Mrs. Sewell's maid made two ineffectual efforts to awaken her mistress on the following morning, for agitation had drugged her like a narcotic, and she slept the dull, heavy sleep of one overpowered by opium. “Why, Jane, it is nigh twelve o'clock,” said she, looking at her watch. “Why did you let me sleep so late?”
“Indeed, ma'am, I did my best to rouse you. I opened the shutters, and I splashed the water into your bath, and made noise enough, I 'm sure, but you did n't mind it all; and I brought up the doctor to see if there was anything the matter with you, and he felt your pulse, and put his hand on your heart, and said, No, it was just overfatigue; that you had been sitting up too much of late, and hadn't strength for it.”
“Where 's Colonel Sewell?” asked she, hurriedly.
“He's gone off to the country, ma'am; leastways, he went away early this morning, and George thinks it was to Killaloe.”
“Is Dr. Beattie here?”
“Yes, ma'am; they all breakfasted with the children at nine o'clock.”
“Whom do you mean by all?”
“Mr. Lendrick, ma'am, and Miss Lucy. I hear as how they are coming back to live here. They were up all the morning in his Lordship's room, and there was much laughing, as if it was a wedding.”
“Whose wedding? What were you saying about a wedding?”
“Nothing, ma'am; only that they were as merry,—that's all.”
“Sir William must be better, then?”
“Yes, ma'am,—quite out of danger; and he 's to have a partridge for dinner, and the doctor says he 'll be downstairs and all right before this day week; and I 'm sure it will be a real pleasure to see him lookin' like himself again, for he told Mr. Cheetor to take them wigs away, and all the pomatum-pots, and that he 'd have the shower-bath that he always took long ago. It's a fine day for Mr. Cheetor, for he has given him I don't know how many colored scarfs, and at least a dozen new waistcoats, all good as the day they were made; and he says he won't wear anything but black, like long ago; and, indeed, some say that old Rives, the butler as was, will be taken back, and the house be the way it used to be formerly. I wonder, ma'am, if the Colonel will let it be,—they say below stairs that he won't.”
“I'm sure Colonel Sewell cares very little on the subject. Do you know if they are going to dine here to-day?”
“Yes, ma'am, they are. Miss Lucy said the butler was to take your orders as to what hour you 'd like dinner.”
“Considerate, certainly,” said she, with a faint smile.
“And I heard Mr. Lendrick say, 'I think you 'd better go up yourself, Lucy, and see Mrs. Sewell, and ask if we inconvenience her in any way;' but the doctor said, 'You need not; she will be charmed to meet you.'”
“He knows me perfectly, Jane,” said she, calmly. “Is Miss Lucy so very handsome? Colonel Sewell called her beautiful.”
“Indeed, I don't think so, ma'am. Mr. Cheetor and me thought she was too robusteous for a young lady; and she's freckled, too, quite dreadful. The picture of her below in the study's a deal more pretty; but perhaps she was delicate in health when it was done.”
“That would make a great difference, Jane.”
“Yes, ma'am, it always do; every one is much genteeler-looking when they 're poorly. Not but old Mr. Haire said she was far more beautiful than ever.”
“And is he here too?”
“Yes, ma'am. It was he that pushed Miss Lucy down into the arm-chair, and said, 'Take your old place there, darling, and pour out the tea, and we'll forget that you were ever away at all.'”
“How pretty and how playful! The poor children must have felt themselves quite old in such juvenile company.”
“They was very happy, ma'am. Miss Cary sat in Miss Lucy's lap all the time, and seemed to like her greatly.”
“There's nothing worse for children than taking them out of their daily habits. I 'm astonished Mrs. Groves should let them go and breakfast below-stairs without orders from me.”
“It's what Miss Lucy said, ma'am. 'Are we quite sure Mrs. Sewell would like it?'”
“She need never have asked the question; or if she did, she might have waited for the answer. Mrs. Sewell could have told her that she totally disapproved of any one interfering with the habits of her children.”
“And then old Mr. Haire said, 'Even if she should not like it, when she knows all the pleasure it has given us, she will forgive it.'”
“What a charming disposition I must have, Jane, without my knowing it!”
“Yes, ma'am,” said the girl, with a pursed-up mouth, as though she would not trust herself to expatiate on the theme.
“Did Colonel Sewell take Capper with him?”
“No, ma'am; Mr. Capper is below. The Colonel gave him a week's leave, and he's going a-fishing with some other gentlemen down into Wicklow.”
“I suspect, Jane, that you people below-stairs have the pleasantest life of all. You have little to trouble you. When you take a holiday, you can enjoy it with all your hearts.”
“The gentlemen does, I believe, ma'am; but we don't. We can't go a-pleasuring like them; and if it a'n't a picnic, or a thing of the kind that's arranged for us, we have nothing for it but a walk to church and back, or a visit to one of our friends.”
“So that you know what it is to be bored!” said she, sighing drearily,—“I mean to be very tired of life, and sick of everything and everybody.”
“Not quite so bad as that, ma'am; put out, ma'am, and provoked at times,—not in despair, like.”
“I wish I was a housemaid.”
“A housemaid, ma'am!” cried the girl, in almost horror.
“Well, a lady's-maid. I mean, I'd like a life where my heaviest sorrow would be a refused leave to go out, or a sharp word or two for an ill-ironed collar. See who is that at the door; there's some one tapping there the last two minutes.”
