Very little came, as was natural, of the talk in the library, to which
the entire afternoon was devoted. The Squire, in his way, was as great
an interruption to the arguments of the Curate as was poor Louisa in
hers; and Gerald sat patiently to listen to his father's indignant
monologue, broken as it was by Frank's more serious attacks. He was
prepared for all they could say to him, and listened to it, sometimes
with a kind of wondering smile, knowing well how much more strongly,
backed by all his prejudices and interests, he had put the same
arguments to himself. All this time nobody discussed the practicability
of the matter much, nor what steps he meant to take: what immediately
occupied both his father and brother was his determination itself, and
the reasons which had led him to it, which the Squire, like Louisa,
could not understand.
"If I had made myself disagreeable," said Mr Wentworth; "if I had
remonstrated with him, as Leonora urged me to do; if I had put a stop to
the surplice and so forth, and interfered with his decorations or his
saints' days, or anything, it might have been comprehensible. But I
never said a syllable on the subject. I give you my word, I never did.
Why couldn't he have sent down for Louisa now, and dined at the Hall, as
usual, when any of my sons come home? I suppose a man may change his
religion, sir, without getting rid of his natural affections," said the
Squire, gazing out with puzzled looks to watch Gerald going slowly down
the avenue. "A man who talks of leaving his wife, and declines to dine
at his father's house with his brothers and sisters, is a mystery I
can't understand."
"I don't suppose he cares for a lively party like ours at this moment,"
said the Curate: "I don't take it as any sign of a want of affection for
me."
The Squire puffed forth a large sigh of trouble and vexation as he
came from the window. "If _I_ were to give in to trouble when it
appears, what would become of our lively party, I wonder?" he said.
"I'm getting an old man, Frank; but there's not a young man in
Christendom has more need to take care of himself, and preserve his
health, than I have. I am very well, thank God, though I have had a
touch of our Wentworth complaint--just one touch. My father had it ten
years earlier in life, and lived to eighty, all the same; but that is
an age I shall never see. Such worries as I have would kill any man.
I've not spoken to anybody about it," said the Squire, hastily, "but
Jack is going a terrible pace just now. I've had a good deal of bother
about bills and things. He gets worse every year; and what would
become of the girls and the little children if the estate were to come
into Jack's hands, is a thought I don't like to dwell upon, Frank. I
suppose he never writes to you?"
"Not for years past," said the Curate--"not since I was at Oxford.
Where is he now?"
"Somewhere about town, I suppose," said the aggrieved father, "or
wherever the greatest scamps collect when they go out of town--that's
where he is. I could show you a little document or two, Frank--but
now," said the Squire, shutting up a drawer which he had unlocked and
partly opened, "I won't; you've enough on your mind with Gerald, and
I told you I should be glad of your advice about Cuthbert and Guy."
Upon which the father and son plunged into family affairs. Cuthbert
and Guy were the youngest of the Squire's middle family--a "lot" which
included Frank and Charley and the three sisters, one of whom was
married. The domestic relations of the Wentworths were complicated in
this generation. Jack and Gerald were of the first marriage, a period
in his history which Mr Wentworth himself had partly forgotten; and
the troop of children at present in the Hall nursery were quite beyond
the powers of any grown-up brother to recognise or identify. It was
vaguely understood that "the girls" knew all the small fry by head and
name, but even the Squire himself was apt to get puzzled. With such a
household, and with an heir impending over his head like Jack, it may
be supposed that Mr Wentworth's anxiety to get his younger boys
disposed of was great. Cuthbert and Guy were arrows in the hand of the
giant, but he had his quiver so full that the best thing he could do
was to draw his bow and shoot them away into as distant and as fresh a
sphere as possible. They were sworn companions and allies, but they
were not clever, Mr Wentworth believed, and he was very glad to
consult over New Zealand and Australia, and which was best, with their
brother Frank.
"They are good boys," said their father, "but they have not any brains
to speak of--not like Gerald and you;--though, after all, I begin to be
doubtful what's the good of brains," added the Squire, disconsolately,
"if this is all that comes of them. After building so much on Gerald for
years, and feeling that one might live to see him a bishop--but,
however, there's still _you_ left; you're all right, Frank?"
"Oh yes, I am all right," said the Curate, with a sigh; "but neither
Gerald nor I are the stuff that bishops are made of," he added,
laughing. "I hope you don't dream of any such honour for me."
