Burgo Brabazon had made up his mind beforehand that if he should be successful in meeting Miss Leslie at Twysden Court, and should find an opportunity of unburdening his mind to her of that which he wanted to say, he would take therewith his farewell of the pomps and vanities of London society. Well, he had succeeded in seeing her, and in having his say into the bargain, and as he passed out of the gates of Twysden Court he murmured to himself with a bitter smile: "Good-bye, proud world. From this day forth you and I are strangers. I choose to cut you, rather than afford you the chance of cutting me."
For, indeed, it was high time for him to think seriously of putting his hand to the plough, only, at present, he was not quite sure in which direction to look for that useful implement, or rather, for its latter-day equivalent.
He had been going into the question of his finances, and had found that in hard cash he was worth a matter of between forty and fifty pounds, that sum representing the balance of his last quarter's allowance. He had a tolerable stock of jewellery and trinkets, which would always fetch something should the worst come to the worst. His uncle had discharged all his liabilities, so that his calculations were not disturbed by any question of what he owed to others. It was true that in the interim he had run up various little accounts with his tailor, his bootmaker, and so on. But such trifles were not worth a second thought. He had always accustomed his tradespeople to waiting, and he had no wish to hurt their feelings by offering them ready money. It was with a clear conscience that he said to himself, "When a fellow finds himself in a fix such as I'm in now, there's really a sort of sweet satisfaction in knowing that he doesn't owe a shilling to a soul."
But fifty pounds, even if doled out with the most cheeseparing economy, will not last for ever, and when the end of it should be reached, what then? He had not forgotten "old Garden's" offer to be his banker till brighter days should dawn; but he was by no means inclined to accept it. "As he said, a spell of hard work will do me good, and I'll work my fingers to the bone before I'll apply to him."
Evidently the first thing to be done was to get rid of his rooms, which were within fifty yards of New Bond Street, and move into lodgings which would accord better with the exiguity of his resources. But it was requisite that he should either find a fresh tenant or give a month's notice. Fortunately he knew a fellow who was dissatisfied with his own "diggings," and would jump at the chance of securing his.
In the interval between his last interview with Mr. Garden and his afternoon at Twysden Court he had had ample time to turn over a score of different projects in his mind, each of which, however, when he came to consider it in detail, proved to be either more or less impracticable, or else to have certain features in connection with it against which his somewhat fastidious taste revolted. He had spoken to the lawyer about enlisting, but when he came to reckon up all that he had seen and been told about life in barracks (several of his acquaintances were military men), and to call to mind the class of persons from whom three-fourths of the British army is recruited, the prospect seemed to him the reverse of alluring. Could he have made sure of being at once despatched on active service, where there would have been a chance of promotion, he would have enlisted without hesitation; but the thought of a dull, inglorious life in barracks and all that was implied thereby, appalled him.
Had he but possessed the requisite capital, he would have gone out to the States, or Australia, and after serving a couple of years to the business, would have bought a cattle ranch or a sheep run, and have sunk or swum by the venture. But, as we have seen, his worldly fortune amounted to the preposterously inadequate sum of fifty pounds, all told.
Sometimes a great longing would come over him when he thought of these things, and a voice would seem to whisper in his ear, "What a consummate ass you must have been to tear up your uncle's cheque! Think of all you might have done with it. Think of----"
But at this point Burgo would jump up and begin to stamp about the room, swearing softly to himself as he did so.
No, not if it would have made him the owner of a dozen cattle ranches, would he have accepted Sir Everard's cheque with the conditions attached to it.
Far rather would he starve.
It was no more than natural that at times his thoughts should revert to his other uncle, Mr. Denis Clinton, who was only two and a half years the junior of Sir Everard. To Burgo he was little more than a name. Uncle and nephew had never met since the latter was quite a child. Mr. Denis Clinton was a bachelor and a misogynist, and a miser to boot. He had no belief in the claims of relationship, more especially in the case of relatives to whom fortune had not proved over kind. And that had been the hap of his sister Elinor--Burgo's mother--who, against the wishes of her relatives, had persisted in marrying a naval lieutenant of good family, but with no pecuniary resources except his pay, and a private income of a hundred a year. When, a few years later, Lieutenant Brabazon died, after a long illness, and deeply in debt, and when his widow found it imperative on her to appeal to her relatives for help, Denis Clinton had contented himself with sending her a twenty pound note, coupled with an intimation that she must not look to him for any further aid. He would not have been the man he was if at the same time he had not told her in the plainest possible terms that she had no one to thank for her indigent condition but herself, and that she had brought it all on by her own headstrong folly.
Between Sir Everard and his brother there was no love lost. They were in every way so wholly the opposite of each other, and had been from their boyhood, they looked at life from two such different standpoints, that there seemed no common ground of unity between them. They had neither seen nor held any communication with each other for nearly a score years, nor had they any desire to do so.
Mr. Denis Clinton was the owner of a large but not very productive property on the borders of Yorkshire and Lancashire, attached to which was an old manor house, in which he lived a secluded and penurious life, "the world forgetting, by the world forgot." As matters stood at present he was next heir to the title and entailed estates.
But although, in his many musings over his position, Burgo's thoughts did occasionally revert to his Uncle Denis, it was never with any serious intention of applying to him for the pecuniary help needed to give him, Burgo, a fair start in life. Even if he could have sufficiently humbled his pride to ask him--which he knew to be an impossibility--he felt sure that his application would have been met by a refusal. All he used to say to himself was: "If my Uncle Denis had been a different kind of man from what he is, if he had been another Uncle Everard, then, perhaps, I might have made known my need to him, in which case, if he had chosen to hold out a helping hand, I should not have turned away."
As matters fell out, his choice of a profession was ultimately determined by accident.
One night, about eleven o'clock, as he was strolling along the Strand, he came upon a crowd of men and boys at the corner of a side street, congregated round a hansom cab and a couple of stalwart policemen. Burgo was not fond of street crowds, and was proceeding to push his way through the fringe of this one, when he heard one man say to another, "What's the bloomin' row?" "A cabby wot's fell off his box in a fit, and cut his 'ead open," replied the other. Then a third man joined in, apparently a stranger to the others: "It's one of old Hendry's 'ansoms," he said. "All that's wanted is for the cabby to get inside his own flycatcher, and let some cove drive him home."
