“I am delighted to see you again, Will,” Mr. Palethorpe said, as he was shown in. “Alice is out at present, but she will be back before long. I must congratulate you on your promotion, which I saw in the Gazette this morning.”
“Yes, sir, my good fortune sticks to me, except for this wound, and it is nothing serious and will soon be right again.”
“Don’t say good fortune, lad. You have won your way by conduct and courage, and you have a right to be proud of your position. I believe you are the youngest captain in the service, and that without a shadow of private interest to push you on. I am very glad to hear that your wound is so slight.”
“You are not looking well, sir,” Will said, after they had chatted for a time.
“No, I have had a shock which, I am ashamed to say, I have allowed to annoy me. I came home with ￡70,000. Of that I invested ￡40,000 in good securities, and allowed the rest to remain in my agent’s hands until he came upon some [pg 363]good and safe security. Well, I was away with Alice in the country when he wrote to me to say that he strongly recommended me to buy a South Sea stock which everyone was running after, and which was rising rapidly. I must own that it seemed a good thing, so I told him to buy. Well, it went up like wildfire, and I could have sold out at four times the price at which I bought. At last I wrote to him to realize, and he replied that it had suddenly fallen a bit, and recommending me to wait till it went up again, which it was sure to do. I didn’t see a London paper for some days, and when I did get one I found, to my horror, that the bubble had burst, and that the stock was virtually not worth the paper on which it was printed. The blow has affected me a good deal. I admit now that it was foolish, and feel it so; but when a man has been working all his life, it is hard to see nearly half of the fortune he has gained swept away at a blow.”
“It is hard, sir, very hard. Still, it was fortunate that you had already invested ￡40,000 in good securities. After all, with this house and ￡40,000 you will really not so very much miss the sum you have lost.”
“That is exactly what I tell myself, Will. Still, you know, a dog with two bones in his mouth will growl if he loses one of them. Nevertheless ￡40,000 is not to be despised by any means, and I shall have plenty to give my little Alice a good portion when she marries.”
“That will be comfortable for her, sir, but I should say that the man would be lucky if he got her without a shilling.”
“Well, well, we’ll see, we’ll see. I have no desire to part with her yet.”
“That I can well understand, sir.”
[pg 364]
“Ah, here she is!”
A rosy colour spread over the girl’s face when she saw who her father’s visitor was.
“I expected you in a day or two,” she said, “but not so soon as this. When we saw your name in the Gazette we made sure that it would not be long before you paid us a visit. I am glad to see that your wound has not pulled you down much.”
“No indeed. I am all right; but it was certain that I should come here first of all.”
“And what are your plans now?” Mr. Palethorpe asked.
“I am going to set to work at once to discover my family. I have not been to my lawyer yet, so I don’t know how much he has done, but I certainly mean to go into the business in earnest.”
“Well, it doesn’t matter to you much now, Will, whether your family are dukes or beggars. You can stand on your own feet as a captain in the royal navy with a magnificent record of services.”
“Yes, I see that, sir; but still I certainly do wish to be able to prove that I come of at least a respectable family. I have not the least desire to obtain any rank or anything of that kind, only to know that I have people of my own.”
“I do not say that it is not a laudable ambition, but I don’t believe that anyone would think one scrap better or worse of you were you to find that you were heir to a dukedom.”
Will slept there that night, and the next morning drove into the city to his lawyer’s office. “Well, Captain Gilmore?” said that gentleman as Will entered his private room. “I am glad to see you. I have been quietly at work making [pg 365]enquiries since you were last here. I sent a man down to Scarcombe some months ago. He learned as much as he could there, and since then has been going from village to village and has traced your father’s journeyings for some months. Now that you are home I should suggest employing two or three men to continue the search and to find out if possible the point from which your father started his wanderings. Assuming, as I do, that he was the son of Sir Ralph Gilmore, I imagine that he must have quarrelled with his father at or about the time of his marriage. In that case he would probably come up to London. I have observed that most men who quarrel with their parents take that step first. There, perhaps, he endeavoured to obtain employment. The struggle would probably last two, or three, or four years. I take the last to be the most likely period, for by that time you would be about three years old. I say that because he could hardly have taken you with him had you been younger.
