CHAPTER VII.—REGINALD’S STORY.
‘My father,’ said the lieutenant, ‘was a gentleman of great property, and a close friendship existed between him and the brother of his wife—Sir Carnaby, to wit. They became mixed up with a discontented body of people named Jacobites; and a short time before the unhappy affair which we have been talking about, two warrants were issued for their apprehension. My father was seized at once; but Sir Carnaby Vincent contrived to make his escape for a time, till at length he closed his flight at this place. You know what happened when he and his servant arrived here; they were surprised by a party of military, who had received notice of their movements; and my uncle was shot dead. His attendant fortunately escaped, and returned, after a short time had elapsed, to our family with the sad news. The proceedings against my father, Sir Henry Ainslie, were suspended through want of sufficient evidence, and he was allowed to come back to his home, only to die shortly afterwards, broken both in spirits and in circumstances. Before his death, he made an appalling disclosure to my mother, the sum of it being this—that, trusting to the ultimate success of the revolution which he had been hoping to raise, both he and Sir Carnaby had heavily mortgaged their estates, and placed all their available money at the service of the king that was to be. Where this large amount had been placed, or to whom it had been intrusted, it is now impossible to say, for my father breathed his last ere he could impart any additional information. The consequences of this act proved most disastrous. Our mansion and estates were immediately seized upon; and beyond a small income which my mother possessed in her own right, we were left with scarcely any means of support. From the scanty information we could gather from Sir Carnaby’s attendant, it was considered not at all improbable that the disposal of this wealth had been intrusted to his master; and subsequent inquiries proved that he had actually taken with him in his flight a number of valuable papers and documents. What these papers referred to, it is equally impossible to say; but there has always existed among us a strong impression that they related to the immense sum which had been advanced upon the family estates.’
‘Well, sir,’ exclaimed old Hobb, when the narrative had arrived at this stage, ‘you don’t suppose that the gentleman brought all that lump of money here?’
‘Not the money exactly,’ answered Reginald, smiling. ‘I don’t credit my plotting relative with being such a fool as to carry that about with him.’
‘The soldiers found but little in them saddle-bags, an’ he brought nought else with him; I can swear to that,’ said Dipping obstinately.
‘My good man,’ returned Ainslie, ‘the documents I refer to might have been carried about his person.’
‘Nothin’ was found on the body when it was searched, before being buried; I remember that right enough, sir,’ persisted old Hobb.
‘That is the very point I wished to come to,’ said the lieutenant triumphantly. ‘You are sure that no papers of any kind were discovered on his person?’
‘Quite sure, sir,’ replied Dipping emphatically.
‘Then just listen to what I have to say,’ continued Reginald, speaking in an impressive voice and fixing his eyes upon the landlord’s countenance. ‘The man-servant who accompanied Sir Carnaby to this place swears that his master corresponded with no single person during his flight; moreover, that he handled the saddle-bags you have just now been speaking of, several times, and remembers to have noticed that one of them contained a small black box.’
The wondering expression on old Hobb’s face had considerably increased by this time.
‘We have now got to a critical point in my story,’ continued the lieutenant. ‘Derrick—the man who accompanied Sir Carnaby hither—told me he was the first to hear the sound of the approaching military, and that, being apprehensive of danger, he stole along the gallery with the intention of waking his master. When Sir Carnaby opened the door of his room, the man was surprised to find him fully dressed. Hurried as their conference must have been, Derrick was sharp enough to notice that his master had been using some sort of a knife, and that the black box which he had before seen that night on the table, had now disappeared, and that the saddle-bags were empty. However, all persuasion could not induce my unfortunate relative to flee, which in itself appears to be very strange. He told his attendant that he would follow him if he would take the horses to the place agreed upon—that more lives than his own depended upon his not leaving the place at once, and several other things equally incomprehensible. Derrick at last unwillingly consented to obey his instructions, and left the house, wondering much at his master’s conduct. The two, as you know, never met again.—This man,’ resumed Ainslie, after a pause—‘this man, Derrick, always expressed a belief—a strange one, truly—that Sir Carnaby was so anxious for the safety of the contents of that precious saddle-bag, that he would not retire to rest until he had placed it in a secure hiding-place. He might possibly have just been concluding his task as the attendant arrived at his door with the alarming news; at any rate, it seems not at all unlikely that his object in sending the man to a rendezvous was in order to gain time, while he made a desperate attempt to unearth again this mysterious box prior to escaping from the inn with it. Or, it is quite possible that my uncle, being startled by the report of firearms, resolved to let this precious property, which would implicate so many persons, remain in its place of concealment, trusting, in the event of his escape, to return and secure it once more.’
