SOMETHING MORE HAPPENS
Checkley held the door of the office wide open, and invited Elsie to
enter. The aspect of the room, solid of furniture, severe in its
fittings, with its vast table covered with papers, struck her with a
kind of terror. At the table sat her guardian, austere of countenance.
All the way along she had been imagining a dialogue. He would begin with
certain words. She would reply, firmly but respectfully, with certain
other words. He would go on. She would again reply. And so on. Everybody
knows the consolations of imagination in framing dialogues at times of
trouble. They never come off. The beginning is never what is expected,
and the sequel, therefore, has to be changed on the spot. The conditions
of the interview had not been realised by Elsie. Also the beginning was
not what she expected. For her guardian, instead of frowning with a brow
of corrugated iron, and holding up a finger of warning, received her
more pleasantly than she had imagined it possible for him, bade her sit
down, and leaned back, looking at her kindly.
'And so,' he said, 'you are twenty-one--twenty-one--to-day. I am no
longer your guardian. You are twenty-one. Everything that is past seems
to have happened yesterday. So that it is needless to say that you were
a baby only yesterday.'
'Yes; I am really twenty-one.'
'I congratulate you. To be twenty-one is, I believe, for a young lady at
least, a pleasant time of life. For my own part, I have almost forgotten
the memory of youth. Perhaps I never had the time to be young. Certainly
I have never understood why some men regret their youth so
passionately. As for your sex, Elsie, I know very little of it except in
the way of business. In that way, which does not admit of romance, I
must say that I have sometimes found ladies importunate, tenacious,
exacting, persistent, and even revengeful.'
'Oh!' said Elsie, with a little winning smile of conciliation. This was
only a beginning--a prelude--before the unpleasantness.
'That, Elsie, is my unfortunate experience of women--always in the
way of business, which of course may bring out the worst qualities.
In society, of which I have little experience, they are
doubtless--charming--charming.' He repeated the word, as if he had found
an adjective of whose meaning he was not quite clear. 'An old bachelor
is not expected, at the age of seventy-five, to know much about such a
subject. The point before us is that you have this day arrived at the
mature age of twenty-one. That is the first thing, and I congratulate
you. The first thing.'
'I wonder,' thought Elsie timidly, 'when he will begin upon the next
thing--the real thing.'
There lay upon the table before him a paper with notes upon it. He took
it up, looked at it, and laid it down again. Then he turned to Elsie and
smiled--he actually smiled--he unmistakably smiled. 'At twenty-one,' he
said, 'some young ladies who are heiresses come into their property----'
'Those who are heiresses. Unhappily, I am not.'
'Come into their property--their property. It must be a beautiful thing
for a girl to come into property, unexpectedly, at twenty-one. For a
man, a temptation to do nothing and to make no more money. Bad! Bad! But
for a girl already engaged, a girl who wants money, a girl who is
engaged--eh--to a penniless young solicitor----'
Elsie turned crimson. This was the thing she expected.
'Under such circumstances, I say, such a stroke of fortune would be
providential and wonderful, would it not?'
She blushed and turned pale, and blushed again. She also felt a strong
disposition to cry--but repressed that disposition.
'In your case, for instance, such a windfall would be most welcome. Your
case is rather a singular case. You do not belong to a family which has
generally disregarded money--quite the reverse--you should inherit the
love of money--yet you propose to throw away what I believe are very
good prospects, and----'
'My only prospect is to marry George Austin.'
'So you think. I have heard from your mother, and I have seen your
sister Hilda. They object very strongly to the engagement.'
'I know, of course, what they would say.'
'Therefore, I need not repeat it,' replied Mr. Dering drily. 'I learn,
then, that you are not only engaged to this young gentleman, but that
you are also proposing to marry upon the small income which he now
possesses.'
'Yes--we are prepared to begin the world upon that income.'
'Your mother asked me what chance he had in his profession. In this
office he can never rise to a considerable salary as managing clerk. If
he had money, he might buy a partnership. But he has none, and his
friends have none. And the profession is congested. He may remain all
his life in a position not much better than he now occupies. The
prospect, Elsie, is not brilliant.'
