Nicholas groaned. “What a cellar my father kept!”
The light of the candle Renny carried fell on starkly bare bins and shelves and on those which still boasted a fair store of spirits and wines.
It illumined the strongly marked features of the two men, at the same time heightening the contrast between them — Nicholas, the man of the world, his mind enriched by experience and travel, detached, not given to extremes of joy or sorrow — Renny, his life concentrated on the activities of Jalna, circumscribed by his own tastes, high-mettled as one of his own hunters, with a kind of virgin elegance about him.
With the bottle of port in his hand, Nicholas said — “I expect you had quite a surprise tonight.”
“Yes. I had.”
“A pity you aren’t in this too.”
“I’d as lief not.”
“You are an odd chap. Aren’t you interested in making some easy money?”
“I don’t like losing it.”
Nicholas chuckled. “That trait must have come from your Scotch grandfather. I mean caution. Not that I think you are generally cautious. As for me, I’ve sold my shares in Indigo Lake. Thought it well to get out while the going was good.”
Renny looked relieved. “I’m glad of that. Did you get your money?”
“A cheque is on the way.”
“Are you positive?”
“Why are you looking like that?” Nicholas asked this question with an abruptly startled air.
“Read this.” Renny took the folded newspaper from his pocket and held it in the candlelight.
Nicholas said testily — “I can’t without my glasses. What is it?”
Renny read — “‘Disappeareance of Lemuel Y. Kronk, mining broker. Promoter of non-existent mining stock?’ That is the heading, Uncle Nick. The article just goes on to say that he has fleeced a lot of people and skipped out.”
“I can’t believe it! Let me see the paper.” He frowned at it and was able to make out the gist of the article.
“What sort of man was he? How did you meet him?”
“I didn’t meet him. Eden did the investing for me. I guess for all of us.”
Renny drew back from him in consternation. “My God, Uncle Nick, are you telling me you handed over your good money to that boy and an unknown and unlicensed broker?”
“Was he unlicensed?”
“This article says so. He’s been swindling people not only here but in the United States. Lots of them.”
Nicholas raised the bottle of port as though he would like to break it over Mr. Kronk’s head.
“The scoundrel,” he said. Then he remembered the other investors, waiting upstairs to celebrate, and a sardonic smile bent his lips.
“What will my brother say? And my mother! Good God — my poor old mother!”
Steps approached along the passage and Finch looked in at the door. He said — “Meg sent me down to find out if anything is wrong. They’re all in the drawing-room waiting. They’ve brought out the best wineglasses and there’s a fresh fire. I wish I had something to celebrate.”
Nicholas ruefully asked of Renny — “Shall I bring the port?”
“Brandy might be better.”
“Right. We’ll drink brandy.”
“Why?” asked Finch. “Why change?” In the candlelight his pink-cheeked boy’s face shone bright with curiosity.
They did not trouble to answer him. The port was replaced and Renny produced a bottle of the French brandy in its stead. The candle was on a slant so that the wax melted and fell in hot globules on his hand. Abstractedly he rubbed them off; the little procession formed and marched back to the drawing-room. The fresh fire in the fireplace had a quantity of dry kindling in it. The flames leaped and crackled, as in joy at being set free. The light of the lamp paled beside them. Those present appearead to have arranged themselves as for a ceremony. Her chair in the full light of the fire, old Adeline Whiteoak was a figure strangely resembling that of the parrot Boney whose tall perch stood behind her. Both held their heads forward a little. In her extreme age her profile tended to a predatory outline, as did his. He was clothed in bright plumage, while she wore a tea-gown of dark-green velvet, its wide sleeves lined with red and with a red collar. With his claws he firmly gripped the perch, while she as firmly held to the arms of her chair, for she was stirred to a pleasurable excitement not often experienced of late. The rubies, diamonds, and emeralds of her rings caught and held the firelight. “Come, come,” she was saying. “What’s all this delay? Let’s get together and celebrate. Let’s hear what money everyone has made, eh, Boney?” And she raised her face to the parrot.
