Burgo Fitzgerald.
On the night before Christmas Eve two men were sitting together in
George Vavasor's rooms in Cecil Street. It was past twelve o'clock,
and they were both smoking; there were square bottles on the table
containing spirits, with hot water and cold water in jugs, and one
of the two men was using, and had been using, these materials for
enjoyment. Vavasor had not been drinking, nor did it appear as though
he intended to begin. There was a little weak brandy and water in
a glass by his side, but there it had remained untouched for the
last twenty minutes. His companion, however, had twice in that time
replenished his beaker, and was now puffing out the smoke of his pipe
with the fury of a steamer's funnel when she has not yet burned the
black off her last instalment of fresh coals. This man was Burgo
Fitzgerald. He was as handsome as ever;--a man whom neither man nor
woman could help regarding as a thing beautiful to behold;--but
not the less was there in his eyes and cheeks a look of haggard
dissipation,--of riotous living, which had become wearisome, by its
continuance, even to himself,--that told to all who saw him much
of the history of his life. Most men who drink at nights, and are
out till cockcrow doing deeds of darkness, become red in their
faces, have pimpled cheeks and watery eyes, and are bloated and not
comfortable to be seen. It is a kind dispensation of Providence who
thus affords to such sinners a visible sign, to be seen day by day,
of the injury which is being done. The first approach of a carbuncle
on the nose, about the age of thirty, has stopped many a man from
drinking. No one likes to have carbuncles on his nose, or to appear
before his female friends with eyes which look as though they were
swimming in grog. But to Burgo Fitzgerald Providence in her anger had
not afforded this protection. He became at times pale, sallow, worn,
and haggard. He grew thin, and still thinner. At times he had been
ill to death's door. Among his intimate friends there were those who
heard him declare frequently that his liver had become useless to
him; and that, as for gastric juices, he had none left to him. But
still his beauty remained. The perfect form of his almost god-like
face was the same as ever, and the brightness of his bright blue eye
was never quenched.
On the present occasion he had come to Vavasor's room with the object
of asking from him certain assistance, and perhaps also some amount
of advice. But as regarded the latter article he was, I think, in the
state of most men when they seek for counsellors who shall counsel
them to do evil. Advice administered in accordance with his own views
would give him comfortable encouragement, but advice on the other
side he was prepared to disregard altogether. These two men had known
each other long, and a close intimacy had existed between them in the
days past, previous to Lady Glencora's engagement with Mr. Palliser.
When Lady Glencora endeavoured, vainly as we know, to obtain aid from
Alice Vavasor, Burgo had been instigated to believe that Alice's
cousin might assist him. Any such assistance George Vavasor would
have been quite ready to give. Some pecuniary assistance he had
given, he at that time having been in good funds. Perhaps he had for
a moment induced Burgo to think that he could obtain for the pair the
use of the house in Queen Anne Street as a point at which they might
meet, and from whence they might start on their journey of love. All
that was over. Those hopes had been frustrated, and Lady Glencora
M'Cluskie had become Lady Glencora Palliser and not Lady Glencora
Fitzgerald. But now other hopes had sprung up, and Burgo was again
looking to his friend for assistance.
"I believe she would," Burgo said, as he lifted the glass to
his mouth. "It's a thing of that sort that a man can only
believe,--perhaps only hope,--till he has tried. I know that she is
not happy with him, and I have made up my mind that I will at least
ask her."
"But he would have her fortune all the same?"
"I don't know how that would be. I haven't inquired, and I don't mean
to inquire. Of course I don't expect you or any one else to believe
me, but her money has no bearing on the question now. Heaven knows I
want money bad enough, but I wouldn't take away another man's wife
for money."
"You don't mean to say you think it would be wicked. I supposed you
to be above those prejudices."
"It's all very well for you to chaff."
"It's no chaff at all. I tell you fairly I wouldn't run away with any
man's wife. I have an old-fashioned idea that when a man has got a
wife he ought to be allowed to keep her. Public opinion, I know, is
against me."
