“You are right, uncle—it is like groping in the dark. And yet I feel as sure as that I am standing here at the present moment that sooner or later a ray of light will be vouchsafed to me from somewhere. As to when and how it will come, I know nothing; but that it will come, if I clothe my soul with patience, I never for one moment doubt.”
“My poor boy! But why not let well alone? You are wasting your life in the chase of a phantom. Be content with what you have achieved already.”
“Never—never—so help me Heaven! I will go on groping in the dark as you call it, till in that dark I clutch my enemy’s hand—and drag out of it into the full light of day the man on whose head lies the innocent blood of Percy Osmond.”
“A waste of youth, of hope, of happiness,” said the old soldier sadly.
“For me there is neither youth, nor hope, nor happiness, till my task is accomplished. Uncle, I have set myself to do this thing, and no power on earth can move me from it.”
“I am heart and soul with you, boy, as you know full well already. But at times it does seem to me as if you were following nothing better than a deceptive will-o’-the-wisp, which, the further you follow it, the further it will lead you astray.”
“No will-o’-the-wisp, uncle, but a steadfast-shining star; blood-red like Mars, if you will, but a guide across the pathless waste which leads to the goal to which I shall one day surely attain.”
Three weeks later General St. George and his nephew were settled at Park Newton, while Mrs. Garside and Edith installed themselves in a pretty little cottage, half a mile beyond the park gates, but on the side opposite to Duxley.
Lionel Dering’s marriage was still kept a profound secret: and as Edith, during the short time she had lived at Duxley, had never gone out without a thick veil over her face, there was not much fear that she would be recognized in her new home. Richard Dering rode over to the Cottage every other day, and we may be sure that Jane Culpepper was also a frequent visitor. Equally a matter of course was it that Tom Bristow, by the merest chance in the world, should often call in during the very time that Miss Culpepper was there: for Providence is kind to lovers, and seems often to arrange meetings for them, without their taking any trouble to do so on their own account.
Not a single day—nay, not a single hour had Kester St. George spent at Park Newton since his accession to the property. He had been down to Duxley on two occasions, and had taken up his quarters at the Royal Hotel, where his steward had waited upon him for the transaction of necessary business, and where the chief tenants of the estate had been invited to a banquet at his expense. But not once had he set foot even inside the park gates. He hated the place, the neighbourhood, the people. London and Paris, according to his view, were the only places fit for a man of fortune to live in, and it was from the latter place that he despatched a letter to his uncle, half ironical in tone, congratulating that veteran on his choice of the ancestral roof-tree for his future home, and hoping that he might live for fifty years to enjoy it. The General smiled grimly to himself as he read the letter and tossed it over to Richard.