CHAPTER III.

The young gentlemen, engaged at a few shillings a week to perform liquidation drudgery in Messrs. Asherill and Swanland's offices, were so accustomed to regard the members of their firm as autocrats that they affected the airs of autocrats themselves when out of the presence chamber, and were consequently indignant if the outer world, happily ignorant of the nature of accountants, treated them as if they were very ordinary mortals indeed.

Having nothing to do for half an hour save kick their heels in that dingy, dirty, fusty, comfortless hall which the Great Eastern Railway Company generously offers for the use of the travellers on its line who repair to London Street, Mr. Bailey improved the occasion by delivering a series of orations on the folly of that old sinner Asherill, who detained them talking humbug till they lost the train, and having eased his feelings so far, he next proceeded to relieve them further by anathematizing Mortomley, who chose Saturday of all days in the week, and that Saturday of all Saturdays in the year, to take up his residence in Queer Street.

"I won't stand it," finished Mr. Bailey, while his eyes wandered over that cheerful expanse of country which greets the traveller who journeys by train from London to Stratford, as he nears the latter station. "I'll give them notice on Monday. They could not get on without me. I'd like to know where they could possibly find a man able to work as I can who would put up with such treatment. On Monday I will give them a piece of my mind they won't relish as much as they will their cut of roast beef to-morrow."

Which was all very well, but as Mr. Bailey had been in the habit of making the same statement about once a fortnight upon an average, since liquidation came into fashion, his companion attached less importance to it than might otherwise have been the case.

"What a day it has turned out!" was all the comment he made.

"Yes, and they are at home safe and snug before this, or on their way to it. Well, it is of no use talking."

"I wonder if we shall have far to walk," said the junior, whose name was Merle.

"Miles no doubt," answered Mr. Bailey, "and get drenched to the skin. But what do they care! We are not flesh and blood to them. We are only pounds shillings and pence."

Which was indeed a very true remark, although it emanated from Mr. Bailey. Had he been aware how exactly his words defined his employers' feelings, he would not perhaps have been so ready to give utterance to them.

As matters stood, he grumbled on until they were turned out in the drenching rain to get from Leytonstone Station to Whip's Cross as best they could. Green Grove Lane was still leafy, and flowers bloomed gaily in the railway gardens, and Leytonstone church stood in its graveyard a picturesque object in the landscape, and there was a great peace about that quiet country station with its level crossing and air of utter repose which might have been pleasant to some people.

But it did not prove agreeable to Mr. Bailey. A soaking rain. An indefinite goal. An unknown amount of work to be got through!

Very comprehensively and concisely Mr. Bailey read a short commination service over Mr. Mortomley and his affairs, whilst he and Merle stood on the down platform waiting the departure of the train ere crossing the line.

He had got his directions from the station master, and they did not agree with those issued at head-quarters.

"He should have gone to Snaresbrook. That was the nearest point, but, however, he could not miss his way. It was straight as an arrow after he get to the 'Green Man,' still keeping main road to the left."

Which instructions he followed so implicitly that the pair found themselves finally at Leyton Green.

From thence they had to make their way back into the Newmarket Road, and as that way lay along darksome lanes under the shade of arching trees, through patches of Epping Forest, while all the time the rain continued to pour down, steadily and determinedly, it may be imagined how much Mr. Bailey was enamoured of Mortomley and his estate by the time the two clerks reached Homewood.

But once within the portals of that place, circumstances put on a more cheerful aspect. A bright fire blazed in the old-fashioned hall, glimpses were caught of well lighted and comfortably furnished rooms. Rupert, with a rare civility, addressed them with a polite hope that they were not very wet, and Mrs. Mortomley, after reading Mr. Swanland's note, sent to inquire if they would not like some tea.

With which, Mr. Bailey having readily responded in the affirmative, they were provided presently. Rupert in the meantime having recommended half a glass of brandy, which Merle gulped down thankfully, and Mr. Bailey sipped sullenly, angry a whole one had not been advised.

When the dining-room door was shut, and the pair had made an onslaught on the cold fowl and ham sent in with tea for their delectation, Merle remarked,

"What a stunning place, ain't it!"

"Ay, it is a snug crib enough," replied the other, who had already beheld wreck and ruin wrought in much finer abodes.

"They don't seem a bad sort," observed Merle, who, being young to the business, still thought a bankrupt might be a gentleman, and who moreover was not a tip-top swell like Bailey, whose father rented a house at fifty pounds a year, and only let off the first floor in order to make the two obstinate ends meet.

"What do you mean?" inquired Bailey.

"Why, asking us to have tea and all that," was the innocent answer.

"Pooh!" replied his companion. "Why, it is all over now. They don't know it, but the whole place belongs to us, I mean to our governors. The tea is ours, and the bread and butter and the ham, and not this fowl alone, but every hen and chicken on the premises. Hand me over the loaf, I am as hungry as a hunter."

Had little Mrs. Mortomley understood matters at that moment as she understood them afterwards, she would, hospitable as was her disposition, have turned those two nice young clerks out into the weather, and told them to make up their accounts in the Works or Thames Street, as they should never enter the house at Homewood so long as she remained in it.

But she did not understand, and accordingly after tea the making out of the liabilities proceeded under Rupert's superintendence, Mrs. Mortomley's presence being occasionally required when any question connected with her own department had to be answered.

"I do not see why these debts should be put down," said Dolly at last. "Of course, all household liabilities I shall defray out of my own money."

"No, you won't," replied Rupert brusquely. "You will want every penny of your money for yourself, or I am much mistaken."

At length Mr. Bailey bethought him of asking Rupert about the return trains, and finding that the last was due in three quarters of an hour, stated that as it seemed impossible the work could be finished then, he and Merle would be down at about eight o'clock on Monday morning.

Having given which promise he went out into the night, followed by his junior, and Homewood was shortly after shut up, and every member of the household, tired out with the events of the day, went early to bed, and woke the next morning with a sense of rest and ease as strange as it proved transitory.

