"Bertram. I mean the business is not ended, as fearing to hear of
it hereafter.
"1st Soldier. Do you know this Captain Dumain?"
_All's Well that Ends Well_.
One evening, some weeks after the date of the last chapter, Mr. Robert
Beaufort sat alone in his house in Berkeley Square. He had arrived that
morning from Beaufort Court, on his way to Winandermere, to which he was
summoned by a letter from his wife. That year was an agitated and
eventful epoch in England; and Mr. Beaufort had recently gone through the
bustle of an election--not, indeed, contested; for his popularity and his
property defied all rivalry in his own county.
The rich man had just dined, and was seated in lazy enjoyment by the side
of the fire, which he had had lighted, less for the warmth--though it was
then September--than for the companionship;--engaged in finishing his
madeira, and, with half-closed eyes, munching his devilled biscuits.
"I am sure," he soliloquised while thus employed, "I don't know exactly
what to do,--my wife ought to decide matters where the girl is concerned;
a son is another affair--that's the use of a wife. Humph!"
"Sir," said a fat servant, opening the door, "a gentleman wishes to see
you upon very particular business."
"Business at this hour! Tell him to go to Mr. Blackwell."
"Yes, sir."
"Stay! perhaps he is a constituent, Simmons. Ask him if he belongs to
the county."
"Yes, Sir."
"A great estate is a great plague," muttered Mr. Beaufort; "so is a great
constituency. It is pleasanter, after all, to be in the House of Lords.
I suppose I could if I wished; but then one must rat--that's a bore. I
will consult Lilburne. Humph!"
The servant re-appeared. "Sir, he says he does belong to the county."
"Show him in!--What sort of a person?"
"A sort of gentleman, sir; that is," continued the butler, mindful of
five shillings just slipped within his palm by the stranger, "quite the
gentleman."
"More wine, then-stir up the fire."
In a few moments the visitor was ushered into the apartment. He was a
man between fifty and sixty, but still aiming at the appearance of youth.
His dress evinced military pretensions; consisting of a blue coat,
buttoned up to the chin, a black stock, loose trousers of the fashion
called Cossacks, and brass spurs. He wore a wig, of great luxuriance in
curl and rich auburn in hue; with large whiskers of the same colour
slightly tinged with grey at the roots. By the imperfect light of the
room it was not perceptible that the clothes were somewhat threadbare,
and that the boots, cracked at the side, admitted glimpses of no very
white hosiery within. Mr. Beaufort, reluctantly rising from his repose
and gladly sinking back to it, motioned to a chair, and put on a doleful
and doubtful semi-smile of welcome. The servant placed the wine and
glasses before the stranger;--the host and visitor were alone.
"So, sir," said Mr. Beaufort, languidly, "you are from ------shire; I
suppose about the canal,--may I offer you a glass of wine?"
"Most hauppy, sir--your health!" and the stranger, with evident
satisfaction, tossed off a bumper to so complimentary a toast.
"About the canal?" repeated Mr. Beaufort.
"No, sir, no! You parliament gentlemen must hauve a vaust deal of
trouble on your haunds--very foine property I understaund yours is, sir.
Sir, allow me to drink the health of your good lady!"
"I thank you, Mr.--, Mr.--, what did you say your name was?--I beg you a
thousand pardons."
"No offaunce in the least, sir; no ceremony with me--this is perticler
good madeira!"
"May I ask how I can serve you?" said Mr. Beaufort, struggling between
the sense of annoyance and the fear to be uncivil. "And pray, had I the
honour of your vote in the last election!"
"No, sir, no! It's mauny years since I have been in your part of the
world, though I was born there."
"Then I don't exactly see--" began Mr. Beaufort, and stopped with
dignity.
"Why I call on you," put in the stranger, tapping his boots with his
cane; and then recognising the rents, he thrust both feet under the
table.
"I don't say that; but at this hour I am seldom at leisure--not but what
I am always at the service of a constituent, that is, a voter! Mr.--, I
beg your pardon, I did not catch your name."
