BETWEEN DUTY AND DUTY.
For a while Ellen stood silent, enjoying the luxury of a well-earned victory;
then she turned and went upstairs to Henry’s room. The first thing that
she saw was the crutch which her brother had used as a missile of war with such
effect, still lying where it had fallen on the carpet. She picked it up and
placed it by his chair.
“How do you do, Henry?” she said blandly. “I hear that you
have surpassed yourself this morning.”
“Now, look here, Ellen,” he answered, in a voice that was almost
savage in its energy, “if you have come to bait me, I advise you to give
it up, for I am in no mood to stand much more. You sent Mr. Milward up here to
insult me, and I treated him as he deserved; though now I regret that under
intolerable provocation I forgot myself so far as to condescend to violence. I
am very sorry if I have interfered with your matrimonial projects, though there
is a certain justice about it, seeing how constantly you attempt to interfere
with mine; but I could not help it. No man of honour could have borne the
things that fellow thought fit to say, and it is your own fault for encouraging
him to say them.”
“Oh, pray, my dear Henry, let us leave this cant about that after all
that has happened and is happening, the less said of honour the better. It is
quite useless for you to look angry, since I presume that you will not try to
silence me by throwing things in my face. And now let me tell you that,
although you have done your best, you have not succeeded in ‘interfering
with my matrimonial projects’ which, in fact, were never so firmly
established as they are at this moment.”
“Do you mean to say,” asked Henry in astonishment, “that the
man has put up with—well, with what I was obliged to inflict upon him,
and that you still contemplate marrying him after the way in which he has
threatened to jilt you?”
“Certainly I mean to say it. We have set the one thing against the other
and cried quits, though of course he has bargained that he shall have nothing
more to do with you, and also that, should you persist in your present conduct,
he shall not be forced to receive you at his house after our marriage.”
“Really he need not have troubled to make that stipulation.”
“We are not all fools, Henry,” Ellen went on; “and I did not
feel called upon to break an engagement that in many ways suits me very well
because you have chosen to quarrel with Edward and to use violence towards him.
Do not be afraid, Henry: I have not come here to lecture you; I come to say
that I wash my hands of you. In the interests of the family, of which you are
the head, I still venture to hope that you will repent of the past and that
better counsels may prevail as to the future. I hope, for instance, that you
will come to see that your own prosperity and good name should not be
sacrificed in order to gratify a low passion. But this is merely a pious wish
and by the way. You are a middle-aged man, and must take your own course in
life; only I decline to be involved in your ruin. If in the future I should
however be able to do anything to mitigate its consequences so far as this
property is concerned, I will do it; for I at least think more of my family
than of myself, and most of all of the dying wishes of our father. And now,
Henry, as a sister to a brother I say good-bye to you for so long as you
persist in your present courses. Henceforth when we meet it will be as
acquaintances and no more. Good-bye, Henry.” And she left the room.
“That is a pleasant speech to have to listen to,” reflected Henry
as the door closed behind her. “Of the two I really think that I prefer
Mr. Milward’s mode of address, for he can be answered, or at any rate
dealt with; but it is difficult to answer Ellen, seeing that to a great extent
she has the right on her side. What a position for a man! If I had tried, I
could not have invented a worse one. I shall never laugh again at the agonies
of a heroine placed between love and duty, for it is my own case. Or rather let
us leave the love out of it, and say that I stand between duty and duty, the
delicate problem to decide being: Which is the higher of these duties and who
shall be sacrificed?”
As he thought thus, sadly enough, there was a knock upon his door, and Lady
Graves entered the room, looking very sorrowful and dignified in her
widow’s robe.
“So I haven’t seen the worst of it,” Henry muttered.
“Well, I may as well get it over.” Then he added aloud, “Will
you sit down, mother? I am sorry that I cannot rise to receive you.”
“My boy,” she said in a low voice, “I have been thinking a
great deal of the sad scene which took place in connection with your dear
father’s death, and of my subsequent conduct towards you, and I have come
to apologise to you. I do not know the exact circumstances that led you to act
as you have done,—I may even say that I scarcely wish to know them; but
on reflection I feel that nothing but the strongest reasons or considerations
of honour would have induced you to refuse your father’s last request,
and that I have therefore no right to judge you harshly. This came home to me
when I saw you leaving the room yonder a few nights since, and your face showed
me what you were suffering. But at that time my heart was too frozen with
grief, and, I fear, also too much filled with resentment against you to allow
me to speak. If you can tell me anything that will give me a better
understanding of the causes of all this dreadful trouble, I shall be grateful
to you; for then we may perhaps consult together and find some way out of it.
