The sun was just rising. In two years of mutation and change it had seen
the little cottage clinging like a swallow's nest to the rocky caves of
a great Sierran canyon give way to a straggling, many-galleried hotel,
and a dozen blackened chimneys rise above the barren tableland where
once had stood the lonely forge. To that conservative orb of light and
heat there must have been a peculiar satisfaction in looking down a few
hours earlier upon the battlements and gables of Oldenhurst, whose base
was deeply embedded in the matured foundations and settled traditions
of an English county. For the rising sun had for ten centuries found
Oldenhurst in its place, from the heavy stone terrace that covered the
dead-and-forgotten wall, where a Roman sentinel had once paced, to
the little grating in the cloistered quadrangle, where it had seen a
Cistercian brother place the morning dole. It had daily welcomed the
growth of this vast and picturesque excrescence of the times; it had
smiled every morning upon this formidable yet quaint incrustation
of power and custom, ignoring, as Oldenhurst itself had ignored, the
generations who possessed it, the men who built it, the men who carried
it with fire and sword, the men who had lied and cringed for it, the
King who had given it to a favorite, the few brave hearts who had died
for it in exile, and the one or two who had bought and paid for it. For
Oldenhurst had absorbed all these and more until it had become a story
of the past, incarnate in stone, greenwood, and flower; it had even
drained the life-blood from adjacent hamlets, repaying them with tumuli
growths like its own, in the shape of purposeless lodges, quaintly
incompetent hospitals and schools, and churches where the inestimable
blessing and knowledge of its gospel were taught and fostered. Nor had
it dealt more kindly with the gentry within its walls, sending some to
the scaffold, pillorying others in infamous office, reducing a few to
poverty, and halting its later guests with gout and paralysis. It had
given them in exchange the dubious immortality of a portrait gallery,
from which they stared with stony and equal resignation; it had
preserved their useless armor and accoutrements; it had set up their
marble effigies in churches or laid them in cross-legged attitudes to
trip up the unwary, until in death, as in life, they got between the
congregation and the Truth that was taught there. It had allowed an
Oldenhurst crusader, with a broken nose like a pugilist, on the strength
of his having been twice to the Holy Land, to hide the beautifully
illuminated Word from the lowlier worshipper on the humbler benches; it
had sent an iconoclastic Bishop of the Reformation to a nearer minster
to ostentatiously occupy the place of the consecrated image he had
overthrown. Small wonder that crowding the Oldenhurst retainers
gradually into smaller space, with occasional Sabbath glimpses of the
living rulers of Oldenhurst already in railed-off exaltation, it had
forced them to accept Oldenhurst as a synonym of eternity, and left the
knowledge of a higher Power to what time they should be turned out
to their longer sleep under the tender grass of the beautiful outer
churchyard.
And even so, while every stone of the pile of Oldenhurst and every tree
in its leafy park might have been eloquent with the story of vanity,
selfishness, and unequal justice, it had been left to the infinite mercy
of Nature to seal their lips with a spell of beauty that left mankind
equally dumb; earth, air, and moisture had entered into a gentle
conspiracy to soften, mellow, and clothe its external blemishes of
breach and accident, its irregular design, its additions, accretions,
ruins, and lapses with a harmonious charm of outline and color; poets,
romancers, and historians had equally conspired to illuminate the
dark passages and uglier inconsistencies of its interior life with the
glamour of their own fancy. The fragment of menacing keep, with its
choked oubliettes, became a bower of tender ivy; the grim story of its
crimes, properly edited by a contemporary bard of the family, passed
into a charming ballad. Even the superstitious darkness of its religious
house had escaped through fallen roof and shattered wall, leaving only
the foliated and sun-pierced screen of front, with its rose-window and
pinnacle of cross behind. Pilgrims from all lands had come to see
it; fierce Republicans had crossed the seas to gaze at its mediaeval
outlines, and copy them in wood and stucco on their younger soil.
