“The sheriff and those fellows won’t squeal very hard about their performances here,” said Stoddard. “And they won’t try to rescue the prisoner, even for a reward, from a house where the dead come back to life.”
“No; but you can’t hold a British prisoner in an American private house for ever. Too many people know he has been in this part of the country; and you may be sure that the fight here and the return of Mr. Glenarm will not fail of large advertisement. All I can ask of you, Mr. Glenarm, is that you hold the fellow a few hours after I leave, to give me a start.”
“Certainly. But when this trouble of yours blows over, I hope you will come back and help Jack to live a decent and orderly life.”
My grandfather spoke of my remaining with a warmth that was grateful to my heart; but the place and its associations had grown unbearable. I had not mentioned Marian Devereux to him, I had not told him of my Christmas flight to Cincinnati; for the fact that I had run away and forfeited my right made no difference now, and I waited for an opportunity when we should be alone to talk of my own affairs.
At luncheon, delayed until mid-afternoon, Bates produced champagne, and the three of us, worn with excitement and stress of battle, drank a toast, standing, to the health of John Marshall Glenarm.
“My friends,”—the old gentleman rose and we all stood, our eyes bent upon him in, I think, real affection, —“I am an old and foolish man. Ever since I was able to do so I have indulged my whims. This house is one of them. I had wished to make it a thing of beauty and dignity, and I had hoped that Jack would care for it and be willing to complete it and settle here. The means I employed to test him were not, I admit, worthy of a man who intends well toward his own flesh and blood. Those African adventures of yours scared me, Jack; but to think”—and he laughed—“that I placed you here in this peaceful place amid greater dangers probably than you ever met in tiger-hunting! But you have put me to shame. Here’s health and peace to you!”
“So say we all!” cried the others.
“One thing more,” my grandfather continued, “I don’t want you to think, Jack, that you would really have been cut off under any circumstances if I had died while I was hiding in Egypt. What I wanted, boy, was to get you home! I made another will in England, where I deposited the bulk of my property before I died, and did not forget you. That will was to protect you in case I really died!”—and he laughed cheerily.
The others left us—Stoddard to help Larry get his things together—and my grandfather and I talked for an hour at the table.
“I have thought that many things might happen here,” I said, watching his fine, slim fingers, as he polished his eye-glasses, then rested his elbows on the table and smiled at me. “I thought for a while that I should certainly be shot; then at times I was afraid I might not be; but your return in the flesh was something I never considered among the possibilities. Bates fooled me. That talk I overheard between him and Pickering in the church porch that foggy night was the thing that seemed to settle his case; then the next thing I knew he was defending the house at the serious risk of his life; and I was more puzzled than ever.”