The Bramleighs of Bishop's Folly Part 78

"And whom do you call our man, sir?" "I mean Rogers--the fellow we have been writing about."

"How and when has this happened?"

Temple proceeded to repeat what he had learned at the prefecture of the police, and read out the words of the telegram.

"Let us see," said Lord Culduff, seating himself in a well-cushioned chair. "Let us see what new turn this will give the affair. He may be recaptured, or he may be, most probably is, drowned. We then come in for compensation. They must indemnify. There are few claims so thoroughly chronic in their character as those for an indemnity. You first discuss the right, and you then higgle over the arithmetic. I don't want to go back to town this season. See to it then, Temple, that we reserve this question entirely to ourselves. Let Blagden refer everything to us."

"They have sent the news home already."

"Oh! they have. Very sharp practice. Not peculiar for any extreme delicacy either. But I cannot dine with Blagden, for all that. This escape gives a curious turn to the whole affair. Let us look into it a little. I take it the fellow must have gone down--eh?"

"Most probably."

"Or he might have been picked up by some pa.s.sing steamer or by a fishing-boat. Suppose him to have got free, he 'll get back to England, and make capital out of the adventure. These fellows understand all that nowadays."

Temple, seeing a reply was expected, a.s.sented.

"So that we must not be precipitate, Temple," said Lord Culduff, slowly. "It's a case for caution."

These words, and the keen look that accompanied them, were perfect puzzles to Temple, and he did not dare to speak.

"The thing must be done this wise," said Lord Culduff. "It must be a 'private and confidential' to the office, and a 'sly and ambiguous' to the public prints. I 'll charge myself with the former; the latter shall be your care, Temple. You are intimate with Flosser, the correspondent of the 'Bell-Weather.' Have him to dinner and be indiscreet. This old Madeira here will explain any amount of expansiveness. Get him to talk of this escape, and let out the secret that it was we who managed it all. Mind, however, that you swear him not to reveal anything. It would be your ruin, you must say, if the affair got wind; but the fact was Lord Culduff saw the Neapolitans were determined not to surrender him, and knowing what an insult it would be to the public feeling of England that an Englishman was held as a prisoner at the galleys, for an act of heroism and gallantry, the only course was to liberate him at any cost and in any way. Flosser will swear secrecy, but hints at this solution as the _on dit_ in certain keen coteries. Such a mode of treating the matter carries more real weight than a sworn affidavit. Men like the problem that they fancy they have unravelled by their own acuteness.

And then it muzzles discussion in the House, since even the most blatant Radical sees that it cannot be debated openly; for all Englishmen, as a rule, love compensation, and we can only claim indemnification here on the a.s.sumption that we were no parties to the escape. Do you follow me, Temple?"

"I believe I do. I see the drift of it at last."

"There's no drift, sir. It is a full, palpable, well-delivered blow. We saved Rogers; but we refuse to explain how."

"And if he turns up one of these days, and refuses to confirm us?"

"Then we denounce him as an impostor; but always, mark you, in the same shadowy way that we allude to our share in his evasion. It must be a sketch in water-colors throughout, Temple,--very faint and very transparent. When I have rough-drafted my despatch you shall see it.

Once the original melody is before you, you will see there is nothing to do but invent the variations."

"My Lady wishes to know, my Lord, if your Lordship will step upstairs to speak to her?" said a servant at this conjuncture.

"Go up, Temple, and see what it is," whispered Lord Culduff. "If it be about that box at the St. Carlos, you can say our stay here is now most uncertain. If it be a budget question, she must wait till quarter-day."

He smiled maliciously as he spoke, and waved his hand to dismiss him.

Within a minute--it seemed scarcely half that time--Lady Culduff entered the room, with an open letter in her hand; her color was high, and her eyes flashing, as she said:--

"Make your mind at ease, my Lord. It is no question of an opera-box, or a milliner's bill, but it is a matter of much importance that I desire, to speak about. Will you do me the favor to read that, and say what answer I shall return to it?"

Lord Culduff took the letter and read it over leisurely, and then, laying it down, said, "Lady Augusta is not a very perspicuous letter-writer, or else she feels her present task too much for her tact, but what she means here is, that you should give M. Pracontal permission to ransack your brother's house for doc.u.ments, which, if discovered, might deprive him of the t.i.tle to his estate. The request, at least, has modesty to recommend it."

"The absurdity is, to my thinking, greater than even the impertinence,"

cried Lady Culduff. "She says, that on separating two pages, which by some accident had adhered, of Giacomo Lami's journal,--whoever Giacomo Lami may be,--_we_--_we_ being Pracontal and herself--have discovered that it was Giacomo's habit to conceal important papers in the walls where he painted, and in all cases where he introduced his daughter's portrait; and that as in the octagon room at Castello there is a picture of her as Flora, it is believed--confidently believed--such doc.u.ments will be found there as will throw great light on the present claim--"

"First of all," said he, interrupting, "is there such a portrait?"

"There is a Flora; I never heard it was a portrait. Who could tell after what the artist copied it?"

