We have got a hint they rely on it. And here's a point to be noted: the deed fixes five-and-twenty as the period of his majority; and just as he attains that age, his father being nearly that time dead, they put their shoulders to the wheel."

"Put their d--d numbskulls under it, you mean. How can they move--how can they stir? I'd like to know how they can touch my t.i.tle? I don't care a curse about them. What the plague's frightening you and Crowe _now_? I'm blest if I don't think you're growing old. Why can't you stick to your own view?--you say one thing one day and another the next.

Egad, there's no knowing where to have you."

The Baronet was talking bitterly, scornfully, and with all proper contempt of his adversaries, but there's no denying he looked very pale.

"And there certainly is activity there; cases have been with counsel on behalf of Guy Deverell, the son and heir of the deceased," pursued Mr.

Pelter, with his hands in his pockets, looking grimly up into the Baronet's face.

"Won't you sit down?--do sit down, Pelter; and you haven't had wine?"

said Sir Jekyl.

"Thanks--I've had some sherry."

"Well, you must have some claret. I'd like a gla.s.s myself."

He had rung the h.e.l.l, and a servant appeared.

"Get claret and gla.s.ses for two."

The servant vanished deferentially.

"I'm not blaming you, mind; but is it not odd we should have known nothing of this son, and this pretended marriage till now?"

"Odd!--oh dear, no!--you don't often know half so much of the case at the other side--nothing at all often till it's on the file."

"Precious satisfactory!" sneered Sir Jekyl.

"When we beat old Lord Levesham, in Blount and Levesham, they had not a notion, no more than the man in the moon, what we were going on, till we produced the release, and got a direction, egad." And the attorney laughed over that favourite recollection.

CHAPTER XIV.

Pelter opens his mind.

"Take a gla.s.s of claret. This is '34. Maybe you'd like some port better?"

"No, thanks, this will do very nicely," said the accommodating attorney.

"Thirty-four? So it is, egad! and uncommon fine too."

"I hope you can give me a day or two--not business, of course--I mean by way of holiday," said Sir Jekyl. "A little country air will do you a world of good--set you up for the term."

Mr. Pelter smiled, and shook his head shrewdly.

"Quite out of the question, Sir Jekyl, I thank you all the same--business tumbling in too fast just now--I daren't stay away another day--no, no--ha, ha, ha! no rest for us, sir--no rest for the wicked. But this thing, you know, looks rather queerish, we thought--a little bit urgent: the other party has been so sly; and no want of money, sir--the sinews of war--lots of tin there."

"Yes, of course; and lots of tin here, too. I fancy fellows don't like to waste money only to hold their own; but, egad, if it comes to be a pull at the long purse, all the worse for them," threw in the Baronet.

"And their intending, you know, to set up this marriage," continued the attorney without minding; "and that Herbert Strangways being over here with the young pretender, as we call him, under his wing; and Strangways is a deuced clever fellow, and takes devilish sound view of a case when he lays his mind to it. It was he that reopened that great bankruptcy case of Onslow and Grawley, you remember."

Sir Jekyl a.s.sented, but did not remember.

"And a devilish able bit of chess-play that was on both sides--no end of concealed property--brought nearly sixty thousand pounds into the fund, egad! The creditors pa.s.sed a vote, you remember--spoke very handsomely of him. Monstrous able fellow, egad!"

"A monstrous able fellow he'll be if he gets my property, egad! It seems to me you Pelter and Crowe are half in love with him," said Sir Jekyl, flushed and peevish.

"We'll hit him a hard knock or two yet, for all that--ha, ha!--or I'm mistaken," rejoined old Mr. Pelter.

"Do you know him?" inquired Sir Jekyl; and the servant at the same time appearing in answer to his previous summons, he said--

"Go to the parlour and tell Mr. Doocey--you know _quietly_--that I am detained by business, but that we'll join them in a little time in the drawing-room."

So the servant, with a reverence, departed.

"I say, _do_ you?"

"Just a little. Seven years ago, when I was at Havre, he was stopping there too. A very gentlemanlike man--sat beside him twice at the table d'hote. I could see he knew d--d well who I was--wide awake, very agreeable man, very--wonderful well-informed. Wonderful ups and downs that fellow's had--clever fellow--ha, ha, ha!--I mentioned you, Sir Jekyl; I wanted to hear if he'd say anything--fishing, hey? Old file, you know"--and the attorney winked and grinned agreeably at Sir Jekyl.

"Capital claret this--cap-i-tal, by Jupiter! It came in natural enough.

We were talking of England, you see. He was asking questions; and so, talking of country gentlemen, and county influence, and parliamentary life, you know, I brought in _you_, and asked him if he knew Sir Jekyl Marlowe." Another wink and a grin here. "I asked, a bit suddenly, you know, to see how he'd take it. Did not show, egad! more than that decanter--ha, ha, ha!--devilish cool dog--monstrous clever fellow--not a bit; and he said he did not know you--had not that honour; but he knew a great deal of you, and he spoke very handsomely--upon my honour--quite au--au--handsomely of you, he did."

"Vastly obliged to him," said Sir Jekyl; but though he sneered I think he was pleased. "You don't recollect what he said, I dare say?"

"Well, I can_not_ exactly."

"Did he mention any unpleasantness ever between us?" continued Sir Jekyl.

"Yes, he said there had, and that he was afraid Sir Jekyl might not remember his name with satisfaction; but he, for his part, liked to forget and forgive--that kind of thing, you know, and young fellows being too hot-headed, you know. I really--I don't think he bears you personally any ill-will."

"There has certainly been time enough for anger to cool a little, and I really, for my part, never felt anything of the kind towards him; I can honestly say _that_, and I dare say he knows it. I merely want to protect myself against--against madmen, egad!" said Sir Jekyl.

"I think that copy of a marriage settlement you showed me had no names in it," he resumed.

"No, the case is all put like a moot point, not a name in it. It's all nonsense, too, because every man in my profession knows a copying clerk never has a notion of the meaning of anything--letter, deed, pleading--nothing he copies--not an iota, by Jove!"

"Finish the bottle; you must not send it away," said Sir Jekyl.

"Thanks, I'm doing very nicely; and now as they may open fire suddenly, I want to know"--here the attorney's eyes glanced at the door, and his voice dropped a little--"any information of a confidential sort that may guide us in--in----"

"Why, I fancy it's _all_ confidential, isn't it?" answered Sir Jekyl.

"Certainly--but aw--but--I meant--you know--there was aw--a--there was a talk, you know, about a deed. Eh?"

"I--I--_yes_, I've heard--I know what you mean," answered Sir Jekyl, pouring a little claret into his gla.s.s. "They--those fellows--they lost a deed, and they were d--d impertinent about it; they wanted--you know it's a long time ago--to try and slur my poor father about it--I don't know exactly how, only, I think, there would have been an action for slander very likely about it, if it had not stopped of itself."

Sir Jekyl sipped his claret.