It was a real _bouleversement_, but Josina, supposing that Arthur had saved her father's life at the risk of his own, and had then added to his merit by recovering the lost money, found it natural enough. For the full details of the robbery had never been told to her. "Better leave it alone, Jos," Arthur had said when she had again shown a desire to know more. "It was a horrid business and you won't want to dream of it. Another minute and that d--d villain would have--but there, I'd advise you to leave it alone."
Jos, suspecting nothing, had not demurred, but on the contrary had thought Arthur as modest as he was brave. And the doctor, with an eye to his patient's well-being, had taken the same view. "Put no questions to him," he said, "and don't talk to him about it. Time enough to go into it by and by, when the shock's worn off. The odds are that he will remember nothing that happened just before the scoundrel struck his--that's the common thing--and so much the better, my dear. Let sleeping dogs lie, or, as we doctors say, don't think about your stomach till your victuals trouble you."
So Josina knew no particulars except that Arthur had saved his uncle's life, and Clement--she shuddered as she thought of it--had come up in time to be of service. And no one at Garth knew more. But, knowing so much, it was not surprising to her that Arthur should be restored to favor, and, lately forbidden the house, should now rule it as a master. And clearly Arthur, also, found the position natural, so easily did he fall into it. He was up and down the old shallow stairs--which the Squire, true to the fashions of his youth, had never carpeted--a dozen times a day. He was as often in and out of his uncle's bedroom, or sitting on the deep window-seat on which generations of mothers had sunned their babes; and all this with a laugh and a cheery word that wondrously brightened the sick room.
Alert, quick, serviceable, and willing to take any responsibility, he made himself a favorite with all. Even Calamy, who shook his head over every improvement in the Squire, and murmured much of the "old lamp flickering before it went out," grew hopeful in his presence. Miss Peacock adored him. He put Josina's nose out of joint.
Of the young fellow, whose moodiness had of late perplexed his companions in the bank, not a trace remained. Had they seen him as he was now they might have been tempted to think that a weight had been lifted from him. But he seemed, for the time, to have forgotten the bank. He rarely mentioned the Ovingtons.
There was one at Garth, however, who had not forgotten either the bank or the Ovingtons; and proved it presently to Arthur's surprise. "Jos,"
said the Squire one afternoon. And when she had replied that she was there, "Where is Arthur?"
"I think he has just come in, sir."
"Prop me up. And send him to me. Do you leave us."
She went, wondering a little for she had not been dismissed before.
She sent Arthur, who, after his usual fashion, scaled the stairs at three bounds. He found the old man sitting up in the shadow of the curtains, a grotesque figure with his bandaged head. The air of the room was not so much musty as ancient, savoring of worm-eaten wood and long decayed lavender, and linen laid by in presses. On each side of the drab tester hung a dim flat portrait, faded and melancholy, in a carved wooden frame, unglazed; below each hung a sampler. "You sent for me, sir?"
"Ay. When's that money due?"
The question was so unexpected that for a moment Arthur did not take it in. Then the blood rushed to his face. "My mother's money, sir?"
"What else? What other money is there, that's due? I forget things but I dunno forget that."
"You don't forget much, sir," Arthur replied cheerfully. "But there's no hurry about that."
"When?"
"Well, in two months from the twenty-first, sir. But there is not the least hurry."
"This is the seventeenth?"
"Yes, sir."
"Well, I'll pay and ha' done with it. But I'll ha' to sell stock. East India Stock it is. What are they at, lad?"
"Somewhere about two hundred and seventy odd, I think, sir."
"And how do you sell 'em?" The Squire knew a good deal about buying stock but little about selling it, and he winced as he put the question. But he bore the pang gallantly, for had not the boy earned his right to the money and to his own way? Ay, and earned it by a service as great as one man could perform for another? For the Squire had no more reason than those about him to doubt that he owed his life to his nephew. He had found him beside his bed when he had recovered his senses, and putting together this and certain words which had fallen from others, and adding his own hazy impressions of the happenings of the night, and of the young man on whose shoulder he had leant, he had never questioned the fact. "How do you go about to sell 'em?" he repeated. "I suppose you know?"
"Oh, yes, sir, it's my business," Arthur replied. "You have to get a transfer--they are issued at the India House. You've only to sign it before two witnesses. It is quite simple, sir."
"Well, I can do that. Do you see to it, lad."
"You wouldn't wish to do it through Ovington's?"
"No!" the Squire rapped out. "Do it yourself. And lose no time. Write at once."
"Very well, sir. I suppose you have the certificates?"
"'Course I have," annoyed. "Isn't the stock mine?"
"Very good, sir. I'll see to it."
