THE curtains were undrawn, and the candles were lighted. All within
looked just as he had so often seen it. The sick girl lay on her sofa,
with her small spaniel at her feet Miss Grainger was working at a table,
and Emily sat near her sister, bending over the end of the sofa, and
talking to her. “Let me see that letter again, Florry,” she said, taking
a letter from the passive fingers of the sick girl. “Yes, he is sure it
must have been Calvert. He says, that though the Swiss papers give the
name Colnart, he is sure it was Calvert, and you remember his last words
here as he went away that evening?”
“Poor fellow!” said Florence, “I am sure I have no right to bear him
good will, but I am sorry for him--really sorry. I suppose, by this
time, it is all over?”
“The wound was through, the throat, it is said,” said Miss Grainger.
“But how confused the whole story is. Who is Barnard, and why did
Calvert fight to save Barnard’s honour?”
“No, aunt. It was to rescue Mr. Graham’s, the man who was about to marry
Sophia Calvert.”
“Not at all, Milly. It was Graham who shot Barnard; and then poor
Calvert, horrified at his friend’s fate--”
Calvert never waited for more. He saw that there was that amount of
mistake and misunderstanding, which required no aid on his part, and
now nothing remained but to present himself suddenly before them as a
fugitive from justice seeking shelter and protection. The rest he was
content to leave to hazard.
A sharp ring at the door-bell was scarcely answered by the servant, when
the man came to the drawing-room door, and made a sign to Miss Grainger.
“What is it, Giacomo? What do you mean?” she cried.
“Just one moment, signora; half a minute here,” he said.
Well accustomed to the tone of secrecy assumed by Italians on occasions
the least important, Miss Grainger followed him outside, and there,
under the glare of the hall-lamp, stood Calvert, pale, his hair
dishevelled, his cravat loosened, and his coat-sleeve torn. “Save me!
hide me!” said he, in a low whisper. “Can you--will you save me?”
She was one not unfitted to meet a sudden change; and, although secretly
shocked, she rallied quickly, and led him into a room beside the hall “I
know all,” said she. “We all knew it was your name.”
“Can you conceal me here for a day--two days at furthest?”
“A week, if you need it.”
“And the servant--can he be trusted?”
“To the death. I’ll answer for him.”
“How can you keep the secret from the girls?”
“I need not; they must know everything.”
“But Florence; can she--has she forgiven me?”
“Yes, thoroughly. She scarcely knows about what she quarrelled with you.
She sometimes fears that she wronged you; and Milly defends you always.”
“You have heard--you know what has happened to me?”
“In a fashion: that is, we only know there has been a duel. We feared
you had been wounded; and, indeed we heard severely wounded.”
“The story is too long to tell you now; enough, if I say it was all
about Sophy. You remember Sophy, and a fellow who was to have married
her, and who jilted her, and not only this but boasted of the injury
he had done her, and the insult he had thrown on us. A friend of
mine, Barnard, a brother officer, heard him--but why go on with this
detail?--there was a quarrel and a challenge, and it was by merest
accident I heard of it, and reached Basle in time. Of course, I was not
going to leave to Barnard what of right belonged to me. There were, as
you can imagine, innumerable complications in the matter. Rochefort, the
other man’s friend, and a French fellow, insisted on having a finger in
the pie. The end of it was, I shot Graham and somebody else--I believe
Rochefort--put a bullet into Barnard. The Swiss laws in some cantons
are severe, and we only learned too late that we had fought in the very
worst of them; so I ran, I don’t know how, or in what direction. I lost
my head for a while, and wandered about the Voralberg and the Splugen
for a week or two. How I find myself now here is quite a mystery to me.”
There was a haggard wildness in his look that fully accorded with all he
said, and the old lady felt the most honest pity for his sufferings.
“I don’t know if I’m perfectly safe here,” said he, looking fearfully
around him. “Are you sure you can conceal me, if need be?”
“Quite sure; have no fear about that. I’ll tell the girls that your
safety requires the greatest caution and secrecy, and you’ll see how
careful they will be.”
“Girls _will_ talk, though,” said he, doubtingly.
“There is the double security here--they have no one to talk to,” she
said, with a faint smile.
“Very true. I was forgetting how retired your life was here. Now for
the next point. What are you to tell them--I mean, how much are they to
know?”
The old lady looked puzzled; she felt she might easily have replied, “If
they only know no more than I can tell them, your secret will certainly
be safe;” but, as she looked at his haggard cheek and feverish eye, she
shrunk from renewing a theme full of distress and suffering. “Leave it
to me to say something--anything which shall show them that you are in a
serious trouble, and require all their secrecy and sympathy.”
“Yes, that may do--at least for the present. It will do at least with
Emily, who bears me no ill will.”
“You wrong Florence if you imagine that _she_ does. It was only the
other day, when, in a letter from Loyd, she read that you had left the
army, she said how sorry she was you had quitted the career so suited to
your abilities.”
