CHAPTER XVI
Jasper Adelstone was in love.
It was some time before he would bring himself to admit it even to himself, for he was wont to pride himself on his superiority to all attacks of the tender passion.
Often and often had he amused himself and his chosen companions by ridiculing the conditions of those weak mortals who allowed themselves to be carried away by what he termed a weak and contemptible affection for the other sex.
Marriage, he used to say, was entirely a matter of business. A man didn't marry until he was obliged, and then only did so to better himself. As to love, and that kind of thing – well, it was an exploded idea – a myth which had died out; at any rate, too absurd a thing altogether for a man possessed of common sense – for such a man, for instance, as Jasper Adelstone. He had seen plenty of pretty women and was received by them with anything but disfavor. He was good-looking, almost handsome, and would have been that if he could have got rid of the sharp, cunning glint of his small eyes; and he was clever and accomplished. He was just the man, it would have been supposed, to fall a victim to the tender passion; but he had stuck fast by his principles, and gone stealthily along the road to success, with his cold smile ready for everyone in general, and not a warm beam in his heart for anyone in particular.
And now! Yes, he was in love – in love as deeply, unreasoningly, as impulsively as the veriest school-boy.
This was very annoying! It would have been very annoying if the object of his passion had been an heiress or the lady of title whom he had in his inmost mind determined to marry, if he married at all; for he would have preferred to have attained to his ambition without any awkward and inconvenient love-making.
But the girl who had inspired him with this sudden and unreasoning passion was, much to his disgust, neither an heiress nor an offshoot of nobility.
She was a mere nobody – the niece of an obscure painter! She was not even in society!
There was no good to be got by marrying her, none whatever. She could not help him a single step on his ambitious path through life. On the first evening of his meeting with Stella, when the beauty, and, more than her beauty, the nameless charm of her bright, pure freshness, overwhelmed and startled him, he took himself to task very seriously.
"Jasper," he said, "you won't go and make a fool of yourself, I hope! She is entirely out of your line. She is only a pretty girl; you've seen a score, a hundred as pretty, or prettier; and she's a mere nobody! Oh, no, you won't make a fool of yourself – you'll go back to town to-morrow morning."
But he did not go back to town; instead, he went into the conservatory at the Rectory, and made up a bouquet and took it to the cottage, and sank deeper still into the mire of foolishness, as he would have called it.
But even then it was not too late. He might have escaped even then by dint of calling up his selfish nature and thinking of all his ambitions; but Stella unfortunately roused – what was more powerful in him than his sudden love – his self-conceit.
She actually dared to defend Lord Leycester Wyndward!
That was almost the finishing stroke, unwittingly dealt by Stella, and he went away inwardly raging with incipient jealousy.
But the last straw was yet to come that should break the back of all his prudent resolves, and that was the meeting with Stella and Lord Leycester in the river-woods, and Lord Leycester's attack on him.
That moment – the moment when he lay on the ground looking up at the dark, handsome, angry, and somewhat scornful face of the young peer – Jasper Adelstone registered a vow.
He vowed that come what would, by fair means or foul, he would have Stella.
He vowed that he would snatch her from the haughty and fiery young lord who had dared to hurl him, Jasper, to the dust and insult him.
What love he already possessed for her suddenly sprang up into a fierce flame of jealous passion, and as he rode home to the Rectory he repeated that vow several times, and at once, without the loss of an hour, began to hunt about for some means to fulfill it.
He was no fool, this Jasper Adelstone, for all his conceit, and he knew the immense odds against him if Lord Leycester really meant anything by his attention to Stella; he knew what fearful advantages Leycester held – all the Court cards were in his hands. He was handsome, renowned, noble, wealthy – a suitor whom the highest in the land would think twice about before refusing.
He almost guessed, too, that Stella already loved Leycester; he had seen her face turned to the young lord – had heard her voice as she spoke to him.
He ground his teeth together with vicious rage as he thought of the difference between her way of speaking to him and to Leycester.
"But she shall speak to me, look at me like that before the game is over," he swore to himself. "I can afford to wait for my opportunity; it will come, and I shall know how to use it. Curse him! Yes, I am determined now. I will take him from her."
It was a bold, audacious resolution; but then Jasper was both bold and audacious in the most dangerous of ways, in the cold, calculating manner of a cunning, unscrupulous man.
