LAID WITH HIS FOREFATHERS.
So great a man as Sir Richard Yorke must of course be honoured with a
great funeral. He had died on a Thursday; the interment was fixed for
the next Friday week: which, taking the heat of the weather and sundry
other trifles into consideration, was a little longer than it need
have been. Sir Vincent, his new dignity as head of the Yorke family
lying upon him with a due and weighty self-importance, was determined
(like Jonas Chuzzlewit of wide memory) that the public should see he
did not grudge to his late father any honour in the shape of plumes
and mutes and coaches and show, that it was in his power to accord to
him. There were three costly coffins, one of them of lead, and at the
very least three and sixty sets of towering feathers. So that Portland
Place was as a gala that day, and windows and pavements were alike
filled with sight-gazers.
The Rev. William Yorke, Minor Canon of Helstonleigh Cathedral,
Chaplain of Hazledon, and Rector of Coombe Lee, was bidden to it. He
was not very nearly related to the deceased (his father and Sir
Richard had been second cousins), but he was undoubtedly a rising man
in the Church, and Sir Vincent thought fit to remember the connection.
The clergyman stood in the relationship of brother-in-law to Hamish
Channing; and it was at Hamish's house he stayed during the brief
stay--two days--of his sojourn in town.
Another, honoured with an invitation, was Gerald Yorke. Roland was not
of a particularly exacting disposition, but he did think he, the
eldest, ought not to have been passed over for his younger brother.
Oughts don't go for much, however, in some things, as Roland knew.
Gerald belonged to the great world: he had, fashionable chambers,
fashionable friends, fashionable attire, and a fashionable drawl; his
private embarrassments were nothing to Sir Vincent; in fact they might
be said to be fashionable too: and so Gerald, the consequential, was
bidden to a seat in a mourning-coach, with feathers nodding on the
four horses' heads.
Roland was ignored. Not more entirely so than if Sir Vincent had never
heard there was such a man in the world. A lawyer's clerk, enjoying a
pound a week and a turn-up bedstead, who took copying home to do at
twopence a page, and avowed he had just been nearly on the point of
turning hot-pie vendor, was clearly not an individual fit to be
suffered in contact with a deceased baronet, even though it were only
to follow him to the tomb of his forefathers. But, though Roland was
not there, his master was Mr. Greatorex. And Mr. Greatorex, as
solicitor and confidential man of business to the late Sir Richard,
occupied no unimportant post in the procession.
It was late in the afternoon; and the mortal remains, bereft of all
their attendant pomp and plumes and scutcheons had been left in their
resting-place, when a mourning coach drew up to Mr. Channing's, out of
which stepped William and Gerald Yorke. Roland, happening to be there,
watched the descent from the drawing-room window side by side with
Nelly Channing, and it may be questioned which of the two looked on
with the more unsophisticated interest. Mr. Greatorex had not been
quite so unmindful of Roland's claims to be considered as Sir Vincent
was, and had told him he might take holiday on the day of his uncle's
funeral, by remaining away from the office.
Roland obeyed one portion of it literally--the taking _holiday_. It
never occurred to Roland that he might turn the day to profit, by
putting his shoulder to the wheel, and his fingers to copying; holiday
was holiday, and he took it as such. Rigged out in a handsome new suit
of black (made in haste by Lord Carrick's tailor), black gloves, and a
band of cloth on his hat, Roland spent the forepart of the day in
sightseeing. As many showplaces as could be gone into for nothing, or
next to nothing, he went to; beginning with Madame Tussaud's waxwork,
for which somebody gave him admission, and ending with a live giantess
down in Whitechapel. Late in the afternoon, and a little tired, he
arrived at Hamish Channing's, and was rewarded by seeing Annabel. Mrs.
Bede Greatorex (gracious that day) had given Miss Channing permission
to spend the evening there to meet her sister's husband, the Rev.
William Yorke. Hamish, just in from his office, sat with them. Nelly
Channing, her nose flattened against the windowpane, shared with
Roland the delight of the descent from the coach. Its four black
horses and their lofty plumes, struck on the child's mind with a
sensation of awe that nearly overpowered the admiration. She wore a
white frock with black sash, and had her sleeves tied up with black
ribbons. Mrs. Channing, herself in black silk, possessed a large sense
of the fitness of things, and deemed it well to put the child in these
ribbons today, when two of the mourners would be returning there from
the funeral.
