Mr Thursley would have nothing to do with the further steps which
Gervase took. He would take no further interest in such a madman. Had he
even employed this money, which had been providentially kept out of
sight till Mr Burton’s arrangement was made, and of which nobody knew
anything--had he embarked in business with it--for there was no doubt
now that he had a capacity for business--and made his own of it, and
laid the foundations of fortune, and then stepped forward when he was
able to afford it, and paid the balance of his father’s debts, the
thing might have been permissible enough, and would no doubt have had a
very good effect. But to do it now--when instead of having a good effect
it would have a bad one, as if Mr Burton had kept back something:
whereas it had been the very source of that high appreciation which had
made all his creditors his friends, that he had kept back nothing--this
was more grievous than words could say. It was Gervase’s money, not his
father’s. He had been sent away to make anything he could of that almost
lapsed property, with the understanding that anything he recovered
should be his own. And it was all settled, as Mr Thursley repeated over
and over again--all _done_--the acquittance signed, the whole matter
laid at rest. Why should he interfere, after his father had
completed everything? These arguments were repeated over and
over--argumentatively, entreatingly, angrily--but without effect.
Gervase was not even intelligent at this crisis of his being. He did not
seem to understand. He was like a man dazed and stupefied, unable to
comprehend anything but one thing, and with his entire mind concentrated
on that, whatever any one might say. No argument or reason had any
weight with him, not even the tremulous question of Madeline, who made
no attempt to hold him back, except by asking--“Do you think, perhaps,
my father is right, and that they might think something has been held
back?” “What is that to me?” he had replied; “I must do what is honest,
whatever they think.” “Oh, _Honest_!” Mr Thursley cried, with a fierce
little laugh of indignation and contempt. As a matter of fact, Gervase
did produce an effect which was not good so far as public opinion was
concerned. Mr Burton had been almost canonised for his honourable
dealing, his openness and frankness, the “every assistance” which he had
given to the liquidators, and that certainty, which everybody had, that
nothing had been kept back. But it came to pass exactly as Mr Thursley
had predicted, when the matter was re-opened. The creditors who had got
three-fourths of their debts indeed got the whole, and were so much the
better off, and had their mouths closed for evermore. But the world in
which Mr Burton and his transactions were known, and which had given
him so much credit for keeping nothing back, now discovered to its
amazement that something had been kept back, and had all its usual
suspicions awakened. And even the creditors scarcely thanked Gervase. He
put them in the wrong, making them feel that they had been premature in
their applauses. They looked back upon their accounts suspiciously, to
see whether old Burton, after all, had not in some way got the better of
them.
As for Gervase himself, he was entirely absorbed by this business. He
went, indeed, to Madeline for sympathy, and told her all that was
happening, and how he was tormented and kept in pain by the innumerable
delays and all the vexatious fuss and formality through which he was
dragged before his business could be accomplished. The renunciation of
all the money, which had indeed been gained by his own exertions, cost
him nothing. He did not think of it; but the waiting, the
confabulations, the meetings that had to be called, the papers that had
to be signed, the special consent on all hands to make the transaction
as odious and as tiresome as possible, did affect him, and that most
painfully. He was harassed to death during those early summer days, in
which London looks its best, and all the crowd of fashion pours in.
Madeline, though her society was not that of fashion, yet had, as
everybody has, a greater amount of engagements, a quickened current of
life during the season, that high tide of English hurry. And though her
heart was with the lover, who was no longer a lover, who seemed to have
forgotten everything, both in the present and the future, except this
one dogged resolve to get rid of his money, and silence at once and for
ever all criticism or censure,--yet she was compelled to carry on the
routine of her usual life, to go out, to lose herself more or less in
the bustle and commotion of the period, and could not be entirely at his
command, as he seemed to expect. In short, there fell between them, if
not a cloud, yet a mist which veiled each from the other, making Gervase
believe that her sympathy had failed, and tormenting Madeline with the
thought that his love was no longer what it was, and that she had lost
her place in his life. He came to her, but he talked of nothing but his
business, of the stage at which he had now arrived, of the prospect
there was of coming to a conclusion. And she had so often to hurry on
these long explanations, to say “Gervase, I must go. Don’t think me
unkind,--I would rather stay with you a thousand times, but I _must_
go.” He would give her a look which she scarcely understood, whether it
was reproach or consent. “I know, I know,” he would say, and go off
heavily, never looking behind him. This lasted like a fever for weeks:
he always absorbed in the business which it was so difficult to get done
with; she full of wretched thoughts, thinking she had lost him, not
without a feeling that he had lost himself, going on with her gaieties,
which was worse. If it had but happened at another time of the year, it
would not have been quite so bad; and oh, if Gervase had but stayed at
home, if he had but gone into the business, if he had kept everything
straight, if it had never happened at all!
