The Castle Inn

by Stanley John Weyman

  CHAPTER XXIII

  BULLY POMEROY

  The man held a candle in a hand that wavered and strewed tallowbroadcast; the light from this for a moment dazzled the visitors. Thenthe draught of air extinguished it, and looking over the servant'sshoulder--he was short and squat--Mr. Thomasson's anxious eyes had aglimpse of a spacious old-fashioned hall, panelled and furnished in oak,with here a blazon, and there antlers or a stuffed head. At the fartherend of the hall a wide easy staircase rose, to branch at the firstlanding into two flights, that returning formed a gallery round theapartment. Between the door and the foot of the staircase, in the warmglow of an unseen fire, stood a small heavily-carved oak table, withJacobean legs, like stuffed trunk-hose. This was strewn with cards,liquors, glasses, and a china punch-bowl; but especially with cards,which lay everywhere, not only on the table, but in heaps and batchesbeneath and around it, where the careless hands of the players hadflung them.

  Yet, for all these cards, the players were only two. One, a mansomething under forty, in a peach coat and black satin breeches, sat onthe edge of the table, his eyes on the door and his chair lying at hisfeet. It was his voice that had shouted for Jarvey and that now salutedthe arrivals with a boisterous 'Two to one in guineas, it's a catchpoll!D'ye take me, my lord?'--the while he drummed merrily with his heels ona leg of the table. His companion, an exhausted young man, thin andpale, remained in his chair, which he had tilted on its hinder feet; andcontented himself with staring at the doorway.

  The latter was our old friend, Lord Almeric Doyley; but neither he norMr. Thomasson knew one another, until the tutor had advanced some pacesinto the room. Then, as the gentleman in the peach coat cried, 'Curseme, if it isn't a parson! The bet's off! Off!' Lord Almeric dropped hishand of cards on the table, and opening his mouth gasped in a paroxysmof dismay.

  'Oh, Lord,' he exclaimed, at last. 'Hold me, some one! If it isn'tTommy! Oh, I say,' he continued, rising and speaking in a tone ofquerulous remonstrance, 'you have not come to tell me the old man'sgone! And I'd pitted him against Bedford to live to--to--but it's likehim! It is like him, and monstrous unfeeling. I vow and protest it is!Eh! oh, it is not that! Hal--loa!'

  He paused there, his astonishment greater even than that which he hadfelt on recognising the tutor. His eye had lighted on Julia, whosefigure was now visible on the threshold.

  His companion did not notice this. He was busy identifying the tutor.'Gad! it is old Thomasson!' he cried, for he too had been at Pembroke.'_And_ a petticoat! _And_ a petticoat!' he repeated. 'Well, I am spun!'

  The tutor raised his hands in astonishment. 'Lord!' he said, with a fairshow of enthusiasm, 'do I really see my old friend and pupil, Mr.Pomeroy of Bastwick?'

  'Who put the cat in your valise? When you got to London--kittens? Youdo, Tommy.'

  'I thought so!' Mr. Thomasson answered effusively. 'I was sure of it! Inever forget a face when my--my heart has once gone out to it! And you,my dear, my very dear Lord Almeric, there is no danger I shall ever--'

  'But, crib me, Tommy,' Lord Almeric shrieked, cutting him short withoutceremony, so great was his astonishment, 'it's the Little Masterson!'

  'You old fox!' Mr. Pomeroy chimed in, shaking his finger at the tutorwith leering solemnity; he, belonging to an older generation at theCollege, did not know her. Then, 'The Little Masterson, is it?' hecontinued, advancing to the girl, and saluting her with mock ceremony.'Among friends, I suppose? Well, my dear, for the future be pleased tocount me among them. Welcome to my poor house! And here's to betteringyour taste--for, fie, my love, old men are naughty. Have naught to dowith them!' And he laughed wickedly. He was a tall, heavy man, with ahard, bullying, sneering face; a Dunborough grown older.

  'Hush! my good sir. Hush!' Mr. Thomasson cried anxiously, after makingmore than one futile effort to stop him. Between his respect for hiscompanion, and the deference in which he held a lord, the tutor was inagony. 'My good sir, my dear Lord Almeric, you are in error,' hecontinued strenuously. 'You mistake, I assure you, you mistake--'

  'Do we, by Gad!' Mr. Pomeroy cried, winking at Julia.' Well, you and I,my dear, don't, do we? We understand one another very well.'

