A new Friend.
“I hope I should have done exactly as you did in that Arden business,”
said Mr. Tottenham; “but I can’t tell. The amount of meanness and
falseness to all one’s own rules which one feels in one’s self in a
great emergency is wonderful. I never put any dependence on myself. Now
I will tell who, or rather what I am. The pronoun Who is inappropriate
in my case. I am nobody; but when you know what I am--if, indeed, my
name does not tell you--”
“No,” said Edgar, forcing himself into attention.
“It is not a bad name; there are fine people, I believe, who bear it,
and who hold up their heads with the best. But if you belonged to a
middle-class London family, and had a mother and sisters, you would have
no difficulty in identifying me. I am not a Tottenham with a Christian
name like other people. I am Tottenham’s, in the possessive case.”
“I begin to understand,” said Edgar.
What an effort it was to him! But he grew more capable of making the
effort as he tried to make it, and actually looked up now with a gleam
of intelligence in his eye.
“You begin to realize me,” said his companion. “I am Tottenham’s. I have
been Tottenham’s all my life. My father died when I was only a small
boy. I hope, though I don’t know, that he might have had sense enough to
habituate me to my fate from the beginning, which would have made it
much easier. But my mother, unfortunately, was a lady, or thought
herself so. She brought me up as if there was not such a thing as a shop
in the world. She buys everything at Howell and James’s of set purpose
and malice prepense, when she could get all she wants at cost price in
our own place; to be sure she can afford it, thanks to the shop. I never
knew anything about this said shop till I was at Eton, when I denied the
connection stoutly, and fought for it, and came off triumphant, though
the other fellow was the biggest. When I went home for the holidays, I
told the story. ‘You were quite right not to give in to it, my dear,’
said my mother. ‘But is it true?’ said I. Poor dear, how she
prevaricated! She would not have told a lie for the world, but a tiny
little bit of a fib did not seem so bad. Accordingly I found it out, and
had to go back to Eton, and beg the fellow’s pardon, and tell him it
wasn’t a lie he told, but the truth, only I had not known it. I don’t
think any of them thought the worse of me for that.”
“I should think not,” cried Edgar, beginning to rouse up.
“No, I don’t suppose they did; but from that day I became thin-skinned,
as people call it, and scented the shop afar off in everything people
said. My mother’s contempt for it, and shame of it, got deep into my
mind. I grew sensitive. I did not like to give my name when I went
anywhere. I felt sure some one would say, ‘Oh, Tottenham’s!’ when my
card was taken in. I can’t tell you the misery this gave me all through
school and college. I hated the shop, and was afraid of it. I was
morbidly ashamed of my name. I went and wandered about in vacation,
wearing other men’s names as I might have borrowed their coats. Not
without their consent, mind you,” he added, sharply. “I did nothing
dishonourable; but I had a horror of being Tottenham, a horror which I
cannot describe.”
“That was strange!”
“You think so? Well, so do I _now_; and it was very unfortunate for me.
It got me into many scrapes; it almost cost me my wife. You don’t know
my wife? I must take you out to see her. I was introduced to her under
somebody else’s name--not a very distinguished name, it is true, Smith,
or Brown, or something, and under that name she accepted me; but when I
told her how things really were, her countenance flamed like that of the
angel, do you remember? in Milton, when Adam says something caddish--I
forget what exactly. How she did look at me! ‘Ashamed of your name!’ she
said, ‘and yet ask _me_ to share it!’ There is pride and pride,” said
Mr. Tottenham to himself with musing admiration. “The poor dear mother
thought she was proud; Mary _is_ so; that makes all the difference. I
got into such trouble as I never was in all my life. She sent me right
away; she would have nothing to say to me; she cast me off as you might
cast away that cinder with that pair of tongs. For a time I was the most
miserable fellow on the face of the earth. I wandered about the place
where she lived night and day; but even then, if you will believe me, it
cost me a very hard struggle indeed to get to the shop. When I was
desperate, I did.”
“Why is he telling _me_ all this, I wonder?” said Edgar to himself; but
he was interested, he could not tell how, and had raised his head, and
for the moment shaken off something of the burden from his own back.