Burgo shouldered his way through the crowd till he had reached the heart of it.
"What's the matter, Robert?" he inquired of one of the policemen, as he slipped a shilling into his hand.
The man carried a finger to his helmet, but could tell him no more than he knew already.
"You are sure his fall was not the result of drink?" queried Mr. Brabazon.
"Sure of that, sir. I and my mate both know the man. He's a very decent sort of fellow, and a teetotaler."
"Is he much hurt?"
"Oh, no, sir; nothing to speak of. A little bit dazed-like, as you may see for yourself, but nothing more. Still, it's hardly safe to let him get on the box; he might be took like it again before he got to the yard."
"Certainly. I see that this is one of my friend Mr. Hendry's cabs, so I tell you what you had better do. Put the man inside, and I will drive him home to the yard." And with that he handed the constable his card.
The police were only too glad to be thus relieved of a difficulty which was detaining them from their more regular duties. Accordingly the man was bundled inside, while Burgo mounted to the perch behind; then the crowd divided to let him through, while somebody called out for a cheer for the "toff," which was heartily responded to.
Mr. Tobias Hendry was a jobmaster and cab proprietor, well known to Burgo, who, in the course of his career, had had many a "trap" from him on hire--an elastic term which must be understood as including vehicles of various kinds. The only two horses Burgo had ever owned had been bought for him by Mr. Hendry, and when hard compulsion, in the shape of certain racing liabilities which he found a difficulty in meeting, had compelled him to part from them, it was "Toby H."--as he was generally called among his intimates--who, succeeded in disposing of them for him at a not too ruinous loss.
Mr. Hendry happened to be in the yard when Burgo drove in, but when the flaps of the hansom were flung back and Joey Bunch, with his ensanguined visage, stumbled out of the interior, and when, by the light of the lamp over the stable door, he recognised the driver, his face put on such an expression of comic perplexity that Burgo could not help laughing aloud.
"Been up to some of your little games, Mr. Brabazon, I reckon," said the jobmaster dryly. He was an elderly, wiry, rather undersized man, with iron-gray hair and short side whiskers to match.
"For once you are mistaken, Mr. Hendry," replied Burgo. And therewith he proceeded, as briefly as possible, to put the other in possession of the facts of the case.
"I'm really very much obliged to you, Mr. Brabazon," said the jobmaster. "It isn't every gentleman that would put himself to the trouble you have. As for Bunch, he's the most steady-going driver I have. I hope there's nothing serious the matter with him, but, of course, I must have him seen by a doctor before I can let him go out again. Yes, Mr. Brabazon, I'mverymuch obliged to you."
"But, as it happens, it is I who want to be obliged to you, Mr. Hendry."
"In what way can I serve you, sir?"
"If your office is empty, let us go in there for a few minutes." A sudden resolution (at the time it seemed to him almost like an inspiration) had come to him while he was driving Joey Bunch home.
The jobmaster led the way, and as soon as the office door was shut behind them Burgo said: "I don't know whether you are aware that my uncle, Sir Everard Clinton, has discarded me--cast me off--will have nothing more to do with me. But such is the unpleasant fact. It's not because I have kicked over the traces, or done anything to offend him, but simply because he has taken to himself a wife half his own age who, to serve some purpose of her own, has succeeded in poisoning his mind and setting him against me. Now, as I have very little money, and can't live on air, it's evident I must find work of some kind. The worst of it is that I've been brought up to nothing, and have no aptitude or gift of any kind. Under those circumstances what is a man to do? That is a question, Mr. Hendry, which, if I've put to myself once, I have a hundred times. At length I have decided that there are only two things I can do with any degree of credit to myself or others, and those are, riding and driving. But where's the good of either of them to a fellow who has neither a horse nor a trap to call his own?"
"Don't know, I'm sure, Mr. Brabazon, unless he makes use of the horses and traps of his friends. And a good many young men do that, sir, who are in the same predicament as yourself."
"True for you, Mr. Hendry, but I've no inclination to add one more to their number. No, sir, what I've decided upon doing is to try to earn my living as a hansom-cab driver, and I have come to you, Mr. Hendry, as a man whom I've known for a number of years, to ask you to give me a start; in other words, as our friend Joey would say, to 'put me on the job.'"
Hendry stared at him open-mouthed for a second or two. Then he said: "You don't seriously mean what you say, Mr. Brabazon?"
"Most seriously I do. I was never more in earnest in my life."
"Well, sir, you're not the first broken-down swell--if you'll excuse the term--that I've known take to driving a hansom for a living, but they have mostly been of a different quality from you. Still, needs must when a certain person drives. I don't suppose starving's any pleasanter to a man that's had a college education, than to one who can neither read nor write. If you like to look me up at eleven to-morrow forenoon, Mr. Brabazon, I may have something to say to you."
Burgo did not fail to keep the appointment, and the result was that on the following Monday morning, having in the interim taken out a license in due form at Scotland Yard, he started in his new career. It appeared that Mr. Hendry had just become the owner of a hansom which had been the property of a medical man. It was what the jobmaster himself termed "a real elegant turn-out," and he was only too pleased to have secured such a man as Mr. Brabazon to drive it. Into its shafts he put a half-blood mare, which he had bought a bargain, because she had once come down on her knees when her former owner, a very nervous old gentleman, was taking his constitutional in the Park. By this time Burgo had vacated his rooms off New Bond Street for a much more unpretentious domicile no great distance from Mr. Hendry's yard. He had written Mr. Garden a half-cynical, half-humorous note, telling him what he had decided upon doing, and advising him of his changed address. He had also looked up Benny Hines, partly for the same purpose, and partly to ascertain whether the old man had anything fresh to communicate with reference to Sir Everard. But it appeared that affairs in Great Mornington Street were going on much as they had for the last two months. If it could not be averred that the baronet was any worse in health, there seemed to be no visible signs of improvement. Dr. Hoskins continued to call three or four times a week, and his patient still went for a drive on most fine afternoons. But with a man of the baronet's years such a state of things could not go on much longer. If there was no improvement, it seemed inevitable that he must gradually, although it might be almost imperceptibly, become weaker. That they saw no company at No. 22, and went nowhere, was sufficiently accounted for by the state of Sir Everard's health.
