The Black Abbot
Dick Alford nodded. As soon as he could escape from his brother’s
presence, he went round to the garage and, taking out his car, drove
to Willow House. Arthur was still on the lawn, walking up and down,
and from his attitude of depression Dick gathered that something
unusual had happened. Possibly he had been told about the breaking off
of the engagement. But here he attributed the wrong cause.
“I want to see you, Gwyn.”
Arthur Gwyn started and turned at the sound of the voice.
“Hullo!” he said awkwardly. “Does Harry know?”
Dick nodded.
“And he’s very angry, I suppose?”
“He is rather furious. That’s what I’ve come to see you about. Where
is Leslie?”
“She’s in the house. Do you want her?”
“No,” said Dick quietly. “I want to talk with you. Come for a walk
with me.”
They strolled out of all possibility of earshot from the house, and
then:
“Harry has decided to take the legal management of the estate out of
your hands, Gwyn,” he said. “He spoke to me this morning of some funds
that you’re handling--about fifty thousand pounds’ worth of stock from
the late Lady Chelford’s estate. Is that money intact?”
Arthur did not answer.
“Is that money intact?” asked Dick again.
“No,” said the other huskily; “not a penny of it.”
Dick stared at the man in horror.
“You mean the money is lost?”
Arthur nodded.
“Yes, I was persuaded to put it into an oil-field in Texas. The shares
are not worth two cents a thousand.”
Dick groaned.
“Oh, you fool, you cussed fool!” he muttered. “Don’t you realize what
this means? I can’t cover you up now, not even for Leslie’s sake. You
madman!”
Arthur Gwyn passed his hand wearily over his eyes.
“What is the use of ragging me?” he asked plaintively. “I’ve been
expecting this trouble, and have lived under the shadow of it for
years. I’ll have to take my medicine.”
“And Leslie?” asked Dick sternly. “What of her? Has she to take your
medicine, too?”
The man’s pallid face was distorted painfully.
“Don’t talk about Leslie, for God’s sake!” he said. “That’s the worst
of it. I’m not scared of Dartmoor or bankruptcy or anything. Leslie’s
the only fear I have.”
“Can you raise the money?”
Arthur gave a harsh little laugh.
“Raise it? How do you think I can raise fifty thousand?”
“You have no friends?”
The lawyer’s lips curled.
“Not fifty thousand pounds’ worth,” he said curtly. “No, I’m afraid,
Alford, I’ve got to go through with it. I’ve been a blackguard, a
vain, stupid fool--I’ve asked for all that is coming to me and I shall
not squeal.”
Dick was silent, going over the problem that this horrible situation
presented. Arthur could go to prison and stay there for the rest of
his life, for all he cared… but Leslie: this would break her heart.
“There is one thing I want you to promise me----” he began, as he
foresaw one possible solution which might present itself to Arthur’s
mind.
The lawyer smiled and nodded.
“You can trust me,” he said. “I’ve got some sort of religion tucked
away inside my system. Self-destruction is not my idea of a
gentleman’s solution. I tell you I’ll stand up to anything that comes,
and I’m not going to blow my brains out and leave a coroner’s jury of
yokels and carpenters to discuss my private affairs and probe into my
iniquities. When will the transfer take place?”
“We’ve got a week yet,” said Dick. “I can hold it up for that long;
but once the papers are in the hands of the other lawyers, nothing can
save you.”
A week! Arthur Gwyn pinched his lower lip in meditation. Seven days.
So far as he was concerned, if he had seven years to make reparation
he could not see daylight.
“And get out of your mind that you’re going to find the Chelford
treasure,” said Dick, and the shock made the man jump.
“Why, how do you know----” he stammered.
“I know all about that. I tell you that you can cut it out. That isn’t
a solution. It’s only robbing Peter to pay Peter; for if there is any
gold--and heaven knows I doubt it--it belongs to Harry and must go to
Harry. What about Leslie’s fortune? Of course that is non-existent.
Does she know?”
“I told her this morning,” said the man, and now Dick understood his
depression. “She took it like a brick; in fact, she seemed almost
happy about it. And why, I can’t for the life of me understand. Women
are queer things.”
“I know one woman who is the most wonderful thing in the world,” said
Dick softly.
He did not wait to see Leslie, but left as hurriedly as he came, and
the man who had been lying at full length beneath the laurel bushes
waited till the two men had disappeared, and then crawled painfully
and carefully back to the road, mounted the wall, and stepped out for
the nearest telegraph office to send his news.
XXXVI
Mr. Gilder arrived at his cottage in the evening and found his
“tenant” sitting on the doorstep smoking a pipe. Fortunately, the
cottage was in the middle of a thin plantation of trees, and the river
at the back made an approach from that direction impossible.
Nevertheless, Mr. Gilder was alarmed at the lack of precaution the man
showed.
“If you’re going to stay here you’ve got to keep inside the house. I
tell you I don’t want people to know that you’re living here. Now,
what is the big news?”
“Come inside,” said Thomas, with a grin, and his host felt that the
invitation into his own house was a little superfluous.
Thomas was not a good story-teller, and it was with many “You see what
I mean’s” and at inordinate length that he unravelled his tangled
narrative.
“I’d been hanging round the house all the morning. I wanted to have a
talk with the young lady----”
“What about?” demanded the other.
“About a certain thing----”
“Now, see here, Thomas: you’re not to speak to Miss Gwyn--do you
understand? You’re not to approach her and you’re not to go anywhere
near the house.”
