Sawn Off: A Tale of a Family Tree

“Why not?” said Denis, through his set teeth. “Better begin at the bottom, sir.”

“Well, yes, my lad, perhaps you had. Now, Very, my dear, say good-bye to him like a woman, and wish him well. Some day in the future you two will meet at dinner and laugh at this rosy-posy boy-and-girl love business. And by the way, Rolleston, my lad, keep your eyes open, and send me any little natural history specimen you find.”

“Good-bye, Veronica,” said Denis, who did not seem to hear the Doctor’s words.

“Good-bye,” she said, giving him a wistful look; and her voice was almost inaudible, while her eyes looked dull and her cheeks ashy pale.

He took her cold limp hand, held it for a few moments in his, then turned and rushed out of the house.

“Papa! Father!”

Only two words; but their tone was enough for the Doctor, who caught her to his heart, then placed her in a chair and turned to the window.

“Hi! Denis!” he roared; and the young man turned, coming back in obedience to the signals the Doctor made, and standing once more in the room.

“Look here, sir, you had better have that money: you’ll want it over yonder.”

“Did you call me back for that, sir?” said the young man bitterly – “to go through this agony again? No: I will make the money I want myself.”

“Bravo!” cried the Doctor, seizing his hand. “But you sha’n’t go!”

Denis stared.

“Do you think I am going to have my little pet here die of a broken heart, for the sake of you, you ugly young scoundrel? No! you sha’n’t go. Here: you stop and comfort Very, and I’ll go over to the Manor and bring my Lord Pinemount to his knees.”

“Doctor Salado!” cried Denis excitedly. “No, no: it is impossible. You must not go. You would be insulted.”

“Then I’ll insult him. Here, Very, my pretty: I’m not to let this boy go, am I?”

For answer the girl flung herself upon Denis’ breast, and clung there sobbing.

“This – this is too hard, sir!” cried Denis passionately.

“I am only man, after all.”

“Well, what do you want to be, boy? There, I don’t like you, and I don’t like your father; but I’m not going to let that stand in the way. I’m going over to the Manor to bring my lord to his knees.”

“You don’t know what you are saying,” cried Denis. “Veronica, he must not go.”

“I do know what I’m saying. Am I not Doctor Salado – a moral magician in my way? Did I not make him give up cutting down the trees?”

“Yes, sir; but you cannot make him retract from driving me off the family tree for a time,” said Denis, with a sad smile. “I am only a beggar now, and I must go.”

“Indeed you will not. And as for being a beggar, Very here will have plenty for you both.”

“Which I could not take.”

“Then, confound you, sir!” cried the Doctor, with mock fury, “I’ll bring an action against you for breach of promise of marriage. There, pet, don’t cry: you shall have your pretty boy.”

“Doctor Salado, you must not go. You don’t know my father.”

“Thoroughly, my lad. There – take heart, both of you. Denis, my lad, you sha’n’t be a pensioner on my bounty. Come, I’ll bet you five pounds that your father and mother dine here with us to-night, and talk to my Very here as if she were their child, as she has to be.”

“Doctor Salado, are you mad?”

“Yes, my lad. I have been all my life, but I’m not at all dangerous. God bless you, my lad! I believe in you, and when I come back you’ll believe in me.”

Volume One – Chapter Eight.

Doctor Salado’s Magic

“Take the good the gods provide you,” seemed to be Denis Rolleston’s motto, for he was very happy with Veronica, while the Doctor made off across the park, gave the bell at the open door a tremendous tug, and then waited till a serious-looking butler came to the front.

“Tell his lordship I want to see him directly.”

“Not at home, sir,” said the man stolidly.

“Tell his lordship I want to see him directly,” cried the Doctor sternly. “He’s in the library: I heard his laugh as I came up to the house.”

“But – ”

“Stand aside, fellow!” cried the Doctor; and he marched in, flung open the library door, and shut it sharply, as Lord Pinemount rose from his chair pale with rage.

“Morning,” said the Doctor. “Sit down. I want a chat with you.”

He took a seat coolly, and looked critically at the angry man before him, who was breathless with passion.

“How dare you!” he said at last – “how dare you force your presence here! Go, sir, before I send for the police.”

“Don’t make a fool of yourself, sir: sit down. You must know that the business is important, or I should not act like this.”

“You are a madman, sir!”

“Yes, perhaps: sit down.”

