THE WAY WHICH SHOWS THAT THEY MEAN IT.
If this kind of thing were to go on, life wouldn't be worth having.
That was the feeling of Ralph, the squire of Newton, as he returned
on that Saturday from London to the Moonbeam; and so far Mr. Neefit
had been successful in carrying out his threat. Neefit had sworn
that he would make the young man's life a burden to him, and the
burden was already becoming unbearable. Mr. Carey had promised to do
something. He would, at any rate, see the infatuated breeches-maker
of Conduit Street. In the meantime he had suggested one remedy of
which Ralph had thought before,--"If you were married to some one
else he'd give it up," Mr. Carey had suggested. That no doubt was
true.
Ralph completed his sojourn at the Moonbeam, leaving that place at
the end of the first week in April, took a run down to his own place,
and then settled himself up to London for the season. His brother
Gregory had at this time returned to the parsonage at Newton; but
there was an understanding that he was to come up to London and be
his brother's guest for the first fortnight in May. Ralph the heir
had taken larger rooms, and had a spare chamber. When Ralph had given
this invitation, he had expressed his determination of devoting his
spring in town to an assiduous courtship of Mary Bonner. At the
moment in which he made that assertion down at Newton, the nuisance
of the Neefit affair was less intolerable to him than it had since
become. He had spoken cheerily of his future prospects, declaring
himself to be violently in love with Mary, though he declared at the
same time that he had no idea of breaking his heart for any young
woman. That last assertion was probably true.
As for living in the great house at the Priory all alone, that he
had declared to be impossible. Of course he would be at home for
the hunting next winter; but he doubted whether he should be there
much before that time, unless a certain coming event should make it
necessary for him to go down and look after things. He thought it
probable that he should take a run abroad in July; perhaps go to
Norway for the fishing in June. He was already making arrangements
with two other men for a move in August. He might be at home for
partridge shooting about the middle of September, but he shouldn't
"go into residence" at Newton before that. Thus he had spoken of it
in describing his plans to his brother, putting great stress on his
intention to devote the spring months to the lovely Mary. Gregory
had seen nothing wrong in all this. Ralph was now a rich man, and
was entitled to amuse himself. Gregory would have wished that his
brother would at once make himself happy among his own tenants
and dependents, but that, no doubt, would come soon. Ralph did
spend two nights at Newton after the scene with Neefit in the
Moonbeam yard,--just that he might see his nags safe in their new
quarters,--and then went up to London. He was hardly yet strong in
heart, because such a trouble as that which vexed him in regard to
Polly does almost make a man's life a burden. Ralph was gifted with
much aptitude for throwing his troubles behind, but he hardly was yet
able to rid himself of this special trouble. That horrid tradesman
was telling his story to everybody. Sir Thomas Underwood knew
the story; and so, he thought, did Mary Bonner. Mary Bonner, in
truth, did not know it; but she had thrown in Ralph's teeth, as an
accusation against him, that he owed himself and his affections to
another girl; and Ralph, utterly forgetful of Clarissa and that now
long-distant scene on the lawn, had believed, and still did believe,
that Mary had referred to Polly Neefit. On the 10th of April he
established himself at his new rooms in Spring Gardens, and was
careful in seeing that there was a comfortable little bed-room for
his brother Greg. His uncle had now been dead just six months, but he
felt as though he had been the owner of the Newton estate for years.
If Mr. Carey could only settle for him that trouble with Mr. Neefit,
how happy his life would be to him. He was very much in love with
Mary Bonner, but his trouble with Mr. Neefit was of almost more
importance to him than his love for Mary Bonner.
In the meantime the girls were living, as usual, at Popham Villa, and
Sir Thomas was living, as usual, in Southampton Buildings. He and his
colleague had been unseated, but it had already been decided by the
House of Commons that no new writ should be at once issued, and that
there should be a commission appointed to make extended inquiry at
Percycross in reference to the contemplated disfranchisement of the
borough. There could be no possible connexion between this inquiry
and the expediency of Sir Thomas living at home; but, after some
fashion, he reconciled further delay to his conscience by the fact
that the Percycross election was not even yet quite settled. No doubt
it would be necessary that he should again go to Percycross during
the sitting of the Commission.
