IN VERNEY HOUSE.
MR. LARKIN got into his cab, and ordered the cabman, in a loud voice,
to drive to Verney House.
"Didn't he know Verney House? He thought every cabman in London knew
Verney House! The house of Lord Viscount Verney, in ---- Square. Why it
fills up a whole side of it!"
He looked at his watch. He had thirty-seven minutes to reach it in. It
was partly to get rid of a spare half hour, that he had paid his
unprofitable visit to Rosemary Court.
Mr. Larkin registered a vow to confer no more with Mr. Dingwell. He
eased his feelings by making a note of this resolution in that
valuable little memorandum book which he carried about with him in his
pocket.
"_Saw Mr. Dingwell this day--as usual impracticable and ill-bred to a
hopeless degree--waste of time and worse--resolved that this gentleman
being inaccessible to reason, is not to be argued, but DEALT with,
should occasion hereafter arise for influencing his conduct._"
Somewhere about Temple Bar, Mr. Larkin's cab got locked in a string of
vehicles, and he put his head out of window, not being sorry for an
opportunity of astonishing the citizens by calling to the driver--
"I say, my good fellow, can't you get on? I told Lord Verney to expect
me at half-past one. Do, pray, get me out of this, _any_ way, and you
shall have a gratuity of half-a-crown. Verney House is a good way from
this. _Do_ try. His lordship will be as much obliged to you as I am."
Mr. Larkin's assiduities and flatteries were, in truth, telling upon
Lord Verney, with whom he was stealing into a general confidence which
alarmed many people, and which Cleve Verney hated more than ever.
With the pretty mansion of Hazelden, the relations, as Lord Verney
would have said of the House of Ware, were no longer friendly. This
was another instance of the fragility of human arrangements, and the
vanity of human hopes. The altar had been erected, the swine
sacrificed, and the augurs and haruspices on both sides had predicted
nothing but amity and concord. Game, fruit, and venison, went and
came,--"Much good may it do your good heart." "It was ill-killed,"
&c. Master Shallow and Master Page could not have been more courteous
on such occasions. But on the _fete champetre_ had descended a sudden
procella. The roses were whirling high in the darkened air, the
flatteries and laughter were drowned in thunder, and the fiddles and
glasses smashed with hailstones as large as potatoes.
A general election had come and gone, and in that brief civil war old
Vane Etherage was found at the wrong side. In Lord Verney's language
neighbour meant something like vassal, and Etherage who had set up his
banner and arrayed his power on the other side, was a rebel--the less
forgivable that he had, as was authentically demonstrated, by this
step himself inflicted that defeat in the county which had wounded
Lord Verney to the quick.
So silence descended upon the interchange of civil speeches; the
partridges and pheasants, winged from Ware in a new direction, and old
Vane Etherage stayed his friendly hand also; and those tin cases of
Irish salmon, from the old gentleman's fisheries, packed in ice, as
fresh as if they had sprung from the stream only half an hour before,
were no longer known at Ware; and those wonderful fresh figs, green
and purple, which Lord Verney affected, for which Hazelden is famous,
and which Vane Etherage was fond of informing his guests were
absolutely unequalled in any part of the known world! England could
not approach them for bulk and ripeness, nor foreign parts--and he had
eaten figs wherever figs grow--for aroma and flavour, no longer
crossed the estuary. Thus this game of beggar-my-neighbour began. Lord
Verney recalled his birds, and Mr. Etherage withdrew his figs. Mr.
Etherage lost his great black grapes; and Lord Verney sacrificed his
salmon, and in due time Lord Verney played a writ, and invited an
episode in a court of law, and another, more formidable, in the Court
of Chancery.
So the issues of the war were knit again, and Vane Etherage was now
informed by his lawyers there were some very unpleasant questions
mooted affecting the title to the Windermore estate, for which he
payed a trifling rent to the Verneys.
So, when Larkin went into Verney House, he was closeted with its noble
master for a good while, and returning to a smaller library--devoted
to blue books and pamphlets--where he had left a despatch-box and
umbrella during his wait for admission to his noble client, he found
Cleve busy there.
"Oh, Mr. Larkin. How d'ye do? Anything to say to me?" said the
handsome young man, whose eye looked angry though he smiled.
"Ah, thanks. No--_no_, Mr. Verney. I hope and trust I see you well;
but no, I had not any communication to make. Shall I be honoured, Mr.
Verney, with any communication from you?"
"I've nothing to say, thanks, except of course to say how much obliged
I am for the very particular interest you take in my affairs."
"I should be eminently gratified, Mr. Verney, to merit your
approbation; but I fear, sir, as yet I can hardly hope to have merited
your thanks," said Mr. Larkin, modestly.
"You won't let me thank you; but I quite understand the nature and
extent of your kindness. My uncle is by no means so reserved, and he
has told me very frankly the care you have been so good as to take of
me. He's more obliged even than I am, and so, I am told, is Lady
Wimbledon also."
Cleve had said a great deal more than at starting he had at all
intended. It would have been easy to him to have dismissed the
attorney without allusion to the topic that made him positively
hateful in his eyes; but it was not easy to hint at it, and quite
command himself also, and the result illustrated the general fact that
total abstinence is easier than moderation.
