CHAPTER VTHE SEEKING OF BEALBY
On the same Monday evening that witnessed Bealby’s first experience of the theatre, Mr. Mergleson, the house steward of Shonts, walked slowly and thoughtfully across the corner of the park between the laundry and the gardens. His face was much recovered from the accidents of his collision with the Lord Chancellor, resort to raw meat in the kitchen had checked the development of his injuries, and only a few contusions in the side of his face were more than faintly traceable. And suffering had on the whole rather ennobled than depressed his bearing. He had a black eye, but it was not, he felt, a common black eye. It came from high quarters and through no fault of Mr. Mergleson’s own. He carried it well. It was a fruit of duty rather than the outcome of wanton pleasure-seeking or misdirected passion.
He found Mr. Darling in profound meditation over some peach trees against the wall. They were not doing so well as they ought to do and Mr. Darling was engaged in wondering why.
“Good evening, Mr. Darling,” said Mr. Mergleson.
Mr. Darling ceased rather slowly to wonder and turned to his friend. “Good evening, Mr. Mergleson,” he said. “I don’t quite like the look of these here peaches,blowedif I do.”
Mr. Mergleson glanced at the peaches, and then came to the matter that was nearest his heart.
“You ’aven’t I suppose seen anything of your stepson these last two days, Mr. Darling?”
“Naturallynot,” said Mr. Darling, putting his head on one side and regarding his interlocutor. “Naturally not,—I’ve left that to you, Mr. Mergleson.”
“Well, that’s what’s awkward,” said Mr. Mergleson, and then, with a forced easiness, “You see, I ain’t seen ’im either.”
“No!”
“No. I lost sight of ’im—” Mr. Mergleson appeared to reflect—“late on Sattiday night.”
“’Ow’s that, Mr. Mergleson?”
Mr. Mergleson considered the difficulties of lucid explanation. “We missed ’im,” said Mr. Mergleson simply, regarding the well-weeded garden path with a calculating expression and then lifting his eyes to Mr. Darling’s with an air of great candour. “And we continue to miss him.”
“Well!” said Mr. Darling. “That’s rum.”
“Yes,” said Mr. Mergleson.
“It’s decidedly rum,” said Mr. Darling.
“We thought ’e might be ’iding from ’is work. Or cut off ’ome.”
“You didn’t send down to ask.”
“We was too busy with the week-end people. On the ’ole we thought if ’e’adcut ’ome, on the’ole, ’e wasn’t a very serious loss. ’E got in the way at times.... And there was one or two things ’appened—... Now that they’re all gone and ’e ’asn’t turned up—Well, I came down, Mr. Darling, to arst you. Where’s ’e gone?”
“’E ain’t come ’ere,” said Mr. Darling surveying the garden.
“I ’arf expected ’e might and I ’arf expected ’e mightn’t,” said Mr. Mergleson with the air of one who had anticipated Mr. Darling’s answer but hesitated to admit as much.
The two gentlemen paused for some seconds and regarded each other searchingly.
“Where’s ’egotto?” said Mr. Darling.
“Well,” said Mr. Mergleson, putting his hands where the tails of his short jacket would have been if it hadn’t been short, and looking extraordinarily like a parrot in its more thoughtful moods, “to tell you the truth, Mr. Darling, I’ve ’ad a dream about ’im—and it worries me. I got a sort of ideer of ’im as being in one of them secret passages. ’Iding away. There was a guest, well, I say it with all respec’ butanyonemight ’ave ’id from ’im.... S’morning soon as the week-end ’ad cleared up and gone ’ome, me and Thomas went through them passages as well as we could. Not a trace of ’im. But I still got that ideer. ’E was a wriggling, climbing,—enterprising sort of boy.”
“I’ve checked ’im for it once or twice,” said Mr. Darling with the red light of fierce memories gleaming for a moment in his eyes.
“’E might even,” said Mr. Mergleson, “well, very likely ’ave got ’imself jammed in one of them secret passages....”
“Jammed,” repeated Mr. Darling.
“Well—got ’imself somewhere where ’e can’t get out. I’ve ’eard tell there’s walled-up dungeons.”
“They say,” said Mr. Darling, “there’s underground passages to the Abbey ruins—three good mile away.”
“Orkward,” said Mr. Mergleson....
“Drat ’is eyes!” said Mr. Darling, scratching his head. “What does ’e mean by it?”
“We can’t leave ’im there,” said Mr. Mergleson.
“I knowed a young devil once what crawled up a culvert,” said Mr. Darling. “’Is father ’ad to dig ’im out like a fox.... Lord! ’ow ’e walloped ’im for it.”
“Mistake to ’ave a boy in so young,” said Mr. Mergleson.
“It’s all very awkward,” said Mr. Darling, surveying every aspect of the case. “You see—. ’Is mother sets a most estrordinary value on ’im. Most estrordinary.”
“I don’t know whether she oughtn’t to be told,” said Mr. Mergleson. “I was thinking of that.”
Mr. Darling was not the sort of man to meet trouble half-way. He shook his head at that. “Not yet, Mr. Mergleson. I don’t think yet. Not until everything’s been tried. I don’t think there’s any need to give her needless distress,—none whatever. If you don’t mind I think I’llcome up to-night—nineish say—and ’ave a talk to you and Thomas about it—a quiet talk. Best to begin with aquiettalk. It’s a dashed rum go, and me and you we got to think it out a bit.”
“That’s whatIthink,” said Mr. Mergleson with unconcealed relief at Mr. Darling’s friendliness. “That’s exactly the light, Mr. Darling, in which it appears to me. Because, you see—if ’e’s all right and in the ’ouse, why doesn’t ’e come for ’is vittels?”