Part 7

"If I'd the money to emigrate and she'd come with me, I'd go to-morrow," Hubert said, "and be damned to the good time."

Hubert was in love, Arthur reflected. Also, he had never known any other condition and could not realise the horrible realities of dirt and disease.

"Feel a bit uplifted, I expect, just now," he remarked casually.

Hubert stopped and faced him. "Do I look uplifted?" he asked.

He certainly did not. He had an air of settled melancholy at the best of times, and at this moment he had apparently abandoned himself to the deepest gloom.

Five weeks earlier Arthur would have advised his cousin to take his courage in his hands and break away from Hartling at any cost--even as Eleanor had once advised himself--but now he could appreciate to the full Hubert's difficulty.

And then it occurred to him that he had still just enough money to solve the present problem. If that expression of the wish to emigrate had been sincere, he might free his cousin by offering him the loan of, say two hundred pounds. It would, in any case, be interesting to see whether or not he would accept the chance if it were given to him. But he knew, even as the will to help Hubert rose up in him, that he was afraid.

Old Kenyon would surely find out who had advanced that money and then he would.... Arthur was not quite sure what he would do, but he feared the consequences. He might be turned out of Hartling; he would certainly lose any hope of that future remuneration for which he was now working.

The thought of making an offer flashed through his mind and was rejected. He must, at least, have his three months.

"Oh! cheer up, old man," he advised the gloomy Hubert with an assumption of hopefulness. "Things are never as bad as you think they're going to be. Something will happen, right enough."

"There's only one thing that'll help me," Hubert muttered, as they once more continued their walk.

"And that's bound to happen sooner or later," Arthur returned. "I dare say you won't have to wait much longer."

Hubert gave a little snort of impatience. "Jolly fine," he said; "but the pater, for instance, has been practically waiting all his life."

Arthur was stirred to candour. "In a way," he said, "but I don't suppose it has worried him much."

"Hasn't it? You ask him," retorted Hubert.

Arthur thought over that for a moment before he said, "If I did, he probably wouldn't tell me. You're a secretive lot down here, you know. You're absolutely the first person who has given me any sort of confidence."

"We can't," Hubert replied. "It isn't safe. You never know what the old man'll find out--he's damnably sharp in some things, and he's got us all as tight as wax. If he chose to cut up rough, he could turn any of us out of here without a blessed penny. I don't suppose he'd like it, for instance, if he knew that I was talking like this to you. But--I don't know--I wanted to tell you, and that affair of Ken's makes you think a bit, doesn't it? He's in a cleft stick all right now--like the rest of us."

Arthur had a memory of his first night at Hartling, and of the way in which his uncle had suddenly dropped out of the conversation after his father had, with apparent gentleness, expressed surprise that his son did not go to live in Italy. Was it possible that that quiet expression veiled a threat?

"But the old man's a good sort, surely," Arthur protested. "He wouldn't do anything absolutely rotten, I mean."

"You never know what he'll do," Hubert said. "You ask the pater about Uncle Jim, Eleanor's father. I don't suppose he'd mind telling you. You're practically one of us now, aren't you?"

But some spirit in Arthur rebelled furiously against that suggestion.

"Good Lord, no; not in that way," he asserted vigorously. "I'm perfectly free to go whenever I want to. Even if I haven't got a cent, I could always get a job as a doctor."

"Yes, you score there," Hubert agreed, without enthusiasm. "Wish to God I'd got a profession."

Their conversation was interrupted at this point by their arrival at the little power-house in which Scurr, the engineer-chauffeur, was busily engaged on a minor repair to one of the temporarily dismantled dynamos. And as they returned to the house half an hour later, Arthur determinedly discussed certain alterations the Committee were proposing in connection with the thirteenth and fourteenth holes of the golf course. He had definitely quashed the assertion that he was now to be numbered among those who were waiting for a certain long deferred event, and chose to think no more about that subject at present. He was, as he had asserted, free to leave Hartling whenever he wished. He was not tied in any way, he never could be. And there was no reason why he should not enjoy his three months' holiday. He was sorry for Hubert, but if he had that £200, he probably would not dare to break away. It would not be worth while for one thing, and for another he was too "soft," spoilt by the ease of a luxurious life.

