"That is more than I can answer," said Augustus, cautiously.
"Well," said Sedley, pushing back his chair from the table, "if I am not permitted to see Colonel Bramleigh, I shall have made this journey for nothing--without, sir, that you will consent to occupy your father"s position, and give your sanction to a line of action?"
"You know my father, Mr. Sedley, and I need not tell you how so presumptuous a step on my part might be resented by him."
"Under ordinary circ.u.mstances, I am sure he would resent such interference: but here, in the present critical emergency, he might feel, and not without reason, perhaps, more displeased at your want of decision."
"But when I tell you, Mr. Sedley, that I know nothing of business, that I know no more of the share list than I do of Sanscrit, that I never followed the rise and fall of the funds, and am as ignorant of what influences the exchanges as I am of what affects the tides,--when I have told you all this, you will, I am sure, see that any opinion of mine must be utterly valueless."
"I don"t exactly know, Mr. Bramleigh, that I"d have selected you if I wanted a guide to a great speculation or a large investment; but the business which has brought me down here is not of this nature. It is, besides, a question as to which, in the common course of events, you might be obliged to determine what line you would adopt. After your father, you are the head of this family, and I think it is time you should learn that you may be called upon tomorrow, or next day, to defend your right, not only to your property, but to your name."
"For Heaven"s sake, what do you mean?"
"Be calm, sir, and grant me a patient hearing, and you shall hear the subject on which I have come to obtain your father"s opinion; and failing that, yours--for, as I have said, Mr. Bramleigh, a day or two more may make the case one for your own decision. And now, without entering into the history of the affair, I will simply say that an old claim against your father"s entailed estates has been recently revived, and under circ.u.mstances of increased importance; that I have been, for some time back, in negotiation to arrange this matter by a compromise, and with every hope of success; but that the negotiations have been unexpectedly broken off by the demands of the claimant,--demands so far above all calculation, and, indeed, I may say above all fairness,--that I have come over to ask whether your father will accede to them or accept the issue of the law as to his right."
Augustus sat like one stunned by a heavy blow, not utterly unconscious, but so much overcome and so confused that he could not venture to utter a word.
"I see I have shocked you by my news, Mr. Bramleigh; but these are things not to be told by halves."
"I know nothing of all this; I never so much as heard of it," gasped out Augustus. "Tell me all that you know about it."
"That would be a somewhat long story," said the other, smiling; "but I can, in a short s.p.a.ce, tell you enough to put the main facts before you, and enable you to see that the case is, with all its difficulties of proof, a very weighty and serious one, and not to be dismissed, as your father once opined, as the mere menace of a needy adventurer."
With as much brevity as the narrative permitted, Sedley told the story of Pracontal"s claim. It was, he said, an old demand revived; but under circ.u.mstances that showed that the claimant had won over adherents to his cause, and that some men with means to bring the case to trial had espoused his side. Pracontal"s father, added he, was easily dealt with; he was a vulgar fellow, of dissipated habits, and wasteful ways; but his taste for plot and intrigue--very serious conspiracies, too, at times--had so much involved him that he was seldom able to show himself, and could only resort to letter-writing to press his demands. In fact, it was always his lot to be in hiding on this charge or that; and the police of half Europe were eager in pursuit of him. With a man so deeply compromised, almost outlawed over the whole Continent, it was not difficult to treat, and it happened more than once that he was for years without anything being heard of him; and, in fact, it was clear that he only preferred his claim as a means of raising a little money, when all other means of obtaining supplies had failed him. At last, news of his death arrived. He died at Monte Video; and it was at first believed that he had never married, and consequently, that his claim, if it deserved such a name, died with him. It was only three years ago that the demand was revived, and this man, M. Anatole Pracontal, as he called himself, using his maternal name, appeared in the field as the rightful owner of the Bramleigh estates.
"Now this man is a very different sort of person from his father. He has been well educated, mixed much with the world, and has the manners and bearing of a gentleman. I have not been able to learn much of his career; but I know that he served as a lieutenant in a French hussar regiment, and subsequently held some sort of employment in Egypt. He has never stooped to employ threat or menace, but frankly appealed to the law to establish his claim; and his solicitor, Kelson, of Furnivars Inn, is one of the most respectable men in the profession."
"You have seen this Monsieur Pracontal yourself?"
"Yes. By a strange accident I met him at your brother"s, Captain Bramleigh"s, breakfast table. They had been fellow-travellers, without the slightest suspicion on either side how eventful such a meeting might be. Your brother, of course, could know nothing of Pracontal"s pretensions; but Pracontal, when he came to know with whom he had been travelling, must have questioned himself closely as to what might have dropped from him inadvertently."
Augustus leaned his head on his hand in deep thought, and for several minutes was silent. At last he said, "Give me your opinion, Mr.
Sedley,--I don"t mean your opinion as a lawyer, relying on nice technical questions or minute points of law, but simply your judgment as a man of sound sense, and, above all, of such integrity as I know you to possess,--and tell me what do you think of this claim? Is it,--in one word, is it founded on right?"
"You are asking too much of me, Mr. Bramleigh. First of all, you ask me to disa.s.sociate myself from all the habits and instincts of my daily life, and give you an opinion on a matter of law, based on other rules of evidence than those which alone I suffer myself to be guided by.
