CHAPTER III.
A MYSTERIOUS VISITOR.
The next day was fine, and Mr. Sampson and his visitor set out in a dogcart directly after breakfast on a tour of inspection. They got over a good deal of ground between an eight o’clock breakfast and a six o’clock dinner, and John Treverton had the pleasure of surveying many of the broad acres that were in all probability to be his own; but the farms which lay within adrive of Hazlehurst did not constitute a third of Jasper Treverton’s possessions. Mr. Sampson told his companion that the estates were worth about eleven thousand a year altogether, besides which there was an income of about three thousand more accruing from money in the funds. The old man had begun life with only six thousand a year, but some of his land bordered closely on the town of Beechampton, and had developed from agricultural land into building land in a manner that had increased its value seven-fold. He had lived quietly, and had added to his estate year after year by fresh purchases and investments, until it reached its present amount. To hear of such wealth was like some dream of fairyland to John Treverton. Mr. Sampson spoke of it as if to all intents and purposes it were already in the other’s possession. His sound legal mind could not conceive the possibility of any sentimental objection on the part of either the gentleman or the lady to the carrying out of a condition which was to secure the possession of that noble estate to both. Of course, in due time Mr. Treverton would make Miss Malcolm a formal offer, and she would accept him. Idiocy so abject on the part of either the gentleman or the lady as a refusal to comply with so easy a condition was scarcely within the limits of human folly.
Looking at the matter from this point of view, Mr. Sampson was surprised to perceive a certain air of gloom and despondency about his companion which seemed quite unnatural to a man in his position. John Treverton’s eye kindled with a gleam of triumph as he gazed across the broad, bare fields which the lawyer showed him; but in the next minute his face grew sombre again, and he listened to the description of the property with an absent air that was inexplicable to Thomas Sampson. The solicitor ventured to say as much by-and-by, when they were driving homeward through the winter dusk.
‘Well, you see, my dear Sampson, there’s many a slip between the cup and the lip,’ John Treverton answered, with that light, airy tone which most people found particularly agreeable. ‘I must confess that the manner in which this estate has been left is rather a disappointment to me. My cousin Jasper told me that his death would make me a rich man. Instead of this I find myself with a blank year of waiting before me, and with my chances of coming into possession of this fortune entirely dependent upon the whims and caprices of a young lady.’
‘You don’t suppose for a moment that Miss Malcolm will refuse you?’
John Treverton was so long before he answered this question that the lawyer presently repeated it in a louder tone, fancying that it had not been heard upon the first occasion.
‘Do I think she’ll refuse me?’ repeated Mr. Treverton, inrather an absent tone. ‘Well, I don’t know about that. Women are apt to have romantic notions on the money question. She has enough to live upon, you see. She told me as much last night, and she may prefer to marry some one else. The very terms of this will are calculated to set a high-spirited girl against me.’
‘But she would know that in refusing you she would deprive you of the estate, and frustrate the wishes of her friend and benefactor. She’d scarcely be so ungrateful as to do that. Depend upon it, she’ll consider it her duty to accept you—not a very unpleasant duty either, to marry a man with fourteen thousand a year. Upon my word, Mr. Treverton, you seem to have a very poor opinion of yourself, when you imagine the possibility of Laura Malcolm refusing you.’
John Treverton made no reply to this remark, and was silent during the rest of the drive. His spirits improved, or seemed to improve a little at dinner, however, and he did his best to make himself agreeable to his host and hostess. Miss Sampson thought him the most agreeable man she had ever met, especially when he consented to sit down to chess with her after dinner, and from utter listlessness and absence of mind allowed her to win three games running.
‘What do you think of Miss Malcolm, Mr. Treverton?’ she asked, by-and-by, as she was pouring out the tea.
‘You mustn’t ask Mr. Treverton any questions on that subject, Eliza,’ said her brother, with a laugh.
‘Why not?’