And now for Burgo began a new life indeed, one which, as he presently found, tended to expand his ideas in directions never thought of before, and to alter his views of many things in a quite remarkable way. The "passing show," as seen from the perch of a hansom, wore for him an aspect very different from that which it had assumed when looked at from the box-seat of Lord Ockbrook's drag. It seemed to have undergone a quite kaleidoscopic transformation between whiles. But, as he told himself, what he saw now was the real thing--was the great throbbing pulse of London, with some at least of its complex workings and amazing contrasts laid bare for his inspection; while here and there he obtained glimpses of its multifarious undercurrents of joy, hope, fear, misery, and despair, and of a poverty so extreme that it grinds the life out of some of its victims, while transforming others into the semblance of brute beasts. To live for six months the life of a London "cabby" is, for a man with eyes to see and a mind susceptible of receiving and retaining impressions, an education of itself--but what an education!
Various reports were current in those clubs of which Mr. Brabazon had been a member, as to the cause of his sudden disappearance, for, so far as was known, he had gone without saying a word to anybody. Although somewhat reserved and stand-offish except with a chosen few, he had been by no means unpopular; but none, even among his most intimate friends, was in a position to furnish any authentic tidings of his whereabouts, or to account definitely for his continued absence. Some had it (for with your club gossip fact and invention very often go hand in hand) that he had gone on an exploring expedition among the wilds either of Africa or Asia, they were not sure which. Others averred that he had got so deeply into debt, by no means for the first time, as to have offended his uncle beyond forgiveness, and that, as a consequence, he had been expatriated, with the understanding that his allowance would cease the moment he should set foot on English soil without leave being given him to do so. Nor were these the only fables promulgated which found a more or less ready credence in this or the other smoking-room. But when, on different occasions, two men came forward and averred that they had seen Burgo Brabazon driving a swell hansom for hire in the West End, their statements were received either with polite incredulity or unconcealed derision. Of course the explanation was simple enough. It was merely one case the more of mistaken identity.
The only change in his appearance made by Burgo, except that he had taken into regular wear his very oldest suit of tweeds, was that he had shaved off his moustache, and had begun to cultivate an inch of side whisker. But this, to an ordinary club acquaintance, or any one who had not been on intimate terms with him, was enough to alter his aspect almost beyond casual recognition. Then, his face had sunken somewhat of late, thereby bringing his cheek bones into greater prominence; and because his features were thinner, they looked longer and older. That several of his whilom acquaintances should see him without recognising him was scarcely to be wondered at. Indeed, more than one of them had engaged his cab, and been driven by him to wherever they had wanted to go, and had paid him at the end of the journey, without having the slightest suspicion as to the driver's personality. But on such occasions Burgo always spoke in a feigned voice, and had a trick, which he had picked up when a boy, of treating his fare to a very pronounced squint of his left eye.
But, as a rule, he saw old acquaintances without seeing them. He neither turned away his face, nor let his eyes rest on them. To him they were as the most absolute strangers--people on whom he had never set eyes before, and, for anything he knew or cared, might never do so again.
There came an afternoon when, in a temporary jam of vehicles, just outside the Marble Arch, Burgo, perched aloft on his cab, found himself close to Mrs. Mordaunt's barouche. For a couple of minutes or more there was no possibility of turning a wheel. Seated with her back to the horses, and facing her aunt and another lady, was Clara Leslie. Her eyes and Burgo's met. She gave a little start, bit her lip, and then bent forward as if to assure herself that it was really he. A second look convinced her. He sat as if carved out of stone, his features as devoid of expression as those of some old Egyptian deity. But however changed he might be in other ways, she knew him by his eyes. For her there were no such eyes in the world. Her own seemed to dilate as she looked, while every trace of colour fled her face. Busy discussing the latest morsel of scandal, neither Mrs. Mordaunt nor her friend saw anything. Then the crowd parted as if by magic--the magic brought to bear by the police on duty--and Burgo's mare, obedient to its driver's signal, dashed forward. The same instant there was a little cry from Mrs. Mordaunt. Miss Leslie had fainted.
As a cab-driver Burgo was a decided success, earning, as he did, considerably more money for Mr. Hendry than any other driver in the yard. But he was not conceited enough to take the merit thereof in any way to himself, but rightly put it down to the superior attractiveness of the vehicle driven by him. His hours were long, but he was glad of that; less time was left him for brooding over the past and all it had robbed him of. Mr. Hendry and he remained on the best of terms. If the jobmaster's treatment of him differed in many respects from that which he usually accorded his men, it was no more, perhaps, than might be expected under the circumstances; at any rate, it was a state of things on which Burgo never presumed. He knew his place, and he was careful never to cross the line he had laid down for himself when he accepted it. Without associating with his brother cabbies more than was absolutely necessary, he was on pleasantly free-and-easy terms with them. In the way of jokes he could give and take with the best, and when the occasion demanded he could drop into the vernacular, or hold his own in a slanging match, after a fashion which would have considerably astonished his uncle had he happened to overhear him.
When in after days Burgo came to look back on this episode in his career he could recognise that it had not been a wholly unhappy time with him. He was at an age when it is impossible for a man worth calling a man to be actively miserable for any length of time. Fate had smitten him hardly; both Love and Fortune had turned their backs on him; the gilt had been rubbed off his gingerbread with a vengeance; and yet, as time went on, he was surprised to find that he was by no means so wretched as he deemed himself to have a right to be. When the discovery dawned upon him he could not resist a certain sense of disappointment, and was inclined to be savage with himself. But presently it seemed much better to laugh at, rather than be angry with, himself, and to regard the whole affair with philosophical indifferentism as from the standpoint of an outsider. He would be at once both actor and spectator of his own little tragi-comedy.
Summer was on the turn; Goodwood was a thing of the past till another year; wearied legislators were anxiously speculating as to the proximate prorogation of Parliament; and the prospects of the coming grouse season were being eagerly discussed by those interested in such matters, when, on a certain sunny afternoon, Burgo Brabazon, who had just set down a fare, and was making his way back in leisurely fashion to the rank from which he usually plied, was hailed by the porter of the Mastodon Club. As he drew up by the kerb the man said: "Old gent--hot weather--fainting-fit--come round again all right--won't wait for his carriage--wants to be taken home in a keb."
Scarcely had the last words left the man's lips before Burgo beheld coming slowly and feebly down the club steps, and leaning heavily on the arm of another member, none other than his uncle, Sir Everard Clinton.
