The Honour of the Clintons

by Archibald Marshall

CHAPTER I

THE SQUIRE CONFRONTED

The lilacs in the station-yard at Kencote were blossoming again. Again the train crawled over the sun-dappled meadows, and Joan was on the platform to meet it. This time it was Humphrey who got out of it.

"Hullo!" she said brightly. "They've sent the luggage-cart. I thought you'd like to walk."

He had hardly smiled when she greeted him, and now frowned. "I wanted to see the Governor," he said. "However, it won't take long to walk. Come along."

"How's Susan?" Joan asked as they set out.

"All right," said Humphrey shortly. "She's gone to her people."

He cleared the preoccupation from his face, and looked at his sister. "You look blooming," he said. "Do you miss Nancy?"

"Yes, awfully," she said, "but I'm going to stay with them the moment they get back. I hear from her every day. They're having a gorgeous time. They are going to take me abroad with them next year. I shall love it."

"I've got a piece of news for you," said Humphrey after a pause. "Bobby Trench is engaged to be married."

A flush crept over her face and died away again before she said, "That's rather sudden, isn't it? Who is he going to marry?"

"Lady Bertha Willersley. Can't say I admire his taste much. She's amusing enough for a time, but I should think she'd tire you to death if you had too much of her. She can't be much younger than he is, either. She's been about almost ever since I can remember."

"Oh, well," said Joan, with an embarrassed laugh, "it shows I was right."

"I'm not sure that it doesn't," Humphrey admitted. "Bobby has always been a friend of mine, and I like him well enough; but he is rather a rotter. I think you're pretty well out of it, Joan."

"I'm sure I am," she said. "But you didn't say so at the time."

"Poor old girl," he said. "We gave you rather a bad time, didn't we? But you did lead him on a bit, didn't you?"

"I didn't," said Joan indignantly. "I always said I wouldn't have him."

"Well, he told me himself that you would have said 'yes' one evening if somebody hadn't come in."

She was silent.

"It's true then?" he said, with a glance at her.

"Oh, I don't know. I might have done, but I should have been very sorry for it afterwards."

"You'd have had a topping good time."

"I suppose that is what tempted me, just a little. But it would be horrid to marry for that."

"What made you change? He was most awfully in love with you, to do him justice, though he seems to have got over it pretty quickly."

"Yes, he did seem to be. But it shows how little it was worth. It wasn't the sort of way John was in love with Nancy."

"It was when Nancy fixed up her little affair that you sent Bobby about his business."

"Yes. Don't let's talk about it any more. I'm sick of Bobby Trench."

"Governor been at you about him?"

"He has never forgiven me. Perhaps he will now. But I know mother was glad, so I don't much care."

"How is the Governor?" asked Humphrey, rather gloomily. "Fairly amiable?"

"Fairly. I think he misses Nancy; but of course he is glad she married John. He is so well off."

Humphrey took no notice of this shaft. He hardly spoke again until they reached the house, when he went straight into his father's room.

"Well, my boy," said the Squire. "What good wind blows you here? I thought you were moving down to Hampshire this week."

"The house isn't quite ready yet. Susan has gone to her people. I thought I'd run down. And—I've got something to talk to you about."

"Yes, well!" The Squire was a little suspicious. He didn't want to part with any money for the moment.

"What have you decided about Gotch? Clark is leaving us, and wants things settled. She doesn't want to find another place. She wants to get married."

"Well, then, let her get married," said the Squire, with some show of heat. "It's nothing to do with me. Let Gotch marry her, and find a place to take her to, if he can. I've no room for another married keeper here, as I've filled up the place that Mr. Gotch saw fit to refuse."

"Yes, I know," said Humphrey. "But look here, father, can't you forget that now, and do what he wants? He did me a jolly good turn, you know. I might have been killed, or injured for life, if it hadn't been for him."

"I know all that, and I was ready to make him the most handsome reward for what he did. He saw fit to refuse it, as I think in the most ungrateful way, and there's an end. I kept the offer open for a month. I did everything that could be expected of me, and a good deal more. I've washed my hands of Mr. Gotch altogether."