“It's Miss Lucy, ma'am; she wants to know if she may come in?”
Mrs. Sewell looked in the glass before which she was sitting, and as speedily passed her hands across her brow, and by the action seeming to chase away the stern expression of her eyes; then, rising up with a face all smiles, she rushed to the door and clasped Lucy in her arms, kissing her again and again, as she said, “I never dreamed of such happiness as this; but why didn't you come and awaken me? Why did you rob me of one precious moment of your presence?”
“I knew how tired and worn-out you were. Grandpapa has told me of all your unwearying kindness.”
“Come over to the light, child, and let me see you well. I 'm wildly jealous of you, I must own, but I 'll try to be fair and judge you honestly. My husband says you are the loveliest creature he ever saw; and I declare I 'm afraid he spoke truly. What have you done with your eyes? they are far darker than they used to be; and this hair,—you need not tell me it's all your own, child. Gold could not buy it. Yes, Jane, you are right, she is perfectly beautiful.”
“Oh, do not turn my head with vanity,” said Lucy, blushing.
“I wish I could,—I wish I could do anything to lessen any of your fascinations. Do you know it's very hard—very hard indeed—to forgive any one being so beautiful, and hardest of all for me to do so?”
“Why for you?” said Lucy, anxiously.
“I'll tell you another time,” said she, in a half-whisper, and with a significant glance at her maid, who, with the officiousness of her order, was taking far more than ordinary trouble to put things to rights. “There, Jane,” said her mistress, at last, “all that opening and shutting of drawers is driving me distracted; leave everything as it is, and let us have quiet. Go and fetch me a cup of chocolate.”
“Nothing else, ma'am?”
“Nothing; and ask if there are any letters for me. It's a dreadful house, Lucy, for sending one's letters astray. The Chief used to have scores of little scented notes sent up to him that were meant for me, and I used to get masses of formal-looking documents that should have gone to him; but everything is irregular here. There was no master, and, worse, no mistress; but I 'll hope, as they tell me here, that there will soon be one.”
“I don't know,—I have not heard.”
“What a diplomatic damsel it is! Why, child, can't you be frank, and say if you are coming back to live here?”
“I never suspected that I was in question at all; if I had, I 'd have told you, as I tell you now, there is not the most remote probability of such an event. We are going back to live at the Nest. Sir Brook has bought it, and made it over to papa or myself,—I don't know which, but it means the same in the sense I care for, that we are to be together again.”
“How delightful! I declare, child, my envy of you goes on increasing every minute. I never was able to captivate any man, old or young, who would buy a beautiful house and give it to me. Of all the fortunate creatures I ever heard or read of, you are the luckiest.”
“Perhaps I am. Indeed I own as much to myself when I bethink me how little I have contributed to my own good fortune.”
“And I,” said she, with a heavy sigh, “about the most unlucky! I suppose I started in life with almost as fair a promise as your own. Not so handsome, I admit. I had neither these long lashes nor that wonderful hair, that gives you a look of one of those Venetian beauties Giorgione used to paint; still less that lovely mouth, which I envy you more even than your eyes or your skin; but I was good-looking enough to be admired, and I was admired, and some of my admirers were very great folk indeed; but I rejected them all and married Sewell! I need not tell you what came of that. Poor papa foresaw it all. I believe it helped to break his heart; it might have broken mine too, if I happened to have one. There, don't look horrified, darling. I was n't born without one; but what with vanity and distrust, a reckless ambition to make a figure in the world, and a few other like good qualities, I made of the heart that ought to have been the home of anything that was worthy in my nature, a scene of plot and intrigue, till at last I imagine it wore itself out, just as people do who have to follow uncongenial labor. It was like a lady set down to pick oakum! Why don't you laugh, dear, at my absurd simile?”
“Because you frighten me,” said Lucy, almost shuddering.
“I 'm certain,” resumed the other, “I was very like yourself when I was married. I had been very carefully brought up,—had excellent governesses, and was trained in all the admirable discipline of a well-ordered family. All I knew of life was the good side. I saw people at church on Sundays, and fancied that they wore the same tranquil and virtuous faces throughout the week. Above all things I was trustful and confiding. Colonel Sewell soon uprooted such delusions. He believed in nothing nor in any one. If he had any theory at all of life, it was that the world consisted of wolves and lambs, and that one must make an early choice which flock he would belong to. I 'm ashamed to own what a zest it gave to existence to feel that the whole thing was a great game in which, by the exercise of skill and cleverness, one might be almost sure to win. He soon made me as impassioned a gambler as himself, as ready to risk anything—everything—on the issue. But I have made you quite ill, child, with this dark revelation; you are pale as death.”
“No, I am only frightened,—frightened and grieved.”
“Don't grieve for me,” said the other, haughtily. “There is nothing I could n't more easily forgive than pity. But let me turn from my odious self and talk of you. I want you to tell me everything about your own fortune, where you have been all this time, what seeing and doing, and what is the vista in front of you?”
Lucy gave a full account of Cagliari and their life there, narrating how blank their first hopes had been, and what a glorious fortune had crowned them at last. “I 'm afraid to say what the mine returns at present; and they say it is a mere nothing to what it may yield when improved means of working are employed, new shafts sunk, and steam power engaged.”
“Don't get technical, darling; I'll take your word for Sir Brook's wealth; only tell me what he means to do with it. You know he gambled away one large fortune already, and squandered another, nobody knows how. Has he gained anything by these experiences to do better with the third?”
