CHAPTER X. THE DROPPINGS OF A GREAT DIPLOMATIST.
When a man's manner and address are very successful with the world,—when he possesses that power of captivation which extends to people of totally different tastes and habits, and is equally at home, equally at his ease, with young and old, with men of grave pursuits and men of pleasure,—it is somewhat hard to believe that there must not be some strong sterling quality in his nature; for we know that the base metals never bear gilding, and that it is only a waste of gold to cover them with it.
It would be, therefore, very pleasant to think that if people should not be altogether as admirable as they were agreeable, yet that the qualities which made the companionship so delightful should be indications of deeper and more solid gifts beneath. Yet I am afraid the theory will not hold. I suspect that there are a considerable number of people in this world who go through life trading on credit, and who renew their bills with humanity so gracefully and so cleverly, they are never found out to be bankrupts till they die.
A very accomplished specimen of this order was Lord Culduff. He was a man of very ordinary abilities, commonplace in every way, and who had yet contrived to impress the world with the notion of his capacity. He did a little of almost everything. He sang a little, played a little on two or three instruments, talked a little of several languages, and had smatterings of all games and field-sports, so that, to every seeming, nothing came amiss to him. Nature had been gracious to him personally, and he had a voice very soft and low and insinuating.
He was not an impostor, for the simple reason that he believed in himself. He actually had negotiated his false coinage so long, that he got to regard it as bullion, and imagined himself to be one of the first men of his age.
The bad bank-note, which has been circulating freely from hand to hand, no sooner comes under the scrutiny of a sharp-eyed functionary of the bank than it is denounced and branded; and so Culdufif would speedily have been treated by any one of those keen men who, as Ministers, grow to acquire a knowledge of human nature as thorough as of the actual events of the time.
The world at large, however, had not this estimate of him. They read of him as a special envoy here, an extraordinary minister there, now negotiating a secret treaty, now investing a Pasha of Egypt with the Bath; and they deemed him not only a trusty servant of the Crown, but a skilled negotiator, a deep and accomplished diplomatist.
He was a little short-sighted, and it enabled him to pass objectionable people without causing offence. He was slightly deaf, and it gave him an air of deference in conversation which many were charmed with; for whenever he failed to catch what was said, his smile was perfectly captivating. It was assent, but dashed with a sort of sly flattery, as though it was to the speaker's ingenuity he yielded, as much as to the force of the conviction.
He was a great favorite with women. Old ladies regarded him as a model of good ton; younger ones discovered other qualities in him that amused them as much. His life had been anything but blameless, but he had contrived to make the world believe he was more sinned against than sinning, and that every mischance that befell him came of that unsuspecting nature and easy disposition of which even all his experience of life could not rob him.
Cutbill read him thoroughly; but though Lord Culdufif saw this, it did not prevent him trying all his little pretty devices of pleasing on the man of culverts and cuttings. In fact, he seemed to feel that though he could not bring down the bird, it was better not to spoil his gun by a change of cartridge, and so he fired away his usual little pleasantries, well aware that none of them were successful.
He had now been three days with the Bramleighs, and certainly had won the suffrages, though in different degrees, of them all. He had put himself so frankly and unreservedly in Colonel Bramleigh's hands about the coal-mine, candidly confessing the whole thing was new to him, he was a child in money matters, that the banker was positively delighted with him.
With Augustus he had talked politics confidentially,—not questions of policy nor statecraft, not matters of legislation or government, but the more subtle and ingenious points as to what party a young man entering life ought to join, what set he should attach himself to, and what line he should take to insure future distinction and office. He was well up in the gossip of the House, and knew who was disgusted with such an one, and why So-and-so “would n't stand it” any longer.
To Temple Bramleigh he was charming. Of the “line,” as they love to call it, he knew positively everything. Nor was it merely how this or that legation was conducted, how this man got on with his chief, or why that other had asked to be transferred; but he knew all the mysterious goings-on of that wonderful old repository they call “the Office.” “That's what you must look to, Bramleigh,” he would say, clapping him on the shoulder. “The men who make plenipos and envoys are not in the Cabinet, nor do they dine at Osborne; they are fellows in seedy black, with brown umbrellas, who cross the Green Park every morning about eleven o'clock, and come back over the self-same track by six of an evening. Staid old dogs, with crape on their hats, and hard lines round their mouths, fond of fresh caviare from Russia, and much given to cursing the messengers.”
He was, in a word, the incarnation of a very well-bred selfishness, that had learned how much it redounds to a man's personal comfort that he is popular, and that even a weak swimmer who goes with the tide makes a better figure than the strongest and bravest who attempts to stem the current. He was, in his way, a keen observer; and a certain haughty tone, a kind of self-assertion, in Marion's manner, so distinguished her from her sister, that he set Cutbill to ascertain if it had any other foundation than mere temperament; and the wily agent was not long in learning that a legacy of twenty thousand pounds in her own absolute right from her mother's side accounted for these pretensions.
“I tell you, Cutty, it 's only an old diplomatist like myself would have detected the share that bank debentures had in that girl's demeanor. Confess, sir, it was a clever hit.”
“It was certainly neat, my Lord.”
“It was more, Cutty; it was deep,—downright deep. I saw where the idiosyncrasy stopped, and where the dividends came in.”
Cutbill smiled an approving smile, and his Lordship turned to the glass over the chimney-piece and looked admiringly at himself.
“Was it twenty thousand you said?” asked he, indolently.
“Yes, my Lord, twenty. Her father will probably give her as much more. Harding told me yesterday that all the younger children are to have share and share alike,—no distinction made between sons and daughters.”
