CHAPTER XVIII.
SIR HAROLD’S WALK TO FARNWELL.
“Sir Harold,” Mr. Hamilton said, a day or two later, “I have engaged a woman-servant to live in the house. She is old and deaf, and will notice nothing in particular if we simply call you Mr. Harold. I have known her for some years in connection with the laundry work, and as her husband is lately dead, she is very glad of a home. Now that it is settled that Theresa is to be your wife, we must take better care of her.”
“I am glad that you have mentioned this, Mr. Hamilton,” Sir Harold replied, “because I want to talk with you about our future. This idle life is growing a little tiresome, and I should like to travel. Theresa loves me, and relies upon me so much, that I do not see why the wedding should be long delayed.”
“She is very young yet,” faltered Hamilton.
“Nineteen—is she not? And I am nearly thirty, though I have the feelings of a boy,” laughed Sir Harold. “As the autumn will soon be upon us, I intend asking your consent to an early marriage, so that the winter may be spent in Nice, or some similar place. Of course, you would accompany us if you chose to do so, but I do not anticipate returning to England until I can take possession of that which is mine with unimpaired faculties.”
“I am afraid, with all my fears and fancies, that I should be a sort of death’s-head at the feast,” replied Hamilton, a little mournfully. “I hate parting with my Theresa, but she is safer with you. As your wife, the enemy may never suspect whom she really is. If it pleases you—if it pleases Theresa, my dear boy—I amagreeable to all that you may do and desire. But for myself, I shall remain here. I have enough money to buy the place—the money I have saved for Theresa, and I think that the evening of my life may be spent in comparative happiness now that I know my beloved child is well provided for. Treat her tenderly, Sir Harold, for she is like a delicate flower, that would droop and die if neglected or deprived of the sunshine of your love.”
“God helping me, I ever will,” the baronet fervently responded.
“And now,” continued Mr. Hamilton, “what of your business affairs? Between us—Colonel Greyson and me—everything can be managed until you feel disposed to assume the reins of control. I have had a letter from the colonel to-day. He is in Switzerland, and inquires anxiously about you. His letter contains news that surprises me, and we must really try and keep better informed with that which is happening about us. The Earl of Seabright recently met with an accident, and is dead.”
“Indeed!” remarked Sir Harold, indifferently. “I endeavored to become interested in theDaily Telegraphyou brought home last Saturday, but its very strangeness bewildered me. I felt like a man who had been asleep for half a century when I tried to connect the politics I remembered and the politics of to-day.”
“Well, what do you think of my proposal?” continued Hamilton; “you will require funds while abroad, and who so reliable as myself in all that interests you? Besides, the occupation will be of benefit to me, for when you and Theresa are gone, I shall be a lonely old man.”
“I am grateful to you,” the young man said, heartily; “no better arrangement could possibly be made.”
“I am glad that you think so, and, as I have a letter of introduction from the colonel to his London bankers, Iwill present it to-day. It is of no use leaving everything until the last moment, and you will be wanting money soon.”
“Yes,” was the thoughtful rejoinder. “You may draw a few hundreds on my behalf, and enter into arrangements with the colonel to let me have five thousand pounds in a month’s time. I suppose that I have plenty of funds, and I must make Theresa a handsome wedding present. You can explain, if you like, that I am going to be married!”
He laughed pleasantly.
“It shall be as you say,” Mr. Hamilton told him. “And now, if you will excuse me, Harold, I will go and dress, as I want to catch an early train. Our new servant will arrive by and by, and Theresa will look after her.”
An hour later Mr. Hamilton was gone, and after a little lover-like talk with Theresa, Sir Harold strolled into the garden. Wet or fine, he rarely was to be found anywhere else. The low-ceilinged cottage seemed to envelop him. He could not breathe within its close walls.
There had been a heavy fall of rain in the night, and the leaves were still dripping, with a sound that irritated his nerves.
He had been provided with plenty of books and cigars; but neither afforded him any pleasure now, and he wandered out of the garden into the lane beyond.
How many weeks had he been confined within the cottage and its environs? Six or seven? He could not remember exactly, and now the idea for viewing the country beyond seized upon him like an inspiration.
If he should chance to meet people who remembered him, what did it matter? He was a free agent. But there was little likelihood of that, and he strode away, interested in every new object that met his view.
When a sense of weariness began to creep over him,he knew that he must have walked half-a-dozen miles. He looked at his watch. It was eleven when he left the cottage, and now the hands pointed to the hour of one.
Half-a-mile away there was a town perched upon the side of a hill.
“I will get refreshments there,” he thought, “and then hasten back. Theresa will wonder what has become of me.”
He went into the town, and pulled his hat over his eyes like a man who has committed some crime. The people whom he met stared curiously after him. His was no common, everyday figure.
At last he turned into a public house, and, walking into a little parlor, the door of which was held invitingly open by a trim-looking maid, he called for a glass of ale and some biscuits.
“This is Farnwell, is it not?” he presently inquired.
“Yes, sir,” replied the girl.
He was about to express his astonishment at the number of alterations that had taken place in an amazingly short space of time, when he remembered his accident.
“I have not been here for a long time,” he explained, “and everything seems quite strange. Who is the landlord now?”
“Mr. Fletcher, sir.”
“Fletcher? Oh, I do not remember him. I suppose that the house has recently changed hands?”
“Not for ten years, sir,” the maid replied.
“Of course; I had forgotten my long absence. A very nice and quiet town, is it not?”
He turned to a newspaper that lay near him, hoping that the girl would take the hint and retire; but it was not often that so handsome a gentleman talked to her, and she endeavored to continue the conversation.
“Yes, very quiet,” she said; “rather too quiet to myliking, sir, though, of course, we do get a bit of sensation sometimes in connection with the gentry. Now, the best bit for years is the disappearance of Sir Harold Annesley, and everybody is talking about it.”
