The Unknown Ajax Page 15

‘Some things are common knowledge, sir.’

  ‘Yes, and everyone knows that at many of the regular ports they bring the cargoes in as openly as you please, and how much is declared and how much is slipped through is just a matter of – oh, arrangement between the Revenue officer and the captains of the vessels!’ said Richmond.

  ‘Nay, lad, what difference does that make?’ said Hugo. ‘Dishonesty amongst the Preventives doesn’t alter the case.’

  ‘Of course it doesn’t!’ Matthew said, rather shortly. ‘Free-trading is to be deplored – no one denies that! – but while the duties remain at their present level, particularly on such commodities as tea and tobacco and spirits, the temptation to evade –’

  ‘While duties remain at their present level,’ interrupted his lordship grimly, ‘the Board of Customs will get precious little support for its land-guard. Land-guard! Much hope they have of stopping the trade! By God, it puts me out of all patience when I hear that more and more money is being squandered on so-called Prevention! Now we are to have special coastguards, or some such tomfoolery! I’ll lay you any odds the rascals will run the goods in under their noses.’

  ‘Oh, I should think undoubtedly,’ agreed Vincent. ‘I am not personally acquainted with any of the Gentlemen – at least, not to my knowledge – but I have the greatest admiration for persons so full of spunk. I am unhappily aware that they have more pluck than I have.’

  Richmond laughed; but Matthew said in a displeased voice: ‘I wish you will not talk in that nonsensical style! A very odd idea of you Hugh will have!’

  ‘Oh, no, do you think so, Papa? Have you an odd idea of me, cousin? Or any idea of me?’

  Hugo shook his head. ‘Nay, I’m not judging you,’ he said gently.

  Matthew stared at him for a moment, and then gave a reluctant laugh. ‘Well, there’s for you, Vincent!’

  ‘As you say, sir. Something in the nature of a half-armed stop. Do enlighten my ignorance, cousin! Does your very proper dislike of the Gentlemen arise from – er – an innate respectability, or from some particular cause, connected, perhaps, with the wool-trade?’

  ‘There’s no owling done now!’ Richmond objected.

  ‘What’s owling?’ asked Claud, with a flicker of interest.

  ‘Oh, smuggling wool out of the country! But that was when there was a law against exporting wool, and ages ago, wasn’t it, Grandpapa? There used to be a great deal of it done all along the coast.’

  ‘I wasn’t thinking of that,’ said Hugo. ‘There were two things smuggled out of the country, and into France, while we were at war with Boney, that did more harm than owling.’

  ‘Why, what?’ demanded Richmond, frowning.

  ‘Guineas, and information. Did you never hear tell of the guinea boats that were built in Calais? It was before your time, and before mine too, but it was English gold that kept the Empire above hatches. Boney used to encourage English smugglers. He came by a deal of information that didn’t make our task any the easier.’

  Richmond looked rather daunted; but Lord Darracott said testily: ‘No doubt! Possibly we too came by information through the same channel. Do you imagine yourself to be the only person here who thinks smuggling a bad thing? We all think it! It sprang from a damned bad cause, and until that’s removed it will go on, and so it may for anything I’ll do to stop it! Don’t you talk to me about the rights and wrongs of it! Bad laws were made to be broken!’

  He stopped, his hands clenching on the arms of his chair, for a chuckle had escaped Hugo. Vincent put up his glass, and eyed his cousin through it. ‘I do trust you mean to share the joke with us?’ he said.

  ‘I was just thinking what a pudder we’d be in, if every Jack rag of us set about breaking all the laws we weren’t suited with,’ explained Hugo, broadly grinning. ‘Donnybrook Fair would be nothing to it, that road!’

  Nine

  Richmond, knowing that his indiscreet confidence to Vincent was largely to blame for Hugo’s fall from grace, tried gallantly to intervene; but it was Claud who saved Hugo from annihilation. To everyone’s surprise, he suddenly said: ‘Well, Hugo’s right! No question about it!’ He looked up to discover that a singularly baleful stare from his grandfather’s hard eyes was bent upon him, and blanched a little. ‘Well, what I mean is,’ he said manfully, though in a less decided tone, ‘no harm in buying run brandy, though I shouldn’t do it myself, because I don’t like brandy above half. The thing is you don’t know where it’s going to stop. Not the brandy. Running it.’

