The Bramleighs of Bishop's Folly Part 39

"But a compromise is a sort of admission that the claimant was not an impostor--that he had his rights!"

"There are rights, and rights! There are demands, too, that it is often better to conciliate than to defy--even though defiance would be successful."

"And how is it that I never heard of this before?" burst he out, indignantly. "Has a man the right to treat his son in this fashion? to bring him up in the unbroken security of succeeding to an inheritance that the law may decide he has no t.i.tle to?"

"I think that is natural enough. Your father evidently did not recognize this man's right, and felt there was no need to impart the matter to his family."

"But why should my father be the judge in his own cause?"

L'Estrange smiled faintly: the line in the Colonel's letter, in which he spoke of his son's sensitiveness, occurred to him at once.

"I see how you treat my question," said Augustus. "It reminds you of the character my father gave me. What do you say then to that pa.s.sage about the registry? Why, if we be clean-handed in this business, do we want to make short work of all records?"

"I simply say I can make nothing of it."

"Is it possible, think you, that Marion knows this story?"

"I think it by no means unlikely."

"It would account for much that has often puzzled me," said Augustus, musing as he spoke. "A certain self-a.s.sertion that she has, and a habit, too, of separating her own interests from those of the rest of us, as though speculating on a time when she should walk alone. Have you remarked that?"

"_I_ I," said L'Estrange, smiling, "remarked nothing! there is not a less observant fellow breathing."

"If it were not for those words about the parish registry, George,"

said the other, in a grave tone, "I 'd carry a light heart about all this; I'd take my father's version of this fellow, whoever he is, and believe him to be an impostor; but I don't like the notion of foul play, and it does mean foul play."

L'Estrange was silent, and for some minutes neither spoke.

"When my father," said Augustus--and there was a tone of bitterness now in his voice--"when my father drew that comparison between himself and his sons, he may have been flattering his superior intellect at the expense of some other quality."

Another and a longer pause succeeded.

At last L'Estrange spoke:--

"I have been running over in my head all that could bear upon this matter, and now I remember a couple of weeks ago that Longworth, who came with a French friend of his to pa.s.s an evening at the cottage, led me to talk of the parish church and its history; he asked me if it had not been burnt by the rebels in '98, and seemed surprised when I said it was only the vestry-room and the books that had been destroyed. 'Was not that strange?' asked he; 'did the insurgents usually interest themselves about parochial records?' I felt a something like a sneer in the question, and made him no reply."

"And who was the Frenchman?"

"A certain Count Pracontal, whom Longworth met in Upper Egypt. By the way, he was the man Jack led over the high bank, where the poor fellow's leg was broken."

"I remember; he, of course, has no part in the story we are now discussing. Longworth may possibly know something. Are you intimate with him?"

"No, we are barely acquainted. I believe he was rather flattered by the very slight attention we showed himself and his friend; but his manner was shy, and he is a diffident, bashful sort of man, not easy to understand."

"Look here, L'Estrange," said Augustus, laying his hand on the other's shoulder; "all that has pa.s.sed between us here to-night is strictly confidential, to be divulged to no one, not even your sister. As for this letter, I 'll forward it to Sedley, for whom it was intended. I 'll tell him how it chanced that I read it; and then--and then--the rest will take its own course."

"I wonder if Julia intends to come back with me?" said L'Estrange, after a pause.

"No. Nelly has persuaded her to stay here, and I think there is no reason why you should not also."

"No, I 'm always uncomfortable away from my own den; but I 'll be with you early to-morrow. Good-night."

Nelly and Julia did not go to bed till daybreak. They pa.s.sed the night writing a long letter to Jack,--the greater part 'being dictated by Julia while Nelly wrote. It was an urgent entreaty to him to yield to the advice of his brother officers, and withdraw the offensive words he had used to the Admiral. It was not alone his station, his character, and his future in life were pressed into the service, but the happiness of all who loved him and wished him well, with a touching allusion to his poor father's condition, and the impossibility of asking any aid or counsel from him. Nelly went on: "Remember, dear Jack, how friendless and deserted I shall be if I lose you; and it would be next to losing you to know you had quitted the service, and gone Heaven knows where, to do Heaven knows what." She then adverted to home, and said, "You know how happy and united we were all here, once on a time. This is all gone; Marion and Temple hold themselves quite apart, and Augustus, evidently endeavoring to be neutral, is isolated. I only say this to show you how, more than ever, I need your friendship and affection; nor is it the least sad of all my tidings, the L'Estranges are going to leave this.

