THE LONG ODDS ARE LAID.
A man must be very peculiarly constituted--indeed, there must be
something wrong about his organization--if he does not entertain a
certain partiality for his female cousins, even to the third and fourth
generation. But the same remark by no means applies to the brothers of
those attractive kinswomen. Your male cousin either stands first and
foremost on the list of your friends, or you are absolutely uninterested
in his existence. There _are_ instances of family feuds, of course, but
these, nowadays, are comparatively rare. The intercourse between Alan
Wyverne and Max Vavasour had never gone deeper than common careless
courtesy. It was not to be wondered at. Both were in the best society,
but they lived in different sets, meeting often, but seldom coming in
actual contact. Just so, they say, the regular passengers by the
parallel lines of rail converging at London-bridge recognise familiar
faces daily as they speed along side by side, though each may remain to
the other "nameless, nameless evermore." Besides this, the tastes of the
cousins were as dissimilar as their characters; for the mere fact of two
men being extravagant by no means establishes a real sympathy between
them.
Alan's favourite pursuits you know already. Max was lady Mildred
reproduced, with the exception of her great talents, which he had not
fully inherited; but he had the same cool calculating brain, with whose
combinations the well-disciplined heart never interfered. This, added to
a perfect unscrupulousness of thought and action, many diplomatists
besides Vavasour have found to be a very fair substitute for unerring
prescience and profound sagacity. Both morally and physically he was
wonderfully indolent, and, doing most things well, rarely attempted
anything involving the slightest exertion. His shooting was remarkably
good; but two or three hours of a battue about the time of the best
_bouquets_, or a couple of turnip-fields swarming with birds, round
which the stubbles had been driven for miles, were about the extent of
his patience or endurance. As for going out for a real wild day after
partridges, or walking a quaking bog after snipe, or waiting for ducks
at "flight time," he would just as soon have thought of climbing the
Schreckhorn. He rode gracefully, and his hand on a horse was perfection;
but he had not hunted since he was eighteen, and his hacks, all
thoroughbreds with good action, were safe and quiet enough to carry a
Premier. He especially affected watching other men start for cover on
one of those raw drizzling mornings which sometimes turn out well for
hunting, but in every other point of view are absolutely detestable. It
was quite a picture to see him return to his breakfast, and dally over
it with a leisurely enjoyment, and settle himself afterwards into the
easiest of lounging chairs, close to the library fire, with a pile of
French novels within reach of his hand. Occasionally, during the course
of the morning, he would lay aside his book, to make some such
reflective remark as--
"Pours still, doesn't it? About this time Vesey's reins must be
thoroughly soaked and slippery. I wonder how he likes riding that
pulling mare of his. And I should think Count Casca has more mist on his
spectacles than he quite fancies. It's a very strongly enclosed country,
I believe, and the ditches are proverbially deep. He must have 'left all
to his vife' before this."
And then he would resume his reading, with a shrug of his shoulders,
intimating as plainly as words could speak, intense self-congratulation,
and contempt for those who were out in the weather. Yet it was not nerve
in which Max was deficient. Twice already--he was scarcely
twenty-six--his life had been in mortal peril; once at Florence, where
he had got into a bad gambling quarrel, and again in a fearful railway
accident in England. On both occasions he had shown a cool, careless
courage, worthy of the boldest of the valiant men-at-arms whose
large-limbed effigies lined the galleries at Dene. In thews and stature
and outward seeming he was but a degenerate descendant of that stalwart
race, for he was scarcely taller than his sister, and had inherited his
mother's smooth dark complexion and delicate proportions. That same
indolence, it must be owned, told both ways, and went far to neutralize,
for evil as well as for good, the effect of the calculating powers
referred to. He had a certain obstinacy of will, and was troubled with a
few inconvenient scruples, but wanted initiative energy to entangle
himself or others in any of those serious scrapes which are not to be
settled by money. So far, Max Vavasour's page in the _Chronique
Scandaleuse_ was a blank.
The heir of Dene and his friends arrived so late, that they had barely
time to dress for dinner. No private conference took place, apparently,
between the mother and son that evening; but the latter joined the
others very late in the smoking-room. It is scarcely to be presumed that
the doffing of _la grande tenue_ and the donning of an elaborately
embroidered suit of purple velvet, would consume forty-five minutes; so
that half an hour remained unaccounted for, during which interval
probably the boudoir was witness to a few important confidences.