  The girl only answered by a fierce look of contempt. But Mr. Thomassonwas in despair. 'You do not, indeed!' he cried, almost wringing hishands. 'This lady has lately come into a--a fortune, and to-night wascarried off by some villains from the Castle Inn at Marlborough in a--ina post-chaise. I was fortunately on the spot to give her such protectionas I could, but the villains overpowered me, and to prevent my givingthe alarm, as I take it, bundled me into the chaise with her.'

  'Oh, come,' said Mr. Pomeroy, grinning. 'You don't expect us to swallowthat?'

  'It is true, as I live,' the tutor protested. 'Every word of it.'

  'Then how come you here?'

  'Not far from your gate, for no reason that I can understand, theyturned us out, and made off.'

  'Honest Abraham?' Lord Almeric asked; he had listened open-mouthed.

  'Every word of it,' the tutor answered.

  'Then, my dear, if you have a fortune, sit down,' cried Mr. Pomeroy; andseizing a chair he handed it with exaggerated gallantry to Julia, whostill remained near the door, frowning darkly at the trio; neitherashamed nor abashed, but proudly and coldly contemptuous. 'Make yourselfat home, my pretty,' he continued familiarly, 'for if you have a fortuneit is the only one in this house, and a monstrous uncommon thing. Is itnot, my lord?'

  'Lord! I vow it is!' the other drawled; and then, taking advantage ofthe moment when Julia's attention was engaged elsewhere--she dumblyrefused to sit, 'Where is Dunborough?' my lord muttered.

  'Heaven knows,' Mr. Thomasson whispered, with a wink that postponedinquiry. 'What is more to the purpose,' he continued aloud, 'if I mayventure to make the suggestion to your lordship and Mr. Pomeroy, MissMasterson has been much distressed and fatigued this evening. If thereis a respectable elderly woman in the house, therefore, to whose careyou could entrust her for the night, it were well.'

  'There is old Mother Olney,' Mr. Pomeroy answered, assenting with areadier grace than the tutor expected, 'who locked herself up an hourago for fear of us young bloods. She should be old and ugly enough! Hereyou, Jarvey, go and kick in her outworks, and bid her come down.'

  'Better still, if I may suggest it,' said the tutor, who was above allthings anxious to be rid of the girl before too much was said--'Mightnot your servant take Miss above stairs to this good woman--who willdoubtless see to her comfort? Miss Masterson has gone through somesurprising adventures this evening, and I think it were better if youallowed her to withdraw at once, Mr. Pomeroy.'

  'Jarvey, take the lady,' Mr. Pomeroy cried. 'A sweet pretty toad she is.Here's to your eyes and fortune, child!' he continued with an impudentgrin; and filling his glass he pledged her as she passed.

  After that he stood watching while Mr. Thomasson opened the door andbowed her out; and this done and the door closed after her, 'Lord, whatceremony!' he said, with an ugly sneer. 'Is't real, man, or are yoububbling her? And what is this Cock-lane story of a chaise and the rest?Out with it, unless you want to be tossed in a blanket.'

  'True, upon my honour!' Mr. Thomasson asseverated.

  'Oh, but Tommy, the fortune?' Lord Almeric protested seriously. 'I vowyou are sharping us.'

  'True too, my lord, as I hope to be saved!'

  'True? Oh, but it is too monstrous absurd,' my lord wailed. 'The LittleMasterson? As pretty a little tit as was to be found in all Oxford. TheLittle Masterson a fortune?'

  'She has eyes and a shape,' Mr. Pomeroy admitted generously. 'For therest, what is the figure, Mr. Thomasson?' he continued. 'There arefortunes and fortunes.'

  Mr. Thomasson looked at the gallery above, and thence, and slyly, tohis companions and back again to the gallery; and swallowed somethingthat rose in his throat. At length he seemed to make up his mind tospeak the truth, though when he did so it was in a voice little above awhisper. 'Fifty thousand,' he said, and looked guiltily round him.
r />   Lord Almeric rose from his chair as if on springs. 'Oh, I protest!' hesaid. 'You are roasting us. Fifty thousand! It's a bite?'

  But Mr. Thomasson nodded. 'Fifty thousand,' he repeated softly. 'Fiftythousand.'

  'Pounds?' gasped my lord. 'The Little Masterson?'

