I set that piece of knowledge aside, however, for the present. There was a further point which concerned me more particularly just then.

Was the street-door on the latch? Or must Mr. Herbert descend to give his visitor entrance?

The visitor turned the handle, opened the door, and closed it again behind him. I waited until I saw his shadow on the blind. He had taken off his hat and his cloak, and his profile was figured upon it in a silhouette.

I ran down the stairs and across the street without so much as picking up my hat. I opened Mr. Herbert's door, and crept up the staircase until I came to the angle which I had reason to know so well. There I hid myself and waited in the dark. And how dark it was and how intolerably still! Very rarely a burst of laughter, or a voice louder than the usual, would filter up to me from the back part of the house.

But from the studio above, nothing--not the tread of a foot, not the whisper of a voice, not the shuffle of a chair.

What were they debating in such secrecy? I asked myself and then, "Perhaps I had been mistaken after all?" I clung to the possibility, though I had little faith in it. At all events, this night I should make sure--one way or another I should make sure.

After the weariest span, the door was opened. I could not see it because of the turn of the staircase. I stood, in fact, just under the door; but I could see on the wall facing me, at the point where the stairs turned a bright disk of light suddenly appear, such as a lamp will throw. The visitor would pa.s.s by that disk; he would intercept the rays of the lamp; those rays would burn upon his face. I leaned forward, holding my breath; the steps above me cracked as a man descended them. I heard a short "good night," but it was Mr. Herbert who spoke; and then the door was closed again and the disk vanished from the wall I could have cursed aloud, so bent was I upon discovering this visitor; but the footsteps descended towards me in the dark, and I drew myself back into my corner.

As they pa.s.sed me I felt a sudden flap of wind across my face, as though the man was moving his hands in the air to guide him, and I reckoned that the hand was waved within an inch of my nose. A few seconds later and the street-door opened. The sound brought home to me all the folly of my mistake. If I had only waited outside, in that alley, say, where he himself had crept, I should have seen him--I should have known him! Now I must needs wait where I stood until he was clean out of reach, I counted a hundred, a hundred and fifty, two hundred and then in my turn I slipped down the stairs and out of the house. The night was not over-clear, and I could perceive no one in the street. I strained my ears until they ached, and it seemed to me that I heard a light tip-toe tread very faint, diminishing up the hill. I ran in its direction with as little noise as I might. But I heard my spurs clink-clinking even as his had done, only ten times louder.

I stooped and loosed them from my feet. Then I ran on again; it seemed to me that the footsteps grew louder. I turned the corner at the head of the street. In front of me there was a blur of light; the blur defined itself into four moving points of flame as I approached, and, or ever I was aware of it, I had plumped full into my Lord Derwent.w.a.ter, who was walking homewards behind his torch-bearers to the lake.

"Come, my man," said he, "what manners are these?"

"The manners of a man in a desperate hurry," says I, "and so good night to you, my lord;" and I moved on one side.

"Lawrence Clavering!" he cried out and caught me by the arm. "The very man I would be speaking with."

"But to-morrow, my lord--to-morrow."

"Nay, to-night. You come so pat upon my wish that I must needs believe G.o.d sent you;" and the deep gravity of his tone was the very counterpart of his words. I stopped, undecided, and listened. But I could no longer hear the faintest echo of those stealthy footsteps.

"Then there is something new afoot," said I.

"Something new, indeed," says he, "though I take it, it concerns no one but you." And he bade his footmen go forward. "A minute ago a man pa.s.sed me on this road, his cloak was drawn about his face, his hat thrust down upon his ears, but the light of my torches flickered into his eyes, and I knew the man."

"It was doubtless my steward," I blurted out. "He was in Keswick to-day."

"Your steward?" he asked in wonderment "Your steward? No, I should not pester you with news about your steward. It was young Jervas Rookley."

"Well," said I, "what of him, my lord? I have nothing to fear from Jervas Rookley."

"You think that?"

"I know it," I answered, a trifle unsteadily. "At all events, there is solid reason why I should have no grounds for fear." For I bethought me that I had loyally kept faith with him.

Lord Derwent.w.a.ter stood for a moment silent.

"Walk a step with me," he said, and holding my arm he continued, "I would not meddle in your private concerns, Mr. Clavering, but I know Jervas Rookley, and it will be a very ill day for you when you hear his step across the threshold of Blackladies."

I felt a chill slip into my veins, for if he spoke truth and his words fitted so aptly with my suspicions that I could not disbelieve them--why, that day was long become irrevocable. However, I sought to laugh the matter off.

