Of course he knew his job well. Hadn't the Squire taken a pride ever since he had been the smallest of small boys in initiating him into it? Hadn't he seen to it that if he learned nothing else during his long and expensive school and university education, he should learn all that could be learnt about the land and the intricacies of estate management? And hadn't he rejoiced in seeing him take kindly to it ever since? He had been quite content to spend the greater part of his leave at home, often working as hard as if he were a paid agent, even taking papers up to London, working at them there, and writing long letters. He had not been content to take a general interest in the property to which he was one day to succeed, riding or walking about the place and leaving details to the agent and the estate staff. Why, it had been possible, ten years before, when the old agent had been superannuated, to dispense with one altogether for six months, nobody suitable having come forward; and the present one, Mr. Haydon, was hardly more than a bailiff. And more convincingly still, lately, had the Squire discovered that Dick knew his job. He thought he knew it himself, but he had been lost without him, and if Dick continued to keep away from Kencote, he would have to make new arrangements altogether, and get some one in the place of Mr. Haydon to help him.
And now all Dick's knowledge and experience were to be used to thwart him. It would no longer be available for the benefit of Kencote. That was bad enough in itself, but it was far worse to know that it had made Dick independent of him and himself powerless. For the first time in this unhappy business he felt an impulse of pure anger against his son. Hitherto he had been grieved about him, and only angry against others. Now, as these thoughts passed through his mind, he broke out, "That's the most disgraceful thing I've heard of yet. Going to throw the whole place over, is he, and leave me to do the best I can, while he goes and takes service under somebody else? Very well, then. If he is going to throw Kencote over, Kencote will throw him over. I've had as much as I can stand. Now I'll act, and act in a way that will surprise him."
Walter looked up in alarmed surprise. He thought he knew his father, and exactly how far he would go. He had known in discussing matters with Dick that he would make a fuss, and go on making it, until things were accomplished which would make it useless for him to fuss any further. But he had always taken it for granted that Dick had the cards in his hand, and that in the long run he must win the game. But this looked as if they had both miscalculated Dick's hand, and that a trump they had thought to be in his possession was really in his father's.
"What do you mean?" he asked.
"I mean," said the Squire boldly, "that if Dick persists in the course he is taking, I shall make a new will, and I shan't leave him a penny or an acre of land beyond what he gets under the entail."
This was plain enough, but Walter could scarcely believe his ears as he heard it, so entirely subversive was it of all ideas in which he had been brought up. He had never bothered himself much about money. He knew that he would have something by and by, something probably more substantial than the average younger son's portion, that there was, indeed, plenty of money for all of them. But he had taken it for granted, in the same way that he took the daily rise of the sun for granted, that the bulk of it would go with the place—go, that is, to Dick. And, knowing his father as he did, and the principles that guided him, he could not, even now, believe that he really meant to act in a way so destructive of all Kencote ideals as he had indicated.
"Surely you're not going to break the place up!" he said.
"If Dick doesn't come to his senses that's what I will do," said the Squire. "And if I once do it I shan't alter it. I shall have the will prepared, and the day Dick marries this woman I shall sign it. You can tell him that. I'll have nothing more to do with him, directly. He has behaved disgracefully to me, never sending a line for over a month, and letting me know his plans through you. Now you can tell him mine, and you can tell him I'm in earnest." He marched out of the room without further words, leaving Walter with the feeling of a man who has just passed through an earthquake.
Late that night when everybody had gone up to bed Walter went into Humphrey's room. They had not had a chance of speaking together before. He told him of what had happened, of what Dick had told him at Melbury Park, and the Squire that evening downstairs.
Humphrey received the news in silence, and with mixed sensations. "I didn't know Dick had been with you," he said presently.