Trevethlan: A Cornish Story. Volume 1 (of 3)

The stranger they had passed in Mrs. Pendarrel's vestibule was Michael Sinson, newly arrived in London, and come with proper diligence to pay his respects to his patroness. The young countryman was completely overwhelmed by the vision of the two fine ladies who swept by him. But his wonder was not indiscriminating, and it was Mildred who fixed his gaze. He had seen her at Pendarrel, but not with the same impression. In kind and familiar intercourse with the tenantry, she was a very different person. Here she seemed almost a creature of another sphere. With her mien, so quiet and yet so proud; her step, scarcely touching the ground, yet appearing to spurn it; her repose, exhibiting a security which it was impossible to disturb. Michael followed her with his eyes until she had entered the carriage, and continued looking vacantly in the same direction, even after the hall-door was closed. A tap on the shoulder roused him from his abstraction, and he followed a servant into the presence of Mrs. Pendarrel.

The interview was of no great duration. Sinson's patroness was pleased to notice with praise that he was improved in appearance and address; and asked him a few questions respecting the country, which he answered to her satisfaction. She made no allusion to the peculiar services she expected from him, but referred him to her husband at his office for information respecting his promised employment. It was necessary to know a little more of his temper and disposition before making him her confidential agent.

The new Cymon, as in one sense the young rustic might be called, quitted the house in May Fair, filled with vague admiration and ambition. In the fascinations surrounding Miss Pendarrel, he recognised a power superior to anything within his experience; and he framed fantastic expectations from the career he supposed opening before him. But the lover of Iphigenia had concealed a noble heart under a rugged exterior, and his passion developed its high qualities. Michael Sinson was a very different character from Boccaccio's hero.

And was Mercy Page already forgotten?—Happy, perchance, for the too faithful maiden, if so it were.

CHAPTER VIII.

Lucret.

They were not halcyon days in England that succeeded the termination of the long struggle for liberty and existence, which, during more than twenty years, had taxed to the uttermost all the resources of the country; and which, as a whole, must always be regarded by Britons with pride and exultation. We had given peace to the world; but we were unable to preserve tranquillity at home. War is, at the best, a bad education, if sometimes a necessary one, for a young people; and a mature nation will find that its costs are not only money and men. It is a lottery on the grandest scale, both of fortune and life, inducing waste of the one, and recklessness of the other; removing, therefore, in a great measure, the vulgar motives of action, and importing a general laxity of principle. In various ways a long war produces an intestinal feverishness, aggravating any incidental disorder, and favourable to the designs of incendiaries.

The peace was followed by a general fall in wages. It was a result beyond the control of legislation; and it would probably have been unfelt, if prices also had fallen, as naturally they should have done. But the legislature was able in part to prevent this decline, and exercised its power in favour of agricultural produce. Flaming homesteads and shattered machinery soon proclaimed the discontent of the labouring population.

Political agitators sought to turn this discontent into disaffection. Parliamentary reform was demanded with a considerable show of violence. There was much fierce speaking; numbers of clubs started into existence; individuals disfigured themselves with strange costumes; mobs collected in great multitudes. Presently budding Lafayettes discussed the most convenient length for pikes, and would-be Buonapartes mustered their platoons by moonlight.

There was a good deal that was wicked, and not a little that was grotesque, in these proceedings. One party persisted in seeing only the white side of the shield, and declared they were merely ridiculous; another had eyes only for the black, and exaggerated their danger. Nothing is so fatal to the cause of civil liberty as the abuse of the privileges which it confers. The nation consents to wear chains, to control a rebellious member. Having the gout in its great toe, the body politic restricts its indulgences. It was so at the period of which we are treating. The real amount of danger is a question which the candour of posterity will admit could hardly be discussed with tranquillity at the time. Certain it is, that alarm was very great and very general, and under its pressure the nation resigned for a season some of its dearest birth-rights. Personal liberty was endangered by the suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act; the press was shackled; the right of meeting was limited. Arrests were made far and wide. A north-country squire, trotting quietly along upon his hack to meet the hounds, was swept off to jail, instead of sweeping after the fox, suspected of a design to raise the shepherds. It was a mistake, and it is probable that such were not rare. The practice of receiving information from spies, and still more the air of mystery assumed by those in authority, multiplied the apprehensions which might justly be excited by any tumultuous proceedings.

