Dangerous Escapade Read Online Free PDF Page A

“We
were vagabonds, indeed. We have been in turn, gamblers, actors, soldiers, rich
one day, poor the next. Yet it was a good life with father, for he made
everything exciting, and if we sometimes went hungry, he would be sure to make
it up to me before long.”
    Lord Debenham was
much struck by this little history and determined to discover as much as
possible about the mysterious Mr Clareville and his intriguing son.
    “Forgive me,
but is Clareville your real name?”
    “I hardly
know, Sir, I have had so many, but I doubt it.” The Earl doubted it also, but
it was a starting place. He would have inquiries instituted on his young friend's
behalf. That there was a mystery here he was convinced and, considering Master Clareville's
situation, any light that could be shed upon it could only improve matters. Or
so the Earl believed.

 
 
 
    Three

 
    It was late in
a golden spring afternoon when they eventually reached Debenham. As they
trotted over the last rise and beheld the estate laid out before them like a
sumptuous tapestry in green and gold, Master Clareville was conscious of a
sensation of homecoming that he had never experienced before.
    The house,
nestling among the surrounding hillsides, its twisted chimneys casting fantastic
shadows across the velvet smooth lawns, had never appeared more beautiful. It
was a mansion of some antiquity, for the oldest part of the house dated back to
the reign of Richard Coeur de Lion. Little of that stark fortress remained, however,
and the building that now stood was the work of the first Baron Debenham, a
quiet and scholarly gentleman who had constructed the manor house as a home for
his young bride and the progeny for which he longed. He had adopted the new
fashion of the age for rose-red brick and oak, much against the advice of his more
warlike neighbours, still clinging to their grim fortresses. He had ignored
their counsel and, among the rolling hills, had risen a charming half-timbered
brick house set amidst verdant pleasure gardens, its myriad diamond-paned
windows glinting in the sunshine.
    As they came
into sight of the house, Debenham turned to Master Clareville, who was trotting
beside his guardian, astride a dainty grey mare.
    “Well, Kit,
there is your new home.”
    Master Clareville
drank in the scene before him with parted lips. “What is it about such beauty
that makes one want to weep?” he asked with an uncertain little laugh.
    The Earl
smiled. “Perhaps because we know that we can never really possess it.''
    Kit was
puzzled. “But this is your home, Sir, your land, it belongs to you.”
    “No, Kit. This
house will be standing long after I am gone and forgotten. It is merely
entrusted to me for a time, and for that I must be grateful.”
    Master Clareville,
who had never suspected the Earl of such depths, was fascinated by this
unexpected revelation of his character. However, he had no chance to pursue the
conversation as, at that moment, they entered the courtyard.
    Servants
bustled forward to greet their master and, in the ensuing confusion, Kit was
left forlorn and forgotten. He stood a little apart, trying hard to resist the
temptation to catch hold of Debenham's arm as he moved into the house.
    Brought up as
he had been upon the fringes of the fashionable world, nothing had prepared Kit
for the grandeur that met his gaze as he entered his new home.
    He found himself
in a vast echoing chamber from the centre of which rose an ancient oak
staircase. Massive tables and chairs in the style of the previous century
clustered around an enormous marble fireplace in which it was still possible to
roast an oxen whole. In various corners there stood, bearing mute witness to
the valour of the Earl's ancestors, an assortment of ancient suits of armour, adding
much to the splendour but little to the comfort of the chamber.
    Master Clareville,
casting pride to the winds, caught hold of Debenham's arm in a grip so
convulsive that Lord Debenham turned in