But the Squire was too troubled in his mind for laughter. "Jack was
always clever, too," he said, dolefully, "and little good has come of
that. I hope he won't disgrace the family any more than he has done, in
my time, Frank. You young fellows have all your life before you; but
when a man comes to my age, and expects a little comfort, it's hard to
be dragged into the mire after his children. I did my duty by Jack
too--I can say that for myself. He had the same training as Gerald
had--the same tutor at the university--everything just the same. How do
you account for that, sir, you that are a philosopher?" said Mr
Wentworth again, with a touch of irritation. "Own brothers both by
father and mother; brought up in the same house, same school and college
and everything; and all the time as different from each other as light
and darkness. How do you account for that? Though, to be sure, here's
Gerald taken to bad ways too. It must have been some weakness by their
mother's side. Poor girl! she died too young to show it herself; but
it's come out in her children," said the vexed Squire. "Though it's a
poor sort of thing to blame them that are gone," he added, with
penitence; and he got up and paced uneasily about the room. Who was
there else to blame? Not himself, for he had done his duty by his boys.
Mr Wentworth never was disturbed in mind, without, as his family were
well aware, becoming excited in temper too; and the unexpected nature of
the new trouble had somehow added a keener touch of exasperation to his
perennial dissatisfaction with his heir. "If Jack had been the man he
ought to have been, his advice might have done some good--for a
clergyman naturally sees things in a different light from a man of the
world," said the troubled father; and Frank perceived that he too shared
in his father's displeasure, because he was not Jack, nor a man of the
world; notwithstanding that, being Frank and a clergyman, he was
acknowledged by public opinion to be the Squire's favourite in the
family. Things continued in this uncomfortable state up to the
dinner-hour, so that the Curate, even had his own feelings permitted it,
had but little comfort in his home visit. At dinner Mr Wentworth did not
eat, and awoke the anxiety of his wife, who drove the old gentleman into
a state of desperation by inquiries after his health.
"Indeed, I wish you would remonstrate with your papa, Frank," said his
stepmother, who was not a great deal older than the Curate. "After his
attack he ought to be more careful. But he never takes the least
trouble about himself, no more than if he were five-and-twenty. After
getting such a knock on the forehead too; and you see he eats nothing.
I shall be miserable if the doctor is not sent for to-night."
"Stuff!" cried the Squire, testily. "Perhaps you will speak to the cook
about these messes she insists on sending up to disgust one, and leave
me to take care of my own health. Don't touch that dish, Frank; it's
poison. I am glad Gerald is not here: he'd think we never had a dinner
without that confounded mixture. And then the wonder is that one can't
eat!" said Mr Wentworth, in a tone which spread consternation round the
table. Mrs Wentworth secretly put her handkerchief to her eyes behind
the great cover, which had not yet been removed; and one of the girls
dashed in violently to the rescue, of course making everything worse.
"Why did not Gerald and Louisa come to dinner?" cried the ignorant
sister. "Surely, when they knew Frank had come, they would have liked to
be here. How very odd it was of you not to ask them, papa! they always
do come when anybody has arrived. Why aren't they here to-night?"
"Because they don't choose to come," said the Squire, abruptly. "If
Gerald has reasons for staying away from his father's house, what is
that to you? Butterflies," said Mr Wentworth, looking at them in their
pretty dresses, as they sat regarding him with dismay, "that don't
understand any reason for doing anything except liking it or not liking
it. I daresay by this time your sister knows better."
"My sister is married, papa," said Letty, with her saucy look.
"I advise you to get married too, and learn what life is like," said the
savage Squire; and conversation visibly flagged after this effort. When
the ladies got safely into the drawing-room, they gathered into a corner
to consult over it. They were all naturally anxious about him after his
"attack."
"Don't you remember he was just like this before it came on?" said Mrs
Wentworth, nervously; "so cross, and finding fault with the made dishes.
Don't you think I might send over a message to Dr Small--not to come on
purpose, you know, but just as if it were a call in passing?"
But the girls both agreed this would make matters worse.
"It must be something about Jack," they both said in a breath, in a
kind of awe of their elder brother, of whom they had a very imperfect
knowledge. "And it seems we never are to have a chance of a word with
Frank!" cried Letty, who was indignant and exasperated. But at least
it was a consolation that "the boys" were no better off. All next day
Cuthbert and Guy hung about in the vain hope of securing the company
and attention of the visitor. He was at the Rectory the whole morning,
sometimes with Gerald, sometimes with Louisa, as the scouts of the
family, consisting of a variety of brothers, little and big, informed
the anxious girls. And Louisa was seen to cry on one of these
occasions; and Gerald looked cross, said one little spy, whereupon he
had his ears boxed, and was dismissed from the service. "As if Gerald
ever looked anything but a saint!" said the younger sister, who was an
advanced Anglican. Letty, however, holding other views, confuted this
opinion strongly: "When one thinks of a saint, it is aunt Leonora one
thinks of," said this profane young woman. "I'll tell you what Gerald
looks like--something just half-way between a conqueror and a martyr.