"I think he ran away with my wife," said Burgo, with emphasis;
"that's the way I look at it. She was engaged to me first; and she
really loved me, while she never cared for him."
"Nevertheless, marriage is marriage, and the law is against you. But
if I did go in for such a troublesome job at all, I certainly should
keep an eye upon the money."
"It can make no difference."
"It did make a difference, I suppose, when you first thought of
marrying her?"
"Of course it did. My people brought us together because she had a
large fortune and I had none. There's no doubt in the world about
that. And I'll tell you what; I believe that old harridan of an aunt
of mine is willing to do the same thing now again. Of course she
doesn't say as much. She wouldn't dare do that, but I do believe she
means it. I wonder where she expects to go to!"
"That's grateful on your part."
"Upon my soul I hate her. I do indeed. It isn't love for me now so
much as downright malice against Palliser, because he baulked her
project before. She is a wicked old woman. Some of us fellows are
wicked enough--you and I for instance--"
"Thank you. I don't know, however, that I am qualified to run in a
curricle with you."
"But we are angels to such an old she-devil as that. You may believe
me or not, as you like.--I dare say you won't believe me."
"I'll say I do, at any rate."
"The truth is, I want to get her, partly because I love her; but
chiefly because I do believe in my heart that she loves me."
"It's for her sake then! You are ready to sacrifice yourself to do
her a good turn."
"As for sacrificing myself, that's done. I'm a man utterly ruined
and would cut my throat to-morrow for the sake of my relations, if I
cared enough about them. I know my own condition pretty well. I have
made a shipwreck of everything, and have now only got to go down
among the breakers."
"Only you would like to take Lady Glencora with you."
"No, by heavens! But sometimes, when I do think about it at
all,--which I do as seldom as I can,--it seems to me that I might
still become a different fellow if it were possible for me to marry
her."
"Had you married her when she was free to marry any one and when her
money was her own, it might have been so."
"I think it would be quite as much so now. I do, indeed. If I could
get her once, say to Italy, or perhaps to Greece, I think I could
treat her well, and live with her quietly. I know that I would try."
"Without the assistance of brandy and cigars."
"Yes."
"And without any money."
"With only a little. I know you'll laugh at me; but I make pictures
to myself of a sort of life which I think would suit us, and be very
different from this hideous way of living, with which I have become
so sick that I loathe it."
"Something like Juan and Haidée, with Planty Pall coming after you,
like old Lambro." By the nickname of Planty Pall George Vavasor
intended to designate Lady Glencora's present husband.
"He'd get a divorce, of course, and then we should be married. I
really don't think he'd dislike it, when it was all done. They tell
me he doesn't care for her."
"You have seen her since her marriage?"
"Yes; twice."
"And have spoken to her?"
"Once only,--so as to be able to do more than ask her if she were
well. Once, for about two minutes, I did speak to her."
"And what did she say?"
"She said it would be better that we should not meet. When she said
that, I knew that she was still fond of me. I could have fallen at
her feet that moment, only the room was full of people. I do think
that she is fond of me."
Vavasor paused a few minutes. "I dare say she is fond of you," he
then said; "but whether she has pluck for such a thing as this, is
more than I can say. Probably she has not. And if she has, probably
you would fail in carrying out your plan."
"I must get a little money first," said Burgo.
"And that's an operation which no doubt you find more difficult every
day, as you grow older."
"It seems to be much the same sort of thing. I went to Magruin this
morning."
"He's the fellow that lives out near Gray's Inn Lane?"
"Just beyond the Foundling Hospital. I went to him, and he was quite
civil about it. He says I owe him over three thousand pounds, but
that doesn't seem to make any difference."
"How much did you ever have from him?"
"I don't recollect that I ever absolutely had any money. He got a
bill of mine from a tailor who went to smash, and he kept on renewing
that till it grew to be ever so many bills. I think he did once let
me have twenty-four pounds,--but certainly never more than that."