“I have only heard of his acts of munificence or generosity,” said Lucy, gravely.
“What a reproachful face to put on, and for so little!” said the other, laughing. “You don't think that when I said he gambled I thought the worse of him.”
“Perhaps not; but you meant that I should.”
“You are too sharp in your casuistry; but you have been living with only men latterly, and the strong-minded race always impart some of their hardness to the women who associate with them. You'll have to come down to silly creatures like me, Lucy, to regain your softness.”
“I shall be delighted if you let me keep your company.”
“We will be sisters, darling, if you will only be frank with me.”
“Prove me if you like; ask me anything you will, and see if I will not answer you freely.”
“Have you told me all your Cagliari life,—all?”
“I think so; all at least that was worth telling.”
“You had a shipwreck on your island, we heard here; are such events so frequent that they make slight impression?”
“I was but speaking of ourselves and our fortunes,” said Lucy; “my narrative was all selfish.” “Come,—I never beat about the bush,—tell me one thing,—it's a very abrupt way to ask, but perhaps it's the best way,—are you going to be married?”
“I don't know,” said she; and her face and neck became crimson in a moment.
“You don't know! Do you mean that you 're like one of those young ladies in the foreign convents who are sent for to accept a husband whenever the papas and mammas have agreed upon the terms?”
“Not that; but I mean that I am not sure whether grandpapa will give his consent, and without it papa will not either.”
“And why should not grandpapa say yes? Major Traf-ford,—we need n't talk riddles to each other,—Major Trafford has a good position, a good name, and will have a good estate; are not these the three gifts the mothers of England go in pursuit of?”
“His family, I suspect, wish him to look higher; at all events, they don't like the idea of an Irish daughter-in-law.”
“More fools they! Irish women of the better class are more ready to respond to good treatment, and less given to resent bad usage, than any I ever met.”
“Then I have just heard since I came over that Lady Trafford has written to grandpapa in a tone of such condescension and gentle sorrow that it has driven him half crazy. Indeed, his continual inference from the letter is, 'What must the son of such a woman be!'”
“That's most unfair!”
“So they have all told him,—papa, and Beattie, and even Mr. Haire, who met Lionel one morning at Beattie's.”
“Perhaps I might be of service here; what a blush, child! dear me, you are crimson, far too deep for beauty. How I have fluttered the dear little bird! but I 'm not going to rob its nest, or steal its mate away. All I meant was, that I could exactly contribute that sort of worldly testimony to the goodness of the match that old people like and ask for. You must never talk to them about affections, nor so much as allude to tastes or tempers; never expatiate on anything that cannot be communicated by parchment, and attested by proper witnesses. Whatever is not subject to stamp-duty, they set down as mere moonshine.”
While she thus ran on, Lucy's thoughts never strayed from a certain letter which had once thrown a dark shadow over her, and even yet left a gloomy memory behind it. The rapidity with which Mrs. Sewell spoke, too, had less the air of one carried away by the strong current of feeling than of a speaker who was uttering everything, anything, to relieve her own overburdened mind.
“You look very grave, Lucy,” went she on. “I suspect I know what's passing in that little brain. You are doubting if I should be the fittest person to employ on the negotiation; come, now, confess it.”
“You have guessed aright,” said Lucy, gravely.
“But all that 's past and over, child. The whole is a mere memory now, if even so much. Men have a trick of thinking, once they have interested a woman on their behalf, that the sentiment survives all changes of time and circumstance, and that they can come back after years and claim the deposit; but it is a great mistake, as he has found by this time. But don't let this make you unhappy, dear; there never was less cause for unhappiness. It is just of these sort of men the model husbands are made. The male heart is a very tough piece of anatomy, and requires a good deal of manipulation to make it tender, and, as you will learn one day, it is far better all this should be done before marriage than after.—Well, Jane, I did begin to think you had forgotten about the chocolate. It is about an hour since I asked for it.”
“Indeed, ma'am, it was Mr. Cheetor's fault; he was a shooting rabbits with another gentleman.”
“There, there, spare me Mr. Cheetor's diversions, and fetch me some sugar.”
“Mr. Lendrick and another gentleman, ma'am, is below, and wants to see Miss Lucy.”
“A young gentleman, Jane?” asked Mrs. Sewell, while her eyes flashed with a sudden fierce brilliancy.
“No, ma'am, an old gentleman, with a white beard, very tall and stern to look at.”
“We don't care for descriptions of old gentlemen, Jane. Do we, Lucy? Must you go, darling?”
“Yes; papa perhaps wants me.”
“Come back to me soon, pet. Now that we have no false barriers between us, we can talk in fullest confidence.”
Lucy hurried away, but no sooner had she reached the corridor than she burst into tears.
When Lacy reached the drawing-room, she found her father and Sir Brook deep in conversation in one of the window-recesses, and actually unaware of her entrance till she stood beside them.
“No,” cried Lendrick, eagerly; “I can't follow these men in their knaveries. I don't see the drift of them, and I lose the clew to the whole machinery.”
“The drift is easy enough to understand,” said Foss-brooke. “A man wants to escape from his embarrassments, and has little scruple as to the means.”