Max was rather fond of his sister, after his own fashion, and never
vexed or crossed her if he could help it; so when they spoke of her
engagement on the following morning, he not only forbore to reproach her
with its imprudence, but expressed himself hopefully and kindly enough
to satisfy Helen's modest expectations. She knew her brother too well to
anticipate expansiveness or enthusiasm from _that_ quarter. To Alan he
was, naturally, much less cordial in his congratulations; indeed, it was
only by courtesy that they could be called congratulations at all. Max
had a soft, quiet way of saying unpleasant things--truths or the
reverse--that some people rather liked, and others utterly abhorred. On
the present occasion he did not scruple to confess frankly his opinion
as to the undesirability of the match, to which the other listened with
at least equal composure.
"I wish I had not gone to Scotland," Vavasour went on, reflectively. "I
do believe I could have stopped it, if I had only been on the spot, or
forewarned. I needn't say, I have no prejudices against you
personally--nobody _has_ any such weaknesses nowadays"--(how very old
the young face looked as he said it); "but it's a simple question of
political expediency. I may be very fond of Switzerland or Belgium; but,
as an ally, I should much prefer France or Russia. The Squire has told
you, of course? Things are going hard with us just now. I doubt if the
smash can be staved off much longer. A _very_ great match might just
have stood between us and ruin; and Helen would have had the chance of
it, I am certain. _You_ know that, as well as any one. There is
something peculiar about her style of beauty. I am not infatuated about
her because she is my sister; but I swear, there was not a woman in
London fit to be compared with her last season, and I don't know that I
ever saw one--except, perhaps, Nina Lenox in her best days. By the body
of Bacchus! we might have had our choice of all the eligibles in
England!"
"Including Clydesdale, for instance,"--Wyverne remarked.
There was a smile on his lip, but no mirth in his eyes, which fastened
on his cousin's with a piercing earnestness hard to encounter. Not a
muscle of Max's face moved, his pale cheek never flushed for an instant,
and he returned the other's glance quite as steadily.
"Including Clydesdale,"--he answered, in his grave, gentle tones. "Of
course, that would have been the very connexion one would have liked. I
should have tried to make up the match, if you had not unfortunately
come in the way, and I should do so still if anything were to happen to
you. Don't suppose I am going to have you poisoned, or that I shall
shoot you by accident, or machinate against you in any way whatever; but
life is very uncertain; and--my dear Alan--you do ride remarkably hard."
Wyverne laughed merrily, without the slightest affectation or
bitterness. Perhaps he had never liked his companion better than at that
moment.
"By heaven, Max," he said--contemplating the philosopher not without
admiration--"you're about the coolest hand I know. I don't believe
there's another man alive, who would speculate on the advantages
contingent on his cousin's breaking his neck, to the face of the said
unlucky relation. I've hardly the heart to disappoint you, but--I don't
think I shall hunt much this season. I suppose you wouldn't allow
Clydesdale to buy Red Lancer, if Vesey does not take him? Ah! I thought
not. Seriously--I admit all your objections--and more; but I exhausted
my penitence with 'my lady' and the Squire, who appreciated it better
than you would do. What would you have? All are not born to be martyrs.
I quite allow that I ought never to have tried to win Helen; but I'm not
self-denying enough to give her up. I shall keep her, if I can."
"Of course you will," the other replied, resignedly. "Well, I have said
my say, and now things must take their course. _I_ am passive. I hope
the event may be better than the prospect; but I shall give myself no
trouble till the crash comes--nor then, if I can help it. _You_ seem to
get on rather better since you were ruined. By the bye, there's no
chance, I suppose, of that old ruffian, Haldane's, dying and relenting?
My lady told me about his letter--at least, as much as you chose to tell
her."
Wyverne shook his head, but had not time to answer, for at that moment
they joined the rest of the shooting-party, who were at luncheon. Max
had only come out just in time to have this talk with his cousin; but he
remained with them for a couple of hours in the afternoon, seemed in
capital spirits, and never shot better in his life.
I will try to sketch the scene, in the cedar drawing-room at Dene, on
the fourth evening after the arrival of fresh guests. They are the only
addition, so far, to the family party, though more are expected
incontinently.
Helen Vavasour is at the piano, and close to her side, on a low chair,
placed so that his head almost touches her shoulder, sits Alan Wyverne.
He has behaved perfectly to-day, never attempting to monopolize his
_fiancee_, not even securing a place near her when she came out to meet
the shooting-party at luncheon; apparently he thinks he has a right to
indemnify himself for a brief space now. It is rather a brilliant piece
she is playing, but not so difficult as to interfere with a murmured
conversation, evidently very pleasant and interesting to both parties.