"I don't think he's ungrateful. But he has this exceptionally good offer in Canada, if he can put down a few hundred pounds, and——"

"Then let him put down his few hundred pounds. I've no objection."

"He hasn't got it, you know," said Humphrey, with weary patience. "He and Clark have both got a bit, but not enough, and I can't do anything for them at the moment. Denny Croft has cost a lot more than I thought it would to put right, and I haven't got a bob to spare."

"Now, look here, Humphrey. I'm not going to do it, and that's flat. Apart altogether from the fact that I don't think Gotch has behaved well, and I feel myself relieved of all obligation to him now, I object to this emptying of the country that's going on. As long as there are places in England for men like Gotch, I say it's their duty to stay by the old country. Supposing every keeper and farm-hand and so on on this place took it into his head to go off to Canada, where should we be, I should like to know? It's the duty of the people on the land to stick together, or the whole basis of society goes. I stick here and do my duty in my sphere; I don't want to go rushing off to Canada; and I expect others in their sphere to do the same. It's quite certain I'm not going to put down money to help them to run away from their duty. So let's have no more talk about it."

Humphrey did not seem to have been listening very closely to this speech. He did not reply to it.

"Something very disagreeable has happened," he said. "I don't want to tell you the details of it. But it is important that Clark should be got out of the country as soon as possible."

The Squire stared at him, and marked for the first time his serious face. "What do you mean?" he asked. "What has happened?"

"I don't want to tell you more than this, that Clark has it in her power to make mischief. I hope you won't ask any more, but will take my word for it; it's very serious mischief. It's she who wants to go to Canada. I think if Gotch had been left to himself he would have accepted your offer; and I know he is upset at the way you have taken his refusal. Do, for God's sake, let him have what he wants, and take her off, or I don't know what won't happen."

His ordinary level speech had become agitated, but he returned to himself again as he said quietly, "I've said more than I meant to. Take it from me that I'm not exaggerating, and do what I ask, for your own sake as well as mine."

A stormy gleam of light had broken over the Squire's puzzled features. "Do you mean to tell me that you're in disgrace—with this woman?" he asked.

Humphrey looked at him, and then laughed, without amusement. "Oh, it's nothing like that," he said. "But disgrace—yes. It will amount to that for all of us. Mud will stick, and she's prepared to throw it. She has said nothing to Gotch, and has promised not to. She'll say nothing to anybody, if we lend Gotch the money. That's all he wants, you know. He'll pay it back when he's made his way. We must lend him three hundred pounds. He's a steady man and safe. I'd give it him, if I had it. It's the greatest luck in the world that we can close her mouth in that way. Oh, you must do it, father."

He had become agitated again; and it was the rarest thing for him to show agitation.

The Squire was impressed. "I don't say I won't," he said; "but you must show me some cause, Humphrey. I don't understand it yet. And anyhow, I'm not going to pay blackmail, you know. What's the story this woman has got hold of—if you've done nothing, as you say?"

"No, I've done nothing. I don't want to tell you her story, father; and it will do you no good to hear it. Besides, it simply must be kept from getting out. You tell a thing in confidence to one person, and they tell it in confidence to another; and it's public property and the mischief done before you know where you are."

"I shan't tell a soul."

"Can't you just trust me, and think no more about it?"

"No, I can't, Humphrey. You must tell me what it's all about. I can't act in the dark."

Humphrey sat silent, looking on the ground, while the Squire, with a troubled look on his face, waited for him to speak.

He looked up. "Will you promise me definitely that you'll keep it absolutely to yourself?" he asked. "Mother mustn't know, or Dick, or anybody."

"Why not? Neither of them would breathe a word."

"I won't tell it to more than one person. If you won't promise to keep it sacred and give nobody a hint that might put them on the scent, I'll tell somebody else. I must tell somebody, and get advice, as well as money."

"I don't keep things from Dick," said the Squire slowly, "and very seldom from your mother. I'm not a man who likes hugging a secret. If I give you this promise it will be a weight on me. But I'll do it if you assure me that there is some special reason why neither of those two shall be told. I think they ought to be, if it's a question of disgrace, and a way of averting it. I shouldn't like to trust myself to give you the right advice, without consulting them—or at any rate, Dick."