“But the certainty of being found out—”
“There is no greater fallacy than that. Do you imagine that one-tenth of the cheats that men practise on the world are ever brought to light? Or do you fancy that all the rogues are in jail, and all the people who are abroad and free are honest men? Far from it. Many an inspector that comes to taste the prison soup and question the governor, ought to have more than an experimental course of the dietary; and many a juryman sits on the case of a creature far better and purer than himself. But here comes one will give our thoughts a pleasanter channel to run in. How well you look, Lucy! I am glad to see the sunny skies of Sardinia have n't blanched your cheeks.”
“Such a scheme as Sir Brook has discovered!—such an ignoble plot against my poor dear father!” said Lendrick. “Tell her—tell her the whole of it.”
In a very few words Sir Brook recounted the story of Sewell's interview with Balfour, and the incident of the stolen draft of the Judge's writing bartered for money.
“It would have killed my father. The shock would have killed him,” said Lendrick. “And it was this man,—this Sewell,—who possessed his entire confidence of late,—actually wielded complete influence over him. The whole time I sat with my father, he did nothing but quote him,—Sewell said so, Sewell told me, or Sewell suspected such a thing; and always with some little added comment on his keen sharp intellect, his clear views of life, and his consummate knowledge of men. It was by the picture Sewell drew of Lady Trafford that my father was led to derive his impression of her letter. Sewell taught him to detect a covert impertinence and a sneer where none was intended. I read the letter myself, and it was only objectionable on the score of its vanity. She thought herself a very great personage writing to another great personage.”
“Just so,” said Fossbrooke. “It was right royal throughout. It might have begun 'Madame ma soeur.' And as I knew something of the writer, I thought it a marvel of delicacy and discretion.”
“My father, unfortunately, deemed it a piece of intolerable pretension and offensive condescension, and he burned to be well enough to reply to it.”
“Which is exactly what we must not permit. If they once get to a regular interchange of letters, there is nothing they will not say to each other. No, no; my plan is the best of all. Lionel made a most favorable impression the only time Sir William saw him. Beattie shall bring him up here again as soon as the Chief can be about: the rest will follow naturally. Lucy agrees with me, I see.”
How Sir Brook knew this is not so easy to say, as Lucy had turned her head away persistently all the time he was speaking, and still continued in that attitude.
“It cannot be to-night, however, and possibly not tomorrow night,” said Fossbrooke, musing; and though Lucy turned quickly and eagerly towards him to explain his words, he was silent for some minutes, when at length he said, “Lionel started this morning by daybreak, and for England. It must have been a sudden thought. He left me a few lines, in pencil, which went thus,—'I take the early mail to Holyhead, but mean to be back to-morrow, or at farthest the day after. No time for more.'”
“If the space were not brief that he assigns for his absence, I 'd say he had certainly gone to see his father,” said Lendrick.
“It's not at all unlikely that his mother may have arranged to meet him in Wales,” said Sir Brook. “She is a fussy, meddlesome woman, who likes to be, or to think herself, the prime mover in everything. I remember when Hugh Trafford—a young fellow at that time—was offered a Junior Lordship of the Treasury, it was she who called on the Premier, Lord Dornington, to explain why he could not accept office. Nothing but great abilities or great vices enable a man to rise above the crushing qualities of such a wife. Trafford had neither, and the world has always voted him a nonentity.”
“There, Lucy,” said Lendrick, laughing,—“there at least is one danger you must avoid in married life.”
“Lucy needs no teachings of mine,” said Sir Brook. “Her own instincts are worth all my experiences twice told. But who is this coming up to the door?”
“Oh, that is Mr. Haire, a dear friend of grandpapa's.” And Lucy ran to meet him, returning soon after to the room, leaning on his arm.
Lendrick and Haire were very old friends, and esteemed each other sincerely; and though on the one occasion on which Sir Brook and Haire had met, Fossbrooke had been the object of the Chief's violence and passion, his dignity and good temper had raised him highly in Haire's estimation, and made him glad to meet him again.
“You are half surprised to see me under this roof, sir,” said Sir Brook, referring to their former meeting; “but there are feelings with me stronger than resentments.”
“And when my poor father knows how much he is indebted to your generous kindness,” broke in Lendrick, “he will be the first to ask your forgiveness.”
“That he will. Of all the men I ever met, he is the readiest to redress a wrong he has done,” cried Haire, warmly. “If the world only knew him as I know him! But his whole life long he has been trying to make himself appear stern and cold-hearted and pitiless, with, all the while, a nature overflowing with kindness.”
“The man who has attached to himself such a friendship as yours,” said Fossbrooke, warmly, “cannot but have good qualities.”
“My friendship!” said Haire, blushing deeply; “what a poor tribute to such a man as he is! Do you know, sir,” and here he lowered his voice till it became a confidential whisper,—“do you know, sir, that since the great days of the country,—since the time of Burke, we have had nothing to compare with the Chief Baron. Plunkett used to wish he had his law, and Bushe envied his scholarship, and Lysaght often declared that a collection of Lendrick's epigrams and witty sayings would be the pleasantest reading of the day. And such is our public press, that it is for the quality in which he was least eminent they are readiest to praise him. You would n't believe it, sir. They call him a 'master of sarcastic eloquence.' Why, sir, there was a tenderness in him that would not have let him descend to sarcasm. He could rebuke, censure, condemn if you will; but his large heart had not room for a sneer.”
“You well deserve all the love he bears you,” said Len-drick, grasping his hand and pressing it affectionately.