“So that she 'll have what a Frenchman would call 'un million de dot.'”
“Just about what we want, my Lord, to start our enterprise.”
“Ah, yes. I suppose that would do; but we shall do this by a company, Cutty. Have you said anything to Bramleigh yet on the subject?”
“Nothing further than what I told you yesterday. I gave him the papers with the surveys and the specifications, and he said he 'd look over them this morning, and that I might drop in upon him to-night in the library after ten. It is the time he likes best for a little quiet chat.”
“He seems a very cautious, I 'd almost say a timid man.”
“The city men are all like that, my Lord. They 're always cold enough in entering on a project, though they'll go rashly on after they've put their money in it.”
“What's the eldest son?”
“A fool,—just a fool. He urged his father to contest a county, to lay a claim for a peerage. They lost the election and lost their money; but Augustus Bramleigh persists in thinking that the party are still their debtors.”
“Very hard to make Ministers believe that,” said Culduff, with a grin. “A vote in the House is like a bird in the hand. The second fellow, Temple, is a poor creature.”
“Ain't he? Not that he thinks so.”
“No; they never do,” said Culduff, caressing his whiskers, and looking pleasantly at himself in the glass. “They see one or two men of mark in their career, and they fancy—Heaven knows why—that they must be like them; that identity of pursuit implies equality of intellect; and so these creatures spread out their little sails, and imagine they are going to make a grand voyage.”
“But Miss Bramleigh told me yesterday you had a high opinion of her brother Temple.”
“I believe I said so,” said he, with a soft smile. “One says these sort of things every day, irresponsibly, Cutty, irresponsibly, just as one gives his autograph, but would think twice before signing his name on a stamped paper.”
Mr. Cutbill laughed at this sally, and seemed by the motion of his lips as though he were repeating it to himself for future retail; but in what spirit, it would not be safe perhaps to inquire.
Though Lord Culduff did not present himself at the family break fast-table, and but rarely appeared at luncheon, pretexting that his mornings were always given up to business and letter-writing, he usually came down in the afternoon in some toilet admirably suited to the occasion, whatever it might be, of riding, driving, or walking. In fact, a mere glance at his Lordship's costume would have unmistakably shown whether a canter, the croquet lawn, or a brisk walk through the shrubberies were in the order of the day.
“Do you remember, Cutty,” said he, suddenly, “what was my engagement for this morning? I promised somebody to go somewhere and do something; and I 'll be shot if I can recollect.”
“I am totally unable to assist your Lordship,” said the other, with a smile. “The young men, I know, are out shooting, and Miss Eleanor Bramleigh is profiting by the snow to have a day's sledging. She proposed to me to join her, but I did n't see it.”
“Ah! I have it now, Cutty. I was to walk over to Portabandon, to return the curate's call. Miss Bramleigh was to come with me.”
“It was scarcely gallant, my Lord, to forget so charming a project,” said the other, slyly.
“Gallantry went out, Cutty, with slashed doublets. The height and the boast of our modern civilization is to make women our perfect equals, and to play the game of life with them on an absolutely equal footing.”
“Is that quite fair?”
“I protest I think it is. Except in a few rare instances, where the men unite to the hardier qualities of the masculine intelligence the nicer, finer, most susceptible instincts of the other sex,—the organization that more than any other touches on excellence,—except, I say, in these cases, the women have the best of it. Now what chance, I ask you, would you have, pitted against such a girl as the elder Bramleigh?”
“I 'm afraid a very poor one,” said Cutbill, with a look of deep humility.
“Just so, Cutty, a very poor one. I give you my word of honor I have learned more diplomacy beside the drawing-room fire than I ever acquired in the pages of the blue-books. You see it's a quite different school of fence they practise; the thrusts are different, and the guards are different. A day for furs essentially, a day for furs,” broke he in, as he drew on a coat lined with sable, and profusely braided and ornamented. “What was I saying? where were we?”
“You were talking of women, my Lord.”
“The faintest tint of scarlet in the under vest—it was a device of the Regent's in his really great day—is always effective in cold, bright, frosty weather. The tint is carried on to the cheek, and adds brilliancy to the eye. In duller weather a coral pin in the cravat will suffice; but, as David Wilkie used to say, 'Nature must have her bit of red.'”
“I wish you would finish what you were saying about women, my Lord. Your remarks were full of originality.”
“Finish! finish, Cutty! It would take as many volumes as the 'Abridgement of the Statutes' to contain one-half of what I could say about them; and, after all, it would be Sanscrit to you.” His Lordship now placed his hat on his head, slightly on one side. It was the “tigerism” of a past period, and which he could no more abandon than he could give up the jaunty swagger of his walk, or the bland smile which he kept ready for recognition.
“I have not, I rejoice to say, arrived at that time of life when I can affect to praise bygones; but I own, Cutty, they did everything much better five-and-twenty years ago than now. They dined better, they dressed better, they drove better, they turned out better in the field and in the park, and they talked better.”
“How do you account for this, my Lord?”
“Simply in this way, Cutty. We have lowered our standard in taste just as we have lowered our standard for the army. We take fellows five feet seven into grenadier companies now; that is, we admit into society men of mere wealth,—the banker, the brewer, the railway director, and the rest of them; and with these people we admit their ways, their tastes, their very expressions. I know it is said that we gain in breadth; yet, as I told Lord Cocklethorpe (the mot had its success),—what we gain in breadth, said I, we lose in height. Neat, Cutty, was n't it? As neat as a mot well can be in our clumsy language.”
