“Loving play!” cried Garstang, scornfully.
“Yes, my dear, loving play. I vouch for it, and so will his mother.”
“Yes, yes, yes, Kate, dear. He does love you. He told me so, and if he did wrong, poor, poor boy, see how he has been punished.”
“There, my dear, you hear,” cried Wilton, trying hard to speak gently and winningly to her, but failing dismally. “Come to your aunt now.”
“Yes, Kate, darling, do, do please, and help me to try and bring him round. You don’t want to see him lie a corpse at his sorrowing mother’s feet?”
“Come here, Kate,” cried Wilton, fiercely now. “Don’t you make me angry. I am your guardian, and you must obey me. Come away from that man.”
She shuddered, and began to sob now violently.
“Ah, that’s better. You’re coming to your senses now, and seeing things in their proper light. Now, John Garstang, you heard what I said – go.”
“Yes, my child,” said Garstang, taking one of Kate’s hands, and raising it tenderly to his lips, “your uncle is right. I have no place here, no right to protect you, and I must go, trusting that good may come out of evil, and that what has passed, besides opening your eyes to what is a thorough conspiracy, will give you firmness to protect yourself, and teach them that such a project as theirs is an infamy.”
“Don’t stand preaching there, man. Your time’s nearly up. Go, before you are made. Come here to your aunt, Kate.”
“No, my dear, do nothing of the sort,” said Garstang, gently, as she slowly raised her head and gazed imploringly in his face. “You are but a girl, but you must play the woman now – the firm, strong woman who has to protect herself. Go up to your room and insist upon staying there until you have a guarantee that this insolent cub, who is lying here pretending to be insensible, shall cease his pretensions or be sent away. There, go, and heaven protect you; I can do no more.”
Kate drew herself up erect and gazed at him mournfully for a few moments, and then said firmly:
“Yes, Mr Garstang, I will do as you say. Good-bye.”
“Good-bye,” he said, as he bent down and softly kissed her forehead. Then she walked firmly from the room.
“Brave girl!” said Garstang; “she will be a match for you and your plans now, James Wilton.”
“Will you go, sir?” roared the other.
“Yes, I will go. Then it is to be war between us, is it?”
“What you like; I’m reckless now; but you can’t interfere with me there.”
“No, and I will not trample upon a worm when it is down. I shall take no petty revenge, and you dare not persecute that poor girl. Good-bye to you both, and may this be a lesson to you and your foolish wife. As for you, you cur, if I hear that you have insulted your cousin again – a girl that any one with the slightest pretension to being a man would have looked upon as a sister – law or no law, I’ll come down and thrash you within an inch of your life. I’m a strong man yet, as you know.”
He turned and walked proudly out of the room; and as soon as his step had ceased to ring on the oaken floor of the hall Wilton turned savagely upon his son, where he lay upon the thick Turkey carpet, and roared:
“Get up!”
Mrs Wilton shrieked and caught at her husband’s leg, but in vain, for he delivered a tremendous kick at the prostrate youth, which brought him to his senses with a yell.
“What are you doing?” he roared.
“A hundred and fifty thousand pounds!” cried Wilton. “Curse you, I should like to give you a hundred and fifty thousand of those.”
Within half an hour the dog-cart bearing John Garstang and his portmanteau was grating over the gravel of the drive, and as he passed the further wing he looked up at an open window where Kate was standing pale and still.
He raised his hat to her as he passed, but she did not stir, only said farewell to him with her eyes.
But as the vehicle disappeared among the trees of the avenue she shrank away, to stand thinking of her position, of Garstang’s words, and how it seemed now that her girlish life had come to an end that day. For she felt that she was alone, and that henceforth she must knit herself together to fight the battle of her life, strong in her womanly defence, for her future depended entirely upon herself.
And through the rest of that unhappy afternoon and evening, as she sat there, resisting all requests to come down, and taking nothing but some slight refreshment brought up by her maid, she was trying to solve the problem constantly before her:
What should she do now?
Chapter Twelve
Kate was not the only one at the Manor House who declined to come down to dinner.
The bell had rung, and after Mrs Wilton had been up twice to her niece’s room, and reported the ill success of her visits to her lord, Wilton growled out:
“Well, I want my dinner. Let her stay and starve herself into her senses. But here,” he cried, with a fresh burst of temper, “why the devil isn’t that boy here? I’m not going to be kept waiting for him. Do you hear? Where is he?”
“He was so ill, dear, he said he was obliged to go upstairs and lie down.”
“Bah! Rubbish! He wasn’t hurt.”
“Oh, my dear, you don’t know,” sobbed Mrs Wilton.
“Yah! You cry if you dare. Wipe your eyes. Think I haven’t had worry enough to-day without you trying to lay the dust? Ring and tell Samuel to fetch him down.”
“Oh, pray don’t do that, dear; the servants will talk enough as it is.”
“They’d better. I’ll discharge the lot. I’ve been too easy with everybody up to now, and I’ll begin to turn over a new leaf. Stand aside, woman, and let me get to that bell.”
“No, no, don’t, pray don’t ring. Let me go up and beg of him to come down.”
“What! Beg? Go up and tell him that if he don’t come down to dinner in a brace of shakes I’ll come and fetch him with a horsewhip.”
“James, my dear, pray, pray don’t be so violent.”
“But I will be violent. I am in no humour to be dictated to now. I’ll let some of you see that I’m master.”
“But poor dear Claud is so big now.”
“I don’t care how big he is – a great stupid oaf! Go and tell him what I say. And look here, woman.”
“Yes, dear,” said Mrs Wilton, plaintively.
“I mean it. If he don’t come at once, big as he is, I’ll take up the horsewhip.”
Mrs Wilton stifled a sob, and went up to her son’s room and entered, to find him lying on his bed with his boots resting on the bottom rail, a strong odour of tobacco pervading the room, and a patch or two of cigar ashes soiling the counterpane.
“Claud, my dearest, you shouldn’t smoke up here,” she said, tenderly, as she laid her hand upon her son’s forehead. “How are you now, darling?”
“Damned bad.”
“Oh, not quite so bad as that, dearest. Dinner is quite ready.”
” – The dinner!”
“Claud, darling, don’t use such dreadful language. But please get up now, and let me brush your hair. Your father is so angry and violent because you are keeping him waiting. Pray come down at once.”
“Shan’t!”
“Claud, dearest, you