The reader will remember the interview between Gregory Newton and
Clarissa, in which poor Clary had declared with so much emphasis her
certainty that his brother's suit to Mary must be fruitless. This she
had said, with artless energy, in no degree on her own behalf. She
was hopeless now in that direction, and had at last taught herself to
feel that the man was unworthy. The lesson had reached her, though
she herself was ignorant not only of the manner of the teaching, but
of the very fact that she had been taught. She had pleaded, more
than once, that men did such things, and were yet held in favour and
forgiven, let their iniquities have been what they might. She had
hoped to move others by the doctrine; but gradually it had ceased to
be operative, even on herself. She could not tell how it was that her
passion faded and died away. It can hardly be said that it died away;
but it became to herself grievous and a cause of soreness, instead of
a joy and a triumph. She no longer said, even to herself, that he was
to be excused. He had come there, and had made a mere plaything of
her,--wilfully. There was no earnestness in him, no manliness, and
hardly common honesty. A conviction that it was so had crept into
her poor wounded heart, in spite of those repeated assertions which
she had made to Patience as to the persistency of her own affection.
First dismay and then wrath had come upon her when the man who ought
to be her lover came to the very house in which she was living, and
there offered his hand to another girl, almost in her very presence.
Had the sin been committed elsewhere, and with any rival other than
her own cousin, she might have still clung to that doctrine of
forgiveness, because the sinner was a man, and because it is the way
of the world to forgive men. But the insult had been too close for
pardon; and now her wrath was slowly changing itself to contempt. Had
Mary accepted the man's offer this phase of feeling would not have
occurred. Clarissa would have hated the woman, but still might have
loved the man. But Mary had treated him as a creature absolutely
beneath her notice, had evidently despised him, and Mary's scorn
communicated itself to Clarissa. The fact that Ralph was now Newton
of Newton, absolutely in harbour after so many dangers of shipwreck,
assisted her in this. "I would have been true to him, though
he hadn't had a penny," she said to herself: "I would never
have given him up though all the world had been against him."
Debts, difficulties, an inheritance squandered, idle habits, even
profligacy, should not have torn him from her heart, had he possessed
the one virtue of meaning what he said when he told her that he loved
her. She remembered the noble triumph she had felt when she declared
to Mary that that other Ralph, who was to have been Mary's lover,
was welcome to the fine property. Her sole ambition had been to be
loved by this man; but the man had been incapable of loving her.
She herself was pretty, and soft, bright on occasions, and graceful.
She knew so much of herself; and she knew, also, that Mary was far
prettier than herself, and more clever. This young man to whom she
had devoted herself possessed no power of love for an individual,--no
capability of so joining himself to another human being as to feel,
that in spite of any superiority visible to the outside world, that
one should be esteemed by him superior to all others,--because of
his love. The young man had liked prettiness and softness and grace
and feminine nicenesses; and seeing one who was prettier and more
graceful,--all which poor Clary allowed, though she was not so sure
about the softness and niceness,--had changed his aim without an
effort! Ah, how different was poor Gregory!
She thought much of Gregory, reminding herself that as was her sorrow
in regard to her own crushed hopes, so were his. His hopes, too, had
been crushed, because she had been so obdurate to him. But she had
never been false. She had never whispered a word of love to Gregory.