And with this, and a familiar “Bye-bye,” he strolled away, leaving Cutbill to practise before the glass such an imitation of him as might serve, at some future time, to convulse with laughter a select and admiring audience.
CHAPTER XI. A WINTER DAY'S WALK
Lord Culduff and Marion set out for their walk. It was a sharp frosty morning, with a blue sky above and crisp snow beneath. We have already seen that his Lordship had not been inattentive to the charms of costume. Marion was no less so; her dark silk dress, looped over a scarlet petticoat, and a tasteful hat of black astracan, well suited the character of looks where the striking and brilliant were as conspicuous as dark eyes, long lashes, and a bright complexion could make them.
“I 'll take you by the shrubberies, my Lord, which is somewhat longer, but pleasanter walking; and, if you like it, we 'll come back by the hill path, which is much shorter.”
“The longer the road the more of your company, Miss Bramleigh. Therein lies my chief interest,” said he, bowing.
They talked away pleasantly, as they went along, of the country and the scenery, of which new glimpses continually presented themselves, and of the country people and their ways, so new to each of them. They agreed wonderfully on almost everything, but especially as to the character of the Irish,—so simple, so confiding, so trustful, so grateful for benefits, and so eager to be well governed! They knew it all, the whole complex web of Irish difficulty and English misrule was clear and plain before them; and then, as they talked, they gained a height from which the blue broad sea was visible, and thence descried a solitary sail afar off, that set them speculating on what the island might become when commerce and trade should visit her, and rich cargoes should cumber her quays, and crowd her harbors. Marion was strong in her knowledge of industrial resources; but as an accomplished aide-de-camp always rides a little behind his chief, so did she restrain her acquaintance with these topics, and keep them slightly to the rear of all his Lordship advanced. And then he grew confidential, and talked of coal, which ultimately led him to himself,—the theme of all he liked the best. And how differently did he talk now! What vigor and animation, what spirit did he not throw into his sketch! It was the story of a great man, unjustly, hardly dealt with, persecuted by an ungenerous rivalry, the victim of envy. For half, ay, for the tithe of what he had done, others had got their advancement in the peerage,—their blue ribbons and the rest of it; but Canning had been jealous of him, and the Duke was jealous of him, and Palmerston never liked him. “Of course,” he said, “these are things a man buries in his own breast. Of all the sorrows one encounters in life, the slights are those he last confesses; how I came to speak of them now I can't imagine—can you?” and he turned fully towards her, and saw that she blushed and cast down her eyes at the question.
“But, my Lord,” said she, evading the reply, “you give me the idea of one who would not readily succumb to an injustice. Am I right in my reading of you?”
“I trust and hope you are,” said he, haughtily; “and it is my pride to think I have inspired that impression on so brief an acquaintance.”
“It is my own temper, too,” she added. “You may convince, you cannot coerce me.”
“I wish I might try the former,” said he, in a tone of much meaning.
“We agree in so many things, my Lord,” said she, laughingly, “that there is little occasion for your persuasive power. There, do you see that smoke-wreath yonder? That's from the cottage where we're going.”
“I wish I knew where we were going,” said he, with a sigh of wonderful tenderness.
“To Roseneath, my Lord. I told you the L'Estranges lived there.”
“Yes; but it was not that I meant,” added he, feelingly.
“And a pretty spot it is,” continued she, purposely misunderstanding him; “so sheltered and secluded. By the way, what do you think of the curate's sister? She is very beautiful, isn't she?”
“Am I to say the truth?”
“Of course you are.”
“I mean, may I speak as though we knew each other very well, and could talk in confidence together?”
“That is what I mean.”
“And wish?” added he.
“Well, and wish, if you will supply the word.”
“If I am to be frank, then, I don't admire her.”
“Not think her beautiful?”
“Yes; there is some beauty,—a good deal of beauty, if you like; but somehow it is not allied with that brightness that seems to accentuate beauty. She is tame and cold.”
“I think men generally accuse her of coquetry.”
“And there is coquetry, too; but of that character the French call minauderie, the weapon of a very small enchantress, I assure you.”
“You are, then, for the captivations that give no quarter?” said she, smiling.
“It is a glory to be so vanquished,” said he, heroically.
“My sister declared the other night, after Julia had sung that barcarolle, that you were fatally smitten.”
“And did you concur in the judgment?” asked he, tenderly.
“At first, perhaps I did; but when I came to know you a little better—”
“After our talk on the terrace?”
“And even before that. When Julia was singing for you,—clearly for you, there was no disguise in the matter,—and I whispered you, 'What courage you have!' you said, 'I have been so often under fire'—from that instant I knew you.”
“Knew me—how far?”
“Enough to know that it was not to such captivations you would yield,—that you had seen a great deal of that sort of thing.”
“Oh, have I not!”
“Perhaps not always unscathed,” said she, with a sly glance.
“I will scarcely go that far,” replied he, with the air of a man on the best possible terms with himself. “They say he is the best rider who has had the most falls. At least, it may be said that he who has met no disasters has encountered few perils.”
“Now, my Lord, you can see the cottage completely. Is it not very pretty, and very picturesque, and is there not something very interesting—touching almost, in the thought of beauty and captivation—dwelling in this un-travelled wilderness?”
He almost gave a little shudder, as his eye followed the line of the rugged mountain, till it blended with the bleak and shingly shore on which the waves were now washing in measured plash,—the one sound in the universal silence around.
“Nothing but being desperately in love could make this solitude endurable,” said he at last.
