Part 2

Smooth tongued, with a charming and plausible manner, cynical, handsome as all the Stanwys are and have been, an accomplished gambler, too accomplished, perhaps his enemies, and he had many, whispered. He was utterly selfish, utterly pitiless. He had never been known to spare a man or a woman either. Woe to him or to her who fell into his toils. With what fine courtesy, with what charm of manner would he relieve some luckless victim, of his last shilling! How sweetly and sympathetically he would speak of his victims' ill fortune, would suggest some future "revenge," and then pocket his winnings with a grace that could have brought but little comfort to the poor wretch whose possessions had passed out of his own into the keeping of this courtly, delightful, aristocratic gentleman.

So, young men well endowed with money, having a wholesome fear of His Lordship, avoided his Lordship's beautiful daughter, and young men without money were of course not to be considered for a moment.

Therefore, at twenty-eight, Kathleen, unappropriated, and a very beautiful woman, stood staring out of the window this fine May morning, into the dull London Square.

My Lord, slender, dressed with exquisite care, was of a tallness and slimness that permitted his tailor to do justice and honour to his craft. Few men could wear their clothes with such perfect grace as his Lordship. His tailor, long suffering man, groaned at the length of the unpaid bill, but realised that as a walking advertisement Lord Gowerhurst was an asset to his business not to be despised. So the lengthy bill grew longer and more formidable, but youngsters, fresh to town, admiring his Lordship's appearance prodigiously, made it their business to discover who was his Lordship's tailor and Mr. Darbey, of Dover Street, saw to it that Lord Gowerhurst never went shabby and possibly, cunning man, made those who could and would pay, contribute unconsciously to the upkeep of Lord Gowerhurst's external appearance.

He came of a handsome family, the women of which had been toasts in many reigns and through many generations. His forehead was broad and high, crowned by silver hair that curled crisply, his nose was of the type of the eagle's beak, his hands white, well kept, reminiscent of the eagle's claws, a moustache of jetty blackness in admirable contrast to his silvered hair, shaded and beneficently concealed a thin-lipped, hard and somewhat cruel mouth.

My Lord rolled a cigar between his delicate fingers. It was an excellent cigar; years ago Julius Dix and Company had acquired the habit of supplying Lord Gowerhurst with cigars on credit and bad habits are difficult to eradicate. But then his Lordship sent wealthy customers to the quiet but extremely expensive little shop near the Haymarket.

"Our position, Kathleen, is irksome," he said softly, "deucedly irksome. Now and again I have little windfalls, but alas--they grow fewer and farther between as time goes on--at the moment I haven't a bob, you, dear, have not a bob--" he paused and laughed softly. "It recalls the French exercise of my youth. I have not a bob, thou hast not a bob, he has not a bob--" he waved the cigar. "Anyhow, that is the position, and then some kindly breeze of Heaven wafts that stout, prosperous, opulent craft the "Sir Josiah Homewood" on to the horizon of our "sea of troubles," as Shakespeare so aptly puts it!"

He paused, he looked at the slender, upright, girlish back of his daughter.

"So," he went on, "this large, stout, prosperous and richly freighted cargo boat, the Sir Josiah Homewood, rises on the horizon of our eventful lives and----"

"Oh, please," the girl said with a note of impatience in her voice, "leave out all that; I wish to understand exactly--exactly what you propose----"

"Not what I propose, but what Homewood proposes. Really, I rather admire the fellow's presumption. As you know, he has a son, a lad not altogether displeasing, who fortunately but little resembles his father, a fact you may have noticed, Kathleen. Indeed, I might almost say the young fellow is not without his good points; he is prepossessing, a little shy and silent, in which he does not resemble his father. He is well educated, he has Eton and Oxford behind him. By the way, what a time he must have had at Eton, if his parentage ever leaked out, poor devil--however, there it is, the lad is at least presentable--but the father is----"

"Terrible!" the girl said with a shudder.

"Too true, yet it is not proposed you should marry the father. We need money. You, child, need money, and what is more, a prospect, a future. You have nothing and the outlook is not cheering."

"The outlook is hopeless; I have nothing in the world, our family was always hopelessly impoverished, still the little we once had----" Kathleen paused.

