The Red Derelict Part 31

"Hardly, my dear boy. At least not at present--for during my lifetime Everard has no rights. After--"

Wagram looked up quickly, but the old man paused. Then he went on:

"Your first duty is to me; and, that being so, are you contemplating leaving me alone in my old age--my very old age, some might call it-- while you scour the world in search of a wastrel who, if you find him, will lay himself out to ruin within six months all that it has taken me--and you--a lifetime to build up? You cannot do it, Wagram. I have not very much longer to live, but as sure as you leave me it will hasten my death. Now, are you anxious to start upon this search?"

"No, father. While you are here--and may that be for many years to come--I will not leave you."

"Promise me that."

"Solemnly I promise it."

The old man's face brightened as they clasped hands. Then he went on:

"This is no conscious wrong I have done you, Wagram--G.o.d knows. We had every reason--legal and otherwise--for supposing this man to be dead.

We acted in perfect good faith, but--can one be sure of anything? And now give me your attention. Even if the worst comes to the very worst, and that--that other claim should come to be established, I have already effected my utmost to repair the wrong I have, accidentally, done you.

The very day of that blackmailer's first visit to me I sent instructions for an entirely new will to be drawn up, and under it, after my death, you take the whole of my personalty absolutely. That alone will const.i.tute you what some would call a rich man. But--as for Hilversea, well--"

Earlier in this narrative we heard Haldane remark that its present occupants cherished a conviction that the world revolved round Hilversea, and being, perhaps, the most intimate friend of the said occupants he ought to be in a position to judge. Further, he had observed that, if possible, Wagram held that conviction rather more firmly than his father. It was a figure of speech, of course, but that both were wrapped up in the place and its interests, far beyond the ordinary, we have abundantly shown. And now one of them would be called upon to surrender it.

"I have left nothing to chance, Wagram," went on the Squire. "The will is signed and sealed and most carefully drawn. And now observe: it seems to me a sort of inspiration that caused me to have you christened Wagram; but, to make everything doubly safe, the terms run: 'To my son Wagram Gerard, known as Wagram Gerard Wagram.' But I want you to go up to town in a day or two and tell Simc.o.x and Yaxley to let you see it.

You can then satisfy yourself."

Wagram nodded a.s.sent, and the Squire went on:

"This has come upon us--upon you at any rate--in a hurry, and for that very reason we must not allow ourselves to do or say anything in a hurry. Meanwhile we are in possession, which is a strong point. So what we--what you--have got to do is to go on exactly as if this revelation had never been made. There is no telling what Time may work, so give Time his chance. Morally, you are just in the position you would actually have been in--morally, for I repeat again the whole affair was a sheer accident for which n.o.body is to blame--no, not anybody. And, Wagram, if you distrust my advice as possibly too interested, why not take other advice? There is Monsignor Culham, for instance--no one is more competent to advise you."

"Monsignor Culham? Does he know about this, father?"

"Yes; I laid it before him when this blackmailer first approached me."

"And his opinion?"

"Substantially what I have been telling you. He was not in favour of your knowing anything about the matter. Unfortunately, you forced the blackmailer's hand--as he said himself. Morally, and in the sight of G.o.d," went on the old Squire, lapsing into what was, for him, extraordinary vehemence, "your position is just what it would have been but for this--accident. There is no doubt about it. You are the one selected to hold this place in trust, with its many cares and responsibilities and opportunities, so, for G.o.d's sake, Wagram, bear that in mind, and do nothing sudden or rash, either now or after my time."

"I will bear it in mind, father; but it is a position which requires a great deal of thinking out, and that can't be done in a day or a week or a month where such issues are at stake."

"Quite true; leave it at that, then. And now, Wagram, all this has exhausted me more than I can say. I think I will lie down for a bit and try to get a little sleep. Tell them I am on no account to be disturbed."

"Mine!"

No longer the ecstatic intonation of the entrancing possessive, as Wagram, strolling forth to wrestle out alone the blank and deadening revelation he had heard that day, gazed upon the surroundings which had called forth that intensity of self-gratulation on the occasion of our first making his acquaintance. He was now but a mere temporary pensioner. He realised that he was here but for his father's lifetime, for he knew that when left to himself, whatever might be the after consequences, he would leave no stone unturned till he should find his half-brother, and then--

He turned into a seldom-used path in the thick of the shrubbery. The Gothic roof of the chapel rose among the trees at no great distance, and the sight was productive of another heart-tightening. All his pride and joy in the beautiful little sanctuary--and soon it, too, would know him no more. He felt as though about to be cast out of Paradise. But with the thought came another, and it was a wholesome one. What right had he to look upon life as a broken thing simply because one side of its joys had been reft from him? It was not even as though he were about to be thrown forth penniless, or on a meagre, sc.r.a.ping, starvation pittance, which is, perhaps, hardly better, as he had had ample occasion to know during long years of his earlier life. As his father had said, he would be what some would call a rich man in any case; and as an object in life had he not his son's future to secure and his present to watch over?

And then there recurred to his mind a question which Delia Calmour had put to him on a former occasion as to whether he did not find life too good to be real--and his answer to it. There was something prophetic about both. Of late years he had, indeed, found life too good to be real, and was that a state altogether healthy for anybody in this world of probation? He had made an idol of Hilversea.

