The time, so often deferred, at which Mr. Guyon was to pay his first visit to his daughter in her country-house had at length arrived; and the old gentleman made his appearance at Middlemeads with all the advantages of a very juvenile toilet and a new stock of those adjuncts to his personal beauty which he was in the habit of carrying about with him. It was not without reluctance that Mr. Guyon bade adieu to London, which he was accustomed to speak of as "the little village," and its delights; but he felt it absolutely necessary to make himself personally acquainted with that country-house which he had so often depicted to his boon companions in the most glowing terms, and with those country families whom, to the same confidants, he had represented as revelling in the elegant and unostentatious hospitality of the British merchant. He had been a little chaffed by these friends about the calm manner in which his daughter had borne his long-continued separation from her. Some of them compared him to King Lear, some to Captain Costigan; and Mr. Guyon, who knew very little about either of the historical personages between whom and himself a comparison was instituted, thought it was "dam' low," and that the sooner all chance of a repetition of such joking was put a stop to the better.
So the old gentleman came down to Middlemeads, and took up his quarters in one of the best spare-rooms, and strove to make himself agreeable to other people and to enjoy himself simultaneously. This was not very difficult, for he had a grand capacity for living; and his small-talk and geniality, and stories of grand people, made quite an impression amongst the neighbouring families, who thought Mrs. Streightley rather conceited, and Mr. Streightley very dull. Mr. Guyon in a very short time had made himself thoroughly at home, and had taken upon himself--not without Katharine's tacit consent; indeed the whole affair rather amused her than otherwise--the direction of affairs at Middlemeads, and the regulation of the manner in which the day should be spent. He it was who organised the tableaux to which the whole county was invited, which were such a grand success, and which were commemorated in the Morning Post. He it was who arranged for the first meet of the season of the stag-hounds on the Middlemeads lawn, and for the hunt-breakfast at his son-in-law's expense. Robert Streightley was unfortunately compelled to be away in London on business on that interesting occasion; but in his absence Mr. Guyon took the chair, in which he comported himself with the greatest dignity and hospitality; and when the deer was uncarted, waved his hat to the ladies, and rode away after it on one of his son-in-law's horses, to his own intense satisfaction.
Robert Streightley was very frequently compelled to be away in London on business just at that time; and when he was at home, he seemed to have left his mind behind him among the ledgers and the invoices and the share-lists, and to have left his spirits--God knows where! He was thoroughly preoccupied and gloomy, never speaking except when spoken to, and then replying with an obvious effort at the collection of his wandering thoughts. Mr. Guyon noticed this immediately after his arrival, and tried to rally his son-in-law, commencing with much pleasant badinage about the accumulation of wealth by the sale of oneself to the Evil One; an oft-used joke, which he had never known to miss fire hitherto, but which on this occasion was received with perfect silence. Over the quiet dinner, which, as it once or twice happened, Mr. Guyon ate with Katharine and her husband, or in the midst of a large party, it was all the same,--Robert never entered into any thing that was going on, but always remained in the same gloomy, silent, preoccupied state.
Mr. Guyon could never, even in his most amiable moods, have been called a patient man, long-suffering was not one of his virtues; and under his son-in-law's long face and absent manner he suffered acutely. His little mots passed unsmiled at, his anecdotes of the aristocracy evidently had not been listened to; he felt that he was throwing the pearls of his West-end refinement before City swine; and he was highly indignant. But not with Streightley--or at least he dared not openly declare his indignation to his son-in-law--it was on Katharine that he turned the heavy-guns of his wrath, and rebuked his daughter with an acrimony which might have had serious effect on a less self-possessed young lady.
"I come here," said Mr. Guyon one morning in the library, where he had gone to write a letter, and where he found Katharine similarly employed,--"I come here to your house, and I find your husband an altered man. He has lost that cheerfulness, that energy, that buoyancy which distinguished him, and, in fact, he's become a doosid unpleasant dreary bird. How's this? Cheerful before marriage, and miserable after; looks as if marriage was the cause, doesn't it, Kate? And to think that my daughter has not--not striven to--to what d'ye call--bless the lot of the man who--doubles his joys and halves his sorrows, and all that kind of thing? Am I to think that you--but no, that could not be! I must remember----"
"You must remember, papa, if you please," said Kate, looking him full in the face, and speaking in a low stern voice,--"you must remember the manner in which and the conditions under which I married my husband! And, remembering them, you must be good enough never to dare--it is a strong word to use to one's father, but I repeat it--never to dare to address me in this way again. I know my duty to my husband, and--according to my lights, and under the peculiar circumstances of our union--I do it!"