'No--we are fully aware of that. And yet----'
'Allow me, my dear child. You are yourself--we will say for the
moment--without any means of your own.'
'I have nothing.'
'Or any expectations, except from your mother, who is not yet sixty.'
'I could not count upon my mother's death. Besides, she says that, if I
persist, she will not leave me anything at all.'
'So much I understand from herself. Her present intention is to remove
your name from her will, in case you go on with this proposed marriage.'
'My mother will do what she pleases with her property,' said Elsie. 'If
she thinks that I will give way to a threat of this kind, she does not
know me.'
'Do not let us speak of threats. I am laying before you facts. Here they
are plainly. Young Austin has a very small income: he has very little
prospect of getting a substantial income: you, so far as you know, have
nothing; and, also so far as you know, you have no prospect of anything.
These are the facts, are they not?'
'Yes--I suppose these are the facts. We shall be quite poor--very
likely, quite poor always.' The tears rose to her eyes. But this was not
a place for crying.
'I want you to understand these facts very clearly,' Mr. Dering
insisted. 'Believe me, I do not wish to give you pain.'
'All this,' said Elsie, with the beginnings of the family obstinacy in
her eyes, 'I clearly understand. I have had them put before me too
often.'
'I also learn from your sister, Lady Dering, that if you abandon this
marriage she is ready to do anything for you that she can. Her house,
her carriage, her servants--you can command them all, if you please.
This you know. Have you considered the meaning of what you propose? Can
you consider it calmly?'
'I believe we have.'
'On the one side poverty--not what is called a small income. Many people
live very well on what is called a small income--but grinding, hard
poverty, which exacts real privations and burdens you with unexpected
loads. My dear young lady, you have been brought up to a certain amount
of plenty and ease, if not to luxury. Do you think you can get along
without plenty and ease?'
'If George can, I can.'
'Can you become a servant--cook, housemaid, lady's-maid--as well as a
wife--a nurse as well as a mother?'
'If George is made happier by my becoming anything--anything, it will
only make me happier. Mr. Dering, I am sure you wish me well--you are my
father's old friend--you have always advised my mother in her
troubles--my brother was articled to you--but----' She paused,
remembering that he had not been her brother's best friend.
'I mean the best possible for you. Meantime, you are quite fixed in your
own mind: you are set upon this thing. That is clear. There is one other
way of looking at it. You yourself seem chiefly desirous, I think, to
make the man you love happy. So much the better for him.--Are you quite
satisfied that the other party to the agreement, your lover, will remain
happy while he sees you slaving for him, while he feels his own
helplessness, and while he gets no relief from the grinding poverty of
his household--while--lastly--he sees his sons taking their place on a
lower level, and his daughters taking a place below the rank of
gentlewoman?'
'I reply by another question.--You have had George in your office as
articled clerk and managing clerk for eight years. Is he, or is he not,
steadfast, clear-headed, one who knows his own mind, and one who can be
trusted in all things?'
'Perhaps,' said Mr. Dering, inclining his head. 'How does that advance
him?'
'Then, if you trust him, why should not I trust him? I trust George
altogether--altogether. If he does not get on, it will be through no
fault of his. We shall bear our burden bravely, believe me, Mr. Dering.
You will not hear him--or me--complain. Besides, I am full of hope. Oh!
it can never be in this country that a man who is a good workman should
not be able to get on. Then I can paint a little--not very well,
perhaps. But I have thought--you will not laugh at me--that I might
paint portraits and get a little money that way.'
'It is quite possible that he may succeed, and that you may increase the
family income. Everything is possible. But, remember, you are building
on possibilities, and I on facts. Plans very beautiful and easy at the
outset often prove most difficult in the carrying out. My experience of
marriages is learned by fifty years of work, not imaginative, but
practical. I have learned that without adequate means no marriage can be
happy. That is to say, I have never come across any case of wedded
poverty where the husband or the wife, or both, did not regret the day
when they faced poverty together instead of separately. That, I say, is
my experience of such marriages. It is so easy to say that hand in hand
evils may be met and endured which would be intolerable if one was
alone. It isn't only hand in hand, Elsie. The hands are wanted for the
baby, and the evils will fall on the children yet unborn.'
