Читать книгу Under False Pretences - Sergeant Adeline - Страница 20

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There was a little, sunny, green walk opposite the dining-room windows, edged on either side by masses of white and crimson phlox and a row of sunflowers, where the gentlemen of the house were in the habit of taking their morning stroll and smoking their first cigar. It was here that Hugo was slowly pacing up and down when Brian Luttrell came out of the house in search of him.

Hugo gave him a searching glance as he approached, and was not reassured. Brian's face wore a curiously restrained expression, which gave it a look of sternness. Hugo's heart beat fast; he threw away the end of his cigar, and advanced to meet his cousin with an air of unconcern which was evidently assumed for the occasion. It passed unremarked, however. Brian was in no mood for considering Hugo's expression of countenance.

They took two or three turns up and down the garden walk without uttering a word. Brian was absorbed in thought, and Hugo had his own reasons for being afraid to open his mouth. It was Brian who spoke at last.

"Come away from the house," he said. "I want to speak to you, and we can't talk easily underneath all these windows. We'll go down to the loch."

"Not to the loch," said Hugo, hastily.

Brian considered a moment. "You are right," he said, in a low tone, "we won't go there. Come this way." For the moment he had forgotten that painful scene at the boat-house, which no doubt made Hugo shrink sensitively from the sight of the place. He was sorry that he had suggested it.

The day was calm and mild, but not brilliant. The leaves of the trees had taken on an additional tinge of autumnal yellow and red since Brian last looked at them with an observant eye. For the past week he had thought of nothing but of the intolerable grief and pain that had come upon him. But now the peace and quiet of the day stole upon him unawares; there was a restfulness in the sight of the steadfast hills, of the waving trees—a sense of tranquility even in the fall of the yellowing leaves and the flight of the migrating song-birds overhead. His eye grew calmer, his brow more smooth, as he walked silently onward; he drew a long breath, almost like one of relief; then he stopped short, and leaned against the trunk of a tall fir tree, looking absently before him, as though he had forgotten the reason for his proposed interview with his cousin. Hugo grew impatient. They had left the garden, and were walking down a grassy little-trodden lane between two tracks of wooded ground; it led to the tiny hamlet at the head of the loch, and thence to the high road. Hugo wondered whether the conversation were to be held upon the public highway or in the lane. If it had to do with his own private affairs, he felt that he would prefer the lane. But he dared not precipitate matters by speaking.

Brian recollected his purpose at last, however. After a short interval of silence he turned his eyes upon Hugo, who was standing near him, and said, gently—

"Sit down, won't you?—then we can talk."

There was a fallen log on the ground. Hugo took his seat on it meekly enough, but continued his former occupation of digging up, with the point of a stick that he was carrying, the roots of all the plants within his reach. He was so much absorbed by this pursuit that he seemed hardly to attend to the next words that Brian spoke.

"I ought, perhaps, to have had a talk with you before," he said. "Matters have been in a very unsettled state, as you well know. But there are one or two points that ought to be settled without delay."

Hugo ceased his work of destruction; and apparently disposed himself to listen.

"First, your own affairs. You have hitherto had an allowance, I believe—how much?"

"Two hundred," said Hugo, sulkily, "since I joined."

"And your pay. And you could not make that sufficient?"

Hugo's face flushed, he did not answer. He sat still, looking sullenly at the ground. Brian waited for a little while, and then went on.

"I don't want to preach, old fellow, but you know I can't help thinking that, by a little decent care and forethought, you ought to have made that do. Still, it's no good my saying so, is it? What is done cannot be undone—would God it could!"

He stopped short again: his voice had grown hoarse. Hugo, with the dusky red still tingeing his delicate, dark face, hung his head and made no reply.

"One can but try to do better for the future," said Brian, somewhat unsteadily, after that moment's pause. "Hugo, dear boy, will you promise that, at least?"

He put his hand on his cousin's shoulder. Hugo tried to shrink away, then, finding this impossible, averted his face and partly hid it with his hands.

