Complete Works of Stanley J Weyman

by Stanley J Weyman

  Clement sat silent, lost in thought, wondering if he were doing right, and fearing much that the Squire had repented of his generosity and was minded to recall it. If that were so, the awakening from the hopes which he had raised, and the dream of security in which they had lost themselves, would be a cruel shock. Clement shrank from thinking what its effect would be on his father, whose relief had betrayed the full measure of his fears. And his own case was hardly better, for it was not only his fortune that was at stake and that he had thought saved. He had given rein, also, to his hopes. He had let them carry him far into a roseate country where the sun shone and Josina smiled, and all the difficulties that had divided them melted into air. There might be need of time and patience; but with time and patience he had fancied that he might win his way.

  It was cruel, indeed, then if the old man at Garth had changed his mind, if he had played with them, only to deceive them, only to disappoint them! And Clement could not but fear that it was so. The closing day, the wintry air, the prospect before him, as they swung across the darkening land, seemed to confirm his fears and oppress him with misgivings. A long cloud, fish-shaped, hung lowering across the western sky; below it, along the horizon, a narrow strip of angry yellow, unnaturally bright, threw the black, jagged outline of the hills into violent contrast, and shed a pale light on the intervening plain. Ay, he feared the worst. He could think of nothing else that could be the cause of this sudden, this agitated summons. The Squire must have repented. He had changed his mind, and ——

  But here they were at the bridge. The cottages of the hamlet showed here and there a spark of light. They turned to the left, and five minutes later — the horse quickening its pace as they approached its stable — they were winding up the sunken drive under the stark limbs of the beeches. The house stood above them, a sombre pile, its chimneys half obscured by the trees.

  Heavily Clement let himself down, to find Calamy at his elbow. The man had been waiting for him in the dimly lighted doorway. “Mr. Bourdillon has gone to London,” Clement explained. “I have come instead if I can be of any use.” Then he saw that the butler did not know him, and “I am Mr. Clement Ovington,” he added. “You’d better ask your master if he would like to see me.”

  “There’s times when the devil’d be welcome,” the man replied bluntly. “It’s tears and lamentations and woe in the house this night, but God knows what it’s all about, for I don’t. Come in, come in, sir, in heaven’s name, but I’m fearing it’s little good. The devil has us in his tail, and if the master goes through the night — but this way, sir — this way!”

  He opened a door on the left of the hall, pushed the astonished Clement into the room, and over his shoulder, “Here’s one from the bank, at any rate,” he proclaimed. “Maybe he’ll do.”

  Clement took in the scene as he entered, and drew from it an instant impression of ill. The room was in disorder, lighted only by a pair of candles, the slender flames of which were reflected, islanded in blackness, in the two tall windows that, bald and uncurtained, let in the night. The fire, a pile of wood ashes neglected or forgotten, was almost out, and beside it a cupboard-door gaped widely open. A chair lay overturned on the floor, and in another sat the Squire, gaunt and upright, muttering to himself and gesticulating with his stick, while over him, her curls falling about her neck, her face tragic and tear-stained, hung his daughter, her shadow cast grotesquely on the wall behind her. She had a glass in her hand, and by her on the table, from which the cloth had fallen to the floor, stood water and a medicine bottle.

  In their absorption neither of the two had heard Calamy’s words, and for a moment Clement stood in doubt, staring at them and feeling that he had been wrong to come. The trouble, whatever it was, could not be what he had feared. Then, as he moved, half minded to withdraw, Josina heard him, and turned. In her amazement, “Clement!” she cried. “You!”

  The Squire turned in his chair. “Who?” he exclaimed.

  “Who’s there? Has he come?”

  The girl hesitated. The hand that rested on the old man’s shoulder trembled. Then — oh, bravely she took her courage in her hands, and “It is Clement who has come,” she said — acknowledging him so firmly that Clement marvelled to hear her.

  “Clement?” The old man repeated the word mechanically, and for a moment he sought in his mind who Clement might be. Then he found the answer, and “One of them, eh?” he muttered — but not in the voice that Clement had anticipated. “So he won’t face me? Coward as well as rogue, is he? And a Griffin! My God, a Griffin! So he’s sent him?”