It was not to be supposed that Katharine, however devoid of that instinctive perception of love which will make the dullest of women quick to see when trouble is hanging over one dear to her, was either blind or indifferent to the depression of Robert's spirits and the change in his appearance. Towards her, individually, he was always the same,--studious and eager to forward her wishes, and bounding his to making her happy; but he was preoccupied and gloomy. He was beginning to look old, too; the vigorous upright look which had been the first thing in his appearance to strike an observer, was less conspicuous than it had been, and his step was slower and heavier. His wife was not blind to the alteration, and she put it all down to the account of "business." In this general conclusion she was quite right; but Katharine had not the remotest glimmering of a suspicion that misfortune and loss were constituents of this "business." She believed her husband to be a very rich man, whose ambition it was to become very much richer, and whose life was devoted to the realisation of that ambition. She had never ceased to regard him as the "City man" of their first acquaintance; and though her ideas respecting the transactions carried on by City men had undergone considerable alteration since that time, she was as far as ever from a real comprehension of the risks and the anxieties which her husband's life included. The making of money in larger or smaller sums Katharine understood to be his calling; and so far as the variation was between larger and smaller, she comprehended anxiety being involved; but as to serious loss, as to ruin, she had not the faintest notion of such a possibility. Of Mr. Guyon's transactions with her husband Mrs. Streightley was also profoundly ignorant. Robert had taken care she should be so, for his sake as well as for her own. He knew Katharine's delicacy of feeling and her pride perfectly, and he also appreciated her acuteness and keenness as they deserved. From hurt and indignant mortification at discovering that her father had taken such means to "exploiter" her marriage, to questioning why a clever and shrewd man of business, such as Katharine well knew Robert to be, should admit such unscrupulous demands on her father's part, would be an easy and natural transition; and Robert shrunk with terror from the idea that any such clue should ever find its way to his wife's hands. No symptom of such danger had shown itself; the feelings with which Katharine regarded her father had ceased to be of a kind to prompt her to much personal interest in his affairs, and by nature she was not inquisitive. That Mr. Guyon's pursuits were frivolous in the extreme; that he presented that most contemptible of spectacles--an old man aping the dissolute manners of an objectionable order of youth, Katharine was becoming more and more painfully aware; but she looked no deeper into his life than the surface, from which she turned away with a feeling which, had she investigated it, she must have acknowledged to be contempt.
The nobility of Katharine's nature asserted itself in the manner in which she regarded the marriage of Gordon Frere and Hester Gould. That the intelligence should not cost her a pang of exceeding keenness was impossible; but she did battle with herself against the temptations to bitterness and enmity against Hester which beset her, and she came nobly out of the strife. Little did she dream how closely her demeanour was scrutinised; little did she imagine that the bright dark eyes of the obsequious Mr. Daniel Thacker, perhaps the humblest of Mrs. Streightley's servants and the most respectful of her admirers, were steadily directed to her face for many days during his stay at Middlemeads, with the purpose of reading what might appear on that fair dial indicative of storm and turmoil in her heart. She had no suspicion that she was watched; but, as she also had nothing whatever to hide, there was no danger in her unconsciousness. The brief sharp pain she endured had come and passed when she was alone. She remembered how she had envied Hester Gould her wealth, only because it left her free to marry as she liked: she remembered her own bitter saying, "she may buy instead of being bought," and she thought it had been strangely realised. But she would not be unjust either to Hester Gould or to her own false lover. She would acknowledge that Hester had many attractions other than her wealth; she would acknowledge her fair share of beauty, her talents, her good manners, the numerous charms which might easily secure a genuine attachment. She was ready to believe that Gordon Frere might really love Hester; and the more ready, as she had reason to know the shallowness and fickleness of his nature. "I daresay he cares for her as much as he cared for me," Katharine thought; "and in this case he can afford to indulge his fancy,--in mine he could not. She is fortunate that he can love her and marry her, otherwise she too would find that he would love her and leave her, as he left me, to the ridicule of her friends, and a broken heart, were she fool enough to break her heart for him. And he--he has only done exactly what I did, even supposing he does not love her. He has only married for money. With this difference, to be sure,--that I would have shared poverty with him, and he would not face it for me: with this other difference too, that I was in earnest, and he was only amusing himself. Our positions are pretty much the same in the end; we are both rich, we are parted from each other, and satisfied to be so, and another has the first claim on each. I have no right to despise him for the marriage he has made, nor dares he to despise me."
So Katharine wrote to Ellen Streightley, and expressed interest in the marriage, and hope of its happiness, which were perfectly sincere, and were most welcome to the recipient of her letter. She treated the subject with polite indifference in her reply to Lady Henmarsh. She understood cousin Hetty tolerably well, and disdained the spitefulness which she perceived too thoroughly to stoop to retaliation. It was a fortunate circumstance for Robert that his sister had remained with her mother at the Brixton villa after Miss Gould's marriage, and thus no occasion arose for the lengthened and frequent discussion of the event. Had Ellen been at Middlemeads, she would have talked about the wedding to an embarrassing extent. As it was, his reluctance to mention Gordon Frere's name--a reluctance which Katharine did not suspect--was seconded by her own, which Robert's state of mind prevented him from surmising; and after a mere formal comment, whose insufficiency, considering the intimacy subsisting between the Streightleys and Miss Gould, did not fail to strike Mr. Thacker, the subject was dropped. He tried to talk about the wedding, at which he had been present, and at which his sisters had officiated as bridesmaids; but he had not courage to persevere in the face of Robert's silence and the well-bred coldness of Katharine's manner, which plainly implied that the matter was one wholly devoid of interest to her; but, of course, if Mr. Thacker chose to pursue that topic of conversation, she was bound to listen and to reply.