"And he says he'll give you money now? I suppose you told him why you
wanted it."
"I didn't name her,--but I told him what would make him understand
that I hoped to get off with a lady who had a lot of tin. I asked him
for two hundred and fifty. He says he'll let me have one hundred and
fifty on a bill at two months for five hundred,--with your name to
it."
"With my name to it! That's kind on his part,--and on yours too."
"Of course I can't take it up at the end of two months."
"I dare say not," said Vavasor.
"But he won't come upon you then,--nor for a year or more afterwards.
I did pay you what you lent me before."
"Yes, you did. I always thought that to be a special compliment on
your part."
"And you'll find I'll pull you through now in some way. If I don't
succeed in this I shall go off the hooks altogether soon; and if I
were dead my people would pay my debts then."
Before the evening was over Vavasor promised the assistance asked
of him. He knew that he was lending his name to a man who was
utterly ruined, and putting it into the hands of another man who was
absolutely without conscience in the use he would make of it. He knew
that he was creating for himself trouble, and in all probability
loss, which he was ill able to bear. But the thing was one which came
within the pale of his laws. Such assistance as that he might ask of
others, and had asked and received before now. It was a reckless deed
on his part, but then all his doings were reckless. It was consonant
with his mode of life.
"I thought you would, old fellow," said Burgo, as he got up to go
away. "Perhaps, you know, I shall pull through in this; and perhaps,
after all, some part of her fortune will come with her. If so you'll
be all right."
"Perhaps I may. But look here, Burgo,--don't you give that fellow up
the bill till you've got the money into your fist."
"You may be quite easy about that. I know their tricks. He and I will
go to the bank together, and we shall squabble there at the door
about four or five odd sovereigns,--and at last I shall have to give
him up two or three. Beastly old robber! I declare I think he's worse
than I am myself." Then Burgo Fitzgerald took a little more brandy
and water and went away.
He was living at this time in the house of one of his relatives in
Cavendish Square, north of Oxford Street. His uncles and his aunts,
and all those who were his natural friends, had clung to him with a
tenacity that was surprising; for he had never been true to any of
them, and did not even pretend to like them. His father, with whom
for many years he had not been on speaking terms, was now dead; but
he had sisters whose husbands would still open their houses to him,
either in London or in the country;--would open their houses to him,
and lend him their horses, and provide him with every luxury which
the rich enjoy,--except ready money. When the uttermost stress of
pecuniary embarrassment would come upon him, they would pay something
to stave off the immediate evil. And so Burgo went on. Nobody now
thought of saying much to reproach him. It was known to be waste of
words, and trouble in vain. They were still fond of him because he
was beautiful and never vain of his beauty;--because in the midst
of his recklessness there was always about him a certain kindliness
which made him pleasant to those around him. He was soft and gracious
with children, and would be very courteous to his lady cousins. They
knew that as a man he was worthless, but nevertheless they loved him.
I think the secret of it was chiefly in this,--that he seemed to
think so little of himself.
But now as he walked home in the middle of the night from Cecil
Street to Cavendish Square he did think much of himself. Indeed such
self-thoughts come naturally to all men, be their outward conduct
ever so reckless. Every man to himself is the centre of the whole
world;--the axle on which it all turns. All knowledge is but his own
perception of the things around him. All love, and care for others,
and solicitude for the world's welfare, are but his own feelings as
to the world's wants and the world's merits.
He had played his part as a centre of all things very badly. Of that
he was very well aware. He had sense enough to know that it should be
a man's lot to earn his bread after some fashion, and he often told
himself that never as yet had he earned so much as a penny roll. He
had learned to comprehend that the world's progress depends on the
way in which men do their duty by each other,--that the progress
of one generation depends on the discharge of such duties by that
which preceded it;--and he knew that he, in his generation, had done
nothing to promote such progress. He thoroughly despised himself,--if
there might be any good in that! But on such occasions as these, when
the wine he had drunk was sufficient only to drive away from him the
numbness of despair, when he was all alone with the cold night air
upon his face, when the stars were bright above him and the world
around him was almost quiet, he would still ask himself whether
there might not yet be, even for him, some hope of a redemption,
--some chance of a better life in store for him. He was still
young,--wanting some years of thirty. Could there be, even for him,
some mode of extrication from his misery?
