In half an hour Jasper Benham was back in the turnip field on the Rush Heath land where Tom Stook was still wielding his hoe.
"Tom, can you trot four miles at a stretch?"
"Lord, sur, what for?"
Jasper told him as much as he could tell such a man as Tom Stook.
"I'd take you up behind me, but you're such a big fellow, Tom. Leave your hoe in the hedge, and hold on to my stirrup. I'll tell you more as we go along."
And so they set out for Stonehanger.
They went by way of Bramble End, Jasper leaving Devil Dick tethered in Stook's little cow-lodge. Rogue Tom had come by a pretty shrewd notion of what Jasper Benham expected of him. He took the lead as they made their way over the common.
"No nag in t' old quarry, sir?"
"No."
"T' crossways at Dudden's Oak, that be the spot, then, Master Jasper."
"Sure?"
"Mounseer has to cross t' ridge. Let him take what track he will, he'll come to t' crossways at Dudden's Oak, unless he goes by t' woods and ditches."
Jasper agreed. Stook was a fox who knew the country.
They skirted the upper part of the common, and took a farm track that led to the crossways at Dudden's Oak. The old tree, a huge shell with its boughs half dead, stood in the centre of a triangular piece of grass. There was a wood between two of the converging roads, and Jasper laid Tom Stook in ambush in this wood.
"You'll get your glimpse of the gentleman, Tom, if he comes this way."
"I'd be glad to get a sound o' t' furriner's voice."
"You'd know him by the voice?"
"I've heard him speak in t' dark. If I see him and sound him I'll know 'em all for t' same man."
Jasper leaned against the trunk of the old oak with his face toward the two ways that led south-east and south-west. De Rothan might come by either road. Nor had Jasper been there fifteen minutes before he saw a mounted man appear far down under the oak boughs on the Rookhurst track. It was De Rothan himself, jogging along at a comfortable trot, yet sitting very straight and stiff in the saddle, like some grand seigneur riding over his estate. Jasper waited for him on the green point of grass between the two roads. He had seen Tom Stook's brown face thrust itself momentarily between the hazel boughs like the face of a satyr. He was on the alert.
De Rothan recognised Jasper when he was within thirty yards of Dudden's Oak. A slight knitting of the brows betrayed his impatience. But he came on with all the fine and unembarrassed confidence of a grandee.
Jasper stood forward with a sweep of the hat.
"I must ask you to stop, sir."
De Rothan pulled up, and gave Jasper a stiff bow. He was high in the stirrups of his dignity, and ready to play the grand monarch.
"Good day to you, Meester Benham."
"Good day to you, Chevalier. Will you be so good as to tell me whence you come, and where you are going?"
De Rothan looked haughty.
"Indeed, sir, by what right do you ask these questions?"
"By a right that it is not yours to question. I am a King's officer and we have our orders. You will be so good as to answer me."
"I take it as a reflection on my honour."
"Take it as you please. We have to supervise the comings and goings, even of our guests."
"Meester Benham, do you suggest——?"
"I ask you to answer my question."
"Your way of asking it is insolent."
"I stand by my orders. We are neither of us here to question them."
De Rothan appeared to do some rapid thinking. Then he gave an irritable shrug of the shoulders.
"I suppose an exile has to suffer suspicion. If you would know it, sir, I have been riding to exercise myself and my horse. I rode from my house to Stonehanger Common; I ride back again to my house. Is that what you require?"
"I take your answer at its value, sir. You may pass on."
De Rothan looked at Jasper as though he were half-minded to ride him down. He appeared to swallow something. He was a man who preferred to make very sure of success before he struck.
"I am deeply beholden to you, Meester Benham, for your serene patronage. There are things that we do not forget."
"Remember them when you please, Chevalier."
"I choose my own time, Meester Benham. I do not chastise insolence until the occasion suits me."
Jasper gave him a vicious smile.
"Do not postpone it too long, sir. We do not live so very far apart. Good day to you."
De Rothan rode on.
Then Tom Stook's brown face appeared. It was one broad grin.
"T' same furriner—all over. I've seen him meet t' smuggling Frenchy—Jerome. That be him, Master Jasper."
"Well, he's a liar, Tom."
"Liar! All Frenchies be liars. Good for you, Master Jasper."
Jasper sent Tom Stook home with a silver crown in his pocket, and rode back alone to Rush Heath. He wanted to worry this matter out, to think out his plans for dealing with Durrell and De Rothan. Jasper had no desire to drag the whole neighbourhood into the adventure. In a way it was his own affair, and he meant to carry it on his own shoulders. His motives and emotions were jumbled together. The one outstanding fact was his determination to break De Rothan. He would outwit the man, corner him, fight him, if need be, and get up early one morning to see him hanged. It was a question of duty; and it was not. Jasper loved and hated. These things are sufficient without a man dragging in duty and religion, and trying to cover up the essential and elemental passions with sentimental affectations, and platitudes about patriotism.
Jasper had been away from Rush Heath since the morning. Jack Bumpstead was not to be found, and Jasper, going in to stable Devil Dick, found a strange nag in one of the stalls. Old Mrs. Ditch, the housekeeper, met him in the passage, her grey curls very much in order, and a ribbon in her cap.
"La, Master Jasper, Mr. Winter came two hours ago. I had dinner kept back awhile. There be some cold victuals laid out for you."
"What—Mr. Jeremy?"
Mrs. Ditch looked coy. Mr. Jeremy was a gentleman who forever caused a tender fluttering among all sorts and conditions of women.
