The Black Abbot
“You’ve wrecked and ruined my life,” the pretty virago went on, “with
your interference, and after all the work I’ve done! After all them--I
mean those hours I’ve spent with his lordship workin’ at the treasure
an’ he told me I was the most helpful secretary he’d ever had.…”
He let her talk herself to a sobbing incoherence.
“All this may be true,” he said soothingly, “and probably is. The
point is, your presence here is a little--indelicate.”
Seeing her look round over her shoulder as she was talking, he had
taken a quick survey of the ruins, expecting to discover that she had
a companion. But there was nobody in sight. The ground sloped steeply
from where he stood to the little Ravensrill, the broad brook which
had for a thousand years marked the boundary of the manor. Unless
somebody was concealed behind the fallen masonry she was alone.
“I suppose you want me to clear out now,” she gulped, and he inclined
his head.
“I will walk with you to Fontwell Cutting--that is the nearest way to
the village,” he said, and she was too much occupied with her
manufactured misery to resent his offer.
What had she been doing in the Abbey ruins so early in the morning? He
knew that it was useless to ask her.
As they passed down the steep path to the road she spoke over her
shoulder.
“I wouldn’t marry him for a million pounds!” she said viciously. “He
is going to marry Leslie Gwyn, isn’t he? I wish him joy!”
“I will convey your kind message,” he said ironically, an indiscreet
rejoinder, for it roused the devil in her.
“Mind he doesn’t lose her, that’s all!” she screamed. “I know!
Everybody knows! You want her money too--the Second Son’s in love with
her--that’s a nice lookout for Harry Chelford!”
He sat swinging his legs over the edge of the bluff, watching her till
she was out of sight.
Everybody knew that he loved Leslie Gwyn! And only at that moment he
knew it himself!
VI
In all the City of London there was perhaps no office more elegant
than that in which Mr. Arthur Gwyn spent his leisurely business hours.
It was a large room, panelled in white wood, with pink-shaded wall
brackets of frosted silver. Its floor was covered with a deep rose
carpet into which the feet sank as into an old lawn; and such
furnishing as the room held was of the most costly description.
Visitors and clients who had business with this dainty lawyer were
warned not to smoke in his sacred presence. The windows were doubled
to keep out the noises of Holborn; there were exterior sun blinds to
exclude the fugitive rays of pale sunlight which occasionally bathed
the City; and long velvet curtains, in harmony with the carpet, to
shut out the horrid world that roared and palpitated outside Mr.
Gwyn’s exquisite chamber. In this room was a faint aroma of roses--he
was partial to the more expensive varieties of perfume, and had a
standing order with the best of the Grasse houses.
He was a fair man with an unblemished skin and a small yellow
moustache; a credit to his hosier and shirtmaker. His wasp-waisted
morning coat fitted him without the suspicion of a wrinkle; his gray
waistcoat, the severe dark trousers with the thinnest of white
stripes, the patent shoes, the exact cravat, were all parts of a
sartorial symmetry.
Mr. Gwyn seldom appeared in the courts. His head clerk, a gray-haired
man of fifty, who was generally supposed by Mr. Gwyn’s brother
solicitors to be the brains of the business, prepared most of the
briefs, interviewed the majority of clients, leaving to his employer
the most important.
On a bright morning in the early days of September, Mr. Gwyn’s big
Rolls glided noiselessly to the sidewalk, the youthful footman seated
by the side of the driver sprang out and opened the door, and Arthur
Gwyn stepped daintily forth. There was a small white rose in his
buttonhole, and the passer-by who saw him, noting the perfect shine of
his silk hat, the glitter of his patent shoes, and the ebony stick
that he carried in his gloved hand, thought he was a bridegroom
stopping on his way to church.
He entered the tiny electric lift and was whisked up to the first
floor. A porter opened his door with a little bow and Arthur walked
in, followed by the servitor, who took his hat, gloves, and cane, and
disappeared with them to an inner room. Mr. Gwyn sat down at his desk,
glanced at the letters that had been left opened for his inspection
and pushed them aside. He pressed an onyx bell-push twice, and in a
few seconds his hard-faced managing clerk came in, carrying a wad of
papers in his hand.
“Close the door, Gilder. What are these?”
Gilder threw the papers on the polished table.
“Mostly writs,” he said curtly.
“For me?”
Gilder nodded and Arthur Gwyn turned over the papers idly.
“There is going to be trouble if they give judgment against you for
some of these,” said Gilder. “Up to now, I’ve managed to keep them out
of court, but there are at least three of these which must be paid. I
haven’t had a chance to speak to you since I came back from my
holidays. Did you lose much at Goodwood?”
“Eight or nine thousand,” said Arthur Gwyn lightly. “It may have been
more or less.”
“That means you don’t know because you haven’t paid,” said Gilder
bluntly.
“I paid a few--the more pressing,” the other hastened to assure him.
“What are these?”
He fingered the writs again with his beautifully manicured hand.
“One of them is very serious indeed,” said Gilder, picking it out from
the rest. “The trustees of the Wellman estate are suing you for three
thousand pounds--the loan you had from Wellman.”
“Can’t you fix them?”
Gilder shook his head.
“I can’t fix trustees--you know that. This is going to look ugly if it
comes into court.”
Arthur Gwyn shrugged his shoulders.
