Читать книгу The Price of Silence - Fred M. White - Страница 4

II - PRIMERY NAMES HIS TERMS

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The girl stood there more or less shyly in the doorway. She was not exactly beautiful in the strict sense of the word, but then, beauty has no comparison with charm, and Audrey Venables had that to the full. When she smiled the spectator forgot the rather fascinating irregularity of her features in the sunshine of her presence. She was neither tall, nor short, and the clear brown olive of her skin owed nothing to cheap art, but had been painted there in nature's own exquisite shades by the suns and rains of her own native land. She was plainly enough dressed, after the manner of one who spends most of her time in the open air, and she carried birth and breeding from her well poised head to her dainty finger tips. She was young, too, not more than three and twenty probably, but there was an intelligence on her face and an expression in her eyes that told not only of high intelligence but equally high courage.

"I am in no hurry, Sir Wilton," she said. "I came over from the rectory to help you with those letters. But if you are busy, I can easily run over again after tea."

Primery regarded this desirable vision with eyes that spoke of frank and honest admiration, and yet without the faintest suggestion of boldness in them. He struggled to his feet and stood up so that all his physical infirmities were apparent and appealed at once to everything that was womanly in the girl's nature.

"Won't you introduce me?" Primery smiled.

Oakes did the necessary in a grudging spirit.

"Mr. John Primery," he said, "an American gentleman and old friend of mine who is quite well known on the other side as a brilliant writer of short stories. He happens to be passing through Hampshire on his way from Southampton, so he thought that he would give me a look in. I am afraid I shan't be able to induce him to stay, much as I should like to."

It was a pretty plain intimation to Primery, but he ignored it and turned to the girl with one of his most fascinating smiles.

"I don't think my friend, Oakes, is quite correct, Miss Venables," he said. "You see, I am here on a long holiday, and this lovely place intrigues me. You live here, I presume?"

"I have lived here all my life," Audrey Venables said. "You see my father is rector of the parish, and I happen to be his only child. He is one of the men who married late in life, so he is quite old now, and it is my pleasure and privilege to look after him."

"Nearly blind," Oakes supplemented.

"Yes, I am sorry to say that is quite true, Mr. Primery," Audrey went on. "But I have not wasted my time here altogether. You see, for two years before his death, I acted as private secretary to Sir Wilton's father. And I am rather hoping that I shall be kept on. You see, it is a very small living, and there are many things that my father needs."

"I am quite sure he will keep you on," Primery said. "And I hope that you and I will be very good friends. Unfortunately I can't get about much, but there are a good many things I can do, and I am quite sure—"

"Yes, yes," Oakes broke in irritably. "You needn't stay any longer now, Miss Venables. I shall be glad if you will come along after tea. Meanwhile, myself and my friend—"

But Audrey had already discreetly vanished. The door had hardly closed behind her when Oakes turned angrily on his companion.

"Now look here, John," he said. "We had better understand one another at once. I have turned over a new leaf. It will take me all my time the next ten years to pull things together because my father left things in a devil of a mess, and—"

"And had his own son to thank for it," Primery interrupted calmly. "Why, you were bleeding him to death all the time we were working together. But do you mean to tell me honestly that things are as bad here as you say they are?"

"Every bit," Oakes growled, "The estate is mortgaged to the hilt, even the furniture doesn't belong to me. Of course, it looks very nice on the surface, and Sir Wilton Oakes of Priors Gate is a big bug in this neighbourhood, or at least, so the neighbours think. But frankly I haven't got a penny."

"Then it seems to me that I have arrived just at the psychological moment," Primery said. "If you chuck up all this, with an old title hanging to it, then you are a bigger fool than I take you for. My hat, and with your opportunities! What price Sir Wilton Oakes, of Priors Gate, burglar and criminal! Who would suspect for a moment that all the robberies were planned under this roof? I suppose I must have passed thirty or forty great houses on the way from Southampton here, all of them sitting up and asking to be robbed. My dear chap, there is literally millions in it, and only you and me to share the plunder. There isn't one of the old gang in New York who knows that I am over here, nor one of them who knows the whereabouts of the man we used to call Carlton. So we can make an entirely fresh start amongst the simple sons of the soil here, and get away with the plunder just how and when we please. You leave it to me. I'll work out the schemes as I always do, and I shan't shirk my share of the work either. Upon my word, it's ideal. Just about once a month we stroll quietly out one evening after everybody has gone to bed and come back an hour or two later with anything up to twenty thousand pounds worth of loot. And I know where to get rid of it, too. And all the rest of the time you will be a county magnate managing your estates and sitting on the local Bench and all the rest of it. And I shall pass as an old friend of yours, who saved your life in romantic circumstances out west, and these infirmities of mine will be supposed to be caused by it. So that you owe everything to me and are correspondingly grateful. You can tell people if you like that I am an American gentleman of some means, and they need never know that I am as much of an Englishman as any of the rest of them. And there is another thing they will never know."

"I understand," Oakes said. "You mean your—"

"Hush. Don't mention it. Never breathe a word of that even to me. Because that secret is vital to our plans, and you never know who may be listening. Upon my word, my dear chap, it was one of the luckiest days of my life when I traced you to England and decided to look you up. A man with a poetic disposition like mine and a lover of the beautiful in nature—"

"Oh, cut it out," Oakes said coarsely. "Cut it out. I know you like to pose as an intellectual."

"It's no pose at all," Primery said calmly. "If I weren't so fond of the good things of this life, I should take a cottage in the country somewhere and devote myself entirely to the pursuit of letters. In the right sort of cottage, with a bathroom and electric light, and the right sort of wife—and by Jove, that little girl who was here just now would be an ideal helpmate. I can keep my head about women as far as most men, but upon my word, Oakes, that little brown fairy fairly knocked me over."

"Oh, did she?" Oakes sneered. "You can come off the grass there as soon as you like. I have a nephew who comes down here occasionally, in fact, he is doing some business for me, a young fellow who looks like making his mark at the Bar. And if I don't marry, he will be Sir Cecil Oakes some of these days."

"Well?" Primery asked bluntly. "Well?"

"Well, those two are more or less engaged to be married. At any rate, I know there is an understanding between them. They were lovers as children. So you see, my friend—"

"I see nothing," Primery said with a gleam in his eye. "You know perfectly well that if I set my hand on a thing, I never take it back. And if I want to marry Audrey Venables, I will, in spite of a thousand Cecil Oakes. Don't you be a fool, old son. I can show you how to save the situation so that this lovely place will be free of debt, and you will be a rich man into the bargain. So shall I for that matter, but that is another story."

"You mean to stay here, then?" Oakes asked.

"Certainly I do," Primery replied. "Love's young dream and unlimited treasure! Lord, what a prospect!"

"And if I decline?" Oakes snarled.

"My dear fellow, you won't decline," Primery murmured sweetly. "You dare not. Think it over. Look at the prospect. We are safe, safe as the foundations of this house. And what am I demanding in return? Merely the right to live in this lovely old place—the price of my silence."

The Price of Silence

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