"Recriminations, my love, are useless!" his Lordship said.

"There was very little and now that little hath taken unto itself wings and has flown away----" He stroked his long drooping moustache with his slender hand. "So it behoves us to make our arrangements for the future. Sir Josiah and I have discussed everything."

"You mean myself, you have arranged the deeds of sale, I suppose, how much am I worth?"

"Your value is inestimable. Sir Josiah, worthy Baronet, more daring than I, puts it down in actual figures--" he paused. "I made a note of them. He advances me--" He took some papers from his pocket, "the sum of twelve thousand pounds--advances, mind you, Kathleen, a kindly loan, which I shall, no doubt, find useful----"

"That is your part of the payment," she said bitterly, "go on!"

"He buys a fine house, an estate, he settles it on his son; by the way the lad's name is Allan."

"I know," she said, "go on."

"He settles a fine estate on this Allan, with an income of eight thousand a year, not so bad, eh?"

"And this is all conditional----"

"On your marrying the said Allan Homewood. I think," he said, as he rose from his breakfast table, "I have on the whole not done so badly for you!"

"And yourself," she said; "not so badly!" She smiled bitterly, then shrugged her shapely shoulders. "Very well, I suppose it is only left for me to say thank you very much indeed!"

"Quite so. The alternative, dear child, is this"--his lordship waved his hand--"an elderly unmarried lady residing in, say, a Brighton Boarding House, her face bearing some evidence of a past but long since faded beauty, her title, if she is foolish enough to make use of it, subjecting her to some little annoyance, mingled with a certain amount of servile respect. Not a pretty picture, my love, but a very true one."

"And the alternative is to marry Mr. Allan Homewood?"

"A pleasant alternative, and its acceptance never for a moment in doubt, eh?"

"Never for a moment in doubt," she repeated.

"Then it only remains for me to say Heaven bless you, my child, and to send a wire of acceptance to Sir Josiah. No, on second thought, I'll telephone him from the Club." He paused for a moment to arrange his necktie before the glass over the mantel, then went to the door. At the door. he stood and looked at her for a moment, then went out, a satisfied smile on his thin aristocratic face.

The girl stood there by the window for a long time. She was thinking. She had much to think about. She was twenty-eight and a beautiful woman of twenty-eight has no doubt many memories.

Presently she sighed and turned away from the window. A fine place and eight thousand a year and more when Josiah Homewood was laid with his fathers. Well! things might be worse, and the lad himself, she liked him. He was younger than she was by four years, but what did that matter?

She had seen him once or twice, had liked him vaguely, there was little to dislike about him. He was not handsome, she was glad of that, she hated handsome men, nor was he plain. Again she was glad; she disliked anything that was ugly. He was also, despite his parentage, a gentleman. She liked him for that most of all.

"If he had been vulgar like his father, three times the money would not have been enough," she said to herself.

Still, there were memories, memories that rose up out of the past, the memory of a face, of eager, ardent, worshipping eyes, of a lame, halting speech, words disjointed and broken, eager, pleading, yet hopeless words. "I love you, oh! I love you; don't turn from me. I know I am not worthy, Kathleen, but I love you so!"

She laughed suddenly, she felt ashamed and annoyed to realise that there were tears on her lashes and on her cheeks.

"Folly!" she said aloud. "Folly, and it's all dead and gone ten, years ago, ten years--" she laughed, "a lifetime! He's married to someone else; if he's sensible, he will have married someone with money, for he had none, poor fellow!"

Meanwhile at the Club, where the better part of his day and practically the whole of his night was spent, Lord Gowerhurst had looked up a telephone number and was putting a call through.

"Homewood--yes, Sir Josiah Homewood, is he in? Yes, I do, Gowerhurst--Lord Gowerhurst--You'll put him through--then hurry!"

He waited and then came a voice. It was evidently the voice of a stout man in a state of anxiety.

"Yes, it's me, it's Homewood, my Lord----"

Lord Gowerhurst detected the anxiety, purposely he delayed, he told himself the man was anxious--naturally--"Let him be anxious, let him remain on tenter hooks for a time!" It would do him no harm.

"Is that Sir Josiah Homewood?"

"Yes, yes, Homewood, I'm speaking to Lord Gowerhurst, aren't I?"

