OPINIONS DIFFER
The nights were chilly in the early autumn, and a blazing fire lighted
up the drawing-room at Trevlyn Farm. On a comfortable sofa, drawn close
to it, sat Mrs. Ryle, a warm shawl thrown over her black silk gown--soft
cushions heaped around her. A violent cold had made an invalid of her
for some days past, but she was recovering. Her face was softened by a
white cap of delicate lace; but its lines had grown haughtier and firmer
with her years. She wore well, and was handsome still.
Trevlyn Farm had prospered. It was a lucky day for Mrs. Ryle when she
decided upon her step-son's remaining on it. He had brought energy and
goodwill to bear on his work; a clear head and calm intelligence; and
time had contributed judgment and experience. Mrs. Ryle knew that she
could not have been more faithfully served, and gradually grew to feel
his value. Had they been really mother and son, they could not have been
better friends. In the beginning she was inclined to discountenance
sundry ways and habits George favoured. He did not turn himself into a
_working_ farmer, as his father had done, and as Mrs. Ryle thought he
ought to do. George objected. A man who worked on his own farm must give
it a less general supervision, he urged: and after all, it was only the
cost of an additional day-labourer. His argument carried reason with it;
and keen and active Farmer Apperley, who deemed idleness the greatest
sin (next, perhaps, to hunting) a young farmer could commit, nodded
approval. George did not put aside his books; his classics, and his
studies in general literature; quite the contrary. In short, George Ryle
appeared to be going in for a gentleman--as Cris Chattaway chose to term
it--a great deal more than Mrs. Ryle considered would be profitable for
him or for her. But George had held on his course, in a quiet,
undemonstrative way; and Mrs. Ryle had at length fallen in with it.
Perhaps she now saw its wisdom. That he was essentially a gentleman, in
person and manners, in mind and conduct, she could only acknowledge, and
she felt a pride in him she had never dreamed she should feel for any
one but Treve.
Could she feel pride in Treve? Not much, with all her partiality.
Trevlyn Ryle was not turning out quite satisfactorily. There was nothing
very objectionable to be urged against him; but Mrs. Ryle was accustomed
to measure by a high standard of excellence; and of that Treve fell
exceedingly short. She had not deemed it well that George Ryle should be
too much of a gentleman, but she had determined Trevlyn should be one.
Upon the completion of his school life, he was sent to Oxford. The cost
might have been imprudently heavy for Mrs. Ryle, had she borne it
unassisted; but Trevlyn had gained a scholarship at Barmester Grammar
School, and the additional cost was light. Treve, once at Oxford, did
not get on quite so fast as he might have done. Treve spent; Treve
seemed to have plenty of wild-oats to sow; Treve thought he should like
a life of idleness better than farming. His mother had foolishly
whispered the fond hope that he might some time be owner of Trevlyn
Hold, and Treve reckoned upon its fulfilment more confidently than was
good for him. Meanwhile, until the lucky chance arrived which should
give him the inheritance (though by what miracle the chance was to fall
was at present hidden in the womb of mystery), Treve, upon leaving
college, was to assume the mastership of Trevlyn Farm, in accordance
with the plan originally decided upon by Mrs. Ryle. He would not be
altogether unqualified for this: having been about the farm since he was
a child, and seen how it should be worked. Whether he would give
sufficient personal attention to it was another matter.
Mrs. Ryle expressed herself as not being too confident of him--whether
of his industry or qualifications she did not state. George had given
one or two hints that when Treve came home for good, he must look out
for something else; but Mrs. Ryle had waived away the hints as if they
were unpleasant to her. Treve must prove what metal he was made of,
before assuming the management, she briefly said. And George suffered
the subject to drop.
Treve had now but one more term to keep at the university. At the
conclusion of the previous term he had not returned home: remaining on a
visit to a friend, who had an appointment in one of the colleges. But
Treve's demand for money had become somewhat inconvenient to Mrs. Ryle,
and she had begged George to pay Oxford a few days' visit, that he might
see how Treve was really going on. George complied, and proceeded to
Oxford, where he found Treve absent--as in the last chapter you heard
him say to Maude Trevlyn.
