A SUPERFINE CONSCIENCE
However much Mr. Everard Romfrey may have laughed at Nevil Beauchamp with
his 'banana-wreath,' he liked the fellow for having volunteered for that
African coast-service, and the news of his promotion by his admiral to
the post of commander through a death vacancy, had given him an exalted
satisfaction, for as he could always point to the cause of failures, he
strongly appreciated success. The circumstance had offered an occasion
for the new commander to hit him hard upon a matter of fact. Beauchamp
had sent word of his advance in rank, but requested his uncle not to
imagine him wearing an additional epaulette; and he corrected the
infallible gentleman's error (which had of course been reported to him
when he was dreaming of Renee, by Mrs. Culling) concerning a lieutenant's
shoulder decorations, most gravely; informing him of the anchor on the
lieutenant's pair of epaulettes, and the anchor and star on a
commander's, and the crown on a captain's, with a well-feigned
solicitousness to save his uncle from blundering further. This was done
in the dry neat manner which Mr. Romfrey could feel to be his own turned
on him.
He began to conceive a vague respect for the fellow who had proved him
wrong upon a matter of fact. Beauchamp came from Africa rather worn by
the climate, and immediately obtained the command of the Ariadne
corvette, which had been some time in commission in the Mediterranean,
whither he departed, without visiting Steynham; allowing Rosamund to
think him tenacious of his wrath as well as of love. Mr. Romfrey
considered him to be insatiable for service. Beauchamp, during his
absence, had shown himself awake to the affairs of his country once only,
in an urgent supplication he had forwarded for all his uncle's influence
to be used to get him appointed to the first vacancy in Robert Hall's
naval brigade, then forming a part of our handful in insurgent India.
The fate of that chivalrous Englishman, that born sailor-warrior, that
truest of heroes, imperishable in the memory of those who knew him, and
in our annals, young though he was when death took him, had wrung from
Nevil Beauchamp such a letter of tears as to make Mr. Romfrey believe the
naval crown of glory his highest ambition. Who on earth could have
guessed him to be bothering his head about politics all the while! Or
was the whole stupid business a freak of the moment?
It became necessary for Mr. Romfrey to contemplate his eccentric nephew
in the light of a mannikin once more. Consequently he called to mind,
and bade Rosamund Culling remember, that he had foreseen and had
predicted the mounting of Nevil Beauchamp on his political horse one day
or another; and perhaps the earlier the better. And a donkey could have
sworn that when he did mount he would come galloping in among the Radical
rough-riders. Letters were pouring upon Steynham from men and women of
Romfrey blood and relationship concerning the positive tone of Radicalism
in the commander's address. Everard laughed at them. As a practical
man, his objection lay against the poor fool's choice of the peccant
borough of Bevisham. Still, in view of the needfulness of his learning
wisdom, and rapidly, the disbursement of a lot of his money, certain to
be required by Bevisham's electors, seemed to be the surest method for
quickening his wits. Thus would he be acting as his own chirurgeon,
gaily practising phlebotomy on his person to cure him of his fever. Too
much money was not the origin of the fever in Nevil's case, but he had
too small a sense of the value of what he possessed, and the diminishing
stock would be likely to cry out shrilly.
To this effect, never complaining that Nevil Beauchamp had not come to
him to take counsel with him, the high-minded old gentleman talked. At
the same time, while indulging in so philosophical a picture of himself
as was presented by a Romfrey mildly accounting for events and smoothing
them under the infliction of an offence, he could not but feel that Nevil
had challenged him: such was the reading of it; and he waited for some
justifiable excitement to fetch him out of the magnanimous mood, rather
in the image of an angler, it must be owned.
'Nevil understands that I am not going to pay a farthing of his expenses
in Bevisham?' he said to Mrs. Culling.
She replied blandly and with innocence, 'I have not seen him, sir.'
He nodded. At the next mention of Nevil between them, he asked, 'Where
is it he's lying perdu, ma'am?'
'I fancy in that town, in Bevisham.'
'At the Liberal, Radical, hotel?'
'I dare say; some place; I am not certain . . . .'
'The rascal doctor's house there? Shrapnel's?'
'Really . . . I have not seen him.'
'Have you heard from him?'
'I have had a letter; a short one.'
'Where did he date his letter from?'
'From Bevisham.'
'From what house?'
Rosamund glanced about for a way of escaping the question. There was
none but the door. She replied, 'From Dr. Shrapnel's.'
'That's the Anti-Game-Law agitator.'
'You do not imagine, sir, that Nevil subscribes to every thing the horrid
man agitates for?'
'You don't like the man, ma'am?'
'I detest him.'
'Ha! So you have seen Shrapnel?'