Cornelius Peach was one of those who were willing to believe the alarm to be in the main unfounded, and he used good-humouredly to quiz his sister for the timidity with which she adopted every rumour of the day. The worthy clerk was clearly in some matters a follower of the philosopher of Abdera. He very much preferred laughter to tears; regarded public affairs with a lofty disdain, so long as his roast, boiled, or hashed was ready at the right time; lived in a Utopia of his own, and was more likely to die of seeing an ass eating figs than of any ordinary calamity. He could not understand why an individual should fret himself concerning parliamentary corruption, tyranny of government, abuse of patronage, or any other stalking-horse of sedition. No one had attempted to bribe him; he felt indifferently free; he was a candidate for no place; he had no vote for anything, and rejoiced that he had not. His even cheerfulness was wont to make his friends declare, that their Peach was all sunny side; there were no signs of shade about him.

His lodger was of a less contented mood: the symptoms of effervescence had assumed a somewhat menacing aspect around his home. For some time much disquiet had prevailed among the miners of Somersetshire, and the same was now rapidly spreading among their Cornish brethren, from Redruth to St. Ives. Minor outrages were of no uncommon occurrence. The dread which Miss Peach seemed to entertain of seeing a modern Jack Straw encamped on Hampstead Heath, was felt on better grounds in the far-west, and caused trepidation among the tea-sipping gossips of Kerrier and Penwith. So the orphans learnt from the letters of Polydore Riches. And they were made rather anxious by perceiving, that the good chaplain seemed in writing, to disguise the real amount of his apprehensions. Often in reading his missives, did Randolph and Helen turn their thoughts fondly towards Trevethlan, and wish they had never left the towers by the sea.

And in the brother such yearnings were quickened by an ever-increasing discontent with his position. This feeling had soon driven him from Winter's chambers, and he was now reading with Mr. Travers, an eminent special pleader. But dissatisfaction was again creeping over him. It was true he did not neglect his studies, and he had duly eaten his dinners to keep Michaelmas Term. Surely there is no fear that any of our old institutions to which a dinner is attached will wholly die. There is a strength in the British appetite, against which utilitarianism may struggle in vain, till hunger and thirst are no more. So at the Inns of Court. The exercises, and moots, and even the revels have vanished, but the dinners remain. Attendance on the former has been commuted into fines to maintain the latter. And long may they endure, those social meetings, where many a lasting friendship is formed, and the bonds of brotherhood cemented, which in England unite an order, declared by D'Aguesseau, aussi ancien que la magistrature, aussi noble que la vertu, aussi nécessaire que la justice.

As a novice, Randolph was partly interested and partly disconcerted on his introduction to these assemblies. He felt a reverence for the old hall, standing on the site of that of the knights whose dust reposed in the neighbouring church. He looked with respect on the coats of arms of the successive treasurers, emblazoned on the oak panelling of the walls, and subscribed with many a name of high distinction. On the dais, beneath the portraits of Littleton and Coke, sat some of the leading advocates of the day, partaking a more luxurious repast than that allotted to the occupants of the floor below. And on the opposite side to the young student were the juniors of the bar, men who had risen, were rising, had not begun to rise, and never would rise.

It was all curious and new. The very gown in which Randolph dined, rustled on his shoulders with a forensic feeling. The repast was apportioned to messes of four, all of which had precisely the same fare. The attendants were called paniers; because—an enemy has suggested—supported by donkeys. The platters were of Peter Piper's metal, and the cups were earthenware. As at the table of Prior's pococurante couple—

Trifles all these: forgotten perhaps by the fortunate lawyer, whose clerk groans under the weight of his brief-bag; ridiculed by the disappointed man, whose early clients have long disappeared; but interesting and entertaining to the neophyte, whose ambition foresees the career of the first, whose self-reliance is too strong to fear the fate of the second.

These last were the feelings which had inspired Randolph in the solitude of Trevethlan Castle, and conjured up those airy visions which seemed so fair in the sight of himself and his sister. The very first encounter with the world had dimmed the prospect for a moment, and the brother's subsequent intercourse with it confirmed rather than diminished his disappointment. It was not that he was disheartened by perceiving how very inadequate an idea he had formed of the labour necessary to attain his object. The long rows of law-calf on Mr. Travers's shelves had no terrors for him. Nor was it that he felt as yet any decided uneasiness at living under a feigned name. He had never for an instant imagined it was wrong, and it had his father's sanction. Yet this circumstance might be a chief source of his discontent. He had not known the levelling tendency of a public school, nor the freedom of college. From those early lessons in the picture-gallery at Trevethlan, he had silently grown up in the consciousness that he should be the head of an ancient race, and perhaps, in building his castle in the air, he regarded himself as an architect in the midst of masons. He never thought of himself as Morton, humble and unknown, but as the representative of a high family, recognized and honoured.