“Why not try that resource, my Lord? I could almost promise you that the young lady who lives yonder is quite ready to be adored and worshipped, and all that sort of thing; and it would be such a boon on the frosty days, when the ground is too hard for hunting, to have this little bit of romance awaiting you.”
“Coquetry and French cookery pall upon a man who has lived all his life abroad, and he actually longs for a little plain diet, in manners as well as meals.”
“And then you have seen all the pretty acts of our very pretty neighbor so much better done?”
“Done by real artists,” added he.
“Just so. Amateurship is always a poor thing. This is the way, my Lord. If you will follow me, I will be your guide here; the path here is very slippery, and you must take care how you go.”
“When I fall, it shall be at your feet,” said he, with his hand on his heart.
As they gained the bottom of the little ravine down which the footpath lay, they found Julia, hoe in hand, at work in the garden before the door. Her dark woollen dress and her straw hat were only relieved in color by a blue ribbon round her throat, but she was slightly flushed by exercise, and a little flurried, perhaps, by the surprise of seeing them, and her beauty, this time, certainly lacked nothing of that brilliancy which Lord Culduff had pronounced it deficient in.
“My brother will be so sorry to have missed you, my Lord,” said she, leading the way into the little drawing-room, where, amidst many signs of narrow fortune, there were two or three of those indications which vouch for cultivated tastes and pleasures.
“I had told Lord Culduff so much about your cottage, Julia,” said Marion, “that he insisted on coming to see it, without even apprising you of his intention.”
“It is just as well,” said she artlessly. “A little more or less sun gives the only change in its appearance. Lord Culduff sees it now as it looks nearly every day.”
“And very charming that is,” said he, walking to the window and looking out. And then he asked the name of a headland, and how a small rocky island was called, and on which side lay the village of Portshandon, and at what distance was the church, the replies to which seemed to afford him unmixed satisfaction; for, as he resumed his seat, he muttered several times to himself, “Very delightful indeed; very pleasing in every way!”
“Lord Culduff was asking me as he came-along,” said Marion, “whether I thought the solitude—I think he called it the savagery of this spot—was likely to be better borne by one native to such wildness, or by one so graced and gifted as yourself, and I protest he puzzled me.”
“I used to think it very lonely when I came here first, but I believe I should be sorry to leave it now,” said Julia, calmly.
“There, my Lord,” said Marion, “you are to pick your answer out of that.”
“As to those resources which you are so flattering as to call my gifts and graces,” said Julia, laughing, “such of them at least as lighten the solitude were all learned here, I never took to gardening before; I never fed poultry.”
“Oh, Julia! have mercy on our illusions!”
“You must tell me what they are, before I can spare them. The curate's sister has no claim to be thought an enchanted princess.”
“It is all enchantment!” said Lord Culduff, who had only very imperfectly caught what she said.
“Then, I suppose, my Lord,” said Marion, haughtily, “I ought to rescue you before the spell is complete, as I came here in quality of guide.” And she rose as she spoke. “The piano has not been opened to-day, Julia. I take it you seldom sing of a morning?”
“Very seldom, indeed.”
“So I told Lord Culduff; but I promised him his recompense in the evening. You are coming to us to-morrow, ain't you?”
“I fear not. I think George made our excuses. We are to have Mr. Longworth and a French friend of his here with us.”
“You see, my Lord, what a gay neighborhood we have; here is a rival dinner-party,” said Marion.
“There's no question of a dinner; they come to tea, I assure you,” said Julia, laughing.
“No, my Lord, it's useless; quite hopeless. I assure you she 'll not sing for you of a morning.” This speech was addressed to Lord Culduff, as he was turning over some music-books on the piano.
“Have I your permission to look at these?” said he to Julia, as he opened a book of drawings in water-colors.
“Of course, my Lord. They are mere sketches taken in the neighorhood here, and, as you will see, very hurriedly done.”
“And have you such coast scenery as this?” asked he, in some astonishment, while he held up a rocky headland of several hundred feet, out of the caves at whose base a tumultuous sea was tumbling.
“I could show you finer and bolder bits than even that.”
“Do you hear, my Lord?” said Marion, in a low tone, only audible to himself. “The fair Julia is offering to be your guide. I 'm afraid it is growing late. One does forget time at this cottage. It was only the last day I came here I got scolded for being late at dinner.”
And now ensued one of those little bustling scenes of shawling and embracing with which young ladies separate. They talked together, and laughed, and kissed, and answered half-uttered sentences, and even seemed after parting to have something more to say; they were by turns sad, and playful, and saucy—all of these moods being duly accompanied by graceful action, and a chance display of a hand or foot, as it might be, and then they parted.
“Well, my Lord,” said Marion, as they ascended the steep path that led homewards, “what do you say now? Is Julia as cold and impassive as you pronounced her, or are you ungrateful enough to ignore fascinations all displayed and developed for your own especial captivation?”
“It was very pretty coquetry, all of it,” said he, smiling. “Her eyelashes are even longer than I thought them.”
“I saw that you remarked them, and she was gracious enough to remain looking at the drawing sufficiently long to allow you full time for the enjoyment.”
The steep and rugged paths were quite as much as Lord Culduff could manage without talking, and he toiled along after her in silence, till they gained the beach.
“At last a bit of even ground,” exclaimed he, with a sigh.
“You'll think nothing of the hill, my Lord, when you've come it three or four times,” said she, with a malicious twinkle of the eye.
“Which is precisely what I have no intention of doing.”
“What! not cultivate the acquaintance so auspiciously opened?”
“Not at this price,” said he, looking at his splashed boots.
“And that excursion, that ramble, or whatever be the name for it, you were to take together?”