“Indeed! I scarce hoped for so much of interest in me.”
“Oh, she talks continually about you; and always as of one, who
only needs the guidance of some true friend to be a man of mark and
distinction yet.”
“It is very good, very kind of her,” he said; and, for an instant,
seemed lost in thought.
“I’ll go back now,” said Miss Grainger, “and prepare them for your
coming. They’ll wonder what has detained me all this while. Wait one
moment for me here.”
Calvert, apparently, was too much engaged with his own thoughts to hear
her, and suffered her to go without a word. She was quickly back again,
and beckoning him to follow her, led the way to the drawing-room.
Scarcely had Calvert passed the doorway, when the two girls met him, and
each taking a hand, conducted him without a word to a sofa. Indeed, his
sickly look, and the air of downright misery in his countenance, called
or all their sympathy and kindness.
“I have scarcely strength to thank you!” he said to them, in a faint
voice. Though the words were addressed to both, the glance he gave
towards Florence sent the blood to her pale cheeks, and made her turn
away in some confusion.
“You’ll have some tea and rest yourself, and when you feel once quiet
and undisturbed here you’ll soon regain your strength,” said Emily, as
she turned towards the tea-table. While Florence, after a few moments’
hesitation, seated herself on the sofa beside him.
“Has she told you what has befallen me?” whispered he to her.
“In part--that is, something of it. As much as she could in a word or
two; but do not speak of it now.”
“If I do not now, Florence, I can never have the courage again.”
“Then be it so,” she said eagerly. “I am more anxious to see you strong
and well again, than to hear how you became wretched and unhappy.”
“But if you do not hear the story from myself, Florence, and if you
should hear the tale that others may tell of me--if you never know how I
have been tried and tempted--”
“There, there--don’t agitate yourself, or I must leave you; and, sec,
Milly is remarking our whispering together.”
“Does she grudge me this much of your kindness?”
“No; but--there--here she comes with your tea.” She drew a little table
in front of him, and tried to persuade him to eat.
“Your sister has just made me a very generous promise, Emily,” said
he. “She has pledged herself--even without hearing my exculpation--to
believe me innocent; and although I have told her that the charges that
others will make against me may need some refutation on my part, she
says she’ll not listen to them. Is not that very noble--is it not truly
generous?”
“It is what I should expect from Florence.”
“And what of Florence’s sister?” said he, with a half furtive glance
towards her.
“I hope, nothing less generous.”
“Then I am content,” said he, with a faint sigh. “When a man is as
thoroughly ruined as I am, it might be thought he would be indifferent
to opinion in every shape--and so I am, beyond the four walls of this
room; but here,” and he looked at each in turn, “are the arbiters of
my fate; if you will but be to me dear sisters--kind, compassionate,
forgiving sisters--you will do more for this crushed and wounded heart,
than all the sympathy of the whole world beside.”
“We only ask to be such to you,” cried Florence, eagerly: “and we feel
how proud we could be of such a brother; but, above all, do not distress
yourself now, by a theme so painful to touch on. Let the unhappy events
of the last few weeks lie, if not forgotten, at least unmentioned, till
you are calm and quiet enough to talk of them as old memories.”
“Yes! but how can I bear the thought of what others may say of
me--meanwhile?”
“Who are these others--we see no one, we go into no society?”
“Have you not scores of dear friends, writing by every post to ask
if this atrocious duellist be ‘your’ Mr. Calvert, and giving such a
narrative, besides, of his doings, that a galley-slave would shrink from
contact with such a man? Do I not know well how tenderly people deal
with the vices that are not their own? How severe the miser can be on
the spendthrift, and how mercilessly the coward condemns the hot blood
that resents an injury, and how gladly they would involve in shame the
character that would not brook dishonour?”
“Believe me, we have very few ‘dear friends’ at all,” said Florence,
smiling, “and not one, no, not a single one of the stamp you speak of.”
“If you were only to read our humdrum letters,” chimed in Emily, “you’d
see how they never treat of anything but little domestic details of
people who live as obscurely as ourselves. How Uncle Tom’s boy has got
into the Charterhouse; or Mary’s baby taken the chicken-pox.”
“But Loyd writes to you--and not in this strain?”
“I suspect Joseph cares little to fill his pages with what is called
news,” said Emily, with a laughing glance at her sister, who had turned
away her head in some confusion.
“Nor would he be one likely to judge you harshly,” said Florence,
recovering herself. “I believe you have few friends who rate you more
highly than he does.”
“It is very generous of him!” said Calvert, haughtily; and then,
catching in the proud glance of Florry’s eyes a daring challenge of his
words, he added, in a quieter tone, “I mean, it is generous of him
to overlook how unjust I have been to him. It is not easy for men
so different to measure each other, and I certainly formed an unfair
estimate of him.”
“Oh! may I tell him that you said so?” cried she, taking his hand with
warmth.