And Hubert, on his side, made but one further reference to his love affair. No doubt he was afraid that he had already been rather indiscreet, for just before they reached the house he said,--

"Absolutely between you and me, of course, what I told you this afternoon."

"Rather. Absolutely," Arthur assured him.

It was impossible not to have a slight feeling of contempt for them all, Arthur thought, even though he had began to pity them. Congratulating himself anew on his own magnificent independence, he was inclined, just then, to regard the Kenyons as parasitic, bloodless creatures. He had once pictured them as vultures; now he saw them rather as jackals.

After dinner that evening, however, he was influenced to modify once again the continually fluctuating impression he received of the Hartling household. He was warm with the comfort of good food and good wine, and inclined to be generous and a trifle sentimental when this new record was laid before him.

His uncle apparently knew something of the confidences his son had given that afternoon, for it was with a new, a more intimate manner that he came across to Arthur in the drawing-room after dinner.

"Having your usual game to-night?" he asked.

"Oh! I don't know. Why?" Arthur said. Of all the Kenyons, his uncle was, he considered, the most to be despised. He was so confounded sloppy.

Joe Kenyon made a vague gesture with the hand that held his cigar and the long ash fell and broke on the carpet. He frowned impatiently, looked down at the ash and apparently decided to forget it.

"Didn't know if you'd come for a stroll in the garden," he said.

"Right you are. Come along," Arthur agreed, in a spasm of pity for the futility of the man.

The Kenyons always sought the garden if they had anything of the least importance to say, and he inferred that his uncle had some admission to make now concerning Hubert's unfortunate engagement. Was it possible that they wanted him to be a sort of intermediary between them and the old man?

But when they were in the garden and out of earshot of the house, Mr Kenyon displayed no immediate anxiety to discuss his son's affairs. Instead of that he began to give Arthur what seemed to be rather paternal advice.

"Can't think why you go off to the billiard-room directly after dinner," he said, "when you've got this. Billiards are all right after dark, but you miss the best hour of daylight going in there at nine o'clock this time o' year."

"Well, I'm out of doors all day," was Arthur's excuse.

"Playing golf or croquet or tennis," his uncle commented.

Arthur was startled. This was the last quarter from which he had expected a criticism of his way of life.

"Didn't know you objected to games," he said curtly.

Joe Kenyon did not appear to hear that. The gray sky of the afternoon had broken, the sun was setting among a tangled mass of cloud, and he was watching the spectacle with the entranced eyes of a dreamer.

"I'll admit," he murmured half apologetically, "that it's a trifle too dramatic. But at my age one wants the broad effects. However, I suppose you don't _see_ these things."

Arthur turned his attention to the sunset. "Looks uncommonly like rain," he said.

His uncle laughed. "We all have our different compensations," he said. "Yours is games and mine the ability to see things. However, I don't know what we should do without 'em."

"Compensations?" Arthur repeated. "I don't know that I'd thought of games in that light."

"You will in time, if you stay here," was his uncle's answer, given a little sadly.

"But I don't mean to," Arthur asserted.

Joe Kenyon turned reluctantly from the contemplation of the sunset and looked at his nephew. "Then you'd better break away while you have the chance," he said. "I'm a fool to say this to you, but Hubert told me of your talk this afternoon, and I--well, I'm sorry for you."

Arthur raised his eyebrows.

"You're getting drawn in, though you mayn't know it," his uncle continued, "and if you do your life will be wasted. You'll be sucked dry like the rest of us. Damn it, I can't say more than that. I shouldn't have said as much if you hadn't been so decent to Hubert this afternoon."

Arthur's conscience pricked him, and at the same moment he had a warm sense of friendship for his cousin. "Did he tell you that?" he said. "I'm glad he thought so anyhow. I thought I'd been rather rotten to him as a matter of fact."

