CAPTAIN CLAVERING MAKES HIS LAST ATTEMPT.
The yachting scheme was first proposed to Archie by his brother Hugh.
"Jack says that he can make a berth for you, and you'd better come,"
said the elder brother, understanding that when his edict had thus
gone forth, the thing was as good as arranged. "Jack finds the boat
and men, and I find the grub and wine,--and pay for the fishing,"
said Hugh; "so you need not make any bones about it." Archie was not
disposed to make any bones about it as regarded his acceptance either
of the berth or of the grub and wine, and as he would be expected to
earn his passage by his work, there was no necessity for any scruple;
but there arose the question whether he had not got more important
fish to fry. He had not as yet made his proposal to Lady Ongar, and
although he now knew that he had nothing to hope from the Russian
spy,--nevertheless he thought that he might as well try his own hand
at the venture. His resolution on this head was always stronger after
dinner than before, and generally became stronger and more strong
as the evening advanced;--so that he usually went to bed with a
firm determination "to pop," as he called it to his friend Doodles,
early on the next day; but distance affected him as well as the hour
of the day, and his purpose would become surprisingly cool in the
neighbourhood of Bolton Street. When, however, his brother suggested
that he should be taken altogether away from the scene of action, he
thought of the fine income and of Ongar Park with pangs of regret,
and ventured upon a mild remonstrance. "But there's this affair of
Julia, you know," said he.
"I thought that was all off," said Hugh.
"O dear, no; not off at all. I haven't asked her yet."
"I know you've not; and I don't suppose you ever will."
"Yes, I shall;--that is to say, I mean it. I was advised not to be
in too much of a hurry; that is to say, I thought it best to let her
settle down a little after her first seeing me."
"To recover from her confusion?"
"Well, not exactly that. I don't suppose she was confused."
"I should say not. My idea is that you haven't a ghost of chance, and
that as you haven't done anything all this time, you need not trouble
yourself now."
"But I have done something," said Archie, thinking of his seventy
pounds.
"You may as well give it up, for she means to marry Harry."
"No!"
"But I tell you she does. While you've been thinking he's been doing.
From what I hear he may have her to-morrow for the asking."
"But he's engaged to that girl whom they had with them down at the
rectory," said Archie, in a tone which showed with what horror he
should regard any inconstancy towards Florence Burton on the part of
Harry Clavering.
"What does that matter? You don't suppose he'll let seven thousand
a year slip through his fingers because he had promised to marry a
little girl like her? If her people choose to proceed against him
they'll make him pay swinging damages; that is all."
Archie did not like this idea at all, and became more than ever
intent on his own matrimonial prospects. He almost thought that he
had a right to Lady Ongar's money, and he certainly did think that
a monstrous injustice was done to him by this idea of a marriage
between her and his cousin. "I mean to ask her as I've gone so far,
certainly," said he.
"You can do as you like about that."
"Yes; of course I can do as I like; but when a fellow has gone in for
a thing, he likes to see it through." He was still thinking of the
seventy pounds which he had invested, and which he could now recover
only out of Lady Ongar's pocket.
"And you mean to say you won't come to Norway?"
"Well; if she accepts me--"
"If she accepts you," said Hugh, "of course you can't come; but
supposing she don't?"
"In that case, I might as well do that as anything else," said
Archie. Whereupon Sir Hugh signified to Jack Stuart that Archie would
join the party, and went down to Clavering with no misgiving on that
head.
Some few days after this there was another little dinner at the
military club, to which no one was admitted but Archie and his friend
Doodles. Whenever these prandial consultations were held, Archie
paid the bill. There were no spoken terms to that effect, but the
regulation seemed to come naturally to both of them. Why should
Doodles be taken from his billiards half-an-hour earlier than usual,
and devote a portion of the calculating powers of his brain to
Archie's service without compensation? And a richer vintage was
needed when so much thought was required, the burden of which Archie
would not of course allow to fall on his friend's shoulders. Were
not this explained, the experienced reader would regard the devoted
friendship of Doodles as exaggerated.
"I certainly shall ask her to-morrow," said Archie, looking with
a thoughtful cast of countenance through the club window into the
street. "It may be hurrying the matter a little, but I can't help
that." He spoke in a somewhat boastful tone, as though he were proud
of himself and had forgotten that he had said the same words once or
twice before.
"Make her know that you're there; that's everything," said Doodles.
