Complete Works of a E W Mason

by A. E. W. Mason

  Bellingham and Bassett went out of the room. A footman lit three candles in the hall and led the way up to the lumber-room. In the drawing-room the rest of that unseasonable party waited. Elliot was seized with an uneasy notion that in the eight or nine years since the refuge had been used, the lumber-room might have been cleaned and the walls freshly painted. Failure in this test, just because it was so convincing if it were true, would, if it were false, off-set all the rest. Sir James Elliot forgot the pattern which events must copy and waited in a dreadful expectation. The young ladies said nothing. If they had, they would have vowed they were ready to die, so terrible had become the suspense and the anxiety. But in truth they were exhilarated. Not one fumbled for her smelling-salts or felt her head swimming with the vapours. They were important. They were in the centre of great matters, they would have a theme to astonish their friends for the rest of life. Their one fear was lest they should be sent out of the room and they remained very quiet. Mr. Henry Scoble flung himself back in his chair and gnawed the edge of his handkerchief between his teeth. How in the world had any slip occurred? The boy was to be led by — who was the fellow? — Traetta — young Traetta into proposing that he should steal away from the festival of San Januarius and go fishing in the bay. He was to meet his — friends, and Scoble’s lips smiled grimly as in his thoughts he used the word, in the darkness of the arch under the Head of Naples, he was to be quietly knocked on the head, stripped of his buckles — yes, and the diamond brooch with which Frances had pinned his cloak, and dumped overboard into the water — a perfectly simple plan, which, according to Domenico, had been executed without a flaw — though, to be sure, it had cost a devil of a lot of money. What then had gone wrong?

  But whilst he asked himself this question, the diamond brooch set his thoughts towards Frances. A devilish, good-looking woman she had been — nay, was so still, and passionate. Henry Scoble licked his lips over her passion. Yet he had always distrusted her a little over this — this removal of the boulder in his path. Yes, protest as she might, she had always seemed to be keeping something hidden from him. He turned sharply in his chair towards her. She shook her head, forbidding him to move. She sat apart, her hands upon her lap, her eyes staring from a face of stone.

  There was a sound of voices in the passage. The two young men came into the room. Bassett shut the door and Bellingham stood beside him until the latch caught. Then Bellingham advanced until he was face to face with Julian. His face was very grave.

  “It’s as you say, Linchcombe.”

  He could have used no words more simple or spoken them with less emphasis. But no other words, no heavier emphasis were needed.

  XXVIII. AFTER EIGHT YEARS

  HENRY SCOBLE WAS the first to break the silence. Whether he thought to carry off the affair as a piece of impudence beneath his consideration or merely to gain a night for consultation with his wife, no one in the room was to know. He got up with a contemptuous flourish.

  “Since my servants seem to have renounced their duties and the night is growing late—” he said, and he bowed to Lady Fritton, giving her the lead.

  As that stout lady wheezed herself out of her armchair, Brute Bellingham stepped forward to help her.

  “There are matters best left to the men,” he said sententiously. He had gone openly over to Julian’s side, and Henry Scoble flushed with anger. Henry Scoble was to be called to account now in his own house, it seemed, and he could hardly turn his back on the challenge.

  “Come, girls,” said Lady Fritton. “Very likely the men will bungle it no worse than we should.”

  She laid her arm lightly on Bellingham’s and led the women towards the door. But as she came opposite to Julian, she put her escort aside and moving close to him, asked in a kindly voice:

  “Boy, at dinner on the day of San Januarius, where did you sit?”

  “Next to your Ladyship. There was an Italian lady on the other side of me. I had not much room,” said Julian, and the impish smile shone for a second on his face. The old lady’s heart warmed to him.

  “And what was our position?”

  “We were towards the end of the table. Opposite to us was an irreverent Monsignor with a sense of humour.” The old lady nodded her head. “We were facing the window.”

  Lady Fritton smiled.

  “That was the circumstance which I remember best of all,” she said. “The sun of Naples may be all the poets say, but it can be a damnable grievance to an old woman.”