The Squire and the Rector are playing their everlasting piquet, which
has been going on for nearly a score of years, and is still undecided.
It is a very good match, and both are fair players, though each is
disposed privately to undervalue his adversary's science, characterizing
him as "the best card-holder in Europe." The great difference is that
Vavasour looks at a bad hand with a cheerful unconcern, whereas Geoffry
Knowles knits his brow, and bites his lip, when luck is running against
him, and has never learnt to dissemble his discontent or discomfiture.
Lady Mildred is reclining on her own peculiar sofa, and, on a stool
close to her elbow, lounges Bertie Grenvil--better known as "The Cherub"
in half the fast coteries of London, and throughout the Household
Brigade.
It is a very fair face to look upon, shaded by masses of soft, sunny
silken hair, and lighted up by large, eloquent eyes of the darkest blue.
It would be almost faultless, were it not for the extreme effeminacy,
which the delicately trained moustache fails to redeem. He is one of "my
lady's" prime favourites; she has assisted him ere this with her
countenance and counsel, when such help was sorely needed; for it is a
wild, wicked little creature--reckless and enterprising as Richelieu in
his pagehood--always gambling and love-making, in places where he has no
earthly business to risk his money or his heart. With those smooth
pink-and-white cheeks, and plaintive manner, and innocent ways of his,
The Cherub has done more mischief already than a dozen years of
perpetual penance could atone for. At this moment he is confiding to "my
lady" the hopes and fears of his last _passion malheureuse_, suppressing
carefully the name of the object--a very superfluous precaution, for
Lady Mildred has guessed it long ago, and can afford to be
amused--innocently. She knows, what Bertie does not wot of, that his
pursuit will be absolutely _theoretical_ and fruitless.
Very near them, lounges Max Vavasour. He looks up, ever and anon, from
that eternal _novelette_, and as his eye meets his mother's, a quick
glance of intelligence passes between them. It is more than probable
that he has been, told off for "interior and picket duty" this evening,
but the time for action has not yet come.
Only two of the party remain to be noticed. They are sitting together,
rather remote from the rest, and somewhat in the shadow. We will take
the younger man first, though his appearance is not exactly attractive.
His features, naturally coarse and exaggerated, bear evident traces of
self-indulgence, if not of intemperance; that cruel sensual mouth would
spoil a better face, and the effect of an unpleasantly sanguine
complexion is rather heightened than relieved by crisp, strong reddish
hair, coming low down on the heavy forehead, and framing the pendulous
cheeks; his big, ungainly frame is far too full and fleshy for his
years; one solitary sign of "race" shows itself in his hands, somewhat
large, but perfectly shaped. Yet, if the possessor of all these personal
disadvantages were to enter any London drawing-room side by side with
Bertie Grenvil, and it were a question of being warmly welcomed, the
odds would be heavily against the Guardsman. I wish an "alarum and
flourish of trumpets" were available to accompany the announcement of so
august a name. That is no other than Raoul, tenth Earl of Clydesdale,
Viscount Artornish, lord of a dozen minor baronies, and Premier _Parti_
of England.
His income varies by tens of thousands, according to the price of divers
minerals, but never falls short of the colossal. He owns broad lands and
manors in nearly every county north of the Tyne; and, when he came of
age four years ago, the border-side blazed with as many bale-fires, as
ever were lighted in old days to give warning that the lances of
Liddesdale were out on the foray. Ever since he left college, the
match-makers of Great Britain have been hard on his trail; and his
movements, as chronicled in the _Post_, are watched with a keener
interest than attaches to the "progress" of any royal personage. He is
so _terribly_ wealthy that even the great city financiers speak of his
resources with a certain awe; for, independently of his vast income,
there are vague reports of accumulations, varying from a quarter to half
a million. His father died when the present Earl was in his cradle.
There is nothing very remarkable, outwardly, about the other man.
Harding Knowles has rather a disappointing face: you feel that it ought
to have been handsome, and yet that is about the last epithet you would
apply to it. The features individually are good, and there is plenty of
intellect about them, though the forehead is narrow; but the general
expression is disagreeable--something between the cunning and the
captious. There is a want of repose, just now, about his whole
demeanour--a sort of fidgety consciousness of not being in his right
place; he is always changing his position restlessly, and his hands are
never still for a moment. He had been Clydesdale's "coach" at Oxford for
two or three terms, and had acquired a certain hold on the latter's
favour, chiefly by the exercise of a brusque, rough flattery, which the
Earl chose to mistake for sincerity and plain speaking.