‘Do you mean to say that the gentleman hid it in this very house?’ gasped the landlord, with considerable astonishment depicted on his countenance.
‘That is what I think.’
‘Well, well!’ exclaimed the old man, ‘to think that I should ha’ slept an’ eaten an’ drunk within them blessed walls for fifteen year, with—who knows—half a million of property hidden about the place unbeknown to me! Suppose there had been a fire, sir.’
‘It is fortunate there has not been one,’ replied Reginald.
‘Am I to understand that you wish to search the house?’ inquired old Hobb, whose imagination was fired with a variety of wild speculations, among which the probable discovery of a strong case of bullion figured not the least conspicuously.
‘The whole house!—certainly not,’ answered Reginald with a faint smile. ‘I am afraid that would waste too much valuable time. What I want first is a bed for the night.’
‘There’s the room which Sir Carnaby himself had: your honour wouldn’t have no objection to that?’
‘Certainly not,’ said Ainslie. ‘The knowledge that the room has some unpleasant circumstances connected with it will not affect me in the least. I shall sleep as soundly in that apartment as in any other.’
‘Very good, sir.’ And mine host was about to leave the apartment, when his visitor arrested him. ‘One word more, Mr Dipping.’
‘Certainly, sir.’
‘I have placed complete confidence in you,’ said Ainslie, ‘and have intrusted to your keeping a secret, the importance of which you must be well aware of. I wish you to guard it carefully. You have kept that secret fairly enough,’ pointing to the scrap of writing; ‘try if you cannot keep this one too.—Do you understand?’
The landlord intimated that he would do as his visitor wished, and then departed, leaving Reginald to digest such thoughts as this conversation had called up.
The twilight was by this time gray, and very little light remained, while a few solitary objects that could be seen through the dimmed glass in the old casements, looked shadowy and opaque. With the exception of one small lamp, which Hobb Dipping had placed upon the table, the room was but imperfectly lighted by the flickering fire. Outside, the snow was silently falling, not thickly, but in large steady flakes. The wind had dropped, and with it the whirling drift, while the old walls of the Saxonford Arms had ceased to groan and creak.
‘Sir,’ said Hobb, reappearing once more, ‘the room’s ready. Shall I show you the way?’
Reginald motioned to the landlord to lead on, and they passed out together into a dark draughty passage.
‘This here’s the staircase, sir,’ remarked old Dipping, who was in advance, bearing the light; ‘and that be the very place where the poor gentleman fell.’
The landing before them was lighted by a gray ghostly window, which faded into insignificance on the approach of the landlord’s yellow, flaring lamp. When this apparition was passed, there came three shallow steps up, then a short dusky gallery, and Reginald Ainslie found himself in the room with which his departed relative had had so mysterious a connection.
‘This, sir,’ said old Hobb, extending his right hand somewhat after the manner of a travelling showman—‘this, sir, is Sir Carnaby’s room.’
‘Well, landlord,’ said Reginald, ‘I think I need detain you no longer.’
Bidding mine host good-night, Ainslie carefully fastened the door, and then sat down before the fire, to ponder over his strange situation, ere consigning himself to rest for the night.