  She laid her plump hand with a charming motherliness upon Julian’s shoulder and passed on to the door. Brute Bellingham held it open and she drove her reluctant party in front of her. At the door she turned and looked towards Frances Scoble, who had risen when the other women rose, but kept her place by the fire.

  “I stay with my husband,” said Frances Scoble.

  “And indeed Lady Frances is gravely concerned,” Julian added.

  “Well!” Lady Fritton shrugged her shoulders helplessly. There came into her mind the moving words of the court-usher at the beginning of grave trials. She said very solemnly and quietly: “God send you all a good deliverance,” and she went out.

  It was odd, Julian thought, that she should use those words. It was the second time that he had heard them from the lips of a friend.

  Brute Bellingham shut the door. Then he said:

  “Gurton!”

  Gurton looked towards Julian, who nodded his head.

  “Take the other servants with you!”

  Brute Bellingham followed them to the Library door and closed that carefully after they had gone out. When he turned back into the room, Henry Scoble’s rage burst out of him. Brute Bellingham was officiating; the little unimportant Tory squire with his handful of turnip fields, and at Grest, too. The impudence of it! —

  “Quite the Master of the Ceremonies, Mr. Bellingham! Upon my word, Beau Nash must yield his place. Was there ever a more comical pretension!” Then he swung round on Julian.

  “Now, I suppose we come, Signor Marelli, to the real business of the evening. Well, what’s the price of this cock and bull story? Come, out with it! A good stinging price, I’ll be bound. Mud’s up or down according to whom it’s to spatter. What’s your price, man? — I beg your pardon for using the word.”

  “The usual price of murder,” Julian answered.

  For a moment Henry stopped. For a moment he measured the slender frame of the youth in front of him with his eyes and compared it with his own. Then he laughed brutally and confidently.

  “But you’re alive, my good fellow.”

  “You must ask my half-sister why. She hated better than you did. You meant murder — just plain, straightforward murder — to satisfy your simple needs; place, land, money, opportunity.”

  “It’s a lie,” cried Henry.

  “But Frances,” Julian continued. He turned towards her. “If there’s an Italian in this room, there the Italian stands.” He had not raised his voice, he had not so much as lifted an arm to point her out or moved a step to approach her. But she shrank back against the wall and, as though she was blind, her hand sought for and gripped the edge of the mantelpiece.

  “Frances Scoble wanted all you wanted. But she hated and she must have more. A blow on the head, a boy thrown into the water, oblivion, death! Not enough to satisfy the hatred of twelve years. She must maim and the maimed boy, who could sing well enough for an Earl amongst his friends, must fail in that hard school, where only a rare few survive at a cost which makes survival worthless, and go down to die miserably in the gutter with his memories of Grest to bear him company.”

  “Calumny! Slander!” Frances Scoble cried in a sudden fierce voice, which in itself gave the lie to her words. There was no remorse in it, not even fear. Hatred made it shake like the flame of a candle in a wind. Regret that the last letter of her purpose had not been fulfilled made it bitter as salt.

  “It is true,” Elliot rejoined, and his voice was breaking with pain and self-reproach, “
Lady Frances took me aside at Naples. She asked me, with a fear and an anxiety which I could not understand, whether it was possible that Julian had the making of a great singer. To my shame, I answered no. I no more understood the relief with which she listened than I had understood the dread which had prompted the question.”

  Julian’s memories went back to a hut upon the hillside against which he had leaned and sung.

  “Costanza Traetta was the better judge,” he said with a smile which was meant to salve the reproach. He struck a bell on a small table and Gurton answered it.

  “There is a portmanteau in my chaise,” said Julian. “Here are the keys. You will find a roll of papers. Will you bring it to me?”

  Gurton took the keys. The stables were built a hundred yards or so from the house, and the speed with which Gurton brought the roll to the drawingroom took everyone of them by surprise. Julian thanked him and when he had gone, he turned to Bellingham.

