A Terrible Temptation: A Story of To-Day
distinctly pledging yourself to keep the secret so long as I continue
to furnish you with the means of living. You hesitate. Is it not fair?”
“Well, it looks fair; but it is an awkward thing, signing a paper of
that sort.”
“You doubt me, sir; you think that, because I have told one great
falsehood, from good but erring motives, I may break faith with you. Do
not insult me with these doubts, sir. Try and understand that there are
ladies and gentlemen in the world, though you prefer gypsies. Have you
forgotten that night when you laid me under so deep a debt, and I told
you I never would forget it? From that day was I not always your
friend? was I not always the one to make excuses for you?”
Reginald assented to that.
“Then trust me. I pledge you my honor that I am this day the best
friend you ever had, or ever can have. Refuse to sign that paper, and I
shall soon be in my grave, leaving behind me my confession, and other
evidence, on which you will be dismissed from this house with ignominy,
and without a farthing; for your best friend will be dead, and you will
have killed her.”
He looked at her full: he said, with a shade of compunction, “I am not
a gentleman, but you are a lady. I'll trust you. I'll sign anything you
like.”
“That confidence becomes you,” said Lady Bassett; “and now I have no
objection to show you I deserve it. Here is a letter to Mr. Rolfe, by
which you may learn I have already placed three thousand pounds to his
account, to be laid out by him for your benefit in Australia, where he
has many confidential friends; and this is a check for five hundred
pounds I drew in your favor yesterday. Do me the favor to take it.”
He did her that favor with sparkling eyes.
“Now here is the paper I wish you to sign; but your signature will be
of little value to me without Mary Meyrick's.”
“Oh, she will sign it directly: I have only to tell her.”
“Are you sure? Men can be brought to take a dispassionate view of their
own interest, but women are not so wise. Take it, and try her. If she
refuses, bring her to me _directly._ Do you understand? Otherwise, in
one fatal hour, her tongue will ruin _you,_ and destroy me.”
Impressed with these words, Reginald hurried to Mrs. Meyrick, and told
her, in an off-hand way, she must sign that paper directly.
She looked at it and turned very white, but went on her guard directly.
“Sign such a wicked lie as that!” said she. “That I never will. You
_are_ his son, and Huntercombe shall be yours. She is an unnatural
mother.”
“Gammon!” said Reginald. “You might as well say a fox is the son of a
gander. Come now; I am not going to let you cut my throat with your
tongue. Sign at once, or else come to her this moment and tell her so.”
“That I will,” said Mary Meyrick, “and give her my mind.”
This doughty resolution was a little shaken when she cast eyes upon
Lady Bassett, and saw how wan and worn she looked.
She moderated her violence, and said, sullenly, “Sorry to gainsay
_you,_ my lady, and you so ill, but this is a paper I never can sign.
It would rob him of Huntercombe. I'd sooner cut my hand off at the
wrist.”
“Nonsense, Mary!” said Lady Bassett, contemptuously.
She then proceeded to reason with her, but it was no use. Mary would
not listen to reason, and defied her at last in a loud voice.
“Very well,” said Lady Bassett. “Then since you will not do it my way,
it shall be done another way. I shall put my confession in Sir
Charles's hands, and insist on his dismissing him from the house, and
you from your farm. It will kill me, and the money I intended for
Reginald I shall leave to Compton.”
“These are idle words, my lady. You daren't.”
“I dare anything when once I make up my mind to die.”
She rang the bell.
Mary Meyrick affected contempt.
A servant came to the door.
“Request Sir Charles to come to me immediately.”
CHAPTER XLIV.
“DON'T you be a fool,” said Reginald to his nurse.
“Sir Charles will send you to prison for it,” said Lady Bassett.
“For what I done along with you?”
“Oh, he will not punish his wife; he will look out for some other
victim.”
“Sign, you d--d old fool!” cried Reginald, seizing Mary Meyrick roughly
by the arm.
Strange to say, Lady Bassett interfered, with a sort of majestic
horror. She held up her hand, and said, “Do not dare to lay a finger on
her!”
Then Mary burst into tears, and said she would sign the paper.
While she was signing it, Sir Charles's step was heard in the corridor.
He knocked at the door just as she signed. Reginald had signed already.
Lady Bassett put the paper into the manuscript book, and the book into
the bureau, and said “Come in,” with an appearance of composure belied
by her beating heart.
“Here is Mrs. Meyrick, my dear.”
In those few seconds so perfect a liar as Mary Meyrick had quite
recovered herself.
“If you please, sir,” said she, “I be come to ast if you will give us a
new lease, for ourn it is run out.”
“You had better talk to the steward about that.”
“Very well, sir,” and she made her courtesy.
Reginald remained, not knowing exactly what to do.
“My dear,” said Lady Bassett, “Reginald has come to bid us good-by. He
is going to visit Mr. Rolfe, and take his advice, if you have no
objection.”
“None whatever; and I hope he will treat it with more respect than he
does mine.”
Reginald shrugged his shoulders, and was going out, when Lady Bassett
said, “Won't you kiss me, Reginald, as you are going away?”
He came to her: she kissed him, and whispered in his ear, “Be true to
me, as I will be to you.”
