ON BUSINESS.
Ten thousand pounds! These words have very different meanings to
different people. Many of us can form little idea of what those simple
syllables contain. They enclose as in a golden casket, rest, freedom
from care, bounty, kindness, an easy existence, and an ending free of
anxiety to many. To others they are nothing more than a cipher on paper,
a symbol without any connection with themselves. To some it is great
fortune, to others a drop in the ocean. A merchant will risk it any day,
and think but little if the speculation is a failure. A prodigal will
throw it away in a month, perhaps in a night. But the proportion of
people to whom its possession would make all the difference between
poverty and wealth far transcends the number of those who are careless
of it. It is a pleasure to deal with such a sum of money even on paper.
To be concerned in giving it away, makes even the historian, who has
nothing to do with it, feel magnificent and all-bounteous. Jock, who had
as little experience to back him as any other boy of his age, felt a
vague elation as he drove in by Lucy's side to Farafield. To confer a
great benefit is always sweet. Perhaps if we analyse it, as is the
fashion of the day, we will find that the pleasure of giving has a
_fond_ of gratified vanity and self-consideration in it; but this
weakness is at least supposed to be generous, and Jock was generous to
his own consciousness, and full of delight at what was going to be done,
and satisfaction with his own share in it. But Lucy's sensations were
very different. She went with him with no goodwill of her own, like a
culprit being dragged to execution. Duty is not always willing, even
when we see it most clearly. Young Lady Randolph had a clear conviction
of what she was bound to do, but she had no wish to do it, though she
was so thoroughly convinced that it was incumbent upon her. Could she
have pushed it out of her own recollection, banished it from her mind,
she would have gladly done so. She had succeeded for a long time in
doing this--excluding the consideration of it, and forgetting the burden
bound upon her shoulders. But now she could forget it no longer--the
thongs which secured it seemed to cut into her flesh. Her heart was sick
with thoughts of the thing she must do, yet revolted against doing. "Oh,
papa, papa!" she said to herself, shaking her head at the grim,
respectable house in which her early days had been passed, as they drove
past it to Mr. Rushton's office. Why had the old man put such a burden
upon her? Why had not he distributed his money himself and left her
poor if he pleased, with at least no unnatural charge upon her heart and
life?
"Why do you shake your head?" said Jock, who was full of the keenest
observation, and lost nothing.
He had an instinctive feeling that she was by no means so much
interested in her duty as he was, and that it was his business to keep
her up to the mark.
"Don't you remember the old house?" Lucy said, "where we used to live
when you were a child? Where poor papa died--where----"
"Of course I remember it. I always look at it when I pass, and think
what a little ass I used to be. But why did you shake your head? That's
what I want to know."
"Oh, Jock!" Lucy cried; and said no more.
"That throws very little light on the question," said Jock. "You are
thinking of the difference, I suppose. Well, there is no doubt it's a
great difference. I was a little idiot in those days. I recollect I
thought the circus boy was a sort of little prince, and that it was
grand to ride along like that with all the people staring--the grandest
thing in the world----"
"Poor little circus boy! What a pretty child he was," said Lucy. And
then she sighed to relieve the oppression on her breast, and said, "Do
you ever wonder, Jock, why people should have such different lots? You
and I driving along here in what we once would have thought such state,
and look, these people that are crossing the road in the mud are just as
good as we are----"
Jock looked at his sister with a philosophical eye, in which for the
moment there was some contempt. "It is as easy as a, b, c," said Jock;
"it's your money. You might set me a much harder one. Of course, in the
way of horses and carriages and so forth, there is nothing that money
cannot buy."
This matter-of-fact reply silenced Lucy. She would have asked, perhaps,
why did I have all this money? being in a questioning frame of mind; but
she knew that he would answer shortly because her father made it, and this
was not any more satisfactory. So she only looked at him with wistful eyes
that set many much harder ones, and was silent. Jock himself was too
philosophical to be satisfied with his own reply.
"You see," he said condescendingly, "Money is the easiest explanation.
If you were to ask me why Sir Tom should be Sir Tom, and that man sweep
a crossing, I could not tell you."
"Oh," cried Lucy, "I don't see any difficulty about that at all, for Tom
was born to it. You might as well say why should baby be born to be the
heir."
Jock did not know whether to be indignant or to laugh at this feminine
begging of the question. He stared at her for a moment uncertain, and
then went on as if she had not spoken. "But money is always
intelligible. That's political economy. If you have money, as a matter
of course you have everything that money can buy; and I suppose it can
buy almost everything?" Jock said, reflectively.
"It cannot buy a moment's happiness," cried Lucy, "nor one of those
things one wishes most for. Oh Jock, at your age don't be deceived like
that. For my part," she cried, "I think it is just the trouble of life.
If it was not for this horrible money----"
She stopped short, the tears were in her eyes, but she would not betray
to Jock how great was the difficulty in which she found herself. She
turned her head away and was glad to wave her hand to a well known face
that was passing, an acquaintance of old times, who was greatly elated
to find that Lady Randolph in her grandeur still remembered her. Jock
looked on upon all this with a partial comprehension, mingled with
disapproval. He did not quite understand what she meant, but he
disapproved of her for meaning it all the same.