Jasper made for the dining-room. In the Chippendale arm-chair by the window sat a shortish, thickset, hard-headed man in black, smoking a long pipe, and looking out on life with steel-black, whimsical eyes. He had one of those Roman heads, with harsh strong features, power in every line, and a cynical kindliness about the mouth.
"Why, Jeremy——!"
"Jeremy it is, lad. Come over and kiss me."
They laughed, and came together to grip hands with the impulsiveness of two men who have learned to love each other as men can.
"What are you doing down here?"
"Filling a chair and a bed."
"Good, by George! It's a year since we've seen you. Where's Squire Kit? Have you seen him?"
Jeremy settled the tobacco in the bowl of his pipe with the end of his little finger.
"Having a nap upstairs, Jasper. Curse me, lad, it's good to see you. Brown and lusty, eh, though you had a broken arm in the spring. What, Jack Bumpstead's no gossip. And how's that old blackguard, Goffin? I've brought him down a pound of snuff."
Jeremy Winter had been a gentleman of many adventures, and his picturesque career had culminated in the founding of a fencing school in a quiet street near St. James's. Jeremy and Jasper's mother had been cousins, and for twenty years Mr. Winter had descended at spasmodic intervals upon Rush Heath, never with much money in his pocket, but with plenty of audacity and cheerfulness in his eyes. He would have tales to tell of Canada, or the East Indies, or of service in the Austrian army, or of bronzed and ragged adventures in Spain. There was something lovable about the man. He was tough, capable, humorous, warm-hearted, a master of the small sword and the sabre, imperturbable and smiling in the face of odds.
Jasper sat himself down at the table with a resentful and freshly remembered hunger. Jeremy Winter's coming struck him as the most welcome of coincidences. One could tell things to Jeremy that a man would not tell to any other living creature.
They talked hard, touching on a dozen familiar memories, and filling in the gaps between the now and the then. Jeremy had made a success of his fencing school, but as he put it—"London's a sort of howling wilderness just now. Every blessed soul seems to have gone off somewhere into the country to help to drill bumpkins, and stand ready for the French. I shut up the school for a month. There were only a few raw youngsters to teach."
When Jasper had dined they strolled out into the garden with the elbow-to-elbow air of men well pleased to be together. Jeremy had taught Jasper to fence as a boy. He had taken some pride in the lad, for their temperaments were much alike. Jasper had much of the elder man's nerve and courage and imperturbable toughness.
"Well, lad, how's the sword-arm?"
"Out of practice. I have an idea, Jeremy, that you are the very man I want."
"What, getting ready for a quarrel—woman—and all that?"
"More than that. I'll tell you."
In the long walk Bob the gardener had thrown down half a dozen hazel fagots, for sticking the rows of sweet peas. Jeremy brought out a knife, chose two hazel boughs, sliced off the twigs and shaped them to the length of two foils.
"Let's try you, Jasper."
They stood in the grass walk and fenced together, the sunlight shining on the brown hazel stocks and on their intent faces. Jeremy Winter was extraordinarily quick and supple for a man of fifty. He had the wrist of a blacksmith and the cunning of a player on the spinet. Jasper was slow and out of practice. Jeremy touched him five times in as many minutes.
"Stiff. Is the business serious?"
They began to pace up and down the grass walk while Jasper told Jeremy Winter the truth about Stonehanger. Jeremy was a good listener, shrewd, attentive, and ready to compare new facts with the gleanings of a very varied experience. He was an easy man to confide in, because he was so full of a sage understanding. Jeremy had led a picturesque and rather dissipated life between the twenties and forties, and it is the man who has been a man who is of most use to his brother men.
"So you fell in love with the girl, lad. What! I'm old dog enough to know that! Heaven help me, it happened to me every month when I was a youngster. But I was only in love—once—you know; the great splash; and she left me to drown."
"That's all done with, Jeremy."
"Twenty years ago, sir."
"No, I mean my small incident. It was just an inclination; no more than that."
Jeremy regarded him with an affectionate twinkle.
"Just so—just so."
"I have got to pull this nest of spies to pieces. The girl mustn't blame me. I've got to do my duty."
"Duty! You be very careful of that word, Jasper. It's a fool's word. I don't trust men who talk about their duty. Why not send a file of soldiers in?"
Jasper stared at the chimneys of the house that rose against the stately gloom of the cedars.
"I have a mind to carry the thing through myself."
"Out of consideration for the lady!"
"No. This Frenchman and I have a score to settle."
Jeremy stroked a firm and shiny chin.
"Who is he? An émigré?"
"Pretends to be. He calls himself the Chevalier de Rothan."
"What?"
"De Rothan."
Jeremy said something under his breath.
"Tall, dark rogue, is he, with the airs of a grandee, drooping tip to his nose, wears black, and talks about St. Louis?"
"That's the man! Do you know him, Jeremy?"
Winter looked thoughtful.
"I've met him in London."
"Where?"
"At my school. He came in to fence; Jack Sidebotham brought him. He was all over my best men."
They paused, and looked each other in the eyes.
"Jasper, the fellow is one of the best swordsmen in the country. I had a turn with him."
He smiled a grim little smile.
"Vanity, that's his weak point, too much flourish. I had him pinked, but—"
Jasper threw up his chin.
"All right, Jeremy. I'd tackle him—curse him!—even if he were a better man than you."
"You wait a bit, my lad."
"You had better call me a coward!"
Jeremy laid a hand on Jasper's shoulder.
"Stop that. Do you think I don't love you, lad? Do you think I want to have you run through by a swaggering blackguard like De Rothan? He's a good shot, too, mind you. You wait a bit, till we have had a week with the foils."
As men they knew each other, and Jasper was touched.
"I'm a hot-headed fool, Jeremy. I'll do what you wish."