Chapter XVII: A Memorable Journey

Yes, it was true! Randolph Hay, the rightful heir, was in full possession of Haymore. He had also entered into his estate with much more ease than could have been anticipated either by himself, his friends or his lawyers.

To explain how this happened, a brief summary of events is necessary.

It will be remembered that Ran Hay, with his young bride, Judy, and a small party of friends, sailed on November the 29th from New York by the steamship _Boadicea_, hound for Liverpool.

Ran, Judy and Will Walling had staterooms in the first cabin; Mike, Dandy and Longman had berths in the second cabin.

This arrangement, on the part of the three last mentioned, was much against the will of Ran, who would gladly have provided his brother-in-law and his two friends with the best accommodations the ship afforded, but that from very delicacy of feeling toward them he could not offer to do so. Besides, he knew that all three of these men had money enough to pay for a first-class passage each, had they desired it, but that for prudential reasons Dandy and Longman did not choose to squander their savings in that needless manner, and that Mike cast in his lot with his two friends; and so their little party voyaged in the plain but clean and wholesome second cabin.

There could not, however, be much communication between the three in the first cabin and the three in the second, though they met occasionally on the common ground of the forward deck.

Here Ran had long talks with his friends, and learned much more of the past history of Dandy and Longman than he had ever known before.

Here, Judy, wrapped from head to heel in her heavy fur cloak, would often join them, for the weather continued fine. “Wonderful!—just wonderful!” was the verdict of all the ship’s passengers; the oldest “salt” declaring that never, at this season of the year, had he known such weather in crossing the Atlantic.

Not one of our party suffered from seasickness. The only effect the voyage seemed to have upon them was an increase of health, vigor and appetite.

Their ship was rather a slow one, that was all.

It was a splendid winter morning about the seventh day out. The sky, of a clear, deep blue, without a single cloud, and on fire with a sun too dazzling to be seen, overhung a sea whose waves were like molten sapphires. The ship, with all her snowy sails spread and filled, was flying on before a fresh, fair wind.

On the forward deck, grouped together, were Ran, Judy, Mike, Dandy and Longman. The hunter had been telling his story for the first time to Ran and Judy.

“And so you are from Chuxton! Is not that a strange coincidence? Haymore Hall and hamlet is in the neighborhood of Chuxton, I think,” said Ran.

“About ten miles off, sir. Chuxton is the nearest market town and railway station to Haymore,” replied Longman.

“Well, my dear fellow, as you say you would never have left your native country if you could have obtained employment to suit you——” Ran said in a modest and hesitating way.

“Among guns and game,” Longman interjected with a laugh.

“Exactly—’among guns and game?—I do earnestly hope that it may be in my way to suit you. Longman, I know nearly nothing of my patrimonial estate, but I have heard my father say that there was no such place for game in all the North Riding. I hope and trust and pray,” added Ran, with boyish earnestness, “that I may be able to make you head gamekeeper at Haymore without injustice to others.”

“I would not take another man’s place to his hurt, sir,” said the hunter.

“I know that, good fellow. Nor would I offer you such an effront. But it will hurt no one to make you an extra keeper at a good salary.”

“There, now, Longman! D’ye moind that? Isn’t it jist what I was afther tilling ye!” exclaimed Mike. “Didn’t I say if Ran, or bigging his honor’s pardin, Misther Hay, hadn’t a place riddy made to shute ye, he’d crayate one? D’ye moind?”

“Something like that,” replied the hunter, laughing. “But I really do not wish Mr. Hay to make a place for me.”

“Friends,” said the young squire, “we will leave that question until we get to Haymore. But in the meantime don’t distress me by calling me Mr.—anybody! I am Ran to all my old companions.”

“Ouns! But whatever would the gintry round Haymore be thinking to hear the squire called be his Christian name, with divil a handle to it, be the loikes av us?” demanded Mike, with a laugh.

“I do not care what they think! They will soon know that I and my Judy and my friends came from the mining camps in the backwoods and mountains of North America, and that they must not expect more polish from us or more politeness than neighborly, loving kindness inspires. And now, Dandy, old friend, what do you intend to do when we all reach England?” inquired Ran of the old man, who seemed to have been left out, or to have withdrawn himself from the conversation.

“Indeed, then, I don’t know, sir! I hevn’t a living soul belonging to me in the old country except it is my brother’s orphan child, my niece, Julia Quin. When I left England she was a good-looking young wench, some seventeen years old, and was at service in a parson’s family down in Hantz. She’ll be married by this time, I reckon, with no end of kids! But, anyways, I’ll look her up, sir, if she is to be found.”

