Chapter 15

How the Misses Blake discover a gigantic fraud--How Terence is again arraigned, and brought before the Court on a charge of duplicity--and how he is nearly committed for contempt.

Reaching home, they find the atmosphere there decidedly clouded. Miss Priscilla, who has returned from her drive just a moment before, is standing in the hall, gazing with a stern countenance upon the old-fashioned eight-day clock, in which two or three people might be safely stowed away. The clock regards her not at all, but ticks on loudly with a sort of exasperating obstinacy, as though determined to remind every one of the flight of time.

"Who has wound this clock?" demands Miss Priscilla, in an awful tone. With a thrill of thankfulness the girls feel they can answer truthfully, "Not I."

"Dear me!" says Miss Penelope, timidly, advancing from the morning-room; "I did. You were so long out, Priscilla, and I feared--I mean, I thought it would save you the trouble."

"Trouble in winding a clock! What trouble could there be in that? And it is _never_ wound until Saturday evening. For twenty years I have wound it on Saturday evening. A good eight-day clock nearly fifty years old can't bear being tampered with. Now, Penelope, why did you do that? You know that I can't endure old rules to be upset."

"But, my dear Priscilla, I only thought as I was passing----"

"You _thought_, Penelope; but I wish you _wouldn't_ think. There are other things you ought to think about that you often neglect; and----"

"Now, Priscilla, is that just? I think--I _hope_ I seldom neglect my duty; and I must say I didn't expect this from _you_."

Here Miss Penelope dissolves into tears, to Monica's grief and dismay.

"Oh, Aunt Priscilla, I am sure Aunt Pen only meant to save you trouble," she says, earnestly, putting her arms round Miss Penelope, who sobs audibly on her shoulder.

"And who says I thought anything else?" says poor Miss Priscilla, fiercely, though her voice trembles with emotion: it is terrible to her to see her faithful friend and sister in tears of her causing. "Penelope, I meant nothing, but I have heard something that has grieved and disturbed me: so I must needs come home and avenge my ill-temper on the best creature in the world. Alas! I am a wicked woman."

"Oh, no, no," cries Miss Penelope. "My dear Priscilla, you will break my heart if you talk thus. My good soul, come in here and tell me what has happened to distress you."

In truth it is quite plain now that something has happened during her drive to take Miss Priscilla's well-balanced mind off its hinges.

"Where is Terence?" she asks, looking from one to other of the group in the hall.

"Here," says Terence himself, coming leisurely towards her from a side-passage.

"Come in here with me," says Miss Priscilla; and they all follow her into the morning-room.

Here she turns and faces the unconscious Terence with a pale, reproachful face.

"When I tell you I have just come from Mitson the coast-guard, and that I thanked him for having lent you his gun, you will understand how I have been grieved and pained to-day," she says, a tremor in her voice.

Terence is no longer unconscious; and Monica feels that her heart is beating like a lump of lead.

"Oh! what is it, Priscilla?" asks Miss Penelope, greatly frightened.

"A tale of craft and cunning," says Miss Priscilla in a hollow tone. "Mitson tells me he never lent him that gun. Terence has wilfully deceived us, his poor aunts, who love him and only desire his good. He has, I fear, basely mystified us to accomplish his own ends, and has indeed departed from the precious truth."

"I never said Mitson did lend it to me," says Terence, sullenly: "you yourself suggested the idea, and I let it slide, that was all."

"All! Is not prevarication only a _mean_ lie? Oh, Terence, I am so deeply grieved! I know not what to say to you."

The scene is becoming positively tragical. Already a sense of crime of the blackest and deepest dye is overpowering Terence.

"Whom _did_ you get that gun from, Terence?" asks Miss Priscilla, sternly.

No answer.

"Now, Terence, be calm," says Miss Penelope. "Sit down now, Terence, and collect yourself, and don't be untruthful again."

"I have told no lie, aunt," says Terence, indignantly.

"Then tell your good Aunt Priscilla who gave you the gun."

Dead silence.

"Are we to understand that you _won't_ tell us, Terence?" asks Miss Priscilla, faintly. She is now much the more nervous of the two old maids.

Terence casts a hasty glance at Monica's white face, and then says, stoutly,--

"I don't want to tell, and I _won't_!"

"Terence!" exclaims the usually mild Miss Penelope, with great indignation, and is going to further relieve her mind, no doubt, when Miss Priscilla, throwing up her hands, checks her.

