They entered the closet, which was quite empty. The Squire looked round, and you could hardly have said whether he was relieved or disappointed.
“No furniture here,” said the Squire, and looked through the dusty window. “Did you say anything to me lately—I don’t mean this morning—about this room, or the closet—or anything—I forget—”
“Lor’ bless you! Not I. I han’t been thinkin’ o’ this room this forty year.”
“Is there any sort of old furniture called a ‘buffet’—do you remember?” asked the Squire.
“A buffet? why, yes—to be sure—there was a buffet, sure enough, in this closet, now you bring it to my mind,” said Cooper. “But it’s papered over.”
“And what is it?”
“A little cupboard in the wall,” answered the old man.
“Ho—I see—and there’s such a thing here, is there, under the paper? Show me whereabouts it was.”
“Well—I think it was somewhere about here,” answered he, rapping his knuckles along the wall opposite the window. “Ay, there it is,” he added, as the hollow sound of a wooden door was returned to his knock.
The Squire pulled the loose paper from the wall, and disclosed the doors of a small press, about two feet square, fixed in the wall.
“The very thing for my buckles and pistols, and the rest of my gimcracks,” said the Squire. “Come away, we’ll leave the dog where he is. Have you the key of that little press?”
No, he had not. The old master had emptied and locked it up, and desired that it should be papered over, and that was the history of it.
Down came the Squire, and took a strong turnscrew from his gun-case; and quietly he reascended to King Herod’s room, and, with little trouble, forced the door of the small press in the closet wall. There were in it some letters and cancelled leases, and also a parchment deed which he took to the window and read with much agitation. It was a supplemental deed executed about a fortnight after the others, and previously to his father’s marriage, placing Gylingden under strict settlement to the elder son, in what is called “tail male.” Handsome Charlie, in his fraternal litigation, had acquired a smattering of technical knowledge, and he perfectly well knew that the effect of this would be not only to transfer the house and lands to his brother Scroope, but to leave him at the mercy of that exasperated brother, who might recover from him personally every guinea he had ever received by way of rent, from the date of his father’s death.
It was a dismal, clouded day, with something threatening in its aspect, and the darkness, where he stood, was made deeper by the top of one of the huge old trees overhanging the window.
In a state of awful confusion he attempted to think over his position. He placed the deed in his pocket, and nearly made up his mind to destroy it. A short time ago he would not have hesitated for a moment under such circumstances; but now his health and his nerves were shattered, and he was under a supernatural alarm which the strange discovery of this deed had powerfully confirmed.
In this state of profound agitation he heard a sniffing at the closet-door, and then an impatient scratch and a long low growl. He screwed his courage up, and, not knowing what to expect, threw the door open and saw the dog, not in his dream-shape, but wriggling with joy, and crouching and fawning with eager submission; and then wandering about the closet, the brute growled awfully into the corners of it, and seemed in an unappeasable agitation.
Then the dog returned and fawned and crouched again at his feet.
After the first moment was over, the sensations of abhorrence and fear began to subside, and he almost reproached himself for requiting the affection of this poor friendless brute with the antipathy which he had really done nothing to earn.
The dog pattered after him down the stairs. Oddly enough, the sight of this animal, after the first revulsion, reassured him; it was, in his eyes, so attached, so good-natured, and palpably so mere a dog.
By the hour of evening the Squire had resolved on a middle course; he would not inform his brother of his discovery, nor yet would he destroy the deed. He would never marry. He was past that time. He would leave a letter, explaining the discovery of the deed, addressed to the only surviving trustee—who had probably forgotten everything about it—and having seen out his own tenure, he would provide that all should be set right after his death. Was not that fair? at all events it quite satisfied what he called his conscience, and he thought it a devilish good compromise for his brother; and he went out, towards sunset, to take his usual walk.
Returning in the darkening twilight, the dog, as usual attending him, began to grow frisky and wild, at first scampering round him in great circles, as before, nearly at the top of his speed, his great head between his paws as he raced. Gradually more excited grew the pace and narrower his circuit, louder and fiercer his continuous growl, and the Squire stopped and grasped his stick hard, for the lurid eyes and grin of the brute threatened an attack. Turning round and round as the excited brute encircled him, and striking vainly at him with his stick, he grew at last so tired that he almost despaired of keeping him longer at bay; when on a sudden the dog stopped short and crawled up to his feet wriggling and crouching submissively.
Nothing could be more apologetic and abject; and when the Squire dealt him two heavy thumps with his stick, the dog whimpered only, and writhed and licked his feet. The Squire sat down on a prostrate tree; and his dumb companion, recovering his wonted spirits immediately, began to sniff and nuzzle among the roots. The Squire felt in
