"Sir Vincent Yorke to Mr. Greatorex.
"Send Roland Yorke down to me by first train. Lose no time."
"Good old Dick!" repeated Roland in the fulness of his heart. "I thought he'd remember me; and there was I reproaching him like an ungrateful Tom-cat! It is to appoint me to the bailiff's place, Mr. Greatorex."
"Well--it may be," mused Mr. Greatorex. "But I had fancied the post was filled up."
"Not it, sir. Long live Dick! When did he come back from Paris?"
"I know nothing about Sir Vincent's recent movements, Mr. Yorke. You had better be getting to the Waterloo Station. Have you money for the journey?"
"I've got about sevenpence-halfpenny, sir."
Mr. Greatorex took a half-sovereign from his desk, and ten shillings in silver. "I don't know how often the trains run," he observed, "but if you go at once to the station, you will be all right for the first that starts."
Not to the station, let it start as soon as it would, without first seeing Annabel, and telling her of his good fortune. Away up the stairs went Roland, in search of her, leaping over some boxes that stood packed in the hall: and there he encountered Mr. Bede Greatorex. It was four whole days since Roland had met him, and he thought he had never seen a face so changed in the short space of time. Annabel was not at home, Bede said; she had gone to Mr. Channing's.
"You don't look well, sir."
"Not very, I believe. I am about to try what a month or two's absence will do for me."
"And leave us to old Brown!--thatwillbe a nice go!" exclaimed Roland in blank dismay. "But I may not have to stay," he added more brightly, as recollection returned to him "Vincent Yorke has telegraphed for me, sir, and I and Mr. Greatorex think that he is about to appoint me his bailiff."
A smile crossed the haggard face of Bede. "I wish you success in it," he kindly said.
"Thank you, sir. And I'm sure I wish you and Mrs. Greatorex heaps of pleasure, and I heartily hope you'll come home strong. Oh! and, Mr. Bede--Carrick's coming back."
Bede nodded in answer. Greatorex and Greatorex knew more of the matter than Roland, since it was they who had intimated to the peer that the coast was now sufficiently clear for him.
Roland leaped into a cab, and was taken to Mr. Channing's. He waited in the empty dining-room; and when Annabel came to him, told her hurriedly of what had happened. The cab was waiting at the door, Roland was eager, and her pale cheeks grew rosy with blushes as he talked and held her hands.
"It can't be for anything else, you know, Annabel. He is going to instal me off-hand for certain, or else he would have written and not telegraphed: perhaps the new bailiff (if he did appoint one) has turned out to be no good. There'll be a pretty cottage, I daresay, its walls all covered with roses and lilies, with two hundred a year; and we shall be as happy as the day's long. You'll not mind trying it, will you?"
No, Annabel whispered, the cheeks deepening to crimson, she would not mind trying it. "I think--I think, Roland," she added, bending down her pretty face, "that I might have a pupil if I liked; and be well paid for her."
"That's jolly," said Roland. "We might do, with that, if Dick only offered me one hundred. He is uncommonly close-fisted. There'd be a house free, and no end of fruit and garden-stuff; and living in the country is very cheap."
"It is Jane Greatorex."
"Ohshe," cried Roland, his countenance falling. "She is a regular little toad, Annabel. I'd not like you to be bothered with her."
"She would be always good with me. Mr. and Mrs. Bede are going away, and Mr. Greatorex does not want us there any longer. He said a few words to me today about my returning home to mamma at Helstonleigh and taking Jane with me: that is, if mamma has no objection. He said he would like Jane to be with me better than with any one; and he'd make it worth my while in point of salary."
"Then, Annabel, if you don't object to the young monkey, that's settled, and I shall look upon it that we are as good as married. What a turn in fortune's wheel! Won't I serve Dick with my best blood and marrow! I'll work for him till my arms drop. I say! couldn't I just see Hamish? I'd like to tell him."
He ran softly up the stairs as he spoke. Hamish was in bed; and just now alone, save for Miss Nelly, who had rolled herself upon the counterpane like a ball, her cheek close to his. Roland whispered all the items of good news exultantly: it never occurred to him to think that they might turn out to be castles in the air. A smile, partaking somewhat of the old amused character, flitted across Hamish's wasted but still beautiful face, and sat in his blue eyes as he listened.
"You'll leave Annabel especially to me, won't you, Hamish; and wish us both joy and happiness?"
"I wish you both the best wishes I can wish, Roland--God's blessing," was the low, earnest answer. "His blessing through this life, and in that to come."
Roland bent his face down to Nelly's to hide its emotion, and began kissing her. His grief for Hamish Channing sometimes showed itself like any girl's.
"I have left you her guardian, Roland."
"Me!" exclaimed Roland, the surprise sending him and his wet eyes bolt upright.
"You and Arthur jointly. You will take care of her interests, I know."
"Oh, Hamish, how good of you! Nelly's guardian!Won'tI take care of her! and love her, too. I'll buy her sixpen'orth of best sugared almonds every day."
Hamish smiled. "Not her personal guardian, Roland; her mother will be that. I meant as to her property."
"Never mind; it's all one. Thank you, Hamish, for your trust in me. Oh, I am proud! And mind that you are a good girl, Miss Nelly, now that I shall have the right to call you to order."
