CHAPTER 4
Only twelve months ago Stephen Lord had renewed the lease of his house for a period of seven years. Nancy, had she been aware of this transaction, would assuredly have found courage to enter a protest, but Mr. Lord consulted neither son nor daughter on any point of business; but for this habit of acting silently, he would have seemed to his children a still more arbitrary ruler than they actually thought him.
The dwelling consisted of but eight rooms, one of which, situated at the rear of the entrance passage, served Mr. Lord as sitting-room and bed-chamber; it overlooked a small garden, and afforded a side glimpse of the kitchen with its outer appurtenances. In the front room the family took meals. Of the chambers in the storey above, one was Nancy’s, one her brother’s; the third had, until six years ago, been known as ‘Grandmother’s room,’ and here its occupant, Stephen Lord’s mother, died at the age of seventy-eight. Wife of a Norfolk farmer, and mother of nine children, she was one of the old-world women whose thoughts found abundant occupation in the cares and pleasures of home. Hardship she had never known, nor yet luxury; the old religion, the old views of sex and of society, endured with her to the end.
After her death the room was converted into a parlour, used almost exclusively by the young people. At the top of the house slept two servants, each in her own well-furnished retreat; one of them was a girl, the other a woman of about forty, named Mary Woodruff. Mary had been in the house for twenty years; she enjoyed her master’s confidence, and, since old Mrs. Lord’s death, exercised practical control in the humbler domestic affairs.
With one exception, all parts of the abode presented much the same appearance as when Stephen Lord first established himself antiquated, and in primitive taste. Nancy’s bedroom alone here. The furniture was old, solid, homely; the ornaments were displayed the influence of modern ideas. On her twentieth birthday, the girl received permission to dress henceforth as she chose (a strict sumptuary law having previously been in force), and at the same time was allowed to refurnish her chamber. Nancy pleaded for modern reforms throughout the house, but in vain; even the drawing-room kept its uninviting aspect, not very different, save for the removal of the bed, from that it had presented when the ancient lady slept here. In her own little domain, Miss. Lord made a clean sweep of rude appointments, and at small expense surrounded herself with pretty things. The woodwork and the furniture were in white enamel; the paper had a pattern of wild-rose. A choice chintz, rose-leaf and flower on a white ground, served for curtains and for bed-hangings. Her carpet was of green felt, matching in shade the foliage of the chintz. On suspended shelves stood the books which she desired to have near her, and round about the walls hung prints, photographs, chromolithographs, selected in an honest spirit of admiration, which on the whole did no discredit to Nancy’s sensibilities.
To the best of Nancy’s belief, her father had never seen this room. On its completion she invited him to inspect it, but Mr. Lord coldly declined, saying that he knew nothing, and cared nothing, about upholstery.
His return to-day was earlier than usual. Shortly after five o’clock Nancy heard the familiar heavy step in the passage, and went downstairs.
‘Will you have a cup of tea, father?’ she asked, standing by the door of the back room, which was ajar.
‘If it’s ready,’ replied a deep voice.
She entered the dining-room, and rang the bell. In a few minutes Mary Woodruff appeared, bringing tea and biscuits. She was a neat, quiet, plain-featured woman, of strong physique, and with set lips, which rarely parted save for necessary speech. Her eyes had a singular expression of inquietude, of sadness. A smile seldom appeared on her face, but, when it did, the effect was unlooked for: it touched the somewhat harsh lineaments with a gentleness so pleasing that she became almost comely.
Having set down the tray, she went to Mr. Lord’s door, gave a soft tap, and withdrew into the kitchen.
Nancy, seated at the table, turned to greet her father. In early life, Stephen Lord must have been handsome; his face was now rugged, of unhealthy tone, and creased with lines betokening a moody habit. He looked much older than his years, which were fifty-seven. Dressed with excessive carelessness, he had the appearance rather of one at odds with fortune than of a substantial man of business. His short beard was raggedly trimmed; his grizzled hair began to show the scalp. Judging from the contour of his visage, one might have credited him with a forcible and commanding character; his voice favoured that impression; but the countenance had a despondent cast, the eyes seemed to shun observation, the lips suggested a sullen pride, indicative of some defect or vice of will.
Yet in the look which he cast upon her, Nancy detected a sign of more amiability than she had found in him of late. She addressed him with confidence.