“It is a bliss, I am afraid, I must deny myself.”
“You are wrong, my Lord,—very wrong. My brothers at least assure me that Julia is charming en tête-à-tête. Indeed, Augustus says one does not know her at all till you have passed an hour or two in such confidential intimacy. He says 'she comes out'—whatever that may be—wonderfully.”
“Oh, she comes out, does she?” said he, caressing his whiskers.
“That was his phrase for it. I take it to mean that she ventures to talk with a freedom more common on the Continent than in these islands. Is that coming out, my Lord?”
“Well, I half suspect it is,” said he, smiling faintly.
“And I suppose men like that?”
“I 'm afraid, my dear Miss Bramleigh,” said he, with a mock air of deploring—“I 'm afraid that in these degenerate days men are very prone to like whatever gives them least trouble in everything, and if a woman will condescend to talk to us on our own topics, and treat them pretty much in our own way, we like it, simply because it diminishes the distance between us, and saves us that uphill clamber we are obliged to take when you insist upon our scrambling up to the high level you live in.”
“It is somewhat of an ignoble confession you have made there,” said she, haughtily.
“I know it—I feel it—I deplore it,” said he, affectedly.
“If men will, out of mere indolence—no matter,” said she, biting her lip. “I 'll not say what I was going to say.”
“Pray do. I beseech you finish what you have so well begun.”
“Were I to do so, my Lord,” said she, gravely, “it might finish more than that. It might at least go some way towards finishing our acquaintanceship. I 'm sorely afraid you 'd not have forgiven me had you heard me out.”
“I 'd never have forgiven myself, if I were the cause of it.”
For some time they walked along in silence, and now the great house came into view—its windows all glowing and glittering in the blaze of a setting sun, while a faint breeze lazily moved the heavy folds of the enormous flag that floated over the high tower.
“I call that a very princely place,” said he, stopping to admire it.
“What a caprice to have built it in such a spot,” said she. “The country people were not far wrong when they called it Bishop's Folly.”
“They gave it that name, did they?”
“Yes, my Lord. It is one of the ways in which humble folk reconcile themselves to lowly fortune; they ridicule their betters.” And now she gave a little low laugh to herself, as if some unuttered notion had just amused her.
“What made you smile?” asked he.
“A very absurd fancy struck me.”
“Let me hear it. Why not let me share in its oddity?”
“It might not amuse you as much as it amused me.”
“I am the only one who can decide that point.”
“Then I 'm not so certain it might not annoy you.”
“I can assure you on that head,” said he, gallantly.
“Well, then, you shall hear it. The caprice of a great divine has, so to say, registered itself yonder, and will live, so long as stone and mortar endure, as Bishop's Folly; and I was thinking how strange it would be if another caprice just as unaccountable were to give a name to a less pretentious edifice, and a certain charming cottage be known to posterity as the Viscount's Folly. You're not angry with me, are you?”
“I'd be very angry indeed with you, with myself, and with the whole world, if I thought such a casualty a possibility.”
“I assure you, when I said it I did n't believe it, my Lord,” said she, looking at him with much graciousness; “and, indeed, I would never have uttered the impertinence if you had not forced me. There, there goes the first bell; we shall have short time to dress.” And, with a very meaning smile and a familiar gesture of her hand, she tripped up the steps and disappeared.
“I think I 'm all right in that quarter,” was his lordship's reflection as he mounted the stairs to his room.
CHAPTER XII. AN EVENING BELOW AND ABOVE STAIRS.
It was not very willingly that Mr. Cutbill left the drawing-room, where he had been performing a violoncello accompaniment to one of the young ladies in the execution of something very Mendelssohnian and profoundly puzzling to the uninitiated in harmonics. After the peerage he loved counterpoint; and it was really hard to tear himself away from passages of almost piercing shrillness, or those still more suggestive moanings of a double bass, to talk stock and share-list with Colonel Bramleigh in the library. Resisting all the assurances that “papa wouldn't mind it, that any other time would do quite as well,” and such like, he went up to his room for his books and papers, and then repaired to his rendezvous.
“I 'm sorry to take you away from the drawing-room, Mr. Cutbill,” said Bramleigh, as he entered; “but I am half expecting a summons to town, and could not exactly be sure of an opportunity to talk over this matter on which Lord Culduff is very urgent to have my opinion.”
“It is not easy, I confess, to tear oneself away from such society. Your daughters are charming musicians, Colonel. Miss Bramleigh's style is as brilliant as Meyer's; and Miss Eleanor has a delicacy of touch I have never heard surpassed.”
“This is very flattering, coming from so consummate a judge as yourself.”
“All the teaching in the world will not impart that sensitive organization which sends some tones into the heart like the drip, drip of water on a heated brow. Oh, dear! music is too much for me; it totally subverts all my sentiments. I 'm not fit for business after it, Colonel Bramleigh, that's the fact.”
“Take a glass of that 'Bra Mouton.' You will find it good. It has been eight-and-thirty years in my cellar, and I never think of bringing it out except for a connoisseur in wine.”
“Nectar,—positively nectar,” said he, smacking his lips. “You are quite right not to give this to the public. They would drink it like a mere full-bodied Bordeaux. That velvety softness—that subdued strength, faintly recalling Burgundy, and that delicious bouquet, would all be clean thrown away on most people. I declare, I believe a refined palate is just as rare as a correct ear; don't you think so?”
“I'm glad you like the wine. Don't spare it. The cellar is not far off. Now then, let us see. These papers contain Mr. Stebbing's report. I have only glanced my eye over it, but it seems like every other report. They have, I think, a stereotyped formula for these things. They all set out with their bit of geological learning; but you know, Mr. Cutbill, far better than I can tell you, you know sandstone doesn't always mean coal?”