Roland did not seem quite to define the future duties in his own mind. Nelly raised her tear-stained face, and looked at him defiantly.
"I'm going away with papa."
"Not with him, my child," whispered Hamish. "You must stay here a little while. You and mamma will come later."
Nelly burst into sobs. "Heaven is better than this. I want to go there."
"We shall all get there in time, Nelly," observed Roland in much gloom, "but I wish I could have gone now in his stead. Oh, Hamish, I do I do indeed! Gerald's black work will never be out of my heart. And there's your book getting its crown of laurels at last, and you not living to wear them!"
The gentle face, bright with a light not of this world, was turned to Roland. "A better crown is waiting for me," he murmured. "My Lord and Master knows how thankfully I shall go to it."
A stamping outside as of an impatient cab-horse on the frosty street, reminded Roland that he was bound on a non-delayable mission. On the stairs he met Annabel, caught hold of her without ceremony, and gave her shrinking face a few farewell kisses.
"Goodbye, darling. When I come back it will be as bailiff of Sunny Mead."
Roland's delay had been just enough to cause him to miss a train, and the evening was considerably later when he was at length deposited at the small station near Sunny Mead.
Looking up the road and down the road in the cold moonlight, uncertain which was his way, he found himself accosted by a man in the garb of a groom.
"I beg pardon, sir: are you Mr. Yorke."
"Yes."
"I've got the dog-cart here, sir."
"Oh, have you?" returned Roland; "I thought Sunny Mead was close to the station."
"It's a matter of ten minutes' walk, sir; but they gave me orders to be down, and wait for every train until you came."
"How long has Sir Vincent been back from Paris?" questioned Roland, as they bowled along.
"From Paris, sir? He haven't been to it: not lately. The accident stopped his going."
"What accident?"
Ah! what accident! Roland's eyes opened to their utmost width with surprise, as he listened to the answer.
"Good heavens! And it was caused, you say, by Gerald Yorke?"
"That it was, sir."
"Why, he's my brother."
"Well, sir, accidents happen unintentional to the best of us," observed the man, striving to be polite. "Some of 'em said that the gentleman didn't show himself 'cute at handling of a gun."
"I don't believe he ever handled one in his life before," avowed impulsive Roland. "What a fool he must have been! How is Sir Vincent going on? I'm sure I hope it was no great damage."
"Sir Vincent was going on all right till today, sir; and as to the damage it was not thought to be much. We hear now that it has taken a turn for the worse. They talk of erysipelas."
"Oh, that's nothing," said Roland. "I knew a fellow who got erysipelas in the face at Port Natal till it was as big as a pumpkin, but he did his work all the same. That's it," he mentally decided, as they approached the house. "Poor Dick, confined indoors, can't look after things himself, and is going to put me to do it."
Upon a flat bed, or couch, in the downstairs room, where we saw him breakfasting with Gerald, lay Sir Vincent Yorke, his dog beside him. He held out his hand to greet Roland. Impulsively and rather explosively, that unsophisticated African traveller burst out with regrets on the score of the accident, and the more especially that it should have been caused by Gerald.
"Ay, it was a bad job," said Sir Vincent, quietly. "Sit down Roland. Here near to me. I am in a good bit of pain, and don't care to talk at a distance."
Roland took the chair pointed to, not a yard off Sir Vincent as he lay, and the two looked at each other. A kind of honest shame was on Roland's face: he was inwardly asking himself how much more disgrace Gerald meant to bring on him. The moderator lamp, a soft, thin perforated paper thrown over to subdue its brightness, was behind the invalid.
"I hope you'll soon be about again, Vincent."
"I hoped so, too, until this morning," was Sir Vincent's answer. "My leg was very uneasy all last night, and I sent at daybreak for the surgeon. He came, and was obliged to tell me that an unfavourable change had taken place: in fact, that dangerous symptoms had set in."
"But you can be cured?" cried Roland.
"No, not now."
"Not be cured!" exclaimed Roland, starting up with wild eyes, and hardly knowing what to understand. "Do you mean, that it will be long first?"
"I mean, that I shall never be cured at all in this world. Sit down, Roland, and listen quietly. The wound, regarded at first as a very simple one, and apparently continuing to progress well, has taken a turn for the worse; and must shortly end in death. Now, do be tranquil, old fellow, and listen. You are my heir, you know, Roland."
Roland, constrained to patience and his chair, stared, and pulled at his whiskers, and stared again.
"Your heir?"
"Certainly. My heir."
The contingency had never, in the whole course of his life, entered into the imagination of simple Roland. He sat in speechless bewilderment.
"The moment the breath goes out of this poor frail body--and the doctors tell me it will not be many more hours in it now--you will be Sir Roland Yorke. The fourth baronet, and the possessor of the Yorke estates--such as they are."
"Oh, my gracious!" uttered Roland, a vast deal more startled at the prospect than he had been at that of crying hot-pies in Poplar. "Do you mean it, Vincent?"
"Meanit! Where are your wits gone, that you need ask? You must know as well as I do that you come next in succession."
"I never thought of it; never once. I don't want it, Vincent, old fellow; I don't, indeed. I hope, with all my heart, you'll get well, and hold it for yourself. Oh, Dick, I hope you will!"