“Have you ever heard from her since you left England?” inquired Judy, breaking into the conversation the first time for the last half hour, and interested the moment another woman was brought upon the tapis.

“Lor’, no, Miss Judy!—which I beg your pardon. Mistress Hay; but I do be forgetting sometimes. Neither me nor mine was ever any great hand at letter writing. And she was doing well at the vicarage, I knowed. And I was wandering about, seeking of my fortin, which I never yet found, though I might have found it the very next blow of my pick, for aught I know, if I had had the parsaverance to stay, which I couldn’t have after the boys here left, and so for twenty years I haven’t heard a word of my niece. She may be dead, poor wench; for death is no respecter of persons, though she was a fine, strapping, strong wench, too. Yes, that is so.”

“I hope not. I hope she is alive and well for your sake. Where did you say you left her at service?”

“At the vicarage, ma’am, in my native town, ma’am.”

“And what town was that?”

“Medge, ma’am. In Hantz, on the south coast, where I was born and riz.”

Judy had started at the first mention of Medge. Now she hastily inquired:

“What was the name of the vicar?”

“One Rev. Mr. Campbell, ma’am; the Rev. Mr. James Campbell. He came from Scotland, horridonally; but settled into the south coast of England. Yes, that was so.”

By this time Ran was listening with the deepest interest to the words of old Dandy, but leaving Judy to sustain the conversation.

“Why, Mr. Quin, we know who he is,” she gayly exclaimed.

“Do you know, ma’am? Indeed, and how, if you please?”

“Why, Mr. Quin, it is too long a story to tell you how now; and besides, it concerns other people that I would rather not talk about; but this I can tell you, that the Rev. Mr. Campbell is not now at Medge, but——”

“Where is he then, ma’am, if you please to tell me that I may know where to seek for him? For I shall go to him first of all to ask after my niece.”

“He is quite at the opposite end of England. He is at Haymore Rectory, where we are all going.”

“The Lord be good to us! Is that so?” exclaimed Dandy joyfully.

“Indeed, yes! And now, Mr. Quin, if you wish to hear news of your niece, Julia, you will have to go all the way to Haymore with us. And I am so glad that we will not be separated. It will be so pleasant for us all to go together to Haymore.”

“Yes, Dandy, old boy, and you must stop with me, you know, until you find your niece,” added Ran.

“And will I see the Rev. Mr. James Campbell himself?” inquired Quin in some doubt.

“Of course you will. And as servants don’t change places as often in the old country as they do in the new, it is more than likely you will find your niece at the rectory, unless she is married,” said Judy.

“Or—dead, poor wench!” added Dandy.

“Oh, no, indeed. She’s not dead! I’m certain of it,” exclaimed Judy, with good-natured but inexcusable presumption.

“I’ll take that for a prophecy, anyways, ma’am, and believe into it. Yes, that is so.”

“And you will come with us to Haymore, Dandy?” said Ran.

“I thank you kindly, sir; I will.”

“Pray, Mr. Quin, stop calling me sir. You are an old man and I am a young one, almost a boy, and it is not fitting for you to call me sir.”

“Mr. Hay, I was brought up into the Church of England, and teached to be content with that station of life into which the Lord had called me; likewise, to respect my pastors and masters, and to honor my sooperioors. And twenty years’ wandering among the mines haven’t made me forget them airly lessons, nor yet my good manners, sir,” said Dandy, with a ceremonious bow, as he lifted his fur cap from his bald head.

“Judy, can’t you bring them to reason?” inquired Ran, with a laugh.

“Sorrow a worrd they’ll listen to meself!” exclaimed Judy, backsliding into dialect, as she frequently did.

“Well, do as you please, or I’ll make you!” laughed Ran.

And from that hour it was understood that the whole party should keep together until they should reach Haymore, instead of separating at Liverpool, as had been first intended.

The weather continued very fine, though very cold.

On the morning of the tenth they reached Queenstown.

There Mr. Walling went on shore and telegraphed to his London correspondents, Messrs. Sothoron & Drummond, Attorneys-at-Law, Lincoln’s Inns Fields, that his client, Mr. Randolph Hay, and himself would be in London on the afternoon of the twelfth.

The run from Queenstown to Liverpool was as fine as any preceding part of the voyage.

They reached port in the early dawn of the morning on the twelfth.