  The tutor nodded again; and without asking leave, with a dogged airunlike his ordinary bearing when he was in the company of those abovehim, he drew a decanter towards him, and filling a glass with a shakinghand raised it to his lips and emptied it. The three were on their feetround the table, on which several candles, luridly lighting up theirfaces, still burned; while others had flickered down, and smoked in theguttering sockets, among the empty bottles and the litter of cards. Inone corner of the table the lees of wine had run upon the oak, anddripped to the floor, and formed a pool, in which a broken glass lay infragments beside the overturned chair. An observant eye might have foundon the panels below the gallery the vacant nails and dusty lines whenceLelys and Knellers, Cuyps and Hondekoeters had looked down on twogenerations of Pomeroys. But in the main the disorder of the scenecentred in the small table and the three men standing round it; alighted group, islanded in the shadows of the hall.

  Mr. Pomeroy waited with impatience until Mr. Thomasson lowered hisglass. Then, 'Let us have the story,' he said. 'A guinea to a Chinaorange the fool is tricking us.'

  The tutor shook his head, and turned to Lord Almeric. 'You know SirGeorge Soane,' he said. 'Well, my lord, she is his cousin.'

  'Oh, tally, tally!' my lord cried. 'You--you are romancing, Tommy!'

  'And under the will of Sir George's grandfather she takes fifty thousandpounds, if she make good her claim within a certain time from to-day.'

  'Oh, I say, you are romancing!' my lord repeated, more feebly. 'Youknow, you really should not! It is too uncommon absurd, Tommy.'

  'It's true!' said Mr. Thomasson.

  'What? That this porter's wench at Pembroke has fifty thousand pounds?'cried Mr. Pomeroy. 'She is the porter's wench, isn't she?' he continued.Something had sobered him. His eyes shone, and the veins stood out onhis forehead. But his manner was concise and harsh, and to the point.

  Mr. Thomasson. glanced at him stealthily, as one gamester scrutinisesanother over the cards. 'She is Masterson, the porter's,foster-child,' he said.

  'But is it certain that she has the money?' the other cried rudely. 'Isit true, man? How do you know? Is it public property?'

  'No,' Mr. Thomasson answered, 'it is not public property. But it iscertain and it is true!' Then, after a moment's hesitation, 'I saw somepapers--by accident,' he said, his eyes on the gallery.

  'Oh, d--n your accident!' Mr. Pomeroy cried brutally. 'You are very fineto-night. You were not used to be a Methodist! Hang it, man, we knowyou,' he continued violently, 'and this is not all! This does not bringyou and the girl tramping the country, knocking at doors at midnightwith Cock-lane stories of chaises and abductions. Come to it, man, or--'

  'Oh, I say,' Lord Almeric protested weakly. 'Tommy is an honest man inhis way, and you are too stiff with him.'

  'D--n him! my lord; let him come to the point then,' Mr. Pomeroyretorted savagely. 'Is she in the way to get the money?'

  'She is,' said the tutor sullenly.

  'Then what brings her here--with you, of all people?'

  'I will tell you if you will give me time, Mr. Pomeroy,' the tutor saidplaintively. And he proceeded to describe in some detail all that hadhappened, from the _fons et origo mali_--Mr. Dunborough's passion forthe girl--to the stay at the Castle Inn, the abduction at Manton Corner,the strange night journey in the chaise, and the stranger release.

  When he had done, 'Sir George was the girl's fancy-man, then?' Pomeroysaid, in the harsh overbearing tone he had suddenly adopted.

  The tutor nodded.

  'And she thinks he has tricked her?'

  'But for that and the humour she is in,' Mr. Thomasson answered, with asubtle glance at the other's face, 'you and I might talk here tillDoomsday, and be none the better, Mr. Pomeroy.'

  His frankness provoked Mr. Pomeroy to greater frankness. 'Consume yourimpertinence!' he cried. 'Speak for yourself.'

  'She is not that kind of woman,' said Mr. Thomasson firmly.

  'Kind of woman?' cried Mr. Pomeroy furiously. 'I am this kind of man.Oh, d--n you! If you want plain speaking you shall have it! She hasfifty thousand, and she is in my house; well, I am this kind of man!I'll not let that money go out of the house without having a fling atit! It is the devil's luck has sent her here, and it will be my follywill send her away--if she goes. Which she does not if I am the kind ofman I think I am. So there for you! There's plain speaking.'

  'You don't know her,' Mr. Thomasson answered doggedly. 'Mr. Dunboroughis a gentleman of mettle, and he could not bend her.'

  'She was not in his house!' the other retorted, with a grim laugh. Then,in a lower, if not more amicable tone, 'Look here, man,' he continued,'d'ye mean to say that you had not something of this kind in your mindwhen you knocked at this door?'

  'I!' Mr. Thomasson cried, virtuously indignant.

  'Ay, you! Do you mean to say you did not see that here was a chance in ahundred? In a thousand? Ay, in a million? Fifty thousand pounds is notfound in the road any day?'

