There & Back Part 54

"Rubbish!" cried the baronet contemptuously. "You want to get money out of me! But you shan't!--not a d.a.m.ned penny!"

"I do want to get money from you, sir," said Richard. "I kept the poor fellow alive--kept him in dinners at least, him and his sister, till I fell ill and couldn't work."

At the word _sister_ the baronet grew calmer. It was nothing about the lost heir! The other sort did not matter: they were no use against the enemy!

Richard paused. The baronet stared.

"I haven't a penny to call my own, or I should not have come to you,"

resumed Richard.

"I thought so! That's your orthodox style! But you've come to the wrong man!" returned sir Wilton. "I never give anything to beggars."

He did not in the least doubt what he heard, but he scarcely knew what he answered--wondering where he had seen the fellow, and how he came to be so like his wife. The remembered ugliness of her infant prevented all suggestion that this handsome fellow might be the same.

"You are the last man, sir Wilton, from whom I would ask anything for myself," said Richard.

"Why so?"

Richard hesitated. To let him suspect the same claim in himself, would be fatal.

"I swear to you, sir Wilton," he said, "by all that men count sacred, I come only to tell you that Arthur and Alice Manson, your son and daughter, are in dire want. Your son may be dead; he looked like it three days ago, and had no one to attend to him; his sister had to leave him to earn their next day's food. Their mother lay a corpse in the other of their two rooms."

"Oh! she's gone, is she! That alters the case. But what became of all the money I gave her? It was more than her body was worth; soul she never had any!"

"She lost it somehow, and her son and daughter starved themselves to keep her in plenty, so that by the time she died, they were all but dead themselves."

"A pair of fools."

"A good son and daughter, sir!"

"Attached to the young woman, eh?" asked the baronet, looking hard at him.

"Very much; but hardly more than to her brother," answered Richard.

"G.o.d knows if I had but my strength," he cried, almost in despair, and suddenly shooting out his long thin arms, with his two hands, wasted white, at the ends of them, "I would work myself to the bone for them, and not ask you for a penny!"

"I provided for their mother!--why didn't they look after the money?

_I'm_ not accountable for _them_!"

"Ain't you accountable for giving the poor things a mother like that, sir?"

"By Jove, you have me there! She _was_ a bad lot--a d.a.m.ned liar!--Young fellow, I don't know who you are, but I like your pluck! There ain't many I'd let stand talking at me like that! I'll give you something for the poor creatures--that is, mind you, if you've told me the truth about their mother! You're sure she's dead? Not a penny shall they have if she's alive!"

"I saw her dead, sir, with my own eyes."

"You're sure she wasn't shamming?"

"She couldn't have shammed anything so peaceful."

The baronet laughed.

"Believe me, sir," said Richard, "she's dead--and by this time buried by the parish."

"G.o.d bless my soul! Well, it's none of my fault!"

"She ate and drank her own children!" said Richard with a groan, for his strength was failing him. He sank into a chair.

"I will give you a cheque," said sir Wilton, rising, and going to a writing-table in the window. "I will give you twenty pounds for them in the meantime--and then we'll see--we'll see!--that is," he added, turning to Richard, "if you swear by G.o.d that you have told me nothing but the truth!"

"I swear," said Richard solemnly, "by all my hopes in G.o.d the saviour of men, that I have not wittingly uttered a word that is untrue or incorrect."

"That's enough. I'll give you the cheque."

He turned again to the table, sat down, searched for his keys, unlocked and drew out a drawer, took from it a cheque-book, and settled himself to write with deliberation, thinking all the time. When he had done--"Have the goodness to come and fetch your money," he said tartly.

"With pleasure!" answered Richard, and went up to the table.

Sir Wilton turned on his seat, and looked him in the face, full in the eyes. Richard steadily encountered his gaze.

"What is your name?" said sir Wilton at length. "I must make the cheque payable to you!"

"Richard Tuke, sir," answered Richard.

"What are you?"

"A bookbinder. I was here all the summer, sir, repairing your library."

"Oh! bless my soul!--Yes! that's what it was! I thought I had seen you somewhere! Why didn't you tell me so at first?"

"It had nothing to do with my coming now, and I did not imagine it of any interest to you, sir."

"It would have saved me the trouble of trying to remember where I had seen you!"

Then suddenly a light flashed across his face.

"By heaven," he muttered, "I understand it now!--They saw it--that look on his face!--By Jove!--But no; she never saw _her_!--She must have heard something about him then!--They didn't treat you well, I believe!"

he said: "--turned you away at a moment's notice!--I hope they took that into consideration when they paid you?"

"I made no complaint, sir. I never asked why I was dismissed!"

"But they made it up to you--didn't they?"

"I don't submit to ill usage, sir." "That's right! I'm glad you made them pay for it!"

"To take money for ill usage is to submit to it, it seems to me!" said Richard.

"By Jove, there are not many would call money ill usage!--Well, it wasn't right, and I'll have nothing to do with it!--Here," he went on, wheeling round to the table, and drawing his cheque-book toward him, "I will give you another cheque for yourself."

"I beg your pardon, sir," said Richard, "but I can take nothing for myself! Don't you see, sir?--As soon as I was gone, you would think I had after all come for my own sake!"