A DISCLOSURE.
Mr Coningham was at my door by ten o’clock, and we set out together for
Umberden Church. It was a cold clear morning. The dying Autumn was
turning a bright thin defiant face upon the conquering Winter. I was in
great spirits, my mind being full of Mary Osborne. At one moment I saw
but her own ordinary face, only what I had used to regard as dulness I
now interpreted as the possession of her soul in patience; at another I
saw the glorified countenance of my Athanasia, knowing that, beneath
the veil of the other, this, the real, the true face ever lay. Once in
my sight the frost-clung flower had blossomed; in full ideal of glory
it had shone for a moment, and then folding itself again away, had
retired into the regions of faith. And while I knew that such could
dawn out of such, how could I help hoping that from the face of the
universe, however to my eyes it might sometimes seem to stare like the
seven-days dead, one morn might dawn the unspeakable face which even
Moses might not behold lest he should die of the great sight? The keen
air, the bright sunshine, the swift motion--all combined to raise my
spirits to an unwonted pitch; but it was a silent ecstasy, and I almost
forgot the presence of Mr Coningham. When he spoke at last, I started.
‘I thought from your letter you had something to tell me, Mr
Cumbermede,’ he said, coming alongside of me.
‘Yes, to be sure. I have been reading my grannie’s papers, as I told
you.’
I recounted the substance of what I had found in them.
‘Does it not strike you as rather strange that all this should have
been kept a secret from you?’ he asked.
‘Very few know anything about their grandfathers,’ I said; ‘so I
suppose very few fathers care to tell their children about them.’
‘That is because there are so few concerning whom there is anything
worth telling.’
‘For my part,’ I returned, ‘I should think any fact concerning one of
those who link me with the infinite past out of which I have come,
invaluable. Even a fact which is not to the credit of an ancestor may
be a precious discovery to the man who has in himself to fight the evil
derived from it.’
‘That, however, is a point of view rarely taken. What the ordinary man
values is also rare; hence few regard their ancestry, or transmit any
knowledge they may have of those who have gone before them to those
that come after them.’
‘My uncle, however, I suppose, told _me_ nothing because, unlike the
many, he prized neither wealth nor rank, nor what are commonly
considered great deeds.’
‘You are not far from the truth there,’ said Mr Coningham in a
significant tone.
‘Then _you_ know why he never told me anything!’ I exclaimed.
‘I do--from the best authority.’
‘His own, you mean, I suppose.’
‘I do.’
‘But--but--I didn’t know you were ever--at all--intimate with my
uncle,’ I said.
He laughed knowingly.
‘You would say, if you didn’t mind speaking the truth, that you thought
your uncle disliked me--disapproved of me. Come, now--did he not try to
make you avoid me? You needn’t mind acknowledging the fact, for, when I
have explained the reason of it, you will see that it involves no
discredit to either of us.’
‘I have no fear for my uncle.’
‘You are honest, if not over-polite,’ he rejoined. ‘--You do not feel
so sure about my share. Well, I don’t mind who knows it, for my part. I
roused the repugnance, to the knowledge of which your silence
confesses, merely by acting as any professional man ought to have
acted--and with the best intentions. At the same time, all the blame I
should ever think of casting upon him is that he allowed his
high-strung, saintly, I had almost said superhuman ideas to stand in
the way of his nephew’s prosperity.’
‘Perhaps he was afraid of that prosperity standing in the way of a
better.’
‘Precisely so. You understand him perfectly. He was one of the best and
simplest-minded men in the world.’
‘I am glad you do him that justice.’
‘At the same time I do not think he intended you to remain in absolute
ignorance of what I am going to tell you. But, you see, he died very
suddenly. Besides, he could hardly expect I should hold my tongue after
he was gone.’
‘Perhaps, however, he might expect me not to cultivate your
acquaintance,’ I said, laughing to take the sting out of the words.
‘You cannot accuse yourself of having taken any trouble in that
direction,’ he returned, laughing also.
‘I believe, however,’ I resumed, ‘from what I can recall of things he
said, especially on one occasion, on which he acknowledged the
existence of a secret in which I was interested, he did not intend that
I should always remain in ignorance of everything he thought proper to
conceal from me then.’