So Mr. Griffith was right, and Polydore Riches wrong. But the worthy chaplain was in no fault. No education could have prevailed against the circumstances of the case. A youth spent in isolation and reverie, is almost certain to lead to a manhood of irresolution. The habit of thinking becomes a curse, when it is developed too early. Such precociousness is apt to result in a purely negative character. This was the misfortune of Randolph. And although he carefully pursued his studies, and concealed his disquietude from Helen, he often sighed for the peace of his home, and sometimes even thought of abandoning his scheme, and returning thither.

The same feelings made him distant and reserved in his intercourse with the men in Hall and at Mr. Travers's chambers. He had no sympathy with their buoyancy, and he disliked their familiarity. There was, however, one of the latter, with whom he grew gradually intimate, having been introduced to him by Mr. Winter. Seymour Rereworth was a man of calm but decided opinions, of quiet and diligent habits, of polished manners, and of great attainments. He possessed also the advantages which Randolph missed so much, having been educated at Eton, and having obtained high honours at college. Looking to his profession for distinction more than actual maintenance, he earnestly and steadily pursued his aim, never revolting from the weary drudgery, never disheartened by the thorny intricacies, through which the lawyer is doomed to plod in his way to eminence. Very particular in his choice of friends, he was interested by the mixture of enthusiasm and embarrassment which he detected in Randolph, and sought his friendship. Where Rereworth sought, he won. And he was of great service to his companion, supplying his want of knowledge of the world with his own, which was of the best kind; not consisting in a familiarity with knavery and vice, but able to foil the one and repel the other; and excelling in all those qualities which are comprised in the word, tact. He had a large acquaintance in society; was himself very well connected; was always a welcome guest, and, when he chose to throw away an evening, had always an invitation available.

Him did Randolph once or twice, during the winter, persuade to come and spend an evening at Hampstead. And it must be confessed that Seymour paid his second visit at least as willingly as his first. If he liked the brother, he no less admired the sister. He mused sometimes on the circumstances of so singular, he might say so romantic, a pair. Helen's dark and gentle eyes, and soft and pleasant tones, haunted him occasionally in his studies, and kept his pen suspended in the midst of many a tedious draught. But Rereworth was not a man to fall in love in a hurry.

For Helen, she was always glad to see him. In spite of all her brother's precautions, she sometimes detected the gloom and discontent which hung upon his brow, and she saw that Rereworth's society always charmed them away. Her own life was so tranquil and uniform that she had soon ceased to regret the quiet of Trevethlan, and she roamed about the vicinity of Hampstead, seeking a spot she might liken to Merlin's Cave, and only occasionally disturbed by the letters of Polydore Riches.

CHAPTER IX.

Shakspeare.

So the winter passed on. Christmas might remind the orphans of a custom which prevailed in the Cornwall of old times, and which may possibly still survive in some localities, when the family of each homestead bore a bowl of cider in jocund procession to their orchard, and, selecting the most respectable apple-tree, splashed his trunk with the bright liquor, and wished him good luck in the coming season. "Would," exclaimed Cornelius Peach, with great unction, when Helen told him the story, "would that I had been born in some strange, half-barbarous land! These great towns kill all good customs. Even what little carol-singing there is, is a mere trade."

Christmas passed, and the new year was destined to introduce Helen to another order of singing. Thirty years ago the London season began earlier than at present. January was not over, when a note from Mrs. Winter invited the brother and sister to accompany her to the opera. A vague excitement rose in Helen's breast, and sparkled in her eyes, as she gave the note to Randolph. She felt that she should like to go, but a certain shyness made her timid. She watched her brother's face while he glanced over the invitation, and saw with some regret that he did not partake her anticipations. But he said that it was very kind of Mrs. Winter, and that of course they would go.

On the appointed evening the lawyer's carriage called for the orphans, and they joined him and his wife. It was a gloomy ride. The night was foggy and dark. The mist condensed on the windows, and permitted nothing to be seen but the general glare of the lamps. This sort of isolation, and the continuous rumble of the carriage, suited Randolph's mood. He was haunted by forebodings of evil. He was angry with himself for accepting the invitation. He felt an indefinite fear of the crowd with which he was about to mingle. It was not as Morton that he ought to appear in public. Yet should his selfish pride debar Helen of the offered amusement? He leant back in his corner of the carriage, abstracted and silent.

