Chapter 8: Great-Uncle Rick Walks the Hall

Sam had produced a horse complete with saddle and a reputed skittishness. That horse was the pride of Sam’s big heart. It had once won a small purse at some country fair or something of the sort, and since then it had been kept only to wear the saddle at rare intervals. Not that Sam ever rode. He drove a spring-board behind a thin, sorrowful mule called “Suggah.” But the saddle horse was rented at times to white folk of whom Sam approved.

Soon after the arrival of the Ralestones at Pirate’s Haven, Sam had brought this four-footed prodigy to their attention. But claiming that the family were his “folks,” he indignantly refused to accept hire and was hurt if one of them did not ride at least once a day. Ricky had developed an interest in the garden and had accepted the loan of Sam’s eldest son, an earth-brown child about as tall as the spade, to help her mess about. Rupert spent the largest part of his days shut up in Bluebeard’s chamber. Which of course left the horse to Val.

And Val was becoming slightly bored with Louisiana, at least with that portion of it which immediately surrounded them. Charity was hard at work on her picture of the swamp hunter, for Jeems had come back without warning from his mysterious concerns in the swamp. There was no one to talk to and nowhere to go.

LeFleur had notified them that he believed he was on the track of some discreditable incident in the past of their rival which would banish him from their path. And no more handkerchiefs had been found, ownerless, in their hall. It was a serene morning.

But, Val thought long afterwards, he should have been warned by that very serenity and remembered the old saying, that it was always calmest before a storm. On the contrary, he was riding Sam’s horse along the edge of that swamp, wondering what lay hidden back in that dark jungle. Some day, he determined, he would do a little exploring in that direction.

A heron arose from the bayou and streaked across the metallic blue of the sky. Another was wading along, intent upon its fishing. Sam’s yellow dog, which had followed horse and rider, set up a barking, annoyed at the haughty carriage of the bird. He scrambled down the steep bank, drove it into flight after its fellow.

Val pulled his shirt away from his sticky skin and wondered if he would ever feel really cool again. There was something about this damp heat which seemed to remove all ambition. He marveled how Ricky could even think of trimming roses that morning.

Sam’s dog began to bark deafeningly again, and Val looked around for the heron which must have aroused his displeasure. There was none. But across the swamp crawled an ungainly monster.

Four great rubber-tired wheels, ten feet high, as he later learned, supported a metal framework upon which squatted two men and the driver of the monstrosity. With the ponderous solemnity of a tank it came on to the bayou.

Val’s mount snorted and his ears pricked back. He began to have very definite ideas about what he saw. The thing slipped down the marshy bank and took to the water with ease, turning its square nose downstream and sending waves shoreward.

“Ride ‘em, cowboy!” yelled one of the men derisively as Sam’s horse decided to stand on his hind legs and wave at the strange apparition as it went by. Val brought him down upon four feet again, and he stood sweating, his ears still back.

“What do you call that?” the boy shouted back.

“Prospecting engine for swamp use,” answered the driver. “Don’t you swampers ever get the news?”

The car, or whatever it was, moved on downstream and so out of sight.

“Now I wonder what that was,” Val said aloud as his mount sidled toward the center of the road. The hound-dog came up and sat down to kick a patch of flea-invaded territory which lay behind his left ear. Again the morning was quiet.

But not for long. A mud-spattered car came around the bend in the road and headed at Val, going a good pace for the dirt surfacing. Before it quite reached him it stopped and the driver stuck his head out of the window.

“Hey, you, move over! Whatya tryin’ to do--break somebody’s neck?”

Val surveyed him with interest. The man was, perhaps, Rupert’s age, a small, thin fellow with thick black hair and the white seam of an old scar beneath his left eye.

“This is,” the boy replied, “a private road.”

“Yeah,” he snarled, “I know. And I’m the owner. So get your hobby-horse going and beat it, kid.”

Val shifted in the saddle and stared down at him.

“And what might your name be?” he asked softly.

“What d’yuh think it is? Hitler? I’m Ralestone, the owner of this place. On your way, kid, on your way.”

“So? Well, good morning, cousin.” Val tightened rein.

The invader eyed him cautiously. “What d’yuh mean--cousin?”

“I happen to be a Ralestone also,” the boy answered grimly.