Life at Middlemeads proceeded much as usual, except that the amusements of autumn were substituted for those of spring. There was no other change in the aspect of affairs at the stately and luxurious country-house, over which Katharine presided with grace and dignity which seemed to grow more and more remarkable. Her beauty was at its zenith now; and no doubt the subsidence of all angry and impetuous feeling, the "settling down" which had taken place within the past year, had told upon her physically as well as morally. She had not, indeed, acted upon Mrs. Stanbourne's advice in its spirit. She had not faced the fact that the greatest of all her obligations towards her husband was the obligation to love him. She had not tried to realise that; and in so far the change in her was maimed and incomplete. But she had kept the letter of her promise to her friend, and ruled her life with more consideration for her husband than in the earlier days of their marriage. Had there been no obstacle, as unfortunately there was, in the secret bound in Robert's conscience, to a perfect understanding between the husband and wife, it might have come about at this period, when Gordon Frere's marriage had completed the severance of the past from Katharine's present life.
Mrs. Stanbourne was at Middlemeads shortly after the marriage of Gordon and Hester, and had been even more anxious than before to find Katharine on good terms with Robert. She was about to leave England for an indefinite time; and she would fain have gone away leaving her young kinswoman more intent on happiness, and less intent on pleasure, than she had found her on her first visit to Middlemeads. Observation had but increased her respect and regard for Robert Streightley; and she now noticed his depressed and careworn manner with sincere regret. She was at a loss to what origin to ascribe it; for things were far better, in a domestic point of view, than they had been in the spring. Had Mrs. Stanbourne met Mr. Guyon at Middlemeads, she might have discerned at least a portion of the truth, bringing, as she would have done, clearer notions of "business" than those of Katharine to aid her observations; but that gentleman avoided her with a persistent caution, for which, while far from divining its motives, she was unfeignedly grateful. Mrs. Stanbourne could not have thoroughly understood Mr. Guyon, had she had ever so favourable an opportunity of detecting him; but she despised him intuitively, and had often taken herself to task for the unreasoning dislike with which he inspired her.
"My dear Kate, what quantities of money you spend on furniture!" said Mrs. Stanbourne to Katharine, a day or two before she left Middlemeads. She had entered the morning-room, and found Mrs. Streightley looking over an upholsterer's pattern-book; while a "young man" stood by, awaiting her decision and her orders. She had given them, and the young man had taken his departure, charged by Katharine to have certain articles ready for her inspection by a certain day of the ensuing week.
"Do I?" asked Katharine absently. "Well, perhaps I do; but I did not choose the things here myself, you know; and then, I like change."
"May I ask what you are changing now, Kate?"
"O dear, yes, of course. It's my dressing-room furniture. I hate that walnut-wood, it looks so brittle; and I was quite delighted with Lady Kilmantan's rooms; so I am going to have just the same. They will be charming, with a conservatory and an aviary thrown out on the western side--just the aspect, you know."
"But your present conservatory is a splendid one, Kate, to say nothing of your acre of glass at the gardens."
"But I don't care for that great show thing; I want one of my own, that no one can go into except I specially invite them, and where I can choose the flowers myself, and put common flowers in if I please, and not be dictated to by the gardeners. See, here are the plans; charming, are they not? Here's to be a delicious little fountain, and the floor is to be white marble."
"Very pretty, Kate; but also very expensive. Don't think me intrusive, dear, or impertinent, if I say again I think you spend a very great deal of money. Mr. Streightley is very rich, I believe; do you know how rich?"
"N-not exactly," said Kate hesitatingly. "I know nothing about his income, except that he tells me to do just as I like. People talk of him to me as a 'City magnate,' and as if there were no end to his money."
"Have you any idea how much you spend yourself, Kate, in a year?"
"No, I have not. Every thing of this kind"--and she waved her hand, to indicate the room in which they were sitting, with its luxurious appointments--"Mr. Streightley arranges for. I have nothing to do with money except for my private expenses, dress, and that; and I have not had any bills yet."
"I fancy they will surprise you when they arrive, Kate. But if Mr. Streightley has said nothing, I am perhaps taking fright unnecessarily." And then Mrs. Stanbourne rather abruptly turned the conversation to her approaching departure from England. She was to winter at Rome with her daughter and her son-in-law; and she and Katharine indulged in talking about a proposed plan for the Streightleys joining the party there. It did very well to talk about, if nothing more came of it; and the vague prospect softened the pain with which Katharine bade her friend adieu a few days later.
The alterations at Middlemeads went on briskly, and, like all alterations, exhibited a tendency to extend their scope and increase their variety. The dull wintry weather had come now, and the comfort of the luxurious house was somewhat interfered with by the presence of workmen and the disarrangement of some of the rooms. Under a momentary impression created by what Mrs. Stanbourne had said, Katharine had spoken to her husband about the cost of her intended improvements, which had now extended far beyond the narrow sphere of her own apartments. It was the first time the subject of money had been mooted between them; and Katharine's manner was slightly constrained, her pride slightly touched. She shrank from the least possibility of a rebuke, from the shade of an imputation that she had interpreted the carte-blanche which her husband had given her too liberally. A different and more painful kind of embarrassment possessed Robert; and his over-eagerness to hide it from his wife, his stern resolution to carry out to the letter the tacit contract between them, induced him to reassure her with so much vehemence, that Katharine never gave the subject another thought, but plunged into her plans with fresh vigour and heedless extravagance.