His sister on the other hand was gay and excited. She kept up a lively conversation with Mr. and Mrs. Winter, and peered through the window at what was to her an unknown world. So it was until the carriage turned a corner, and entered a broader and better-lighted thoroughfare than those it had traversed previously. Its speed abated: it even stopped—were they there? No, it moves again: papers are pressed against the glasses: another pause, and another advance: and now Mr. Winter has lowered his window, the door is opened, the steps let down, and before Helen has time to think, she finds herself leaning upon his arm, and ascending a spacious staircase. She looks round, and sees her brother and Mrs. Winter close behind.

A few minutes more, and she stood in the front of a box, and gazed on a vast area, dimly lighted by a circle of small lustres immediately beneath her, and an immense chandelier far above. They were very early; but few boxes were occupied, the foot-lights were not raised, and the orchestra was nearly empty. The dark green of the great curtain seemed almost black in the gloom. Helen asked Mrs. Winter if it were not very dark.

"Ah! wait a moment," said that lady.

And in fact, even as she spoke, a row of bright lamps rose in front of the curtain, and a flood of splendour from the central chandelier irradiated the whole house, displaying the occupants of the boxes, as portraits set in frames of rich crimson. A rustle of conversation murmured from the pit, but was soon lost in the confused sounds which came from the orchestra, now rapidly filling. With a wild kind of surprise Helen listened to those discordant tones, and noted how by degrees they melted into harmony with the leader's long-drawn note. At length there was silence; a gentleman with a small wand took his place at a desk in front of the musicians, talking and laughing with those near him; a little bell rang behind the curtain; and after three taps of the wand, the orchestra whirled away into the overture to an opera then new to a London audience, never to become antiquated.

The foot-lights sank, and the great green curtain rose. The stage was nearly dark. A droll-looking personage came stealthily forward, bowing in acknowledgment of the applause, or of the laughter, which greeted his appearance. Helen laughed, without knowing why. She had a book, but she was too much absorbed to consult it, and kept her eyes fixed on the stage. The droll-looking man sang a whimsical complaint, and retreated from approaching footsteps. There was a struggle between a gentleman and a lady, interrupted by an old man in a night-cap. The old man was killed. There was passionate lamentation over his body. There were scenes, of which Helen scarcely knew whether they were comic or serious. Then came a rural festival which raised her spirits; the gentleman she had seen at first, now courted one of the country girls; hand in hand they quitted the stage, amidst a hurricane of applause. But Helen was unconscious of the enthusiasm around her, so strongly was she impressed by the music. She had heard Ambrogetti and Fodor sing La ci darem.

The duet was repeated with nearly the same effect. And for the novices, for Randolph as well as Helen, this was the great stage sensation of the night. Other portions of the opera, Zerlina's touching remonstrance with her jealous lover, the prayer, the whirlwind of passion in which the first act terminates, the semi-grotesque marvels of the second with their wonderful music, all excited more or less emotion; but none so fresh and absorbing as that induced by the immortal duet between the peasant-girl and the profligate.

And a particular circumstance distracted Randolph's attention during the second act. In the interval which followed the first, Mrs. Winter called her young friends' notice to the house, then very well filled, instructed them in its technicalities, and pointed out a few notable personages among the audience, whom she happened to know by sight. While in this manner she was directing Randolph's eye along the tier of boxes level with her own, his regard fell upon a young lady of so remarkable an aspect, that after mechanically following Mrs. Winter's instruction, he turned hastily to look once more at his fair neighbour. Never in his life, he thought, had he seen so attractive an object. She was evidently engaged in an animated conversation with some one in the back of the box whom he could not see. Playfulness sparkled in her otherwise soft eyes, archness curved her brows, and Randolph almost imagined he could hear the silvery laugh which parted her lips. He tried to obtain a glimpse of the happy person to whom she was talking, but the attempt was vain. He could only discover that with her there was an elderly lady, whose back was turned towards him. It was not to her that the sallies of the young one were addressed. Randolph began to construct a romance, still gazing on the interesting box. Suddenly he caught his charmer's eye. It was but for a moment; he could not see that the expression of her face varied in the most trifling particular; yet he felt that he blushed like fire, and he perceived that the elder lady leant forward, and looked towards him. What, thought he, lowering his eyes for an instant, and pursuing his romance, is she so quick in detecting a glance? It must be the mother. The thought passed, and he looked up. He encountered the supposed mother's gaze fixed full upon his face. Had he not seen those features before? Ideas raced through his mind with a dream-like rapidity. Some theorists say that the visions of a night are contained in the moment of falling asleep. Surely equally swift was the flight of that lady's thoughts; or why, after a look of a single second, did her countenance assume that expression of scorn or defiance? An expression quite apart from any which might have rebuked the intrusive stare of a stranger; which even attracted the notice of her companion, who glanced again at Randolph, and then at his sister.