"Yes--ah, Homewood, is that you? Well, about that little matter we were discussing yesterday--" his lordship drawled, "the proposition that you placed before me with such engaging frankness, I should not be surprised if you remember----"

"Yea, my Lord, I've not forgotten! Not me!" The voice came chokingly, uncertain, but above all things eager.

"I have discussed it with the person--most concerned!"

"And what does her ladyship----"

"My dear Homewood, no names on the telephone, no names I beg!"

"No, no, of course not, my mistake, my Lord. I wouldn't think of mentioning any names, not for a moment, my Lord. Still what does she--the person--the party, I mean, my Lord, what does she--er--her----"

"I quite understand the--as you say--party--is inclined to give very favourable consideration to the matter. In fact, I may say, my dear Homewood, that the matter is practically settled on the basis you suggested."

Sir Josiah Homewood in his luxurious City office, closed his eyes as in ecstasy! He clung to the telephone receiver and an expression of rapt and perfect contentment stole over his features.

"Then--then it's all right. I may regard it as all right, my--my--Lord--she, the party, I mean----"

"Agrees--" said Lord Gowerhurst shortly. "Briefly, yes she agrees--the matter is settled and now it only remains to complete the contract, you understand, eh?"

"I understand, ha, ha, very good, just so, the Contract, always dealing with contracts I am, but not many like this! Ha, ha, splendid--and now your Lordship and the other party, I mean the other contracting party, will dine at my house in Grosvenor Square to-night."

Gowerhurst frowned. "Oh, very well!" he said ungraciously.

"Half past seven at Grosvenor Square, your Lordship remembers the number?"

"At half past seven, then!" His Lordship said and hung up the receiver.

"And that," my Lord said, "is that! When my time comes, and I am in no hurry for it to come, especially just now, I shall be able to close my eyes on this world, knowing that I have done my duty to my only child, a truly comforting reflection--And now for a brandy with the merest suggestion of soda, and if possible a little game of billiards." And he went up the Club's handsome staircase.

None of the multitudinous clerks in the large and palatial offices of Sir Josiah Homewood, Son and Company, Limited, had ever seen the Managing Director in such a delightful temper, for sometimes his temper was not delightful. This morning he beamed on all and sundry. Young Alfred Cope, who supported a widowed Mother on an insignificant salary, had long been trying to muster up courage to ask for a rise. It seemed to him that this morning, this bright May morning, the opportunity had come, and so opportunity sent him, a shivering, trembling wretch, tapping nervously on the highly polished mahogany door of Sir Josiah's private office.

"Well?" Sir Josiah said. "Well, and what do you want?"

Alfred stumbled lamely into his pitiful story.

Sir Josiah frowned. "How much are you getting paid now?" he demanded.

"Forty-two. Forty-two shillings a week! Bless my heart and soul, princely, princely! Why, when I was a lad such a wage would have been considered handsome, sir, and here you come asking me for more--Why; bless me, let me tell you this, Cope--the City is bristling with clerks, bristling with 'em, you can't move for clerks, sir, and most of 'em out of work! I've only got to hold up my finger, sir, like this--" He thrust a broad, stumpy finger into the air, "and say 'Clerk!' and a hundred would rush at me. I'd be suffocated! Do you understand me, Cope? Simply crushed to death by the rush! If I put an advertisement in the papers, I'd have to hire a policeman to keep the Quee--the Queek--what d'ye call the thing from obstructing the traffic--Forty-two shillings, you ought to go down on your knees, sir, on your knees and thank Heaven that you are earning such a salary! Princely! That's what it is, princely!"

And so on, for ten long, fear laden, wretched minutes, at the end of which the hapless wretch slunk away, thanking God that he had not been dismissed or that his wretched two and forty shillings had not been reduced to thirty or less.

"Forty-two shillings--and wants more," Sir Josiah said to himself, "bless me, what are things coming to?" Then he banished the frown, he beamed all over his round red face.

