by Neil Munro
CHAPTER XL -- THE DAY OF JUDGMENT
Simon went to the library and saw plainly that the storm was come.
"Sit down, Simon, sit down," said his Grace and carefully sharped a pen.
The Chamberlain subsided in a chair; crossed his legs; made a mouth asif to whistle. There was a vexatious silence in the room till the Dukegot up and stood against the chimney-piece and spoke.
"Well," said he, "I could be taking a liberty with the old song andsinging 'Roguery Parts Good Company' if I were not, so far as musicgoes, as timber as the table there and in anything but a key for musiceven if I had the faculty. Talking about music, you have doubtless notheard the ingenious ballant connected with your name and your exploits.It has been the means of informing her Grace upon matters I hadpreferred she knew nothing about, because I liked to have the women Iregard believe the world much better than it is. And it follows thatyou and I must bring our long connection to an end. When will it be mostconvenient for my Chamberlain to send me his resignation after 'twelveyears of painstaking and intelligent service to the Estate,' as we mightbe saying, on the customary silver salver?"
Simon cursed within but outwardly never quailed.
"I know nothing about a ballant," said he coolly, "but as for the restof it, I thank God I can be taking a hint as ready as the quickest. YourGrace no doubt has reasons. And I'll make bold to say the inscriptionit is your humour to suggest would not be anyway extravagant, forthe twelve years have been painstaking enough, whatever about theirintelligence, of which I must not be the judge myself."
"So far as that goes, sir," said the Duke, "you have been a pattern. Andit is your gifts that make your sins the more heinous; a man of a moresluggish intelligence might have had the ghost of an excuse for failingto appreciate the utmost loathsomeness of his sins."
"Oh! by the Lord Harry, if it is to be a sermon--!" cried Simon, jumpingto his feet.
"Keep your chair, sir! keep your chair like a man!" said the Duke. "I amthinking you know me well enough to believe there is none of the commonmoralist about me. I leave the preaching to those with a better conceitof themselves than I could afford to have of my indifferent self. Nopreaching, cousin, no preaching, but just a word among friends, even ifit were only to explain the reason for our separation."
The Chamberlain resumed his chair defiantly and folded his arms.
"I'll be cursed if I see the need for all this preamble," said he; "butyour Grace can fire away. It need never be said that Simon MacTaggartwas feared to account for himself when the need happened."
"Within certain limitations, I daresay that is true," said the Duke.
"I aye liked a tale to come to a brisk conclusion," said theChamberlain, with no effort to conceal his impatience.
"This one will be as brisk as I can make it," said his Grace. "Up tillthe other day I gave you credit for the virtue you claim--the readinessto answer for yourself when the need happened. I was under the delusionthat your duel with the Frenchman was the proof of it."
"Oh, damn the Frenchman!" cried the Chamberlain with contempt andirritation. "I am ready to meet the man again with any arm he chooses."
"With any arm!" said the Duke dryly. "'Tis always well to have a wholeone, and not one with a festering sore, as on the last occasion. Ohyes," he went on, seeing Simon change colour, "you observe I havelearned about the old wound, and what is more, I know exactly where yougot it."
"Your Grace seems to have trustworthy informants," said the Chamberlainless boldly, but in no measure abashed. "I got that wound through yourown hand as surely as if you had held the foil that gave it, for thewhole of this has risen, as you ought to know, from your sending me toFrance."
"And that is true, in a sense, my good sophist. But I was, in that, theunconscious and blameless link in your accursed destiny. I had you sentto France on a plain mission. It was not, I make bold to say, a missionon which the Government would have sent any man but a shrewd one anda gentleman, and I was mad enough to think Simon Mac-Taggart was both.When you were in Paris as our agent--"
"Fah!" cried Simon, snapping his fingers and drawing his face in agrimace. "Agent, quo' he! for God's sake take your share of it and sayspy and be done with it!"
The Duke shrugged his shoulders, listening patiently to theinterruption. "As you like," said he. "Let us say spy, then. You were tolearn what you could of the Pretender's movements, and incidentallyyou were to intromit with certain of our settled agents at Versailles.Doubtless a sort of espionage was necessary to the same. But I makebold to say the duty was no ignoble one so long as it was done withsome sincerity and courage, for I count the spy in an enemy's country isengaged upon the gallantest enterprise of war, using the shrewdness thatalone differs the quarrel of the man from the fury of the beast, andhimself the more admirable, because his task is a thousand times moredangerous than if he fought with the claymore in the field."
"Doubtless! doubtless!" said the Chamberlain. "That's an old talebetween the two of us, but you should hear the other side upon it."
"No matter; we gave you the credit and the reward of doing your duty asyou engaged, and yet you mixed the business up with some extremely dirtywork no sophistry of yours or mine will dare defend. You took our money,MacTaggart--and you sold us! Sit down, sit down and listen like a man!You sold us; there's the long and the short of it, and you sold ourfriends at Versailles to the very people you were sent yourself to actagainst. Countersap with a vengeance! We know now where Bertin got hisinformation. You betrayed us and the woman Cecile Favart in the onefilthy transaction."
The Chamberlain showed in his face that the blow was home. His mouthbroke and he grew as grey as a rag.
"And that's the way of it?" he said, after a moment's silence.
"That's the way of it," said the Duke. "She was as much the agent--letus say the spy, then--as you were yourself, and seems to have broughtmore cunning to the trade than did our simple Simon himself. If herfriend Montaiglon had not come here to look for you, and thereby put uson an old trail we had abandoned, we would never have guessed the sourceof her information."
"I'll be cursed if I have a dog's luck!" cried Simon.
Argyll looked pityingly at him. "So!" said he. "You mind our old countrysaying, _Ni droch dhuine dan da fein_--a bad man makes his own fate?"
"Do you say so?" cried MacTaggart, with his first sign of actualinsolence, and the Duke sighed.
"My good Simon," said he, "I do not require to tell you so, for you knowit very well. What I would add is that all I have said is, so far asI am concerned, between ourselves; that's my only tribute to our oldacquaintanceship. Only I can afford to have no more night escapades atDoom or anywhere else with my fencibles, and so, Simon, the resignationcannot be a day too soon."
"Heaven forbid that I should delay it a second longer than is desirable,and your Grace has it here and now! A fine _fracas_ all this about apuddock-eating Frenchman! I do not value him nor his race to the extentof a pin. And as for your Grace's Chamberlain--well, Simon MacTaggarthas done very well hitherto on his own works and merits."
"You may find, for all that," says his Grace, "that they were all summedup in a few words--'he was a far-out cousin to the Duke.' _Sic itur adastra_."
At that Simon put on his hat and laughed with an eerie and unpleasantstridency. He never said another word, but left the room. The sound ofhis unnatural merriment rang on the stair as he descended.
"The man is fey," said the Duke to himself, listening with a startledgravity.