Basil and Annette

"I think not; I should be placing myself in a false position. We will not talk of it any more to-night, Chaytor. I am tired and shall go to bed."

"So shall I. The conversation has been a bit too sentimental for me. Besides, when you say that you are cut off from sympathy and human influences here, you are not paying me a very great compliment, after the sacrifices I have made for you. But it is the way of the world."

"Why, Chaytor," said Basil, with affectionate emphasis, "I never proposed that we should part. My hope was that we should go home together. You are as much out of place here as I am. With your capacities and with money in your pocket, you could carve a career in England which would make you renowned."

"It is worth thinking of; but I must have your renewed promise, Basil, that you will not throw up our partnership here till we have made our fortune."

"I give you the promise. It would be folly to land in the old country penniless."

"So that the upshot of it is, that it all depends upon money. In my opinion everything in life does."

"You do yourself an injustice, and are not speaking in your usual vein. I daresay I am to blame for it. Forgive me, friend."

"Oh, there's nothing to forgive; but it is strange, isn't it, that the first difference we have had should have sprung from the prospect of our making our pile? Good night, old fellow."

"Good night, Chaytor."

CHAPTER XXII

Chaytor lay awake that night, brooding. He found himself on the horns of a dilemma, and all the cunning of his nature was needed to meet the difficulty and overcome it successfully. The scheme he had laid, and very nearly matured, had been formed and carried out in the expectation that the run of ill-luck which had pursued him on the goldfields would continue. But now the prospect was suddenly altered. Gold floated before his eyes; he saw the stuff in the claim they were working more thickly studded than ever with the precious metal; extravagant as were the calculations which Basil had worked out they were not too extravagant for his imagination, and certainly not sufficiently extravagant for his cupidity. There was no reason in the world why these anticipations should not be more than fulfilled. Fabulous fortunes had been realised on the goldfields before to-day-why should not the greatest that had ever been made be theirs? He was compelled to take Basil into this calculation. He could not work alone in the claim; a mate was necessary, and where should he find one so docile as Basil? With all his heart he hated Basil, who seemed to hold in his hands the fate of the man who had schemed to destroy him. Luck had changed and the end he had in view must be postponed, must even, perhaps, be ultimately abandoned. To turn his back upon the fortune within his grasp for a problematical fortune in the old country was not to be dreamt of. The bird he had in hand was worth infinitely more than the two he had in the bush-these two being Annette and Basil's uncle. The result of his cogitations was that the scheme upon which he had been engaged should remain in abeyance until it was proved whether the gold they had struck in their claim was a flash in the pan, or would hold out till their fortunes were made. In the former case he would carry out his scheme to the bitter end: in the latter he would amass as much money as he could, and then fly to America, where life would be almost as enjoyable as in England. It was hardly likely, if Basil discovered his treachery, that he would follow him for the mere purpose of revenge. "He is not vindictive," thought the rogue; "he is a soft-hearted fool, and will let me alone." Thus resolved, Chaytor waited for events. It is an example of the tortuous reasoning by which villainy frequently seeks to justify itself that Chaytor threw from his soul the responsibility of a contemplated crime, by arguing that the result did not depend upon him but upon nature. If the claim proved to be as rich as they hoped, Basil would be spared; if the gold ran out, he must take the consequences. Having thus established that circumstance would be the criminal, the evil-hearted man disposed himself for sleep.

He had not long to wait to decide which road he was to tread. During the week they learned that their anticipations of wealth were not to be realised. Each bucket of earth that was sent up from the shaft became poorer and poorer, and from the last they obtained but a few grains of gold. The following day they met with no better fortune; the rich patch was exhausted; the pocket in which they had found the gold was empty.

"Down tumble our castles," said Basil, with a certain bitterness.

"We may strike another rich patch," said Chaytor, and thought, "I will not wait much longer. I am sick of fortune's freaks; I will take the helm again, and steer my ship into pleasure's bay."

