Читать книгу Musk and Amber - A. E. W. Mason - Страница 6
ОглавлениеTwo Truants
The words of the song jingled in Elliot’s brain until he fell asleep, but in the morning, when the sun slanted across the garden, he took a more cheerful view. He rode with Julian at half past twelve, he on a quiet cob, Julian on a pony, and could hardly believe that the boy at his side was the same who had whimpered in his sleep and then opened his tragic eyes upon him the night before. For all the boy’s talk was of ships and great seamen and great victories upon the waters. He was full to the brim of Commodore Anson who had captured the great galleon Acapulco and just lately brought his ship, the Centurion, back to Spithead after circumnavigating the world in the wake of Francis Drake. All his conversation was in terms of the sea. They never moved to the right or to the left, but always to starboard or to port. However, Julian was very gentle with Mr. Elliot, when owing to his ignorance he made a mistake and Mr. Elliot enjoyed himself immensely. They came out from a ride, cut through a wood on to a high knoll where the fields of grass and plough were spread below them, and in the distance the great house overlooked its Italian garden and its lake.
“So you are going to be an Admiral, Julian,” said Elliot. “And what of Grest?”
The boy looked across the country to his house and said with a smile:
“I shall always come back to Grest.”
“You are fond of it?”
“It’s my home.”
He looked up at Elliot.
“I am not a politician, you see.”
Mr. Elliot nodded gravely.
“No?”
“No. But my wife and children will be there. Between voyages I shall always come back to Grest, and when I’m old I shall stump about looking after it.”
“Oh, yes. Old Timbertoes. I had forgotten you were going to lose a leg,” said Mr. Elliot.
Julian laughed and they rode homewards. Neither had mentioned the ominous little moment of the night before. In the clear daylight with the countryside laughing to the sun and the blood brisk in their veins, night and its terrors were very far away. This was the real Julian Linchcombe, the Admiral to be, who was not a politician but would stump happily about his garden on his wooden leg with his wife and his children and manage his affairs in the quarter-deck style, gruff and kindly, masterful and wise. There was nothing amiss with Julian, Mr. Elliot thought comfortably; and a small incident later confirmed him in his belief.
It happened on the Monday morning. The vicar of the parish church, which stood in the park under the east side of the house, had come in to supper after his last service on the Sunday evening. One or two neighbours were present and Julian, who had been allowed to sit up, had thrown off his mourning and appeared resplendent in a pink silk suit with an embroidered waistcoat of white satin. The hour of ten had struck whilst they were all still at the table and the dreaded moment had passed unnoticed. At eleven on Monday morning Mr. Elliot had made his adieux, his chaise was waiting at the door to drive him away and he went up to his room to make sure that none of his belongings had been left behind. Satisfied upon that point he came out into the long corridor, just as Julian ran quickly up the stairs with a book under his arm. He did not notice Mr. Elliot at the first, for he was continually looking over his shoulder as if he feared to be pursued. He opened a door and slipped through the doorway. At that moment the boy’s tutor, a short-sighted old scholar in horn-rimmed spectacles, called out from the vestibule below.
“Julian! Julian!”
Mr. Elliot followed Julian, thinking that the cry had not reached him. He found himself in a short passage from which a narrow staircase climbed to a great attic hidden away in the roof. Elliot remembered it as a lumber-room full of old furniture and cabinets, pictures and big disused mirrors. On the bottom step stood Julian. When he saw his friend Mr. Elliot, the look of concern upon his face changed to an impish grin. He flourished the book he was carrying, a volume of Hakluyt’s Principal Navigations, and then laying a finger on his lips, scuttled upstairs as quickly and silently as he could.
Meanwhile the tutor’s voice continued to call upon his pupil from the vestibule. Mr. Elliot went back into the long corridor, carefully closing the door behind him, and saw the tutor panting up the stairs with a hand heavy upon the banisters. He stopped when he saw Mr. Elliot.
“Have you seen Julian, Mr. Elliot?”
Mr. Elliot lied regrettably without the least hesitation.
“No, Sir! I said good-bye to him in the portico.”
“Dear! Dear!” cried the tutor with a groan. “I am sure that he has gone up to the attic. But I can never find him there. He has some hiding-place.” The tutor wiped his forehead with his handkerchief. “There’s a morning wasted, Mr. Elliot! And I was going to introduce him to Cicero’s De Senectute!”
“Very appropriate to be sure,” said Mr. Elliot with a chuckle.
“Boys!” cried the tutor, throwing up his hands in despair and turning down the stairs again.
“Yes, boys are the very devil,” said Mr. Elliot, and five minutes later he drove away from the door with a pleasant feeling that he too had been playing truant from his lessons.
“Just the young imp a boy of his age should be,” he reflected and laughed aloud. But he was to remember that little narrow staircase and Julian with his grin and his finger on his lips at a time when no laughter was possible.