"It's no good making vague promises," he said by-and-bye. "What do you mean? If you want me to promise to live on my pay or anything of that sort——"

"Nothing of that sort," Brian interrupted him. "Only, that you will act honourably and straightforwardly—that you will not touch what is not your own——"

Hugo shook off the kindly hand and started up with something like an oath upon his lips. "Why are you always talking about that affair! I thought it was past and done with," he said, turning his back upon his cousin, and switching the grass savagely with his cane.

"Always talking about it! Be reasonable, Hugo."

"It was only because I was at my wits' end for money," said the lad, irritably. "And that came in my way, and—I had never taken any before——"

"And never will again," said Brian. "That's what I want to hear you say."

But Hugo would say nothing. He stood, the impersonation of silent obstinacy, digging the end of his stick into the earth, or striking at the blue bells and the brambles within reach, resolved to utter no word which Brian could twist into any sort of promise for the future. He knew that his silence might injure his prospects, by lowering him in Brian's estimation—Brian being now the arbiter of his fate—but for all that he could not bring himself to make submission or to profess penitence. Something made the words stick in his throat; no power on earth would at that moment have forced him to speak.

"Well," said Brian at last, in a tone which showed deep disappointment, "I am sorry that you won't go so far, Hugo. I hope you will do well, however, without professions. Still, I should have been better satisfied to have your word for it—before I left Netherglen."

"Where are you going?" said Hugo, suddenly facing him.

"I don't quite know."

"To London?"

"No, Abroad."

"Abroad?" repeated Hugo, with a wondering accent. "Why should you go abroad?"

"That's my own business."

"But—but—" said the lad, flushing and paling, and stammering with eagerness, "I thought that you would stay here, and that Netherglen and everything would belong to you, and—and——"

"And that I should shoot, and fish, and ride, and disport myself gaily over my brother's inheritance—that my own hand deprived him of!" cried Brian, with angry bitterness. "It is so likely! Is it you who have no feeling, or do you fancy that I have none?"

"But the place is yours," faltered Hugo, with a guilty look, "Strathleckie is yours, if Netherglen is not."

"Mine! Yes, it is mine after a fashion," said Brian, while a hot, red flush crept up to his forehead, and his brows contracted painfully over his sad, dark eyes. "It is mine by law; mine by my father's will; and if it had come into my hands by any other way—if my brother had not died through my own carelessness—I suppose that I might have learnt to enjoy it like any other man. But as it is—I wish that every acre of it were at the bottom of the loch, and I there, too, for the matter of that! I have made up my mind that I will not benefit by Richard's death. Others may have the use of his wealth, but I am the last that should touch it. I will have the two or three hundred a year that he used to give me, and I will have nothing more."

Hugo's face had grown pale. He looked more dismayed by this utterance than by anything that Brian as yet had said. He opened his lips once or twice before he could find his voice, and it was in curiously rough and broken tones that he at length asked a question.

"Is this because of what people say about—about you—and—Richard?"

He seemed to find it difficult to pronounce the dead man's name. Brian lifted up his face.

"What do people say about me and Richard, then?" he said.

Hugo retreated a little.

"If you don't know," he said, looking down miserably, "I can't tell you."

Brian's eyes blazed with sudden wrath.

"You have said too little or too much," he said. "I must know the rest. What is it that people say?"

"Don't you know?"

"No, I do not know. Out with it."

"I can't tell you," said Hugo, biting his lips. "Don't ask me, ask someone else. Anyone."

"Is 'anyone' sure to know? I will hear it from you, and from no one else. What do people say?"

Hugo looked up at him and then down again. The struggle that was waging between the powers of good and evil in his soul had its effect even on his outer man. His very lips turned white as he considered what he should say.

Brian noted this change of colour, and was moved by it, thinking that he understood Hugo's reluctance to give him pain. He subdued his own impatience, and spoke in a lower, quieter voice.

"Don't take it to heart, Hugo, whatever it may be. It cannot be worse than the thing I have heard already—from my mother. I don't suppose I shall mind it much. They say, perhaps, that I—that I shot my brother"—(in spite of himself, Brian's voice trembled with passionate indignation)—"that I killed Richard purposely—knowing what I did—in order to possess myself of this miserable estate of his—is that what they say?"

