Wilfrid Cumbermede

‘By the powers!’ exclaimed Mr Close, revealing himself an Irishman at once in the surprise of my presence, ‘and whom have we here?’

I felt my voice tremble a little as I replied,

‘Mrs Wilson allowed me to come, sir. I assure you I have not been hurting anything.’

‘Who’s to tell that? Mrs Wilson has no business to let any one come here. This is my quarters. There—you’ve got one in your hand now! You’ve left finger-marks on the blade, I’ll be bound. Give it me.’

He stretched out his hand. I drew back.

‘This one is mine,’ I said.

‘Ho, ho, young gentleman! So you’re a collector—are you? Already too! Nothing like beginning in time. Let me look at the thing, though.’

He was a little man, as I have said, dressed in black, with a frock coat and a deep white neckcloth. His face would have been vulgar, especially as his nose was a traitor to his mouth, revealing in its hue the proclivities of its owner, but for a certain look of the connoisseur which went far to redeem it. The hand which he stretched out to take my weapon, was small and delicate—like a woman’s indeed. His speech was that of a gentleman. I handed him the sword at once.

He had scarcely glanced at it when a strange look passed over his countenance. He tried to draw it, failed, and looking all along the sheath, saw its condition. Then his eyes flashed. He turned from me abruptly, and went up the stair he had descended. I waited anxiously for what seemed to me half an hour: I dare say it was not more than ten minutes. At last I heard him revolving on his axis down the corkscrew staircase. He entered and handed me my sword, saying—

‘There! I can’t get it out of the sheath. It’s in a horrid state of rust. Where did you fall in with it?’

I told him all I knew about it. If he did not seem exactly interested, he certainly behaved with some oddity. When I told him what my grandmother had said about some battle in which an ancestor had worn it, his arm rose with a jerk, and the motions of his face, especially of his mouth, which appeared to be eating its own teeth, were for a moment grotesque. When I had finished, he said, with indifferent tone, but eager face—

‘Well, it’s a rusty old thing, but I like old weapons. I’ll give you a bran new officer’s sword, as bright as a mirror, for it—I will. There now! Is it a bargain?’

‘I could not part with it, sir—not for the best sword in the country,’ I answered. ‘You see it has been so long in our family.’

‘Hm! hm! you’re quite right, my boy. I wouldn’t if I were you. But as I see you know how to set a right value on such a weapon, you may stay and look at mine as long as you like. Only if you take any of them from their sheaths, you must be very careful how you put them in again. Don’t use any force. If there is any one you can’t manage easily, just lay it on the window-sill, and I will attend to it. Mind you don’t handle—I mean touch—the blades at all. There would be no end of rust-spots before morning.’

I was full of gratitude for the confidence he placed in me.

‘I can’t stop now to tell you about them all, but I will—some day.’

So saying he disappeared once more up the little staircase, leaving me like Aladdin in the jewel-forest. I had not been alone more than half an hour or so, however, when he returned, and taking down a dagger, said abruptly,

‘There, that is the dagger with which Lord Harry Rolleston’—I think that was the name, but knowing nothing of the family or its history, I could not keep the names separate—‘stabbed his brother Gilbert. And there is—’

He took down one after another, and with every one he associated some fact—or fancy perhaps, for I suspect now that he invented not a few of his incidents.

‘They have always been fond of weapons in this house,’ he said. ‘There now is one with the strangest story! It’s in print—I can show it you in print in the library there. It had the reputation of being a magic sword—’

‘Like King Arthur’s Excalibur?’ I asked, for I had read a good deal of the history of Prince Arthur.

