"Is it worth what, my son?"
"You know, father. After hearing that lady talk I don"t want Avonsyde."
The elder Lovel frowned. He was silent for a moment; then he laid his hand on the boy"s shoulder.
"Look me in the face, lad, and answer me a question."
"Yes, father."
"Do you trust me?"
"Why, of course. Can you doubt it?"
"Then go to bed and to sleep, and believe that nothing shall be done which in the slightest degree shall tarnish your honor. Go to bed, boy, and sleep peacefully, but just put one thought under your pillow. Right is right and wrong is wrong. It sometimes so happens, Rupert, that it is not the right and best thing to be simply magnanimous."
Rupert smiled.
"I am quite certain you will decide as my mother would have liked best, sir," he said, and then he took his candle and left the room.
The greater part of the night the elder Lovel sat up. Early the next morning he paid the family lawyers a visit.
"I have made up my mind, Mr. Baring," he said to the younger of these gentlemen. "For the next few months I shall remain in England, but I shall not bring my son forward as an heir to the Avonsyde property until I can claim for him unbroken and direct descent. As I told you yesterday, there are two unexpected obstacles in my way. I have sustained a loss--I don"t know how. An old tankard and a parcel of valuable letters cannot be found. I am not leaving a stone unturned to recover them. When I can lay my hand on the tankard and when, even more important, I can produce the letters, I can show you by an unbroken chain of evidence that my boy is the eldest son of the eldest son in direct descent. I make no claim until I make all claim, Mr. Baring."
"I have to-day had a letter from the old ladies at Avonsyde," answered Mr. Baring. "They seem pleased with the boy who is at present claiming the property. From the tone of Miss Griselda"s letter, I should judge that if your boy does not put in his appearance the child who is at present at Avonsyde will be publicly recognized as the heir. Even a public recognition does not really interfere with your son if you can prove his t.i.tle; but undoubtedly it will be best for all parties that you should make your claim before the other child is put into a false position."
"When do you antic.i.p.ate that the old ladies will absolutely decide?"
"They name a date--the 5th of May."
"I think I can promise one thing: after the 5th of May neither Rupert nor I will interfere. We make claim before or on that date, not afterward. The fact is, we know something of the child who is now at Avonsyde."
Mr. Lovel, after enjoining absolute secrecy on the lawyers, went his way, and that evening had a long interview with Mrs. Lovel.
"I fear," he said in conclusion, "that in no case would your girls come into the place, except indeed under certain conditions."
"What are they?" asked Mrs. Lovel.
"That we find neither tankard nor letters and in consequence do not make our claim, and that little Philip Lovel dies."
"Is he so ill as that?"
"He is physically unsound. The best doctors in Melbourne have examined him and do not believe he will live to manhood. His mother comes of an unhealthy family, and the boy takes after her physically--not mentally, thank G.o.d!"
"Poor little Phil! He has a wonderfully sweet face."
"He has the bravest nature I ever met. My boy and girls would almost die for Phil. The fact is, all this is most complicated and difficult, and much of the mischief would have been avoided if only that wretched sister-in-law of mine had been above-board."
"Yes," answered Mrs. Lovel; "but even her stealing a march on you does not give you back the tankard nor the letter."
"True; and I don"t suppose even she could have stolen them. Well, Rachel, we must all hope for the best."
"If there is a thing that worries me," said Nancy White to herself--"if there is a thing that keeps coming and coming into my dreams and getting that fantastic and that queer in shape--one time being big enough to hold quarts and quarts of water, and another time so small that you"d think it would melt before your very eyes--it"s this wretched silver can. It"s in my mind all day long and it"s in my dreams all night long. There! I wonder if the bit of a thing is bright enough now."
As Nancy spoke to herself she rubbed and polished and turned round and round and tenderly dusted the lost tankard of the house of Lovel until it really shone like a mirror.
"It takes a deal of trouble, and I"m sure it isn"t worth it," she said to herself. "I just kept it more out of a bit of mischief than anything else in the beginning; but it just seems to me now as if I hated it, and yet I couldn"t part with it. I believe it"s a bit of a haunted thing, or it wouldn"t come into my dreams after this fashion."
Nancy kept the tankard up in her bedroom. After giving it a last fond rub and looking at it queerly with an expression half of admiration, half of fear, she locked it up in a little cupboard in the wall and tripped downstairs to attend to her mistress" comforts.
Mrs. Lovel kept no secrets from her old servant, and Nancy knew about her mistress" adventures in London and her unexpected meeting with the friend of her early days, Rupert Lovel. Still, Nancy had a shrewd suspicion that not quite all was told her; she had a kind of idea that there was something in the background.
