Bred in the Bone; Or, Like Father, Like Son Part 2

"It was lucky for him," murmured he, as he replaced his weapon in his pocket, "that the help came on _my_ side;" then lit his pipe, and leisurely walked home.

Three hours later returned the keeper (for whose arrival he had been sitting up), with twinkling eye and a look of triumph.

"Well, you caught the beggar, did you, Grange?"

"Oh yes, we caught him fast enough," responded the other, grinning; "we caught the whole lot of them. And who d'ye think they were? Why, it was the whole party from the house, as had come out to play at poachers! Who ever heard of such a game? Some on 'em got it hot, I reckon, in the new spinney yonder. But _that_ was no matter. We've all had our skins full of rum punch, and a sov. apiece, because Squire says we proved ourselves good watch-dogs. And here," continued the old man, exultingly, "are a couple of sovs. for yourself. 'Give them to that tall young fellow,'

says Squire, 'as you posted by the Decoy Pond, for he knows how to use his fists.' Why, that 'ere chap as you had the tussle with was Carew hisself!"

A deadly paleness overspread the young man's cheeks.

"Was that Carew?" he said.

"Yes, indeed, it was; though none of us know'd it. You needn't look so skeared. He ain't annoyed with you; he's pleased, bless 'ee, and here's the proof of it."

"You may keep the guineas, Grange," said Yorke, gravely; "only keep my secret too. If he thinks I was a night-watcher, let him continue in that belief."

"Why, it's the best introduction to Carew as you could have!" insisted the astonished keeper. "You have only to go up to the great house to-morrow, and say: 'Here's the man as proved your match last night,'

and--"

"You must allow me to be the best judge of my own affairs," interrupted the young fellow, haughtily; "so you will be so good as to say nothing more about the matter."

"Just as you please, Sir; and I am sure you are very kind," answered the keeper, slipping the coins into his pocket. "Squire hisself could not be more liberal, that's certain. You are tired, I see; and I wish you good-night, Sir, or rather good-morning."

"Good-night, Grange."

"Now, that's what I call pride," said Walter, grimly, as he closed the door upon his lodger; "and I am sure I hope, for his sake, it may never have a fall."

When Richard Yorke was thus left to himself he did a curious thing; he took out the life-preserver from its receptacle, and having made up the fire, placed it in the centre of the burning ma.s.s, so that in the morning there was nothing left of it save a dull lump of lead.

CHAPTER IV.

ACROSS THE THRESHOLD.

A day or two pa.s.sed by, and nothing more was heard of Carew's combat with the young watcher; some other mad frolic had doubtless entered into the Squire's head and driven that one out. The hot punch imbibed after his swim in the Decoy Pond seemed to have averted all evil consequences, or perhaps he was case-hardened to such things. It was not uncommon with him to spend whole winter nights on a neighboring "broad," in pursuit of the mere-fowl that haunted it, in water or ice or swamp. He treated his body as an enemy, and strove to subdue it--though not for the good reasons of the Apostle--by every sort of harshness and imprudence; or rather he behaved toward it as a wayward father toward his child--at one time with cruel severity, at another with the utmost luxury and indulgence. No rich man, probably, ever gave his heir so many chances of inheritance, or excited in him so many false hopes, as did the Squire of Crompton, who had no heir.

The hunting season had begun with him after its usual fas.h.i.+on; he seldom troubled himself to find a fox, but turned one out of a bag to insure sport, or ran a drag over the most difficult and dangerous country that could be selected.

Yorke had almost made up his mind to take the keeper's advice, and distinguish himself by putting his neck to the same risks as Carew, on horseback, in order to recommend himself to his notice, when an event occurred by which he attained his end in another way.

Tired of the park, wherein he had dwelled so long, and which every day the approach of winter made more bare and desolate, he had taken a solitary walk along the highway which led to the market-town. He was returning, and had reached the top of the long hill where the park fence began, and a high solid gate--so that no dogs could enter--gave access to that wild domain, when a confused murmur in the keen blue air caused him to look back. For a mile or more the road was straight, and the leafless trees and hedges left the prospect open to him in all directions; at the extremity of the road was some huge moving object, which, advancing at great speed, disclosed the Squire's mail phaeton, drawn by four antlered stags, and followed at some distance by three or four mounted grooms, apparently unable to keep up with him. Carew himself was standing up like some charioteer of old, and, although he already outstripped the very wind, was laying about him frantically with his whip, as up the hill the frightened creatures tore as if the ground were level. The reason of this headlong speed was at the same time made evident by the appearance of a pack of hounds, which, followed by a numerous field in scarlet, was coming across the gra.s.s-land in full cry.