"Let him alone, Penelope," she says, sadly. "Perhaps he has some good reason: let us not press him too far. Obduracy is better than falsehood. Let us go and pray that heaven may soften his heart and grant him a right understanding."

With this the two old ladies walk slowly and with dignity from the room, leaving the criminal with his sisters.

Monica bursts into tears and flings her arms round his neck. "You did it for _me_. I know it!--I saw it in your eyes," she says. "Oh, Terence, I feel as if it was all my fault."

"Fiddlesticks!" says Mr. Beresford, who is in a boiling rage. "Did you ever hear anything like her? and all about a paltry thing like that! She couldn't behave worse if I had been convicted of murder. I'm convinced"--viciously--"it was all baffled curiosity that got up her temper. She was _dying_ to know about that gun, and so I was determined I wouldn't gratify her. A regular old cat, if ever there was one."

"Oh, no! don't speak like that; I am sure they love you--and they were disappointed--and----"

"They'll have to get through a good deal of disappointment," says Terence, still fuming. "What right have they to make me out a Sir Galahad in their imaginations? I'd perfectly _hate_ to be a Sir Galahad; and so I tell them." This is not strictly correct as the Misses Blake are out of hearing. "And as for their love, they may keep it, if it only means blowing a fellow up for nothing."

"Aunt Penelope was just as bad," says Kit. "I really"--with dignified contempt--"felt quite _ashamed_ of her!"

* * * * *

Miss Priscilla keeps a diary, in which she most faithfully records all that happens in every one of the three hundred and sixty-five days of every year.

About this time there may be seen in it an entry such as follows:

"_Saturday, July 3._--I fear Terence told a LIE! He _certainly_ equivocated! Penelope and I have done our best to discover the real owner of THE gun, but as yet have failed. The secret rests with Terence, and to force his confidence would be unchristian; but it _may_ transpire in _time_."

After this come sundry other jottings, such as--

"_Monday, July 5._--Past four. Fanny Stack called. Penelope in the garden, as usual. All the trouble of entertaining falling upon _my_ hands. Still, I do not repine. Providence is good; and Penelope of course, dear soul, should be allowed the recreation that pertains to her garden. And, indeed, a sweet place she makes of it."

After this again comes a third paragraph:

"_Tuesday, July 6._--Terence again most wilful, and Kit somewhat saucy; yet my heart yearns over these children. God grant they be guided by a tender hand along the straight and narrow way!"

* * * * *

It is the next day, July 7, and the two Misses Blake, standing in the dining-room, are discussing Terence again. They have had a great shock, these two old ladies, in the discovery of a duplicity that they in their simplicity have magnified fourfold. How is it possible they should remember how _they_ felt thirty years ago?

"I doubt we must keep a tight hand upon him, Penelope," says Miss Priscilla, sorrowfully. "The rector is very lax. He goes to him day by day, but beyond Greek and Latin seems to imbibe little else. And _morals_ are the groundwork of all, and surely superior to the languages spoken by those who believed in heathen gods. I wonder at the rector, I must say. But we must only make up for his deficiences by keeping a tight hand, as I said before, upon this unhappy boy."

"Yes, but not _too_ tight, Priscilla; that might only create a rebellious feeling and destroy all our chances of success. And we are bent on leading this poor dear boy (poor Katherine's boy, Priscilla) into the way of truth."

"Yes, yes; we must be cautious, _most_ cautious, in our treatment," says Miss Priscilla, nervously, "and very careful of his comings and goings, without _appearing_ to be so! Dear me! dear me! I wonder if the greatness of our cause justifies so much deceit. It sounds jesuitical, my dear Penelope, say what we can."

"The end justifies the means," says Miss Penelope, as solemnly as if this speech emanated from her throat as an original remark.

"Oh, don't! my dear Penelope!" says Miss Priscilla, with a shudder; "that is _their_ principal argument."

"Whose? The children's?" asks Miss Penelope, startled.

"No; the Jesuits,--the Inquisitors,--those dreadful people we read of in 'Westward Ho,'" says Miss Priscilla, protestingly. "Still, I agree with you; secrecy is the part we have to play. We must keep one eye" (as if there was only one between them) "upon him without _seeming_ to do so. And there he is,"--pointing through the window to where Terence may be seen coming slowly towards the window in which they stand in a most unhappy frame of mind.

"I wonder where he can have been for the past half-hour," says Miss Priscilla presently, in a nervous whisper, though Terence is so far off that if she spoke at the top of her lungs he could not have heard her.