“How could I deserve it? Such a man's friendship is above all the merits of one like me. Why, sir, it is honor and distinction before the world. I would not barter his regard for me to have a seat beside him on the Bench. By the way,” added he, cautiously, “let him not see the papers this morning. They are at it again about his retirement. They say that Lord Wilmington had actually arranged the conditions, and that the Chief had consented to everything; and now they are beaten. You have heard, I suppose, the Ministry are out?”
“No; were they Whigs?” asked Lendrick, innocently.
Haire and Fossbrooke laughed heartily at the poor doctor's indifference to party, and tried to explain to him something of the struggle between rival factions, but his mind was full of home events, and had no place for more. “Tell Haire,” said he at last,—“tell Haire the story of the letter of resignation; none so fit as he to break the tale to my father.”
Fossbrooke took from his pocket a piece of paper, and handed it to Haire, saying, “Do you know that handwriting?”
“To be sure I do! It is the Chief's.”
“Does it seem a very formal document?”
Haire scanned the back of it, and then scrutinized it all over for a few seconds. “Nothing of the kind. It's the sort of thing I have seen him write scores of times. He is always throwing off these sketches. I have seen him write the preamble to a fancied Act of Parliament,—a peroration to an imaginary speech; and as to farewells to the Bar, I think I have a dozen of them,—and one, and not the worst, is in doggerel.”
Though, wherever Haire's experiences were his guides, he could manage to comprehend a question fairly enough, yet where these failed him, or wherever the events introduced into the scene characters at all new or strange, he became puzzled at once, and actually lost himself while endeavoring to trace out motives for actions, not one of which had ever occurred to him to perform.
Through this inability on his part, Sir Brook was not very successful in conveying to him the details of the stolen document; nor could Haire be brought to see that the Government officials were the dupes of Sewell's artifice as much as, or even more than, the Chief himself.
“I think you must tell the story yourself, Sir Brook; I feel I shall make a sad mess of it if you leave it to me,” said he, at last; “and I know, if I began to blunder, he 'd overwhelm me with questions how this was so, and why that had not been otherwise, till my mind would get into a helpless confusion, and he'd send me off in utter despair.”
“I have no objection whatever, if Sir William will receive me. Indeed, Lord Wilmington charged me to make the communication in person, if permitted to do so.”
“I 'll say that,” said Haire, in a joyful tone, for already he saw a difficulty overcome. “I 'll say it was at his Excellency's desire you came;” and he hurried away to fulfil his mission. He came almost immediately in' radiant delight. “He is most eager to see you, Sir Brook; and, just as I said, impatient to make you every amende, and ask your forgiveness. He looks more like himself than I have seen him for many a day.”
While Sir Brook accompanied Haire to the Judge's room, Lendrick took his daughter's arm within his own, saying, “Now for a stroll through the wood, Lucy. It has been one of my day-dreams this whole year past.”
Leaving the father and daughter to commune together undisturbed, let us turn for a moment to Mrs. Sewell, who, with feverish anxiety, continued to watch from her window for the arrival of a telegraph messenger. It was already two o'clock. The mail-packet for Ireland would have reached Holyhead by ten, and there was therefore ample time to have heard what had occurred afterwards.
From the servant who had carried Sewell's letter to Traf-ford, she had learned that Trafford had set out almost immediately after receiving it; the man heard the order given to the coachman to drive to Richmond Barracks. From this she gathered he had gone to obtain the assistance of a friend. Her first fear was that Trafford, whose courage was beyond question, would have refused the meeting, standing on the ground that no just cause of quarrel existed. This he would certainly have done had he consulted Fossbrooke, who would, besides, have seen the part her own desire for vengeance played in the whole affair. It was with this view that she made Sewell insert the request that Fossbrooke might not know of the intended meeting. Her mind, therefore, was at rest on two points. Trafford had not refused the challenge, nor had he spoken of it to Fossbrooke.
But what had taken place since? that was the question. Had they met, and with what result? If she did not dare to frame a wish how the event might come off, she held fast by the thought that, happen what might, Trafford never could marry Lucy Lendrick after such a meeting. The mere exchange of shots would place a whole hemisphere between the two families, while the very nature of the accusation would be enough to arouse the jealousy and insult the pride of such a girl as Lucy. Come, therefore, what might, the marriage is at an end.
If Sewell were to fall! She shuddered to think what the world would say of her! One judgment there would be no gainsaying. Her husband certainly believed her false, and with his life he paid for the conviction. But would she be better off if Trafford were the victim? That would depend on how Sewell behaved. She would be entirely at his mercy,—whether he determined to separate from her or not. His mercy, seemed a sorry hope to cling to. Hopeless as this alternative looked, she never relented, even for an instant, as to what she had done; and the thought that Lucy should not be Trafford's wife repaid her for all and everything.
While she thus waited in all the feverish torture of suspense, her mind travelled over innumerable contingencies of the case, in every one of which her own position was one of shame and sorrow; and she knew not whether she would deem it worse to be regarded as the repentant wife, taken back by a forgiving pitying husband, or the woman thrown off and deserted! “I suppose I must accept either of those lots, and my only consolation will be my vengeance.”
“How absurd!” broke she out, “are they who imagine that one only wants to be avenged on those who hate us! It is the wrongs done by people who are indifferent to us, and who in search of their own objects bestow no thought upon us,—these are the ills that cannot be forgiven. I never hated a human being—and there have been some who have earned my hate—as I hate this girl; and just as I feel the injustice of the sentiment, so does it eat deeper and deeper into my heart.”