  “Where is Arthur?” Josina asked sharply.

  “He left for London this morning — by the coach.”

  “Ay, ay,” the Squire said. “That’s it.”

  Clement plucked up courage. “And hearing that you wanted him, I came to explain. I feared from what the messenger said that there was something amiss.”

  “Something amiss!” The Squire repeated the words in an indescribable tone. “That’s what he calls it! Something amiss!”

  Clement looked from one to the other. “If there is anything I can do?”

  “You?” bluntly. “Why, you be one of them!”

  “No!” Josina interposed. “No, father. He has no part in it! I swear he has not!”

  But, “One of them! One of them!” the Squire repeated in the same stubborn tone, yet without lifting his voice.

  “No!” Josina repeated as firmly as before; and the hand that rested on her father’s shoulder slid round his neck. She held him half embraced. “But he may tell you what has happened. He may explain, sir?”

  “Explain!” the Squire muttered. Contempt could go no farther.

  “Shall I tell him, sir?”

  “You’re a fool, girl! The man knows.”

  “I am sure he does not!” she said.

  Again Clement thought that it was time to interpose, “Indeed I do not, sir,” he said. “I am entirely in the dark.” In truth, looking on what he did, seeing before him the unfamiliar room, the dark staring windows, and the old man so unlike himself and so like King Lear or some figure of tragedy, he was tempted to think the scene a dream. “If you will tell me what is the matter, perhaps I can help. Arthur left this morning for London. He went to raise the money with which he was entrusted — —”

  “Entrusted?” the Squire cried with something of his old energy. He raised his head and struck the floor with his stick. “Entrusted? That’s what you call it, is it?”

  Clement stared. “I don’t understand,” he said.

  “What did he tell you?” Josina asked. “For heaven’s sake speak, Clement! Tell us what he told you.”

  “Ay,” the Squire chimed in. “Tell us how you managed it. Now it’s done, let’s hear it.” For the time scorn, a weary kind of scorn, had taken the place of anger and subdued him to its level.

  But Clement was still at sea. “Managed it?” he repeated. “What do you — —”

  “Tell us, tell us — from the beginning!” Jos cried, at the end of her patience. “About this money? What did Arthur tell you? What did he tell you — this morning?”

  Then for the first time Clement saw what was in question, and he braced himself to meet the shock which he foresaw. “He told us,” he said, “what Mr. Griffin had consented to do — that he had given him securities for twelve thousand pounds for the use of the bank and to support its credit. He had the stock with him, and he received from the bank, in return for it, an undertaking to replace the amount two months after date with interest at seven per cent. It was thought best that he should take it to London himself, as it was so large a sum and time was everything. And he went by the coach this morning — to realize the money.”

  Josina shivered. “He took it without authority,” she said, her voice low.

  “He stole it,” the Squire said, “out of that cupboard.”

  “Oh, but that’s impossible, sir!” Clement replied with eagerness. He felt an immense relief, for he thought that
he saw light. He took note of the Squire’s condition, and he fancied that his memory, if not his mind, had given way. He had forgotten what he had done. That was it! “That’s impossible, sir,” he repeated firmly. “He had a proper transfer of the stock — India Stock it was — signed and witnessed and all in order.”

  “Signed and witnessed?” the Squire ejaculated. “Signed and — signed, your grandmother! So that’s your story, is it? Signed and witnessed, eh?”

  But Clement was beginning to be angry. “Yes, sir,” he said. “That is our story, and it is true.” He thought that he had hit on the truth, and he clung to it. The Squire had signed and the next minute had forgotten the whole transaction — Clement had heard of such cases. “He had the transfer with him,” he continued, “signed by you and witnessed by himself and — and Miss Griffin. I saw it myself. I saw the signatures, and I have seen yours, sir, often enough on a cheque to know it. The transfer was perfectly in order.”

  “In whose favor, young man?”

