supped downstairs with Miss Esperance at seven o'clock. He was the most
unpunctual of mortals, and when he first came, infuriated Elsa by
sometimes forgetting to eat any lunch at all. But when he discovered
that these lapses really distressed Miss Esperance, he schooled himself
to keep as nearly as possible to the appointed hours. He was never late
for supper, for that would have been discourteous to Miss Esperance, and
he was incapable of discourtesy; but he did allow himself a certain
amount of laxity with regard to lunch. As for breakfast--ever since the
coming of the children he had been a model of punctuality, for they woke
him up so uncommonly early.
When he entered his room after the walk with Montagu, he found his lunch
all ready set on the round table in the middle of the room. This table
was sacred to meals, and he was not permitted to pile it with books and
papers. Hence, he was wont to regard its oaken emptiness between whiles
with a wistful envy. It was so much good space wasted. His lunch was
always very nicely laid, and to-day there was cold beef, thin dainty
slices adorned with parsley by Elsa's careful hand, and beside the beef
stood a covered vegetable dish. Mr. Wycherly sat down at the table,
poured out a glass of ale from the little Toby jug set at his right hand
and mechanically lifted the cover of the dish. Potatoes were in that
dish, and at the sight of them he rose hastily from the table. He went
over to his big, knee-hole desk, and sitting down in front of it said
aloud: "And all these years she has been digging potatoes for me!"
Like a tired schoolboy he leaned forward, his arms upon his desk, laid
his head down on them, and the room was very still.
When Elsa went in to take away the dishes, he had gone out: but his
lunch was untouched. She shook her head ominously, and went and turned
down his bed, though it was only early afternoon.
Mr. Wycherly walked and walked till he was quite worn out. He got back
to the house about four o'clock, crawled up to his room, and sank quite
exhausted into his big chair by the window. All afternoon Elsa had been
watching for him, and three minutes after his return she followed him
upstairs bearing a little tray on which were set a cup of tea and a
plate of most tempting-looking scones. She didn't even knock at his
door, but went straight in, pushed the round table up to his elbow and
laid the little tray upon it. She took up her stand at the window with
her back to Mr. Wycherly, remarking fiercely: "From this place I'll not
stir till you've taken that tea."
She did not even add the usual tardy "sir," and Mr. Wycherly was so
startled that he never noticed the omission. He drank the tea, and ate
two scones, and all the time Elsa stood with her back to him looking out
of the window.
Presently he touched her on the arm. "I am very much obliged to you,
Elsa," he said. "I think I must have forgotten to eat as much lunch as
usual, I was so extremely tired, but I feel much refreshed now."
Elsa grunted something quite inaudible, took the tray off the table,
and, still with averted head, stumped out of the room.
But the fates had not done with Mr. Wycherly that day. As he and Miss
Esperance sat down to supper, Montagu, who for some reason was rather
later than usual in going to bed, came in to say good night to them. He
first kissed his aunt, who sat at one end of the table, then went to
kiss Mr. Wycherly who sat at the other. Having said good night, of
course he lingered, leant confidingly against his tutor, and in the
universal fashion of children who would fain put off the evil hour of
bed, remarked detachedly: "You've got chops. Aunt Esperance has only
got an egg. Don't you like chops, Aunt Esperance? I do, much better
than eggs."
Mr. Wycherly dropped back in his chair, looking painfully distressed.
For a moment there was a dreadful pause, but the beautiful breeding of
Miss Esperance stood her in good stead even then.
"Do you know," she exclaimed, as though a sudden thought had struck her,
"I feel unusually hungry to-night. I think I will defy my doctor for
once, and take a chop after all, Mr. Wycherly."
And Miss Esperance handed up her little plate for the chop which Mr.
Wycherly joyfully placed upon it. But now came another difficulty.
Miss Esperance, who had eaten a boiled egg at this hour nearly every
night for some twenty years, had no fork.
"Montagu, my son," she said cheerfully, "run and ask Elsa for a fork for
me."
No man ever existed who cared less about eating than Mr. Wycherly.