"A very ill day indeed, for on that day I lose Blackladies to the Crown."

"The danger will come from Jervas Rookley himself."

"Then it will be man to man."

We were now come within a few paces of the footmen, so that the flare of their torches lighted up our faces fitfully. My companion stopped.

"I have known men, Lawrence," he said, "who went down to their graves in the winter of their years--children--all the more lovable for that, maybe," for an instant his grip tightened about my arm, "but none the less children, and I have known others who were greybeards in their teens."

He paused and looked at me doubtfully, as though he would say more.

"You will be wary of this man. He can have little friendliness for you and it will be no common motive that can bring him back to these parts. You will be wary of him, Lawrence?"

So much I readily promised, and again he stood shifting from one foot to the other, balanced, uneasily, betwixt speech and silence. But all he said was, again--

"You will be wary of him, Lawrence," and so with a grasp of the hand moved off.

I watched him going, and as the torches dwindled to candle-flames and, from candle-flames to sparks, a great desire grew in me to run after him and disclose all that I knew of Jervas Rookley. The desire grew almost to a pa.s.sion. Had I spoken then, doubtless he would have spoken then, and so, much would have been saved me. But I had given my word to hold this estate in trust, and ignorance or the a.s.sumption of ignorance was the condition of my keeping it. The torches vanished in the darkness. I walked back to the inn and mounted my horse. As I rode out of the courtyard, I saw, far away down the street and close to the lake's edge, four stars, as it were, burning. There was still time. I turned my horse; but I had given my word, and I spurred him to a gallop up the Castle Hill and rode down Borrowdale to Blackladies.

CHAPTER VII.

A DISPUTE AND ITS CONSEQUENCES.

But as I rode, this warning I had received swelled in importance; it became magnified to a menace, and my desire to speak changed into an overmastering regret that I had not spoken. I had kept my word loyally to--well, to Ashlock, since so I still must term him, even in my thoughts--nay, was still keeping it the while he played false with me.

That he trusted me to keep it I was a.s.sured by the memory of his words and looks on that night when he had talked of my picture in the hall.

Why, then, should he play false? There was but one man who might be able to enlighten me upon the point--Lord Derwent.w.a.ter--and to that one man my lips were closed, I was, moreover, disturbed too by the knowledge that I had planned to travel to Grasmere on the following day, and be absent there until the night, thus leaving Rookley a free hand. It was late when I turned out of Borrowdale, but I noticed that there was a light still burning in the steward's office. I rode into the courtyard of the stables, and, leaving my horse there, walked to the front of the house. One or two of the attic windows still showed bright, and the ground floor was dimly lit. But somehow the house smote on me as strangely desolate and dark.

Luke Blacket was waiting to let me in, and whether it was that my strained fancies tricked me into discovering a mute hostility upon his face, but it broke in upon me with a full significance that all the servants, down to the lowest scullion, must be in the secret, and were leagued against me. I saw myself entering a trap, and so piercing a sense of loneliness invaded me, that I plumbed to the very bottom of despondency. I stood in the doorway gazing across the valley. The hills stood sentinel leaguering me about, the voices of innumerable freshets sounded chilly in my ears, as though their laughter had something of a heedless cruelty; my whole nature cried out for a companion, and with so urgent a demand that I bethought me of the light shining in the steward's office. It would be Aron without a doubt, sitting late over the books. I went down the pa.s.sage and opened the door.

Aron rose hastily to his feet, and began some apology.

"Mr. Ashlock," he said, "requested me----" But I cut him short, weary for one honest word of truth.

"That will do, Aron. I have no wish to disturb you;" and I threw myself on to a couch which was ranged against the wall. "I am very tired," said I, and lay with my eyes closed.

Aron's pen stopped scratching. He sat for a second without moving.

Then he came over to the couch, and, or ever I was aware of it, began pulling off my boots.

I opened my eyes and started up. In his old, worn face there was a look of friendliness which at that moment cheered me inexpressibly.

"Nay," said I, "you are too old a servant, Aron, to offer help of that kind, and I too young a master to accept it. Let it be!"

He straightened his back, and the friendliness increased upon his face. He glanced quickly about the room, and stepped softly to my side.

"Master Lawrence," he began, in much the tone a nurse may use to a child, and then, "sir, I mean, I beg your pardon." In a trice he was the formal, precise servant again.

"Nay," said I, "I know not but what I like the first t.i.tle the better."