In the afternoon Mr. Dean called and asked specially for Mrs. Mortomley, and when Dolly went down to him, she found that he wished to tell her in his own formal way that the idea of Miss Halling, his promised wife, the future mistress of Elm Park remaining in a house where bailiffs were unhappily located, had troubled and was troubling him exceedingly. Of course, he felt every sympathy for Mrs. Mortomley in her sad position, and for Mr. Mortomley in his present unfortunate circumstances, but—

"In a word," broke in Dolly, "you want Antonia to leave Homewood and go to your sister. That is it, is it not, Mr. Dean? Of course I can make no objection, and when affairs are arranged here she can return to be married from her uncle's house."

For a moment Mr. Dean was touched. He saw Dolly believed matters would be so arranged that Homewood should still belong to Mortomley, and that she offered hospitality to a woman she cordially disliked on this supposition. And he thought it rather nice of the little woman, whose face he could not avoid noticing was very white and pinched, though she carried the trouble lightly, and, in his opinion, with almost unbecoming indifference. But Mr. Dean quickly recovered his balance. These people were paupers. Great heavens! literally paupers, except for the few thousands left of Mrs. Mortomley's fortune. They might ask him to lend them money. Presuming upon their relationship to Miss Halling, they might even expect to be asked to stay at his house—at Elm Park—a gentleman's mansion, across the threshold of which no bankrupt's foot had ever passed. At the bare idea of such complications, Mr. Dean turned hot and cold alternately.

He had done much for these Mortomley people already. He had broke the news of the impending catastrophe to Mr. Forde, and after that act of weakness what might they not expect in the future!

When Mr. Dean thought of this he felt horrified at the possible consequences resulting from his extraordinary amiability. Indeed, he felt so horrified that dismay for a minute or two tied his tongue, and it was Dolly who at last broke the silence. Leaning back in an easy-chair, her thin white hands clasped together, her eyes too large and bright, but still looking happy and restful, she said, "I should like very much, Mr. Dean, to know where your thoughts are wandering?"

Mr. Dean, thus aroused, answered with a diplomatic truthfulness which afterwards amazed himself.

"I was thinking of you and Mr. Mortomley, and Miss Halling and myself."

"Yes?" Dolly said inquiringly. There had been a time when she would have remarked all four were interesting subjects, but on that especial Sunday she was a different woman from the Mrs. Mortomley of Mr. Dean's earlier recollection.

"To a lady possessed of your powers of observation," began Mr. Dean, "I need scarcely remark that difficulties might arise were Miss Halling to take up even a temporary abode with my sister, and therefore—"

"I comprehend what you mean, and I know why you hesitate," said Mrs. Mortomley, as her visitor paused and cast about how to finish his sentence, "but I really do not see what can be done. I am afraid," she added, with a pucker of her forehead, which had latterly grown habitual when she was troubled or perplexed. "Antonia would not like my Aunt Celia. My aunt is goodness itself, but a very little eccentric. Still, if she understood the position—"

"I hope you do not think me capable of adding to your anxiety at such a time as this," interposed Mr. Dean pompously.

All unconsciously Mrs. Mortomley had managed to offend his dignity as she had never offended it before when she suggested the idea of quartering the future mistress of Elm Park on a spinster living upon an extremely limited income in some remote wilds.

"I should not for a moment entertain the idea of asking any of your relations or friends to receive the lady whom I hope soon to call my wife. I have anxiously considered the whole matter, and after mature deliberation have arrived at the conclusion that Mr. Rupert Halling is the only relative with whom Miss Halling can now with propriety reside until she gives me the right to take her to Elm Park."

"You propose then that Rupert shall leave Homewood also," said Mrs. Mortomley. She wore a shawl thrown over her shoulders, for the rain had made her feel chilly, and Mr. Dean did not notice that under it she clasped both hands tightly across her heart as she spoke.

"With that view," he answered, "I took suitable apartments yesterday in the immediate vicinity of his studio."

"I did not know he had a studio," she remarked.

"With commendable prudence and foresight he secured one a couple of months back in the neighbourhood of the Regent's Park."

"And it was there I suppose he painted that picture he sold for twenty pounds."

"Twenty guineas," amended Mr. Dean. "A friend of mine did pay him that very handsome amount for a sketch of a little girl which the purchaser imagined bore some resemblance to a deceased daughter of his own."

"His model being Lenore, doubtless."

"I should say most probably."

Dolly did not answer. She sat for a minute or two looking out at the leaves littering the lawn, at the sodden earth, at the late blooming flowers beaten almost into the earth by reason of the violence of the rain—then she said,

"And so they, Antonia and Rupert, go to those lodgings you spoke of?"

"Yes, on Tuesday next, if Miss Halling can complete her preparations in the time."

"Rats leave a sinking ship," murmured Mrs. Mortomley to herself.

"I beg your pardon," observed Mr. Dean, not catching the drift of her pleasant sentence.

"I said," explained Dolly, speaking very slowly and distinctly, "that rats leave a sinking ship. So the story goes at all events, and I, for one, see no reason to doubt its truthfulness. If you think of it, what more natural than that they should go. They are detestable creatures in prosperity. Why should they alter their natures in adversity?"

"I am very stupid I fear," said Mr. Dean; "but I confess I fail to see the drift of your remark."

"I can make it plain enough," she retorted. "Here are a man and a woman who must have starved unless we or you had provided them with the necessaries of life. It was not very pleasant for me to have Antonia Halling here, but she has had the best we could give her; and never a cross look or grudging word to mar her enjoyment of the good things of this life—things she prizes very highly.

"As for Rupert, he has been treated by my husband as a brother or a son. We made no difference between them and Lenore, except that I have denied my child what she wanted sometimes, and they have never been denied.

"And the end of it all is that when my husband's affairs go wrong, they leave us, and allow a stranger to break the tidings. That is why I call them rats, Mr. Dean—your fiancée and her brother. I am sure heaven made Antonia Halling a helpmate—meet for you—for she is as selfish, as worldly, as calculating, and as cold as even Mr. Dean, of Elm Park."

Having finished which explicit speech, Dolly rose and gathered her shawl more closely about her figure, bowed, and would have left the room had Mr. Dean not hindered her departure.

"Mrs. Mortomley," he said, "I can make allowances for a lady placed as you are; but I beg leave to say you are utterly mistaken in your estimate of me."

