CHAPTER X
“Here’s something got amongst us!”—Knight of Malta.
Two or three nights after his memorable conversation with Robert Beaufort, as Lord Lilburne was undressing, he said to his valet:
“Dykeman, I am getting well.”
“Indeed, my lord, I never saw your lordship look better.”
“There you lie. I looked better last year—I looked better the year before—and I looked better and better every year back to the age of twenty-one! But I’m not talking of looks, no man with money wants looks. I am talking of feelings. I feel better. The gout is almost gone. I have been quiet now for a month—that’s a long time—time wasted when, at my age, I have so little time to waste. Besides, as you know, I am very much in love!”
“In love, my lord? I thought that you told me never to speak of—”
“Blockhead! what the deuce was the good of speaking about it when I was wrapped in flannels! I am never in love when I am ill—who is? I am well now, or nearly so; and I’ve had things to vex me—things to make this place very disagreeable; I shall go to town, and before this day week, perhaps, that charming face may enliven the solitude of Fernside. I shall look to it myself now. I see you’re going to say something. Spare yourself the trouble! nothing ever goes wrong if I myself take it in hand.”
The next day Lord Lilburne, who, in truth, felt himself uncomfortable and gene in the presence of Vaudemont; who had won as much as the guests at Beaufort Court seemed inclined to lose; and who made it the rule of his life to consult his own pleasure and amusement before anything else, sent for his post-horses, and informed his brother-in-law of his departure.
“And you leave me alone with this man just when I am convinced that he is the person we suspected! My dear Lilburne, do stay till he goes.”
“Impossible! I am between fifty and sixty—every moment is precious at that time of life. Besides, I’ve said all I can say; rest quiet—act on the defensive—entangle this cursed Vaudemont, or Morton, or whoever he be, in the mesh of your daughter’s charms, and then get rid of him, not before. This can do no harm, let the matter turn out how it will. Read the papers; and send for Blackwell if you want advice on any new advertisements. I don’t see that anything more is to be done at present. You can write to me; I shall be at Park Lane or Fernside. Take care of yourself. You’re a lucky fellow—you never have the gout! Good-bye.”
And in half an hour Lord Lilburne was on the road to London.
The departure of Lilburne was a signal to many others, especially and naturally to those he himself had invited. He had not announced to such visitors his intention of going till his carriage was at the door. This might be delicacy or carelessness, just as people chose to take it: and how they did take it, Lord Lilburne, much too selfish to be well-bred, did not care a rush. The next day half at least of the guests were gone; and even Mr. Marsden, who had been specially invited on Arthur’s account, announced that he should go after dinner! he always travelled by night—he slept well on the road—a day was not lost by it.
“And it is so long since you saw Arthur,” said Mr. Beaufort, in remonstrance, “and I expect him every day.”
“Very sorry—best fellow in the world—but the fact is, that I am not very well myself. I want a little sea air; I shall go to Dover or Brighton. But I suppose you will have the house full again about Christmas; in that case I shall be delighted to repeat my visit.”
The fact was, that Mr. Marsden, without Lilburne’s intellect on the one hand, or vices on the other, was, like that noble sensualist, one of the broken pieces of the great looking-glass “SELF.” He was noticed in society as always haunting the places where Lilburne played at cards, carefully choosing some other table, and as carefully betting upon Lilburne’s side. The card-tables were now broken up; Vaudemont’s superiority in shooting, and the manner in which he engrossed the talk of the sportsmen, displeased him. He was bored—he wanted to be off—and off he went. Vaudemont felt that the time was come for him to depart, too; Robert Beaufort—who felt in his society the painful fascination of the bird with the boa, who hated to see him there, and dreaded to see him depart, who had not yet extracted all the confirmation of his persuasions that he required, for Vaudemont easily enough parried the artless questions of Camilla—pressed him to stay with so eager a hospitality, and made Camilla herself falter out, against her will, and even against her remonstrances—(she never before had dared to remonstrate with either father or mother),—“Could not you stay a few days longer?”—that Vaudemont was too contented to yield to his own inclinations; and so for some little time longer he continued to move before the eyes of Mr. Beaufort—stern, sinister, silent, mysterious—like one of the family pictures stepped down from its frame. Vaudemont wrote, however, to Fanny, to excuse his delay; and anxious to hear from her as to her own and Simon’s health, bade her direct her letter to his lodging in London (of which he gave her the address), whence, if he still continued to defer his departure, it would be forwarded to him. He did not do this, however, till he had been at Beaufort Court several days after Lilburne’s departure, and till, in fact, two days before the eventful one which closed his visit.