‘Early to-day, father.’
‘Yes.’
The monosyllable sounded gruff, but again Nancy felt satisfaction. Mr. Lord, who disliked to seat himself unless he were going to keep his position for some time, took the offered beverage from his daughter’s hand, and stood with it before the fireplace, casting glances about the room.
‘How have you felt, father?’
‘Nothing to complain of.’
His pronunciation fell short of refinement, but was not vulgar. Something of country accent could still be detected in it. He talked like a man who could strike a softer note if he cared to, but despises the effort.
‘I suppose you will have a rest to-morrow?’
‘I suppose so. If your grandmother had lived,’ he added thoughtfully, ‘she would have been eighty-four this week on Thursday.’
‘The 23rd of June. Yes, I remember.’
Mr. Lord swallowed his tea at two draughts, and put down the cup. Seemingly refreshed, he looked about him with a half smile, and said quietly:
‘I’ve had the pleasure of punishing a scoundrel to-day. That’s worth more than the Jubilee.’
Nancy waited for an explanation, but it was not vouchsafed.
‘A scoundrel?’ she asked.
Her father nodded—the nod which signified his pleasure that the subject should not be pursued. Nancy could only infer that he spoke of some incident in the course of business, as indeed was the case.
He had no particular aptitude for trade, and that by which he lived (he had entered upon it thirty years ago rather by accident than choice) was thoroughly distasteful to him. As a dealer in pianofortes, he came into contact with a class of people who inspired him with a savage contempt, and of late years his business had suffered considerably from the competition of tradesmen who knew nothing of such conflicts between sentiment and interest. A majority of his customers obtained their pianos on the ‘hire-purchase system,’ and oftener than not, they were persons of very small or very precarious income, who, rabid in the pursuit of gentility, signed agreements they had little chance of fulfilling; when in pecuniary straits, they either raised money upon the instruments, or allowed them to fall into the hands of distraining creditors. Inquiry into the circumstances of a would-be customer sometimes had ludicrous results; a newly-married couple, for instance, would be found tenanting two top-floor rooms, the furnishing whereof seemed to them incomplete without the piano of which their friends and relatives boasted. Not a few professional swindlers came to the office; confederate rogues, vouching for each other’s respectability, got possession of pianos merely to pawn or sell them, having paid no more than the first month’s charge. It was Mr Lord’s experience that year by year the recklessness of the vulgar became more glaring, and deliberate fraud more artful. To-day he had successfully prosecuted a man who seemed to have lived for some time on the hire-purchase system, and it made him unusually cheerful.
‘You don’t think of going to see the Queen to-morrow?’ said his daughter, smiling.
‘What have I to do with the Queen? Do you wish to go?’
‘Not to see Her Majesty. I care as little about her as you do. But I thought of having a walk in the evening.’
Nancy phrased it thus with intention. She wished to intimate that, at her age, it could hardly be necessary to ask permission. But her father looked surprised.
‘In the evening? Where?’
‘Oh, about the main streets—to see the people and the illuminations.’
Her voice was not quite firm.
‘But,’ said her father, ‘there’ll be such a swarm of blackguards as never was known. How can you go into such a crowd? It’s astonishing that you should think of it.’
‘The blackguards will be outnumbered by the decent people, father.’
‘You suppose that’s possible?’ he returned gloomily.
‘Oh, I think so,’ Nancy laughed. ‘At all events, there’ll be a great majority of people who pretend to be decent. I have asked Jessica Morgan to go with me.’
‘What right had you to ask her, without first finding out whether you could go or not?’
It was spoken rather gravely than severely. Mr. Lord never looked fixedly at his daughter, and even a glance at her face was unusual; but at this juncture he met her eyes for an instant. The nervous motion with which he immediately turned aside had been marked by Nancy on previous occasions, and she had understood it as a sign of his lack of affection for her.
‘I am twenty-three years old, father,’ she replied, without aggressiveness.
‘That would be something of an answer if you were a man,’ observed the father, his eyes cast down.
‘Because I am a woman, you despise me?’
Stephen was startled at this unfamiliar mode of address. He moved uneasily.
‘If I despised you, Nancy, I shouldn’t care very much what you did. I suppose you must do as you like, but you won’t go with my permission.’
There was a silence, then the girl said:
‘I meant to ask Horace to go with us.’
