Volume Ii Part 9 (1/2)

Haggard, as he tore the envelope open and read the telegram with difficulty by the light of one of the Chinese lanterns, blurted out:

”By Jove! s.h.i.+rtings, the poor old governor's dead.”

There was considerable consternation. The Warren party hurried away, and though dancing went on, the two young hostesses, perhaps in their natural grief for their friend's loss, joined in it no more.

As poor Connie wept herself to sleep that night in her sister's arms, she whispered her tale of sorrow into her ear. Her last words were, ”Lottie, darling, I shall never, never forgive pa.”

CHAPTER VII.

HAGGARD COMES INTO HIS OWN.

Old Justice Haggard had died rather suddenly. He had been ailing for several weeks; as his son had remarked, his handwriting had been the first symptom of the breakdown. His articulation, too, had become thickened, and one evening he was found seated in his chair by his study fire speechless, his face painfully drawn on one side; within an hour he had peacefully pa.s.sed away.

The king was dead, long live the king. Reginald Haggard came into his own. But though Haggard had talked of settling down into a county magnate in the case of his father's death, when that event happened he failed to do so.

”I couldn't stand it, you know. The dreadful dinners and the dreadful people would have finished me, I think,” he had said.

So after the funeral, Haggard returned to The Warren, but not before he had given the old steward final and definite instructions, which caused that worthy man's hair to almost stand on end.

”Cunningham,” he said, ”if you want to remain on the estate as my steward, you'll have to alter the state of things here. My father, you know, muddled along in a happy-go-lucky sort of way. As long as his pigs took the first prize at the county shows he was happy. That was his ambition. Now, Cunningham, you'll have to make the place pay. There are a lot of old servants, old pensioners and old horses, all eating their heads off here, and doing no work. You'll have to make a clean sweep of the lot. Were I to attempt to do it myself they'd worry my life out. Now I want you to act as a buffer. From your decisions there is to be no appeal. They are to look to you, and not to me. As I said, the place must be made to pay, that's the first point; the second is, that I am not to be bothered. It used to amuse my father to sit in his justice-room every morning and to be perpetually receiving and answering letters from all sorts of people about the place. That sort of thing won't suit me. You know as well as I do that my father got nothing out of the place.”

”Sir----” began the Scotchman.

”Wait till I have done, Cunningham, and you will see that you have nothing to say. I know what you are going to tell me. That it is my duty to come and live in this place, with these yokels, to have the ague at least twice a year, as my father did before me, and to ask my friends down in September to shoot my partridges. Those were my father's views, they're not mine. As to the house, I shall let it, and I shall do the same with the shooting. With regard to the property, if you can get an income out of it for me, well and good; if you can't, I don't suppose anybody can; and in that case I intend to be shot of the whole bag of tricks.”

”Ye wud'na think of pairting with the property, sir,” said the astonished steward; ”it's been your fathers' before you for centuries.”

”It must pay me three per cent., Cunningham, or I shall a.s.suredly sell it. Of course any legal liability I have I must fulfil; but there's been a good deal too much sentiment lately in the management of the place. My father was fond of pigs and paupers; I can't say I care for either. You will grant no new leases except at their full value. If d.i.c.k can't get a living out of a farm, that's no reason for letting him have it rent free. The estate must be improved, Cunningham--as a property. You understand me, I take it?”

”I could'na fail to do that, Mr. Reginald.”

The steward carried out his instructions. It is needless to say that Reginald Haggard became unpopular. Ash Priory was let; the old servants, those few who had any work left in them, got new and harder places at less wages; those who were past work went into the poor-house.

The Haggard estate actually returned three per cent on its market value, and everybody in the neighbourhood of the Priory agreed that Mr.

Cunningham the steward was an exceedingly hard man.

Haggard was very particular about one thing. A large diamond-shaped hatchment on which the arms of the Haggards were emblazoned came down from town and was duly affixed over the princ.i.p.al entrance to the Priory.

”It's to stay up for a year mind, Cunningham, tenant or no tenant, and then you can take it down and burn it if you like.”

The death of Justice Haggard caused the postponement of the proposed visit to Walls End Castle, and it was not till more than a year afterwards that the old earl's eyes were gladdened by the sight of his favourite, his great-nephew's wife.

During the year of mourning, Georgie Haggard presented her husband with a son. The child had been born at The Warren. Their recent mourning had effectually prevented the Haggards from going much into society, so rather against the grain, Haggard had consented to remain the guest of his father-in-law, varying the monotony of his long stay at The Warren by an occasional run up to town. At first he had proposed a furnished house, but he had been warned by the local pract.i.tioner that it would be unwise and imprudent to subject his wife to unnecessary fatigue, or to let her lose the benefit of the air of her native place. There was not much fuss made on the arrival of the little George; he, poor little chap, was provided with a humble attendant from the village, Fanchette being still retained to minister to the wants, whims and foibles of the elder child.

Miss Lucy Warrender had enjoyed the successive delights of two London seasons; she went everywhere, she was as much admired as ever. Lucy Warrender was not a mere beauty to be stared at; she was a brilliant conversationalist and possessed considerable powers of repartee. She had an artless way of administering cruel stabs to her female acquaintances which frequently turned them into enemies. When Mrs. Charmington had innocently asked her whether she considered her proposed appearance upon the stage _infra dig._, she had replied that she thought her friend couldn't do better, ”for,” added she gently, ”they tell me, dear Mrs.

Charmington, that actresses never grow old.” Lucy Warrender had not been without her triumphs; she had had several offers, and good offers too, but she refused them all, and Lucy Warrender was Lucy Warrender still.

Excitement was an absolute necessity to Lucy; there was a persistent craving in her mind for something new, and a ceaseless round of amus.e.m.e.nt was what she could not do without. Many girls would have knocked up from the effects of continuous late hours, heated rooms and high living, but Lucy seemed to thrive upon it. She was now nearly two-and-twenty, and from the time she had been able to think she had never troubled herself about anybody's comfort but her own. The maternal instinct had never been awakened in her; she petted the little Lucius simply because he was good-looking, and because she knew that a well-dressed, good-looking young person engaged in petting a child who is also well-dressed and good-looking is a pleasant and picturesque object. Just in the same way she was accustomed to hang on her uncle's arm and gaze up into his face, not because she cared one iota for her uncle, but because she considered it an effective tableau. The sole reason that Lucy Warrender never accepted any of the good offers which she received was, that she thought herself better off as her own mistress. If Lucy Warrender had been a man, she would have been one of those wholly un.o.bjectionable persons, one of those single-minded individuals, whose life is pa.s.sed in trying to get the greatest possible amount of personal enjoyment out of this world. As we know, Lucy was not troubled with what is called a heart; true she had made what she now considered a mistake at the outset, but she had burnt her fingers so severely that from that time she was never likely again to lapse from her religion of self-wors.h.i.+p. When they had first returned from Switzerland, she had had considerable cause for anxiety, for the fear of being found out had troubled her a good deal, but that shadow had gradually pa.s.sed away and the whole affair now seemed to her merely like a troubled dream, which she still remembered in a vague sort of way.