"Sir," said the stranger, helping himself to a third glass of wine;
"here's a health to your young folk! And now to business." Here the
visitor, drawing his chair nearer to his host, assuming a more grave
aspect, and dropping something of his stilted pronunciation, continued,
"You had a brother?"
"Well, sir," said Mr. Beaufort, with a very changed countenance.
"And that brother had a wife!"
Had a cannon gone off in the ear of Mr. Robert Beaufort, it could not
have shocked or stunned him more than that simple word with which his
companion closed his sentence. He fell back in his chair--his lips
apart, his eyes fixed on the stranger. He sought to speak, but his
tongue clove to his mouth.
"That wife had two sons, born in wedlock!"
"It is false!" cried Mr. Beaufort, finding a voice at length, and
springing to his feet. "And who are you, sir? and what do you mean
by--"
"Hush!" said the stranger, perfectly unconcerned, and regaining the
dignity of his haw-haw enunciation, "better not let the servants hear
aunything. For my pawt, I think servants hauve the longest pair of ears
of auny persons, not excepting jauckasses; their ears stretch from the
pauntry to the parlour. Hush, sir!--perticler good madeira, this!"
"Sir!" said Mr. Beaufort, struggling to preserve, or rather recover, his
temper, "your conduct is exceedingly strange; but allow me to say that
you are wholly misinformed. My brother never did marry; and if you have
anything to say on behalf of those young men--his natural sons--I refer
you to my solicitor, Mr. Blackwell, of Lincoln's Inn. I wish you a good
evening."
"Sir!--the same to you--I won't trouble you auny farther; it was only out
of koindness I called--I am not used to be treated so--sir, I am in his
maujesty's service--sir, you will foind that the witness of the marriage
is forthcoming; you will think of me then, and, perhaps, be sorry. But
I've done, 'Your most obedient humble, sir!'" And the stranger, with a
flourish of his hand, turned to the door. At the sight of this
determination on the part of his strange guest, a cold, uneasy, vague
presentiment seized Mr. Beaufort. There, not flashed, but rather froze,
across him the recollection of his brother's emphatic but disbelieved
assurances--of Catherine's obstinate assertion of her son's alleged
rights--rights which her lawsuit, undertaken on her own behalf, had not
compromised;--a fresh lawsuit might be instituted by the son, and the
evidence which had been wanting in the former suit might be found at
last. With this remembrance and these reflections came a horrible train
of shadowy fears,--witnesses, verdict, surrender, spoliation--arrears--
ruin!
The man, who had gained the door, turned back and looked at him with a
complacent, half-triumphant leer upon his impudent, reckless face.
"Sir," then said Mr. Beaufort, mildly, "I repeat that you had better see
Mr. Blackwell."
The tempter saw his triumph. "I have a secret to communicate which it is
best for you to keep snug. How mauny people do you wish me to see about
it? Come, sir, there is no need of a lawyer; or, if you think so, tell
him yourself. Now or never, Mr. Beaufort."
"I can have no objection to hear anything you have to say, sir," said the
rich man, yet more mildly than before; and then added, with a forced
smile, "though my rights are already too confirmed to admit of a doubt."
Without heeding the last assertion, the stranger coolly walked back,
resumed his seat, and, placing both arms on the table and looking Mr.
Beaufort full in the face, thus proceeded,--
"Sir, of the marriage between Philip Beaufort and Catherine Morton there
were two witnesses: the one is dead, the other went abroad--the last is
alive still!"
"If so," said Mr. Beaufort, who, not naturally deficient in cunning and
sense, felt every faculty now prodigiously sharpened, and was resolved to
know the precise grounds for alarm,--"if so, why did not the man--it was
a servant, sir, a man-servant, whom Mrs. Morton pretended to rely on--
appear on the trial?"
"Because, I say, he was abroad and could not be found; or, the search
after him miscaurried, from clumsy management and a lack of the rhino."
"Hum!" said Mr. Beaufort--"one witness--one witness, observe, there _is_
only one!--does not alarm me much. It is not what a man deposes, it is
what a jury believe, sir! Moreover, what has become of the young men?