‘For a reason which I am not at liberty to discuss.’
‘Oh, indeed!’ said Miss Sampson, with a sudden tightening of her thin lips. ‘I had no idea—at least I thought—that Laura Malcolm was almost a stranger to Mr. Treverton.’
‘And you’re quite right in your supposition, Miss Sampson,’ answered John Treverton, ‘nor is there any reason why the subject should be tabooed. I think Miss Malcolm very handsome, and that her manner is remarkable for grace and dignity—and that is all I am able to think about her at present, for we are, as you say, almost strangers to each other. As far as I could judge she seemed to me to be warmly attached to my cousin Jasper.’
Eliza Sampson shook her head rather contemptuously.
‘She had reason to be fond of him,’ she said. ‘Of course you are aware that she was completely destitute when he brought her home, and her family were, I believe, a very disreputable set.’
‘I fancy you must be mistaken, Miss Sampson,’ John Treverton answered, with some warmth. ‘My cousin Jasper told me that Stephen Malcolm had been his friend and fellow-student at the University. He may have died poor, but I heard nothing which implied that he had fallen into disreputable courses.’
‘Oh, really,’ said Miss Sampson; ‘of course you know bestand no doubt whatever your cousin told you was correct. But to tell the truth Miss Malcolm has never been a favourite of mine. There’s a reserve about her that I’ve never been able to get over. I know the gentlemen admire her very much, but I don’t think she’ll ever have many female friends. And what is of so much consequence to a young woman as a female friend?’ concluded the lady sententiously.
‘Oh, the gentlemen admire her very much, do they?’ repeated John Treverton. ‘I suppose, then, she has had several opportunities of marrying already?’
‘I don’t know about that, but I know of one man who is over head and ears in love with her.’
‘Would it be any breach of confidence on your part to say who the gentleman is?’
‘Oh, dear, no. I found out the secret for myself, I assure you. Miss Malcolm has never condescended to tell me anything about her affairs. It is Edward Clare, the vicar’s son. I have seen them a good deal together. He used to be always making some excuse for dropping in at the Manor-house to talk to Mr. Treverton about old books, and papers for the Archæological Society, and so on, and anybody could see that it was for Miss Malcolm’s sake he spent so much of his time there.’
‘Do you think she cared about him?’
‘Goodness knows. There’s no getting at what she thinks about anyone. I did once ask her the question, but she turned it off in her cold, haughty way, saying that she liked Mr. Clare as a friend, and all that kind of thing.’
Thomas Sampson had looked rather uneasy during this conversation.
‘You mustn’t listen to my sister’s foolish gossip, Treverton,’ he said; ‘it’s hard enough to keep women from talking scandal anywhere, but in such a place as this they seem to have nothing else to do.’
John Treverton had taken his part in this conversation with a keener interest than he was prepared to acknowledge himself capable of feeling upon the subject of Laura Malcolm. What was she to him, that he should feel such a jealous anger against this unknown Edward Clare? Were not all his most deeply-rooted feelings in her disfavour? Was she not rendered unspeakably obnoxious to him by the terms of his kinsman’s will?
‘There’s something upon that man’s mind, Eliza,’ said Mr. Sampson, as he stood upon the hearthrug, warming himself in a thoughtful manner before the fire for a few minutes, after his guest had gone to bed. ‘Mark my words, Eliza, there’s something on John Treverton’s mind.’
‘What makes you think so, Tom?’
‘Because he’s not a bit elated about the property that he has come into, or will come into in a year’s time. And it isn’t in human nature for a man to come into fourteen thousand a year which he never expected to inherit, and take it as coolly as this man takes it.’
‘What do you mean by a year’s time, Tom? Hasn’t he got the estate now?’
‘No, Eliza; that’s the rub.’ And Mr. Sampson went on to explain to his sister the terms of Jasper Treverton’s will, duly warning her that she was not to communicate her knowledge of the subject to anyone, on pain of his lasting displeasure.