“It is evident that he had either no hope of being reconciled to his father or that he was himself too angry to make advances. I therefore propose to send men north from London to enquire upon all the principal roads. A man with a violin and a little child cannot have been altogether forgotten in the villages in which he stopped, and I hope to be able to trace his way up to Yorkshire. Again, I should employ one of the Bow Street runners to make enquiries in London for a man with his wife and child who lived here so many years ago, and whose name was Gilmore. I am supposing, you see, that that was his real name, and not one that he had assumed. I confess I have my doubts about it. A man who quits his home for ever after a desperate quarrel is as likely [pg 366]as not to change his name. That of course we must risk. While these enquiries are being made I should like you to go back to your old home; it is possible that other mementoes of his stay there may have escaped the memory of the old people with whom you lived. Anything of that kind would be of inestimable value.”
“I will go down,” Will said. “I am afraid there is little chance of my finding them both alive now. I fancy they were about fifty-five when I went to live with them, which would make them near eighty now. One or other of them, however, may be alive. I have not been to my agent yet, and therefore do not know whether he still sends them the allowance I made them.”
After leaving the lawyer he went to his agent and found that the allowance was still paid, and regularly acknowledged by a receipt from the clergyman. He supposed, therefore, that certainly one, if not both, of the old people were still alive. He went back to Dulwich and said that he had taken a seat on the north coach for that day week. “I could not bring myself to leave before,” he said, “and I knew you would keep me.”
“Certainly, my boy. I don’t think either Alice or myself would forgive you were you to run away the moment you returned.”
When the time came Will started for the north, though he felt much reluctance to leave Alice. He acknowledged now to himself that he was deeply in love with her. Though from her father’s manner he felt that when he asked for her hand he would not be refused, about Alice herself he felt far less confident. She was so perfectly open and natural with him [pg 367]that he feared lest she might regard him rather as a brother than as a lover, and yet the blush which he had noticed when he first met her on his return gave him considerable hope.
On arriving at Scarborough he stopped for the night at the house of his old friend Mrs. Archer. She and her husband listened with surprise and pleasure to his stories of his adventures in spite of his assurances that these were very ordinary matters, and that it was chiefly by luck that he had got on. He was a little surprised when, in reply to this, Mrs. Archer used the very words Mr. Palethorpe had uttered. “It is of no use your talking in that way, Will,” she said. “No doubt you have had very good fortune, but your rapid promotion can only be due to your conduct and courage.”
“I may have conducted myself well,” he said warmly, “but not one bit better than other officers in the service. I really owe my success to the fortunate suggestion of mine as to the best method of attacking that pirate hold. As a reward for this the admiral gave me the command of L’Agile, and so, piece by piece, it has grown. But it was to my good fortune in making that suggestion, which really was not made in earnest, but only in reply to the challenge of another midshipman, that it has all come about. Above all, Mrs. Archer, I shall never forget that it was the kindness you showed me, and the pains you took in my education, that gave me my start in life.”
The next day he drove over to Scarcombe, and to his pleasure, on entering the cottage, found John and his wife both sitting just where he had last seen them. They both rose to greet him.
“Thank God, Will,” John said, “that we have been spared [pg 368]to see you alive again! I was afraid that our call might come before you returned.”
“Why, father, I don’t think you look a year older than you did when I last saw you. Both you and mother look good for another ten years yet.”
“If we do, Will, it will be thanks to the good food you have provided for us. We live like lords; meat every day for dinner, and fish for breakfast and supper. I should not feel right if I didn’t have a snack of fish every day. Then we have ale for dinner and supper. There is no one in the village who lives as we do. When we first began we both felt downright fat. Then we agreed that if we went on like that we never could live till you came back, so we did with a little less, and as you see we both fill out our clothes a long way better than we did when you were here last.”
“Well you certainly do both look uncommonly well, father.”
“And you ain’t married yet, Will?”
“No, I’ve not done anything about that yet, though perhaps it won’t be very long before I find a wife. I am not going to apply to go on service again for a time, so I’ll have a chance to look round, though I really have one in my mind’s eye.”
“Tell us all about it, Will,” the old woman said eagerly; “you know how interested we must be in anything that affects you.”