He was clever – undoubtedly clever; he had been very successful, and had made that success by his own unaided efforts. Already, young as he was, he was beginning to be talked about. When people were in any great difficulty in his branch of the law, they went to him, sure of finding him cool, ready, and capable.
His chambers in the inn held a little museum of secrets – secrets about persons of rank and standing, who were supposed to be quite free from such inconvenient things as skeletons in cupboards.
People came to him when they were in any social fix; when they owed more money than they could pay; when they wanted a divorce, or were anxious to hush up some secret, whose threatened disclosure involved shame and disgrace, and Jasper Adelstone was always ready with sound advice, and, better still, some subtle scheme or plan.
Yes, he was a successful man, and had failed so seldom – almost never – that he felt he could be confident in this matter, too.
"I have always done well for others," he thought. "I have gained some difficult points for other people; now I will undertake this difficult matter for myself."
He went home to the Rectory and pondered, recalling all he knew of old Etheridge. It was very little, and the rector could tell him no more than he knew already.
James Etheridge lived the life of a recluse, appearing to have no friends or relations save Stella; nothing was known about his former life. He had come down into the quiet valley some years ago, and settled at once in the mode of existence which was palpable to all.
"Is he, was he, ever married?" asked Jasper.
The rector thought not.
"I don't know," he said. "He certainly hasn't been married down here. I don't think anything is known about him."
And with this Jasper had to be content. All the next day, after his meeting with Stella and Leycester, he strolled about the meadows hoping to see her, but failed. He knew he ought to be in London, but he could not tear himself away.
His arm felt a little stiff, and though there was nothing else the matter with it, he bound it up and hung it in a sling, explaining to the rector that he had fallen from his horse.
Then he heard of the party at the Hall, and grinding his teeth with envy and malice, he stole into the lane and watched Stella start.
In his eyes she looked doubly beautiful since he had sworn to have her, and he wandered about the lane and meadows thinking of her, and thinking, too, of Lord Leycester all that evening, waiting for her to return, to get one look at her.
Fortune favored him with more than a look, for while he was waiting the boy from the post-office came down the lane, and Jasper, with very little difficulty, persuaded him to give up the telegram to his keeping.
I am sorry to say that Jasper was very much tempted to open that telegram, and if he resisted the temptation, it was not in consequence of any pangs of conscience, but because he thought that it would scarcely be worth while.
"It is only some commission for a picture," he said to himself. "People don't communicate secretly by telegram excepting in cipher."
So he delivered it unopened as we know, but when he heard that sudden exclamation of the old man's he was heartily sorry he had not opened it.
When he parted from Stella at the gate, he walked off down the lane, but only until out of sight, and then returned under the shadow of the hedge and waited.
He could see into the studio, and see the old man sitting in the chair bowed with sorrow; and Stella's graceful figure hovering about him.
"There was something worth knowing in that telegram," he muttered. "I was a fool not to make myself acquainted with it. What will he do now?"
He thought the question out, still watching, and the old man's movements seen plainly through the lighted windows – for Stella had only drawn the muslin curtain too hurriedly and imperfectly – afforded an answer.
"He is going up to town," he muttered.
He knew that there was an early market train, and felt sure that the old man was going by it.
Hastily glancing at his watch, he set his hat firmly on his head, dipped his arm out of the sling, and ran toward the Rectory; entering by a side door he went to his room, took a bag containing some papers, secured his coat and umbrella, and leaving a note on the breakfast-table to the effect that he was suddenly obliged to go to town, made for the station.
As he did not wish to be seen, he kept in the shadow and waited, and was rewarded in a few minutes by the appearance of Mr. Etheridge.
There was no one on the station beside themselves, and Jasper had no difficulty in keeping out of the old man's way. A sleepy porter sauntered up and down, yawning and swinging his lantern, and Jasper decided that he wouldn't trouble him by taking a ticket.
The train came up, Mr. Etheridge got into a first-class carriage, and Jasper, waiting until the last moment, sprang into one at the further end of the train.
"Never mind the ticket," he said to the porter. "I'll pay at the other end."
The train was an express from Wyndward, and Jasper, who knew how to take care of himself, pulled the curtains closed, drew a traveling cap from his bag, and curling himself up went to sleep, while the old man, a few carriages further off, sat with his white head bowed in sorrowful and wakeful meditation.
