Tarnished Silver E-Book

Mary Frances Outram

• Herausgeber: BookRix
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2013

Beschreibung

Tarnished Silver written by Mary Frances Outram. Author of "The Story of a Log-house," and "The Mystery of the Ash Tree". This book was first published in 1914.

Leseprobe

Mary Frances Outram

Tarnished Silver

Mary Frances Outram BookRix GmbH & Co. KG80331 Munich

CHAPTER I-Mr. Field Lays Down the Law

In the breakfast-room of a large house near the seacoast Mr. Thomas Algernon Field sat eating a plain boiled egg.

It was a long time since he had tasted such a rarity, and he was enjoying it to the full.

Not that eggs were scarce in his establishment, but it was seldom that they found their way to his table in so simple a form. The Earl of Monfort, the owner of the adjoining estate, regularly ate a boiled egg every morning of his life--three hundred and sixty-five in the year, and one more in leap year, so he made his boast--but to Mr. Thomas Algernon Field this would have been sheer folly and waste.

Mr. Field had a French cook--a French cook whose salary far exceeded that of many a hard-worked clerk; and of what use was such an expensive treasure unless to turn out elaborate and costly menus? So to the detriment of his digestion, but with a brave effort to keep up the honour of his table, the master of the house wrestled daily with complicated dishes burdened with high-sounding names, though often longing secretly in his heart of hearts for plainer and more wholesome fare.

The room in which he sat was a fine one, with long windows opening on to a wide terrace with heavy stone balustrades, over and through which masses of roses climbed in graceful luxuriance of spray and bloom. Beyond lay yet another terrace, wider and larger than the first, with beds gay with many-coloured flowers, set in the greenest of velvet turf. A belt of trees bounded the further side of the lower platform, their topmost branches were bent sideways and shorn by the prevailing winds, while in the distance stretched the straight blue line of the North Sea, now rippling and sparkling in the morning sunshine.

Mr. Field finished his egg and leant back pompously in his carved oak chair.

He was a strongly built man, of medium height and with a tendency to stoutness, which did not improve his already clumsy figure. His neck was short and thick, and more than one layer of what is popularly known as a double chin lurked beneath his square and heavy jaws. Small eyes of a pale tawny brown looked out from under scarcely defined eyebrows, which twitched and frowned nervously, betokening a restless and uneasy mind. A scrubby moustache only slightly hid the thin compressed lips, at the corners of which ran deeply graven lines, as if they sought by their almost cruel hardness to counteract the weakness of the brow. It was a selfish and secretive face, and just at present it was a very self-satisfied one as it turned towards the fair scene beyond the casement.

"Julius," he said, turning to the other occupant of the room, "it's not every lad of your age who starts in life with such prospects. A house like Farncourt and enough dollars to buy up all the landowners round about! My sakes--not many boys in England can boast of that, I can tell you! Don't you forget it, Julius; and don't let others forget it either."

"I think Farncourt is a horrid old hole, father, and what use is it saying you can buy up all the landowners when you can't get the only bit of ground you really want, however much you try, even though it only belongs to a poor fisherman like Timothy Green?"

The speaker was a small boy of about ten years of age. He might have been a good-looking child if it had not been for the discontented expression upon his face, and the ill-tempered mouth and chin. From his speech, if you did not look at him, he might have been double his age.

Thomas Field's countenance darkened as he directed his gaze beyond the terrace boundary, where, in a gap between the trees, a whitewashed cottage could be seen, standing out plainly against the background of sea.

As a red rag to a bull, so was this unpretentious building to the owner of Farncourt.

"It is absurd," he exclaimed, as he had done many a time before, "to think that a beggarly old fellow with one foot in the grave should be able to defy me openly and ruin my view, when I offer him good money down, tenfold more than the ramshackle hovel is worth, if he'll only clear out to a better house and leave me in peace. When the whole of this fine place is mine, honestly bought and paid for, why should he be allowed to stick there in full sight of my windows, so that I can't look out without for ever seeing that one blot which spoils it all?"

"He says he'd rather die in his bed there than own Farncourt," replied the boy.

"Obstinate old duffer," exclaimed his father, "but I doubt he'll get his desire sooner than he thinks. The way the cliff is breaking away there is a caution, and some fine night he may find his precious roof come tumbling down upon his head; which will be a good way out of the difficulty for me, even if it does not benefit him overmuch! I'll not rest till I'm master of all the land I can see from Farncourt Tower, and have the undisputed right to prevent upstarts from loafing about the place."

"There are two new people come to live at Mrs. Sheppard's house," remarked Julius, "a lady and a boy. I saw him on the beach yesterday, and he seemed rather jolly. I mean to have him here to play with me sometimes."