“Well, mother, among the many adventures I have been through I must tell you the one connected with this young lady.”
He then told her of his first meeting, of his stay at her father’s house, and of the hurricane which they experienced together.
[pg 369]
“Well, mother, I met her again unexpectedly more than two and a half years ago in London. Her father had come over here to live, and has a fine house at Dulwich. I have just been staying there for a week, and I have some hope that when I ask her she will consent to be my wife.”
“Of course she will,” the old woman said quite indignantly. “How could she do otherwise? Why, if you were to ask the king’s daughter I am sure she would take you. Here you are, one of the king’s captains, have done all sorts of wonderful things, and have beaten his enemies all over the world, and you are as straight and good-looking a young gentleman as anyone wants to see. No one, who was not out of her mind, could think of saying ‘No’ to you.”
“Ah, mother, you are prejudiced! To you I am a sort of swan that has come out of a duck’s egg.”
They chatted for some time, and then Will said:
“Are you quite sure, John, that the bundle the clergyman handed over to me contained every single thing my father left behind him?”
“Well, now I think of it, Will, there is something else. I never remembered it at the time, but when my old woman was sweeping a cobweb off the rafters the other day she said: ‘Why, here is Will’s father’s fiddle’, and, sure enough, there it was. It had been up there from the day you came into the house, and if we noticed it none of us ever gave it a thought.”
“I remember it now,” Will exclaimed. “When I was a young boy I used to think I should like to learn to play on it, and I spoke to Miss Warden about it. But she said I had better stick to my lessons, and then as I grew up I could learn it if I still had a fancy to do so.”
[pg 370]
He got on to a chair, and took it from the rafter on which it had so long lain. Then he carefully wiped the dust off it.
“It looks a very old thing, but that makes no difference in its value to me. I don’t see in the least how this can be any clue whatever to my father’s identity. Still, I will take it away with me and show it to my lawyer, who is endeavouring to trace for me who my father was.”
“And do you think that he will succeed, Will?”
“I rather believe he will. At any rate he has found a gentleman, a baronet, who has the same name and bears the same coat of arms as is on the seal which was in my father’s bundle. We are trying now to trace how my father came down here, and where he lived before he started. You see I must get as clear a story as I can before I go to see this gentleman. Mind, I don’t want anything from him. He may be as rich as a lord for anything I care, and may refuse to have anything to do with me, but I want to find out to what family I really belong.”
“He must be a bad lot,” John said, “to allow your father to tramp about the country with a fiddle.”
“I would not say that,” Will said; “there are always two sides to a story, and we know nothing of my father’s reasons for leaving home. It may have been his fault more than his father’s, so until I know the rights and wrongs of the case I will form no judgment whatever.”
“That is right, my boy,” the old woman said. “I have noticed that when a boy runs away from home and goes to sea it is as often his fault as his father’s. Sometimes it is six of one and half a dozen of the other; sometimes the father is a brute, but more often the son is a scamp, a worth[pg 371]less fellow, who will settle down to nothing, and brings discredit on his family. So you are quite right, Will, not to form any hard judgment on your grandfather till you know how it all came about.”
“I certainly don’t mean to, mother. Of course I have so little recollection of my father that it would not worry me much if I found that it were his fault, though of course I would rather know that he was not to blame. Still, I should wish to like my grandfather if I could, and if I heard that my poor father was really entirely to blame I should not grieve much over it.”
“I can’t help thinking that he was to blame, Will. He was a curious-looking man, with a very bitter expression at times on his face, as if he didn’t care for anyone in the world, except perhaps yourself, and he often left you alone in the village when he went and wandered about by himself on the moor.”
“Well, well,” Will said, “it matters very little to me which way it is. It is a very old story now, and I dare say that there were faults on both sides.”
Will spent a long day with the old people and then returned to Scarborough, taking the violin with him. When he told how he had found it Mr. Archer took the instrument and examined it carefully.
“I think really,” he said at last, “that this violin may prove a valuable clue, as valuable almost as that coat of arms. That might very well have been picked up or bought for a trifle at a pawnshop, or come into the hands of its possessor in some accidental way. But this is different; this, unless I am greatly mistaken, is a real Amati, and therefore [pg 372]worth at least a couple of hundred guineas. That could hardly have come accidentally into the hands of a wandering musician; it must be a relic of a time when he was in very different circumstances, and may well have been his before he left the home of his childhood.”