Hugo answered by a bare little monosyllable—

"Yes."

"And who says this?"

"Everyone. The whole country side."

"Then—if this is believed so generally—why have no steps been taken to prove my guilt? Good God, my guilt! Why should I not be prosecuted at once for murder?"

"There would be no evidence, they say." Hugo murmured, uneasily. "It is simply a matter of assertion; you say you shot at a bird, not seeing him, and they say that you must have known that he was there. That is all."

"A matter of assertion! Well, they are right so far. If they don't believe my word, there is no more to be said," replied Brian, sadly, his excitement suddenly forsaking him. "Only I never thought that my word would even be asked for on such a subject by people who had known me all my life. You don't doubt me, do you, Hugo?"

"How could I?" said Hugo, in a voice so low and shaken that Brian could scarcely hear the words. But he felt instinctively that the lad's trust in him, on that one point, at least, had not wavered, and with a warm thrill of affection and gratitude he held out his hand. It gave him a rude shock to see that Hugo drew back and would not take it.

"What! you don't trust me after all?" he said, quickly.

"I—I do," cried Hugo, "but—what does it matter what I think? I'm not fit to take your hand—I cannot—I cannot——"

His emotion was so genuine that Brian felt some surprise, and also some compunction for having distrusted him before.

"Dear Hugo," he said, gently, "I shall know you better now. We have always been friends; don't forget that we are friends still, although I may be on the other side of the world. I'm going to try and lose myself in some out-of-the-way place, and live where nobody will ever know my story, but I shall be rather glad to think sometimes that, at any rate, you understand what I felt about poor Richard—that you never once misjudged me—I won't forget it, Hugo, I assure you."

He pressed Hugo's still reluctant hand, and then made him sit down beside him upon the fallen tree.

"We must talk business now," he said, more cheerfully—though it was a sad kind of cheerfulness after all—"for we have not much time left. I hear the luncheon-bell already. Shall we finish our talk first? You don't care for luncheon? No more do I. Where had we got to? Only to the initial step—that I was going abroad. I have several other things to explain to you."

His eyes looked out into the distance as he spoke; his voice lost its forced cheerfulness, and became immeasurably grave and sad. Hugo listened with hidden face. He did not care to turn his gloomy brows and anxiously-twitching lips towards the speaker.

"I shall never come back to Scotland," said Brian, slowly. "To England I may come some day, but it will be after many years. My mother has the management of Strathleckie; as well as of Netherglen, which belongs to her. She will live here, and use the house and dispose of the revenues as she pleases. Angela remains with her."

"But if you marry——"

"I shall never marry. My life is spoilt—ruined. I could not ask any woman to share it with me. I shall be a wanderer on the face of the earth—like Cain."

"No, no!" cried Hugo, passionately. "Not like Cain. There is no curse on you——"

"Not even my mother's curse? I am not sure," said Brian. "I shall be a wanderer, at any rate; so much is certain: living on my three hundred a year, very comfortably, no doubt; until this life is over, and I come out clear on the other side——"

Hugo lifted his face. "You don't mean," he whispered, with a look of terrified suspicion, "that you would ever lay hands on yourself, and shorten your life in that way?"

"Why, no. What makes you think that I should choose such a course? I hope I am not a coward," said Brian, simply. "No, I shall live out my days somewhere—somehow; but there is no harm in wishing that they were over."

There was a pause. The dreamy expression of Brian's eyes seemed to betoken that his thoughts were far away. Hugo moved his stick nervously through the grass at his feet. He could not look up.

"What else have you to tell me?" he said at last.

"Do you know the way in which Strathleckie was settled?" said Brian, quietly, coming down to earth from some high vision of other worlds and other lives than ours. "Do you know that my grandfather made a curious will about it?"

"No," said Hugo. It was false, for he knew the terms of the will quite well; but he thought it more becoming to profess ignorance.

"This place belonged to my mother's father. It was left to her children and their direct heirs; failing heirs, it reverts to a member of her family, a man of the name of Gordon Murray. We have no power to alienate any portion of it. The rents are ours, the house and lands are ours, for our lives only. If we die, you see, without children, the property goes to these Murrays."