When the train arrived at the terminus, Jasper, awaking from a refreshing sleep, drew aside the curtain and watched Mr. Etheridge get out, waited until he approached the cab-stand, then following up behind him nearer, heard him tell the cabman to drive him to King's Hotel, Covent Garden.
Then Jasper called a cab and drove to the square in which his chambers were situated, dismissed the cab, and saw it crawl away out of sight, and climbed up the staircase which served as the approach to the many doors which lined the narrow grim passages.
On one of these doors his name was inscribed in black letters; he opened this door with a key, struck a light, and lit a candle which stood on a ledge, and entered a small room which served for the purpose of a clerk's office and a client's waiting-room.
Beyond this, and communicating by a green baize door, was his own business-room, but there were still other rooms behind, one his living-room, another in which he slept, and beyond that a smaller room.
He entered this, and holding the light on high allowed its rays to fall upon a man lying curled up on a small bed.
He was a very small man, with a thin, parchment-lined face, crowned by closely-cropped hair, which is ambiguously described as auburn.
This was Jasper's clerk, factotum, slave. He it was who sat in the outer office and received the visitors, and ushered them into Jasper's presence or put them off with excuses.
He was a singular-looking man, no particular age or individuality. Some of Jasper's friends were often curious as to where Jasper had picked him up, but Jasper always evaded the question or put it by with some jest, and Scrivell's antecedents remained a mystery.
That he was a devoted and never tiring servant was palpable to all; in Jasper's presence he seemed to live only to obey his will and anticipate his wishes. Now, at the first touch of Jasper's hand, the man started and sat bolt upright, screening his eyes from the light and staring at Jasper expectantly.
"Awake, Scrivell?" asked Jasper.
"Yes, sir, quite," was the reply; and indeed he looked as if he had been on the alert for hours past.
"That's right. I want you. Get up and dress and come into the next room. I'll leave the candle."
"You needn't, sir," was the reply. "I can see."
Jasper nodded.
"I believe you can – like a cat," he said, and carried the card with him.
In a few minutes – in a very few minutes – the door opened and Scrivell entered.
He looked wofully thin and emaciated, was dressed in an old but still respectable suit of black, and might have been taken for an old man but for the sharp, alert look in his gray eyes, and the sandy hair, which showed no signs of gray.
Jasper was sitting before his dressing-table opening his letters, which he had carried in from the other room.
"Oh, here you are," he said. "I want you to go out."
Scrivell nodded.
"Do you know King's Hotel, Covent Garden?" asked Jasper.
"King's? Yes, sir."
"Well, I want you to go down there."
He paused, but he might have known the man would not express any surprise.
"Yes, sir," he said, as coolly as if Jasper had told him to go to bed again.
"I want you to go down there and keep a look-out for me. A gentleman has just driven there, an old man, rather bent, with long white hair. Understand?"
"Yes," was the quiet reply.
"He will probably go out the first thing, quite early. I want to know where he goes."
"Only the first place he goes to?" was the question.
Jasper hesitated.
"Suppose you keep an eye upon him generally till, say one o'clock, then come back to me. I want to know his movements, you understand, Scrivell!"
"I understand, sir," was the answer. "Any name?"
Jasper hesitated a moment, and a faint color came into his face. Somehow he was conscious of a strange reluctance to mention the name – her name; but he overcame it.
"Yes, Etheridge," he said, quietly, "but that doesn't matter. Don't make any inquiries at the hotel or elsewhere, if you can help it."
"Very good, sir," said the man, and noiselessly he turned and left the room.
Little did Stella, dreaming in the cottage by the sweet smelling meadows and the murmuring river, think that the first woof of the web which Jasper Adelstone was spinning for her was commenced that night in the grim chambers of Lincoln's-inn.
As little did Lady Wyndward guess, as she lay awake, vainly striving to find some means of averting the consequences of her son's "infatuation" for the painter's niece, that a keener and less scrupulous mind had already set to work in the same direction.
CHAPTER XVII
Jasper undressed and went to bed, and slept as soundly as men of his peculiar caliber do sleep, while Scrivell was standing at the corner of a street in Covent Garden, with his hands in his pockets and his eyes on the entrance to King's Hotel. A little after nine Jasper awoke, had his bath, dressed, went out, got some breakfast, and sat down to work, and for the time being forgot – actually forgot – that such an individual as Stella Etheridge existed.
