VC - A Chronicle of Castle Barfield and of the Crimea Part 7

CHAPTER VI

There was no sleep in the grey-stone house on the Beacon Hill, on that eventful night on which Polson Jervase left his home, for anybody except the domestics, who were ignorant of the blow which had fallen on the household. Jervase made no pretence of courting sleep at all: but having banked up the fire he went down into the cellar, brought up a couple of bottles of brandy, and prepared himself to make a night of it. It had not been his habit for years to drink to excess, but in his earlier days at any time of trouble he had gone to that false solace, and now the instinct came back to him. James kept him company awhile in his potations, but by and by crept off to bed, and Jervase sat alone drinking fiercely, at first without apparent effect.

General Boswell rose before dawn without having closed an eye, and waited for the daylight. At its first dawning he walked softly to the room in which Irene lay and tapped quietly at the door.

'Who's there?' his daughter's voice asked him, and he answered:

'It is I, dear. I wish to speak to you for a moment.' The girl unlocked the door and left it partly open. He waited for a moment and then half entered the room. 'I am just starting for home,' he said. 'And in an hour the carriage will be here to bring you away. Pray be ready for it.'

She answered 'Yes,' and her father walked downstairs and into the hall.

He was searching for his hat and overcoat when Jervase lurched out of the parlour. His bloodshot eyes and staggering gait showed in what fashion he had pa.s.sed the night.

'You're off?' he said, thickly. 'Won't you have some breakfast?'

'No,' said the General. 'Go back to your bottle.'

'Look here,' said Jervase, 'I shall put this all right. I've had the night to think it over, and I shall effect a compromise. D'ye see? I shall effect a compromise. It won't cost you a penny, and it won't break me. I shall have a sleep by and by, and then I shall go and see Stubbs, and effect a compromise. I hope you don't bear malice, General? You'll shake hands before you go, won't you?'

'No,' said the General. 'Go back to--your bottle.'

'But I say,' Jervase proceeded, with a drunken tenacity, 'you ain't going to bear malice, are you, General?'

'Stand out of my way, you drunken beast!' the General responded, 'or I'll do you a mischief.'

'Oh, if that's the way you're going to take it, all right,' said Jervase. 'James and me are going to stand the racket--it won't hurt you either in credit or in pocket, and I don't see what you've got to be shirty about. It wasn't exactly what you might call a legirrimate transaction, but there are lots of things in business that are not legirrimate. See 'em done every day--see 'em done by respec'able people.'

Boswell by this time had found his hat and overcoat, and was prepared to go. He turned his back upon his host and re-ascended the stairs and knocked a second time at Irene's door.

'Is that you, Papa?'

'Yes, it is I. Can you hear me?'

'Oh, yes, distinctly.'

'I shall return for you. Keep your door locked until I come. Jervase has been drinking and he may annoy you.' With that, he walked back to the hall, where Jervase, holding on by the handle of the door, was solemnly swaying to and fro. 'I shall regret,' said Boswell, 'to be forced to use violence: but if you do not instantly free me of your very disagreeable presence I shall be compelled to do you damage. Stand on one side, I tell you. Go!'

There was that in the ring of his voice which pierced to Jervase's intelligence, bemused as he was, and he staggered back into the parlour.

The General undid the fastenings of the door and walked out into the keen, bright morning air. When he returned an hour later, Jervase had drunk himself to sleep, and there was no further trouble with him. Irene was ready and came from her bedroom at the General's call. His heart ached as he looked at her, for the pa.s.sage of that one night of sleepless grief had blighted all her fresh young beauty as a year of sickness might have done. He took her to his arms and held her there until she drew gently away from him.

'I know, dear,' she said in a voice she bravely tried to control, but with no great success. 'I know, dear.'

They exchanged no further words until they reached home, but her father placed an arm about her shoulders and drew her to his breast, where she nestled quietly. She had wept all her tears away, but a dry sob shook her frame from time to time, and with every repet.i.tion of the sound the father's face twitched as if a rough hand had been laid upon a wound. He parted from her tenderly when they reached home, and they met again at the breakfast table.

'You understand everything that has happened, dear?' he asked. 'I think so.'