They have never been heard of for years. They are probably dead; if so,
I am heir-at-law!"
"I know where one of them is to be found at all events."
"The elder?--Philip?" asked Mr. Beaufort anxiously, and with a fearful
remembrance of the energetic and vehement character prematurely exhibited
by his nephew.
"Pawdon me! I need not aunswer that question."
"Sir! a lawsuit of this nature, against one in possession, is very
doubtful, and," added the rich man, drawing himself up--"and, perhaps
very expensive!"
"The young man I speak of does not want friends, who will not grudge the
money."
"Sir!" said Mr. Beaufort, rising and placing his back to the fire--"sir!
what is your object in this communication? Do you come, on the part of
the young man, to propose a compromise? If so, be plain!"
"I come on my own pawt. It rests with you to say if the young men shall
never know it!"
"And what do you want?"
"Five hundred a year as long as the secret is kept."
"And how can you prove that there is a secret, after all?"
"By producing the witness if you wish."
"Will he go halves in the L500. a year?" asked Mr. Beaufort artfully.
"That is moy affair, sir," replied the stranger.
"What you say," resumed Mr. Beaufort, "is so extraordinary--so
unexpected, and still, to me, seems so improbable, that I must have time
to consider. If you will call on me in a week, and produce your facts, I
will give you my answer. I am not the man, sir, to wish to keep any one
out of his true rights, but I will not yield, on the other hand, to
imposture."
"If you don't want to keep them out of their rights, I'd best go and tell
my young gentlemen," said the stranger, with cool impudence.
"I tell you I must have time," repeated Beaufort, disconcerted.
"Besides, I have not myself alone to look to, sir," he added, with
dignified emphasis--"I am a father!"
"This day week I will call on you again. Good evening, Mr. Beaufort!"
And the man stretched out his hand with an air of amicable condescension.
The respectable Mr. Beaufort changed colour, hesitated, and finally
suffered two fingers to be enticed into the grasp of the visitor, whom he
ardently wished at that bourne whence no visitor returns.
The stranger smiled, stalked to the door, laid his finger on his lip,
winked knowingly, and vanished, leaving Mr. Beaufort a prey to such
feelings of uneasiness, dread, and terror, as may be experienced by a man
whom, on some inch or two of slippery rock, the tides have suddenly
surrounded.
He remained perfectly still for some moments, and then glancing round the
dim and spacious room, his eyes took in all the evidences of luxury and
wealth which it betrayed. Above the huge sideboard, that on festive days
groaned beneath the hoarded weight of the silver heirlooms of the
Beauforts, hung, in its gilded frame, a large picture of the family seat,
with the stately porticoes--the noble park--the groups of deer; and
around the wall, interspersed here and there with ancestral portraits of
knight and dame, long since gathered to their rest, were placed
masterpieces of the Italian and Flemish art, which generation after
generation had slowly accumulated, till the Beaufort Collection had
become the theme of connoisseurs and the study of young genius.
The still room, the dumb pictures--even the heavy sideboard seemed to
gain voice, and speak to him audibly. He thrust his hand into the folds
of his waistcoat, and griped his own flesh convulsively; then, striding
to and fro the apartment, he endeavoured to re-collect his thoughts.
"I dare not consult Mrs. Beaufort," he muttered; "no--no,--she is a fool!
Besides, she's not in the way. No time to lose--I will go to Lilburne."
Scarce had that thought crossed him than he hastened to put it into
execution. He rang for his hat and gloves and sallied out on foot to
Lord Lilburne's house in Park Lane,--the distance was short, and
impatience has long strides.
He knew Lord Lilburne was in town, for that personage loved London for
its own sake; and even in September he would have said with the old Duke
of Queensberry, when some one observed that London was very empty--"Yes;
but it is fuller than the country."
