George Vavasor, the Wild Man.
It will no doubt be understood that George Vavasor did not roam about
in the woods unshorn, or wear leathern trappings and sandals, like
Robinson Crusoe, instead of coats and trousers. His wildness was of
another kind. Indeed, I don't know that he was in truth at all wild,
though Lady Macleod had called him so, and Alice had assented to her
use of the word.
George Vavasor had lived in London since he was twenty, and now, at
the time of the beginning of my story, he was a year or two over
thirty. He was and ever had been the heir to his grandfather's
estate; but that estate was small, and when George first came to
London his father was a strong man of forty, with as much promise
of life in him as his son had. A profession had therefore been
absolutely necessary to him; and he had, at his uncle John's
instance, been placed in the office of a parliamentary land agent.
With this parliamentary land agent he had quarrelled to the knife,
but not before he had by his talents made himself so useful that
he had before him the prospects of a lucrative partnership in the
business. George Vavasor had many faults, but idleness--absolute
idleness--was not one of them. He would occasionally postpone his
work to pleasure. He would be at Newmarket when he should have been
at Whitehall. But it was not usual with him to be in bed when he
should be at his desk, and when he was at his desk he did not whittle
his ruler, or pick his teeth, or clip his nails. Upon the whole
his friends were pleased with the first five years of his life in
London--in spite of his having been found to be in debt on more than
one occasion. But his debts had been paid; and all was going on
swimmingly, when one day he knocked down the parliamentary agent
with a blow between the eyes, and then there was an end of that.
He himself was wont to say that he had known very well what he was
about, that it had behoved him to knock down the man who was to have
been his partner, and that he regretted nothing in the matter. At any
rate the deed was looked upon with approving eyes by many men of good
standing,--or, at any rate, sufficient standing to help George to
another position; and within six weeks of the time of his leaving the
office at Whitehall, he had become a partner in an established firm
of wine merchants. A great-aunt had just then left him a couple of
thousand pounds, which no doubt assisted him in his views with the
wine merchants.
In this employment he remained for another period of five years, and
was supposed by all his friends to be doing very well. And indeed
he did not do badly, only that he did not do well enough to satisfy
himself. He was ambitious of making the house to which he belonged
the first house in the trade in London, and scared his partners by
the boldness and extent of his views. He himself declared that if
they would only have gone along with him he would have made them
princes in the wine market. But they were men either of more prudence
or of less audacity than he, and they declined to walk in his
courses. At the end of the five years Vavasor left the house, not
having knocked any one down on this occasion, and taking with him a
very nice sum of money.
The two last of these five years had certainly been the best period
of his life, for he had really worked very hard, like a man, giving
up all pleasure that took time from him,--and giving up also most
pleasures which were dangerous on account of their costliness. He
went to no races, played no billiards, and spoke of Cremorne as a
childish thing, which he had abandoned now that he was no longer
a child. It was during these two years that he had had his love
passages with his cousin; and it must be presumed that he had, at any
rate, intended at one time to settle himself respectably as a married
man. He had, however, behaved very badly to Alice, and the match had
been broken off.
He had also during the last two years quarrelled with his
grandfather. He had wished to raise a sum of money on the Vavasor
estate, which, as it was unentailed, he could only do with his
grandfather's concurrence. The old gentleman would not hear of
it,--would listen with no patience to the proposition. It was in
vain that George attempted to make the squire understand that the
wine business was going on very well, that he himself owed no man
anything, that everything with him was flourishing;--but that his
trade might be extended indefinitely by the use of a few thousand
pounds at moderate interest. Old Mr. Vavasor was furious. No documents
and no assurances could make him lay aside a belief that the wine
merchants, and the business, and his grandson were all ruined and
ruinous together. No one but a ruined man would attempt to raise
money on the family estate! So they had quarrelled, and had never
spoken or seen each other since. "He shall have the estate for his
life," the squire said to his son John. "I don't think I have a right
to leave it away from him. It never has been left away from the heir.
But I'll tie it up so that he shan't cut a tree on it." John Vavasor
perhaps thought that the old rule of primogeniture might under such
circumstances have been judiciously abandoned--in this one instance,
in his own favour. But he did not say so. Nor would he have said it
had there been a chance of his doing so with success. He was a man
from whom no very noble deed could be expected; but he was also one
who would do no ignoble deed.
After that George Vavasor had become a stockbroker, and a stockbroker
he was now. In the first twelve months after his leaving the wine
business,--the same being the first year after his breach with
Alice,--he had gone back greatly in the estimation of men. He had
lived in open defiance of decency. He had spent much money and had
apparently made none, and had been, as all his friends declared, on
the high road to ruin. Aunt Macleod had taken her judgement from this
period of his life when she had spoken of him as a man who never did
anything. But he had come forth again suddenly as a working man; and
now they who professed to know, declared that he was by no means
poor. He was in the City every day; and during the last two years had
earned the character of a shrewd fellow who knew what he was about,
who might not perhaps be very mealy-mouthed in affairs of business,
but who was fairly and decently honourable in his money transactions.