"Perhaps if we ask him he may tell us," says Miss Penelope, equally nervous and decidedly with great doubt as to the success of her suggestion.

"Well, you ask him," says Miss Priscilla.

"I am greatly wanting in _force_ on occasions such as these," says Miss Penelope, hurriedly. "No, no, my dear; you ask him. But be gentle with him, my dear Priscilla."

"Why can't _you_ do it?" persists Miss Blake, plainly anxious to shift the obnoxious task from her own shoulders to another's. "You have great influence with the children, I have remarked many times."

"Nothing to _yours_," says Miss Penelope, with an agitated wave of her hand. "I couldn't do it; indeed I _couldn't_, my dear Priscilla," openly quaking. "Don't ask me. See, here he comes! Now be firm,--be _firm_, Priscilla, but lenient, _very_ lenient: he is only a boy, remember, and even the great Luther was strangely wanting in principle when young."

"It is my duty; I suppose I must go through with it," says poor Miss Priscilla, sighing; and then she throws wide the window and calls to Terence to come to her.

"Where have you been, Terence?"

"At the back gate, aunt."

"But, my _dear_ Terence, _why_ at the back gate? Such a nice day for a good long wholesome walk! Why spend it at the back gate?"

"Because--that is--I----"

"My dear boy, be calm. Wait a moment now, Terence, and don't hurry yourself. There is no occasion for haste."

"I was only going to say, aunt----"

"Pause now, Terence: consider well before you speak. Though, indeed, there should be no need for consideration when only the simple but lovely truth is required. Truth is always lovely, Terence; it is a flower of great beauty. Collect yourself, now." (This is a favorite formula with the Misses Blake.) "Don't tell a lie, Terence!"

"Why should I tell a lie?" says Terence, fiercely, feeling at this moment that death, when compared with nagging, would be sweet.

"Oh, Terence, what a tone! and to your good aunt Penelope, who loves you! Such a tone as that, my dear, is unchristian. Now, we don't want to know what you were _doing_ at the back gate. Why should you be afraid of us? Are we not your greatest friends? But what could you have been doing for half an hour at the back gate, Terence?"

"I went up there with Michael, aunt."

"I didn't ask you that, dear. I am afraid you have no confidence in us, Terence. I didn't ask you who went with you. Can't you say yes or no, Terence? Were you _long_ at the gate?"

"No, aunt."

"Was any one but Michael with you?"

"Yes, aunt."

"Was it Adams?"

"No, aunt."

"Can't you say anything but yes or no, Terence? Have you no command of the Queen's English, after all the money, too, your poor father wasted on your education,--and now the rector? Speak up, my dear child, and tell us everything honestly and nobly."

"But there is nothing to tell, aunt, except that----"

"No, collect yourself, Terence; take time, my dear. _Now_, answer me: who was with you, besides Michael?"

"Timothy, aunt."

The hoary-headed butler being, like Cæsar's wife, above suspicion, the Misses Blake are pulled up pretty short,--so short, indeed, that they forget to ask if any one besides the respectable Timothy was at the obnoxious back gate. Perhaps had they known that the smith's son, and two or three other young men, had been there, and that all had been talking the most violent politics, their fears for Terence's morality would have increased rather than diminished.

As it is, they are well pleased.

"But why didn't you say that at once, my dear boy? We are so afraid of your mixing with evil companions."

Terence thinks of the smith's son, and his unqualified opinion that all landlords and aristocrats and sovereigns should be "stamped out," and wonders if _he_ would come under the category of evil companions, but he wisely refrains from speech.

"And," says Miss Penelope, softly, "why didn't you tell us before leaving the house where you were going? I am sure, if you had, both your aunt Priscilla and I would have been delighted _to go with you_, busy though we were."

This is the climax. Again in Terence's fevered imagination the smith's son arises, wielding his brawny brown arm like a sledge-hammer, as he noisily lays down the laws of extermination: he can see himself, too, joining in the fray, and defying the smith's son's opinion with an eloquence of which he had been only proud. He feels he is deceiving these two old ladies, and is angry with himself for doing it, and still more angry with them for making him do it.

"I am glad we have heard the truth at _last_, Terence," says Miss Priscilla. "There is nothing so mean or contemptible as a lie."

"You are enough to make _any_ fellow tell a lie," bursts out Terence, with miserable rage, "with your questionings and pryings!"

At this awful speech, the two Misses Blake burst into tears, and Terence dashes in a fury from the room.