We know what was the mode which now, at this moment, was suggesting
itself to him. He was proposing to himself, as the best thing that he
could do, to take away another man's wife and make himself happy with
her! What he had said to Vavasor as to disregarding Lady Glencora's
money had been perfectly true. That in the event of her going off
with him, some portion of her enormous wealth would still cling to
her, he did believe. Seeing that she had no children he could not
understand where else it should all go. But he thought of this
as it regarded her, not as it regarded him. When he had before
made his suit to her,--a suit which was then honourable, however
disadvantageous it might have seemed to be to her--he had made in his
mind certain calculations as to the good things which would result
to him if he were successful. He would keep hounds, and have three or
four horses every day for his own riding, and he would have no more
interviews with Magruin, waiting in that rogue's dingy back parlour
for many a weary wretched half-hour, till the rogue should be pleased
to show himself. So far he had been mercenary; but he had learned to
love the girl, and to care more for her than for her money, and when
the day of disappointment came upon him,--the day on which she had
told him that all between them was to be over for ever,--he had, for
a few hours, felt the loss of his love more than the loss of his
money.
Then he had had no further hope. No such idea as that which now
filled his mind had then come upon him. The girl had gone from him
and married another man, and there was an end of it. But by degrees
tidings had reached him that she was not happy,--reaching him through
the mouths of people who were glad to exaggerate all that they had
heard. A whole tribe of his female relatives had been anxious to
promote his marriage with Lady Glencora M'Cluskie, declaring that,
after all that was come and gone, Burgo would come forth from his
troubles as a man of great wealth. So great was the wealth of the
heiress that it might withstand even his propensities for spending.
That whole tribe had been bitterly disappointed; and when they heard
that Mr. Palliser's marriage had given him no child, and that Lady
Glencora was unhappy,--they made their remarks in triumph rather
than in sorrow. I will not say that they looked forward approvingly
to such a step as that which Burgo now wished to take,--though as
regarded his aunt, Lady Monk, he himself had accused her; but they
whispered that such things had been done and must be expected, when
marriages were made up as had been that marriage between Mr. Palliser
and his bride.
As he walked on, thinking of his project, he strove hard to cheat
himself into a belief that he would do a good thing in carrying Lady
Glencora away from her husband. Bad as had been his life he had
never before done aught so bad as that. The more fixed his intention
became, the more thoroughly he came to perceive how great and
grievous was the crime which he contemplated. To elope with another
man's wife no longer appeared to him to be a joke at which such men
as he might smile. But he tried to think that in this case there
would be special circumstances which would almost justify him, and
also her. They had loved each other and had sworn to love each other
with constancy. There had been no change in the feelings or even in
the wishes of either of them. But cold people had come between them
with cold calculations, and had separated them. She had been, he told
himself, made to marry a man she did not love. If they two loved
each other truly, would it not still be better that they should come
together? Would not the sin be forgiven on account of the injustice
which had been done to them? Had Mr. Palliser a right to expect more
from a wife who had been made to marry him without loving him? Then
he reverted to those dreams of a life of love, in some sunny country,
of which he had spoken to Vavasor, and he strove to nourish them.
Vavasor had laughed at him, talking of Juan and Haidée. But Vavasor,
he said to himself, was a hard cold man, who had no touch of romance
in his character. He would not be laughed out of his plan by such as
he,--nor would he be frightened by the threat of any Lambro who might
come after him, whether he might come in the guise of indignant uncle
or injured husband.