But what a change there was in him since Burgo had seen him last He looked the mere wreck of his former self. He had been a tall, robust-looking, well-set-up man, as upright in figure as a military martinet, with the fine healthy colour (although he had a way of fancying himself out of sorts when there was nothing more serious the matter with him than a mild attack of dyspepsia) of one who habitually spent much of his time in the open air. Now he had all the appearance of a man who was slowly but surely dying of some incurable disease. His face, which wore the pallor of old ivory, had shrunken till there seemed little left of it besides skin and bone. His eyes had lost all their old-time brightness and clear fixity of regard. His figure was bowed as might be that of a man a century old, and so attenuated and worn away that it seemed hard to believe his clothes had not been made for some one half as big again as himself. Burgo felt a great wave of commingled love, grief, compassion, and rage surge over his heart as he watched his uncle descending the club steps.
His friend, having helped Sir Everard into the cab and taken leave of him, said to Burgo: "No. 22 Great Mornington Street," adding in a lower voice, "Ring and summon some of the servants as soon as you get there and see that he is properly helped out of the cab."
Burgo drove very steadily. Ten minutes brought them to their destination. As soon as he had drawn up he leapt to the ground, ran up the steps of the house, and gave a mighty tug at the bell. Then going back to the cab, he leant forward, and looking Sir Everard straight in the face, said: "Uncle, won't you let me help you to alight?"
The old man started at the sound of his voice; then he began to tremble, and staring hard at him, he said: "Who are you? Surely--surely you can't be my nephew, Burgo Brabazon?"
"But, indeed, I can be, and am Burgo Brabazon, and you are my Uncle Everard. You used to say I had my mother's eyes. Have you forgotten what they were like, uncle?"
"Ah! now I recognise you; now I know you are speaking the truth. Still, you are changed somehow. For that matter"--with a deep sigh--"are we not all changed? But--but what's this? It was you who drove me here, and--and you are wearing a badge. What is the meaning of it?"
"Simply, sir, that I am endeavouring to earn an honest livelihood by driving a cab."
"My God! and has it come to that? My nephew--poor, hardly done by Josephine's son! Ah, dear shade, while on earth so dearly loved, forgive me--forgive!" The last words were spoken half under his breath.
By this a couple of footmen had appeared on the scene, but not with any unseemly amount of haste. In their opinion, it was a piece of "confounded cheek" on the part of a common cabby to ring the bell as this one had done. But their faces changed at sight of their master. Waving them aside, Sir Everard said in a low voice to Burgo: "Don't let those fellows come near me. Help me yourself into the house, but--but put that horrid badge out of sight!"
So Burgo, having first beckoned a near-at-hand crossing-sweeper to take charge of his horse and cab, helped his uncle to alight, and then gave him his arm up the steps and into the house.
"You must not leave me, my dear boy--not on any account," said Sir Everard emphatically, as soon as the servants had been sent about their business. "Her ladyship will probably want to get rid of you--nay, she is sure to do so--but promise me not to leave me, promise me not to allow yourself to be turned out of doors by her."
"If it is your wish, uncle, that I should remain here I will certainly do so."
"It is my wish, my most earnest wish." Then, with a ghost of his old authoritative manner, he added: "In point of fact I order you to stay."
"In that case, I had better send my horse and cab home as soon as possible. Have you anyone whom I can entrust them with?"
"Grimes, the stable-help, is your man. Ring for him."
So, presently Grimes drove off with the horse and cab, being also the bearer of a message from Burgo to Mr. Hendry.
"And now assist me upstairs to my own room," said Sir Everard, when the man was gone.
It had been a room well-known to Burgo of old, and perhaps was the only one in the house which had not been more or less transmogrified by Lady Clinton. Its furniture was dark, substantial, and old-fashioned. Two of its sides were lined with mahogany cases crammed with coins, medals, and curios of various kinds. Of late, however, Sir Everard seemed to have lost all interest in his old pursuits. On the floor stood a couple of unopened boxes containing purchases forwarded to him by one of his agents from abroad, but as yet he had not had the heart to open them. It was a fact which proclaimed more eloquently than words the pass to which he had been brought. As soon as the baronet had been relieved of his overcoat, and established in his own particular chair, he said: "You see a great change in me, don't you, my boy?"
"I do indeed, sir."
"You, too, are altered, I hardly know how, but there's a difference. It seems to me that you get more like your mother every time I see you."
"It's a long time since you saw me last, uncle."
"So it is--more's the pity. How long? But never mind now. If her ladyship wants to bundle you out, you will refuse to go, eh?"
"You already have my promise, sir. Here I am, and here I will stay till you yourself order me to begone."
"With you here, Burgo, I shall have nothing to be afraid of."
"But what have you to be afraid of at any time, uncle?"
He cast his eyes slowly around as if to make sure that they were alone. Then leaning forward, he said in a whisper: "Sometimes--God help me!--I fear for my life."
Burgo started. Was it because Sir Everard's words had sufficed to give a definite shape and consistency to certain half-fledged suspicions of his own?
He did not reply, not, indeed, knowing what to say, but waited to hear more. "Then, again, there are times," resumed the baronet, "when I cast the fear--the thought--the suspicion (call it what you will) from me as utterly unworthy of me--wholly degrading--nay, far worse than degrading toher; times when I tell myself that old age is creeping upon me, that my constitution is breaking up (a few years earlier, maybe, than at one time I thought it would), and that, the circumstances being such as they are, I ought to deem myself one of the most fortunate of mortals, seeing that in Giulia I have secured one of the most devoted of nurses and the most affectionate of wives."
Burgo felt that it was expected of him to say something; and yet, on so delicate a topic, and one about which he knew so little, would it not be an impertinence on his part to venture on an opinion of any kind?
"I presume, sir, that you have not gone all this time without seeking medical advice?" was his diplomatic remark.
"Certainly not. I had only been three days at home when I sent for Hoskins, who knows my constitution, if anybody does. He's attending me still; but, if a frequent change of physic may be taken as any criterion, he's puzzled what to make of me; though, of course, he would be the last man in the world to admit it. In fact, I've tried to pin him down more than once to a definite opinion, but there's nothing to be got out of him save vague generalities."
