with the inmates of withington chase two uneventful years glided imperceptibly away. between sir gilbert and his wife the name of the proscribed heir was never mentioned; to all seeming he had vanished out of their lives as completely as if he had never existed. that his image still dwelt more or less in his father's thoughts was only in the natural order of things, but to faithful mr. page alone, from whom the baronet had few or no secrets, did alec's name ever cross his lips, and to him no oftener than was unavoidable.
the lawyer had duly remitted his quarterly allowance to the young man, forwarding it now to one obscure continental town and now to another, in accordance with alec's written request; but, beyond that, nothing whatever was known of him or his whereabouts.
then one day the baronet received a letter from his son, dated from catanzaro, a small out-of-the-way town in southern italy.
in it the writer stated that he was utterly tired of the idle, purposeless life he had been leading for the past two years, and that if his father would agree to give him six thousand pounds down, he would emigrate to the united states and never trouble him for another shilling as long as he lived. but he would do more, much more, than that, should his father consent to his proposition. in that case he would agree to the cutting off of the entail and would sign whatever documents might be needful for the due carrying out of that design. sir gilbert sat staring at the letter after he had finished reading it like a man whose faculties had been paralysed by sheer amazement.
so absorbed was his attention that he was unconscious of the door behind him being opened and of the entry of his wife. her footfalls made no noise on the thick carpet. she went up behind him and was on the point of placing a hand on his shoulder, when her gaze vas attracted to the letter which lay spread open on the writing-table in front of him.
lady clare was more than a score of years younger than her husband and her eyesight was still as keen as ever it had been. half-a-dozen seconds sufficed her to take in the sense of alec's letter, the handwriting of which she had at once recognised. a little gasp escaped her before she knew it. an instant later the baronet had started to his feet, and was confronting her with flaming eyes; involuntarily his hand closed over the letter.
"madam, i am not in the habit of being startled in this way," he said, "nor do i like it."
"on the contrary, dear, it was you who startled me," she replied in her blandest accents, with a hand pressed to her left side. "of course i naturally supposed that you had heard the door opened and shut, and was on the point of addressing you when you started up as if you had been shot."
"humph! i have had occasion before to-day to beg of you not to be quite so feline in your movements," he answered with something like a snarl. "did you--did you read any portion of the letter that was on the table in front of me?"
"my dear gilbert, what do you take me for! that there was a letter there, i am aware, but as for reading as much as a line of it----"
"there, there, that will do. just ring the bell, will you, and then tell me what you want to see me about."
when the servant came in response to the summons, he said: "tell graves to bring the dog-cart round at once."
ten minutes later saw sir gilbert on his way to mapleford with his son's letter in his pocket. in such a contingency he felt that he could not do better than seek the advice of his valued counsellor.
mr. page, a tall, lanky, somewhat loose-jointed man, with a long thin face, a prominent nose and an expression that was a curious compound of hard common sense, shrewdness and good-nature, gave vent to a low whistle when he had come to the end of alec's epistle.
"what an exceedingly foolish young man!" were his first words.
"why so, pray--why so?" demanded the baronet with a lifting of his eyebrows.
"to offer to sell his birthright for a mess of pottage--for that is what he here proposes to do."
"six thousand pounds is a large sum, page."
"in itself it may perhaps seem so, but what is it in comparison with the reversion of withington chase and the other entailed property? why, it's not equivalent to one year's rent-roll! a very foolish young man!"
"it is to be presumed that he knows his own business best," remarked the baronet drily. "besides, you seem to forget the many hundreds of pounds--nay, i may say thousands--that i have had to disburse at different times by reason of his extravagance."
the lawyer shook his head.
"there's more under the surface, i feel convinced, than either you or i yet know of." then, after a pause, during which he seemed lost in thought, he added, "i should not be in the least surprised if a woman were at the bottom of this business."
the baronet was startled.
"that is a possibility which did not suggest itself to me," he said. "it would, indeed, be just like alec to finish up his career by contracting a low marriage." then with a shrug he added: "but he can please himself about that when once the proposition embodied by him in his letter has been duly carried into effect."