"I gathered that you'd been very friendly," Joe Kenyon replied, his attention returning to the sunset. "Not that you can be of any help in his case."

"I don't know, I might," Arthur blurted out on the impulse of the moment. "Look here, I've got a couple of hundred pounds he's welcome to, if he'd care to have it. He said something about trying his luck in Canada if he could raise the money."

His uncle made no answer for a few seconds, then he definitely resigned himself to the loss of the sunset, drew his nephew's arm through his own, and began to walk slowly up and down the length of the broad gravel walk upon which they had been standing.

"Good of you, Arthur, very good and generous of you," he said; "but it's no use. Hubert's in love and he's a bit above himself, but he'd never do anything in Canada. He's too soft and ignorant. We only guess what the world's like outside this place, but the things we do guess don't tempt us to explore it." He paused a moment before he continued: "We don't talk about ourselves, of course, but you must know the truth pretty well by this time--besides, you're practically one of us now."

Arthur was keenly interested. "I'm not sure that I do know the truth, Uncle Joe," he said. "Except--well, Hubert told me this afternoon that your father--er--keeps you pretty short of cash and so on; makes it jolly difficult for you to sort of--well--break away."

Joe Kenyon smiled grimly. "Difficult!" he repeated, and then, "I suppose you haven't got a cigar on you? All right, never mind. I smoke too much: that's another compensation."

"Couldn't you tell me how things are, a bit more?" Arthur ventured. "You know I might be able to help."

"It isn't easy to tell you, you see," Joe Kenyon said, after a short pause. "Let's sit down. But ..." he hesitated, grunting and sighing, before he blurted out, "But you might just run up to the house and get me a couple of cigars, there's a good fellow. Then, I'll--I'll tell you a story. Only you needn't, that is, I shouldn't say anything to the others about our being down here."

While his uncle had been talking, Arthur's heart had warmed to him, but in the ten minutes that now intervened while he went to the house for the cigars, he had a brief reaction. As he entered the house, the habit of mind that had been growing upon him for the past five weeks strangely reasserted itself. He was aware again of the futility and weakness of the Kenyons, their laziness, their self-indulgence, and what he could only regard as the meanness of their attitude towards the expected inheritance.

And his uncle seemed to be the very type of all these aspects of the family--a man so idle and weak that he could not exist without his cigar for half an hour. He might have endless excuses, but there must be a horribly lax strain in him somewhere. He was afraid even of his own sisters and his brother-in-law. He had not wanted them to know where he was and what he was saying.

In deference to that wish, however, Arthur went to the smoking-room for the desired cigars--a room that was used as a store and in which no one ever sat. There was more or less realisable wealth there, he reflected, as he opened a box of his uncle's cigars.

Why, these cigars must have cost over five pounds a hundred before the war.

He was crossing the hall on his return to the garden, when the drawing-room door opened and Miss Kenyon came out. Arthur had a feeling that she had deliberately tried to catch him. He had always disliked and rather feared her. She was different from the other Kenyons, more decided and more efficient. He had not modified his original opinion of her as a hard woman.

"Going out?" she asked coldly.

"Yes; it's jolly in the garden," Arthur said.

"Is my brother out there?" she continued.

Arthur hesitated on the edge of an implied untruth, but she gave him no opportunity to prevaricate, adding almost immediately,--

"I wish you would tell him I want to speak to him."

"I will, if I can find him," Arthur said.

"Oh! You'll know where to find him," Miss Kenyon replied, and re-entered the drawing-room.

It was almost certain, then, Arthur reflected, that she had heard him and had come out to give him that message. She had probably seen him coming up the garden, and had some purpose in putting an end to his conversation with her brother. He was annoyed by the interruption. He felt bound now to deliver her message and had no doubt that it would put an end to his uncle's confidences.

"I met Miss Kenyon in the hall as I was coming out," he said, as he rejoined his uncle. "At least, I think she must have seen me coming up from the drawing-room window. She came out and told me to tell you that she wanted to speak to you, and went back again."