"I am not mistaken," she replied. "I understand you better than you understand yourself. Do you think I cannot see to the bottom of so shallow a stream? Do you imagine for a moment I fail to understand, that last Thursday night you turned the question over and over in your mind as to whether you could give up Antonia Halling when I made you understand the position of her uncle's affairs? You have decided and rightly you cannot give her up. No jury would hold the non-success of a relation a sufficient reason for jilting a woman.

"And I really believe Antonia is so thoroughly alive to her own interests that she would take the matter into court. Good-bye, Mr. Dean. You and your future wife are a representative couple."

"What an awful woman," said Mr. Dean, addressing himself after her departure. "I declare," he added, speaking to Rupert, who immediately after entered the room, "I would not marry Mrs. Mortomley if she had twenty thousand a year."

"How rare it is to find two people so unanimous in opinion," remarked Rupert with a sneer. He did not like Mr. Dean at the best of times, and at that moment he had a grudge against him, because he knew it was Mr. Dean who must have told Mr. Forde about that twenty guineas for a sketch of the small Lenore. "I am sure poor mistaken Dolly would not marry you if you settled fifty thousand per annum on her. But what has she been saying to cause such vehement expression of opinion?"

"She says you and your sister are rats; that you have eaten of the best in the ship, and leave it now it is sinking."

"Upon my honour I am afraid Mrs. Mortomley is right," was the reply. "Hers is a view of the question which did not strike me before; but it is not open to dispute. Still what would the dear little soul have one do? Stay with the vessel till it disappears? If she speak the word, I for one am willing to do so."

"I hoped to hear common sense from one member of this household at all events," was Mr. Dean's reply, uttered loftily and contemptuously.

"So you would from me if I were not in love with my aunt," Rupert answered tranquilly. "More or less, less sometimes than more, I have always been in love with Dolly. She is not pretty, except occasionally, and she can be very disagreeable; and she is some years older than myself; and she is an adept at spending money; and upon the whole she is not what the world considers a desirable wife for a struggling man. But she has—to use a very vulgar expression—pluck, and by Jove if I live to be a hundred, I shall never see a woman I admire so thoroughly as my uncle's wife. But this is sentimental," Mr. Halling proceeded. "And I stifle it at the command of common sense. On Tuesday I leave Homewood for those desirable apartments in which you wish me to play propriety to the future lady of The Elms."

Through the rain Mr. Dean drove away foaming with rage. Could he have lived his time over again, no Miss Halling would ever have been asked to grace his abode. No young person, with a vagabond brother in a velvet suit, should ever have been mistress of The Elms.

But Mrs. Mortomley had put the case in a nutshell. He must marry Antonia, though Mortomley were bankrupt ten thousand times over.

And Antonia knew it, and under the roof which had sheltered her for so many a long night, she returned thanks for the fact to whatever deity she actually worshipped.

It is not for me to state what god hers chanced to be, but certainly it was not that One of whom Christians speak reverently.

CHAPTER IV.

Up and down under the shelter of this verandah, Rupert paced impatiently for a few minutes after Mr. Dean's departure, the sound of the rain pouring on the roof making a suitable accompaniment to thoughts that were about the most anxious the young man's mind had ever held.

Now that the step had been taken and the die cast, liquidation assumed a different aspect to that it had worn when viewed from a distance. Something he could not have defined in the manner of the two clerks filled him with a vague uneasiness, whilst Mr. Dean's determination that his fiancée should be exposed no longer to the contaminating associations of Homewood annoyed him beyond expression. True, for some time previously he had been drifting away from his uncle. Whilst Dolly thought he was assisting her husband and still devoting himself to the town business, he was really working for many hours a week in his new painting-room, which he reached by taking advantage of that funny little railway between Stratford and Victoria Park, which connects the Great Eastern and the North London lines.

He had never entered the offices of the General Chemical Company since the day when he opened his lips to warn his uncle of the probable consequences of that weakness which induced him to struggle on long after he ought to have stopped. He very rarely honoured the Thames Street Warehouse with his presence, and he never interfered in the business unless Mortomley asked him to arrange a disputed account or call upon the representative of some country house who might chance when in town to take up his quarters at a West-end hotel.

Nevertheless, he did not like the idea of cutting himself utterly adrift from his relatives. Homewood had been home to him, more truly home than his father's house ever proved. Spite of all the anxiety of the later time, his residence under Mortomley's roof had been a happy period. He liked his uncle and his wife, and the little Lenore, and—well there was no use in looking back—the happy days were gone and past, and he must look out for himself. He could not afford to quarrel with Mr. Dean, and Dolly's bitter speech still rankled in his memory, but yet he had not meant to give up Homewood entirely, and Mr. Dean must have blundered in some way to leave such an impression on Mrs. Mortomley's mind.

"I will have it out with her at once," he decided, and he threw away his cigar, girt up his loins for the coming struggle, and re-entered the house.

He found Dolly in the library writing a letter. When he entered, she raised her head to see who it was, but immediately and without remark resumed her occupation.

There was a bright red spot flaming on each cheek, and a dangerous sparkle in her eyes, which assured Rupert the air was not yet clear, and that the storm might come round again at any moment.

But he knew the sooner they commenced their quarrel the more speedily it would be over, and so plunged into the matter at once.

"Dolly, what have you been doing to Mr. Dean? He has gone off looking as black as a thunder-cloud."

"I have been giving him a piece of my mind," she answered without looking up, and her pen flew more rapidly over the paper.

"Your explanation is not lady-like, but it is explicit," remarked Rupert, "I am afraid you will soon not have any mind left if you are so generous in disposing of it."

"If my mind proves of no more use to me in the future than it has in the past, the sooner I dispose of it all the better," was the reply.

"Do you think you are wise in commencing your present campaign by quarrelling with everybody?" he inquired.

"Yes, if every one is like Mr. Dean and—and other people."

"Meaning me?"

"Meaning you, if you choose to take the cap and wear it."

"Do you know Mr. Dean says he would not marry you if you had twenty thousand a year?"

"It is a matter of the utmost indifference to me what Mr. Dean says or thinks either."

"He told me you considered Antonia and myself little, if at all, better than rats."

"Did he happen to tell you what I thought of him?"

There was no shaming or threatening Dolly into a good temper when a mood like this was on her. So Rupert changed his tactics.

"Do put down your pen and let us talk this matter over quietly together."