Fortunately for Sir Harold, another customer came in, and he hastily finished his beer.
His thoughts reverted to Theresa, and he regretted that he had left her without a word about his intentions.
He jumped up, said “Good-morning” to the buxom maid, and left the house.
He strode rapidly through the town, unaware that he was being followed by a spare little man, whose face betrayed emotions of the most violent and complex kind.
Once out of the town, Sir Harold’s long legs took quicker and longer strides, and the little man began to run. He panted painfully for a little while, and then cried:
“Master! Master!”
Sir Harold swung round, and eyed the man wonderingly.
“Well?” he demanded. “I am afraid that you have made some mistake, my good fellow.”
“Don’t you know me, Sir Harold?” cried the man. “I’m Stimson, your valet. You left me to go to London, and I followed the next day with all the luggage, and have never seen you since.”
“I really don’t know you, Stimson; I am very sorry, and I wish that you had not met me.”
“Oh, Sir Harold, I thought that you were dead. I never did believe what they said about your running away. I knew you too well.”
“That is what they say, is it?” Sir Harold said. “Well, I am glad of it. I have no desire to undeceive them, whoever ‘they’ may be.”
Stimson stood watching anxiously every expression of his master’s face.
“I will tell you that which very few people know, Stimson—I fell from the train at Tenterden on that fatal day, and had ten years of my life utterly obliterated. That is why I do not recognize you. I am told that I shall soon be all right again, and there is only one other of my old friends in the secret—Colonel Greyson.”
“Oh, master, it is good to hear your voice again!” was the valet’s hysterical rejoinder. “You want me again, don’t you, Sir Harold? You said that I should always remain with you.”
“I am ready to keep my word, Stimson, because I am really in need of a valet. I am to be married soon, and intend going abroad immediately, to stay until my memory is fully restored.”
The valet stared at him doubtfully, and blankly said:
“Married, Sir Harold?”
“Yes, to the daughter of the man who saved my intellect, if not my life. I never want you to refer to the past, Stimson. That is over and done with—at least, that portion which brought me so much sorrow. I understand that I was infatuated with a cold-hearted, beautiful flirt, who is engaged to some other fellow already. There, that is done with. You may accompany me now, but I rely upon your absolute secrecy. I am not staying far from here, and you will be very useful, for my wardrobe is limited to what I have on my back!”
“The luggage is still at the London hotel, Sir Harold, and I waited there for you until I was penniless. Shall I fetch it away?” the valet asked.
“We will talk about that later, as I wish to arouse no suspicion. To everybody, for a time, I am to be plain Mr. Harold.”
“Yes, master; I shall not forget,” the half-hysterical Stimson replied.
Theresa was watching for her lover, and the dark rings under her eyes told of the anxiety she had endured.
The appearance of a stranger frightened her, and Sir Harold drew her aside, whispering:
“Poor little girl! How thoughtless of me to leave you so long without one word of explanation. But I did not intend going so far, Theresa, and then, my old valet recognized me, and I have engaged him to go with us on our wedding tour. I can see that he is trustworthy, and he is half-frantic with joy. Is there room for him in this little nest? If not, we must find him lodgings somewhere until we go away.”
“I think that we can manage, Harold,” Theresa said, happy tears standing in her eyes. “Oh, I was so frightened when I could not find you. I am always dreaming that I have lost you!”
“There is not much fear of that, darling,” he said, laughingly, and pressing a kiss to her lips.
By the time Mr. Hamilton returned from London a room had been put to rights for the valet, the resources of the cottage being taxed to their utmost.
The visit to the metropolis had been successful in every way, and the evening was spent in writing a somewhat lengthy letter to Colonel Greyson, wherein Sir Harold’s arrangements for the immediate future were fully set forth.
It was nearly midnight when Sir Harold retired, and he wished Hamilton an affectionate “Good-night!” saying, “You have overdone yourself to-day. Do not sit up too long.”
“No, Harold; I have a few old papers to destroy. I shall not be many minutes.”
The young man went up to his room, which was directly over the one in which he had left Mr. Hamilton.
For a little while he heard the rustling of papers, then a sudden silence, followed by the opening of a door.
Five—ten minutes passed, and there was not a sound.
Slipping into his clothes again, Sir Harold stepped downstairs, and Mr. Hamilton was apparently asleep. The young man spoke to him, but there was no reply. Then he ran and shook him. The head dropped forward, and one glance revealed that he was dead—the hanging lower jaw, the glazing eyes, filled with unutterable horror, and the stiffening hands.
“My God!” gasped Sir Harold. “Poor Theresa!”
He lifted the poor old man to a sofa, and a scrap of paper dropped from the nerveless fingers, bearing these words:
Tracked at last, Lambert Egerton, assassin of the Count Crispi, of blessed memory. It is useless to evade us longer. Your doom is sealed! Your life and the life of the child of the false Theresa Ludovci are demanded by the Brotherhood. Blood for blood! Prepare, for at any moment the avenger may be upon you! You are spared a little longer, so that you may understand the tortures of the doomed!
Tracked at last, Lambert Egerton, assassin of the Count Crispi, of blessed memory. It is useless to evade us longer. Your doom is sealed! Your life and the life of the child of the false Theresa Ludovci are demanded by the Brotherhood. Blood for blood! Prepare, for at any moment the avenger may be upon you! You are spared a little longer, so that you may understand the tortures of the doomed!
The writing was a mere scrawl, and the spelling and grammar proclaimed the author to be an illiterate foreigner.
For a minute Sir Harold stared at the paper aghast, then darting through the open doorway, he plunged into the garden in quest of the man or woman the shock of whose presence had deprived Mr. Hamilton of life.