Politicians had equally pointed to it as a convincing evidence of their
own principles and in refutation of each other; and it had survived
both. For it was this belief in its own perpetuity that was its strength
and weakness. And that belief was never stronger than on this bright
August morning, when it was on the verge of dissolution. A telegram
brought to Sir Robert Mainwaring had even then as completely shattered
and disintegrated Oldenhurst, in all it was and all it meant, as if the
brown-paper envelope had been itself charged with the electric fluid.
Sir Robert Mainwaring, whose family had for three centuries possessed
Oldenhurst, had received the news of his financial ruin; and the vast
pile which had survived the repeated invasion of superstition, force,
intrigue, and even progress, had succumbed to a foe its founders and
proprietors had loftily ignored and left to Jews and traders. The
acquisition of money, except by despoilment, gift, royal favor, or
inheritance, had been unknown at Oldenhurst. The present degenerate
custodian of its fortunes, staggering under the weight of its
sentimental mortmain already alluded to, had speculated in order to
keep up its material strength, that was gradually shrinking through
impoverished land and the ruined trade it had despised. He had invested
largely in California mines, and was the chief shareholder in a San
Francisco Bank. But the mines had proved worthless, the Bank had that
morning suspended payment, owing to the failure of a large land and
timber company on the Sierras which it had imprudently “carried.”
The spark which had demolished Oldenhurst had been fired from the new
telegraph-station in the hotel above the great Sierran canyon.
There was a large house-party at Oldenhurst that morning. But it had
been a part of the history of the Mainwarings to accept defeat gallantly
and as became their blood. Sir Percival,--the second gentleman on the
left as you entered the library,--unhorsed, dying on a distant moor,
with a handful of followers, abandoned by a charming Prince and a
miserable cause, was scarcely a greater hero than this ruined but
undaunted gentleman of eighty, entering the breakfast-room a few
hours later as jauntily as his gout would permit, and conscientiously
dispensing the hospitalities of his crumbling house. When he had
arranged a few pleasure parties for the day and himself thoughtfully
anticipated the different tastes of his guests, he turned to Lady
Mainwaring.
“Don't forget that somebody ought to go to the station to meet the
Bradleys. Frank writes from St. Moritz that they are due here to-day.”
Lady Mainwaring glanced quickly at her husband, and said sotto voce, “Do
you think they'll care to come NOW? They probably have heard all about
it.”
“Not how it affects me,” returned Sir Robert, in the same tone; “and
as they might think that because Frank was with them on that California
mountain we would believe it had something to do with Richardson
involving the Bank in that wretched company, we must really INSIST upon
their coming.”
“Bradley!” echoed the Hon. Captain FitzHarry, overhearing the name
during a late forage on the sideboard, “Bradley!--there was an awfully
pretty American at Biarritz, travelling with a cousin, I think--a Miss
Mason or Macy. Those sort of people, you know, who have a companion
as pretty as themselves; bring you down with the other barrel if one
misses--eh? Very clever, both of them, and hardly any accent.”
“Mr. Bradley was a very dear friend of Frank's, and most kind to him,”
said Lady Mainwaring, gravely.
“Didn't know there WAS a Mr. Bradley, really. He didn't come to the
fore, then,” said the unabashed Captain. “Deuced hard to follow up those
American husbands!”
“And their wives wouldn't thank you, if you did,” said Lady Griselda
Armiger, with a sweet smile.
“If it is the Mrs. Bradley I mean,” said Lady Canterbridge from the
lower end of the table, looking up from her letter, “who looks a little
like Mrs. Summertree, and has a pretty cousin with her who has very good
frocks, I'm afraid you won't be able to get her down here. She's booked
with engagements for the next six weeks. She and her cousin made all the
running at Grigsby Royal, and she has quite deposed that other American
beauty in Northforeland's good graces. She regularly affiche'd him, and
it is piteous to see him follow her about. No, my dear; I don't believe
they'll come to any one of less rank than a Marquis. If they did, I'm
sure Canterbridge would have had them at Buckenthorpe already.”
“I wonder if there was ever anything in Frank's admiration of this Miss
Macy?” said Lady Mainwaring a few moments later, lingering beside her
husband in his study.