  “Our brokers’, sir.”

  The Squire flared up. “I did not sign it!” he cried. “It’s a lie, sir! I signed nothing! Nothing!”

  But Josina intervened. She, poor girl, saw light. “Yes,” she said, “my father did sign something — on Saturday after dinner. But it was a lease. I and Arthur witnessed it.”

  “And what has that to do with it?” the Squire asked passionately. “What the devil has that to do with it? I signed a lease and — and a counterpart. I signed no transfer of stock, never put hand to it! Never! What has the lease to do with it?”

  But Josina was firm. “I am afraid I see now, sir,” she said. “You remember that you signed a paper to try your pen? And I signed it too, father, by mistake? You remember? Ah!” — with a gesture of despair— “if I had only not signed it!”

  The Squire groaned. He, too, saw it now. He saw it, and his head sank on his breast. “Forger as well as thief!” he muttered. “And a Griffin!”

  And Clement’s heart sank too as he met the girl’s anguished eyes and viewed the Squire’s bowed head and the shame and despair that clothed themselves in an apathy so unlike the man. He saw that here was a tragedy indeed, a tragedy fitly framed in that desolate room with its windows staring on the night and its air of catastrophe; a tragedy passing bank failures or the loss of fortune. And in his mind he cursed the offender.

  But even as the words rose to his lips, doubt stayed them. There was, there must be, some mistake. The thing could not be. He knew Arthur, he thought that he knew Arthur; he knew even the darker side of him — his selfishness, his lack of thought for others, his desire to get on and to grow rich. But this thing Arthur never could have done! Clement recalled his gay, smiling face, his frank bearing, his care-free eyes, the habit he had of casting back a lock from his brow. No, he could not have done this thing. “No, sir, no!” he cried impulsively. “There is some mistake! I swear there is! I am sure of it.”

  “You’ve the securities?”

  “Yes, but I am sure — —”

  “You’re all in it,” the Squire said drearily. And then, with energy and in a voice quivering with rage, “He’s learned this at your d — d counter, sir! That’s where it is. It’s like to like, that’s where it is. Like to like! I might ha’ known what would happen, when the lad set his mind on leaving our ways and taking up with yours. I might ha’ known that that was the blackest day our old house had ever seen — when he left the path his fathers trod and chose yours. You can’t touch pitch and keep your hands clean. You ha’ stole my daughter — d — n you, sir! And you ha’ taught him to steal my money. I mind me I bid your father think o’ Fauntleroy, I never thought he was breeding up a Fauntleroy in my house.” And, striking the table with all his old vitality, “You are thieves! thieves all o’ you! And you ha’ taught my lad to thieve!”

  “That is not true!” Clement cried. “Not a word of that is true!”

  “You ha’ stole my daughter!”

  Clement winced. She had told him, then.

  “And now you ha’ stole my money!”

  “That, at least, is not true!” He held up his head. He stepped forward and laid his hand on the table. “That is not true,” he repeated firmly. “Yon do not know my father, Mr. Griffin, though you may think you do. He would see the bank break a hundred times, he would see every penny pass from him, before he would do this that you say has been done. Your nephew told us what I have told you, and we believed him — naturally we believed him. We never suspected. Not a suspicion crossed my father’s mind or mine. We saw the certificates, we saw the transfer, we knew your handwriting. It was in order, and — —”

  “And you thought — you ha’ the impudence to tell me that you thought that I should throw thousands, ay, thousands upon thousands into the gutter — to save your bank?”

  “We believed what we were told,” Clement maintained. “Why not — as you put the question, sir? Your nephew had five thousand pounds at stake. His share in the bank was at stake. He knew as well as we did that with this assistance the bank was secure. We supposed that for his sake and the sake of his prospects — —”

  “I don’t believe it!” the Squire retorted. “I’ll never believe it. Your father’s a trader. I know ‘em, and what their notion of honesty is. And you tell me — —”

  “I tell you that a trader is nothing if he be not honest!” Clement cried hotly. “Honesty is to him what honor is to you, Mr. Griffin. But we’ll leave my father’s name out of this, if you please, sir. You may say what you like of me. I have deserved it.”