There was such a tone of authority in the Doctor’s words that his lordship dropped back in his chair wondering at his own action.

“That’s better. Now then, Pinemount, let’s look the state of affairs in the face. Your boy loves my child.”

“I have no son, sir. I have cut him off.”

“Humph! All talk, sir. Can’t be done. He loves my girl, and she loves him. He is up at my house now; and after I have talked to you I want you to bring her ladyship over to the young people, and make things comfortable.”

“Yes, you are mad,” said his lordship, reassuring himself. “How dare you presume like this! Leave my house, sir!”

“Don’t raise your voice, man, and let all the servants know you are in a passion.”

“The insolence – the presumption! Look here, sir: if you are not mad, who and what are you, that you dare to come and make such a proposition to me?”

“Ah!” said the Doctor, as Lady Pinemount entered, looking anxiously from one to the other, while the visitor advanced to meet her, took her hand, kissed it with courtly grace, and led her to a chair.

“I repeat, sir, who and what are you, that you presume to come and sow dissension in my peaceful village – heartburnings in my home? Who are you?”

“Your cousin Richard, who died abroad.”

“What!” roared his lordship. “Impostor, you lie!”

“No, sir: you are the impostor, or rather usurper. I grieve to say, madam – Mrs Rolleston – that I am Lord Pinemount, and that your husband has no right whatever here.”

“I – ”

“Silence, sir!” said Lord Pinemount, with dignity. “Accept the position, and hear what I have to say.”

“Is this true, sir?” faltered the lady.

“You will know if you listen, madam. Nay, you both must know, by the inquiries that were made before your husband succeeded to the title and estates. I saw all the papers with the advertisements; but I was happy, was rich, and detested England for an old association, and I preferred to remain dead to all who had known me. When at last I did return to England, for my child’s sake – a widower – I came down here. The Sandleighs was for sale, and I bought it.”

There was something like a groan here, and the lady gazed wildly at her husband.

“Of course I thought of claiming the title; but I met you and your son, and I said to myself, ‘Why should I make his family wretched?’ Then, as you know, while I was in doubt, Love came and cleared away the difficulty and decided me. If I had claimed the title it would have been for Veronica’s sake. Well, Denis loves her; and in due time – a long time hence, if your husband will study his health and not cut his life short by passion and apoplexy – Denis will be My Lord, – my child My Lady. That is enough for me. I am contented to be the Doctor and go on as the naturalist still.”

“But – but – ” faltered the lady. “My husband – Mr Rolleston, if what you say is true – ”

“He knows it is true. But not Mr Rolleston, – Lord Pinemount still. Madam, I tell you I am very rich, and my wants are very few. The title is nothing to me. Yes, it is – it is my one secret. There, Pinemount, am I an impostor now?”

“I am stunned,” faltered the bearer of the title.

“Bah! that will soon go off. Lady Pinemount, our esteem, I am sure, is mutual, and I believe you like your son’s choice.”

“Indeed, indeed I do!” cried Lady Pinemount eagerly.

“You would not be a woman if you did not,” said the Doctor warmly. “There, Pinemount, you may take my word – the more easily that you see I want nothing from you but your cousinship. Still the family lawyers can see papers that would convince the greatest sceptic living. Let bygones be forgotten. Give me your hand.”

The said hand was raised doubtingly, but it was seized and warmly grasped.

“Now then,” said the Doctor, “I promised your son to bring you up to ask my child to be your son’s wife.”

“Is this some dream?” said Lord Pinemount, in a subdued voice.

“No, sir – the broad sunlight of fact. There, my dear cousin, Lady Pinemount, is eager to take my darling in her arms, and you are as eager to grasp the hand of as true and brave a young fellow as ever stepped. Will you order the carriage, Lady Pinemount?”

“But – but,” faltered Lord Pinemount, “do I understand that you will not ask me to give up the title – the estate?”

“Only when the great end comes, and your son reigns in your stead – and ours, sir. God bless him! for I love him as if he was my son. Lady Pinemount – cousin, sister – you will come on at once?”

She could not speak, but pressed the hand he gave her and held it to her lips.

“But what magic is this?” whispered Denis two hours later, when he had felt the warm grasp of his father’s hand, and seen him kiss and bless Veronica, who was now seated on a couch with Lady Pinemount’s arm round her waist “Doctor Salado’s magic, my dear boy. Some day I will give you the recipe. There – never mind now. You will represent the family tree, and its finest limb is not sawn off.”

