The question which disturbed Frances, which nobody knew or cared for,
was just as little likely to gain attention next day as it had been on
the evening of Mr Winterbourn’s death. Lady Markham returned to Nelly
before breakfast; she was with her most of the day; and Markham, though
he lent an apparent attention to what Frances said to him, was still far
too much absorbed in his own subject to be easily moved by hers. “Gaunt?
Oh, he is all right,” he said.
“Will you speak to him, Markham? Will you warn him? Mr Ramsay says he is
losing all his money; and I know, oh Markham, I _know_ that he has not
much to lose.”
“Claude is a little meddler. I assure you, Fan, Gaunt knows his own
affairs best.”
“No,” cried Frances: “when I tell you, Markham, when I tell you! that
they are quite poor, _really_ poor--not like you.”
“I have told you, my little dear, that I am the poorest beggar in
London.”
“Oh Markham! and you drive about in hansoms, and smoke cigars, all day.”
“Well, my dear, what would you have me do? Keep on trudging through the
mud, which would waste all my time; or get on the knife-board of an
omnibus? Well, these are the only alternatives. The omnibuses have their
recommendation--they are fun; but after a while, society in that
development palls upon the intelligent observer. What do you want me to
do, Fan? Come, I have a deal on my mind; but to please you, and to make
you hold your tongue, if there is anything I can do, I will try.”
“You can do everything, Markham. Warn him that he is wasting his
money--that he is spending what belongs to the old people--that he is
making himself wretched. Oh, don’t laugh, Markham! Oh, if I were in your
place! I know what I should do--I would get him to go home, instead of
going to--those places.”
“Which places, Fan?”
“Oh,” cried the girl, exasperated to tears, “how can I tell?--the places
you know--the places you have taken him to, Markham--places where, if
the poor General knew it, or Mrs Gaunt----”
“There you are making a mistake, little Fan. The good people would think
their son was in very fine company. If he tells them the names of the
persons he meets, they will think----”
“Then you know they will think wrong, Markham!” she cried, almost with
violence, keeping herself with a most strenuous effort from an outburst
of indignant weeping. He did not reply at once; and she thought he was
about to consider the question on its merits, and endeavour to find out
what he could do. But she was undeceived when he spoke.
“What day did you say, Fan, the funeral was to be?” he asked, with the
air of a man who has escaped from an unwelcome intrusion to the real
subject of his thoughts.
Sir Thomas found her alone, flushed and miserable, drying her tears
with a feverish little angry hand. She was very much alone during these
days, when Lady Markham was so often with Nelly Winterbourn. Sir Thomas
was pleased to find her, having also an object of his own. He soothed
her, when he saw that she had been crying. “Never mind me,” he said;
“but you must not let other people see that you are feeling it so much:
for you cannot be supposed to take any particular interest in
Winterbourn: and people will immediately suppose that you and your
mother are troubled about the changes that must take place in the
house.”
“I was not thinking at all of Mrs Winterbourn,” cried Frances, with
indignation.
“No, my dear; I knew you could not be. Don’t let any one but me see you
crying. Lady Markham will feel the marriage dreadfully, I know. But now
is our time for our grand _coup_.”
“What grand _coup_?” the girl said, with an astonished look.
“Have you forgotten what I said to you at the Priory? One of the chief
objects of my life is to bring Waring back. It is intolerable to think
that a man of his abilities should be banished for ever, and lost not
only to his country but his kind. Even if he were working for the good
of the race out there---- But he is doing nothing but antiquities, so
far as I can hear, and there are plenty of antiquarians good for nothing
else. Frances, we must have him home.”
“Home!” she said. Her heart went back with a bound to the rooms in the
Palazzo with all the green _persiani_ shut, and everything dark and
cool: it was getting warm in London, but there were no such precautions
taken. And the loggia at night, with the palm-trees waving majestically
their long drooping fans, and the soft sound of the sea coming over the
houses of the Marina--ah, and the happy want of thought, the pleasant
vacancy, in which nothing ever happened! She drew a long breath. “I
ought not to say so, perhaps; but when you say home----”
“You think of the place where you were brought up? That is quite
natural. But it would not be the same to him. He was not brought up
there; he can have nothing to interest him there. Depend upon it, he
must very often wish that he could pocket his pride and come back. We
must try to get him back, Frances. Don’t you think, my dear, that we
could manage it, you and I?”