“I really don't know,” said Sir Robert, abstractedly: “his letters were
filled with her praises, and Richardson thought--”
“Pray don't mention that man's name again,” said Lady Mainwaring, with
the first indication of feeling she had shown. “I shouldn't trust him.”
“But why do you ask?” returned her husband.
Lady Mainwaring was silent for a moment. “She is very rich, I believe,”
she said slowly. “At least, Frank writes that some neighbors of theirs
whom he met in the Engadine told him they had sold the site of that
absurd cottage where he was ill for some extravagant sum.”
“My dear Geraldine,” said the old man, affectionately, taking his wife's
hand in his own, that now for the first time trembled, “if you have any
hope based upon what you are thinking of now, let it be the last and
least. You forget that Paget told us that with the best care he could
scarcely ensure Frank's return to perfect health. Even if God in his
mercy spared him long enough to take my place, what girl would be
willing to tie herself to a man doomed to sickness and poverty? Hardly
the one you speak of, my dear.”
Lady Canterbridge proved a true prophet. Mrs. Bradley and Miss Macy
did not come, regretfully alleging a previous engagement made on the
continent with the Duke of Northforeland and the Marquis of Dungeness;
but the unexpected and apocryphal husband DID arrive. “I myself have not
seen my wife and cousin since I returned from my visit to your son
in Switzerland. I am glad they were able to amuse themselves without
waiting for me at a London hotel, though I should have preferred to
have met them here.” Sir Robert and Lady Mainwaring were courteous but
slightly embarrassed. Lady Canterbridge, who had come to the station in
bored curiosity, raised her clear blue eyes to his. He did not look like
a fool, a complaisant or fashionably-cynical husband--this well-dressed,
well-mannered, but quietly and sympathetically observant man. Did he
really care for his selfish wife? was it perfect trust or some absurd
Transatlantic custom? She did not understand him. It wearied her and she
turned her eyes indifferently away. Bradley, a little irritated, he knew
not why, at the scrutiny of this tall, handsome, gentlemanly-looking
woman, who, however, in spite of her broad shoulders and narrow hips
possessed a refined muliebrity superior to mere womanliness of outline,
turned slightly towards Sir Robert. “Lady Canterbridge, Frank's cousin,”
explained Sir Robert, hesitatingly, as if conscious of some vague
awkwardness. Bradley and Lady Canterbridge both bowed,--possibly the
latter's salutation was the most masculine,--and Bradley, eventually
forgetting her presence, plunged into an earnest, sympathetic, and
intelligent account of the condition in which he found the invalid at
St. Moritz. The old man at first listened with an almost perfunctory
courtesy and a hesitating reserve; but as Bradley was lapsing into
equal reserve and they drove up to the gates of the quadrangle, he
unexpectedly warmed with a word or two of serious welcome. Looking up
with a half-unconscious smile, Bradley met Lady Canterbridge's examining
eyes.
The next morning, finding an opportunity to be alone with him, Bradley,
with a tactful mingling of sympathy and directness informed his host
that he was cognizant of the disaster that had overtaken the Bank, and
delicately begged him to accept any service he could render him. “Pardon
me,” he said, “if I speak as plainly to you as I would to your son: my
friendship for him justifies an equal frankness to any one he loves; but
I should not intrude upon your confidence if I did not believe that my
knowledge and assistance might be of benefit to you. Although I did not
sell my lands to Richardson or approve of his methods,” he continued, “I
fear it was some suggestion of mine that eventually induced him to form
the larger and more disastrous scheme that ruined the Bank. So you see,”
he added lightly, “I claim a right to offer you my services.” Touched
by Bradley's sincerity and discreet intelligence, Sir Robert was equally
frank. During the recital of his Californian investments--a chronicle
of almost fatuous speculation and imbecile enterprise--Bradley was
profoundly moved at the naive ignorance of business and hopeless
ingenuousness of this old habitue of a cynical world and an intriguing
and insincere society, to whom no scheme had been too wild for
acceptance. As Bradley listened with a half-saddened smile to the grave
visions of this aged enthusiast, he remembered the son's unsophisticated
simplicity: what he had considered as the “boyishness” of immaturity was
the taint of the utterly unpractical Mainwaring blood. It was upon this
blood, and others like it, that Oldenhurst had for centuries waxed and
fattened.