I think, of all the men I ever saw, he is my hero," said Letty,
meditatively. The youngest Miss Wentworth was not exactly of this
latter opinion, but she did not contradict her sister. They were kept
in a state of watchfulness all day, but Frank's mission remained a
mystery which they could not penetrate; and in the evening Gerald
alone made his appearance at the hall to dinner, explaining that
Louisa had a headache. Now Louisa's headaches were not unfrequent, but
they were known to improve in the prospect of going out to dinner. On
the whole, the matter was wrapt in obscurity, and the Wentworth
household could not explain it. The sisters sat up brushing their
hair, and looking very pretty in their dressing-gowns, with their
bright locks (for the Wentworth hair was golden-brown of a Titian hue)
over their shoulders, discussing the matter till it was long past
midnight; but they could make nothing of it, and the only conclusion
they came to was, that their two clergymen brothers were occupied in
negotiating with the Squire about some secret not known to the rest of
the family, but most probably concerning Jack. Jack was almost unknown
to his sisters, and awoke no very warm anxiety in their minds; so they
went to sleep at last in tolerable quiet, concluding that whatever
mystery there was concerned only the first-born and least loved of the
house.
While the girls pursued these innocent deliberations, and reasoned
themselves into conviction, the Squire too sat late--much later than
usual. He had gone with Frank to the library, and sat there in
half-stupefied quietness, which the Curate could not see without
alarm, and from which he roused himself up now and then to wander off
into talk, which always began with Gerald, and always came back to his
own anxieties and his disappointed hopes in his eldest son. "If Jack
had been the man he ought to have been, I'd have telegraphed for him,
and he'd have managed it all," said the Squire, and then relapsed
once more into silence. "For neither you nor I are men of the world,
Frank," he would resume again, after a pause of half an hour,
revealing pitifully how his mind laboured under the weight of this
absorbing thought. The Curate sat up with him in the dimly-lighted
library, feeling the silence and the darkness to his heart. He could
not assist his father in those dim ranges of painful meditation.
Grieved as he was, he could not venture to compare his own distress
with the bitterness of the Squire, disappointed in all his hopes and
in the pride of his heart; and then the young man saw compensations
and heroisms in Gerald's case which were invisible to the unheroic
eyes of Mr Wentworth, who looked at it entirely from a practical point
of view, and regarded with keen mortification an event which would lay
all the affairs of the Wentworths open to general discussion, and
invite the eye of the world to a renewed examination of his domestic
skeletons. Everything had been hushed and shut up in the Hall for at
least an hour, when the Squire got up at last and lighted his candle,
and held out his hand to his son--"This isn't a very cheerful visit
for you, Frank," he said; "but we'll try again to-morrow, and have one
other talk with Gerald. Couldn't you read up some books on the
subject, or think of something new to say to him? God bless my soul!
if I were as young and as much accustomed to talking as you are, I'd
surely find out some argument," said the Squire, with a momentary
spark of temper, which made his son feel more comfortable about him.
"It's your business to convince a man when he's wrong. We'll try
Gerald once more, and perhaps something may come of it; and as for
Jack--" Here the Squire paused, and shook his head, and let go his
son's hand. "I suppose it's sitting up so late that makes one feel so
cold and wretched, and as if one saw ghosts," said Mr Wentworth.
"Don't stay here any longer, and take care of the candles. I ought to
have been in bed two hours ago. Good-night."
And as he walked away, the Curate could not but observe what an aged
figure it looked, moving with a certain caution to the door. The great
library was so dim that the light of the candle which the Squire
carried in his hand was necessary to reveal his figure clearly, and
there was no mistaking his air of age and feebleness. The Curate's
thoughts were not very agreeable when he was left by himself in the
half-lighted room. His imagination jumped to a picture very possible,
but grievous to think of--Jack seated in his father's place, and "the
girls" and the little children turned out upon the world. In such a
case, who would be their protector and natural guardian? Not Gerald,
who was about to divest himself of ties still closer and more sacred.
The Curate lit his candle too, and went hastily to his room when that
thought came upon him. There might be circumstances still more
hopeless and appalling than the opposition of a rector or the want of
a benefice. He preferred to return to his anxiety about Gerald, and to
put away that thought, as he went hurriedly up-stairs.