"Listen to me, Julius," said his father; "you get quite enough of your own way as it is, but I do draw the line somewhere. Ask me for anything in reason and you'll get it, but to be allowed to bring within my doors any chance riff-raff you may happen to pick up, that I cannot and will not permit."

"He's not a riff-raff," answered Julius sulkily, "he's quite a gentleman, even if he has rather shabby clothes, and he's not come on chance. John says he's going to live here for some time."

"How often have I told you not to gossip with your groom," retorted Mr. Field. "If the earl chooses to allow his tenants to let lodgings it's no business of mine, and he may turn his end of the village into slums for all I care, but the part that belongs to me, I keep for myself and my own people. I've knocked about the world all my life, and now I've made my pile and settled down on my private estate, no one is to go wandering over it without my permission. I came here for quiet and solitude, and I mean to see that I get it, in spite of all the earls in creation. If you find that stranger woman or her boy trespassing within my grounds, let me know about it, and I'll soon teach them their place."

"I don't see why I shouldn't play with him," rejoined Julius, petulantly pushing back his chair from the table, and kicking his feet about. "You won't let me talk to John, and I don't like the gardener's boys; they're horrid rude fellows and won't do what I want."

"You've got everything you can desire that money will buy," answered his father sternly. "Only last month I gave you that thoroughbred pony which you had set your heart on, and which cost me a pretty penny, I assure you, though you're welcome to another if you wish, for all it matters to me. You've got the best games and books that can be bought, enough to stock a shop, and yet it appears you are not satisfied. There are motors in the garage, and boats on the lake, with servants at hand to do your every bidding, why should you go hankering after loafers you know nothing about, and who have the impudence to hang about my property against my express desire."

"It's no fun playing games by myself," grumbled Julius. "Now that old Finney has gone, I've not even got him to help me. I want a boy the same age as me, that I can lick if he gets cheeky, and who won't call me names, like the gardener's sons."

"Call you names, like the gardener's sons," repeated Mr. Field incredulously. "I never heard of such a thing. Benson shall have a piece of my mind about this before the day is out, and if he can't teach his cubs to behave themselves, he must look out for another situation, that's all. If things go on at the Good Hope mine as they have done in the past, the world will hear about you, Julius, and at no very distant time either. Folk must climb down when they speak to you, and treat you with fitting respect. You've had advantages that I never enjoyed, and some fine day, if I mistake not, you'll find yourself at the top of the tree; so in the meantime, my lad, don't price yourself too cheap, but just stand up with the best of them. There's a new tutor coming next term in place of Finney--a younger man who has carried off every prize he could win and charges accordingly, so you'd better get as much as you can out of him when he arrives, and leave this shabby young rascal and the gardener's boys to fight it out together upon the beach."

With a satisfied air, as if the last word had now been said, Mr. Field rose from his chair and sauntered out to charge Benson with the enormity of his offence, a congenial task which lost nothing in the doing. Meanwhile Julius, left to himself in the breakfast-room, proceeded to feed Pat, his Irish terrier, with chicken rissoles, until that amusement palled, and he whistled to the dog to follow him out of doors.

Aimlessly the child wandered round to the back of the house, where a row of splendid rabbit-hutches with pedigreed inhabitants claimed his attention for a few brief moments. There was nothing to do there, for the lad specially engaged to attend to their wants had just given them their morning meal, and each silky creature was already contentedly nibbling the tender cabbage leaves so plentifully provided for their repast. To excite Pat by inviting him to put his nose through the wire netting was the only interest in that quarter, and as the dog sensibly refused to respond, there was nothing for it but to go further afield.

For about half an hour Julius watched the cleaning of the great sixty-horse-power car, amusing himself by executing a series of deafening hoots upon the motor horn to the distraction of the chauffeur, who had learnt only too well that to remonstrate only meant a prolongation of the din.

From the garage to the stables was the next move, and the order was given to saddle the new pony.

"I'm going to take Prince over those hurdles again," Julius remarked as John led the beautiful animal out of its stall. "You'd better come to the field to set them up for me."

"The vet said as how Prince had been too hard set at them last time, sir, seeing as he strained his off foreleg a bit," replied the groom, "and the master he told me he didn't wish the pony to jump again for a while, though he was all right for a quiet ride."

"What's the fun of a pony that can't jump?" exclaimed the boy impatiently. "I don't want to walk about the roads as if I was at a funeral. I won't ride at all if I can't try the hurdles, so you may take the stupid beast away."

"There's Red Rover, sir, if you want another horse. I'll saddle him in a jiffey, and he's a rare one at a gallop, even though he's not so light at the fences as Prince."