‘Horace—pooh!’
Again a silence. Mr. Lord laid down his cup, moved a few steps away, and turned back.
‘I didn’t think this kind of thing was in your way,’ he said gruffly. ‘I thought you were above it.’
Nancy defended herself as she had done to Jessica, but without the playfulness. In listening, her father seemed to weigh the merits of the case conscientiously with wrinkled brows. At length he spoke.
‘Horace is no good. But if Samuel Barmby will go with you, I make no objection.’
A movement of annoyance was Nancy’s first reply. She drummed with her fingers on the table, looking fixedly before her.
‘I certainly can’t ask Mr. Barmby to come with us,’ she said, with an effort at self-control.
‘Well, you needn’t. I’ll speak about it myself.’
He waited, and again it chanced that their eyes met. Nancy, on the point of speaking, checked herself. A full minute passed, and Stephen stood waiting patiently.
‘If you insist upon it,’ said Nancy, rising from her chair, ‘we will take Mr. Barmby with us.’
Without comment, Mr. Lord left the room, and his own door closed rather loudly behind him.
Not long afterwards Nancy heard a new foot in the passage, and her brother made his appearance. Horace had good looks, but his face showed already some of the unpleasant characteristics which time had developed on that of Stephen Lord, and from which the daughter was entirely free; one judged him slow of intellect and weakly self-willed. His hair was of pale chestnut, the silky pencillings of his moustache considerably darker. His cheek, delicately pink and easily changing to a warmer hue, his bright-coloured lips, and the limpid glistening of his eyes, showed him of frail constitution; he was very slim, and narrow across the shoulders. The fashion of his attire tended to a dandiacal extreme,—modish silk hat, lavender necktie, white waistcoat, gaiters over his patent-leather shoes, gloves crushed together in one hand, and in the other a bamboo cane. For the last year or two he had been progressing in this direction, despite his father’s scornful remarks and his sister’s good-natured mockery.
‘Father in yet?’ he asked at the door of the dining-room, in subdued voice.
Nancy nodded, and the young man withdrew to lay aside his outdoor equipments.
‘What sort of temper?’ was his question when he returned.
‘Pretty good—until I spoilt it.’
Horace exhibited a pettish annoyance.
‘What on earth did you do that for? I want to have a talk with him to-night.’
‘About what?’
‘Oh, never mind; I’ll tell you after.’
Both kept their voices low, as if afraid of being overheard in the next room. Horace began to nibble at a biscuit; the hour of his return made it unnecessary for him, as a rule, to take anything before dinner, but at present he seemed in a nervous condition, and acted mechanically.
‘Come out into the garden, will you?’ he said, after receiving a brief explanation of what had passed between Nancy and her father. ‘I’ve something to tell you.’
His sister carelessly assented, and with heads uncovered they went through the house into the open air. The garden was but a strip of ground, bounded by walls of four feet high; in the midst stood a laburnum, now heavy with golden bloom, and at the end grew a holly-bush, flanked with laurels; a border flower-bed displayed Stephen Lord’s taste and industry. Nancy seated herself on a rustic bench in the shadow of the laburnum, and Horace stood before her, one of the branches in his hand.
‘I promised Fanny to take her to-morrow night,’ he began awkwardly.
‘Oh, you have?’
‘And we’re going together in the morning, you know.’
‘I know now. I didn’t before,’ Nancy replied.
‘Of course we can make a party in the evening.’
‘Of course.’
Horace looked up at the ugly house-backs, and hesitated before proceeding.
‘That isn’t what I wanted to talk about,’ he said at length. ‘A very queer thing has happened, a thing I can’t make out at all.’
The listener looked her curiosity.
‘I promised to say nothing about it, but there’s no harm in telling you, you know. You remember I was away last Saturday afternoon? Well, just when it was time to leave the office, that day, the porter came to say that a lady wished to see me—a lady in a carriage outside. Of course I couldn’t make it out at all, but I went down as quickly as possible, and saw the carriage waiting there,—a brougham,—and marched up to the door. Inside there was a lady—a great swell, smiling at me as if we were friends. I took off my hat, and said that I was Mr. Lord. “Yes,” she said, “I see you are;” and she asked if I could spare her an hour or two, as she wished to speak to me of something important. Well, of course I could only say that I had nothing particular to do,—that I was just going home. “Then will you do me the pleasure,” she said, “to come and have lunch with me? I live in Weymouth Street, Portland Place.”