He went to the township, openly for provisions and secretly to see if there was any news from England. There were letters at the Post Office awaiting Basil Whittingham, Esq. Chaytor put them in his pocket without opening them, purchased some provisions, and set forth to rejoin Basil. He was more careful in his movements than he had ever been. He had a premonition that the unopened letters contained news of more than ordinary importance, and if he were tracked and followed now his plans would be upset and all the trouble he had taken thrown away. Basil and he were hidden from the world; no one knew of their whereabouts, no person had any knowledge of their proceedings. Should Basil disappear, who would suspect? Not a soul. Basil had not a friend or acquaintance in all the colonies who was anxious for his safety or would be curious to know what had become of him.

Midway between the township at which he had obtained Basil's letters and the claim which had animated him with delusive hopes the schemer halted for rest. He listened and looked about warily to make sure that no one had followed him. Not a sound fell upon his ears, no living thing was within hail. There are parts of the Australian woods which are absolutely voiceless for twenty-three out of every twenty-four hours. This one hour, maybe, is rendered discordant by the crows, whose harsh cries grate ominously upon the ear. At the present moment, however, these pestilential birds were far away, and satisfied that there was no witness of his proceedings, Chaytor threw himself upon the earth and opened the letters. The first he read was from the lawyers, who had already written to Basil in reply to the letters his false friend had forged. It was to the following effect: -

"Dear Sir,

"We write at the request of your uncle, Mr. Bartholomew Whittingham, who, we regret to say, is seriously ill. He desires us to inform you that he has abandoned the intention as to the disposition of his property with which he made you acquainted before your departure from England. A will has been drawn out and duly signed, constituting you his sole heir. Ordinarily this would not have been made known to you until the occurrence of a certain event which appears imminent, but our client wished it otherwise, and as doctors happily are not invariably correct in their prognostications it may happen that you will yet be in time to see him if you use dispatch upon the receipt of this communication, and take ship for England without delay. To enable you to do this we enclose a sight draft upon the Union Bank of Australia for five hundred pounds, and should advise you to lose not a day in putting it to the use desired by our client. It is our duty at the same time to say that we hold out no hope that you will arrive in time. In the expectation of seeing you within a reasonable period, and receiving your instructions, we have the honour to remain,

"Your obedient servants,"Bulfinch & Bulfinch."

There was another letter from the lawyers:

""Dear Sir,

"Following our letter of yesterday's date we write to say that we have been directed by your uncle Mr. Bartholomew Whittingham, to forward to you the sealed enclosure which you will find herewith. We regret to inform you that our client is sinking fast, and that the doctors who are attending him fear that he cannot last through the week.

"We have the honour to remain,"Your obedient servants,"Bulfinch & Bulfinch."

Before unfastening the "sealed enclosure," Chaytor rose in a state of great excitement, and allowed his thoughts to find audible expression:

"At last! Here is the certainty. No more Will-o'-the-wisps. Fortune is mine-do you hear? – mine. Truly, justly mine. Who has worked for it but I? Tell me that. Would the idiot Basil ever have humbled himself as I did; would he ever have worked his old uncle as I have done? What is the result? I softened the old fellow's heart, and the money he would have left to some charity has fallen to me. Every labourer is worthy of his hire, and I am worthy of mine. Basil would never have had one penny of the fortune, and therefore it is my righteous due. At last, at last! No more sweating and toiling. The world is before me, and I shall live the life of a gentleman. There is work still to be done, both here and at home, and I will do it. No blenching, Chaytor; no flinching now. What has to be done must and shall be done. There is less danger in making the winning move than in upsetting the board after the game I have played. Hurrah! Let me see what the precious 'enclosure' has to say for itself."

