The Village by the River Part 3

"Well, no, it's not business; and it certainly is not pleasure. You remember I had an old G.o.dfather, Major Lessing? I'm sure he amply fulfilled his G.o.dfatherly duty by the silver milk-jug he gave me at my baptism--which I've never set eyes on for many a long year, by the way--and the tips he shoved into the palm of my hand whenever I paid him a visit on my way from school. I don't think I've seen him since; and why, now that he's dying, he has a particular desire for a call, I can't tell you. It's inconvenient, to say the least of it."

"_Must_ you go?" asked Sally, despairingly.

"I'm afraid so. It's the last thing one can do for him, poor old chap!"

"He might have chosen some other time to be ill," said Sally, who, not knowing the major, was inclined to be heartless.

"Well, yes. But we won't lose our holiday; we'll come again later, Sally."

"We shan't! I'm perfectly certain we shan't!" cried Sally, turning away her head so that Paul should not see that there were tears in her eyes. "It was too delightful a plan to carry out."

The next day found Paul and his sister back in London. Sally was to go to an aunt for a few days, until Paul could settle his plans; and when he had seen her off from the station, he turned his own steps in the direction of the quiet square where his G.o.dfather had spent his solitary life since the days of his retirement from active service.

His eyes turned instinctively to the windows, to see if the blinds were drawn down; but the house wore its usual aspect of dignified reserve, with its slightly opened cas.e.m.e.nts. The imperturbable butler, who answered Paul's ring at the bell, seemed at first inclined to question his right to enter.

"My master is very sadly, sir; he's not fit to see any one."

"But he sent for me," said Paul, quietly. "Will you let him know, as soon as possible, that Paul Lessing has come in answer to his letter?"

At the mention of the familiar name Smith's manner altered perceptibly; he threw open the library door and ushered Paul in. It was scarcely a minute before he returned.

"My master is awake and will see you at once, sir."

"Has he been long ill?" Paul asked.

"It's been coming on gradual for a year or more, sir. Creeping paralysis is what the doctors call it. He's no use left in his legs, and very little in his arms or hands; but his brain seems as active as ever. He took a turn for the worse last week, and the end, they think, may come at any time."

"Thank you; I'll go upstairs now."

He entered the sick-room so quietly that the nurse, who sat by the bedside, did not hear him; but the grey head on the pillow turned quickly, and the dying eyes shone with eager welcome.

"I'm glad you've come; I thought you meant to leave it till too late,"

was the abrupt greeting.

"I was abroad, and did not get your letter at once," Paul said gently.

"And you came back? That's more than many fellows would have done.

Nurse, draw up those blinds, and leave us, please; there are several things I have to say. No, you need not talk about my saving my strength. What good will it do? A few minutes more life, perhaps," he added testily, as he saw the nurse giving Paul some admonition under her breath. "Women are a nuisance, Paul; and at no time do they prove it more than when you are ill and under their thumb. There! take a seat close by me, where I can see you."

"You wanted to see me about something particular, your lawyer told me,"

said Paul, filled with pity at the sight of the perfectly helpless figure. "It may be that I can carry out some wish of yours. I should be glad to be of service to you."

Major Lessing did not answer for some minutes, and Paul ascribed his silence to exhaustion. In reality the keen eyes were scanning Paul's face critically, as if trying to read his character.

"I wanted to see you; and now you've come I don't know what to make of you. It has crossed my mind more than once since I've lain here, that I've been a rash fool to make a man I know so little of, my heir."

Paul could not repress an exclamation of astonishment; the news gave him anything but unmixed pleasure.

"It was surely very rash, sir. I've no possible claim upon you. I have scarcely even any connection with you except the name."

"That's it," said the major. "You have the name, and that must be carried on and a distant tie of relations.h.i.+p; and there's something else, Paul. Years ago I wanted to marry your mother. You are my G.o.dson; you might have been my real son, you see."