Whatsoever was set before him, that he ate meekly and without
comment--if he remembered. He always offered to help Miss Esperance
from whatever dish was set before him at supper, and she as invariably
refused it. It would have seemed to him an unwarrantable piece of
interference even so indirectly to criticise her housekeeping as to
suggest what she should eat. But to-day there had occurred something
which had entirely shaken him out of his usual patient acquiescence in
existing conditions: so that, when Montagu pointed out that his fare was
so much better than that of Miss Esperance, he was seized by a new
anguish of self-reproach. Had he, all these years, been living
luxuriously?--that is how poor Mr. Wycherly put it to himself--while
she, who with her frail little hands had pulled him forcibly back from
the abyss into which he was so surely slipping, had she been living
sparely, and he never even noticed whether she had enough to eat? In
his misery he was ready to accuse himself of having starved Miss
Esperance that he might go full-fed himself.
It was rather a silent meal. Miss Esperance did her best to start
topics of interest, but his response, though never lacking in urbane
attention, was somewhat half-hearted and depressed.
When he had gone upstairs to his own room, Miss Esperance waited with
the little bell, which summoned Elsa, still in her hand till that good
woman appeared, when she asked anxiously: "Elsa, do you know if anything
has occurred to upset Mr. Wycherly? He is not looking at all well
to-night."
Elsa shook her head. "I dinna ken, mem, what it'll be, but he never
touched his denner, and when he came back this afternoon he looked like
he'd been greetin' and greetin' sair."
Elsa paused; Miss Esperance made no answer, but stood still, looking at
the lamp on the table, lost in thought.
"It's no the old thing," Elsa added suddenly, lowering her voice.
Miss Esperance put out her hand as if warding off a blow. "Of course
not," she exclaimed. "I am surprised, Elsa, that you should so far
forget yourself as to refer, to--that time--so long ago, so entirely
passed."
The little lady seemed in some subtle fashion to withdraw herself to an
immense distance from the homely serving-woman who stood fingering her
apron and saying nothing. She knew that she had offended her mistress,
and when Miss Esperance was offended, she, usually the gentlest and
friendliest of women, became quite unapproachable. She left the room
with her usual noiseless tread, and for a good five minutes after she
had gone Elsa stood where she was, still fingering her apron and
wondering what she could do to make amends.
Mr. Wycherly sat at his knee-hole table far into the night. From the
recesses of a drawer that had been locked for years he brought forth
papers; long, legal-looking papers, and set himself, for the first time
since he came to live with Miss Esperance, to look into his financial
position. He made many notes and his brow was furrowed by care and
thought, for his brain lent itself with difficulty to the understanding
of figures. Still he persevered, and gradually his expression became
less pained and perplexed. For once he did not leave his papers
scattered all over the table. He arranged them neatly in bundles and
put them back again into the drawer and locked it.
When he had finished these unusually orderly arrangements, he pulled up
the blind of Montagu's window and looked out toward Arthur's Seat. It
was a moonlight night, and something of the large peace of that majestic
hill seemed to pass into his soul, for his gentle, scholarly face was no
longer troubled, and he whispered as if in prayer: "Thank God, I can at
least do that for her. Thank God!"
The tender moonbeams touched Mr. Wycherly's hair, white since he was
seven and twenty, to purest silver, and there seemed a benediction in
that quiet hour for the little house that held so much of innocence and
sorrow and repentance.
*CHAPTER VII*
*ELSA DRIVES THE NAIL HOME*
And toward such a full or complete life, a life of various yet select
sensation, the most direct and effective auxiliary must be, in a word,
Insight.--MARIUS THE EPICUREAN.
When Elsa came to clear away Mr. Wycherly's breakfast next morning she
shut the door carefully behind her and stumped--never had woman a
heavier foot than Elsa--across to his writing-table, where she stood
facing him in silence.
Mr. Wycherly was, as usual, bent over a book, and the book was Roger
Ascham's "Schoolmaster." It was his habit ever since he had begun to
teach Montagu to read therein for a few minutes every morning that he
might start the lessons for the day in a frame of mind "fresh and
serenely disposed."
When Elsa planted herself full in his view he had just reached the
sentence describing the sixth virtue in a scholar: "He that is naturally
bold to ask any question," and was smiling to himself in the thought
that both his pupil and the small Edmund fulfilled this condition to the
very letter, when he looked up and saw Elsa.
"Sir," said Elsa, "do ye not want an account of your money?"
"No, Elsa," Mr. Wycherly answered, smiling still, although a little
startled by the interruption, "not in the least. I probably should not
understand it if you gave it to me. Do you want any more? Because, if
so, I have some for you." And Mr. Wycherly made as if to open one of
the drawers of his table.