"Money can't be horrible," he said, "unless it's badly spent: and to say
you can't buy happiness with it is nonsense. If it don't make _you_
happy to save people from poverty it will make them happy, so somebody
will always get the advantage. What are you so silly about, Lucy? I
don't say money is so very fine a thing. I only say it's intelligible.
If you ask me why a man should be a great deal better than you or me,
only because he took the trouble to be born----"
"I am not so silly, though you think me so silly, as to ask that," said
Lucy; "that is so easy to understand. Of course you can only be who you
are. You can't make yourself into another person; I hope I understand
that."
She looked him so sweetly and seriously in the face as she spoke, and
was so completely unaware of any flaw in her reply, that Jock,
argumentative as he was, only gasped and said nothing more. And it was
in this pause of their conversation that they swept up to Mr. Rushton's
door. Mr. Rushton was the town-clerk of Farafield, the most important
representative of legal knowledge in the place. He had been the late Mr.
Trevor's man of business, and had still the greater part of Lucy's
affairs in his hands. He had known her from her childhood, and in the
disturbed chapter of her life before her marriage, his wife had taken a
great deal of notice, as she expressed it, of Lucy: and young Raymond,
who had now settled down in the office as his father's partner (but
never half such a man as his father, in the opinion of the community),
had done her the honour of paying her his addresses. But all that had
passed from everybody's mind. Mrs. Rushton, never very resentful, was
delighted now to receive Lady Randolph's invitation, and proud of the
character of an old friend. And if Raymond occasionally showed a little
embarrassment in Lucy's presence, that was only because he was by nature
awkward in the society of ladies, and according to his own description
never knew what to say.
"And what can I do for your ladyship this morning?" Mr. Rushton said,
rising from his chair. His private room was very warm and comfortable,
too warm, the visitors thought, as an office always is to people going
in from the fresh air. The fire burned with concentrated heat, and Lucy,
in her furs and suppressed agitation, felt her very brain confused. As
for Jock, he lounged in the background with his hands in his pockets,
reading the names upon the boxes that lined the walls, and now that it
had come to the crisis, feeling truly helpless to aid his sister, and
considerably in the way.
"It is a very serious business," said Lucy, drawing her breath hard. "It
is a thing you have never liked or approved of, Mr. Rushton, nor any
one," she added, in a faint voice.
"Dear me, that is very unfortunate," said the lawyer, cheerfully; "but I
don't think you have ever been much disapproved of, Lady Randolph. Come,
there is nothing you can't talk to me about--an old friend. I was in
all your good father's secrets, and I never saw a better head for
business. Why, this is Jock, I believe, grown into a man almost! I
wonder if he has any of his father's talent? Is it about him you want to
consult me? Why, that's perfectly natural, now he's coming to an age to
look to the future," Mr. Rushton said.
"Oh, no! it is not about Jock. He is only sixteen, and, besides, it is
something that is much more difficult," said Lucy. And then she paused,
and cleared her throat, and put down her muff among Mr. Rushton's
papers, that she might have her hands free for this tremendous piece of
business. Then she said, with a sort of desperation, looking him in the
face: "I have come to get you to--settle some money for me in obedience
to papa's will."
Mr. Rushton started as if he had been shot. "You don't mean----" he
cried, "You don't mean---- Come, I dare say I am making a mountain out of
a mole-hill, and that what you are thinking of is quite innocent. If not
about our young friend here, some of your charities or improvements? You
are a most extravagant little lady in your improvements, Lady Randolph.
Those last cottages you know--but I don't doubt the estate will reap the
advantage, and it's an outlay that pays; oh, yes, I don't deny it's an
outlay that pays."
Lucy's countenance betrayed the futility of this supposition long before
he had finished speaking. He had been standing with his back to the
fire, in a cheerful and easy way. Now his countenance grew grave. He
drew his chair to the table and sat down facing her. "If it is not that,
what is it?" he said.
"Mr. Rushton," said Lucy, and she cleared her throat. She looked back
to Jock for support, but he had his back turned to her, and was still
reading the names on the lawyer's boxes. She turned round again with a
little sigh. "Mr. Rushton, I want to carry out papa's will. You know all
about it. It is codicil F. I have heard of some one who is the right
kind of person. I want you to transfer ten thousand pounds----"
The lawyer gave a sort of shriek; he bolted out of his chair, pushing it
so far from him that the substantial mahogany shivered and tottered upon
its four legs.
"Nonsense!" he said, "Nonsense!" increasing the firmness of his tone
until the word thundered forth in capitals, "NONSENSE!--you are going
out of your senses; you don't know what you are saying. I made sure we
had done with all this folly----"
When it had happened to Lucy to propose such an operation as she now
proposed, for the first time, to her other trustee, she had been spoken
to in a way which young ladies rarely experience. That excellent man of
business had tried to put this young lady--then a very young lady--down,
and he had not succeeded. It may be supposed that at her present age of
twenty-three, a wife, a mother, and with a modest consciousness of her
own place and position, she was not a less difficult antagonist. She was
still a little frightened, and grew somewhat pale, but she looked
steadfastly at Mr. Rushton with a nervous smile.
