Part 21 (1/2)

”You discharged me, sir--but I thought better of it.”

A grunt was the only answer to this impertinence.

”You seem to have been muddling things nicely in my absence,” observed Trimmer after a moment, with cool audacity.

”Have I? That's all you know. Who told you what I've been doing?”

”Your heir is dead, I hear. I hope you had nothing to do with that.”

”What do you mean, sir--what do you mean?”

”I mean that I hope you didn't send him away to the war to save money and keep him from further debt.”

”My family affairs are nothing to do with you, sir.”

”So you have told me for the last forty years, sir. I liked the young man. There was nothing bad about him. But I hear you drove him to forgery.”

”It's a lie--a lie!”

”How did he get your checks?”

The miser made no answer. Trimmer came over, and fixed glittering eyes upon him. The old man cowered.

”You've ruined the boy, and sent him to the war. I can see it in your face. I knew what would happen if I let you alone--I knew you'd do some rascally meanness that--”

”Trimmer, it's a lie!” cried the old man, shaking as with a palsy, and drawing further down into his pillow. ”I'm an old man--I'm helpless--I won't be bullied.”

”This is one of the occasions when I feel that a shaking would do you good,” declared Trimmer.

”No, no--not now--not again! Last time, I was bad for a week. The shock might kill me. It would be murder.”

”Well, and would that matter?” asked Trimmer, callously. He stood at the bedside, with a duster in one hand and a medicine-gla.s.s in the other, polis.h.i.+ng the gla.s.s in the most leisurely fas.h.i.+on, and speaking in hard, even tones. He looked down upon the old wreck as on the carcase of a dead dog.

They were a strange pair, these two, and the world outside, although it knew something of the influence of Trimmer over his master, had no conception of its real extent. Trimmer ought to have been a master of men; but some defect in his mental equipment at the beginning of life, or an unkind fate, was responsible for his becoming a menial. He was a slave of habit, a stickler for scrupulous tidiness. A dusty room or an ill-folded suit of clothes would agitate him more than the rocking of an empire. He entered the service of Herresford when quite a young man, and that service had become a habit with him, and he could not break it. He was bound to his menial occupation by bonds of steel; and the idea of doing without Trimmer was as inconceivable to his master as the idea of going without clothes. The miser, who followed no man's advice, nevertheless revealed more of his private affairs to his valet than to his lawyers. And Trimmer, who consulted n.o.body, and was by nature secretive, jealously guarded his master's interests, and insisted on being consulted in all private matters. A miser himself, Trimmer approved and fostered the miserly instincts of his master, until there had grown up between them an intimacy that was almost a partners.h.i.+p.

And, now that Herresford was broken in health, and had become a pitiful wreck, he preferred to be left entirely at Trimmer's mercy.

”What are you going to do about an heir now?” asked the valet, curtly.

”Have you made a new will?”

”No, I've not. Why should I? I left everything to the boy--with a reasonable amount for his mother. In the event of his death, his mother inherits. You wouldn't have me leave my money to charities--or rascally servants like you, who are rolling in money? You needn't be anxious. I told you that you would have your fifty thousand dollars, if you were in my service at my death and behaved yourself--and if I died by natural means! Ha, ha! I had to put in that clause, or you would have smothered me with my own pillows long ago.”

”Very likely--very likely,” murmured Trimmer indifferently, as though the suggestion were by no means strained. He had heard it many hundreds of times before. It was a favorite taunt.

”Who is that coming up the drive?” asked the invalid, craning his neck to look out of the window.

”It is Mrs. Swinton, sir, and Mr. Swinton.”

”On foot?” cried the old man. ”And since when, pray, did they begin to take the walking exercise? Ha! ha! Coming to see me--about their boy. Of course, you've heard all about it, Trimmer.”