It might be that his heart was as sore, but he had not been injured
as she had been injured. She despised the owner of Newton Priory. She
would scorn him should he come again to her and throw himself at her
feet. But Gregory could not despise her. She had, indeed, preferred
the bad to the good. There had been lack of judgment. But there had
been on her side no lack of truth. Yes;--she had been wrong in her
choice. Her judgment had been bad. And yet how glorious he had looked
as he lay upon the lawn, hot from his rowing, all unbraced, brown and
bold and joyous as a young god, as he bade her go and fetch him drink
to slake his thirst! How proud, then, she had been to be ordered by
him, as though their mutual intimacies and confidences and loves were
sufficient, when they too were alone together, to justify a reversal
of those social rules by which the man is ordered to wait upon the
woman. There is nothing in the first flush of acknowledged love that
is sweeter to the woman than this. All the men around her are her
servants; but in regard to this man she may have the inexpressibly
greater pleasure of serving him herself. Clarissa had now thought
much of these things, and had endeavoured to define to herself what
had been those gifts belonging to Ralph which had won from her her
heart. He was not, in truth, handsomer than his brother Gregory,
was certainly less clever, was selfish in small things from habit,
whereas Gregory had no thought for his own comfort. It had all come
from this,--that a black coat and a grave manner of life and serious
pursuits had been less alluring to her than idleness and pleasure. It
had suited her that her young god should be joyous, unbraced, brown,
bold, and thirsty. She did not know Pope's famous line, but it all
lay in that. She was innocent, pure, unknowing in the ways of vice,
simple in her tastes, conscientious in her duties, and yet she was
a rake at heart,--till at last sorrow and disappointment taught her
that it is not enough that a man should lie loose upon the grass with
graceful negligence and call for soda-water with a pleasant voice.
Gregory wore black clothes, was sombre, and was a parson;--but, oh,
what a thing it is that a man should be true at heart!
She said nothing of her changing feelings to Mary, or even to
Patience. The household at this time was not very gay or joyous.
Sir Thomas, after infinite vexation, had lost the seat of which
they had all been proud. Mary Bonner's condition was not felt to be
deplorable, as was that of poor Clary, and she certainly did not
carry herself as a lovelorn maiden. Of Mary Bonner it may be said
that no disappointment of that kind would affect her outward manner;
nor would she in any strait of love be willing to make a confidence
or to discuss her feelings. Whatever care of that kind might be
present to her would be lightened, if not made altogether as nothing,
by her conviction that such loads should be carried in silence, and
without any visible sign to the world that the muscles are overtaxed.
But it was known that the banished Ralph had, in the moment of his
expected prosperity, declared his purpose of giving all that he had
to give to this beauty, and it was believed that she would have
accepted the gift. It had, therefore, come to pass that the name
of neither Ralph could be mentioned at the cottage, and that life
among these maidens was sober, sedate, and melancholy. At last there
came a note from Sir Thomas to Patience. "I shall be home to dinner
to-morrow. I found the enclosed from R. N. this morning. I suppose
he must come. Affectionately, T. U." The enclosed note was as
follows:--"Dear Sir Thomas, I called this morning, but old Stemm was
as hard as granite. If you do not object I will run down to the villa
to-morrow. If you are at home I will stay and dine. Yours ever, Ralph
Newton."
The mind of Sir Thomas when he received this had been affected
exactly as his words described. He had supposed that Ralph must come.
He had learned to hold his late ward in low esteem. The man was now
beyond all likelihood of want, and sailing with propitious winds; but
Sir Thomas, had he been able to consult his own inclinations, would
have had no more to do with him. And yet the young Squire had not
done anything which, as Sir Thomas thought, would justify him in
closing his doors against one to whom he had been bound in a manner
peculiarly intimate. However, if his niece should choose at last
to accept Ralph, the match would be very brilliant; and the uncle
thought that it was not his duty to interfere between her and so
great an advantage. Sir Thomas, in truth, did not as yet understand
Mary Bonner,--knew very little of her character; but he did know that
it was incumbent on him to give her some opportunity of taking her
beauty to market. He wrote a line to Ralph, saying that he himself
would dine at home on the day indicated.
"Impossible!" said Clary, when she was first told.
"You may be sure he's coming," said Patience.
"Then I shall go and spend the day with Mrs. Brownlow. I cannot stand
it."
"My dear, he'll know why you are away."
"Let him know," said Clarissa. And she did as she said she would.
When Sir Thomas came home at about four o'clock on the Thursday which
Ralph had fixed,--Thursday, the fourteenth of April,--he found that
Clarissa had flown. The fly was to be sent for her at ten, and it was
calculated that by the time she returned, Ralph would certainly have
taken his leave. Sir Thomas expressed neither anger nor satisfaction
at this arrangement,--"Oh; she has gone to Mrs. Brownlow's, has she?
Very well. I don't suppose it will make much difference to Ralph."