That was the secret of his power, that he could concentrate his attention on one subject to the absolute abnegation of all others.
Several visitors put in an appearance on business, Jasper opening the door by means of a wire which drew back the handle, without moving.
At about half-past twelve someone knocked. Jasper opened the door, and a tall, fashionably-dressed young gentleman entered.
It was a certain Captain Halliday, who had been one of the guests at Wyndward Hall on the first night of our introduction there.
Captain Halliday was a man about town; one who had been rich, but who had worked very hard to make himself poor – and nearly succeeded. He was a well-known man, and a member of a fast club, at which high play formed the chief amusement.
Jasper knew him socially, and got up – a thing he did not often do – to shake hands.
"How do you do?" he said, motioning him to a chair. "Anything I can do for you?"
It was generally understood by Jasper's acquaintances that Jasper's time was money, and they respected the hours devoted by him to business.
Captain Halliday smiled.
"You always come to the point, Adelstone," he replied. "Yes, I want a little advice."
Jasper sat down and clasped his hands over his knee; they were very white and carefully-kept hands.
"Hope I may be able to give it to you. What is it?"
"Well look here," said the captain, "you don't mind my smoking a cigarette, do you? I can always talk better while I am smoking."
"Not at all – I like it," said Jasper.
"But the lady clients?" said the captain, with a little contraction of the eyelids, which was suspiciously near a wink.
"I don't think they mind," said Jasper. "They are generally too occupied with their own business to notice. A light?" and he handed the wax tapers which stood on his desk for sealing purposes.
The captain lighted his cigarette slowly. It was evident that the matter upon which he required advice was delicate, and only to be attacked with much deliberation.
"Look here!" he began; "I've come upon rather an awkward business."
Jasper smiled. It not unfrequently happened that his clients came to him for money, and not unfrequently he managed to find some for them – of course through some friend, always through some friend "in the City," who demanded and obtained a tolerably large interest.
Jasper smiled, and wondered how much the captain wanted, and whether it would be safe to lend it.
"What is it?" he said.
"You know the Rookery?" asked the captain.
Jasper nodded.
"I was there the other night – I'm there every night, I'm afraid," he added; "but I am referring to the night before last – "
"Yes," said Jasper, intending to help him. "And luck went against you, and you lost a pile."
"No, I didn't," said the captain; "I won a pile."
"I congratulate you," said Jasper, with a cool smile.
"I won a pile!" said the captain, "from all round; but principally from a young fellow – a mere boy, who was there as a visitor, introduced by young Bellamy – know young Bellamy?"
"Yes, yes," said Jasper – he was very busy. "Everybody knows Bellamy. Well!"
"Well, the young fellow – I was awfully sorry for him, and tried to persuade him to turn it up, but he wouldn't. You know what youngsters are when they are green at this confounded game?"
Jasper nodded again rather more impatiently. Scrivell would be back directly, and he was anxious to hear the result of his scrutiny.
"Luck went with him at first, and he won a good deal, but it turned after a time and I was the better by a cool hundred and fifty; I stopped at that – it was too much as it was to win from a youngster, and he gave me his I O U."
The captain paused and lit another cigarette.
"Next morning, being rather pressed – did I tell you I went home with Gooch and one or two others and lost the lot?" he broke off, simply.
Jasper smiled.
"No, you did not mention it, but I can quite believe it. Go on."
"Next morning, being rather pressed – I wanted to pay my own I O U's – I looked him up to collect his."
"And he put you off, and you want me to help you," said Jasper, smiling behind his white hand.
"No, I don't. I wish you'd hear me out," said the captain, not unnaturally aggrieved by the repeated interruption.
"I beg your pardon!" said Jasper. "I thought I should help to bring you to the point. But, there, tell it your own way."
"He didn't refuse; he gave me a bill," said the captain; "said he was sorry he couldn't manage the cash, but expecting me to call had got a bill ready."
"Which you naturally declined to accept from a perfect stranger," said Jasper.
"Which I did nothing of the sort," said the captain, coolly. "It was backed by Bellamy, and that was good enough for me. Bellamy's name written across the back, making himself responsible for the money, if the young fellow didn't pay."
"I understand what a bill is," said Jasper, with a smile.
"Of course," assented the captain, puffing at his cigarette, "Bellamy's name, mind, which was good enough for me."