The spectacle, though weird and strange, was by no means without a certain grandeur--like some barbarous pageant. Yorke understood the situation at a glance. He had heard the keeper say that, not content with his wild progresses through the park, the Squire had sworn to drive his stags one day into the market-town, and this he had doubtless actually accomplished; but, on his return, he had had the misfortune to be caught sight of by one of his own packs of hounds, which were now in full pursuit of him, like another Actaeon. The terrified stags, with that deep-mouthed menace of their natural enemies ringing in their ears, at once threw off all control, and had left their grooms behind them in half a dozen bounds. If only the harness held, they would be at the lodge gate in a very few minutes; but, on the other hand, the hounds were nearer to that point, which they were approaching diagonally. They were running, of course, by sight, like greyhounds, and with greyhounds'

speed. Above their eager mellow notes, and the mad shouting of the excited sportsmen, and the ceaseless winding of the disregarded horn, above the thunder of his own wheels, and of the hoofs of his strange steeds upon the wintry road, rang out Carew's hoa.r.s.e tones: "The gate, the gate!" If only that wooden wall could be interposed between his stags and their pursuers, all might yet be well. But, though the lodge-keeper had been drawn by the tumult to his door, he stood there like one amazed and fascinated by the spectacle before him, and paralyzed with the catastrophe that seemed impending.

"Gate, gate, you gaping idiot!" roared the Squire, with a frightful curse; but the poor shaking wretch had not the power to stir; it was Yorke himself who dashed at the latch, and threw the long gate wide to let the madman pa.s.s, and then slammed it back upon the very jaws of the hounds. They rushed against the solid wood like a living battering-ram, and howled with baffled rage; and some leaped up and got their fore-paws over it, and would have got in yet, but that Richard beat them back with his bare hands.

In the mean time Carew and his stags swept up the park like a whirlwind, and presently, coming to a coppice, the frightened creatures dashed into it, doubtless for covert, where wheel and rein and antler, tangling with trunk and branch, soon brought them to a full stop.

"Good lad!" exclaimed Carew, as Yorke hurried up to help him; "you are a good plucked one, you are; you shall keep the lodge, if you will, instead of that lily-livered scoundrel who was too frightened to move.

Oh, I ask pardon; you are a gentleman, are you?"

"Sir, I hope so," answered the young man, stiffly, his anger only half subdued by the necessity for conciliation.

"Then, come up to the house and dine, whoever you are; I'll lend you a red coat. Curse those grooms! what keeps them? One can't sit upon a stag's head to quiet him as though he were a horse." (Two of the stags were down, and b.u.t.ting, at one another with their horns.) "What a pace we came up White Hill! I tried to time them, but I could not get my watch out. You moved yourself like a flash of lightning, else I thought we must have pinned you against the gate. It was well done, my lad, well done; and I'm your debtor."

The Squire held out his hand, for the first time, for Yorke to shake.

"Why, what's this?" said he, peering into the other's eyes. "I have seen your face before, my friend."

"Yes, Sir; a week or two ago I played the part of night-watcher in your preserves--it was a mad prank; but"--and here the young fellow smiled roguishly--"it was better than poaching, you must admit."

"What!" cried the Squire, delighted, "are you the fellow that had that bout with me in the Decoy Pond? Why, I thought you were one of my own men, and sent you something; but, of course, my scoundrels drank it. I'm glad to see you, Sir, by daylight. It was the uncertain moons.h.i.+ne that hampered me, else, by Jove, I'd have given you 'one, two!' We must have it out another day, for a drawn battle is just the thing I hate. What's your name, young gentleman, and where do you live?"

"I live close by, Sir; I am in lodgings for the present."

"Ay, ay, for the hunting, I suppose," said the impetuous Squire. "Hark to those devils of dogs; they are howling yet; they would have had my stags by this time but for you. Well, well; send for your portmanteau, and take up your quarters at Crompton; you shall have a hearty welcome; only don't be late for dinner--seven, Sir, sharp. Here are my knavish grooms at last."

And, under cover of the fire of imprecations which the Squire poured upon his approaching retainers, the young landscape-painter withdrew. He had obtained his end at last, and he wished to retire before Carew should put that question to him for a second time--what is your name?--which, at such a moment, it would, for certain reasons, have been embarra.s.sing to answer.

He betook himself at once to the keeper's lodge, and packing up his wardrobe, which, though of modest dimensions, comprised all that was requisite for a gentleman's costume, dispatched it to the great house.

He followed it himself shortly afterward, only waiting to dash off a note by the afternoon's post for town. It was literally a "hurried line," and would have better suited these later telegraphic days, when thoughts, though wire-drawn, are compressed, and brevity is the soul of cheapness, as of wit. "_I have got my foot in, and however it may be pinched, will keep the door open. Direct to me at Crompton_."

