While the interview between Sir Brook and the Chief Baron lasted,--and
it was a long time,--the anxiety of those below-stairs was great to
know how matters were proceeding. Had the two old men, who differed so
strongly in many respects, found out that there was that in each which
could command the respect and esteem of the other, and had they gained
that common ground where it was certain there were many things they
would agree upon?
“I should say,” cried Beattie, “they have become excellent friends
before this. The Chief reads men quickly, and Fossbrooke's nature is
written in a fine bold hand, easy to read and impossible to mistake.”
“There, there,” burst in Haire,--“they are laughing, and laughing
heartily too. It does me good to hear the Chief's laugh.”
Lendrick looked gratefully at the old man whose devotion was so
unvarying. “Here comes Cheetor,--what has he to say?”
“My Lord will dine below-stairs to-day, gentlemen,” said the butler;
“he hopes you have no engagements which will prevent your meeting him at
dinner.”
“If we had, we 'd soon throw them over,” burst out Haire. “This is the
pleasantest news I have heard this half-year.”
“Fossbrooke has done it. I knew he would,” said Beattie; “he's just
the man to suit your father, Tom. While the Chief can talk of events,
Fossbrooke knows people, and they are sure to make capital company for
each other.”
“There's another laugh! Oh, if one only could hear him now,” said Haire;
“he must be in prime heart this morning. I wonder if Sir Brook will
remember the good things he is saying.”
“I 'm not quite so sure about this notion of dining below-stairs,” said
Beattie, cautiously; “he may be over-taxing his strength.”
“Let him alone, Beattie; leave him to himself,” said Haire. “No man ever
knew how to make his will his ally as he does. He told me so himself.”
“And in these words?” said Beattie, slyly.
“Yes, in those very words.”
“Why, Haire, you are almost as useful to him as Bozzy was to Johnson.”
Haire only caught the last name, and, thinking it referred to a judge on
the Irish bench, cried out, “Don't compare him with Johnston, sir; you
might as well liken him to _me!_”
“I must go and find Lucy,” said Lendrick. “I think she ought to go and
show Mrs. Sewell how anxious we all are to prove our respect and regard
for her in this unhappy moment; the poor thing will need it.”
“She has gone away already. She has removed to Lady Lendrick's house in
Merrion Square; and I think very wisely,” said Beattie.
“There 's some Burgundy below,--Chambertin, I think it is,--and Cheetor
won't know where to find it,” said Haire. “I'll go down to the cellar
myself; the Chief will be charmed to see it on the table.”
“So shall I,” chimed in Beattie. “It is ten years or more since I saw a
bottle of it, and I half feared it had been finished.”
“You are wrong,” broke in Haire. “It will be nineteen years on the 10th
of June next. I 'll tell you the occasion. It was when your father,
Tom, had given up the Solicitor-Generalship, and none of us knew who
was going to be made Chief Baron. Plunkett was dining here that day, and
when he tasted the Burgundy he said, 'This deserves a toast,
gentlemen,' said he. 'I cannot ask you to drink to the health of the
Solicitor-General, for I believe there is no Solicitor-General; nor
can I ask you to pledge the Chief Baron of the Exchequer, for I believe
there is no Chief Baron; but I can give you a toast about which there
can be no mistake nor misgiving,--I give you the ornament of the Irish
Bar.' I think, I hear the cheers yet. The servants caught them up, too,
in the hall, and the house rang with a hip-hurrah till it trembled.”
“Well done, Bozzy!” said Beattie. “I'm glad that my want of memory
should have recalled so glorious a recollection.”
At last Fossbrooke's heavy tread was heard descending the stairs, and
they all rushed to the door to meet him.
“It is all right!” cried he. “The Chief Baron has taken the whole event
in an admirable spirit, and, like a truly generous man, he dwells on
every proof of regard and esteem that has been shown him, and forgets
the wrongs that others would have done him.”
“The shock, then, did not harm him?” asked Lendrick, eagerly.
“Far from it; he said he felt revived and renovated. Yes, Beattie, he
told me I had done him more good than all your phials. His phrase was,
'_Your_ bitters, sir, leave no bad flavor behind them.' I am proud to
think I made a favorable impression upon him; for he permitted me not
only to state my own views, but to correct some of his. He agrees now to
everything. He even went so far as to say that he will employ his first
half-hour of strength in writing to Lady Trafford; and he charges you,
Beattie, to invite Lionel Trafford to come and pass some days here.”
“_Viva!_” cried Haire; “this is grand news.”
“He asks, also, if Tom could not come over for the wedding, which he
trusts may not be long deferred,--as he said with a laugh, 'At _my_ time
of life, Sir Brook, it is best to leave as little as possible to _Nisi
Prius._'”
“You must tell me all these again, Sir Brook, or I shall inevitably
forget them,” whispered Haire in his ear.