Julius eyed the smart little cob that had been his favourite mount till the new-comer arrived upon the scene, and felt half inclined to follow the friendly advice. But after all, what was the good of going for a gallop when there was nowhere special to gallop to, and no one to gallop with except John, who was apt to be surly if you went too fast? So he shook his head.

"I don't want Red Rover," he said. "They're a rotten lot, all of them. I'll get father to give me a stronger pony next time, that won't strain its silly old legs by jumping over a footstool."

Turning his back upon the stable yard he made his way slowly into the lane.

"I wish the new tutor was here," he said to himself, "even old Finney would be better than nobody. I think I'll go to Timothy Green's cottage and see how far the cliff has broken away. Father seemed to think it was going pretty fast. I wonder if some day the house will really topple over on to the beach."

With some definite purpose at length in his mind, Julius hurried down the track which led through the copse to the sea. The trees thinned as he neared the cliff, those that were left, standing out gaunt and weather-beaten by the storms which broke upon them so fiercely from the east.

A rough fence enclosing a patch of ground marked the boundary of the small domain which had so excited the wrath of Mr. Field. The cottage lay end on to the sea, its low door facing the south. Hardy flowers bloomed within the little plot, but Julius remarked with surprise that the wall, on the further side of the garden had disappeared since he had last walked that way.

Passing the rickety gate that gave entrance from the lane, he crept cautiously to the edge of the cliff and peeped down.

CHAPTER II-Forbidden Fruit

Far below lay the debris of the crag not yet carried away by the waves which now crept sleepily along the shore. Harmless, gentle ripples they looked that day, softly crooning a lullaby to the pebbles on the beach; very different to the angry guise in which they appeared on winter nights, when the mighty hissing billows came leaping up the cliff like hungry tongues, seeking to lick out the very foundations of the land. Many a great slice had they already snatched away. Acre after acre of fair cornfield and forest had once stood where now the ocean rolled, and every year fresh portions of the fruitful earth disappeared beneath the irresistible onslaught of the foe.

North and south as far as eye could reach, Julius could trace the long rampart of cliff facing the wide expanse of water. In the distance a lonely church stood perched upon the edge, a mere deserted shell, with ruined tower and roofless nave, of which the greater part had long since fallen into the sea. Sole relic it remained of the prosperous city which once in bygone years had clustered round its walls.

As Julius withdrew his gaze from the distant prospect to the nearer one at his feet, he noticed the effects of the last storm on his humble neighbour's property.

A large hawthorn hung head downward, its roots holding on like claws in the crumbling crag, while bits of broken garden fence still clung in untidy festoons over yawning gaps along the upper portion of the cliff. Fragments of bricks and boards were scattered upon the shore below, waiting in disorderly confusion for the waves to finish their handiwork and bury them out of sight. Only a foot or two of solid ground remained between the sea end of the dwelling and the top of the landslip. Already great cracks were making themselves seen in the cottage walls, showing the gradual subsidence of the soil beneath.

"I wonder old Timothy dares to stay in his house when any moment a lump of earth may break away," said the boy to himself. "What a lot has gone since I was here last! I remember there used to be a pigsty here in the spring, but I suppose that's it lying in pieces on the shore. I wonder if the pig was in it when it went down."

As he meditated upon this possible tragedy the door of the house opened and two people came out. Julius at once recognized them as the stranger lady and her little son, whom he had met before and been cautioned to avoid. He crouched down behind a sheltering bush until they should pass by.

"She's got rather a nice face," he murmured, "and the boy's not half bad, in spite of all father says against them."

It was no wonder that the lonely child looked with longing eyes upon the pair. Others as well as he had found comfort in the calm sweetness which rested as the habitual expression on Madelaine Power's fair features. As she turned at the porch to wave farewell to old Timothy, the honeysuckle made a fitting frame to her tall, graceful figure, clad in the simple black gown which tells the story of widowhood to the world.

Julius watched her as she walked down the path towards the gate, her eyes full of mother-love as she met the eager upturned gaze of the curly-headed child at her side, and a sharp pang of jealousy shot through his heart, leaving a sore feeling behind.

"It's a perfect beauty, mother!" the boy was saying. "I think it was just awfully good of Timothy to give it to me."

Julius noticed that the lad was carrying something beneath his jacket, carefully pressed against his chest--something that moved, for it needed both hands and arms to hold it safe.

"We'll have to make a little house for it, Robin," answered his mother. "I'm afraid it will feel rather strange at first, poor creature, in its unaccustomed quarters."

"I wonder what he's got," soliloquized Julius. "I expect it's a puppy or a kitten, or some idiotic thing like that. What's the use of making such a fuss about it, when they're as common as blackberries."