Without lingering longer in the city than was necessary to get their baggage through the customhouse and fortify themselves with a substantial early breakfast at the “Queen’s,” they took the first mail train for London, where they arrived in the middle of the afternoon.

Mr. Will Walling, an experienced traveler, who had been in London several times before, became the guide of the party, and took them from Euston Square down to Morley’s Hotel, Trafalgar Square, where they secured a comfortable suite of apartments on the second floor front.

Mike, Dandy and Longman went to find cheaper quarters. Again Ran would gladly have entertained them at Morley’s, but could not offer to do so without affronting their spirit of independence.

Even Mike, to whom Ran ventured an invitation, declined his brother-in-law’s hospitality, and cast in his lot with his two old mining friends. But he promised to look in again in the evening to let Ran and Judy know where he and his companions had found quarters.

After a hasty dinner in the private parlor of the Hays, Mr. Will Walling left the young pair still over their dessert and went out and called a cab and drove to Lincoln’s Inns Fields to call on Messrs. Sothoron & Drummond.

They had been the solicitors of the Hays, of Haymore, for many years, and were, of course, deeply interested in all that concerned them.

Much correspondence had already passed between the London and New York firms, bearing on the recent appearance of the undoubted lawful heir of Haymore in opposition to the fraudulent pretender, so that there was already a perfect understanding of the case established between them.

It was now a little after business hours, but Mr. Will Walling felt sure that, having received his dispatch announcing his visit, one or both members of the firm would remain at their office to receive him.

In fact, he found both gentlemen there. The case was considered much too important to admit of neglect or indifference, and being after office hours, they were quite at leisure to give their whole attention to the business in hand.

Mr. Walling spent four hours with Messrs. Sothoron & Drummond, and together the three gentlemen went through the mass of documents, all together constituting indisputable, immovable proof of Randolph Hay’s identity as the only lawful heir of Haymore.

I will not weary my reader with any of the lawyers’ talk, but hasten on to its results.

It was nearly nine o’clock when the three gentlemen, having brought their interview to an end, left the office together and separated, to seek their several destinations—Sothoron to his home on Clapham Common, Drummond to his club on Regent Street, and Walling to his friends at Morley’s.

Mr. Will found Ran and Judy seated at the front window of their parlor, in which the gas had been turned down low to enable them to see out into the street, for they were gazing down on the panorama of the night scene on Trafalgar Square.

“Well!” exclaimed Mr. Will, as he entered the room, flung his hat across the floor and dropped into a large easy-chair near the two young people, “are you ready to set out for Yorkshire and Haymore by the first mail train to-morrow morning?”

“What do you mean?” inquired Ran, looking around, rather startled by the abrupt entrance and action of his lawyer, while Judy also wheeled her chair and raised her eyes inquiringly to the first speaker.

“Just what I asked. Are you ready to start for Haymore Hall by the first train to-morrow morning?” repeated Mr. Will.

“What is the use of your asking that, Walling, when you know there is ever such a law fight to go through first. And even after I have won my suit, as of course I shall win it, there must be writs of ejectment, and the Lord knows what all, before we can get that villain out of my house: for ‘possession is nine points of the law,’ you know, and you may depend he will contest the tenth point to the bitter end,” said Ran.

“Not at all!” heartily exclaimed Will Walling; “there will be no fight. The fellow will not fight; he’ll fly. And though ‘possession is nine points of the law,’ he has never had possession. What do you think of that?”

“I think your words are more incomprehensible than ever. I do not understand them in the least,” replied Ran.

“Nor do I,” added Judy.

“Well, then, listen, both of you. I have been three or four or more hours closeted with Sothoron & Drummond.”

“Yes.”

“And we have been over, together, all the documentary proofs of your identity as Randolph Hay, the only lawful heir of Haymore.”

“Well?”

“Well, every document connected with the case has your name, that is, Randolph Hay, as the heir and now the owner of Haymore.”

“Of course.”

“And you, and you only, are Randolph Hay.”

“Undoubtedly. But there is another who has taken my name and estates.”

“He has taken your name and stolen and squandered a good deal of your money during the last few months; there is no doubt about that. Nor will you ever get a penny of that lost money back; there is no hope of that. These moneys he has obtained by fraud from your bailiff, John Prowt, of Haymore, and from your family solicitors, Sothoron & Drummond, at Lincoln’s Inns Fields. But, my dear sir, for all that, he has never been in possession of your estate.”

“Why not, when——”

“But he is not Randolph Hay, in whose name all the documents are made out.”