Elsie hung her head. Then she replied timidly: 'I have thought even of
that. It only means that we go lower down in the social scale.'
'Only? Yet that is everything. People who are well up the ladder too
often deride those who are fighting and struggling to get up higher. It
is great folly or great ignorance to laugh. Social position, in such a
country as ours, means independence, self-respect, dignity, all kinds of
valuable things. You will throw these all away--yet your grandfathers
won them for you by hard work. You are yourself a gentlewoman--why?
Because they made their way up in the world, and placed their sons also
in the way to climb. That is how families are made--by three generations
at least of steady work uphill.'
Elsie shook her head sadly. 'We can only hope,' she murmured.
'One more word, and I will say no more. Remember, that love or no love,
resignation or not, patience or not, physical comfort is the beginning
and the foundation of all happiness. If you and your husband can satisfy
the demands of physical comfort, you may be happy--or at least resigned.
If not---- Well, Elsie, that is all. I should not have said so much had
I not promised your mother and your sister. I am touched, I confess, by
your courage and your resolution.'
'We mean never to regret, never to look back, and always to work and
hope,' said Elsie. 'You will remain our friend, Mr. Dering?'
'Surely, surely.--And now----'
'Now'--Elsie rose--'I will not keep you any longer. You have said what
you wished to say very kindly, and I thank you.'
'No.--Sit down again; I haven't done with you yet, child. Sit down
again. No more about that young villain--George Austin.' He spoke so
good-humouredly, that Elsie complied wondering, but no longer afraid.
'Nothing more about your engagement. Now, listen carefully, because this
is most important. Three or four years ago a person wrote to me. That
person informed me that he--for convenience we will call the person a
man--wished to place a certain sum of money in my hands in trust--for
you.'
'For me? Do you mean--in trust? What is Trust?'
'He gave me this sum of money to be given to you on your twenty-first
birthday.'
'Oh!' Elsie sat up with open eyes. 'A sum of money?--and to me?'
'With a condition or two. The first condition was, that the interest
should be invested as it came in: the next, that I was on no
account--mind, on no account at all--to tell you or any one of the
existence of the gift or the name of the donor. You are now twenty-one.
I have been careful not to afford you the least suspicion of this happy
windfall until the time should arrive. Neither your mother, nor your
sister, nor your lover, knows or suspects anything about it.'
'Oh!' Elsie said once more. An interjection may be defined as a
prolonged monosyllable, generally a vowel, uttered when no words can do
justice to the subject.
'And here, my dear young lady'--Elsie cried 'Oh!' once more because--the
most curious thing in the world--Mr. Dering's grave face suddenly
relaxed and the lines assumed the very benevolence which she had the day
before imparted to his portrait, and wished to see upon his
face!--'Here, my dear young lady'--he laid his hand upon a paper--'is
the list of the investments which I have made of that money. You have,
in fact, money in Corporation bonds--Newcastle, Nottingham,
Wolverhampton. You have water shares--you have gas shares--all good
investments, yielding at the price of purchase an average of nearly
three and two-thirds per cent.'
'Investments? Why--how much money was it, then? I was thinking when you
spoke of a sum of money, of ten pounds, perhaps.'
'No, Elsie, not ten pounds. The money placed in my hands for your use
was over twelve thousand pounds. With accumulations, there is now a
little under thirteen thousand.'
'Oh!' cried Elsie for the third time and for the same reason. No words
could express her astonishment.
'Yes; it will produce about four hundred and eighty pounds a year.
Perhaps, as some of the stock has gone up, it might be sold out and
placed to better advantage. We may get it up to five hundred pounds.'
'Do you mean, Mr. Dering, that I have actually got five hundred pounds a
year--all my own?'
'That is certainly my meaning. You have nearly five hundred pounds a
year all your own--entirely your own, without any conditions
whatever--your own.'