But I repeat that I do not come to force your confidence. I come, Henry, to
express my regret, and to mourn with you over a husband and a father whom we
both loved dearly,”—and, moved by a sudden impulse of affection,
she bent down and kissed her son upon the forehead.
He returned the embrace, and said, “Mother, those are the first kind
words that I have heard for a long while from any member of my family; and I
can assure you that I am grateful for them, and shall not forget them, for I
thought that you had come here to revile me like everybody else. You say that
you do not ask my confidence, but fortunately a man can speak out to his mother
without shame, even when he has cause to be ashamed of what he must tell her.
Now listen, mother: as you know, I never was a favourite in this house; I dare
say through my own fault, but so it is. From boyhood everybody more or less
looked down upon me, and, with the exception of yourself, I doubt if anybody
cared for me much. Well, I determined to make my own way in the world and to
show you all that there was something in me, and to a certain extent I
succeeded. I worked hard to succeed too; I denied myself in many ways, and
above all I kept myself clear from the vices that most young men fall into in
one shape or another. Then came this dreadful business of my brother’s
death, and just as I was beginning really to get on I was asked to leave the
profession which was everything to me. From the letters that reached me I
gathered that in some mysterious way it lay in my power, and in mine alone, to
pull the family affairs out of the mire if I returned home. So I retired from
the Service and I came, because I thought that it was my duty, for hitherto I
have tried to do my duty when I could see my way to it. On the first night of
my arrival here I learned the true state of affairs from Ellen, and I learned
also what it was expected that I should do to remedy it—namely, that I
should marry a young lady with whom I had but a slight acquaintance, but who,
as it chances, is the owner of the mortgages on this estate.”
“It was most indiscreet of Ellen to put the matter like that,” said
Lady Graves.
“Ellen is frequently indiscreet, mother; but doubtless it never occurred
to her that I should object to doing what she is so ready to do for
herself—marry for money. I am glad you see, however, that her method was
not exactly calculated to prepossess any man in favour of a marriage, of which
he did not happen to have thought for himself. Still the young lady came, and I
liked her exceedingly; I liked her more than any woman that I had met before,
the one inexplicable thing about her to my mind—being why on earth she
should wish to marry me, as I understand is, or was, the case.”
“You foolish boy!” said Lady Graves, smiling a little; “do
you not understand that she had become fond of you during that week when you
were here together the year before last?”
“I can’t say that I understand it, mother, for I had not much to do
with her. But even if it is so, it does not satisfactorily explain why her
father should be equally anxious for this match. Of course I know that he has
given lots of reasons, but I cannot help thinking that there is something
behind them all. However, that is neither here nor there.”
“I fancy, Henry, that the only thing behind Mr. Levinger’s reasons
is an earnest desire for the happiness of a daughter to whom he is much
attached.”
“Well, mother, as I was saying, I took a great fancy to the girl, and
though I did not at all like the idea of making advances to a lady to whom we
are under such obligations, I determined to put my pride in my pocket, and, if
I still continued to admire her after further acquaintance, to ask her if she
would allow me to share her fortune, for I think that is an accurate way of
putting it. So I went off to stay at Monk’s Lodge, and the chapter of
troubles began. The girl who indirectly was the cause of my accident became my
nurse, and it seems that she grew attached to me, and—I grew attached to
her. It was not wonderful: you know her; she is very beautiful, she has a good
heart, and in most ways she is a lady. In short, she is a woman who in any less
prejudiced country would certainly be received into society if she had the
means to enter it. Well, so things went on without anything remarkable
happening, until recently.” And he repeated to her fairly and fully all
that had passed between himself and Joan.
“Now, mother,” he said, “I have made my confession to you,
and perhaps you will understand how it came about that, fresh from such scenes,
and taken as I was utterly by surprise, I was unable to promise what my father
asked. I do not know what your judgment of my conduct may be; probably you
cannot think of it more harshly than I do myself, and in excuse of it I can
only say that the circumstances were strange, and, as I have discovered, I love
the woman. What, therefore, is my duty towards her?” “Did you ever
promise to marry her, Henry?” “Promise? Yes, I said that I would;
for, as you know, I am a bit of a puritan, although I have little right to that
title now, and it seemed to me that marriage was the only way out of the
trouble.”
“Does she expect you to marry her, then?”
“Certainly not. She declares that she would not allow it on any
consideration. But this goes for nothing, for how can I take advantage of her
inexperience and self-sacrificing folly? You have the whole facts: what do you
think that I should do?”