“A despatch, ma'am,” said her maid, as she laid a paper on the table and withdrew. Mrs. Sewell clutched it eagerly, but her hand trembled so she could not break the envelope. To think that her whole fate lay there, within that fold of paper, so overcame her that she actually sickened with fear as she looked on it.
“Whatever is done, is done,” muttered she, as she broke open the cover. There were but two lines; they ran thus:—
“Holyhead, 12 o'clock.
“Have thought better of it. It would be absurd to meet him. I start for town at once, and shall be at Boulogne to-morrow.
“Dudley.”
She sat pondering over these words till the paper became blurred and blotted by her tears as they rolled heavily along her cheeks, and dropped with a distinct sound. She was not conscious that she wept. It was not grief that moved her; it was the blankness of despair,—the sense of hopelessness that comes over the heart when life no longer offers a plan or a project, but presents a weariful road to be travelled, uncheered and dreary.
Till she had read these lines it never occurred to her that such a line of action was possible. But now that she saw them there before her, her whole astonishment was that she had not anticipated this conduct on his part. “I might have guessed it; I might have been sure of it,” muttered she. “The interval was too long; there were twelve mortal hours for reflection. Cowards think acutely,—at least, they say that in their calculations they embrace more casualties than brave men. And so he has 'thought better of it,'—a strange phrase. 'Absurd to meet him!' but not absurd to run away. How oddly men reason when they are terrified! And so my great scheme has failed, all for want of a little courage, which I could have supplied, if called on; and now comes my hour of defeat, if not worse,—my hour of exposure. I am not brave enough to confront it. I must leave this; but where to go is the question. I suppose Boulogne, since it is there I shall join my husband;” and she laughed hysterically as she said it.
While the interview between Sir Brook and the Chief Baron lasted,—and it was a long time,—the anxiety of those below-stairs was great to know how matters were proceeding. Had the two old men, who differed so strongly in many respects, found out that there was that in each which could command the respect and esteem of the other, and had they gained that common ground where it was certain there were many things they would agree upon?
“I should say,” cried Beattie, “they have become excellent friends before this. The Chief reads men quickly, and Fossbrooke's nature is written in a fine bold hand, easy to read and impossible to mistake.”
“There, there,” burst in Haire,—“they are laughing, and laughing heartily too. It does me good to hear the Chief's laugh.”
Lendrick looked gratefully at the old man whose devotion was so unvarying. “Here comes Cheetor,—what has he to say?”
“My Lord will dine below-stairs to-day, gentlemen,” said the butler; “he hopes you have no engagements which will prevent your meeting him at dinner.”
“If we had, we 'd soon throw them over,” burst out Haire. “This is the pleasantest news I have heard this half-year.”
“Fossbrooke has done it. I knew he would,” said Beattie; “he's just the man to suit your father, Tom. While the Chief can talk of events, Fossbrooke knows people, and they are sure to make capital company for each other.”
“There's another laugh! Oh, if one only could hear him now,” said Haire; “he must be in prime heart this morning. I wonder if Sir Brook will remember the good things he is saying.”
“I 'm not quite so sure about this notion of dining below-stairs,” said Beattie, cautiously; “he may be over-taxing his strength.”
“Let him alone, Beattie; leave him to himself,” said Haire. “No man ever knew how to make his will his ally as he does. He told me so himself.”
“And in these words?” said Beattie, slyly.
“Yes, in those very words.”
“Why, Haire, you are almost as useful to him as Bozzy was to Johnson.”
Haire only caught the last name, and, thinking it referred to a judge on the Irish bench, cried out, “Don't compare him with Johnston, sir; you might as well liken him to me!”
“I must go and find Lucy,” said Lendrick. “I think she ought to go and show Mrs. Sewell how anxious we all are to prove our respect and regard for her in this unhappy moment; the poor thing will need it.”
“She has gone away already. She has removed to Lady Lendrick's house in Merrion Square; and I think very wisely,” said Beattie.
“There 's some Burgundy below,—Chambertin, I think it is,—and Cheetor won't know where to find it,” said Haire. “I'll go down to the cellar myself; the Chief will be charmed to see it on the table.”
“So shall I,” chimed in Beattie. “It is ten years or more since I saw a bottle of it, and I half feared it had been finished.”
“You are wrong,” broke in Haire. “It will be nineteen years on the 10th of June next. I 'll tell you the occasion. It was when your father, Tom, had given up the Solicitor-Generalship, and none of us knew who was going to be made Chief Baron. Plunkett was dining here that day, and when he tasted the Burgundy he said, 'This deserves a toast, gentlemen,' said he. 'I cannot ask you to drink to the health of the Solicitor-General, for I believe there is no Solicitor-General; nor can I ask you to pledge the Chief Baron of the Exchequer, for I believe there is no Chief Baron; but I can give you a toast about which there can be no mistake nor misgiving,—I give you the ornament of the Irish Bar.' I think, I hear the cheers yet. The servants caught them up, too, in the hall, and the house rang with a hip-hurrah till it trembled.”
“Well done, Bozzy!” said Beattie. “I'm glad that my want of memory should have recalled so glorious a recollection.”
At last Fossbrooke's heavy tread was heard descending the stairs, and they all rushed to the door to meet him.