Mr. Beaufort found Lord Lilburne reclined on a sofa, by the open window
of his drawing-room, beyond which the early stars shone upon the
glimmering trees and silver turf of the deserted park. Unlike the simple
dessert of his respectable brother-in-law, the costliest fruits, the
richest wines of France, graced the small table placed beside his sofa;
and as the starch man of forms and method entered the room at one door, a
rustling silk, that vanished through the aperture of another, seemed to
betray tokens of a _tete-a-tete_, probably more agreeable to Lilburne
than the one with which only our narrative is concerned.
It would have been a curious study for such men as love to gaze upon the
dark and wily features of human character, to have watched the contrast
between the reciter and the listener, as Beaufort, with much
circumlocution, much affected disdain and real anxiety, narrated the
singular and ominous conversation between himself and his visitor.
The servant, in introducing Mr. Beaufort, had added to the light of the
room; and the candles shone full on the face and form of Mr. Beaufort.
All about that gentleman was so completely in unison with the world's
forms and seemings, that there was something moral in the very sight of
him! Since his accession of fortune he had grown less pale and less
thin; the angles in his figure were filled up. On his brow there was no
trace of younger passion. No able vice had ever sharpened the
expression--no exhausting vice ever deepened the lines. He was the beau-
ideal of a county member,--so sleek, so staid, so business-like; yet so
clean, so neat, so much the gentleman. And now there was a kind of
pathos in his grey hairs, his nervous smile, his agitated hands, his
quick and uneasy transition of posture, the tremble of his voice. He
would have appeared to those who saw, but heard not, The Good Man in
trouble. Cold, motionless, speechless, seemingly apathetic, but in truth
observant, still reclined on the sofa, his head thrown back, but one eye
fixed on his companion, his hands clasped before him, Lord Lilburne
listened; and in that repose, about his face, even about his person,
might be read the history of how different a life and character! What
native acuteness in the stealthy eye! What hardened resolve in the full
nostril and firm lips! What sardonic contempt for all things in the
intricate lines about the mouth. What animal enjoyment of all things so
despised in that delicate nervous system, which, combined with original
vigour of constitution, yet betrayed itself in the veins on the hands and
temples, the occasional quiver of the upper lip! His was the frame above
all others the most alive to pleasure--deep-chested, compact, sinewy, but
thin to leanness--delicate in its texture and extremities, almost to
effeminacy. The indifference of the posture, the very habit of the dress
--not slovenly, indeed, but easy, loose, careless--seemed to speak of the
man's manner of thought and life--his profound disdain of externals.
Not till Beaufort had concluded did Lord Lilburne change his position or
open his lips; and then, turning to his brother-in-law his calm face, he
said drily,--
"I always thought your brother had married that woman; he was the sort of
man to do it. Besides, why should she have gone to law without a vestige
of proof, unless she was convinced of her rights? Imposture never
proceeds without some evidence. Innocence, like a fool as it is, fancies
it has only to speak to be believed. But there is no cause for alarm."
"No cause!--And yet you think there was a marriage."
"It is quite clear," continued Lilburne, without heeding this
interruption; "that the man, whatever his evidence, has not got
sufficient proofs. If he had, he would go to the young men rather than
you: it is evident that they would promise infinitely larger rewards than
he could expect from yourself. Men are always more generous with what
they expect than with what they have. All rogues know this. 'Tis the
way Jews and usurers thrive upon heirs rather than possessors; 'tis the
philosophy of post-obits. I dare say the man has found out the real
witness of the marriage, but ascertained, also, that the testimony of
that witness would not suffice to dispossess you. He might be
discredited--rich men have a way sometimes of discrediting poor
witnesses. Mind, he says nothing of the lost copy of the register--
whatever may be the value of that document, which I am not lawyer enough
to say--of any letters of your brother avowing the marriage. Consider,
the register itself is destroyed--the clergyman dead. Pooh! make
yourself easy."
"True," said Mr. Beaufort, much comforted; "what a memory you have!"
"Naturally. Your wife is my sister--I hate poor relations--and I was
therefore much interested in your accession and your lawsuit. No--you
may feel--at rest on this matter, so far as a successful lawsuit is
concerned. The next question is, Will you have a lawsuit at all? and is
it worth while buying this fellow? That I can't say unless I see him
myself."