Mrs. Trevlyn sat by the drawing-room fire, enveloped in her shawl, and
supported by her pillows. The thought of these things was bringing a
severe look to her proud face. She had scarcely seen George since his
return; had not exchanged more than ten words with him. But those ten
words had not been of a cheering nature; and she feared things were not
going on satisfactorily with Treve. With that hard look on her features,
how wonderfully her face resembled that of her dead father!
Presently George came in. Mrs. Ryle looked up eagerly at his entrance.
"Are you better?" he asked, advancing, and bending with a kindly smile.
"It is long since you had such a cold as this."
"I shall be all right in a day or two," she answered. "Yesterday I
thought I was going to have a long illness, my chest was so painful. Sit
down, George. What about Treve?"
"Treve was not at Oxford. He had gone to London."
"You told me so. What had he gone there for?"
"A little change, Ferrars said. He had been gone a week."
"A little change? In plain English, a little pleasure, I suppose. Call
it what you will, it costs money."
George had seated himself opposite to her, his arm resting on the centre
table, and the red blaze lighting up his frank, pleasant face. In figure
he was tall and slight; his father, at his age, had been so before him.
"Why did you not follow him to London?" resumed Mrs. Ryle. "It would
have been less than a two hours' journey from Oxford."
George turned his large dark eyes upon her, some surprise in them. "How
was I to know where to look for him, if I had gone?"
"Could Mr. Ferrars not give you his address?"
"No. I asked him. Treve had not told him where he should put up. In
fact, Ferrars did not think Treve knew himself. Under these
circumstances, my going to town would have been only waste of time and
money."
"It is of no use your keeping things from me," resumed Mrs. Ryle, after
a pause. "Has Treve contracted fresh debts at Oxford?"
"I fancy he has. A few."
"A 'few'--and you 'fancy!' George, tell me the truth. That you know he
has, and that they are not a few."
"That he has, I believe to be true: I gathered as much from Ferrars. But
I do not think they are serious; I do not indeed."
"Why did you not inquire? I would have gone to every shop in the town,
in order to ascertain. If he is contracting more debts, who is to pay
them?"
George was silent.
"When shall we be clear of Chattaway?" she abruptly resumed. "When will
the last payment be due?"
"In a month or two's time. Principal and interest will all be paid off
then."
"It will take all your efforts to make up the sum."
"It will be ready, mother. It shall be."
"I don't doubt it. But it will not be ready, George, if a portion is to
be taken from it for Treve."
George knit his brow. He was falling into thought.
"I _must_ get rid of Chattaway," she resumed. "He has been weighing us
down all these years like an incubus; and now that emancipation has
nearly come, were anything to delay it, I should--I think I should go
mad."
"I hope and trust nothing will delay it," answered George. "I am more
anxious to get rid of Chattaway than, I think, even you can be. As to
Treve, his debts must wait."
"But it would be more desirable that he should not contract them."
"Of course. But how are we to prevent his contracting them?"
"He ought to prevent it himself. _You_ did not contract debts."
"I!" he rejoined, in surprise. "I had no opportunity of doing so. Work
and responsibility were thrown upon me before I was old enough to think
of pleasure: and they kept me steady."
"You were not naturally inclined to spend, George."
"There's no knowing what I might have acquired, had I been sent out into
the world, as Treve has," he rejoined.
"It was necessary that Treve should go to college," said Mrs. Ryle,
quite sharply.
"I am not saying anything to the contrary," George quietly answered. "It
was right that he should go--as you wished it."
"I shall live--I hope I shall live--I pray that I may live--to see
Trevlyn lawful possessor of the Hold. A gentleman's education was
essential to him: hence I sent him to Oxford."
George made no reply. Mrs. Ryle felt vexed. She knew George disapproved
her policy in regard to Trevlyn, and charged him with it now. George
would not deny it.