"None in the least," said Patience, severely. "Nothing of that kind
will make any difference to him." But at that time Ralph had been
above an hour in the house.
We will now return to Ralph and his adventures. He had come up to
London with the express object of pressing his suit upon Mary Bonner;
but during his first day or two in London had busied himself rather
with the affairs of his other love. He had been with Mr. Carey, and
Mr. Carey had been with Mr. Neefit. "He is the maddest old man that
I ever saw," said Mr. Carey. "When I suggested to him that you were
willing to make any reasonable arrangement,--meaning a thousand
pounds, or something of that kind,--I couldn't get him to understand
me at all."
"I don't think he wants money," said Ralph.
"'Let him come down and eat a bit of dinner at the cottage,' said he,
'and we'll make it all square.' Then I offered him a thousand pounds
down."
"What did he say?"
"Called to a fellow he had there with a knife in his hand, cutting
leather, to turn me out of the shop. And the man would have done it,
too, if I hadn't gone."
This was not promising, but on the following morning Ralph received a
letter which put him into better heart. The letter was from Polly
herself, and was written as follows:--
Alexandra Cottage, Hendon,
April 10th, 186--.
MY DEAR SIR,
Father has been going on with all that nonsense of his,
and I think it most straightforward to write a letter
to you at once, so that things may be understood and
finished. Father has no right to be angry with you, anyway
not about me. He says somebody has come and offered him
money. I wish they hadn't, but perhaps you didn't send
them. There's no good in father talking about you and
me. Of course it was a great honour, and all that, but
I'm not at all sure that anybody should try to get above
themselves, not in the way of marrying. And the heart is
everything. So I've told father. If ever I bestow mine, I
think it will be to somebody in a way of business,--just
like father. So I thought I would just write to say that
there couldn't be anything between you and me, were it
ever so; only that I was very much honoured by your coming
down to Margate. I write this to you, because a very
particular friend advises me, and I don't mind telling you
at once,--it is Mr. Moggs. And I shall show it to father.
That is, I have written it twice, and shall keep the
other. It's a pity father should go on so, but he means it
for the best. And as to anything in the way of money,--oh,
Mr. Newton, he's a deal too proud for that.
Yours truly,
MARYANNE NEEFIT.
As to which letter the little baggage was not altogether true in one
respect. She did not keep a copy of the whole letter, but left out
of that which she showed to her father the very material passage
in which she referred to the advice of her particular friend, Mr.
Moggs. Ralph, when he received this letter, felt really grateful to
Polly, and wrote to her a pretty note, in which he acknowledged her
kindness, and expressed his hope that she might always be as happy
as she deserved to be. Then it was that he made up his mind to go
down at once to Popham Villa, thinking that the Neefit nuisance
was sufficiently abated to enable him to devote his time to a more
pleasurable pursuit.
He reached the villa between three and four, and learned from the
gardener's wife at the lodge that Sir Thomas had not as yet returned.
He did not learn that Clarissa was away, and was not aware of that
fact till they all sat down to dinner at seven o'clock. Much had been
done and much endured before that time came. He sauntered slowly up
the road, and looked about the grounds, hoping to find the young
ladies there, as he had so often done during his summer visits; but
there was no one to be seen, and he was obliged to knock at the door.
He was shown into the drawing-room, and in a few minutes Patience
came to him. There had been no arrangement between her and Mary as
to the manner in which he should be received. Mary on a previous
occasion had given him an answer, and really did believe that that
would be sufficient. He was, according to her thinking, a light,
inconstant man, who would hardly give himself the labour necessary
for perseverance in any suit. Patience at once began to ask him
after his brother and the doings at the Priory. He had been so
intimate at the house, and so dear to them all, that in spite of
the disapprobation with which he was now regarded by them, it was
impossible that there should not be some outer kindness. "Ah," said
he, "I do so look forward to the time when you will all be down
there. I have been so often welcome at your house, that it will be my
greatest pleasure to make you welcome there."
"We go so little from home," said Patience.
"But I am sure you will come to me. I know you would like to see
Greg's parsonage and Greg's church."
"I should indeed."