It was late autumn, and the woodland scents were moist and earthy.

Brown leaves, crimped and curled, cl.u.s.tered clingingly upon the oak boughs, and the ground was already carpeted with them. He had followed the most secluded paths, sacred, indeed, to himself and the gamekeepers.

The white scut of a rabbit darting across a ride; the rustle of pheasants scuttling away in the undergrowth, or the vast flap-flap of wood-pigeon's wings--now gathered in flocks--detonating in the deep silence of the covert as they fled disturbed from their intended roost; a couple of squirrels chattering angrily at the intruder from the high security of a fir limb--const.i.tuted the only sights and sounds. In a day or two these woods would echo and re-echo the crack of guns, and now he thought how he had been looking forward with keen enjoyment to the best shooting party of the year. His guests would go as they had come, thinking--as they had often thought before--that Wagram was about the luckiest and most-to-be-envied man on earth; and, up till this morning, would he not cordially have agreed with such opinion! Would he not?

The "pride of life!"

Now a sound of voices struck upon his ear. The path he was following ended in a gate, beyond which was the road--a lonely woodland road, intersecting the coverts. As he laid his hand upon this gate to open it he recognised one of the voices--a sweet, full soprano that by this time he had come to know fairly well. The other was strong, harsh, common, but also feminine. Not feeling at all inclined to talk to anybody just then he would have turned back, but--it was too late.

Delia Calmour gave a little cry of astonishment as he opened the gate.

"Why, Mr Wagram, who'd have thought of meeting you here?"

The little flush of surprise, perhaps of something else, which mantled her cheeks as she put out a hand, half shyly, lent an additional sparkle to her eyes, making a whole that was very alluring. She was in semi-winter garb, with a touch of fur, and her bicycle stood against the hedge. The other was a dark, beady-eyed, gipsy-looking woman.

"Such fun!" rattled the girl. "I've been having my fortune told; only I can't make head or tail of it."

Here the other, with a half-knowing leer--for, of course, she had at once decided that this meeting was no accidental one--opened on Wagram with the stock professional whine.

"I'll tell yours too, sir, and it's sure to be bright--and--"

Then she stopped. Wagram's gaze was fixed sternly upon her.

"Go away," he said. "I've seen you before, and I've warned you before that we had no use for such as you in this neighbourhood. You had better leave it at once, for I shall send word to the police at Ba.s.singham to pay you some very particular attention."

The tramp, seeing he was in earnest, and that there was nothing more to be got out of him, waxed bold and defiant.

"You'd do that, would you Squire?" she snarled. "All right. Maybe there's them as knows more about your little game than you thinks of.

Maybe you'll not be finding everything as easy always; no, and I 'opes yer won't--tramplin' upon a pore woman who's tryin' to make a honest livin'." And, cursing and growling, the hag shuffled off down the road.

In his then frame of mind the words were startling to Wagram. What on earth--was his altered position already common property? was his first thought, as he read into the malevolent words the very last meaning that the mind of their utterer could have held.

"I am surprised at you, Miss Calmour," he said gravely, "listening to the pestiferous humbug of the commonest type of hedge-side charlatan.

Really, I had a better opinion of you."

"And--has it fled?" answered the girl, with a pretty pleading penitence that was not wholly mock. "I only let her tell my fortune for the fun of the thing--and she said some very queer things--not at all after the pattern of stock bosh which I had expected. In fact, they were rather weird--about green seas, smooth and oily, and a battered ship--and terrors--and perhaps death, but if not death, then great happiness.

Yes; really it was quite creepy; strange too, for what on earth can I ever have to do with battered ships or green seas--or great happiness either?" she added to herself mournfully. Then again, aloud: "But do you think there may be anything in these people's powers of prediction?"

"No, I do not," he answered decisively, and with some sternness.

"Certainly not. The knowledge of the future is in other hands than those of a common wayside impostor, whom, if I were doing my duty, I ought to have at once had arrested and locked up on a former occasion when she tried to play that humbugging game in my presence."

"Oh yes; she got into the wrong corner this time," laughed Delia. "You are a magistrate, are you not, Mr Wagram?"

"I have seen this particular fraud before, and gave her a trifle, as she seemed really in want," he answered. "In strict duty I ought to have had her locked up, but strict duty is rather a hard thing to carry out always. But anything that encourages superst.i.tion is to me especially abhorrent. The greatest harm these impostors do is not merely in obtaining hard-earned silver from ignorant people but in keeping alive the idea that they can possess any supernatural power--let alone wisdom--at all."

The girl looked at him with a covert smile.

"Be merciful to one of those 'ignorant people,'" she said softly.

"Though, really, I did not believe in any supernatural power about the affair; I only let her do it for the fun of the thing."

"I should hope not. With your talents and education I could not have believed it of you. And yet--you hardly know where to draw the line.

When you find people, whose upbringing and education, and everything else, ought to put them miles above anything of the kind, steeped over head and ears in such puerile superst.i.tions as throwing spilled salt over the shoulder, scared of having a peac.o.c.k's feather brought into their houses, or of getting up first of thirteen from the table, or of walking under a ladder--really it makes one--well, cynical."

"But--walking under a ladder is unlucky sometimes, Mr Wagram."