But it was not the will of Fate that the name of Osbaldistone should make any figure in that short and inglorious campaign. Thorncliff was killed in a duel with one of his brother officers. The sot Percie died shortly after, according to the manner of his kind. Dickon broke his neck in spurring a blood mare beyond her paces. Wilfred the fool died fighting at Proud Preston on the day of the Barricades; and his gallantry was no less that he could never remember an hour together for which king he was doing battle.
John also behaved boldly and died of his wounds a few days after in the prison of Newgate, to the despair of old Sir Hildebrand, who did not long survive him. Indeed he willingly laid himself down to die, after having first disinherited Rashleigh as a traitor, and left his much encumbered estates to his nephew, Frank Osbaldistone.
Mr. Osbaldistone the elder now took an unexpected view of his son's prospects. He had cared nothing for his family in the past—indeed, never since he had been expelled from Osbaldistone Hall to make way for his younger brother. But now he willingly spent his money in taking up the mortgages upon the Osbaldistone estates, and he urged upon Frank the necessity of going down at once to the Hall, lest Rashleigh should get before him in that possession which is nine points of the law.
So to Osbaldistone Hall went Frank once more, his heart not a little sore within him for the good days he had spent in it, and especially because of the thought that he would now find there no madcap Die Vernon to tease and torment him out of his life.
First of all, to make his title clear, Frank had been desired to visit the hospitable house of old Justice Inglewood, with whom Sir Hildebrand had deposited his will. As it chanced, it was in that good gentleman's power to give the young man some information which interested him more than the right of possession to many Osbaldistone Halls.
After dinner in the evening Frank and the Justice were sitting together, when all of a sudden Squire Inglewood called upon his companion to pledge a bumper to "dear Die Vernon, the rose of the wilderness, the heath-bell of Cheviot, that blossom transported to an infamous convent!"
"Is not Miss Vernon, then, married?" cried Frank, in great astonishment, "I thought his Excellency—"
"Pooh—pooh! His Excellency and his Lordship are all a humbug now, you know," said the Justice; "mere St. Germains titles—Earl of Beauchamp and ambassador plenipotentiary from France, when the Duke Regent scarce knew that he lived, I daresay. But you must have seen old Sir Frederick Vernon at the hall, when he played the part of Father Vaughan?"
"Good Heavens," cried Frank, "then Father Vaughan was Miss Vernon's father?"
"To be sure he was," said the Justice, coolly; "there's no use keeping the secret now, for he must be out of the country by this time—otherwise no doubt it would be my duty to apprehend him. Come, off with your bumper to my dear lost Die!"