'Oh!' She sat in silence, her hands locked. Then the tears came into her
eyes. 'Oh, George!' she murmured, 'you will not be so very poor after
all.'
'That is all I have to say to you at present, Elsie,' said Mr. Dering.
'Now you may run away and leave me. Come to dinner this evening. Your
mother and your sister are coming. I shall ask Austin as well. We may
perhaps remove some of those objections. Dinner at seven sharp,
Elsie.--And now you can leave me.'
'I said last night,' said Elsie, clasping her hands with feminine
superstition, 'that something was going to happen. But I thought it was
something horrid. Oh, Mr. Dering, if you only knew how happy you have
made me! I don't know what to say. I feel stunned. Five hundred pounds a
year! Oh! it is wonderful! What shall I say? What shall I say?'
'You will say nothing. Go away now. Come to dinner this evening.--Go
away, my young heiress. Go and make plans how to live on your enlarged
income. It will not prove too much.'
Elsie rose. Then she turned again. 'Oh, I had actually forgotten. Won't
you tell the man--or the woman--who gave you that money for me, that I
thank him from my very heart? It isn't that I think so much about money,
but oh! the dreadful trouble that there has been at home because George
has none--and this will do something to reconcile my mother. Don't you
think it will make all the difference?'
'I hope that before the evening you will find that all opposition has
been removed,' said her guardian cautiously.
She walked away in a dream. She found herself in Lincoln's Inn Fields:
she walked all round that great square, also in a dream. The spectre of
poverty had vanished. She was rich: she was rich: she had five hundred
pounds a year. Between them they would have seven hundred pounds a year.
It seemed enormous. Seven hundred pounds a year! Seven--seven--seven
hundred pounds a year!
She got out into the street called Holborn, and she took the modest
omnibus, this heiress of untold wealth. How much was it? Thirteen
millions? or thirteen thousand? One seemed as much as the other. Twelve
thousand: with accumulations: with accumulations--ations--ations. The
wheels of the vehicle groaned out these musical words all the way. It
was in the morning when the Bayswater omnibus is full of girls going
home to lunch after shopping or looking at the shops. Elsie looked at
these girls as they sat along the narrow benches. 'My dears,' she longed
to say, but did not, 'I hope you have every one got a brave lover, and
that you have all got twelve thousand pounds apiece--with accumulations--
twelve thousand pounds--with accumulations--ations--ations--realising
four hundred and eighty pounds a year, and perhaps a little more. With
accumulations--ations--ations--accumulations.'
She ran into the house and up the stairs singing. At the sound of her
voice her mother, engaged in calculations of the greatest difficulty,
paused wondering. When she understood that it was the voice of her child
and not an organ-grinder, she became angry. What right had the girl to
run about singing? Was it insolent bravado?
Elsie opened the door of the drawing-room and ran in. Her mother's cold
face repelled her. She was going to tell the joyful news--but she
stopped.
'You have seen Mr. Dering?' asked her mother.
'Yes; I have seen him.'
'If he has brought you to reason----'
'Oh! He has--he has. I am entirely reasonable.'
Mrs. Arundel was astonished. The girl was flushed of face and bright of
eye; her breath was thick; her lips were parted. She looked entirely
happy.
'My dear mother,' she went on, 'I am to dine with him to-night. Hilda is
to dine with him to-night. You are to dine with him to-night. It is to
be a family party. He will bring us all to reason--to a bag full of
reasons.'
'Elsie, this seems to me to be mirth misplaced.'
'No--no--in its right place--reasons all in a row and on three shelves,
labelled and arranged and classified.'
'You talk in enigmas.'
'My dear mother'--yet that morning the dear mother would not speak to
the dear daughter--'I talk in enigmas and I sing in conundrums. I feel
like an oracle or a Delphic old woman for dark sayings.'
She ran away, slamming the door after her. Her mother heard her singing
in her studio all to herself. 'Can she be in her right mind?' she asked
anxiously. 'To marry a Pauper--to receive the admonition of her
guardian--and such a guardian--and to come home singing. 'Twould be
better to lock her up than let her marry.'