"You had better go away and not ask me to talk at all," she answered; but she ceased writing nevertheless.

"Do you want that letter posted?" he inquired.

"No, I shall send it by a messenger."

"It is not to Mr. Dean, is it?"

"To Mr. Dean," she repeated. "What should I write to Mr. Dean for? It is to no one connected with Mr. Dean or you."

"Well, lay it aside for a few minutes and tell me in what way we have annoyed you."

"You have annoyed me by want of straightforwardness. Mr. Dean has annoyed me by his insolence, unintentional though I believe it to have been. But that only makes the sting the sharper. Who is he that his future wife should be taken away from Homewood the moment misfortune threatens it? What is Antonia that she should be treated as though she were one of the blood royal?"

"Mr. Dean is one of the most intolerable bores I ever met," replied Rupert calmly. "And Antonia is, in my opinion, an extremely calculating and commonplace young person. But Mr. Dean has money and his prejudices, and I am sure you do not wish to prevent Antonia marrying the only rich man who is ever likely to make her an offer.

"Now Mr. Dean regards a man who fails to meet his engagements as a little lower than a felon. I believe he would quite as soon ask a ticket-of-leave fellow to Elm Park as a merchant whose affairs are embarrassed, and there is no use in trying to argue him out of his notions. We must take people as they are, Dolly."

"Yes, if it is necessary to take them at all," she agreed.

"It is very necessary for me," he said. "I cannot afford to quarrel with Mr. Dean, or to have Antonia thrown on my hands, as she would be if he refused to marry her."

"He will not refuse," observed Dolly. "He has thought that subject over, and decided it is too late to draw back now."

"How do you know?" asked Rupert in amazement.

"Because I taxed him with having done so, and he could not deny it. Pray assure him next time you meet he need not fear Archie or myself presuming on the relationship and asking him for help, and scheming for invitations to Elm Park. So far as I am concerned I should be glad never to see him or his wife (that is to be) again."

"Good heavens!" ejaculated Rupert. Over what awful perils he had been gliding all unconsciously. If her conversation were as she reported it, might not Mr. Dean well call little Mrs. Mortomley a dreadful woman. Certainly the sooner Antonia was away from Homewood, the better for all parties concerned.

He had been imprudent himself, but how could he imagine the nature of the interview which preceded his own; he must see Mr. Dean again immediately. He must carry a fictitious apology from Dolly to that gentleman, and then arrange for their eternal separation. All these things raced through his mind, and then he said,

"You are a perfect Ishmael, Dolly."

"Am I?" she retorted. "Well I am content. The idea pleases me, for I always considered Ishmael's mother a much more attractive sort of woman than Sarah, and I have no doubt Abraham thought so too."

She was recovering her good temper by slow degrees, it is true; but still Rupert understood that the wind was shifting round to a more genial quarter.

"Why should we—you and I—quarrel?" he suddenly asked, stretching out his hand across the table towards her.

She did not give him hers as he evidently expected she would, but answered,

"Because I do hate people who are secret and deceitful and not straightforward."

"You mean about that picture?" he said.

"Yes," she agreed; "the picture was the first thing which shocked me, and since that you leave a stranger to say you intend that I shall be all alone through this trouble—all alone!"

There was an unconscious pathos in the way she repeated those two last words which wrung Rupert's heart.

"I never intended to leave you alone," he replied. "I do not intend to do so now. I must go to these confounded lodgings with Antonia, because the powers that be insist on my going, but neither she nor Mr. Dean can expect me to stay with her the whole day. She must get some one of her innumerable female friends to bear her company; and I shall be here almost continually. Upon my soul, Dolly, if I dare offend Mr. Dean, nothing should induce me to leave Homewood at this juncture; indeed, I told him in so many words, that if you wished me to stay I would remain."

She did not answer for a few moments, then she said,

"You were quite safe in telling him that, Rupert. You knew I would never ask anyone to sacrifice his own interests to my fancies."

"You are angry with me still!" he remarked, then finding she remained silent, he went on,

"I confess I did wrong about that picture, but I did not sin intentionally, with any idea of concealment, or separating my interests from yours. I only held my peace, because I did not want Forde to know; and no harm would have been done had that pompous old idiot held his tongue, and not considered it necessary to explain that the brother of his future wife was able to earn money for his own wants.

"The moment this liquidation business was settled, I meant to tell you concerning that and the studio, but I was so vexed about Dean's wish for Antonia to leave here, that I felt I could not talk to you freely. Do you believe me? Indeed what I have said is the literal truth."

"It may be," she answered, "but it is not quite the whole truth. However that does not signify very much. No doubt you are wise in making provision for yourself,—but oh!"

And covering her face with her hands, she ended her sentence with a paroxysm of tearless grief.

In a moment Rupert was beside her, "What is it, what is the matter, Dolly? Dolly, speak to me; there is nothing on earth I will not do for you if you only tell me what you want."

She lifted her head and looked at him as a person might who had just returned from a journey through some strange and troubled land.

For many a day that look haunted Rupert Halling; it will haunt him at intervals through the remainder of his life. She put back her hair which had fallen over her face, with a painful slowness of movement foreign to her temperament. She opened her lips to speak, but her tongue refused its office.

Then Rupert frightened ran into the dining-room, and brought her wine, but she put it aside, and he fetched her water, and held the tumbler for her to drink.

As if there had been some virtue in the draught, her eyes filled with tears—heavy tears that gathered on her lashes and then fell lingeringly drop by drop; but soon the trouble found quicker vent, and she broke into an almost hysterical fit of weeping.

"Cry, dear, cry, it will do you good," he said as she strove vainly to check her sobs. "Do not try to speak at present, you will only make yourself worse."

But Dolly would speak.

"I am so sorry you should have seen me like this" she panted. "I did not mean to be so stupid."

He was standing beside her bathing her hair and forehead with eau de cologne, but his hand shook as he poured out the scent, and he felt altogether, as he defined the sensation to himself, "nervous as a woman."

"Dolly," he began when she grew calm again, "what was the trouble—the special trouble I mean—which caused all this. Do try to tell me. If it was anything I said or did, forgive me; for I never meant to say or do anything to hurt you."