“I mean to do it for myself dearest sister. It is a debt I cannot permit
another to acquit for me.”
“Don’t you think you are forgetting our guest’s late fatigues, and what
need he has of rest and quietness, girls?” said Miss Grainger, coming
over to where they sat.
“I was forgetting everything in my joy, aunt,” cried Florence. “He is
going to write to Joseph like a dear, dear brother as he is, and we
shall all be so happy, and so united.”
“A brother? Mr. Calvert a brother?” said the old lady, in consternation
at such a liberty with one of that mighty house, in which she had once
lived as an humble dependant.
“Yes,” cried he. “It is a favour I have begged, and they have not denied
me.”
The old lady’s face flushed, and pride and shame glowed together on her
cheeks.
“So we must say good-night,” said Calvert, rising; “but we shall have a
long day’s talk together, to-morrow. Who is it that defines an aunt as a
creature that always sends one to bed?” whispered he to Florence.
“What made you laugh, dear?” said her sister, after Calvert had left the
room.
“I forget--I didn’t know I laughed--he is a strange incomprehensible
fellow--sometimes I like him greatly, and sometimes I feel a sort of
dread of him that amounts to terror.”
“If I were Joseph, I should not be quite unconcerned about that jumbled
estimation.”
“He has no need to be. They are unlike in every way,” said she, gravely;
and then, taking up her book, went on, or affected to go on reading.
“I wish Aunt Grainger would not make so much of him. It is a sort of
adulation that makes our position regarding him perfectly false,” said
Emily. “Don’t you think so, dear?”
Florence, however, made no reply, and no more passed that evening
between them.
Few of us have not had occasion to remark the wondrous change produced
in some quiet household, where the work of domesticity goes on in
routine fashion, by the presence of an agreeable and accomplished guest.
It is not alone that he contributes by qualities of his own to the
common stock of amusement, but that he excites those around him to
efforts, which develop resources they had not, perhaps, felt conscious
of possessing. The necessity, too, of wearing one’s company face, which
the presence of a stranger exacts, has more advantages than many wot of.
The small details whose discussion forms the staple of daily talk--the
little household cares and worries--have to be shelved. One can scarcely
entertain their friends with stories of the cook’s impertinence, or
the coachman’s neglect, and one has to see, as they do see, that the
restraint of a guest does not in reality affect the discipline of a
household, though it suppress the debates and arrest the discussion.
It has been often remarked that the custom of appearing in
parliament--as it was once observed--in court-dress, imposed a degree
of courtesy and deference in debate, of which men in wide-awake hats and
paletots are not always observant; and, unquestionably, in the little
ceremonial observances imposed by the stranger’s presence, may be seen
the social benefits of a good breeding not marred by over-familiarity.
It was thus Calvert made his presence felt at the villa. It was true he
had many companionable qualities, and he had, or at least affected to
have, very wide sympathies. He was ever ready to read aloud, to row,
to walk, to work in the flower-garden, to sketch, or to copy music,
as though each was an especial pleasure to him. If he was not as high
spirited and light hearted as they once had seen him, it did not
detract from, but rather added to the interest he excited. He was in
misfortune--a calamity not the less to be compassionated that none could
accurately define it; some dreadful event had occurred, some terrible
consequence impended, and each felt the necessity of lighten ing the
load of his sorrow, and helping him to bear his affliction. They were so
glad when they could cheer him up, and so happy when they saw him take
even a passing pleasure in the pursuits their own days were spent in.
They had now been long enough in Italy not to feel depressed by its
dreamy and monotonous quietude, but to feel the inexpressible charm of
that soft existence, begotten of air, and climate, and scenery. They had
arrived at that stage--and it _is_ a stage--in which the olive is
not dusky, nor the mountain arid: when the dry course of the torrent
suggests no wish for water. Life--mere life--has a sense of luxury about
it, unfelt in northern lands. With an eager joy, therefore, did they
perceive that Calvert seemed to have arrived at the same sentiment, and
the same appreciation as themselves. He seemed to ask for nothing
better than to stroll through orange groves, or lie under some spreading
fig-tree, drowsily soothed by the song of the vine-dresser, or the
unwearied chirp of the cicala. How much of good there must be surely in
a nature pleased with such tranquil simple pleasures! thought they. See
how he likes to watch the children at their play, and with what courtesy
he talked to that old priest. It is clear dissipation may have damaged,
but has not destroyed that fine temperament--his heart has not lost its
power to feel. It was thus that each thought of him, though there was
less of confidence between the sisters than heretofore.