Mrs. Streightley found the distance from London inconvenient, when each day required her to pronounce a judgment upon some new pattern in furniture or hangings, or to decide for or against some piece of virtù or ornament of a rare and costly description. The season was dull down in Buckinghamshire; and though London was in a certain sense, the fashionable one, dull also, it would at least offer that dear delight to all who lead such lives as hers--a change. So she assented very gladly to a proposition which Robert made to her at the beginning of November, that they should remove to the house in Portland Place for a month. The reason he assigned for this arrangement, on his own part, was the plea of "business," which Katharine never inquired into; and in a few days, with the ease and celerity with which rich people make even the most out-of-the-way arrangements, Katharine found herself settled in her town-house, if not with all the luxury and completeness of "the season," in very perfect comfort. She had not thought it necessary to apprise Mr. Guyon of her intention of coming up to town; nor did she let him know immediately that she had done so. On the second afternoon after her arrival in London she called at his house, but without any expectation of finding him at home. She was, however, shown into the dingy dining-room--more dingy than ever; and there her father joined her after a few minutes. He expressed all the fit and appropriate sentiments on beholding her, with his usual fluency; but he did not express surprise quite successfully. This did not strike Katharine at the time; but as she drove back to Portland Place, having invited her father to dinner on the following day, she thought of it, and felt sure that he had not been surprised,--in fact, that he knew she was in town.
"How very odd!" she thought; "has Robert been to see him? And if he has, why should papa not have mentioned it, and said at once he had been expecting to see me?"
"I called on papa this afternoon," she said to her husband that day at dinner, at which meal she could not help observing Robert's unusual gloom and thoughtfulness. "He is coming to dine with us to-morrow. Have you seen him yet?"
"Yes," said Robert; "he came to the office yesterday."
Some feeling like anger, but which she could not precisely define, caused Katharine to turn red and hot for a moment. Her husband said no more, and seemed lost in thought. Had their mistress chanced to look towards them, she would have seen a very expressive glance exchanged between the servants in attendance. The "situation" was not quite a mystery for the servants' hall, and the opinion there for some time had been that "the old 'un was a-comin' of it a deal too strong, and he'd find Streightley wouldn't stand it much longer."
Katharine felt uncomfortable, she did not know why; and she watched her father on the following day with a degree of attention she had seldom bestowed upon him of late. His manner was as jaunty, his conversation was as fluent, his juvenility was as marked, as well-preserved, as ever. He was delightfully facetious; and when he told Katharine that he had all sorts of messages in charge for her from Cousin Hetty, and that--gad! he had nearly forgotten the chief news of all--sentence of death against Sir Timothy; couldn't live a month, the doctors said; and as they had the power of proving the soundness of their own judgment, of course he wouldn't live a month,--he made the little joke quite fascinating. Still there was something about him, and about Robert, who was a poor dissembler, which Katharine did not like, did not understand, and which made her uncomfortable. There was a fourth person present; a circumstance which each felt to be a relief. This was Ellen Streightley. Katharine had gone that afternoon to the Brixton villa, and had paid Robert's mother a visit, during which she had been as charming and agreeable as she could be when she chose. She had brought Ellen home with her; and an instinct now made her doubly glad she had done so. Robert had thanked her warmly and gratefully for her prompt attention to his mother and to Ellen, and had looked as happy as ever for a little. Somehow Katharine liked his thanks, liked his kind words; and when she wondered what was amiss, found herself hoping it was nothing involving any distress of mind to Robert.
Mr. Guyon went away early, having told his daughter he should come to breakfast on the morrow. "But I daresay I shall not see you, my dear," he added; "for Robert and I have business to talk over, and we mean to shut you out,--don't we, Robert?" And the affectionate father-in-law nodded in his most airy and jovial way to Mr. Streightley. But Robert only bowed. He was immovably grave, and Katharine almost made up her mind that she would ask him what was the cause of his restraint and gloom. She never did ask the question, however; for the following day found her full of all the delightful occupations which she had planned for herself in town--found her bent on enjoying all that London had to offer during its partial eclipse, and also found her father and Robert apparently on as good terms as ever. Robert had noticed his wife's transient uneasiness, and, determined to adhere to his fatal resolution of concealment, he had applied himself to the task of hiding the truth, this time with success.
The pallid footman, who still remained in attendance on Mr. Guyon in Queen Anne Street, had been of late leading such an easy life--had had so much time for the enjoyment of social carouses at his club, for the cultivation of female society, for the promotion of the growth of his whiskers, and other large-souled pursuits--had, above all, been enabled to indulge in his favourite luxury of lying in bed late o' mornings to such an extent since his young mistress's marriage, that he received his master's announcement that breakfast for two must be ready at nine o'clock the next morning with disgust which he felt it difficult to restrain. As, however, he knew from experience that Mr. Guyon possessed a temper which he never gave himself the trouble of placing under much restraint, and which had hitherto vented itself in strange but particularly strong oaths, and which, as the pallid domestic feared, had a strong leaning towards the use of sticks and horsewhips, he thought it better to say nothing, and took care that the meal was ready at the appointed time.