“It is all right!” cried he. “The Chief Baron has taken the whole event in an admirable spirit, and, like a truly generous man, he dwells on every proof of regard and esteem that has been shown him, and forgets the wrongs that others would have done him.”
“The shock, then, did not harm him?” asked Lendrick, eagerly.
“Far from it; he said he felt revived and renovated. Yes, Beattie, he told me I had done him more good than all your phials. His phrase was, 'Your bitters, sir, leave no bad flavor behind them.' I am proud to think I made a favorable impression upon him; for he permitted me not only to state my own views, but to correct some of his. He agrees now to everything. He even went so far as to say that he will employ his first half-hour of strength in writing to Lady Trafford; and he charges you, Beattie, to invite Lionel Trafford to come and pass some days here.”
“Viva!” cried Haire; “this is grand news.”
“He asks, also, if Tom could not come over for the wedding, which he trusts may not be long deferred,—as he said with a laugh, 'At my time of life, Sir Brook, it is best to leave as little as possible to Nisi Prius.'”
“You must tell me all these again, Sir Brook, or I shall inevitably forget them,” whispered Haire in his ear.
“And shall I tell you, Lendrick, what I liked best in all I saw of him?” said Sir Brook, as he slipped his arm within the other's, and drew him towards a window. “It was the way he said to me, as I rose to leave the room, 'One word more, Sir Brook. We are all very happy, and, in consequence, very selfish. Let us not forget that there is one sad heart here,—that there is one upstairs there who can take no part in all this joy. What shall we, what can we, do for her?' I knew whom he meant at once,—poor Mrs. Sewell; and I was glad to tell him that I had already thought of her. 'She will join her husband,' said I, 'and I will take care that they have wherewithal to live on.'
“'I must share in whatever you do for her, Sir Brook,' said your father; 'she has many attractive qualities; she has some lovable ones. Who is to say what such a nature might not have been, if spared the contamination of such a husband?'
“I'm afraid I shocked, if I did not actually hurt him, by the way I grasped his hands in my gratitude for this speech. I know I said, 'God bless you for those words!' and I hurried out of the room.”
“Ah, you know him, sir!—you read him aright! And how few there are who do it!” cried Haire, warmly.
The old Judge was too weak to appear in the drawing-room; but when the company entered the dining-room, they found him seated at the table, and, though pale and wasted, with a bright eye and a clear, fresh look.
“I declare,” said he, as they took their places, “this repays one for illness. No, Lucy,—opposite me, my dear. Yes, Tom, of course; that is your place,—your old place;” and he smiled benignly as he said it. “Is there not a place too many, Lucy?”
“Yes, grandpapa. It was for Mrs. Sewell, but she sent me a line to say she had promised Lady Lendrick to dine with her.”
The old Chief's eyes met Fossbrooke's, and in the glances they exchanged there was much meaning.
“I cannot eat, Sir Brook, till we have had a glass of wine together. Beattie may look as reproachfully as he likes, but it shall be a bumper. This old room has great traditions,” he went on. “Curran and Avonmore and Parsons, and others scarce their inferiors, held their tournaments here.”
“I have my doubts if they had a happier party round the board than we have to-night,” said Haire.
“We only want Tom,” said Dr. Lendrick. “If we had poor Tom with us, it would be perfect.”
“I think I know of another too,” whispered Beattie in Lucy's ear. “Don't you?”
“What soft nonsense is Beattie saying, Lucy? It has made you blush,” said the Chief. “It was all my fault, child, to have placed you in such bad company. I ought to have had you at my side here; but I wanted to look at you.”
Leaving them thus in happy pleasantry and enjoyment, let us turn for a moment to a very different scene,—to a drawing-room in Merrion Square, where at that same hour Lady Lendrick and Mrs. Sewell sat in close conference.
Mrs. Sewell had related the whole story of the intended duel, and its finale, and was now explaining to her mother-in-law how impossible it would be for her to continue any longer to live under the Chief Baron's roof, if even—which she deemed unlikely—he would still desire it.
“He 'll not turn you out, dear,—of that I am quite certain. I suspect I am the only one in the world he would treat in that fashion.”
“I must not incur the risk.”
“Dear me, have you not been running risks all your life, Lucy? Besides, what else have you open to you?”
“Join my husband, I suppose, whenever he sends for me,—whenever he says he has a home to receive me.” “Dudley, I 'm certain, will do his best,” said Lady Lendrick, stiffly. “It is not very easy for a poor man to make these arrangements in a moment. But, with all his faults,—and even his mother must own that he has many faults,—yet I have never known him to bear malice.” “Certainly, Madam, you are justified in your panegyric by his conduct on the present occasion; he has, indeed, displayed a most forgiving nature.”
“You mean by not fighting Trafford, I suppose; but come now, Lucy, we are here alone, and can talk freely to each other; why should he fight him?”
“I will not follow you, Lady Lendrick, into that inquiry, nor give you any pretext for saying to me what your candor is evidently eager for. I will only repeat that the one thing I ever knew Colonel Sewell pardon was the outrage that no gentleman ever endures.”
“He fought once before, and was greatly condemned for it.”
“I suppose you know why, Madam. I take it you have no need I should tell you the Agra story, with all its shameful details?”
“I don't want to hear it; and if I did I would certainly hesitate to listen to it from one so deeply and painfully implicated as yourself.”