A very few words will suffice to explain this: When Florence recovered
from the shock Calvert had occasioned her on the memorable night of his
visit, she had nothing but the very vaguest recollection of what had
occurred. That some terrible tidings had been told her--some disastrous
news in which Loyd and Calvert were mixed up: that she had blamed
Calvert for rashness or indiscretion; that he had either shown a letter
he ought never to have shown, or not produced one which might have
averted a misfortune; and, last of all, that she herself had done or
said something which a calmer judgment could not justify--all these were
in some vague and shadowy shape before her, and all rendered her anxious
and uneasy. On the other hand, Emily, seeing with some satisfaction that
her sister never recurred to the events of that unhappy night, gladly
availed herself of this silence to let them sleep undisturbed. She was
greatly shocked, it is true, by the picture Calvert’s representation
presented of Loyd. He had never been a great favourite of her own; she
recognised many good and amiable traits in his nature, but she deemed
him gloomy, depressed, and a dreamer--and a dreamer, above all, she
regarded as unfit to be the husband of Florence, whose ill health had
only tended to exaggerate a painful and imaginative disposition. She
saw, or fancied she saw, that Loyd’s temperament, calm and gentle
though it was, deemed to depress her sister. His views of life were very
sombre, and no effort ever enabled him to look forward in a sanguine
or hopeful spirit If, however, to these feelings an absolute fault of
character were to be added--the want of personal courage--her feelings
for him could no longer be even the qualified esteem she had hitherto
experienced. She also knew that nothing could be such a shock to
Florence, as to believe that the man she loved was a coward; nor could
any station, or charm, or ability, however great, compensate for such
a defect As a matter, therefore, for grave after-thought, but not
thoroughly “proven,” she retained this charge in her mind, nor did she
by any accident drop a hint or a word that could revive the memory of
that evening.
As for Miss Grainger, only too happy to see that Florence seemed to
retain no trace of that distressing scene, she never went back to it,
and thus every event of the night was consigned to silence, if not
oblivion. Still, there grew out of that reserve a degree of estrangement
between the sisters, which each, unconscious of in herself, could detect
in the other. “I think Milly has grown colder to me of late, aunt She is
not less kind or attentive, but there is a something of constraint about
her I cannot fathom,” would Florence say to her aunt While the other
whispered, “I wonder why Florry is so silent when we are alone together?
She that used to tell me all her thoughts, and speak for hours of what
she hoped and wished, now only alludes to some commonplace topic--the
book she has just read, or the walk we took yesterday.”
The distance between them was not the less wide that each had secretly
confided to Calvert her misgivings about the other. Indeed, it would
have been, for girls so young and inexperienced in life, strange not to
have accorded him their confidence. He possessed a large share of that
quality which very young people regard as sagacity. I am not sure that
the gift has got a special name, but we have all of us heard of some one
“with such a good head,” “so safe an adviser,” “such a rare counsellor
in a difficulty,” “knowing life and mankind so well,” and “such an
aptitude to take the right road in a moment of embarrassment.” The
phoenix is not usually a man of bright or showy qualities; he is, on
the contrary, one that the world at large has failed to recognise. If,
however, by any chance he should prove to be smart, ready-witted, and a
successful talker, his sway is a perfect despotism. Such was Calvert; at
least such was he to the eyes of these sisters. Now Emily had confided
to him that she thought Loyd totally unworthy of Florence. His good
qualities were undeniable, but he had few attractive or graceful ones;
and then there was a despondent, depressed tone about him that must
prove deeply injurious to one whose nature required bright and cheery
companionship. Calvert agreed with every word of this.
Florence, on her side, was, meanwhile, imparting to him that Loyd was
not fairly appreciated by her aunt or her sister. They deemed him very
honourable, very truthful, and very moral, but they did not think highly
of his abilities, nor reckon much on his success in life. In fact,
though the words themselves were spared her, they told her in a hundred
modes that “she was throwing herself away;” and, strange as it may read,
she liked to be told so, and heard with a sort of triumphant pride that
she was going to make a sacrifice of herself and all her prospects--all
for “poor Joseph.” To become the auditor of this reckoning required
more adroitness than the other case; but Calvert was equal to it. He
saw where to differ, where to agree with her. It was a contingency which
admitted of a very dexterous flattery, rather insinuated, however, than
openly declared; and it was thus he conveyed to her that he took the
same view as the others. He knew Loyd was an excellent fellow, far too
good and too moral for a mere scamp like himself to estimate. He was
certain he would turn out respectable, esteemed, and all that. He would
be sure to be a churchwarden, and might be a poor-law guardian; and his
wife would be certain to shine in the same brightness attained by
him. Then stopping, he would heave a low, faint sigh, and turn the
conversation to something about her own attractions or graceful gifts.
How enthusiastically the world of “society” would one day welcome
them--and what a “success” awaited her whenever she was well enough to
endure its fatigue. Now, though all these were only as so many fagots
to the pile of her martyrdom, she delighted to listen to them, and never
wearied of hearing Calvert exalt all the greatness of the sacrifice she
was about to make, and how immeasurably she was above the lot to which
she was going to consign herself.