“There is nothing ugly about a loan----”
“You were Wellman’s lawyer,” interrupted Gilder. “And he was not
capable of managing his affairs. I tell you that will look ugly, and
the Law Society will be asking questions. You’ll have to raise money
to settle this case out of court.”
“What are the others?” asked Arthur Gwyn sulkily.
“There’s one for twelve hundred pounds, furniture supplied to Willow
House, and another from the vendor of Willow House for balance of
purchase money unpaid.”
Arthur Gwyn leaned back in his chair, took out a gold toothpick and
chewed it.
“What is the full amount?”
“About six thousand pounds,” said Gilder, gathering up the writs.
“Can’t you raise it?”
His employer shook his head.
“A bill?”
“Who is going to back it?” asked the lawyer, looking up.
Gilder scratched his chin.
“What about Lord Chelford?” he asked.
VII
Arthur Gwyn laughed softly.
“And what do you imagine Chelford would say if I went to him with such
a proposal? You seem to forget, my dear fellow, that to Chelford I am
the brother of a young lady who on her twenty-fifth birthday inherits
the greater part of a million pounds. I’m not only the brother, but I
am her trustee. Besides which, I am managing his mother’s estate. What
would he think if I tried? Chelford’s a fool, but he’s not such a fool
as that, and I would remind you that all his business affairs are in
the hands of the Second Son.”
“You mean Alford--why do you call him that?”
“He’s always been known as the Second Son since he was a child,” said
the other impatiently. “He is a shrewd devil, never forget that,
Gilder. I don’t know whether or not he suspects that I’m a fake, and
that Leslie’s fortune is a myth, but there have been times when he has
asked some deucedly uncomfortable questions.”
“Is the fortune a myth?” asked Gilder, and his companion looked at him
slyly.
“You ought to know, my friend,” he said. “We have been living on it
for eight years! The croupiers of Monte Carlo have raked into their
treasury quite a lot of it--various bookmakers I could mention have
built handsome villas out of it. A myth? It wasn’t a myth ten years
ago. It was two hundred thousand pounds short of a myth! But
to-day----”
He spread out his hands and eyed the writs with a whimsical smile.
“What do you expect to get from Chelford?” asked Gilder. “He has no
money.”
Mr. Gwyn chuckled.
“You may be sure that before I went to the expense and trouble of
buying--or nearly buying--a house adjoining Chelford’s place, and
before I took the trouble to bring Leslie and him into touch, I took
the elementary precaution of sizing up his position. He is
comparatively poor, because that brother of his will sell none of the
estates. He has the family obsession--their motto is ‘Hold Fast.’
Harry Chelford is realizable at a quarter of a million--apart from the
buried treasure.”
They both laughed at this.
“You’ve been lucky up to a point,” said Gilder seriously. “It was luck
to inherit his legal business----”
A clerk came in with some letters to sign at this moment, and, after
he was gone:
“Does your sister still think she is an heiress?” asked Gilder.
“She has that illusion,” replied the other coolly. “Of course she
thinks so! You don’t imagine Leslie would lend herself to that kind of
ramp, do you?”
He took a pen from the silver tray before him, dipped it into the ink,
and, drawing a sheet of paper toward him, scribbled down the figures.
“Six thousand pounds is a lot of money,” he said. “I lost three times
that amount when Black Satin was beaten a short head in the Drayton
Handicap. The only thing to do is to rush the wedding.”
“What about the Yorkshire property?” suggested the managing clerk.
Arthur Gwyn made a little grimace.
“I put a man in to buy it. I could have made twenty thousand profit on
that. There’s coal in abundance; that I have proved. But the Second
Son was on the job, damn him!”
There was a long silence.
“What are you going to do?” asked Gilder.
“I don’t know. I’m at my wits’ end.” Arthur Gwyn threw down the pen.
“The position is exquisite torture to a man of my sensibility. Can’t
you suggest anything?”
“Give me five minutes,” said Gilder, and went out.
As Gilder was making his way to his own office, a clerk handed him a
letter. It was addressed to him personally, in an illiterate hand.
Behind the door of his office bureau, he opened the envelope.
The letter began without any preliminary:
His lordship is still working on the treasure. He had an old book sent
to him from Germany last Tuesday, written by a German who was in this
country hundreds of years ago. I cannot read the title because of the
funny printing, which is like old English. His lordship has also had a
plan sent to him from a London bookseller of Fossaway Manor. His
lordship’s brother, Mr. Alford, has sold Red Farm to Mr. Leonard for
£3,500 [here Mr. Gilder smiled]. Miss Gwyn came to tea yesterday with
his lordship and Mr. Alford, and afterward Miss Gwyn and his lordship
went for a walk in the home park. There is some talk about the Black
Abbot having been seen near the old abbey. He was seen by Thomas
Elwin, the half-witted son of Elwin, his lordship’s cowman, but nobody
takes any notice of this. He has now been seen by Mr. Cartwright, the
grocer. His lordship has had an offer for his Yorkshire estate, but I
heard Mr. Alford advise him not to sell as he was sure there was coal
on it.
Gilder nodded, understanding just how his employer’s plan had fallen
through.
… When I was taking tea into the library I heard his lordship say that
he wanted the wedding to take place in October, but Miss Gwyn said she
would like it after Christmas. His lordship said that he didn’t mind
because he was so busy. Mr. Alford said he thought that the marriage
settlement should be fixed by Sampson & Howard, who were the old Lord
Chelford’s solicitors, but his lordship said that he thought the