‘I presume you are right. I think his conduct in this respect arose
chiefly from anxiety that the formation of your character should not be
influenced by the knowledge of certain facts which might unsettle you,
and prevent you from reaping the due advantages of study and
self-dependence in youth. I cannot, however, believe that by being open
with you I shall now be in any danger of thwarting his plans, for you
have already proved yourself a wise, moderate, conscientious man,
diligent and painstaking. Forgive me for appearing to praise you. I had
no such intention. I was only uttering as a fact to be considered in
the question, what upon my honour I thoroughly believe.’
‘I should be happy in your good opinion, if I were able to appropriate
it,’ I said. ‘But a man knows his own faults better than his neighbour
knows his virtues.’
‘Spoken like the man I took you for, Mr Cumbermede,’ he rejoined
gravely.
‘But to return to the matter in hand,’ I resumed; ‘what can there be so
dangerous in the few facts I have just come to the knowledge of, that
my uncle should have cared to conceal them from me? That a man born in
humble circumstances should come to know that he had distinguished
ancestors, could hardly so fill him with false notions as to endanger
his relation to the laws of his existence.’
‘Of course--but you are too hasty. Those facts are of more importance
than you are aware--involve other facts. Moldwarp Hall is _your_
property, and not Sir Giles Brotherton’s.’
‘Then the apple was my own, after all!’ I said to myself exultingly. It
was a strange fantastic birth of conscience and memory--forgotten the
same moment, and followed by an electric flash--not of hope, not of
delight, not of pride, but of pure revenge. My whole frame quivered
with the shock; yet for a moment I seemed to have the strength of a
Hercules. In front of me was a stile through a high hedge: I turned
Lilith’s head to the hedge, struck my spurs into her, and over or
through it, I know not which, she bounded. Already, with all the
strength of will I could summon, I struggled to rid myself of the
wicked feeling; and although I cannot pretend to have succeeded for
long after, yet by the time Mr Coningham had popped over the stile, I
was waiting for him, to all appearance, I believe, perfectly calm. He,
on the other hand, from whatever cause, was actually trembling. His
face was pale, and his eye flashing. Was it that he had roused me more
effectually than he had hoped?
‘Take care, take care, my boy,’ he said, ‘or you won’t live to enjoy
your own. Permit me the honour of shaking hands with Sir Wilfrid
Cumbermede Daryll.’
After this ceremonial of prophetic investiture, we jogged away quietly,
and he told me a long story about the death of the last proprietor, the
degree in which Sir Giles was related to him, and his undisputed
accession to the property. At that time, he said, my father was in very
bad health, and indeed died within six months of it.
‘I knew your father well, Mr Cumbermede,’ he went on, ‘--one of the
best of men, with more spirit, more ambition than your uncle. It was
_his_ wish that his child, if a boy, should be called Wilfrid,--for
though they had been married five or six years, their only child was
born after his death. Your uncle did not like the name, your mother
told me, but made no objection to it. So you were named after your
grandfather, and great-grandfather, and I don’t know how many of the
race besides.--When the last of the Darylls died--’
‘Then,’ I interrupted, ‘my father was the heir.’
‘No; you mistake: your uncle was the elder--Sir David Cumbermede
Daryll, of Moldwarp Hall and The Moat,’ said Mr Coningham, evidently
bent on making the most of my rights.
‘He never even told me he was the eldest,’ I said. ‘I always thought,
from his coming home to manage the farm when my father was ill, that he
was the second of the two sons.’
‘On the contrary, he was several years older than your father, but
taking more kindly to reading than farming, was sent by his father to
Oxford to study for the Church, leaving the farm, as was tacitly
understood, to descend to your father at your grandfather’s death.
After the idea of the Church was abandoned he took a situation,
refusing altogether to subvert the order of things already established
at the Moat. So you see you are not to suppose that he kept you back
from any of your rights. They were his, not yours, while he lived.’
‘I will not ask,’ I said, ‘why he did not enforce them. That is plain
enough from what I know of his character. The more I think of that, the
loftier and simpler it seems to grow. He could not bring himself to
spend the energies of a soul meant for higher things on the assertion
and recovery of earthly rights.’
‘I rather differ from you there; and I do not know,’ returned my
companion, whose tone was far more serious than I had ever heard it
before, ‘whether the explanation I am going to offer will raise your
uncle as much in your estimation as it does in mine. I confess I do not
rank such self-denial as you attribute to him so highly as you do. On
the contrary I count it a fault. How could the world go on if everybody
was like your uncle?’
