The Wicked Marquis Part 13

'Don't make a fool of yourself, Vont,' he said. 'Your daughter and I understand one another, and our concerns have nothing to do with you.

If you have anything to say to me, come up to the Abbey to-morrow.

You'll find your gun in the thicket.' He turned round and he kissed Marcia's fingers, just like I'd seen them do in the distance at their fine parties up there, and he strolled away. There was the gun in the thicket, and he knew it, and I knew it, and I couldn't move, and he went. And all I could hear was Marcia crying, and those birds singing behind, and I just slipped away into the wood."

"Uncle, is it worth while bringing this all up again?" David interrupted.

"Aye, it's worth while!" the old man insisted fiercely. "It's worth while for fear I should forget, for the old place has its cling on me.

That next day I went to the Abbey, and I saw the Marquis. He was quite cool, sent the servants out--he'd no weapon near--and he talked a lot that I don't understand and never shall understand, but it was about Marcia, and that she was his, and was leaving with him for London that evening. I just asked him one question. 'It's for shame, then?' I asked. And he looked at me just as though I were some person whom he was trying to make understand, who didn't quite speak the language.

And he said--'Your daughter made her choice months ago, Vont. She will live the life she desires to live. I am sorry to take her away from you. Think it over, and try and feel sensible about it.' It was then I felt a strange joy, that I've never been able rightly to understand.

I'd just remembered that the cottage was mine, and I had a sudden feeling that I wanted to sit at the end of the garden and watch the Abbey and curse it, curse it with a Bible on my knee, till its stones fell apart and the gra.s.s grew up from the walks and the damp grew out in blotches on the walls. And that's why I've come back after all these years."

"And you're just the same?" David asked curiously. "You feel just the same about him?"

"Don't you, my lad?" his uncle demanded. "You're not telling me that you're climbing down?"

David took the old man's arm.

"On the contrary, uncle," he said, "my promised share of the work is done. I hold his promissory notes for forty thousand pounds, due in three months. I have sold him some shares that aren't worth forty thousand pence, and won't be for many a year. I've cheated him, if you like, but when the three months comes you can make him a bankrupt, if you will. I'll give you the notes."

Richard Vont drew himself up. He turned his face towards the Abbey, growing a little indistinct now in the falling twilight.

"It's grand hearing," was all he said. "There's Mary, coming round with the supper, boy. I'll take the liberty of asking you to have a bite with me and a gla.s.s of ale, but I'll not forget that you're the great David Thain, the millionaire from America, who took kindly notice of me on the steamer. Come this way, sir," he went on, throwing open the cottage door. "It's a queer little place, but it's a novelty for you American gentlemen. Step right in, sir. Mrs. Wells," he announced, "this is a gentleman who was kind to me upon the steamer, and he promised that if ever he was this way he'd drop in. He'll take some supper with me. You'll do your best for us?"

The old lady looked very hard at David Thain, and she dropped a curtsey.

"From America, too," she murmured. "'Tis a wonderful country! Aye, I'll do my best, Richard Vont."

CHAPTER X

Mr. Wadham, Junior, a morning or so later, rang the bell at Number 94 Grosvenor Square and aired himself for a moment upon the broad doorstep, filled with a comfortable sense that this time, at least, in his prospective interview, he was destined to disturb the disconcerting equanimity of his distinguished client. He was duly admitted and ushered into the presence of the Marquis, who laid down the newspaper which he was reading, nodded affably to his visitor and pointed to a chair.

"Your request for an interview, Mr. Wadham," the former said, "antic.i.p.ated my own desire to see you. Pray be seated. I am entirely at your service."

Mr. Wadham paused for a moment and decided to cross his legs. He was already struggling against that enervating sense of insignificance which his client's presence inevitably imposed upon him.

"We heard yesterday morning from Mr. Merridrew," he commenced. "He made us a remittance which was four hundred pounds short of what we expected. His explanation was that your lordship had received that sum from him."

"Quite right, Mr. Wadham," the Marquis a.s.sented affably. "Quite right.

I was in the neighbourhood, and, finding Mr. Merridrew with a considerable sum of money in hand, I took from him precisely the amount you have stated."

"Your lordship has perhaps overlooked the fact," Mr. Wadham continued, "that we are that amount short of the interest on the Fakenham mortgage--Number Seven mortgage, we usually call it."

"Dear me!" the Marquis observed. "Surely such a trifling sum does not disturb your calculations? You do not run my affairs on so narrow a margin as this, I trust, Mr. Wadham?"