It is the drip, drip, that eats away the rock, and iteration ever so
faint, will cleave its way at last: so Florry, without in the slightest
degree disparaging Loyd, grew at length to believe, as Calvert assured
her, that “Master Joseph” was the luckiest dog that ever lived, and had
carried off a prize immeasurably above his pretensions.
Miss Grainger, too, found a confessor in their guest: but it will spare
the reader some time if I place before him a letter which Calvert wrote
to one of his most intimate friends a short time after he had taken up
his abode at the villa. The letter will also serve to connect some past
events with the present now before us.
The epistle was addressed Algernon Drayton, Esq., Army and Navy Club,
London, and ran thus:
“My dear Algy,--You are the prince of ‘our own
correspondents,’ and I thank you, ‘imo corde,’ if that be
Latin for it, for all you have done for me. I defy the whole
Bar to make out, from your narrative, who killed who, in
that affair at Basle. I know, after the third reading of it,
I fancied that I had been shot through the heart, and then
took post-horses for Zurich. It was and is a master-piece of
the bewildering imbroglio style. Cultivate your great gifts,
then, my friend. You will be a treasure to the court of
Cresswell, and the most injured of men or the basest of
seducers will not be able at the end of a suit to say which
must kneel down and ask pardon of the other. I suppose I
ought to say I’m sorry for Barnard, but I can’t. No, Algy, I
cannot. He was an arrant snob, and, if he had lived, he’d
have gone about telling the most absurd stories and getting
people to believe them, just on the faith of his stupidity.
If there is a ridiculous charge in the world, it is that of
‘firing before one’s time,’ which, to make the most of it,
must be a matter of seconds, and involves, besides, a
question as to the higher inflammability of one’s powder. I
don’t care who made mine, but I know it did its work well.
I’m glad, however, that you did not deign to notice that
contemptible allegation, and merely limited yourself to what
resulted. Your initials and the stars showered over the
paragraph, are in the highest walk of legerdemain, and I can
no more trace relatives to antecedents, than I can tell what
has become of the _egg_ I saw Houdin smash in my hat.
“I know, however, I mustn’t come back just yet There is that
shake-of-the-headiness abroad that makes one uncomfortable.
Fortunately, this is no-sacrifice to me. My debts keep me
out of London, just as effectually as my morals. Besides
this, my dear Algy, I’m living in the very deepest of
clover, domesticated with a maiden aunt and two lovely
nieces, in a villa on an Italian lake, my life and comforts
being the especial care of the triad. Imagine an infant-
school occupied in the care of a young tiger of the spotted
species, and you may, as the Yankees say, realise the
situation. But they seem to enjoy the peril of what they are
doing, or they don’t see it, I can’t tell which.
“‘Gazetted out,’ you say; ‘Meno male,’ as they say here. I
might have been promoted, and so tempted to go back to that
land of Bores, Bearers, and Bungalores, and I am grateful to
the stumble that saves me from a fall. But you ask, what do
I mean to do? and I own I do not see my way to anything.
Time was when gentleman-riding, coach-driving, or billiards,
were on a par with the learned professions; but, my dear
Drayton, we have fallen upori a painfully enlightened age,
and every fellow can do a little of everything.
“You talk of my friends? You might as well talk of my Three
per Cents. If I had friends, it would be natural enough they
should help me to emigrate as a means of seeing the last of
me; but I rather suspect that my relatives, who by a figure
of speech represent the friends aforesaid, have a lively
faith that some day or other the government will be at the
expense of my passage--that it would be quite superfluous in
them to provide for it.
“You hint that I might marry, meaning thereby marry with
money; and, to be sure, there’s Barnard’s widow with plenty
of tin, and exactly in that stage of affliction that
solicits consolation; for when the heart is open to sorrow,
Love occasionally steps in before the door closes. Then, a
more practical case. One of these girls here--the fortune is
only fifteen thousand--I think over the matter day and
night, and I verily believe I see it in the light of
whatever may be the weather at the time: very darkly on the
rainy days; not so gloomy when the sky is blue and the air
balmy.
“Do you remember that fellow that _I_ stayed behind for at
the Cape, and thereby lost my passage, just to quarrel with
Headsworth? Well, a feeling of the same sort is tempting
me sorely at this time. There is one of these girls, a poor
delicate thing, very pretty and coquettish in her way, has
taken it into her wise head to prefer a stupid loutish sort
of young sucking barrister to me, and treats me with an
ingenious blending of small compassion and soft pity to
console my defeat. If you could ensure my being an afflicted
widower within a year, I’d marry her, just to show her the
sort of edged tool she has been playing with. I’m often half
driven to distraction by her impertinent commiseration. I
tried to get into a row with the man, but he would not have
it. Don’t you hate the fellow that won’t quarrel with you,
worse even than the odious wretch who won’t give you credit?