Frances shook her head, and said she did not know. “But I should be very
glad--oh, very glad: if I am to stay here,” she said.
“Of course you would be glad; and of course you are to stay here. You
could not leave your poor mother by herself. And now that Markham--now
that probably everything will be changed for Markham---- If Markham were
out of the way, it would be so much easier; for, you know, he always was
the stumbling-block. She would not let Waring manage him, and she could
not manage him herself.”
Frances was so far instructed in what was going on around her, that she
knew how important in Markham’s history the death of Mr Winterbourn had
been; but it was not a subject on which she could speak. She said: “I am
very sorry papa did not like Markham. It does not seem possible not to
like Markham. But I suppose gentlemen---- Oh, Sir Thomas, if he were
here, I would ask papa to do something for me; but now I don’t know who
to ask to help me--if anything can be done.”
“Is it something I can do?”
“I think,” she said, “any one that was kind could do it; but only not a
girl. Girls are good for so little. Do you remember Captain Gaunt, who
came to town a few weeks ago? Sir Thomas, I have heard that something
has happened to Captain Gaunt. I don’t know how to tell you. Perhaps you
will think that it is not my business; but don’t you think it is your
friend’s business, when you get into trouble? Don’t you think that--that
people who know you--who care a little for you--should always be ready
to help?”
“That is a hard question to put to me. In the abstract, yes; but in
particular cases---- Is it Captain Gaunt for whom you care a little?”
Frances hesitated a moment, and then she answered boldly: “Yes--at least
I care for his people a great deal. And he has come home from India,
not very strong; and he knew nothing about--about what you call Society;
no more than I did. And now I hear that he is--I don’t know how to tell
you, Sir Thomas--losing all his money (and he has not any money) in the
places where Markham goes--in the places that Markham took him to. Oh,
wait till I have told you everything, Sir Thomas! they are not rich
people,--not like any of you here. Markham says he is poor----”
“So he is, Frances.”
“Ah,” she cried, with hasty contempt, “but you don’t understand! He may
not have much money; but they--they live in a little house with two
maids and Toni. They have no luxuries or grandeur. When they take a
drive in old Luca’s carriage, it is something to think about. All that
is quite, quite different from you people here. Don’t you see, Sir
Thomas, don’t you see? And Captain Gaunt has been--oh, I don’t know how
it is--losing his money; and he has not got any--and he is
miserable--and I cannot get any one to take an interest, to tell him--to
warn him, to get him to give up----”
“Did he tell you all this himself?” said Sir Thomas, gravely.
“Oh no, not a word. It was Mr Ramsay who told me; and when I begged him
to say something, to warn him----”
“He could not do that. There he was quite right; and you were quite
wrong, if you will let me say so. It is too common a case, alas! I don’t
know what any one can do.”
“Oh, Sir Thomas! if you will think of the old General and his mother,
who love him more than all the rest--for he is the youngest. Oh, won’t
you do something, try something, to save him?” Frances clasped her
hands, as if in prayer. She raised her eyes to his face with such an
eloquence of entreaty, that his heart was touched. Not only was her
whole soul in the petition for the sake of him who was in peril, but it
was full of boundless confidence and trust in the man to whom she
appealed. The other plea might have failed; but this last can scarcely
fail to affect the mind of any individual to whom it is addressed.
Sir Thomas put his hand on her shoulder with fatherly tenderness. “My
dear little girl,” he said, “what do you think I can do? I don’t know
what I can do. I am afraid I should only make things worse, were I to
interfere.”
“No, no. He is not like that. He would know you were a friend. He would
be thankful. And oh, how thankful, how thankful I should be!”
“Frances, do you take, then, so great an interest in this young man? Do
you want me to look after him for your sake?”