"Stop!" Elsa exclaimed, "I've five pound yet, but I'm fear'd. I'd
rather you had it back."
"But why?" Mr. Wycherly asked. "There must be many expenses, many extra
expenses since the children came----"
"When the bairnies came," said Elsa, looking severely at Mr. Wycherly,
"you gave me three ten-pound notes, and ever since I've been deceiving
the mistress. Twenty-five pounds have I spent in groceries and odds and
ends, and she so surprised--like that the bairns didna' mak' so great a
difference--and I just daurna gae on. I'm fear'd. If she was ever to
ken--and she's that gleg in the uptak, she'll ken somehow, an' it's me
she'll blame, and no you."
Elsa's voice broke. The favour of her mistress was very precious to
her, and as yet she could not feel that Miss Esperance had quite
forgiven her for her indiscretion of the night before. Mr. Wycherly had
obtained quite a large sum of money for the valuable books he sold when
he and Miss Esperance went to fetch the children, and on their return he
had given thirty pounds to Elsa, bidding her get any extras that might
be necessary, without troubling her mistress. At the time Elsa had
taken the money willingly enough, for she felt that it would be more
usefully expended in her hands than if Mr. Wycherly kept it. "He'll
just waste it on some haver of a bit book," she said to herself, and
salved her conscience with this reflection; and it had, undoubtedly,
tided the little household over a difficult time. But now, she felt,
this cooking of the household books could not go on. It must come to an
end with the money, and her mistress would wonder why, all at once, the
weekly expenses had increased so mightily. Searching inquiries would be
made. Elsa knew that she could not lie to Miss Esperance, and she came
to the conclusion that as the money was his, it would be better that Mr.
Wycherly should make the necessary explanation and bear the blame. She
would be his accomplice in this innocent deception no longer.
Therefore did she take from her pocket a screw of paper which she
unfolded, displaying the five sovereigns wrapped in it, and laid them
down on Mr. Wycherly's desk in a row.
"I can give an account for every penny of the twenty-five pound," said
Elsa, turning away from the table, "and you maun just tell her the
truth--sir. The tradesman's books'll be gey and big this week," she
added, significantly.
Mr. Wycherly leant back in his chair and gazed helplessly at Elsa, who
was now removing his breakfast things with her customary clatter. She
would not meet his eye, for an uneasy feeling that she had "gone back on
him" to a certain extent, disturbed her, and she was more than usually
unapproachable in consequence.
She had finished clearing the table and was about to depart with the
tray when Mr. Wycherly spoke: "Elsa," he said, "you had better take this
money and use it as you did the other. You are quite right that Miss
Esperance must know. It is an impertinence on our part to do anything
without her knowledge: but I hope--I sincerely hope that in the future
Miss Esperance will permit me to act as guardian to her great-nephews in
more than name; that she will give me the _right_ to take my share--in
whatever may be necessary. But be reassured as to this, Elsa, I will
not allow you to be blamed for what, after all, was wholly my fault: a
grievous fault in taste, I confess: but it was done hastily, and, to be
quite candid, I had wholly forgotten the circumstance until you very
properly reminded me of it."
Mr. Wycherly spoke earnestly, and while he was talking Elsa had laid
down the tray again on the centre table. She made no answer to this
unusually long speech from him, but stood with her hard old face set
like a flint, wholly expressionless, till she remarked suddenly and
irrelevantly: "Could you tak' your breakfast at eight o'clock instead o'
nine, sir?"
"Certainly," Mr. Wycherly replied, rather astonished at this abrupt,
change of subject, "if you will be kind enough to call me rather
earlier. Those little people wake me in excellent time."
"Would you let the mistress come here to her breakfast wi' you?"
Mr. Wycherly rose to his feet. "Do you think Miss Esperance would so
far honour me, Elsa?"
Elsa and Mr. Wycherly stood looking at one another across the room.
Suddenly she bent her eyes upon the carpet and spoke in a low,
monotonous voice.
"Sir," she said, "it's like this. The mistress never gets a proper
breakfast for those wee bairns----"
"I can well believe that," Mr. Wycherly interrupted.
"Now if you, sir" (it was surprising how fluently the 'sir' came to Elsa
just then), "would just say that you'd like your breakfast a wee thing
sooner in the morning and would ask the mistress, would she no have hers
wi' you for the company. Then me an' Robina'll see that the wee boys
has theirs. Don't you think, sir, you'd eat more yersel', if ye was no
read--readin' a' the time? If ye'd just tell the mistress that? It's
dull-like, isn't it, to eat yer lane?"