It was not a nice trait in the young man, if it was a characteristic one, that he did not take the trouble even to leave so much word as that for the old keeper, who was engaged in his outdoor duties, but simply inclosed the few s.h.i.+llings in which he was indebted to him inside an envelope, addressed to Walter Grange. The old man liked him, as he well knew, and would have prized a few words of farewell; but Yorke was in a hurry to change his quarters for the better; he had climbed from low to high, and gave no further thought to the ladder which had so far served him. But yet he had some prudence too. Though he had dwelled so long in the Carew domains, so careful had he been not to intrude his presence inopportunely on its master, that he had never so much as seen, except at a distance, the mansion to which he was now an invited guest. How grand it showed, as his elastic step drew near it, with tower and turret standing up against the gloomy November sky, and all its broad-winged front alive with light! How good it would be to call so fine a place his home! How excellent to be made heir to the childless man who ruled it, and who could leave it to whomsoever his whim might choose!

It was unusual for a guest to approach Crompton for the first time on foot. The Squire's jovial friends used for the most part strange conveyances, such as tandems and randoms, and the great flower-beds in the lawn in front gave sign that some such equipage had been lately driven up not altogether with dexterity. It is difficult at all times to drive "unicorn," and more so if the horses are not used to that method of progression, and still more so if the charioteer is somewhat inebriated; and all these conditions had been fulfilled a few minutes previously in the case of Mr. Frederick Chandos, a young gentleman of twenty-one years of age, but of varied experience, who had just arrived that day on his first visit. But when Yorke appeared at the front-door, there was no less attention paid to him than if he had driven up with four-in-hand. Obsequious footmen a.s.sisted him to take off his wrappers in the great hall, whose vastness dwarfed the billiard-table in its centre to bagatelle proportions. A profusion of wax-lights--and no others were permitted at Crompton, save in the servants' offices--showed eight s.h.i.+ning pillars of rare marble, and a grand staircase broad enough for a coach-and-four, and up which, indeed, Carew _had_ ridden horses for a wager; while all the walls were hung with huge-figured tapestry--"The Tent of Darius" and "The Entry of Alexander into Babylon," both miracles of patient art. The grandeur of the stately place was marred, however, by signs of revel and rough usage. The Persian monarch, spared by his Grecian conqueror, had been deprived, by some more modern barbarian, of his eyes; while the face of his royal consort had been cut out of the threaded picture, to judge by the ragged end of the canvas, by a penknife. The very pillars were notched in places, as though some mad revelers had striven to climb to the pictured ceiling, from which G.o.ds and men looked down upon them with amaze; the thick-piled carpet of the stairs was cut and torn, doubtless by horses'

hoofs; and here and there a gap in the gilt bal.u.s.ters showed where they had been torn away in brutal frolic. A groom of the chambers preceded the new guest up stairs, and introduced him to a bachelor's apartment, small, but well furnished in the modern style, whither his portmanteau had been already taken. "Squire has given orders, Sir," said he, respectfully, "that he should be informed as soon as you arrived. What name shall I say, Sir? But here he is himself."

As the groom withdrew, Carew made his appearance at the open door. He was smoking a cigar, although it was within an hour of dinner-time; and at his heels slouched a huge bull-dog, who immediately began to growl and sniff at the new guest. "Quiet, you brute!" exclaimed the Squire, with his customary garnish of strong expletive. "Welcome to Crompton, Mr.--I forget your name; or rather you forgot, I think, to favor me with it."

"My name is Richard Yorke, Sir."

"Yorke, Yorke--that sounds easterly. You are of the Cambridges.h.i.+re stock, I reckon, are you not?"

"No, Sir," returned the other, with a slight tremor in his voice, which he could not control; "I come from nearer home. Your wife's first husband was called Yorke, if you remember, and I bear his name, although I am her lawful son, by you, Sir."

CHAPTER V.

AT CROMPTON.

After the bold avowal made at the conclusion of the last chapter, Richard Yorke and his father (for such indeed he was) stood confronting one another, for near a minute, without a word. A tempest of evil pa.s.sions swept over Carew's swarthy face, and his eyes flashed with a fire that seemed to threaten personal violence. The bull-dog, too, as though perceiving his master's irritation with the stranger, began to growl again; and this, perhaps, was fortunate for the young man, as affording a channel for the Squire's pent-up wrath. With a great oath, leveled alike at man and brute, he raised his foot, and kicked the latter to the other side of the room.

"Impudent b.a.s.t.a.r.d!" cried he; "how dare you show your face beneath my roof?"