mrs. Pascoe, a daughter on either side.

"Good gracious, Mr. Ashley," she remarked, "you appear well loaded."

Holding the basket with one hand, I swept off my hat with a flourish.

"You observe me fallen on evil days," I said to her. "I am sunk so low that I needs must sell cabbages to Mr. Couch and his clerks. Repairing the roof at home has well nigh ruined me, and I am obliged to hawk my produce about the town."

She stared at me, her mouth agape, and the two daughters opened their eyes wide. "Unfortunately," I said, "this basketful that I have here is due to another customer. Otherwise I would have pleasure in selling you some carrots. But in future, when you lack vegetables at the rectory, remember me."

I went off to find the waiting dogcart, and as I heaved the carrier into it, and climbed up and took the reins, while the groom jumped up beside me, I saw her still staring at me, at the street corner, her face dumbfounded. Now the story would go round that Philip Ashley was not only eccentric, drunk, and mad, but a pauper in the bargain.

We drove home by the long avenue from Four Turnings, and while the boy put away the dogcart I went into the house the back way-the servants were at dinner-and, going upstairs by their staircase, I tiptoed through to the front and to my room. I looked the vegetable basket in my wardrobe, and went downstairs to eat some lunch.

Rainaldi would have closed his eyes and shuddered. I wrought havoc upon a pigeon pie, and washed it down with a great tankard of ale.

Rachel had been in and waited-she left a note to say so-and, thinking I would not return, had gone up to her room. For this once I did not mind her absence. I think my guilty delight would have shown too plainly on my face.

No sooner had I swallowed my meal than I was off again, this time on horseback, to Pelyn. Safe in my pocket I had the doc.u.ment, which the attorney, Mr. Trewin, had sent to me, as he had promised, by special messenger. I also had the will. The prospect of this interview was not as pleasing as that of the morning had been; nevertheless, I was undaunted.

My G.o.dfather was at home, and in his study.

"Well, Philip," he said, "if I am a few hours premature, no matter. Let me wish you a happy birthday."

"Thank you," I said, "and I would also thank you, in return, for your affection for me and for Ambrose, and for your guardianship over these past years."

"Which," he said smiling, "ends tomorrow."

"Yes," I said, "or rather, tonight, at midnight. And as I do not want to rouse you from your sleep at such an hour, I would like you to witness my signature to a doc.u.ment I wish to sign, which will come into effect at that precise moment."

"H'm," he said, reaching for his spectacles, "a, doc.u.ment, what doc.u.ment?"

I brought the will from my breast pocket.

"First," I said, "I would like you to read this. It was not given to me willingly, but only after much argument and discussion. I had long felt such a paper must be in existence, and here it is."

I pa.s.sed it to him. He placed his spectacles on his nose and read it through. "It is dated, Philip," he said, "but it is not signed."

"Quite so," I answered, "but it is in Ambrose's hand, is it not?"

"Why, yes," he replied, "undoubtedly. What I do not understand is why he never had it witnessed and sent to me. I had expected such a will as this from the first days he was married, and told you so."

"It would have been signed," I said, "but for his illness, and for the fact that he expected, any month, to be home here and give it to you in person. That I know."

He laid it down on his desk.

"Well, there it is," he said. "These things have happened in other families. Unfortunate for his widow, but we can do no more for her than we have done. A will without a signature is invalid."

"I know," I said, "and she did not expect otherwise. As I told you just now, it was only by dint of much persuasion that I retrieved this paper from her. I must return it, but here is a copy."

I pocketed the will, and gave him the copy I had made.

"What now?" he said. "Has anything else come to light as well?"

"No," I answered, "only that my conscience tells me I have been enjoying something that is not mine by right. Ambrose intended to sign that will, and death, or rather illness in the first place, prevented him. I want you to read this doc.u.ment that I have had prepared."

And I handed him the scroll that had been drawn up by Trewin at Bodmin.

He read it slowly, carefully, his face becoming grave as he did so, and it was only after a long while that he removed his spectacles and looked at me.

"Your cousin Rachel," he said, "has no knowledge of this doc.u.ment?"

"No knowledge whatsoever," I answered, "never by word or intimation has she expressed any thought of what I have had put there, and what I intend to do. She is utterly and entirely innocent of my purpose. She does not even know that I am here, or that I have shown you the will. As you heard her say a few weeks ago, she intends to leave for London shortly."

He sat at his desk, his eyes upon my face.

"You are quite determined upon this course?" he said to me.

"Quite," I answered him.

"You realize that it may lead to abuse, that there are few safeguards, and that the whole of the fortune due to you eventually, and to your heirs, may be dispersed?"

"Yes," I said, "and I am willing to take the risk."

He shook his head, and sighed. He rose from his chair, looked out of the window, and returned to it again.

"Does her adviser, Signor Rainaldi, know of this doc.u.ment?" he asked.

"Most certainly not," I said.

"I wish you had told me of it, Philip," he said. "I could have discussed it with him. He seemed to me a man of sense. I had a word with him that evening. I went so far as to tell him about my uneasiness as to that overdraft. He admitted that extravagance was a fault, and always had been. That it had led to trouble, not only with Ambrose, but also with her first husband, Sangalletti. He gave me to understand that he, Signor Rainaldi, is the only person who knows how to deal with her."