“And shall I tell you, Lendrick, what I liked best in all I saw of him?”
said Sir Brook, as he slipped his arm within the other's, and drew him
towards a window. “It was the way he said to me, as I rose to leave
the room, 'One word more, Sir Brook. We are all very happy, and, in
consequence, very selfish. Let us not forget that there is one sad heart
here,--that there is one upstairs there who can take no part in all this
joy. What shall we, what can we, do for her?' I knew whom he meant at
once,--poor Mrs. Sewell; and I was glad to tell him that I had already
thought of her. 'She will join her husband,' said I, 'and I will take
care that they have wherewithal to live on.'
“'I must share in whatever you do for her, Sir Brook,' said your father;
'she has many attractive qualities; she has some lovable ones. Who is to
say what such a nature might not have been, if spared the contamination
of such a husband?'
“I'm afraid I shocked, if I did not actually hurt him, by the way I
grasped his hands in my gratitude for this speech. I know I said, 'God
bless you for those words!' and I hurried out of the room.”
“Ah, _you_ know him, sir!--_you_ read him aright! And how few there are
who do it!” cried Haire, warmly.
The old Judge was too weak to appear in the drawing-room; but when the
company entered the dining-room, they found him seated at the table,
and, though pale and wasted, with a bright eye and a clear, fresh look.
“I declare,” said he, as they took their places, “this repays one for
illness. No, Lucy,--opposite me, my dear. Yes, Tom, of course; that is
your place,--your old place;” and he smiled benignly as he said it. “Is
there not a place too many, Lucy?”
“Yes, grandpapa. It was for Mrs. Sewell, but she sent me a line to say
she had promised Lady Lendrick to dine with her.”
The old Chief's eyes met Fossbrooke's, and in the glances they exchanged
there was much meaning.
“I cannot eat, Sir Brook, till we have had a glass of wine together.
Beattie may look as reproachfully as he likes, but it shall be a bumper.
This old room has great traditions,” he went on. “Curran and Avonmore
and Parsons, and others scarce their inferiors, held their tournaments
here.”
“I have my doubts if they had a happier party round the board than we
have to-night,” said Haire.
“We only want Tom,” said Dr. Lendrick. “If we had poor Tom with us, it
would be perfect.”
“I think I know of another too,” whispered Beattie in Lucy's ear. “Don't
you?”
“What soft nonsense is Beattie saying, Lucy? It has made you blush,”
said the Chief. “It was all my fault, child, to have placed you in such
bad company. I ought to have had you at my side here; but I wanted to
look at you.”
Leaving them thus in happy pleasantry and enjoyment, let us turn for a
moment to a very different scene,--to a drawing-room in Merrion Square,
where at that same hour Lady Lendrick and Mrs. Sewell sat in close
conference.
Mrs. Sewell had related the whole story of the intended duel, and its
finale, and was now explaining to her mother-in-law how impossible it
would be for her to continue any longer to live under the Chief Baron's
roof, if even--which she deemed unlikely--he would still desire it.
“He 'll not turn you out, dear,--of that I am quite certain. I suspect I
am the only one in the world he would treat in that fashion.”
“I must not incur the risk.”
“Dear me, have you not been running risks all your life, Lucy? Besides,
what else have you open to you?”
“Join my husband, I suppose, whenever he sends for me,--whenever he says
he has a home to receive me.” “Dudley, I 'm certain, will do his best,”
said Lady Lendrick, stiffly. “It is not very easy for a poor man to make
these arrangements in a moment. But, with all his faults,--and even his
mother must own that he has many faults,--yet I have never known him to
bear malice.” “Certainly, Madam, you are justified in your panegyric by
his conduct on the present occasion; he has, indeed, displayed a most
forgiving nature.”
“You mean by not fighting Trafford, I suppose; but come now, Lucy, we
are here alone, and can talk freely to each other; why should he fight
him?”
“I will not follow you, Lady Lendrick, into that inquiry, nor give you
any pretext for saying to me what your candor is evidently eager for.
I will only repeat that the one thing I ever knew Colonel Sewell pardon
was the outrage that no gentleman ever endures.”
“He fought once before, and was greatly condemned for it.”
“I suppose you know why, Madam. I take it you have no need I should tell
you the Agra story, with all its shameful details?”
“I don't want to hear it; and if I did I would certainly hesitate to
listen to it from one so deeply and painfully implicated as yourself.”
“Lady Lendrick, I will have no insinuations,” said she, haughtily. “When
I came here, it never occurred to me I was to be insulted.”
“Sit down again, Lucy, and don't be angry with me,” said Lady Lendrick,
pressing her back into her chair. “Your position is a very painful
one,--let us not make it worse by irritation; and to avoid all
possibility of this, we will not look back at all, but only regard the
future.”
“That may be more easy for _you_ to do than for _me_”
“Easy or not easy, Lucy, we have no alternative; we cannot change the
past.”
“No, no, no! I know that,--I know that,” cried she, bitterly, as her
clasped hands dropped upon her knee.