"then you really mean to accept his offer to cut off the entail?"
"i do. if i had any hesitation before, your last suggestion would have effectually disposed of it. i am certainly inclined to believe that you have hit upon the real reason which underlies his offer. well, i am glad he has sufficient sense and good-feeling left to betake himself to a country where there's not a creature who knows him. in that case a mésalliance on his part will be a matter of very minor consequence. and now let us consider by what means we can most readily lay our hands on six thousand pounds."
a week later sir gilbert and mr. page set out for italy.
it had never been the baronet's practice to take his wife into his confidence about matters which, from his point of view, did not concern her, consequently he had kept his own counsel as far as alec's letter and its contents were concerned. it would be time enough to tell her after the all-important document should have been signed by which alec renounced his birthright. he began to regard young randolph, the present lady clare's eldest son, with very different eyes from those with which he had hitherto looked upon the boy. a few more days and he would be the heir of withington. the pity of it was that the title could not descend to him as well as the estates. that was a point as to which the law was manifestly to blame.
lady clare betrayed not the slightest interest as to the nature of the business which was taking her husband and mr. page all the way to italy. so well did she play her part that no faintest suspicion entered sir gilbert's mind that she had any knowledge of the existence of alec's letter, much less of the nature of its contents. she judged, and rightly, that her husband would not have been at the trouble to go to italy and take his lawyer with him, unless he had agreed to accept the terms proposed by his eldest son. after all, then, the one great grievance of her life would cease to exist, and her darling randolph would become his father's heir, as he ought to have been all along! only herself knew with what eager anxiety she awaited her husband's return. surely, surely, he would not be so cruel as to keep the good news from her an hour after it should be his to tell! he could not fail to know how happy it would make her.
the theory propounded by mr. page as to the motive which lay at the foundation of alec's letter to his father, was not very wide of the mark. had it not been for a certain pair of brilliant black eyes, in all probability it would never have been written.
about six months before, in the course of his aimless wanderings alec had found himself and his very limited luggage at catanzaro, a small but romantically situated calabrian town, a few miles inland from the gulf of squillace.
the place had pleased him and he had made up his mind to stay there awhile.
he had accordingly taken up his quarters at the principal osteria, kept by one giuseppe rispani. alec lived very simply, and, of late, had learnt to confine his wants within narrow limits, so that his father's allowance, conjointly with his own income of one hundred and eighty pounds a year, amply sufficed for all his needs.
rispani was a widower with one son, who had lately left home for england in the hope of bettering his fortunes, and one daughter, giovanna by name, at that time a beautiful girl of nineteen.
rispani's wife had been an englishwoman, whom he had married for the sake of her little fortune of five hundred pounds, while she had married him for his beaux yeaux; for in early life the italian had been a very handsome man, with a soft tongue and a persuasive manner which poor miss verinder had found it impossible to resist.
the signora rispani, who at one time had been a governess, and, later on, companion to a lady of rank, was a woman of considerable education and refinement. she took great pains with the tuition and bringing up of her daughter, and to her mother giovanna owed it that she was almost as familiar with the english tongue as the italian.
unfortunately the signora died when giovanna was about thirteen years old, just the age when a mother's care and watchfulness were most needed, for the girl's disposition, like her father's, was cold, calculating, and avaricious; and when the one person was gone whose untiring effort it had been to keep down the weeds of selfishness and greed of which her nature was so prolific--for the signora had by no means been blind to her daughter's defects--it was not difficult to foretell what the result would be.
if giuseppe rispani had known anything of the doctrine of heredity, he might have pointed to his daughter as a living example of it as far as the reproduction in her of certain of his own most predominant qualities was concerned.
in appearance giovanna was a true daughter of the sunny south.
her figure was tall, with a certain stateliness of carriage that became her well. her complexion was of the clearest and most transparent olive, her eyes and hair as black as midnight, while her features were almost classic in the regularity of their outlines. in any country in the world giovanna rispani would have been accounted a very beautiful young woman.
