THE ELDEST SON

BY

ARCHIBALD MARSHALL

Author of "Exton Manor"

NEW YORK DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY 1919

COPYRIGHT, 1911, BY DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY Published September, 1911

To KATHLEEN

CONTENTS

CHAPTER

I The Squire Is Infernally Worried II A Question of Matrimony III Exit Miss Bird IV The Dower-House V Lady George VI Blaythorn Rectory VII The Squire Puts His Foot Down VIII The Squire Feels Trouble Coming IX Dick Pays a Sunday Visit X The Meet at Apthorpe Common XI Dick Leaves Kencote and Makes a Discovery XII The House Party XIII The Hunt Ball XIV A Shoot XV The Guns and the Ladies XVI The Money Question XVII Sunday and Monday XVIII Mrs. Clinton Chooses a Governess XIX Mrs. Clinton In Jermyn Street XX Aunt Laura Intervenes XXI An Engagement XXII Dick Comes Home XXIII Humphrey Counts His Chickens XXIV Virginia Goes to Kencote XXV A Lawn Meet XXVI What Miss Phipp Saw XXVII The Run of the Season XXVIII Property XXIX Brothers XXX Miss Bird Hears All About It

CHAPTER I

THE SQUIRE IS INFERNALLY WORRIED

"Nina," said the Squire, "I'm most infernally worried." He was sitting in his wife's morning-room, in a low chair by the fire. In front of him was a table set for tea for one—himself. There were buttered toast and dry toast and preserves, a massive silver teapot, milk jug, cream jug, and sugar basin, a breakfast cup of China tea, and two boiled eggs, one of which he was attacking, sitting forward in his chair with his legs bent. He had come in from hunting a few minutes before, at about six o'clock, and it was his habit thus to consume viands which most men of his age and bulk might have been afraid of, as likely to spoil their dinner. But he was an active man, in spite of his fifty-nine years and his tendency to put on flesh, and it would have taken more than a tea that was almost a meal to reduce his appetite for dinner at eight, after a day in the saddle and a lunch off sandwiches and a flask of sherry. When his tea was over he would indulge himself in half an hour's nap, with the Times open at the leader page on his knee, and go up to dress, feeling every inch of him a sportsman and an English country gentleman.

His tea was generally brought to him in his library. This evening a footman had followed him into that room immediately upon his entering the house, as usual, had unbuckled his spurs, pulled off his boots for him, and put on in their place a pair of velvet slippers worked in silk, which had been warming in front of the fire. Only when his coat was wet or much splashed with mud did the Squire change that. He considered smoking-jackets rather effeminate, and slippers, on ordinary occasions, "sloppy." It was only in his dressing-room or on these evenings after hunting that he wore them. Otherwise, if he had to change his boots during the daytime he put on another pair. He was particular on little points like this. All his rules were kept precisely, by himself and those about him.

This evening he had told the footman, and the butler who had followed him into the room with the tray, that he would have his tea in Mrs. Clinton's room, and he had marched across the hall with a firm and decisive step, in his red coat and buckskin breeches, between which and his hand-knitted heather-mixture socks showed a white expanse of under-drawers round a muscular calf.

Mrs. Clinton sat opposite to him in another low chair, at work on a woollen waistcoat. He always wore waistcoats made by her, thick for the winter, light for the summer, and she knitted his socks for him, of which he required a large number, for he hated them to be darned. He liked to see her working for him like this. He was a rich man, but a woman ought to work with her hands for her husband, whether he was rich or poor. It was her wifely duty, and incidentally it kept her out of mischief. Mrs. Clinton, at the age of fifty-four, with her smooth yellow-grey hair and her quiet and composed face, did not look as if she would be up to serious mischief, even if this and other restrictions were removed from her. She looked up when her husband addressed her, and marked the furrow between his heavy eyebrows. Then she looked down again at her work and waited for him to unbosom himself further.

"How old is Dick?" asked the Squire, leaning forward to put a spoonful of yolk of egg into his mouth with one hand, while he shielded his grey beard with the other.

She knew then the subject upon which he had expressed himself as infernally worried, for he was not accustomed to keep the first stirrings of discontent to himself.

"He was thirty-four last April," she said.

"Thirty-four," he repeated. "Yes; and I was twenty-four when I married you. That's early. I shouldn't advise any young man to marry at that age, unless, perhaps, he was the only one to keep a name going—as I was, of course—at least in my immediate family. But thirty-four! It's really time Dick thought about it. He's the eldest son. It's his duty. And as far as I can see he never gives the matter a thought. Eh?"

"As far as I can see he is not thinking about it," said Mrs. Clinton.

"Well, if I couldn't see you couldn't see. I say it is time that he did begin thinking about it. I'm getting on now—good for another twenty years, I should hope, but I want to see the succession assured. Walter is the only one of the boys that's married, and he's only got two girls. Of course, he may have a son—they're coming pretty quick—but I've never got over that doctoring business. I shouldn't like the heir of Kencote to be brought up in a place like Melbury Park, and I say so freely—to you."

This was the echo of an old disturbance. The Squire's third son had refused to take Orders, with a view of occupying the family living, but had studied medicine, and was now practising in a suburb of London, and not one of the most genteel suburbs either. That furrow always appeared faintly in the Squire's brow when he was forced to mention the distasteful words Melbury Park.

"I think it would be a good thing if Dick were to marry," said Mrs. Clinton.

"Good thing? Of course it would be a good thing. That's just what I'm saying. There's Humphrey; he doesn't look much like marrying, either. In fact, if he doesn't pick up a wife with a pot of money, I'd rather he didn't. He spends quite enough as it is. I've no opinion of that London life, except for a bit when a man's young and before he settles down. Dick has been in the Guards now for—what?—twelve years. I never meant that he should take up soldiering as a profession. Just a few years spent with a good regiment—as I had myself, in the Blues—that's all right for a young fellow who has a good property to succeed to. But an eldest son ought to settle down, on the property, and get married, and have sons to succeed him."

"Dick comes here a good deal," said Mrs. Clinton, "and he takes an interest in the property."

"Well, I should hope he did," responded the Squire. "The property will belong to him when my time's over. What do you mean?"

"I only mean that Dick is not wrapped up in London life and all that goes with it, as Humphrey seems to be."

"Oh, Humphrey! I've no patience with Humphrey. If Kencote isn't good enough for him let him stay away. Only I won't pay any more bills for him. He has a good allowance and he must keep within it. I've told him so. Now if I'd put him into the army, instead of the Foreign Office, he might have stuck to it and made a profession of it. I wish I had—into a working regiment. It would have done him all the good in the world. However, I don't want to talk about Humphrey. I don't expect an heir to come from him; and Frank is too young to marry yet. Besides—a sailor! It's better for him to marry later. Dick ought to marry, and there's an end of it. And when he comes down to-morrow I shall tell him so."

Mrs. Clinton made no immediate reply, but after a pause, during which the Squire came to the end of his eggs and began to attack the buttered toast, she said, "I have to tell you something, Edward, which I am afraid will disturb you."