"It was not that," she replied; then after a moment's hesitation she went on. "A dreadful feeling came over me, Rupert, that this liquidation will turn out badly. I have had the feeling at intervals ever since Friday evening, and it seemed just then to overwhelm me. It may be folly, but I cannot shake off the notion that my poor husband will be ruined. If liquidation is what we thought, why should Mr. Dean want Antonia to leave here? Why, if we are only asking for time in which to pay our debts, should such disgrace attach itself to us?"

Now this was just the question Rupert had been vainly asking himself, and he stood silent, unable to answer.

"Think it over until to-morrow," she added, noticing his hesitation. "I am afraid you are worldly and selfish, Rupert, but I do not think you are unfeeling, or quite ungrateful. Think it over for the sake of poor Archie and me and little Lenore, and—I won't insult you by saying for your own sake too. Put yourself quite out of the question, and consider us alone. There was a time when we considered you, and though that time is past, still I hope you can never quite forget."

She rose and stretched out both hands to him, in token of reconciliation and her own woman's weakness which dreaded facing the dark future all alone.

"Dolly dear," he answered, holding her hands tight, "you are so true, a man must be a wretch to cheat you."

For evermore till Eternity Rupert Halling can never quite forget uttering those words, nor the way in which he failed to keep the promise they contained.

CHAPTER V.

Thus armed against the weather he walked round to the stables, clapped a saddle on the back of Mr. Mortomley's favourite black mare, Bess, unloosed her headstall, put on her bridle, led her through the side gate, which he closed behind him, looked once again to the girths and drew them up a hole tighter; then after a pat and a "Gently, my beauty, stand quiet, pet," he put one foot in the stirrup, and next instant was square in his seat.

Madam Bess hated rain as cordially as some human beings, and tossed her head and made a little play with her heels, and quivered a little all over with indignation at being taken out in such weather by any one except her master; but Rupert was a good as well as a merciful rider, and he humoured the pretty creature's whims till she forgot to show them, and after plunging, shying, cantering with a sideway motion, intended to express rebellion and disgust, she settled down into a long easy trot, which in about three quarters of an hour brought Rupert to the gates of Elm Park.

There, one of the ostlers chancing to be at the lodge talking to the old woman whose duty and pleasure it was to curtsey to Mr. Dean each time he came in or went out, he dismounted and gave Bess to the man, with strict orders to rub her down and give her a feed.

"I must take her a good round after I leave here," he remarked, "and it is nasty weather for horses as well as men."

Now Master Rupert had always been very free of his money at Elm Park, and no rumours of coming misfortune at Homewood had reached the people connected with Mr. Dean's elegant mansion, so Bess was rubbed till her coat shone like a looking-glass, and she herself kicked short impatient kicks with one heel at a time; and she had a great feed of corn and a long draught of water, and her heart was refreshed within her.

Meantime her rider, instead of proceeding along the avenue, which took many and unnecessary turns, so as to give the appearance of greater extent to Mr. Dean's domain, selected a short cut through the shrubbery and flower-garden, finally reaching the west front of the house by means of a light iron gate which gave entrance to a small lawn, kept trim and smooth as a bowling-green.

At a glass door on this side of the house Rupert caught sight of a familiar face, which brightened up as its owner recognised in the half-drowned visitor a favourite of the house.

"Well, Mr. Housden, and how are you?" said the young man, standing outside and shaking the wet off him after the fashion of a Newfoundland dog.

"I keep my health wonderful considering, thank you, Mr. Rupert," answered the butler, for it was that functionary who stood at the glass door contemplating the weather. "And how is the family at Homewood, sir?"

"My uncle is very ill," was the reply; "he has not been able to be out of his room for the last three weeks. Mrs. Mortomley and my sister and Miss Lenore are as usual. Governor is at dinner I suppose?"

"No, sir, Mr. Dean has finished dinner, or I should not be disengaged. He is sitting over his dessert, sir, with a bottle of his very particular old port."

"The thermometer was so low it took that to raise it," muttered Rupert to himself; then added, "Ask Rigby to step this way and take these dripping things of mine, will you, Housden? I want to see Mr. Dean."

"Allow me, Mr. Rupert. Let me relieve you of your coat." And Mr. Housden, who would have been grievously insulted had the young man seemed to suppose he could condescend so far, took the waterproof, and the knickerbockers, and the hat, and the whip, and conveyed them himself to Rigby, after which he announced Mr. Halling's arrival to his master, and received orders to show him in.

What with dinner and its accompaniments, Mr. Dean had been half dozing in his arm-chair when his butler informed him of Mr. Halling's presence, and he arose to meet his visitor with a stupid confusion of manner which at once gave Rupert an advantage over him.

If he had not dined and been quite awake, and in full possession of his business senses, he would not have greeted Rupert with that awkward—

"Yes, to be sure, Mr. Halling. Did not expect to see you again so soon; not such an evening as this I mean."

"Oh! I don't care for rain," Rupert answered. "I ride between the drops."

"Will you take a glass of port or what?" asked Mr. Dean, touching the wine decanter tenderly.

"Thank you," the young man answered, "I will have some, or 'what,' supposing it assume the shape of a tumbler of hot brandy-and-water, if you have no objection, for I have still far to ride to-night, and I do not want to be laid up; and besides," he added with a smile, "your port is too strong for me, my head won't stand it."

"Housden, bring the brandy and some boiling water, boiling remember, at once," said Mr. Dean relieved that his visitor refused to partake of the wonderful port for which he had paid such a price per bottle that ordinary mortals would not have dared to swallow it except in teaspoonfuls.

"You are really very good and very generous to receive me so courteously after the way in which we parted," remarked Rupert when they were left alone. "The fact is I was put out to-day and I said what I ought not to have said, and Mrs. Mortomley was put out and she said what she ought not to have said, and we both want to apologise to you. She is sorry and I am sorry, and I think, sir, as it was you who told Mr. Forde about that picture your friend kindly purchased from me, which confidence in fact caused the whole disturbance, you ought to forgive us both."

Even Mr. Dean could not swallow this sentence at one gulp.

"Do you mean," he asked doubtfully, "to say Mrs. Mortomley has expressed her regret for the improper—yes,"—continued Mr. Dean after a pause devoted to considering whether he had employed the right word,—"most improper remark she made this afternoon."