From that time, Randolph's attention was almost entirely engrossed by his fascinating neighbour. He missed the statue's nod, and lost his share of the laugh at Naldi's comic terror. His sister observed the cause of his abstraction, and looked in the same direction, at a moment when the elder lady happened to turn towards her.

"Surely," Helen exclaimed, "I have seen that face before! Yet how can it be?"

Randolph knew right well, but he was silent.

"Do you know those ladies, Mrs. Winter?" Helen asked.

"No, Miss Morton. It is really a beautiful girl."

"Beautiful!" Randolph thought; "beautiful! Ay, she is more than beautiful."

And the presentiment he had felt before came gloomily back upon his heart.

But the fair stranger was not the only damsel who attracted admiration in the opera-house that night.

"Who is that, Melcomb?" asked a portly, good-humoured personage, leaning on the rail of the orchestra, and looking towards Mrs. Winter's box. "A new face, is it not?"

"The girl with the bird of paradise in her hair?" answered Melcomb. "Fie! Winesour. Have you forgotten Cressy?—Though, to be sure, the gentle Cressida may have a new face to-night, or any night."

"Pooh! you know who I mean," Winesour persisted; "in the tier below."

"The pallid thing in black?" said Melcomb. "It's in a state of willowhood. You see through a glass of Chambertin."

"May I never drink another," cried Winesour, with a quaint twinkle of his small grey eye, "if she ever saw an opera before. Think you I have no eyes? Vorrei e non vorrei. She followed Fodor's notes with her lips apart, and tears in her eyes. She cried, Melcomb."

"Winesour turned enthusiastic for a pale-cheeked girl!" said Melcomb. "What next? But I love not rhapsody, so—adieu!"

But while he chose to speak of Helen's appearance in these disparaging terms, Melcomb had really observed her with admiration, and determined to ascertain who she might be. He was one of those handsome, careless, profligate fellows, who are too well regarded by the men, and too easily pardoned by the women. One murder, it has been rather absurdly said, makes a villain; ten thousand, a hero. But it may with some truth be remarked, that the number of hearts a Melcomb breaks rather adds to his fame than diminishes his reputation. He rises upon ruin.

Melcomb, however, was at last positively thinking of marriage, and had become the slave professed of Mildred Pendarrel. But he sped not in his wooing as he conceived he had a right to expect. Now, it is an annoying thing for one accustomed to carry the citadel by storm, to be obliged to sit down and proceed according to the slow routine of a siege; and still more disagreeable to be unable to make any impression on the enemy's works. This was Melcomb's present position. He was favoured by the mother, he was foiled by the daughter. It was a case quite out of his experience. Mildred rode with him, danced with him, flirted with him; but she never let him utter more than one serious word. The instant he assumed an air of gravity, she prevented his speech with a jest. His courtship was a perpetual laugh. It grew quite fatiguing. Love was pleasant enough, except to make. Melcomb sometimes thought of retiring from the field. He was not stimulated by difficulty, and he was afraid of rejection. Melcomb refused! What a disgrace! Yet he felt morally certain that this would be his fate, if he now ventured to drive Mildred to Yes or No. At the same time, he was unwilling to withdraw. The match would be decidedly advantageous to him, and the lady correctly ornamental. So he bore with her frolic humour as best he might. When accosted by Winesour in the pit, he had sought refuge there from Mildred's sallies; and had been struck by the strange beauty, whose earnest interest in the music seemed, indeed, to distinguish a novice, and excited a languid curiosity in the used-up coxcomb. He now returned to Mrs. Pendarrel's box, to obtain a nearer view of the fair unknown, and not without some notion of provoking Mildred's jealousy. But her mother anticipated him.

"Can you tell me," she asked, "who those ladies are, Mr. Melcomb? You know everybody."

"My knowledge is at fault," he answered. "Shall I inquire?"

"I should like to know," Mrs. Pendarrel continued; "but they are going, and so shall I."

Mrs. Winter's party, unconscious of the interest they excited, were waiting, clustered together, for the announcement of their carriage, when Mrs. Pendarrel's was declared to stop the way. At the sound of the name, Randolph and Helen involuntarily turned, and found themselves face to face with the lady who had before attracted their observation. She swept haughtily past them, without seeming to be aware of their surprise, and was followed by Mildred, leaning on the arm of Melcomb.