"What I think unwise is your having led Treve to build hopes upon
succeeding to Trevlyn Hold," he said.
"Why?" she haughtily asked. "He will come into it."
"I do not see how."
"He has far more right to it than he who is looked upon as its
successor--Cris Chattaway," she said, with flashing eyes. "You know
that."
George could have answered that neither of them had a just right to it,
whilst Rupert Trevlyn lived; but Rupert and his claims had been so
completely ignored by Mrs. Ryle, as by others, that his advancing them
would have been waived away as idle talk. Mrs. Ryle resumed, her voice
unsteady. It was most rare that she suffered herself to speak of these
past grievances; but when she did, her vehemence mounted to agitation.
"When my boy was born, the news that Joe Trevlyn's health was failing
had come home to us. I knew the Squire would never leave the property to
Maude, and I expected that my son would inherit. Was it not natural that
I should do so?--was it not his right?--I was the Squire's eldest
daughter. I had him named Trevlyn; I wrote a note to my father, saying
he would not now be at fault for a male heir, in the event of poor Joe's
not leaving one----"
"He did leave one," interrupted George, speaking impulsively.
"Rupert was not born then, and his succession was afterwards barred by
my father's will. Through deceit, I grant you: but I had no hand in that
deceit. I named my boy Trevlyn; I regarded him as the heir; and when the
Squire died and his will was opened, it was found he had bequeathed all
to Chattaway. If you think I have ever once faltered in my hope--my
resolve--to see Trevlyn some time displace the Chattaways, you do not
know much of human nature."
"I grant what you say," replied George; "that, of the two, Trevlyn has
more right to it than Cris Chattaway. But has it ever occurred to you to
ask, _how_ Cris is to be displaced?"
Mrs. Ryle did not answer. She sat beating her foot upon the ottoman, as
one whose mind is not at ease. George continued:
"It appears to me the wildest possible fallacy, the bare idea of
Trevlyn's being able to displace Cris Chattaway in the succession. If we
lived in the barbarous ages, when inheritances were wrested by force of
arms, when the turn of a battle decided the ownership of a castle, then
there might be a chance that Cris might lose Trevlyn Hold. As it is,
there is none. There is not the faintest shadow of a chance that it can
go to any one beside Cris. Failing his death--and he is strong and
healthy--he _must_ succeed. Why, even were Rupert--forgive my alluding
to him again--to urge _his_ claims, there would be no hope for him. Mr.
Chattaway legally holds the estate; he has willed it to his son; and
that son cannot be displaced by others."
Her foot beat more impatiently; a heavier line settled on her brow.
Often and often had the arguments now stated by her step-son occurred to
her aching brain. George spoke again.
"And therefore, the improbability--I may say the impossibility--of
Treve's ever succeeding renders it unwise that he should have been
taught to build upon it. Far better, mother, the thought had never been
so much as whispered to him."
"Why do you look at it in this unfavourable light?" she cried angrily.
"Because it is the correct light. The property is Mr.
Chattaway's--legally his, and it cannot be taken from him. It will be
Cris's after him. It is simply madness to think otherwise."
"Cris may die," said Mrs. Ryle sharply.
"If Cris died to-morrow, Treve would be no nearer succession. Chattaway
has daughters, and would will it to each in turn rather than to Treve.
He can will it away as he pleases. It was left to him absolutely."
"My father was mad when he made such a will in favour of Chattaway! He
could have been nothing less. I have thought so many times."
"But it was made, and cannot now be altered. Will you pardon me for
saying that it would have been better had you accepted the state of
affairs, and endeavoured to reconcile yourself to them?"
"_Better?_"
"Yes; much better. To rebel against what cannot be remedied can only do
harm. I would a great deal rather Treve succeeded to Trevlyn Hold than
Cris Chattaway: but I know Treve never will succeed: and, therefore, it
is a pity it was ever suggested to him. He might have settled down more
steadily had he never become possessed of the idea that he might some
time supersede Cris Chattaway."
