The Long Vacation

CHAPTER XVIII. THE EVIL STAR

Lancelot said, That were against me, what I can I will; And there that day remained.-TENNYSON.

It was on the night before the final bustle and fury, so to speak, of preparation were to set in, when arrivals were expected, and the sellers were in commotion, and he had been all day putting the singers one by one through their parts, that as he went to his room at night, there was a knock at Lancelot's door, and Gerald came in, looking deadly white. He had been silent and effaced all the evening, and his aunt had thought him tired, but he had rather petulantly eluded inquiry, and now he came in with-

"Lance, I must have it out with some one."

"An Oxford scrape?" said Lance.

"Oh no, I wish it was only that." Then a silence, while Lance looked at him, thinking, "What trouble could it be?" He had been very kind and gentle with the little Miranda, but the manner had not struck Lance as lover-like.

There was a gasp again-

"That person, that woman at the gate, do you remember?"

Therewith a flash came over Lance.

"My poor boy! You don't mean to say-"

Neither could bring himself to say the word so sacred to Lancelot, and which might have been so sacred to his nephew.

"How did you guess?" said Gerald, lifting up the face that he had hidden on the table.

"I saw the likeness between you and the girl. She reminded me of some one I had once seen."

"Had you seen her?"

"Once, at a concert, twenty odd years ago. Your aunt, too, was strangely carried back to that scene, by the girl's voice, I suppose."

"Poor child!" said Gerald, still laying down his head and seeming terribly oppressed, as Lance felt he well might be.

"It is a sad business for you," said the uncle, with a kind hand on his shoulder. "How was it she did not claim you before?-not that she has any real claim."

"She did not know my real name. My father called himself Wood. I never knew the rest of it till after I came home. That fellow bribed the gardener, got in over the wall, or somehow, and when she saw you, and heard you and me and all three of us, it gave her the clue."

"Well, Gerald, I do not think she can dare to-"

"Oh!" interrupted Gerald, "there's worse to come."

"What?" said Lance, aghast.

"She says," and a sort of dry sob cut him short, "she says she had a husband when she married my father," and down went his head again.

"Impossible," was Lance's first cry; "your father's first care was to tell Travis all was right with you. Travis has the certificates."

"Oh yes, it was no fault of my father-my father, my dear father-no, but she deceived him, and I am an impostor-nobody."

"Gently, gently, Gerald. We have no certainty that this is true. Your father had known her for years. Tell me, how did it come out- what evidence did she adduce?"

Gerald nerved himself to sit up and speak collectedly.

"I believe it is half that circus fellow's doing. I think she is going to marry him, if she hasn't already. She followed me, and just at the turn down this road, as I was bidding the Mona girl goodnight, she came up with me, and said I little thought that the child was my sister, and how delightful it was to see us acting together. Well then, I can't say but a horror came over me. I couldn't for the life of me do anything but draw back, there was something so intolerable in the look of her eyes, and her caressing manner," and he shuddered, glad of his uncle's kind hand on his shoulder. "Somehow, I let her get me out upon the high ground, and there she said, 'So you are too great a swell to have word or look for your mother. No wonder, you always were un vilain petit miserable; but I won't trouble you-I wouldn't be bound to live your dull ennuyant ladies' life for millions. I'll bargain to keep out of your way; but O'Leary and I want a couple of hundred pounds, and you'll not grudge it to us.' I had no notion of being blackmailed, besides I haven't got it, and I told her she might know that I am not of age, and had no such sum ready to hand. She was urgent, and I began to think whether I could do anything to save that poor little sister, when she evidently got some fresh impulse from the man, and began to ask me how I should like to have it all disclosed to my nobs of friends. Well, I wasn't going to be bullied, and I answered that my friends knew already, and she might do her worst. 'Oh, may I?' she said; 'you wouldn't like, my fine young squire, to have it come out that I never was your father's wife at all, and that you are no more than that gutter- child.' I could not understand her at first, and said I would not be threatened, but that made her worse, and that rascal O'Leary came to her help. They raised their demands somehow to five hundred, and declared if they had not it paid down, they should tell the whole story and turn me out. Of course I said they were welcome. Either I am my father's lawful son, or I am not, and if not, the sooner it is all up with me the better, for whatever I am, I am no thief and robber. So I set off and came down the hill; but the brute kept pace with me to this very door, trying to wheedle me, I believe. And now what's to be done? I would go off at once, and let Uncle Clem come into his rights, only I don't want to be the death of him and Cherie."