Roland had risen and caught the outstretched hand. As Sir Vincent heard the earnest tones, and saw the face of genuine concern shining out in all its guileless simplicity, the tears in the honest eyes, he came to the conclusion that Roland had been somewhat depreciated among them.
"Nothing can save me, Roland; the doctors have pronounced me to be past human skill, and I feel for myself that I am so. It has not been long, one day, 'to set my house in order,' has it?"
Amidst Roland's general confusion, nothing had struck him more than the change in Vincent's tone. The old, mincing affectation was utterly gone. A man cannot retain such when brought face to face with death.
"If you could but get well!" repeated poor Roland, rubbing his hot face as he got back to his chair.
"Doctors, lawyers, and parsons--I have had them all here today," resumed Sir Vincent. "The first man I sent for, after the fiat was pronounced, was a lawyer from the village hard by: there might not be time, I feared, to get down old Greatorex. He made a short will for me: and it was only when I began to consider what its provisions should be, that I (so to say) remembered you as my heir and successor."
Roland sat, hopelessly listening, unable to take in too much at once.
"The entailed property lapses to you; but there is some, personal and else, at my own disposal. With the exception of a few legacies, I have bequeathed it all to you, Roland--and you'll be poor enough: and I've appointed you sole executor. But I think you will make a better man, as the family's head, than I might have made in the long run; and I am truly glad that it is you to succeed, and not Gerald."
Roland gave a groan.
"I allude to his disposition, which I don't think great things of, and to his propensity for spending," continued Sir Vincent. "Gerald would have every acre of the estate mortgaged in a couple of years: I think you will be different. Don't live beyond your means, Roland; that's all.
"I'll try to do my very best by everybody," replied Roland. "As to living beyond my means, Annabel will see to that, and take care of me. Dick! Dick! it seems so wicked of me to talk coolly of it, as if I were speculating on your death. I wish you'd try and live! I don't want the estate and the money; I never thought of such a thing as coming in to it. I rushed down here tonight, hoping you were going to make me your bailiff; and I thought how well I'd try to serve you, and what a good fellow you were for doing it."
"Ah," was the dying man's slight comment, as he drew himself a trifle higher in the bed. "You will be master instead of bailiff; that's all the difference. I had just engaged a bailiff when you wrote: and I'd advise you to keep him on, Roland, unless you really feel competent to the management yourself."
"I'll keep him on until I've learnt it; that won't be long first. I must have something to employ my time in, Vincent."
"True: I wish I had had it. An idle man must, almost of necessity, glide into various kinds of mischief: of which debt is one."
"You need not fear debt for me, Vincent," was the earnest answer. "I have lived too long on empty pockets, and earned a crust before I ate it, to have ill ways for money or inclination to spend. Why, my best dress suit has been in pawn these two months: and old Greatorex had to advance me twenty shillings to bring me down here."
Something like a smile flitted over Sir Vincent's lips. He pointed to a desk that stood on a side-table.
"When I am gone, Roland, you can open that: there's a little loose cash in it. It will be enough to repay Greatorex and redeem your clothes."
"But I'd not like to take it, Vincent, thank you. I'd not, indeed."
"Why, man! it will be your own then."
"Oh, well--I never!" cried Roland softly: quite unable to realize his fast-approaching position.
"The danger to some people might lie in being thus suddenly raised from poverty to affluence," remarked Sir Vincent. "It has shipwrecked many a one."
"Don't fear for me, or for the estate either, Vincent. Had this happened some seven or eight years ago, when I was a lazy, conceited, ignorant young fool, nearly as stuck-up as Gerald, I can't say how it might have been. But I went to Port Natal, you know; and I gained my life's lesson there. Hamish Channing has left me guardian to Nelly. I can guess why he did it, too--that the world may see he thinks me worthy to be trusted at last. He had always the most delicately generous heart in Christendom."
"Hamish and I!" murmured Sir Vincent, in self-communing, "on the wing nearly together."
Yes, it was so. And Roland, with all his lamentation, could not alter the fiat.
"What was the lesson you learnt at Port Natal?"
"Not to be a reckless spendthrift; not to be idle and useless. Vincent," added Roland, bending his face forward in its strange earnestness, and dropping his voice till it was scarcely louder than a whisper, "I learnt in Port Natal that there was another world to live for after this: I learnt that our time was not our own to waste in sin, but God's time, given us to use for the best. A chum of mine out there, named Bartle, was struck down by an accident; the doctor said he'd not live the day out--and he didn't. It was a caution to hear his moans and groans, Vincent. He had not been very bad, as far as I knew, in the ways that the world calls bad; he had only been careless and idle, and wasted his days, and never thought of what was to come after. I wish everybody that's the same had seen him die, Vincent, and heard his dreadful cries for mercy. If ever I forget to remember it, I think God would forget me. I saw many such sudden deaths, and plenty of remorse for them, but none as trying as his. It taught me a lesson: brought me to thought, you know. Don't you fear for me, Vincent; it will be all right, I hope: and if I could ever be so foolhardy as to look at a step on the backward route, Annabel would not let me take it."