“If it does n't, it ought to,” said Cutbill, with a laugh, for the wine had made him jolly, and familiar besides.
“There are many things in this world which ought to be, but which, unhappily, are not,” said Bramleigh, in a tone evidently meant to be half-reproachful. “And as I have already observed to you, mere geological formation is not sufficient. We want the mineral, sir; we want the fact.”
“There you have it; there it is for you,” said Cutbill, pointing to a somewhat bulky parcel in brown paper in the centre of the table.
“This is not real coal, Mr. Cutbill,” said Bramleigh, as he tore open the covering, and exposed a black misshapen lump. “You would not call this real coal?”
“I 'd not call it Swansea nor Cardiff, Colonel, any more than I 'd say the claret we had after dinner to-day was 'Mouton;' but still I'd call each of them very good in their way.”
“I return you my thanks, sir, in the name of my wine-merchant. But to come to the coal question—what could you do with this?”
“What could I do with it? Scores of things—if I had only enough of it. Burn it in grates—cook with it—smelt metals with it—burn lime with it—drive engines, not locomotives, but stationaries, with it. I tell you what, Colonel Bramleigh,” said he, with the air of a man who was asserting what he would not suffer to be gainsaid. “It's coal quite enough to start a company on; coal within the meaning of the act, as the lawyers would say.”
“You appear to have rather loose notions of joint-stock enterprises, Mr. Cutbill,” said Bramleigh, haughtily.
“I must say, Colonel, they do not invariably inspire me with sentiments of absolute veneration.”
“I hope, however, you feel, sir, that in any enterprise—in any undertaking—where my name is to stand forth, either as promoter or abetter, that the world is to see in such guarantee the assurance of solvency and stability.”
“That is precisely what made me think of you; precisely what led me to say to Culduff, 'Bramleigh is the man to carry the scheme out.'”
Now the familiarity that spoke of Culduff thus unceremoniously in great part reconciled Bramleigh to hear his own name treated in like fashion, all the more that it was in a quotation; but still he winced under the cool impertinence of the man, and grieved to think how far his own priceless wine had contributed towards it. The Colonel therefore merely bowed his acknowledgment and was silent.
“I'll be frank with you,” said Cutbill, emptying the last of the decanter into his glass as he spoke. “I 'll be frank with you. We 've got coal; whether it be much or little, there it is. As to quality, as I said before, it is n't Cardiff. It won't set the Thames on fire, any more than the noble lord that owns it; but coal it is, and it will burn as coal—and yield gas as coal—and make coke as coal, and who wants more? As to working it himself, Culduff might just as soon pretend he 'd pay the National Debt. He is over head and ears already; he has been in bondage with the children of Israel this many a day, and if he was n't a peer he could not show; but that's neither here nor there. To set the concern a-going we must either have a loan or a company. I 'm for a company.”
“You are for a company,” reiterated Bramleigh, slowly, as he fixed his eyes calmly but steadily on him.
“Yes, I 'm for a company. With a company, Bramleigh,” said he, as he tossed off the last glass of wine, “there 's always more of P. E.”
“Of what?”
“Of P. E.—Preliminary expenses! There 's a commission to inquire into this, and a deputation to investigate that. No men on earth dine like deputations. I never knew what dining was till I was named on a deputation. It was on sewerage. And didn't the champagne flow! There was a viaduct to be constructed to lead into the Thames, and I never think of that viaduct without the taste of turtle in my mouth, and a genial feeling of milk-punch all over me. The assurance offices say that there was scarcely such a thing known as a gout premium in the City till the joint-stock companies came in; now they have them every day.”
“Revenons à nos moutons, as the French say, Mr. Cutbill,” said Bramleigh, gravely.
“If it's a pun you mean, and that we 're to have another bottle of the same, I second the motion.”
Bramleigh gave a sickly smile as he rang the bell, but neither the jest nor the jester much pleased him.
“Bring another bottle of 'Mouton,' Drayton, and fresh glasses,” said he, as the butler appeared.
“I 'll keep mine; it is warm and mellow,” said Cutbill. “The only fault with that last bottle was the slight chill on it.”
“You have been frank with me, Mr. Cutbill,” said Bramleigh, as soon as the servant withdrew, “and I will be no less so with you. I have retired from the world of business—I have quitted the active sphere where I have passed some thirty odd years, and have surrendered ambition, either of money-making, or place, or rank, and come over here with one single desire, one single wish—I want to see what's to be done for Ireland.”
Cutbill lifted his glass to his lips, but scarcely in time to hide the smile of incredulous drollery which curled them, and which the other's quick glance detected.
“There is nothing to sneer at, sir, in what I said, and I will repeat my words. I want to see what's to be done for Ireland.”
“It 's very laudable in you, there can be no doubt,” said Cutbill, gravely.
“I am well aware of the peril incurred by addressing to men like yourself, Mr. Cutbill, any opinions—any sentiments—which savor of disinterestedness, or—or—”
“Poetry,” suggested Cutbill.
“No, sir; patriotism was the word I sought for. And it is not by any means necessary that a man should be an Irishman to care for Ireland. I think, sir, there is nothing in that sentiment at least which will move your ridicule.”
“Quite the reverse. I have drunk 'Prosperity to Ireland' at public dinners for twenty years; and in very good liquor too, occasionally.”
“I am happy to address a gentleman so graciously disposed to listen to me,” said Bramleigh, whose face was now crimson with anger. “There is only one thing more to be wished for—that he would join some amount of trustfulness to his politeness; with that he would be perfect.”