“Thank you very much for the information, Mr. Archer! I see at once that it may very well be a strong link in the chain.”
Two days later he returned to London. Mr. Palethorpe was greatly pleased to hear that he had found so valuable a clue.
“I don’t care a rap for family,” he said, “but at the same time I suppose every man would like his daughter—” Here he stopped abruptly. “I mean to say,” he said, “would like to have for his son-in-law a man of good family. I grant that it is a very stupid prejudice, still I suppose it is a general one. You told me, I think, that your lawyer had found out that this Sir Ralph Gilmore had only two sons, and that one of them had died suddenly and unmarried.”
“That is so, sir.”
“Then in that case, you see, if you prove your identity you would certainly be heir to the baronetcy.”
“I suppose so, sir. I have never given the matter any thought. It is not rank I want, but family. Still, I might not be heir to the baronetcy, for even supposing that my father was really the other son, he might have had children older than I am who remained with their grandfather.”
“That is possible,” Mr. Palethorpe said, “though unlikely. Why should he have left them behind him when he went out into the world?”
[pg 373]
“He might not have wished to bother himself with them; he might have intended to claim them later. No one can say.”
“Well, on the whole, I should say that your chance of coming into the baronetcy is distinctly good. It would look well, you know—Captain Sir William Gilmore, R.N.”
“We mustn’t count our chickens too soon, Mr. Palethorpe,” Will laughed; “but nevertheless I do think that the prospects are favourable. Still, I must wait the result of the search that my lawyer has been carrying on.”
“Well, you know my house is your home as long as you like to use it.”
“Thank you, sir! but I don’t like to intrude upon your kindness too much, and I think that I will take a lodging somewhere in the West End, so that I may be within easy reach of you here.”
“Well, it must be as you like, lad. In some respects, perhaps, it will be best so. I may remind you, my boy, that it is not always wise for two young people to be constantly in each other’s society.” And he laughed.
Will made no answer; he had decided to defer putting the question until his claim was settled one way or the other.
In a few days he again called upon his lawyer.
“I have found out enough,” the latter said, “to be certain that your father started from London with his violin and you, a child of three. I have considerable hopes that we shall, ere long, get a clue to the place where he lived while in London. The runner has met a woman who remembers distinctly such a man and a sick wife and child lodging in the house of a friend of hers. The friend has moved away and she has lost sight [pg 374]of her, but she knows some people with whom the woman was intimate, and through them we hope to find out where she lives.”
“That is good news indeed,” Will said. “I had hardly hoped that you would be so successful.”
“It is a great piece of luck,” the lawyer said. “I have written to my other agents to come home. It will be quite sufficient to prove that he journeyed as a wandering musician for at least fifty miles from London. Of course if further evidence is necessary they can resume their search.”
“I have found a clue too, sir,” Will said; and he then related the discovery of the Amati, the possession of which showed that the minstrel must at one time have been in wealthy circumstances.
“That is important indeed,” the lawyer said, rubbing his hands. “Now, sir, if we can but find out where the man lived in London I think the chain will be complete, especially if he was in comparatively good circumstances when he went there. The woman will also, doubtless, be able to give a description of his wife as well of himself, and with these various proofs in your hand I think you may safely go down and see Sir Ralph Gilmore, whom I shall, of course, prepare by letter for your visit.”
Four days afterwards Will received a letter by an office-boy from his lawyer asking him to call.
“My dear sir,” he said as Will entered, “I congratulate you most heartily. I think we have the chain complete now. The day before yesterday the Bow Street runner came in to say that he had found the woman, and that she was now living out at Highgate. Yesterday I sent my clerk up to see [pg 375]her, and this is his report. I may tell you that nothing could possibly be more satisfactory.”
