The Honour of the Clintons Part 35

"I don't know," said Joan, as they walked out of the station together.

"It is something about Ronald. He is not to come here yet. Oh, what can it be?"

"It isn't anything about Ronald," Virginia said. "We know that much.

But it is some great trouble, and I suppose your father has asked him not to come for the present."

"Yes," said Joan. "Mother said she would tell me more after they had talked to you and d.i.c.k. Father has been indoors all day. I believe he is ill. Oh, Virginia, I am sure something dreadful is going to happen."

They drove straight to the house, and d.i.c.k went in at once to his father's room. The Squire was sitting in his chair, doing nothing. He looked aged and grey.

"Well, d.i.c.k," he said, looking up, without a smile. "This is a black home-coming. Ask your mother and Virginia to come in. Virginia must know. I'll tell you the story at once."

He told his story, without the circ.u.mlocutions he had used to Mrs.

Clinton. His voice was tired as he told it, and his narrative was almost bald. "There it is," he ended up. "I don't know whether I'm right or not. Your dear mother says I am. I hope I am. It means untold misery and disgrace. But I shan't pay her a penny, directly or indirectly."

Virginia looked anxiously at d.i.c.k, who had been sitting with downcast eyes, and now looked up at his father.

"You needn't worry yourself about that, father," he said.

The Squire's face brightened a little.

"You mean that you think I'm right," he said. "I suppose I am. But I can't be certain of it."

"I can," said d.i.c.k. "She can disguise it as she likes; but it's blackmail. We don't pay blackmail."

There were visible signs of relief at this uncompromising statement.

The Squire began to argue against it, not because he was not glad it had been made, but to justify his doubts.

"I know it's a difficult case," said d.i.c.k. "It's a most extraordinarily difficult case. The only way through it is to act on a broad principle, and stick to it through thick and thin. That's what you've done, and I'm very glad of it. You couldn't have done anything else, really, though you may think you could. Under no circ.u.mstances do we pay money to anybody to keep anything dark."

"Money _was_ paid," said the Squire.

"I had no idea whatever," said Virginia, with frightened eyes.

"Oh, of course not," said d.i.c.k. "It wasn't your fault."

His face was clouded. "I can't blame Humphrey," the Squire said, with his eyes on him.

d.i.c.k made no reply.

"He came on purpose to ask you," said Virginia. "He didn't try to keep it from you."

"He did keep it from me," said d.i.c.k. "I ought to have known."

"What should you have done?" asked the Squire.

d.i.c.k did not answer. Mrs. Clinton broke in. "Let us leave that alone," she said. "Humphrey had poor Susan to consider. We have no right to blame him for what he did."

"I say nothing about that, for the present," said d.i.c.k. "I must think it over. If I had been there he would not have got the money."

"He wouldn't have told you why he wanted it," Virginia said. "I think you would have paid it--to Gotch--as I did."

"You see how difficult it all is, d.i.c.k," said Mrs. Clinton. "At every moment there have been difficulties. Do not think harshly of poor Humphrey."

"He is out of it," said d.i.c.k, "at the other side of the world. See what comes of his actions. We couldn't be touched if it were not for that--in any way that will harm us. Susan is dead. n.o.body else had done anything they could have been accused of, or made sorry for, up till that time."

"Susan had," said Mrs. Clinton. "She was alive then; and she was Humphrey's wife. And wouldn't it have been terrible for us then if she had been punished?"

d.i.c.k's face was hard.

"d.i.c.k, supposing it had been me!" said Virginia.

"Oh, my dear!" he exclaimed impatiently.

"No, but you must think of it in that way. He stood by her. He _couldn't_ let that happen to her."

"Well," said d.i.c.k unwillingly, "when you've said that at every stage it has been a difficult question, perhaps you have said all that can be said. The trouble is that it is that payment to Gotch that is coming home to us. That's why, even if father had thought it right, otherwise, to pay her this money now, it would have been the most foolish thing he could have done. He would have been endorsing that transaction. As it is, he can say quite truly that he refused to do it, and we, who did do it, had no idea what it was done for."

"Yes, I see that," said the Squire, "and I never thought of it before.

The two things would have hung together."

"She would have made further demands," said d.i.c.k. "We should have been under her thumb."

"She said she would satisfy me of that," said the Squire.

"She may have said so. She would have been too clever for you. She would have drawn us in, until we should have had to do something downright dishonourable--that there couldn't have been any doubt about--or defy her and take the consequences, as we've got to do now.

We should have been living under the sword, perhaps for years, never knowing when it was going to fall, sh.e.l.ling out money all the time.

Oh, it doesn't do to think about! And no better off at the end of it than we are now."

"It's true," said the Squire. "I wish I'd had you to show it all so clearly to me while I was going through that awful time, making up my mind. Oh, Lord!" He wiped his brow, damp with the horror of thinking of it.

"You made up your mind without seeing clearly," said Mrs. Clinton.

"You did what was right because it was right."

"And now we've got to take our punishment for it," said the poor Squire, with a wry smile.

"That is what we'd better talk about," said d.i.c.k. "The other is all over. We can talk about that later."

"Herbert Birkett is coming down to-morrow," said the Squire. "I wrote and told him he must, and he sent me a wire. He is playing golf at North Berwick. It is her threat of an action for conspiracy that I want to ask him about."

"That's bluff," said d.i.c.k. "Who conspired to do what? Humphrey is out of the country. He had better stay there. She can't get at him.

Everybody else is blameless. You refused, and you were the only one besides him who knew anything about it."

"I can't prove that, and she won't stick at lies."

"That's true enough. But you _can_ prove it. She will have to get the Gotches over to prove anything at all, and his evidence will clear you.

Besides, you refused her the second time."

"I _can't_ prove that. There were only she and I."