No parasite can be perfect, unless he knows when to talk and when to
hold his tongue. Knowles had mastered that part of the science,
thoroughly. On the present occasion he saw that the silent humour
possessed his patron, and was careful not to interrupt the lordly
meditations; only throwing in now and then a casual observation
requiring no particular answer. No one dreams of deep drinking nowadays
in general society; but the Earl has evidently taken quite as much
claret as was good for him--enough to make him obstinate and savage.
That pair at the piano seem to fascinate him strangely. He keeps
watching every movement of Wyverne's lips, and every change in Helen's
colour, as if he would guess the import of their low earnest words. A
far deeper feeling than mere curiosity is evidently at work. It is well
that the half-closed fingers shade his eyes just now, for they are not
good to meet--hot and blood-shot, with a fierce longing and wrathful
envy. Not an iota of all this escaped Harding Knowles; but he allowed
the bad brutal nature to seethe on sullenly, till he deemed it was time
to work the safety-valve.
"A pretty picture," he said at last, with rather a contemptuous glance
in the direction of the lovers--Clydesdale ground out a bitter blasphemy
between his teeth; but the other went on as if he had heard
nothing--"Yes, a very pretty picture; and Sir Alan Wyverne deserves
credit for his audacity. But I can't help feeling provoked, at such a
rare creature being so perfectly thrown away. If ever there was a woman
who was born to live in state, she sits there; and they will have to be
pensioners of the Squire's, if they want anything beyond necessaries.
It's a thousand pities."
"You mean she might have made a better match?" the other asked: he felt
he must say something, but he seemed to speak unwillingly, and his
voice, always harsh and guttural, sounded thicker and hoarser than
usual.
"Yes, I am sure she might have made a better match: I _think_ she might
have made--the best in England."
Knowles spoke very slowly and deliberately, almost pausing between each
of the last words. His keen steady gaze fastened on Clydesdale, till the
Earl's fierce blue eyes sank under the scrutiny, and the flush on his
cheek deepened to crimson.
"What the d--l's the use of talking about that now?" he grumbled out,
"now that it's all over and settled?"
"Settled, but not all over. I'm not fond of betting as a rule; but I
should like to take long odds--_very_ long odds, mind, for Wyverne's
dangerous when he is in earnest--that the engagement never comes off."
Lord Clydesdale paused quite a minute in reflection. There was a wicked
crafty significance in the other's look that he could not misunderstand.
"I don't know what you call long odds," he said at last, "but I'll lay
_you_ five thousand to fifty that it is not broken off within the year."
There are men, not peculiarly irascible or punctilious, who would have
resented those words and the tone in which they were spoken as a direct
personal insult; but Knowles was not sensitive when it was a question of
his own advantage or advancement, and had sucked in avarice with his
mother's milk.
"I'll book that bet," he answered, coolly. "I take all chances in. Sir
Alan might die, you know, before the year is out; or Miss Vavasour might
come to her senses."
So he wrote it down carefully on his ivory tablets, affixing the date
and his initials. They both knew it--he was signing a bond, just as
effectually as if it had been engrossed on parchment and regularly
witnessed and sealed. But neither cared to look the other in the face
now. In the basest natures there lingers often some faint useless
remnant of shame. I fancy that Marcus rather shrank from meeting his
patron's glance, when he went out from the Decemvir's presence to lay
hands on Virginius's daughter.
While this conversation was going on, Max Vavasour had roused himself
from his easy chair, and strolled over towards the piano. It is probable
that he had got his orders from "my lady's" eloquent eye. As he came
near, Wyverne drew back slightly, with a scarcely perceptible movement
of impatience, and Helen stopped playing. They both guessed that her
brother had not disturbed himself without a purpose.
"It's a great shame to interrupt you, Alan," Max said; "but one has
certain duties towards one's guests, I believe; and you might help me
very much, if you would be good-natured. You see, all this isn't much
fun for Clydesdale; and I want to keep him in good humour, if I
can--never mind why. He's mad after _ecarte_ just now, and he has heard
that you are a celebrity at it. He asked me to-day if I thought you
would mind playing with him? I would engage him myself with pleasure;
but it would be no sport to either party. He knows, just as well as you
do, how infamously I play."
Wyverne very seldom refused a reasonable request, and he was in no mood
to be churlish.
"What must be, must be," he replied, with a sigh of resignation. "If the
Great Earl is to be amused, and no other martyr is available, thy
servant is ready, though not willing. I thought I had lost enough in my
time at that game. It is hard to have to lose, now, such a pleasant seat
as this. Tell him I'll come directly. I suppose he don't want to gamble?
