The Under Secretary Part 5

So he spent an idle hour alone before his guests appeared for breakfast.

He wandered through the great and gloomy hall, the vaulted ceiling of which had so often echoed to the laughter of the banquets held there in bygone days. It was now tenanted only by the many suits of armour that had belonged to his ill.u.s.trious forefathers. His steps sounded in a grim fashion upon the floor of polished oak, and as he pa.s.sed the huge fireplace, where once the oxen had been roasted whole to satisfy the Gargantuan appet.i.tes of mediaeval warriors, a servant threw open the door leading into the long picture gallery.

What an array of fine pictures was there! For each member of this ancient family his or her arms had been painted in the right-hand corner of the canvas. The Chisholms were a handsome, stalwart race, the men strong and the women beautiful. In the features of nearly all, however, there was the same predominant characteristic, the stern gravity, which in Dudley was so often mistaken for actual asperity. Before the last portrait at the farther end of the gallery--the picture of a young and eminently beautiful woman--the young man paused. It was his mother.

Deep in contemplation, he stood before it for a long time. His lips moved, but no sound escaped them. At last, with a deep sigh, he pa.s.sed on, still walking at the same slow pace, plunged in his melancholy thoughts.

He pa.s.sed round the big quadrangle, through one great room after the other: the blue drawingroom, Anne Boleyn's sitting-room, the grand drawing-room, the library, each an apartment of fine dimensions, mostly panelled in oak dark with age and containing antique furniture, curios connected with the family history through eight unbroken centuries, with many other priceless works of art.

Two or three of the smaller rooms, such as the breakfast-room, the dining-room, and his dead mother's boudoir, were alone furnished in modern style. In all the others there seemed to linger an atmosphere of bygone centuries. This was the fine old home which so many mothers coveted for their daughters. Indeed, there were a hundred pretty and well-born girls in London, each of whom was at that moment ready to become chatelaine of Wroxeter.

But Dudley strolled on slowly, almost like a man in a dream. He was seldom at Wroxeter out of the shooting season. The place was to him something of a white elephant. He had spent his boyhood there, but recollections of the rather unhappy life and early death of that grave-faced woman, his mother, caused him to dislike the old place. One or two memories he would fain forget--memories of his mother's sorrow regarding her husband's mode of life and eccentricities. Truth to tell, husband and wife did not live happily together, and Dudley, knowing this, had been his mother's sympathiser and champion.

These handsome rooms, with their ancient tapestries, wonderful carpets, exquisite carvings, old Venetian mirrors and time-darkened gilt, even in the gay light of morning seemed to him sombre and full of ghosts of the past. He only used the library and half a dozen of the smaller and more modern rooms in the eastern wing. The splendid state apartments which he had just pa.s.sed through he seldom visited. No one entered them, except the servants to clean and open the windows, and the upholsterer who at fixed intervals came from Shrewsbury to examine the tapestries worked centuries ago by the fair hands of the Chisholm women.

From the great drawing-room, a huge apartment with a rather low ceiling curiously carved, he pa.s.sed on, and traversing one of the ante rooms, found himself in the long corridor which ran the whole length of the quadrangle. The stone flooring was worn hollow in the centre by the tramp of generations of armed men, and the quaint arched doors were heavy and studded with monstrous nails. He stood there for a few minutes, glancing through the diamond panes out into the ancient courtyard. His abstracted mood was suddenly disturbed by the sound of the breakfast gong. As his guests would be awaiting him, he must throw care to the dogs for a few hours and try to amuse them.

Turning, he walked down the long corridor. As he did so he recollected the strange tradition which he had heard in his youth--namely, that in this pa.s.sage had been seen at certain intervals a strange old lady, humpbacked and small, dressed in rusty black, who "walked" the corridor even in the middle of the day, and then suddenly disappeared through a door which for a full century past had been walled up. This legendary apparition was known to the family as Lady Margaret, and whenever she showed herself in the corridor it was a presage of evil to the Chisholms.