Bradley was true to his promise of assistance, and with the aid of two
or three of his brother-millionaires, whose knowledge of the resources
of the locality was no less powerful and convincing than the security
of their actual wealth, managed to stay the immediate action of the
catastrophe until the affairs of the Sierran Land and Timber Company
could be examined and some plan of reconstruction arranged.
During this interval of five months, in which the credit of Sir Robert
Mainwaring was preserved with the secret of his disaster, Bradley was a
frequent and welcome visitor to Oldenhurst. Apart from his strange and
chivalrous friendship for the Mainwarings--which was as incomprehensible
to Sir Robert as Sir Robert's equally eccentric and Quixotic
speculations had been to Bradley--he began to feel a singular and weird
fascination for the place. A patient martyr in the vast London house he
had taken for his wife and cousin's amusement, he loved to escape the
loneliness of its autumn solitude or the occasional greater loneliness
of his wife's social triumphs. The handsome, thoughtful man who
sometimes appeared at the foot of his wife's table or melted away like
a well-bred ghost in the hollow emptiness of her brilliant receptions,
piqued the languid curiosity of a few. A distinguished personage, known
for his tactful observance of convenances that others forgot, had made a
point of challenging this gentlemanly apparition, and had followed it up
with courteous civilities, which led to exchange of much respect but no
increase of acquaintance. He had even spent a week at Buckenthorpe, with
Canterbridge in the coverts and Lady Canterbridge in the music-room and
library. He had returned more thoughtful, and for some time after
was more frequent in his appearances at home, and more earnest in his
renewed efforts to induce his wife to return to America with him.
“You'll never be happy anywhere but in California, among those common
people,” she replied; “and while I was willing to share your poverty
THERE,” she added dryly, “I prefer to share your wealth among civilized
ladies and gentlemen. Besides,” she continued, “we must consider Louise.
She is as good as engaged to Lord Dunshunner, and I do not intend that
you shall make a mess of her affairs here as you did in California.”
It was the first time he had heard of Lord Dunshunner's proposals; it
was the first allusion she had ever made to Louise and Mainwaring.
Meantime, the autumn leaves had fallen silently over the broad terraces
of Oldenhurst with little changes to the fortunes of the great house
itself. The Christmas house-party included Lady Canterbridge, whose
husband was still detained at Homburg in company with Dunshunner;
and Bradley, whose wife and cousin lingered on the continent. He was
slightly embarrassed when Lady Canterbridge turned to him one afternoon
as they were returning from the lake and congratulated him abruptly upon
Louise's engagement.
“Perhaps you don't care to be congratulated,” she said, as he did not
immediately respond, “and you had as little to do with it as with that
other? It is a woman's function.”
“What other?” echoed Bradley.
Lady Canterbridge slightly turned her handsome head towards him as she
walked unbendingly at his side. “Tell me how you manage to keep
your absolute simplicity so fresh. Do you suppose it wasn't known at
Oldenhurst that Frank had quite compromised himself with Miss Macy over
there?”
“It certainly was not known 'over there,'” said Bradley, curtly.
“Don't be angry with me.”
Such an appeal from the tall, indifferent woman at his side, so
confidently superior to criticism, and uttered in a low tone, made him
smile, albeit uneasily.
“I only meant to congratulate you,” she continued carelessly.
“Dunshunner is not a bad sort of fellow, and will come into a good
property some day. And then, society is so made up of caprice, just
now, that it is well for your wife's cousin to make the most of her
opportunities while they last. She is very popular now; but next
season--” Seeing that Bradley remained silent, she did not finish
the sentence, but said with her usual abruptness, “Do you know a Miss
Araminta Eulalie Sharpe?”
Bradley started. Could any one recognize honest Minty in the hopeless
vulgarity which this fine lady had managed to carelessly import into her
name? His eye kindled.
“She is an old friend of mine, Lady Canterbridge.”
“How fortunate! Then I can please you by giving you good news of her.
