“I am now to bid you farewell,” said he, “and that forever. For now you go among my enemies, where all your former prejudices will revive. I never yet failed to charm a person when I wanted; even you, my good friend—to call you so for once—even you have now a very different portrait of me in your memory, and one that you will never quite forget. The voyage has not lasted long enough, or I should have wrote the impression deeper. But now all is at an end, and we are again at war. Judge by this little interlude how dangerous I am; and tell those fools”—pointing with his finger to the town—“to think twice and thrice before they set me at defiance.”
X
Passages at New York
I have mentioned I was resolved to steal a march upon the Master; and this, with the complicity of Captain M’Murtrie, was mighty easily effected: a boat being partly loaded on the one side of our ship, and the Master placed on board of it, the while a skiff put off from the other, carrying me alone. I had no more trouble in finding a direction to my lord’s house, whither I went at top speed, and which I found to be on the outskirts of the place, a very suitable mansion, in a fine garden, with an extraordinary large barn, byre, and stable, all in one. It was here my lord was walking when I arrived; indeed, it had become his chief place of frequentation, and his mind was now filled with farming. I burst in upon him breathless, and gave him my news: which was indeed no news at all, several ships having outsailed the Nonesuch in the interval.
“We have been expecting you long,” said my lord; “and indeed, of late days, ceased to expect you any more. I am glad to take your hand again, Mackellar. I thought you had been at the bottom of the sea.”
“Ah! my lord, would God I had!” cried I. “Things would have been better for yourself.”
“Not in the least,” says he grimly. “I could not ask better. There is a long score to pay, and now—at last—I can begin to pay it.”
I cried out against his security.
“O!” says he, “this is not Durrisdeer, and I have taken my precautions. His reputation awaits him; I have prepared a welcome for my brother. Indeed, fortune has served me; for I found here a merchant of Albany who knew him after the ’Forty-five, and had mighty convenient suspicions of a murder: someone of the name of Chew it was, another Albanian. No one here will be surprised if I deny him my door; he will not be suffered to address my children, nor even to salute my wife: as for myself, I make so much exception for a brother that he may speak to me. I should lose my pleasure else,” says my lord, rubbing his palms.
Presently he bethought himself, and set men off running, with billets, to summon the magnates of the province. I cannot recall what pretext he employed; at least, it was successful; and when our ancient enemy appeared upon the scene, he found my lord pacing in front of his house under some trees of shade, with the Governor upon one hand and various notables upon the other. My lady, who was seated in the verandah, rose with a very pinched expression and carried her children into the house.
The Master, well dressed, and with an elegant walking-sword, bowed to the company in a handsome manner and nodded to my lord with familiarity. My lord did not accept the salutation, but looked upon his brother with bended brows.
“Well, sir,” says he at last, “what ill wind brings you hither of all places, where (to our common disgrace) your reputation has preceded you?”
“Your lordship is pleased to be civil,” cries the Master, with a fine start.
“I am pleased to be very plain,” returned my lord; “because it is needful you should clearly understand your situation. At home; where you were so little known, it was still possible to keep appearances; that would be quite vain in this province; and I have to tell you that I am quite resolved to wash my hands of you. You have already ruined me almost to the door, as you ruined my father before me;—whose heart you also broke. Your crimes escape the law; but my friend the Governor has promised protection to my family. Have a care, sir!” cries my lord, shaking his cane at him: “if you are observed to utter two words to any of my innocent household, the law shall be stretched to make you smart for it.”
“Ah!” says the Master, very slowly. “And so this is the advantage of a foreign land! These gentlemen are unacquainted with our story, I perceive. They do not know that I am the true Lord Durrisdeer; they do not know you are my younger brother, sitting in my place under a sworn family compact; they do not know (or they would not be seen with you in familiar correspondence) that every acre is mine before God Almighty—and every doit of the money you withhold from me, you do it as a thief, a perjurer, and a disloyal brother!”
“General Clinton,” I cried, “do not listen to his lies. I am the steward of the estate, and there is not one word of truth in it. The man is a forfeited rebel turned into a hired spy: there is his story in two words.”
It was thus (in the heat of the moment) I let slip his infamy.
“Fellow,” said the Governor, turning his face sternly on the Master, “I know more of you than you think for. We have some broken ends of your adventures in the provinces, which you will do very well not to drive me to
