The Master of Greylands. Mrs. Henry Wood
table and kicking her legs about. "I hope we shall never get one at all."
"It would be easy enough to get one, but for this trouble about Ethel's music," grumbled Mrs. Castlemaine. "I have a great mind to send her to the Grey Nunnery for her lessons. Sister Charlotte, I know, is perfect on the piano; and she would be thankful for the employment."
"Papa would not let her go to the Nunnery," said the sharp girl. "He does not like the Grey Ladies."
"I suppose he'd not. I'm sure, what with this disqualification and that disqualification, a good governess is as difficult to fix upon as----get off the table, my sweet child," hastily broke off Mrs. Castlemaine: "here's your papa."
The Master of Greylands entered the red parlour, after his short interview in the yard with Commodore Teague. Miss Flora slipped past him, and disappeared. He saw a good deal to find fault with in her rude, tomboy ways; and she avoided him when she could. Taking the paper, he stirred the fire into a blaze, just as he had, not many minutes before, stirred his own fire upstairs.
"It is a biting-cold day," he observed. "I think I must have caught a little chill, for I seem to feel cold in an unusual degree. What's that?"
Mrs. Castlemaine held the letters still in her hand; and by the expression of her countenance, bent upon the contents, he could perceive there was some annoyance.
"This governess does not do; it is as bad as the last. She lacked music; this one lacks French. Is it not provoking, James?"
Mr. Castlemaine took up the letters and read them.
"I should say she is just the sort of governess for Flora," he observed. "The testimonials are excellent."
"But her want of French! Did you not observe that?"
"I don't know that French is of so much consequence for Flora as the getting a suitable person to control her. One who will hold her under firm discipline. As it is, she is being ruined."
"French not of consequence for Flora!" repeated Mrs. Castlemaine. "What can you mean, James?"
"I said it was not of so much consequence, relatively speaking. Neither is it."
"And while Ethel's French is perfect!"
"What has that to do with it?"
"I will never submit to see Flora inferior in accomplishments to Ethel, James. French I hold especially by: I have felt the want of it myself. Better, of the two, for her to fail in music than in speaking French. If it were not for Ethel's senseless whim of continuing to take music lessons, there would be no trouble."
"Who's this, I wonder?" cried Mr. Castlemaine.
He alluded to a visitor's ring at the hall bell. Flora came dashing in.
"It's a gentleman in a fur coat," she said. "I watched him come up the avenue."
"A gentleman in a fur coat!" repeated her mother.
"Some one who has walked from Stilborough this cold day, I suppose."
Miles entered. On his small silver waiter lay a card. He presented it to his master and spoke. "The gentleman says he wishes to see you, sir. I have shown him into the drawing-room."
The Master of Greylands was gazing at the card with knitted brow and haughty lips. He did not understand the name on it.
"What farce is this?" he exclaimed, tossing the card on the table in anger. And Mrs. Castlemaine bent to read it with aroused curiosity.
"Anthony Castlemaine."
"It must be an old card of your father's, James," she remarked, "given, most likely, year's ago, to some one to send in, should he ever require to present himself here--perhaps to crave a favour."
This view, just at the moment it was spoken, seemed feasible enough to Mr. Castlemaine, and his brow lost its fierceness. Another minute, and he saw how untenable it was.
"My father never had such a card as this, Sophia. Plain 'Anthony Castlemaine,' without hold or handle. His cards had 'Mr.' before the name. And look at the strokes and flourishes--it's not like an English card. What sort of a person is it, Miles?"
"A youngish gentleman sir. He has a lot of dark fur on his coat. He asked for Mr. James Castlemaine."
"Mr. James Castlemaine!" echoed the Master of Greylands, sharply, as he stalked from the room, card in hand.
The visitor was standing before a portrait in the drawing-room contemplating it earnestly. It was that of old Anthony Castlemaine, taken when he was about fifty years of age. At the opening of the door he turned round and advanced, his hand, extended and a pleasant smile on his face.
"I have the gratification, I fancy, of seeing my Uncle James!"
Mr. Castlemaine kept his hands to himself. He looked haughtily at the intruder; he spoke frigidly.
"I have not the honour of your acquaintance, sir."
"But my card tells you who I am," rejoined the young man. "I am indeed your nephew, uncle; the son of your elder brother. He was Basil, and you are James."
"Pardon me, sir, if I tell you what I think you are. An impostor."
"Ah no, do not be afraid, uncle. I am verily your nephew, Anthony Castlemaine. I have papers and legal documents with me to prove indisputably the fact; I bring you also a letter from my father, written on his death-bed. But I should have thought you might know me by my likeness to my father; and he--I could fancy that portrait had been taken for him"--pointing to the one he had been looking at. "He always said I greatly resembled my grandfather."
There could be no dispute as to the likeness. The young man's face was the Castlemaine face exactly: the well formed, handsome features, the clear and fresh complexion, the brilliant dark eyes. All the Castlemaines had been alike, and this one was like them all; even like James, who stood there.
Taking a letter from his pocket-book, he handed it to Mr. Castlemaine. The latter broke the seal--Basil's own seal; he saw that--and began to peruse it. While he did so, he reflected a little, and made up his mind.
To acknowledge his nephew. For he had the sense to see that no other resource would be left him. He did it with a tolerably good grace, but in a reserved cold kind of manner. Folding up the letter, he asked a few questions which young Anthony freely answered, and gave a brief account of the past.
"And Basil--your father--is dead, you say! Has been dead four weeks. This letter, I see, is dated Christmas Day."
"It was on Christmas Day he wrote it, uncle. Yes, nearly four weeks have elapsed since his death: it took place on the fourteenth of January; his wife, my dear mother, had died on the same day six years before. That was curious, was it not? I had meant to come over here immediately, as he charged me to do; but there were many matters of business to be settled, and I could not get away until now."
"Have you come over for any particular purpose?" coldly asked Mr. Castlemaine.
"I have come to stay, Uncle James. To take possession of my inheritance."
"Of your inheritance?"
"The estate of Greylands' Rest."
"Greylands' Rest is not yours," said Mr. Castlemaine.
"My father informed me that it was. He brought me up to no profession: he always said that Greylands' Rest would be mine at his own death; that he should come into it himself at the death of his father, and thence it would descend to me. To make all sure, he left it to me in his will. And, as I have mentioned to you, we did not hear my grandfather was dead until close upon last Christmas. Had my father known it in the summer, he would have come over to put in his claim: he was in sufficiently good health then."
"It is a pity you should have come so far on a fruitless errand, young man. Listen. When your father, Basil, abandoned his home here in his youth, he forfeited all claim to the inheritance. He asked for his portion, and had it;