Lucy received the news of Jane’s engagement with genuine vexation,
and then grew vexed with herself for feeling vexed. Conscience took
alarm, and pronounced that envy and pride had a share in her
vexation. Self retorted: It is not envy to see that Jane is
mercenary, nor pride to dislike vulgarity. Conscience insisted: It is
envy to be annoyed by Jane’s getting married before you, and it is
pride to brand Mr. Durham as vulgar, and then taboo him as beyond the
pale. Self pleaded: No one likes growing old and being made to feel
it; and who would not deprecate a connection who will put one out of
countenance at every turn? But Conscience secured the last word: If
you were younger than Jane, you would make more allowances for her;
and if Mr. Durham were engaged to any one except your sister, you
would think it fair not to condemn him as destitute of every virtue
because he is underbred.
Thus did Conscience get the better of Self. And Lucy gulped down
dignity and disappointment together when, in reply to Miss Drum’s,
‘My dear, I hope your sisters are well, and enjoying their little
gaieties,’ she said, cheerfully: ‘Now, really, you should give me
something for such wonderful news: Jane is engaged to be married.’
There was nothing Miss Drum relished more than a wedding ‘between
persons suited to each other, and not ridiculous on the score of age
and appearance,’ as she would herself pointedly have defined it. Now
Jane was obviously young enough and pretty enough to become a bride;
so Miss Drum was delighted, and full of interest and of inquiries,
which Lucy found it rather difficult to answer satisfactorily.
‘And who is the favoured gentleman, my dear?’
‘Mr. Durham, of Orpingham Place, in Gloucestershire. Very rich it
seems, and a widower. His only daughter,’ Lucy hurried on with an
imperceptible effort, ‘married that Mr. Hartley Catherine and I used
to meet so often at Notting Hill. She was thought to be a great
heiress; but I suppose this will make some difference.’
‘Then he is rather old for Jane?’
‘He is not yet fifty it seems, though of course that is full old. By
what he says, Orpingham Place must be a very fine country-seat; and
Jane appears cut out for wealth and pleasure, she has such a power of
enjoying herself;’ and Lucy paused.
Miss Drum, dropping the point of age, resumed: ‘Now what Durham will
this be, my dear. I used to know a Sir Marcus Durham—a gay, hunting
Baronet. He was of a north-country family; but this may be a branch
of the same stock. He married an Earl’s daughter, Lady Mary; and she
used to take precedence, let who would be in the room, which was not
thought to be in very good taste when the dowager Lady Durham was
present. Still an Earl’s daughter ought to understand good breeding,
and that was how she acted; I do not wish to express any opinion.
Perhaps Mr. Durham may have a chance of the Baronetcy, for Sir Marcus
left no children, but was succeeded by a bachelor brother; and then
Jane will be “my lady” some day.’
‘No,’ replied Lucy; ‘I don’t think that likely. Mr. Durham is
enormously wealthy, by what I hear; but not of a county family. He
made his fortune in the City.’
Miss Drum persisted: ‘The cadets of even noble families have made
money by commerce over and over again. It is no disgrace to make a
fortune; and I see no reason why Mr. Durham should not be a baronet
some day. Many a City man has been as fine a gentleman as any idler
at court. Very likely Mr. Durham is an elegant man of talent, and
well connected; if so, a fortune is no drawback, and the question of
age may be left to the lady’s decision.’
Lucy said no more: only she foresaw and shrank from that approaching
day of undeceiving which should bring Mr. Durham to Brompton-on-Sea.
Once set off on the subject of family, there was no stopping Miss
Drum, who, having had no proveable great-grandfather, was sensitive
on the score of pedigree.
‘You might not suppose it now, Lucy, but it is well known that our
family name of Drum, though less euphonious than that of Durham, is
in fact the same. I made the observation once to Sir Marcus, and he
laughed with pleasure, and often afterwards addressed me as cousin.
Lady Mary did not like the suggestion; but no one’s fancies can alter
a fact:’ and the old lady looked stately, and as if the Drum-Durham
theory had been adopted and emblazoned by the College of Heralds;
whereas, in truth, no one besides herself, not even the easy-tempered
Gawkins, held it.
Meanwhile, all went merrily and smoothly at Notting Hill. As Jane had
said, she was old enough to know her own mind, and apparently she
knew it. When Mr. Durham presented her with a set of fine diamonds,
she dropped naturally into calling him George; and when he pressed
her to name the day, she answered, with an assumption of girlishness,
that he must talk over all those dreadful things with Catherine.
To Miss Charlmont he had already opened his mind on the subject of
settlements: Jane should have everything handsome and ample, but Pug
must not lose her fortune either. This Catherine, deeming it right
and reasonable, undertook to explain to Jane. Jane sulked a little to
her sister, but displayed only a smiling aspect to her lover, feeling
in her secret heart that her own nest was being particularly well
feathered: for not only were Mr. Durham’s new marriage settlements
most liberal, in spite of Stella’s prospective twenty thousand pounds
on coming of age, and twenty thousand at her father’s demise; but
Catherine, of her own accord, provided that at her death all her
share of their father’s property should descend to Jane, for her own
separate use, and at her own absolute disposal. The younger sister,
indeed, observed with safe generosity: ‘Suppose you should marry,
too, some day?’ But Catherine, grateful for any gleam of
unselfishness in her favourite sister, answered warmly and
decisively: ‘I never meant to marry, and I always meant what fortune
I had to be yours at last: only, dear, do not again think hardly of
our poor father’s oversight.’
Mr. Durham was urgent to have the wedding day fixed, and Jane
reluctant merely and barely for form’s sake. A day in August was
named, and the honeymoon pre devoted to Paris and Switzerland. Then
Miss Charlmont pronounced it time to return home; and was resolute
that the wedding should take place at Brompton-on-Sea, not at Netting
Hill as the hospitable Tykes proposed.
Jane was now nothing loth to quit town; Mr. Durham unwilling to lose
her, yet willing as recognising the step for an unavoidable
preliminary. Nevertheless, he felt hurt at Jane’s indifference to the
short separation; whilst Jane, in her turn, felt worried at his
expecting any show of sentiment from her, though, having once
fathomed his feelings, she kept the worry to herself and produced the
sentiment. He looked genuinely concerned when they parted at London
Bridge Station; but Jane never in her life had experienced a greater
relief than now, when the starting train left him behind on the
platform. A few more days, and it would be too late to leave him
behind: but she consoled herself by reflecting that without him she
might despair of ever seeing Paris; Switzerland was secondary in her
eyes.
Miss Drum had often set as a copy, ‘Manners make the Man,’ and
explained to her deferential pupils how in that particular phrase
‘Man’ includes ‘Woman.’ Catherine in later life reflected that
‘Morals make the Man’ (including Woman) conveys a not inferior truth.
Jane might have modified the sentence a trifle further, in employing
it as an M copy, and have written, ‘Money makes the Man.’