Part 7

“Indeed,” he answered, indifferently, and, pulling forward a chair, he seated himself beside his father. “I am happy to believe, sir, that you’re prepared to speak of me as freely in my presence as in my absence.”

“I am to take this as your permission, Charles?” asked Mr. Bradbury, smoothly.

“Why not?” my uncle asked, smiling.

“Well, then, I have introduced this young gentleman to your father as your brother’s son, John Craike. I have already informed your father of the steps you took to prevent his arrival at Craike House.”

“My sole concern,” said the gentleman, carelessly, “is that I failed.”

“You admit your culpability?” asked Mr. Bradbury, meeting him with an equal composure.

“Culpability! Pray, your snuff-box, Bradbury—I haven’t mine by me. Thank you!” leaning forward and taking a pinch. “I admit no culpability, my dear Bradbury.”

“It is, to be sure, merely a question of phrase,” Mr. Bradbury conceded, drily. “It is enough for me that you failed. Admitting this, then, do you admit equally your responsibility for your brother’s disappearance from England?”

I saw my grandfather lean forward in his chair, his hands now gripping the ebony stick; the movement was not lost upon my uncle.

He answered swiftly, “That, Bradbury, I deny wholly. You are well aware of my affection for my brother, and my natural grief at his disappearance.”

“Well aware,” said Mr. Bradbury, with some show of anger. “And well aware, Charles, that if you were responsible, you would not dare to admit this before your father, knowing his actual affection for your brother as for no other being. Yet you admit before him your culpability—your guilt—in regard to this young gentleman—your brother’s son. Understanding that Mr. Edward Craike here takes a—shall I say tolerant?—view of many things that others,—I,—that the law of England regard as crimes, Charles Craike—as crimes punishable with the utmost rigour.”

“Really, Bradbury, you grow prosy,” Mr. Charles protested.

“You impose upon our friendship, Bradbury,” the old man muttered.

“Mr. Craike,” said Mr. Bradbury, “would you have me make-believe to you of all men? Your son attempts to put away his brother’s son. He admits his guilt coolly—with effrontery, and you say nothing! I expected you to say nothing. But by his denial of his responsibility for the disappearance of Richard Craike from England, Charles here proves this to me—his realisation of your love for his brother, and the certainty of your righteous anger and his punishment, if it could be proved against him.”

“Bradbury! Bradbury!” Charles Craike murmured, smiling; but for the first time I saw a show of colour in his face, and a tightening of his lips.

“The lad,” persisted Mr. Bradbury, “is Richard’s son. Legitimate! Be silent, Charles”—as the gentleman, with a bitter exclamation, started from his chair. “Don’t think that I, of all men, would come here, present this lad to Mr. Craike as his grandson, unless I were in possession of irrefutable proofs—that Richard Craike was married to Mary Howe, and that the boy is the child of that marriage. Nor would I have brought him to this house, but that I realise, as fully as I understand aught of Mr. Craike—that the best of Mr. Craike—his natural affection—was given wholly to his elder son.”

Mr. Bradbury leaned forward, eyeing the pair keenly. Charles Craike, impassive now, sat back in his chair; the old man had lowered his eyes, and now it seemed at last was moved and trembling; the ebony stick in his grasp clattered upon the hearth.

“I hoped,” said Mr. Bradbury, “to offer my client a little happiness in his last days. If I could not give him back his son, at least I could give him his grandson—look for look, colour for colour—the image of his son.”

Now my grandfather’s eyes burned suddenly upon me; now he leaned forward in his chair; colouring and confused, I sat staring at him in turn. He muttered then, “Bradbury—these proofs!”

“The proofs are in our possession, sir. Necessarily, I could not bring them to this house.”

“Ay, but proofs, proofs—your bare word.”

“Mr. Craike,” said Mr. Bradbury, disdainfully, “when have you ever had occasion before to question my probity?”

My grandfather was silent; again his eyes were cast down; the ebony stick in his grasp did not cease to clatter on the hearth. Charles Craike sat silent. Mr. Bradbury, snapping his snuff-box, rose from his chair.