"It was the miniature," Helen whispered to her brother, who had become suddenly pale.

In a few moments Melcomb returned to the crush room, and observed the strangers with a well-bred stare. Randolph frowned, and the coxcomb smiled. Mrs. Winter's carriage was called. Melcomb noted the name, and learnt the destination. For the present it was enough. The beau had become too idle and indifferent to be very mischievous. He accepted a sensation if it fell in his path, but he would not go out of his way to seek one. "Hampstead's a great distance," he muttered, and drove to the Argyll Rooms.

CHAPTER X.

Milton.

Extremely startled was Mrs. Pendarrel by the appearance of the orphans of Trevethlan at the opera. Domestic affairs had temporarily diverted her suspicions respecting them, and her intentions were in a manner dormant. Great, therefore, was her surprise, when following a glance of Mildred's in which she detected some slight emotion, her own eye fell upon a face, like, yes the very image of Henry Trevethlan: the very image of what he was that fatal day, when her hasty and haughty speech drove him from her presence, for once and for ever. With a sort of fascination she gazed upon the stranger, and saw that he returned the regard with a curiosity or wonder, that changed while she looked into hatred and defiance. "Can it be possible?" she asked herself. Several times during the remainder of the performance, she turned towards Mrs. Winter's box, and never failed to catch Randolph's eye. And finally, in leaving the house, she noticed the manner in which both he and Helen started at the announcement of her name, and again met that proud resentment which she remembered so well in the lover of her girlhood.

"Winter!" she mused when she lay down for rest, "Winter! Ay, that is the name of their lawyer. I ought to know it well. And what do they here? Why this apparent privacy? Why seek this veil for their poverty? I must discover. They must be unmasked. Who knows but they are involved? What plan are they devising to save those mouldering towers?"

A long train of reflections passed through Esther's mind as she lay awake that night. In the morning she summoned Michael Sinson to her presence. The young man was already considerably improved in appearance, had lost his rusticity, and acquired a manner "free and easy," with a very excellent opinion of himself. The change might be partly due to certain vague aspirations which pleased his vanity, and at the same time sharpened his natural foresight and cunning. He was abject in deference towards his patroness.

"Sinson," said she, when he came before her, "you know Mr. Trevethlan well?"

"Certainly, ma'am; from his very cradle."

"They say, he is abroad."

He noted the words—they say. "Yes, ma'am."

"There is a Mr. Winter, a lawyer, living at Hampstead," Mrs. Pendarrel continued. "He has some friend remarkably like what I should expect ... young Trevethlan to be. I desire to find out who this person is, and what are his pursuits. Be so good as to inquire, if you can. Good morning, Sinson."

But the peasant lingered.

"Did you ever hear, ma'am," he said, brushing his hat, and casting down his eyes, "that the late Mr. Trevethlan's marriage was not regular?"

Mrs. Pendarrel lost no word of the slow-spoken insinuation. Every nerve of her body quivered, but she was silent.

"It was no blame to my unfortunate relation, ma'am," Sinson proceeded; "but the report was very common, I have heard, at Trevethlan, soon after the time."

"Pshaw! sir," Esther said, having now mastered her emotion; "common fame is a common liar. Good-day to you."

And Michael departed, well aware that his patroness suspected this friend of Mr. Winter to be no other than the heir of Trevethlan, and believing also that he had sent a shaft home to her heart, which might further the projects lurking dimly in his own. The more he advanced in her confidence the greater became his own assurance, and he now quitted the house in May Fair, with a certain exultation gleaming in his dark sinister eyes.

He had already supposed that he might find a subordinate instrument of use to him, and had even selected his man. He mingled now and then in the promiscuous assembly of vice and folly which met at the Argyll Rooms. There he had occasionally thrown away a guinea—he was liberally supplied with money—at hazard and had played at the same table with Melcomb. There also he met a man, in the smallness of whose stakes and the desperation of his play, Sinson read ruin. He paid the gambler assiduous court.

Lewis Everope had inherited a moderate patrimony, and lived as if it were inexhaustible. He had been to a university, only to squander his money, and to obtain no distinction. Confident in his abilities, he never gave them fair play. He seemed to think that intuition could supply the place of information. He rarely finished a book—did he not know what the author was about to say? Thus his knowledge was of little value, because it was never complete. Every hour a new Cynthia attracted his attention. He did almost everything by halfs, and therefore few things well. Desultory men are not often men of principle, and he was not one of the exceptions. He was fond of society, and too careless to avoid its temptations. Very soon he learned the difficulty of saying "No."