"He _shall_ supersede him----"
The door opened to admit a visitor, and he who entered was no other than
Rupert Trevlyn. Ignore his claims as she would, Mrs. Ryle felt it would
not be seemly to discuss before him Treve's chance of succession. She
had in truth completely put from her all thought of the claims of
Rupert. He had been deprived of his right by Squire Trevlyn's will, and
there was an end to it. Mrs. Ryle rather liked Rupert; or, it may be
better to say, she did not _dis_like him; really to like any one except
Treve, was not in her nature. She liked Rupert in a negative sort of
way; but would not have helped him to his inheritance by lifting a
finger. In the event of her possessing no son to be jealous for, she
might have taken up the wrongs of Rupert--just to thwart Chattaway.
"Why, Rupert," said George, rising, and cordially shaking hands, "I
heard you were ill again. Maude told me so to-day."
"I am better to-night. Aunt Ryle, they said you were in bed."
"I am better, too, Rupert. What has been the matter with you?"
"Oh, my chest again," said Rupert, pushing the waving hair from his
bright and delicate face. "I could hardly breathe this morning."
"Ought you to have come out to-night?"
"I don't think it matters," carelessly answered Rupert. "For all I see,
I am as well when I go out as when I don't. There's not much to stay in
for, there."
Painfully susceptible to cold, he edged himself closer to the hearth
with a slight shiver. George took the poker and stirred the fire, and
the blaze went flashing up, playing on the familiar objects of the room,
lighting up the slender figure, the well-formed features, the large blue
eyes of Rupert, and bringing out all the signs of constitutional
delicacy. The transparent fairness of complexion and the bloom of the
cheeks, might have whispered a warning.
"Octave thought you were going up there to-night, George."
"Did she?"
"The two Beecroft girls are there, and they turned me out of the
drawing-room. Octave said 'I wasn't wanted.' Will you play chess
to-night, George?"
"If you like; after supper."
"I must be home by half-past ten, you know. I was a minute over the
half-hour the other night, and one of the servants opened the door for
me. Chattaway pretty nearly rose the roof off, he was so angry; but he
could not decently turn me out again."
"Chattaway is master of Trevlyn Hold for the time being," remarked Mrs.
Ryle. "Not Squire; never Squire"--she broke off, straying abruptly from
her subject, and as abruptly resuming it. "You will do well to obey him,
Rupert. When I make a rule in this house, I _never permit it to be
broken_."
A valuable hint, if Rupert had only taken it for guidance. He meant
well: he never meant, for all his light and careless speaking, to
disobey Mr. Chattaway's mandate. And yet it happened that very night!
The chess-board was attractive, and the time slipped on to half-past
ten. Rupert said a hasty good night, snatched up his hat, tore through
the entrance-room and made the best speed his lungs allowed him to
Trevlyn Hold. His heart was beating as he gained it, and he rang that
peal at the bell which had sent its echoes through the house; through
the trembling frame and weak heart of Mrs. Chattaway.
He rang--and rang. There came back no sign that the ring was heard. A
light shone in Mrs. Chattaway's dressing-room; and Rupert took up some
gravel, and gently threw it against the window. No response was accorded
in answer to it; not so much as the form of a hand on the blind; the
house, in its utter stillness, might have been the house of the dead.
Rupert threw up some more gravel as silently as he could.
He had not to wait very long this time. Cautiously, slowly, as though
the very movement feared being heard, the blind was drawn aside, and the
face of Mrs. Chattaway appeared looking down at him. He could see that
she had not begun to undress. She shook her head; raised her hands and
clasped them with a gesture of despair; and her lips formed themselves
into the words, "I may not let you in."
He could not hear the words, but read the expression of the whole all
too clearly--Chattaway would not suffer him to be admitted. Mrs.
Chattaway, dreading possibly that her husband might cast his eyes within
her dressing-room, quietly let the blind fall again, and removed her
shadow from the window.