"Since I fathomed that woman in Mount Street, I've felt that you must
make the score off your own bat, if you're to make it at all."
"You did that well," said Archie, who knew that the amount of
pleasing encouragement which he might hope to get from his friend,
must depend on the praise which he himself should bestow. "Yes; you
certainly did bowl her over uncommon well."
"That kind of thing just comes within my line," said Doodles, with
conscious pride. "Now, as to asking Lady Ongar downright to marry
me,--upon my word I believe I should be half afraid of doing it
myself."
"I've none of that kind of feeling," said Archie.
"It comes more in your way, I daresay," said Doodles. "But for me,
what I like is a little bit of management,--what I call a touch of
the diplomatic. You'll be able to see her to-morrow?"
"I hope so. I shall go early,--that is, as soon as I've looked
through the papers and written a few letters. Yes, I think she'll see
me. And as for what Hugh says about Harry Clavering, why, d---- it,
you know, a fellow can't go on in that way; can he?"
"Because of the other girl, you mean?"
"He has had her down among all our people, just as though they were
going to be married to-morrow. If a man is to do that kind of thing,
what woman can be safe?"
"I wonder whether she likes him?" asked the crafty Doodles.
"She did like him, I fancy, in her calf days; but that means nothing.
She knows what she's at now, bless you, and she'll look to the
future. It's my son who'll have the Clavering property and be the
baronet, not his. You see what a string to my bow that is."
When this banquet was over, Doodles made something of a resolution
that it should be the last to be eaten on that subject. The matter
had lost its novelty, and the price paid to him was not sufficient to
secure his attention any longer. "I shall be here to-morrow at four,"
he said, as he rose from his chair with the view of retreating to the
smoking-room, "and then we shall know all about it. Whichever way
it's to be, it isn't worth your while keeping such a thing as that
in hand any longer. I should say give her her chance to-morrow, and
then have done with it." Archie in reply to this declared that those
were exactly his sentiments, and then went away to prepare himself in
silence and solitude for the next day's work.
On the following day at two o'clock Lady Ongar was sitting alone
in the front room on the ground-floor in Bolton Street. Of Harry
Clavering's illness she had as yet heard nothing, nor of his absence
from London. She had not seen him since he had parted from her on
that evening when he had asked her to be his wife, and the last words
she had heard from his lips had made this request. She, indeed, had
then bade him be true to her rival,--to Florence Burton. She had told
him this in spite of her love,--of her love for him and of his for
her. They two, she had said, could not now become man and wife;--but
he had not acknowledged the truth of what she had said. She could
not write to him. She could make no overtures. She could ask no
questions. She had no friend in whom she could place confidence. She
could only wait for him, till he should come to her or send to her,
and let her know what was to be her fate.
As she now sat she held a letter in her hand which had just
been brought to her from Sophie,--from her poor, famished, but
indefatigable Sophie. Sophie she had not seen since they had parted
on the railway platform, and then the parting was supposed to be made
in lasting enmity. Desolate as she was, she had congratulated herself
much on her escape from Sophie's friendship, and was driven by no
qualms of her heart to long for a renewal of the old ties. But it was
not so with the more affectionate Sophie; and Sophie therefore had
written,--as follows:--
Mount Street--Friday morning.
DEAREST DEAREST JULIE,--My heart is so sad that I cannot
keep my silence longer. What; can such friendship as ours
has been be made to die all in a minute? Oh, no;--not
at least in my bosom, which is filled with love for my
Julie. And my Julie will not turn from her friend, who
has been so true to her,--ah, at such moments too,--oh,
yes, at such moments!--just for an angry word, or a little
indiscretion. What was it after all about my brother?
Bah! He is a fool; that is all. If you shall wish it,
I will never speak to him again. What is my brother to
me, compared to my Julie? My brother is nothing to me. I
tell him we go to that accursed island,--accursed island
because my Julie has quarrelled with me there,--and he
arranges himself to follow us. What could I do? I could
not tie him up by the leg in his London club. He is a man
whom no one can tie up by the leg. Mon Dieu, no. He is
very hard to tie up.
Do I wish him for your husband? Never! Why should I wish
him for your husband? If I was a man, my Julie, I should
wish you for myself. But I am not, and why should you not
have him whom you like the best? If I was you, with your
beauty and money and youth, I would have any man that
I liked,--everything. I know, of course,--for did I not
see? It is that young Clavering to whom your little
heart wishes to render itself;--not the captain who is a
fool,--such a fool! but the other who is not a fool, but
a fine fellow;--and so handsome! Yes; there is no doubt
as to that. He is beautiful as a Phoebus. [This was
good-natured on the part of Sophie, who, as the reader may
remember, hated Harry Clavering herself.]