  ‘I collect that some meaning lies behind these cryptic utterances,’ remarked Vincent. ‘Or am I indulging optimism too far?’

  ‘Much too far!’ said Lord Darracott gratingly.

  ‘No, you ain’t!’ retorted Claud, stung. ‘What’s more, if you’d as much know as you think you have, you wouldn’t ask me what I mean, because it’s as plain as a pikestaff!’

  ‘Is that to my address?’ demanded his lordship ominously.

  ‘No, no, sir! Good God, no!’ said Claud hastily. ‘Talking to my brother! Besides, you do know what I mean: you told us all about it yourself! Hawkhurst Gang!’

  ‘The Hawkhurst Gang!’ ejaculated his lordship, and fell suddenly into silence.

  ‘Yes, of course no one wants– But that was years ago!’ Richmond said. ‘Nothing like that happens nowadays!’

  ‘It could, though,’ said Claud. ‘Never thought about it much before, but now I do come to think about it I’m dashed if I don’t think it’s bound to happen!’

  ‘Nonsense!’ snapped his lordship.

  ‘Well, Father –’ said Matthew hesitantly, ‘one must hope, of course – but I own that there is a great deal of sense in what Claud says.’ He looked across the table at Hugo, and said: ‘The Hawkhurst Gang was a pernicious set of ruffians – smugglers, you understand – that held a rule of terror over the countryside when your grandfather was a boy. They committed every sort of atrocity, and were so strong in numbers – how many men was it they were able to muster within an hour, Father?’

  ‘I forget,’ returned his lordship shortly.

  ‘Five hundred,’ supplied Richmond. ‘And they used to have regular battles with rival gangs!’

  ‘They indulged in far worse practices than that, my boy,’ said Matthew dryly.

  ‘Yes, I know – murdering people, and torturing any they thought had informed against them – horrid! It went on for years, too. I wish I had been alive then!’

  ‘Wish you’d been alive then?’ echoed Claud. The height of his collar made it impossible for him to turn his head, so he was obliged to slew his whole body round in his chair to obtain a view of Richmond, seated beside him. ‘Well, of all the jingle-brained things to say!’

  ‘No, because only think what sport it would have been! None of us – I don’t mean only ourselves, but everyone like us! – seems to have made the least push to get the better of the gang, and of course the Government did nothing but what was paltry, but I’ll swear the country people only wanted someone to lead them! Arms, too, but we could have supplied them with arms, and made them into – what do you call those irregular troops that fought in Spain, Hugo?’

  ‘Guerrilleros,’ Hugo responded, regarding him with a lurking twinkle. ‘So that’s what you’d have enjoyed, is it?’

  Richmond blushed, but his eyes still glowed. ‘Well, you must own it – it would have been something like!’

  Hugo shook his head. ‘Nay, lad, what it would have been like is something you’ve never seen.’

  ‘Oh, you mean burning ricks, and laying the country waste, but that wouldn’t happen! I daresay the gang would have tried to burn our houses, but we should have kept watch – yes, and laid ambushes, too!’

  ‘Well, if that’s your notion of comfort it ain’t mine!’ said Claud. ‘Dashed if I don’t think you’ve got windmills in your head!’

  Lord Darracott thr
ust back his chair, and rose. ‘I wish to hear no more from any of you!’ he said harshly. ‘I don’t know which puts me the more out of patience, Hugh’s damned morality, or your nonsense, Richmond! Matthew, I want a word with you! The rest of you may join the ladies.’

  He then stalked out of the room, and Vincent, getting up, said: ‘That I take to be a command. Shall we go?’

  His lordship was not seen again that evening, but shortly before the tea-tray was brought in Matthew joined the drawing-room party, all of whom, with the exception of Vincent, who was absent, were gathered round a card-table. As Matthew entered the room, his wife laid her hand face upwards on the table, to the accompaniment of a chorus of indignant protests, which she acknowledged with a small, triumphant smile.

  ‘Dash it, Mama, that makes it five times you’ve looed the board!’

  ‘Oh, Aurelia, you wretch!’