Roland had spoken in characteristic oblivion that the case, as to the sudden striking down, bore so entire an analogy to the one before him. Sir Vincent recalled it to him.
"Yes. Just as it is with me, Roland."
"Oh--but--you've got time yet, you know, Dick," he said, a little confused. "A parson, who was knocking about, over there, in a threadbare coat, came in and saw Bartle, and talked to him about the thief on the cross. Bartle couldn't see it; his fears didn't let him;youmay."
"Yes, yes," replied Sir Vincent, with a half smile, but Roland thought it looked like a peaceful one. "I have had a parson with me also, Roland."
Roland's face lighted up with a kind of reverence. Sir Vincent put out his hand and stroked the dog.
"You'll be kind to him, Roland?"
"Oh, won't I, Dick! What's his name?"
"Spot."
"Here! Spot, Spot!"
"Go, Spot. Go to your future master."
"Come, then, old fellow. Spot! Spot!"
The dog made a sudden leap to the side of Roland at the call, and rubbed his nose against the extended hand.
"I'll be as good to him as if he were a child," spoke Roland, in his earnestness. "See! we are friends already, Vincent."
And this simple-hearted young fellow was the scapegoat they had all despised! Sir Vincent caught the strong hand and clasped it within his delicate one.
Early in the afternoon and the Waterloo Railway Station. A gentleman got out of a first-class carriage, and made his way to one of the waiting hansoms.
"Stop at the first hatter's you come to," he said to the driver.
Leaping out when his directions were obeyed, he entered the shop and asked for a mourning band to be put on his hat; a "deep one." You do not need to be told who it was, and what the black band was for. Vincent had died about eight o'clock in the morning, and the Natal traveller was Sir Roland Yorke.
Save for the fact that he had some money in his pockets, in actual reality, which afforded a kind of personal ease to the mind, he was anything but elated at the change of position. On the contrary, he felt very much subdued. Roland could not be selfish, and the grief and shock brought him by the unexpected death of his cousin Vincent, outweighed every thought of self. He had already tasted some of the fruits of future power. Servants and others had referred to him that morning as the new baronet and their master; his pleasure had been consulted in current matters touching the house and estate, his orders been requested as to the funeral. Roland was head of all now, the sole master. Setting aside the sadness that filled his heart to the exclusion of all else, the very suddenness of the change would prevent him as yet realizing it in his own mind.
With the conspicuous band on his hat, stretching up rather above the top of the crown, Roland entered the cab again, and ordered it to the office. There he presented himself to Mr. Greatorex.
"Well?" said the lawyer, turning round from his desk "So you are back again! What did Sir Vincent want with you? Has he made you his bailiff?"
Roland sadly shook his head. And Mr. Greatorex saw that something was wrong.
"What's amiss?" he hastily inquired.
"If you please sir, I am Sir Roland now."
"You are what?" exclaimed Mr. Greatorex.
"It's only too true," groaned Roland. "Poor Vincent is dead. Mr. Greatorex, I'd work on all fours for a living to the end of my days if it could bring him to life again. I never thought to come in, I'm sure; and I wouldn't willingly. He died at eight o'clock this morning."
Mr. Greatorex leaned back in his chair and relieved his mind by a pastime he might have caught from Roland--that of staring. Not having heard of Sir Vincent's accident, this assertion of his death sounded only the more surprising. Was Roland telling the truth? He almost questioned it. Roland, perceiving the doubt, gave a summary of particulars, and Mr. Greatorex slowly realized the facts.
Sir Roland Yorke! The light-headed, simple-minded clerk, who had been living on a pound a week and working sufficiently hard to get it, suddenly transformed into a powerful baronet! It was like a romance in a child's fairy tale. Mr. Greatorex rose and held out his hand.
"I must congratulate you on your succession, Sir Roland, sad though the events are that have led to it."
"Now don't! please don't!" interrupted Roland. "I hope nobody will do that, sir: it sounds like a wrong on poor Dick. Oh, I'd bring him to life again if I were able."
"I trust you will make us your men of business, Sir Roland," resumed Mr. Greatorex, still standing. "We have been solicitors to the head of the Yorke family in succession for many years now."
"I'm sure if you'll be at the trouble of acting for me, I should like nothing better, sir: bad manners to me if I could have any different thought! And I've put your name and Mr. Bede's down in the list for the funeral, if you'll please attend it. There'll be but a few of us in all. Gerald (though I shouldn't thinkhewill show his face at it), William Yorke, Arthur Channing, two or three of Dick's friends, and you and Mr. Bede. Poor Dick said to me when he was dying not to have the same kind of show he had for his father's funeral, he saw the folly of it now, but the quietest I could order. I think he has gone to heaven, Mr. Greatorex."
But that the subject was a solemn one, Mr. Greatorex had certainly laughed at the quaint simplicity of the concluding sentence. One reminiscence in connection with the past funeral rose forcibly in his mind--of the slighting neglect shown to the young man now before him. He, the real heir-presumptive, only that nobody had the wit to think of it, was not deemed good enough to follow his uncle to the grave. But stood in his place now.
Bede would not be able to attend the ceremony, Mr. Greatorex said aloud: he was already in France, having crossed over with his wife by the last mail train.
