"Because, I say, he was abroad and could not be found; or, the search after him miscaurried, from clumsy management and a lack of the rhino."

"Hum!" said Mr. Beaufort--"one witness--one witness, observe, there is only one!--does not alarm me much. It is not what a man deposes, it is what a jury believe, sir! Moreover, what has become of the young men?

They have never been heard of for years. They are probably dead; if so, I am heir-at-law!"

"I know where one of them is to be found at all events."

"The elder?--Philip?" asked Mr. Beaufort anxiously, and with a fearful remembrance of the energetic and vehement character prematurely exhibited by his nephew.

"Pawdon me! I need not aunswer that question."

"Sir! a lawsuit of this nature, against one in possession, is very doubtful, and," added the rich man, drawing himself up--"and, perhaps very expensive!"

"The young man I speak of does not want friends, who will not grudge the money."

"Sir!" said Mr. Beaufort, rising and placing his back to the fire--"sir!

what is your object in this communication? Do you come, on the part of the young man, to propose a compromise? If so, be plain!"

"I come on my own pawt. It rests with you to say if the young men shall never know it!"

"And what do you want?"

"Five hundred a year as long as the secret is kept."

"And how can you prove that there is a secret, after all?"

"By producing the witness if you wish."

"Will he go halves in the L500. a year?" asked Mr. Beaufort artfully.

"That is moy affair, sir," replied the stranger.

"What you say," resumed Mr. Beaufort, "is so extraordinary--so unexpected, and still, to me, seems so improbable, that I must have time to consider. If you will call on me in a week, and produce your facts, I will give you my answer. I am not the man, sir, to wish to keep any one out of his true rights, but I will not yield, on the other hand, to imposture."

"If you don't want to keep them out of their rights, I'd best go and tell my young gentlemen," said the stranger, with cool impudence.

"I tell you I must have time," repeated Beaufort, disconcerted.

"Besides, I have not myself alone to look to, sir," he added, with dignified emphasis--"I am a father!"

"This day week I will call on you again. Good evening, Mr. Beaufort!"

And the man stretched out his hand with an air of amicable condescension. The respectable Mr. Beaufort changed colour, hesitated, and finally suffered two fingers to be enticed into the grasp of the visitor, whom he ardently wished at that bourne whence no visitor returns.

The stranger smiled, stalked to the door, laid his finger on his lip, winked knowingly, and vanished, leaving Mr. Beaufort a prey to such feelings of uneasiness, dread, and terror, as may be experienced by a man whom, on some inch or two of slippery rock, the tides have suddenly surrounded.

He remained perfectly still for some moments, and then glancing round the dim and s.p.a.cious room, his eyes took in all the evidences of luxury and wealth which it betrayed. Above the huge sideboard, that on festive days groaned beneath the h.o.a.rded weight of the silver heirlooms of the Beauforts, hung, in its gilded frame, a large picture of the family seat, with the stately porticoes--the n.o.ble park--the groups of deer; and around the wall, interspersed here and there with ancestral portraits of knight and dame, long since gathered to their rest, were placed masterpieces of the Italian and Flemish art, which generation after generation had slowly acc.u.mulated, till the Beaufort Collection had become the theme of connoisseurs and the study of young genius.

The still room, the dumb pictures--even the heavy sideboard seemed to gain voice, and speak to him audibly. He thrust his hand into the folds of his waistcoat, and griped his own flesh convulsively; then, striding to and fro the apartment, he endeavoured to re-collect his thoughts.

"I dare not consult Mrs. Beaufort," he muttered; "no--no,--she is a fool! Besides, she's not in the way. No time to lose--I will go to Lilburne."

Scarce had that thought crossed him than he hastened to put it into execution. He rang for his hat and gloves and sallied out on foot to Lord Lilburne's house in Park Lane,--the distance was short, and impatience has long strides.

He knew Lord Lilburne was in town, for that personage loved London for its own sake; and even in September he would have said with the old Duke of Queensberry, when some one observed that London was very empty--"Yes; but it is fuller than the country."

Mr. Beaufort found Lord Lilburne reclined on a sofa, by the open window of his drawing-room, beyond which the early stars shone upon the glimmering trees and silver turf of the deserted park. Unlike the simple dessert of his respectable brother-in-law, the costliest fruits, the richest wines of France, graced the small table placed beside his sofa; and as the starch man of forms and method entered the room at one door, a rustling silk, that vanished through the aperture of another, seemed to betray tokens of a tete-a-tete, probably more agreeable to Lilburne than the one with which only our narrative is concerned.

It would have been a curious study for such men as love to gaze upon the dark and wily features of human character, to have watched the contrast between the reciter and the listener, as Beaufort, with much circ.u.mlocution, much affected disdain and real anxiety, narrated the singular and ominous conversation between himself and his visitor.

The servant, in introducing Mr. Beaufort, had added to the light of the room; and the candles shone full on the face and form of Mr. Beaufort.