The young man paused to watch the effect of his narrative, especially of the last words. Nancy returned his gaze with frank astonishment.
‘What sort of lady was it?’ she asked.
‘Oh, a great swell. Somebody in the best society—you could see that at once.’
‘But how old?’
‘Well, I couldn’t tell exactly; about forty, I should think.’
‘Oh!—Go on.’
‘One couldn’t refuse, you know; I was only too glad to go to a house in the West End. She opened the carriage-door from the inside, and I got in, and off we drove. I felt awkward, of course, but after all I was decently dressed, and I suppose I can behave like a gentleman, and—well, she sat looking at me and smiling, and I could only smile back. Then she said she must apologise for behaving so strangely, but I was very young, and she was an old woman,—one couldn’t call her that, though,—and she had taken this way of renewing her acquaintance with me. Renewing? But I didn’t remember to have ever met her before, I said. “Oh, yes, we have met before, but you were a little child, a baby in fact, and there’s no wonder you don’t remember me?” And then she said, “I knew your mother very well.”
Nancy leaned forward, her lips apart.
‘Queer, wasn’t it? Then she went on to say that her name was Mrs. Damerel; had I ever heard it? No, I couldn’t remember the name at all. She was a widow, she said, and had lived mostly abroad for a great many years; now she was come back to settle in England. She hadn’t a house of her own yet, but lived at a boarding-house; she didn’t know whether to take a house in London, or somewhere just out in the country. Then she began to ask about father, and about you; and it seemed to amuse her when I looked puzzled. She’s a jolly sort of person, always laughing.’
‘Did she say anything more about our mother?’
‘I’ll tell you about that presently. We got to the house, and went in, and she took me upstairs to her own private sitting-room, where the table was laid for two. She said that she usually had her meals with the other people, but it would be better for us to be alone, so that we could talk.’
‘How did she know where to find you?’ Nancy inquired.
‘Of course I wondered about that, but I didn’t like to ask. Well, she went away for a few minutes, and then we had lunch. Everything was A-1 of course; first-rate wines to choose from, and a rattling good cigar afterwards—for me, I mean. She brought out a box; said they were her husband’s, and had a laugh about it.’
‘How long has she been a widow?’ asked Nancy.
‘I don’t know. She didn’t wear colours, I noticed; perhaps it was a fashionable sort of mourning. We talked about all sorts of things; I soon made myself quite at home. And at last she began to explain. She was a friend of mother’s, years and years ago, and father was the cause of their parting, a quarrel about something, she didn’t say exactly what. And it had suddenly struck her that she would like to know how we were getting on. Then she asked me to promise that I would tell no one.’
‘She knew about mother’s death, I suppose?’
‘Oh yes, she knew about that. It happened not very long after the affair that parted them. She asked a good many questions about you. And she wanted to know how father had got on in his business.’
‘What did you say?’
‘Oh, I told her I really didn’t know much about it, and she laughed at that.’
‘How long did you stay there?’
‘Till about four. But there’s something else. Before I went away she gave me an invitation for next Saturday. She wants me to meet her at Portland Road Station, and go out to Richmond, and have dinner there.’
‘Shall you go?’
‘Well, it’s very awkward. I want to go somewhere else on Saturday, with Fanny. But I didn’t see how to refuse.’
Nancy wore a look of grave reflection, and kept silence.
‘It isn’t a bad thing, you know,’ pursued her brother, ‘to have a friend of that sort. There’s no knowing what use she might be, especially just now.’
His tone caused Nancy to look up.
‘Why just now?’
‘I’ll tell you after I’ve had a talk with father to-night,’ Horace replied, setting his countenance to a show of energetic resolve.
‘Shall I guess what you’re going to talk about?’
‘If you like.’
She gazed at him.
‘You’re surely not so silly as to tell father about all that nonsense?’
‘What nonsense?’ exclaimed the other indignantly.
‘Why, with Fanny French.’
‘You’ll find that it’s anything but nonsense,’ Horace replied, raising his brows, and gazing straight before him, with expanded nostrils.
‘All right. Let me know the result. It’s time to go in.’
Horace sat alone for a minute or two, his legs at full length, his feet crossed, and the upper part of his body bent forward. He smiled to himself, a smile of singular fatuity, and began to hum a popular tune.
