Andre Norton: The Essential Collection (240 page)

"And don't use the guest towels," Ricky called after him. "You know that they're only to look at."

When Val emerged from the bathroom he found the hall deserted. Sounds from below suggested that his family had basely left him for food. He started along the passage. Not far from the stairs was the writing-desk where Rupert had left it. Val picked it up, thinking that he might as well take it along down with him.

CHAPTER VII

BY OUR LUCK!

Depositing the desk on the seat of one of the hall chairs, Val started toward the dining-room, a grim hole which Lucy had calmly forced the family to use but which they all cordially disliked. Its paneled walls, crystal-hung chandelier, marble-fronted fireplace, and inlaid floor gave it the appearance of one of the less cozy rooms in a small palace. There were also two tasteful portraits of dead ducks which had been added as a finishing touch by some tenant during the eighties and which still remained upon the walls to Ricky's unholy joy.

But the long table, the high-backed chairs, the side serving-table, and the two tall cabinets of china were fine enough pieces if one cared for the massive. Ricky's table-cloth of violent-hued peasant linen was not in keeping with the china and glassware Letty-Lou had set out upon it. Charity was commenting upon this ensemble as Val entered.

"Doesn't this red and green plaid seem a bit—well, bright?" The corners of her mouth twitched betrayingly.

"No," Ricky returned firmly. "This cloth matches the ducks."

"Oh, yes, the ducks," Charity eyed them. "So you consider that the ducks are the note you wish to emphasize?"

"Certainly." Ricky surveyed the picture hanging opposite her. "I consider them unique. Not everyone can have ducks in the dining-room nowadays."

"For which they should be eternally thankful," observed Rupert. "They are rather gaudy, aren't they?"

"Oh, but I like the expression in this one's glassy eye," Ricky pointed out. "You might call this study 'Gone But Not Forgotten.'"

"Corn-bread, please," Val asked, thus attempting to put an end to the art-appreciation class.

"I think," continued Ricky, undisturbed as she passed him the plate heaped with golden squares, "that they are slightly surrealist. They distinctly resemble the sort of things one is often pursued by in one's brighter nightmares."

"Do you have any really good pictures?" asked Charity, resolutely averting her gaze from the ducks.

"Three, but they've been loaned to the museum," answered Rupert. "Not by well-known painters, but they're historically interesting. There's one of the first Lady Richanda, and one of the missing Rick. That's the best of the lot, according to LeFleur. I saw a photograph of it once. Come to think about it, Val looks a lot like the boy in the picture. He might have sat for it."

They all turned to eye Val. He arose and bowed. "I find these compliments too overwhelming," he murmured.

Rupert grinned. "And how do you know that that remark was intended as a compliment?"

"Naturally I assumed so," his brother retorted with a dignity which disappeared as the piece of corn-bread in his hand broke in two, the larger and more liberally buttered portion falling butter side down on the table. Ricky smiled in a pained sort of way as she attempted to judge from her side of the table just how much damage Val's awkwardness had done.

"If you were the graceful hostess," he informed her severely, "you would now throw your piece in the middle to show that anyone could suffer a like mishap."

Ricky changed the subject hurriedly by passing beans to Charity.

"So Val looks like the ghost," Charity said a moment later. "Now I will have to go to town and see that portrait. Just where is it?"

Rupert shook his head. "I don't know. But it's listed in the catalogue as 'Portrait of Roderick Ralestone, Aged Eighteen.'"

"Just Val's age, then." Ricky spooned some watermelon pickles onto her plate. "But he was older than that when he left here."

"Let's see. He was born in February, 1788, which would make him fourteen when his parents died in 1802. Then he disappeared in 1814, twelve years later. Just twenty-six when he went," computed Rupert.

"A year younger than you are now," observed Ricky.

"And nine years older than yourself at this present date," Val added pleasantly. "Why this sudden interest in mathematics?"

"Oh, I don't know. Only somehow I always thought Rick was younger when he went away. I've always felt sorry for him. Wonder what happened to him afterwards?"

"According to our rival," Rupert pulled his coffee-cup before him as Letty-Lou took away their plates, "he just went quietly away, married, lived soberly, and brought up a son, who in turn fathered a son, and so on to the present day. A tame enough ending for our wild privateersman."

"I'll bet it isn't true. Rick wouldn't end like that. He probably went off down south and got mixed up in some of the revolutions they were having at the time," suggested Ricky. "He couldn't just settle down and die in bed. I could imagine him scuttling a ship but not being a quiet business man."

"He was one of Lafitte's men, wasn't he?" asked Charity. At their answering nods, she went on: "Lafitte was a business man, you know. Oh, I don't mean that forge he ran in town, but his establishment at Grande Terre. He was more smuggler than pirate, that's why he lasted so long. Even the most respected tradesmen had dealings with him. Why, he used to post notices right in town when he held auctions at Barataria, listing what he had to sell, mostly smuggled Negroes and a few cargoes of luxuries from Europe. He was a privateer under the rules of war, but he was never a real pirate. At least, that's the belief held nowadays."

"We can't turn up our noses at pirates," laughed Ricky. "This house was built by pirate gold. We only wish—"

From the hall came a dull thump. Ricky's napkin dropped from her hand into her coffee-cup. Rupert laid down his spoon deliberately enough, but there was a certain tension in his movements. Val felt a sudden chill. For Letty-Lou was in the kitchen, the family were in the dining-room. There should be no one in the hall.

Rupert pushed back his chair. But Val was already half-way to the door when his brother joined him. And Ricky, suddenly sober, was at their heels.

Zzzzzrupp!
The slitting sound was clear as they burst into the hall. On the fur rug by the couch lay the writing-desk. Its lid was thrown back and by it crouched Satan industriously ripping the remnants of lining from its interior. As Rupert came up, the cat drew back, his ears flattened and his lips a-snarl.