"Lady Kathleen Homewood," he said to himself, "Lady Kathleen Homewood, my daughter-in-law! Lady Kathleen--ah ha!" He rubbed his hands. "That'll make Cutler sit up! The fellow gives himself airs because his daughter married a fellow who is Governor of some place no one in their senses ever heard of--His Excellency the Governor--Bless my heart! I'm sick to death of His Excellency! Now Cutler will turn green, eh? There's nothing like the real thing, the real old true blue-blooded British aristocracy--can't get over that, eh? No, no fear!"

Usually it takes but two to make a bargain; in this case it required four. Three of the four were agreed, himself first of all, now His Lordship, the Earl of Gowerhurst, and Lady Kathleen Stanwys, his daughter. There was but one other, but that one other was a good boy, a dutiful son; he would do exactly what his father wished.

"Thank God I don't look for opposition from him!" Sir Josiah thought. "Never trod a better lad than mine, bless him! He knows my heart's set on this, knows it he does, and he'll do it to please me! He's not like other young fellows with their fancy tricks. Besides that, the girl's a beauty, apart from her blood and breeding! If she is a little older than he, well, what of that? It's the blood, the birth that is, what tells every time and by George--by George, when I have grandchildren I'll be able to look at 'em and say to myself--'These grandchildren of mine are also the grandchildren of an Earl!' And that's something these days, eh? That's something!" So he fell to muttering and chuckling to himself, this highly pleased old gentleman, and presently he picked up a pen and all unconsciously scribbled many times on the blotting paper:

"Lady Kathleen Homewood, Lady Kathleen Homewood, my daughter-in-law, Lady Kath----"

"Eh, what's that?"

"I thought I'd remind you that it is past one, Sir Josiah, and you were to lunch with Mr. Cutler and Mr.----"

"Oh, bless my soul, yes, I'd clean forgotten--many thanks--Jarvis--quite right, sensible of you!"

Mr. Jarvis, the head clerk, bowed and would have retired.

"Oh, Jarvis, one moment, here, help me into my coat, there's a good feller! That young feller, young what's his name--Cope--Crope--eh?"

"Cope, sir, yes, sir!"

"What sort of a chap is he, good worker and all that?"

"A very attentive worker and a respectable young man!"

"Supports a widowed mother, I understand?"

"Yes, sir!"

"Bless me, well, well. I've been having a chat with him--where's my umbrella?--having a chat with him--a man can't support a widowed mother cheaply these days, eh, Jarvis?"

"Very expensive days, sir!"

"Quite so, expensive hobby, too, supporting widowed mothers. Raise his salary to--say Three pound ten, Jarvis, and report to me how he goes on! My hat, do you see my hat? Oh, thanks, I'll be back at two-thirty, Jarvis----"

And Sir Josiah went out.

*CHAPTER III*

*A DESIRABLE FAMILY MANSION*

DEAR SIR,

"In reply to your advertisement in the _Daily Telegraph,_ I am at the moment in a position to offer you a very fine old historical mansion situated in West Sussex on the Hampshire border. The house has been untenanted for a number of years and will require considerable attention. In the hands of a man of wealth and taste, it could be restored to its original condition and would form one of the most picturesque and desirable mansions in the Country. It is eminently a place that it is necessary to see and a description of it would take too much time now, for as I have previously mentioned, I am only, at the moment, in a position to offer it as it has already been seen and highly approved by a wealthy American gentleman and it is quite probable that he will close at the bargain price at which the house and estate of seven hundred and fifty acres, including part of a small and picturesque village, is being offered. I would urge on you, therefore, if you care to consider the place, to view it without one moment's delay, as obviously it will be sold to the first who makes a good offer. I may add that the Mansion in question, with its many historical associations, would make a country seat fit for any nobleman in the land. May I finally repeat my urgent advice to view the place at once, as the delay of even an hour may be prejudicial to your obtaining it. Believe me, sir,

Yours truly, DALABEY AND SON."

Over this letter Sir Josiah pondered a little and frowned a little.

"It's rather like having a pistol at one's head! Hanged if it isn't!" he muttered. "But it reads all right, it reads--the goods! Historical Mansion, seven hundred and fifty acres, fit for a nobleman, with part of a village, sounds right--sounds right--" he muttered. He nodded his head. "But this hurry--why it's a confounded nuisance, that's what it is. How can I go? I've got--let me see--har hum--" He muttered to himself and frowned heavily.