"And for most people."
"Well, I meant to get some fellow to discount this, get some money for it, you know, but happening to meet Bellamy at the club, it occurred to me that he mightn't like the bill hawked about, so I asked him if he'd take it up. See?"
"Quite. Whether he'd give you the money for it – the hundred and fifty pounds. I see," said Jasper. "Well?"
"Well, I put it rather delicately – there was a lot of fellows about – and he didn't seem to understand me. 'What bill do you mean, old man?' he said. 'I took an oath not to fly any more paper a year ago, and I've kept it, by George!'"
Jasper leant forward slightly; the keen, hard look which comes into the eyes of a hound that suddenly scents game, came into his. But this time he did not speak; as was usual with him when interested, he remained silent.
"Well, I flatter myself I played a cool hand," said the captain, complacently flicking the ash from his cigarette. "I knew the bill was a – a – "
"Forgery," said Jasper, coldly.
The captain nodded gravely.
"A forgery. But I felt for the poor young beggar, and didn't want to be hard on him; so I pretended to Bellamy that I'd made a mistake and meant somebody else, and explained that I'd been at the champagne rather freely the other night; and – you know Bellamy – he was satisfied."
"Well?" said Jasper, in a low voice.
"Well, then I took a cab, and drove to 22 Percival street – "
He paused abruptly, and bit his lip; but Jasper, though he heard the address, and had stamped it, as it were, on his memory, showed no sign of having noticed it, and examined his nails curiously.
"I drove to the young fellow's rooms, and he confessed to it. Poor young beggar! I pitied him from the bottom of my heart – I did indeed. Wrong, I know. Justice, and example, and all that, you'll say; but if you'd seen him, with his head buried in his hands, and his whole frame shaking like a leaf, why, you'd have pitied him yourself."
Jasper put up his hand to his mouth to hide a sneer.
"Very likely," he said – "most likely. I have a particularly soft heart for – forgers."
The captain started slightly. It was a horrible word!
"I don't believe the young beggar meant it, not in cold blood, you know; but he was so knocked of a heap by my dropping down upon him, and so afraid of looking like a welsher that the idea of the bill struck him, and he did it. He swears that Bellamy and he are such chums, that Bellamy wouldn't have minded."
"Ah," said Jasper, with a smile, "the judge and jury will look at that in a different light."
"The judge and jury! What do you mean?" demanded the captain. "You don't think I'm going to – what's-its-name – prosecute?"
"Then what are you here for?" Jasper was going to say, but politely corrected it to "Then what can I do for you?"
"Well, here's the strange part of the story! I went home to find the bill and tear it up – "
Jasper smiled again, and again hid the delicate sneer.
"But if you'll believe me, I couldn't find it! What do you think I'd done with it?"
"I don't know," said Jasper. "Lit your cigar with it!"
"No; in a fit of absence of mind – we'll call it champagne cup and brandy-and-soda! – I'd given it to old Murphy with some other bills in payment of a debt. Think of that! There's that poor young beggar almost out of his mind with remorse and terror, and that old wretch, Murphy, has got that bill! And if it isn't got from him he'll have the law of young – of the boy as sure as Fate is Fate!"
"Yes; I know Murphy," said Jasper with delicious coolness. "He'd be so wild that he'd not rest satisfied until he'd sent your fast young friend across the herring-pond."
"But he mustn't! I should never forgive myself! Think of it, Adelstone! Quite a young boy – a curly-headed young beggar that ought to be forgiven a little thing of this sort!"
"A little thing!" and Jasper laughed.
He also rose and looked as if he had already expended as much of his time as he could afford.
"Well?" he said.
"Well!" echoed the captain. "Now I want you to send for that bill, Adelstone, and get it at once."
"Certainly," said Jasper. "I may be permitted to mention that you are doing rather a – well, very injudicious thing? You are losing a hundred and fifty pounds to save your gentleman from – well, departing for that bourne to which he will certainly sooner or later wend. He will get transported sooner or later; a youngster who begins like this always goes on. Why lose a hundred and fifty pounds? But there," he added, seeing a look of quiet determination on the captain's honest, if simple, face, "that is your business; mine is to give you advice, and I've done it. If you'll write a check for the amount, I'll send my clerk over to Murphy's. He is out at present, but he'll be back," looking at the clock, "before you have written the check," and he handed the captain a pen, and motioned him politely to the desk.