“But he is at Haymore Hall now. And it will require a legal process to get him out, for he will fight every inch of the ground.”

“Not at all! He is not at Haymore Hall, nor has he ever been there. His fraudulent presence is not known there. If he were there now, or ever had been there, or if his person were known there under his stolen name of Randolph Hay, then, I grant you, in that case we might have to meet some trouble and confusion, yet not much. And as it is, we shall have no trouble at all.”

“But this is strange. How is it that he has never been to Haymore?” inquired Ran.

“Because, it seems, he prefers to squander the revenues of the estate in Paris. But let me tell you what I have this afternoon learned of the fellow from Messrs. Sothoron & Drummond.”

“Yes, pray do,” said Judy.

“It seems, then, that when he first brought his—lady over here, he intended to go to Haymore, and even had grand preparations made there for their reception; but from some caprice, he changed his mind and went to Paris, where he has been with his—lady ever since, squandering money just as if he knew it did not belong to him, and deferring his return from time to time, and drawing large sums from—your bankers.”

“From what I know of Gentleman Geff, I should think it hard to draw him from the saloons of Paris to the seclusion of a Yorkshire country house,” said Ran.

“Yes; but now it seems he is really coming with a party of friends to spend Christmas at Haymore Hall. He has sent down orders for the house to be prepared to receive himself and—lady and guests by the fifteenth. Now then, the servants at the Hall are preparing to receive Mr. and Mrs. Randolph Hay, whom they have never seen. Now you and your wife are Mr. and Mrs. Randolph Hay.”

“Well, what do you advise?” inquired Ran.

“Why, man alive, your course is as plain as daylight. You and your wife take the first train to-morrow and speed to Yorkshire and to Haymore Hall, where you will arrive early in the evening, where you will, no doubt, find everything ready for you and be joyfully received by your servants. To be sure, you will arrive rather earlier than you were expected; but that will not matter much, especially as it will give you time to get well rested before you will be called upon to receive Gentleman Geff and his distinguished party.”

“Oh, that will be the most delicious fun!” exclaimed Judy, clapping her hands with glee; “and we will have, besides Ran and myself, Mike, Dandy and Longman all drawn up in a line to welcome him. He will think all Grizzly Gulch has come to Haymore Hall.”

“For his guilty soul it would seem

“‘Birnam forest come to Dunsinane.’”

said Will Walling.

“There would be an awful row,” exclaimed Ran.

“Not at all. There would be a surprise, a panic and a flight. That is, if you let the villain go. I am not sure that you ought not to have a warrant and an officer ready to arrest him. Or rather, I am sure that you ought.”

“I would rather not, if he will leave quietly,” said Ran.

“But you must make no terms with a criminal. That would be ‘compounding a felony,’ a serious offense against English law.”

“Well, is it settled? Shall we go to-morrow morning?” inquired Judy.

“Yes, dear; certainly,” replied Ran.

“And I will go down to the office and find a Bradshaw and see about our train,” said Mr. Will, picking up his hat and hurrying out of the room.

He had scarcely disappeared when the door opened and Mike, Dandy and Longman entered the parlor.

Judy ran forward to welcome them, while Ran turned up the gas.

“We have been sitting in the dark to watch the scene in the square below,” Judy explained.

“Well, boys, have you found comfortable quarters?” inquired Ran, as soon as they were all seated.

“Illigant; and chape enough, too, be the same token, close by in the Strand; a very ginteel, dooble-bidded bidroom. Longman, being av a giant fit for a circus, do hev one bid all to himsilf. And Dandy and me, being av little fellows, do have the ithir to oursilves,” Mike explained.

While they were still talking Mr. Will Walling returned to the room with a Bradshaw in his hand. He greeted the three visitors pleasantly, dropped into a chair and said:

“Well, there is a train that leaves Euston Square Station at six in the morning and reaches Chuxton at three in the afternoon. After that there is no other parliamentary train until twelve noon, which would make it nine in the evening when it stops at Chuxton, and would be too late to go on to Haymore the same night.”

“Oh, then, we will leave by the earlier train, if Judy has no objection,” said Ran.

“I? Why, I never minded getting up early!” exclaimed Judy.

“What do you say, boys?” inquired Ran.

“The sooner the better for us, sir,” replied Dandy, speaking for the rest, who promptly assented.

And then, as the hour was late, the visitors bade good-night, and the party left behind separated and retired to rest, to be ready for their early rising.