Jacob's Ladder Part 39

Breakfast at the Castle was a sufficiently cheerful meal, chiefly owing to the efforts of Jacob and the Marquis. Mr. Dane Montague came limping past the windows but made no attempt to join the party.

Hartwell was reported locked in his room, and the Marchioness, who came a little late, seemed utterly unaware that anything unusual had happened.

"So glad to see you back again, Mr. Pratt," she murmured. "I trust that you enjoyed your visit to your friends."

"You are very kind," Jacob replied, a little staggered.

"Mr. Pratt brings us bad news," the Marquis intervened suavely. "He is compelled to return to London this morning."

"Mary will be very disappointed," the Marchioness observed. "She has been so looking forward to some more tennis."

"If Mr. Pratt felt able to reconsider his decision," her husband began--

"Impossible!" Jacob interrupted curtly. "There are considerations," he added, "which I cannot altogether ignore."

"Bit of an exodus, I should imagine," Felixstowe remarked. "Our friend Mr. Hartwell was just ringing for a Bradshaw as I came down."

"It is so difficult to amuse guests before the shooting begins," the Marchioness sighed.

Dauncey ate his breakfast in almost stupefied silence. He found himself alone with Jacob for a moment in the hall afterwards.

"Have we all gone mad, Jacob?" he asked. "Or have you developed an hysterical sense of humour? Why haven't we locked the old man up and sent for the police?"

"It's the young 'un," Jacob explained. "I like 'em both. Besides, what's the use of making a fuss? You've punished Hartwell, Felixstowe has settled with Dane Montague, and they've the Glasgow Daisy to deal with between them."

"It's the old man I can't understand," Dauncey confessed. "He sits there like a lay figure of courtesy and kindliness. To listen to him, one would believe that he would rather die than have a guest ill-used."

Their host himself, accompanied by his son, came suddenly out of the breakfast room. For the first time, the former appeared discomposed.

He came at once to Jacob and addressed him without preamble.

"Mr. Pratt," he said, "I have only this moment properly understood the very disgraceful and unworthy attempt on the part of my two other guests to carry out a scheme of private vengeance upon you whilst subject to the incarceration necessitated by my plans."

"You are referring," Jacob observed coldly, "to the affair of the Glasgow Daisy?"

"I beg, sir," the Marquis continued, "that you will acquit me of all complicity in that most unwarrantable and improper attempt to inflict punishment upon you. For your incarceration I accept the responsibility. That you were kept short of food was a natural adjunct to our enterprise. The other branch of the affair, however, humiliates me. I regret it extremely. I tender to you, Mr. Pratt, my apologies."

Jacob bowed.

"I am very glad to hear," he said, "that you were not a party to the most brutal portion of the plot. At the same time, to be quite frank with you, Marquis, I should have expected from you some expression of regret for your rather serious breach of hospitality. It is surely not a slight thing to starve and imprison an invited guest with the view of extorting money from him."

The Marquis smiled tolerantly.

"The matter presents itself to you, naturally, Mr. Pratt, in a distorted light," he observed. "I am quite sure that if I had been brought up in your environment, your point of view would be mine.

You must remember, however, that we are now upon the soil where my forefathers for many generations kept together a great army of dependents by exacting tribute from those more richly endowed with this world's goods. If you will look closely around you, Mr. Pratt, you will see that even the Castle, which has been the property of my family for seven hundred years, is sadly in need of repair. We lack too many modern conveniences. My garden wall needs fresh b.u.t.tresses, an engine house is necessary to pump water from the well--in short, the estate needs money. Not having it, I can only adopt the general principle which is common to all mankind. I endeavour to procure it from others."

"The prisons of England," Dauncey remarked, "are filled with temporary visitors who have imbibed the same ideas."

The Marquis gazed at Dauncey as though confronted by some new sort of natural curiosity to whose appearance in the world he was inclined to extend a mild but unenthusiastic welcome.

"You have more apprehension than your friend, I am sure, Mr. Pratt,"

he said. "If you will excuse me, I will see that the arrangements for your departure are in progress."...

It seemed to Jacob that Lady Mary was keeping purposely out of his way. At a few minutes before the time for their departure, she appeared, however, and drew him to one side down one of the garden walks.

"Mr. Pratt," she said, "I don't know what you're thinking of all of us."

"I know what I'm thinking about one of you, at any rate," he declared gratefully. "I should have been most unhappy if I had been compelled to leave without thanking you from the bottom of my heart for your kindness."

"I am more thankful than I can tell you that I was able to do what I did," she a.s.sured him earnestly, "and I want you, if you can, to set that as much as possible against my father's shocking breach of the laws of hospitality. Only he can't help it, poor man. He has a whimsical att.i.tude towards life which seems unchangeable."

"I shall forget it," Jacob promised. "Thanks to you, nothing serious occurred."

"There is one thing more," she went on. "Believe me, I am not approaching this in the same spirit as my father, but if by any chance you found yourself able to do anything for Jack--in the shape of employment, I mean--it would be so good for him and such a relief to me."

"I shall be going to America very shortly," Jacob reflected, "in which case I shall need some one to help me with my correspondence. Dauncey will have to stay at home to look after my interests here."

"That would be wonderful," she declared enthusiastically. "Jack really isn't a fool--in fact he is quite clever in some things--but he does need steadying down, and I'm so afraid that if nothing happens he will drift into taking life as casually as--as--"

"I understand," Jacob interrupted. "Leave it to me, Lady Mary.

Something shall be done, I promise you."

The motor horn was sounding and they turned back. Jacob, notwithstanding the disgraceful treatment which he had received, was conscious of a curious unwillingness to take his place in the car and leave Kelsoton Castle behind him.

"You must let me know," his companion begged softly, "how things go on with you and Miss Bultiwell."

"There will never be anything to tell you," he a.s.sured her. "I am becoming quite confident about that."

She smiled at him enigmatically. Her footsteps, too, were lagging.

"Our love affairs don't seem to be prospering, do they?" she sighed.

Jacob leaned a little towards her.

"I should be almost content,"--

Dauncey interrupted them a little ruthlessly. He held his watch in his hand.

"This is the only train to-day, Jacob," he broke in, "and Lord Felixstowe says that we shall barely catch it."

Jacob climbed into the car. The Marquis bade them all a punctilious and courteous farewell. Lady Mary waved her hand and swung away down the little path that led to the sea. When Jacob looked back, there was no one standing upon the Castle steps but the Marquis, bland, courteous, a very striking and distinguished figure. So ended Jacob's visit, momentous in more ways than one.

CHAPTER XXIII

With a sigh of relief, Jacob handed his driver to the caddy and watched the career of a truly hit ball down the smooth fairway. There was a little murmur of applause from a hundred or so of onlookers. By that stroke, Jacob had opened the Cropstone Wood Golf Links.