‘Just so,’ said Mr Close. ‘Well, that sword had been in the family for many years—I may say centuries. One day it disappeared, and there was a great outcry. A lackey had been discharged for some cause or other, and it was believed he had taken it. But before they found him, the sword was in its place upon the wall. Afterwards the man confessed that he had taken it, out of revenge, for he knew how it was prized. But in the middle of the next night, as he slept in a roadside inn, a figure dressed in ancient armour had entered the room, taken up the sword, and gone away with it. I dare say it was all nonsense. His heart had failed him when he found he was followed, and he had contrived by the help of some fellow-servant to restore it. But there are very queer stories about old weapons—swords in particular. I must go now,’ he concluded, ‘for we have company to-night, and I have a good many things to see to.’

So saying he left me. I remained a long time in the armoury, and then returned to the library, where I seated myself in the same corner as before, and went on with my reading—lost in pleasure.

All at once I became aware that the light was thickening, and that I was very hungry. At the same moment I heard a slight rustle in the room, and looked round, expecting to see Mrs Wilson come to fetch me. But there stood Miss Clara—not now in white, however, but in a black silk frock. She had grown since I saw her last, and was prettier than ever. She started when she saw me.

‘You here!’ she exclaimed, as if we had known each other all our lives. ‘What are you doing here?’

‘Reading,’ I answered, and rose from the floor, replacing the book as I rose. ‘I thought you were Mrs Wilson come to fetch me.’

‘Is she coming here?’

‘Yes. She told me not to leave the library till she came for me.’

‘Then I must get out of the way.’

‘Why so, Miss Clara?’ I asked.

‘I don’t mean her to know I am here. If you tell, I shall think you the meanest—’

‘Don’t trouble yourself to find your punishment before you’ve found your crime,’ I said, thinking of my own processes of invention. What a little prig I must have been!

‘Very well, I will trust you,’ she returned, holding out her hand.—‘I didn’t give it you to keep, though,’ she added, finding that, with more of country manners than tenderness, I fear, I retained it in my boyish grasp.

I felt awkward at once, and let it go.

‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘Now, when do you expect Mrs. Wilson?’

‘I don’t know at all. She said she would fetch me for dinner. There she comes, I do believe.’

Clara turned her head like a startled forest creature that wants to listen, but does not know in what direction, and moved her feet as if she were about to fly.

‘Come back after dinner,’ she said: ‘you had better!’ and darting to the other side of the room, lifted a piece of hanging tapestry, and vanished just in time, for Mrs Wilson’s first words crossed her last.

‘My dear boy—Master Cumbermede, I should say, I am sorry I have not been able to get to you sooner. One thing after another has kept me on my legs till I’m ready to drop. The cook is as tiresome as cooks only can be. But come along; I’ve got a mouthful of dinner for you at last, and a few minutes to eat my share of it with you, I hope.’

I followed without a word, feeling a little guilty, but only towards Mrs Wilson, not towards myself, if my reader will acknowledge the difference—for I did not feel that I ought to betray Miss Clara. We returned as we came; and certainly whatever temper the cook might be in, there was nothing amiss with the dinner. Had there been, however, I was far too hungry to find fault with it.

‘Well, how have you enjoyed yourself, Master Wilfrid? Not very much, I am afraid. But really I could not help it,’ said Mrs Wilson.

‘I couldn’t have enjoyed myself more,’ I answered. ‘If you will allow me, I’ll go back to the library as soon as I’ve done my dinner.’

‘But it’s almost dark there now.’

‘You wouldn’t mind letting me have a candle, Mrs Wilson?’

‘A candle, child! It would be of no use. The place wouldn’t light up with twenty candles.’

‘But I don’t want it lighted up. I could read by one candle as well as by twenty.’

‘Very well. You shall do as you like. Only be careful, for the old house is as dry as tinder, and if you were to set fire to anything, we should be all in a blaze in a moment.’

‘I will be careful, Mrs Wilson. You may trust me. Indeed you may.’

She hurried me a little over my dinner. The bell in the court rang loudly.

‘There’s some of them already! That must be the Simmonses. They’re always early, and they always come to that gate—I suppose because they haven’t a carriage of their own, and don’t like to drive into the high court in a chaise from the George and Pudding.’