Well,--why should he not be your own? As for your poor
Sophie, she would do all in her power to assist the friend
whom she love. There is that little girl,--yes; it is
true as I told you. But little girls cannot have all they
want always. He is a gay deceiver. These men who are so
beautiful as Phoebus are always deceivers. But you need
not be the one deceived;--you with your money and your
beauty and your--what you call rank. No, I think not; and
I think that little girl must put up with it, as other
little girls have done, since the men first learned how to
tell lies. That is my advice, and if you will let me I can
give you good assistance.
Dearest Julie, think of all this, and do not banish your
Sophie. I am so true to you, that I cannot live without
you. Send me back one word of permission, and I will come
to you, and kneel at your feet. And in the meantime, I am
Your most devoted friend,
SOPHIE.
Lady Ongar, on the receipt of this letter, was not at all changed in
her purpose with reference to Madame Gordeloup. She knew well enough
where her Sophie's heart was placed, and would yield to no further
pressure from that quarter; but Sophie's reasoning, nevertheless, had
its effect. She, Lady Ongar, with her youth, her beauty, her wealth,
and her rank, why should she not have that one thing which alone
could make her happy, seeing, as she did see, or as she thought she
saw, that in making herself happy she could do so much, could confer
such great blessings on him she loved? She had already found that the
money she had received as the price of herself had done very little
towards making her happy in her present state. What good was it to
her that she had a carriage and horses and two footmen six feet high?
One pleasant word from lips that she could love,--from the lips of
man or woman that she could esteem,--would be worth it all. She had
gone down to her pleasant place in the country,--a place so pleasant
that it had a fame of its own among the luxuriantly pleasant seats of
the English country gentry; she had gone there, expecting to be happy
in the mere feeling that it was all her own; and the whole thing had
been to her so unutterably sad, so wretched in the severity of its
desolation, that she had been unable to endure her life amidst the
shade of her own trees. All her apples hitherto had turned to ashes
between her teeth, because her fate had forced her to attempt the
eating of them alone. But if she could give the fruit to him,--if she
could make the apples over, so that they should all be his, and not
hers, then would there not come to her some of the sweetness of the
juice of them?
She declared to herself that she would not tempt this man to be
untrue to his troth, were it not that in doing so she would so
greatly benefit himself. Was it not manifest that Harry Clavering was
a gentleman, qualified to shine among men of rank and fashion, but
not qualified to make his way by his own diligence? In saying this of
him, she did not know how heavy was the accusation that she brought
against him; but what woman, within her own breast, accuses the
man she loves? Were he to marry Florence Burton, would he not ruin
himself, and probably ruin her also? But she could give him all that
he wanted. Though Ongar Park to her alone was, with its rich pastures
and spreading oaks and lowing cattle, desolate as the Dead Sea shore,
for him,--and for her with him,--would it not be the very paradise
suited to them? Would it not be the heaven in which such a Phoebus
should shine amidst the gyrations of his satellites? A Phoebus
going about his own field in knickerbockers, and with attendant
satellites, would possess a divinity which, as she thought, might
make her happy. As she thought of all this, and asked herself these
questions, there was an inner conscience which told her that she
had no right to Harry's love or Harry's hand; but still she could
not cease to long that good things might come to her, though those
good things had not been deserved. Alas, good things not deserved
too often lose their goodness when they come! As she was sitting
with Sophie's letter in her hand the door was opened, and Captain
Clavering was announced.
Captain Archibald Clavering was again dressed in his very best, but
he did not even yet show by his demeanour that aptitude for the
business now in hand of which he had boasted on the previous evening
to his friend. Lady Ongar, I think, partly guessed the object of
his visit. She had perceived, or perhaps had unconsciously felt, on
the occasion of his former coming, that the visit had not been made
simply from motives of civility. She had known Archie in old days,
and was aware that the splendour of his vestments had a significance.
Well, if anything of that kind was to be done, the sooner it was done
the better.
"Julia," he said, as soon as he was seated, "I hope I have the
pleasure of seeing you quite well?"
"Pretty well, I thank you," said she.
"You have been out of town, I think?" She told him that she had been
in the Isle of Wight for a day or two, and then there was a short
silence. "When I heard that you were gone," he said, "I feared that
perhaps you were ill!"