"It isn't a question of a narrow margin, your lordship," Mr. Wadham replied. "There is, as a rule, no margin at all. We usually have to make the amount up by overdrawing, or by advancing it ourselves. This time the firm wish me to point out that we are unable to do either."

"Dear me! Dear me!" the Marquis e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed, in a tone of some concern.

"I had no idea, Mr. Wadham, if you will forgive my saying so, that your firm was in so impecunious a position."

"Impecunious?" the lawyer murmured, with his eyes fixed upon his client. "I scarcely follow your lordship."

"Did I not understand you to say," the Marquis continued, "that this trifle of four hundred pounds has upset your arrangements to such an extent that you are unable to make your customary payments on my behalf?"

"Will your lordship forgive my pointing out," Mr. Wadham explained, "that these payments are on your account, and that it is no part of the business of solicitors to finance their clients, without a special arrangement? We have our own more lucrative investments continually open to us, and we are at the present moment several thousand pounds out of pocket on account of recent law expenses."

"The whole thing," the Marquis p.r.o.nounced, "seems to me very trifling.

State in precise terms, if you please, Mr. Wadham, the object of your visit."

"To ask for your lordship's instructions as to the payment of twelve hundred pounds interest, due to-morrow," Mr. Wadham replied. "We have eight hundred pounds in hand from Mr. Merridrew. So far from having any other funds of your lordship's at our disposal, we are, as I have pointed out, your creditor for a somewhat considerable amount."

The Marquis was leaning back in his chair, the tips of his long, elegant fingers pressed gently together.

"It appears to me, Mr. Wadham," he said quietly, "that your visit is, in a sense, an admonitory one. Your firm resents--am I not right?--the fact that I have found it convenient to help myself to a portion of the revenue accruing from my estate."

"We should not presume for a moment to take up such an att.i.tude," the lawyer protested. "On the other hand, the four hundred pounds in question requires replacement by to-morrow."

"And you find the raising of that sum inconvenient, eh, Mr. Wadham?"

The young man was distinctly ill at ease. His instructions were to be firm and dignified but by no means to offend; to deliver a formal protest against this tampering with funds already dedicate, but to do or say nothing which would give the Marquis any excuse for reprisals against the firm. Mr. Wadham began to wonder whether perhaps he was a person of small tact, or whether these instructions were more than usually difficult to carry out.

"There is no sacrifice, your lordship," he said slowly, "which my firm would hesitate to make in your interests and the interests of the Mandeleys estate. At the same time, the unexpected necessity for finding these sums of money is, I must confess, at times a strain upon us."

The Marquis nodded sympathetically. He rose to his feet, crossed the room towards his desk, which he unlocked with a key attached to a gold chain, and returned with a bundle of scrip in his hand.

"I have here, Mr. Wadham," he announced, "scrip in a very famous oil company, the face value of the shares being, I believe, a trifle over forty thousand pounds. I, in fact, paid that price for them at the beginning of the week."

The young lawyer uncrossed his legs and swallowed hard. He was prepared for many shocks, but this one seemed outside the region of all human probability.

"Did I understand your lordship to say that you had paid forty thousand pounds for them?" he gasped.

The Marquis a.s.sented with an equable little nod.

"I was somewhat favoured in the matter," he admitted, "as the value of the shares has, I believe, already considerably increased. The amount I actually paid for them was, in round figures, forty thousand and one hundred pounds--transfer duty, or something of that sort. I have little head for figures, as you know, Mr. Wadham. You had better take these--not for sale, mind, but for deposit at one of my banks. You will probably find that, under the circ.u.mstances, they will permit you to overdraw an additional five hundred pounds on my account, without embarra.s.sing your own finances."

Mr. Wadham, Junior, took the bundle of scrip into his hand, and glanced hastily through it.

"The Pluto Oil Company of Arizona," he murmured reflectively.

"The name of the company is doubtless unknown to you," the Marquis observed indulgently; "they are, in fact, only just commencing operations--but it is the opinion of my friend and financial adviser, Mr. David Thain, that the forty thousand pounds' worth of shares you have in your hand will be worth at least two hundred thousand before the end of the year."

"Mr. David Thain, the multi-millionaire?" Mr. Wadham faltered.

"The same!"

The lawyer gripped the bundle hard in one hand, closed his eyes for a moment, opened them again and struck out boldly.

"As your lordship's adviser," he said, "may I enquire as to the nature of the payment which you have made? Forty thousand pounds is not a sum which either of the banks with whom your lordship has credit--"