Joe Kenyon was leaning back in one of the comfortable wicker chairs that were scattered about the garden, and gave no sign of being perturbed by the message.

"Got the cigars?" he asked, stretching out his hand, and then after an interval in the course of which he had got the cigar satisfactorily going, he went on: "Esther's so cautious. She thinks I'm indiscreet. Perhaps I am, but I can't really see what difference it can make, so long as we don't say anything against the old man. And in any case, I trust you, Arthur. I can trust you, can't I?"

There was a wistful note in the last sentence that robbed it of any offence, and Arthur was touched by it. The effect of his brief visit to the house was being dissipated already by the surroundings of the garden.

"Rather. Yes, absolutely," he said gently. "I mean what possible reason could I have for giving you away?"

Joe Kenyon sighed. "Reason?" he reflected. "Well, reason enough in all conscience."

Arthur was puzzled. "What?" he asked.

"Oh! there you are," his uncle replied. "Either you know too little or too much, and one has to trust you in either case. But surely, my dear boy, you can at least see that you've got it in your power to give any of us away to the old man?"

"Oh, good Lord!" Arthur ejaculated in an undertone. He had a horrible picture of the Kenyons living a life of eternal suspicion and distrust, fearing that one or other of them might by some trick or disloyalty obtain an unfair hold on the old man's affection. His uncle's next speech, however, destroyed that picture even as it began to take shape.

"That doesn't apply to us, of course," he said. "We've got a sort of unspoken agreement between ourselves. Had to have. We _hadn't_ at first though, you know," he continued, looking round and changing his voice as if he were making an unexpected announcement.

"Hadn't you?" Arthur murmured encouragingly.

"By Jove, no," his uncle went on reminiscently. "But that was nearly forty years ago, of course; just after this place was built; at the time when I tried to break away." He paused a moment and then went on: "I wanted to be an artist. I've got portfolios of stuff upstairs if you'd ever care to look at 'em. I dare say I shouldn't have been any good, not really first-class, but I can see things, and now and again I can get something down. There was a note of the wood I made when we first came here, that was rather good. I'll show it to you sometime. The wood was pretty nearly all pines then. The old man planted those larches--said the pines were too gloomy. I dare say he was right."

"And he wouldn't let you become an artist?" Arthur put in.

"He didn't actually forbid it," Joe Kenyon said. "But he made it simply impossible. He--well"--he lowered his tone almost to a whisper--"we used to believe in those days that he had some insidious disease or other. I suppose he must have started the idea himself. I can't remember. But I know that my poor mother used to be very depressed about it at times. She died in '83, you know, a year or two after we came here to live. However, what with one thing and another, there seemed to be no alternative except to put off my going to Paris--from month to month at first, and afterwards from year to year." He gave a grim laugh as he added. "In a way of speaking you may say it's going on still. Not long ago at dinner I was talking about Italy and the old man asked me why I didn't go there."

"Yes, it was after I came. I heard him," Arthur said. "But--I didn't understand...."

"Oh, well! if I'd said I would, I shouldn't have got the money to go with in the first place," his uncle explained, "and in the second it would have been all up with me so far as the old man's will was concerned. He never threatens one, not directly, but we _know_. And, well, I can't face the thought of the workhouse. They don't allow you cigars there, I'm told," he concluded whimsically.

Arthur thought that he could realise the old situation fairly accurately. His uncle's original weakness showed so clearly through his narration. He had, no doubt, procrastinated, and bargained with himself, continually shirking the immediate necessity to take definite action. All that side of the affair was comprehensible enough, but what of that other point from which the narrative had so casually rambled away?

"Yes, I see," Arthur agreed sympathetically; "but what was it you were going to say about your having some agreement among yourselves, uncle? It was apropos of my being an outsider, you know."

