STAGE II.
CHAPTER I.
WHAT MR. NETLEY SAID.
A LONG, dree journey by that very unsavoury route to and from the Continent—Rotterdam and Harwich—and Jerome Wellfield, on the morning after his parting from his sister and sweetheart, found himself in London. He had nothing to do there—no business in the great city—no means, no right to take any pleasure in the same. He made his way from the Liverpool Street Station to that at Euston Square, where he found he had some two hours to wait before the express to Irkford should start.
Who does not know the dreariness of such hours of waiting, weary, travel-worn and alone, in some great wilderness of a city station? They were the two most dismal hours he had ever passed.
At last, at eleven in the forenoon, the train to Manchester started. Jerome cast himself into a second-class compartment, and with weary eyes saw, when he was not half-dozing, ‘the happy autumn fields’ through which the express rushed smoothly and swiftly, and with slackened speed at last rolled into that cheering and inspiriting terminus, the London Road Station, Manchester.
From Ems—even from Elberthal—to Manchester! The contrast just flashed across his mind as he alighted.
A clerk presently accosted him inquiringly, ‘Mr. Wellfield?’ and then gave him a note which he carried. The note was a kindly, pleasant one from Mr. Netley, begging him to go to his house, and make it his headquarters until his business in Manchester was settled. Business prevented him from coming to the station himself and taking his guest home, but he would be in to dinner at seven. The address was given, and he hoped his clerk would bring word that Mr. Wellfield was on his way to ‘Birch Lodge.’
With the sensation that this was true friendliness, Jerome bade the youth tell Mr. Netley that he accepted his invitation with many thanks, and, getting into a cab, gave the address, and was driven to Mr. Netley’s house—his ‘box,’ as he called it in his note.
For a bachelor’s box it was remarkably roomy and comfortable. The housekeeper had evidently expected the guest, and led him upstairs to the room prepared for him. Declining her offer of refreshments, he was left alone, with exactly two hours on his hands before dinner-time. Part of the time he employed in writing that letter to Sara which has already been spoken of—the rest in meditations, not particularly agreeable, on his ‘present condition and future prospects.’ During the few hours he had been in England he had felt a distinctly stronger chagrin and disappointment at the idea of the utter loss of home than he had yet experienced. He could not understand nor account for this feeling, but it was there, and it was strong. He felt a sudden rush of indignation at the manner in which he had been all these years cheated and hoodwinked—and that by his father. This Mr. Bolton, who now reigned at the Abbey—who and what was he? The desire to visit the place once more grew stronger. Wild schemes for becoming rich, and having the place back again, ran riot in his mind—chimerical schemes, for, as each one rose and fell, he had to tell himself again and again that each was vanity. In England—in this part of England especially—the way in which men made fortunes was that of trade and successful speculation. He knew absolutely nothing of trade, and had not the remotest idea in what ‘speculation’ consisted. He saw no way at all of becoming rich. He saw the most probable and the best fate he could expect rise up and stand very clearly before his mental eyes—a secretaryship, clerkship, or something of that kind—neither of them avocations in which, as a rule, money is very rapidly accumulated.
In the midst of these agreeable meditations the dinner-bell rang, and he went downstairs and found his host standing in the hall, looking out for him—a grey-haired, round-faced, pink-cheeked, elderly man, with a bland smile and an amiable expression.
His appearance for some reason caused Jerome a kind of shock, he had unconsciously expected something so different. The climax of disillusion and commonplace appeared to have been reached when Mr. Netley, shaking hands with him and smiling benevolently, said he was sure Mr. Wellfield wanted his dinner. With his usual sang froid, Jerome, after a momentary pause, smiled slightly, and said ‘Yes,’ he was very hungry. They went into the dining-room, and here Mr. Netley volunteered the remark that he thought business had better wait until after dinner, to which Jerome again yielded a cordial assent, and they took their places—Jerome with an ever-deeper suspicion that somehow Mr. Netley was not—the only word he could think of was, ‘sharp’—that, for a solicitor of his standing, he was decidedly not very sharp.
‘Have you ever been in Manchester before?’ asked Mr. Netley.
‘As a child, I may. Never since I grew up; nor, indeed, in any place like it.’
‘Ah! it’s an odd kind of place. Very thorough-going—strong political views, you know.’
‘Yes, I suppose so. Not that I know anything about politics; I never took the slightest interest in them.’
‘No? Not been thrown in the way of that kind of thing, I suppose?’
‘Not at all. All my friends have been musical, or literary, or artistic people—or, nothing in particular, like myself.’
‘I see. Well, there is a section in Manchester that goes in for art, and music, and that kind of thing. We’ve very fine music here—concerts, you know—a great many concerts, in the season.’
‘Yes, I suppose everyone has heard that Manchester is a music-loving town.’