  ‘Aunt! That was my forlorn hope! You’ve left me without a feather to fly with!’

  ‘Well! you are all very merry!’ said Matthew. ‘Silver-loo, eh?’

  ‘No, copper-loo, sir,’ replied Richmond. ‘We were too fly to be hooked in to play silver-loo with my aunt!’

  ‘Aha! so you have been physicking them, have you, my dear?’

  ‘I should rather think she has!’ said Claud. ‘If she don’t loo the board outright, you may depend upon it she holds Pam!’

  ‘Except when Hugo has it! Hugo, if you’ve saved your groats again – !’

  ‘No, not this time. My luck is nothing to her ladyship’s. Do you always hold such cards, ma’am?’

  ‘I am, in general, very fortunate,’ said Lady Aurelia. She gathered up her fan and her reticule, and said graciously: ‘Well, that was very diverting! You would have stared, I daresay, Matthew, had you seen us being so foolish, and cutting such jokes!’

  Matthew had never known his wife to cut jokes, or to behave foolishly, but he accepted this without a blink, saying that he was glad she had been so well entertained. He then looked round the room, and asked, with a slight frown, what had become of Vincent. To this she replied with majestic unconcern that she had no notion, but it was to be inferred from the subsequent folding of her lips that she was displeased.

  ‘Begged to be excused,’ said Claud. ‘Beneath his touch to play copper-loo.’

  ‘Stupid fellow!’ Matthew said, his frown deepening.

  He did not mention Vincent again until he was alone with Lady Aurelia. He found her ladyship attired in a voluminous dressing-gown, reading a volume of sermons, as was her invariable custom, while her maid brushed her hair. She raised her eyes, and after a moment’s dispassionate study of his face, placed a marker in her book, laid it down, and dismissed the maid.

  ‘Well, Matthew?’

  He was fidgeting about the room, and at first seemed to have nothing of much moment to say; but after making several desultory remarks, to which she responded with accustomed patience, he disclosed the real purpose of his visit by saying that he wished she would speak to Vincent.

  ‘It would be useless,’ she replied.

  ‘He is behaving abominably!’ Matthew said angrily. ‘I am vexed to death! If anyone has a right to resent Hugh’s presence it is I – though I trust I have too much dignity to conduct myself towards him as Vincent does! It is a fortunate circumstance that Hugh is a muttonhead, and doesn’t know when Vincent is cutting at him, but sooner or later Vincent will go too far, and a pretty uproar there will be!’

  ‘I do not consider Hugh a muttonhead, nor do I think he is unaware of Vincent’s hostility.’

  He stared at her. ‘I cannot imagine why you should say so, ma’am! For my part, he seems to me little better than a dummy! It is always so with these clumsy giants: beef-witted! When I think of the future – that oaf in my father’s shoes! – I declare I don’t know how to support my spirits! But as for coming the ugly, as Vincent does– Upon my word, he will be well served if Hugh does take offence! That is –’ He paused, looking harassed, but Lady Aurelia said nothing, and after a minute he burst out with the true cause of his anxiety. ‘I do not conceal from you, Aurelia, that my mind misgives me! There is no saying what might come of it, if a quarrel were to spring up between those two! Vincent is capable of anything: he is my father over again!’

  She considered this calmly, before saying: ‘There is a want of conduct in him that vexes me very much, but I cannot suppose that he would go so far as to force such a quarrel upon his cousin as I collect you have in mind, my dear Matthew.’

  It was what he had in mind, but he exclaimed instantly: ‘Good God, I hope not indeed! It does not bear thinking of!’ He took a hasty turn about the room. ‘I wish I knew what to do for the best! I don’t understand Vincent: I have frequently been shocked by the reckless things he will do. His temper, too! Then the feeling he seems to have for this place: one would imagine he had always expected to inherit it, but that is absurd! And– But I will not say all I feel upon this occasion!’

  ‘You are afraid that Vincent may force a duel on his cousin,’ she said relentlessly. ‘I cannot think it possible. If he did so, it could only be with the intention of putting a period to Hugh’s life, and that, my dear sir, would be such an infamous act as I am persuaded no son of ours would be capable of performing.’

