第58章 CHAPTER XIV LADY OSTERMORE(3)

"And your father's destitution means our destitution - yours and mine; for his gambling schemes have consumed my portion long since."He laughed and shrugged. "I marvel I should concern myself,"said he. "What can it avail me to save the rags that are left him of his fortune? He's sworn I shall never touch a penny that he may die possessed of.""But there's the entail," she reminded him. "If restitution is demanded, the Crown will not respect it. 'Twill be another sop to throw the whining curs that were crippled by the bubble, and who threaten to disturb the country if they are not appeased. If Wharton carries out this exposure, we're beggars - utter beggars, that may ask an alms to quiet hunger.""'Tis Wharton's present hate of me," said he thoughtfully, and swore. "The damned puppy! He'd make a sacrifice of me upon the altar of respectability, just as he made a sacrifice of the South Sea bubblers. What else was the stinking rakehell seeking but to put himself right again in the eyes of a town that was nauseated with him and his excesses? The self-seeking toad that makes virtue his profession - the virtue of others - and profligacy his recreation!" He smote fist into palm. "There's a way to silence him.""Ah?" she looked up quickly, hopefully.

"A foot or so of steel," Rotherby explained, and struck the hilt of his sword. "I might pick a quarrel with him. 'Twould not be difficult. Come upon him unawares, say, and strike him. That should force a fight.""Tusk, fool! He's all empanoplied in virtue where you are concerned. He'd use the matter of your affair with Caryll as a reason not to meet you, whatever you might do, and he'd set his grooms to punish any indignity you might put upon him.""He durst not."

"Pooh! The town would all approve him in it since your running Caryll through the back. What a fool you were, Charles."He turned away, hanging his head, full conscious, and with no little bitterness, of how great had been his folly.

"Salvation may lie for you in the same source that has brought you to the present pass - this man Caryll," said the countess presently. "I suspect him more than ever of being a Jacobite agent.""I know him to be such."

"You know it?"

"All but; and Green is assured of it, too." He proceeded to tell her what he knew. "Ever since Green met Caryll at Maidstone has he suspected him, yet but that I kept him to the task he would have abandoned it. He's in my pay now as much as in Lord Carteret's, and if he can run Caryll to earth he receives his wages from both sides.""Well - well? What has he discovered? Anything?""A little. This Caryll frequented regularly the house of one Everard, who came to town a week after Caryll's own arrival.

This Everard - Sir Richard Everard is known to be a Jacobite.

He is the Pretender's Paris agent. They would have laid him by the heels before, but that by precipitancy they feared to ruin their chances of discovering the business that may have brought him over. They are giving him rope at present.

Meanwhile, by my cursed folly, Caryll's visits to him were interrupted. But there has been correspondence between them.""I know," said her ladyship. "A letter was delivered him just now. I tried to smoke him concerning it. But he's too astute.""Astute or not," replied her son, "once he leaves Stretton House it should not be long ere he betrays himself and gives us cause to lay him by the heels. But how will that help us?""Do you ask how? Why, if there is a plot, and we can discover it, we might make terms with the secretary of state to avoid any disclosure Wharton may intend concerning the South Sea matter.""But that would be to discover my father for a Jacobite! What advantage should we derive from that? 'Twould be as bad as t'other matter.""Let me die, but ye're a slow-witted clod, Charles. D'ye think we can find no way to disclose the plot and Mr. Caryll -and Everard, too, if you choose - without including your father? My lord is timidly cautious, and you may depend he'll not have put himself in their hands to any extent just yet."The viscount paced the chamber slowly in long strides, head bent in thought, hands clasped behind him. "It will need consideration," said he. "But it may serve, and I can count upon Green. He is satisfied that Caryll befooled him at Maidstone, and that he kept the papers he carried despite the thoroughness of Green's investigations. Moreover, he was handled with some roughness by Caryll. For that and the other matter he asks redress - thirsts for it. He's a very willing tool, as I have found.""Then see that you use him adroitly to your work," said his mother. "Best not leave town at present, Charles.""Why, no," said he. "I'll find me a lodging somewhere at hand, since my fond sire is determined I shall pollute no longer the sacrosanctity of his dwelling. Perhaps when I have pulled him out of this quicksand, he will deign to mitigate the bitterness of his feelings for me. Though, faith, I find life endurable without the affection he should have consecrated to me.""Ay," she said, looking up at him. "You are his son; too much his son, I fear. 'Tis why he dislikes you so intensely. He sees in you the faults to which he is blind in himself.""Sweet mother!" said his lordship, bowing.

She scowled at him. She could deal in irony herself - and loved to - but she detested to have it dealt to her.

He bowed again; gained the door, and would have passed out but that she detained him.

"'Tis a pity, on some scores, to dispose so utterly of this Caryll," she said. "The pestilent coxcomb has his uses, and his uses, like adversity's, are sweet."He paused to question her with his eyes.

"He might have made a husband for Hortensia, and rid me of the company of that white-faced changeling.""Might he so?" quoth the viscount, face and voice, expressionless.

"They were made for each other," her ladyship opined.

"Were they so?"

"Ay - were they. And faith they've discovered it. I would you had seen the turtles in the arbor an hour ago, when Isurprised them."

His lordship attempted a smile, but achieved nothing more than a wry face and a change of color. His mother's eyes, observing these signs, grew on a sudden startled.

"Why, fool," quoth she, "do you hold there still? Art not yet cured of that folly?""What folly, ma'am?"

"This folly that already has cost you so much. 'Sdeath! As I'm a woman, if you'd so much feeling for the girl, I marvel ye did not marry her honestly and in earnest when the chance was yours."The pallor of his face increased. He clenched his hands. "Imarvel myself that I did not," he answered passionately - and went out, slamming the door after him, and leaving her ladyship agape and angry.