|His father's death put Dick at once in a very different position from
the one he had previously occupied. It was a family revolution. And on
the very evening of the funeral, that poor shabby funeral, Dick began
then and there to think the future over.
Poor people have to manage things very differently from rich ones; and
when Edmund Plantagenet was laid to rest at last in the Oxford cemetery,
no member of the family save, Dick himself was there to assist at the
final ceremony. Only Gillespie accompanied him to the side of the grave
out of all the college; but when they reached the chapel, they found
Gillingham standing there hatless before them--urged, no doubt, by some
late grain of remorse for his own prime part in this domestic drama;
or was it only perhaps by a strong desire to see the last act of his
tragedy played out to its bitter climax? After the ceremony he left
hurriedly at once in the opposite direction. The two friends walked
home alone in profound silence. That evening Gillespie came up to Dick's
rooms to bear him company in his trouble. Dick was deeply depressed.
After awhile he grew confidential, and explained to his friend the full
gravity of the crisis. For Mr. Plan-tagenet, after all, poor weak sot
though he was, had been for many years the chief bread-winner of the
family. Dick and Maud, to be sure, had done their best to eke out
the housekeeping, expenses, and to aid the younger children as far as
possible; but, still, it was the father on whose earnings they all as a
family had depended throughout for rent and food and clothing. Only Maud
and Dick were independent in any way; Mrs. Plantagenet and the
little ones owed everything to the father. He had been a personage at
Chiddingwick, a character in his way, and Chiddingwick for some strange
reason had always been proud of him. Even 'carriage company' sent their
children to learn of him at the White Horse, just because he was 'old
Plantagenet,' and a certain shadowy sentiment attached to his name and
personality. Broken reprobate as he was, the halo of past greatness
followed him down through life to the lowest depths of degradation and
penury.
But now that his father was dead, Dick began to realize for the first
time how far the whole family had been dependent for support upon the
old man's profession. Little as he had earned, indeed, that little had
been bread-and-butter to his wife and children. And now that Dick came
to face the problem before him like a man, he saw only too plainly that
he himself must fill the place Mr. Plantagenet had vacated. It was a
terrible fate, but he saw no way out of it. At one deadly blow all his
hopes for the future were dashed utterly to the ground. Much as he hated
to think it, he saw at once it was now his imperative duty to go down
from Oxford. He must do something-without delay to earn a livelihood
somehow for his mother and sisters. He couldn't go on living there in
comparative luxury while the rest of his family starved, or declined on
the tender mercies of the Chiddingwick workhouse.
Gradually, bit by bit, he confided all this, broken-hearted, to
Gillespie. There were no secrets between them now; for the facts as to
poor Mr. Plantagenet's pitiable profession had come out fully at the
inquest, and all Oxford knew that night that Plantagenet of Durham, the
clever and rising history man, who was considered safe for the
Marquis of Lothian's Essay, was, after all, but the son of a country
dancing-master. So Dick, with a crimson face, putting his pride in his
pocket, announced to his friend the one plan for the future that now
seemed to him feasible--to return at once to Chiddingwick and take up
his father's place, so as to keep together the _clientele_. Clearly he
must do something to make money without delay; and that sad resolve was
the only device he could think of on the spur of the moment.
'Wouldn't it be better to try for a schoolmaster-ship?' Gillespie
suggested cautiously. He had the foresight of his countrymen. 'That
wouldn't so much unclass you in the end as the other. You haven't a
degree, of course, and the want of one would naturally tell against you.
But you might get a vacant place in some preparatory school--though the
pay, of course, would be something dreadfully trivial.'
'That's just it,' Dick answered, bursting with shame and misery, but
facing it out like a man. 'Gillespie, you're kindness itself--such a
dear, good fellow!--and I could say things to you I couldn't say to
anybody else on earth that I know of, except my own family. But even to
you I can't bear to say what must be said sooner or later. You see,
for my mother's sake, for my sisters', for my brothers', I _must_ do
whatever enables me to make most money. I must pocket my pride--and I've
got a great deal--ever so much too much--but I must pocket it all the
same, and think only of what's best in the end for the family. Now, I
should _hate_ the dancing--oh, my dear, dear fellow, I can't tell you
how I should hate it! But it's the one thing by which I could certainly
earn most money. There's a good connection there at Chiddingwiok, and
it's all in the hands of the family.
People would support me because I was my father's son. If I went home
at once, before anybody else came to the town to fill the empty place,
I could keep the connection together; and as I wouldn't spend any
money--well, in the ways my poor father often spent it--I should easily
earn enough to keep myself and the children. It'll break my heart to do
it--oh, it'll break my heart!--for I'm a very proud man; but I see no
way out of it. And I, who hoped to build up again by legitimate means
the fortunes of the Plantagenets!'
Gillespie was endowed with a sound amount of good Scotch common-sense.
He looked at things more soberly.
'If I were you,' he said in a tone that seemed to calm Dick's nerves,
'even at the risk of letting the golden opportunity slip, I'd do nothing
rashly. A step down in the social scale is easy enough to take; but,
once taken, we all know it's very hard to recover. Have you mentioned
this plan of yours to your mother or sister?'