"I mean to say," returned Rupert, "that Mrs. Mortomley has retracted those observations which pointed to my being a rat, that I have explained everything in our conduct which seem to need explanation to her satisfaction, that we are now perfectly good friends again, and that she has commissioned me to say she hopes you will not attach any importance to words spoken in a time of great trouble by a woman placed in a position of such difficulty as she is at present."

"Then upon my honour," exclaimed Mr. Dean, "the message does Mrs. Mortomley credit. I could not have believed her capable of sending it."

"Neither could I," thought Rupert, but he added aloud. "You do not quite know Mrs. Mortomley yet, I see. She is very impulsive, and often says a vast deal more than she really means; but when she calms down, she is as ready to confess she was wrong as she proved to give offence. I do not think any human being could live in the same house with my uncle's wife and not love her."

"Young man," said Mr. Dean with a solemn shake of his head while he poured himself out yet another glass of that particular port, "were I in your place I should not talk so glibly about love. There are people—yes indeed there are who might think you meant something not quite right."

If Rupert had yielded to the impulse strongest upon him at that moment, he would have leaned back in his chair and laughed aloud at the idea this moral old sinner evidently attached to his words, but he had a purpose to serve, and so with surprise not altogether simulated he said,

"Is that really your opinion, sir? then I will never use the expression again. Esteem is a good serviceable word. Do you approve of it."

Mr. Dean looked hard at Rupert to ascertain whether the young man were making game of him or not, but no sign of levity rewarding his scrutiny, he answered,

"It is a very good word indeed, but one I do not consider applicable in the present case. I am perfectly well aware that I do not possess that facility of expression and power of repartee possessed by those persons whose society Mrs. Mortomley at one time so much enjoyed, but I can see as far through a millstone as any one with whom I am acquainted, and esteem is not the word I should employ myself in this case."

"Perhaps you are right," replied Rupert carelessly; "but to return to the original subject, she is sorry for having said what she did, and so am I, and I have come here to apologise. When, however, I stated that if Mrs. Mortomley wished me to remain at Homewood I would do so, I spoke even at the risk of offending you, the literal truth. We have been treated generously at Homewood, and on thinking the matter over, it seemed to me that I at all events ought not to desert the ship if Mrs. Mortomley wished me to remain on board.

"But," he continued seeing Mr. Dean's face grow dark with passion at the prospect of his will being disputed, "she does not wish me to remain. She sees the reasonableness of your wishing Antonia to leave Homewood immediately, and she feels it only just that you should know she considers under my uncle's altered circumstances, it would be better for all communication between Elm Park and Homewood to cease."

Mr. Dean paused before he answered. Of course if he married Antonia Halling, this was precisely the point he wished to carry, and yet there was something in this sudden change of policy which filled him with doubt and surprise.

Had Rupert said in so many words that Mrs. Mortomley declared she never wished to see the owner of Elm Park again, the position would not have been so unintelligible; but this tone of submission and conciliation was so unlike anything he had ever associated with Mrs. Mortomley that he could not avoid expressing his astonishment at it.

"I am quite at a loss," he said at length, "to understand the reasons which could have induced Mrs. Mortomley to alter her course of conduct and withdraw her expressed opinions with such rapidity."

In a moment Rupert saw his error, and hastened to repair it.

"To be quite frank," he confessed, "I put the matter rather strongly to her, and not to weary your patience, if Mrs. Mortomley can on occasion be stormy she can also be unselfish. She does not want to mar my sister's prospects. She does not desire that my uncle's past kindness to us shall ever be considered to constitute a claim upon you in the future. There is the case in a nutshell. Of course we had a much longer conversation than that I have condensed. In a word, till my uncle has paid his creditors and is prosperous again, you need never fear that he or his wife will wish to renew their acquaintance with you."

Mr. Dean shook his head.

"Your uncle will never be prosperous again," he remarked.

"I hope matters are not so bad as that," answered Rupert.

"When a man," continued Mr. Dean, "lets things go so far as he has done, he is, to all intents and purposes, commercially dead. No, Mr. Mortomley will never hold up his head again in the business world. It is well he has his wife's money to fall back upon, and I hope her friends will advise him to use it prudently—"

"Do you really say, sir, you think my uncle will not be able to pull through?"

"I do not exactly understand what you mean by pulling through," answered Mr. Dean, "but if you have any expectation of seeing his creditors paid, and he occupying his old standing, you will be very much disappointed, that is all."

"But, good heavens! the business is a fine business, and there is stock and plant and book debts, and—"

"I don't care what there is," interrupted Mr. Dean, "once an estate goes into liquidation or bankruptcy, stock and plant and good-will and book debts and everything else are really as valueless as old rubbish. What is the good of machinery if it is standing still? What is the use of a business unless it is worked, and that by somebody who understands it? What do you suppose Homewood, and every stick of furniture in the house, and every ounce of stock in the works would fetch under the hammer? Pooh! don't talk to me about creditors ever being paid when once affairs pass out of a man's own hands. There is where your uncle made his mistake. If he had come to me for advice a couple of years ago, I could have told him what to do."

"What ought he to have done?" asked Rupert.

"Why, faced his affairs, and then called a private and friendly meeting of his creditors. If there were one or two who opposed, he should, with the consent of those who did not oppose, have offered a sum to be rid of them altogether. He should then, furnished with authentic data, have said, "Now, here is a business worth so much a year. In so many years you can be paid in full. I must have a small income out of the concern for my services, and you can appoint an accountant to examine the books, check the accounts, and divide the money every three months." He would have been as much master in his own works as a man ever can be who is in debt. All these writs and other disgraceful embarrassments would have been avoided; but what is the use of talking of all this now? Mortomley's Estate has been allowed to go to the dogs, and the dogs have got it, and it will be a very clever creditor indeed who manages to snatch even a morsel out of their mouths."

"But, sir," pleaded Rupert, "you advised the present course to be adopted."

"I said there was no other course now to be adopted," amended Mr. Dean. "Could any man in his right senses say there was another way out of the difficulty, with men in possession and hungry creditors waiting impatiently to sweep the place clear? It is better that none should have money than that one should, to the exclusion of others; and this is where your uncle will be blamed, for paying out the men who proceeded to extremity, and not paying those who were patient and gave him time. No doubt he will get his discharge in due course, but how will that benefit him? He is done for commercially. He can never do any more good for himself or those belonging to him."