"Well, see to it. And, mark ye, when you're in Aldersbury see Welshes, and tell them I'm waiting for that lease of lives. I signed the agreement for the new lease six weeks ago and I should ha' had the lease by now. Stir 'em up, and say I must have it. The longer I'm waiting the longer the bill will be! I know 'em, damn 'em, though Welshes are not the worst."
When he had settled this he wanted a letter written, and Arthur sat down at the oaken bureau that stood between the windows, its faded green lining stained with the ink of a century and its pigeon-holes crammed with receipts and sample-bags. While he wrote his thoughts were busy with the matter that they had just discussed, but it was not until he found himself standing at a window outside the room, staring with unseeing eyes over the green vale, that he brought his thoughts to a head, and knew that even at the eleventh hour he hesitated.
Yes, he hesitated. The thing that he had so much desired, that had presented itself to him in such golden hues, that had dazzled his ambition and absorbed his mind, was within his grasp now, ready to be garnered--and yet he hesitated. Ovington was a just man and beyond doubt would release him and cancel the partnership agreement, if he desired to have it cancelled. And he was very near to desiring it at this moment.
For he saw now that there were other things to be garnered--Garth, its broad acres, its fine rent-roll, the old man's savings, Josina. Secure of the Squire's favor he had but to stretch out his hand, and all these things might be his; might certainly be his if he gave up the bank and his prospects there. That step, if he took it, would remove his uncle's last objection; it would bind him to him by a triple bond.
And it would do more. It would ease his own mind, by erasing from the past--for he would no longer need the five thousand--a thing which troubled his conscience and harassed him when he lay awake at night.
It would erase that blot, it would make all clean behind him, and it would at the same time remove the impalpable barrier that had risen between him and his mother.
It was still in his power to do all this. A word would do it. He had only to go back to the Squire and tell him that he had changed his mind, that he no longer wanted the money, and was not going into the bank.
He hesitated, standing at the window, looking on the green vale and the hillside beyond it. Yes, he might do it. But what if he repented later? And what security had he for those other things? His uncle might live for years, long years, might live to quarrel with him and discard him. Did not the proverb say that it was ill-work waiting for dead men's shoes? And Josina? Doubtless he might win Josina, for the wooing; he had no doubt about that. But he was not sure that he wanted Josina.
He decided at last that the question might wait. Until he had written the letter to the brokers, until then, at any rate, either course was open to him. He went downstairs. In the wainscoted hall, small and square, with a high narrow window on each side of the door, his mother and Josina were sitting on one of the window seats. The door stood open, the spring air and the sunshine poured in. "I'm telling her that she's not looking well," his mother said, as he joined them.
"She spends too much time in that room," he answered. Then, after a moment's thought, rattling the money in his fob, "Is Farmer coming to-day?"
"No." The girl spoke listlessly. "I don't think he is."
"He's made a wonderful recovery," his mother observed.
"Yes--if it's a real recovery."
"At any rate, the doctor hopes that he may come downstairs in ten days. And then, I'm afraid, we shall have Josina to nurse."
The girl protested that she was well, quite well. But her heavy eyes and the shadows under them belied her words.
"Well, I'm off to town," he said, "I have to see Welshes for him."
He left them, and ten minutes later he was on the road to Aldersbury, still undecided, still uncertain what course he would pursue, and at one moment accusing himself of a weakness that deserved the contempt of every strong man, at another praising moderation and a country life. Had he had eyes and ears for the things about him as he rode, he might have found much to support the latter view. The cawing of rooks, the murmur of wood-doves, the scents of late spring filled the balmy air. The sky was pure blue, and beneath it the pastures shone yellow with buttercups. Tree and field, bank and hedge-row rioted in freshest green, save where the oak wood, slow to change and careless of fashion, clung to its orange garb, or the hawthorn stood out, a globe of snow. The cuckoo and the early corncrake told of coming summer, and behind him the Welsh hills simmered in the first heat of the year.
Clement, had he passed that way, would have noted it all, and in the delight of the eye and the spring-tide of all growing things would have found ground to rejoice, whatever his trouble.
But Arthur, wrapt in his own thoughts, barely noticed these things. He rode with his eyes fixed on his horse's ears, and only roused himself when he saw the very man whom he wished to see coming to meet him. It was Dr. Farmer, in the mahogany-topped boots, the frilled shirt, and the old black coat--shaped as are our dress coats but buttoned tightly round the waist--which the dust of a dozen summers and every road in the district had whitened.
"Hallo, doctor!" Arthur cried as they met. "Are you going up to the house to-day?"
"No, Mr. Bourdillon. But I can if necessary. How is he?"
"That is what I want you to tell me. One can't talk freely at the house and I have a reason for wishing to know. How is he, doctor?"
"Do you mean----"
"Has this really shaken him? Will he be the same man again?"