“I might marry the sister, I suppose, to-morrow; but that
alone is a reason against it. Besides, she is terribly
healthy; and though I have lost much faith in consumption,
from cases I have watched in my own family, bad air and bad
treatment will occasionally aid its march. Could you, from
such meagre data as these, help me with a word of advice?
for I do like the advice of an unscrupulous dog-like
yourself--so sure to be practical Then there is no cant
between men like us--we play ‘cartes sur table.’
“The old maid who represents the head of this house has been
confidentially sounding me as to an eligible investment for
some thousands which have fallen in from a redeemed
mortgage. I could have said, ‘Send them to me, and you shall
name the interest yourself;’ but I was modest, and did not.
I bethought me, however, of a good friend, one Algy Drayton,
a man of large landed property, but who always wants money
for drainage. Eh, Algy! Are your lips watering at the
prospect? If so, let your ingenuity say what is to be the
security.
“Before I forget it, ask Pearson if he has any more of that
light Amontillado. It is the only thing ever sets me right,
and I have been poorly of late. I know I must be out of
sorts, because all day yesterday I was wretched and
miserable at my misspent life and squandered abilities. Now,
in my healthier moments, such thoughts never cross me. I’d
have been honest if Nature had dealt fairly with me; but
the younger son of a younger brother starts too heavily
weighted to win by anything but a ‘foul’ You understand this
well, for we are in the same book. We each of us pawned our
morality very early in life, and never were rich enough to
redeem it. Apropos of pledges, is your wife alive? I lost a
bet about it some time ago, but I forget on which side. I
backed my opinion.
“Now, to sum up. Let me hear from you about all I have
been asking; and, though I don’t opine it lies very much in
your way, send me any tidings you can pick up--to his
disadvantage, of course--of Joseph Loyd, Middle
Temple. You know scores of attorneys who could trace him.
Your hint about letter writing for the papers is not a bad
one. I suppose I could learn the trick, and do it at
least as well as some of the fellows whose lucubrations I
read. A political surmise, a spicy bit of scandal, a
sensation trial wound up with a few moral reflections upon
how much better we do the same sort of things at home. Isn’t
that the bone of it? Send me--don’t forget it--send me some
news of Rocksley. I want to hear how they take all that I
have been doing of late for their happiness. I have half of
a letter written to Soph--a sort of mild condolence, blended
with what the serious people call profitable reflections and
suggestive hints that her old affection will find its way
back to me one of these days, and that when the event
occurs, her best course will be to declare it. I have
reminded her, too, that I laid up a little love in her heart
when we parted, just as shrewd people leave a small balance
at their bankers’ as a title to reopen their account at a
future day.
“Give Guy’s people a hint that it’s only wasting postage-
stamps to torment me with bills. I never break the envelope
of a dun’s letter, and I know them as instinctively as a
detective does a swell-mobsman. What an imaginative race
these duns must be. I know of no fellow, for the high
flights of fancy, to equal one’s tailor or bootmaker. As to
the search for the elixir vitae, it’s a dull realism after
the attempts I have witnessed for years to get money out of
myself.
“But I must close this; here is Milly, whose taper fingers
have been making cigarettes for me all the morning, come to
propose a sail on the lake!--fact Algy!--and the wolf is
going out with the lambs, just as prettily and as decorously
as though his mother had been a ewe and cast ‘sheep’s eyes’
at his father. Address me, Orta, simply, for I don’t wish it
to be thought here that my stay is more than a day by day
matter. I have all my letters directed to the post-office.
“Yours, very cordially,
“Harry Calvert.”
The pleasant project thus passingly alluded to was not destined to
fulfilment; for as Calvert with the two sisters were on their way to
the lake, they were overtaken by Miss Grainger, who insisted on
carrying away Calvert, to give her his advice upon a letter she had just
received. Obeying with the best grace he could, and which really did not
err on the score of extravagance, he accompanied the old lady back to
the house, somewhat relieved, indeed, in mind, to learn that the letter
she was about to show him in no way related to him nor his affairs.
“I have my scruples, Mr. Calvert, about asking your opinion in a case
where I well know your sympathies are not in unison with our own; but
your wise judgment and great knowledge of life are advantages I cannot
bring myself to relinquish. I am well aware that whatever your feelings
or your prejudices, they will not interfere with that good judgment.”
“Madam, you do me honour; but, I hope, no more than justice.”
“You know of Florry’s engagement to Mr. Loyd?” she asked, abruptly, as
though eager to begin her recital; and he bowed. “Well, he left this
so hurriedly about his father’s affairs, that he had no time to settle
anything, or, indeed, explain anything. We knew nothing of his prospects
or his means, and he just as little about my niece’s fortune. He had
written, it is true, to his father, and got a most kind and affectionate
answer, sanctioning the match, and expressing fervent wishes for his
happiness--Why do you smile, Mr. Calvert?”
“I was only thinking of the beauty of that benevolence that costs
nothing; few things are more graceful than a benediction--nothing so
cheap.”