"I cannot see that exactly," answered Rupert. "If he were stripped to-morrow of every worldly effect, he could, given ordinary health, earn a very respectable income by means of his genius."

"What is genius?" inquired Mr. Dean, who was by this time standing before the fire and laying down the law in that manner which makes so many very commonplace gentlemen considered oracles by their wives and acquaintances. "Ah! you cannot tell me, I see; but I can tell you. Genius is success. It is of no use declaring a man is clever or has great talents or exceptional abilities. I say prove it. How are you to prove it? Show me his banker's book, show me the receipts signed by his tradesmen, show me the style in which he lives, show me these things, and I will then believe he has possessed either the genius to make money or the genius to keep money when made by his father before him."

"Then you think the man who paints a picture can have no genius unless he is able to sell it likewise?"

"I am sure of it. That person is an idiot who, possessing a certain amount of sense, requires as much more to make use of it. Take your uncle's case. According to your statement he possesses genius. Well, what has it done for him, wherein is he better at this moment than one of his own workmen? He began life with a good business. Where is that business now? He had a respectable connection, and what must he do but allow himself to be drawn into a connection—pray do not suppose I mean to speak harshly of your father, who first introduced him to it—which seems to have been anything but respectable. Once entangled, his genius failed to show him any way out of the net he had allowed to enclose him. His genius cannot enable him to make good articles out of bad. He marries a woman with money, and he tries to patch up his tottering credit with part of her fortune. If that is what genius does for a man, better have none say I. Now look at me," added Mr. Dean, after he had paused to take breath, and Rupert did look at him with as strong a feeling of repulsion as Dolly had ever felt. "No one ever accounted me clever. My father called me plodding Billy, and said I would never do much for myself or anybody else. What has the result been?"

If all his future had depended upon holding his peace at that moment, Rupert must have answered,

"That you seem to have done remarkably well for yourself at any rate."

"You are right," said Mr. Dean briskly, appropriating the remark as a compliment. "And in doing well for myself, I have done well for others. I have employed clerks and servants. I have paid good salaries. I have never set myself up as being ashamed of my business, and my business has not been ashamed of me. I have never tried to push out of my own rank in life, but I have sat at banquets side by side with a lord, and many a time I have spoken after an earl at a public meeting. I might have stood for member of parliament, and may yet be in the House if after a year or two I feel disposed to interest myself in politics. Contrast my position with that of your clever uncle and say whether you do not agree with me that the true meaning of genius is success. Will not your sister be a vast deal better off at Elm Park with everything money can buy, than your little Mrs. Mortomley at Homewood with the sheriff's officer in possession? Am not I right in what I say? Have not I reason on my side?"

"You have so much reason," answered Rupert a little sadly, "that before long I shall come and ask your advice as to how I am to compass success. To-night I have to take Leytonstone on my way back to Whip's Cross, a ride all round Robin Hood's Barn, is it not?"

"What are you going to Leytonstone for?" asked Mr. Dean.

"I—I have to see a man about a picture he wants me to paint for him," hesitated Rupert, for he did not wish to state the real errand on which he was bound, and, plausible romancer though he could be on occasion, Mr. Dean's question took him by surprise.

"Ah!" remarked Mr. Dean, a comfortable feeling of conscious righteousness diffusing a heightened colour over his face, already highly coloured with the glow of virtue and thirty-four port. "You must give up all that sort of work if you wish to be successful. I have never opened a ledger on Sunday, and I have tried to put business out of my mind altogether. If a man is to be successful, he must conform to all the usages of the country in which he happens to be placed. Now we are placed in England, and I do not know any country in which religion is made so easy; and if you think of it, religion is a most useful institution. It teaches the poor their proper place, and—"

Rupert could stand no more of this. "I have lived in a house, Mr. Dean," he answered, "where, I think, there was one genuine Christian at any rate, and I agree with you and him, that Sunday labour for gentle or simple is a thing to be avoided; but my work to-night is a work of necessity, and the Bible pronounces no curse on our performing it in such a case as that!"

"No, no, certainly not; I suppose you are short of money. Well, good evening; tell Mrs. Mortomley I will try to forget all she said to-day."

"Yes, I will tell her," answered Rupert, "and thank you very much for your kindness. Don't come out with me pray," he added,—which was an utterly unnecessary entreaty as Mr. Dean had no intention of doing so. "I can find my way quite well. Good-night," and he went.

But when he had reached the middle of the hall, he paused, and drew a long deep breath.

"If I were in Antonia's place," he murmured, "sooner than marry that self-sufficient cad, I would go down to the Lea and drown myself, or else take poison."

Rupert really felt at the minute what he said, but the worst of it was that such minutes never, in the young man's nature, lengthened themselves into hours.

CHAPTER VI.

"I do not mind the weather," answered Rupert, which was fortunate, for the rain was pouring in such torrents that the noise made by the mare's hoofs was inaudible through the rushing tempest, and it was only by help of the ostler's lanthorn that Rupert could tell where Bess stood shivering and cringing, as the drops pelted like hail-stones upon her.

But if the night had been ten times worse than was the case, Rupert would still have persisted in his intention of riding round by Leytonstone. Comfort and assurance he felt he must have, some accurate knowledge of their actual position he was determined to obtain for Dolly, and so he proceeded through the darkness, with the rain sweeping in gusts up from the south-east, and expending the full force of its fury upon horse and horseman wherever an opening in the forest glades exposed both to its violence.

A lonely ride, lonely and dreary, the road now winding through common lands covered with gorse, and broom and heather, now leading through patches of the forest, now skirting gravel and sand pits, and again passing by skeletons of new houses run up hastily and prematurely by speculative builders.

And wherever any other road which could possibly lead back to Homewood crossed that Rupert desired to pursue, a difference of opinion took place between him and Bess, she being quite satisfied that the way they ought to go was the way which led to her stable; Rupert, on the contrary, being quite determined that she should carry him to Leytonstone.

At length the violence of the storm somewhat abated, and as he passed the 'Eagle,' at Snaresbrook, from behind a bank of wild watery-looking clouds the moon rose slowly and as if reluctantly, whilst the wind grew higher and swept over the lonely country lying towards and beyond Barkingside in blasts that almost took away the young man's breath.