In fact, he stood well on 'Change.
And during these two years he had stood a contest for a seat in
Parliament, having striven to represent the metropolitan borough of
Chelsea, on the extremely Radical interest. It is true that he had
failed, and that he had spent a considerable sum of money in the
contest. "Where on earth does your nephew get his money?" men said to
John Vavasor at his club. "Upon my word I don't know," said Vavasor.
"He doesn't get it from me, and I'm sure he doesn't get it from my
father." But George Vavasor, though he failed at Chelsea, did not
spend his money altogether fruitlessly. He gained reputation by the
struggle, and men came to speak of him as though he were one who
would do something. He was a stockbroker, a thorough-going Radical,
and yet he was the heir to a fine estate, which had come down from
father to son for four hundred years! There was something captivating
about his history and adventures, especially as just at the time of
the election he became engaged to an heiress, who died a month before
the marriage should have taken place. She died without a will, and
her money all went to some third cousins.
George Vavasor bore this last disappointment like a man, and it was
at this time that he again became fully reconciled to his cousin.
Previous to this they had met; and Alice, at her cousin Kate's
instigation, had induced her father to meet him. But at first there
had been no renewal of real friendship. Alice had given her cordial
assent to her cousin's marriage with the heiress, Miss Grant, telling
Kate that such an engagement was the very thing to put him thoroughly
on his feet. And then she had been much pleased by his spirit at that
Chelsea election. "It was grand of him, wasn't it?" said Kate, her
eyes brimming full of tears. "It was very spirited," said Alice. "If
you knew all, you would say so. They could get no one else to stand
but that Mr. Travers, and he wouldn't come forward, unless they would
guarantee all his expenses." "I hope it didn't cost George much,"
said Alice. "It did, though; nearly all he had got. But what matters?
Money's nothing to him, except for its uses. My own little mite is
my own now, and he shall have every farthing of it for the next
election, even though I should go out as a housemaid the next day."
There must have been something great about George Vavasor, or he
would not have been so idolized by such a girl as his sister Kate.
Early in the present spring, before the arrangements for the Swiss
journey were made, George Vavasor had spoken to Alice about that
intended marriage which had been broken off by the lady's death. He
was sitting one evening with his cousin in the drawing-room in Queen
Anne Street, waiting for Kate, who was to join him there before going
to some party. I wonder whether Kate had had a hint from her brother
to be late! At any rate, the two were together for an hour, and the
talk had been all about himself. He had congratulated her on her
engagement with Mr. Grey, which had just become known to him, and had
then spoken of his own last intended marriage.
"I grieved for her," he said, "greatly."
"I'm sure you did, George."
"Yes, I did;--for her, herself. Of course the world has given me
credit for lamenting the loss of her money. But the truth is, that as
regards both herself and her money, it is much better for me that we
were never married."
"Do you mean even though she should have lived?"
"Yes;--even had she lived."
"And why so? If you liked her, her money was surely no drawback."
"No; not if I had liked her."
"And did you not like her?"
"No."
"Oh, George!"
"I did not love her as a man should love his wife, if you mean that.
As for my liking her, I did like her. I liked her very much."
"But you would have loved her?"
"I don't know. I don't find that task of loving so very easy. It
might have been that I should have learned to hate her."
"If so, it is better for you, and better for her, that she has gone."
"It is better. I am sure of it. And yet I grieve for her, and in
thinking of her I almost feel as though I were guilty of her death."
"But she never suspected that you did not love her?"
"Oh no. But she was not given to think much of such things. She took
all that for granted. Poor girl! she is at rest now, and her money
has gone, where it should go, among her own relatives."
"Yes; with such feelings as yours are about her, her money would have
been a burden to you."
"I would not have taken it. I hope, at least, that I would not have
taken it. Money is a sore temptation, especially to a poor man like
me. It is well for me that the trial did not come in my way."
"But you are not such a very poor man now, are you, George? I thought
your business was a good one."
"It is, and I have no right to be a poor man. But a man will be poor
who does such mad things as I do. I had three or four thousand pounds
clear, and I spent every shilling of it on the Chelsea election.
Goodness knows whether I shall have a shilling at all when another
chance comes round; but if I have I shall certainly spend it, and
if I have not, I shall go in debt wherever I can raise a hundred
pounds."
"I hope you will be successful at last."
"I feel sure that I shall. But, in the mean time, I cannot but know
that my career is perfectly reckless. No woman ought to join her lot
to mine unless she has within her courage to be as reckless as I am.
You know what men do when they toss up for shillings?"
"Yes, I suppose I do."
"I am tossing up every day of my life for every shilling that I
have."
"Do you mean that you're--gambling?"
"No. I have given that up altogether. I used to gamble, but I never
do that now, and never shall again. What I mean is this,--that I hold
myself in readiness to risk everything at any moment, in order to
gain any object that may serve my turn. I am always ready to lead a
forlorn hope. That's what I mean by tossing up every day for every
shilling that I have."
