How bitterly and unwillingly, again and again, he anathematised the hour, in which that—to him—fatal packet was so inopportunely discovered by John Balderstone, and its blighting contents brought to light!
Had it only, by fate, been left forgotten, unknown in its place of concealment, for a year or so more, all might have gone well with him; but now—now—he could only curse heavily and grind his teeth in the impotency of his wrath and the deep bitterness of his disappointment.
'All the world's a stage, and the men and women only players;' but he who had played the deliberate villain in the drama of Cecil's life as yet, was still unmasked, and Hew grinned with malicious triumph as he thought of that.
The generous Sir Piers felt that he owed Hew some reparation for the loss of his Indian appointment, and the heavy blight that had fallen on all the prospects once before him; and he hoped that if Hew would only settle down to work and study, that something—he knew not precisely what—might be done for him yet; but Hew, exasperated by the trick fortune had played him, and the humiliating change in his position, had taken heavily to the bottle of late, and his naturally savage nature became at times inflamed to the verge of madness.
Mary was inevitably lost to him now; and that which he deemed much more important—her money! But if Cecil could be removed—crushed—destroyed—thrust out of his path and of this life too—he, Hew, would again be the heir of entail—heir to Eaglescraig and the baronetcy.
But where was Cecil now?
Could he but discover him—could he but cross his path, he would not be over particular about how he got rid of him; and at such times dark and terrible thoughts possessed him.
To drown care, and as a source of excitement, he had plunged deeper into his dissipations; he had become a more frequent visitor at race-courses, where a very little of his own money went into the pockets of others, while a good deal of the money of others accrued to him, by some mysterious process. He also stuck to his card playing—écarté being, as of old, his favourite game; and unless each rubber thereat represented a sum larger than he deemed sufficient to give zest to the game, even écarté had no charms for him.
Some of his escapades drew upon him the indignation of the general, and feeling himself all but discarded, his absences from Eaglescraig became longer and more frequent; so that none there knew precisely of his haunts or whereabouts, till the portly Mr. Tunley brought the startling intelligence one day that 'after a terrible bout of delirious trimmins, Master Hew was—or believed himself to be—dying, at the Montgomerie Arms Inn,' where he prayed the general in pity to come and see him once again.
Accompanied by a medical adviser and old John Balderstone, Sir Piers at once rode to the old posting-house indicated; and there, pale, wan, hollow cheeked, and with eyes unnaturally sunk and bloodshot, he found his once favoured protégé in a state that shocked him.