“That may be so. I have nothing to say to it,” she rejoined, in some
irritation. “But old Mr. Loyd’s letter was very beautiful, and very
touching. He reminded Joseph that he himself had married on the very
scantiest of means, and that though his life had never been above the
condition of a very poor vicar, the narrowness of his fortune had not
barred his happiness. I’d like to read you a passage--”
“Pray do not You have given me the key-note, and I feel as if I could
score down the whole symphony.”
“You don’t believe him, then?”
“Heaven forfend! All I would say is, that between a man of his
temperament and one of mine discussion is impossible; and if this be the
letter on which you want my opinion, I frankly tell you I have none to
give.”
“No, no! this is not the letter; here is the letter I wish you to
read. It has only come by this morning’s post, and I want to have your
judgment on it before I speak of it to the girls.”
Calvert drew the letter slowly from its envelope, and, with a sort of
languid resignation, proceeded to read it As he reached the end of the
first page, he said, “Why, it would need a lawyer of the Ecclesiastical
Court to understand this. What’s all this entangled story about
irregular induction, and the last incumbent, and the lay impropriator?”
“Oh, you needn’t have read that! It’s the poor old gentleman’s account
of his calamity; how he has lost his vicarage, and is going down to a
curacy in Cornwall. Here,” said she, pointing to another page, “here is
where you are to begin; ‘I might have borne--’”
“Ah, yes!” said he, reading aloud; “‘I might have borne up better under
this misfortune if it had not occurred at such a critical moment of my
poor boy’s fate, for I am still uncertain what effect these tidings will
have produced on you. I shall no longer have a home to offer the young
people, when from reasons of health, or economy, or relaxation, they
would like to have left the town and come down to rusticate with us.
Neither will it be in my power to contribute--even in the humble shape I
had once hoped--to their means of living. I am, in short, reduced to
the very narrowest fortune, nor have I the most distant prospect of any
better: so much for myself As for Joseph, he has been offered, through
the friendly intervention of an old college companion, an appointment at
the Calcutta Bar. It is not a lucrative nor an important post, but one
which they say will certainly lead to advancement and future fortune.
Had it not been for his hopes--hopes which had latterly constituted the
very spring of his existence--such an opening as this would have been
welcomed with all his heart; but now the offer comes clouded with all
the doubts as to how you may be disposed to regard it. Will you consent
to separate from the dear girl you have watched over with such loving
solicitude for years? Will she herself consent to expatriation and the
parting from her sister and yourself? These are the questions which
torture his mind, and leave him no rest day or night! The poor fellow
has tried to plead his cause in a letter--he has essayed a dozen
times--but all in vain.
“My own selfishness shocks me,” he says, “when I read over what I have
written, and see how completely I have forgotten everything but my own
interests. If he remain at home, by industry and attention he may hope,
in some six or seven years, to be in a position to marry; but six or
seven years are a long period of life, and sure to have their share of
vicissitudes and casualties. Whereas, by accepting this appointment,
which will be nearly seven hundred a year, he could afford at once to
support a wife, of course supposing her to submit willingly to the
privations and wants of such straitened fortunes. I have offered to tell
his story for him--that story he has no strength to tell himself--but I
have not pledged to be his advocate; for, while I would lay down my life
to secure his happiness, I cannot bring myself to urge, for his sake,
what might be unfair or ungenerous to exact from another.
“‘Though my son’s account of your niece leaves us nothing more to ask or
wish for in a daughter, I am writing in ignorance of many things I would
like to know. Has she, for instance, the energy of character that would
face a new life in a new and far away land? Has she courage--has she
health for it? My wife is not pleased at my stating all these reasons
for doubt; but I am determined you shall know the worst of our case from
ourselves, and discover no blot we have not prepared you for.’” Calvert
mattered something here, but too inaudibly to be heard, and went on
reading: “‘When I think that poor Joe’s whole happiness will depend on
what decision your next letter will bring, I have only to pray that
it may be such as will conduce to the welfare of those we both love so
dearly I cannot ask you to make what are called ‘sacrifices’ for us: but
I entreat you let the consideration of affection weigh with you, not
less than that of worldly interests, and also to believe that when one
has to take a decision which is to influence a lifetime, it is as safe
to take counsel from the heart as from the head--from the nature that is
to feel, as from the intellect that is to plan.’
“I think I have read enough of this,” said Calvert, impatiently. “I know
the old gent’s brief perfectly. It’s the old story: first gain a girl’s
affections, and let her friends squabble, if they dare, about the
settlements. He’s an artful old boy, that vicar! but I like him, on the
whole, better than his son, for though he does plead in forma pauperis,
he has the fairness to say so.”
“You are very severe, Mr. Calvert. I hope you are too severe,” said the
old lady, in some agitation.
“And what answer are you going to give him?” asked he, curtly.