  Mr. Thomasson grinned in a sickly fashion. 'I know that,' he said.

  'Well, what is your idea? What do you want?'

  The tutor did not answer on the instant, but after stealing one or twofurtive glances at Lord Almeric, looked down at the table, a nervoussmile distorting his mouth. At length, 'I want--her,' he said; andpassed his tongue furtively over his lips.

  'The girl?'

  'Yes.'

  'Oh Lord!' said Mr. Pomeroy, in a voice of disgust.

  But the ice broken, Mr. Thomasson had more to say. 'Why not?' he saidplaintively. 'I brought her here--with all submission. I know her,and--and am a friend of hers. If she is fair game for any one, she isfair game for me. I have run a risk for her,' he continued pathetically,and touched his brow, where the slight cut he had received in thestruggle with Dunborough's men showed below the border of his wig,'and--and for that matter, Mr. Pomeroy is not the only man who hasbailiffs to avoid.'

  'Stuff me, Tommy, if I am not of your opinion!' cried Lord Almeric. Andhe struck the table with unusual energy.

  Pomeroy turned on him in surprise as great as his disgust. 'What?' hecried. 'You would give the girl and her money--fifty thousand--to thisold hunks!'

  'I? Not I! I would have her myself!' his lordship answered stoutly.'Come, Pomeroy, you have won three hundred of me, and if I am not totake a hand at this, I shall think it low! Monstrous low I shall thinkit!' he repeated in the tone of an injured person. 'You know. Pom, Iwant money as well as another--want it devilish bad--'

  'You have not been a Sabbatarian, as I was for two months last year,'Mr. Pomeroy retorted, somewhat cooled by this wholesale rising among hisallies, 'and walked out Sundays only for fear of the catchpolls.'

  'No, but--'

  'But I am not now, either. Is that it? Why, d'ye think, because Ipouched six hundred of Flitney's, and three of yours, and set the maregoing again, it will last for ever?'

  'No, but fair's fair, and if I am not in this, it is low. It is low,Pom,' Lord Almeric continued, sticking to his point with abnormalspirit. 'And here is Tommy will tell you the same. You have had threehundred of me--'

  'At cards, dear lad; at cards,' Mr. Pomeroy answered easily. 'But thisis not cards. Besides,' he continued, shrugging his shoulders andpouncing on the argument, 'we cannot all marry the girl!'

  'I don't know,' my lord answered, passing his fingers tenderly throughhis wig. 'I--I don't commit myself to that.'

  'Well, at any rate, we cannot all have the money!' Pomeroy replied,with sufficient impatience.

  'But we can all try! Can't we, Tommy?'

  Mr. Thomasson's face, when the question was put to him in that form, wasa curious study. Mr. Pomeroy had spoken aright when he called it achance in a hundred, in a thou
sand, in a million. It was a chance, atany rate, that was not likely to come in Mr. Thomasson's way again.True, he appreciated more correctly than the others the obstacles in theway of success--the girl's strong will and wayward temper; but he knewalso the humour which had now taken hold of her, and how likely it wasthat it might lead her to strange lengths if the right man spoke at theright moment.

  The very fact that Mr. Pomeroy had seen the chance and gauged thepossibilities, gave them a more solid aspect and a greater reality inthe tutor's mind. Each moment that passed left him less willing toresign pretensions which were no longer the shadowy creatures of thebrain, but had acquired the aspect of solid claims--claims made his byskill and exertion.

  But if he defied Mr. Pomeroy, how would he stand? The girl's position inthis solitary house, apart from her friends, was half the battle; in asneaking way, though he shrank from facing the fact, he knew that shewas at their mercy; as much at their mercy as if they had planned theabduction from the first. Without Mr. Pomeroy, therefore, the master ofthe house and the strongest spirit of the three--

  He got no farther, for at this point Lord Almeric repeated his question;and the tutor, meeting Pomeroy's bullying eye, found it necessary to saysomething. 'Certainly,' he stammered at a venture, 'we can all try, mylord. Why not?'

  'Ay, why not?' said Lord Almeric. 'Why not try?'

  'Try? But how are you going to try?' Mr. Pomeroy responded with ajeering laugh. 'I tell you, we cannot all marry the girl.'

  Lord Almeric burst in a sudden fit of chuckling. 'I vow and protest Ihave it!' he cried. 'We'll play for her! Don't you see, Pom? We'll cutfor her! Ha! Ha! That is surprising clever of me; don't you think? We'llplay for her!'