"What is the matter with him?" asked Roland. "He looked as ill as he could look yesterday."
"I don't know what the matter is," said Mr. Greatorex. "He has an inward complaint, and I fear it must be making great strides. His name will be taken out of the firm tomorrow, and give place to Frank's. It was Bede's own request: it is as if he fears he may never be capable of business again."
"I'm sure I hope he will," cried Roland in his sympathy. "About me, Mr. Greatorex? Of course I'd not like to leave you at a pinch; I'll come to the office tomorrow morning and do my work as usual for a day or two, until you've found somebody to replace me. I should like to take this afternoon for myself."
But Mr. Greatorex with a smile, thought they should not need to trouble Sir Roland: which was no doubt an agreeable intimation: and Roland really had a good deal to do in connection with his new position.
"If I'm not forgetting!" he exclaimed, just as he was taking his departure. "There's the money you lent me, sir, and I thank you for the loan of it."
In taking the sovereign from his pocket, he pulled out several. Mr. Greatorex jokingly remarked that he had apparently no longer need to borrow.
"It is from poor Dick's desk," sadly observed Roland. "He told me there was enough money in it to repay the pound to you and get my clothes out of pawn, and that it would be all my own when he died. Well, what do you think I found there when I opened it today?--Nearly a hundred pounds in gold and bank notes!"
"But you have not got all that about you, I hope?"
"Yes I have, sir; it was safer to bring it up than to leave it. I shall pay it into the banker's. I've got to show myself there, I suppose, and leave my signature in their books; it won't be so neat a one as poor Dick's."
Roland departed. Looking in for a moment at the office as he went out, and announcing himself as Sir Roland Yorke, upon which Mr. Hurst burst out laughing in his face. He dashed in on Mrs. Jones with his news, ate nearly the whole of a shilling Madeira cake that happened to be on the table, while he talked, and made a voluntary promise to that tart and disbelieving matron to refurnish her house from top to bottom.
Then the cab was ordered to the banker's, where his business was satisfactorily adjusted. Gerald's chambers were not far off, and Roland took them next. The servant met him with the bold assertion that his master was out.
"Don't bother yourself to deny him, my good man; I saw his face at the window," said Roland, with frankness. "You may safely show me in: I am not a creditor."
"Well, sir, we are obliged to be excessively cautious, just now, and that's the truth," apologized the man in a tone of confidence. "Mr. Yorke, I think?"
"Sir Roland Yorke," corrected Roland.
"Sir?" returned the man, looking at him as if he thought he saw a lunatic.
"Sir Roland Yorke," was the emphatic repetition. "Have the goodness to announce me."
And the servant opened the room door and did it.
As Roland saw Gerald's quick look of surprise, he would, under other circumstances, have shaken in his shoes at the fun. But sadness wholly reigned over him today. And--if truth must be told--a terrible aversion to Gerald for his work and its fruits held possession of the new heir.
"Oh, it's you," cried Gerald, roughly. "What on earth possessed the fellow?"
"The fellow did right, Gerald. I gave him my name, and he announced it."
"Don't come here with your fool's blabber. He said 'Sir Roland Yorke.'"
"And it is what I am."
Gerald's face grew dark with passion. He had an especial dislike to be played with.
"Vincent's dead, Gerald."
"It is a lie."
"Vincent died this morning at eight o'clock," repeated Roland. "I was with him: he telegraphed for me yesterday. Look at this mourning band"--showing his hat--"I've just been to get it put on. Do you think I'd have the face to invent a jest on this subject? Vincent Yorke is dead, poor fellow, and I have come into things as Sir Roland. Not that I can fully believe it myself yet." The tone of the voice, the deep black band, and a kind of subtle instinct within himself brought conviction of the truth home to Gerald Yorke. Had it been to save his fame, he could not have helped the loud brazen tone from going out of his voice, or the dread that took possession of his whole aspect.
"What--has--he--died--of?"
"The gunshot wound."
A pause. Gerald broke it.
"It was going on well. I heard so only two days ago."
"But it took a sudden turn for the worse; and he is dead."
Gerald's face assumed a tinge as of bluish chalk. Was he to havetwolives on his soul? Hamish Channing's had surely been enough for him without Vincent Yorke's. Pushing back his damp hair, he met Roland's steady look, and so made believe to feel nothing, went to the fire, and stirred it gently.
"Why did the doctors let it takethisturn?" he asked, flinging down the poker. "It was as simple a wound as ever was given."
"I suppose they'd have helped it if they could."
Another pause.
"Well--of course--as youhavesucceeded, I must congratulate you," said Gerald stiffly and lamely. Absently, too, for he was buried in thought, reflecting on what an idiotic policy his, to Roland, had been: but this contingency had never occurred to him more than it had to Roland.
"Vincent had a good lot of property that was not entailed," resumed Gerald. "Do you know who he has willed it to? Did he make a will?"
"He made a will yesterday, before telegraphing for me," Gerald lifted his face with a transient hope.
"I wonder if he has remembered me?"
"I think not. Except some legacies to the servants, and a keepsake for Miss Trehern--his watch and diamond ring, I fancy--he said nobody's name was mentioned in the will but mine. It has not been opened: I thought I'd leave it till after the funeral. I am the executor."