They came upstairs, William and Gerald Yorke, and entered the
drawing-room, the silk scarves on their shoulders, and the flowing
hat-bands of crape sweeping the ground. Nelly backed into a corner,
and stood there staring at the attire. It was the first time the
clergyman and Roland had met for many years. As may have been gathered
during back pages, Roland did not hold his cousin in any particular
admiration, but he knew good manners (as he would himself have phrased
it) better than to show aught but civility now. In fact, Roland's
resentment was very much like that of a great many more of us--more
talk than fight. They shook hands, Roland helped him to take off the
scarf, and for a few moments they were absorbed in past interests.
Whatever Roland's old prejudices might have been he could not deny
that the Rev. William Yorke was good-looking as of yore; a tall,
slender, handsome man of four-and-thirty now, bearing about him the
stamp of a successful one; his fresh countenance was genial and kind,
although a touch of the noted Yorke pride sat on it.
That pride, or perhaps a consciousness of his own superiority, for
William Yorke was a good man and thought well of himself for it,
prevented his being so frankly cordial with Roland as he might have
been. Roland's many faults in the old days (as the clergyman had
deemed them), and the one great fault which had brought humiliation to
him in two ways, were very present to his mind tonight. Slighting
remarks made by Gerald on his brother during the day, caused Mr. Yorke
to regard Roland as no better than a mauvais sujet, down in the world,
and not likely to get up in it. Gerald, on the contrary, he looked
upon as a successful and rising man. Mr. Yorke saw only the surface of
things, and could but judge accordingly.
"How is Constance?" enquired Roland. "I sent her word not to marry
you, you know."
"Constance is well and happy, and charged me to bring you a double
share of love and good remembrances," answered the clergyman, slightly
laughing.
"Dear old Constance! I say," and Roland dropped his voice to a
mysterious whisper, "is not Annabel like her? One might think it the
same face."
Mr. Yorke turned and glanced at Annabel--she was talking apart with
Gerald. "Yes, there is a good deal of resemblance," he carelessly said,
rather preoccupied with marvelling how the young man by his side came
to be so well dressed.
Roland, his resentments shallow as the wind, and as fleet in passing,
would have shaken hands with Gerald as a matter of course. Gerald
managed to evade the honour without any apparent rudeness; he had the
room to greet and his silk scarf to unwind, and it really seemed to
Roland that it was quite natural he should be overlooked.
"A magnificent funeral," spoke Gerald, glancing askance at Roland's
fine suit of mourning, every whit as handsome as his own. "Seven
mourning coaches-and-four, and no end of private carriages."
"But I can't say much for their manners, they did not invite me," put
in Roland. "I'm older than you, Gerald."
"Aw--ah--by a year or two," croaked Gerald in his worst tone, as to
affectation and drawl. "One has, I take it, to--aw--consider the
position of a--aw--party on these--aw--occasions, not how old they may
be."
"Oh, of course," said Roland, some slight mockery in his good-natured
voice. "You are a man of fashion, going in for white-bait and iced
champagne, and I'm only an unsuccessful fellow returned like a bad
shilling, from Port Natal, and got to work hard for my bread and
cheese and beer."
As the hour of William Yorke's return from the funeral was uncertain,
but expected to be a late one, it had been decided that the meal
prepared should be a tea-dinner--tea and cold meats with it. Gerald
was asked to remain for it. A few minutes, and they were seated in the
dining-room at a well-spread board, Mrs. Channing presiding; Hamish,
with his bright face, his genial hospitality, and his courtly manners,
facing her. Roland and Annabel were on one side, the clergyman and
Gerald on the other. Miss Nelly, on a high chair, wedged herself in
between her mamma and Roland.
"Treason!" cried Hamish. "Who said little girls were to be at table?"
"Mamma did," answered quick Nelly. "Mamma said I should have a great
piece of fowl and some tongue."
"Provided you were silent, and not troublesome," put in Mrs. Channing.
"I'll keep her quiet," said Roland. "Nelly shall whisper only to me."
Miss Nelly's answer was to lay her pretty face close to Roland's. He
left some kisses on it.
