with a slow and mechanical gait; and Dick, following close behind her, heard from within the cottage his father’s voice upraised in an anathema, and the shriller tones of the Admiral responding in the key of war.
CHAPTER VIII
BATTLE ROYAL
Squire Naseby, on sitting down to lunch, had inquired for Dick, whom he had not seen since the day before at dinner; and the servant answering awkwardly that Master Richard had come back, but had gone out again with the pony-phaeton, his suspicions became aroused, and he cross-questioned the man until the whole was out. It appeared from this report that Dick had been going about for nearly a month with a girl in the Vale – a Miss Van Tromp; that she lived near Lord Trevanion’s upper wood; that recently Miss Van Tromp’s papa had returned home from foreign parts after a prolonged absence; that this papa was an old gentleman, very chatty and free with his money in the public-house – whereupon Mr. Naseby’s face became encrimsoned; that the papa, furthermore, was said to be an admiral – whereupon Mr. Naseby spat out a whistle brief and fierce as an oath; that Master Dick seemed very friendly with the papa – “God help him!” said Mr. Naseby; that last night Master Dick had not come in, and to-day he had driven away in the phaeton with the young lady.
“Young woman,” corrected Mr. Naseby.
“Yes, sir,” said the man, who had been unwilling enough to gossip from the first, and was now cowed by the effect of his communications on the master. “Young woman, sir!”
“Had they luggage?” demanded the Squire.
“Yes, sir.”
Mr. Naseby was silent for a moment, struggling to keep down his emotion, and he mastered it so far as to mount into the sarcastic vein, when he was in the nearest danger of melting into the sorrowful.
“And was this – this Van Dunk with them?” he asked, dwelling scornfully on the name.
The servant believed not, and being eager to shift the responsibility to other shoulders, suggested that perhaps the master had better inquire further from George the stableman in person.
“Tell him to saddle the chestnut and come with me. And then you can take away this trash,” added Mr. Naseby, pointing to the luncheon; and he arose, lordly in his anger, and marched forth upon the terrace to await his horse.
There Dick’s old nurse shrunk up to him, for the news went like wildfire over Naseby House, and timidly expressed a hope that there was nothing much amiss with the young master.
“I’ll pull him through,” the Squire said grimly, as though he meant to pull him through a threshing-mill; “I’ll save him from this gang; God help him with the next! He has a taste for low company, and no natural affections to steady him. His father was no society for him; he must go fuddling with a Dutchman, Nance, and now he’s caught. Let us pray he’ll take the lesson,” he added, more gravely, “but youth is here to make troubles, and age to pull them out again.”
Nance whimpered and recalled several episodes of Dick’s childhood, which moved Mr. Naseby to blow his nose and shake her hard by the hand; and then, the horse having arrived opportunely, to get himself without delay into the saddle and canter off.
He rode straight, hot spur, to Thymebury, where, as was to be expected, he could glean no tidings of the runaways. They had not been seen at the George; they had not been seen at the station. The shadow darkened on Mr. Naseby’s face; the junction did not occur to him; his last hope was for Van Tromp’s cottage; thither he bade George guide him, and thither he followed, nursing grief, anxiety, and indignation in his heart.
“Here it is, sir,” said George, stopping.
“What! on my own land!” he cried. “How’s this? I let this place to somebody – M’Whirter or M’Glashan.”
“Miss M’Glashan was the young lady’s aunt, sir, I believe,” returned George.
“Ay – dummies,” said the Squire. “I shall whistle for my rent too. Here, take my horse.”
The Admiral, this hot afternoon, was sitting by the window with a long glass. He already knew the Squire by sight, and now, seeing him dismount before the cottage and come striding through the garden, concluded without doubt he was there to ask for Esther’s hand.
“This is why the girl is not yet home,” he thought; “a very suitable delicacy on young Naseby’s part.”
And he composed himself with some pomp, answered the loud rattle of the riding-whip upon the door with a dulcet invitation to enter, and coming forward with a bow and a smile, “Mr. Naseby, I believe,” said he.
The Squire came armed for battle; took in his man from top to toe in one rapid and scornful glance, and decided on a course at once. He must let the fellow see that he understood him.
“You are Mr. Van Tromp?” he returned roughly, and without taking any notice of the proffered hand.
“The same, sir,” replied the Admiral. “Pray be seated.”
“No, sir,” said the Squire, point-blank, “I will not be seated. I am told that you are an admiral,” he added.
“No, sir, I am not an admiral,” returned Van Tromp, who now began to grow nettled and enter into the spirit of the interview.
“Then why do you call yourself one, sir?”
“I have to ask your pardon, I do not,” says Van Tromp, as grand as the Pope.
But nothing was of avail against the Squire.
“You sail under false colours from beginning to end,” he said. “Your very house was taken under a sham name.”
“It is not my house. I am my daughter’s guest,” replied the Admiral. “If it were my house – ”
“Well?” said the Squire, “what then? hey?”
The Admiral looked at him nobly, but was silent.
“Look here,” said Mr. Naseby, “this intimidation is a waste of time; it is thrown away on me, sir; it will not succeed with me. I will not permit you even to gain time by your fencing. Now, sir, I presume you understand what brings me here.”
“I am entirely at a loss to account for your intrusion,” bows and waves Van Tromp.
“I will try to tell you, then. I come here as a father” – down came the riding-whip upon the table – “I have right and justice upon my side. I understand your calculations, but you calculated without me. I am a man of the world, and I see through you and your manœuvres. I am dealing now with a conspiracy – I stigmatise it as such, and I will expose it and crush it. And now I order you to tell me how far things have gone, and whither you have smuggled my unhappy son.”
“My God, sir!” Van Tromp broke out, “I have had about enough of this. Your son? God knows where he is for me! What the devil have I to do with your son? My daughter is out, for the matter of that; I might ask you where she is, and what would you say to that? But this is all midsummer madness. Name your business distinctly, and be off.”
“How often am I to tell you?” cried the Squire. “Where did your daughter take my son to-day in that cursed pony carriage?”
“In a pony carriage?” repeated Van Tromp.