At the appointed time Mr. Guyon entered the dining-room, seized the newspaper, and turned hurriedly to a particular spot in its columns, laid the sheet down again with a reassured air, glanced through his letters, and then, leaning his elbows on the mantelshelf, carelessly glanced at himself in the glass. The careless glance became more attentive, more strained, and more fixed, as he noticed a curious odd expression of puffiness round his eyes, a tightness across his forehead, a full, heavy, bloodshot look in the eyeballs, and a sallow bloated look generally. He had had a strange singing in his head the last few days, a sense of fullness and dizziness, a disagreeable notion of black specks flashing before his eyes; and as he regarded his altered appearance in the glass, he remembered these various ailments, and shook his head gravely. "This won't do, Ned!" he soliloquised, leaning his chin on his hand, and looking at his reflected image; "this won't do! You've gone to grief most infernally within the last few months, and you're showing signs of shutting up. You can't carry on at the pace, Ned! It's all very well for the young fellows with whom you've been living; they're fresh and strong, and can stand any thing; but you're a doosid old bird, Ned, and you're getting stiff and cranky, and all this night-work plays the devil with you! You must cut it," continued Mr. Guyon, tweaking a gray hair out of his whiskers; "you must cut it, and lie fallow for a bit. If this thing only pulls through to-day," he said after a pause, "I'll drop the whole lot, and go off quietly to some German baths, and simmer and stew and drink the waters, and come back a new man. If it comes off! phew!" and here Mr. Guyon ran his hand through his hair. "Well, if it does not, I shall go abroad all the same, and try the sea-breezes of Boulogne."
Whether the mention of such an excursion had a singular effect on him, or whether he was really in a bad state of health, it is certain that Mr. Guyon felt so flushed and strangled at this moment that he reeled to a chair, and undid his very elaborate blue bird's-eye cravat, and loosened his shirt-collar, and sat puffing and panting for a few minutes, when he rang the bell, and ordered the pallid footman to bring him some brandy and soda-water. He had taken a few sips of this beverage, and was beginning to feel a little more himself, when a phaeton drawn by a splendid pair of chestnuts came dashing up the street, and stopped at Mr. Guyon's door. The natty groom sprung to the horses' heads; the gentleman who had been driving descended, and gave a tremendous rap; and presently the pallid footman announced "Mr. Stallbrass!"
Mr. Stallbrass, of Wood Street, Cheapside, and the Willows, Tulse Hill, was, at the former address, a Manchester warehouseman in a very large way of business; at the latter, a fine old English gentleman of large means and decidedly sporting tendencies. Cramped in early youth by the objectionable attentions of a father of commercial habits and evangelical tendencies; married when very young to the daughter of his objectionable father's senior partner, a pale little woman with drab hair and a weak spine; condemned thus to lead his City life amidst long flat pasteboard boxes, and his home life amidst short round Claphamite divines, Mr. Stallbrass--thanks to his glorious constitution--had had the good fortune to outlive both his father and his wife, to inherit both their fortunes, and to be able to indulge his peculiar tastes in the freest and the easiest manner. Although he still was "the firm" in Wood Street, he attended to business but rarely. How could he, indeed, when he never was absent from any of the great race-meetings in the summer, from any steeplechase or "pugilistic revival" in the winter? To know sporting-men of all kinds, from the highest to the lowest; to call them by their Christian or nick-names; to get the office on all sporting events; have his name mentioned in Bell as "that real Corinthian," or as "amongst the élite present we observed--;" to have the red-jacketed touts touch their hats to him,--these were the delights of life which Mr. Stallbrass coveted, and which he now enjoyed. He had made Mr. Guyon's acquaintance in some fast society, and had been greatly impressed by the old gentleman's manners and tone, which he afterwards affirmed to be "the real thing, and no flies;" and he determined to cultivate his acquaintance, though he saw at a glance all the flaws of his character. For Mr. Stallbrass was, as he himself expressed it, "a long way off a fool," and saw in an instant that any intimacy between him and Guyon could only be carried on by his opening his purse-strings, and consenting to pay, as Telemachus usually pays, for Mentor's countenance and counsel. But in this case Telemachus, though not a youth, was decidedly an aspiring man, aspiring to be one of a good set, and hitherto he had soared no higher than the outside ring of the fast stockbrokers. Old Guyon undoubtedly went into good society of its kind, and could, if he chose, pull Stallbrass up with him. So Stallbrass's house, horses, traps, and hospitality, were very much at Mr. Guyon's service; and there was only one thing appertaining to Mr. Stallbrass which the old campaigner was warned off, and that was Mr. Stallbrass's purse. Of course old Guyon had made the assault in that quarter at a very early period of their acquaintance, but had been met with such a straightforward rebuff, delivered without the slightest possibility of being misunderstood, that he had from, that time contented himself with his right of "free warren" over the appanages above mentioned, and never renewed the attempt.
But in every other way Mr. Stallbrass surrendered to the superior abilities, and bowed down before the more exalted position, of his friend. See him now as he comes into the room--a tall, big, burly man, with a heavy grizzled beard and moustache, light-drab overcoat, cutaway undercoat, blue bird's-eye cravat with a big dog's-tooth set in gold for a pin, long waistcoat, horsey tight trousers, and gaiter-boots. Mr. Stallbrass has a big white hand, on the little finger of which he wears a big horseshoe ring; a keen sunken eye, a pair of bushy brows, a swaggering gait, and a loud strident voice. In Mr. Guyon's house, in Mr. Guyon's company, the swagger is left out of the gait, and the tones of the voice are modulated. "Chesterfield"--that is the playful name by which Mr. Stallbrass passes amongst his friends on the Stock Exchange--"Chesterfield," they say, "tears and ramps awfully this side Temple Bar; but old Guyon could drive him in a basket fourwheeler!"