On the whole he was not sorry when he reached that great public-house which stands where three roads meet near the pond at Leytonstone. There he dismounted, and giving Bess in charge of a man who knew the mare and her rider well, he walked on past the church, down the little bye-street leading to the picturesque station, across the line, and so to a new road intersecting an estate that had been recently cut up for building, and where already houses were dotting the fields, where two or three years previously there was no sign of human habitation.

One of these houses belonged to Mr. Gibbons; he had bought it for a very low price, and nobly indifferent to the horrible newness of its appearance, to the nakedness of its garden, and that general misery of aspect peculiar to a suburb while in its transition state from country to town, he removed his household goods from Islington, where he had previously resided, and set himself at work to make a home in the wilderness.

He was a man content to wait for trees to grow, and shrubs to mature, and creepers to climb. His was the order of mind which can plant an asparagus bed and believe the three years needful for it to come to perfection will really pass away in regular course. He procured a mulberry-tree and set it, and he would have done the same with a walnut had the size of his garden justified the proceeding.

As it was, he looked forward to eating fruit grown on his own walls and espaliers; he directed the formation and stocking of his garden with great contentment. He built a greenhouse; he ordered in a Virginia creeper and a Wistaria, which he hoped eventually to see cover the front of his house; he put up a run for his fowls; and he talked with unconcealed pride of his "place near the forest," where his children grew so strong and healthy, he declared that the butcher's bills frightened him.

To men of this sort, men who are willing to sow in the spring, and patient enough to wait for the ripening in the autumn, England owes most of her prosperity; but ordinary humanity may well be excused if it shrink from the idea of settling down in a spic-and-span new house in an unfinished neighbourhood.

Rupert's humanity, at all events, accustomed as it was to the wealth of foliage at Homewood, to the stately trees and bushy shrubs, and matured gardens, and lawns covered with soft old turf, recoiled with horror from the naked coldness of Mr. Gibbon's residence, and his teeth chattered as the uncertain moonbeams glanced hither and thither over new brick walls, and stuccoed pillars, and British plate-glass, and all those other items which go to compose a British villa in the nineteenth century.

The wind, sweeping over the Essex marshes and across Wanstead flats, brought with it heavy gusts of showers, and one of these pursued Rupert as he ploughed his way over the loose stones and gravel which had been laid upon the road.

"It is a nice night and a nice hour for a visit," he reflected. "I wonder what Gibbons will say to my intruding on his privacy on the Sabbath-day." And he paused for a moment before applying his hand to the knocker, and listened to the vocal strength of the family, which was employed at the moment in singing psalms in that peculiar style which the clergy assure us is especially pleasing to the Almighty.

They, it is to be presumed, must know something about the matter. Certainly, the performance affords pleasure to no one of God's creatures except to the vocalists themselves. In a lull of the wind Rupert could hear the shrill trebles of the young ladies, the cracked voice of their mother, the gruff growling of the two sons, and the deep bass of Mr. Gibbons himself, all engaged in singing spiritual songs in unison.

"It will be a charity to interrupt that before they bring the ceiling down," said the visitor, and he forthwith gave such a thundering double knock that the music ceased as if a cannon had been fired amongst the vocalists.

Miss Amy's hands dropped powerless from the keyboard of the piano, and Mr. Gibbons, forgetful of the sacred exercises in which he had been engaged, first exclaimed,

"Who the devil can that be?" and then proceeded to ascertain who it was for himself.

"I beg ten thousand pardons for intruding upon you," Rupert was beginning, but Mr. Gibbons would listen to no apology.

"Bless my soul!" he exclaimed, "what can have brought you out such a night? Come in and have some supper. We were just going to have supper. The rain came down in such buckets we could not get to church, so the young people were having a little music. ("Music!" thought Rupert.) Come in, there is no one here except ourselves."

"You are very kind," Rupert answered, "but I cannot stop. I am wet, and have had a long, miserable ride. I only want to ask you half-a-dozen questions, and then I must get home. I left my mare at the 'Green Man,' and she is drowned, poor old girl."

"Well, you must take something," said Mr. Gibbons, who in trade insisted upon his pound of flesh if he saw the slightest hope of getting it, but who out of trade was liberal and hospitable to a commendable degree.

"I will take nothing, thank you," Rupert replied decidedly, "except hope, if you are able to give me that. I have been drinking brandy-and-water at the house of my respected brother-in-law that is to be, and I can't stand much of that sort of thing. I wonder how it is prosperous men are able to drink what they do after dinner and never turn a hair, whilst poor wretches who never knew what it was to have a five-pound note between them and beggary are knocked over by a few glasses."

They were standing by this time in a small room covered with oil-cloth, which Mrs. Gibbons, who was a notable manager, used for cutting out her children's garments. She neutralised the cold of the oilcloth by standing on a wool mat; and then, as she remarked to her friends, there was no trouble in sweeping up the clippings, as there would have been had she laid down a carpet.

The apartment did not look cheerful. It was on a piece with the outside of the house; but Rupert had a confidence in Mr. Gibbons which proved more consolatory at the moment than any amount of luxurious furniture could have done.

"What is the matter? What has gone wrong now?" asked Mr. Gibbons, ignoring the young man's irrelevant statement, which, indeed, having a wider experience, he did not in the least believe.

In a few sentences Rupert told him the events of the last two days. There was no person living to whom Rupert Halling could talk so freely as to this sharp, shrewd man of business, whom he did not like, with whom he had not an idea in common, who he knew could, to quote an old proverb, "lie as fast as a dog can trot," but in whose judgment he trusted as if he had been a prophet.

Mr. Gibbons sat beside the table, his arms crossed on it, looking at Rupert, and Rupert sat at a little distance, and spoke right on, never stopping till he had said his say.

When the story was told Mr. Gibbons rose and took a few turns up and down the room.

"If you think of it, Forde has not made a bad move," he remarked at last, stopping in his walk. "He can keep the matter as quiet as he likes, he can tell his directors what he pleases, and if there is any game left to play he can play it without much interference. I did not think he had it in him to devise such a scheme, but perhaps it was not he, only Kleinwort. There is nothing that little thief could not do except be honest."