Alice did not quite understand him, and perhaps he did not intend
that she should. Perhaps his object was to mystify her imagination.
She did not understand him, but I fear that she admired the kind of
courage which he professed. And he had not only professed it: in that
matter of the past election he had certainly practised it.
In talking of beauty to his sister he had spoken of himself as being
ugly. He would not generally have been called ugly by women, had not
one side of his face been dreadfully scarred by a cicatrice, which in
healing, had left a dark indented line down from his left eye to his
lower jaw. That black ravine running through his cheek was certainly
ugly. On some occasions, when he was angry or disappointed, it was
very hideous; for he would so contort his face that the scar would,
as it were, stretch itself out, revealing all its horrors, and his
countenance would become all scar. "He looked at me like the devil
himself--making the hole in his face gape at me," the old squire
had said to John Vavasor in describing the interview in which the
grandson had tried to bully his grandfather into assenting to his own
views about the mortgage. But in other respects George's face was not
ugly, and might have been thought handsome by many women. His hair
was black, and was parted in the front. His forehead, though low,
was broad. His eyes were dark and bright, and his eyebrows were very
full, and perfectly black. At those periods of his anger, all his
face which was not scar, was eye and eyebrow. He wore a thick black
moustache, which covered his mouth, but no whiskers. People said of
him that he was so proud of his wound that he would not grow a hair
to cover it. The fact, however, was that no whisker could be made to
come sufficiently forward to be of service, and therefore he wore
none.
The story of that wound should be told. When he was yet hardly more
than a boy, before he had come up to London, he was living in a
house in the country which his father then occupied. At the time
his father was absent, and he and his sister only were in the house
with the maid-servants. His sister had a few jewels in her room, and
an exaggerated report of them having come to the ears of certain
enterprising burglars, a little plan was arranged for obtaining them.
A small boy was hidden in the house, a window was opened, and at the
proper witching hour of night a stout individual crept up-stairs in
his stocking-feet, and was already at Kate Vavasor's door,--when,
in the dark, dressed only in his nightshirt, wholly unarmed, George
Vavasor flew at the fellow's throat. Two hours elapsed before the
horror-stricken women of the house could bring men to the place.
George's face had then been ripped open from the eye downwards, with
some chisel, or house-breaking instrument. But the man was dead.
George had wrenched from him his own tool, and having first jabbed
him all over with insufficient wounds, had at last driven the steel
through his windpipe. The small boy escaped, carrying with him two
shillings and threepence which Kate had left upon the drawing-room
mantelpiece.
George Vavasor was rather low in stature, but well made, with small
hands and feet, but broad in the chest and strong in the loins. He
was a fine horseman and a hard rider; and men who had known him well
said that he could fence and shoot with a pistol as few men care to
do in these peaceable days. Since volunteering had come up, he had
become a captain of Volunteers, and had won prizes with his rifle at
Wimbledon.
Such had been the life of George Vavasor, and such was his character,
and such his appearance. He had always lived alone in London, and did
so at present; but just now his sister was much with him, as she was
staying up in town with an aunt, another Vavasor by birth, with whom
the reader will, if he persevere, become acquainted in course of
time. I hope he will persevere a little, for of all the Vavasors Mrs.
Greenow was perhaps the best worth knowing. But Kate Vavasor's home
was understood to be in her grandfather's house in Westmoreland.
On the evening before they started for Switzerland, George and Kate
walked from Queen Anne Street, where they had been dining with Alice,
to Mrs. Greenow's house. Everything had been settled about luggage,
hours of starting, and routes as regarded their few first days;
and the common purse had been made over to George. That portion of
Mr. Grey's letter had been read which alluded to the Paynims and
the glasses of water, and everything had passed in the best of
good-humour. "I'll endeavour to get the cold water for you," George
had said; "but as to the breakfasts, I can only hope you won't put
me to severe trials by any very early hours. When people go out for
pleasure it should be pleasure."
The brother and sister walked through two or three streets in
silence, and then Kate asked a question.
"George, I wonder what your wishes really are about Alice?"
"That she shouldn't want her breakfast too early while we are away."
"That means that I'm to hold my tongue, of course."
"No, it doesn't."
"Then it means that you intend to hold yours."
"No; not that either."
"Then what does it mean?"
"That I have no fixed wishes on the subject. Of course she'll marry
this man John Grey, and then no one will hear another word about
her."
"She will no doubt, if you don't interfere. Probably she will whether
you interfere or not. But if you wish to interfere--"
"She's got four hundred a year, and is not so good-looking as she
was."
"Yes; she has got four hundred a year, and she is more handsome now
than ever she was. I know that you think so;--and that you love her
and love no one else--unless you have a sneaking fondness for me."
"I'll leave you to judge of that last."
"And as for me,--I only love two people in the world; her and you. If
ever you mean to try, you should try now."