What was Rupert to do? Lie on the grass that skirted the avenue, and
take his night's rest under the trees in the freezing air and night
dews? A strong frame, revelling in superfluous health, might possibly
risk that; but not Rupert Trevlyn.
A momentary thought come over him that he would go back to Trevlyn Farm,
and ask for a night's shelter there. He would have done so, but for the
recollection of Mrs. Ryle's stern voice and sterner face when she
remarked that, as he knew the rule made for his going in, he must not
break it. Rupert had never got on too cordially with Mrs. Ryle. He
remembered shrinking from her haughty face when he was a child; and
somehow he shrank from it still. No; he would not knock them up at
Trevlyn Farm.
What must he do? Should he walk about until morning? Suddenly a thought
came to him--were the Canhams in bed? If not, he could go there, and lie
on their settle. The Canhams never went to bed very early. Ann Canham
sat up to lock the great gate--it was Chattaway's pleasure that it
should not be done until after ten o'clock; and old Canham liked to sit
up, smoking his pipe.
With a brisk step, now that he had decided on his course, Rupert walked
down the avenue. At the first turning he ran against Cris Chattaway, who
was coming leisurely up it.
"Oh, Cris! I am so glad! You'll let me in. They have shut me out
to-night."
"Let you in!" repeated Cris. "I can't."
Rupert's blue eyes opened in the starlight. "Have you not your
latch-key?"
"What should hinder me?" responded Cris. "_I'm_ going in; but I can't
let you in."
"Why not?" hotly asked Rupert.
"I don't choose to fly in the Squire's face. He has ordered you to be in
before half-past ten, or not to come in at all. It has gone half-past
ten long ago: is hard upon eleven."
"If you can go in after half-past ten, why can't I?" cried Rupert.
"It's not my affair," said Cris, with a yawn. "Don't bother. Now look
here. It's of no use following me, for I shall not let you in."
"Yes you will, Cris."
"_I will not_," responded Cris, emphatically. Rupert's temper was
getting up.
"Cris, I wouldn't show myself such a hangdog sneak as you to be made
king of England. If every one had their rights, Trevlyn Hold would be
mine, to shut you out of it if I pleased. But I wouldn't please. If only
a dog were turned out of his kennel at night, I would let him into the
Hold for shelter."
Cris put his latch-key into the lock. "_I_ don't turn you out. You must
settle that question with the Squire. Keep off. If he says you may be
let in at eleven, well and good; but I'm not going to encourage you in
disobeying orders."
He opened the door a few inches, wound himself in, and shut it in
Rupert's face. He made a great noise in putting up the bar, which was
not in the least necessary. Rupert had given him his true
appellation--that of sneak. He was one: a false-hearted, plausible,
cowardly sneak. As he stood at a table in the hall, and struck a match
to light his candle, his puny face and dull light eyes betrayed the most
complaisant enjoyment.
He went upstairs smiling. He had to pass the angle of the corridor where
his mother's rooms were situated. She glided silently out as he was
going by. Her dress was off, and she had apparently thrown a shawl over
her shoulders to come out to Cris: an old-fashioned spun-silk shawl,
with a grey border and white centre: not so white, however, as the face
of Mrs. Chattaway.
"Cris!" she said, laying her hand upon his arm, and speaking in the most
timid whisper, "why did you not let him in?"
"I thought we had been ordered not to let him in," returned he of the
deceitful nature. "_I_ have been ordered, I know that."
"You might have done it just for once, Cris," his mother answered. "I
know not what will become of him, out of doors this sharp night."
Cris disengaged his arm, and continued his way up to his room. He slept
on the upper floor. Maude was standing at the door of her chamber when
he passed--as Mrs. Chattaway had been.
"Cris--wait a minute," she said, for he was hastening by. "I want to
speak a word to you. Have you seen Rupert?"
"Seen him and heard him too," boldly avowed Cris. "He wanted me to let
him in."