Not for some weeks had he talked so much in so short a time. The excitement of meeting his nephew had lent him a fictitious strength, but the effort now told upon him. "Pour me out three-parts of a wine-glassful of that green stuff," he said, indicating a bottle on a side table, "and then fill it up with water."
Having swallowed the cordial, he lay back for a little space with closed eyes. But presently he roused himself, and looked at his watch. "Her ladyship is past her time," he said; "she may be here at any moment."
A curiously apprehensive expression showed itself in his eyes, and Burgo seemed to detect a distinct note of timidity in his voice when he spoke next.
"I'm not sure that I've done right, Burgo, in pressing you to stay," he said; "she won't approve of it--I'm certain she won't approve of it."
"I presume, uncle, that you are master in your own house," said Burgo, with a touch of sternness in his voice.
The old man looked at him for a moment or two in silence. Then he said: "I used to be master in my own house, wasn't I, my boy?"
"No man more so, sir."
"Ah I well, I'm not now. How it's all come about would take too long to tell. Indeed, I'm by no means sure that I'm clear about it myself. It's all due to my breakdown in health, I suppose. I'm not like the same man I used to be. The days come and go, I hardly know how, nor do I greatly care. Giulia has relieved me of all worry and responsibility; she has taken everything into her own hands." Then, after a momentary pause, he added: "And to-day I'm a cipher in my own house."
His chin sank forward on his breast, and for a minute or two he seemed lost in thought. Then, lifting his head, and speaking with an echo of his old energy, he said: "But whether Giulia approves of your being here or no, you must stay, Burgo--you have promised me that."
"As I have said already, not till you bid me go will I budge an inch."
"But the worst of it is that I'm by no means sure of myself from one hour to another. Such is her influence over me that she seems able to make me say and do whatever she chooses. It's a shameful confession for a man to make, but it's the truth. As I remarked before, she's the most devoted of nurses, the most affectionate of wives; and yet, for all that, there are occasions when, for some inscrutable reason, my soul rises in revolt against her. Sometimes, when I wake up in the dark hours, and see her by the dim light of the night-lamp standing by my bedside, and holding in her hand the potion she has mixed for me, a chill horror comes over me--an unreasoning dread of I know not what. It is as though I had just succeeded in breaking the fetters of some dreadful nightmare, but still felt its influence upon me. Happily for me, such moments come but seldom. When I look up into Giulia's beautiful eyes the nightmare feeling leaves me, I swallow my draught, and sink back on my pillows, feeling profoundly grateful that I am blessed with so loving a wife. Ah! that must be the barouche."
Burgo rose, crossed to the window, and looked out. "It is her ladyship," he said quietly.
"Quick--give me a little more of that cordial before she comes upstairs," said Sir Everard.
As Burgo took back the glass he gripped him by the hand. "Courage, uncle!" he said; "remember that you are the master of your own actions, and that under this roof no one has either the right or the power to act in any way whatever in opposition to your wishes."
But Sir Everard scarcely seemed to hear him; his eyes were bent apprehensively on the door. Burgo groaned inwardly. He felt that if it came to a contest with Lady Clinton, both he and his uncle would be ignominiously defeated, simply because the latter would not have enough strength of will to hold his own against her.
The door opened and her ladyship entered the room.
She had been later than usual in reaching the club on her return from the Park, having had to call at her dressmaker'sen route. When told by the hall-keeper at the Mastodon that, as a consequence of a slight attack of indisposition, Sir Everard had already gone home, she drove there as quickly as possible. The report of Vallance, Sir Everard's man, reassured her in some measure. His master on his return seemed in no way worse than when he had left the house with her ladyship, but the strangest part of the affair was that the cabman who had brought him home had not only been allowed to assist him into the house, but was actually closeted with Sir Everard at that moment. Vallance had only been about a year in the baronet's service, and had never set eyes on Mr. Brabazon before that day.
Consequently it was with no ordinary feelings of curiosity that her ladyship opened the study door. Who could this mysterious cabman be who had been shut up with her husband for the last half-hour or more? One glance at his face was enough. Despite the change in his appearance, she recognised Burgo on the instant. Her ebon brows came together for a second or two while she stood holding the open door, and her eyelids contracted in a curiously feline manner. She drew a single long breath, and next moment her face became illumined with one of her sunniest smiles. Closing the door behind her, she went slowly forward.
"My dear," Sir Everard made haste to begin, speaking in an anxious, hurried voice, "this is my nephew, Burgo Brabazon, whom, if I mistake not, you have met on one occasion already. I came over a little queer at the club this afternoon--a mere nothing, due entirely, I believe, to the heat of the weather--and Burgo being fortunately at hand, was enabled to convey me home. He has fallen upon evil days, Giulia, having actually been compelled to drive a cab in order to keep himself from starving. My sister's son--the boy whom I promised his dying mother I would act a father's part by! It is nothing less than shocking, and I feel myself greatly to blame that things should have been allowed to come to such a pass with him. But all that must be altered from to-day. Meanwhile, until I have time and strength to think matters over and decide what had best be done, I have requested him to take up his abode under my roof, which he has agreed to do. So long as he is here he will be able to attend to my little needs, especially at night time, and so divide with you a burden which, although you refuse to admit it, is really beyond your strength, and cannot fail before long to become altogether intolerable."
"Intolerable! my dear Everard, as if anything could be that to me which in the slightest degree concerns your dear self!" exclaimed her ladyship in her clear vibrant tones. "You must not say such things unless you wish both to hurt and offend me" Then turning to Burgo, she added: "All the same, Mr. Brabazon, I am very pleased to see you here, and I trust that your presence and company will help to cheer up your uncle and do him more good than all Dr. Hoskins's prescriptions." Speaking thus, she crossed to him, and smilingly offered her hand. "This house, I have been told, was your home for many years in your youth; why should it not be the same again?"
The baronet heaved a deep sigh of relief, and his face brightened perceptibly.
Burgo took her ladyship's hand and bowed over it. "Thank you very much, Lady Clinton, for your kindly welcome," was all he could find to say. For once in a way he felt thoroughly nonplussed. His eyes met hers, but in them he read nothing aggressive, nothing defiant; they were brilliant, as they could not help being, but beyond that, expression they had none. He noticed, however, that the smile which wreathed the full ruddiness of her lips did not extend beyond them.
