CHAPTER XXIV. MR. BEAUMONT WINS HIS CASE.

In truth he had a silver tongue
Whose mild persuasive accents rung

Like music in her ear;

Despite her dread, despite her hate.
She ever let him rule her fate
And change her heart from joy elate

To one that ached with fear.

The shadows of solitude and dreariness had ever hung like ill-omened clouds over Garsworth Grange, but now the shadows were deepened by the presence of death. To the eerie atmosphere of the old house had been added a new element of fear, and every lonely room, every shadowy corner and every echoing corridor seemed to be filled with a weird feeling of the supernatural. Jellicks and Munks were not by any means imaginative folk, but even they felt the influence of the spell of horror which seemed to brood over the lonely mansion, and conversed together in low whispers with furtive looks around as if expecting a whole host of goblins and spirits to start forth from the brooding shadows. Miss Cassy and Una both kept to their rooms, mutually trying to cheer one another, and the only person who seemed to move about at all was Patience Allerby, who glided through the bare rooms and dusky passages like an unquiet ghost. And not unlike a ghost did she look with her haggard face, burning eyes, and slim figure, carrying with her the paper she had stolen from the sanctity of the dead man's chamber, the paper which hidden in her bosom seemed to her excited fancy to feel bitterly cold as if its dead owner had grasped it with his chill hand to drag it forth from its hiding-place. True, the paper would benefit her son, and it was legally his, still the memory of that stealthy theft in the dark night, while yet the corpse lay stiffly on the bed, seemed to haunt her conscious-stricken soul like a crime.

And amid all this horror and dreariness which clung round the place, the dead man lay in his coffin in the dismal room he had occupied during life. No flowers were placed on the bed or on the coffin, no relatives wept over the white set face to melt its frozen apathy with hot tears, no voice of lamentation was heard bewailing a good man's fate; lonely in death as he had been in life, Randal Garsworth, who had sacrificed the pleasures of this earth to a delusion, lay unloved and uncared for in the silent room as if he had lain for generations in the vault of his ancestors.

Sometimes when Munks or Jellicks had taken their turns in watching the body, Patience would come for a time and, kneeling down, pray for the dead man's soul; but the sneering look on the still countenance seemed to mock her prayers and she fled away in horror at the thoughts that gibing smile provoked.

On the second day after the death of the squire, a visitor came to see Patience, one whom she half expected, and the housekeeper was not at all astonished at beholding Beaumont standing at the door of her room, about four o'clock in the afternoon.

"Why do you come here?" she asked half in anger, half in dread.

"Because I want to speak to you," replied Beaumont, leisurely closing the door and taking a seat. "I know it is not quite the thing to pay visits so soon after a death, but Miss Challoner and her aunt are, I believe shut up in their rooms, Munks and that serpent you call Jellicks are safe in the kitchen, so I came in at the back of the house quite unperceived to see you."

"What about?" she asked stolidly.

"I think you can pretty well guess," he replied coolly, "about the conversation I had with you the other day--I want your answer."

"The answer is--no."

"Is it, indeed--ah! we'd better chat over it for a time. I may persuade you to change your mind."

"You'll never do that," she said with a kind of gloomy triumph, "never."

"Indeed--we'll see," he retorted calmly; "by-the-way I hope you don't mind me smoking, but it is so deucedly shivery in this tomb of a house that it gives me the creeps."

"You can smoke," she said curtly.

"Thanks--you know I love my creature comforts."

He rolled himself a cigarette, lighted it, and then blowing a thin cloud of blue smoke, crossed his legs and looked complacently at her.

"So you say no?" he observed with a smile. "Of course you know the consequences?"

"I do."

"And you are prepared to abide by them?"

"I am."

"Noble mother! May I ask your reasons?"

"Yes--and I will tell you my reasons," she said deliberately. "I half intended to agree to your scheme the other day, as I thought it would benefit my son--but now I have found a way to benefit him without participation in your villainy."

"The deuce you have," said Beaumont curiously. "How clever you are--come tell me all about it."

She smiled coldly at his evident uneasiness and went on speaking calmly with a certain malignant satisfaction which was not by any means acceptable to Mr. Beaumont.

"I asked the squire before he died to help Reginald Blake, telling him I was the boy's nurse and anxious to see him settled in life, he refused at first but by working on his delusion about re-incarnation I got him to give Reginald a cheque for one hundred pounds."

"Oh, and you think Reginald would prefer one hundred pounds down to ten thousand a year?" he said with an ugly look.

"Reginald doesn't know anything about it; the squire signed the cheque and wrote a letter, enclosed them both in an envelope and sealed it with his arms, then I, by his directions, locked it up in his desk."

"Where it is still?"

"No, I have got it. I have it here," she said, producing the letter from her bosom and holding it up to him.

"How did you get it?" he asked craftily.

"I watched by the body the first night after death, and remembering where he had put the letter, I took his keys from under his pillow and obtained it, then I locked up the desk and replaced the keys."

"Ah, perhaps you don't know that you have been guilty of a felony?"

"I don't care," she retorted defiantly. "You won't tell?"

"Won't I? that depends; at all events I'd like to look at that letter," he said, stretching out his hand.

She put the letter quickly behind her back.

"No, you won't see it."

"Why not?"

"Because I don't trust you."

"Very well," he said deliberately, "if you don't let me see the contents of the letter, I'll go straight to the lawyers when they arrive and tell them you stole it."

