The Master of Stair 27

The Master of Stair 27

“I am undecided, but any message addressed to ‘The Blue Posts,’ Covent

Garden, will find me.”

 

“I will remember it.”

 

The King’s messenger put on his hat and coat in silence; he was not a

man for commonplaces, and his haughty manners prevented them in others.

He saluted the two men very abruptly and turned from the room.

 

Jerome Caryl made no attempt to accompany him: there was a quiet

dislike in his stiff bow. As the door closed, he remarked to Sir

Perseus:

 

“Middleton is crazed, I think, to trust that man with such a mission.”

 

“I do not like him,” was the answer, “but he may be very staunch.”

 

“He knows everything,” said Jerome Caryl, frowning. “And his

credentials are such that I must trust him—but I doubt his discretion,

and I wish Middleton could have sent me a man of whom I knew something.”

 

As Mr. Wedderburn was crossing the dark, outer room he felt a timid

touch on his arm; some one fleet and noiseless of foot had overtaken

him. It was Delia Featherstonehaugh,—for the moment he had utterly

forgotten her.

 

“Would you do me a favor?” she said panting.

 

He turned, but it was too dark to see her face.

 

“Why, tell it me,” he answered.

 

“I want you to help me save the Macdonalds of Glencoe—I have—a reason.”

 

There was a long pause; she grew frightened.

 

“Won’t you answer?” she said piteously.

 

“I have no power,” he replied sternly.

 

“Ah, yes, as much as any of them—and I am afraid the Macdonalds—afraid

of—” she paused.

 

“Of whom?”

 

“The Master of Stair,” she whispered.

 

He uttered his slight reckless laugh.

 

“Content ye—I will defend ye from the Master of Stair—on my soul, ye

are a sweet thing—I will see ye next time.”

 

She fell back, panting into the dark and he passed on into the outer

room where a man was busy sorting and arranging Jacobite pamphlets. He

rose to open the door.

 

“Those are lampoons ye write?” demanded Mr. Wedderburn.

 

The Jacobite smiled:

 

“Yes, sir,” he said in a low voice, “I do not write them, but they are

lampoons.”

 

“Against whom?”

 

“All the Whigs, sir—one in particular.”

 

Mr. Wedderburn held the open door in his hand; he spoke over his

shoulder:

 

“The Master of Stair?” he asked.

 

The Jacobite answered under his breath.

 

“Truly that devil—the Master of Stair.”

 

Mr. Wedderburn’s blue eyes flashed dark and fierce.

 

“Be careful, sir, how ye offend the devil,” he said, and, banging the

door furiously in the face of the Jacobite, strode off down the street.

 

 

 

 

CHAPTER XIII

 

THE MASTER’S WIFE

 

 

Late that evening the Master of Stair entered his mansion in St.

James’s Square and passed through the great empty house to the library

at the back. This room was vast, handsomely furnished and gloomy,

well-lit by hanging lamps and a great fire on the massive hearth; the

walls were lined with books, the ceiling domed and painted with dark

figures that appeared to mount into endless space; the chimneypiece,

wreathed with heavy garlands of wooden flowers, supported a huge

branched silver stand filled with candles that were reflected in the

mirror behind. Dull red velvet curtains draped the long windows, and a

heavy pile carpet of the same color covered the floor. In the center of

the wall, facing the door, stood a large black oak desk with a bureau

either side; on it lay papers and books with two grim bronze busts,

labeled “Cato” and “Solon” in lettering that glittered somberly; one of

the lamps hung immediately over the desk and threw a strong light down

on the man who sat there reading a faded calf-bound volume.

 

He was quietly dressed in dark brown, and his face, wrinkled, as a

walnut shell, was almost hidden by the ringlets of his enormous

periwig; he was thin and bent, sixty or sixty-five and had an

indescribable air of ease and comfort, as if he was in his element and

vastly enjoying himself.

 

The Master of Stair paused on the threshold and glanced round the

somber room.

 

“Good-evening, my lord,” he said.

 

The man at the desk looked up, half-reluctantly.

 

“What o’clock is it, John?” he asked.

 

“Between twelve and one,” answered the Master of Stair. “I am later, my

lord, than I meant to be.” He came into the room as he spoke, and

seated himself on one of the stiff-backed chairs by the fire.

 

“Where is Lady Dalrymple?” he asked drearily.

 

Viscount Stair shut his book and so turned in his chair that he faced

his son.

 

“Gone to the ball at Kensington,” he answered dryly, “accompanied by

Tom Wharton.”

 

“Why did you permit it?” flashed the Master of Stair.

 

The father shrugged his shoulders.

 

“You must manage your own wife, John,” he answered. “Everybody is at

the ball. Tom Wharton is as good as another.”

 

Sir John interrupted him:

 

“Tom Wharton is the greatest rake in England,” he said. “I do not

choose to have him across my threshold—when I returned from Romney this

morning you told me Lady Dalrymple was at the Toyshop with him—now you

tell me they have gone to the ball together.”

 

“Why didn’t you go yourself?” asked the Viscount calmly. “Who do you

think is to take her about?—she must be seen at Court sometimes.”

 

“I was better employed,” answered the Master. “You know well enough, my

lord, that I have it in hand to crush this rising—this plot—I am but

now from one of these Jacobite dens where I have been aping the part of

King’s messenger from France.”

 

“In those clothes?” asked his father sarcastically.

 

The Master of Stair answered impatiently: “I forgot them. I had been

dining with Montague, and went straight on to the meeting-place.”

 

Viscount Stair gave an unpleasant smile.

 

“Well,” he said calmly, “you have a fine head, John, you make a good

many slips—a number of false steps. Take care the last isn’t up Tower

Hill.” He spoke with an air of abstraction, as if, himself indifferent

to everything, he could still feel cynically amused at the blunders of

others.

 

His son gave him an angry glance.

 

“I have not deserved this, my lord; I have kept inside the law during

many storms, and now I _am_ the law.”

 

The Viscount leaned a little forward; as he moved it was noticeable

that his neck was wry, a defect that gave him the appearance of leering

over his shoulder as if he listened to some one who whispered there at

his ear.

 

“_I_ have kept you inside the law,” he said. “_My_ advice has guided

you so far—you reckless fool if you had asked me you had not gone among

conspirators in that habit.”

 

He pointed mockingly at the gorgeous dress of his son whose anger rose

the more at his tone.

 

“Sir,” he said. “I have achieved my purpose for all I am such a

fool—they were deceived.”

 

“Being bigger fools,” commented the Viscount.

 

“I say, I am at the bottom of their plot,” flashed the Master. “In two

days’ time I shall have every detail to put before the King.”