The party, now greatly diminished; were at breakfast, when the servant entered, as usual, with the letter-bag. Mr. Beaufort, who was always important and pompous in the small ceremonials of life, unlocked the precious deposit with slow dignity, drew forth the newspapers, which he threw on the table, and which the gentlemen of the party eagerly seized; then, diving out one by one, jerked first a letter to Camilla, next a letter to Vaudemont, and, thirdly, seized a letter for himself.
“I beg that there may be no ceremony, Monsieur de Vaudemont: pray excuse me and follow my example: I see this letter is from my son;” and he broke the seal.
The letter ran thus:
“MY DEAR FATHER,—Almost as soon as you receive this, I shall be with you. Ill as I am, I can have no peace till I see and consult you. The most startling—the most painful intelligence has just been conveyed to me. It is of a nature not to bear any but personal communication.
“Your affectionate son,“ARTHUR BEAUFORT.
“Boulogne.
“P.S.—This will go by the same packet-boat that I shall take myself, and can only reach you a few hours before I arrive.”
Mr. Beaufort’s trembling hand dropped the letter—he grasped the elbow of the chair to save himself from falling. It was clear!—the same visitor who had persecuted himself had now sought his son! He grew sick, his son might have heard the witness—might be convinced. His son himself now appeared to him as a foe—for the father dreaded the son’s honour! He glanced furtively round the table, till his eye rested on Vaudemont, and his terror was redoubled, for Vaudemont’s face, usually so calm, was animated to an extraordinary degree, as he now lifted it from the letter he had just read. Their eyes met. Robert Beaufort looked on him as a prisoner at the bar looks on the accusing counsel, when he first commences his harangue.
“Mr. Beaufort,” said the guest, “the letter you have given me summons me to London on important business, and immediately. Suffer me to send for horses at your earliest convenience.”
“What’s the matter?” said the feeble and seldom heard voice of Mrs. Beaufort. “What’s the matter, Robert?—is Arthur coming?”
“He comes to-day,” said the father, with a deep sigh; and Vaudemont, at that moment rising from his half-finished breakfast, with a bow that included the group, and with a glance that lingered on Camilla, as she bent over her own unopened letter (a letter from Winandermere, the seal of which she dared not yet to break), quitted the room. He hastened to his own chamber, and strode to and fro with a stately step—the step of the Master—then, taking forth the letter, he again hurried over its contents. They ran thus:
DEAR, Sir,—At last the missing witness has applied to me. He proves to be, as you conjectured, the same person who had called on Mr. Roger Morton; but as there are some circumstances on which I wish to take your instructions without a moment’s delay, I shall leave London by the mail, and wait you at D– (at the principal inn), which is, I understand, twenty miles on the high road from Beaufort Court.
“I have the honor to be, sir,
“Yours, &c.,“JOHN BARLOW.
Vaudemont was yet lost in the emotions that this letter aroused, when they came to announce that his chaise was arrived. As he went down the stairs he met Camilla, who was on the way to her own room.
“Miss Beaufort,” said he, in a low and tremulous voice, “in wishing you farewell I may not now say more. I leave you, and, strange to say, I do not regret it, for I go upon an errand that may entitle me to return again, and speak those thoughts which are uppermost in my soul even at this moment.”
He raised her hand to his lips as he spoke, and at that moment Mr. Beaufort looked from the door of his own room, and cried, “Camilla.” She was too glad to escape. Philip gazed after her light form for an instant, and then hurried down the stairs.
CHAPTER XI
“Longueville.—What! are you married, Beaufort?
Beaufort.—Ay, as fast
As words, and hands, and hearts, and priest,
Could make us.”
—BEAUMONT AND FLETCHER: Noble Gentleman.
In the parlour of the inn at D– sat Mr. John Barlow. He had just finished his breakfast, and was writing letters and looking over papers connected with his various business—when the door was thrown open, and a gentleman entered abruptly.
“Mr. Beaufort,” said the lawyer rising, “Mr. Philip Beaufort—for such I now feel you are by right—though,” he added, with his usual formal and quiet smile, “not yet by law; and much—very much, remains to be done to make the law and the right the same;—I congratulate you on having something at last to work on. I had begun to despair of finding our witness, after a month’s advertising; and had commenced other investigations, of which I will speak to you presently, when yesterday, on my return to town from an errand on your business, I had the pleasure of a visit from William Smith himself.—My dear sir, do not yet be too sanguine.—It seems that this poor fellow, having known misfortune, was in America when the first fruitless inquiries were made. Long after this he returned to the colony, and there met with a brother, who, as I drew from him, was a convict. He helped the brother to escape. They both came to England. William learned from a distant relation, who lent him some little money, of the inquiry that had been set on foot for him; consulted his brother, who desired him to leave all to his management. The brother afterwards assured him that you and Mr. Sidney were both dead; and it seems (for the witness is simple enough to allow me to extract all) this same brother then went to Mr. Beaufort to hold out the threat of a lawsuit, and to offer the sale of the evidence yet existing—”
“And Mr. Beaufort?”