Dudley laughed within himself as he remembered his childish terror when his old nurse used to relate those dramatic stories about her deformed ladyship and the evil influence she exerted upon his house. It is strange how deeply rooted become many of the convictions of our childhood, especially where a family superst.i.tion is concerned; and Chisholm, even though he was a level-headed man of the world, had in his more mature years found himself wondering whether, after all, there had been any foundation for the legend.

Family ghosts do not, however, appear nowadays. They were all "laid"

last century. So he laughed again to himself and continued on his way across the east wing to the bright breakfast-room, where his two guests were already awaiting him.

"What a lazy beggar you are, Dudley!" cried Benthall, as his host greeted them and took his seat at the head of the table.

"No, my dear fellow," protested the Under-Secretary. "I--oh, well, I've been up quite a long time, and have already consulted Marston about our sport to-day. He says there are some strong birds over in the Dean Copse, so we'll work that this morning."

"Excellent! I recollect the splendid sport we got there last year!"

exclaimed the colonel, a tall, white-haired, soldierly old fellow with a somewhat florid complexion and a well-trimmed moustache. He was a first-cla.s.s shot, and now that he had retired from the Diplomatic Service, spent the whole of the shooting season at one house or another in different parts of the country. He was a popular, all-round sportsman, always welcome at any house-party, for he was full of droll stories, a bachelor, and a great favourite among the ladies. The announcement of a hostess to the effect that "Colonel Murray-Kerr will be here," was always received with satisfaction by both s.e.xes. As he had graduated as military attache at the Emba.s.sies in Vienna, St.

Petersburg, and, finally, in Rome, he was a cosmopolitan of cosmopolitans, though at the same time a thorough Englishman, and one of Dudley's most intimate friends.

There were letters on the table for their host, two bulky ones marked "On His Majesty's Service," from the Foreign Office, and another, the handwriting on the envelope of which he saw at a glance to be Claudia's.

He glanced at this, then placed it in his pocket unopened.

"Oh, read it, my dear fellow," laughed the colonel, quickly divining that it was from a woman. "Don't mind us in the least."

"Only tell us who's the lady," chimed in Benthall merrily.

"Oh, it's nothing," Dudley a.s.sured them, rather annoyed, nevertheless.

"From Lady Richard--eh?" suggested the old officer chaffingly. "By Jove!" he went on; "she's really charming. I was staying last week down at Fernhurst, the place old Meldrum has just bought in Suss.e.x, and she was there. Quite a host of smart women were staying there, but she, of course, eclipsed them all. I fear she's a sad flirt, Dudley, my boy, even though they say she's a bit fond of you."

"I know she's a flirt," Chisholm answered, rather thoughtfully. The mention of the name of Meldrum brought to his mind what Claudia had admitted, namely, that she had taken Lady Meldrum to his rooms.

The old colonel, who always maintained a diplomatic smartness in his attire, was a terrible gossip. He was a living Debrett, and a guide to knowledge affecting social affairs in half the courts of Europe. He knew everybody, as well as everything worth knowing about them. This was his hobby. Perhaps he rode it all the more perseveringly because a natural talent for inquisitiveness had been steadily cultivated during his long service as an attache; for, as all the world knows, an official of this standing is little better than a spy. So, without any thought of hurting his young host's feelings, he continued his reminiscences of the house-party:

"We had splendid sport down at Fernhurst. The birds were very strong, and there were several excellent shots. But Lady Richard was, of course, the centre of all the attractions. Every man Jack among the males was absolutely her slave, lock, stock and barrel! By Jove! I don't think in all my diplomatic career I've ever seen a woman play them off one against the other with such _finesse_. Meldrum seems to have got into society wonderfully well of late. The young Grand-Duke Stanislas was there, and he made desperate love to the pretty widow.