vanna had not reached the age of nineteen without having had several suitors, eligible and otherwise, for her hand, but to one and all she had turned a deaf ear. her father had in no wise tried to influence her choice, being, indeed, firmly persuaded in his own mind that it would have been futile to attempt to do so; but had merely laughed pleasantly as each baffled aspirant went his way, and remarked that vanna, had plenty of time before her in which to make up her mind.
alec clare had not been many days an inmate of the osteria of the golden fig before it became clear to vanna rispani, that in the tall, handsome young englishman, she had achieved another conquest.
vanna had never made a practice of waiting on her father's guests, holding herself, indeed, somewhat haughtily aloof, but she condescended to wait on alec. it was not his looks that attracted her, but the fact that in him she found some one who could talk to her in her mother's native tongue.
she was proud of her ability to speak english, but it was an acquisition which had been in some danger of becoming rusty from disuse; now, however, a day rarely passed without she and alec having at least one long talk together. to him, too, who had lived for the last two years among what might be termed the byeways of life, it was an inexpressible pleasure to have lighted on some one with whom he could converse in his own tongue; for although by this time he could speak italian almost as fluently as a native, his thoughts and self-communings were all couched in the language to which he had been born.
giovanna was wholly free from self-consciousness and mauvaise honte; she was as self-possessed as a woman twice her age; consequently there was a charming ease and naturalness in her intercourse with alec, which he found increasingly fascinating as time went on.
it was surprising what a number of things they found to talk about, and how naturally one subject seemed to lead up to another. if sometimes alec's talk went a little over the girl's head, if he now and then started a subject which for her was devoid of interest, she was careful not to betray the fact. she might be secretly bored, but her lips never lost their smile, nor her eyes their sparkle.
the heir of withington chase lingered on week after week in the little italian town till a couple of months had gone by, without caring to ask himself why he did so.
at length the time came when he had neither the power nor the will to tear himself away. self-deception was a species of weakness in which he had never indulged; he had always dealt frankly with himself, and he did so now. he was in love with the innkeeper's daughter, and he admitted it. more than once, in years gone by, his fancy had been taken captive, but in every case the day had come, and that after no long time, when he had snapped the silken thread that loosely held him, and had gone on his way again, heart whole and fancy free.
but it was no frail silken chain that held him now: he was a helpless captive bound hand and foot in love's golden fetters.
when, however, he asked himself what prospect there was of his passion being reciprocated, he could but reply that he had no grounds whatever for answering the question in his own favour. that vanna sought his society and that she derived a certain amount of pleasure from it, could not be doubted; but, on the other hand, every one of those signs was wanting which are supposed to foreshadow the dawn of love in a young girl's heart. she was as easy and unembarrassed in his company as in that of her father, which, of itself; seemed to indicate the absence of any special regard for him. and yet there were times when an inscrutable something glanced at him for a moment out of the depths of her magnificent eyes and kindled a sudden flame of hope in his heart, which, if it quickly died down again, left behind it a certain glow less evanescent than itself.
at length a time arrived when it became clear to alec that matters between himself and vanna could not go on much longer as they were. the state of uncertainty in which he lived was fast becoming intolerable to him. not much longer could he keep silent. he would give words to the passion that was consuming him and win all or lose all by the result.
on more than one occasion in the course of their many talks together, giovanna had so far opened her mind as to confide to alec the longing which beset her to get away from the dull and narrow routine of her life in her native town. she wanted to see something of the world, to live a larger and freer existence in some country beyond the sea.
probably it was owing to the influence of these talks that the inception of the scheme was due which, a few weeks later, alec embodied in his letter to his father.
should the latter prove willing to give him the sum he had specified, he would ask giovanna to become his wife, and if she consented, he would seek with her a home in the new world, where his six thousand pounds would, he confidently hoped, prove the corner-stone from which to build up one of those colossal fortunes in comparison with which the revenues of withington chase would seem insignificant indeed. in any case, as he truthfully stated in his letter, he was heartily sick of the idle, purposeless existence he had been leading for a couple of years. for aught he knew to the contrary, his father might never revoke the promise extracted from him not to return to england till leave should be given him to do so.
meanwhile his life was slowly rusting away.