“That is exactly the point on which I want your advice; for though
I know well you are no friend to young Loyd, I believe you to be our
sincere well-wisher, and that your judgment will be guided by the honest
feelings of regard for us.”
Without deigning to notice this speech, he arose and walked up and
down the room apparently deep in thought He stopped at last, and said,
abruptly, “I don’t presume to dictate to you in this business; but if I
were the young lady’s guardian, and got such a letter as this, my reply
would be a very brief one.”
“You’d refuse your consent?”
“Of course I would! Must your niece turn adventuress, and go off to
Heaven knows where, with God knows whom? Must she link her fortunes to
a man who confessedly cannot face the world at home, but must go to
the end of the earth for a bare subsistence? What is there in this man
himself, in his character, station, abilities, and promise, that are to
recompense such devotion as this? And what will your own conscience say
to the first letter from India, full of depression and sorrow, regrets
shadowed forth, if not avowed openly, for the happy days when you were
all together, and contrasts of that time, with the dreary dulness of an
uncheered existence? _I_ know something of India, and I can tell you it
is a country where life is only endurable by splendour. Poverty in such
a land is not merely privation, it is to live in derision and contempt.
Everyone knows how many rupees you have per month, and you are measured
by your means in everything. That seven hundred a year, which sounds
plausibly enough, is something like two hundred at home, if so much.
Of course you can override all these considerations, and, as the vicar
says, ‘Let the heart take precedence of the head.’ _My_ cold and
worldly counsels will not stand comparison with _his_ fine and generous
sentiments, no more than I could make as good a figure in the pulpit
as he could. But, perhaps, as a mere man of the world, I am his equal;
though there are little significant hints in that very letter that show
the old parson is very wide awake.”
“I never detected them,” said she, curtly.
“Perhaps not, but rely upon one thing. It was not such a letter as
he would have addressed to a man. If _I_, for instance, had been the
guardian instead of you, the whole tone of the epistle would have been
very different.”
“Do you think so?”
“Think so! I know it I had not read ten lines till I said to myself,
‘This was meant for very different eyes from mine.’”
“If I thought that--”
“Go on,” said he; “finish, and let me hear what you would say or do,
when arrived at the conclusion I have come to.”
So far, however, from having come to any decision, she really did not
see in the remotest distance anything to guide her to one.
“What would you advise me to do, Mr. Calvert?” said she, at last, and
after a pause of some time.
“Refer him to me; say the point is too difficult for you; that while
your feelings for your niece might overbear all other considerations,
those very feelings might be the sources of error to you. You might, for
instance, concede too much to the claim of affection; or, on the other
hand, be too regardful of the mere worldly consideration. Not that, on
second thoughts, I’d enter upon this to him, I’d simply say a friend in
whom I repose the fullest confidence, has consented to represent me in
this difficult matter. Not swayed as I am by the claims of affection,
he will be able to give a calmer and more dispassionate judgment than
I could. Write to Mr. Calvert, therefore, who is now here, and say what
the mere business aspect of the matter suggests to you to urge. Write to
him frankly, as to one who already is known to your son, and has lived
on terms of intimacy with him. His reply will be mine.”
“Is not that a very cold and repelling answer to the good vicar’s
letter?”
“I think not, and I suspect it will have one good effect The parson’s
style will become natural at once, and you’ll see what a very different
fashion he’ll write when the letter is addressed to me.”
“What will Florence say?”
“Nothing, if she knows nothing. And, of course, if you intend to take
her into your counsels, you must please to omit _me_. I’m not going
to legislate for a young lady’s future with herself to vote in the
division!”
“But what’s to become of me, if you go away in the middle of the
negotiation, and leave me to finish it?”
“I’ll not do so. I’ll pledge my word to see you through it. It will be
far shorter than you suspect. The vicar will not play out his hand when
he sees his adversary. You have nothing to do but write as I have told
you; leave the rest to me.”
“Florence is sure to ask me what the vicar has written; she knows that I
have had his letter.”
“Tell her it is a purely business letter; that his son having been
offered a colonial appointment, he wishes to ascertain what your fortune
his, and how circumstanced, before pledging himself further. Shock her a
little about their worldliness, and leave the remainder to time.”
“But Joseph will write to her in the meanwhile and disabuse her of
this.”
“Not completely. She’ll be annoyed that the news of the colonial place
did not come first from himself; she’ll be piqued into something not
very far from distrust; she’ll show some vexation when she writes; but
don’t play the game before the cards are dealt. Wait, as I say--wait and
see. Meanwhile, give me the vicar’s note, for I dread your showing it to
Florry, and if she asks for it, say you sent it to Henderson--isn’t
that your lawyer’s name?--in London, and told him to supply you with the
means of replying to it.”
Like a fly in a cobweb, Miss Grainger saw herself entangled wherever she
turned, and though perhaps in her secret heart she regretted having ever
called Calvert to her counsels, the thing was now done and could not be
undone.