up within him. Not even in India had he seen a Palace more impressive or in more exquisite taste than his own home.
The Post chaise carried him over the bridge that spanned the lake and into the courtyard beside the front door.
Eagerly the Earl jumped out to pay the driver and gave him a generous tip.
As he did so, he was astonished to see that moss was growing on the steps leading up to the front door.
Several of the windows on the front of The Castle were cracked and broken.
The door was open and, as the Post chaise drove away, the Earl walked into the hall.
It was then that he stood still as if he was shocked into immobility.
The hall, which he remembered as being particularly fine, was now dirty and undusted.
There were ashes in the huge fireplace and an atmosphere of neglect, which he thought must be part of his imagination.
There appeared to be no one about and he well remembered that there were always two liveried footmen on duty in the hall and the butler was always within call.
Finally he found his way to the kitchen.
It was there from Marlow and Mrs. Marlow, who had been butler and cook since he was born, that he learned the ominous truth.
From the moment that he had left for India and his uncle had taken over, Basil Burne had started to economise on everything.
He dismissed most of the staff, not only in the house but on the estate.
“We couldn’t believe it, Master Michael,” Mrs. Marlow related in a tearful voice, “and I kept thinkin’ you’d come back from India and stop what that wicked man was a-doin’.”
What that wicked man was doing, the Earl was to discover, was to take every penny that he possessed and put it into his name.
Holding Power of Attorney, Basil Burne had sold every share that his nephew owned.
At the same time he sold everything he could find in The Castle that was not entailed on to succeeding Earls.
Fortunately there was not a great deal that was not entailed.
But things that had belonged to his mother had gone and his father’s superb collection of snuffboxes of which he had been exceedingly proud.
Early next morning, after a sleepless night, the Earl drove into Oxford to see his father’s Solicitors.
It had not been a fast journey.
There were only two horses left in the stable, which had been kept by his uncle for him to use up to the last minute before he disappeared. They were getting on in age and would travel only at a pace that suited them.
Without any help the Marlows had looked after Basil Burne as best they could.
He told them bluntly that they could stay with him and he would provide their board and lodging, but they would have no wages.
“No wages!” the Earl exclaimed in horror.
“What could we do, my Lord?” Marlow asked. “If we left, it meant the workhouse.”
“I cried and cried and pleaded with him,” Mrs. Marlow joined in, “but he wouldn’t listen. There was no one we could turn to for help.”
“What did the Vicar have to say to all this?” the Earl asked.
“Oh, he left a year after your Lordship went to India,” Marlow replied. “Mr. Basil told him he wouldn’t pay his stipend so there be nothing he could do but go.”
“So you mean the Church is closed.”
“Someone comes from the other Parishes about once a month. Otherwise the Vicarage be shut up and I’m not sure who has the key of the Church.”
When the Earl confronted his father’s Solicitors, he had difficulty in choosing his words because he was feeling so angry.
They should at least have written to tell him what was occurring.
The Solicitor facing him across the desk was an elderly man who, he learnt, had at first been entirely hoodwinked by his uncle.
“He told me, my Lord, that things were difficult on the Stock Exchange,” the Solicitor said, “and a great number of your father’s investments had fallen in value. So he thought it only right that he should economise.”
“Do you realise,” the Earl asked him angrily, “that the pensioners have not been paid for three weeks and before that they were receiving only a pittance? I gather that they are now on the verge of starvation.”
“I did not know that, my Lord,” the Solicitor replied. “Of course when the news came through that the Viceroy had been murdered, your uncle would have then expected that your Lordship would come home.”
“So he then took everything that he had not taken already,” the Earl said sharply. “The servants tell me that he has gone to America.”
“If that is true,” the Solicitor answered, “it will be extremely difficult to get hold of him. America is a very large country and so it would cost your Lordship a great deal of money to bring a case against him.”
“Which, as you are well aware,” the Earl retorted, “I do not now have.”
As he drove back to The Castle, he wondered despairingly what he could do.
He had travelled home comfortably and had had a number of things to pay for in India before he left.
He had taken only a little money with him when he went out in the first place.
He then relied on his salary for all that he required.
The Viceroy had been most particular in not allowing his young aides-de-camp to run up large debts.
He made it possible for them to have ample pocket money while everything else, more or less, was provided for them.
The Earl realised now that he had nothing in the Bank and his entire fortune, if that was the right word for it, consisted of under twenty pounds.
He had intended to cash a cheque at his Bank in London.
However in the end he had just boarded the first train that would bring him back to The Castle.
‘What am I to do? What the devil am I to do?’ he asked himself over and over again.
He knew frantically that he had to do something.
Then suddenly he felt as if the man he had loved and admired so much was guiding him.
‘There must be someone,’ he told himself, ‘from whom I can borrow enough to at least keep my people from starving.’
He had not missed, as he drove through the village, that the cottages all needed the