His career was much the same, when he quitted the university with a very ignoble degree, and entered an inn of court and a pleader's chambers, in the idea of being admitted to the forum. He became immersed in gay company; enjoyed, like Alfieri when an ensign in the Asti militia, the greatest possible liberty of doing nothing, which was precisely the one thing he was determined to do; in spite of the remonstrances of his friends, continually postponed his call to the bar; and in point of fact never was called.

So the years sped by in idleness, and Everope's resources dwindled and dwindled. At little over forty he was without means, and without a profession. He still hung about the inns of court, pitied by the charitable, despised by the worldly wise. His naturally sanguine temper lent him a certain gaiety of heart, which made him popular with some; and as he never plagued people with his embarrassments, he was still able to find companions. He had been one of Travers's early pupils, and he occasionally looked in at his chambers even yet, although it must be owned very far from a welcome guest.

But he had reached the end of his tether. One might fancy him going wistfully round and round, straining his chain to nibble at some distasteful weed, eagerly pursuing any waif or stray wafted within his circle by the wind, not yet showing his straits by the poorness of his coat, still able to raise a laugh by some eccentricity, but with the lustre of his eyes sadly dimmed, and the confidence of his bearing wofully abated. "When things come to the worst, they must mend," he had been wont to say, forgetting that things never do come to the worst on this side the grave. And now, sanguine still, he clung to hope in the midst of despair, and trusted to chance to retrieve his ruin. It is one of the evils of a course like his, that by the time it is run, the energy which might have shaped a new one is lost, and the self-deluded victim falls, too probably never again to rise. And then is such a course most miserable, when its slave is aware of his own degradation, repents and sins on, always harassed by self-contempt, never safe in self-reliance, always thinking of what he might have been, never remembering what he yet may be.

Men in Everope's condition have but little option in selecting their acquaintance, and often find the embarrassments they cannot uniformly conceal, embolden intrusion, which they would gladly avoid, but are unable to repel. So when Sinson made some advances towards him, the spendthrift intuitively hated, yet silently endured them. And now Michael determined, if possible, to make Everope his bondman.

He had lost no time in fulfilling Mrs. Pendarrel's behest, and found little difficulty in tracing Morton to the pleader's chambers. He had not obtained an opportunity of seeing him, but felt certain that the student was no other than Trevethlan. He recollected that Everope had some connection with the law, and might be of service in the schemes which fluctuated indistinctly in his mind. He sought the gambler at the Argyll Rooms.

And he was not disappointed. He saw the wretched man's last guinea swept away by the ruthless rake, and met him as he rose from the table, pale and desperate. "Fortune's a jade, sir," Sinson said, "come and drink a glass of champagne." Everope, scarcely knowing what he did, accepted the invitation, and quaffed glass after glass of the fluid which promised him a temporary oblivion of his plight. He undoubtedly achieved this object, and was unable to resist when his entertainer undertook to see him home. He was, however, sensible enough to be surprised when Sinson followed him into his chambers.

"You are a cool fellow," he stammered. "This is not exactly a palace. I'll get a light, that is if there's a match, and then you can spy the nakedness of the land. Hang me, if you don't look like a spy."

Michael answered by producing a flask. The spendthrift's eyes glistened, and with some trouble he discovered a couple of glasses.

"It is reversing the order of things," he muttered, "reversing the order of things. But no matter. Sufficient for the day—"

As they continued to converse, Everope's contempt for his companion, slid gradually into familiarity. At length the latter, after glancing round the room, exclaimed:—

"Egad! Everope, I guess you're not in arrears for rent?"

"Why so, sir?" asked the spendthrift, with a return of his distant manner.

"Why, there's nothing to levy."

Everope laughed, and dismal it was to hear.

"Clients are few," suggested Sinson, ignorantly.

No answer.

"Family unfriendly," continued the intruder.

"Family!" shouted Everope, springing to his feet with an oath, "what d'ye mean, sir?" He clenched his fist, but it fell to his side. "Ha!" said he, "I am feeble —

Kean, sir, Kean——" He sank into his chair, and burst into tears.

This paroxysm restored him to some degree of recollection. When it passed away, Sinson drew his chair near him, and laid his hand on his arm. The spendthrift shrank from the touch. Michael quietly took out his purse, and allowed some pieces of gold to roll on the table.

"Mr. Everope," said he, in the oiliest tones possible, "I ask your pardon for my impertinent intrusion. It was meant all in good will. I was sorry to see the scurvy tricks fortune played you to-night. I came to ask if this petty sum would be any accommodation."