“Lady Lendrick, I will have no insinuations,” said she, haughtily. “When I came here, it never occurred to me I was to be insulted.”
“Sit down again, Lucy, and don't be angry with me,” said Lady Lendrick, pressing her back into her chair. “Your position is a very painful one,—let us not make it worse by irritation; and to avoid all possibility of this, we will not look back at all, but only regard the future.”
“That may be more easy for you to do than for me”
“Easy or not easy, Lucy, we have no alternative; we cannot change the past.”
“No, no, no! I know that,—I know that,” cried she, bitterly, as her clasped hands dropped upon her knee.
“For that reason then, Lucy, forget it, ignore it. I have no need to tell you, my dear, that my own life has not been a very happy one, and if I venture to give advice, it is not without having had my share of sorrows. You say you cannot go back to the Priory?”
“No; that is impossible.”
“Unpleasant it would certainly be, and all the more so with these marriage festivities. The wedding, I suppose, will take place there?”
“I don't know; I have not heard;” and she tried to say this with an easy indifference.
“Trafford is disinherited, is he not?—passed over in the entail, or something or other?”
“I don't know,” she muttered out; but this time her confusion was not to be concealed.
“And will this old man they talk of—this Sir Brook somebody—make such a settlement on them as they can live on?”
“I know nothing about it at all.”
“I wonder, Lucy dear, it never occurred to you to fascinate Dives yourself. What nice crumbs these would have been for Algy and Cary!”
“You forget, Madam, what a jealous husband I have!” and her eyes now darted a glance of almost wild malignity.
“Poor Dudley, how many faults we shall find in you if we come to discuss you!”
“Let us not discuss Colonel Sewell, Madam; it will be better for all of us. A thought has just occurred; it was a thing I was quite forgetting. May I send one of your servants with a note, for which he will wait the answer?”
“Certainly. You will find paper and pens there.”
The note was barely a few lines, and addressed to George Kincaid, Esq., Ely Place. “You are to wait for the answer, Richard,” said she, as she gave it to the servant.
“Do you expect he will let you have some money, Lucy?” asked Lady Lendrick, as she heard the name.
“No; it was about something else I wrote. I'm quite sure he would not have given me money if I asked for it.”
“I wish I could, my dear Lucy; but I am miserably poor. Sir William, who was once the very soul of punctuality, has grown of late most neglectful. My last quarter is over-due two months. I must own all this has taken place since Dudley went to live at the Priory. I hear the expenses were something fabulous.”
“There was a great deal of waste; a great deal of mock splendor and real discomfort.”
“Is it true the wine bill was fifteen hundred pounds for the last year?”
“I think I heard it was something to that amount.”
“And four hundred for cigars?”
“No; that included pipes, and amber mouthpieces, and meerschaums for presents,—it rained presents!”
“And did Sir William make no remark or remonstrance about this?”
“I believe not. I rather think I heard that he liked it. They persuaded him that all these indiscretions, like his new wigs, and his rouge, and his embroidered waistcoats, made him quite juvenile, and that nothing made a man so youthful as living beyond his income.”
“It is easy enough to see how I was left in arrear; and you, dear, were you forgotten all this while and left without a shilling?”
“Oh, no; I could make as many debts as I pleased; and I pleased to make them, too, as they will discover one of these days. I never asked the price of anything, and therefore I enjoyed unlimited credit. If you remark, shopkeepers never dun the people who simply say, 'Send that home.'—How quickly you did your message, Richard! Have you brought an answer? Give it to me at once.”
She broke open the note with eager impatience, but it fell from her fingers as she read it, and she lay back almost fainting in her chair.
“Are you ill, dear,—are you faint?” asked Lady Len-drick.
“No; I 'm quite well again. I was only provoked,—put out;” and she stooped and took up the letter. “I wrote to Mr. Kincaid to give me certain papers which were in his hands, and which I know Colonel Sewell would wish to have in his own keeping, and he writes me this:—
“Dear Madam,—I am sorry that it is not in my power to comply with the request of your note, inasmuch as the letters referred to were this morning handed over to Sir Brook Fossbrooke on his producing an order from Colonel Sewell to that intent.—I am, Madam, your most obedient servant,
“George Kincaid.”
“They were letters, then?”
“Yes, Lady Lendrick, they were letters,” said she, dryly, as she arose and walked to the window, to hide an agitation she could no longer subdue. After a few minutes she turned round and said, “You will let me stay here to-night?”
“Certainly, dear; of course I will.”
“But the children must be sent for,—I can't suffer them to remain there. Will you send for them?”
“Yes; I 'll tell Rose to take the carriage and bring them over here.”
“This is very kind of you; I am most grateful. We shall not be a burden beyond to-morrow.”
“What do you mean to do?”
“To join my husband, as I told you awhile ago. Sir Brook Fossbrooke made that the condition of his assisting us.”
“What does he call assisting you?”
“Supporting us,—feeding, housing, clothing us; we shall have nothing but what he will give us.”
“That is very generous, indeed.”
“Yes; it is generous,—more generous than you dream of, for we did not always treat him very well; but that also is a bygone, and I 'll not return to it.”
“Come down and have some dinner,—it has been on the table this half-hour; it will be nigh cold by this.”
“Yes; I am quite ready. I'd like to eat, too, if I could. What a great resource it is to men in their dark hours that they can drink and smoke! I think I could do both to-day if I thought they would help me to a little insensibility.”