The document was as follows:
“I called on Mrs. Giles. She is a respectable person who lets her house in lodgings. Twenty-five years ago she had a house in Westminster, and let the drawing-room floor to a gentleman of the name of Gilmore. He was rather tall and dark, and very variable in his temper. He had his wife with him, and two months afterwards a child was born. It was christened at St. Matthew’s. I was its god-mother, as they seemed to have very few friends in the town. Mr. Gilmore was out a good deal looking for employment. He used to write of an evening, and I think made money by it. He was very fond of his violin. Sometimes it was soft music he played, but if he was in a bad temper he would make it shriek and cry out, and I used to think there was a devil shut up in it. It was awful! When he came to me he had plenty of money, but it was not long before it began to run short, and they lived very plain. He had all sorts of things, whips and books and dressing-cases. These gradually went, and a year after the child was born they moved upstairs, the rooms being cheaper for them. A year later they occupied one room. The wife fell ill, and the rent was often in arrears. He was getting very shabby in his dress too. The child was three years old when its mother died. He sold all he had left to bury her decently, and as he had no money to pay his arrears of rent, he gave me a silver-mounted looking-glass, which I understood his mother had given him, and he said: ‘Don't you sell this, but keep it, and one day or other I will come back and redeem it.’?”
“This is the glass, sir,” the lawyer said. “My clerk redeemed it after telling her that her lodger had died long ago. [pg 376]He went round to St. Matthew’s Church and obtained the certificate of the child’s baptism. So I think now, Mr. Gilmore, that we have all the evidence that can be required. Mrs. Giles, on hearing that the child was alive, said she would be happy to come forward and repeat what she had said to my clerk. She seemed very interested in the affair, and is evidently a kindly good-hearted woman. I fancy the silver frame is of Italian workmanship, and will probably be recognized by your grandfather. At any rate, someone there is sure to know it. Now I think you are in a position to go down and see him, and if you wish I will write to him to-day. I shall not go into matters at all, and shall merely say that the son of his son, Mr. William Gilmore, is coming down to have an interview with him, and is provided with all necessary proofs of his birth.”
The next morning Will took the coach and went down to Radstock, in Somersetshire. He put up at the inn on his arrival, and next morning hired a gig and drove to the house of Sir Ralph Gilmore. It was a very fine mansion standing in an extensive park.
“Not a bad place by any means,” Will said to himself; “I should certainly be proud to bring Alice down here.”
He alighted at the entrance and sent in his name, and was immediately shown into the library, where a tall old man was sitting.
“I understand, sir,” he said stiffly, “that you claim to be the son of my son, William Gilmore?”
“I do, sir, and I think the proofs I shall give you will satisfy you. You will understand, sir, please, before I do so, that I have no desire whatever to make any claim upon you; I simply wished to be recognized as a member of your family.”
[pg 377]
The old man looked him up and down, and then motioned him to take a seat.
“And what has become of your father, supposing him to be your father?” he asked with an evident effort.
“He died, sir, nearly twenty years ago.”
The old man was silent for some little time, and then he said: “And you, sir, what have you been doing since then? But first, in what circumstances did he die?”
“In the very poorest. For the last two years of his life he earned his living and mine as a wandering fiddler.”
“And what became of you?”
“I was brought up, sir, by a fisherman in the village in Yorkshire in which my father died.”
“Your manner of speech does not at all agree with that, sir,” the old man said sharply.
“No, sir,” Will said quietly. “I had the good fortune to attract the interest of the clergyman’s daughter, and she was good enough to assist me in my education and urge me on to study.”
“And what is your trade or profession, sir?”
“I have the honour, sir, to be post-captain in His Majesty’s navy.”
“You a post-captain in His Majesty’s navy!” the old man said scornfully. “Do you think to take me in with such a tale as that? You might possibly be a very junior lieutenant.”
“I am not surprised that you think so, sir. Nevertheless I am indeed what I say. My name appeared in the Gazette a month ago.”
“I remember now,” the baronet said, “there was a William Gilmore appointed to that rank. The name struck me as I glanced through the Gazette. I had noticed it before on [pg 378]several occasions, and I sighed as I thought to myself how different must have been his career from that of my unfortunate son. Now, sir, I beg that you will let me see your proofs.”
“In the first place, sir, there is this seal with your armorial bearings, which was found upon him after his death. This is a looking-glass, one which I believe was given to him by his mother. This is the violin with which he earned his living.”
The old man stretched his hand out for the violin, with tears in his eyes.
