"To usurp Trevlyn Hold over him was an injury. It was Rupert's: neither yours nor his; but had it come to one of you, it should have been to him; you had no manner of right to it. And what about the two thousand pounds bond?"
Squire Trevlyn asked the last question in an altered and very significant tone. Mr. Chattaway's green face grew greener.
"I held the bond, and I enforced its payment in justice to my wife and children. I could do no less."
"In justice to your wife and children!" retorted Squire Trevlyn. "James Chattaway, did a thought ever cross you of God's justice? I believe from my very heart that my father cancelled that bond upon his dying bed, died believing Thomas Ryle released from it; and you, in your grasping, covetous nature, kept the bond with an eye to your own profit. Did you forget that the eye of the Great Ruler of all things was upon you, when you pretended to destroy that bond? Did you suppose that Eye was turned away when you usurped Trevlyn Hold to the prejudice of Rupert? Did you think you would be allowed to enjoy it in security to the end? It may look to you, James Chattaway, as it would to any superficial observer, that there has been wondrous favour shown you in this long delay of justice. I regard it differently. It seems to me that retribution has overtaken you at the worst time: not the worse for you, possibly, but for your children. By that inscrutable law which we learn in childhood, a man's ill-doings are visited on his children: I fear the result of your ill-doing will be felt by yours. Had you been deposed from Trevlyn Hold at the time you usurped it, or had you not usurped it, your children must have been brought up to play their parts in the busy walks of life; to earn their own living. As it is, they have been reared to idleness and luxury, and will feel their fall in proportion. Your son has lorded it as the heir of Trevlyn Hold, as the future owner of the works at Blackstone, and lorded it, as I hear, in a very offensive manner. He will not like to sink down to a state of dependency; but he will have to do it."
"Where have you been gathering your account of things?" interposed Mr. Chattaway.
"Never mind where. I have gathered it, and that is sufficient. And now—to go back to Rupert Trevlyn. Will you give me a guarantee that he shall be held harmless?"
"No," growled Mr. Chattaway.
"Then it will be war to the knife between you and me. Mind you—I do not think there's any necessity to ask you this; as the ricks were not yours, but mine, at the time of the occurrence, you could not, as I believe, become the prosecutor. But I prefer to be on the safe side. On the return of Rupert, if you attempt to prosecute him, the first thing that I shall do will be to insist that he prosecutes you for the assault, and I shall prosecute you for the usurpation of Trevlyn Hold. So it will be prosecution and counter-prosecution, you see. Mark you, James Chattaway, I promise you to do this, and you know I am a man of my word. I think we had better let bygones be bygones. What are you going to do about the revenues of the Hold?"
"The revenues of the Hold!" stammered Mr. Chattaway, wiping his hot face, for he did not like the question.
"The past rents. The mesne profits you have received and appropriated since Squire Trevlyn's death. Those profits are mine."