'I wrote to Maud about it this, evening,' Dick answered sadly, 'and I
told her I might possibly have to make this sacrifice.'
Gillespie paused and reflected. After a minute's consideration, he drew
his pipe from his mouth and shook out the ashes.
'If I were you,' he said again, in a very decided voice, 'I'd let the
thing hang a bit. Why shouldn't you run down to Chiddingwick tomorrow
and talk matters over with your people? It costs money, I know; and just
at present I can understand every penny's a penny to you. But I've a
profound respect for the opinions of one's women in all these questions.
They look more at the social side, I'll admit, than men; yet they often
see things more clearly and intelligently, for all that, than we do.
They've got such insight. If they demand this sacrifice of you, I
suppose you must make it; but if, as I expect, they refuse to sanction
it, why, then, you must try to find some other way out of it.'
Gillespie's advice fell in exactly with Dick's own ideas; for not only
did he wish to see his mother and Maud, but also he was anxious to meet
Mary Tudor again and explain to her with regret that the engagement
which had never existed at all between them must now be ended. So he
decided to take his friend's advice at once, and start off by the first
train in the morning to Chiddingwick.
He went next day. Gillespie breakfasted with him, and remained when he
left in quiet possession of the armchair by the fireside. He took up
a book--the third volume of Mommsen--and sat on and smoked, without
thinking of the time, filling up the interval till his eleven o'clock
lecture. For at eleven the Senior Tutor lectured on Plato's 'Republic.'
Just as the clock struck ten, a hurried knock at the door aroused
Gillespie's attention.
'Come in!' he said quickly, taking his pipe from his mouth.
The door opened with a timid movement, standing a quarter ajar, and a
pale face peeped in with manifest indecision.
'A lady!' Gillespie said to himself, and instinctively knocked the
unconsumed tobacco out of his short clay pipe as he rose to greet her.
'Oh, I beg your pardon,' a small voice said, in very frightened accents.
'I think I must be mistaken. I wanted Mr. Richard Plantagenet's rooms.
Can you kindly direct me to them?'
'These are Mr. Plantagenet's rooms,' Gillespie answered, as gently as a
woman himself, for he saw the girl was slight, and tired, and delicate,
and dressed in deep mourning of the simplest description. 'He left me
here in possession when he went out this morning, and I've been sitting
ever since in them.'
The slight girl came in a step or two with evident hesitation.
'Will he be long gone?' she asked tremulously. 'Perhaps he's at lecture.
I must sit down and wait for him.'
Gillespie motioned her into a chair, and instinctively pulled a few
things straight in the room to receive a lady.
'Well, to tell you the truth,' he said, 'Plantagenet's gone down this
morning to Chiddingwick. I--I beg your pardon, but I suppose you're his
sister.'
Maud let herself drop into the chair he set for her, with a despondent
gesture.
'Gone to Chiddingwick! Oh, how unfortunate!' she cried, looking puzzled.
'What am I ever to do? This is really dreadful!'
And, indeed, the situation was sufficiently embarrassing; for she had
run up in haste, on the spur of the moment, when she received Dick's
letter threatening instant return, without any more money than would pay
her fare one way, trusting to Dick's purse to frank her back again. But
she didn't mention these facts, of course, to the young man in Dick's
rooms, with the blue-and-white boating jacket, who sat and looked hard
at her with profound admiration, reflecting to himself, meanwhile, how
very odd it was of Plantagenet never to have given him to understand
that his sister was beautiful! For Maud was always beautiful, in a
certain delicate, slender, shrinking fashion, though she had lots of
character; and her eyes, red with tears, and her simple little black
dress, instead of spoiling her looks, somehow served to accentuate the
peculiar charms of her beauty.
She sat there a minute or two, wondering what on earth to do, while
Gillespie stood by in respectful silence. At last she spoke.
'Yes, I'm his sister,' she said simply, raising her face with a timid
glance towards the strange young man. 'Did Dick tell you when he was
coming back? I'm afraid I must wait for him.'
'I don't think he'll be back till rather late,' Gillespie answered, with
sympathy. 'He took his name off Hall. That means to say,' he added in
explanation, 'he won't be home to dinner.'
Maud considered for a moment in doubt. This was really serious. Then she
spoke once more, rather terrified.
'He won't stop away all night, I suppose?' she asked, turning up her
face appealingly to the kindly-featured stranger. For what she could do
in that case, in a strange, big town, without a penny in her pocket, she
really couldn't imagine.
Gillespie's confident answer reassured her on that head.
'Oh no; he won't stop away,' he replied, 'for he hasn't got leave; and
he wouldn't be allowed to sleep out without it. But he mayn't be back,
all the same, till quite late at night--perhaps ten or eleven. It would
be hardly safe for you, I think, to wait on till then for him. I mean,'
he added apologetically, 'it might perhaps be too late to get a train
back to Chiddingwick.'
Maud looked down and hesitated. She perused the hearthrug.
'I think,' she said at last, after a very long pause, 'you must be Mr.
Gillespie.'
'That's my name,' the young man answered, with an inclination of the
head, rather pleased she should have heard of him.