He had much important business to see to, that day, a meeting of Directors at twelve, another at two, and there were things to be arranged and discussed that Sir Josiah knew would require his clear brain and intellect. How could, he go journeying down to some remote part of Sussex to view this ancient mansion with its historical associations, desirable as it might be?

Sir Josiah looked up from the letter and glanced across the breakfast table at his son.

Allan was reading. It would have been noteworthy had Allan not been reading. The lad was always reading. His book was propped up against a teacup and he seemed to have forgotten his breakfast.

A good looking, big and broad shouldered young fellow this, with clean cut features and massive jaw and a broad high forehead! Muscle and sinew were there, but there was intelligence and brain power in that noble forehead of his.

Fully six feet stood he in his socks, massive of build, with straight, honest blue eyes and waving hair that was neither dark nor fair. A face that might in its strength seem a little hard, a little fierce, even a little forbidding, but that the mouth atoned for all.

No man with a mouth like this could be other than very human, very tender and kindly, very generous, the mouth of a man who could give much, suffer much and love greatly.

But Sir Josiah saw nothing of all this, he only saw Allan, his son, reading another of those confounded books, for which Sir Josiah had no feeling, except of the deepest disgust.

"Allan!"

"Father?" The young man looked up. "I'm sorry!" he said. "Did you speak to me before?"

"No, I didn't, and breakfast ain't the time, Allan, to be stuffing your head with all that there nonsense!"

Allan smiled. "You had your letters, and as I had my book----"

"You always have your book! I never saw such a fellow for reading--but I'm not saying anything, my boy. No, no, you're a good lad. Few sons please their old fathers as you do me--we're not quarrelling, Allan lad!"

"We never have yet, father, and we never will, I think!"

"I know!" said Sir Josiah. "Ah, Allan, you're doing well, a fine woman, beautiful as a picture, tall and stately, and the daughter of an Earl. Why, boy, you ought to be in the Seventh Heaven of delight and instead you sit there with your nose in a book!"

"She is a fine and a beautiful and I believe a good woman," said Allan, "but her father--" he paused. "I could have wished her a better father!"

"An Earl, an Earl!" cried the old man. "A better father than an Earl! Bless me, Allan--what nonsense! However, you're marrying her not her father; it's all settled, all agreed--" He rubbed his hands, his round red face shone with benevolence and joy. "You're a sensible and dutiful fellow, Allan! You say to yourself, 'My old father wishes it--The girl is good and beautiful and well born, I don't know particularly that I love her--come to that perhaps I don't, but I might go farther and fare worse!' Eh, that's it, isn't it? And you're doing it, boy, because you know it will give pleasure to the old man!"

"I think you have got my reasoning very correctly, father!" Allan said.

"There's no one else?" Sir Josiah said.

"No one else, no--and I like Lady Kathleen. I admire her and I pity her----"

"Pity--pity--bless my soul, boy, pity. Why should you pity her? Isn't she well born, doesn't she move in the best, the very best society? Isn't she the only daughter, only child come to that, of an Earl? Pity her?"

"Just that, I pity her, I am deeply sorry for her. I think she suffers a good deal and can't you understand why?"

"I--I don't know, lad, how should I know what the feelings of a young Society lady are?"

"She is proud and she is poor, there's suffering in that--She is proud and she knows that her father's name is in bad odour. Do you think a sensitive, highly strung girl as she is doesn't feel a thing like that? Yes, I pity her, and if through me her life may be made a little happier, why not? Last night when you and her father were talking money--she and I had much to say to one another. She was very open and very frank to me and I to her. We made no pretence--we know that we do not love one another. She is desperately poor and she is marrying me chiefly--entirely for the money you are going to give us both. I know that you are lending Lord Gowerhurst money, that he has not the slightest intention of every repaying you--Oh, Kathleen and I have been perfectly open and frank with one another--I understand that she cares for no one else. She has the same assurances from me, so there--" Allan laughed sharply, "you have it, the usual thing, a marriage of convenience! How can I pretend that I like it, Father, when I do not? You--you know that I would sooner not--but it is arranged, it is agreed--I do not love her, but thank God I can and do respect her and I feel sorry for her--and so we shall go through with it, Father!" he concluded.