Chapter 7 THE PRODIGAL'S RETURN

Michael Berrington walked home alone, but he was no longer lonely.

In his hand he held a tiny bunch of primroses, in his heart was already enshrined a small oval face with hazel stars for eyes, and alluring dimples which might well have tempted St. Anthony's self.

He was dreaming of dimples, eyes, and all the pretty foolishness of a youthful lover's first great passion as he entered his home.

Comrade, the faithful deerhound, met him at the entrance.

"There is news, yonder, master, but I cannot quite understand it," the great animal tried dumbly to explain, and restlessly led the way back towards the library.

Lights were burning, the door open, and old Bates the butler coming nervously forward, when a voice, rich, sweet, and powerful, though broken once and again by an explanatory hiccough, broke the silence:

"The jolly Muse, her wings to try,

No frolic flights need take,

But round the bowl would dip and fly

Like swallows round a lake.

And that I think's a reason fair

To drink and fill again."

"Mr. Michael, Mr. Michael," faltered Bates, in nervous agitation.

But Michael Berrington put him aside with commanding hand.

He knew he was going in to greet his father for the first time in his life.

Stephen Berrington lolled back in the wide armchair. Before him on a table was placed a large bowl of punch, in his mouth was a long pipe.

He was very much at home.

He rose, smiling, at sight of the tall figure on the threshold. If he had been drinking he was by no means drunken, and his appearance was that of a very handsome but somewhat dissipated man of fifty, dressed in the height of fashion, his powdered wig a little awry, but his eyes bright and wonderfully amused at the present moment. His manner was perfectly friendly.

"Why, Michael!" he cried. "Demn it all, lad, if the first sight of you doesn't make me feel an old man. Come, you'll shake hands with a prodigal father? You're not your poor mother's son, else."

He held out a welcoming hand as he spoke, but Michael ignored it, dropping into a chair.

In all his visions and pictures of his father's return he had never imagined this.

Stephen Berrington did not appear to take offence at his son's refusal of greeting, but sank back into his chair, refilling his glass with punch.

"Old Bates hasn't forgotten his mixture," he observed drily, "though it's nearly thirty years since I tasted it. Thirty years! Well! you'll have heard the story, Mike, and I suppose have long since written me down as a black-hearted devil who's no fit company for honest men."

He passed his hand wearily over his brow as he spoke.

Michael flushed. Though he had expected his father's return eventually, the shock of this unlooked-for home-coming had thrown him off his balance.

"I was with my mother and grandfather on their death-beds," said he, shortly.

His father sighed.

"Yes," he said. "I don't wonder you refused my hand, lad; yet there's more excuse than you know of. I can't tell you all now, but I will-one day."

Michael was twisting the stems of a little bunch of primroses between nervous fingers.

"Ralph Conyers is dead also," he replied unsteadily.

Stephen Berrington looked up sharply.

"I know," he answered. "Ah yes! Of course that story has been drummed well into you. A moment's weakness, and a man's whole lifetime to be cursed for it."

"It cost his friends more."

"Oh, aye; I know. But what of it? If I had not spoken we should have all been strung up in a row. I could not have saved Pryor and Farquhar. No, nor Conyers either, for that matter. As it was I saved my own skin, and never really hurt theirs. What blame?"

"Need a gentleman ask that question?"

"Tra, la, la! Sir Henry always was a good schoolmaster there. A trifle out of date, though, my son, as you will find. Why, even Morry himself took my word for it and shook hands afterwards."

"Morry?"

"Morice Conyers-poor old Ralph's son. A buck worth having for a son, too. Why! we're the best of friends."

"Morice Conyers your friend?"

"You look unbelieving, my Bayard, but it is true that I drove down here on friend Morry's coach, and, had it not been for my ardent longing to embrace you and see again these ancestral halls, I should now be toasting the prettiest eyes in the kingdom, and drinking to the august health of our liege lord Prince Florizel, who is at present between the sheets in his royal residence at Carlton House, suffering from an attack of indigestion."

Then, suddenly dropping his lighter tone of badinage, the speaker leant forward.

"Look here, Michael," he said,-and there lacked not a certain wistful pleading in his tones,-"others have agreed to let the past be forgotten; can't my own son join them there? It's true my crop of wild oats was plentiful enough. As for that Jacobite affair, I-well-I've often wished that I'd been in Pryor's place, and written finis on a jumble of mistakes and a life which was not then quite such a wretched failure."

"If it had been only--"

"Roast me, sir! Are you my Lord High Inquisitor to ask what else I've been doing through these years, and call me blackguard for everything not explained?"

"You forget my mother."

Stephen Berrington's hand dropped, whilst his blue eyes wavered and fell before the stern gaze of the younger man.

"Aye," he muttered, "I'll cry 'Mea culpa' there. My poor little Norah. Yes, I'll admit I was to blame."

"You broke her heart."

"Slit me if I would, had she ever won mine! The marriage was a mistake. But come, lad, I've had enough of platitudes and fault-finding. I come to make merry, and find a dour face as ill to meet as Calvin's own,-and, as for drink, the bowl is empty. Ha, ha! I'm for Langton Hall and a night of it with my merry friends. Tra lal-de-lal! You may come, too; an' you list, son Michael. You'll remember your filial duties an' fall on my neck in welcome after a stoop or so of punch and some of Conyers' boasted port. Rare bucks those, and the devil of a time awaiting us. Cast glum looks to the dogs, boy, and join me. You'll be welcome. I'll stake my head on that. Steenie Berrington's son needn't fear the cold shoulder."

He rose, staggering slightly, and laying a hand on his son's arm to steady himself.

Something in the touch sent a thrill-half shudder-through Michael.

His father. Yes! His father.

Old Sir Henry's dying words came back to him vividly enough.

"If he returns I leave the honour of Berrington in your hands. Swear you will watch over it always."

Yes, he had sworn that he would hold the honour even when it lay in another's power to trample it under foot; and swiftly it came to him that he could not keep that oath and stand against this newly-found parent. For the honour of his house he must be his father's friend and companion.

Perhaps he found it less hard to yield, feeling that helpless touch on his arm, and seeing that half-pleading, half-defiant look on the handsome but weak face.

"Yes," he replied. "I will come."

Sir Stephen greeted the decision with a roar of laughter.

"Well done, Mike," he cried. "Split me, but I don't believe you're so sour after all, in spite of those straight looks. We'll be comrades, eh, boy? and drown the ghosts in the flowing bowl. They'll need drowning," he added, leaning against his son's broad shoulder and speaking in a whisper. "That's why I didn't come before. Not that I care for Sir Henry; he may frown an' curse at me till he rots, I'll but drink the deeper. But the little mother is different; she looks sad, and I see her crying over there by her tambour frame, and I know the tears are for me. That's what I can't stand, Mike, d'you hear? It makes me-there, there, I'm a drunken fool or yet not drunk enough,

'And that I think's a reason fair

To drink and fill again.'"

He flung back his head with a rollicking laugh over the refrain. Ghosts there should not be at Berrington Manor.

"Let's to the Hall," he cried, with an oath. "There's good wine, good company, and pretty faces there, if Phil Berkeley's to be believed. He vows Morry's sister's a jewel fit for a king's crown. You'll be your father's son where a pair of pretty eyes are to be toasted, eh, boy? Ha! ha!"

But Michael did not reply, though his own eyes were grim for those of a youth who went a-wooing.