Mr. Stallbrass, following close upon the announcement of the pallid footman, found Mr. Guyon finishing the soda-water and brandy, and stopped in the doorway, shaking his uplifted forefinger.
"Hallo, my noble Captain! Comed and cotched you in the werry act, as the man says, did I? That won't do, Major--that tells all sorts of stories of last night's hanky-panky, that does!"
"Ah, Stallbrass, my good fellow!" said Mr. Guyon, wiping his lips and rising much refreshed, but still rather tottery; "glad to see you, doosid glad. You're punctual as to--as to--you know!"
"I know! Lord bless you, I always know, as the man says. We're goln' to have a fine day after all."
"I hope so; it looks like it. Make all the difference to us, eh?"
"Well, yes. If there was to be much more mud, it would tell against Devilskin, it would! He's a light 'oss, you know, though a rare plucked 'un; but mud's the devil. Get into one of those sticky quagmires, and where are you? as the man says."
"Did you hear any thing after I left last night?"
"Yes. The Marquis came up to Jack Green's--you know old Jack Green?--and an out-and-out tout the Marquis is! He'd seen Devilskin that morning, and says he's first-rate, head and tail up, fit to jump a town! The Marquis--you know why he's called the Marquis--no? Why, because he was cab-boy to Lord Waterford in the old days--the Marquis saw Griffin, who's going to ride Devilskin to-day, and he's put the pot on so far as he can go, and says there's nothing to touch him in the lot."
"I see Devilskin holds his place in the betting."
"Yes. Vixen came with a rush yesterday afternoon, I understand; but her temper's so awful, her people never know what she's going to do. That's good for our side, as the man says; and besides, she can't hold a candle to the black horse--if he's meant."
"If he's meant! Why, good Lord! there can't be a doubt about that."
"There's always a doubt about any turf event, my noble Captain; and these Davidsons, who own Devilskin, are reg'lar legs, you know--legs, as the man says! But Griffin swears he means to ride on the square, and--what's the matter with you now?"
"Nothing, my dear boy, nothing. I've been a little queer these last few days, that's all. I--I suppose you've not hedged?"
"Not a penny! My book ain't so heavy as yours; at least so I gathered from what they said at Pommeroy's last night. You must have done a heavy lot, you must; but you West-end swells can stand it,--that's one thing, as the man says."
"If the man said that," said Mr. Guyon with a very ghastly smile, "he talked about what he knew nothing of. However, let's have breakfast now, and then get down to Croydon."
The breakfast, an elaborate one of the heavy sporting order--many kidneys, large chops, ham and eggs--was done ample justice to by Mr. Stallbrass, whose digestive powers were never out of order; while Mr. Guyon merely picked at a sardine with a shaking hand, and drank tea feverishly. In the course of the meal Mr. Stallbrass said----
"Saw Bob Streightley going to the Great Western as I drove through. Going down to his place in Bucks, I suppose; and going early, as if it was to his business. He is a rum 'un--as Jack Green says, 'The early bird's worth two worms in the bush.' He don't look well, don't Bob Streightley, though; pale in the gills, and seems to me to have aged a good deal."
"The anxieties of a gigantic business, my dear Stallbrass----"
"Yes, a little too gigantic if he doesn't look out; and likely to be a good deal less before he's done with it!"
"What do you mean by that? you're so infernally enigmatical, my good fellow," said old Guy on with great irritability, "that, damme, one might as well talk to the--the riddle Egyptian thing."
"O, I'm sorry I spoke--never holler! as old Jack Green says," replied Mr. Stallbrass, who was easily offended. "I'll be as mum as the dumb cove at Manchester for the rest of the day."
"What a doosid provokin' fellow you are!" screamed Mr. Guyon in a fresh access of petulance. "Didn't you understand that I asked you to speak, and not be silent? What was that you were saying about Streightley?"
"It's not what I say, but what every body--old Jack Green and the rest of 'em, are saying--that he's going too much a-head; that he was hard hit by that bank smash; that instead of pulling up, he went a-head after that; and that he must look out!"
Whether the information thus conveyed was new to Mr. Guyon or not, could not have been guessed by the expression of his features. A twitch passed across his face; but when he spoke his looks expressed scorn rather than astonishment, and he said, "Parcel of dam' cackling fellows; let 'em leave Streightley alone. He'll be a merchant-prince when they've returned to their native gutters, by Jove!" The old gentleman braved it out nobly; but it was only by a strong effort, for his heart sunk within him, and he felt a presentiment of impending evil.