"Which, of course, you would not do?" answered Maude, bitterly. "I
wonder if you ever performed a good-natured action in your life?"
"Can't remember," mockingly retorted Cris.
"Where is Rupert? What is he going to do?"
"You know where he is as well as I do: I suppose you could hear him. As
to what he is going to do, I didn't ask him. Roost in a tree with the
birds, perhaps."
Maude retreated into her room and closed the door. She flung herself
into a chair, and burst into a passionate flood of tears. Her heart
ached for her brother with pain that amounted to agony: she could have
forced down her proud spirit and knelt to Mr. Chattaway for him: almost
have sacrificed her own life to bring comfort to Rupert, whom she loved
so well.
He--Rupert--stamped off when the door was closed against him, feeling he
would like to stamp upon Cris himself. Arrived in front of the lodge, he
stood and whistled, and presently Ann Canham looked from the upper
casement in her nightcap.
"Why, it's never you, Master Rupert!" she exclaimed, in intense
surprise.
"They have locked me out, Ann. Can you manage to come down and open the
door without disturbing your father? If you can, I'll lie on the settle
for to-night."
Once inside, there ensued a contest. In her humble way, begging pardon
for the presumption, Ann Canham proposed that Master Rupert should
occupy her room, and she'd make herself contented with the settle.
Rupert would not hear of it. He threw himself on the narrow bench they
called the settle, and protested that if Ann said another word about
giving up her room, he would go out and spend the night in the avenue.
So she was fain to go back to it herself.
A dreary night on that hard bench; and the morning found him cold and
stiff. He was stamping one foot on the floor to stamp life into it, when
old Canham entered, leaning on a crutch. Ann had told him the news, and
the old man was up before his time.
"But who shut you out, Master Rupert?" he asked.
"Chattaway."
"Ann says Mr. Cris went in pretty late last night. After she had locked
the big gate."
"Cris came up whilst I was ringing to be let in. He went in himself, but
would not let me enter."
"He's a reptile," said old Canham in his anger. "Eh me!" he added,
sitting down with difficulty in his armchair, and extending the crutch
before him, "what a mercy it would have been if Mr. Joe had lived!
Chattaway would never have been stuck up in authority then. Better the
Squire had left Trevlyn Hold to Miss Diana."
"They say he would not leave it to a woman."
"That's true, Master Rupert. And of his children there were but his
daughters left. The two sons had gone. Rupert the heir first: he died on
the high seas; and Mr. Joe next."
"Mark, why did Rupert the heir go to sea?"
Old Canham shook his head. "Ah, it was a bad business, Master Rupert,
and it's as well not to talk of it."
"But _why_ did he go?" persisted Rupert.
"It was a bad business, I say. He, the heir, had fallen into wild ways,
got to like bad company, and that. He went out one night with some
poachers--just for the fun of it. It wasn't on these lands. He meant no
harm, but he was young and random, and he went out and put a gauze over
his face as they did,--just, I say, for the fun of it. Master Rupert,
that night they killed a gamekeeper."
A shiver passed through Rupert's frame. "_He_ killed him?--my uncle,
Rupert Trevlyn?"
"No, it wasn't he that killed him--as was proved a long while
afterwards. But you see at the time it wasn't known exactly who had done
it: they were all in league together, all in a mess, as may be said. Any
way, the young heir, whether in fear or shame, went off in secret, and
before many months had gone over, the bells were tolling for him. He had
died far away."
"But people never could have believed that a Trevlyn killed a man?" said
Rupert, indignantly.
Old Canham paused. "You have heard of the Trevlyn temper, Master
Rupert?"
"Who hasn't?" returned Rupert. "They say I have a touch of it."
"Well, those that believed it laid it to that temper, you see. They
thought the heir had been overtook by a fit of passion, and might have
done the mischief in it. In those fits of passion a man is mad."
"Is he?" abstractedly remarked Rupert, falling into a reverie. He had
never before heard this episode in the history of the uncle whose name
he bore--Rupert Trevlyn.