With Edged Tools

by Henry Seton Merriman

It would seem that that strange hollow energy of old age had laid its hand upon Sir John Meredith, for he was the first to appear in the breakfast-room the next morning. He went straight to the sideboard where the letters and newspapers lay in an orderly heap. It is a question whether he had not come down early on purpose to look for a letter. Perhaps he could not stay in his bed with the knowledge that the postman had called. He was possibly afraid to ask his old servant to go down and fetch his letters.

His bent and knotted hands fumbled among the correspondence, and suddenly his twitching lips were still. A strange stillness indeed overcame his whole face, turning it to stone. The letter was there; it had come, but it was not addressed to him.

Sir John Meredith took up the missive; he looked at the back, turned it, and examined the handwriting of his own son. There was a whole volume—filled with pride, and love, and unquenchable resolve—written on his face. He threw the letter down among its fellows, and his hand went fumbling weakly at his lips. He gazed, blinking his lashless lids, at the heap of letters, and the corner of another envelope presently arrested his attention. It was of the same paper, of the same shape and hue, as that addressed to Miss Chyne. Sir John drew a deep breath, and reached out his hand. The letter had come at last. At last, thank God! And how weakly ready he was to grasp at the olive branch held out to him across a continent!

He took the letter; he made a step with it towards the door, seeking solitude; then, as an afterthought, he looked at the superscription. It was addressed to the same person, Miss Chyne, but in a different handwriting—the handwriting of a man well educated but little used to wielding the pen.

“The other,” mumbled Sir John. “The other man, by God!”

And, with a smile that sat singularly on his withered face, he took up a newspaper and went towards the fireplace, where he sat stiffly in an armchair, taking an enormous interest in the morning's news. He read a single piece of news three times over, and a fourth time in a whisper, so as to rivet his attention upon it. He would not admit that he was worsted—would not humble his pride even before the ornaments on the mantelpiece.

Before Millicent came down, looking very fresh and pretty in her tweed dress, the butler had sorted the letters. There were only two upon her plate—the twin envelopes addressed by different hands. Sir John was talking with a certain laboured lightness to Lady Cantourne, when that lady's niece came into the room. He was watching keenly. There was a certain amount of interest in the question of those two envelopes, as to which she would open first. She looked at each in turn, glanced furtively towards Sir John, made a suitable reply to some remark addressed to her by the baron, and tore open Jack's envelope. There was a gravity—a concentrated gravity—about her lips as she unfolded the thin paper; and Sir John, who knew the world and the little all-important trifles thereof, gave an impatient sigh. It is the little trifle that betrays the man, and not the larger issues of life in which we usually follow precedent. It was that passing gravity (of the lips only) that told Sir John more about Millicent Chyne than she herself knew, and what he had learnt did not seem to be to his liking.

There is nothing so disquieting as the unknown motive, which disquietude was Sir John's soon after breakfast. The other men dispersed to put on gaiters and cartridge-bags, and the old aristocrat took his newspaper on to the terrace.

Millicent followed him almost at once.

“Sir John,” she said, “I have had a letter from Africa.”