Uttering throating caressing sounds he shook his plumage, then said a few words in Hindustani.
“Hear that?” she cried. “Pearl of the harem, he calls me.... Ah, the darling!” And she stretched up a hand to him which he fondled with his beak.
Wakefield had thrown himself on the fur rug at her feet. It was his bedtime but no one gave him the command to go. He lay sprawled at ease, his dark eyes roving with indolent assurance from one point of interest to another.
Eden and Piers sat side by side on the window seat, fresh-coloured, eager for the coming disclosure. Piers felt himself a man among men. He had made money. He had speculated on the stock market and made more money. He laughed to himself when he remembered how he had that morning overtaken Pheasant on the road and given her a lift as far as the post office. She had been on her way to post a letter for Mrs. Clinch. She had looked prettier than he had ever seen her. He could not get the thought out of his head. Yet, strangely, he could not see her face with clarity. It had been so changeful during that drive. It had gone from shyness to composure and then to mirth, when something he said had made her laugh. It was her laughter, high and pure, that remained with him so clearly, and, now hearing it in imagination, he laughed within himself.
Ernest and Dilly were seated side by side on the sofa, their expectant faces turned toward the door. They had exchanged brief but exhilarating confidences on the subject of speculation. Each had declared that the act was the exciting thing about it. The profit was of only secondary consideration. Dilly was smoking a cigarette, a spectacle which Meg looked on with disapproval. She and Ernest shared an ashtray. He looked like a man about to propose a health.
Lady Buckley and Meg had pieces of embroidery in their laps but their hands were idle and their eyes fixed on the three who now entered. Nicholas came first with the air of a French aristocrat on his way to the guillotine. After him came Renny bearing the bottle of brandy, and lastly young Finch wearing, for reasons known only to himself, a hangdog air.
Renny set the bottle on the small table beside the glasses.
“Well,” he asked, “who’s for it?”
His grandmother peered at the bottle.
“I thought ’twas to be port wine,” she said.
Meg added — “Yes. I have the port glasses ready.”
Ernest exclaimed, disappointed — “Why the change? Cognac does not agree with me, nor, I think, will the ladies wish for it.”
“They’ll need it,” said Renny.
“I like a drop of cognac,” his grandmother declared. “Let me have the glass in the curve of my hand to warm it.” She eagerly watched the ceremony of filling her glass.
Lady Buckley asked — “May I enquire why this air of mystery?”
“Yes,” said Meg, “we’re curious to know what was going on down in the wine cellar.”
Renny said — “There is no mystery, Aunty. The plain fact is that this man Kronk has skipped out with the spondulics.” He stood, with the tray of glasses in his hands, like a man dispensing poison. Yet a flicker of mordant amusement crossed his lips as he scanned their faces, observing the effect of his words.
“Incredible,” said Ernest. “I don’t believe a word of it.”
Nicholas heaved a noisy sigh. “It’s true enough.”
“Who told you?”
“It’s in the evening paper. Read
it to them, Renny.”
Renny sat down the tray, took the paper from his pocket, and began to read aloud. “‘Disappearance of promoter of Indigo Lake Mine. Swindled many thousands of dollars from credulous investors both here and in the United States.’” He hesitated, letting the words sink in, then finished the brief article, inconspicuous in a back page of the paper.
A palpable movement ran through the room, as though each were conscious of sudden physical discomfort. Then Ernest rose, with an unfolding of his long person, and crossed to his mother.
“Mamma,” he said, “don’t you think you had better go to bed?”
“Why?” she demanded. “It’s still early.”
“You’ve had a tiring day....”
“All my days are tiring now.... What did Renny read from the newspaper?”
“Oh, that was nothing,” he lied. “Nothing of interest. Do please let me help you to your room, Mamma.” He patted her back, encouraging her.
Eden had sprung up, come to Renny, and was devouring the article over his shoulder. “It’s impossible,” he said, but even while he denied its possibility, a chill gripped his heart.