CHAPTER 5
When they assembled at table, Mr. Lord had recovered his moderate cheerfulness. Essentially, he was anything but ill-tempered; Horace and Nancy were far from regarding him with that resentful bitterness which is produced in the victims of a really harsh parent. Ten years ago, as they well remembered, anger was a rare thing in his behaviour to them, and kindness the rule. Affectionate he had never shown himself; reserve and austerity had always distinguished him. Even now-a-days, it was generally safe to anticipate mildness from him at the evening meal. In the matter of eating and drinking his prudence notably contradicted his precepts. He loved strong meats, dishes highly flavoured, and partook of them without moderation. At table his beverage was ale; for wine—unless it were very sweet port—he cared little; but in the privacy of his own room, whilst smoking numberless pipes of rank tobacco, he indulged freely in spirits. The habit was unknown to his children, but for some years he had seldom gone to bed in a condition that merited the name of sobriety.
When the repast was nearly over, Mr. Lord glanced at his son and said unconcernedly:
‘You have heard that Nancy wants to mix with the rag-tag and bobtail to-morrow night?’
‘I shall take care of her,’ Horace replied, starting from his reverie.
‘Doesn’t it seem to you rather a come-down for an educated young lady?’
‘Oh, there’ll be lots of them about.’
‘Will there? Then I can’t see much difference between them and the servant girls.’
Nancy put in a word.
‘That shows you don’t in the least understand me, father.’
‘We won’t argue about it. But bear in mind, Horace, that you bring your sister back not later than half-past eleven. You are to be here by half-past eleven.’
‘That’s rather early,’ replied the young man, though in a submissive tone.
‘It’s the hour I appoint. Samuel Barmby will be with you, and he will know the arrangement; but I tell you now, so that there may be no misunderstanding.’
Nancy sat in a very upright position, displeasure plain upon her countenance. But she made no remark. Horace, who had his reasons for desiring to preserve a genial tone, affected acquiescence. Presently he and his sister went upstairs to the drawing-room, where they sat down at a distance apart—Nancy by the window, gazing at the warm clouds above the roofs opposite, the young man in a corner which the dusk already shadowed. Some time passed before either spoke, and it was Horace’s voice which first made itself heard.
‘Nancy, don’t you think it’s about time we began to behave firmly?’
‘It depends what you mean by firmness,’ she answered in an absent tone.
‘We’re old enough to judge for ourselves.’
‘I am, no doubt. But I’m not so sure about you.’
‘Oh, all right. Then we won’t talk about it.’
Another quarter of an hour went by. The room was in twilight. There came a knock at the door, and Mary Woodruff, a wax-taper in her hand, entered to light the gas. Having drawn the blind, and given a glance round to see that everything was in order, she addressed Nancy, her tone perfectly respectful, though she used no formality.
‘Martha has been asking me whether she can go out to-morrow night for an hour or two.’
‘You don’t wish to go yourself?’ Miss. Lord returned, her voice significant of life-long familiarity.
‘Oh no!’
And Mary showed one of her infrequent smiles.
‘She may go immediately after dinner, and be away till half-past ten.’
The servant bent her head, and withdrew. As soon as she was gone, Horace laughed.
‘There you are! What did father say?’
Nancy was silent.
‘Well, I’m going to have a word with him,’ continued the young man, sauntering towards the door with his hands in his pockets. He looked exceedingly nervous. ‘When I come back, I may have something to tell you.’
‘Very likely,’ remarked his sister in a dry tone, and seated herself under the chandelier with a book.
Horace slowly descended the stairs. At the foot he stood for a moment, then moved towards his father’s door. Another hesitancy, though briefer, and he knocked for admission, which was at once granted. Mr. Lord sat in his round-backed chair, smoking a pipe, on his knees an evening paper. He looked at Horace from under his eyebrows, but with good humour.
‘Coming to report progress?’
‘Yes, father,—and to talk over things in general.’
The slim youth—he could hardly be deemed more than a lad tried to assume an easy position, with his elbow on the corner of the mantelpiece; but his feet shuffled, and his eyes strayed vacantly. It cost him an effort to begin his customary account of how things were going with him at the shipping-office. In truth, there was nothing particular to report; there never was anything particular; but Horace always endeavoured to show that he had made headway, and to-night he spoke with a very pronounced optimism.