All about that gentleman was so completely in unison with the world's forms and seemings, that there was something moral in the very sight of him! Since his accession of fortune he had grown less pale and less thin; the angles in his figure were filled up. On his brow there was no trace of younger pa.s.sion. No able vice had ever sharpened the expression--no exhausting vice ever deepened the lines. He was the beau-ideal of a county member,--so sleek, so staid, so business-like; yet so clean, so neat, so much the gentleman. And now there was a kind of pathos in his grey hairs, his nervous smile, his agitated hands, his quick and uneasy transition of posture, the tremble of his voice. He would have appeared to those who saw, but heard not, The Good Man in trouble. Cold, motionless, speechless, seemingly apathetic, but in truth observant, still reclined on the sofa, his head thrown back, but one eye fixed on his companion, his hands clasped before him, Lord Lilburne listened; and in that repose, about his face, even about his person, might be read the history of how different a life and character! What native acuteness in the stealthy eye! What hardened resolve in the full nostril and firm lips! What sardonic contempt for all things in the intricate lines about the mouth. What animal enjoyment of all things so despised in that delicate nervous system, which, combined with original vigour of const.i.tution, yet betrayed itself in the veins on the hands and temples, the occasional quiver of the upper lip! His was the frame above all others the most alive to pleasure--deep-chested, compact, sinewy, but thin to leanness--delicate in its texture and extremities, almost to effeminacy. The indifference of the posture, the very habit of the dress--not slovenly, indeed, but easy, loose, careless--seemed to speak of the man's manner of thought and life--his profound disdain of externals.

Not till Beaufort had concluded did Lord Lilburne change his position or open his lips; and then, turning to his brother-in-law his calm face, he said drily,--

"I always thought your brother had married that woman; he was the sort of man to do it. Besides, why should she have gone to law without a vestige of proof, unless she was convinced of her rights? Imposture never proceeds without some evidence. Innocence, like a fool as it is, fancies it has only to speak to be believed. But there is no cause for alarm."

"No cause!--And yet you think there was a marriage."

"It is quite clear," continued Lilburne, without heeding this interruption; "that the man, whatever his evidence, has not got sufficient proofs. If he had, he would go to the young men rather than you: it is evident that they would promise infinitely larger rewards than he could expect from yourself. Men are always more generous with what they expect than with what they have. All rogues know this. 'Tis the way Jews and usurers thrive upon heirs rather than possessors; 'tis the philosophy of post-obits. I dare say the man has found out the real witness of the marriage, but ascertained, also, that the testimony of that witness would not suffice to dispossess you. He might be discredited--rich men have a way sometimes of discrediting poor witnesses. Mind, he says nothing of the lost copy of the register--whatever may be the value of that doc.u.ment, which I am not lawyer enough to say--of any letters of your brother avowing the marriage. Consider, the register itself is destroyed--the clergyman dead. Pooh! make yourself easy."

"True," said Mr. Beaufort, much comforted; "what a memory you have!"

"Naturally. Your wife is my sister--I hate poor relations--and I was therefore much interested in your accession and your lawsuit. No--you may feel--at rest on this matter, so far as a successful lawsuit is concerned. The next question is, Will you have a lawsuit at all? and is it worth while buying this fellow? That I can't say unless I see him myself."

"I wish to Heaven you would!"

"Very willingly: 'tis a sort of thing I like--I'm fond of dealing with rogues--it amuses me. This day week? I'll be at your house--your proxy; I shall do better than Black well. And since you say you are wanted at the Lakes, go down, and leave all to me."

"A thousand thanks. I can't say how grateful I am. You certainly are the kindest and cleverest person in the world."

"You can't think worse of the world's cleverness and kindness than I do," was Lilburne's rather ambiguous answer to the compliment. "But why does my sister want to see you?"

"Oh, I forgot!--here is her letter. I was going to ask your advice in this too."

Lord Lilburne took the letter, and glanced over it with the rapid eye of a man accustomed to seize in everything the main gist and pith.

"An offer to my pretty niece--Mr. Spencer--requires no fortune--his uncle will settle all his own--(poor silly old man!) All! Why that's only L1000. a year. You don't think much of this, eh? How my sister can even ask you about it puzzles me."

"Why, you see, Lilburne," said Mr. Beaufort, rather embarra.s.sed, "there is no question of fortune--nothing to go out of the family; and, really, Arthur is so expensive, and, if she were to marry well, I could not give her less than fifteen or twenty thousand pounds."

"Aha!--I see--every man to his taste: here a daughter--there a dowry.

You are devilish fond of money, Beaufort. Any pleasure in avarice,--eh?"

Mr. Beaufort coloured very much at the remark and the question, and, forcing a smile, said,--

"You are severe. But you don't know what it is to be father to a young man."

"Then a great many young women have told me sad fibs! But you are right in your sense of the phrase. No, I never had an heir apparent, thank Heaven! No children imposed upon me by law--natural enemies, to count the years between the bells that ring for their majority, and those that will toll for my decease. It is enough for me that I have a brother and a sister--that my brother's son will inherit my estates--and that, in the meantime, he grudges me every tick in that clock. What then? If he had been my uncle, I had done the same. Meanwhile, I see as little of him as good breeding will permit. On the face of a rich man's heir is written the rich man's memento mori! But revenons a nos moutons. Yes, if you give your daughter no fortune, your death will be so much the more profitable to Arthur!"

"Really, you take such a very odd view of the matter," said Mr.