“I gave it to him,” he said, “when he was eighteen. I thought it a great piece of extravagance at the time, but he had such a taste for music that I thought he deserved the best instrument I could get. The looking-glass I also recognize, and of course the seal. Is there anything more, sir?”
“This, sir, is the certificate of my baptism at St. Matthew’s Church, Westminster. This is a statement of my lawyer’s clerk, who interviewed the woman in whose house my father and mother lived, and my mother died.”
The baronet took it and read it in silence.
“I can produce also,” Will went on, as the old man laid it down with a sigh, “the evidence of the lady who educated me, and to whom I owe all the good fortune that has befallen me. The old fisherman and his wife who brought me up are still alive, though very old. I have means of obtaining abundant evidence from my shipmates in the various vessels in which I have sailed that I am the boy who left that village at the age of fifteen, and entered as a ship’s boy in one of His Majesty’s vessels.”
“And you are now—?” the baronet asked.
[pg 379]
“I am now twenty-three, sir.”
“And a captain?”
“That is so, sir. I was made a midshipman before I had been three months on board, partly because I saved the first lieutenant’s life, and partly because I understood enough mathematics to take an observation. Of course I served my time as a midshipman, and a year after passing I was made a second lieutenant. By the death of my first lieutenant at the battle of St. Vincent I succeeded to his post, and obtained the rank of captain for my share in the battle of Camperdown. I received post rank the other day when, in command of the Ethalion, I brought the Bellone, a frigate of Admiral Bompart’s fleet, a prize to Portsmouth.”
“Well, sir, your career has indeed been creditable and successful, and I am proud to acknowledge, as my grandson and heir to my title, a young gentleman who has so greatly distinguished himself. For I do acknowledge you. The proofs you have given me leave no doubt in my mind whatever that you are the son of my second son. You were, of course, too young to remember whether he ever spoke to you of me.”
“Yes, sir. I was but five at the time of his death, and have but a very faint recollection of him.”
“Of course, of course,” the baronet said; “it was a sad affair. Perhaps I was to blame to some extent, though I have never thought so. Your father was, as doubtless you know, a second son. Although somewhat eccentric in disposition, and given to fits of passion, I had no serious occasion to complain of him until he went up to Oxford. There he got into a wild and dissipated set, and became the wildest and most dissipated among them. His great talent for music was his bane. He was continually asked out. After being two years up there, and costing me very large sums in paying his debts, [pg 380]he was sent down from the university. He would not turn his hands to anything, and went up to London with the idea of making his way somehow. He made nothing but debts, got into various scandalous affairs, and dragged our name through the dust. At last he came home one day and calmly informed me that he had married a woman in a rank of life beneath him. She was, I believe, the daughter of a horse-dealer of very doubtful character. He also said that he wanted ￡1200 to enable him to start fair. I lost my temper and said that he should not have another pound from me. We had a desperate quarrel, and he left the house, taking with him all his belongings. It was four years before I took any steps to bring him back. Then his elder brother died, and on that I took every means to find him out. That he would ever be a credit to me I did not even dare to hope, but at least he could not be allowed to live in poverty. I advertised widely and employed detectives for months, but all without result. I have long since given up any hopes of ever seeing him again. I am glad, indeed, to find that the title, at my death, will not go to a distant cousin, but to my grandson, a gentleman in every way worthy of it. You are not married, I hope?”
“I am not married, sir; but I think, if you had asked the question, I should have replied that I was engaged, or rather had hopes of being engaged soon.”
“Who is she?” the baronet asked quickly.
“She is the only daughter of a successful West Indian planter, a man of the highest standing in the colony, who has now returned and settled here.”
The baronet heaved a sigh of relief.
“That is well,” he said; “and considering that you have been all your life at sea, and have had no opportunity of making the acquaintance of ladies of titled families, it is better [pg 381]than I could have expected. As I do not know the procedure in these matters I had better consult my lawyer as to the best way of using these relics and the proofs you have given me that you are my grandson. It may be that my recognition of you is sufficient, but it would be as well to make sure that at my death there will be no opposition to your succession. You will stop here for a day or two, I hope, before going up to town to arrange the little affair you spoke of, and I think if your chances were good before, they will be still better now that you are recognized as heir to a baronetcy and one of the finest estates in England.”