"It is the prettiest church, I think, in England, and the park is
very nice. The whole house wants a deal of doing to, but I shall set
about it some day. I don't know a pleasanter neighbourhood anywhere."
It would have been so natural that Patience should tell him that he
wanted a mistress for such a home; but she could not say the words.
She could not find the proper words, and soon left him, muttering
something as to directions for her father's room.
He had been alone for twenty minutes when Mary came into the room.
She knew that Patience was not there; and had retreated up-stairs.
But there seemed to be a cowardice in such retreating, which
displeased herself. She, at any rate, had no cause to be afraid of
Mr. Newton. So she collected her thoughts, and arranged her gait,
and went down, and addressed him with assumed indifference,--as
though there had never been anything between them beyond simple
acquaintance. "Uncle Thomas will be here soon, I suppose," she said.
"I hope he will give me half-an-hour first," Ralph answered. There
was an ease and grace always present in his intercourse with women,
and a power of saying that which he desired to say,--which perhaps
arose from the slightness of his purposes and the want of reality in
his character.
"We see so little of him that we hardly know his hours," said Mary.
"Uncle Thomas is a sad truant from home."
"He always was, and I declare I think that Patience and Clary have
been the better for it. They have learned things of which they would
have known nothing had he been with them every morning and evening. I
don't know any girls who are so sweet as they are. You know they have
been like sisters to me."
"So I have been told."
"And when you came, it would have been like another sister coming;
only--"
"Only what?" said Mary, assuming purposely a savage look.
"That something else intervened."
"Of course it must be very different,--and it should be different.
You have only known me a few months."
"I have known you enough to wish to know you more closely than
anybody else for the rest of my life."
"Mr. Newton, I thought you had understood me before."
"So I did." This he said with an assumed tone of lachrymose
complaint. "I did understand you,--thoroughly. I understood that I
was rebuked, and rejected, and disdained. But a man, if he is in
earnest, does not give over on that account. Indeed, there are things
which he can't give over. You may tell a man that he shouldn't drink,
or shouldn't gamble; but telling will do no good. When he has once
begun, he'll go on with it."
"What does that mean?"
"That love is as strong a passion, at any rate, as drinking or
gambling. You did tell me, and sent me away, and rebuked me because
of that tradesman's daughter."
"What tradesman's daughter?" asked Mary. "I have spoken of no
tradesman's daughter. I gave you ample reason why you should not
address yourself to me."
"Of course there are ample reasons," said Ralph, looking into his
hat, which he had taken from the table. "The one,--most ample of all,
is that you do not care for me."
"I do not," said Mary resolutely.
"Exactly;--but that is a sort of reason which a man will do his best
to conquer. Do not misunderstand me. I am not such a fool as to think
that I can prevail in a day. I am not vain enough to think that I can
prevail at all. But I can persist."
"It will not be of the slightest use; indeed, it cannot be allowed. I
will not allow it. My uncle will not allow it."
"When you told me that I was untrue to another person--; I think that
was your phrase."
"Very likely."
"I supposed you had heard that stupid story which had got round to my
uncle,--about a Mr. Neefit's daughter."
"I had heard no stupid story."
"What then did you mean?"
Mary paused a moment, thinking whether it might still be possible
that a good turn might be done for her cousin. That Clarissa had
loved this man with her whole heart she had herself owned to Mary.
That the man had professed his love for Clary, Clary had also let
her know. And Clary's love had endured even after the blow it had
received from Ralph's offer to her cousin. All this that cousin knew;
but she did not know how that love had now turned to simple soreness.
"I have heard nothing of the man's daughter," said Mary.
"Well then?"
"But I do know that before I came here at all you had striven to gain
the affections of my cousin."
"Clarissa!"
"Yes; Clarissa. Is it not so?" Then she paused, and Ralph remembered
the scene on the lawn. In very truth it had never been forgotten.
There had always been present with him when he thought of Mary Bonner
a sort of remembrance of the hour in which he had played the fool
with dear Clary. He had kissed her. Well; yes; and with some girls
kisses mean so much,--as Polly Neefit had said to her true lover. But
then with others they mean just nothing. "If you want to find a wife
in this house you had better ask her. It is certainly useless that
you should ask me."