  “There is the evidence here to prove every charge that I have made — the confessions of Domenico the courier, the Traetta family, Crespino Ferrer and his wife, the accounts of the monies received and paid by Fabricio Menico the attorney, on behalf of the Earl of Linchcombe — it is all here, their signatures attested by the Cavalier Durante and a summary of the investigation by Lelio Zanotti, one of the chief lawyers of Naples. I beg you to keep it in safety.” Brute Bellingham took the roll of papers gingerly. Indeed with its tape and its parchment and its seals, it looked a formidable charge.

  “It smells damnably of the Law,” he grumbled. “It may never have to be used,” said Julian consolingly. “It all depends on Henry Scoble.” Brute Bellingham’s face wore at once a brighter look.

  “I’m not a lawyer, God be praised,” he said fervently. “Nor I hope a fire-eater either. I am just a plain countryman, and—”

  “And there seems to be but the one way of settlement, with no more words than need be,” said Julian, and he stepped lightly forward to Henry Scoble.

  It seemed to Sir James Elliot that he had been waiting for this moment to come like an actor in the wings for his cue. He took his handkerchief from his pocket and flourished it, so that its perfume scented the air.

  “The musk and amber of revenge, Henry Scoble,” he said, and he whipped it sharply across Scoble’s face.

  Scoble stood stock still. He was as white as one of his sanguine complexion could well be, but his eyes gleamed with pleasure; and he behaved with a dignity quite in contrast with his outbursts of rage.

  He turned towards Elliot as the oldest of his acquaintances present.

  “Although you are against me, Sir James, I hope you will for a few necessary minutes serve me as my friend?”

  Sir James hesitated. Violent encounters were not within his experience. He was the looker-on and had not the least wish to play even the smallest part in the cast, much less that of Charles his friend to Henry Scoble. But Julian added his entreaty.

  “If you please, Sir James,” and Elliot bowed.

  “Mr. Bellingham, will you oblige me?” Julian continued.

  “At your service,” Bellingham answered.

  There was no question in any man’s mind but that the quarrel, so vital to both the enemies, must be fought out to its end before he slept. Bellingham, once more Master of the Ceremonies, but this time on familiar ground, drew back the curtains and opened a pair of long windows. They gave upon the big portico above the Italian garden. The harvest moon was at the full, its great orb a golden red. There was not a cloud in the pale sky, nor a breath of wind in the garden. As far as the eye could reach the country slept in a light clear as the day, but more magical. The night was warm as a night in June.

  “Candles will not be needed, Sir James?” Bellingham asked.

  In the matter of candles, Sir James was an expert. His eyes had been too often distracted and dazzled in a hundred theatres by the ring of candles round the boxes for him now to disregard their danger.

  “They would be the friends of chance,” he agreed.

  Chance had nothing to do with the weaving of the pattern. So it must not spoil the copy. Since he had been cast for the part of Charles his friend, he must play it out honestly and fairly.

  “Then will you come with me?” said Bellingham, and he lead Elliot into the Library.

  Henry Scoble took off his coat and waistcoat and rolled back the shirt-sleeve of his right arm. Julian followed his example, and when Henry saw the youth whom he was to fight made yet more slender and ethereal by the circumstance that he was dressed in white from his throat to the black edge of his shoes, he smiled with a contemptuous pleasure. This was certainly the best way of stifling the whole unchancy business. He would finish with Julian to-night. If there were trouble over the duel, he would plead his clergy and escape all punishment. He might have to postpone his entry into the Government, but not for long. There would be no doubt, too, some unpleasant gossip, but both his acres and his shoulders were broad enough to sustain and subdue it. As for those rolls of parchment which Brute Bellingham held — what value could they have if Julian were dead? They were mere imputations, forgeries made by a rogue. Whatever had been done, had been done in Italy. There was no law in England which could put him on his trial here or send him to Italy to stand upon it there. And there was no Scoble in Italy to raise a question. Besides he had little doubt that he could persuade Brute Bellingham to hand the evidence over to him, once Julian was silenced and underground. Brute Bellingham was poor even for a country squire — there were places and profits within his own patronage. The Earl of Linchcombe could deal with Brute Bellingham — so long as he had dealt with Julian first. And upon that point he was not in doubt; and for an odd reason. He knew very well — no one in the room better — that Julian was matched against him; but he could not get it out of his head that it was none the less one of those Italian singers whom he was going to fight — one of those soprani who, like Senesino, screamed with terror and ran off the stage amidst an uproar of laughter if a piece of canvas scenery fell upon their heads, or suffered themselves to be horsewhipped in the streets for an impertinence. Cowards, every man-jack amongst them, and here was one, with the accent of Italy and the high notes of a woman’s voice when he sang, just waiting to be spitted at the end of his sword!