‘If everybody was like my uncle, he would have been forced to accept
the position,’ I said; ‘for there would have been no one to take it
from him.’
‘Perhaps. But you must not think Sir Giles knew anything of your
uncle’s claim. He knows nothing of it now.’
I had not thought of Sir Giles in connection with the matter--only of
Geoffrey; and my heart recoiled from the notion of dispossessing the
old man who, however misled with regard to me at last, had up till then
shown me uniform kindness. In that moment I had almost resolved on
taking no steps till after his death. But Mr Coningham soon made me
forget Sir Giles in a fresh revelation of my uncle.
‘Although,’ he resumed, ‘all you say of your uncle’s indifference to
this world and its affairs is indubitably correct, I do not believe,
had there not been a prospect of your making your appearance, that he
would have shirked the duty of occupying the property which was his
both by law and by nature. But he knew it might be an expensive
suit--for no one can tell by what tricks of the law such may be
prolonged--in which case all the money he could command would soon be
spent, and nothing left either to provide for your so-called aunt, for
whom he had a great regard, or to give you that education, which,
whether you were to succeed to the property or not, he counted
indispensable. He cared far more, he said, about your having such a
property in yourself as was at once personal and real, than for your
having any amount of property out of yourself. Expostulation was of no
use. I had previously learned--from the old lady herself--the true
state of the case, and, upon the death of Sir Geoffrey Daryll, had at
once communicated with him--which placed me in a position for urging
him, as I did again and again, considerably to his irritation, to
assert and prosecute his claim to the title and estates. I offered to
take the whole risk upon myself; but he said that would be tantamount
to giving up his personal liberty until the matter was settled, which
might not be in his lifetime. I may just mention, however, that,
besides his religious absorption, I strongly suspect there was another
cause of his indifference to worldly affairs: I have grounds for
thinking that he was disappointed in a more than ordinary attachment to
a lady he met at Oxford--in station considerably above any prospects he
had then. To return: he was resolved that, whatever might be your fate,
you should not have to meet it without such preparation as he could
afford you. As you have divined, he was most anxious that your
character should have acquired some degree of firmness before you knew
anything of the possibility of your inheriting a large property and
historical name; and I may appropriate the credit of a negative share
in the carrying out of his plans, for you will bear me witness how
often I might have upset them by informing you of the facts of the
case.’
‘I am heartily obliged to you,’ I said, ‘for not interfering with my
uncle’s wishes, for I am very glad indeed that I have been kept in
ignorance of my rights until now. The knowledge would at one time have
gone far to render me useless for personal effort in any direction
worthy of it. It would have made me conceited, ambitious, boastful: I
don’t know how many bad adjectives would have been necessary to
describe me.’
‘It is all very well to be modest, but I venture to think differently.’
‘I should like to ask you one question, Mr Coningham,’ I said.
‘As many as you please.’
‘How is it that you have so long delayed giving me the information
which on my uncle’s death you no doubt felt at liberty to communicate?’
‘I did not know how far you might partake of your uncle’s disposition,
and judged that the wider your knowledge of the world, and the juster
your estimate of the value of money and position, the more willing you
would be to listen to the proposals I had to make.’
‘Do you remember,’ I asked, after a canter, led off by my companion,
‘one very stormy night on which you suddenly appeared at the Moat, and
had a long talk with my uncle on the subject?’
‘Perfectly,’ he answered. ‘But how did you come to know? _He_ did not
tell you of my visit!’
‘Certainly not. But, listening in my night-gown on the stair, which is
open to the kitchen, I heard enough of your talk to learn the object of
your visit--namely, to carry off my skin to make bagpipes with.’
He laughed so heartily that I told him the whole story of the pendulum.
‘On that occasion,’ he said, ‘I made the offer to your uncle, on
condition of his sanctioning the commencement of legal proceedings, to
pledge myself to meet every expense of those, and of your education as
well, and to claim nothing whatever in return, except in case of
success.’
This quite corresponded with my own childish recollections of the
interview between them. Indeed there was such an air of simple
straightforwardness about his whole communication, while at the same
time it accounted so thoroughly for the warning my uncle had given me
against him, that I felt I might trust him entirely, and so would have
told him all that had taken place at the Hall, but for the share his
daughter had borne in it, and the danger of discovery to Mary.