Elsa picked up her tray and hastened from the room, feeling that do as
she would, she and Mr. Wycherly were doomed to be fellow-conspirators.
The sun came out and shone on the five sovereigns lying on the
writing-table, and Montagu, at that moment coming in to his lessons,
spied them.
"What a lot of money!" he exclaimed. "What are you going to do with it?"
"I hope," said Mr. Wycherly, quite gaily, "that I am going to buy large
pieces of happiness with it."
"Can you buy happiness?" Montagu asked wonderingly, ever desirous to
search out any doubt.
"No," Mr. Wycherly said decidedly, "not the best kinds, but it sometimes
happens that one can buy useful things that help--to a certain
degree--in obtaining happiness: and it is those useful things I hope to
buy."
"Useful things," Montagu repeated in a disappointed tone, "like
pinafores? Those sort of things wouldn't make _me_ happy." Montagu
loathed the blue pinafores enforced by Miss Esperance, and considered it
a degradation to wear one.
"I'm not sure that I shall buy pinafores," said Mr. Wycherly; "they are
not the only useful things in the world."
"Useful things are always dull," Montagu persisted.
"On the contrary," Mr. Wycherly replied, "useful things are sometimes
full of the most exquisite romance."
That day early after lunch he called upon Lady Alicia Carruthers. She
was at home and alone, and he stayed with her nearly all the afternoon.
Lady Alicia would not let him go till he had had a cup of tea, and this
marked an epoch in the life of Mr. Wycherly at Remote, for it was the
first time he had broken bread in a neighbour's house.
Shortly after this he astonished his relatives by suddenly demanding
entire control of his property. He sent for the family lawyer, a
certain Mr. Woodhouse, and went into his affairs with a thoroughness and
an amount of legal acumen that quite amazed that worthy man.
Mr. Wycherly's brothers were by no means pleased. For many years--ever
since he had, much against their will, and in direct opposition to the
advice and warnings showered upon him, resigned his fellowship and
withdrawn himself finally from the scene of all his former interests--he
had been well content to spend about half his little income while the
remainder accumulated under their careful stewardship, presumably for
their benefit and that of their children. He had asked no questions and
appeared, as indeed he was, quite contented with the arrangement. So
entirely had he accepted existing conditions, that when he wanted money
in a hurry, in order to see that Miss Esperance and the children should
make the journey in decent comfort, he had sold his most precious books
instead of telegraphing to his solicitor.
But with the advent of Archie's children Mr. Wycherly was completely
shaken out of his groove. His humble desire to hide his shame from the
eyes of men (for to him, even in times when occasional excess was
regarded by the majority less severely than it is now, it meant disgrace
and dishonour) gave way to the more ardent desire that these boys might
take their place in the world he had left; see, and be seen, and, if
possible, seize all the opportunities that he himself had thrown away.
Mr. Woodhouse had travelled all the way from Shrewsbury to Edinburgh to
confer with Mr. Wycherly, and he stayed with Lady Alicia, for the public
house at Burnhead was of a very humble order, having no bedroom to offer
to the wayfaring stranger. Like many other people, he had fallen under
the charm of Miss Esperance, and he not only acquiesced, but positively
encouraged Mr. Wycherly in all his plans for the disposal of his
property. It is quite possible that he was not sorry to see his other
clients of that name disappointed. "They've kept him short all these
years, when they had no earthly right to, just because he and the old
lady are as unworldly as a pair of babies--and now, after all their
scheming and saving, the whole of that money will go to benefit her
relations," said Mr. Woodhouse to Lady Alicia, with a chuckle. "It's
poetic justice, that's what I call it."
Mr. Woodhouse was standing on the hearthrug warming his coat-tails. He
had returned for the night from Remote, and was quite prepared to enjoy
a comfortable chat with Lady Alicia and her pretty daughter, Margaret,
who were sitting by the fire knitting diligently.
"Do you happen to know?" asked Lady Alicia, who had never dared ask the
question of Miss Esperance, "what caused the--er--mental break-down,
that made Mr. Wycherly leave Oxford?"
The keen eyes under the bushy eyebrows twinkled with amusement as Mr.