He has two to one the best of it, though, when he has made me stir from
here. Helen, perhaps you would not mind singing just one or two songs? I
am Spartan in my tastes so far: I like to be marshalled to my death with
sweet music."
So the two sat down, at the _ecarte_ table. Clydesdale betrayed an
eagerness quite disproportionate to the occasion when Max Vavasour
summoned him to the encounter. He suggested that the stakes should be a
"pony" on the best of eleven games: to this Alan demurred.
"I have given up gambling now," he said; "but, even when I played for
money, I never did so with women in the room. A pony is a nominal stake
with you, of course: with me, it is different. You may have ten on, if
you like. I only play one rubber."
The other assented without another word, and the battle began. The Earl
was far from a contemptible adversary; but he was palpably over-matched.
Wyverne had held his own before this with the best and boldest of half
the capitals in Europe. He played carelessly at first, for his thoughts
were evidently elsewhere; but got interested as the game went on, and
developed all the science he possessed: it carried him through one or
two critical points against invariably indifferent cards. At last they
were five games all, and were commencing "_la belle_." Max, Harding
Knowles, and Bertie Grenvil (who never could keep away from a
card-table, unless some extraordinary potent counter-excitement were
present) had been watching the match from the beginning; the last having
invested 11--10 on Wyverne--taken by Clydesdale eagerly. The cards ran
evenly enough. By dint of sheer good play Alan scored three to his
opponent's two. As he was taking up his hand in the next deal, Miss
Vavasour came up softly behind him, and leant her arm on the high carved
back of his chair. She felt sure that her cousin would win, and wanted
to share even in that trivial triumph. I wonder how often in this world
women have unconsciously baulked the very success they were most anxious
to secure? Alan held the king and the odd trick certain; but, if his
life had depended on the issue, he could not have helped looking up into
the glorious dark eyes to thank them for their sympathy. At that moment
his adversary played first, and Wyverne followed suit, without marking.
It was one of those fatal _coups_ that Fortune never forgives. The next
deal Clydesdale turned up the king, and won the _vole_ easily.
Even Max Vavasour, who knew him well, and had seen him play for
infinitely larger stakes, was astonished at the excitement that the Earl
displayed; he dashed down the winning card with an energy which shook
the table, and actually glared at his opponent with a savage air of
exultation, utterly absurd and incomprehensible under the circumstances.
Alan leant back in his chair, regarding the victor's flushed cheek and
quivering lips with an amused smile, not wholly devoid of sarcasm.
"On my honour, I envy you, Clydesdale," he said quietly; "there's an
immense amount of pleasure before you. Only conceive the luxury of being
able to gratify such a passion for play as yours must be, without danger
of ruin! I never was so interested about anything in my life as you were
about that last hand; and bad cards for ten years, at heavy stakes,
would only get rid of some of your superfluous thousands."
The exultation faded from the Earl's face, and it began to lower
sullenly. He felt that he had made himself ridiculous, and hated Wyverne
intensely for having made it more apparent.
"You don't seem to understand that we were playing for love," he
muttered. "I had heard so much of your play, that I wanted to measure
myself against it, and I was anxious to win. It appears that the great
guns miss fire sometimes, like the rest of us."
"Of course they do," Wyverne answered, cheerfully. "Not that I am the
least better than the average. But we are all impostors from first to
last."
The party broke up for the night almost immediately afterwards. Alan
laughed to scorn all his fair cousin's penitential fears about "her
having interrupted him just at the wrong moment." It is doubtful if he
ever felt any self-reproach for his carelessness, till Bertie Grenvil
looked up plaintively in his face, as the two were wending their way to
the smoking-room.
"Alan, I _did_ believe in your _ecarte_," he said.
There was not much in the words, but the Cherub uttered them with the
air of a man to whom so wonderfully few things are left to believe in,
that the defalcation of one of those objects of faith is a very serious
matter indeed.
Yet Wyverne was wrong, and did his adversary in some sort injustice,
when he supposed that the spirit of the gambler accounted altogether for
the latter's eagerness and excitement. Other and different feelings were
working in Lord Clydesdale's heart when he sat down to play. One of
those vague superstitious presentiments that men are ashamed to confess
to their dearest friends shot across him at the moment. He had said
within himself--"It is my luck against his, not only now, but hereafter.
If I win at this game, I shall beat him at others--at _all_." So you
see, in the Earl's imagination, much more was at issue than the nominal
stakes; and there was a double meaning in his words--"We were playing
_for love_."