“For that reason then, Lucy, forget it, ignore it. I have no need to
tell you, my dear, that my own life has not been a very happy one, and
if I venture to give advice, it is not without having had my share of
sorrows. You say you cannot go back to the Priory?”
“No; that is impossible.”
“Unpleasant it would certainly be, and all the more so with these
marriage festivities. The wedding, I suppose, will take place there?”
“I don't know; I have not heard;” and she tried to say this with an easy
indifference.
“Trafford is disinherited, is he not?--passed over in the entail, or
something or other?”
“I don't know,” she muttered out; but this time her confusion was not to
be concealed.
“And will this old man they talk of--this Sir Brook somebody--make such
a settlement on them as they can live on?”
“I know nothing about it at all.”
“I wonder, Lucy dear, it never occurred to you to fascinate Dives
yourself. What nice crumbs these would have been for Algy and Cary!”
“You forget, Madam, what a jealous husband I have!” and her eyes now
darted a glance of almost wild malignity.
“Poor Dudley, how many faults we shall find in you if we come to discuss
you!”
“Let us not discuss Colonel Sewell, Madam; it will be better for all of
us. A thought has just occurred; it was a thing I was quite forgetting.
May I send one of your servants with a note, for which he will wait the
answer?”
“Certainly. You will find paper and pens there.”
The note was barely a few lines, and addressed to George Kincaid, Esq.,
Ely Place. “You are to wait for the answer, Richard,” said she, as she
gave it to the servant.
“Do you expect he will let you have some money, Lucy?” asked Lady
Lendrick, as she heard the name.
“No; it was about something else I wrote. I'm quite sure he would not
have given me money if I asked for it.”
“I wish _I_ could, my dear Lucy; but I am miserably poor. Sir William,
who was once the very soul of punctuality, has grown of late most
neglectful. My last quarter is over-due two months. I must own all this
has taken place since Dudley went to live at the Priory. I hear the
expenses were something fabulous.”
“There was a great deal of waste; a great deal of mock splendor and real
discomfort.”
“Is it true the wine bill was fifteen hundred pounds for the last year?”
“I think I heard it was something to that amount.”
“And four hundred for cigars?”
“No; that included pipes, and amber mouthpieces, and meerschaums for
presents,--it rained presents!”
“And did Sir William make no remark or remonstrance about this?”
“I believe not. I rather think I heard that he liked it. They persuaded
him that all these indiscretions, like his new wigs, and his rouge, and
his embroidered waistcoats, made him quite juvenile, and that nothing
made a man so youthful as living beyond his income.”
“It is easy enough to see how I was left in arrear; and _you_, dear,
were you forgotten all this while and left without a shilling?”
“Oh, no; I could make as many debts as I pleased; and I pleased to make
them, too, as they will discover one of these days. I never asked the
price of anything, and therefore I enjoyed unlimited credit. If you
remark, shopkeepers never dun the people who simply say, 'Send that
home.'--How quickly you did your message, Richard! Have you brought an
answer? Give it to me at once.”
She broke open the note with eager impatience, but it fell from her
fingers as she read it, and she lay back almost fainting in her chair.
“Are you ill, dear,--are you faint?” asked Lady Len-drick.
“No; I 'm quite well again. I was only provoked,--put out;” and she
stooped and took up the letter. “I wrote to Mr. Kincaid to give me
certain papers which were in his hands, and which I know Colonel Sewell
would wish to have in his own keeping, and he writes me this:--
“Dear Madam,--I am sorry that it is not in my power to comply with the
request of your note, inasmuch as the letters referred to were this
morning handed over to Sir Brook Fossbrooke on his producing an order
from Colonel Sewell to that intent.--I am, Madam, your most obedient
servant,
“George Kincaid.”
“They were letters, then?”
“Yes, Lady Lendrick, they were letters,” said she, dryly, as she arose
and walked to the window, to hide an agitation she could no longer
subdue. After a few minutes she turned round and said, “You will let me
stay here to-night?”
“Certainly, dear; of course I will.”
“But the children must be sent for,--I can't suffer them to remain
there. Will you send for them?”
“Yes; I 'll tell Rose to take the carriage and bring them over here.”
“This is very kind of you; I am most grateful. We shall not be a burden
beyond to-morrow.”
“What do you mean to do?”
“To join my husband, as I told you awhile ago. Sir Brook Fossbrooke made
that the condition of his assisting us.”
“What does he call assisting you?”
“Supporting us,--feeding, housing, clothing us; we shall have nothing
but what he will give us.”
“That is very generous, indeed.”
“Yes; it is generous,--more generous than you dream of, for we did not
always treat him very well; but _that_ also is a bygone, and I 'll not
return to it.”
“Come down and have some dinner,--it has been on the table this
half-hour; it will be nigh cold by this.”
“Yes; I am quite ready. I'd like to eat, too, if I could. What a great
resource it is to men in their dark hours that they can drink and smoke!
I think I could do both to-day if I thought they would help me to a
little insensibility.”