"I wish to Heaven you would!"
"Very willingly: 'tis a sort of thing I like--I'm fond of dealing with
rogues--it amuses me. This day week? I'll be at your house--your proxy;
I shall do better than Black well. And since you say you are wanted at
the Lakes, go down, and leave all to me."
"A thousand thanks. I can't say how grateful I am. You certainly are
the kindest and cleverest person in the world."
"You can't think worse of the world's cleverness and kindness than I do,"
was Lilburne's rather ambiguous answer to the compliment. "But why does
my sister want to see you?"
"Oh, I forgot!--here is her letter. I was going to ask your advice in
this too."
Lord Lilburne took the letter, and glanced over it with the rapid eye of
a man accustomed to seize in everything the main gist and pith.
"An offer to my pretty niece--Mr. Spencer--requires no fortune--his uncle
will settle all his own--(poor silly old man!) All! Why that's only
L1000. a year. You don't think much of this, eh? How my sister can even
ask you about it puzzles me."
"Why, you see, Lilburne," said Mr. Beaufort, rather embarrassed, "there
is no question of fortune--nothing to go out of the family; and, really,
Arthur is so expensive, and, if she were to marry well, I could not give
her less than fifteen or twenty thousand pounds."
"Aha!--I see--every man to his taste: here a daughter--there a dowry.
You are devilish fond of money, Beaufort. Any pleasure in avarice,--eh?"
Mr. Beaufort coloured very much at the remark and the question, and,
forcing a smile, said,--
"You are severe. But you don't know what it is to be father to a young
man."
"Then a great many young women have told me sad fibs! But you are right
in your sense of the phrase. No, I never had an heir apparent, thank
Heaven! No children imposed upon me by law--natural enemies, to count
the years between the bells that ring for their majority, and those that
will toll for my decease. It is enough for me that I have a brother and
a sister--that my brother's son will inherit my estates--and that, in the
meantime, he grudges me every tick in that clock. What then? If he had
been my uncle, I had done the same. Meanwhile, I see as little of him as
good breeding will permit. On the face of a rich man's heir is written
the rich man's _memento mori_! But _revenons a nos moutons_. Yes, if
you give your daughter no fortune, your death will be so much the more
profitable to Arthur!"
"Really, you take such a very odd view of the matter," said Mr. Beaufort,
exceedingly shocked. "But I see you don't like the marriage; perhaps you
are right."
"Indeed, I have no choice in the matter; I never interfere between father
and children. If I had children myself, I will, however, tell you, for
your comfort, that they might marry exactly as they pleased--I would
never thwart them. I should be too happy to get them out of my way. If
they married well, one would have all the credit; if ill, one would have
an excuse to disown them. As I said before, I dislike poor relations.
Though if Camilla lives at the Lakes when she is married, it is but a
letter now and then; and that's your wife's trouble, not yours. But,
Spencer--what Spencer!--what family? Was there not a Mr. Spencer who
lived at Winandermere--who----"
"Who went with us in search of these boys, to be sure. Very likely the
same--nay, he must be so. I thought so at the first."
"Go down to the Lakes to-morrow. You may hear something about your
nephews;" at that word Mr. Beaufort winced.
"'Tis well to be forearmed."
"Many thanks for all your counsel," said Beaufort, rising, and glad to
escape; for though both he and his wife held the advice of Lord Lilburne
in the highest reverence, they always smarted beneath the quiet and
careless stings which accompanied the honey. Lord Lilburne was singular
in this,--he would give to any one who asked it, but especially a
relation, the best advice in his power; and none gave better, that is,
more worldly advice. Thus, without the least benevolence, he was often
of the greatest service; but he could not help mixing up the draught with
as much aloes and bitter-apple as possible. His intellect delighted in
exhibiting itself even gratuitously. His heart equally delighted in that
only cruelty which polished life leaves to its tyrants towards their
equals,--thrusting pins into the feelings and breaking self-love upon the
wheel. But just as Mr. Beaufort had drawn on his gloves and gained the
doorway, a thought seemed to strike Lord Lilburne:
"By the by," he said, "you understand that when I promised I would try
and settle the matter for you, I only meant that I would learn the exact
causes you have for alarm on the one hand, or for a compromise with this
fellow on the other. If the last be advisable you are aware that I
cannot interfere. I might get into a scrape; and Beaufort Court is not
my property."