"Cinders! What has he done?" demanded Charity, swooping down upon her pet. At her coming, he fled under the couch out of reach.

Rupert picked up the desk. "Nothing much," he laughed. "Just torn all that lining loose, as I had planned to do."

"What is this?" Ricky disentangled a small slip of white from the torn and musty velvet. "Why, it's a piece of paper," she answered her own question. "It must have been under the lining and Satan pulled it out with the cloth."

"Here," Rupert took it from her, "let me see it."

He scanned the faded lines of writing. "Val! Ricky!" He looked up, his face flushed with excitement. "Listen!"

"Gatty has returned from the city. The raiders calling themselves the 'Buck Boys' are headed this way. Gatty tells me that Alexander is with them, having deserted the plantation a week ago. Since his malice towards us is well known, it is easy to believe that he means us open harm. I am making my preparations accordingly. The valuables now under this roof, together with the proceeds from the last voyage of the blockade runner,
Red Bird
, I am putting in that safe place discovered by me in childhood, of which I have sometimes spoken. Remember the hint I once gave you—By Our Luck. Having written this in haste, I shall intrust it to Gatty—"

"That's the end; the rest is gone." Rupert stared down at the scrap of paper in his hand as if he simply could not believe in its reality.

"Richard wrote that." Ricky touched the note in awe. "But why didn't Gatty give it to Miles when he came?"

"Gatty was probably a slave who ran when the raiders appeared," suggested Rupert. "He or she must have hidden this in here before leaving. We'll never know."

"But we've got our clue!" cried Ricky. "We knew that the hiding-place was in this hall, and now we have the clue."

"'By our Luck.'" Rupert looked about him thoughtfully. "That's not the most helpful—"

"Rupert!" Ricky seized him by the arm. "There's only one thing in this room that will answer that. Can't you see? The niche of the Luck!"

Their gaze followed her pointing finger to the mantel above their heads.

"I believe she's right! Wait until I get the step-ladder from the kitchen." Rupert was gone almost before he had finished speaking.

"Oh, if it's only true!" Ricky stared up like one hypnotized. "Then we'll be rich and—"

"Don't count your chickens before they're hatched," Val reminded her, but he didn't think that she heard him.

Then Rupert was back with the ladder. He climbed up, leaving the three of them clustered about its foot.

"Nothing here but two stone studs to hold the Luck in place," he said a moment later.

"Why not try pressing those?" suggested Charity.

"All right, here goes." He placed his thumbs in the corners of the niche and threw his weight upon them.

"Nothing happened." Ricky's voice was deep with disappointment.

"Look!" Val pointed over her shoulder.

To the left of the fireplace were five panels of oak, to balance those on the other side about the door of the unused drawing-room. The center one of these now gaped open, showing a dark cavity.

"It worked!" Ricky was already heading for the opening.

There behind the paneling was a shallow closet which ran the full length of the five panels. It was filled with a collection of bags and small chests, a collection which appeared much larger when it lay in the gloom within than when they dragged it out. Then, when they had time to examine it carefully, they discovered that their booty consisted of two small wooden boxes or chests, one fancifully carved and evidently intended for jewels, the other plain but locked; a felt bag and another of canvas, and a package hurriedly done up in cloth. Rupert spread it all out on the floor.

"Well," he hesitated, "where shall we begin?"

"Charity thought about how to open it, and it was her cat that found us the clue—let her choose," Val suggested.

"Good," agreed Rupert. "And what's your choice, m'lady?"

"What woman could resist this?" She laid her hand upon the jewel box.

"Then that it is." He reached for it.

It opened readily enough to show a shallow tray divided into compartments, all of them empty.

"Sold again," Val commented dryly.

Carefully Rupert lifted out the top tray to disclose another on which rested three small leather bags. He loosened the draw-string of the nearest and shook out into his palm a pair of earrings of a quaint pattern in twisted gold set with dull red stones. Charity pronounced them garnets. Though they were not of great value, they were precious in Ricky's eyes, and even Charity exclaimed over them.

The second bag yielded a carnelian seal on a wide chain of gold mesh, the sort of ornament a dandy wore dangling from his watch pocket in the days of the Regency. And the third bag contained a cross of silver, blackened by time, set with amethysts. This was accompanied by a chain of the same dull metal.

Putting these into the girls' hands, Rupert lifted the second tray to lay bare the bottom of the chest. Here again were several small bags. There was another cross, this time of jet inlaid with gold and attached to a short necklace of jet beads; a wide bracelet of coral and turquoise which was crudely made and might have been native work of some sort. Then there was a tiny jewel-set bottle, about which, Ricky declared, there still lingered some faint trace of the fragrance it had once held. And most interesting to Charity was a fan, the sticks carved of ivory so intricately that they resembled lacework stiffened into slender ribs. The covering between them was fashioned of layers of silk painted with a scene of the bayou country, with the moss-grown oaks and encroaching swamp all carefully depicted.

Charity declared that she had never seen its equal and that some great artist must have decorated the dainty trifle. She closed it carefully and slipped it back into its covering, and Rupert took out the last of the bags. From its depths rolled a ring.

It was plain enough, a simple band of gold so deep in shade as to be almost red. Nearly an inch in width, there was no ornamentation of any sort on its broad, smooth surface.

"Do you know what this is?" Rupert turned the circlet around in his fingers.

"No." Ricky was still dangling the earrings before her eyes.

"It is the wedding-ring of the Bride of the Luck."

"What!" Val leaned forward to look down at the plain circle of gold.

Even Ricky gave her brother her full attention now. Rupert turned to Charity.

"You probably know the story of our Luck?" he asked.

She nodded.