have been breaking up the whole system of insidiousness, cruelty, and guilt, which had made him an alien to his father's house." He fixed his eye on the younger Gordon, who busied himself in playing with a pointer at the fireside. "He wrote, you say," said the Baronet, "why did I not know this before-before he died?-Unfortunate son, and more unfortunate father!" Then turning to Vaughan, with a hurried voice, "Wrote in your presence, sir?" Vaughan bowed assent. The old man's feeble countenance filled up; the eye, clouded and pale with long exhaustion, distended, and shot flashes of rage. He rose on his feet by the impulse which seemed to have given new life to his entire frame, and in a voice of stern wrath exclaimed: "Then, sir, I have been scandalously deceived. Treachery has been at work! I have long suspected that some base and vil lanous spirit, nay perhaps under my own roof, was busied in sowing dissension between me and my son. I had employed that young man," pointing to Gordon, "to ascertain the criminals; but they were too well concealed, we were both baffled. But your declarations, sir, have roused me again, and if there is truth to be found on earth, or power in man to punish fraud, hypocrisy, and heartlessness, the actors and abettors in this foulest of all conspiracies shall be the sufferers." The younger Gordon had listened without lifting his eyes till the close, when casually raising them, he caught Vaughan's levelled at him with an expression that could not be mistaken. His haughty spirit caught fire. He started from his chair. "Do you me nace me, sir," said he to Vaughan, in a tone of arrogance and anger. But before he could reply, Gordon had turned to his father. “Am I, sir, the object of this unnatural suspicion?" "Heaven forbid!" said his father, as he drew back, and the passion of the moment vanquishing, sank upon his pillows. "Then, sir," said Gordon, "I presume that we are entitled to expect some evidence of this extraordinary duty and attention on my brother's part. Let whatever determination to interfere with, nay, to intercept his letters, exist, all could not have been intercepted-" 66 "Not all," returned Vaughan, taking Gordon's letter from his pocket. The brother drew back in unequivocal surprise. "This one," continued Vaughan, "it was my friend's last request that I should personally deliver to his father, no matter in whose presence I should find him, and under what unhappy delusion he might have been retained." He put it into the hand of the Baronet. "I have now, sir," said he to the younger Gor don, "done a sacred duty, in perfect disregard of what may be thought of my doing it." Disregard, sir!" repeated Gordon haughtily, and approaching him. 66 "Understand me, Mr. Gordon," pronounc ed Vaughan, firmly. "Disregard was my word. I am not much a provoker of altercation, and least of all in the family of a man for whom, living and dead, I felt and feel the interest of a soldier, and a relative. But I insist on, at least, one letter being allowed to remain in the hands for which it was intended; I insist on justice being done to the widow and child of my friend; and I insist on nature and reason being suffered to make their way with that unhappy and much-abused old gentleman." He looked back on the Baronet, who was reading the letter, with his face bathed in tears. Vaughan would not obtrude on a sorrow that had so much of repentance.. He bowed sternly to Gordon, and left the house; desiring the valet to inform his master that he should remain in the village for the rest of the day. In the evening he received a note from Gordon, couched in the most conciliatory terms, regretting the misunderstanding which had occurred, and pledging his father, who was unfortunately too much indisposed to have the pleasure of personally seeing Major Vaughan on the subject, to the most ample provision for the "interesting survivors of his ever-to-be-lamented brother's family."Vaughan's task was now done; and with a lightened heart, he ordered the postillion to drive to his home. CHAPTER XXXIII. "We weep, we smile, we love, we marry, die! THERE were some embarrassments to Vaughan, connected with his mother's choice of a residence in the neighbourhood of his late uncle's house. It was now Courtney's, probably his fraudulent disinheritor, certainly his bitter enemy, and as certainly the triumphant husband of the woman who had insulted and abjured him. As the village came in view, Vaughan was pressed by painful emotion. The objects by the way-side were familiar, and their familiarity was connected with unhappy remembrances. Halston Hall was visible from the road. He gave one almost involuntary glance at it, and was surprised to see its windows closed. "Courtney, at least, is not here," he exclaimed, and felt his bosom lightened. The postillion suddenly drew up to the road-side. "I must stop, sir," said he, "for the grand funeral, that is coming round by the trees. I think it is from the Hall yonder." Vaughan's attention was deeply stirred. The procession advanced dimly through the winding road, made doubly dark by the shade of the trees and of the declining day. Alone, in the first mourning coach, with folded arms and gloomy brow, sat the man whom he had hoped of all mankind to shun, his treacherous relative, Philip Courtney. A fearful suspicion, that he found impossible to suppress, struck across his brain at the sight. A long train of private carriages followed. The cottagers were all standing at their doors, and not a few, as it passed them, turned aside and wept. Vaughan could bear no more delay. He leaped from the chaise, and, nervously agitated, asked who had died? "Bless you," answered a peasant, "tis plain that you are a stranger in the village, by that question, 'Tis young Mrs. Courtney, the sweetest lady eyes ever looked on. She had been pining and drooping, one may say, almost ever since she married; but her troubles are over now, poor thing, and net a dry eye will follow her to the grave." |