"It comes over me," she said to herself--"it comes over me that unless I, Nancy White, am as sharp as sharp and as cunning as cunning, my missus and my young ladies will be done. What is it that the missus is keeping in the back of her head to make her look that dreamy, and that wistful, and that despairing, and yet that hopeful? My word, if I haven"t seen her smile as if she was almost glad once or twice. Poor dear! maybe she knows as that little delicate chap can"t be the heir; and as to the others--the old gentleman and the fine young lad from the other side of the earth--why, if they have a claim to make, why don"t they make it? And if they don"t make it, then, say I, it"s because they can"t. Well, now, anything is better than suspense, and I"ll question my missus on that very point straight away."
Accordingly, when Nancy had arranged the tea-tray in the most tempting position and stirred the fire into the cheeriest blaze, she knelt down before it and began to make some crisp and delicious toast. Nancy knew that Mrs. Lovel had a weakness for the toast she made, and she also knew that such an employment was very favorable to confidential conversation.
"Well, ma"am," she said suddenly, having coughed once or twice and gone through one or two other little maneuvers to attract attention--"well, ma"am, I wants to have my mind eased on a certain point. Is it, ma"am, or is it not the case that the old gentleman from Australia means to do you a mischief?"
"What do you mean, Nancy?" exclaimed Mrs. Lovel, laying down the lace which she was embroidering and gazing at her old servant in some astonishment. "The old gentleman from Australia? Why, Rupert Lovel cannot be more than forty. He is a man in his prime, splendidly strong; and as to his doing me a mischief, I believe, you silly old woman, that he is one of my best friends."
"The proof of the pudding is in the eating," snorted Nancy. "You"ll excuse me, ma"am, but I"d like to prove that by his actions. He means that young son of his to get possession of Avonsyde--don"t he, ma"am?"
"His son is the real heir, Nancy. Dear Nancy, I wish to say something. I must not be covetous for my little girls. If the real and lawful heir turns up I have not a word to say. Nay, more, I think if I can be glad on this subject I am glad that he should turn out to be the son of my early and oldest friend."
"Oh, yes, ma"am, I"m not a bit surprised about you. Bother that toast, how it will burn! It"s just like you, ma"am, to give up everything for six blessed years, and to have your heart well-nigh broke and your poor eyes dimmed with crying, and then in the end, when the cup that you have been so longing for is almost to your lips, to give up everything again and to be glad into the bargain. That"s just like you, ma"am; but, you"ll excuse me, it ain"t like Nancy White, and if you can be glad in the prospect of seeing your children beggared, I can"t; so there!"
"Dear Nancy," said Mrs. Lovel, laying her hand on the old servant"s shoulder, "how am I to help myself? Both might and right are against me.
Had I not better submit to the inevitable with a good grace?"
"That bonny little Miss Rachel," continued Nancy, "don"t I see her now, with her eyes flashing as she looked up at me and that fine, imperious way she had, and "tell the lady to wear my ring, Nancy," says she,"and tell her that I love her," says she."
"Little darling," whispered the mother, and raising her hand she pressed a tiny ring which she wore to her lips.
"Miss Rachel isn"t meant for poverty," continued Nancy, "and what"s more, I"m very sure Miss Kitty isn"t either; so, ma"am, I"d like to be sure whether they are to have it or not; and a question I"d dearly like to have answered is this: If the middle-aged man, Mr. Rupert Lovel, and his son have a claim to Avonsyde, why don"t they make it? Anything is better than suspense, say I. Why don"t we know the worst and have done with it?"
"Why, Nancy, I thought I had told you everything. Mr. Lovel won"t make a claim until he can make a perfect claim. The fact is, some of his credentials are lost."
"The toast is done, ma"am. May I make bold to ask what you mean by that?
You had better eat your toast while it is hot and crisp, Mrs. Lovel. The good gentleman from Australia hasn"t to go to the old ladies with a character in his hand, like a servant looking for a situation?"
"No, no. Nancy; but he has to bring letters and other tokens to prove his son"s descent, to prove that his son is a true Lovel of Avonsyde of the elder branch, and unfortunately Mr. Lovel has lost some valuable letters and an old silver tankard which has been for hundreds of years in the family, and which was taken from Avonsyde by the Rupert Lovel who quarreled with his relations."
Mrs. Level"s head was bent over her lace, and she never noticed how red Nancy"s face grew at this moment, nor how she almost dropped the steaming kettle with which she was about to replenish the tea-pot.
"Oh, my word!" she exclaimed hastily. "It seems as if toast and kettle and all was turned spiteful to-night. There"s that boiling water flowed over on my hand. Never mind, ma"am--it ain"t nothing. What was it you were saying was lost, ma"am?"
"Letters, Nancy, and a tankard."