“Huh? You the guy who thinks he owns this?” he asked aggressively.

“My brother is the present master of Pirate’s Haven--”

“That’s what he thinks,” replied the rival with a relish. “Well, he isn’t. That is, not until he pays me for my half. And if he wants to get tough, I’ll take it all,” he ended, and withdrew into the car like a lizard into its rock den.

Val sat by the side of the road and watched the car slide along toward the plantation. As it passed him he caught a glimpse of a second passenger in the back seat. It was the red-faced man he had seen with LeFleur’s clerk on the street in New Orleans. Resolutely Val turned back and started for the house in the wake of the rival.

By making use of a short-cut, he reached the front of the house almost as soon as the car. Ricky had been working with the morning-glory vines about the terrace steps, young Sam standing attendance with a rusty trowel and one of the kitchen forks.

At the sound of the car she stood up and tried to brush a smear of sticky earth from the front of her checked-gingham dress. When the rival got out she smiled at him.

“Hello, sister,” he smirked.

She stood still for a moment and her smile faded. When she answered, her voice was chill. “You wished to see Mr. Ralestone?” she asked distantly.

“Sure. But not just yet, sister. You better be pleasant, you know. I’m the new owner here--”

Val rode out of the bushes and swung out of the saddle, coming up behind him. Although the boy was one of the smaller “Black” Ralestones, he topped the invader by a good two inches, and he noted this with delight as he came up to him.

“Ricky,” he said briefly, “go in. And send Sam for Rupert.”

She nodded and was gone. The man turned to face Val. “You again, huh?” he demanded.

“Yes. And Ralestone or no Ralestone, I would advise you to keep a civil tongue in your head,” he began hotly, when Rupert appeared at the door.

“Well, Val,” he asked, a frown creasing his forehead, “what is it?”

The rival advanced a short step and looked up. “So this is the guy who’s trying to do me out of my rights?”

Rupert reached behind him and closed the screen before coming to the head of the terrace steps. “I presume that you are Mr. Ralestone?” he asked quietly.

“‘Course I’m Ralestone,” asserted the other. “And I’m part owner of this place.”

“That has not yet been decided,” answered Rupert calmly. “But suppose you tell me to what we owe the honor of this visit?”

Now, however, the passenger took a hand in the game. He crawled out of the car, taking off his soiled panama to wipe his bald head with a gaudy silk handkerchief.

“Here, here, Mr. Ralestone,” he addressed his companion, “let us have no unpleasantness. We have merely come here today, sir,” he explained to Rupert, “to see if matters could not be settled amicably without having to take recourse to a court of law. Your Mr. LeFleur will give us very little satisfaction, you see. I am a plain and honest man, sir, and I believe an affair of this kind may be best agreed upon between principals. My client, Mr. Ralestone, is a reasonable man; he will be moderate in his demands. It will be to your advantage to listen to our proposal. After all, you cannot contest his rights--”

“But that is just what I am going to do.” Rupert smiled down at them, if a slight twist of the lips may be called a smile. “Have you ever heard that old saying that ‘possession is nine points of the law’? I am the Ralestone in residence, and I shall continue to be the Ralestone in residence until after this case is heard. Now, as I am a busy man and this is the middle of the morning, I shall have to say good-bye--”

“So that’s the way you’re going to take it?” The visiting Ralestone glared at Rupert. “All right. Play it that way and you won’t be here a month from now. Nor,” he turned on Val, “this kid brother of yours, either. You can’t pull this lord-of-the-land stuff on me and get away with it. I’ll--” But he did not finish his threat. Instead, his jaws clamped shut on mid-word. In silence he turned and got into the car to which his counselor had already withdrawn.

The car leaped forward into a rose bush. With a savage twist of the wheel the driver brought it back to the drive, leaving deep prints in the front lawn. Then it was gone, down the drive, as they stood staring after it.

“So that’s that,” Val commented. “Well, all I’ve got to say is that Rick’s branch of the family has sadly gone to seed--”

“Being a southern gentleman has made you slightly snobbish.” Ricky came out from her lurking place behind the door.

“Snobbish!” her brother choked at the injustice. “I suppose that that is your idea of a perfect gentleman, a diamond in the rough--”