Woodhouse surveyed his hostess, who was, he very well knew, devoured by
curiosity.
"I've never really heard the rights of it," he said cautiously, "but
from what I have heard I should gather that it was, as usual, saving
your presence, my dear young lady, a woman who was at the bottom of the
mischief."
"Oh!" exclaimed pretty Margaret, "how very sad. Did she die?"
"She was," said Mr. Woodhouse, gazing into the gracious, pitiful young
face uplifted to his, "a hard, scheming woman, beautiful, of course, not
over young; in fact, I think she was older than he was. He, then, was
considered the handsomest man in Oxford, very distinguished, you know,
with his white hair and young face, all the Wycherlys go gray very
early. At that time there seemed no honour in the university to which
he might not aspire. He was popular in society----"
"He has the most beautiful manners," Lady Alicia remarked, laying down
her knitting and preparing to enjoy herself.
"He had then. In fact, in Oxford he was looked upon as a very brilliant
and rising young man; and the fact that he had some private means made
it possible for him to go into Society, with a big 'S,' rather more than
is usual in such cases."
"I always felt," said Lady Alicia, bridling, "that he had at some time
or another belonged to the great world. But what of the lady?"
"She came down for Commemoration Week; stayed, I think, with the Dean of
Christ Church, and made a dead set at Wycherly. He went down before her
like a ninepin, and they were engaged, and there was 'a marriage
arranged to take place,' before the week was out."
"Why didn't it take place?" asked pretty Margaret eagerly.
"Because, my dear young lady, the lady in question happened to fascinate
a richer man just a week before the wedding day, and poor Wycherly
discovered the whole affair in some fashion that was a very great shock
to him. The only thing he was ever heard to say about it was that it
hurt him rather to hear of her marriage to the other man while he was
still under the impression that she was engaged to him."
"She wasn't worth grieving over," Lady Alicia cried indignantly.
"Poor Mr. Wycherly!" pretty Margaret said softly. "And he is so kind
and gentle always."
"I hope her marriage turned out badly," said Lady Alicia vindictively.
"Your ladyship's pious hope was amply fulfilled," Mr. Woodhouse replied.
"Won't you tell us who she was?" Lady Alicia demanded in honeyed tones.
"Alas, dear Lady Alicia, that I must not do. She is dead--_de mortuis
nil nisi bonum_, you know--may she rest in peace!"
Lady Alicia folded up her knitting. "In that case," she said somewhat
abruptly, "we must not keep you out of your bed any longer, you have had
a tiring day."
* * * * *
"Is he quite capable of managing his own affairs?" Mr. Wycherly's
brothers eagerly asked Mr. Woodhouse on his return some three days
later.
"Perfectly capable," answered that gentleman decidedly. "Indeed, he
shows quite remarkable business capacity, considering how long it is
since he has undertaken anything of the kind. It's a thousand pities he
resigned his fellowship. I would not advise you to attempt any sort of
interference with him--for, however reluctant I might be to give
evidence as to the impropriety of such a course, I should be obliged in
common honesty to do so. It was certainly Quixotic to resign his
fellowship when he did, but it could not be brought up as a proof of
mental incapacity at this time of day."
Mr. Wycherly's brothers did not fail to remind him at this juncture
that, had he listened to them, he would still be enjoying the income of
his fellowship. "No one," they had reiterated, "could take it from him
while he lived. Once a fellow, always a fellow--a fellowship was a
freehold, and what did it matter to the authorities in Oxford what he
did north of the Tweed?"
But Mr. Wycherly had loved his college too dearly to bring shame upon
her, and if he could not serve, neither would he accept wage. And now
that he had every reason to wish that his income was larger, it was the
one step in all the inglorious past that he did not regret.
Through the family solicitor he demanded an account of all monies
belonging to himself: explaining with the utmost clearness that he
intended to educate both Montagu and Edmund "as befitted their position
in life," that he wished to adopt both of them, and that, with their
aunt's consent, the elder of the two was to take his name, and inherit
whatever he could leave him.
"It won't be much," he said to Mr. Woodhouse, when he was discussing
ways and means with him, "for I intend Montagu to go to Winchester and
New College, and of course Edmund, should he go into the navy, will need
a considerable allowance for years to come. But whatever there is, that
they are to have, and, above all, I beg you to make it perfectly clear
to Miss Esperance that she need be under no apprehension as to their
future."