Basil and Annette: A Novel

by B. L. Farjeon

"Good luck, mate!" was the farewell greeting of a number of friends; Basil did not know until now that he had so many. He waved his hand to them, and was gone. But he had not travelled two miles before he heard the sound of a horse's hoofs galloping after him. He turned and saw Mr. Majoribanks.

"It just occurred to me," said the Goldfields' Warden, "that the name of the money-lender I met in Paris, through whom I became acquainted with your namesake, might be useful."

"It is very thoughtful of you," said Basil, "it ought to have occurred to me."

"I know no more about him than I have already told you," said Mr. Majoribanks, "and I am not acquainted with his address, but I believe he lives in London. His name real or assumed--for some of his fraternity trade under false names--is Edward Kettlewell."

"Thank you," said Basil; "I shall remember it."

Mr. Majoribanks kept with him for another mile, and then galloped back to the township. The steamer in which Basil took his passage home started punctually to the hour, and bore Basil from the land in which he had met with so many sweet and bitter experiences; on the forty-fifth day from that of his departure he set foot once more in England.

[CHAPTER XXVIII.]

For cogent reasons Basil had travelled home third-class. It economised his funds--of which he felt the necessity--and it enabled him the better to carry out his wish of not making friends on board. The task upon which he was engaged rendered it advisable that as little curiosity as possible should be aroused respecting himself and his personal history. That he should have to work to some extent in secresy was not congenial to his nature, but by so doing he would have a better chance of success. Until he came face to face with Newman Chaytor it was as well that his operations should be so conducted as not to put his treacherous comrade on his guard.

He had ample time on board ship to review the events of the past few years, and although he found himself wandering through labyrinths of extreme perplexity as to the doings of Newman Chaytor, the conclusion was forced upon him that his false friend had practised towards him a systematic course of treachery and deceit. He had read accounts of men returning home from distant lands for the express purpose of personating others to whom they bore some close personal resemblance, and one famous case presented itself in which such a plot was only exposed by the wonderful skill of the agents employed to frustrate it. There, as in his own case, a large fortune hung upon the issue, but Newman Chaytor had been more successful than the impostor who had schemed to step into the enjoyment of a great estate. Chaytor had obtained possession of the fortune, and was now enjoying the fruits of his nefarious plot. But Basil's information was so imperfect that he was necessarily completely in the dark as to the precise means by which Newman Chaytor had brought his scheming to this successful stage. He knew nothing whatever of the correspondence which Chaytor had carried on with his uncle and Annette. Determined as he was to spare no efforts to unmask the villain, such a knowledge would have spurred him on with indignant fierceness. To recover his fortune, if it were possible to do so, was the lesser incentive; far more important was it, in his estimation, that Annette should be saved from the snare which had been prepared for her.

It was with strange sensations that he walked once more through familiar thoroughfares, and noted that nothing was changed but himself. Since last he trod them he had learnt some of life's saddest lessons; but hope, and faith, and love remained to keep his spirit young. It was no light matter that he had been awakened from the dull lethargy of life into which he had fallen in the earlier days of Princetown; that his faith in human nature had been restored; that he had won affection and esteem from strangers who even now, though the broad seas divided them, had none but kindly thoughts of him. Foul as was the plot of which he was the victim, he had cause to be deeply grateful.