Nicholas rumbled, in an undertone — “We’ve been fleeced. Among us we seem to have lost a tidy sum.”
Old Adeline caught the word lost. “What’s lost?” she demanded. “Let me be, Ernest.” She struck at his hand that patted her. “I want to know what’s lost. Is it a dog? A horse? A reputation? Come now — out with it!” She took a sip of brandy and sat up straight in her chair. She looked alert, eager.
Renny said in an undertone to Nicholas — “She’ll have to know it eventually. I think I’d better tell her now.”
“My money!” cried Meg. “Don’t tell me that man has run off with my money!”
“I’m afraid he has, my dear,” said Nicholas.
Meg’s face flamed to scarlet. “Eden, you led me into this! I trusted you.”
Piers, equally flushed, glared at Eden. “I trusted him too. I put everything I had earned into Indigo Lake.”
Renny said — “Without my leave. You young rascal! Well, now you’ve lost it.” He turned to Eden. “You’ve made a pretty mess of things.”
Eden’s face had gone white. “I’ve lost too.”
“What had you to invest?”
“What I made on commission. Quite a lot.”
“Good Lord!”
Lady Buckley said — “I went with Eden to that wicked man’s office.
He talked most convincingly. I trusted them both.”
“You would have done well, Aunty,” said Renny, “to have consulted me. I’d have warned you.”
She gave a groan. “Oh, how I wish I had!”
The grandmother’s eyes had moved from one speaker to the other, her face expressing both frustration and an arrogant will to delve to the bottom of all this. She thumped on the floor with her stick. Her voice came out harsh and strong.
“I will be told,” she said, and turning to the most vulnerable — “Meg, explain. Has somebody lost money?”
Through tears Meg answered — “Yes, Granny.”
“Who?” she demanded.
The answer came, with a grin, from Renny.
“You, Gran.”
“Me? I couldn’t.”
“Oh, yes, you could. It’s quite easy — with a young fool like Eden and a swindler like Kronk to help you.”
Ernest said — “That is not the way to break the news to my mother.”
His mother said — “Hold your tongue, Ernest. I want the plain truth.” And sitting upright and resolute there she looked well able to bear it.
“After all,” growled Nicholas, “she’s not ruined.” But he thought ruefully — “She’ll have that much less to leave behind her.”
She said — “It was a gold mine. What happened to the gold?”
“There was a mistake, Mamma,” said Ernest. He took out his handkerchief and mopped his high white forehead.
“I made no mistake,” she said emphatically. “I invested my money, safe and sound, in a gold mine.”
Ernest asked, almost tremblingly, for he expected to be her heir — “How much money did you invest, Mamma?”
She snapped out — “Twenty thousand dollars.”
This was a shock indeed. Eden hastened to say — “She forgets. It was far less.”
She heard him and demanded — “How much have I made?”
“Nothing,” said Renny. “You’ve lost. Look here.” He took the newspaper and held it under her nose.
“Is it in print there?” she asked.
Nicholas said, under his breath — “She may as well know the truth.”
“But what a shock for her,” said Ernest.
Augusta put in — “Mamma is able to bear it, and the loss. It means less to her than to any of us.”
Renny tapped the newspaper with his forefinger. “See, Gran? Can you read it? The broker has skedaddled, taking everybody’s money with him.” He threw a glance over his shoulder at Dilly. “Fun, isn’t it?”
Dilly gave a hysterical laugh.
Adeline demanded — “You others — have you lost money too?”
“Everybody,” answered Renny for them. “All but me.”
She shook her head dolefully and a momentary heavy silence enveloped them.
Finch had been too embarrassed to remain in the room. He had left but had lingered in the hall, listening, not so much to the words that were said, as to the tones of the voices which went tingling through his nerves. He now heard his grandmother say loud and clear — “Come here, sir.” He saw Eden cross the room with an almost lounging step and stand in front of her.
“You rascal,” she then said raspingly. “You scallywag. You led me into this.”