Thomas Sampson was too busy next day to devote himself to his guest; so John Treverton went for a long ramble, with a map of the Treverton Manor estate in his pocket. He skirted many a broad field of arable and pasture land, and stood at the gates of farmhouse gardens, looking at the snug homesteads, the great barns and haystacks, the lazy cattle standing knee-deep in the litter of a straw-yard, and wondering whether he should ever be master of these things. He walked a long way, and came home with a slow step and a thoughtful air in the twilight. About a mile from Hazlehurst he emerged from a narrow lane on to a common, across which there was a path leading to the village. As he came out of this lane he saw the figure of a lady in mourning a little way before him. Something in the carriage of the head struck him as familiar; he hurried after the lady, and found himself walking beside Laura Malcolm.
‘You are out rather late, Miss Malcolm,’ he said, not knowing very well what to say.
‘It gets dark so quickly at this time of the year. I have been to see some people at Thorley, about a mile and a half from here.’
‘You do a great deal of visiting among the poor, I suppose?’
‘Yes, I have been always accustomed to spend two or three days a week amongst them. They have come to know me very well, and to understand me, and, much as people are apt to complain of the poor, I have found them both grateful and affectionate.’
John Treverton looked at her thoughtfully. She had a bright colour in her cheeks this evening, a rosy tint which lighted up her dark eyes with a brilliancy he had never seen in them before. He walked by her side all the way back to Hazlehurst, talking first about the villagers she had been visiting, and afterwards about her adopted father, whose loss she seemed to feel deeply. Her manner this evening appeared perfectly frank and natural, and when John Treverton parted from her at the gates of the Manor-house, it was with the conviction that she was no less charming than she was beautiful.
And yet he gave a short, impatient sigh as he turned away from the great iron gates to walk to The Laurels, and it was only by an effort that he kept up an appearance of cheerfulness through the long evening, in the society of the two Sampsons and a bluff, red-cheeked gentleman-farmer, who had been invited to dinner, and to take a hand in a friendly rubber afterwards.
John Treverton spent the following day in the dogcart with Mr. Sampson, inspecting more farms, and getting a clearer idea of the extent and nature of the Treverton property that lay within a drive of Hazlehurst. He told his host that he would be compelled to go back to town by an early train on the next morning. After dinner that evening Mr. Sampson had occasion to retire to his office for an hour’s work upon some important piece of business, so John Treverton, not very highly appreciating the privilege of a prolongedtête-à-têtewith the fair Eliza, put on his hat and went out of doors to smoke a cigar in the village street.
Some fancy, he scarcely knew what, led him towards the Manor-house; perhaps because the lane outside the high garden wall at the side of the house was a quiet place for the smoking of a meditative cigar. In this solitary lane he paced for some time, coming round to the iron gates two or three times to look across the park-like grounds at the front of the house, whose closely-shuttered windows showed no ray of light.
‘I wonder if I could be a happy man,’ he asked himself, ‘as the master of that house, with a beautiful wife and an ample fortune? There was a time when I fancied I could only exist in the stir and bustle of a London life, but perhaps, after all, I should not make a bad country gentleman if I were happy.’
On going back to the lane after one of these meditative pauses before the iron gates, John Treverton was surprised to find that he was no longer alone there. A tall man, wrapped in a loose great-coat, and with the lower part of his face hidden in the folds of a woollen scarf, was walking slowly to and fro before a narrow little wooden door in the garden wall. In that uncertain light, and with so much of his face hidden by the brim of his hat and the folds of his scarf, it was impossible to tell what this man was like, but John Treverton looked at him with a very suspicious feeling as he passed him near the garden door, and walked on to the end of the lane. When he turned back he was surprised to see that the door was open, and that the man was standing on the threshold, talking to some one within. He went quickly back in order to see, if possible, who this some one was, and as he came close to the garden door he heard a voice that he knew very well indeed—the voice of Laura Malcolm.