Humphrey considered again. "No, I won't risk it," he said. "Yes; there is a special reason. It is not to be a matter of consultation, except between you and me."

"Very well," said the Squire unwillingly, "I will tell nobody."

"Not even if they see something is wrong, and press you?"

"You have my word, Humphrey," said the Squire simply.

Humphrey wrung his hands together nervously. "Oh, it's a miserable story," he said. "Clark accuses Susan of stealing that necklace from Brummels."

"What!" exclaimed the Squire, horrified.

"She's prepared to swear to it, and says she will go and lay information, unless we do what they want—help Gotch to settle in Canada."

The Squire sprang from his seat and strode the length of the room. His face was terrific as he turned and stood before Humphrey. "But that's the most scandalous case of blackmail I ever heard of," he said. "You mean to say you are prepared to give in to that! And expect me to help you! You ought to be ashamed of asking such a thing, Humphrey. And to extract a promise from me to keep that to myself! What can you be thinking of? I've not much difficulty in advising you if that's the sort of trouble you're in. Send for a policeman, and have the woman locked up at once. The brazen insolence of it! Let the whole world know of it, if they want to, I say. Your honour can't stand much if that sort of mud is going to stain it. It's your positive duty. I can't think what you can have been thinking of not to do it at once. To give in to the woman! Why, it's shameful, Humphrey! Disgrace! That's where the disgrace is."

Humphrey had sat silent under this exordium, his head bent and his eyes on the ground. He said no word when his father had finished.

A half-frightened look came over the Squire's face. "You've allowed this woman to impose upon you," he said in a quieter voice. "You've lost your head, my boy. Take hold of yourself, and fling the lie back in her face. Punish her for it."

There was another pause before Humphrey said, raising his head, but not his eyes: "It isn't a lie. It's the truth. Oh, my God!"

His frame was shaken by a great sob. He leant forward and buried his face in his hands.

The Squire sat down heavily in his chair. He picked up a paper-knife from the writing-table and balanced it in his hand. For a moment his face was devoid of all expression. Then he turned round to his son and said in a firm voice: "You say Susan did steal them? Are you sure of that? Joan as good as saw that Mrs. Amberley take them. Yes, and it was proved that she sold them, at her trial! Aren't you allowing this woman to bluff you, Humphrey?"

His voice had taken a note of confidence. Humphrey sat up, his face white and hard.

"Mrs. Amberley's selling pearls was a coincidence—unlucky for her," he said. "We know where she got them from. The story they wouldn't listen to was true."

"But Joan!—seeing her at the very cupboard itself!"

"She may have wanted to steal them. She did steal the diamond star."

The Squire drooped. "Still, it may be bluff," he said weakly. "How did Clark know of it?"

"Oh, don't turn the knife round, father," said Humphrey. "It isn't Clark; it's Susan. She told me herself."

"She told you she was a thief!" The Squire's voice had changed, and was harder.

"Yes. It's a wretched story. Don't make it harder for me to tell."

The control in which he had held himself, coming down in the train, walking from the station with Joan, and first addressing his father, was gone. He spoke as if he were broken, but in a hard, monotonous voice.

The Squire's face softened. "Go on, my boy," he said. "Tell me everything. I'll help you if I can."

"I taxed her with it. She's frightened to death. I could only get at it by degrees; and there are some things I don't understand now. I shall clear them up when she's better. She's ill now, and I don't wonder at it."

"Where is she?"

"With her mother. She doesn't know anything. She thinks we've had a row."

"Well, tell me."

"I was a fool not to suspect what was going on. She was head over ears in debt. What she must have been spending on clothes it frightens me to think of. She told me that she had got somebody to make them for almost nothing, but I might have known that was nonsense, if I'd thought about it at all. I remember now some woman or other laughing at me when I told her she dressed herself on two hundred a year. 'I suppose you mean two thousand,' she said, and I should think it couldn't have been much less than that. She had things put away that I'd never seen. She didn't disclose half what she owed when you helped us two years ago. Then she'd been playing Bridge with a lot of harpies—Auction—at sixpenny points—and she's no more head for it than an infant in arms."