“Henry, I am older than you are; I have seen a great deal of life, and
perhaps you, who are curiously unworldly, may think me the reverse. I accept
your story as it stands, well knowing that you have told me the exact truth,
without hiding anything which would weigh against yourself; and on the face of
that story, I cannot say that I consider it to be your duty to marry this poor
girl, with whom, through your own weakness and folly, you have placed yourself
in such false relations though undoubtedly it is your duty to do everything in
your power to provide for her. If you had deliberately set yourself to lead her
astray, the case might be different; only, were you capable of such
conduct—which I know that you are not—you would not now be
tormented by doubts as to your duty towards her. You talk of Joan Haste’s
‘inexperience.’ Are you sure that this is so? The whole history of
her conduct seems to show experience, and even art, or at any rate a knowledge,
very unusual in a girl of her age and position, of how best to work upon a
man’s tenderness and to move his feelings. That art may have been
unconscious, an art which Nature gave her; and that knowledge may have been
intuitive, for of course all things are possible, and I can only judge of what
is probable. At least it is clear that she never expected that you would marry
her, because she knew that such an act would bring you to ruin, and I respect
her for her honesty in this particular.”
“Should a man shrink from his duty because duty means disaster,
mother?”
“Not if it _is_ his duty, perhaps, Henry; but in the present case
that, to say the least of it, is not proved. I will answer your question by
another: Should a man neglect many undoubted duties, among them that of obeying
the dying petition of his father, in order to indulge his conscience with the
sense that he has fulfilled one which is open to doubt? Henry, I do not wish to
push you about this matter, for I see that, even if you do not love Joan Haste
so much as you think, at the least you are strongly attracted to her; also I
see that your self-questionings are honest, and that you are anxious to do what
is right, independently of the possible consequences to yourself. But I do pray
of you not to be led away, and, if you can avoid it, not to see this girl again
at present. Take time to consider: one month, two, three, as you like; and in
the meanwhile do not commit yourself beyond redemption. Remember all that is at
stake; remember that a man in your position is not entirely his own master. Of
myself I will not speak. Why should I? I am old, and my day is done; such years
as remain to me I can drag out in obscurity without repining, for my memories
are enough for me, and I have little care left for any earthly advantage. But
of your family I do not venture to speak. It has been here so long, and your
father loved this place so well, that it breaks my heart to think of its going
to the hammer—after three centuries,”—and the old lady turned
her head and wiped her eyes furtively, then added: “And it will go to the
hammer—it must. I know Mr. Levinger well; he is a curious man, and
whatever his real reasons may be, his mind is set upon this marriage. If he is
disappointed about it, he will certainly take his remedy; indeed, he is bound
to do so, for the money at stake is not his, but his daughter’s.”
“You tell me to take three months to consider, mother; but, looking at
the matter from the family point of view, how am I to do this? It seems that we
have scarcely a sixpence in the world, and a heavy accumulation of debt. Where
is the money to come from to enable us to carry on for another three
months?”
“Beyond the overdue interest there are not many floating liabilities,
Henry, for I have always made it a practice to pay cash. Of course, when the
farms come on hand at Michaelmas the case will be different, for then, unless
they can be let in the meantime, a large sum of money must be found to pay the
covenants and take them over, or they must go out of cultivation. Till then,
however, you need have no anxiety, for, as it chances, at the moment I have
ample funds at command.”
“Ample funds! Where do they come from?”
“Of all my fortune, Henry, there remained to me my jewels, the diamonds
and sapphires that my grandmother left me, which she inherited from her
grandmother. They should have gone to Ellen, but when our need was pressing,
rather than trouble your poor father any more, I sold them secretly. They
realized between two and three thousand pounds—about half their value, I
believe—of which I have a clear two thousand left. Do not tell Ellen of
this, I pray you, for she would be very angry, and I do not feel fit to bear
any scenes at present. And now, my dear, it is luncheon time, so I think that I
will leave you, hoping that you will consider the advice which I have ventured
to give you.” And again she kissed him affectionately and left the room.
“Sold her jewels!” thought Henry, “the jewels that she valued
above any possession in the world! My poor mother! And if I marry this girl, or
do not marry the other, what will her end be? The workhouse, I suppose, unless
Milward gives her a home out of charity, or I can earn sufficient to keep her,
of which I see no prospect. Indeed, I begin to think that she is right, and
that my first duty is owing to my family. And yet how can I abandon Joan? Or if
I do, how can I marry Emma Levinger with this affair upon my hands, begun since
I became acquainted with her? Oh! what an unhappy man am I! Well, there is one
thing to be said,—my evil doing is being repaid to me full measure,
pressed down and running over. It is not often that punishment follows so hard
upon the heels of error.”