He broke the seal, and read:

"My Dear Nephew Basil,

"My sands of life are running out, and before it is too late I write to you, probably for the last time. You will be glad to hear from me direct, I know, for your nature is different from mine, and your heart has always been open to tender impressions. When I cast you from me I dare say you suffered, but after my first unjust feeling of resentment was over my sufferings have been far greater than yours could have been. It is the honest truth that in abandoning you I abandoned the only real pleasure which life had for me; but my obstinacy, dear lad, would not allow me to take steps towards a reconcilement. It may be that had you done so I should still have hardened my heart against you, and should have done you the injustice of thinking that you wished to propitiate me for selfish motives. In these, as I believe them to be, the last hours of my life, I have no wish to spare myself; I can see more clearly now than I have done for many a long year, and my pride deserves no excuse. This 'pride' has been the bane of my life; it has sapped the fountains of innocent enjoyment; it has enveloped me in a steel shroud which shut me out from love and sympathy. You, and you alone, since I was a young man, were able to penetrate this shroud, and even to you I showed only that worse side of myself by which the world must have judged me. I did not give myself the trouble of inquiring whether the counsel I was instilling into you was true or false; I see now that it was false, and it is some comfort to me to know that your nature was too simple and honourable, too loving and sympathetic, to be warped by it. Early in life I met with a disappointment which soured me. There is no need to inscribe that page in this letter-a loving letter, I beg you to believe. It was a disappointment in love, and from the day I experienced it I became soured and embittered. I was a poor man at the time, and I devoted myself to the task of making money; I made it, and much good has it done me. With wealth at my command I set up two dark starting points, which I allowed to influence me in every question under consideration-one, money, the other human selfishness. These, with a dogged and obstinate belief in the correctness of my own judgment on every matter which came before me, made me what I have been. I had no faith, I had no religion; my life was godless, and the attribute of selfishness which I ascribed to the actions of all other men guided and controlled me in mine. You never really saw me in my true character. That I regarded money as the greatest good I did not conceal from you, but other sides of me, even more objectionable than this, were not, I think, revealed to you. The mischief I would have done you glanced off harmlessly, as the action you took in ruining yourself to pay your father's debts proved. You were armed with an shield, my dear lad, a shield in which shone the religious principle, honourable conduct, and faith in human nature. Be thankful for that armour, Basil; it is not every man who is so blessed. And let me tell you this. It is often an inheritance, and if not that, it is often furnished by a mother's loving teaching and influence. You had the sweetest of mothers; mine was of harder grain. I lay no blame upon her, nor, I repeat, do I seek to excuse myself, but I would point out to you, as a small measure of extenuation, that some of us are more fortunate than others in the early training we receive, and in the possession of inherited virtues.

"Basil, my dear lad, you did right in paying your father's debts, despite the base view I expressed of your action. Angry that a step so important should have been taken without my consent being asked, angry, indeed, that it should have been taken at all, I said to myself, 'I will punish him for it; I will teach him a lesson.' So I wrote you a heartless letter, informing you that I had resolved to disinherit you, and suggesting that you should return the money I had freely given you and which was justly yours. There are few men in the world who would have treated that request as you did, and you could not have dealt me a harder blow than when you forwarded me a cheque for the amount, with interest added. Your independence, your manliness, hardened instead of softened me; 'He does it to defy me,' I thought, and I allowed you to leave England under the impression that the ties which had bound us together were irrevocably destroyed. But the blow I aimed at you recoiled upon myself; your reply to my mean and sordid request has been a bitter sting to me, and had you sought to revenge yourself upon me you could not have accomplished your purpose more effectually. I have always lived a lonely life, as you know; since I lost you my home has been still more cheerless and lonesome; but I would not call you back-no, my pride stopped me: I could not endure the thought that you or any man should triumph over me. You see, my boy, I am showing you the contemptible motives by which I was actuated; it is a punishment I inflict upon myself; and I deserve the harshest judgment you could pass upon me. If my time were to come over again, would I act differently? I cannot say. A man's matured character is not easily twisted out of its usual grooves. I am as I have been made, or, to speak more correctly, as I chose to make myself, and I have been justly punished.

"But, Basil, if the harvest I have gathered has been worthless to me and to others, some good may result from it in the future. Not at my hands, at yours. You are my sole heir, and you will worthily use the money I leave you. I look forward to the years to come, and I see you in a happy home, with wife and children around you, and it may be then that you will give me a kind thought and that you will place a flower on my grave.

"I am greatly relieved by this confession. Good-bye, my lad, and God bless you.

"Your affectionate Uncle."Bartholomew Whittingham."