"You!--you don't want his ready money as well as his inheritance, spoke Gerald, in a foam.
"I'm sure I didn't want any of it, I only thought to be his bailiff; but I can't help it if it has come to me," was Roland's quiet answer, as he turned to depart. "Good afternoon, Gerald. I thought it right to call and tell you of his death: you may like to draw your blinds down."
"Thanks," said Gerald, sarcastically.
"You will receive an invitation to the funeral, Gerald. But I'd like to intimate that if you do not care to attend, I shall not look upon it in the light of a slight," added candid Roland, who really spoke in simple good nature. "We shall be enough without you if you'd rather stay away."
Before Gerald's awful rage at the speech was over, for he looked upon it as bestowed in a patronizing light from the new baronet, Roland was vaulting into the waiting cab. Gerald had the pleasure of peeping on from the window.
"Sir Roland Yorke!--Sir Roland Yorke!" he spoke aloud in his horrible mortification. "Sunny Mead for his home, and four thousand a year landed property, and heaps of ready money. Curse the beggar! Curse the shot that has brought him the luck of the inheritance! I'd sell my soul for it to have been mine. I should wear the honours better than he. I wish to Heaven he could die tonight!"
And Mr. Gerald Yorke, looking after the receding cab with a dark and sullen countenance, could indeed have sold his soul; if by so doing he might have annihilated his brother and stepped into his place. He was in that precise frame of mind for which some few men in the world's actual history, and a vast many in fiction, have stained their hands with crime for the greed of gain.
* * * * * *
Tread lightly, speak softly; for death is already hovering in the chamber. As Roland enters on tiptoe he takes in the scene at a glance. Hamish lying, with closed eyes, and the live ball, Miss Nelly, tucked outside beside him her golden curls mingling with his damp hair. A sea of old Helstonleigh faces seems to be gathered round; save that Roland silently clasps Arthur's hand, he takes notice of none. Edging himself between Annabel and Tom Channing, as they stand side by side, he bends his face of concern downwards. The slight stir arouses Hamish, he opens his eyes, and holds up his feeble hand with a remnant of the old smile.
"Back again! Head bailiff?"
Roland bit his lip. His chest was heaving with emotion, his face working. Hamish, who retained his keenest perceptive faculties to the last, spoke again in his faint voice.
"Is it good news?"
"It's good news. Good news, Hamish, and at the same time awfully bad. Vincent's dead, and I'm--I'm in his shoes."
Hamish did not seem to understand. Neither did the others.
"It's me to come after him, poor fellow, you see. I am Sir Roland now."
As the words fell upon the previously silent room, you might have heard a pin drop. Cheeks flushed, eyes looked out their questioning surprise at the speaker. Upon Hamish alone the communication seemed to make no impression: earthly interests were to him now as nothing.
"You will give me Annabel with a will, Hamish, now that I have come into the family inheritance?"
"I had already given her to you, so far as my best will was good to do it. Roland----"
The voice seemed to be fading away altogether, but in the eyes there was an eager gaze. Roland bent his head lower to catch the sounds about to issue from the lips.
"There's a different and a better inheritance, Roland; one of love, and light, and everlasting peace. You will both of you strive for that."
"Yes, that we will. And gain it too. Oh, Hamish, if you could but stop with us a bit longer!" burst forth Roland, letting his suppressed emotion come out with a choking sob. "It's nothing all round but dying. First Vincent, and now you! I never knew such a miserable world as this. I'd have laid down my own life to keep either of you in it."
There stole a smile of ineffable peace over the dying face. It seemed to have caught a ray of the heavenly light in which it would so soon be shining.
It is certainly not often in this life that improbable dreams of fame and fortune get to be realized as they were in the case of Roland Yorke. Down he went to his native place, Helstonleigh, in all the glory of fame and fortune that his imagination had been wont to picture: the dog, Spot, with him. He paid his creditors their debts twice over he made presents to his mother and the world; he went knocking at old Galloway's door, and caused himself to be fully announced, as he had at Gerald's--Sir Roland Yorke. He ran in and out of the proctor's office at will, took possession of his former stool there, and answered callers as if he were the veritable clerk he used to be. He promised a living to Tom Channing, promotion in India to Charley; made a sweeping bow to William Yorke the first time he met him in the street, and called out to know whether he might be considered a scapegoat still. He put up a tombstone to commemorate the virtues of Jenkins. Meeting Harry Huntley, he nearly cried over Hamish. Hamish Channing's book was at length in every heart and home--ah, that he had lived to see it! The good had all come too late forhim. Ellen would be wealthy from henceforth, for her father had regained his fortune; her aunt, stiff Miss Huntley, had died, and bequeathed to her the whole of hers; and little Miss Nelly was an heiress.
Not immediately, however, had Roland hastened to quit London for Helstonleigh, and there's something to tell about it. He had affairs to attend to first; and it took him some time to forget his daily sorrow for the dead. Roland's private belief was that he should never cease to mourn for Hamish; should never rise in the morning, or go to rest at night, without thinking of him and Gerald's miserable work. He entered on his abode at Sunny Mead, his home from henceforth, made himself acquainted with his future position, and what his exact revenues would be. In his imperfect way, but honest wish to do right, he apportioned out plenty of work for himself, and not much to spend, resolving above all things to eschew a life of frivolity and idleness. Roland would rather have followed the plough's tail day by day, than sink to that.