“Well, it’s not a bad thing that I was there this morning,” grinned
Thomas. “Because I heard something that will make you jump!”
It took half-an-hour for him to repeat, with more or less accuracy,
the conversation he had heard on the lawn. When he came to the vital
point, Mr. Gilder whistled.
Arthur Gwyn had managed the Chelford estate without his assistance,
and Gilder was as ignorant of the particulars of the property as if it
were in some other office.
“Fifty thousand, eh?” he mused. “Well, that’s more than Arthur Gwyn
will collect in a hurry.”
“That’s what he said himself,” said Thomas. “He said to Alford:
‘Friends? Well, I haven’t got fifty thousand pounds’ worth’--those
were his very words. He said, ‘I’ll go to Dartmoor, and that doesn’t
worry me. What worries me is Leslie.’”
“Did you hear when the transfer was to be completed--I mean, when the
stocks were to be handed over to the other lawyers?”
“In a week,” said Thomas. “Mr. Alford said, ‘I can hold it up for a
week but I can’t keep it any longer. And once those papers are in the
other bloke’s hands, your name is mud.’”
Fifty thousand pounds! Gilder paced up and down the narrow room, his
hands behind him.
“You say that the engagement with his lordship is broken off?”
“He didn’t say so,” said the man, “but that’s how I took it. He said
‘Was Harry very annoyed?’ That’s his lordship. And Alford said ‘Yes,
and he’s going to change his lawyers.’ And he said, ‘What about
Leslie’s fortune?’----”
“Call her Miss Gwyn, will you?” interrupted Gilder roughly.
“He didn’t say Miss Gwyn, he said ‘Leslie.’ But to oblige you I’ll say
Miss Gwyn,” said Thomas. “He said, ‘What about Miss Gwyn’s fortune? Is
that gone?’ And Gwyn said, ‘Yes, every penny.’”
This was no news to Gilder--Arthur had told him as much.
“And here, Mr. Gilder--the Black Abbot was around last night. I’ve got
an idea about him! His lordship’s scared to death of the Black Abbot.
Did you know that?”
“Don’t talk to me about the Black Abbot!” snapped the man. He wanted
to work this thing out, and the chatter of his guest disturbed him.
“You keep inside and out of sight. I think you’d better go to London
to-night. You’ve got money?”
“I’ve got a bit of money. I was a fool! There’s an old-fashioned diary
in that library that his lordship would give a couple of thousand
pounds to get back, and I had it in my hand! That is the thing I ought
to have pinched.”
“And if it was found on you, you’d have been in prison. As it was, you
had taken money and you got away with it.”
This point of view had not struck the ex-convict before.
“That’s true,” he agreed. “Lord! what a headpiece you’ve got, Mr.
Gilder! If I had your brains----”
But Mr. Gilder was not in a mood for flattery.
“I’ve got an idea,” Thomas went on, unconscious of the distraction he
was causing. “Let me go up to London to-night and come down
to-morrow.”
But Gilder did not hear him. Fifty thousand pounds! And for that price
he could buy--Leslie Gwyn! His pulse quickened at the thought. There
were no “ifs” or “buts.” She would gladly make that sacrifice for her
brother’s sake. This time he had them all in the hollow of his hand:
Leslie, Arthur Gwyn, and last, but not least in dislike, Dick Alford.
Mentally he reviewed his financial position. He had considerably more
than a hundred thousand pounds in gilt-edged securities, which were
easily realizable--or transferable. He had house property in the north
of London, and a fairly large fluid balance at the bank. And he was
fifty. There were fifteen years of life ahead of him--fifteen happy
years. How could he better use his money than in buying happiness? The
life companionship of that fragrant thing, and afterward a will
whereby she lost all interest in his property if she married
again--Mr. Gilder thought a long way ahead. And his marriage would be
a knife in the heart of the Second Son, for he guessed Dick Alford’s
secret.
He saw his way now; the plan was foolproof and invincible. Nothing
stood between him and the realization of what had once been a wild and
foolish hope.
“A week? You’re sure of that?”
Thomas nodded. His cunning eyes had not left Gilder’s face.
Unconscious of the curious scrutiny, Fabrian asked:
“Why do you think this news is interesting to me?”
The man grinned and closed his right eye in a significant wink.
“Didn’t you ask me to tell you how often the young lady went to
Fossaway Manor? Didn’t you tell me to write everything that happened
between her and his lordship?”
Gilder was silent.
It was not a comfortable thought that he had employed such a man as
this to watch the girl he loved.
“You’d better keep close here,” he said. “I don’t want you to be seen
by the villagers or by the people from Fossaway Manor. Does anybody
know you’re here?”
“No, sir. Not even Miss Gwyn: she never asked----”
Gilder interrupted him brusquely.
“If you’re going to town, go by night, and come back by night. I’m not
so sure that it won’t be a good idea to stay here after all.”
He got back to London late in the evening and spent the night in a
strict examination of his finances. He had dismissed from his mind all
thoughts of the Chelford treasure. Mary Wenner had certainly
justification for her confidence. He himself had been deceived when he
had looked through the grating and seen those cylinders neatly
arranged on the stone bench. Who had moved them--the Black Abbot?
There must be some explanation for him. But he had his own ideas on
the subject, and the moment had not yet arrived when he could test his
theory.
The next morning he spent in the City and at Somerset House, examining
the will of the late Lady Chelford. Her legacies were set forth in
detail, and the character of the shares and stocks with which Arthur
Gwyn had been entrusted were particularized, and John Henry Gwyn,
Arthur’s uncle, named as trustee. A search of the court files failed