But the captain changed color, and laughed with some embarrassment.
"Look here," he said, "look here, Adelstone, it isn't quite convenient to write a check – confound it! You talk as if I had the old balance at my bankers! I can't do it. I ask you to lend me the money – see?"
Jasper gave a start of surprise though he felt none. He knew what had been coming.
"I'm very sorry, my dear fellow," he said. "But I'm afraid I can't do it. I am very short this morning, and have some heavy matters to meet. I've been buying some shares for a client, and am quite cleared out for the present."
"But," pleaded the captain, earnestly, more earnestly than he had ever pleaded for a loan on his own account, "but think of the youngster, Adelstone."
Then Jasper smiled – a hard, cold smile.
"Excuse me, Halliday," he said, thrusting his hands in his pockets, "but I have been thinking of him, and I can't see my way to doing this for a young scoundrel – "
"He's no scoundrel," said the captain, with a flush.
"A young forger, then, if you prefer it, my dear fellow," said Jasper, with a cold laugh, "who ought to be punished, if anyone deserves punishment. Why, it is compounding a felony!" he added, virtuously.
"Oh, come!" said the captain, with a troubled smile, "that's nonsense, you talking like that! I want the matter hushed up, Adelstone."
"Well, though I don't agree with you, I won't argue the matter," said Jasper, "but I can't lend you the money to hush it up with, Halliday. If it were for yourself, now – "
There was something in Jasper's cold face, in his compressed, almost sneering lips, and hard, keen eyes, that convinced the captain any further time expended in endeavoring to soften Jasper Adelstone's heart would be time wasted.
"Never mind," he said, "I'm sorry I've taken up your time. Good-morning. Of course this is quite confidential, you know, eh?"
Jasper raised his eyebrows and smiled pleasantly.
"My dear Halliday, you are in a lawyer's office. Nothing that occurs within these walls gets out, unless the client wishes it. Your little story is as safely locked up in my bosom as if you had never told it. Good-morning."
The captain put on his hat and turned to go, but at that moment the door opened and Scrivell entered.
"I beg pardon," he said, and drew back, but paused, and, instead of going out, walked up to Jasper's desk, and laid a piece of paper on it.
Jasper took it up eagerly. There was one line written on it, and it was this:
"22 Percival street!"
Jasper did not start; he did not even change color, but his lips tightened, and a gleam of eagerness shot from his eyes.
With the paper in his hand, he looked up carelessly.
"All right, Scrivell. Oh, by the way, just run after Captain Halliday, and tell him I should like another word with him."
Scrivell disappeared, and in another minute the captain re-entered.
He still looked rather downcast.
"What is it?" he said, with his hand on the door.
Jasper went and closed it; then he laughed in his quiet, noiseless way.
"I'm afraid you'll think me a soft kind of lawyer, Halliday, but this story of yours has touched me; it has, indeed!"
The captain nodded, and dropped into a chair.
"I thought it had," he said, simply. "Touch anybody, wouldn't it?"
"Yes, yes!" said Jasper, with a sigh. "It's very wrong, you know – altogether out of the line, but I suppose you've set your heart on hushing it up, eh?"
"I have, indeed," said the captain, eagerly. "And if you knew all you'd say the same."
"Haven't you told me all?" said Jasper, quietly. "I don't mean the boy's name; you can keep that if you like."
"No, I don't mean to conceal anything, if you'll help me," said the captain ingenuously. "Of course if you had decided not to, I should have kept dark about his name."
"Of course," said Jasper, with a smile; and he glanced at the slip of paper. "Well, perhaps you'd better tell me all, hadn't you?"
"I think I had," assented the captain. "Well, the youngster's name is – Etheridge?"
"Ether – how do you spell it?" asked Jasper, carelessly.
The captain spelt it.
"Not a common name, and he's anything but a common boy; he's a handsome youngster, and I couldn't help pitying him, because he has been left to himself so much – no friends, and all that sort of thing."
"How's that?" asked Jasper, with his eyes cast down, a hungry eagerness eating at his heart. There was some mystery after all, then, about the old man!
"Well, it is this way. It seems he's the son of an old man – a painter, or a writer, or something, who lives away in the country, and who can't bear this boy near him."
"Why?" asked Jasper, examining his nails.
"Because he's like his mother," said the captain, simply.