Now the effect of this little speech of Cleve's upon the attorney, was
to abash Mr. Larkin, and positively to confound him, in a degree quite
unusual in a Christian so armed on most occasions with that special
grace called presence of mind. The blood mounted to his hollow cheeks,
and up to the summit of his tall bald head; his eyes took their
rat-like character, and looked dangerously in his for a second, and
then down to the floor, and scanned his own boots; and he bit his lip,
and essayed a little laugh, and tried to look innocent, and broke down
in the attempt. He cleared his voice once or twice to speak, but said
nothing; and all this time Cleve gave him no help whatsoever, but
enjoyed his evident confusion with an angry sneer.
"I hope Mr. Cleve Verney," at length Mr. Larkin began, "where duty and
expediency pull in opposite directions, I shall always be found at the
right side."
"The winning side at all events," said Cleve.
"The _right_ side, I venture to repeat. It has been my misfortune to
be misunderstood more than once in the course of my life. It is our
duty to submit to misinterpretation, as to other afflictions,
patiently. I hope I have done so. My first duty is to my client."
"_I_'m no client of yours, sir."
"Well, conceding that, sir, to your _uncle_--to Lord _Verney_, I will
say--to his views of what the interests of his house demand, and to
his feelings."
"Lord Verney has been good enough to consult _me_, hitherto, upon this
subject; a not quite unnatural confidence, I venture to think; more
than you seem to suspect. He seems to think, and so do I, that I've a
voice in it, and has not left me absolutely in the hands--in a matter
of so much importance and delicacy--of his country lawyer."
"I had no power in this case, sir; not even of mentioning the subject
to you, who certainly, in one view, are more or less affected by it."
"Thank you for the concession," sneered Cleve.
"I make it unaffectedly, Mr. Cleve Verney," replied Larkin,
graciously.
"My uncle, Lord Verney, has given me leave to talk to you upon the
subject. I venture to decline that privilege. I prefer speaking to
him. He seems to think that _I_ ought to be allowed to advise a little
in the matter, and that with every respect for _his_ wishes; _mine_
also are entitled to be a little considered. Should I ever talk to
you, Mr. Larkin, it shan't be to ask your advice. I'm detaining you,
sir, and I'm also a little busy myself."
Mr. Larkin looked at the young man a second or two a little puzzled;
but encountering only a look of stern impatience, he made his best
bow, and the conference ended.
A few minutes later, in came our old friend, Tom Sedley.
"Oh! Sedley! Very glad to see you here; but I thought you did not want
to see my uncle just now; and this is the most likely place, except
the library, to meet him in."
"He's gone; I saw him go out this moment. I should not have come in
otherwise; and you mustn't send me away, dear Cleve, I'm in such awful
trouble. Everything has gone wrong with us at Hazelden. You know that
quarrying company--the slates, that _odious_ fellow, Larkin, led him
into, before the election and all the other annoyances began."
"You mean the Llanrwyd company?"
"Yes; so I do."
"But that's quite ruined, you know. Sit down."
"I know. He has lost--frightfully--and Mr. Etherage must pay up ever
so much in calls beside; and unless he can get it on a mortgage of the
Windermore estate, he can't possibly pay them--and I've been trying,
and the result is just this--they won't lend it anywhere till the
litigation is settled."
"Well, what can I do?" said Cleve, yawning stealthily into his hand,
and looking very tired. I am afraid these tragic confidences of Tom
Sedley's did not interest Cleve very much; rather bored him, on the
contrary.
"They won't lend, I say, while this litigation is pending."
"Depend upon it they won't," acquiesced Cleve.
"And in the meantime, you know, Mr. Etherage would be ruined."
"Well, I see; but, I say again, what can I do?"
"I want you to try if anything can be done with Lord Verney," said
Tom, beseechingly.
"Talk to my uncle? I wish, dear Tom, you could teach me how to do
that."
"It can't do any harm, Cleve--it can't," urged Tom Sedley, piteously.
"Nor one particle of good. You might as well talk to that picture--I
do assure you, you might."
"But it could be no pleasure to him to ruin Mr. Etherage!"
"I'm not so sure of that; between ourselves, forgiving is not one of
his weaknesses."
"But I say it's quite impossible--an old family, and liked in the
county--it would be a scandal for ever!" pleaded Tom Sedley,
distractedly.
"Not worse than that business of Booth Fanshawe," said Cleve, looking
down; "no, he never forgives anything. I don't think he perceives he's
taking a revenge; he has not _mind_ enough for repentance," said
Cleve, who was not in good humour with his uncle just then.
"Won't you try? you're such an eloquent fellow, and there's really so
much to be said."
"I do assure you, there's no more use than in talking to the
chimney-piece; if you make a point of it, of course, I will; but, by
Jove, you could hardly choose a worse advocate just now, for he's
teasing me to do what I _can't_ do. If you heard my miserable story,
it would make you laugh; it's like a thing in a _petite comedie_, and
it's breaking my heart."
"Well, then, you'll try--won't you try?" said Tom, overlooking his
friend's description of his own troubles.
"Yes; as you desire it, I'll try; but I don't expect the slightest
good from it, and possibly some mischief," he replied.
"A thousand thanks, my dear Cleve; I'm going down to-night. Would it
be too much to ask you for a line, or, if it's _good_ news, a telegram
to Llwynan."
"I may safely promise you that, I'm sorry to say, without risk of
trouble. You mustn't think me unkind, but it would be cruel to let
you hope when there is not, really, a chance."
So Tom drove away to his club, to write his daily love letter to Agnes
Etherage, in time for post; and to pen a few lines for old Vane
Etherage, and try to speak comfortably to that family, over whose
pretty home had gathered so awful a storm.