Gerald sat next to Hamish and opposite to Annabel. Remembering the
state of that gentleman's feelings towards Mr. Channing, it may be
wondered that he condescended to accept his hospitality. Two reasons
induced him to it. Any quarters were more acceptable than his own just
now, and he had no invitation for the evening, even had it been decent
to show himself in the great world an hour after leaving his uncle in
the grave. The other reason was, that he was just now working some ill
to Hamish, and, wished to appear extra friendly to avert suspicion.
"I hope you have not dined, Roland," remarked Hamish, supplying him
with a large plate of pigeon-pie.
"Well, I have, and I've not," replied Roland, beginning upon the
tempting viand. "I bought three sausage-rolls at one o'clock, down
east way: it would have been my dinner but for this."
Gerald flicked his delicate cambric handkerchief out of his pocket and
held it for a moment to his nose, as if he were warding off some bad
odour that brought disgust to him. Sausage-rolls! Whether they, or the
unblushing candour of the avowal were the worst, he hardly knew.
"Sausage-rolls must be delicacies!" he observed with a covert sneer.
And Roland looked across.
"They are not as good as pigeon-pie. But they cost only twopence
apiece: and I had but sixpence with me. I have to regulate my appetite
according to my means," he added with a pleasant laugh and his mouth
full of crust and gravy.
"Roland--as you have, in a manner touched upon the subject--I should
like to ask what you think of doing," interposed William Yorke, in a
condescending but kindly tone. "You seem to have no prospects
whatever."
"Oh I shall get along," cheerfully answered Roland with a side glance
at Miss Channing. "Perhaps you'll see me in housekeeping in a year's
time from this."
"In housekeeping!"
"Yes: with a house of my own--and, something else. I'm not afraid. I
have begun to put my shoulder to the wheel in earnest. If I don't get
on, it shall not be from lack of working for it."
"How have you begun to put your shoulder to the wheel?"
"Well--I take home copying to do in my spare time after office hours.
I have been doing it in earnest over three weeks now."
"And how much do you earn at it weekly?" continued William Yorke.
A slight depression from its bright exultation passed over Roland's
ingenuous face. Hamish saw it, and laughed. Hamish was quite a
confidant, for Roland carried to him all his hopes and their tiresome
drawbacks.
"I can tell you: I added it up," said Roland. "Taking the three weeks
on the average, it has been two-and-twopence a week."
"Two-and-twopence a week!" echoed William Yorke, who had expected him
(after the laudatory introduction) to say at least two pounds two.
Roland detected the surprise and disappointment.
"Oh, well, you know, William Yorke, a fellow cannot expect to make
pounds just at first. What with mistakes, when the writing has to be
begun all over again, and the paying for spoilt paper, which Brown
insists upon, two-and-twopence is not so much amiss. One has to make a
beginning at everything."
"Are you a good hand at accounts?" enquired Mr. Yorke, possibly in the
vague notion that Roland's talents might be turned to something more
profitable than the copying of folios.
"I ought to be," said Roland. "If the counting up, over and over and
over again, of those frying-pans I carried to Port Natal, could have
made a man an accountant, it must have made one of me. I used to be at
it morning and evening. You see, I thought they were going to sell for
about eight-and-twenty shillings apiece, out there: no wonder I often
reckoned them up."
"And they did not!"
"Law, bless you! In the first place nobody wanted frying-pans, and I
had to get a Natal store-keeper to house them in his place for me--I
couldn't leave them on the quay. But the time came that I was obliged
to sell them: they were eating their handles off."
"With rust, I suppose."
"Good gracious, no! with _rent_, not rust. The fellow (they are
regular thieves, over there) charged me an awful rent: so I told him
to put them into an auction. Instead of the eight-and-twenty shillings
each that I had expected to get, he paid me about eight-and-twenty
pence for the lot, case and all. But if you ask whether I am a ready
reckoner, William Yorke, I'm sure I must be that."
The Rev. William Yorke privately thought there might be a doubt
upon the point. He fancied Roland's present prospects could not be
first-rate.
"The copying is nothing but a temporary preliminary," observed Roland.
"I am waiting to get a place under Government. Vincent Yorke I expect
can put me up for one, now he has come into power; and I don't think
he'll want the will, though he did pass me over today."