  ‘No, no, of course not!’ he said. ‘Good God, I should hope– Aurelia, my father told me this evening that he wishes Vincent to remain here for a week or two! I had had no notion that anything like that was in the air, and I cannot like it. I ventured to suggest to my father that it would be wiser to let Vincent go, but you know what he is! He will never listen to one word of advice. Indeed, he is becoming so– However, I do not mean to discuss that! But I don’t deny that I am excessively uneasy, and could almost wish it were not necessary for me to be in London next week. However little intention Vincent may have of bringing things to a – a fatal conclusion, I cannot rid myself of the apprehension that a quarrel might flare up; and I do not scruple to tell you, ma’am, that I do not feel that any dependence may be placed on my father’s nipping anything of that nature in the bud. In fact, the suspicion flashed across my mind– But that’s nonsense, of course! You will not regard it, I beg!’

  ‘Certainly not,’ she replied. ‘I believe you are over-anxious, and although I place no more reliance than you do upon your father’s behaving as he ought I am strongly of the opinion that we may place every reliance on Major Hugh Darracott’s good sense. Of the amiability of his disposition even you can have no doubt. I have observed him narrowly, and have been agreeably surprised. He is a man of principle; his temper is equable; his manners perfectly gentlemanlike and unaffected. The only fault I perceive in him is a tendency to levity, but –’

  ‘Levity?’ broke in Matthew.

  ‘If it escaped your notice, my dear sir, that his atrocious brogue overcame him only when it had been made deplorably plain to him that his family held him in contempt, I can only say that it did not escape mine.’

  ‘You mean to tell me– No, I don’t believe it! He slips into it when he forgets to guard his tongue! If he is shamming it– Well, upon my word, what infernal impudence!’

  ‘I am no friend to levity, but I cannot but acknowledge that in taking his family’s hostility in good part he showed himself to be a man of considerable forbearance,’ said her ladyship repressively.

  He coloured, and looked discomfited. Lady Aurelia, satisfied that her words had gone home, continued in precisely the same composed tone: ‘As to Vincent, though I do not anticipate any such issue as you have suggested, I daresay it would be wiser for me to remain at Darracott Place, instead of returning with you to Mount Street.’

  His expression changed to one of relief. ‘Should you dislike it, ma’am? I own, I should be easier in my mind, for although you may say Vincent does not listen to you I am tolerably certain that while you are at hand he will take care to keep within bounds. But
I don’t mean to press you: it is not an object with my father to make his guests comfortable!’

  ‘My dear sir, I hope my mind is stronger than you believe it to be! I do not suffer from an excess of sensibility. I have never allowed your father’s odd humours to sink my spirits, and it would be a strange thing if I did so now, after nearly thirty years. I am perfectly willing to remain, particularly so because Elvira has twice expressed her wish that I should stay to support her through this very awkward time.’

  ‘Ay, no doubt she must be dreading your departure! I hadn’t thought of that, but I promise you I pity her with all my heart! She is thrown into high fidgets by no more than a rough word from my father. If she could school herself to be a little less in alt she would go on better with him, but her understanding I have never thought superior. I only wish you may not find it a bore to be continually with her!’

  ‘You may be easy on that head. We have the habit of easy intercourse, and if she has little force of mind she is always so good-natured and attentive that you need entertain no fears that I shall not be comfortable.’

  With these words, Lady Aurelia picked up her book again, and Matthew, interpreting this as a sign that the audience was at an end, imprinted a salute upon her cheek, and took himself off to his own room.

  Hugo, meanwhile, had been strolling up and down the terrace, and enjoying the solace of one of his forbidden cigars. His countenance was thoughtful; and when he presently sat down on the parapet there was the hint of a crease between his brows. He remained there for some little time, staring abstractedly before him; but presently some small sound caught his attention, and he turned his head to look searchingly across the shadowed garden below. The moonlight was faint, obscured by broken clouds, but he was able to discern a vague figure striding across the lawn towards the house. He remained motionless, and in another minute or two recognized Vincent. It was not until Vincent had reached the foot of the shallow stone steps that he perceived his cousin. He paused, looking up, and said: ‘Ah! Ajax! Taking the air, or is it possible you were waiting for me?’