'Only for a moment; a moment or two. I cannot endure him. I am sure I
have reason.'
Rosamund flushed exceedingly red. The visit to Dr. Shrapnel's house was
her secret, and the worming of it out made her feel guilty, and that
feeling revived and heated her antipathy to the Radical doctor.
'What reason?' said Mr. Romfrey, freshening at her display of colour.
She would not expose Nevil to the accusation of childishness by
confessing her positive reason, so she answered, 'The man is a kind of
man . . . I was not there long; I was glad to escape. He . . .'
she hesitated: for in truth it was difficult to shape the charge against
him, and the effort to be reticent concerning Nevil, and communicative,
now that he had been spoken of, as to the detested doctor, reduced her to
some confusion. She was also fatally anxious to be in the extreme degree
conscientious, and corrected and modified her remarks most suspiciously.
'Did he insult you, ma'am?' Mr. Romfrey inquired.
She replied hastily, 'Oh no. He may be a good man in his way. He is one
of those men who do not seem to think a woman may have opinions. He does
not scruple to outrage those we hold. I am afraid he is an infidel. His
ideas of family duties and ties, and his manner of expressing himself,
shocked me, that is all. He is absurd. I dare say there is no harm in
him, except for those who are so unfortunate as to fall under his
influence--and that, I feel sure, cannot be permanent. He could not
injure me personally. He could not offend me, I mean. Indeed, I have
nothing whatever to say against him, as far as I . . .'
'Did he fail to treat you as a lady, ma'am?'
Rosamund was getting frightened by the significant pertinacity of her
lord.
'I am sure, sir, he meant no harm.'
'Was the man uncivil to you, ma'am?' came the emphatic interrogation.
She asked herself, had Dr. Shrapnel been uncivil toward her? And so
conscientious was she, that she allowed the question to be debated in her
mind for half a minute, answering then, 'No, not uncivil. I cannot
exactly explain . . . . He certainly did not intend to be uncivil.
He is only an unpolished, vexatious man; enormously tall.'
Mr. Romfrey ejaculated, 'Ha! humph!'
His view of Dr. Shrapnel was taken from that instant. It was, that this
enormously big blustering agitator against the preservation of birds,
had behaved rudely toward the lady officially the chief of his household,
and might be considered in the light of an adversary one would like to
meet. The size of the man increased his aspect of villany, which in
return added largely to his giant size. Everard Romfrey's mental eye
could perceive an attractiveness about the man little short of magnetic;
for he thought of him so much that he had to think of what was due to his
pacifical disposition (deeply believed in by him) to spare himself the
trouble of a visit to Bevisham.
The young gentleman whom he regarded as the Radical doctor's dupe, fell
in for a share of his view of the doctor, and Mr. Romfrey became less
fitted to observe Nevil Beauchamp's doings with the Olympian gravity he
had originally assumed.
The extreme delicacy of Rosamund's conscience was fretted by a remorseful
doubt of her having conveyed a just impression of Dr. Shrapnel, somewhat
as though the fine sleek coat of it were brushed the wrong way.
Reflection warned her that her deliberative intensely sincere pause
before she responded to Mr. Romfrey's last demand, might have implied
more than her words. She consoled herself with the thought that it was
the dainty susceptibility of her conscientiousness which caused these
noble qualms, and so deeply does a refined nature esteem the gift, that
her pride in it helped her to overlook her moral perturbation. She was
consoled, moreover, up to the verge of triumph in her realization of the
image of a rivalling and excelling power presented by Mr. Romfrey, though
it had frightened her at the time. Let not Dr. Shrapnel come across him!
She hoped he would not. Ultimately she could say to herself, 'Perhaps I
need not have been so annoyed with the horrid man.' It was on Nevil's
account. Shrapnel's contempt of the claims of Nevil's family upon him
was actually a piece of impudence, impudently expressed, if she
remembered correctly. And Shrapnel was a black malignant, the foe of the
nation's Constitution, deserving of punishment if ever man was; with his
ridiculous metaphors, and talk of organs and pianos, orchestras and
despotisms, and flying to the sun! How could Nevil listen to the
creature! Shrapnel must be a shameless, hypocrite to mask his wickedness
from one so clear-sighted as Nevil, and no doubt he indulged in his
impudence out of wanton pleasure in it. His business was to catch young
gentlemen of family, and to turn them against their families, plainly.
That was thinking the best of him. No doubt he had his objects to gain.
'He might have been as impudent as he liked to me; I would have pardoned
him!' Rosamund exclaimed. Personally, you see, she was generous. On
the whole, knowing Everard Romfrey as she did, she wished that she had
behaved, albeit perfectly discreet in her behaviour, and conscientiously
just, a shade or two differently. But the evil was done.