After breakfast Mr. Stallbrass lighted a very big cigar, and, as a thin soft rain was beginning to fall, put on a very big driving-coat, with double-sewn seams, which asserted themselves in a very prominent manner, with innumerable pockets, which either gaped wide-open or hid themselves under pent-house ledges, and with a large collar, which, when raised, took in all Mr. Stallbrass's beard and a huge portion of his face. Mr. Guyon having also muffled himself up to the best of his ability, they climbed into the mail phaeton, and started; Mr. Stallbrass driving his splendid pair in excellent style, cutting in and out in the most workmanlike manner, and eliciting great admiration from the cabmen and boys. Before they had gone very far the rain ceased, and Mr. Guyon began to feel the reviving influence of the fresh air, which, with some new information about Devilskin which he received from a mysterious and shabby man, who stopped their phaeton at the foot of Westminster Bridge, made the old gentleman perk up again, and talk in his usual frivolous rattle to his companion, though that strange, puffed, bloated look had not faded out of his face.
Mr. Stallbrass was not given to conversation when he was driving, his attention being almost entirely occupied with his horses, which he had brought to a great state of perfection and simultaneous stepping; so that, with the exception of pointing with his whip to one or two houses where "old Jack Green" had either lived, or had known some one who had lived there, which gave the place quite an interest in Mr. Stallbrass's eyes, he was silent during the drive, and his companion was left to his own reflections. And these were not of a particularly pleasant kind. Mr. Guyon had hacked the favourite for the steeplechase now about to be decided, to a far greater extent than any one, even his sporting friend beside him, knew of; and until that present moment had never seriously attempted to realise his position in case his horse should be beaten. Floating through life in his usual airy manner, with good clothes on his back and a few pounds in his pocket, which prevented him feeling the pressure of any immediate necessity, "handsome Ned Guyon" closed his eyes to disagreeable objects in his old age as readily as he had done in his youth, and sturdily refused to look at the shadows of any coming events. Should his horse win--and he must, damme, he must--Mr. Guyon would, on the settling-day, come into possession of what he termed "a hatful" of money; enough to pay off all his most pressing creditors, without the necessity of seeking aid from Streightley, whose stern face was like a very baleful vision before his father-in-law's imagination. And if the horse were beaten--the old gentleman took off his hat and wiped his brow, on which great beads of sweat had burst out at the mere supposition--well, if the horse were beaten, he should quietly drop across to Boulogne, and stay there until matters were blown over. Katharine would send him pocket-money, and that sort of thing; and there was life in the old dog yet, and, damme, they should see he wasn't beaten.
Such was the tenor of Mr. Guyon's concluding reflections as Mr. Stallbrass turned the spanking chestnuts, who had spanked so much all the way from town as to be covered with foam and lather, into the muddy lane leading to the raceground, which was already lined on either side with crowds of countrymen and village loafers, gathered together to gape and chaff in that blunderheaded manner so pleasant to the English rustic. There were plenty of drags both before and behind them, and Mr. Stallbrass--who affected the coachman whenever he had the reins in his hand--was perpetually jerking his little finger into the air, or waving his whip in answer to recognitions, feeling all the time thoroughly happy at being seen in the company of such an unmistakable and well-known "West-end nob" as Mr. Guyon. Paying the entrance-fee, they turned up through a gate on to the turf; no sooner had they reached which than Mr. Stallbrass had a new excitement, and a new triumph, for the Hon. William Trafford, known as "Tit Trafford" from his love of horse-flesh, ranging up alongside in his drag, and knowing both Guyon and Stallbrass, proposed to the latter to "have a spurt;" and away went Tit Trafford's four bays and Stallbrass's chestnut pair careering off in a race in which the latter had by no means the worst of it. Mr. Guyon disapproved of this proceeding, which caused him to clutch wildly at different portions of the phaeton, and shook and bumped him woefully,--disapproved of it so much that he pronounced it "infernally stoopid," and only fit to have been the act of a "dam schoolboy." It was not until they had secured a good place in the rank, horses had been removed, and a capital lunch spread, that the old gentleman recovered his equanimity.
But long before luncheon, in fact within a minute of the phaeton's stopping, Mr. Guyon had descended into the ring and learned the latest odds about Devilskin. There, in the bawling, fighting, seething, jostling crowd, he made his way, listening to scraps of information given to him now and then by men who muttered mysteriously behind their betting-books, or took off their hats to whisper behind them into Mr. Guyon's ear. It was all right,--nothing to touch him; fit to run for a man's life, Sir Harvey had said that very morning. O, here was Sir Harvey. "Ah, my dear Sir Harvey, one word--only one!" and Mr. Guyon laid his trembling hand on the arm of a big stalwart Yorkshire squire, Sir Harvey Boyce, one of the keenest patrons of the turf, and owner of Devilskin. The two men stood aside for a moment, and Guyon said--
"About the horse? He's right?"
"Right as the mail."
"And--and--he's meant?"
"Meant? d--n it, Guyon----"
"O, don't blaze out at me, Sir Harvey; don't be in a rage. If you knew how heavily I stand on this race! Ever since you put me on in the autumn I've been backing the horse, long odds and short odds; I've not got off a penny, and--" he stopped for breath, and the big burly Yorkshireman, looking at him and noticing how ill he appeared to be, and how the wrinkled hand clasping his arm shook and trembled, said kindly----
"Keep your pecker up, Guyon! I've stood all my money on the horse, and I know there's nothing to beat him in the field."
So, comforted and pleased with this interview, Mr. Guyon made his way back to the phaeton, where Mr. Stallbrass's grooms had already unfastened the hampers and spread the lunch, and where Mr. Stallbrass had now gathered round him two or three men "of the right sort," who were drinking sparkling Moselle, and wondering "what had become of old Guyon."