Maud hesitated once more. Then, after a moment, she seemed to make her
mind up.
'I'm so glad it's you,' she said simply, with pretty womanly confidence;
'for I know you're Dick's friend, and I dare say you'll have guessed
what's brought me up here to-day, even in the midst of our great
trouble. Oh, Mr. Gillespie, did he tell you what he wrote last night to
me?'
Gillespie gazed down at her. Tears stood in her eyes as she glanced
up at him piteously. He thought he had never seen any face before so
pathetically pretty.
'Ye--es; he told me,' the young man answered; hardly liking even
to acknowledge it. 'He said he thought of going back at once to
Chiddingwick, to take up--well, to keep together your poor father's
connection.'
With a violent effort Maud held back her tears.
'Yes; that's just what he wrote,' she went on, with downcast eyes,
her lips trembling as she said it. Then she turned her face to him yet
again.
'But, oh, Mr. Gillespie!' she cried, clasping her hands in her
earnestness, 'that's just what he must never, never, never think of!'
'But he tells me it's the only thing--the family has--to live upon,'
Gillespie interposed, hesitating.
'Then the family can starve!' Maud cried, with a sudden flash of those
tearful eyes. 'We're Plantagenets, and we can bear it. But for Dick to
leave Oxford, and spoil all our best hopes for him--oh, Mr. Gillespie,
can't you feel it would be too, too dreadful? We could never stand it!'
Gillespie surveyed her from head to foot in admiration of her spirit.
Such absolute devotion to the family honour struck a kindred chord in
his half-Celtic nature.
'You speak like a Plantagenet,' he, answered very gravely--for he, too,
had caught some faint infection of the great Plantagenet myth. 'You
deserve to have him stop. You're worthy of such a brother. But don't you
think yourself it would be right of him--as he does--to think first of
your mother and his sisters and brothers?'
Maud rose and faced him.
'Mr. Gillespie,' she cried, clasping her hands, and looking beautiful as
she did so, 'I don't know why I can speak to you so frankly: I suppose
it's because you're Dick's friend, and because in this terrible loss
which has come upon us so suddenly we stand so much in need of human
sympathy. But, oh--it's wrong to say it, of course, yet say it I must;
I don't care one penny whether it's right or whether it's wrong; let us
starve or not, I dodo want Dick to stop on at Oxford!'
Gillespie regarded her respectfully. Such courage appealed to him.
'Well, I dare say I'm as wrong as you,' he answered frankly; 'but, to
tell you the truth--so do I; and I honour you for saying it.'
'Thank you,' Maud cried, letting the tears roll now unchecked, for
sympathy overcame her. She fell back again into, her chair. 'Do you
know,'-she said unaffectedly, 'we don't care one bit what we do at
Chiddingwick; we don't care, not one of us! We'd work our fingers to the
bone, even Nellie, who's the youngest, to keep Dick at Oxford. We don't
mind if we starve, for we're only the younger ones. But Richard's head
of our house now, heir of our name and race; and we were all so proud
when he got this Scholarship. We thought he'd be brought up as the chief
of the Plantagenets ought to be.' She paused a moment and reflected;
then she spoke again. 'To leave Oxford would be bad enough,' she went
on, 'and would cost us all sore; it would be a terrible blow to us,
though, I suppose, that's inevitable; but to come back to Chiddingwick,
and take up my dear father's profession--oh, don't think me undutiful to
his memory, Mr. Gillespie, for our father was a man--if you'd known him
long ago, before he grew careless--a man we had much to be proud of--but
still, well, there! if Dick was to do it, it would break our very hearts
for us.'
'I can see it would,' Gillespie answered, glancing away from her gently,
for she was crying hard now. His heart warmed to the poor girl. How he
wished it had been possible for him to help her effectually!
Maud leaned forward with clasped hands, and spoke still more earnestly.
'Then you'll help me with it?' she said, drawing a sigh. 'You'll work
with me to prevent him? I know Dick thinks a great deal of your advice
and opinion. He's often told me so. You'll try to persuade him not to
leave Oxford, won't you? Or if he leaves, at least not to come back to
Chiddingwick?
Oh, do say you will! for Dick's so much influenced by what you think
and say. You see, he'll want to do what's best for _us_--he's always
so unselfish. But that's not what we want: you must try and make him
neglect _us_, and think only of himself; for the more he thinks of _us_,
the more unhappy and ashamed and desperate he'll make us; and the more
he thinks of himself, why, the better we'll all love him.'
It was a topsy-turvy gospel--but one couldn't help respecting it.
Gillespie rose and 'sported the oak,' closed the big outer door, which
stands as a sign in all Oxford rooms that the occupant is out, or
doesn't wish to be disturbed, and so secures men when reading from
casual interruption. He told Maud what he had done; and Maud, who had
been brought up too simply to distrust her brother's friend, or to
recognise the rules of polite etiquette on such subjects, was grateful
to him for the courtesy.
'Now, we must talk this out together,' he said, 'more plainly and
practically. It's a business matter: we must discuss it as business. But
anyhow, Miss Plantagenet, I'll do my very best to help you in keeping
Dick on at Oxford.'