“After, my dear sir, after!” cried Mr. Stenhouse, with another of his éclats de rire.
Horace made a pause, but returned to the charge with dogged obstinacy.
“I know Roger Musgrave,” he said, “and I know friends who will stand by him as long as there is the slightest hope——”
“Ah, very well, as you please, it is not my concern; and it is quite likely you might make a good thing out of Pouncet,” said Mr. Stenhouse. “By-the-bye, now I think of it, come and breakfast with me to-morrow, when we can speak freely. I have no particular reason to be grateful to him, but Pouncet and I are very old friends. Come to the ‘George’ at eight o’clock, will you? I’d like to inquire into this a little more, for old Pouncet’s sake.”
So they parted, with some hope on Horace’s side, but no very great gratification in respect to his hoped-for “power.”
CHAPTER XXI.
IT was with a slightly accelerated pulse that Horace went next morning to the “George” to keep his appointment. He seemed to have put his own fortune on the cast, and temper and ambition alike forbade his drawing back. Either he must secure Stenhouse as an ally and coadjutor, bound to him by secret ties of interest, or else he must establish his own career upon the charitable and Christian work of restoring to Roger Musgrave such remnants of his inheritance as it might be possible to rescue from the hands of Pouncet and Stenhouse. This last alternative was not captivating to Horace. It was not in his nature, had he been the instrument of such a restoration, to do it otherwise than grudgingly. He was too young as yet to have added any great powers of dissimulation to his other good qualities, and his own disposition sided much more with the clever operator who served his own interests by means of some unsuspecting simpleton, than with the simpleton who permitted himself to be so cheated. Accordingly, his thoughts were very reluctant to undertake that side of the question—still, it was his alternative, and as such he meant to use it.
Mr. Stenhouse entertained his young visitor sumptuously, and exerted all his powers to captivate him. He, too, was ignorant of the person he had to deal with, and did not suspect how entirely uninfluenceable by such friendly cajoleries was the young bear of Marchmain, who had scarcely heart enough to be flattered by them, and had acuteness sufficient to perceive the policy. He began, at length, cautiously enough, upon the subject of their last night’s conversation—cautiously, though with all his usual apparent candour and openness of tone.
“Let us have a little talk now about this business, this hold which you think you have got over poor old Pouncet,” said Mr. Stenhouse. “Do you know, my dear fellow, Pouncet has been established here some thirty years, and the people believe in him; do you think they will take your word, at your age, against so old an authority? I advise you to think of it a little, my friend, before you begin.”
“My word has very little to do with it,” said Horace; “of course, I know nothing of the transaction except by evidence, which has satisfied my own mind; and Squire Musgrave was quite as well known, while he lived, as Mr. Pouncet. Besides, it is your own opinion that the public verdict is always against the attorney; and then,” said Horace, with a slight irrepressible sneer at his own words, “we have all the story in our favour, and the sympathy which everybody feels for a disinherited heir.”