Theodore Dane, with a lowering face and a savage gleam in his blue eyes, stood where he was, with bowed head, considering what the coming of Basil had cost him. He was greatly attracted to Patricia, not by love for her beauty or sweet nature, but because she possessed certain psychic powers which he wished to control. She could, as he now knew, go and return consciously, and that capability showed an advanced state of spiritual evolution. With such a messenger to send into the Unseen, since he could not go himself and Mara refused to obey him, he could accomplish great things. Had he been left alone with the girl, for a certain period, he might have managed to sap her will power and render her his slave. But the coming of Basil changed all that. Basil was young and handsome and ardent, and with a sailor's keen sense of beauty, would be certain to admire, and perhaps love, Patricia. If this was so, Basil certainly would prevent any more experiments being made, and Theodore's evil heart was filled with black rage at the unexpected thwarting of his aims.
"Curse him!" he muttered, alluding to his brother. "He always crosses my path and puts me wrong." And as he spoke he raised his head to survey the goodly heritage which assuredly Basil would gain in the end. "I shall not be driven from here," raged Theodore furiously. "I shall marry the girl and gain the property by getting Basil out of the way. But how is it to be done with safety to myself? I must think."
This meant that Theodore intended to draw to him certain evil counsellors, who, being supernatural, could guide him in the selfish way which he wished to take. And these powers, being evil, would be only too glad to minister to his wicked passions, since by doing so they secured more control of him, and could use him for their own accursed ends, to sow discord on the earth-plane. But Theodore, not being possessed of psychic powers, could not come directly into contact with these beings so malignant and strong. He was obliged to find a medium, and since Mara would not act in that capacity, and since Patricia was lost to him, or would be, through the influence of Basil, the man's thoughts turned to old Brenda Lee, the grandmother of Isa, to whom Harry Pentreddle was engaged. She was accredited with being a witch, and possessed powers which Theodore knew only too well to be real. He had made use of her before, for there was an evil bond between them, and he now intended to make use of her again. Pending a near visit to her and a consultation of those creatures he intended to summon to his assistance, Theodore smoothed his face to smiles and went in to dinner.
It was a very pleasant meal on this especial evening. Squire Colpster appeared to grow young in the cheery atmosphere of Basil's strong and virile youth. The sailor of twenty-five was so gay and bright, and talked in so interesting a manner of what he had seen and where he had been, that even the dreamy Mara was aroused to unexpected vivacity. And Theodore, with rage in his heart and smiles on his face, behaved so amiably and in such a truly brotherly fashion, that Basil and he were quite hand in glove before the time came to retire to rest. The younger brother, straight, honest-natured and kind-hearted, did not credit Theodore with crooked ways, although he knew that his relative was not so straight as he might be. But Basil, calling him internally a crank, set down his deviation from the normal to his secluded life and uncanny studies.
"You ought to go about the world more, Theo," he said at dinner. "It would do you a lot of good."
"Perhaps I may travel some day," said Mr. Dane, in a would-be genial manner. "Just now I have so much interesting work in hand that I don't want to move."
"Some of your cloudy schemes?"
"They are not so very cloudy, although you may think them to be so," said the elder brother significantly, and there was a look in his blue eyes which made Patricia move uneasily. The girl's instinct, let alone what she had seen when she recovered from her trance, showed her clearly how deadly was the enmity between these brothers. But it is only just to say that the dividing feeling was rather on the part of Theodore than on the part of Basil. The latter only mistrusted his brother as a slippery and unscrupulous man, who was to be avoided, but he did not seek to do him any injury. On the other hand, Theodore hated Basil with cold, calculating malignancy, and was on the watch--as Patricia by her sixth sense perceived--to hurt him in every possible way. But nothing of this was apparent to the eyes of Mr. Colpster as he sat at the head of the table, smiling at his newly-returned nephew.
"Tell me," said Mr. Colpster, when Mara and Patricia had retired to the drawing-room, and the three men were smoking comfortably over their coffee, "tell me exactly what happened about the emerald?"
"I can tell you nothing more than what I set forth in my letter," replied Basil, his frank face clouding over. "I went from Nagasaki to Kitzuki, when I arrived in Japan, and offered to buy the emerald. The priests laughed at me for daring to make such an offer, and then told me that the emerald had been stolen."