"No," said Lance, "my dear fellow! You have stood it wisely and bravely so far, go on to do so. I don't feel the least certain that this is not mere bullying. She did not tell you any particulars?"

"No, certainly not."

"Not the name of this supposed predecessor of Edgar's? Where she may have been married, or how? How she parted from him, or how she knows he was alive? It sounds to me a bogus notion, got up to put the screw on you, by surprise. I'll tell you what I'll do. I'll go down to the shop tomorrow morning, see the woman, and extract the truth if possible, and I fully expect that the story will shrink up to nothing."

"'Tis not the estate I care for," said Gerald, looking somewhat cheered. "It is my father's honour and name. If that can be cleared-"

"Do not I care?" said Lance. "My dear brother Edgar, my model of all that was noble and brilliant-whom Felix loved above all! Nay, and you, Gerald, our hope! I would give anything and everything to free you from this stain, though I trust it will prove only mud that will not stick. Anyway you have shown your true, faithful Underwood blood. Now go to bed and sleep if you can. Don't say a word, nor look more like a ghost than you can help-or we shall have to rouge ourselves for our parts. My boy, my boy! You are Edgar's boy, anyway."

And Lancelot kissed the young pale cheek as he had done when the little wounded orphan clung to him fourteen years ago, or as he kissed his own Felix.

Whatever the night was to Gerald, long was the night, and long the light hours of the morning to the ever sleepless Lance before he could rise and make his way to the shop with any hope of gaining admission, and many were the sighs and prayers that this tale might be confuted, and that the matter might be to the blessing of the youth to whom he felt more warmly now than since those winning baby days had given place to more ordinary boyhood. He had a long time to pace up and down watching the sparkling water, and feeling the fresh wind on the brow, which was as capable as ever of aching over trouble and perplexity, and dreading above all the effect on the sister, whose consolation and darling Gerald had always been. How little he had thought, when he had stood staunch against his brother Edgar's persuasions, that Zoraya was to be the bane of that life which had begun so gaily!

When at last the door was unfastened, and, as before, by Ludmilla, he greeted her kindly, and as she evidently expected some fresh idea about the masque, he gave her his card, and asked her to beg her mother to come and speak to him. She started at the name and said-

"Oh, sir, you will do nothing to hurt him-Mr. Underwood?"

"It is the last thing I wish," he said earnestly, and Ludmilla showed him into a little parlour, full of the fumes of tobacco, and sped away, but he had a long time to wait, for probably Mother Butterfly's entire toilette had to be taken in hand.

Before she appeared Lancelot heard a man's voice, somewhere in the entry, saying-

"Oh! the young ass has been fool enough to let it out, has he? I suppose this is the chap that will profit? You'll have your wits about you."

Lance was still his old self enough to receive the lady with-

"I beg to observe that I am not the 'chap who will profit' if this miserable allegation holds water. I am come to understand the truth."

The woman looked frightened, and the man came to her rescue, having evidently heard, and this Lance preferred, for he always liked to deal with mankind rather than womankind. Having gone so far there was not room for reticence, and the man took up the word.

"Madame cannot be expected to disclose anything to the prejudice of her son and herself, unless it was made worth her while."

"Perhaps not," said Lance, as he looked her over in irony, and drew the conclusion that the marriage was a fact accomplished; "but she has demanded two hundred pounds from her son, on peril of exposure, and if the facts are not substantiated, there is such a thing as an action for conspiracy, and obtaining money on false pretences."

"Nothing has been obtained!" said the woman, beginning to cry. "He was very hard on his poor mother."

"Who forsook him as an infant, cast off his father, and only claims him in order to keep a disgraceful, ruinous secret hanging over his life for ever, in order to extort money."