"Sentimental old party," mused Newman Chaytor, as he replaced the letter in its envelope. "If this had fallen into Basil's hands it would have touched him up considerably. The old fellow had to give in after all, but it was my letters that worked the oracle. The credit of the whole affair is mine, and Mr. Bartholomew Whittingham ought to be very much obliged to me for soothing his last hours." He laughed-a cruel laugh. "As for the harvest he has gathered, I promise him that it shall be worthily spent. He sees in the future his heir in a happy home, with wife and children around him. Well! – perhaps. If all goes smooth with the charming Annette, we'll see what we can do to oblige him. Now let me read the little puss's letter; there may be something interesting in it."

"My dear Basil" (wrote Annette), "I have something to tell you. Uncle Gilbert has discovered that we have been corresponding with each other, and there has been a scene. It came through aunt. The day before yesterday they went out and left me and Emily together. From what they said I thought they would have been gone a good many hours, and I got out my desk and began to read your letters all over again. Do you know how many you have written me? Seven; and I have every one of them, and mean to keep them always. After reading them I sat down to write to you-a letter you will not receive, because this will take its place, and because I had not written a dozen words before aunt came in suddenly, and caught me bending over my desk. Seeing her, I was putting my letter away (I never write to you when she is with me) when she came close up to me and laid her hand on mine. 'What is that you are writing?' she asked. 'A letter,' I replied. It was not very clever of me, but I did not for the moment know what other answer to give. 'To whom?' she asked. 'To a friend,' I said. 'Oh, you have friends,' she said; 'tell me who they are.' 'I have only one,' I said, 'and I am writing to him.' 'And he has written to you?' she said. 'Yes,' I said, 'he has written to me.' 'Who is this only friend?' she asked; 'do I know him?' 'Yes,' I said, 'you knew him slightly. There is no reason for concealment; it is Basil, my dear father's friend.' 'Oh,' she said, 'your dear father's friend. Is he in England, then?' 'No,' I answered, 'he is in Australia.' 'His letters should have been addressed to the care of your uncle,' she said, 'and that, I am sure, has not been the case, or they would have passed through our hands. How have you obtained them?' 'It is my secret,' I replied. Fortunately Emily was not in the room, and I do not think they have any suspicion that she has been assisting me; if they had they would discharge her, though I should fight against that. 'Your answers are evasive,' she said. 'They are not, aunt,' I said; 'they are truthful answers.' 'Are you afraid,' she asked, 'if the letters had been addressed to our care, as they ought to have been, that they would not have been given to you?' I did not answer her, and she turned away, and said she would inform Uncle Gilbert of the discovery she had made. I did not go on with my first letter to you when she was gone; I thought I would wait till Uncle Gilbert spoke to me. He did the same evening. 'Your aunt has informed me,' he said, 'that you have been carrying on a correspondence with that man named Basil, who so very nearly imposed upon your father in Australia.' 'That man, uncle,' I said, 'is a gentleman, and he did not try to impose upon my father.' 'It will be to your advantage, my dear niece,' said Uncle Gilbert, very quietly, 'not to bandy words with me, nor say things which may interfere with your freedom and comfort. I am your guardian, and dispute it as you may, I stand in your father's place. To carry on a clandestine correspondence with a young man who is no way related to you is improper and unmaidenly. May I inquire if there is any likelihood of your correspondent favouring us with a visit?' 'I hope I shall see him one day,' I said. 'There is a chance of it then,' he said, 'and you can probably inform me when we may expect him.' 'No, I cannot tell you that,' I said. 'Your aunt believes,' he said, 'that you are not speaking the truth when you answer questions we put to you.' 'All my answers are truthful ones,' I said. 'You refuse to tell us,' he said, 'by what means this secret correspondence has been carried on.' 'I refuse to tell you,' I answered. 'I will not press you,' he said, 'but it will be my duty to discover what you are hiding from me. I shall succeed; I never undertake a task and fail. I always carry it out successfully to the end. In the meantime this correspondence must cease.' 'I will not promise,' I said, 'anything I do not mean to fulfil.' 'That is an honest admission,' he said, 'and I admire you for it. Nevertheless, the correspondence must cease, and if you persist in it I shall find a way to put a stop to it. Your reputation, your good name is at stake, and I must guard you from the consequences of your imprudence. My dear niece, I fear that you are bent upon opposing my wishes. It is an unequal battle between you and me-I tell you so frankly. You are under my control, and I intend to exercise my authority. We will now let the matter drop.' And it did drop there and then, and not another word has been spoken on the subject.