"I don't quite understand you."
"I am plain enough, too. If there is money to be given it is given in
order to defeat what is called justice--to keep these nephews of yours
out of their inheritance. Now, should this ever come to light, it would
have an ugly appearance. They who risk the blame must be the persons who
possess the estate."
"If you think it dishonourable or dishonest--" said Beaufort,
irresolutely.
"I! I never can advise as to the feelings; I can only advise as to the
policy. If you don't think there ever was a marriage, it may, still, be
honest in you to prevent the bore of a lawsuit."
"But if he can prove to me that they were married?"
"Pooh!" said Lilburne, raising his eyebrows with a slight expression of
contemptuous impatience; "it rests on yourself whether or not he prove it
to YOUR satisfaction! For my part, as a third person, I am persuaded the
marriage did take place. But if I had Beaufort Court, my convictions
would be all the other way. You understand. I am too happy to serve
you. But no man can be expected to jeopardise his character, or coquet
with the law, unless it be for his own individual interest. Then, of
course, he must judge for himself. Adieu! I expect some friends
foreigners--Carlists--to whist. You won't join them?"
"I never play, you know. You will write to me at Winandermere: and, at
all events, you will keep off the man till I return?"
"Certainly."
Beaufort, whom the latter part of the conversation had comforted far less
than the former, hesitated, and turned the door-handle three or four
times; but, glancing towards his brother-in-law, he saw in that cold face
so little sympathy in the struggle between interest and conscience, that
he judged it best to withdraw at once.
As soon as he was gone, Lilburne summoned his valet, who had lived with
him many years, and who was his confidant in all the adventurous
gallantries with which he still enlivened the autumn of his life.
"Dykeman," said he, "you have let out that lady?"
"Yes, my lord."
"I am not at home if she calls again. She is stupid; she cannot get the
girl to come to her again. I shall trust you with an adventure, Dykeman
--an adventure that will remind you of our young days, man. This
charming creature--I tell you she is irresistible--her very oddities
bewitch me. You must--well, you look uneasy. What would you say?"
"My lord, I have found out more about her--and--and----"
"Well, well."
The valet drew near and whispered something in his master's ear.
"They are idiots who say it, then," answered Lilburne. "And," faltered
the man, with the shame of humanity on his face, "she is not worthy your
lordship's notice--a poor--"
"Yes, I know she is poor; and, for that reason, there can be no
difficulty, if the thing is properly managed. You never, perhaps, heard
of a certain Philip, king of Macedon; but I will tell you what he once
said, as well as I can remember it: 'Lead an ass with a pannier of gold;
send the ass through the gates of a city, and all the sentinels will run
away.' Poor!--where there is love, there is charity also, Dykeman.
Besides--"
Here Lilburne's countenance assumed a sudden aspect of dark and angry
passion,--he broke off abruptly, rose, and paced the room, muttering to
himself. Suddenly he stopped, and put his hand to his hip, as an
expression of pain again altered the character of his face.
"The limb pains me still! Dykeman--I was scarce twenty-one--when I became
a cripple for life." He paused, drew a long breath, smiled, rubbed his
hands gently, and added: "Never fear--you shall be the ass; and thus
Philip of Macedon begins to fill the pannier." And he tossed his purse
into the hands of the valet, whose face seemed to lose its anxious
embarrassment at the touch of the gold. Lilburne glanced at him with a
quiet sneer: "Go!--I will give you my orders when I undress."
"Yes!" he repeated to himself, "the limb pains me still. But he died!--
shot as a man would shoot a jay or a polecat!
"I have the newspaper still in that drawer. He died an outcast--a felon--
a murderer! And I blasted his name--and I seduced his mistress--and I--
am John Lord Lilburne!"