If ever face expressed condemnatory contempt, Gerald's did, as he
turned it fall on his brother. For, this very hope was being cherished
by himself. It was he who intended to profit by the interest of Sir
Vincent, to be exerted on his behalf. And to have a rival in the same
field, although one of so little account as Roland, was not agreeable.
"The best thing _you_ can do, is to go off again to Port Natal," he
said roughly. "You'll never get along here."
"But I intend to get along, Gerald. Once let me have a fair start--and
I have never had it yet--there's not many shall distance me."
"What do you call a fair start?" asked Mrs. Channing, who always
enjoyed Roland's sanguine dreams.
"A place where I can bring my abilities into use, and be remunerated
accordingly. I don't ask better than to work, and be paid for it. Only
let me earn a couple of hundreds a year to begin with, Mrs. Channing,
and you'd never hear me ask Vincent Yorke or anybody else for help
again."
"You had not used to like the prospect of work, Roland," spoke William
Yorke.
"But then I had not had my pride and laziness knocked out of me at
Port Natal."
William Yorke lifted his eyes. "Did that happen to you?"
"It did," emphatically answered Roland. "Oh, I shall get into
something good by-and-by, where my talents can find play. Of all
things, I should best like a farm."
"A farm!"
"A nice little farm. And if I had a few hundred pounds, I'd take one
tomorrow. Do you know anything of butter-making, Annabel?" he stopped
to ask, dropping his voice.
Annabel bent her blushing face over her plate, and pretended not to
hear. Roland thought she was offended.
"I didn't mean make it, you know," he whispered; "I'd not like to see
you do such a thing"--bringing his face back again to the general
company. "But it's of little good thinking of a farm, you see, William
Yorke, when there's no money to the fore."
"You don't know anything of farming," said Mr. Yorke, inwardly
wondering whether this appeal to Annabel had meant anything, or was
only one of Roland's thoughtless interludes of speech.
"Don't I?" said Roland; "I was on one for ever so long at Port Natal,
and had to drive pigs. It is astonishing the sight of experience a
fellow picks up over there, and the little he learns to live upon."
"Because he has to do it, I suppose."
"That's the secret. I am earning a pound a week now, regular pay, and
make it do for all my wants. You'd not think it, would you, William
Yorke?"
"Certainly not, to look at you," said William Yorke, with a smile.
"Are clothes included?"
"Oh, Carrick goes bail for all that. I'm afraid he'll find the bills
running up; but a fellow, if he's a gentleman, must look decent. I'm
as careful as I can be, and sit in my shirtsleeves at home when it's
hot."
"Lady Augusta has visions of your walking about London streets in a
coat out at elbows. I think it troubles her."
Roland paused, stared, and then started up in impulsive contrition,
nearly pulling off the table-cloth.
"What a thoughtless booby I was, never to let her know! The minute you
get down home, you go to her, William Yorke. Tell her how it is--that
I have the run of Carrick's people for clothes, boots, hats, and all
the rest of it. This suit came home at eight this morning, with an
apology for not sending it last night--the fellow thought I might be
going to the funeral--and a sensible thought too! Look at it!"
stretching out his arms, and turning himself about, that Mr. Yorke
might get a comprehensive view of the superfine frock-coat and silken
linings. "I'm never worse dressed than this: only that my things are
not on new every day. You tell the mother this, William Yorke."
He had not done it in vanity; of that Roland possessed as little as
any one; but in eager, earnest desire to reassure his mother, and
atone to her for his ungrateful forgetfulness. Stooping for his table
napkin, he at down again.
"Yes, I am well-dressed, though I do have to work. And for recreation,
there's this house to come to; and dear old Hamish and Mrs. Channing
receive me with gladness and make much of me, just as though I had
always been good, and Nelly jumps into my arms."
"When do you mean to come to Helstonleigh?"
"Never," answered Roland, with prompt decision. "As I can't go back as
I wanted to--rich--I shall not go at all. What I wish to ask is, when
Arthur Channing is coming up here?"
"Arthur Channing! I cannot tell."
"It is a shame of people to get a fellow's hopes up, and then damp
them. Arthur wrote me word--oh, a month ago--that he was coming to
London on business for old Galloway. Close nearly upon that, comes a
second letter, saying Galloway was not sure that he should require to
send him. I _should_ like to serve him out."