The first few weeks he divided his time between Sunny Mead and London. When in town, he dropped in upon his old friends with native familiarity: prosperity and a title could not change Roland. The office and clerks saw him very often; Mrs. Jones's tea and muffins occasionally suffered by a guest who had a large appetite. He refurnished that tart lady's house for her after a rather sharp battle; for at first Mrs. J. would not accept the boon. The first visitor Roland had the honour of entertaining was Lord Carrick. His white-haired lordship was flourishing in London again, and gave Roland a whole week of his hearty, genial good-natured company at Sunny Mead.
The thorn in the flesh was Gerald, and it happened that Mr. Gerald's career came to a crisis during the week of Lord Carrick's stay at Sunny Mead. On the last day of it, when they were out in the frost, and the peer was imparting to his nephew sundry theories for the best cultivation of land, a servant ran out to announce the arrival of a lady, who had come in great haste from the railway station. She appeared to be in distress, the man added, and said she must at once see Sir Roland.
In distress beyond doubt: for when Roland went clattering in, wondering who it could be, there met him the tear-stained face of Winny. She had brought down a piteous tale. Gerald, arrested the previous day, had lodgings in that savoury prison, Whitecross Street; he had boldly sent her to ask Roland to pay his debts and set him free. Winny, sobbing over some luncheon that Roland good-naturedly set her down to at once, protested that she felt sure one at least of the three little girls would be found in the fire when she got back to them.
Lord Carrick drew Roland aside.
"I'm not ill-natured, me boy, as ye knew long ago, and I'd do a good turn for anybody; but I'd like to give ye a caution.Don't begin by paying Gerald's debts. If ye do, as sure as ye're a living man, ye'll never have a minute's peace for him to the last day of ye're life. Set him free now, and all his thanks would be to run up more for ye to pay. In a year's time he'd be in the same plight again; and he or his creditors would be bothering ye always.Don't begin it. Let him fight out his debts as he best can."
"It's just what I'd like to do," said Roland. "I'd not mind allowing a couple of hundred a year, or so, for Winny and the children. I meant to offer it. It might be paid to her weekly, you know, uncle, and I could slip something more into her hand whenever we met. She might get a bit of peace then. But I don't think it would be doing Gerald any real kindness in the long run to release him from his debts."
Lord Carrick nodded most emphatically.
"I need not tell Winny this, Uncle Carrick--only that she and the kittens shall be taken care of from henceforth. She can carry a sealed note back to Gerald."
"I'll see to him," said Lord Carrick. "If he is to get any help at all, it must be from me. Ye can write the note to him. It would be the worst day's work ye ever entered on if ye attempted to help him. It is nothing else but helping people, Roland, me boy, that has kept me down, and I'd not like to see you begin it. If Gerald can't get clear without assistance, I may come to the rescue later. But he'll have to try."
"Perhaps I might be got to allow him a hundred a year, or so, for himself later," added relenting Roland. "But I'll never have anything to do with his debts, or suffer him to look to me to pay them."
Could Gerald in his distant and gloomy abode, but have heard this, he had surely been ready to shoot the pair of speakers; and with more intentional malignity, too, than he had shot Sir Vincent.
But we began the chapter at Helstonleigh. For once in its monotonous life that faithful city had found something to arouse it from its jog-trot course; and people flew to their doors and windows to gaze after Sir Roland Yorke. It did not seem much less improbable that the time-honoured cathedral might some night disappear altogether, than that the once improvident schoolboy of not too good repute, the careless run-a-gate who had made a moonlight flitting, and left some fifty pounds' worth of debts behind him, should come back Sir Roland, like a hero of romance.
Fruition never answers to anticipations--as Roland found, now that his golden visions came to be realized. The romantic charm of the oft-pictured dream was wanting; the green freshness of sanguine boyhood no longer threw its halo on his heart; the vivid glow of imaginative hope had mellowed down to a sober tint. In manner, in gleeful frankness, Roland was nearly as impulsive and boyish as ever; but his mind had gained a good deal of experience, and reflection had come to him. The chances and changes of the world had worked their effect; and the deaths caused directly or indirectly by Gerald, sat heavily on his generous heart. Adam's curse lies on all things, and there can be no pleasure without pain.
Roland did not miss it. Enough of charm was left to him. Annabel was staying with her mother, and things seemed to have gone back again to the dear old days before Roland had known the world, or tasted of its cares. Roland went calling upon his acquaintance continually, distant and near, making himself at home everywhere. Ellen Channing, worn to a thread-paper with grief, was visiting her father in her maiden home. Nelly made its charm now. The young widow would probably take up her abode at Helstonleigh, in spite of Roland's strong advice that it should be near Sunny Mead.
"I told you I should be sure to get on and make my fortune sometime, Mr. Galloway."
The old proctor, whose health was failing hopelessly, returned a slighting answer. Roland, without ceremony as usual, had dashed into the office, and was sitting on a high desk with his legs dangling. The remark was given in return for some disparaging observation as to Roland's former doings.
"Youmade it! Ugh! A great deal of that."