“Here goes, then, for perfection,” cried Cutbill, gayly. “I 'm ready from this time to believe anything you tell me.”
“Sir, I will not draw largely on the fund you so generously place at my disposal. I will simply ask you to believe me a man of honor.”
“Only that? No more than that?”
“No more, I pledge you my word.”
“My dear Bramleigh, your return for the income-tax is enough to prove that. Nothing short of high integrity ever possessed as good a fortune as yours.”
“You are speaking of my fortune, Mr. Cutbill, not of my character.”
“Ain't they the same? Ain't they one and the same? Show me your dividends, and I will show you your disposition—that's as true as the Bible.”
“I will not follow you into this nice inquiry. I will simply return to where I started from, and repeat, I want to do something for Ireland.”
“Do it, in God's name; and I hope you 'll like it when it 's done. I have known some half-dozen men in my time who had the same sort of ambition. One of them tried a cotton-mill on the Liffey, and they burned him down. Another went in for patent fuel, and they shot his steward. A third tried Galway marble, and they shot himself. But after all there 's more honor where there 's more danger, What, may I ask, is your little game for Ireland?”
“I begin to suspect that a better time for business, Mr. Cutbill, might be an hour after breakfast. Shall we adjourn till to-morrow morning?”
“I am completely at your orders. For my own part, I never felt clearer in my life than I do this minute. I 'm ready to go into coal with you: from the time of sinking the shaft to riddling the slack, my little calculations are all made. I could address a board of managing directors here as I sit; and say, what for dividend, what for repairs, what for a reserved fund, and what for the small robberies.”
The unparalleled coolness of the man had now pushed Bramleigh's patience to its last limit; but a latent fear of what such a fellow might be in his enmity, restrained him and compelled him to be cautious.
“What sum do you think the project will require, Mr. Cutbill?”
“I think about eighty thousand; but I'd say one hundred and fifty—it's always more respectable. Small investments are seldom liked; and then the margin—the margin is broader.”
“Yes, certainly; the margin is much broader.”
“Fifty-pound shares, with a call of five every three months, will start us. The chief thing is to begin with a large hand.” Here he made a wide sweep of his arm.
“For coal like that yonder,” said Bramleigh, pointing to the specimen, “you 'd not get ten shillings the ton.”
“Fifteen—fifteen. I'd make it the test of a man's patriotism to use it. I 'd get the Viceroy to burn it, and the Chief Secretary, and the Archbishop, and Father Cullen. I 'd heat St. Patrick's with it, and the national schools. There could be no disguise about it; like the native whiskey, it would be known by the smell of the smoke.”
“You have drawn up some sort of prospectus?”
“Some sort of prospectus! I think I have. There's a document there on the table might go before the House of Commons this minute; and the short and the long of it is, Bramleigh”—here he crossed his arms on the table, and dropped his voice to a tone of great confidence—“it is a good thing—a right good thing. There 's coal there, of one kind or other, for five-and-twenty years, perhaps more. The real, I may say, the only difficulty of the whole scheme will be to keep old Culduff from running off with all the profits. As soon as the money comes rolling in, he 'll set off shelling it out; he 's just as wasteful as he was thirty years ago.”
“That will be impossible when a company is once regularly formed.”
“I know that,—I know that; but men of his stamp say, 'We know nothing about trade. We have n't been bred up to office-stools and big ledgers; and when we want money, we get it how we can.'”
“We can't prevent him selling out or mortgaging his shares. You mean, in short, that he should not be on the direction?” added he.
“That's it,—that's exactly it,” said Cutbill, joyously.
“Will he like that? Will he submit to it?”
“He 'll like whatever promises to put him most speedily into funds; he'll submit to whatever threatens to stop the supplies. Don't you know these men better than I do, who pass lives of absenteeism from their country; how little they care how or whence money comes, provided they get it? They neither know, nor want to know, about good or bad seasons, whether harvests are fine, or trade profitable; their one question is, 'Can you answer my draft at thirty-one days?'”
“Ah, yes; there is too much, far too much, of what you say in the world,” said Bramleigh, sighing.
“These are not the men who want to do something for Ireland,” said the other, quizzically.
“Sir, it may save us both some time and temper if I tell you I have never been 'chaffed.'”
“That sounds to me like a man saying, I have never been out in the rain; but as it is so, there 's no more to be said.”
“Nothing, sir. Positively nothing on that head.”
“Nor indeed on any other. Men in my line of life could n't get on without it. Chaff lubricates business just the way grease oils machinery. There would be too much friction in life without chaff, Bramleigh.”
“I look upon it as directly the opposite. I regard it as I would a pebble getting amongst the wheels, and causing jar and disturbance, sir.”
“Well, then,” said Cutbill, emptying the last drop into his glass, “I take it I need not go over all the details you will find in those papers. There are plans, and specifications, and estimates, and computations, showing what we mean to do, and how; and as I really could add nothing to the report, I suppose I may wish you a good night.”
“I am very sorry, Mr. Cutbill, if my inability to be jocular should deprive me of the pleasure of your society; but there are still many points on which I desire to be informed.”
“It's all there. If you were to bray me in a mortar you could n't get more out of me than you 'll find in those papers; and whether it 's the heat of the room, or the wine, or the subject, but I am awfully sleepy,” and he backed this assurance with a hearty yawn.
“Well, sir, I must submit to your dictation. I will try and master these details before I go to bed, and will take some favorable moment to-morrow to talk them over.”