“I made up my mind to it, and went at last,” said this odd man, puffing
at his cigar with a vehemence that made it evident he felt it still. “I
found that nobody wanted me there; that everybody preferred not to be
interfered with; that the managers had fallen each into his own way, and
had no desire for me to meddle. But I am not the sort of man that can
stand and look on with his hands in his pockets. You will wonder, and
perhaps you will despise me, when I tell you that I found Tottenham’s on
the whole a very interesting place.”
“I neither wonder nor despise,” said Edgar. “What did you do?”
“What didn’t I do?” said Mr. Tottenham, with rueful humour. “I did all
the mischief possible. I turned the whole place upside down. I
diminished the profits for that year by a third part. I changed the
well-known good order of Tottenham’s into confusion worse confounded.
The old managers resigned in a body. By-the-way, they stayed on all but
one afterwards, when I asked them. As for the assistants, there was
civil war in the place, and more than one free fight between the
different sides; for some sided with me, perhaps because they approved
of me, perhaps because I was the master, and could do what I liked; but
the end was that I stayed there three months, worked there, and then
wrote to Mary; and she took me back.”
“I am very glad to hear it,” said Edgar; and he smiled and sighed with
natural sympathy.
He had become quite interested in the story by this time, and totally
forgotten all about his own miseries. He came out of his cloud finally
just at this point, and took, at last, the cigar which his new friend
had from time to time offered him.
“Ah! come now, this is comfortable,” said Tottenham. “Up to that moment
mine had been a very hard case, don’t you think so? I don’t pretend to
have anything more to grumble about. But, having had a hard case myself,
I sympathize with other people. Yours was a horribly hard case. Tell me
now, that other fellow, that Arden scamp! I know him--as proud as
Lucifer, and as wicked as all the rest of the evil spirits put
together--do you mean to say he allowed you to go away, and give him up
all that fine property, and save him thousands of pounds in a lawsuit,
without making some provision for you? Such a thing was never heard of.”
“No,” said Edgar; “don’t be unjust to him. It was a bitter pill for me
to take a penny from him; but I did, because they made me.”
“And you’ve spent it all!”
Edgar laughed; he could not help it. His elastic nature had mounted up
again; he began to feel sure that he could not be ruined so completely
after all; he must be able to do something. He looked up at his
questioner with eyes full of humour. Mr. Tottenham, who was standing in
front as grave as a judge, looked at him, and did not laugh.
“I don’t see the fun,” he said. “You shouldn’t have done it. You have
let yourself drop half out of recollection before you asked for
anything, whereas you should have got provided for at once. Hang it all!
I suppose there are some places yet where a man in office may place a
friend--and some opportunities left to put a good man in by means of a
job, instead of putting in a bad man by competition, or seniority, or
some other humbug. You should have done that at first.”
“Possibly,” said Edgar, who had been amused, not by the idea of having
spent all his money, but by that of making a clean breast to this man,
whom he had never spoken to before, of the most private particulars of
his life.
Mr. Tottenham made a few turns about the room, where there was for the
moment nobody but themselves. He said then suddenly,
“I take an interest in you. I should like to help you if I could.
Tottenham’s is no end of a good property, and I can do what I like----”
“I am sure I am very much obliged,” said Edgar, laughing. “I should
thank you still more warmly if it were not so funny. Why should you take
an interest in me?”
“It is odd, perhaps,” said the other; but he did not laugh. A smile ran
over his face, that was all, and passed again like a momentary light.
Then he added, “It is not so odd as you think. If I could conceal from
you who my wife was, I might be tempted to do so; but I can’t, for
though I’m only Tottenham’s, she’s in the peerage. My Mary is sister to
Augusta Thornleigh, who--well, who _knew_ you, my dear fellow. Look
here! She’s fashionable and all that; she would not let you see her
daughters, at present, if she could help it; but she’s a good woman,
mind. I have heard her tell your story. If ever there was a hard case,
that was one; and when I heard of it, I resolved, if I ever had the
chance, to stand by you. You behaved like a gentleman. Since we have
been made acquainted, Earnshaw, we have not shaken hands yet!”