“I am happy to say, seems to have spurned the offer. Meanwhile William, incredulous of his brother’s report, proceeded to N–, learned nothing from Mr. Morton, met his brother again—and the brother (confessing that he had deceived him in the assertion that you and Mr. Sidney were dead) told him that he had known you in earlier life, and set out to Paris to seek you—”
“Known me?—To Paris?”
“More of this presently. William returned to town, living hardly and penuriously on the little his brother bestowed on him, too melancholy and too poor for the luxury of a newspaper, and never saw our advertisement, till, as luck would have it, his money was out; he had heard nothing further of his brother, and he went for new assistance to the same relation who had before aided him. This relation, to his surprise, received the poor man very kindly, lent him what he wanted, and then asked him if he had not seen our advertisement. The newspaper shown him contained both the advertisements—that relating to Mr. Morton’s visitor, that containing his own name. He coupled them both together—called on me at once. I was from town on your business. He returned to his own home; the next morning (yesterday morning) came a letter from his brother, which I obtained from him at last, and with promises that no harm should happen to the writer on account of it.”
Vaudemont took the letter and read as follows:
“DEAR WILLIAM,—No go about the youngster I went after: all researches in vane. Paris develish expensive. Never mind, I have sene the other—the young B—; different sort of fellow from his father—very ill—frightened out of his wits—will go off to the governor, take me with him as far as Bullone. I think we shall settel it now. Mind as I saide before, don’t put your foot in it. I send you a Nap in the Seele—all I can spare.
“Yours,“JEREMIAH SMITH.
“Direct to me, Monsieur Smith—always a safe name—Ship Inn, Bullone.”
“Jeremiah—Smith—Jeremiah!”
“Do you know the name then?” said Mr. Barlow. “Well; the poor man owns that he was frightened at his brother—that he wished to do what is right—that he feared his brother would not let him—that your father was very kind to him—and so he came off at once to me; and I was very luckily at home to assure him that the heir was alive, and prepared to assert his rights. Now then, Mr. Beaufort, we have the witness, but will that suffice us? I fear not. Will the jury believe him with no other testimony at his back? Consider!—When he was gone I put myself in communication with some officers at Bow Street about this brother of his—a most notorious character, commonly called in the police slang Dashing Jerry—”
“Ah! Well, proceed!”
“Your one witness, then, is a very poor, penniless man, his brother a rogue, a convict: this witness, too, is the most timid, fluctuating, irresolute fellow I ever saw; I should tremble for his testimony against a sharp, bullying lawyer. And that, sir, is all at present we have to look to.”
“I see—I see. It is dangerous—it is hazardous. But truth is truth; justice—justice! I will run the risk.”
“Pardon me, if I ask, did you ever know this brother?—were you ever absolutely acquainted with him—in the same house?”
“Many years since—years of early hardship and trial—I was acquainted with him—what then?”
“I am sorry to hear it,” and the lawyer looked grave. “Do you not see that if this witness is browbeat—is disbelieved, and if it be shown that you, the claimant, was—forgive my saying it—intimate with a brother of such a character, why the whole thing might be made to look like perjury and conspiracy. If we stop here it is an ugly business!”
“And is this all you have to say to me? The witness is found—the only surviving witness—the only proof I ever shall or ever can obtain, and you seek to terrify me—me too—from using the means for redress Providence itself vouchsafes me—Sir, I will not hear you!”
“Mr. Beaufort, you are impatient—it is natural. But if we go to law—that is, should I have anything to do with it, wait—wait till your case is good. And hear me yet. This is not the only proof—this is not the only witness; you forget that there was an examined copy of the register; we may yet find that copy, and the person who copied it may yet be alive to attest it. Occupied with this thought, and weary of waiting the result of our advertisement, I resolved to go into the neighbourhood of Fernside; luckily, there was a gentleman’s seat to be sold in the village. I made the survey of this place my apparent business. After going over the house, I appeared anxious to see how far some alterations could be made—alterations to render it more like Lord Lilburne’s villa. This led me to request a sight of that villa—a crown to the housekeeper got me admittance. The housekeeper had lived with your father, and been retained by his lordship. I soon, therefore, knew which were the rooms the late Mr. Beaufort had principally occupied; shown into his study, where it was probable he would keep his papers, I inquired if it were the same furniture (which seemed likely enough from its age and fashion) as in your father’s time: it was so; Lord Lilburne had bought the house just as it stood, and, save a few additions in the drawing-room, the general equipment of the villa remained unaltered. You look impatient!—I’m coming to the point. My eye fell upon an old-fashioned bureau—”
“But we searched every drawer in that bureau!”