About ten o'clock, some half-a-dozen of those gay lovers of London, who,
like Lilburne, remain faithful to its charms when more vulgar worshippers
desert its sunburnt streets--mostly single men--mostly men of middle age
--dropped in. And soon after came three or four high-born foreigners,
who had followed into England the exile of the unfortunate Charles X.
Their looks, at once proud and sad--their moustaches curled downward--
their beards permitted to grow--made at first a strong contrast with the
smooth gay Englishmen. But Lilburne, who was fond of French society, and
who, when he pleased, could be courteous and agreeable, soon placed the
exiles at their ease; and, in the excitement of high play, all
differences of mood and humour speedily vanished. Morning was in the
skies before they sat down to supper.
"You have been very fortunate to-night, milord," said one of the
Frenchmen, with an envious tone of congratulation.
"But, indeed," said another, who, having been several times his host's
partner, had won largely, "you are the finest player, milord, I ever
encountered."
"Always excepting Monsieur Deschapelles and--," replied Lilburne,
indifferently. And, turning the conversation, he asked one of the guests
why he had not introduced him to a French officer of merit and
distinction; "With whom," said Lord Lilburne, "I understand that you are
intimate, and of whom I hear your countrymen very often speak."
"You mean De Vaudemont. Poor fellow!" said a middle-aged Frenchman, of
a graver appearance than the rest.
"But why 'poor fellow!' Monsieur de Liancourt?"
"He was rising so high before the revolution. There was not a braver
officer in the army. But he is but a soldier of fortune, and his career
is closed."
"Till the Bourbons return," said another Carlist, playing with his
moustache.
"You will really honour me much by introducing me to him," said Lord
Lilburne. "De Vaudemont--it is a good name,--perhaps, too, he plays at
whist."
"But," observed one of the Frenchmen, "I am by no means sure that he has
the best right in the world to the name. 'Tis a strange story."
"May I hear it?" asked the host.
"Certainly. It is briefly this: There was an old Vicomte de Vaudemont
about Paris; of good birth, but extremely poor--a mauvais sujet. He had
already had two wives, and run through their fortunes. Being old and
ugly, and men who survive two wives having a bad reputation among
marriageable ladies at Paris, he found it difficult to get a third.
Despairing of the noblesse he went among the bourgeoisie with that hope.
His family were kept in perpetual fear of a ridiculous mesalliance.
Among these relations was Madame de Merville, whom you may have heard
of."
"Madame de Merville! Ah, yes! Handsome, was she not?"
"It is true. Madame de Merville, whose failing was pride, was known more
than once to have bought off the matrimonial inclinations of the amorous
vicomte. Suddenly there appeared in her circles a very handsome young
man. He was presented formally to her friends as the son of the Vicomte
de Vaudemont by his second marriage with an English lady, brought up in
England, and now for the first time publicly acknowledged. Some scandal
was circulated--"
"Sir," interrupted Monsieur de Liancourt, very gravely, "the scandal was
such as all honourable men must stigmatise and despise--it was only to be
traced to some lying lackey--a scandal that the young man was already the
lover of a woman of stainless reputation the very first day that he
entered Paris! I answer for the falsity of that report. But that report
I own was one that decided not only Madame de Merville, who was a
sensitive--too sensitive a person, but my friend young Vaudemont, to a
marriage, from the pecuniary advantages of which he was too high-spirited
not to shrink."
"Well," said Lord Lilburne, "then this young De Vaudemont married Madame
de Merville?"