"There, Basil, I have told you everything as far as I can recollect it. I might be much worse off than I am. But it would be different if I did not have you to think of, if I did not feel that I have a dear, dear friend in the world, though he is so many thousands of miles away, and that some day I shall see him again. It is something to look forward to, and not a day passes that I do not think of it. You remember the books you used to tell me of on the plantation. I have read them all again and again, and they are all delightful. If the choice were mine, and you were to be near me, or with me as my dear father wished, I should dearly like to live the old life on the plantation; but there would be a difference, Basil; I could not live it now without books, and I do not see how anybody could. Often do I believe them to be real, and when I have laid down one which has made me laugh and cry I feel as if I had made new friends with whom I can rejoice and sympathise. There will be plenty to talk of when we meet, for that we shall meet some day I have not the least doubt. Only if you would grow rich, and come home soon, it would be so beautiful. Really and truly, Basil, I want a friend, a true friend to talk to about things. 'About what things, Annette?' perhaps you ask. How shall I explain? I will try-only you must remember that I am older than when we were together on the plantation, and that, as Uncle Gilbert implied, in a year or two I shall be a woman.

"Basil, when that time comes I want to have more freedom than I have now; I do not want to feel as if I were in chains; but how shall I be able to set myself free without a friend like you by my side? I do not think I am clever, but one can't help thinking of things. I understand that when my dear father died Uncle Gilbert was doing what he had a right to do in becoming my guardian and taking care of the money that was left. Emily says it is all mine, but I do not know. If it is, I should be glad to give half of it to Uncle Gilbert if he would agree to shake hands with me and bid me good-bye. We should be ever so much better friends apart from each other. I did venture timidly to speak to him once about my dear father's property, but he only said, 'Time enough, time enough; there is no need to trouble yourself about it; wait till you are a good many years older.' But, Basil, I want to be free before I am a good many years older, and how is that to be managed without your assistance? That is what I mean when I say I want a true friend to talk about things."

"I must leave off soon; Emily says the mail for Australia leaves to-day, and this letter has to be posted. I am writing it very early in the morning in my bedroom, before uncle and aunt are up; it is fortunate that they do not rise till late. But to be compelled to write in this way-do you understand now what I mean when I say that I do not want to feel as if I were in chains? Emily says she will manage to post the letter for me without uncle and aunt knowing, and I hope she will be able to. Of course it would be ridiculous for me to suppose that Emily and I can be a match for Uncle Gilbert, for I am certain he is watching me, though there is no appearance of it. The way he talks and the way he looks sometimes puts me in mind of a fox.

"Good-bye, Basil. Do not forget me, and if you do not hear from me for a long time do not think I have forgotten you. I can never, never, do that. Oh, how I wish time would pass quickly!

"Always yours affectionately,"Annette."

When he finished reading Annette's letter Newman Chaytor looked at the date and saw that it had been written a month earlier than the letter from the lawyers. Examining the postmark on the envelope he saw that it could not have been posted till three weeks after it had been written, and that it bore a French stamp.

"The little puss was not in England," he thought, "when she contrived to get this letter popped into the post. That shows that she was right in supposing that Uncle Gilbert was watching her. Sly old fox, Uncle Gilbert. He means to keep tight hold of the pretty Annette. Saint George to the rescue! I feel quite chivalrous, and as if I were about to set forth to rescue maidens in distress. She is not quite devoid of sense, this Annette; it will be an entertainment to have a bout with Uncle Gilbert on her behalf. He saw very little of Basil, and if we resembled each other much less than we do it would be scarcely possible for him to suspect that another man was playing Basil's part in this rather remarkable drama. Time, circumstance, everything is in my favour-but I wish the next few weeks were over."