She looked at him hastily with an eager “Yes”--then paused a little, and
looked again with a dawning understanding which brought the colour to
her cheek. “You mean something more than I mean,” she said, a little
troubled. “But yet, if you will be kind to George Gaunt, and try to help
him, for my sake---- Yes, oh, yes! Why should I refuse? I would not have
asked you if I had not thought that perhaps you would do it--for me.”
“I would do a great deal for you; for your mother’s daughter, much; and
for poor Waring’s child; and again, for yourself. But, Frances, a young
man who is so weak, who falls into temptation in this way--my dear, you
must let me say it--he is not a mate for such as you.”
“For me? Oh no. No one thought--no one ever thought----” cried Frances
hastily. “Sir Thomas, I hear mamma coming, and I do not want to trouble
her, for she has so much to think of? Will you? Oh, promise me. Look for
him to-night; oh, look for him to-night!”
“You are so sure that I can be of use?” The trust in her eyes was so
genuine, so enthusiastic, that he could not resist that flattery. “Yes,
I will try. I will see what it is possible to do. And you, Frances,
remember you are pledged, too; you are to do everything you can for me.”
He was patting her on the shoulder, looking down upon her with very
friendly tender eyes, when Lady Markham came in. She was a little
startled by the group; but though she was tired and discomposed and out
of heart, she was not so preoccupied but what her quick mind caught a
new suggestion from it. Sir Thomas was very rich. He had been devoted to
herself, in all honour and kindness, for many years. What if
Frances----? A whole train of new ideas burst into her mind on the
moment, although she had thought, as she came in, that in the present
chaos and hurry of her spirits she had room for nothing more.
“You look,” she said with a smile, “as if you were settling something.
What is it? An alliance, a league?”
“Offensive and defensive,” said Sir Thomas. “We have given each other
mutual commissions, and we are great friends, as you see. But these are
our little secrets, which we don’t mean to tell. How is Nelly, Lady
Markham? And is it all right about the will?”
“The will is the least of my cares. I could not inquire into that, as
you may suppose; nor is there any need, so far as I know. Nelly is quite
enough to have on one’s hands, without thinking of the will. She is very
nervous and very headstrong. She would have rushed away out of the
house, if I had not used--almost force. She cannot bear to be under the
same roof with death.”
“It was the old way. I scarcely wonder, for my part: for it was never
pretended, I suppose, that there was any love in the matter.”
“Oh no” (Lady Markham looked at her own elderly knight and at her young
daughter, and said to herself, What if Frances----?); “there was no
love. But she has always been very good, and done her duty by him--that,
everybody will say.”
“Poor Nelly!--that is quite true. But still I should not like, if I were
such a fool as to marry a young wife, to have her do her duty to me in
that way.”
“You would be very different,” said Lady Markham with a smile. “I should
not think you a fool at all; and I should think her a lucky woman.” She
said this with Nelly Winterbourn’s voice still ringing in her ears.
“Happily, I am not going to put it to the test. Now, I must go--to look
after your affairs, Miss Frances; and remember that you are pledged to
look after mine in return.”
Lady Markham looked after him very curiously as he went away. She
thought, as women so often think, that men were very strange,
inscrutable--“mostly fools,” at least in one way. To think that perhaps
little Frances---- It would be a great match, greater than Claude
Ramsay--as good in one point of view, and in other respects far better
than Nelly St John’s great marriage with the rich Mr Winterbourn. “I am
glad you like him so much, Frances,” she said. “He is not young--but he
has every other quality; as good as ever man was, and so considerate and
kind. You may take him into your confidence fully.” She waited a moment
to see if the child had anything to say; then, too wise to force or
precipitate matters, went on: “Poor Nelly gives me great anxiety,
Frances. I wish the funeral were over, and all well. Her nerves are in
such an excited state, one can’t feel sure what she may do or say. The
servants and people happily think it grief; but to see Sarah Winterbourn
looking at her fills me with fright, I can’t tell why. _She_ doesn’t
think it is grief. And how should it be? A dreadful, cold, always ill,
repulsive man. But I hope she may be kept quiet, not to make a scandal
until after the funeral at least. I don’t know what she said to you, my
love, that day; but you must not pay any attention to what a woman says
in such an excited state. Her marriage has been unfortunate (which is a
thing that may happen in any circumstances), not because Mr Winterbourn
was such a good match, but because he was such a disagreeable man.”