‘Very well, my boy,’ said his father. ‘If you are satisfied, I shall try to be the same. Have you your pipe with you?—At your age I hadn’t begun to smoke, and I should advise you to be moderate; but we’ll have a whiff together, if you like.’
‘I’ll go and fetch it,’ Horace replied impulsively.
He came back with a rather expensive meerschaum, recently purchased.
‘Hollo! luxuries!’ exclaimed his father.
‘It kept catching my eye in a window,—and at last I couldn’t resist. Tobacco’s quite a different thing out of a pipe like this, you know.’
No one, seeing them thus together, could have doubted of the affectionate feeling which Stephen Lord entertained for his son. It appeared in his frequent glances, in the relaxation of his features, in a certain abandonment of his whole frame, as though he had only just begun to enjoy the evening’s repose.
‘I’ve something rather important to speak about, father,’ Horace began, when he had puffed for a few minutes in silence.
‘Oh? What’s that?’
‘You remember telling me, when I was one and twenty, that you wished me to work my way up, and win an income of my own, but that I could look to you for help, if ever there was need of it—?’
Yes, Stephen remembered. He had frequently called it to mind, and wondered whether it was wisely said, the youth’s character considered.
‘What of that?’ he returned, still genially. ‘Do you think of starting a new line of ocean steamships?’
‘Well, not just yet,’ Horace answered, with an uncertain laugh. ‘I have something more moderate in view. I may start a competition with the P. and O. presently.’
‘Let’s hear about it.’
‘I dare say it will surprise you a little. The fact is, I—I am thinking of getting married.’
The father did not move, but smoke ceased to issue from his lips, and his eyes, fixed upon Horace, widened a little in puzzled amusement.
‘Thinking of it, are you?’ he said, in an undertone, as one speaks of some trifle. ‘No harm in thinking. Too many people do it without thinking at all.’
‘I’m not one of that kind,’ said Horace, with an air of maturity which was meant to rebuke his father’s jest. ‘I know what I’m about. I’ve thought it over thoroughly. You don’t think it too soon, I hope?’
Horace’s pipe was going out; he held it against his knee and regarded it with unconscious eyes.
‘I dare say it won’t be,’ said Mr. Lord, ‘when you have found a suitable wife.’
‘Oh, but you misunderstand me. I mean that I have decided to marry a particular person.’
‘And who may that be?’
‘The younger Miss. French—Fanny.’
His voice quivered over the name; at the end he gave a gasp and a gulp. Of a sudden his lips and tongue were very dry, and he felt a disagreeable chill running down his back. For the listener’s face had altered noticeably; it was dark, stern, and something worse. But Mr. Lord could still speak with self-control.
‘You have asked her to marry you?’
‘Yes, I have; and she has consented.’
Horace felt his courage returning, like the so-called ‘second wind’ of a runner. It seemed to him that he had gone through the worst. The disclosure was made, and had resulted in no outbreak of fury; now he could begin to plead his cause. Imagination, excited by nervous stress, brought before him a clear picture of the beloved Fanny, with fluffy hair upon her forehead and a laugh on her never-closed lips. He spoke without effort.
‘I thought that there would be no harm in asking you to help us. We should be quite content to start on a couple of hundred a year—quite. That is only about fifty pounds more than we have.’
Calf-love inspires many an audacity. To Horace there seemed nothing outrageous in this suggestion. He had talked it over with Fanny French several times, and they had agreed that his father could not in decency offer them less than a hundred a year. He began to shake out the ashes from his pipe, with a vague intention of relighting it.
‘You really imagine,’ said his father, ‘that I should give you money to enable you to marry that idiot?’
Evidently he put a severe restraint upon himself. The veins of his temples were congested; his nostrils grew wide; and he spoke rather hoarsely. Horace straightened his back, and, though in great fear, strung himself for conflict.
‘I don’t see—what right—to insult the young lady.’
His father took him up sternly.