She is the coming sensation. They say she is very rich, but quite one of
the people, you know: in fact, she makes no scruples of telling you her
father was a blacksmith, I think, and takes the dear old man with her
everywhere. FitzHarry raves about her, and says her naivete is something
too delicious. She is regularly in with some of the best people already.
Lady Dungeness has taken her up, and Northforeland is only waiting for
your cousin's engagement to be able to go over decently. Shall I ask
her to Buckenthorpe?--come, now, as an apology for my rudeness to your
cousin?” She was very womanly now in spite of her high collar, her
straight back, and her tightly-fitting jacket, as she stood there
smiling. Suddenly, her smile faded; she drew her breath in quickly.
She had caught a glimpse of his usually thoughtful face and eyes, now
illuminated with some pleasant memory.
“Thank you,” he said smilingly, yet with a certain hesitation, as
he thought of The Lookout and Araminta Eulalie Sharpe, and tried to
reconcile them with the lady before him. “I should like it very much.”
“Then you have known Miss Sharpe a long time?” continued Lady
Canterbridge as they walked on.
“While we were at The Lookout she was our nearest neighbor.”
“And I suppose your wife will consider it quite proper for you to
see her again at my house?” said Lady Canterbridge, with a return of
conventional levity.
“Oh! quite,” said Bradley.
They had reached the low Norman-arched side-entrance to the quadrangle.
As Bradley swung open the bolt-studded oaken door to let her pass, she
said carelessly,--
“Then you are not coming in now?”
“No; I shall walk a little longer.”
“And I am quite forgiven?”
“I am thanking you very much,” he said, smiling directly into her blue
eyes. She lowered them, and vanished into the darkness of the passage.
The news of Minty's success was further corroborated by Sir Robert,
who later that evening called Bradley into the study. “Frank has been
writing from Nice that he has renewed his acquaintance with some old
Californian friends of yours--a Mr. and Miss Sharpe. Lady Canterbridge
says that they are well known in London to some of our friends, but I
would like to ask you something about them. Lady Mainwaring was on the
point of inviting them here when I received a letter from Mr. Sharpe
asking for a BUSINESS interview. Pray who is this Sharpe?”
“You say he writes for a BUSINESS interview?” asked Bradley.
“Yes.”
Bradley hesitated for a moment and then said quietly, “Perhaps, then, I
am justified in a breach of confidence to him, in order to answer your
question. He is the man who has assumed all the liabilities of the
Sierran Land and Timber Company to enable the Bank to resume payment.
But he did it on the condition that you were never to know it. For the
rest, he was a blacksmith who made a fortune, as Lady Canterbridge will
tell you.”
“How very odd--how kind, I mean. I should like to have been civil to him
on Frank's account alone.”
“I should see him on business and be civil to him afterwards.” Sir
Robert received the American's levity with his usual seriousness.
“No, they must come here for Christmas. His daughter is--?”
“Araminta Eulalie Sharpe,” said Bradley, in defiant memory of Lady
Canterbridge.
Sir Robert winced audibly. “I shall rely on you, my dear boy, to help me
make it pleasant for them,” he said.
Christmas came, but not Minty. It drew a large contingent from
Oldenhurst to the quaint old church, who came to view the green-wreathed
monuments, and walls spotted with crimson berries, as if with the blood
of former Oldenhurst warriors, and to impress the wondering villagers
with the ineffable goodness and bounty of the Creator towards the Lords
of Oldenhurst and their friends. Sir Robert, a little gouty, kept the
house, and Bradley, somewhat uneasy at the Sharpes' absence, but more
distrait with other thoughts, wandered listlessly in the long library.
At the lower angle it was embayed into the octagon space of a former
tower, which was furnished as a quaint recess for writing or study,
pierced through its enormous walls with a lance-shaped window, hidden by
heavy curtains. He was gazing abstractedly at the melancholy eyes of Sir
Percival, looking down from the dark panel opposite, when he heard the
crisp rustle of a skirt. Lady Canterbridge tightly and stiffly buttoned
in black from her long narrow boots to her slim, white-collared neck,
stood beside him with a prayer-book in her ungloved hand. Bradley
colored quickly; the penetrating incense of the Christmas boughs
and branches that decked the walls and ceilings, mingled with some
indefinable intoxicating aura from the woman at his side, confused his
senses. He seemed to be losing himself in some forgotten past coeval
with the long, quaintly-lighted room, the rich hangings, and the painted
ancestor of this handsome woman. He recovered himself with an effort,
and said,
“You are going to church?”