‘There is no fear of our being interrupted,’ she said. ‘I would rather talk to you in the garden.’
The man seemed to hesitate a little, muttered something about‘the servants,’ and then went into the garden, the door of which was immediately shut.
John Treverton was almost petrified by this circumstance. Who could this man be whom Miss Malcolm admitted to her presence in this stealthy manner? Who could he be except some secret lover, some suitor she knew to be unworthy of her, and whose visits she was fain to receive in this ignoble fashion. The revelation was unspeakably shocking to John Treverton; but he could in no other manner account for the incident which he had just witnessed. He lit another cigar, determined to wait in the lane till the man came out again. He walked up and down for about twenty minutes, at the end of which time the garden door was re-opened, and the stranger emerged and walked hastily away, John following him at a respectable distance. He went to an inn not far from the Manor-house, where there was a gig waiting for him, with a man nodding sleepily over the reins. He jumped lightly into the vehicle, took the reins from the man’s hands and drove away at a smart pace, very much to the discomfiture of Mr. Treverton, who had not been able to see his face, and who had no means of tracing him any further. He did, indeed, go into the little inn and call for soda-water and brandy, in order to have an excuse for asking who the gentleman was who had just driven away; but the innkeeper knew nothing more than that the gig had stopped before his door half-an-hour or so, and that the horse had had a mouthful of hay.
‘The man as stopped with the horse and gig came in for a glass of brandy to take out to the gentleman,’ he said, ‘but I didn’t see the gentleman’s face.’
John Treverton went back to The Laurels after this, very ill at ease. He determined to see Miss Malcolm next morning before he left Hazlehurst, in order, if possible, to find out something about this mysterious reception of the unknown individual in the loose coat. He made his plans, therefore, for going to London by an afternoon train, and at one o’clock presented himself at the Manor-house.
Miss Malcolm was at home, and he was ushered once more into the study, where he had first seen her.
He told her of his intended departure, an announcement which was not calculated to surprise her very much, as he had told her the same thing when they met on the common. They talked a little of indifferent subjects; she with perfect ease of manner, he with evident embarrassment; and then, after rather an awkward pause, he began:—
‘Oh, by the way, Miss Malcolm, there is a circumstance which I think it my duty to mention to you. It is perhaps of less importance than I am inclined to attach to it, but in a lonely country house like this one cannot be too careful. I was outwalking rather late last night, smoking my solitary cigar, and I happened to pass through the lane at the side of these grounds.’
He paused a moment. Laura Malcolm gave a perceptible start, and he fancied that she was paler than she had been before he began to speak of this affair; but her eyes met his with a steady, inquiring look, and never once faltered in their gaze as he went on:—
‘I saw a tall man, very much muffled up in an overcoat and neckerchief—with his face quite hidden, in fact—walking up and down before the little door in the wall, and five minutes afterwards I was surprised by seeing the door opened, and the man admitted to the garden. The secret kind of way in which the thing was done was calculated to alarm anyone interested in the inmates of this house. I concluded, of course, that it was one of the servants who admitted some follower of her own in this clandestine manner.’
He could not meet Laura Malcolm’s eyes quite steadily as he said this, but the calm scrutiny of hers never changed. It was John Treverton who faltered and looked down.
‘Some follower of her own,’ Miss Malcolm repeated. ‘You know, then, that the person who let this stranger into the garden was a woman?’
‘Yes,’ he answered, not a little startled by her self-possession. ‘I heard a woman’s voice. I took the trouble to follow the man when he came out again, and I discovered that he was a stranger to this place, a fact which, of course, makes the affair so much the more suspicious. I know that robberies are generally managed by collusion with some servant, and I know that the property in this house is of a kind to attract the attention of professional burglars. I considered it, therefore, my duty to inform you of what I had seen.’