'The owner of the salt mine which my partners have for years been robbing is a Major de Blacquaire, whose regiment is just now quartered at Birmingham. They will have the route in a day or two, and I must see him before he goes. I shall drive into the town at once; and then I must run up to London. I do not know as yet what my partners' rascality may have cost me, but I am not a wealthy man, and the business may spell ruin. I cannot afford to be idle, and I must get back into harness. Lord Raglan knows my record. I was with him when he lost his right arm at Waterloo. He has more than once,' the old soldier went on with a certain stateliness, 'expressed a certain regard for me. I have every reason to believe myself highly honoured by his esteem. At a time like this men of experience will be in demand, and I feel hopeful of finding an appointment. I am not yet too old to serve my Queen and country. Lord Raglan will see service again, of course, and he is six years my senior, so that he is scarcely likely to make my years a ground of objection.'

'Take me with you, dear,' said Irene, 'I shall not be very happy if I am left alone.'

'Do you care for the drive this morning?' her father asked.

'I should like it,' she answered, 'of all things.'

'Run away and dress then,' said the General, 'for I have ordered the carriage already, and it will be round in a quarter of an hour. That is short notice for a lady's toilet.' he went on, trying to smile, 'but you must learn military despatch.'

And thus it came about that Polson and Irene met once more before the final parting, for at the moment at which the carriage swept into the barrack square the newly-enlisted recruit was walking towards the orderly room under the guidance of a corporal. The youngster still wore the fluttering ribbons in the shabby old sealskin cap, and that fact and his presence in the barracks told the whole story instantly.

'By Heaven!' cried the General, 'I like that. The lad has grit in him!'

He cried aloud in the ringing clarion voice which advancing years had left in all its rounded sweetness, 'Hi, you there--halt!' and the corporal at the voice straightened himself and stood to attention.

Polson knew the voice, but he walked on until the command was repeated.

The General stopped the carriage and alighted. 'Can you bear to speak to him?' he whispered.

'Yes,' said Irene, 'I wish it.'

The General walked briskly to the recruit, and stretched out his hand towards him. 'You have done well, my lad. You could have done nothing better. You have an old soldier's respect, Polson. You have joined us?'

'Yes, sir,' said Polson, 'I have joined you. Volnay is here, sir--you remember Volnay?'

'His father and I charged together at Waterloo,' said the General. 'He is a good lad. You and he are great friends, I hear?'

'We have been,' Polson answered. 'Major de Blacquaire is here as well; but he has a Staff appointment, and I understand he leaves the corps to-morrow.'

'He is the man I am here to see,' said Boswell. 'Irene is with me, and I believe she wishes to speak to you.'

The young man glanced deprecatingly at his old array, and the General read the glance. 'She will understand all that,' he said, 'just as well as I do. You have seen De Blacquaire?'

'I believe he is in barracks--I saw him a few hours ago.'

'Corporal! 'called the General, 'find Major de Blacquaire, give him General Boswell's compliments, and ask him to receive me.'

The corporal saluted and went his way, a bewildered man, for it had never before fallen to his lot to find a raw recruit in the enjoyment of a General's friendship. There was a mystery here, and it kept the regiment in talk for a little while until the interest in it died out; but it made Polson a man of mark from the first. The corporal was back in a minute with a salute to say that Major de Blacquaire was in his own apartment, and would be proud to see General Boswell at once, so the General sent off Polson to Irene and made his way to De Blacquaire's quarters, piloted by the corporal. De Blaequaire received General Boswell with a show of profound respect.

'I am here,' began the General, plunging into business at once after his own soldierly fashion, 'I am here on an uncommonly unpleasant business.

You are the proprietor of a salt mine. You may not be aware that I have invested the greater part of my fortune in the hands of your neighbours, Messrs. Jervase & Jervoyce.'

'I was not aware of that, sir,' said De Blaequaire, 'and I am very sorry to hear it. The men, to my certain knowledge, are a brace of thieves.'

'I heard a very startling piece of news last night,' the General continued. 'I heard that your solicitor, Mr. Stubbs I believe, has made a charge against my partners of having robbed you and the former proprietor of the mine, my lamented old friend General Airey, through a whole course of years.'

'That is undoubtedly true,' De Blacquaire answered. 'I have evidence that a pa.s.sage exists between their mine and my own, and all the evidence points to the belief that it was purposely made. Their property, I learn, was a miserable failure for many years, and it has now for years yielded them a large income.'

'My share of that income,' said the General, 'has amounted to something like fifteen hundred pounds a year for seven years past, and I need not tell you that it will be my immediate business, so soon as I can realise the money, to repay you--on distinct proof, of course, of the felonious action of my partners.'

'I really do not see, General Boswell,' said De Blacquaire, 'that there is any call upon you to sacrifice yourself for their benefit. The men are wealthy, and I have no doubt that I can force them to disgorge.'