"Sixpenny points!" repeated the Squire.

"Well, it means she could easily lose forty or fifty pounds in an afternoon, and probably did, often enough. She had to find ready money for that. I haven't got at it all yet, but when we went down to Brummels she didn't know which way to turn, and was desperate—ready to do anything. I know there was a—— No, I can't tell you that; and it doesn't matter. I'm not sure it isn't as well for her, and for me, that she did get the money in the way she did."

The Squire's face was very grave. "You know, Humphrey, if she has deceived you, and is capable of this horrible theft, you ought to satisfy yourself——"

Humphrey broke down again, but recovered himself quickly. "Thank God, I know everything," he said. "Everything that matters. She was terrified. She turned to me. There's nothing between us. It's all partly my fault. I'd been in debt myself, and hadn't helped her to keep straight. And we'd had rows, and she was afraid to tell me things."

"Go on, my dear boy," said the Squire very kindly.

"It's soon told. She heard Lady Sedbergh and Mrs. Amberley talking about the hiding-place."

"Was she in the room?"

"She was just outside. The door was open."

"She listened?"

"Yes. She stayed outside, and listened. They went out by another door, and she went into the room at once and took the necklace. She pawned pearls here and there, going out in the evening, veiled, but in a foolish, reckless way. I can't conceive why something didn't come out at the trial. It was she who gave Rachel Amberley's name at that place in the city. She's about the same height. But imagine the folly of it! She says that it 'came over her' to do it, and she only did it that once. She seems to have made up names at the other places."

"Did she get rid of all the pearls?"

"That's what I can't make out yet. She got enough money to pay up everything; but not more. She can't say how much, but it can't possibly have been what the pearls were worth. Perhaps she let some of them go at an absurd value, which would be a reason for those who had got them to lie low. I couldn't get at everything; there was so much that I had to ask about; and she wasn't in a state—— Oh, she'd have been capable of any folly—even throwing some of them away, if she got frightened. We've been dancing on gunpowder. Clark knew all along; or almost from the first."

"Did she help her?"

"Oh no. She was fond of her; she was the daughter of one of their gardeners."

"Are you sure she didn't help her? What do you mean—she was fond of her?"

"I mean that she might have given her away."

"She knew at the time of the trial?"

"Yes."

"Did she threaten Susan, then?"

"No. I think she never meant to do anything at all. Susan had given her a lot of things. She was in with her to that extent—knew about her dressmaking bills. And she wanted to marry Gotch, and Gotch is loyal to us. She didn't want to make trouble. It was only Gotch being kept hanging on about Canada that put it into her head that she had a weapon."

"But you say she threatened you. She must be a bad woman."

"Well, I put her back up. She came to me and said she wanted something done at once, and hinted that she knew things. I was angry at being pressed in that way, and made her speak out. I believe, at first, she thought I was in it; or she wouldn't have come to me in the way she did. I soon disabused her of that idea, if she really held it, and I was furious. I thought it was blackmail, as you did. I threatened to have her up. That scandalised her, and she convinced me that she was telling the truth. She told me to go and ask Susan, if I didn't believe her. It was then, when she had burnt her boats, that she threatened."

"Well—however you look at it—it is blackmail. She's ready to compound a felony. And we are asked to do the same. Humphrey, this is a terrible story. It's the blackest day I've ever known. I don't think I've quite taken it all in yet. Susan a thief! All that we've said and thought about that other woman—and justly too, if she'd been guilty—applies to—to one of ourselves—to a Clinton. I feel stunned by it. I don't know what to say or do."

His face was grey. His very tranquillity showed how deeply he had been hit.

"What we have to do," said Humphrey, "is to avert the disgrace to our name. Fortunately that can be done. It isn't blackmail; Clark never thought of it in that light, or she would have moved long ago. She thought we were not treating Gotch well in refusing him what he asked, after what he had done, and the promises we had made him. He'll never know anything about it. Have him in and tell him that you will lend him the money he wants. That cuts the whole horrible knot."

The Squire made no answer to this. "She is more guilty than the other woman," he went on, as if Humphrey had not spoken. "She stood by and saw an innocent woman suffer. Humphrey, it was very base."