The luncheon and the wine had a still further revivifying effect on that gentleman's spirits; and feeling justly that he was regarded by Mr. Stallbrass and his friends in the "cock-of-the-walk" capacity, he sought to be particularly agreeable, and, having quite a new audience, told some of his best stories--accommodating the principal characters therein with titles freely distributed--with very great success. There were two races before the great event of the day, but they attracted little attention; the first came off while the gentlemen were at luncheon, and they walked down to look at the jumps, while the course was being cleared for the second.
They turned down from the starting-place, and looked first at a low gap, then at two or three flights of turf-covered hurdles, at all of which Sir Harvey Boyce laughed contemptuously, and declared that any donkey could clear them; then they struck across a corner of the field, and came upon a clean ditch with a high bank on its further side, separating a ploughed field from a bit of turnips. The ditch was rather broad, and the bank was high and slippery; then came grass with more hurdles, then grass again, and then just before turning into the straight run home, a stiff post and rail, old, worn, and mended here and there in places with rough stakes and railings, with a drop of six or seven feet into the course below. All the gentlemen regarded this with great curiosity, and Sir Harvey Boyce said, "This is what'll try 'em! There are seven of 'em to start, and except Vixen and Devilskin, all the rest know nothing but flat racin', and have just been taught jumpin' enough to clear those hurdles. But they'll be bumped before they come to this, and nothing's over here but the chestnut mare and my horse, I'll take my oath!" Then they returned to the stand on their carriages, and shortly afterwards the second bell rang and the great race commenced.
There were seven starters, and the race was twice round the course. They got away all together, through the gap and over the first flight of hurdles all in line; a little scattering of them in the ploughed field, where the first symptoms of tailing-off began to be manifested; then came the ditch and bank, where there were three dead refusals, the four safely on the other side being Devilskin, Vixen, a mare called Gray Duchess--whose performances were all unknown, and who belonged to a sporting saddler--and Billy Button, an old steeple-chaser, entered to make running for Vixen. Through the grass they came, Vixen and Devilskin leaving the others about a couple of lengths behind, over the light hurdles, then straight heading up for the drop fence. A crowd had gathered at this point to see the jump taken; and as the horses came up, each thundered out the name of his favourite. With his face dead set, his teeth clinched, and with every muscle of his limbs like steel, Griffin brought his horse straight at the jump, and Devilskin scarcely needing the slightest lifting, cleared it in one great rushing bound, blundered a little on touching the ground, but was up and away ere any of the others were over. Vixen came next, fretting and fuming, her foam-flecked chestnut coat heat-stained and mud-dabbled; her jock, who evidently knew her temper, riding her with a light yet firm hand, and never touching her until she was just preparing to take her spring, when he rammed the spurs home, and brought her over cleverly and safely. Close upon her followed the saddler's gray mare, heavily built and somewhat clumsy in her gallop as she came thundering along, but rising at the jump and skimming it like a bird. It was the prettiest thing that had been seen that day; the people cheered till they were hoarse; and Sir Harvey Boyce turned a trifle pale as he whispered to Tit Trafford that "that was an Irish mare, he'd take his oath, and that he was d--d if he liked her looks." Now past the stand all, Devilskin leading, but Vixen close upon him, and away into the open, Gray Duchess following three lengths behind. Now all excitement, hoarse roar, and wild clamour, for Vixen and Devilskin were neck and neck, over the light hurdles, through the ploughed field, and nearing the high bank. Griffin seems to feel that Devilskin wants a lift here, gathers his horse well up in hand, and comes down heavily on his quarters as he rises to the leap. Cleverly done, Griffin, for Devilskin clears it better than he did the first round. Not so Vixen, also whipped, who rears, boggles, tumbles, and rolls. Devilskin wins! Devilskin! Devilskin! Up goes the clamour from a thousand hoarse throats. What is that cry? The Gray! the Gray! Gray Duchess slips over the high bank like a mist, like a dream, collars Devilskin in the grass, and side by side with him clears the last set of light hurdles, and rounds the corner facing the drop fence. Now, Griffin, for your life! bring all the knowledge, all the pluck learned and nurtured in far-away Yorkshire spinneys to this one test--you have a foeman worthy of your steel-spurs; show that you know yet a better thing than he, and win the race! Up came the horse, blown, panting, with red eyeballs, drooping crest: in the hollow it looked as if it were all over, but Griffin steadied him quietly, and then brought him at the leap with a rush. One tremendous welt he gave him, one home-dig with the spurs, and Devilskin rose at the post and rails,--rose to fall helplessly into the midst of them staked and dying; while, so close as almost to brush his writhing carcass Gray Duchess slips by, and gallops in the winner and sole survivor of the fray.
Mr. Stallbrass closed his race-glass, muttered a strong word, and turned to speak to his friend; but as he turned he felt a heavy weight on his shoulder, and heard the words "Ruined--ruined, by God!" muttered in his ear. The next moment Mr. Guyon was lying on his back at the bottom of the phaeton, livid in the face, and breathing stertorously. An alarm was raised, and a mounted gentleman, announcing himself to be a doctor, rode up to the phaeton, threw himself from his horse, and after a hasty examination, pronounced Mr. Guyon to be in an apoplectic fit, and shook his head very dubiously as to the result.