‘Young lady? What do you mean by “young lady”? After all your education, haven’t you learnt to distinguish a lady from a dressed-up kitchen wench? I had none of your advantages. There was—there would have been some excuse for me, if I had made such a fool of myself. What were you doing all those years at school, if it wasn’t learning the difference between real and sham, getting to understand things better than poor folks’ children? You disappointed me, and a good deal more than I ever told you. I had hoped you would come from school better able to make a place in the world than your father was. I made up my mind long ago that you should never go into my business; you were to be something a good deal better. But after all you couldn’t, or wouldn’t, do what I wanted. Never mind—I said to myself—never mind; at all events, he has learnt to think in a better way than if I had sent him to common schools, and after all that’s the main thing. But here you come to me and talk of marrying a low-bred, low-minded creature, who wouldn’t be good enough for the meanest clerk!’
‘How do you know that, father? What—what right have you to say such things, without knowing more of her than you do?’
There was a brief silence before Mr. Lord spoke again.
‘You are very young,’ he said, with less vehement contempt. ‘I must remember that. At your age, a lad has a sort of devil in him, that’s always driving him out of the path of common sense, whether he will or no. I’ll try my best to talk quietly with you. Does your sister know what has been going on?’
‘I daresay she does. I haven’t told her in so many words.’
‘I never thought of it,’ pursued Mr. Lord gloomily. ‘I took it for granted that everybody must see those people as I myself did. I have wondered now and then why Nancy kept up any kind of acquaintance with them, but she spoke of them in the rational way, and that seemed enough. I may have thought that they might get some sort of good out of her, and I felt sure she had too much sense to get harm from them. If it hadn’t been so, I should have forbidden her to know them at all. What have you to say for yourself? I don’t want to think worse of you than I need. I can make allowance for your age, as I said. What do you see in that girl? Just talk to me freely and plainly.’
‘After all you have said,’ replied Horace, his voice still shaky, ‘what’s the use? You seem to be convinced that there isn’t a single good quality in her.’
‘So I am. What I want to know is, what good you have found.’
‘A great deal, else I shouldn’t have asked her to marry me.’
A vein of stubbornness, unmistakable inheritance from Stephen Lord, had begun to appear in the youth’s speech and bearing. He kept his head bent, and moved it a little from side to side.
‘Do you think her an exception in the family, then?’
‘She’s a great deal better in every way than her sisters. But I don’t think as badly of them as you do.’
Mr. Lord stepped to the door, and out into the passage, where he shouted in his deep voice ‘Nancy!’ The girl quickly appeared.
‘Shut the door, please,’ said her father. All three were now standing about the room. ‘Your brother has brought me a piece of news. It ought to interest you, I should think. He wants to marry, and out of all the world, he has chosen Miss. French—the youngest.’ Horace’s position was trying. He did not know what to do with his hands, and he kept balancing now on one foot, now on the other. Nancy had her eyes averted from him, but she met her father’s look gravely.
‘Now, I want to ask you,’ Mr. Lord proceeded, ‘whether you consider Miss. French a suitable wife for your brother? Just give me a plain yes or no.’
‘I certainly don’t,’ replied the girl, barely subduing the tremor of her voice.
‘Both my children are not fools, thank Heaven! Now tell me, if you can, what fault you have to find with the “young lady,” as your brother calls her?’
‘For one thing, I don’t think her Horace’s equal. She can’t really be called a lady.’
‘You are listening?’
Horace bit his lip in mortification, and again his head swung doggedly from side to side.
‘We might pass over that,’ added Mr. Lord. ‘What about her character? Is there any good point in her?’
‘I don’t think she means any harm. But she’s silly, and I’ve often thought her selfish.’
‘You are listening?’
Horace lost patience.
‘Then why do you pretend to be friends with her?’ he demanded almost fiercely.
‘I don’t,’ replied his sister, with a note of disdain. ‘We knew each other at school, and we haven’t altogether broken off, that’s all.’
‘It isn’t all!’ shouted the young man on a high key. ‘If you’re not friendly with her and her sisters, you’ve been a great hypocrite. It’s only just lately you have begun to think yourself too good for them. They used to come here, and you went to them; and you talked just like friends would do. It’s abominable to turn round like this, for the sake of taking father’s side against me!’
Mr. Lord regarded his son contemptuously. There was a rather long silence; he spoke at length with severe deliberation.