"We got to understand it wouldn't do, that's all," Joe Kenyon said, "not to quarrel among ourselves, that is. Esther was inclined to make mischief in the old days. I don't know whether I ought to be telling you all this. Anyhow, we soon saw that it would never do for us to be jealous of one another. We had to find a _modus vivendi_ and--and take our chance. That was after Catherine married Charles and they had come to live with us. The idea at that time was that Charles was going into the Diplomatic later on."

Kenyon paused, but made no movement to rise and go up to the house in obedience to his sister's summons. His next sentence, however, apparently referred to that issue.

"Seems to me," he said, "that there can't be any harm, now, in telling you these things. I don't mind admitting that we've discussed it among ourselves--Esther, Catherine, Charles, and myself, that is. Of course what Esther says is that you might go behind us, as it were, but I know there's no sort of fear of that."

Arthur had never liked Miss Kenyon; but now he began quite actively to hate her.

"She must have a disgustingly low opinion of me if she could think a thing like that," he said bitterly.

"Oh, well," his uncle replied calmly, "you get like that when you've lived here long enough. Can't trust any one from outside. Never know, that after all these years, we mayn't be left in the lurch. But, as I've pointed out to 'em, you're different."

Nevertheless he was, without doubt, distinctly uneasy. He knew that he had been indiscreet, and now was anxious for reassurance. Twice in the last minute he had ended with an assertion of belief in his nephew's trustworthiness.

And it was with a strong feeling of desire to confirm that belief both for his uncle's sake and his own, that Arthur now said,--

"I wish I could do something to help--to help Hubert, I mean. Don't you think I might say something to Mr Kenyon about it? Reason with him? I wouldn't mind doing it in the least. He always seems reasonable enough when we're talking together. A bit hard, perhaps, rather--what shall I say?--not really interested in life, and so on; but not a bit--well--unkind--cruel, if you know what I mean?"

He had expected an almost scornful refusal of his offer to act as an intermediary, but his uncle appeared ready, at least to consider the proposal.

"That's good of you, Arthur," he said, "but there's another thing to be thought of, too; Esther's dead against the engagement."

That announcement instantly stiffened Arthur in his resolve. The thing was worth doing in any case, but the possibility of inflicting defeat upon Miss Kenyon afforded an immense additional inducement.

"I'd like to do it," he said, with sudden ardour.

Joe Kenyon sat up in his chair and turned to face his nephew with an effect of new interest.

"I don't for a moment believe your embassy will make the least difference, my dear boy," he said earnestly; "but I, personally, should be grateful if you'd undertake it. For Hubert's sake. It would be a--a tremendous compensation for him if he were married, and--well, we don't know yet that the old man will oppose the idea. At the same time I suppose you realise what it may mean for you?"

"Mean? Yes. Well, I suppose ..." Arthur began, uncertain of his uncle's precise intention.

"Mean that you may be turned out of the place at an hour's notice," Joe Kenyon interrupted him. "If you get on the old man's wrong side he'll have no scruples. That's what happened with my brother James, Eleanor's father, you know. He wanted to marry a girl, such a charming girl she was too--Eleanor takes after her--and somehow or other he put the old man's back up. Poor old Jim, he had an awful time--married Eleanor--Eleanor's mother, you understand--out of hand, and they practically starved. He used to write, but we couldn't help him, of course not to count; and the old man wouldn't. He was as hard as nails--hard as nails. They were in South America somewhere, Rio, I think it was, when Jim's wife died, and he only survived her about six months. We heard all about it from a fellow called Payne and his wife. Payne was in the Cable Company out there, and Jim knew them and asked them to bring Eleanor home. She was only seven or eight then, a dark, solemn little chit as ever you saw, poor dear. By God! you could tell she'd been through it. I can see them all standing in the hall now. Payne was a great stout chap with a grayish beard. His wife was a big woman too. They had Lord knows how many children of their own, I believe. And that little solemn elf Eleanor looked like a midget beside them. Thin as a herring she was, but as pretty as a fairy. She was always graceful, even as a bit of a child--sure in her movements--it was a pleasure to watch her...."