"I think you must not speak to me so," she said. "I am not a child, and
I know my father's will and what it meant. It is not nonsense, nor
folly--it may perhaps have been," she said with a little sigh--"not
wise."
"I beg your pardon, Lady Randolph," Mr. Rushton said precipitately,
with a blush upon his middle-aged countenance, for to be sure, when you
think of it, to tell a gracious young lady with a title, one of your
chief clients, that she is talking nonsense, even if you have known her
all her life, is going perhaps a little too far. "I am sure you will
understand _that_ is what I meant," he cried, "unwise--the very word I
meant. In the heat of the moment other words slip out, but no offence
was intended."
She made him a little bow; she was trembling, though she would not have
him see it. "We are not here," she said, "to criticise my father." Lucy
was scarcely half aware how much she had gained in composure and the art
of self-command. "I think he would have been more wise and more kind to
have done himself what he thought to be his duty; but what does that
matter? You must not try to convince me, please, but take the
directions, which are very simple. I have written them all down in this
paper. If you think you ought to make independent inquiries, you have
the right to do that; but you will spare the poor gentleman's feelings,
Mr. Rushton. It is all put down here."
Mr. Rushton took the paper from her hand. He smiled inwardly to himself,
subduing his fret of impatience. "You will not object to let me talk it
over," he said, "first with Sir Tom?"
Lucy coloured, and then she grew pale. "You will remember," she said,
"that it has nothing to do with my husband, Mr. Rushton."
"My dear lady," said the lawyer, "I never expected to hear you, who I
have always known as the best of wives, say of anything that it has
nothing to do with your husband. Surely that is not how ladies speak of
their lords?"
Lucy heard a sound behind her which seemed to imply to her quick ear
that Jock was losing patience. She had brought him with her, with the
idea of deriving some support from his presence; but if Sir Tom had
nothing to do with it, clearly on much stronger grounds neither had her
brother. She turned round and cast a hurried warning glance at him. She
had herself no words ready to reply to the lawyer's gibe. She would
neither defend herself as from a grave accusation, nor reply in the same
tone. "Mr. Rushton," she said faltering, "I don't think we need argue,
need we? I have put down all the particulars. You know about it as well
as I do. It is not for pleasure. If you think it is right, you will
inquire about the gentleman--otherwise--I don't think there need be any
more to say."
"I will talk it over with Sir Tom," said Mr. Rushton, feeling that he
had found the only argument by which to manage this young woman. He even
chuckled a little to himself at the thought. "Evidently," he said to
himself, "she is afraid of Sir Tom, and he knows nothing about this. He
will soon put a stop to it." He added aloud, "My dear Lady Randolph,
this is far too serious a matter to be dismissed so summarily. You are
young and very inexperienced. Of course I know all about it, and so does
Sir Thomas. We will talk it over between us, and no doubt we will manage
to decide upon some course that will harmonise everything."
Lucy looked at him with grave suspicion. "I don't know," she said, "what
there is to be harmonised, Mr. Rushton. There is a thing which I have to
do, and I have shrunk from it for a long time; but I cannot do so any
longer."
"Look here," said Jock, "it's Lucy's affair, it's nobody else's. Just
you look at her paper and do what she says."
"My young friend," said the lawyer blandly, "that is capital advice for
yourself: I hope you always do what your sister says."
"Most times I do," said Jock; "not that it's your business to tell me.
But you know very well you'll have to do it. No one has got any right to
interfere with her. She has more sense than a dozen. She has got the
right on her side. You may do what you please, but you know very well
you can't stop her--neither you, nor Sir Tom, nor the old lady, nor one
single living creature; and you know it," said Jock. He confronted Mr.
Rushton with lowering brows, and with an angry sparkle in his deep-set
eyes. Lucy was half proud of and half alarmed by her champion.
"Oh hush, Jock!" she cried. "You must not speak; you are only a boy. You
must beg Mr. Rushton's pardon for speaking to him so. But, indeed, what
he says is quite true; it is no one's duty but mine. My husband will not
interfere with what he knows I must do," she said, with a little chill
of apprehension. Would he indeed be so considerate for her? It made her
heart sick to think that she was not on this point quite certain about
Sir Tom.
"In that case there will be no harm in talking it over with him," said
the lawyer briefly. "I thought you were far too sensible not to see that
was the right way. Oh, never mind about his asking my pardon. I forgive
him without that. He has a high idea of his sister's authority, which is
quite right; and so have I--and so have all of us. Certainly, certainly,
Master Jock, she has the right; and she will arrange it judiciously, of
that there is no fear. But first, as a couple of business men, more
experienced in the world than you young philanthropists, I will just,
the first time I see him, talk it over with Sir Tom. My dear Lady
Randolph, no trouble at all. Is that all I can do for you? Then I will
not detain you any longer this fine morning," the lawyer said.