"O dear, no; nothing of that sort."
"I am so glad," said Archie; and then he was silent again. He had,
however, as he was aware, thrown a great deal of expression into his
inquiries after her health, and he had now to calculate how he could
best use the standing-ground that he had made for himself.
"Have you seen my sister lately?" she asked.
"Your sister? no. She is always at Clavering. I think it doosed wrong
of Hugh, the way he goes on, keeping her down there, while he is up
here in London. It isn't at all my idea of what a husband ought to
do."
"I suppose she likes it," said Lady Ongar.
"Oh, if she likes it, that's a different thing, of course," said
Archie. Then there was another pause.
"Don't you find yourself rather lonely here sometimes?" he asked.
Lady Ongar felt that it would be better for all parties that it
should be over, and that it would not be over soon unless she could
help him. "Very lonely indeed," she said; "but then I suppose that it
is the fate of widows to be lonely."
"I don't see that at all," said Archie, briskly; "--unless they are
old and ugly, and that kind of thing. When a widow has become a widow
after she has been married ever so many years, why then I suppose she
looks to be left alone; and I suppose they like it."
"Indeed, I can't say. I don't like it."
"Then you would wish to change?"
"It is a very intricate subject, Captain Clavering, and one which I
do not think I am quite disposed to discuss at present. After a year
or two, perhaps I shall go into society again. Most widows do, I
believe."
"But I was thinking of something else," said Archie, working himself
up to the point with great energy, but still with many signs that he
was ill at ease at his work. "I was, by Jove!"
"And of what were you thinking, Captain Clavering?"
"I was thinking,--of course you know, Julia, that since poor little
Hughy's death, I am the next in for the title?"
"Poor Hughy! I'm sure you are too generous to rejoice at that."
"Indeed I am. When two fellows offered me a dinner at the club on the
score of my chances, I wouldn't have it. But there's the fact;--isn't
it?"
"There is no doubt of that, I believe."
"None on earth; and the most of it is entailed, too; not that Hugh
would leave an acre away from the title. I'm as safe as wax as far
as that is concerned. I don't suppose he ever borrowed a shilling or
mortgaged an acre in his life."
"I should think he was a prudent man."
"We are both of us prudent. I will say that of myself, though I
oughtn't to say it. And now, Julia,--a few words are the best after
all. Look here,--if you'll take me just as I am, I'm blessed if I
shan't be the happiest fellow in all London. I shall indeed. I've
always been uncommon fond of you, though I never said anything about
it in the old days, because,--because you see, what's the use of a
man asking a girl to marry him if they haven't got a farthing between
them. I think it's wrong; I do indeed; but it's different now, you
know." It certainly was very different now.
"Captain Clavering," she said, "I'm sorry you should have troubled
yourself with such an idea as this."
"Don't say that, Julia. It's no trouble; it's a pleasure."
"But such a thing as you mean never can take place."
"Yes, it can. Why can't it? I ain't in a hurry. I'll wait your own
time, and do just whatever you wish all the while. Don't say no
without thinking about it, Julia."
"It is one of those things, Captain Clavering, which want no more
thinking than what a woman can give to it at the first moment."
"Ah,--you think so now, because you're surprised a little."
"Well; I am surprised a little, as our previous intercourse was never
of a nature to make such a proposition as this at all probable."
"That was merely because I didn't think it right," said Archie, who,
now that he had worked himself into the vein, liked the sound of his
own voice. "It was indeed."
"And I don't think it right now. You must listen to me for a moment,
Captain Clavering--for fear of a mistake. Believe me, any such plan
as this is quite out of the question;--quite." In uttering that last
word she managed to use a tone of voice which did make an impression
on him. "I never can, under any circumstances, become your wife. You
might as well look upon that as altogether decided, because it will
save us both annoyance."
"You needn't be so sure yet, Julia."
"Yes, I must be sure. And unless you will promise me to drop the
matter, I must,--to protect myself,--desire my servants not to admit
you into the house again. I shall be sorry to do that, and I think
you will save me from the necessity."
He did save her from that necessity, and before he went he gave her
the required promise. "That's well," said she, tendering him her
hand; "and now we shall part friends."
"I shall like to be friends," said he, in a crestfallen voice, and
with that he took his leave. It was a great comfort to him that he
had the scheme of Jack Stuart's yacht and the trip to Norway for his
immediate consolation.