  Bellingham and Elliot came back into the room, Bellingham now carrying two swords in their sheaths. They were followed by a third man, a short, dark, competent person who carried a case of instruments; and at the sight of him Henry Scoble frowned.

  “I sent a messenger with a led horse to the village,” said Bellingham. “He was fortunate enough to find Dr. Conway at home and not yet gone to bed.”

  Dr. Conway stepped forward.

  “I know nothing of the dispute which has caused you to send for me. I understand only that it cannot be settled peaceably. My services are at your disposal.”

  “We all thank you, Dr. Conway,” said Henry Scoble.

  Bellingham spread a cloth upon a table. He looked towards Julian, taking one of the swords from Elliot and resting it on the palms of his hands. The sheath was of white Cordovan leather, the hilt sparkled with gold.

  “This is your sword?”

  “Yes.”

  Bellingham drew the blade from the sheath. It was a rapier of fine blue steel, grooved and tapering to a point. He laid it upon the cloth. Elliot performed the same office for Henry Scoble.

  “You all see that the two swords are of the same length,” said Bellingham; and when all were satisfied, he wrapped the cloth around them.

  “Now, gentlemen, will you be pleased to follow me?”

  He led the way out into the moonlit portico. Some garden chairs were scattered about it, and a big, oblong Persian rug was stretched over the stone floor. Under Bellingham’s directions, Bassett and Robert Joyce set aside the chairs and rolled away the rug. The portico was deep and long. In one corner Dr. Conway opened his case and brought out his instruments and dressings. Brute Bellingham took up a position half
way between the windows and the edge of the platform and half way between the side walls.

  “Here, I think?” he said to Elliot.

  “Yes.”

  “You will take up your positions, gentlemen.”

  Henry Scoble upon Bellingham’s right, Julian upon his left, took their places. He opened the cloth and the two enemies took their swords, measured their distance from each other, each one upright with his feet together. Bellingham held out a walking stick which Elliot handed to him, and over it the swords crossed. The moonlight rippled up and down the blades as they met.

  “So, to it,” said Bellingham. He drew the cane sharply away and stepped back.

  Inside the drawing-room, Frances Scoble drew close to the window. “Kill him!” she whispered, “kill him!” though there was no one to hear. During this last half hour no one had remembered her.

  XXIX. MUSK AND AMBER

  SLR JAMES ELLIOT had twice been flung out of his leisurely and quilted life; once when a boy in handcuffs had burst into tears in the lobby of his apartment in Venice; and now when the same boy was staking his life to avenge a crime and he himself was serving the criminal as his second. There was a difference, however, between the two occasions. In the first, a demand had been made upon him, swift and imperative. He had had to think and act for two; and it was astonishing to him to remember that he had not failed. Now he was a looker-on with a minor function and half of his mind was free to store away the contrast between the moonlit earth sleeping in the dew and the duel to the death in the moonlit porch. He heard the swords grate and hiss as they tried each other out; he saw their points circling like silver about each other within the compass of a curtain ring. But, himself a lamentable swordsman, his mind refused the intricacies of their movements. Idle questions assailed him. Which best nerved the arm and concentrated the eye? The passion to keep or the passion to recover? Did Julian mean to recover Grest and its titles and domains? He had spoken strange words to Gurton. Old Admiral Timbertoes had come back to his house of Grest for a night and a day. For only those few hours...?