About this time Tatham, the Squire\'s body-servant, fell ill, and at his own request was allowed to leave Stanbrook for awhile and go to stay with his married sister, who lived in the next county. Hitherto he and Miss Baynard had shared the duties of the sick-room between them, and as the Squire, instead of gathering strength, seemed to be slowly losing what little was left him, it was evident that some one must be found to fill Tatham\'s place during his unavoidable absence.
Now in the village--a populous and thriving one--the outlying houses of which lay within a bowshot of the park gates of Stanbrook, there dwelt at this time a certain Mrs. Dinkel, herself English, but the widow of a Dutchman who had formerly been head gardener at Heronscourt, the seat of Sir Willoughby Freke. Mrs. Dinkel had been left with enough to keep her comfortably in humble village fashion, but being at the time of her husband\'s death scarcely beyond middle age, and of an active disposition, she presently began to cast about for some way not merely of adding to her limited income, but of banishing from her life the idleness which her soul abhorred.
Being determined to find work, she took the first chance that came in her way, which was to nurse a young lady laid up with a virulent fever. And thus it fell out that within a couple of years of that time Mrs. Dinkel\'s name had become well known throughout a wide circle of provincial society as that of a woman with a born gift for nursing. Like many others of both sexes, she had not discovered her métier till late in life, but having once found it, she stuck to it. Still, her services were not at the beck and call of anybody, nor were they to be bought merely by the offer of a certain number of guineas. She would only go out to nurse among gentlefolk, or, as she termed them, "the quality," and whenever none of the quality stood in need of her services she preferred to stay at home with folded hands, doing nothing, till they should send for her.
When a message from Stanbrook one day reached her, she responded to it with alacrity.
To the Squire it seemed very inconsiderate on Tatham\'s part that he should choose to fall ill at such a time, but as he supposed there was no help for it, it mattered not a jot to him, he said, whom they supplied him with by way of temporary substitute. So, at the express instance of Dr. Banks, Mrs. Dinkel was sent for.
She was a woman of few words and strong nerve, who seemed never to require more than two hours\' sleep out of the twenty-four. All her thoughts and attention were given to her patient; she moved about the sick room almost as silently as a shadow, and before long the Squire found her presence far more soothing, and her ministrations far more gentle, than those of Tatham had been. Nell took to Mrs. Dinkel from the first. They seemed to understand each other instinctively. The sick man was the bond between them. Each in her separate way had for the time being vowed herself to his service.
A few days later, and Mr. Cortelyon had finally made up his mind, bitter as the need for doing so was to him. But it was indeed high time that he should come to some conclusion, for the sands of life were now beginning to run very low indeed, and he knew it. What but a little while before had been a suggestion--not emanating from any outside source, but his own suggestion to himself--had now become a determination. To Mrs. Bullivant in the first place, and to her son after her, he would bequeath three-fourths of everything he was worth.
He was quite aware that, in the ordinary course of things--his grandson being out of the running--his niece\'s claim upon him ought to have had priority of that of everybody else. And he told himself that it should have had if only Nell had been a clear-headed, sensible, businesslike woman of the type of Onoria Bullivant. Unfortunately, she was nothing of the kind. Instead, her head was crammed full of high-flown, sentimental, and quixotic notions (he prided himself on having read her thoroughly), and he felt morally sure that if he were to leave her any large lump sum, say fifteen or twenty thousand pounds, by way of legacy, she would be quite capable, when she found that Master Evan had been left out in the cold, of making over a big slice, perhaps even the whole of it, for the benefit of the brat. Such a result as that must on no account be allowed to come to pass. What he would do was, to invest a certain number of thousands in her name in the Funds, just enough to bring in about three hundred a year, and allow her the interest to live upon. With such an income she could not do much harm, or what the Squire designated to himself as harm. Should she be fool enough to take the boy to live with her, and assume the responsibility of his future, why, she was welcome to do so. But owner of Stanbrook and Barrowmead, and of his latest purchase, that big property on the Yorkshire border, his grandson never should be.
Thus it one day came to pass that Mrs. Bullivant received a note written by Andry Luce, asking her, if convenient, to drive over next day to Stanbrook in time for luncheon, and take her son with her. The widow was a shrewd woman, and it seemed to her that such a note was capable of but one interpretation, and as she drove through the country lanes next day on her way to the Hall her heart beat high with hopes, which, however wanting in substance they might be, were none the less couleur de rose.
In point of fact, before causing his testamentary dispositions to be recorded in black and white the Squire was desirous of taking stock of the youngster whom he was proposing to constitute his heir. If he should prove to be a weak, puling child, or betray any signs of delicacy of constitution, why, in that case that there would be good reason for reconsidering his decision.
As it turned out, the Squire had no cause for uneasiness on that score. Young Gavin Bullivant, who had just entered on his fifth year, looked as strong and sturdy as an oak sapling. He was a bright-eyed, apple-cheeked lad, both inquisitive and acquisitive by natural disposition, and not knowing what shyness meant. He was very like his mother, but more in expression than features, and at times one caught a far-off hint of something in his face, at once hard and cunning, which seemed curiously out of keeping with his years. It was as though a very old man--and not a good old man either--was peering at you from behind a beautiful mask of childhood.
"Not much likeness here to the late lamented--hey?" queried the Squire after a good stare at him, which the boy returned with interest.
Mr. Cortleyon had only met the Hon. Hector on one occasion, at a sale of some of Lord Cossington\'s stock, and had felt no desire to cultivate his acquaintance.
"It may seem like self-flattery to say so," replied Mrs. Bullivant with a complacent smile, "but both in looks and disposition dear Gavin takes wholly after me. Even his grandfather cannot help admitting as much."
Then the Squire proceeded to put several questions to the lad, which he answered with promptitude and aplomb. He betrayed no timidity in the presence of the sick man, although to many a child of his age the latter would have seemed a sufficiently formidable object, with his parchment-like skin, his hollow cheeks, his heavy, grizzled eyebrows, which seemed bent in a perpetual frown, and the strange half-fierce, half-pathetic eyes beneath them, in which the flame of life seemed to burn all the more strongly just now because it was so soon to be extinguished forever.
After that Gavin was planted in the big easy-chair, with a supply of sweet cakes to keep him quiet while his mother and the Squire talked together in confidential fashion.
But it was not in Gavin to keep quiet for any length of time, and hardly had the last cake gone the way of the rest before he had slid from his perch to the ground, bent on a more minute inspection of the room and its contents than he had............