I only recognize one kind of right,--that which the law declares and decrees."
"Is there not such a thing as a moral right?"
"There may be; but we are disputatious enough in this world, with all our artificial aids to some fixity of judgment, and for Heaven"s sake let us not soar up to the realms of morality for our decisions, or we shall bid adieu to guidance forever."
"I "m not of your mind there, sir. I think it is quite possible to conceive a case in which there could be no doubt on which side lay the right, and not difficult to believe that there are men who would act, on conviction, to their own certain detriment."
"It"s a very hopeful view of humanity, Mr. Bramleigh," said the lawyer, and he took a pinch of snuff.
"I am certain it is a just one. At least, I will go this far to sustain my opinion. I will declare to you here, that if the time should ever come that it may depend upon me to decide this matter, if I satisfy my mind that M. Pracontal"s claim be just and equitable,--that, in fact, he is simply asking for his own,--I "ll not screen myself behind the law"s delays or its niceties; I "ll not make it a question of the longest purse or the ablest advocate, but frankly admit that the property is his, and cede it to him."
"I have only one remark to make, Mr. Bramleigh, which is, keep this determination strictly to yourself; and above all things, do not acquaint Colonel Bramleigh with these opinions."
"I suspect that my father is not a stranger to them," said Augustus, reddening with shame and irritation together.
"It is therefore as well, sir, that there is no question of a compromise to lay before you. You are for strict justice and no favor."
"I repeat, Mr. Sedley, I am for him who has the right."
"So am I," quickly responded Sedley; "and we alone differ about the meaning of that word; but let me ask another question. Are you aware that this claim extends to nearly everything you have in the world; that the interest alone on the debt would certainly swallow up all your funded property, and make a great inroad, besides, on your securities and foreign bonds?"
"I can well believe it," said the other, mournfully.
"I must say, sir," said Sedley, as he rose and proceeded to thrust the papers hurriedly into his bag, "that though I am highly impressed--very highly impressed, indeed, with the n.o.ble sentiments you have delivered on this occasion--sentiments, I am bound to admit, that a long professional career has never made me acquainted with till this day--yet, on the whole, Mr. Bramleigh, looking at the question with a view to its remote consequences, and speculating on what would result if such opinions as yours were to meet a general acceptance, I am bound, to say I prefer the verdict of twelve men in a jury-box to the most impartial judgment of any individual breathing; and I wish you a very good-night."
What Mr. Sedley muttered to himself as he ascended the stairs, in what spirit he canva.s.sed the character of Mr. Augustus Bramleigh, the reader need not know; and it is fully as well that our story does not require it should be recorded. One only remark, however, may be preserved; it was said as he reached the door of his room, and apparently in a sort of summing up of all that had occurred to him,--"These creatures, with their cant about conscience, don"t seem to know that this mischievous folly would unsettle half the estates in the kingdom; and there "s not a man in England would know what he was born to, till he had got his father in a madhouse."
CHAPTER XXIX. THE HoTEL BRISTOL
In a handsome apartment of the Hotel Bristol at Paris, sat Lord and Lady Culduff at tea. They were in deep mourning; and though they were perfectly alone, the room was splendidly lighted--branches of candles figuring on every console, and the gla.s.s l.u.s.tre that hung from the ceiling a blaze of waxlights.
If Lord Culduff looked older and more careworn than we have lately seem him, Marion seemed in higher bloom and beauty, and the haughty, half-defiant air which had, in a measure, spoiled the charm of her girlhood, sat with a sort of dignity on her features as a woman.
Not a word was spoken on either side; and from her look of intense preoccupation, as she sat gazing on the broad hem of her handkerchief, it was evident that her thoughts were wandering far away from the place she was in. As they sat thus, the door was noiselessly opened by a servant in deep black, who, in a very subdued voice, said, "The Duke de Castro, your Excellency."
"I don "t receive," was the cold reply, and the man withdrew. In about a quarter of an hour after, he reappeared, and in the same stealthy tone said, "Madame la Comtesse de Renneville begs she may have the honor--"
"Lady Culduff does not receive," said his Lordship, sternly.
"The Countess has been very kind; she has been here to inquire after me several times."
"She is a woman of intense curiosity," said he, slowly.
"I "d have said of great good nature."
"And you "d have said perfectly wrong, madam. The woman is a political _intriguante_ who only lives to unravel mysteries; and the one that is now puzzling her is too much for her good manners."
"I declare, my Lord, that I do not follow you."
"I"m quite sure of that, madam. The sort of address Madame de Renneville boasts was not a quality that your life in Ireland was likely to make you familiar with."
"I beg you to remember, my Lord," said she, angrily, "that all my experiences of the world have not been derived from that side of the Channel."
"I "m cruel enough to say, madam, that I wish they had! There is nothing so difficult as unlearning."
"I wish, my Lord--I heartily wish--that you had made this discovery earlier."
"Madam," said he, slowly, and with much solemnity of manner, "I owe it to each of us to own that I had made what you are pleased to call this "discovery" while there was yet time to obviate its consequences. My very great admiration had not blinded me as to certain peculiarities, let me call them, of manner; and if my vanity induced me to believe that I should be able to correct them, it is my only error."