They did it now very heartily; and in those restless grey eyes, which
were worn by sheer use and perpetual motion, there glimmered some
moisture. Edgar’s eyes were dry, but his whole heart was melted. There
was a pause for a minute or more, and the ashes fell softly on the
hearth, and the clock ticked on the mantel-piece. Then Edgar asked, “How
are they all?” with that sound in his utterance which the French in
their delicate discrimination call tears in the voice.
“Quite well, quite well!” said Tottenham hurriedly; and then he added,
“We didn’t come here to speak of them. Earnshaw, I want you to come to
my house.”
“It is very kind of you,” said Edgar. “I think I have seen Lady Mary.
She is very sweet and lively, like--some one else; with fair hair----”
“Isn’t she?” cried Lady Mary’s admiring husband; and his eyes glowed
again. “I want you to come and stay with us while this business with
Newmarch gets settled.”
“Why?” said Edgar, with genuine surprise; and then he added, “You are a
great deal too good. I should like to go for a day or two. I haven’t
spoken to a lady for months.”
“Poor fellow!” said Mr. Tottenham, taking no notice of the “Why?” “We
live only a little way out of town, on account of the shop. I have never
neglected the shop since the time I told you about. She would not let me
for that matter. Nobody, you see, can snub _her_, in consequence of her
rank; and partly for her sake, partly because I’m rich, I suppose,
nobody tries to snub me. There are many of my plans in which you could
help me very much--for a time, you know, till Newmarch comes off.”
“You are very kind,” said Edgar; but his attention wandered after this,
and other thoughts came into his mind, thoughts of himself and his
forlorn condition, and of the profound uncertainty into which he and all
his ways had been plunged. He scarcely paid any attention to the
arrangements Mr. Tottenham immediately made, though he remembered that
he promised to go out with him next day to Tottenham’s, as his house was
called. “The same as the shop,” he said, with a twinkle in the corner of
his grey eye. Edgar consented to these arrangements passively; but his
patience was worn out, and he was very anxious to get away.
And so this strange evening came to an end, and the morning after it.
The new day arose, a smoky, foggy, wintry morning, through which so many
people went to work; but not Edgar. He looked out upon the world from
his window with a failing heart. Even from Kensington and Brompton,
though these are not mercantile suburbs, crowds of men were jolting
along on all the omnibuses, crowds pouring down on either side of the
street--to work. The shop people went along the road getting and
delivering orders; the maid-servants bustled about the doors in the
foggy, uncertain light; the omnibuses rushed on, on, in a continuous
stream; and everybody was busy. Those who had no work to do, pretended
at least to be busy too; the idlers had not come out yet, had not
stirred, and the active portion of the world were having everything
their own way. Edgar had revived from his depression, but he had not
regained his _insouciance_ and trust in the future. On the contrary, he
was full of the heaviest uncertainty and care. He could not wait longer
for this appointment, which might keep him hanging on half his life,
which was just as near now as when he began to calculate on having it
“about Christmas;” probably the next Christmas would see it just as
uncertain still. He must, he felt, attempt something else, and change
his tactics altogether. He must leave his expensive lodgings at once;
but alas! he had a big bill for them, which he had meant to pay off his
first quarter’s salary. He had meant to pay it the moment that blessed
money for which he should have worked came; and now there was no
appearance, no hope of it ever coming--at least, only as much hope as
there had always been, no more.
Poor Edgar! he might have rushed out of doors and taken to the first
manual work he could find as his heart bade him; but to go and solicit
somebody once more, and hang on and wait, dependent upon the
recollection or the caprice of some one or other who could give
employment, but might, out of mere wantonness, withhold it--this was
harder than any kind of work. He could dig, he felt, and would dig
willingly, or do any other thing that was hard and simple and
straightforward; but to beg for means of working he was ashamed; and
there seemed something so miserable, so full of the spirit of dependence
in having to wait on day by day doing nothing, waiting till something
might fall into his hands. How infinitely better off working men were,
he said to himself; not thinking that even the blessed working man, who
is free from the restraints and punctilios which bind gentlemen, has yet
to stand and wait, and ask for work too, with the best.
