Uncle Max

by Rosa Nouchette Carey

'Look here, sir; I am caught in a trap, and there is no getting out of it. I have lost my place and my character, thanks to Miss Garston,'—another vindictive look at me. 'If you will promise like a gentleman not to take advantage of my evidence, I will tell you all about it.'

'I will make no promises,' he returned, in the same stern voice; 'but if you do not speak I will send for the police at once, and have you up before a magistrate. You have connived at theft; that will be sufficient to criminate you.'

'I know all about that,' was the unflinching answer; 'and I know for the old mistress's sake you will be glad to hush it all up: it would not be pleasant to bring your own cousin before a magistrate, especially after promising the old mistress on her death-bed to be as good to Miss Etta as though she were your own sister.'

I saw the shadow of some sorrowful recollection cross his face as she said this. I had heard from Max how dearly he had loved his aunt Margaret: though her daughter had wrought such evil in his life, he would still seek to shield her. Leah knew this too, and took advantage of her knowledge in her crafty manner.

'It would be best to tell you all, for Mr. Eric's sake. I know Miss Etta will be safe with you. She has done a deal of mischief since she has been under your roof. Somehow crooked ways come natural to her: the old mistress knew that, for she once said to me towards the last, "Leah, I am afraid my poor child has got some twist or warp in her nature; but I hope my nephew will never find out her want of straightforwardness." And she begged me, with tears in her eyes, to watch over her and try to influence her, although I was only a servant; and for a little while I tried, only the devil tempted me, for the sake of poor Bob.'

'Bob is the name of your brother who is at Millbank?' asked Mr. Hamilton, in the same hard voice.

'Yes, sir; he got into a bit of trouble through mixing with bad companions. But there,'—with a sudden fierce light in her eyes that reminded me of a tigress protecting her young,—'I am not going to talk of Bob: lads will get into trouble sometimes. If Mr. Eric had not been so interfering at that time, ordering Bob off the premises whenever he caught sight of him, and calling him a good-for-nothing loafer and all sorts of hard names,—why, he gave Bob a black eye one day when he was doing nothing but shying stones at the birds in the kitchen-garden,—if it had not been for Mr. Eric's treatment of Bob I might have acted better by him.'

'Will you keep to the subject, Leah?' observed her master, in a warning voice. 'I wish to hear how that cheque was taken from my study that night.'

'Well, sir, if you must know,' returned Leah reluctantly, 'Miss Etta was in a bit of a worry about money just then: she had got the accounts wrong somehow, and there was a heavy butcher's bill to be paid. She had let it run on too long, and all the time you believed it was settled every week: it was partly your fault, because you so seldom looked at the accounts, and was always trusting her with large sums of money. Miss Etta did not mean to be dishonest, but she was extravagant, and sometimes her dressmaker refused to wait for the money, and sometimes her milliner threatened to dun her; but she would quiet them a bit with a five- or ten-pound note filched from the housekeeping, always meaning, as she said, to pay it back when she drew her quarterly allowance.

'I used to know of these doings of hers, for often and often she has sent me to pacify them with promises. I told her sometimes that she would do it once too often, but she always said it was for the last time.