"You would not be such a villain?" she cried in despair.

"I don't see why I shouldn't--you always thought me bad, so why should I give the lie to your estimate of my character by proving myself good?--come, choose--the letter, or the exposure!"

Patience looked at him in despair, as she knew by her fatal admission she was in his power--so, with a sudden gesture of anger, she held the letter out to him.

"Take it."

Beaumont laughed softly, and took the letter daintily between his thumb and forefinger.

"I thought you'd have known," he said sneeringly. "Now get me a light."

"To do what?"

"Melt the wax--I want to see what's inside this envelope."

"But you mustn't do that--it's sealed with the Garsworth Arms--the lawyers won't pay the cheque if they find the seal has been tampered with."

"I can re-seal it with the Garsworth Arms," he replied coolly, "don't be alarmed. I know what I'm about."

She looked at him irresolutely, then apparently recognizing the futility of resistance, she lighted a candle and brought it to him.

With a dexterity only acquired by long practice Mr. Beaumont deftly melted the wax of the seal and speedily opened the letter. First he took out the short note, written by the Squire, which he read aloud to Patience, the contents being as follows:

"I give you this money to help you in your life. When I am born again in another body, and come to you for help or friendship, you must help me, if I ask, on my reminding you of this money I now give you--for no one but ourselves will know of this transaction, so you can be certain that he who speaks to you of it will be myself in a new body.

"Randal Garsworth."

"As mad as ever, I see," said Beaumont, with a sneer, putting down the note. "Now for the cheque."

He glanced at it quickly--saw that it was for one hundred pounds, payable to Reginald Blake, and dated the thirtieth of the month--whereupon he gave a low whistle.

"What's the matter?" asked Patience, quickly.

"To-day, I believe, is the fourteenth?"

"Yes--I know what you're going to say--the cheque is dated the thirtieth--I understand that."

"Yes, and you, doubtless, understand that the Squire died on the twelfth, and that this cheque is waste paper?"

"Waste paper?"

"Exactly--it's dated after the Squire's death, so to all intents and purposes, the Squire was not legally in existence when he signed it."

"What nonsense!" she said impatiently. "I saw him sign it myself."

"Of course you did," he replied smoothly. "You don't seem to understand me--a cheque is generally supposed to be signed on the day it is dated; and as this is dated the thirtieth, and the Squire died on the twelfth--well--it's so much waste paper."

"The lawyers will pay it when I explain the circumstances."

"The lawyers have nothing to do with it--the executors might, certainly, recognize it as a claim against the estate, but it is entirely optional with them; if you brought an action, you would, no doubt, recover on the cheque, but I'm afraid the costs would swallow up the amount claimed."

It was in order to get her to consent to join in his scheme that Beaumont thus argued in such a subtle manner, and he certainly succeeded in his plan; for, by taking away her last chance, he reduced her to despair.

"Then I can do nothing to help my son?" she cried, with a terrible expression of anguish on her face.

"Yes, you can--help me to get Reginald the property."

"I'm afraid."

"Afraid of what?" he asked, with supreme contempt, "the law?"

"No!--I'm not afraid of the law--but I am afraid of the curse this money will be to Reginald, if it's unlawfully obtained."

"Oh, if that is all your objection, I think you can set your mind at rest," replied the artist, with a sneer. "I'll help him to spend the money, and take my share of the curse. Don't talk rubbish--by putting Reginald in possession of ten thousand a year you will be harming no one--the money which should rightfully become Una Challoner's will still become hers by marriage, and two people will be made happy--if you will not help me, I'll tell Reginald all about his birth, and he will remain a pauper--if you help me, he will retain all--if you decline, he will lose everything."

"I do not see what chance I have against you," she cried in despair.

"No more do I!"

"You villain!" she said, furiously. "Why do you come and tempt me to sin like this?"

"I'm not tempting you to sin--don't I tell you, it will harm no one. Come, give me your answer--yes or no?"

"Yes," she said, faintly, "I agree."

"You will say that Reginald is the son of Fanny Blake and the Squire?"

"I will--for his sake."

"I don't care for whose sake you do it," he retorted, brutally, rising to his feet. "You've agreed to help me, so that's all I care about--now I'm going to get the papers."

"Where are they?"

"That's my business," said Beaumont, coolly sauntering to the door. "I'll fix up the necessary proofs, all you've got to do is, to tell a consistent story--I'll instruct you. By the way, you are quite sure Una Challoner, and that fool of an aunt, are out of the way?"

"Quite sure--they are in the oak parlour."

"No chance of their coming out?"

"None."

"Very good--then I can get what I want, without suspicion. Have you got the keys of the Squire's desk?"

"No, Dr. Nestley took them yesterday from the room, to give them to Miss Una."

"Confound it--has he done so?"

"I do not know."

"That's a nuisance," said Beaumont, reflectively; "I want to put the papers in the squire's desk and lock them up so that they may be found there in a natural manner. I must get those keys. Humph! never mind--I'll hit on some plan; when do the lawyers arrive?"

"Tomorrow afternoon."

"Well, I'll arrange the papers to-night, and bring them to you to-morrow morning; they must be put in the desk secretly. Now, good-bye at present, and mind, I have your promise."

Patience nodded silently, and turned away with a calm but determined face, while Beaumont went away to carry out the details of his nefarious scheme.

"I have done all I could to resist temptation," she said to herself, bitterly, "I can do no more. If I do sin it is for my son's sake, not my own."