“That's said like a sensible man,” said Cutbill, clapping him familiarly on the shoulder, and steadying himself the while; for as he stood up to go, he found that the wine had been stronger than he suspected. “When we see a little more of each other,” said he, in the oracular tone of a man who had drunk too much; “when we see a little more of each other, we 'll get on famously. You know the world, and I know the world. You have had your dealings with men, and I have had my dealings with men, and we know what's what. Ain't I right, Bramleigh?”
“I have no doubt there is much truth in what you say.”
“Truth, truth, it's true as gospel! There's only one thing, however, to be settled between us. Each must make his little concession with reci-procity—reci-procity, ain't it?”
“Quite so; but I don't see your meaning.”
“Here it is, then, Bramleigh; here's what I mean. If we 're to march together we must start fair. No man is to have more baggage than his neighbor. If I 'm to give up chaff, do you see, you must give up humbug. If I 'm not to have my bit of fun, old boy, you 're not to come over me about doing something for Ireland, that's all,” and with this he lounged out, banging the door after him as he went.
Mr. Cutbill, as he went to his room, had a certain vague suspicion that he had drunk more wine than was strictly necessary, and that the liquor was not impossibly stronger than he had suspected. He felt, too, in the same vague way, that there had been a passage of arms between his host and himself; but as to what it was about, and who was the victor, he had not the shadow of a conception.
Neither did his ordinary remedy of pouring the contents of his water-jug over his head aid him on this occasion.
“I'm not a bit sleepy; nonsense!” muttered he, “so I'll go and see what they are doing in the smoking-room.”
Here he found the three young men of the house in that semi-thoughtful dreariness which is supposed to be the captivation of tobacco; as if the mass of young Englishmen needed anything to deepen the habitual gloom of their natures, or thicken the sluggish apathy that follows them into all inactivity.
“How jolly,” cried Cutbill, as he entered. “I 'll be shot if I believed as I came up the stairs that there was any one here. You haven't even got brandy and seltzer.”
“If you touch that bell, they 'll bring it,” said Augustus, languidly.
“Some Moselle for me,” said Temple, as the servant entered.
“I'm glad you've come, Cutty,” cried Jack; “as old Kemp used to say, anything is better than a dead calm; even a mutiny.”
“What an infernal old hurdy-gurdy! Why haven't you a decent piano here, if you have one at all?” said Cutbill, as he ran his hands over the keys of a discordant old instrument that actually shook on its legs as he struck the chords.
“I suspect it was mere accident brought it here,” said Augustus. “It was invalided out of the girls' schoolroom, and sent up here to be got rid of.”
“Sing us something, Cutty,” said Jack; “it will be a real boon at this moment.”
“I'll sing like a grove of nightingales for you, when I have wet my lips; but I am parched in the mouth, like a Cape parrot. I 've had two hours of your governor below stairs. Very dry work, I promise you.”
“Did he offer you nothing to drink?” asked Jack.
“Yes, we had two bottles of very tidy claret. He called it 'Mouton.'”
“By Jove!” said Augustus, “you must have been high in the governor's favor to be treated to his 'Bra Mouton.'”
“We had a round with the gloves, nevertheless,” said Cutbill, “and exchanged some ugly blows. I don't exactly know about what or how it began, or even how it ended; but I know there was a black eye somewhere. He's passionate, rather.”
“He has the spirit that should animate every gentleman,” said Temple.
“That's exactly what I have. I 'll stand anything, I don't care what, if it be fun. Say it's a 'joke,' and you'll never see me show bad temper; but if any fellow tries it on with me because he fancies himself a swell, or has a handle to his name, he 'll soon discover his mistake. Old Culduff began that way. You 'd laugh if you saw how he floundered out of the swamp afterwards.”
“Tell us about it, Cutty,” said Jack, encouragingly.
“I beg to say I should prefer not hearing anything which might, even by inference, reflect on a person holding Lord Culduff's position in my profession,” said Temple, haughtily.
“Is that the quarter the wind 's in?” asked Cutbill, with a not very sober expression in his face.
“Sing us a song, Cutty. It will be better than all this sparring,” said Jack.
“What shall it be?” said Cutbill, seating himself at the piano, and running over the keys with no small skill. “Shall I describe my journey to Ireland?”
“By all means let's hear it,” said Augustus.
“I forget how it goes. Indeed, some verses I was making on the curate's sister have driven the others out of my head.”
Jack drew nigh, and leaning over his shoulder, whispered something in his ear.
“What!” cried Cutbill, starting up; “he says he'll pitch me neck and crop out of the window.”
“Not unless you deserve it—add that,” said Jack, sternly.
“I must have an apology for those words, sir. I shall insist on your recalling them, and expressing your sincere regret for having ever used them.”
“So you shall, Cutty. I completely forgot that this tower was ninety feet high; but I 'll pitch you downstairs, which will do as well.”
There was a terrible gleam of earnestness in Jack's eye as he spoke this laughingly, which appalled Cutbill far more than any bluster, and he stammered out, “Let us have no practical jokes; they're bad taste. You'd be a great fool, admiral”—this was a familiarity he occasionally used with Jack—“you 'd be a great fool to quarrel with me. I can do more with the fellows at Somerset House than most men going; and when the day comes that they 'll give you a command, and you 'll want twelve or fifteen hundred to set you afloat, Tom Cutbill is not the worst man to know in the City. Not to say, that if things go right down here, I could help you to something very snug in our mine. Won't we come out strong then, eh?”
Here he rattled over the keys once more; and after humming to himself for a second or two, burst out with a rattling merry air, to which he sung,—