“I have never thought of that, sir. I have my profession and nearly ￡40,000 of prize-money, which will enable us to live in great comfort; and indeed I anticipate that her father will wish us to reside with him, or, at any rate, that she shall do so while I am away on service.”
“I hope you will not think of remaining at sea. It would be monstrous for a man heir to ￡10,000 a year, besides very large accumulations, to be knocking about the world and running the risk of having his head taken off with a round-shot every day. I earnestly entreat you not to dream of such a thing.”
“I will think it over. I am fond of the sea, but shall certainly be fonder of my wife, and I feel that your wishes in the matter should weigh with me.”
“Well, I hope you will at least spend a portion of your time here. It will be your future home, and it is well that you should acquaint yourself with your duties. Besides, remember the years that I have been a lonely man.”
“I would rather not give a promise, but I shall certainly take your wishes into consideration.”
“Well, I am content with that, my boy. You will stay [pg 382]here now a few days, I hope. I have so much to hear of your life, and of course I wish to become better acquainted with you.”
Will remained a week, during which time he made a great advance in the baronet’s affections, and the old man seemed to gain some years of life as he walked in the garden and drove through the country with his young heir, whom he was delighted to introduce to everyone.
When he returned to London he at once drove over to Dulwich.
“Well, Will, what is the result of it all?” Mr. Palethorpe asked, for Will had purposely abstained from going to their house after his last interview with his lawyer. “Alice has been imagining all sorts of things: that you had been run over, or had run away with some girl.”
“Father! I never thought that for a moment,” his daughter said indignantly, “though I have been very anxious, for it is nearly a fortnight since he was here.”
“I have done a good deal in the time,” Will said. “I did not write to you, because I wanted to tell you. I am acknowledged as the grandson and heir to the title and estates of Sir Ralph Gilmore.”
Both gave an exclamation of pleasure.
“And now,” he said, taking her hand, “I only need one thing to complete my happiness, and that is, that you will share my good fortune with me. May I hope that it will be so?”
“Certainly you may, Will. I think I have loved you ever since I was a little girl, and acknowledge that my principal reason for inducing father to come to live in England was that I believed I should have more chance of meeting you again here than in Jamaica.”
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“I am heartily glad, too, that it is all settled,” Mr. Palethorpe said. “I have seen it coming on ever since you met us the first time in London, and I may say that I have seen it with pleasure, for there is no one to whom I would sooner trust her happiness than you. Now I will leave you to yourselves.”
It need hardly be said that Alice was as anxious as Sir Ralph Gilmore that Will should quit the navy, and he consequently yielded to their entreaties. He wrote to his grandfather to tell him of his engagement, and the baronet wrote back by return of post to Mr. Palethorpe, begging him to come down with his daughter and Will for a time.
“I only half know him at present,” he said, “and as I understand that just at present he will not want to leave the young lady of his choice, you will gladden an old man if you will all three come down to stay with me.”
Three months later the marriage took place from the house at Dulwich. Sir Ralph Gilmore came up for the ceremony, and the change that the three months had effected in him was extraordinary. He was the gayest of the party.
Among those present at the ceremony were also Will’s two devoted friends, Dimchurch and Tom Stevens. The baronet was greatly pleased with their affection and pride in Will, and offered both good posts on the estate. So none of the comrades went to sea again.
The baronet gave into Will’s hands the entire management of the estate and house, so his death, seven years later, made practically no difference to Will’s position. Will took to country pursuits, and became one of the most popular landlords in Somersetshire, while his wife was quite one of the most popular ladies in the county. Her father, up to the time of his death, spent most of his time down there, and they used the house at Dulwich as their abode when they stayed in [pg 384]London during the season. Mrs. Archer came more than once to stay with them, as their most honoured guest. Stevens and Dimchurch both married. The former became head-gamekeeper on the estate, a post in which he showed great talent. The latter took a small cottage with a bit of land just outside the park gates, for he was able to live very comfortably on the interest of his prize-money. He had no children of his own, and his great pleasure was to wander about with Will’s, telling them of their father’s adventures in the great war.
It was not till well on in the sixties that Sir William Gilmore, captain, R.N., departed this life, a few weeks after the death of his wife, leaving behind him a large family to carry on the old name.