Her ladyship turned to her husband. "Do you feel well enough, dear, after your indisposition of this afternoon, to come down to dinner? Yes--I see that you do. Your nephew's presence has done you good already. There is only just time for me to dress. By-the-by, which room have you assigned Mr. Brabazon?"
"Room? He had better have the one that used to be his years ago. I don't believe it has been slept in since. It will seem to you like old times come back again, Burgo, my boy." He was evidently in the cheeriest of spirits.
"I am afraid I must ask your ladyship to excuse my presence at dinner to-day," said Burgo, evidently a trifle discomposed. "I have no clothes here but these which I am wearing, and----"
"My ladyship is prepared to excuse all shortcomings on that score," she broke in with a short laugh. "And so is Sir Everard. Are you not, dear?"
"Of course, of course. What does it matter for once?"
Scarcely had the door closed behind Lady Clinton before it opened to admit Vallance. He had come to assist Sir Everard to his room.
Sir Everard, leaning on Vallance's arm, came down to dinner in due course, looking, Burgo thought, even more frail and feeble in his dress clothes than in the morning suit he had worn earlier in the day. His appetite was of the poorest, and it was evidently more by way of keeping the others company than for anything he partook of himself that he sat down at table. Greatly to the relief of Burgo, who began to fear that he might be condemned, later in the evening, to atête-à-têtewith Lady Clinton (who, not improbably, was beset by a similar fear), the party was made up at the last moment to a quartette in the person of Signora Dusanti, the widow of a well-known musical conductor. The signora, who herself was no mean musician, and had been a popular teacher before her marriage, was now a middle-aged, plain-featured woman, but with an expression of amiability and good sense which at once impressed Mr. Brabazon in her favour. It appeared that she and Lady Clinton had known each other in years gone by, and that the signora had come to stay for a couple of days in Great Mornington Street previously to her final departure for Italy.
After dinner it was a matter of course that there should be music in the drawing-room; indeed, the evening was given up to it, her ladyship being evidently bent on utilising her friend's talents to the utmost while the opportunity of doing so was afforded her. It may here be remarked that, while merely a third-rate but facile executant, Lady Clinton had a cultivated voice, and sang with taste andbrio. It was the only accomplishment for which she cared, or professed to care.
At ten o'clock Sir Everard retired. As he told his nephew with a smile, he had not sat up till so late an hour he hardly knew when. It had already been proposed by the baronet, and assented to by Lady Clinton in the most amiable manner possible, that, so long as Burgo should remain in Great Mornington Street, or so long as the necessity should continue, he should take on himself the task of watching by his uncle during the night, which her ladyship had heretofore refused to delegate to anybody. It was not that there was any occasion to sit and watch by Sir Everard's bedside throughout the night; he was not so ill as to necessitate any such service; it was merely that Dr. Hoskins considered it essential that his medicine should be administered to him at certain stated hours, provided he were not asleep at the time, in which case the dose must be given him as soon as he should have awakened of his own accord. Lady Clinton smilingly admitted to Burgo that the duty had at length become so automatic to her that she could sleep "like a top" between whiles, and yet always wake up within five minutes of the time her services were required.
Mr. Brabazon having bidden good-night to Lady Clinton and the signora (her ladyship had made it a special request that he should not wait up on their account), was introduced by Vallance to his new quarters. The baronet's bedroom was a spacious apartment with three doors, the first opening into the corridor, the second into a commodious dressing-room, and the third giving access to Lady Clinton's apartments. In the bedroom was a couch, and in the dressing-room a chair bedstead, Burgo having the choice of either, on which to take such rest as he might feel inclined for. On an occasional table near Sir Everard's bed were placed his medicines, acarafeof water, and a small decanter of brandy, together with sundry glasses of different shapes and sizes. Should he be awake at those times, his medicine was to be given him at one, four, and seven o'clock respectively. A night-light burnt on the chimney-piece, making the room a home for grotesque shadows, and imparting to the features of the sleeping man the waxen wanness of those of a corpse. Indeed, so startled was Burgo when his eyes first rested on his uncle's face that he bent over him and listened for his breathing before he could satisfy himself that he was really alive.
The dressing-room, which also had a door opening into the corridor, was lighted with gas, and Burgo noted with satisfaction the presence of a big easy-chair which seemed made on purpose to lounge in and read novels. The nights were too warm for there to be any need for a fire. In the course of the evening he had sent to his lodgings for his dressing-case and a portmanteau of linen and clothes, and having selected two or three volumes from the library before coming upstairs, as soon as he could get rid of Vallance, he proceeded to settle himself for the night. He had discarded his boots for a pair of canvas shoes, and had put on an old shooting-coat, and in place of a stiff collar had swathed his throat with a soft shawl. By this it was a quarter-past eleven, so that he had still nearly two hours to wait before it would be time for Sir Everard to take his first draught. After satisfying himself that his uncle still slept, he turned up the gas in the dressing-room, and settled himself with a book in the easy-chair. But he found it impossible to read. So many strange things had happened to him in the course of the day that he could not help going over them again one by one with the object of arranging them more coherently in his mind than he had yet found an opportunity of doing. He was still engaged thus when he became aware of a low tapping at the door which gave access to the corridor. He crossed to it on tiptoe, opened it, and found himself face to face with Lady Clinton. She was no longer resplendent in heliotrope velvet, with necklace and tiara of diamonds and pearls, but swathed in an ample pale bluepeignoirof soft Indian silk, trimmed with swansdown, and it would have puzzled Burgo to decide in which of the two she looked the moreravissante. In either case she was what he termed her to himself--"a splendid creature."
"I hope I have not disturbed you," she whispered. "I tried to tap as gently as possible, and if you had not heard me I should at once have gone back to my room. I thought I should like to satisfy myself before finally retiring that dear Sir Everard is likely to have a good night, for you must know, Mr. Brabazon, that there are nights when he is very restless, and tosses and turns for hours together." All this was spoken in a low and rapid whisper.
"I am happy to inform you, madam, that my uncle is still sleeping soundly, as he was at the time Vallance left him in my charge," replied Burgo in a voice little raised above her own.
"In that case I am satisfied. I leave him in your hands with every confidence. And so, for the second time,buona notte. It would be absurd to wish you pleasant dreams, because I understand that you propose to yourself to keep awake throughout the night."
"That is certainly my intention."