“That is all I have to say to you, Mr. Craike,” he said, quietly. “I beg you to give this matter your earnest consideration, realising that at least the boy is the heir of Craike House, and realising that it is in your power to enrich him from your private fortunes as surely, sir, you would have enriched your son.”

I wondered at the composure of my Uncle Charles. He had risen with Mr. Bradbury, and now stood leaning against the chimney-piece, his face revealing nothing of the rage which surely racked him.

“I beg to take my leave of you, Mr. Craike,” said Mr. Bradbury, bowing to my grandfather. “Come, lad!”

But as I started up, glad enough to be away, the old man’s cane smote heavily upon the hearth. “The lad,” he growled, “stays here, Bradbury!”

“Mr. Craike, were you alone in this house,” said Mr. Bradbury, swiftly, “nothing could give me keener pleasure than that your grandson should remain with you. But Craike House is Craike House, and the lad goes with me.”

“He stays here!” cried the old man, with sudden stormy anger. “Damn you, Bradbury, he stays here!”

“Mr. Craike, I am answerable for the lad’s safety.”

“Really, Bradbury, really!” Charles deprecated.

“The lad will come to no hurt in this house,” the old man said, and his eyes blazed suddenly at Charles. “You hear me, Charles? No hurt shall come to him! If hurt come to him,—if, in defiance of me you seek to injure him, and separate my son’s son from me, as they took my son from me,—look to it, Bradbury, that no concern for me, and no desire further to keep the secrets of this house, shall stand between my grandson’s enemies and justice! Justice, Bradbury! The boy stays here. You remain to dine with me, Bradbury. There are affairs.”

Smiling triumphantly, Mr. Bradbury bowed.

“I am honoured, Mr. Craike,” he said; and with a flourish, offered his snuff-box to my Uncle Charles, who accepted a pinch, maintaining an ineffable composure.

_Chapter XVIII_. _Compact of Tolerance_

An hour thence I sat in the room which was to be mine while I remained in Craike House, and to which the shadowy Thrale had conducted me. It was a great bed-chamber, its windows overlooking dark woods and hills, and afar through the dropping dusk the leaden greyness of the sea. On entering, I had hastened to throw wide the casement, regardless of the coldness of the wind, but seeking by its freshness to dispel the thick, dead mustiness of the room. A gloomy chamber—the fire smoking on the hearth, the furniture of old dark oak, a great four-poster hung with sombre green silk, presses like tombs, the mirrors, so dull with damp, neglect and age, as scarcely to reflect the pale gleam of the candles, which I had lit against the approaching darkness.

One painting only hung within the room, above the black marble chimney-piece. It might have been a portrait of my Uncle Charles, yet if the painter had depicted faithfully the manner of the man, this cavalier wore no such mask as my uncle affected; the face was boldly evil. The sinister gaze seemed to follow me from hearth to window-seat, the head to bend forward from the rich lace collar; the jewelled hands of this cavalier in green and silver to touch the sword in menace. A hateful portrait, yet I had less dislike of it than of my uncle’s aspect; the portrait might well have revealed the soul of Charles Craike, hid in him by his smiling and composed demeanour, his distinction of person, mode and manner, even as the beauty of the body conceals the skeleton. The ceiling of my room, painted after the manner of my grandfather’s room, suggested by its riot of bodies, gold gleam of wine cups and brocades, the taste of a dead kinsman; mayhap, the cavalier over the chimney-piece had had the decoration of Craike House. Like the hangings of the bed, the tapestries upon the wall—recording the devoutness of some kinswoman by depicting the quest of the Sangreal—were riddled with moth and dull with dust. Over all the room, as over the house and the wood about it, a cloud seemed to brood; still, in the whipping of the ivy against the panes, the whistling of the wind, and the stir of the hangings, I seemed to hear the whispering voices; the gloom prevailed over the pale candlelight or the spurts of flame upon the smoking hearth. “The doomed house—the doomed house”—I repeated my mother’s words. I found resemblance between the house of Craike and my grandfather,—in the decay upon them both, the storms scored on the front of man and house; the breaking frames concealing secret sins, the end approaching. The doomed house—so from my first knowledge of it I thought of my kinsmen’s home amid the darkling wood.