Indeed, so marked were their flirtations, that several of the feminine contingent declared themselves scandalised, and left. But, of course, the real truth was that they knew themselves to be entirely out of the running. One thing, however, struck me as curious--very curious: the hostess, a rather matronly _bourgeoise_ person, seemed to throw the pair into one another's society as much as possible. At any rate, the extravagant flirtation nearly resulted in an open scandal. To my mind, Dudley, she's playing a decidedly dangerous game. Forgive me for saying so, if she's more to you than a jolly acquaintance; but you know the proverb about the pitcher going too often to the well."

"Angling after a Grand-Duke sounds bold," observed Benthall, attacking his cutlet. "I always thought, Dudley, old chap, that she had set her mind on becoming mistress of Wroxeter."

"Oh, I know," exclaimed their host impatiently, although trying to conceal his annoyance, "a lot of rot has been talked! I'm quite well aware of what you fellows mean. But I a.s.sure you that I'm a confirmed bachelor--just as confirmed as you, colonel--and, hang it! if report speaks correctly, you're one of the worst of the woman-haters in the whole of the Albany."

"I've never had any necessity to marry," laughed the old officer, his cheeks flushing with good humour.

"I've piloted some ripping ball-skirts and tailor-made gowns through half the courts of Europe, but I'm still heart-whole."

"A fine record," observed Harry Benthall with his mouth full. At that breakfast-table there was no ceremony, and words were certainly not minced.

"Well, every one seems to be linking my name with Claudia Nevill's,"

Dudley remarked, after commencing his breakfast, "I really can't see why."

"But I can," declared the colonel bluntly. "You're a fool--if you'll forgive me for saying so."

"Why?"

"A fool for giving a second thought to a woman of her stamp," he answered. "Good heavens! if you knew half the tales about her, you'd cut her dead. I wonder why the Meldrums invited her? Suppose they couldn't help it--or something."

"What tales?" asked Dudley, glancing inquiringly from one man to the other.

"No. I'm not going to besmirch any woman's character, my dear fellow,"

replied the elder man. "Only, take my advice and have nothing more to do with her--that's all. She's no good to you, or indeed to any honest man."

"Some foul scandal about her, I suppose," cried Chisholm, his brow darkening for an instant. As a matter of fact, he knew the scandal quite well. It was the common talk in every club in town. But he intended to champion her, even though he had escaped from her net. "Why don't you tell me?"

"It is unnecessary--utterly unnecessary," the colonel answered, making as if breakfast were more important than gossip.

"A pretty woman, smart and popular as she is, always gets talked about, and her enemies are sure to invent some cruel story or other. Half the women in London are envious of Claudia Nevill, hence all these absurd and scandalous tales," Chisholm declared.

"Ah!" laughed the colonel, "as I said, you're gone on her, like the others, Dudley. You are old friends, every one knows. It's a pity that she's so reckless."

"In what manner has she been reckless?"

"Well, if you had been down at Fernhurst and seen her with the young Grand-Duke, you wouldn't defend her actions as you are now doing--well, by Jove! you couldn't. I'm a man of the world, you know, but I must say that the flirtation was a regular blizzard."

"And is every woman who glances prettily at a man from behind her fan, or chats to a fellow in a conservatory, to be condemned?" asked his host. "If so, then society has suddenly become intensely puritanical.

Remember that the licence not allowed to an unmarried girl may justifiably be employed by a widow."

"Widow!" laughed Murray-Kerr adjusting his monocle. "My dear boy, I'm perfectly with you; but then the fair Claudia is one in ten millions.

She's more like a girl of eighteen, in face, figure, and the choice of lovers, than the usual prim and stale relict with whom we are all more or less familiar."

"Just because she's popular, all this confounded gossip buzzes here, there, and everywhere. My name is coupled with hers, and all kinds of ridiculous stories have been started about us. I know, for too many of them have come to my ears."

"Then if you know, Dudley, why don't you take my advice and cut her?"

asked the old officer, fixing his host with his keen eyes.

CHAPTER SIX.