"Mrs. Amberley wasn't innocent," said Humphrey. "She went to steal the necklace, and found it gone. She did steal the star, and that was what she was punished for. Her punishment was deserved. Besides, it's over now. You know that she was let out. She has gone to America. We shall never hear of her over here again."

"It's a very terrible story," said the Squire again. "I don't know what's to be done. I'm all at sea. I must—— Humphrey, why did you make me promise to keep this a secret? Dick ought to be told. He's got a cooler head than I have."

"Dick shall not be told," said Humphrey, almost with violence. "Nor anyone else. We've got to settle this between ourselves. Nobody must suspect anything, and nobody must be put in the position of treating Susan so that others will be tempted to talk about it. If she came down here, and there were two besides you—and me—who knew what she had done, it would be an impossible position. I've made up my mind absolutely about that, and you gave me your word."

"Susan down here!" repeated the Squire, in a tone that made Humphrey wince.

"You won't be asked to have more to do with her than is necessary to keep away all suspicion," he said. "It isn't Susan you have to think of—that's my business—it's yourself, and the whole lot of us. The scandal doesn't bear thinking of if it comes out. Think what it would mean. Think of all you said yourself about Mrs. Amberley. Think of the whole country saying that about one of us; and saying much more, because of what you said—of her keeping quiet about it. Oh, I'm not trying to defend her—but think of the ghastly disgrace. We should never hold up our heads again. Think of the dock for her—and prison! Father, you must put an end to it. Thank God it can be done, without touching your honour."

The knife had gone right home. The Squire sprang up from his chair and strode down the room again. "My honour!" he cried. "Oh, Humphrey, what honour is left to us after this?"

"Susan is sorry," Humphrey went on quickly. "Bitterly sorry. She has been quite different lately. She had a terrible shock. She is spending next to nothing now, and——"

"Oh!" The Squire glared at him, looking more like himself than he had done since Humphrey's disclosure. "She paid her debts out of stolen money. Yes, she was different, when she thought the danger had been removed, and that other woman was safe in prison. She was gay and light-hearted when she came here at Christmas, with that—that crime on her conscience. You say that as if it was to her credit!"

"I don't!" said Humphrey sullenly. "But she is sorry now. She's punished. It isn't for us to punish her again; and punish ourselves. It's too ghastly to think about. Oh, what's the use of going on talking about it, father, while the risk is still hanging over us? Let me send a wire to Clark; or let Gotch do it, this evening. Then we can breathe freely, and talk about all the rest later."

The Squire took another turn down the room. "I won't be hurried into anything," he said with some indignation. "I won't think of what may happen until I've made up my mind, in case I should do something wrong, out of fear. Oh, why can't you let me call in Dick?"

"I won't. And you've got to think of what will happen. The name of Clinton horribly disgraced—held up to the most public scorn—not a corner to hide yourself in. It will last all your lifetime, and mine too, and go on to your grandchildren. You will never know another happy moment. The stain will never come out; it will stick to every one of us."

"Oh, that's enough," said the Squire, seating himself again.

He turned sharply round again. "What do you want me to do?" he asked angrily.

"Send for Gotch—send for him now this moment—and tell him that you have changed your mind. You will arrange to let him have the money he has asked for, and he can go off as soon as he likes."

"I'm to say I've changed my mind?"

"Yes, of course. You don't want to set him wondering."

"Then he will let this woman, Clark, know——" He began to speak more slowly.

"Yes. I shall go back to-morrow morning and see her. I shall have a hold over her, and she will certainly keep quiet, for her own sake."

"She will be liable to prosecution if the truth becomes known from any other source."

"It won't be. She is the only person who knows anything."

"And I shall have compounded a felony too, if it becomes known."

"No. That isn't so. You will have nothing to do with her at all. You will never see her."

"That's true. But she will know why I pay this money."

"Not necessarily. No, she needn't know. I shall tell her I persuaded you. She doesn't know you were so definitely against it. She thinks it was just hanging fire."

The Squire rose from his seat, and went to the empty fireplace, where he took his stand, facing his son.

He looked at him steadily, and said in a quiet but firm voice, "I won't do it, Humphrey."