‘When you are ten years older, you’ll know a good deal more about young women as they’re turned out in these times. You’ll have heard the talk of men who have been fools enough to marry choice specimens. When common sense has a chance of getting in a word with you, you’ll understand what I now tell you. Wherever you look now-a-days there’s sham and rottenness; but the most worthless creature living is one of these trashy, flashy girls,—the kind of girl you see everywhere, high and low,—calling themselves “ladies,”—thinking themselves too good for any honest, womanly work. Town and country, it’s all the same. They’re educated; oh yes, they’re educated! What sort of wives do they make, with their education? What sort of mothers are they? Before long, there’ll be no such thing as a home. They don’t know what the word means. They’d like to live in hotels, and trollop about the streets day and night. There won’t be any servants much longer; you’re lucky if you find one of the old sort, who knows how to light a fire or wash a dish. Go into the houses of men with small incomes; what do you find but filth and disorder, quarrelling and misery? Young men are bad enough, I know that; they want to begin where their fathers left off, and if they can’t do it honestly, they’ll embezzle or forge. But you’ll often find there’s a worthless wife at the bottom of it,—worrying and nagging because she has a smaller house than some other woman, because she can’t get silks and furs, and wants to ride in a cab instead of an omnibus. It is astounding to me that they don’t get their necks wrung. Only wait a bit; we shall come to that presently!’
It was a rare thing for Stephen Lord to talk at such length. He ceased with a bitter laugh, and sat down again in his chair. Horace and his sister waited.
‘I’ve no more to say,’ fell from their father at length. ‘Go and talk about it together, if you like.’
Horace moved sullenly towards the door, and with a glance at his sister went out. Nancy, after lingering for a moment, spoke.
‘I don’t think you need have any fear of it, father.’
‘Perhaps not. But if it isn’t that one, it’ll be another like her. There’s not much choice for a lad like Horace.’
Nancy changed her purpose of leaving the room, and drew a step nearer.
‘Don’t you think there might have been?’
Mr. Lord turned to look at her.
‘How? What do you mean?’
‘I don’t want to make you angry with me—’
‘Say what you’ve got to say,’ broke in her father impatiently.
‘It isn’t easy, when you so soon lose your temper.’
‘My girl,’—for once he gazed at her directly,—‘if you knew all I have gone through in life, you wouldn’t wonder at my temper being spoilt.—What do you mean? What could I have done?’
She stood before him, and spoke with diffidence.
‘Don’t you think that if we had lived in a different way, Horace and I might have had friends of a better kind?’
‘A different way?—I understand. You mean I ought to have had a big house, and made a show. Isn’t that it?’
‘You gave us a good education,’ replied Nancy, still in the same tone, ‘and we might have associated with very different people from those you have been speaking of; but education alone isn’t enough. One must live as the better people do.’
‘Exactly. That’s your way of thinking. And how do you know that I could afford it, to begin with?’
‘Perhaps I oughtn’t to have taken that for granted.’
‘Perhaps not. Young women take a good deal for granted now a-days. But supposing you were right, are you silly enough to think that richer people are better people, as a matter of course?’
‘Not as a matter of course,’ said Nancy. ‘But I’m quite sure—I know from what I’ve seen—that there’s more chance of meeting nice people among them.’
‘What do you mean by “nice”?’ Mr. Lord was lying back in his chair, and spoke thickly, as if wearied. ‘People who can talk so that you forget they’re only using words they’ve learnt like parrots?’
‘No. Just the contrary. People who have something to say worth listening to.’
‘If you take my advice, you’ll pay less attention to what people say, and more to what they do. What’s the good of a friend who won’t come to see you because you live in a small house? That’s the plain English of it. If I had done as I thought right, I should never have sent you to school at all. I should have had you taught at home all that’s necessary to make a good girl and an honest woman, and have done my best to keep you away from the kind of life that I hate. But I hadn’t the courage to act as I believed. I knew how the times were changing, and I was weak enough to be afraid I might do you an injustice. I did give you the chance of making friends among better people than your father. Didn’t I use to talk to you about your school friends, and encourage you when they seemed of the right kind? And now you tell me that they don’t care for your society because you live in a decent, unpretending way. I should think you’re better without such friends.’
Nancy reflected, seemed about to prolong the argument, but spoke at length in another voice.
‘Well, I will say good-night, father.’
It was not usual for them to see each other after dinner, so that a good-night could seldom be exchanged. The girl, drawing away, expected a response; she saw her father nod, but he said nothing.
‘Good-night, father,’ she repeated from a distance.
‘Good-night, Nancy, good-night,’ came in impatient reply.