"You shall tell me in the morning whether Morpheus did not succeed in taking you unawares, as he has a trick of doing with all of us. Vallance has instructions to relieve you at seven o'clock." And with a smile and a nod she was gone.
His thoughts turned persistently to Lady Clinton, to the exclusion of everything else, after she was gone. Her manner of receiving him, her smiling cordiality, her instant acquiescence in everything proposed by her husband, had evidently been as great a surprise to the latter--possibly a greater--as it had been to him. No simple maiden in her teens could have been more seemingly candid and ingenuous than was this woman of three husbands. But was she not overdoing it somewhat? Did not her very persistence in posing as a woman who had no will of her own, as one to whom her husband's whims were law, lay her open to suspicions which might never have germinated had she not accepted what to her, metaphorically speaking, could seem nothing less than a slap on the face, with the manner of one wholly unconscious that she had received a slight at her husband's hands? Was it not a little "too thin," Burgo asked himself? He felt, in his own despite, that to a certain extent she fascinated him, and now that he had seen more of her, seen her in one of her more gracious and captivating moods, he no longer wondered greatly that his uncle should have succumbed to her witcheries. It seemed to him that very few men whom she might deliberately set herself to captivate would be able to hold out against her in the long run, even although they might have been prejudiced against her in the beginning. If he credited himself with being one of the few on whom her fascinations would have been wasted, it merely goes to prove that he had not yet gauged the extent of his own fallibility where a charming and determined woman was concerned. Just then he felt a little bitter against the sex, and was inclined to believe that the experience he had lately gone through would serve him as armour of proof against their sorceries for all time to come.
And yet, while admitting to the full Lady Clinton's powers of fascination, he told himself, almost in the next breath, that there was an indefinable something about her which had for him a certain repellent force. Nor did he fail to call to mind that on the first occasion of his seeing her there was an expression in her eyes which at once served to warn him against her. The same expression had struck him unpleasantly again to-day, only to-day it was far less markedly observable than before. It was as though it had been temporarily veiled with a shining film of amiability and smiling good humour, which, however, could not wholly hide a sinister something which lay darkling below.
Now that he was no longer under the influence of her ladyship's presence, now that he could harden himself against her by calling to mind all that he had lost and gone through as the result of her machinations against him, and when his uncle's ominous words recurred to him: "Sometimes--God help me!--I fear for my life," he felt it impossible to come to any other conclusion than that her ladyship was a very dangerous woman, and that he would be a fool to allow himself for one moment to be hoodwinked by her. Judging from what had gone before, it seemed clear that the chief object she had in view was to create an irreparable breach between himself and his uncle, and if for the moment, and that only by a pure accident, her scheme had been foiled, it would be nothing less than fatuous to imagine she had therefore given it up. "The more she smiles, and the more amiable she looks, the more she is to be feared," was Burgo's final summing-up of the affair.
One o'clock came almost before he was aware of it. So far the time had passed swiftly, and yet he had not read a page. He got up and passed lightly into the other room. He had done so twice before, each time to find his uncle still sleeping as calmly as a little child. Nor was he yet awake. But while Burgo was still standing by his bedside, looking down upon him and saying to himself: "Is this mysterious illness, this sudden break-up of his constitution, due to natural causes, or is there a hidden hand at the bottom of it?" Sir Everard opened his eyes.
For a moment or two he stared up at Burgo as he might have done at a stranger; then there came a flash of recognition. "You! my boy," he exclaimed. "I've been dreaming about you. So glad!--so glad!" Then he held out both his bands. "Help me to sit up," he added.
No sooner had he been helped into a sitting position than he began to cast apprehensive glances, first on one side of the bed, and then on the other. "You are sure she is not in the room?" he whispered.
"Who--her ladyship?" Sir Everard nodded. "No; there is no one here but our two selves," replied Burgo.
"No one behind the curtains, eh?" The bed was of the kind termed Arabian, with a canopy and curtains at the head of it.
"You and I are alone in the room, uncle, I assure you."
"And that door is close shut?" pointing to the one which led to his wife's apartments, theportièrecovering which, just then, was only half drawn.
Burgo crossed the room and satisfied himself on the point. Half hidden as it was by theportière, it might have been open for the space of an inch or two without his being aware of it. He pressed it lightly with his hand. "It is close shut," he said, as he went back, and therewith he proceeded to pour into a glass his uncle's prescribed dose of medicine and add to it the requisite quantity of water. Sir Everard drank it off without a word, but not without the silent protest of a wry face.
After that he lay back for a little while with closed eyes, his lips moving silently as though he were communing with himself. Then opening his eyes and seeing Burgo standing by his bedside, he took hold of one of his hands and pressed it in both his own. "Do you know, my boy," he said, "I feel stronger, better, and brighter in every way to-night than I have any time during the last three weeks."
"I need scarcely assure you, uncle, how glad it makes me to hear you say so. From what you tell me, I presume that your worst times are during the night."
"It is nearly always at night that my attacks come on--not every night, mind you--no, no--if they did I should soon have to be measured for my coffin, but it may be three or four times in the course of a week."
"Do you suffer much pain at those times?"
"The attacks are of two kinds. But it's not the painful bouts I dread most."
"What is the nature of your other attacks?"
"A feverish restlessness which effectually banishes sleep. Hour after hour I toss and turn, trying first one position and then another, seeking rest, but nowhere finding it. At such times I have no absolute pain. It is as if a slow fire were smouldering in my veins and gradually drying up every drop of moisture in my body. When morning breaks I feel as weak and helpless as a newborn child, and at such times I say to myself, 'I hope I shall not live to see another dawn.'"
"This is terrible. And such nights as those you speak of are interspersed with others of a more painful kind?"
"That is so. But, as I said before, although the cramp spasms are pretty stiff at times, I contrive to bear them with tolerable equanimity. They don't exhaust me nearly so much as the other attacks do."
"Would it not be more satisfactory (pardon the question) if you were to seek further medical advice--a second opinion, I mean?"
"It will be time enough to do that when Hoskins himself suggests it. No man stands higher in his profession than he, and I have every confidence in him."
"That may be, sir, but the simple question remains--does he understand your case?"
"I am inclined to believe that there are certain features about it which puzzle him in some measure."
"Then why not----?"
"No, no, my boy, not another word on that score. Did I not say that I was satisfied? If Hoskins can't do me any good, nobody can."