Volume Two – Chapter One.

The Gilded Pill – A Homely Comedy.

Dove and Daws

“Richard Shingle, Shoemaker. Repairs neatly executed.”

This legend was written in yellow letters, shaded with blue, upon an oval red board. Red, blue, and yellow form a pleasing combination to some eyes; but when the yellow is drab, the blue dirty, and the scarlet of a brick-dusty tint, the harmony is not pleasing. Moreover, the literary artist could not be complimented upon his skill in writing in pigment with a camel-hair brush; for, not content to be staid and steadfast in Roman characters, he had indulged in wild flourishes, which gave the signboard the appearance of a battle-field, upon which certain ordinary letters were staggering about, while three or four tyrannical capitals were catching them with lassoes, which twined wildly, round their heads and legs.

For instance, the first “d” was in difficulties, the “g” was pulled out of place, the “h” and “o” tied tightly together, while just below, the “repairs” seemed to be neatly executed indeed, for the “r” had a yellow rope round its neck, having been hung by “Richard,” beneath which word it was suspended, with the rest of the letters kicking frantically because that initial was at its last gasp.

But this idea, probably, did not present itself to the inhabitants of Crowder’s Buildings, a pleasant cul de sac in the neighbourhood of the Angel at Islington. Crowder, once upon a time, bought two houses in a front street, between and under which there was an entrance like a tunnel, leading to the back gardens and back doors of the said houses; and Crowder – now dead and numbered with the just – being a man of frugal mind, gazed at the gardens of his freehold messuage and tenements, and saw that they were useful as cat walks, to make beds growing oyster and other shells, and vegetables of the most melancholy kind. He let the fact dawn upon his understanding that the vegetables grown might be bought better for sixpence per annum, and resolved that he would utilise the space.

To do this, he built up two rows of staring-eyed, four-roomed tenements, sixteen in all, separated by twelve feet of pavement, whitewashed them as they stood staring at one another, and turned the two garden deserts into a busy, thrifty hive, where some twenty or thirty families flourished and grew dirty.

The occupants of the two houses in the street complained, and left; but Crowder let the houses at a higher rent without the gardens – let the little tenements each at ten shillings a week, and turned out those who did not pay; and for the rest of his life collected his own dues, did his own painting and whitewashing – even plastered upon occasion; and at last, while repairing a chimney-stack and putting on a new pot, at the age of seventy-five, like a thrifty soul as he was, he slipped from the ladder, rolled off the roof of Number 10, fell into the open paved space, with his head in the centre gutter, where the soapsuds ran down, and his heels on a scraper – every house had a scraper, to make it complete – and was so much injured that Nature gave him notice to quit his earthly habitation, evicted him, and, save in name, the buildings knew him no more.

For they passed into the hands of Maximilian Shingle, “broker and setrer,” as his brother said – a most worthy member of society: a sticky-fingered man, who, through this last quality, was enabled to lay up honey in store. In fact, he was so well off that, when Crowder’s Buildings were brought to the hammer by Crowder’s heirs, executors, administrators and assigns, the hammer that knocked them down knocked them into Max Shingle’s possession, and they were paid for with Mrs Fraser’s money – a certain amount in thousands which she bestowed, with her two sons Fred and Tom – upon the man who re-won her heart six months after Fred Fraser senior’s death.

It was a retired spot after passing through the tunnel, and hence it became the popular playground of the children of the neighbourhood, who chalked the pavement, broke their knees and heads upon its harsher corners, and made it the scene of the festive dance when a dark-visaged organ-man came down to grind the last new airs of the day.

By a great act of benevolence, Maximilian Shingle, who was a lowly, good man, a shining light at his chapel, where he was deacon, had, though inundated with applications for Number 4 when it became empty, let it to his unlucky brother Richard, who flourished under the sign that heads this chapter, made boots and shoes, and neatly executed the repairs in the dilapidated Oxonians and strong working-men’s bluchers that came to his lot.

It was first-floor front-room cleaning-up day at Richard Shingle’s; and Mrs Shingle – familiarly spoken to as “mother” – was in her glory, having what she called “a good rummage.” Had her home possessed a back yard or a front garden, every article of furniture would have been turned out; but as there was not an inch of back yard, and the front garden was very small, being limited to six flowerpots behind a small green fence on the upstairs window-sill, Mrs Shingle was debarred from that general clearance.