"Come now, this is tall talk, sir," said O'Leary; "the long and short of it is, what will the cove, yourself, or whoever it is that you speak for, come down for one way or another?"

"Nothing," responded Lance.

Neither of the estimable couple spoke or moved under an announcement so incredible to them, and he went on-

"Gerald Underwood would rather lose everything than give hush-money to enable him to be a robber, and my elder brother would certainly give no reward for what would be the greatest grief in his life."

O'Leary grinned as if he wanted to say, "Have you asked him?"

"The priest," she muttered.

"Ay, the meddling parson who has done for you! He would have to come down pretty handsomely."

Lancelot went on as if he had not heard these asides.

"I am a magistrate; I can give you in charge at once to the police, and have you brought before the Mayor for conspiracy, when you will have to prove your words, or confess them to be a lie."

He was not in the least certain that where there was no threatening letter, this could succeed, but he knew that the preliminaries would be alarming enough to elicit something, and accordingly Mrs. O'Leary began to sob out-

"It was when I was a mere child, a bambina, and he used me so cruelly."

There was the first thread, and on the whole, the couple were angry enough with Gerald, his refined appearance and air of careless prosperity, to be willing that he should have a fall, and Lance thus extracted that the "he" who had been cruel was a Neapolitan impresario in a small way, who had detected that Zoraya, when a very little child, had a charming voice, of which indeed she still spoke with pride, saying Lida would never equal it. Her parents were semi- gipsies, Hungarian, and had wandered all over the Austrian empire, acting, singing, and bringing up their children to the like. They had actually sold her to the impresario, who had sealed the compact, and hoped to secure the valuable commodity by making her his wife. In his security he had trained her in the severest mode, and visited the smallest want of success with violence and harshness, so that her life was utterly miserable, and on meeting her brother, who had become a member of a German band, she had contrived to make her escape with him, and having really considerable proficiency, the brother and sister had prospered, and through sundry vicissitudes had arrived at being "stars" in Allen's troupe, where Edgar Underwood, or, as he was there known, Tom Wood, had unfortunately joined them; and the sequel was known to Lancelot, but he could not but listen and gather up the details, disgusted as he was-how the prima donna had accepted his attention as her right, till her jealousy was excited by his evident attraction to "the little English doll, for whom he killed his man"; how she resolved to win him, and how scandalous reports at last had brought him to offer marriage, unknowing, it was plain, of her past. It was not possible to guess how much she was still keeping back, speaking under terror and compulsion as she did. But she declared that he had never loved her, and was always wanting her to be like ces Anglaises fades, and as to her child, he so tormented her about it, and the ways of his absurd mother and sisters, and so expected her to sacrifice her art and her prospects to the little wretch, that she was ready to strangle it! "Maternal love, bah! she was not going to be like a bird or a beast," she said, with a strange wild glance in her eyes that made Lance shudder, and think how much more he respected the bird or beast. Then at Chicago, when Wood's own folly and imprudence had brought on an illness that destroyed his voice, and she knew there would be only starvation, or she should have to toil for the whole of them, Schnetterling, manager of a circus, fell in love with her, and made her good offers to sing in Canada, and Chicago was a place where few questions were asked, so she freed herself.

She had made her rounds with Schnetterling, a prudent German, and in process of time had come to England, where, at Avoncester, both had been attacked by influenza; he died, and she only recovered with a total loss of voice; but he had been prudent and frugal enough to save a sufficient sum to set her up at Rockquay with the tobacco- shop. She had chosen that place on account of American trading- vessels putting in there, as well as those of various foreign nations, with whom her knowledge of languages was available, and no doubt there were some opportunities of dealing in smuggled goods. Just, however, as the smuggling was beginning to be suspected, the circus of O'Leary came in her way, and the old instincts were renewed. Then came the detection and prosecution, and the need of raising the fine. She had recourse to O'Leary, who had before been Schnetterling's underling, and now was a partner in Jellicoe's circus, who knew her capabilities as a manager and actress, and perceived the probabilities of poor little Lida's powers. The discovery that the deserted baby that she had left at Chicago was a young handsome squire, well connected, and, in her eyes, of unlimited means, had of course incited both to make the utmost profit of him. That he should not wish to hush the suspicion up, but should go straight to his uncles, was to them a quite unexpected contingency.