“I’m sorry, Gran,” he said, “terribly sorry.” He knelt with his body very straight, in front of her, as though deliberately making the picture of the penitent. But he went on composedly — “I was as much deceived as you. I thought the mine — everything — was authentic. Even now there may be a mistake.”
“You brought these pictures to me. You persuaded me with all your talk. You can’t get out of that. How much have I lost?”
Nicholas, a little too eagerly, added — “Yes. How much has she lost?”
That was enough to make her recoil from what she thought of as prying into her affairs. She said tartly — “I will not tell what I have lost — not till every one of you comes out with his folly. Now, Nicholas, what about you?”
Nicholas blew into his moustache, then tugged it into place. “Enough,” he said. “A tidy sum. I don’t want to talk about it.”
“I see.... Now you, Ernest — what did the rascal get out of you?”
He answered with dignity, though his voice shook — “I think I agree with Nicholas that we should refrain from giving figures.”
She retorted — “Aye, but Nicholas asked how much I had lost. That was different, eh?” She turned to her daughter, speaking with mock formality. “Lady Buckley, pray how much lighter is your purse?”
Augusta said — “I cannot remember clearly at the moment. I shall tell you tomorrow.”
Old Adeline gave an ironic smile. “She’ll tell me tomorrow.” And she imitated Augusta’s manner of speaking. Then, fixing Meg with a compelling look — “You, Meg — what are the damages?”
Meg sprang up, as though suddenly conscious of Wakefield’s presence. “The child,” she cried, “up till this hour! I must take him to bed.” She heaved him from the rug and led him to the door.
There he halted, turning back into the room.
“I must say goodnight to everybody.”
“Very well, but do be quick about it.”
He felt himself small and good, aloof from all the mysterious and troubled talk going on about him. He made the round of the room, giving a hug to those he liked best, offering a cool cheek to those not so favoured. Meg waited by the door on tenterhooks till the goodnights were accomplished, then bore him off. F
inch had already disappeared.
The grandmother still held the centre of the stage, determined that no loss experienced by the others should equal the dramatic quality of her own. She said —
“This means little to the rest of you, but think what it is to be impoverished at my time of life.”
Nicholas said — “You will never notice the loss, Mamma.”
“How do you know,” she retorted, “when I haven’t told you what I invested?”
He could not say to her that her needs now were few but she guessed what was in his mind.
“I have my ambitions,” she said. “There’s things I want to do.” The remembrance of her new fur coat smote her. “And there’s my Persian lamb coat to be paid for! Dear, oh dear, I wonder if I can return it to the shop.”
Ernest answered — “I’m afraid not. You sent a cheque for it yesterday, Mamma.”
She threw up her hands in despair. Then turned to Eden, who had risen to his feet and was standing apart, with folded arms and hanging head. “Oh, Eden, you deceitful rogue! You came to me secretly with the bright pictures to entice me into a thimblerig. If only your uncles had been with me, you’d never have trapped me, but you came in the time when I was alone.” A tear of pity for herself glistened in her eye.
Renny said — “Have another sip of brandy, Gran?”
Tremblingly she took another sip and was refreshed. “This means little to you others,” she repeated.... “Little to any but me.”
Piers was saying under his breath, through clenched teeth — “It means little to me, eh?”
Eden did not hear what was being said. While kneeling in front of his grandmother, in his nostrils the scent of the eastern perfume she used, the aquiline contour of her face, the bright colours of her gown, filling his eyes, the thought of a new poem had come to him. It was no more clear than a pale star in early twilight, but it was there, challenging the futile flow of words about him. If only he dared to take it up to his room, to capture it on paper, to forget all the turmoil of disappointment and chagrin that seethed within him. But he dared not leave.
His grandmother was saying — “Then there are the new cushions I bought for the pews. Do you think we might stop the making of them?”
“They are to be in the church tomorrow,” said Augusta sombrely.
The Jalna Saga – Deluxe Edition: All Sixteen Books of the Enduring Classic Series & The Biography of Mazo de la Roche Page 169