THE SCHEME IS SUCCESSFUL.
When the matter was mentioned to George Roden by his mother he could
see no reason why she should not dine at Hendon Hall. He himself was
glad to have an opportunity of getting over that roughness of feeling
which had certainly existed between him and his friend when they
parted with each other on the road. As to his mother, it would be
well that she should so far return to the usages of the world as to
dine at the house of her son's friend. "It is only going back to what
you used to be," he said.
"You know nothing of what I used to be," she replied, almost angrily.
"I ask no questions, and have endeavoured so to train myself that I
should care but little about it. But I knew it was so." Then after
a pause he went back to the current of his thoughts. "Had my father
been a prince I think that I should take no pride in it."
"It is well to have been born a gentleman," she said.
"It is well to be a gentleman, and if the good things which are
generally attendant on high birth will help a man in reaching noble
feelings and grand resolves, so it may be that to have been well born
will be an assistance. But if a man derogates from his birth,--as so
many do,--then it is a crime."
"All that has to be taken for granted, George."
"But it is not taken for granted. Though the man himself be knave,
and fool, and coward, he is supposed to be ennobled because the blood
of the Howards run in his veins. And worse again: though he has gifts
of nobility beyond compare he can hardly dare to stand upright before
lords and dukes because of his inferiority."
"That is all going away."
"Would that it could be made to go a little faster. It may be helped
in its going. It may be that in these days the progress shall be
accelerated. But you will let me write to Hampstead and say that you
will come." She assented, and so that part of the little dinner-party
was arranged.
After that she herself contrived to see the Quaker one evening on his
return home. "Yes," said Mr. Fay; "I have heard thy proposition from
Marion. Why should the young lord desire such a one as I am to sit at
his table?"
"He is George's intimate friend."
"That thy son should choose his friend well, I surely believe,
because I see him to be a prudent and wise young man, who does
not devote himself over-much to riotous amusements." George did
occasionally go to a theatre, thereby offending the Quaker's
judgment, justifying the "overmuch," and losing his claim to a full
measure of praise. "Therefore I will not quarrel with him that he has
chosen his friend from among the great ones of the earth. But like to
like is a good motto. I fancy that the weary draught-horse, such as I
am, should not stable himself with hunters and racers."
"This young man affects the society of such as yourself and George,
rather than that of others nobly born as himself."
"I do not know that he shows his wisdom the more."
"You should give him credit at any rate for good endeavours."
"It is not for me to judge him one way or the other. Did he ask that
Marion should also go to his house?"
"Certainly. Why should not the child see something of the world that
may amuse her?"
"Little good can come to my Marion from such amusements, Mrs. Roden;
but something, perhaps, of harm. Wilt thou say that such recreation
must necessarily be of service to a girl born to perform the hard
duties of a strict life?"
"I would trust Marion in anything," said Mrs. Roden, eagerly.
"So would I; so would I. She hath ever been a good girl."
"But do you not distrust her if you shut her up, and are afraid to
allow her even to sit at table in a strange house?"
"I have never forbidden her to sit at thy table," said the Quaker.
"And you should let her go specially as a kindness to me. For my
son's sake I have promised to be there, and it would be a comfort to
me to have another woman with me."
"Then you will hardly need me," said Mr. Fay, not without a touch of
jealousy.
"He specially pressed his request that you would come. It is among
such as you that he would wish to make himself known. Moreover, if
Marion is to be there, you, I am sure, will choose to accompany her.
Would you not wish to see how the child bears herself on such an
occasion?"
"On all occasions, at all places, at all hours, I would wish to have
my child with me. There is nothing else left to me in all the world
on which my eye can rest with pleasure. But I doubt whether it may be
for her good." Then he took his departure, leaving the matter still
undecided, speaking of it with words which seemed to imply that he
must ultimately refuse, but impressing Mrs. Roden with a conviction
that he would at last accept the invitation.
"Doest thou wish it thyself?" he said to his daughter before retiring
to rest that night.
"If you will go, father, I should like it."
"Why shouldst thou like it? What doest thou expect? Is it because the
young man is a lord, and that there will be something of the gilded
grandeur of the grand ones of the earth to be seen about his house
and his table?"
"It is not for that, father."
"Or is it because he is young and comely, and can say soft things as
such youths are wont to say, because he will smell sweetly of scents
and lavender, because his hand will be soft to the touch, with rings
on his fingers, and jewels perhaps on his bosom like a woman?"
"No, father; it is not for that."
"The delicacies which he will give thee to eat and to drink; the
sweetmeats and rich food cannot be much to one nurtured as thou hast
been."
"Certainly not, father; they can be nothing to me.
"Then why is it that thou wouldst go to his house?"
"It is that I may hear you, father, speak among men."
"Nay," said he, laughing, "thou mayst hear me better speak among men
at King's Court in the City. There I can hold my own well enough,
but with these young men over their wine, I shall have but little to
say, I fancy. If thou hast nothing to gain but to hear thy old father
talk, the time and money will be surely thrown away."