  “No,” said Josina.

  “Yes, I have deserved it, and I am ashamed of myself — and proud of myself. But my father has done nothing and known nothing. And for this money, when he learns the truth, Mr. Griffin, he will not touch one penny of it with one of his fingers. It shall be returned to you, every farthing of it, as soon as we can lay our hands on it. Every penny of it shall be returned to you — at once!”

  “Ay,” dryly, “when you have had the use of it!”

  “No, at once! Without the loss of an hour!”

  “You be found out,” said the old man bitterly. “You be found out! That’s it!”

  Clement read an appeal in Josina’s eyes, and he stayed the retort that rose to his lips. “At any rate the money shall be restored,” he said— “at once. I will start for town to-night, and if I can overtake” — he paused, unwilling to utter Arthur’s name— “if I can overtake him before he transfers the stock, the securities shall be returned to you. In that case no harm will be done.”

  “No harm!” the Squire ejaculated. He raised his hand and let it fall in a gesture of despair. “No harm?”

  But Clement was determined not to dwell on that side of it. “If I am not able to do that,” he continued, “the proceeds shall be placed in your hands without the delay of an hour. In which case you must let the signature pass — as good, sir.”

  “Never!” the old man cried, and struck his hand on the table.

  “But after all it is yours,” Clement argued. “And you must see, sir — —”

  “Never! Never!” the Squire repeated passionately.

  “You will not say that in cold blood!” Clement rejoined, and from that moment he took a higher tone, as if he felt that, strange as the call was, it lay with him now to guide this unhappy household. “You have not considered, and you must consider, Mr. Griffin,” he continued, “before you do that, what the consequences may be. If you deny your signature, and anyone, the India House or anyone, stands to lose, steps may be taken which may prove — fatal. Fatal, sir! A point may be reached beyond which even your influence, and all you may then be willing to do, may not avail to save your nephew.”

  The Squire groaned. Clement’s words called up before him and before Josina, not only the thing which Arthur had done, but the position in which he had placed himself. In this room, in this very room in which men of honor — dull and prejudiced, perhaps, but men of honor, and proud of their honor —
had lived and moved for generations, he, their descendant, had done this thing. The beams had stood, the house had not fallen on him. But to Josina’s eyes the candles seemed to burn more mournfully, the windows to stare more darkly on the night, the ashes on the hearth to speak of desolation and a house abandoned and fallen.

  Clement hoped that his appeal had succeeded, but he was disappointed. The old man in his bitterness and unreason was not to be moved — at any rate as yet. He would listen to no arguments, and he suspected those who argued with him. “I’ll never acknowledge it!” he said. “No, I’ll never acknowledge it. I’ll not lie for him, come what may! He has done the thing and disgraced our blood, and what matter who knows it — he has done it! He has made his bed and must lie on it! He went into your bank and learned your tricks, and now you’d have me hush it up! But I won’t, d — n you! I’ll not lie for you, or for him!”

  Clement had a retort on his lips — for what could be more unfair than this? But again Josina’s eyes implored him to be silent, and he crushed back the words. He believed that by and by the Squire would see the thing differently, but for the moment he could do no more, and he turned to the door.

  There in the doorway, and for one moment, Josina’s hands met his, she had one word with him. “You will save him if you can, Clement?” she murmured.

  “Yes,” he promised her, “I will save him if I can.”

  CHAPTER XXXII

  If the news which Arthur had conveyed to the bank on that Monday morning had been much to Clement, it had been more to his father. It had brought to Ovington immense relief at the moment when he had least reason to expect it. The banker had not hidden the position from those who must needs work with him; but even to them he had not imparted the full measure of his fears, much less the extent of the suffering which those fears occasioned him. The anxiety that kept him sleepless, the calculations that tormented his pillow, the regret with which he reviewed the past, the responsibility for the losses of others that depressed him — he had kept these things to himself, or at most had dropped but a hint of them to his beloved Betty.