‘Exactly so,’ said Mr. Netley, looking cheered at this admission. ‘And then there are literary people too, you know, and scientific—oh, many scientific people, whom I don’t know much about. And there are some artists, too. There’s a School of Art—there are a great many pupils at the School of Art, and an exhibition every year of their paintings.’
‘Only their paintings?’ inquired Jerome, politely.
‘Oh, and other people’s paintings, of course. Yes; and a Black and White Exhibition. Do you care for black and white pictures? Have you been much thrown amongst black and white artists—I mean artists who do black and white pictures?’
‘Not more than amongst artists who do red, and green, and blue, and other coloured pictures in general,’ replied Jerome, beginning to feel a little amused, and to realise that probably Mr. Netley was one of those persons who have one manner and set of expressions for business hours, and quite another for those of leisure.
So it proved. When they went into the library, and Mr. Netley began to talk on business, it must have been a very clever man indeed who could have caught him tripping, or who could have discovered any want of perspicacity or acumen in his utterances.
They sat together in the study, with cigars and coffee-cups before them, and Mr. Netley had pulled out some papers, and begun to turn them over, when Jerome, whose impatience had been none the less keen in that he had so strenuously concealed it, said:
‘Before you go into details, I wish you could give me one piece of information. Will there be anything left? Will there be enough just to give my sister a home? That is what I am most anxious to know.’
‘There will be Monk’s Gate, and I think from a hundred to a hundred and twenty pounds’ income. Curate’s pay, Mr. Wellfield, and a curate might make it do.’
‘You are thinking I am not one. That’s true. But this is a great relief. And Monk’s Gate—what is Monk’s Gate?’
‘Your father only sold the Abbey, not Monk’s Gate.’
‘Monk’s Gate, I conclude, is a house. I don’t seem to have any remembrance of it.’
‘It is the little dower-house belonging to the Abbey. It is close to the large outer gate—Monk’s Gate they always called it.’
‘I think I remember.’
‘The old fellows used to use that gate. They went out through it into the fields to fish in the river. They knew what they were about, those old grey-frocks. Show me an abbey that was not built on a site at once fertile, rich, and beautiful. I defy you, sir.’
‘There was Whitby—it’s the only one I can remember; but it always struck me as being rather bleak,’ observed Jerome.
‘Well, Whitby, I grant you. But that was a nunnery. Women like to make themselves uncomfortable for the sake of religion, or what they think religion. But that’s neither here nor there, and if you are ready, I’ll go a little into detail.’
Jerome absently assented, and Mr. Netley was privately thinking, with some contempt:
‘He’s the old Wellfields all over again. Let him only be secure of what will keep him from absolute beggary, and he’ll sit down with it, rather than stir a finger. The only time at which you could arouse that race to a transient activity, was when they were absolutely hard-up. When there wasn’t a coin in the house, they would suddenly drop their pride, and descend to any expedient to stave off personal inconvenience and discomfort. And the most unscrupulous of the whole lot was this lad’s father. This fellow, it strikes me, has all the pride and all the laziness of the breed, but not their dishonesty, I should say. Mother’s blood, perhaps.’
Jerome must have been gratified indeed, could he have known his host’s opinion of him.
There was not very much to be explained. It seemed that Mr. Wellfield had sold the Abbey about seven years ago, when Jerome was nineteen and Avice nine years of age. Mr. Netley explained about the ways in which the purchase-money had been invested, and how the bank failure had come about, which had brought the crash. He was a little surprised, and his theory as to Jerome’s want of character was shaken, when the young man said:
‘It seems to me that in any case, on my father’s death, I should have been reduced to poverty, for, had the money been remaining, I should have made it my first object to regain the Abbey—if I had had to spend every farthing to do so.’
‘You would have found it no easy task, Mr. Wellfield. Mr. Bolton is greatly attached to the place, and I don’t think any price would tempt him.’
Jerome winced—it was galling in the extreme to have to hear of this man in possession with so firm a grasp upon what he had always regarded as his. He hated the thought, and once again, stronger than ever, the desire rushed over him to oust the usurper from his place. And once again succeeded the recoil, the miserable sense of poverty and helplessness, of impotency, which made his temples throb and his blood boil. He sat, with knitted brows, in moody silence, till at last he asked abruptly:
‘And this Monk’s Gate—is it habitable?’
‘Oh, I should say so. I believe there is even some antiquated furniture in it.’
‘I shall go over and see it, at any rate, before I decide upon anything else.’
‘Very well. The key is in my keeping at my office. You shall have it. You shall judge for yourself. Meantime, don’t be in any hurry to leave me. Turn things well over in your mind before you decide to live at Monk’s Gate, or anywhere else. I will do all I can to help you forward.’
‘You are very kind,’ said Jerome, still absently, his mind still vaguely reaching out after some path from his difficulties.
Before going to sleep, he added a postscript to his letter to Sara.
‘Netley tells me he thinks there will be a pittance left, which makes my mind easier with respect to my sister. Ah, my love, I never realised till this night, the power of money. The want of it makes me feel unscrupulous.’