"I would hear him talk, father."
"The young lord?"
"Yes; the young lord. He is bright and clever, and, coming from
another world than our world, can tell me things that I do not know."
"Can he tell thee aught that is good?"
"From what I hear of him from our friend he will tell me, I think,
naught that is bad. You will be there to hear, and to arrest his
words if they be evil. But I think him to be one from whose mouth no
guile or folly will be heard."
"Who art thou, my child, that thou shouldst be able to judge whether
words of guile are likely to come from a young man's lips?" But this
he said smiling and pressing her hand while he seemed to rebuke her.
"Nay, father; I do not judge. I only say that I think it might be
so. They are not surely all false and wicked. But if you wish it
otherwise I will not utter another syllable to urge the request."
"We will go, Marion. Thy friend urged that it is not good that thou
shouldst always be shut up with me alone. And, though I may distrust
the young lord as not knowing him, my confidence in thee is such
that I think that nothing will ever shake it." And so it was settled
that they should all go. He would send to a livery stable and hire a
carriage for this unusual occasion. There should be no need for the
young lord to send them home. Though he did not know, as he said,
much of the ways of the outside world, it was hardly the custom for
the host to supply carriages as well as viands. When he dined, as he
did annually, with the elder Mr. Pogson, Mr. Pogson sent him home in
no carriage. He would sit at the lord's table, but he would go and
come as did other men.
On the Friday named the two ladies and the two men arrived at Hendon
Hall in something more than good time. Hampstead hopped and skipped
about as though he were delighted as a boy might have been at their
coming. It may be possible that there was something of guile even
in this, and that he had calculated that he might thus best create
quickly that intimacy with the Quaker and his daughter which he felt
to be necessary for his full enjoyment of the evening. If the Quaker
himself expected much of that gilding of which he had spoken he was
certainly disappointed. The garniture of Hendon Hall had always been
simple, and now had assumed less even of aristocratic finery than it
used to show when prepared for the use of the Marchioness. "I'm glad
you've come in time," said he, "because you can get comfortably warm
before dinner." Then he fluttered about round Mrs. Roden, paying her
attention much rather than Marion Fay,--still with some guile, as
knowing that he might thus best prepare for the coming of future good
things. "I suppose you found it awfully cold," he said.
"I do not know that we were awed, my lord," said the Quaker. "But the
winter has certainly set in with some severity."
"Oh, father!" said Marion, rebuking him.
"Everything is awful now," said Hampstead, laughing. "Of course the
word is absurd, but one gets in the way of using it because other
people do."
"Nay, my lord, I crave pardon if I seemed to criticize thy language.
Being somewhat used to a sterner manner of speaking, I took the word
in its stricter sense."
"It is but slang from a girl's school, after all," said Roden.
"Now, Master George, I am not going to bear correction from you,"
said Hampstead, "though I put up with it from your elders. Miss Fay,
when you were at school did they talk slang?"
"Where I was at school, Lord Hampstead," Marion answered, "we were
kept in strict leading-strings. Fancy, father, what Miss Watson would
have said if we had used any word in a sense not used in a
dictionary."
"Miss Watson was a sensible woman, my dear, and understood well,
and performed faithfully, the duties which she had undertaken. I do
not know that as much can be said of all those who keep fashionable
seminaries for young ladies at the West End."
"Miss Watson had a red face, and a big cap, and spectacles;--had she
not?" said Hampstead, appealing to Marion Fay.
"Miss Watson," said Mrs. Roden, "whom I remember to have seen once
when Marion was at school with her, was a very little woman, with
bright eyes, who wore her own hair, and always looked as though she
had come out of a bandbox."
"She was absolutely true to her ideas of life, as a Quaker should
be," said Mr. Fay, "and I only hope that Marion will follow her
example. As to language, it is, I think, convenient that to a certain
extent our mode of speech should consort with our mode of living. You
would not expect to hear from a pulpit the phrases which belong to a
racecourse, nor would the expressions which are decorous, perhaps, in
aristocratic drawing-rooms befit the humble parlours of clerks and
artisans."
"I never will say that anything is awful again," said Lord Hampstead,
as he gave his arm to Mrs. Roden, and took her in to dinner.
"I hope he will not be angry with father," whispered Marion Fay to
George Roden, as they walked across the hall together.
"Not in the least. Nothing of that kind could anger him. If your
father were to cringe or to flatter him then he would be disgusted."
"Father would never do that," said Marion, with confidence.
The dinner went off very pleasantly, Hampstead and Roden taking
between them the weight of the conversation. The Quaker was perhaps
a little frightened by the asperity of his own first remark, and
ate his good things almost in silence. Marion was quite contented
to listen, as she had told her father was her purpose; but it was
perhaps to the young lord's words that she gave attention rather than
to those of his friends. His voice was pleasant to her ears. There
was a certain graciousness in his words, as to which she did not
suppose that their softness was specially intended for her hearing.