Then he left her, and she felt like a dead thing, with exhaustion. She
lay on the sofa, and Sir Charles sat beside her, and made her drink a
glass of wine.
She lay very still that afternoon; but at night she slept: a load was
off her mind for the present.
Next day she was so much better she came down to dinner.
What she now hoped was, that entire separation, coupled with the memory
of the boy's misdeeds, would cure Sir Charles entirely of his affection
for Reginald; and so that, after about twenty years more of conjugal
fidelity, she might find courage to reveal to her husband the fault of
her youth at a time when all its good results remained to help excuse
it, and all its bad results had vanished.
Such was the plan this extraordinary woman conceived, and its success
so far had a wonderful effect on her health.
But a couple of days passed, and she did not hear either from Reginald
or Mr. Rolfe. That made her a little anxious.
On the third day Compton asked her, with an angry flush on his brow,
whether she had not sent Reginald up to London.
“Yes, dear,” said Lady Bassett.
“Well, he is not gone, then.”
“Oh!”
“He is living at his nurse's. I saw him talking to an old gypsy that
lives on the farm.”
Lady Bassett groaned, but said nothing.
“Never mind, mamma,” said Compton. “Your other children must love you
all the more.”
This news caused Lady Bassett both anxiety and terror. She divined bad
faith and all manner of treachery, none the less terrible for being
vague.
Down went her health again and her short-lived repose.
Meantime Reginald, in reality, was staying at the farm on a little
business of his own.
He had concerted an expedition with the foreign gent, and was waiting
for a dark and gusty night.
He had undertaken this expedition with mixed motives, spite and greed,
especially the latter. He would never have undertaken it with a 500
pound check in his pocket; but some minds are so constituted they
cannot forego a bad design once formed: so Mr. Reginald persisted,
though one great motive existed no longer.
On this expedition it is now our lot to accompany him.
The night was favorable, and at about two o'clock Reginald and the
foreign gent stood under Richard Bassett's dining-room window, with
crape over their eyes, noses and mouths, and all manner of unlawful
implements in their pockets.
The foreign gent prized the shutters open with a little crowbar; he
then, with a glazier's diamond, soon cut out a small pane, inserted a
cunning hand and opened the window.
Then Reginald gave him a leg, and he got into the room.
The agile youth followed him without assistance.
They lighted a sort of bull's-eye, and poured the concentrated light on
the cupboard door, behind which lay the treasure of glorious old plate.
Then the foreign gent produced his skeleton keys, and after several
ineffective trials, opened the door softly and revealed the glittering
booty.
At sight of it the foreign gent could not suppress an ejaculation, but
the younger one clapped his hand before his mouth hurriedly.
The foreign gent unrolled a sort of green baize apron he had round him;
it was, in reality, a bag.
Into this receptacle the pair conveyed one piece of plate after another
with surprising dexterity, rapidity, and noiseless-ness. When it was
full, they began to fill the deep pockets of their shooting-jackets.
While thus employed, they heard a rapid footstep, and Richard Bassett
opened the door. He was in his trousers and shirt, and had a pistol in
his hand.
At sight of him Reginald uttered a cry of dismay; the foreign gent blew
out the light.
Richard Bassett, among whose faults want of personal courage was not
one, rushed forward and collared Reginald.
But the foreign gent had raised the crowbar to defend himself, and
struck him a blow on the head that made him stagger back.
The foreign gent seized this opportunity, and ran at once at the window
and jumped at it.
If Reginald had been first, he would have gone through like a cat, but
the foreign gent, older, and obstructed by the contents of his pocket,
higgled and stuck a few seconds in the window.
That brief delay was fatal; Richard Bassett leveled his pistol
deliberately at him, fired, and sent a ball through his shoulder; he
fell like a log upon the ground outside.
Richard then leveled another barrel at Reginald, but he howled out for
quarter, and was immediately captured, and with the assistance of the
brave Jessie, who now came boldly to her master's aid, his hands were
tied behind him and he was made prisoner, with the stolen articles in
his pocket.
When they were tying him, he whimpered, and said it was only a lark; he
never meant to keep anything. He offered a hundred pounds down if they
would let him off.
But there was no mercy for him.
Richard Bassett had a candle lighted, and inspected the prisoner. He
lifted his crape veil, and said “Oho!”
“You see it was only a lark,” said Reginald, and shook in every limb.
Richard Bassett smiled grimly, and said nothing. He gave Jessie strict
orders to hold her tongue, and she and he between them took Reginald
and locked him up in a small room adjoining the kitchen.
They then went to look for the other burglar.
He had emptied his pockets of all the plate, and crawled away. It is
supposed he threw away the plate, either to soften Reginald's offense,
or in the belief that he had received his death wound, and should not
require silver vessels where he was going.
Bassett picked up the articles and brought them in, and told Jessie to
light the fire and make him a cup of coffee.
He replaced all the plate, except the articles left in Reginald's
pocket.
Then he went upstairs, and told his wife that burglars had broken into
the house, but had taken nothing; she was to give herself no anxiety.
He told her no more than this, for his dark and cruel nature had
already conceived an idea he did not care to communicate to her, on
account of the strong opposition he foresaw from so good a Christian:
besides, of late, since her daughter came home to back her, she had
spoken her mind more than once.