He went back to Mr. Parchemin that morning.
“I have been waiting for Lord Newmarch,” he said; “he promised me a post
about Christmas, and now he tells me there is just as much hope as
ever, but no more. I must do something else. Could you not take me in as
clerk in your own office? I should not mind a small salary to start
with; anything would do.”
Mr. Parchemin laughed, a dry and echoing “Ha, ha!” which was as dusty
and dry as his office.
“A strange clerk you would make,” he said, looking over his shoulder to
conceal his amusement. “Can you engross?”
“Of course not. How should I? But if a man were to try--”
“Do you know anything about the law? Of what possible use could you be
to us? No; you are a fancy article, entirely a fancy article.
Government,” said the old lawyer, “Government is the thing for you.”
“Government does not seem to see it in that light,” said Edgar. “I have
waited since October.”
“My dear Sir! October is but three months off. You can’t expect, like a
child, to have your wants supplied the moment you ask for anything. A
slice of cake may be given in that way, but not an appointment. You must
have patience, Mr. Earnshaw, you must have patience,” said the old man.
“But I have spent the half of my hundred pounds,” Edgar was about to
say; but something withheld him; he could not do it. Should he not
furnish the old lawyer by so doing with an unquestionable argument
against himself? Should he not expose his own foolishness, the
foolishness of the man who thought himself able to give up everything
for others, and then could do nothing but run into debt and ruin on his
own account? Edgar could not do it; he resolved rather to struggle on
upon nothing, rather to starve, though that was a figure of speech, than
to put himself so much in anyone’s power; which was pride, no doubt, but
a useful kind of pride, which sometimes keeps an erring man out of
further trouble. He went back at once, and paid his landlord a portion
of what he owed him, and removed his goods to a small upstairs room
which he found he could have cheap, and might have had all the time had
he been wise enough to ask. It was the room in which his own servant had
slept when he travelled with such an appendage; but the new-born pride
which had struggled into existence in Edgar’s mind had no such ignoble
part in it as to afflict him on this account. He was quite happy to go
up to his man’s room, where everything was clean and homely, and felt no
derogation of his personal dignity. Thank Heaven, this was one thing
done at least--a step taken, though nothing could be gained by it, only
something spared.
In the afternoon Mr. Tottenham met him at his club, driving a pair of
handsome horses in a smart phaeton, such a turnout as only a rich man’s
can be, everything about it perfect. Edgar had not indulged in any
luxurious tastes during his own brief reign; it had been perhaps too
short to develop them; but he recognised the perfect appointments of the
vehicle with a half sigh of satisfaction and reminiscence. He did not
say, why should this man be lucky enough to have all this when I have
nothing? as so many people do. He was not given to such comparisons, to
that ceaseless contrast of self with the rest of the world, which is so
common. He half smiled at himself for half sighing over the day when he
too might have had everything that heart could desire, and smiled more
than half at the whimsical thought that he had not taken the good of his
wealth half so much then as he would have done now, had he the chance.
He seemed to himself--knowing how short Edgar Arden’s tenure was--to be
aware of a hundred things which Edgar might have done to amuse and
delight him, which indeed Edgar Arden, knowing nothing of his own short
tenure, and believing life to be very long and much delight awaiting
him, never dreamt of making any haste to procure. A curious sense of
well-being seemed to take hold of him as he bowled along the suburban
roads by Mr. Tottenham’s side, wrapped in one of the fur coats which the
chill and foggy evening made comfortable, watching the long lines of
lamps that twinkled and stretched out like a golden thread, and then
were left behind as in the twinkling of an eye. To hear of Lady Mary
Tottenham, who was Lady Augusta’s sister, and aunt to all the young
Thornleighs, seemed somehow like being wafted back to the old
atmosphere, to the state of affairs which lasted so short a time and
ended so suddenly; but which was, notwithstanding its brevity, the most
important and influential moment of his life.