There is to be some new arrangement by which Portshandon is to be united to Killmulluck, and one church to serve for the two parishes. George and Julia think of going to Italy. I can scarcely tell you how I feel this desertion of me now, dearest Jack. I 'd bear up against all these and worse--if worse there be--were I only to feel that you were following out your road to station and success, and that the day was coming when I should be as proud as I am fond of you. You hate writing, I know; but you will, I 'm sure, not fail to send me half a dozen lines to say that I have not pleaded in vain. I fear I shall not soon be able to send you pleasant news from this, the gloom thickens every day around us; but you shall hear constantly." The letter ended with a renewed entreaty to him to place himself in the hands and under the guidance of such of his brother officers as he could rely on for sound judgment and moderation.

"Remember, Jack, I ask you to do nothing that shall peril honor; but also nothing in anger, nothing out of wounded self-love."

"Add one line,--only one, Julia," said she, handing the pen to her, and pushing the letter before her; and without a word Julia wrote: "A certain coquette of your acquaintance--heartless, of course, as all her tribe--is very sorry for your trouble, and would do all in her power to lessen it. To this end she begs you to listen patiently to the counsels of the present letter, every line of which she has read, and to believe that in yielding something--if it should be so--to the opinion of those who care for you, you acquire a new right to their affection, and a stronger t.i.tle to their love."

Nelly threw her arm around Julia's neck, and kissed her again and again.

"Yes, darling, these dear words will sink into his heart, and he will not refuse our prayer."

CHAPTER XXV. MARION'S AMBITIONS

Colonel Bramleigh's malady took a strange form, and one which much puzzled his physicians. His feverish symptoms gradually disappeared, and to his paroxysms of pa.s.sion and excitement there now succeeded a sort of dreary apathy, in which he scarcely uttered a word, nor was it easy to say whether he heard or heeded the remarks around him. This state was accompanied by a daily increasing debility, as though the powers of life were being gradually exhausted, and that, having no more to strive for or desire, he cared no more to live.

The whole interest of his existence now seemed to centre around the hour when the post arrived. He had ordered that the letter-bag should be opened in his presence, and as the letters were shown him one by one, he locked them, unopened and unread, in a despatch-box, so far strictly obedient to the dictates of the doctor, who had forbidden him all species of excitement. His family had been too long accustomed to the reserve and distance he observed towards them to feel surprised that none were in this critical hour admitted to his confidence, and that it was in presence of his valet, Dorose, the letters were sorted and separated, and such as had no bearing on matters of business sent down to be read by the family.

It was while he continued in this extraordinary state, intermediate, as it seemed, between sleeping and waking, a telegram came from Sedley to Augustus, saying, "Highly important to see your father. Could he confer with me if I go over? Reply at once." The answer was, "Unlikely that you can see him; but come on the chance."

Before sending off this reply, Augustus had taken the telegram up to Marion's room, to ask her advice in the matter. "You are quite right, Gusty," said she; "for if Sedley cannot see papa, he can certainly see Lord Culduff."

"Lord Culduff," cried he, in amazement "Why, what could Lord Culduff possibly know about my father's affairs? How could he be qualified to give an opinion upon them?"

"Simply on the grounds of his great discrimination, his great acuteness, joined to a general knowledge of life, in which he has admittedly few rivals."

"Grant all that; but here are special questions, here are matters essentially personal; and with all his Lordship's tact and readiness, yet he is not one of us."

"He may be, though, and very soon, too," replied she, promptly.

"What do you mean?" asked he, in a voice of almost dismay.

"Just what I say, Augustus; and I am not aware it is a speech that need excite either the amazement or the terror I see in your face at this moment."

"I _am_ amazed; and if I understand you aright, I have grounds to be shocked besides."

"Upon my word," said she, in a voice that trembled with pa.s.sion, "I have reason to congratulate myself on the score of brotherly affection.

Almost the last words Jack spoke to me at parting were, 'For G.o.d's sake, shake off that old scamp;' and now you--that hold a very different position amongst us--you, who will one day be the head of the family, deliberately tell me you are shocked at the prospect of my being allied to one of the first names in the peerage."

"My dear Marion," said he, tenderly, "it is not the name, it is not the rank I object to."

"It is his fortune, then? I'm sure it can't be his abilities."

"It is neither. It is simply that the man might be your grandfather."

"Well, sir," said she, drawing herself up, and a.s.suming a manner of intense hauteur, "and if _I_,--I conclude I am the person most to be consulted,--if I do not regard this disparity of years as an insurmountable obstacle, by what right can one of my family presume to call it such?"