And here was I to remain after Mr. Bradbury’s departure from the house that night. I had the assurance of my grandfather’s protection, against my uncle, who hated me, as he had hated my father. What was this treasure old Edward Craike had amassed that for it—surely for it—Charles should have sold his soul? Now, for the fear of losing this treasure, compelled by the threatening of an old and breaking man to hold his hand from me—his rival; the irony of it brought a bitter smile to my lips. I had no definite terror yet of the house and its folk; terror I might have on the moors, terror in the Stone House—to be done to death in my sleep, or terror in the hands of Blunt—shipped aboard his brig, for, it might be, the port of death; but here I was no more afraid of the event than a man may be afraid of life’s adventure. I understood easily that the will of one man—though this man near to dying—held in thrall the folk of Rogues’ Haven; that this will decreed that I should dwell securely in the house; I believed my uncle, for all his jealous hate of me, would not dare lift his hand further to do me hurt. The mystery of the house, even as the mystery of life to be, allured me; I was glad to be in the Rogues’ Haven, and in the company of its folk, even as I was glad to be alive.

As yet my grandfather had not addressed me directly. The fluttering ghost, Thrale, ere leaving me in my room, had said no more than that a bell would summon me to dinner; that he would then have the room properly prepared for me; and that a groom would bring my baggage over from the inn that night. I had laved my face and hands, and smoothed my hair; this was all the toilet I might make for dinner, and I was resting in a chair by the hearth when there came a knocking on my door. At my call “Come in!” my uncle entered. He stood an instant in the doorway; from my subsequent knowledge of him he had a just appreciation of the advantages of his appearance,—a superb figure of a man, even as in the niceties and preciseness of his dress and his courtly manners he bore the semblance of a gentleman. He had made a change of his dress; he wore still sober black, which he affected ever; but his coat and breeches were cut very elegantly; his linen was of a silver whiteness, and illumined by a fine diamond in his cravat; the snuff-box in his delicate fingers was set with brilliants. He made me a little bow and smiled upon me.

“Pray be seated, nephew,” he said, as I rose from my chair. “I trust that I do not intrude on your repose.”

I sought to match my manners with his own, but failed lamentably; bowing with an ill grace, drawing a chair forward for him with a clatter, and feeling myself colour to the tips of my ears, I said, “I’m not so weary for the want of rest these past few nights, sir, that I’d be sleeping now. Pray sit down!”

He sat down, lolling back in his chair, and crossing his shapely legs. “Surely between kinsmen,” he said, smiling, “frankness is natural. Your meaning is patent. Having had so little sleep through my detention of you at the Stone House, you’re weary, and would rest alone. My dear nephew, selfishness has always been my failing—indeed, it is a failing of our family. Forgive me, then, if I trespass, having a word or two to say to you. Will you hear me?”

“Surely.”

He said deliberately, “For aught that I have done to keep you from this house; for aught that I have said concerning you, your parentage and birth, I offer no excuse and ask no pardon. I am no hypocrite at least, my nephew. Indeed, I did believe, when I read Bradbury’s letter to my father, that though our blood might run in you, you could have no legitimate claim upon us. I do not question Mr. Bradbury’s assurance now”—with a hasty wave of his hand, as if to pacify my swift resentment. “You took affront—natural affront—at words of mine you overheard in the Stone House; accepting Mr. Bradbury’s assurance, I own myself mistaken. I tell you, nephew, believing as I then believed, I still would do what I have done to keep you from my father, and to prevent any marks of favour he may show you. Am I frank with you?”

“You’d have me believe so,” I muttered, vengefully.

He laughed, and made me a bow. “Nephew,” he said, “you’re here; you’ve caught the fancy of your grandfather; how long you’ll retain it I’ll not conjecture, knowing so little of you. He’ll have no hurt come to you at my hands; it is my habit to obey him,”—with a bitter sneer.

“Fearing him?” I ventured.

“As much as I fear any man,” he answered, carelessly. “It’s to my advantage to be dutiful; it is to the advantage of any man to be dutiful to a rich kinsman, as of the place-hunter to fawn upon a personage with star or ribbon. Tush, nephew, my practice is the practice of all wise men: to accept the fact, and shape myself to the fact, to seek advantage, and employ what wit I have for the attainment of it. I’m not prepared to love you, nephew; there is no need for that hypocrisy.”