There came a time, however, in the middle of June, when all the
entertainments were at their height, and Madeline, with a distracted
mind, going “everywhere,” so far as her circle extended, doing all her
father’s society duties and her own, keeping “in the swim,” as he
insisted she should do, was more occupied than ever--when Gervase at
last got his business completed. She heard that he had come several
times when she could not see him, retreating from the door when she had
visitors, or turned away when she was out. To her horror and dismay,
several days elapsed thus without a meeting. She felt that at any moment
she might receive a letter saying that Gervase had gone away, that he
had left England, that she should see him no more. She went and came to
her parties, to her engagements, at the highest tension, terrified to
see upon the hall-table every time she came in the note which would
pronounce this doom. Her little notes to him remained unanswered. She
was told by the servants that he had called, but had not remained or
left any message. Madeline’s anxiety and trouble had risen to
fever-heat. He came on Sunday afternoon at last, but he was scarcely
seated when some wretched partner of the night before drifted in to
talk about Lady C.’s ball and the great garden-party at Valley House,
and the Lord Mayor’s _fête_ at the Mansion House, while Gervase sat
silent, taking no share in the vain, exceptionally vain, talk. He
departed, with a hasty touch of her hand, and a murmur of “I’ll come
again,” when another and another stranger arrived to discourse on the
same enthralling subjects. “To-night,” she whispered desperately, not
able to contain herself; “to-night--I shall be alone to-night.” What did
it matter who heard her? He nodded, she thought, though he did not look
at her, and went away, leaving her to the exhilarating task of that talk
about society, which is much the same whether your horizon is bounded by
the Foreign Office or by the Mansion House. The interval was terrible
to her till all those Sunday triflers had departed. She told her father
at dinner, fearing lest he might think it his duty to give her his
company on the Sunday evening, as he often did, that she expected
Gervase. “Oh,” said Mr Thursley, elevating his eyebrows. “I have
scarcely seen him,” Madeline said, unable to contain the turmoil of her
feelings, “for a week.”
“Oh,” said Mr Thursley again, “the less you see of that madman the
better, it appears to me.”
“I hope you don’t believe, papa,” cried Madeline, “that anything that
has happened has changed my feelings.”
“I am very sorry to hear,” said Mr Thursley; “it has changed his, I am
pretty sure. And if he thinks he is to hook on to you now for a
living----”
“You don’t seem to see that you are insulting me as well as Gervase,”
she said hastily; then added, in a subdued tone, “I beg your pardon.”
“It’s time, I think; but never mind,” said her father. “I can allow for
your feelings, Maddie--distracted by that fellow and his fancies; but
mind, I’ll not stand that, whatever he may say now.”
Madeline made no reply. Fathers perhaps will never learn to relinquish
that kind of remark. Mr Thursley was as well aware as any one that it
was a futile kind of thing to say; but he had been watching his daughter
closely, and he thought he saw that Gervase’s conduct had shaken her
trust in him. It was as well, perhaps, to throw in a word to help the
adverse impression; but he did not attempt to hinder the meeting. He
went out himself to one of the houses where there was music or
conversation going on on Sunday evening, and left the coast free.
Madeline went up-stairs to the drawing-room with a beating heart. She
thought, like her father, that Gervase had thrown off all softer
feelings in the shock of family downfall and overthrow. What so likely
to stun and paralyse a young man with a strong sense of honour, and with
that innate conviction of personal superiority to all rebuffs and
slights of fortune which an English youth’s education gives! Poverty
would not have hurt him; but this mingling of doubt and mystery and
intricate confusing business, the perhaps undeserved applauses of which
his father had been the object for his partial just dealing, the
certainly undeserved suspicion and blame of which he had himself been
the object for completing that justice, the sense of the foundations of
the earth shaken, and the ground failing under his feet, which such
revelations are apt to bring,--all these things were enough, and more
than enough, to upset the fine balance of a mind more delicate than
strong. It had never appeared that Gervase was strong. His
fastidiousness, and what had appeared, even to Madeline, over-delicacy
in respect to the business, augured but little fortitude to resist
actual calamity. She had in her own heart, with a pang which there was
no possibility of ignoring, come to much the same conclusion as her
father, that Gervase’s love had not been robust enough to withstand the
change of all his other conditions. She did not, indeed, believe, nor
did Mr Thursley believe, that any interested motive would induce Gervase
to pretend a sentiment which no longer existed. But she waited with
little doubt as to what he would say to her when he came, with a faint
hope indeed still flickering at the bottom of her heart, but no
expectation that she could feel to be reasonable. He would tell her, she
had little doubt, that he was going away to the ends of the earth,
perhaps back to the West Indies, perhaps to America, where he had made
so many friends.