For a little space silence reigned in the room. Sir Everard was still holding Burgo's hand, which the latter took as a sign that he did not want him to go, or to be left alone.
"My brain must be softening," resumed the sick man after a time. "I seem to be continually losing my reckoning. Your memory is doubtless better than mine. What day of the week and month is this?"
Burgo told him.
"So! I thought the year was at least a fortnight older than that. I shall not die till after the 12th of October. I shall live to see my sixty-fourth birthday." He spoke the words as if to himself. Burgo felt nearly sure that his uncle was unaware he had spoken aloud.
Nothing more was said. A minute later Sir Everard's hold of his nephew's hand relaxed. He had dropped off to sleep. Burgo went back to his easy-chair in the dressing-room.
Six Everard's last words, uttered half unconsciously, had struck a chill to his heart. What did they portend? What meaning save one could they have? He had by no means forgotten what "old Garden" had told him--that if his uncle should live to see his sixty-fourth birthday, he would inherit the legacy of £15,000 bequeathed him by his cousin, the eccentric Mrs. Macdona. Coupling this fact with the words last spoken by his uncle, it seemed to Burgo that but one conclusion could be deduced therefrom, to wit, that the baronet, unknown to his own lawyer, had made a will in which the whole, or the greater part of whatever he might die possessed of, was left to his wife, and that, consequently, if he outlived his sixty-fourth birthday, Mrs. Macdona's legacy would come into the settlement. Therefore was there a very potent reason why his lamp of life, however low it might now seem to burn, should not be allowed to flicker out till the 12th of October should have come and gone. After that, who could say what might not happen? Even now was not the ground being prepared? Was not the plot developing itself slowly but surely towards a preordained end? Were not his uncle's mysterious illness and gradually growing feebleness but the skilfully arranged stepping-stones to a conclusion long determined on, so that, when at length the end came, it would seem to all concerned merely the natural, but inevitable outcome of all that had gone before? Oh, if it were indeed so, as Sir Everard's own words seemed to clearly imply, it was horrible--horrible!
What was to be done? What could be done? As far as Burgo could see--nothing. It was true that he was here, under his uncle's roof, and that unlimited access to the sick man had been granted him by Lady Clinton, with an absence of any apparentarrière pensèe, which, considering the circumstances, was in itself suspicious; but what then? He could not be by his uncle's side through every hour of the day and night. Sir Everard must be waited on and have his medicine measured out for him by other hands than those of his nephew, and whatever nefarious design might be afoot, could be persevered in and carried out to the tragic finale despite all Burgo's vigilance. His hands were tied; he was bound and helpless; and Lady Clinton knew it far better than he. When she found that circumstances had brought uncle and nephew together again, she had doubtless seen her way to treat the circumstance as one of little or no consequence--perhaps even to turn it to account for her own purposes. Should Sir Everard die, it might be to her advantage to be able to point to the fact that his nephew had helped to nurse him; besides which, Mr. Brabazon would be one witness the more to her own untiring devotion in the dual rôle of wife and nurse.
All these things Burgo Brabazon apprehended clearly, but what he did not discern was a way by which his uncle could be extricated from the deadly net which too evidently was being woven about him. To broach the subject to him was out of the question so long as he had nothing but vague suspicions wherewith to back up his words. Neither could he repeat to his uncle those last words which the latter had let fall before dropping asleep, and ask him the meaning of them. It was quite evident that they had not been intended for his, Burgo's, ear. Clearly, it would be the height of folly to imperil his position under his uncle's roof by speaking of things about which he was supposed to know nothing, and which, it was just possible, might, after all, have no real basis of fact. All he could do just now was to watch and wait and keep a close tongue, while being especially careful not to give Lady Clinton any cause for suspecting that he saw more under the surface than it was intended he should see. Meanwhile he had time before him. Sir Everard himself had averred that his life was safe till the 12th of October should have come and gone.
At four o'clock the sick man was still sleeping. Burgo did not disturb him, but sat by his side and waited. It was nearly an hour later before he awoke. "I seem to have overslept my time," he said with a smile as he glanced at the clock on the chimney-piece, the figures of which were large enough for him to read as he lay in bed. "It's not often I do that. The difficulty with me is to get more than about half as much sleep as I should like. It seems strange to see you here, Burgo, my boy," he added, while the latter proceeded to pour out his medicine. "I'm so used to being waited upon through the night by my wife, that for a second or two after opening my eyes I could not put this and that together. Ugh! awfully nasty stuff this last mixture Hoskins has sent me," he added, as he gave the glass back to his nephew.
Lying back on his pillow, and speaking in the quiet, contemplative way of a man whose dictum is open to no dispute, he presently went on: "I think I have already told you what an affectionate wife and devoted nurse Giulia is. Yes. What would have become of me through all this wearying illness had it not been for her loving care and untiring sacrifice of herself to the needs and whims of her sick husband! But for her I should not be here now. It is she who has kept me alive. From the first she refused to let any hireling come between herself and me. How much I owe her I alone could tell."
Burgo stared, as well he might. What was he to think? What believe? Which mood of his uncle represented the real man? Could it be that his mind was failing him?--that no weight ought to be attached to anything he might give utterance to, and that his moods, in whatever direction they pointed, were merely those of the passing moment? Burgo found himself in a position at once perplexing and unsatisfactory.
But while he was asking himself these questions his uncle's eyelids drooped and closed, and a minute later his low regular breathing told that he was asleep.
As Burgo turned to leave the room he involuntarily started. He saw, or believed that he saw, a slight movement of the inner door, as though it might have been open for an inch or two, and suddenly closed at the instant he turned. He took no further notice, but walked straight out of the bedroom into the dressing-room. But, trivial as the incident was, he could not get it out of his mind. Had her ladyship been an unseen auditor of what had just passed between his uncle and himself? It was a question which, although he had no means of answering it, led up to another and a much more startling one: Had his uncle--for the senses of sick people are often almost preternaturally acute--become in some way aware that his wife was making an unseen third at the interview? and had he said what he did in praise of her with the deliberate intention that it should be overheard by her, and so serve to lull to sleep any suspicions which his nephew's presence under his roof might otherwise have given birth to?
Here was food enough for cogitation to last him till seven o'clock or longer, on the stroke of which hour the punctual Vallance knocked at the dressing-room door, and brought his first night's vigil to an end.