"No," said Liancourt somewhat sadly, "it was not so decreed; for
Vaudemont, with a feeling which belongs to a gentleman, and which I
honour, while deeply and gratefully attached to Madame de Merville,
desired that he might first win for himself some honourable distinction
before he claimed a hand to which men of fortunes so much higher had
aspired in vain. I am not ashamed," he added, after a slight pause, "to
say that I had been one of the rejected suitors, and that I still revere
the memory of Eugenie de Merville. The young man, therefore, was to have
entered my regiment. Before, however, he had joined it, and while yet in
the full flush of a young man's love for a woman formed to excite the
strongest attachment, she--she---" The Frenchman's voice trembled, and he
resumed with affected composure: "Madame de Merville, who had the best
and kindest heart that ever beat in a human breast, learned one day that
there was a poor widow in the garret of the hotel she inhabited who was
dangerously ill--without medicine and without food--having lost her only
friend and supporter in her husband some time before. In the impulse of
the moment, Madame de Merville herself attended this widow--caught the
fever that preyed upon her--was confined to her bed ten days--and died as
she bad lived, in serving others and forgetting self.--And so much, sir,
for the scandal you spoke of!"
"A warning," observed Lord Lilburne, "against trifling with one's health
by that vanity of parading a kind heart, which is called charity. If
charity, _mon cher_, begins at home, it is in the drawing-room, not the
garret!"
The Frenchman looked at his host in some disdain, bit his lip, and was
silent.
"But still," resumed Lord Lilburne, "still it is so probable that your
old vicomte had a son; and I can so perfectly understand why he did not
wish to be embarrassed with him as long as he could help it, that I do
not understand why there should be any doubt of the younger De
Vaudemont's parentage."
"Because," said the Frenchman who had first commenced the narrative,--
"because the young man refused to take the legal steps to proclaim his
birth and naturalise himself a Frenchman; because, no sooner was Madame
de Merville dead than he forsook the father he had so newly discovered--
forsook France, and entered with some other officers, under the brave,
in the service of one of the native princes of India."
"But perhaps he was poor," observed Lord Lilburne. "A father is a very
good thing, and a country is a very good thing, but still a man must have
money; and if your father does not do much for you, somehow or other,
your country generally follows his example."
"My lord," said Liancourt, "my friend here has forgotten to say that
Madame de Merville had by deed of gift; (though unknown to her lover),
before her death, made over to young Vaudemont the bulk of her fortune;
and that, when he was informed of this donation after her decease, and
sufficiently recovered from the stupor of his grief, he summoned her
relations round him, declared that her memory was too dear to him for
wealth to console him for her loss, and reserving to himself but a,
modest and bare sufficiency for the common necessaries of a gentleman,
he divided the rest amongst them, and repaired to the East; not only to
conquer his sorrow by the novelty and stir of an exciting life, but to
carve out with his own hand the reputation of an honourable and brave
man. My friend remembered the scandal long buried--he forgot the
generous action."
"Your friend, you see, my dear Monsieur de Liancourt," remarked Lilburne,
"is more a man of the world than you are!"
"And I was just going to observe," said the friend thus referred to,
"that that very action seemed to confirm the rumour that there had been
some little manoeuvring as to this unexpected addition to the name of De
Vaudemont; for, if himself related to Madame de Merville, why have such
scruples to receive her gift?"
"A very shrewd remark," said Lord Lilburne, looking with some respect at
the speaker; "and I own that it is a very unaccountable proceeding, and
one of which I don't think you or I would ever have been guilty. Well,
and the old Vicomte?"
"Did not live long!" said the Frenchman, evidently gratified by his
host's compliment, while Liancourt threw himself back in his chair in
grave displeasure. "The young man remained some years in India, and when
he returned to Paris, our friend here, Monsieur de Liancourt (then in
favour with Charles X.), and Madame de Merville's relations took him up.
He had already acquired a reputation in this foreign service, and he
obtained a place at the court, and a commission in the king's guards. I
allow that he would certainly have made a career, had it not been for the
Three Days. As it is, you see him in London, like the rest of us, an
exile!"
"And I suppose, without a sous."
"No, I believe that he had still saved, and even augmented, in India, the
portion he allotted to himself from Madame de Merville's bequest."
"And if he don't play whist, he ought to play it," said Lilburne. "You
have roused my curiosity; I hope you will let me make his acquaintance,
Monsieur de Liancourt. I am no politician, but allow me to propose this
toast, 'Success to those who have the wit to plan, and the strength to
execute.' In other words, 'the Right Divine!'"
Soon afterwards the guests retired.