“I may meet them coming home; it's all the same. You like HIM?” she said
abruptly, pointing to the portrait. “I thought you did not care for that
sort of man over there.”
“A man like that must have felt the impotence of his sacrifice before he
died, and that condoned everything,” said Bradley, thoughtfully.
“Then you don't think him a fool? Bob says it was a fair bargain for
a title and an office, and that by dying he escaped trial and the
confiscation of what he had.”
Bradley did not reply.
“I am disturbing your illusions again. Yet I rather like them. I think
you are quite capable of a sacrifice--perhaps you know what it is
already.”
He felt that she was looking at him; he felt equally that he could not
respond with a commonplace. He was silent.
“I have offended you again, Mr. Bradley,” she said. “Please be
Christian, and pardon me. You know this is a season of peace and
goodwill.” She raised her blue eyes at the same moment to the Christmas
decorations on the ceiling. They were standing before the parted drapery
of the lance window. Midway between the arched curtains hung a spray
of mistletoe--the conceit of a mischievous housemaid. Their eyes met it
simultaneously.
Bradley had Lady Canterbridge's slim, white hand in his own. The next
moment voices were heard in the passage, and the door nearly opposite to
them opened deliberately. The idea of their apparent seclusion and half
compromising attitude flashed through the minds of both at the same
time. Lady Canterbridge stepped quickly backward, drawing Bradley with
her, into the embrasure of the window; the folds of the curtain swung
together and concealed them from view.
The door had been opened by the footman, ushering in a broad-shouldered
man, who was carrying a travelling-bag and an umbrella in his hand.
Dropping into an arm-chair before the curtain, he waved away the
footman, who, even now, mechanically repeated a previously vain attempt
to relieve the stranger of his luggage.
“You leave that 'ere grip sack where it is, young man, and tell Sir
Robert Mainwaring that Mr. Demander Sharpe, of Californy, wishes to
see him--on business--on BUSINESS, do ye' hear? You hang onter that
sentence--on BUSINESS! it's about ez much ez you kin carry, I reckon,
and leave that grip sack alone.”
From behind the curtain Bradley made a sudden movement to go forward;
but Lady Canterbridge--now quite pale but collected--restrained him with
a warning movement of her hand. Sir Robert's stick and halting step were
next heard along the passage, and he entered the room. His simple and
courteous greeting of the stranger was instantly followed by a renewed
attack upon the “grip sack,” and a renewed defence of it by the
stranger.
“No, Sir Robert,” said the voice argumentatively, “this yer's a BUSINESS
interview, and until it's over--if YOU please--we'll remain ez we air.
I'm Demander Sharpe, of Californy, and I and my darter, Minty, oncet had
the pleasure of knowing your boy over thar, and of meeting him agin the
other day at Nice.”
“I think,” said Sir Robert's voice gently, “that these are not the only
claims you have upon me. I have only a day or two ago heard from
Mr. Bradley that I owe to your generous hands and your disinterested
liberality the saving of my California fortune.”
There was the momentary sound of a pushed-back chair, a stamping of
feet, and then Mr. Sharpe's voice rose high with the blacksmith's old
querulous aggrieved utterance.
“So it's that finikin', conceited Bradley agin--that's giv' me away!
Ef that man's all-fired belief in his being the Angel Gabriel and Dan'l
Webster rolled inter one don't beat anythin'! I suppose that high-flyin'
jay-bird kalkilated to put you and me and my gal and yer boy inter
harness for his four hoss chariot and he sittin' kam on the box drivin'
us! Why don't he tend to his own business, and look arter his own
concerns--instead o' leaving Jinny Bradley and Loo Macy dependent
on Kings and Queens and titled folks gen'rally, and he, Jim Bradley,
philanderin' with another man's wife--while that thar man is hard at
work tryin' to make a honest livin' fer his wife, buckin' agin faro an'
the tiger gen'rally at Monaco! Eh? And that man a-inter-meddlin' with
me! Ef,” continued the voice, dropped to a tone of hopeless moral
conviction, “ef there's a man I mor'aly despise--it's that finikin' Jim
Bradley.”