"Sir," Everope answered, while his fingers twitched convulsively, "I do not take such accommodation from strangers."

"We need not be strangers," said Sinson. "And if you are so delicate, you can give me your note of hand. I assure you I do not want the trifle."

Everope looked about the room.

"By the way," continued the tempter, "there's a fellow in the Temple called Morton. Pupil of a Mr. Travers. Know him?"

"I may have seen him at Travers's," the spendthrift answered, sullenly.

"I wish you could find out who he is," Sinson said, "and what he's doing. I have a sort of interest in him."

Everope only continued searching about the apartment.

"Was it paper you were looking for?" Sinson asked, and tore a leaf from his pocket-book.

I O U wrote Everope.

It requires no parchment and blood now-a-days to sign a compact with the fiend.

"Good-night, Everope," said Michael, folding the note in his book. "Recollect what I said about Morton."

The spendthrift closed his door, and returned to the table, and sat down and played mechanically with the golden counters. Embarrassed as he had often been, he had not yet learnt the ways and means of raising money, and this was his initiation. Miserable man! Better for him had it been to submit to any usury than, with his weak temper, to become the debtor of Michael Sinson.

His vacillation was remarkably shown the following day. He rose at a late hour, nervous and feverish, strangely troubled with an idea that he had sold himself to be the instrument of some villany. He knew nothing of the man who had furnished him with money. He could not even tell where to find him. What were his designs with regard to Morton? The little Everope had seen of the young student had won his respect. Ought he not to tell him what had occurred? If he knew where to find this Sinson, he would return the money.

It was dusk of the evening. He remembered that Morton would be keeping Hilary Term. He did not belong to the Temple, but he lived there. He went down into the cloisters and paced to and fro, waiting till hall should be over. At length Randolph came out alone, and Everope joined him abruptly.

"Morton," the spendthrift asked, in a low, husky voice, "were you ever in want?"

The owner of Trevethlan Castle was amazed and affronted, but he said nothing. Since the visit to the opera, every hour made him more impatient of his disguise.

"I ask you were you ever in want?" repeated Everope, with some fierceness. "I do not mean did you ever need a meal, or lack a coat; but were you ever embarrassed? Were you ever afraid, or ashamed to show your face? Did you ever tremble to think, not perhaps of to-morrow, but of to-morrow month? Did you ever shudder at the thought of disgrace? Have you any relatives whom you esteem and love? Whose memory has been to some extent your guardian angel? who have begun to pity and ceased to regard you? To whom you have done injustice? Ay, hark in your ear,—did you ever think that to them your death would be a relief?"

"Is the man mad?" Randolph asked himself, but said nothing aloud.

"I see," continued Everope, gloomily; "I see you are more fortunate. You have no sympathy with a vaurien. My confidence is made in vain: for if you cannot answer these questions, I can. You do not know the circumstances which give force to temptation. Pity those who do. Pity me, Morton. Lay up my words, and have a pardon ready when the day comes."

They had reached Fleet-street. The spendthrift turned suddenly and hurried away, before Randolph could fulfil an intention he had conceived of offering assistance. His own mind was at this time so disturbed, that the episode scarcely increased his agitation. Nevertheless, he went the next morning to make the offer, which Everope's abrupt departure had prevented in the evening. The spendthrift lived in garrets looking down from a great height on a narrow dingy lane. The visitor found the outer door closed, "the oak sported," in the language of college. But he had learnt that this by no means proved the absence of the occupant, and he supposed that in Everope's case there might be good reason for the precaution. So he rapped long and loud at the massive door. There was no answer: no sound indicated the presence of any living creature. "Mr. Everope," Randolph shouted through the narrow aperture intended to receive letters. He repeated the call several times. At length a slight shuffling noise came along the passage inside, and paused at the door.

"Is it you, Morton?" the spendthrift asked.

"Yes. I wish to speak with you."

"Excuse me," said Everope; "I am not well. I cannot see you now. My head aches."

"Nay," Randolph urged, in a low tone. "Only for a moment. Can I be of service to you? I am not rich, but perhaps——From what you said, I thought——"

A sigh, so profound that it might be termed a groan, escaped from Everope's breast. But he lashed himself into a spasm of anger.

"You mistook me, sir," he said, savagely, "and you trouble me. I can hear no more."

And he went back from the door with a quick and heavy tread. He had been to the rooms again the night before, had lost all he borrowed, and accepted a fresh loan from Sinson. It is but the first step that costs.

Randolph betook himself to chambers with a notion that he did not engross all the misery of the world.

CHAPTER XI.