William Yorke smiled. "Serve out Arthur?"
"Arthur! I'd like to draw Arthur round the old city in a car of
triumph, as we used to chair our city members. I mean that wretch of a
Galloway. He ought to be taken up for an impostor. Why did he go and
tell Arthur he should send him to London, if he didn't mean to?"
Gerald Yorke let his fork fall in a semi-passion, and nearly chipped
the beautiful plate of Worcester china: was _all_ the conversation to
be monopolised by Roland and his miserable interests? It was high time
to interfere. Picking up the fork with an air, he cleared his throat.
"Sir Vincent comes into about four thousand a-year, entailed property.
We went in to hear the will read by old Greatorex. It's not much, is
it?"
"Not to one reared to the notions Vincent Yorke has been," said
Hamish. "But he has more than that, I presume?"
"Some odds and ends, I believe: I asked Greatorex. And there's the
little homestead down in Surrey. Sir Richard's liabilities die with
him. Perhaps he had wiped them off beforehand?"
"I'm sure he had," said Roland, with good-natured warmth. "Oh, we hear
a good deal in our office. As to four thousand a-year being little for
one man, you should have been at Port Natal, Gerald, and you'd
estimate it differently."
"To a man about town, like myself, it seems a starvation pittance,
considering what Sir Vincent will have to do out of it," returned
Gerald loftily, speaking to any at table, rather than to his brother.
"That's just it," said Roland. "If I were a man about town, and had
not been out to Port Natal and learnt the value of money, it might
seem so to me. Dick won't find it enough, I daresay. I should think a
rent of four hundred a-year riches!"
Gerald curled his lip. "No doubt; and some pigs to drive."
"I'd like a pig, Roland," cried Nelly Channing, turning to him, and
unconsciously creating a diversion. "A pretty little pig, with blue
ribbons."
"As pretty as you," said Roland, squeezing her. "You mean a
guinea-pig, little stupid. As to driving pigs, Gerald--it's not a very
good employment of course; but you see I had to do what I was put
to--or starve."
"I'd rather starve than do it," retorted Gerald. "And so would any one
with the instincts of a gentleman."
"You only go out there and try what starving is; you'd t good-humour
ell a different tale," said Roland, maintaining his good-humour.
"Starving there means starving."
Some one of those turns in conversation, which occur so naturally,
brought round the subject to Mr. Ollivera. Roland, imparting sundry
revelations of his home-life at Mrs. Jones's--or, as he called her
still, Mrs. Jenkins--mentioned the clergyman's name.
"Don't you mean to call and see him?" he asked of William Yorke.
"You'd better."
But Mr. Yorke declined. "My time in London is so very short," he said;
"I go home tomorrow. Besides, I have really no acquaintance with Mr.
Ollivera. We never met but on one occasion."
"When you lent him your surplice," spoke Roland. And William Yorke
looked up in surprise.
"What do you know about it?"
"Oh, I know a great deal," returned Roland. "I say--why did you not
attend that night yourself? You promised."
"I did not promise. All I said was that I would consider of it. Upon
reflection, I thought it better not to go. The circumstances were very
peculiar; and the Dean, had he come to know of it, might have taken me
to task."
"Not he," said independent Roland. "The Dean's made of sterling gold."
"What sort of a chanter does Tom make?" enquired Hamish.
"Very fair; very fair, indeed," replied William Yorke, some patronage
in his tone, meant for the absent young minor canon. Consciously vain
of his own excellence in chanting, Mr. Yorke could but accord
comparative praise to Tom Channing's. The vanity was not without
cause; Mr. Yorke's sweet and sonorous voice was wont to fill the
aisles of the old cathedral with its melody.
Just as the tea was over, one of the servants came in with a folded
weekly review hot from the press on her silver waiter, and presented
it to her master. Hamish opened it with a slight apology, and was
glancing at its pages, when he folded it again with a sudden movement
and quietly put it in his pocket. His sight, in the moment's happy
confusion, partially faded; a bright hectic lighted his cheek; his
whole heart leaped up within him, as with a rushing, blissful sense of
realized hope. For he had seen that a review of his book was there.