“Any secret drawers?”
“Secret drawers! No! there were no secret drawers that I ever heard of!”
Mr. Barlow rubbed his hands and mused a moment.
“I was struck with that bureau; for any father had had one like it. It is not English—it is of Dutch manufacture.”
“Yes, I have heard that my father bought it at a sale, three or four years after his marriage.”
“I learned this from the housekeeper, who was flattered by my admiring it. I could not find out from her at what sale it had been purchased, but it was in the neighbourhood she was sure. I had now a date to go upon; I learned, by careless inquiries, what sales near Fernside had taken place in a certain year. A gentleman had died at that date whose furniture was sold by auction. With great difficulty, I found that his widow was still alive, living far up the country: I paid her a visit; and, not to fatigue you with too long an account, I have only to say that she not only assured me that she perfectly remembered the bureau, but that it had secret drawers and wells, very curiously contrived; nay, she showed me the very catalogue in which the said receptacles are noticed in capitals, to arrest the eye of the bidder, and increase the price of the bidding. That your father should never have revealed where he stowed this document is natural enough, during the life of his uncle; his own life was not spared long enough to give him much opportunity to explain afterwards, but I feel perfectly persuaded in my mind—that unless Mr. Robert Beaufort discovered that paper amongst the others he examined—in one of those drawers will be found all we want to substantiate your claims. This is the more likely from your father never mentioning, even to your mother apparently, the secret receptacles in the bureau. Why else such mystery? The probability is that he received the document either just before or at the time he purchased the bureau, or that he bought it for that very purpose: and, having once deposited the paper in a place he deemed secure from curiosity—accident, carelessness, policy, perhaps, rather shame itself (pardon me) for the doubt of your mother’s discretion, that his secrecy seemed to imply, kept him from ever alluding to the circumstance, even when the intimacy of after years made him more assured of your mother’s self-sacrificing devotion to his interests. At his uncle’s death he thought to repair all!”
“And how, if that be true—if that Heaven which has delivered me hitherto from so many dangers, has, in the very secrecy of my poor father, saved my birthright front the gripe of the usurper—how, I say, is–”
“The bureau to pass into our possession? That is the difficulty. But we must contrive it somehow, if all else fail us; meanwhile, as I now feel sure that there has been a copy of that register made, I wish to know whether I should not immediately cross the country into Wales, and see if I can find any person in the neighbourhood of A– who did examine the copy taken: for, mark you, the said copy is only of importance as leading to the testimony of the actual witness who took it.”
“Sir,” said Vaudemont, heartily shaking Mr. Barlow by the hand, “forgive my first petulance. I see in you the very man I desired and wanted—your acuteness surprises and encourages me. Go to Wales, and God speed you!”
“Very well!—in five minutes I shall be off. Meanwhile, see the witness yourself; the sight of his benefactor’s son will do more to keep him steady than anything else. There’s his address, and take care not to give him money. And now I will order my chaise—the matter begins to look worth expense. Oh! I forgot to say that Monsieur Liancourt called on you yesterday about his own affairs. He wishes much to consult you. I told him you would probably be this evening in town, and he said he would wait you at your lodging.”
“Yes—I will lose not a moment in going to London, and visiting our witness. And he saw my mother at the altar! My poor mother—Ah, how could my father have doubted her!” and as he spoke, he blushed for the first time with shame at that father’s memory. He could not yet conceive that one so frank, one usually so bold and open, could for years have preserved from the woman who had sacrificed all to him, a secret to her so important! That was, in fact, the only blot on his father’s honour—a foul and grave blot it was. Heavily had the punishment fallen on those whom the father loved best! Alas, Philip had not yet learned what terrible corrupters are the Hope and the Fear of immense Wealthy, even to men reputed the most honourable, if they have been reared and pampered in the belief that wealth is the Arch blessing of life. Rightly considered, in Philip Beaufort’s solitary meanness lay the vast moral of this world’s darkest truth!
Mr. Barlow was gone. Philip was about to enter his own chaise, when a dormeuse-and-four drove up to the inn-door to change horses. A young man was reclining, at his length, in the carriage, wrapped in cloaks, and with a ghastly paleness—the paleness of long and deep disease upon his cheeks. He turned his dim eye with, perhaps, a glance of the sick man’s envy on that strong and athletic, form, majestic with health and vigour, as it stood beside the more humble vehicle. Philip did not, however, notice the new arrival; he sprang into the chaise, it rattled on, and thus, unconsciously, Arthur Beaufort and his cousin had again met. To which was now the Night—to which the Morning?