All this was not exactly told to Lancelot, but he extracted it, or gathered it before he was able to arrive at what was really important, the name of Zoraya's first husband, where she was married, and by whom, and where she had parted from him. She was so unwilling to give particulars that he began almost to hope to make her confess that the whole was a myth, but at last she owned that the man's name was Giovanni Benista, and that the marriage had taken place at Messina; she knew not in what church, nor in what year, only it was before the end of the old regime, for she recollected the uniforms of the Bomba soldiers, though she could not remember the name of the priest. Benista was old, very old-the tyrant and assassin that he was, no doubt he was dead. She often thought he would have killed her-and the history of his ill-treatment had to be gone through before it appeared that she had fled from him at Trieste with her brother, in an English trading-vessel, where their dexterity and brilliancy gained them concealment and a passage. This was certainly in the summer of 1865. Of Benista she knew nothing since, but she believed him to have come from Piedmont.

Lance found Gerald walking up and down anxiously watching for him, and receiving him with a "Well!" that had in it volumes of suspense.

"Well, Gerald, I do not think there can be any blame attached to your father, whatever comes of it. He was deceived as much as any one else, and his attachment to you seems to have been his great offence."

"Thank Heaven! Then he was deceived?"

"I am afraid there was some previous ceremony. But stay, Gerald! There is no certainty that it was valid in the first place, and in the next, nothing is known of Benista since 1865, when he was an old man, so that there is a full chance that he was dead before-"

"Before April 1868. I say, Uncle Lance, they want to make no end of a bear-fight for my coming of age. I must be out of the way first."

"Don't cry out too soon. Even if the worst came to the worst, as the property was left to you by will individually, I doubt whether this discovery, if real, would make any difference in law. I do not know."

"But would I take it on those terms? It would be simply defrauding Clement, and all of you-"

"Perhaps, long before, we may be satisfied," said Lance. "For the present, I think nothing can be done but endeavour to ascertain the facts."

"One comfort is," said Gerald, "I have gained a sister. I have walked with her to the corner of her place-the marble works, you know-and she really is a jolly little thing, quite innocent of all her mother's tricks, thinking Mrs. Henderson the first of human beings, except perhaps Flight, the aesthetic parson. I should not have selected him, you know, but between them they have kept her quite a white sheet-a Miranda any Ferdinand might be glad to find, and dreading nothing so much as falling into the hands of that awful brute. Caliban himself couldn't have been worse! I have promised her to do what I can to save her-buy her off-anything."

"Poor child," said Lance. "But, Gerald, nothing of this must be said these next few days. We can't put ourselves out of condition for this same raree-show."

"I'm sure it's a mere abomination to me," said Gerald disconsolately. "I can't think why we should be dragged into all this nuisance for what is not even our own concern."

"I'm sure I thought you the rope that dragged me! At any rate much higher up on it."

"Well, I never thought you would respond-you, who have enough on your hands at Bexley."

"One stroke even on the outskirts is a stroke for all the cause."

"The cause! I don't believe in the cause, whatever it is. What a concatenation now, that you and I should make fools of ourselves in order to stave off the establishment of national education, as if we could, or as if it was worth doing."

"Then why did you undertake it?"

"Oh, ah! Why, one wants something to do down here, and the Merrifield lot are gone upon it; and I did want to go through the thing again, but now it seems all rot."

"Nevertheless, having pledged ourselves to the performance, we cannot cry off, and the present duty is to pack dull care away, put all this out of our heads, and regard it as a mere mare's nest as long as possible, and above all not upset Cherry. Remember, let this turn out as it will, you are yourself still, and her own boy, beloved for your father's sake, the joy of our dear brother, and her great comforter. A wretched mistake can never change that."

Lance's voice was quivering, and Gerald's face worked. Lance gave his hand a squeeze, and found voice to say-

"'Hold thee still in the Lord, and abide patiently upon Him.' And meantime be a man over it. It can be done. I have often had to forget."