Who does not know the way in which a man may set himself at work to
gain admission into a woman's heart without addressing hardly a word
to herself? And who has not noted the sympathy with which the woman
has unconsciously accepted the homage? That pressing of the hand,
that squeezing of the arm, that glancing of the eyes, which are
common among lovers, are generally the developed consequences of
former indications which have had their full effect, even though they
were hardly understood, and could not have been acknowledged, at
the time. But Marion did, perhaps, feel that there was something of
worship even in the way in which her host looked towards her with
rapid glances from minute to minute, as though to see that if not
with words, at any rate with thoughts, she was taking her share
in the conversation which was certainly intended for her delight.
The Quaker in the mean time ate his dinner very silently. He was
conscious of having shown himself somewhat of a prig about that slang
phrase, and was repenting himself. Mrs. Roden every now and then
would put in a word in answer rather to her son than to the host, but
she was aware of those electric sparks which, from Lord Hampstead's
end of the wire, were being directed every moment against Marion
Fay's heart.
"Now just for the fashion of the thing you must sit here for a
quarter of an hour, while we are supposed to be drinking our wine."
This was said by Lord Hampstead when he took the two ladies into the
drawing-room after dinner.
"Don't hurry yourselves," said Mrs. Roden. "Marion and I are old
friends, and will get on very well."
"Oh yes," said Marion. "It will be pleasure enough to me just to
sit here and look around me." Then Hampstead knelt down between
them, pretending to doctor up the fire, which certainly required no
doctoring. They were standing, one on one side and the other on the
other, looking down upon him.
"You are spoiling that fire, Lord Hampstead," said Mrs. Roden.
"Coals were made to be poked. I feel sure of that. Do take the poker
and give them one blow. That will make you at home in the house for
ever, you know." Then he handed the implement to Marion. She could
hardly do other than take it in her hand. She took it, blushed up to
the roots of her hair, paused a moment, and then gave the one blow to
the coals that had been required of her. "Thanks," said he, nodding
at her as he still knelt at her feet and took the poker from her;
"thanks. Now you are free of Hendon Hall for ever. I wouldn't have
any one but a friend poke my fire." Upon that he got up and walked
slowly out of the room.
"Oh, Mrs. Roden," said Marion, "I wish I hadn't done it."
"It doesn't matter. It was only a joke."
"Of course it was a joke! but I wish I hadn't done it. It seemed at
the moment that I should look to be cross if I didn't do as he bade
me. But when he had said that about being at home--! Oh, Mrs. Roden,
I wish I had not done it."
"He will know that it was nothing, my dear. He is good-humoured and
playful, and likes the feeling of making us feel that we are not
strangers." But Marion knew that Lord Hampstead would not take it as
meaning nothing. Though she could see no more than his back as he
walked out of the room, she knew that he was glowing with triumph.
"Now, Mr. Fay, here is port if you like, but I recommend you to stick
to the claret."
"I have pretty well done all the sticking, my lord, of which I am
competent," said the Quaker. "A little wine goes a long way with me,
as I am not much used to it."
"Wine maketh glad the heart of man," said Roden.
"True enough, Mr. Roden. But I doubt whether it be good that a man's
heart should be much gladdened. Gladness and sorrow counterbalance
each other too surely. An even serenity is best fitted to human life,
if it can be reached."
"A level road without hills," said Hampstead. "They say that horses
are soonest tired by such travelling."
"They would hardly tell you so themselves if they could give their
experience after a long day's journey." Then there was a pause, but
Mr. Fay continued to speak. "My lord, I fear I misbehaved myself in
reference to that word 'awful' which fell by chance from thy mouth."
"Oh, dear no; nothing of the kind."
"I was bethinking me that I was among the young men in our court
in Great Broad Street, who will indulge sometimes in a manner of
language not befitting their occupation at the time, or perhaps their
station in life. I am wont then to remind them that words during
business hours should be used in their strict sense. But, my lord, if
you will take a farm horse from his plough you cannot expect from him
that he should prance upon the green."
"It is because I think that there should be more mixing between what
you call plough horses and animals used simply for play, that I have
been so proud to make you welcome here. I hope it may not be by many
the last time that you will act as a living dictionary for me. If you
won't have any more wine we will go to them in the drawing-room."
Mrs. Roden very soon declared it necessary that they should start
back to Holloway. Hampstead himself did not attempt to delay them.
The words that had absolutely passed between him and Marion had
hardly been more than those which have been here set down, but yet
he felt that he had accomplished not only with satisfaction but with
some glory to himself the purpose for which he had specially invited
his guests. His scheme had been carried out with perfect success.
After the manner in which Marion had obeyed his behest about the
fire, he was sure that he was justified in regarding her as a friend.