He had crossed from Regent Street through Hanover Square, and as he
came out by the iron gates into Oxford Street, a poor wretched girl,
lightly clad in thin raiment, into whose bones the sharp freezing air
was penetrating, asked him for money. Would he give her something to
get drink, so that for a moment she might feel the warmth of her life
renewed? Such midnight petitions were common enough in his ears, and
he was passing on without thinking of her. But she was urgent, and
took hold of him. "For love of God," she said, "if it's only a penny
to get a glass of gin! Feel my hand,--how cold it is." And she strove
to put it up against his face.
He looked round at her and saw that she was very young,--sixteen,
perhaps, at the most, and that she had once,--nay very lately,--been
exquisitely pretty. There still lingered about her eyes some remains
of that look of perfect innocency and pure faith which had been hers
not more than twelve months since. And now, at midnight, in the
middle of the streets, she was praying for a pennyworth of gin, as
the only comfort she knew, or could expect!
"You are cold!" said he, trying to speak to her cheerily.
"Cold!" said she, repeating the word, and striving to wrap herself
closer in her rags, as she shivered--"Oh God! if you knew what it
was to be as cold as I am! I have nothing in the world,--not one
penny,--not a hole to lie in!"
"We are alike then," said Burgo, with a slight low laugh. "I also
have nothing. You cannot be poorer than I am."
"You poor!" she said. And then she looked up into his face.
"Gracious; how beautiful you are! Such as you are never poor."
He laughed again,--in a different tone. He always laughed when any
one told him of his beauty. "I am a deal poorer than you, my girl,"
he said. "You have nothing. I have thirty thousand pounds worse than
nothing. But come along, and I will get you something to eat."
"Will you?" said she, eagerly. Then looking up at him again, she
exclaimed--"Oh, you are so handsome!"
He took her to a public-house and gave her bread and meat and beer,
and stood by her while she ate it. She was shy with him then, and
would fain have taken it to a corner by herself, had he allowed her.
He perceived this, and turned his back to her, but still spoke to her
a word or two as she ate. The woman at the bar who served him looked
at him wonderingly, staring into his face; and the pot-boy woke
himself thoroughly that he might look at Burgo; and the waterman from
the cab-stand stared at him; and women who came in for gin looked
almost lovingly up into his eyes. He regarded them all not at all,
showing no feeling of disgrace at his position, and no desire to
carry himself as a ruffler. He quietly paid what was due when the
girl had finished her meal, and then walked with her out of the
shop. "And now," said he, "what must I do with you? If I give you a
shilling can you get a bed?" She told him that she could get a bed
for sixpence. "Then keep the other sixpence for your breakfast," said
he. "But you must promise me that you will buy no gin to-night." She
promised him, and then he gave her his hand as he wished her good
night;--his hand, which it had been the dearest wish of Lady Glencora
to call her own. She took it and pressed it to her lips. "I wish I
might once see you again," she said, "because you are so good and so
beautiful." He laughed again cheerily, and walked on, crossing the
street towards Cavendish Square. She stood looking at him till he was
out of sight, and then as she moved away,--let us hope to the bed
which his bounty had provided, and not to a gin-shop,--she exclaimed
to herself again and again--"Gracious, how beautiful he was!" "He's
a good un," the woman at the public-house had said as soon as he
left it; "but, my! did you ever see a man's face handsome as that
fellow's?"
[Illustration: Burgo Fitzgerald.]
Poor Burgo! All who had seen him since life had begun with him had
loved him and striven to cherish him. And with it all, to what a
state had he come! Poor Burgo! had his eyes been less brightly blue,
and his face less godlike in form, it may be that things would
have gone better with him. A sweeter-tempered man than he never
lived,--nor one who was of a kinder nature. At this moment he had
barely money about him to take him down to his aunt's house at
Monkshade, and as he had promised to be there before Christmas Day,
he was bound to start on the next morning, before help from Mr.
Magruin was possible. Nevertheless, out of his very narrow funds he
had given half a crown to comfort the poor creature who had spoken to
him in the street.