But she did the best she could to get at the floor for a busy scrub while her husband and daughter were away; and the consequence was that the side-table had its petticoats tucked up round its waist, thereby revealing the fact that its legs were not mahogany, but deal; the hearthrug was rolled up, and sitting in the big-armed Windsor chair; the fender had gone to bed in the back room; and the chairs seemed to be playing at being acrobats, and were standing one upon the other; while the chimney ornaments – shepherds and shepherdesses for the most part – were placed as spectators on the top of the little cupboard to look on.

Mrs Shingle finished her task of cleaning up before descending, carrying a pail which had to be emptied and rinsed out before her hands were dried.

Mrs Shingle was a pleasant, plump woman, who had run a good deal to dimple; in fact, the backs of her hands were full of coy little pits, where the water hid when she washed, and her wedding ring lay in a kind of furrow, from not having grown with her hands.

She gave a few touches with a duster to the lower room, which was half sitting, one-fourth kitchen, and one-fourth workshop, inasmuch as there was a low shoemaker’s bench, with its tools, under the window, beneath which, and secured to the wall by a strap, were lasts, knives, awls, pincers, and various other implements of the shoemaker’s art. On a stand close by stood a sewing machine, and on the table were patches of kid and patent leather, evidently awaiting the needle.

Mrs Shingle had finished her hurried cleaning, and the furniture was put back; had been to the glass and arranged her hair, and finished off by taking out three pins, which she stuck in her mouth, as if it were a cushion, giving herself a shake, which caused her dress, that had been round her waist, to fall into its customary folds; and then, sitting down she was busy at work binding boot-tops, when the open door was darkened, and a fashionably dressed young man, of five-and-twenty, tapped on the panel with the end of his stick, entered with a languid walk, said, “How do, aunt?” and seated himself on the edge of the table.

The visitor’s clothes were very good, but they had a slangy cut, and might have been made for some Leviathan of a music-hall, who intended to delineate what he termed “a swell.” For the cuffs of the excessively short coat nearly hid the young fellow’s hands, even as the ends of his trousers almost concealed his feet; his shirt front was ornamented with large crimson zigzag patterns, and his hat was so arranged on the back of his head that it pressed down over his forehead a series of unhappy, greasy-looking little curls, which came down to his eyebrows.

Mrs Shingle nodded, and stabbed a boot-top very viciously as the young man saluted her.

“Old man out?” he said.

“You know he is,” retorted Mrs Shingle, “else you wouldn’t have come.”

“Don’t be hard on a fellow, aunt. You know I can’t help coming. Where’s Jessie?”

“Out,” said Mrs Shingle, sharply.

“She always is out when I come,” drawled the young man, tapping his teeth with his cane. “I believe she is upstairs now.”

“Then you’d better go up and see,” exclaimed Mrs Shingle. “Look here, Fred, I’m sure your father don’t approve of your coming here.”

“I can’t help what the governor likes,” was the reply.

“I’m not going to ask him where I’m to go. Is Jessie out?”

“I told you she was, sir.”

“Don’t be so jolly cross, aunt. It’s all right, you know. The old man will kick a bit, but he’ll soon come round. Don’t you be rusty about it. You ought to be pleased, you know; because she ain’t likely to have a chance to do half so well. I shall go and meet her.”

As he spoke, the young man – to wit, Frederick Fraser, step-son of Maximilian Shingle, Esq, of Oblong Square, Pentonville – slowly descended from the table, glanced at himself in the glass, and made for the door.

“She’s gone down the Goswell Road, I know,” said the young man, turning to show his teeth in a grin.

“No, no,” exclaimed Mrs Shingle hastily.

“Thank ye, I know,” said the young fellow, with a wink, and he passed out.

“Bother the boy!” exclaimed Mrs Shingle petulantly. “Now he’ll meet her, and she’ll be upset, and Dick will be cross, and Tom look hurt. Oh, dear, dear, dear, I wish she’d been as ugly as sin!”

There was an interval of angry stitching, as if the needle was at enmity with the soft leather, and determined to do it to death, and then Mrs Shingle cried, “Here she is!”

“Ah, my precious!” she added, as a trim, neat little figure came hurrying in snatched off her hat and hung it behind the door.

She was only in a dark brown stuff dress, but it was the very pattern of neatness, as it hung in the most graceful of folds; while over all shone as sweet a face as could be seen from east to west, with the bright innocence looking out of dark grey eyes.