Frances, who had no clue to her mother’s thoughts, or to any
appropriateness in this short speech, had little interest in it. She
said, somewhat stiffly, that she was sorry for poor Mrs Winterbourn--but
much more sorry for her own mother, who was having so much trouble and
anxiety. Lady Markham smiled upon her, and kissed her tenderly. It was a
relief to her mind, in the midst of all those anxious questions, to have
a new channel for her thoughts; and upon this new path she threw herself
forth in the fulness of a lively imagination, leaving fact far behind,
and even probability. She was indeed quite conscious of this, and
voluntarily permitted herself the pleasant exercise of building a new
castle in the air. Little Frances! And she said to herself there would
be no drawback in such a case. It would be the finest match of the
season; and no mother need fear to trust her daughter in Sir Thomas’s
hands.
Sir Thomas came back next morning when Lady Markham was again absent. He
informed Frances that he had gone to several places where he was told
Captain Gaunt was likely to be found, and had seen Markham as usual
“frittering himself away;” but Gaunt had nowhere been visible. “Some one
said he had fallen ill. If that is so, it is the best thing that could
happen. One has some hope of getting hold of him so.” But where did he
live? That was the question. Markham did not know, nor any one about.
That was the first thing to be discovered, Sir Thomas said. For the
first time, Frances appreciated her mother’s business-like arrangements
for her great correspondence, which made an address-book so necessary.
She found Gaunt’s address there; and passed the rest of the day in
anxiety, which she could confide to no one, learning for the first time
those tortures of suspense which to so many women form a great part of
existence. Frances thought the day would never end. It was so much the
more dreadful to her that she had to shut it all up in her own bosom,
and endeavour to enter into other anxieties, and sympathise with her
mother’s continual panic as to what Nelly Winterbourn might do. The
house altogether was in a state of suppressed excitement; even the
servants--or perhaps the servants most keenly of any, with their quick
curiosity and curious divination of any change in the atmosphere of a
family--feeling the thrill of approaching revolution. Frances with her
private preoccupation was blunted to this; but when Sir Thomas arrived
in the evening, it was all she could do to curb herself and keep within
the limits of ordinary rule. She sprang up, indeed, when she heard his
step on the stair, and went off to the further corner of the room, where
she could read his face out of the dimness before he spoke; and where,
perhaps, he might seek her, and tell her, under some pretence. These
movements were keenly noted by her mother, as was also the alert air of
Sir Thomas, and his interest and activity, though he looked very grave.
But Frances did not require to wait for the news she looked for so
anxiously.
“Yes, I am very serious,” Sir Thomas said, in answer to Lady Markham’s
question. “I have news to tell you which will shock you. Your poor young
friend Gaunt--Captain Gaunt--wasn’t he a friend of yours?--is lying
dangerously ill of fever in a poor little set of lodgings he has got. He
is far too ill to know me or say anything to me; but so far as I can
make out, it has something to do with losses at play.”
Lady Markham turned pale with alarm and horror. “Oh, I have always been
afraid of this! I had a presentiment,” she cried. Then rallying a
little: “But, Sir Thomas, no one thinks now that fever is brought on by
mental causes. It must be bad water or defective drainage.”
“It may be--anything; I can’t tell; I am no doctor. But the fact is, the
young fellow is lying delirious, raving. I heard him myself--about
stakes and chances and losses, and how he will make it up to-morrow.
There are other things too. He seems to have had hard lines, poor
fellow, if all is true.”
Frances had rushed forward, unable to restrain herself. “Oh, his mother,
his mother--we must send for his mother,” she cried.
“I will go and see him to-morrow,” said Lady Markham. “I had a
presentiment. He has been on my mind ever since I saw him first. I
blame myself for losing sight of him. But to-morrow----”
“To-morrow--to-morrow; that is what the poor fellow says.”