‘You are very good, but I can fortunately set your mind quite at rest with regard to the plate and other valuables in this house. The man you saw last night is not a burglar, and it was I who admitted him to the garden.’
‘Indeed?’
‘Yes. He is a relation of mine, who wished to see me without making his appearance here the subject of gossip among the Hazlehurst people. He wrote to me, telling me that he was about to travel through this part of the country, and asking me to give him a private interview. It suited his humour best to come to this place after dark, and to leave it unobserved, as he thought.’
‘I trust you will not think me intrusive for having spoken of this subject, Miss Malcolm?’
‘Not at all. It was natural you should be interested in the welfare of the house.’
‘And in yours. I hope that you will believe that was nearer my thoughts than any sordid fears as to the safety of the old plate and pictures. And now that I am leaving Hazlehurst, Miss Malcolm, may I venture to ask your plans for the future?’
‘They are scarcely worth the name of plans. I intend moving from this house to the lodgings I spoke of the other day; that is all.’
‘Don’t you think you will find living alone very dull? Would it not be better for you to go into a school, or some place where you could have society?’
‘I have thought of that, but I don’t fancy I should quite like the monotonous routine of a school. I am prepared to find my life a little dull, but I am very fond of this place, and I am not without friends here.’
‘I can quite imagine that. You ought to have many friends in Hazlehurst.’
‘But I have not many friends. I have not the knack of forming friendships. There are only two or three people in the world whose regard I feel sure of, or who seem to understand me.’
‘I hope your heart is not quite inaccessible to new claims. There is a subject which I dare not speak of just yet, which it might be cruel to urge upon you at a time when I know your mind is full of grief for the dead; but when the fitting time does come I trust I may not find my case quite hopeless.’
He spoke with a hesitation which seemed strange in so experienced a man of the world. Laura Malcolm looked up at him with the same steady gaze with which her eyes had met his when he spoke of the incident of the previous night.
‘When the fitting time comes you will find me ready to act in obedience to the wishes of my benefactor,’ she answered quietly. ‘I do not consider that the terms of his will are calculated to secure happiness for either of us; but I loved him too dearly—I respect his memory too sincerely to place myself in opposition to his plans.’
‘Why should not our happiness be secured by that will, Laura?’ John Treverton asked, with sudden tenderness. ‘Is there no hope that I may ever win your love?’
She shook her head sadly.
‘Love very seldom grows out of a position such as ours, Mr. Treverton.’
‘We may prove a happy exception to the general rule. But I said I would not talk of this subject to-day. I only wish you to believe that I am not altogether mercenary—that I would rather forego this fortune than force a hateful alliance upon you.’
Miss Malcolm made no reply to this speech, and after a few minutes’ talk upon indifferent subjects, John Treverton wished her good-bye.
‘She would accept me,’ he said to himself as he left the house. ‘Her words seemed to imply as much; the rest remains with me. The ice has been broken, at any rate. But who can that man be, and why did he visit her in such a secret, ignominious manner? If we were differently circumstanced, if I loved her, I should insist upon a fuller explanation.’
He went back to The Laurels, to bid his friends the Sampsons good-bye. The lawyer was ready to drive him over to the station, and made him promise to run down to Hazlehurst again as soon as he was able, and to make The Laurels his headquarters on that and all other occasions.
‘You’ll have plenty of love-making to do between this and the end of the year,’ Mr. Sampson said, facetiously.
He was in very good spirits, having that morning made an advance of money to Mr. Treverton on extremely profitable terms, and he felt a personal interest in that gentleman’s courtship and marriage.
John Treverton went back to town in almost as thoughtful a mood as that in which he had made the journey to Hazlehurst. Plan his course as he might, there was a dangerous coast ahead of him, which he doubted his ability to navigate. Very far away gleamed the lights of the harbour, but between that harbour and the frail bark that carried his fortunes how many shoals and rocks there were whose perils he must encounter before he could lie safe at anchor?