“Back again, mother,” accompanied by a hasty kiss, was the reply to Mrs Shingle’s salute.

Then, brushing the crisp fair hair back from her white temples, the girl popped herself into a chair, opened a packet, drew close to the sewing machine, and in response to the pressure of a couple of little feet, that would have made anything but cold crystallised iron thrill, the wheel revolved, and with a clinking rattle the needle darted up and down.

“Have I been long?”

“No, my dear – quick as quick!” said Mrs Shingle, watching her child curiously.

“I wanted to get back and finish this, so as to take it in,” said the girl, making the machine rattle like distant firing.

“Did you meet Mr Fred?”

“Fred? No, mother,” was the reply, as the girl started, coloured, and the consequence was a tangle of the threads and a halt. “Has he been here?” she continued, as with busy fingers she tried to set the work free once more.

“Yes, just now, and set out to meet you. I wonder how you could have missed him.”

There was a busy pause for a few minutes, during which some work was hastily finished; and while Mrs Shingle kept watching her child from time to time uneasily, the latter rose from the machine, and began to double up the jacket upon which she had been at work, and to place it with a couple more lying close by on a black cloth.

“I hope you don’t encourage him, Jessie,” said Mrs Shingle at last.

“Mother!” exclaimed the girl, and her face became like crimson – “how can you?”

“Well, there, there, I’ll say no more,” exclaimed Mrs Shingle – “only it worries me. Now, make haste, there’s a dear, or you’ll be late. Don’t stop about, Jessie; and, whatever you do, don’t come back without the money. Your uncle’d sure to come or send to-day, and it’s so unpleasant not being ready.”

“I’ll be as quick as I can, mother,” said Jessie briskly.

“And you won’t stop, dear?”

“I don’t know what you mean, mother,” said the girl, with a tell-tale blush on her cheek.

“How innocent we are, to be sure!” exclaimed Mrs Shingle, tartly. Then, smiling, she continued, “There, I’m not cross, but I don’t quite like it. Of course, Tom don’t know when you go to the warehouse, and won’t be waiting. There, I suppose young folks will be young folks.”

“I can’t help it, mother, if Mr Fraser meets me by accident,” said Jessie, blushing very rosily, and pouting her lips.

“But he mustn’t meet you by accident; and it oughtn’t to be. Uncle Max would be furious if he knew of it, and those two boys will be playing at Cain and Abel about you, and you mustn’t think anything about either of them.”

“Mother!” exclaimed Jessie.

“I can’t help it, my dear; I must speak, and put a stop to it. Your father would be very angry if he knew.”

“Oh, don’t say so, mother!” pleaded Jessie, with a troubled look.

“But I must say it, my dear, before matters get serious; and I’ve been thinking about it all, and I’ve come to the conclusion that it must all be stopped. There! what impudence, to be sure! I believe that’s him come again.”

“May I come in?” said a voice, after a light tap at the door. And a frank, bearded face appeared in the opening.

“Yes, you can come in,” said Mrs Shingle sharply. But, in spite of her knitted brows, she could not keep back a smile of welcome as the owner of the frank face entered the room, kissed her, and then turned and caught Jessie’s hands in his, with the result that the parcel she was making up slipped off the table to the ground.

“There, how clumsy I am!” he exclaimed, picking up the fallen package, and nearly striking his head against Jessie’s, as, flushed and agitated, she stooped too. “Well, aunt dear, how are you?”

“Oh, I’m well enough,” said Mrs Shingle tartly, as she stretched a piece of silk between her fingers and her teeth, and made it twang like a guitar string. “What do you want here?”

“What do I want, aunt? All right, Jessie – I’ll tie the string. Thought I’d come in and carry Jessie’s parcel.”

“Oh, there!” exclaimed the girl.

“Now, look here, Mr Tom Fraser,” said Mrs Shingle, holding up her needle as if it were a weapon of offence: “you two have been planning this.”

“Mother!” cried Jessie.

“Oh no, we did not, aunt,” cried the young man; “it was all my doing. No, no, Jessie – I’ll carry the parcel.”

“No, no, Tom; indeed you must not.”

“I should think not, indeed!” cried Mrs Shingle, who, as she glanced from one to the other, and thought of her own early days, plainly read the love that was growing up between the young people; but could not see that her first visitor, Fred, had come back, and was standing gazing, with a sallow, vicious look upon his face, at what was going on inside, before going off with his teeth set and an ugly glare in his eyes.