But to Robin the little, warm, furry bundle he held so closely to his breast meant a treasure precious beyond words, the possession of which had suddenly turned his prospects rose-colour. All the way down the lane his busy tongue never ceased. Plan after plan for the accommodation of his new favourite was poured into his mother's attentive ear.

Julius listened enviously until the clear ringing voice had died away in the distance. When he could hear it no longer, he rose from his hiding-place and sauntered slowly and discontentedly home.

It was early next morning when he met Robin once again.

Yielding to John's persuasions he had condescended to mount Red Rover, and after a good gallop on the heath was returning by the road that led to the sea. He was about to pass in at the lodge gates which guarded Farncourt, when he caught sight of Robin coming towards him on an ancient grey pony, whose sedate bearing and somewhat stiff movements proclaimed a long life of uneventful toil.

"That's a fine old cow you've got," he said rudely, when the pair reached the entrance of the park.

Robin flushed. Pride had filled his heart when he said good-bye to his mother at the garden door, and he and the blacksmith's pony had gone out alone into the great unknown. No boy was he, enjoying a rare and unwonted ride--rather was he a knight in armour on his trusty warhorse, pacing forth undauntedly to do battle with tyrants and dragons in the cause of Right. And now--to hear his charger called a cow! It was galling, to say the least of it, and his spirit rose to the occasion.

"Insult me not, caitiff!" he exclaimed, "or thou shalt rue the day. Stand and deliver!"

With a whoop, more like that of an Indian at Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show than of an errant knight of King Arthur's Table, the boy suddenly applied his whip to the old pony's flanks, making him lurch heavily forward to the charge.

Surprised by the unexpected attack, it required all Julius' horsemanship to calm Red Rover, and stay the plunging of the fiery little cob. Quieted at length, he managed to bring him to a standstill within the gates, and from that safe vantage ground he turned to face the enemy.

"You'd better not come in here with your clumsy beast," he called out. "If you do, you'll be prosecuted. Look, it's written up on that board."

"I desire not to set foot within thy territory," replied Robin grandly. "I go forth to the great battle where the king awaits me, relying upon my trusty sword."

Taken aback by this strange form of address, Julius watched silently as the youthful combatant laboriously turned his steed and passed with sober tread along the road. One more shot came Parthian-wise as they went their way, revealing the boy beneath the knight.

"It's all very well to call my pony a cow, but it can shake hands and open a gate, and I expect that's more than yours can do."

As Julius rode up the avenue one purpose only filled his mind. How could he get to know this lad, and find out more about the delightful game which he seemed to be enjoying all by himself.

"If only we could play at being knights together, what glorious tournaments we could have in the meadow," he thought. "He looked so jolly and brave when he came banging into Red Rover like that, just as if he was a real warrior. I wonder how he taught his pony to shake hands. I wish Prince could learn to do it too. Why does father hate to have anybody here? I don't think it's fair. Anyhow, I'm going to try and see the boy again, whatever any one may say."

The late afternoon sun was shining down on Sea View Cottage as Julius crept up to a small hole in the hedge which separated the garden from the lane. A pretty picture met his eye as he peered through. Not a stone's throw from him stood the little house, nestling in a bower of green, its long slope of rich brown thatch cut into fantastic patterns, across which wandering creepers seemed to cast protecting arms. A profusion of sweet-smelling flowers filled the narrow border on each side of the path, making a bright foreground to the scene.

The stranger lady sat sewing in a low chair beneath a tree, while beside her was the quondam knight, hard at work with hammer and saw fashioning something out of old boxes and wire.

"Where's Peter?" suddenly exclaimed Robin, springing to his feet.

"Who's Peter?" whispered Julius to himself, as he tried to get a better view of the group.

The words had no sooner fallen from his lips than a tiny brown rabbit darted out of the hedge at his feet and hopped rapidly down the road. Quick as thought, Pat the terrier had the little creature in his mouth, from which Julius rescued it a moment later, trembling and terrified, but apparently none the worse for its unceremonious capture.

"What a good thing it was that you and your dog were just passing when Peter slipped out," said Robin to him as he walked into the garden and delivered up the runaway.

It was with certain qualms of conscience that Julius had lifted the latch of the gate and entered the forbidden ground, but he strove to stifle them as best he could. Even if his father did see him, surely he would not blame him for doing such a kind and simple act? It was very unlikely, however, that he would know anything at all about it, for he hardly ever came to that end of the village, and Sea View Cottage lay quite off the beaten track. There would surely be no harm just finding out if the boy was a nice fellow after all, for if he wasn't, he would not trouble his head about him again.