"Lady Augusta a.s.sumes to believe this story."

"Lady Augusta is only too glad to believe what everybody else would p.r.o.nounce incredible; but this is not all, she has the inconceivable impertinence to prefer this request to us, to make us a party to our own detriment,--as if it were matter of perfect indifference who possessed these estates, and who owned Castello."

"I declare I have heard sentiments from your brother Augustus that would fully warrant this impression. I have a letter of his in my desk wherein he distinctly says, that once satisfied in his own mind--not to the conviction of his lawyer, mark you, nor to the conviction of men well versed in evidence, and accustomed to sift testimony, but simply in his own not very capacious intellect--that the estate belongs to Pracontal, he 'll yield him up the possession without dispute or delay."

"He's a fool! there is no other name for him," said she, pa.s.sionately.

"Yes, and his folly is very mischievous folly, for he is abrogating rights he has no pretension to deal with. It is as well, at all events, that this demand was addressed to us and not to your brother, for I'm certain he'd not have refused his permission."

"I know it," said she, fiercely; "and if Lady Augusta only knew his address and how a letter might reach him, she would never have written to us. Time pressed, however; see what she says here. 'The case will come on for trial in November, and if the papers have the value and significance Count Pracontal's lawyers suspect, there will yet be time to make some arrangement,--the Count would be disposed for a generous one,--which might lessen the blow, and diminish the evil consequences of a verdict certain to be adverse to the present possessor.'"

"She dissevers her interests from those of her late husband's family with great magnanimity, I must say."

"The horrid woman is going to marry Pracontal."

"They say so, but I doubt it--at least, till he comes out a victor."

"How she could have dared to write this, how she could have had the shamelessness to ask me,--_me_ whom she certainly ought to know,--to aid and abet a plot directed against the estates--the very legitimacy of my family--is more than I can conceive."

"She 's an implicit believer, one must admit, for she says, 'if on examining the part of the wall behind the pedestal of the figure nothing shall be found, she desires no further search.' The spot is indicated with such exactness in the journal that she limits her request distinctly to this."

"Probably she thought the destruction of a costly fresco might well have been demurred to," said Lady Culduff, angrily. "Not but, for my part, I 'd equally refuse her leave to touch the moulding in the surbase. I am glad, however, she has addressed this demand to us, for I know well Augustus is weak enough to comply with it, and fancy himself a hero in consequence. There is something piquant in the way she hints that she is asking as a favor what, for all she knows, might be claimed as a right. Imagine a woman saying this!"

"It is like asking me for the key of my writing-desk to see if I have not some paper or letter there, that might, if published, give me grave inconvenience."

"I have often heard of her eccentricities and absurdities, but on this occasion I believe she has actually outdone herself. I suppose, though this appeal is made to us conjointly, as it is addressed to me, I am the proper person to reply to it."

"Certainly, my Lady."

"And I may say--Lord Culduff feels shocked equally with myself at the indelicacy of the step you have just taken; failing to respect the tie which connects you with our family, you might, he opines, have had some regard for the decencies which regulate social intercourse, and while bearing our name, not have ranked yourself with those who declare themselves our enemies. I may say this, I may tell her that her conduct is shameless, an outrage on all feeling, and not only derogatory to her station, but unwomanly?"

"I don't think I 'd say that," said he, with a faint simper, while he patted his hand with a gold paper-knife. "I opine the better way would be to accept her Ladyship's letter as the most natural thing in life _from her_; that she had preferred a request, which coming from _her_, was all that was right and reasonable. That there was something very n.o.ble and very elevated in the way she could rise superior to personal interests, and the ties of kindred, and actually a.s.sert the claims of mere justice; but I'd add that the decision could not lie with us--that your brother being the head of the family, was the person to whom the request must be addressed, and that we would, with her permission, charge ourselves with the task. Pray hear me out--first of all, we have a delay while she replies to this, with or without the permission we ask for; in that interval you can inform your brother that a very serious plot is being concerted against him; that your next letter will fully inform him as to the details of the conspiracy--your present advice being simply for warning, and then, when, if she still persist, the matter must be heard, it will be strange if Augustus shall not have come to the conclusion that the part intended for him is a very contemptible one--that of a dupe."

"Your Lordship's mode may be more diplomatic; mine would be more direct."

"Which is exactly its demerit, my Lady," said he, with one of his blandest smiles, "In _my_ craft the great secret is never to give a flat refusal to anything. If the French were to ask us for the Isle of Wight, the proper reply would be a polite demand for the reasons that prompted the request--whether 'Osborne' might be reserved--and a courteous a.s.surance that the claim should meet with every consideration and a cordial disposition to make every possible concession that might lead to a closer union with a nation it was our pride and happiness to reckon on as an ally."

"These fallacies never deceive any one."

"Nor are they meant to do so, any more than the words 'your most obedient and humble servant' at the foot of a letter; but they serve to keep correspondence within polite limits."

"And they consume time," broke she in, impatiently.

"And, as you observe so aptly, they consume time."

"Let us have done with trifling, my Lord. I mean to answer this letter in my own way."