Paul felt a lump in his throat; this love-story of long ago was pathetic. His mother had died when he was still quite a child, but she lived in his memory as beautiful and fascinating.

"She was half Irish," he said.

The major nodded. "So, partly from sentimental reasons, and partly because there was no one better, I've left the property at Rudham to you," he went on with a smile. "There would have been plenty of money to have left with it; but I've made some very bad speculations lately, and lost a great deal. I took to speculation from sheer want of amus.e.m.e.nt. I was a good billiard player as long as I had the use of my limbs; but here I've been, literally tied by the legs, for the last two years. The only thing properly alive about me was my brain, and speculation has interested me; but I was badly hit ten days ago. There will be some money, but you won't be a rich man."

"I don't care about it," interposed Paul, eagerly.

"Then you ought to; a landlord poorly off is in a bad case in these days; and I want things kept as they are, Paul. I've not lived at Rudham, but I've kept my eye on it all the same; and what you call progress, and its attendant abominations, has not hurt it much yet. I made a mistake when I let the bishop nominate a successor to the living when old Gregg died three years ago. Curzon's a go-ahead fellow, from all that I hear; I don't want a go-ahead squire."

"I'm afraid you've made another mistake, and, if there's time, you had better undo it," said Paul, gravely.

"Do I look like a man who can re-arrange all his matters?" asked the Major, irritably. "After all, what I ask of you is no very hard thing to grant; simply to accept the good the G.o.ds provide, and let well alone."

"But that for me is an impossible condition," said Paul. "I cannot let things alone if I feel that I can better them. I'm in no way fitted for a country squire; I've been brought up on different lines from you, and arrived at very different conclusions. I am grateful to you for your thought of me, but I want to live my own life unfettered by any conditions."

"And this is how you show your readiness to carry out any wish of mine?" said the major, bitterly.

"I'm sorry; but I promised in the dark, not knowing that my principles would be involved."

"I'm glad to hear you have any. May I ask what you call yourself? A Lessing who is not a Conservative is not worthy of the name."

"I scarcely know what I am; but my friends call me a Socialist."

"Then in Heaven's name, I've made a bigger blunder than the last!" said the squire, with an odd thrill in his voice.

"It's not my fault; and there may still be time to undo it," said Paul, rising, for the flush that crept to the major's temples warned him that the interview had been too long and too exciting. "I would thank you, if I could, for the thought of me, and I am sorry to have been the cause of disappointment, but it would not have been honest to hide my opinions."

"No; you've been honest enough, in all conscience. If there's yet time----" He broke off, turning away his head, and taking no notice of Paul's departure.

All that night Paul paced his room in deep thought. The scene he had witnessed had stirred him more than a little; and it grieved him to his heart that he had so seriously disturbed the last moments of a dying man.

"But I could not have hoodwinked him," he thought; "no honest man could. But to-morrow I'll prove to him that I am ready to help him in any way that I can. If he will only talk quietly, and keep his temper, he could surely suggest some more fitting heir than I; and the business details could be fairly quickly settled if I could take down his wishes and see his lawyer. He must yet have several days to live, I should think, with his extraordinary vitality of brain."

At a very early hour the following morning, therefore, Paul presented himself again at the house in the square, with the request that he might have a short interview with the major.

"Very sorry, sir," said Smith, with an added gloom of manner, "but my master's much worse; they don't think he'll live through the day. He was very restless last night; and nothing would satisfy him but that I should go off in the middle of the night and fetch Mr. Morgan--the lawyer as wrote to you, sir; but when I got him here my master had lost his power of speech. He knew Mr. Morgan quite well, but he could not make him understand what he wanted."

"And now?" asked Paul, pitifully.

"The doctor is just coming down the stairs, and will speak to you, sir."

Paul went out into the hall to meet him. "How did you find the major?"

Paul inquired.

"Dead," replied the doctor, drawing on his gloves. "He died as I entered the room."