“None!” I assented bitterly.

“But while my father lives,” he proceeded, “we’re to be inmates of this house. We’re to meet daily; to live our lives together; to appear in public together. It would be tedious to me that we should be for ever wrangling. Let us then be frank with each other,—hate each other, but let us not show our lack of breeding by impoliteness. John, while we’re together in this house, I am prepared to play dutiful kinsman, preceptor, friend. And you?”

For my very hate of him I could only seek to match my wit with his own. I answered, “And I, my dear uncle, am prepared to ape the part of dutiful nephew—to assume all the respect, affection, trust, I do not feel for you.”

He laughed; he rose from his chair. “We understand one another, nephew. I compliment you upon your breeding. Let us join the gentlemen.”

He took my arm with a gay show of cordiality; arm in arm we went down to dinner, as the bell was clanging through the house.

_Chapter XIX_. _Company at Dinner_

The dining-room was gloomy as a vault. The candles, burning in branching silver sticks on the white cloth, might have been tapers burning for the dead. A tapestry of flickering lights and shadows seemed to drape the room; ever and anon the leaping firelight or the waving candle-flame would be reflected from some piece of plate, or crystal, or gilded frame. I saw the colour show like blood from one great canvas. In the dimness, the servants moving to and fro in final preparation for the meal, seemed ghostly figures. I wondered that all should be old men, till I recollected Mr. Bradbury’s explanation to me of the name of Rogues’ Haven, the fact that my grandfather retained about himself his associates and servitors in the making of his fortunes.

I found my grandfather seated in a chair by the fire, and engaged in conversation with Mr. Bradbury. Mr. Craike had put off his gown for an old-fashioned coat of black, gold-braided and gold-buttoned, and a flapped waistcoat of black silk, flowered with gold; the red jewels glittered still upon his hands, and a brooch of red stones secured the fine laces at his throat. He presented a singular, almost barbaric figure in contrast to the precision of my uncle and Mr. Bradbury.

Waiving formality, all the company at dinner was assembled in the dining-room; two young folk were seated a little apart,—a girl of about my own years and a youth perhaps a year older—him I knew, by his dark likeness to my uncle, for his son Oliver, whom Mr. Bradbury had already mentioned to me; but he had not spoken to me of the girl. My uncle, leading me forward, presented me to her; I scarcely caught his words for my confusion, as I bowed awkwardly to her curtsy; but I gathered that she was his ward, Miss Milne; and I recollected that Milne was his wife’s name. I remember that I was repelled by my impression of a dark, sullen face; her black hair fell in ringlets about thin white shoulders, her lips were pale, her grey eyes seemed sunken. Her grey gown became her ill, and she wore no ornament.

My attention was claimed instantly by my uncle—“My dear John,—your cousin Oliver”—blandly making us known, yet his tone suggesting to me disfavour, if not actual dislike, for the ungainly figure of his son. Ungainly, yet built strongly, wholly lacking his father’s elegance,—his hair coarse and black, his brows black, his look sullen and lowering—Oliver Craike yet pleased me more than any of my kinsmen to whom I had been made known. I understood the sturdy strength of him for the rippling muscles displayed by the fine cut of his black clothes; his hand gripped mine with a force that was not hostile; his eyes looked as sullenly at me as Miss Milne’s. “You’re welcome, cousin,” he muttered, while my uncle smiled on us urbanely, and expressed a polite wish that as kinsmen we might be friends.

But Mr. Bradbury claimed my immediate attention; with a word of apology to my grandfather, he rose from his chair, and drew me apart from them.

“I’ll be penning a letter to Chelton,” he said. “Have you any commission with which you care to entrust me? My letter to your mother at least will be delivered.”

“No more than a message to her,” I answered, with a sudden longing for the peace and happiness of Chelton and my mother’s cottage, and for the companionship of Tony Vining. “That I’m all eagerness to return to her. That I’ll not long remain here.”

“I shall assure her,” he said, smiling at me, “that you’re safe with your grandfather, and that you’ve commended yourself to his favour, and are happy.”

“You interpret me too freely, Mr. Bradbury,” I said.