"Oh--well--I've come into one, at any rate."
"The only way you were ever likely to attain to one. Left to your own exertions, you'd have got back here with holes in your breeches."
"Now don't you be personal, sir," was the laughing rejoinder. "I'm Sir Roland Yorke, you know."
"And a fine Sir Roland you'll be!"
"I'll try and be a good one," said Roland emphatically, as he caught Arthur's eye--who was seated in the place of state as the head of the office, for the proctor had virtually resigned it. "Arthur knows he can trust me now: ask him, else, sir. Hamish knew it also before he died."
"I should like to hear what business he had to die, and who killed him?" cried old Galloway explosively. "It was done amongst you, I know. A nice thing for my old friend Mr. Huntley to get back to England and find his son-in-law dead: the bright, true young fellow that he loved as the apple of his eye."
"Yes, I think he was killed among us, up there," sadly avowed Roland, his honest face kindling with shame. "But I did not help in it, Mr. Galloway; I'd have given my life to save his. I wish I could!"
"Wishes won't bring him back. I saw his wife yesterday--his widow, that is. I'm sure I couldn't bear to look at her."
"Did you see sweet little Nelly?" cried Roland eagerly, his thoughts taking a turn. "If ever I have a girl of my own I hope she'll be like that child."
"Now just you please to take yourself off, Sir Roland, and come in when we're a little less busy," returned the proctor, who was very much out of sorts that morning. "You are hindering business, just as you used to do."
But perhaps the greatest of all small delights was that of encountering Mr. Butterby. Roland had just emerged from the market house one Saturday, where he had been in the thick of the throng, making himself at home, and inquiring affably the price of butter of all the faces he remembered, and been seduced into buying a tough old gander, on the grave assurance that it was a young and tender goose, when he and the detective met face to face.
"Well?" said Roland, dangling the goose in his hand, as unblushingly as though it had been a bouquet of choice flowers.
"Well?" returned Mr. Butterby. "How are you, sir? I heard you were down here."
"Ay. I've come to set things straight that I left crooked. And glad to be able to do it at last. You've heard about me, I suppose, Butterby?"
"I've heard," assented Butterby. "You are Sir Roland Yorke, and have come into the family estates and honours, through the untimely death of Sir Vincent. A lucky shot for you, sir."
"Lucky?" groaned Roland. "Well, in one sense I suppose it was: but don't go and think me a heartless camel, Butterby. I declare to you that if I could bring Sir Vincent back, though I had to return to my work again, and the turn-up bedstead at Mrs. J.'s, I'd do it this minute cheerfully. When I sat by, watching him die, knowing he was going to make room for me, I felt downright wicked: almost as bad as my nice brother must have felt, who shot him. Did you read about it in the newspapers?--they had got it all as pat as might be. I can't think, for my part, how they lay hold of things."
Butterby nodded assent. There was little he did not read, if it could in the remotest degree concern him.
"I'm paying up, Butterby. Paying everybody, and something over. If ever I get into debt again call me an owl. Galloway groans and grunts, and says I shall; but I fancy he knows better. What do you think? He took his hat off to me in the street yesterday! formerly he'd hardly nod to me over his shoulder sideways."
"How were the folks up yonder, Sir Roland, when you left?" asked Butterby, jerking his head in the direction of London. "Is Miss Rye all right?"
"Oh, she's uncommon jolly. The last day I called there, Mrs. J. said she supposed she and Winter--they call him Winter now--would be making a match of it. Upon that, I told Miss Rye I'd buy her the wedding dress. Instead of being properly grateful, she advised me not to talk so fast. I say, Butterby, thatwasa mistake of yours, that was--the taking her into custody for the one that killed John Ollivera."
"Ay," carelessly returned Mr. Butterby, with a kind of sniff. "The best of us go in for mistakes, you know."
"I supposeyoucan't help it, just as some people can't help dreaming," observed Roland with native politeness. "I went up and saw his grave yesterday. I say, shall you ever pitch upon the right one?"
But that Mr. Butterby turned his eyes away towards the Guildhall opposite before he answered, Roland might have observed a peculiar shade cross their steady light. Whatever curious outlets his speculations had drifted to in the course of years, as to the slayer of Mr. Ollivera, he knew the truth now.
"Shan't try at it, sir. Take it from first to last, it has been about the queerest case that over fell under mortal skill; and we are content for the future to let it be."
"I won't forget you, Butterby. You've not been a bad one on the whole. A snuffbox would be of no use, you said; but you shall have something else. And look here, if ever you should come within range of my place in Surrey, I'd be glad to see you there for half an hour's chat. Good-day, old Butterby. Isn't this a prime goose? I've just been giving seven shillings for it."
He and his ancient goose went vaulting off. Roland frequently took articles home to help garnish Lady Augusta's dinner-table; very much to the wrath of the cook, who found she had double work.
But it must not be thought Roland led entirely an idle life at Helstonleigh. Apart from personal calls on his friendship, in the shape of dropping in upon people, he had work on his hands. By Mrs. J.'s permission he was replacing the plain stone on poor Jenkins's grave with one of costly marble. Roland himself undertook the inscription. Not being accustomed to composition, he found it a puzzling task.