"Do you mean quite useless?" asked Ralph, beginning to be somewhat
abashed.
"Absolutely useless. Did I not tell you something else,--something
that I would not have hinted to you, had it not been that I desired
to prevent the possibility of a renewal of anything so vain? But you
think nothing of that! All that can be changed with you at a moment,
if other things suit."
"That is meant to be severe, Miss Bonner, and I have not deserved it
from you. What has brought me to you but that I admire you above all
others?"
"You shouldn't admire me above others. Is a man to change as he likes
because he sees a girl whose hair pleases him for the moment better
than does hers to whom he has sworn to be true?" Ralph did not forget
at this moment to whisper to himself for his own consolation, that
he had never sworn to be true to Clarissa. And, indeed, he did feel,
that though there had been a kiss, the scene on the lawn was being
used unfairly to his prejudice. "I am afraid you are very fickle, Mr.
Newton, and that your love is not worth much."
"I hope we may both live till you learn that you have wronged me."
"I hope so. If my opinion be worth anything with you, go back to her
from whom you have allowed yourself to stray in your folly. To me you
must not address yourself again. If you do, it will be an insult."
Then she rose up, queenly in her beauty, and slowly left the room.
There must be an end of that. Such was Ralph's feeling as she
left the room, in spite of those protestations of constancy and
persistence which he had made to himself. "A fellow has to go on with
it, and be refused half a dozen times by one of those proud ones," he
had said; "but when they do knuckle under, they go in harness better
than the others." It was thus that he had thought of Mary Bonner, but
he did not so think of her now. No, indeed. There was an end of that.
"There is a sort of way of doing it, which shows that they mean it."
Such was his inward speech; and he did believe that Miss Bonner meant
it. "By Jove, yes; if words and looks ever can mean anything." But
how about Clarissa? If it was so, as Mary Bonner had told him, would
it be the proper kind of thing for him to go back to Clarissa? His
heart, too,--for he had a heart,--was very soft. He had always been
fond of Clarissa, and would not, for worlds, that she should be
unhappy. How pretty she was, and how soft, and how loving! And how
proudly happy she would be to be driven about the Newton grounds by
him as their mistress. Then he remembered what Gregory had said to
him, and how he had encouraged Gregory to persevere. If anything of
that kind were to happen, Gregory must put up with it. It was clear
that Clarissa couldn't marry Gregory if she were in love with him.
But how would he look Sir Thomas in the face? As he thought of this
he laughed. Sir Thomas, however, would be glad enough to give his
daughter, not to the heir but to the owner of Newton. Who could be
that fellow whom Mary Bonner preferred to him--with all Newton to
back his suit? Perhaps Mary Bonner did not know the meaning of being
the mistress of Newton Priory.
After a while the servant came to show him to his chamber. Sir Thomas
had come and had gone at once to his room. So he went up-stairs and
dressed, expecting to see Clarissa when they all assembled before
dinner. When he went down, Sir Thomas was there, and Mary, and
Patience,--but not Clarissa. He had summoned back his courage and
spoke jauntily to Sir Thomas. Then he turned to Patience and asked
after her sister. "Clarissa is spending the day with Mrs. Brownlow,"
said Patience, "and will not be home till quite late."
"Oh, how unfortunate!" exclaimed Ralph. Taking all his difficulties
into consideration, we must admit that he did not do it badly.
After dinner Sir Thomas sat longer over his wine than is at present
usual, believing, perhaps, that the young ladies would not want to
see much more of Ralph on the present occasion. The conversation was
almost entirely devoted to the affairs of the late election, as to
which Ralph was much interested and very indignant. "They cannot do
you any harm, sir, by the investigation," he said.
"No; I don't think they can hurt me."
"And you will have the satisfaction of knowing that you have been the
means of exposing corruption, and of helping to turn such a man as
Griffenbottom out of the House. Upon my word, I think it has been
worth while."
"I am not sure that I would do it again at the same cost, and with
the same object," said Sir Thomas.
Ralph did have a cup of tea given to him in the drawing-room, and
then left the villa before Clarissa's fly had returned.