"Cousins of yours, are they?"

"Second cousins. I have never troubled myself about the exact degree of relationship until within the last day or two. I find that Gordon Murray would be my second cousin once removed, and that his child or children—he has more than one, I believe—would, therefore, be my third cousins. A little while ago I should have thought it highly improbable that any of the Gordon Murrays would ever come into possession of Strathleckie, but it is not at all improbable now."

"Where do these Murrays live?"

"In London, I think. I am not sure. I have asked Colquhoun to find out all that he can about them. If there is a young fellow in the family, it might be well to let him know his prospects and invite him down. I could settle an income on him if he were poor. Then the estate would benefit somebody."

"You can do as you like with the income," said Hugo.

The words escaped him half against his will. He stole a glance at Brian when they were uttered, as if anxious to ascertain whether or no his cousin had divined his own grudging, envious thoughts. He heartily wished that Richard's money had come to him. In Brian's place it would never have crossed his mind that he should throw away the good fortune that had fallen to his lot. If only he were in this lucky young Murray's shoes!

Brian did not guess the thoughts that passed through Hugo's mind, but that murmured speech reminded him of another point which he wished to make quite clear.

"Yes, I can do what I like with the income," he said, "and also with a sum of money that my father invested many years ago which nobody has touched at present. There are twelve thousand pounds in the Funds, part of which I propose to settle upon you so as to make you more independent of my help in the future."

Hugo stammered out something a little incoherent; it was a proposition which took him completely by surprise. Brian continued quietly—

"Of course, I might continue the allowance that you have had hitherto, but then, in the event of my death, it would cease, for I cannot leave it to you by will. I have thought that it would be better, therefore, to transfer to you six thousand pounds, Hugo, over which you have complete control. All I ask is that you won't squander it. Colquhoun says that he can safely get you five per cent for it. I would put it in his hands, if I were you. It will then bring you in three hundred a year."

"Brian, you are too good to me," said Hugo. There were tears in his eyes; his voice trembled and his cheek flushed as he spoke "You don't know——"

Then he stopped and covered his face with his hands. A very unwonted feeling of shame and regret overpowered him; it was as much as he could do to refrain from crying like a child. "I can't thank you," he said, with a sob which made Brian smile a little, and lay his hand affectionately on his shoulder.

"Don't thank me, dear boy," he said. "It's very little to do for you; but it will perhaps help to keep you out of difficulties. And if you are in any trouble, go to Colquhoun. I will tell him how far he may go on helping you, and you can trust him. He shall not even tell me what you say to him, if you don't wish me to know. But, for Heaven's sake, Hugo, try to keep straight, and bring no disgrace upon our name. I have done what I could for you—I may do more, if necessary; but there are circumstances in which I should not be able to help you at all, and you know what those are."

He thought that he understood Hugo's impulsive disposition, but even he was not prepared for the burst of passionate remorse and affection with which the boy threw himself almost at his feet, kissing his hands and sobbing out promises of amendment with all the abandonment of his Southern nature. Brian was inclined to be displeased with this want of self-control; he spoke sharply at last and told him to command himself. But some time elapsed before Hugo regained his calmness. And when Brian returned to the house, he could not induce his cousin to return with him; the young fellow wandered away through the woods with drooping head and dejected mien, and was seen no more till late at night.

He came back to the house too late to say good-bye to Brian, who had left a few lines of farewell for him. His absence, perhaps, added a pang to the keen pain with which Brian left his home; but if so, no trace of it was discernible in the kindly words which he had addressed to his cousin. He saw neither his mother nor Angela before he went; indeed, he avoided any formal parting from the household in general, and let it be thought that he was likely to return in a short time. But as he took from his groom the reins of the dog-cart in which he was about to drive down to the station, he looked round him sadly and lingeringly, with a firm conviction at his heart that never again would his eyes rest upon the shining loch, the purple hills, and the ivy-grown, grey walls of Netherglen. Never again. He had said his last farewell. He had no home now!