“Nay, now,” he protested, smiling. “I’m anxious only to convey to your good mother a message that may allay her fears, and set her mind at rest.” Lowering his tone, that only I might hear him, he added, “You’re safe here, lad. Your grandfather’s will is law. I assure you that you have won his favour by your looks and speech, your resemblance to your father. You will be safe; a year or so, a few months—nay, days, maybe—and you’ll be rich and free to live your life where and how you will. And I’ll be accurately informed of your condition here; I’ll be at hand.”

He broke off, observing that from the hearth my grandfather and my uncle watched us closely. And at the moment Thrale stepped forward to announce that dinner was served; my uncle gave my grandfather his arm to assist him to his chair at the head of the table. The old man presided, with Mr. Bradbury on his right and my uncle on his left; I sat with the girl beside me, my cousin Oliver frowned darkly at us from across the board.

Mr. Bradbury had prepared me for my grandfather’s wealth—the neglect and disorder of house and grounds might have served to negative this; I wondered yet at the magnificence of the silver upon the table and at the luxury of the meal. I wondered at the richness, and the fantastic design and chasing of this massy plate, at the curious goblets of crystal, as at the rare wines and meats and fruits. But I was amazed and more concerned at my grandfather’s servants—old men, old rogues—I looked on wrinkled faces, brown as with the burning of tropic suns and the lashing of tropical seas; brown hands offered me dishes and filled my glass; a sleeve slipping back from a bony wrist showed me dull blue tattoo marks; glancing over my shoulder I saw an evil brown face, and believed that the old man leered at me. All the while the girl beside me uttered not a word; Oliver devoted himself to his dinner; and my grandfather conversed in low tones with Mr. Bradbury. Not till the girl had left us silently, and the cloth was drawn, and we sat over our wine, did aught come to break the silence about me. My cousin, I saw, was drinking deeply; his face was flushed with wine; once, as he looked up suddenly, and our eyes met, he scowled blackly at me. My uncle was sitting watching his son, his look expressive of contempt; now, as if to divert my attention from Oliver’s intoxication, he leaned forward, and with a tolerable show of cordiality, bade me draw in my chair, and take wine with him.

But my grandfather broke in, “I’ve a toast, Bradbury—a toast, Charles,” and rose unsteadily, and lifted his glass in a shaking hand. Mr. Bradbury raised his glass, my uncle watched the old man, smiling; Oliver was muttering thickly to himself; I saw the old brown men watching from the shadows.

“A toast,—I’ll drink few more, Bradbury—I’ll drink few more. I’ll give ye the fortunes of our family—Charles, and the rest of ye. I’ll drink to my son Dick’s home-coming—hey, Charles—hey, Bradbury? Or, if he’s dead, I’ll have ye drink to my heir—whosoever he may be!”

He laughed harshly, and drank his wine. The stem of the crystal snapped suddenly in my uncle’s fingers; the wine ran blood-red from his white hand. Oliver burst into a roar of drunken laughter.

_Chapter XX_. _Soul of a Man_

Mr. Bradbury took his leave shortly after dinner, driving off in his coach, attended by the Bow Street runners. He was allowed no further opportunity of speech with me, my uncle engaging him in conversation; my grandfather sitting grim and silent by the fire. From time to time, I found his eyes studying me, as I sat glumly apart; his face was expressionless of his sentiment to me. My cousin Oliver had been aided from the room by Thrale on my uncle’s direction. On Mr. Bradbury’s departure, the old man went to his room, leaning on his son; and I was left alone by the fire.

The fire was burning down into coals; the candles flickered on the chimney-piece; the reflections flitted like white moths over the mirrors; else the room was draped with shadows. All about me I heard furtive sounds; out of the gloom I believed that the bleared eyes of the old rogues who served my grandfather surveyed me secretly,—this may have been no more than a phantasm of my mind, yet I could have sworn that, when the coals fell, and the red flame splashed into the well of darkness about me, I saw those wrinkled brown faces—surely burnt by the suns of the Spanish Main or the Indies. Rogues’ Haven! I was realising what manner of man was my grandfather; I was conjecturing that he had sailed across the seas in his heady youth, and grown rich with plunder.