It was a warm evening, only half dark: the windows were all open, the
spacious room scarcely lighted, in a soft twilight fit for the talk of
lovers, not very fit, Madeline felt, for the sterner communication which
she looked for. She flitted about like a ghost in her white dress,
hesitating whether she should not light candles or ring for additional
lamps. She was still doubting when Gervase came up-stairs. She could
hear him coming up, unaccompanied by any servant, and with a quickened
step, which made her heart beat still more quickly. The stillness of the
room, the faint light, and her evident solitude, which made her afraid,
gave Gervase courage.
“Madeline, you are waiting for me?” he said.
“Surely, Gervase--I hoped--that you were sure to come.”
“You might have known I would come.” He made her sit in the chair where
he had throned her so often, and drew a lower one to her feet. “Thank
heaven that at last I have you to myself! And thank heaven it is all
over and done with, this horrible business that has stood between us!”
“It has stood between us, Gervase.”
“Horribly! but now I feel again my own man,--every penny is paid.”
“And you have nothing, Gervase.”
“I have the house--which of course I must sell, and all that is in it.
That will leave me a few thousands better than nothing. Madeline, what
will your father say? I do not ask--perhaps I ought--what do you say?”
“Gervase--I thought you had ceased to mind what I thought.”
“Ceased to mind! I never minded so much. If I wanted you before,
Maddie, I want you ten thousand times more now. Don’t you understand,
how the worst of it all was, that this abominable business absorbed me,
enthralled me, so that I could think of nothing else. Now it is over,
for ever and ever, thank God. Cease to mind! _You_ never thought that.”
She gave his hand a little pressure, a mute apology, and all the heavy
clouds that had been veiling her horizon flew away like mists before the
winds.
“But,” he said, pillowing his cheek upon that soft hand, leaning upon
her with a sense of indescribable rest and consolation,”--your father?
What are we to do? how are we to manage? I see all the difficulties. I
grudge you to a poor man as much as he does--but I cannot give you up,
Madeline.”
“Nobody asked you,” she said, with a smile. Madeline felt that she would
break down altogether if she did not keep up the lighter tone.
“And what will he say to a man who has nothing in the world but a house
in Harley Street?” Gervase said. “What am I to say to him? What am I to
do?”
“That is the first question,” she said. “What are you to do? The house
in Harley Street means--something.”
“I can’t let it out in lodgings, can I, Madeline?--or take boarders: or
set up a school--though many men do that.”
“Do you ever think--they say you proved yourself so good a man of
business,” said Madeline, with hesitation,--“do you ever think,
Gervase, of putting the money--into----”
“Business! I loathe it more than ever,” he cried. “I hate the very
name!”
Madeline gave vent to a gentle sigh. “My father would be more pleased
with that than anything,” she said. “Everything, I think, might have
been smoothed away. He thinks you did so well--in the West Indies,
Gervase.”
“Did I do well? fighting against chicanery, dishonesty, fraudulent
delays, fictitious excuses, everything that is most abhorrent to an
honest man: they think it all fair, that is the worst of it. If they can
disgust and sicken you, and make you think that no rights are worth that
struggle, then they rejoice. That is their object all the time. A
hundred times I was on the eve of throwing up the whole business,
crying, Perish your filthy money! and flying to you to save me from
cynicism and misanthropy and scorn of every kind.”
“But you did not fly. You stood fast and conquered, Gervase.”
“A poor victory,” he said, shaking his head, “and one only because they
roused the worst part of my nature. I don’t know what I might develop
into were I to carry on that cursed battle.”
“Gervase!”
“I beg your pardon, my dearest. It isn’t a blessed battle, anyhow. It
enlists all one’s worst passions. I began to feel almost that it was a
distinction to tell a bigger lie, and cheat worse than my opponent, so
long as I got the better of him. If you were not a rich man’s daughter,
I think I know what I should do.”
“Tell me,” she said.
“The house would give us so much income, enough for a backbone,
something to fall back upon, pay our little rent, and leave something
over for you to pay your milliner’s bill, Maddie. Fancy the pleasure of
paying for your bonnets! and then--you don’t mean to tell me I could not
get something to do--writing, keeping accounts, nay, teaching, if
necessary. I should not be in the least afraid. But, my love, you are a
rich man’s daughter, and there is an end of it. I have to satisfy your
father--and heaven knows how I am to do it.”
“To satisfy him--to a certain point, Gervase. He must not be
unreasonable. He has not absolute power, any more than any other
authority. I will speak to him.”
“Yes, you must speak to him; but in the first place I must speak. I
can’t put it all on you. He must hear what I have to say. He will think,
and think rightly, that a man who can’t speak for himself is not worth
much. And I know that he will scoff at what I say. He will tell me to go
about my business. What can I do to your father, Madeline, to bring him
over to our side?”
She shook her head. “There is only one thing I know, Gervase; if you
were to go with your little money into business--it does not matter
what----”
He made a gesture of despair. “Can a man ever do well what he hates? But
I will not say that. I would rather sweep the streets. But if there is
nothing else for it, for _you_, Madeline----”
They were interrupted by the heavy foot of Mr Thursley coming
up-stairs.