“You quite misunderstand me, my dear sir,” said Sir Robert's hurried
voice; “he told me you had pledged him to secrecy, and he only revealed
it to explain why you wished to see me.”
There was a grunt of half-placated wrath from Sharpe, and then the voice
resumed, but more deliberately, “Well, to come back to business: you've
got a boy, Francis, and I've got a darter, Araminty. They've sorter
taken a shine to each other and they want to get married. Mind yer--wait
a moment!--it wasn't allus so. No, sir; when my gal Araminty first seed
your boy in Californy she was poor, and she didn't kalkilate to get
inter anybody's family unbeknownst or on sufferance. Then she got rich
and you got poor; and then--hold on a minit!--she allows, does my girl,
that there ain't any nearer chance o' their making a match than they
were afore, for she isn't goin' to hev it said that she married your son
fur the chance of some day becomin' Lady Mainwaring.”
“One moment, Mr. Sharpe,” said the voice of the Baronet, gravely: “I am
both flattered and pained by what I believe to be the kindly object of
your visit. Indeed, I may say I have gathered a suspicion of what might
be the sequel of this most unhappy acquaintance of my son and your
daughter; but I cannot believe that he has kept you in ignorance of his
unfortunate prospects and his still more unfortunate state of health.”
“When I told ye to hold on a minit,” continued the blacksmith's voice,
with a touch of querulousness in its accent, “that was jist wot I was
comin' to. I knowed part of it from my own pocket, she knowed the rest
of it from his lip and the doctors she interviewed. And then she says to
me--sez my girl Minty--Pop,' she sez, 'he's got nothing to live for now
but his title, and that he never may live to get, so that I think ye kin
jist go, Pop, and fairly and squarely, as a honest man, ask his father
to let me hev him.' Them's my darter's own words, Sir Robert, and when
I tell yer that she's got a million o' dollars to back them, ye'll know
she means business, every time.”
“Did Francis know that you were coming here?”
“Bless ye, no! he don't know that she would have him. Ef it kem to that,
he ain't even asked her! She wouldn't let him until she was sure of
YOU.”
“Then you mean to say there is no engagement?”
“In course not. I reckoned to do the square thing first with ye.”
The halting step of the Baronet crossing the room was heard distinctly.
He had stopped beside Sharpe. “My dear Mr. Sharpe,” he said, in a
troubled voice, “I cannot permit this sacrifice. It is too--too great!”
“Then,” said Sharpe' s voice querulously, “I'm afraid we must do without
your permission. I didn't reckon to find a sort o' British Jim Bradley
in you. If YOU can't permit my darter to sacrifice herself by marryin'
your son, I can't permit her to sacrifice her love and him by NOT
marryin' him. So I reckon this yer interview is over.”
“I am afraid we are both old fools, Mr. Sharpe; but--we will talk this
over with Lady Mainwaring. Come--” There was evidently a slight struggle
near the chair over some inanimate object. But the next moment the
Baronet's voice rose, persuasively, “Really, I must insist upon
relieving you of your bag and umbrella.”
“Well, if you'll let me telegraph 'yes' to Minty, I don't care if yer
do.”
When the room was quiet again, Lady Canterbridge and James Bradley
silently slipped from the curtain, and, without a word, separated at the
door.
There was a merry Christmas at Oldenhurst and at Nice. But whether
Minty's loving sacrifice was accepted or not, or whether she ever
reigned as Lady Mainwaring, or lived an untitled widow, I cannot
say. But as Oldenhurst still exists in all its pride and power, it is
presumed that the peril that threatened its fortunes was averted,
and that if another heroine was not found worthy of a frame in its
picture-gallery, at least it had been sustained as of old by devotion
and renunciation.