Davenport Dunn, a Man of Our Day. Volume 1

“I ‘ll have it, my Lord; the place is as good as mine this minute,” said O’Reilly, as he stepped on shore; and as he spoke his heart thrilled with the concentrated delights of a whole life of happiness.

CHAPTER X. A “SMALL DINNER”

Lady Lackington and Lady Grace Twining passed the morning together. Their husbands’ departure on the picnic excursion offered them a suitable subject to discuss those gentlemen, and they improved the occasion to some purpose.

The Viscountess did not, indeed, lean very heavily on her Lord’s failings; they were, as she described them, the harmless follies of certain middle-aged gentlemen, who, despite time and years, would still be charming and fascinating. “He likes those little easy conquests he is so sure of amongst vulgar people,” said she. “He affects only to be amused by them, but he actually likes them; and then, as he never indulges in this sort of thing except in out-of-the-way places, why, there ‘s no great harm in it.”

Lady Grace agreed with her, and sighed. She sighed, because she thought of her own burden, and how far more heavily it pressed. Twining’s were no little foibles, no small weaknesses; none of his faults had their root in any easy self-deceptions. Everything he did or said or thought was maturely weighed and considered; his gay, laughing manner, his easy, light-hearted gesticulation, his ready concurrence in the humor about him, were small coin that he scattered freely while he pondered over heavy investments.

From long experience of his crafty, double-dealing nature, coupled with something very near aversion to him, Lady Grace had grown to believe that in all he said or did some unseen motive lay, and she brought herself to believe that even his avaricious and miserly habits were practised still less for the sake of saving than for some ulterior and secret end.

Of the wretched life they led she drew a dreary picture: a mock splendor for the world, a real misery at home; all the outward semblance of costly living, all the internal consciousness of meanness and privation. He furnished houses with magnificence, that he might let them; he set up splendid equipages, that, when seen, they should be sold. “My very emeralds,” said she, “were admired and bought by the Duchess of Windermere. It is very difficult to say that there is anything out of which he cannot extract a profit. If my ponies were praised in the park, I knew it was only the prelude to their being at Tattersall’s in the morning; even the camellia which I wore in my hair was turned to advantage, for it sold the conservatory that raised it. And yet they tell me that if – they say that – I mean – I am told that the law would not construe these as cruelty, but simply a very ordinary exercise of marital authority, something unpleasant, perhaps, but not enough to warrant complaint, still less resistance.”

“But they are cruelties,” broke in Lady Lackington; “men in Mr. Twining’s rank of life do not beat their wives – ”

“No, they only break their hearts,” sighed Lady Grace; “and this, I believe, is perfectly legal.”

“They were doing, or going to do, something about that t’ other day in the Lords. That dear old man, Lord Cloudeslie, had a bill or an amendment to somebody’s bill, by which – I ‘m not sure I ‘m quite correct about it – but I believe it gave the wife power to take her settlement. No, that is not it; she was to be able, after five years of great cruelty – I’m afraid I have no clear recollection of its provisions, but I know the odious Chancellor said it would effectually make women independent of men.”

“Of course it never will become law, then,” sighed Lady Grace, again.

“Who knows, dear? They are always passing something or other they ‘re sorry for afterwards in either House. Shall I tell you who’d know all about it? – that Mr. Davenport Dunn. He is just the kind of person to understand these things.”

“Indeed!” exclaimed Lady Grace, with more animation in her manner.

“Let as ask him to dinner,” said Lady Lackington; “I know him sufficiently to do so, – that is, I have met him once. He ‘ll be charmed, of course; and if there is anything very good and very safe to be done on the Bourse, he ‘ll certainly tell us.”

“I don’t care for the Bourse. Indeed, I have nothing to speculate with.”

“That is the best reason in the world, my dear, to make a venture; at least, so my brother-in-law, Annesley, says. You are certain to come out a winner, and in my own brief experiences, I never gave anything, – I only said, ‘Yes, I ‘ll have the shares.’ They were at fifty-eight and three-quarters, they said, and sure to be at sixty-four or five; and they actually did rise to seventy, and then we sold – that is, Dunn did – and remitted me twelve hundred and fifty-three pounds odd.”

“I wish he could be equally fortunate with me. I don’t mean as regards money,” said Lady Grace; and her cheek became crimson as she spoke.

“I have always said there’s a fate in these things; and who knows if his being here Just at this moment is not a piece of destiny.”

“It might be so,” said the other, sadly.

“There,” said Lady Lackington, as she rapidly wrote a few lines on a piece of note-paper, “that ought to do: —

“‘Dear Mr. Dunn, – If you will accept of an early dinner, with Lady Grace Twining and myself for the company, to-day, you will much oblige

“‘Your truly,

“‘Georgina Lackington.’”

“To another kind of man I’d have said something about two pauvres femmes délaissées, but he ‘d have been frightened, and probably not come.”

“Probably,” said Lady Grace, with a sigh.

“Now, let us try the success of this.” And she rang a bell, and despatched the note.

Lady Lackington had scarcely time to deliver a short essay on the class and order of men to which Mr. Davenport Dunn pertained, when the servant returned with the answer. It was a very formal acceptance of the invitation, “Mr. Davenport Dunn presented his compliments,” – and so on.

“Of course, he comes,” said she, throwing the note away. “Do you know, my dear, I half suspect we have been indiscreet; for now that we have caught our elephant, what shall we do with him?”

“I cannot give you one solitary suggestion.”

“These people are not our people, nor are their gods our gods,” said Lady Lackington.

“If we all offer up worship at the same temple, – the Bourse,” said Lady Grace, something sadly, – “we can scarcely dispute about a creed.”

“That is only true in a certain sense,” replied the other. “Money is a necessity to all; the means of obtaining it may, therefore, be common to many. It is in the employment of wealth, in the tasteful expenditure of riches, that we distinguish ourselves from these people. You have only to see the houses they keep, their plate, their liveries, their equipages, and you perceive at once that whenever they rise above some grovelling imitation they commit the most absurd blunders against all taste and propriety. I wish we had Spicer here to see about this dinner, it is one of the very few things he understands; but I suppose we must leave it to the cook himself, and we have the comfort of knowing that the criticism on his efforts will not be of a very high order.”

“We dine at four, I believe,” said Lady Grace, in her habitual tone of sorrow, as she swept from the room with that gesture of profound woe that would have graced a queen in tragedy.

Let us turn for a moment to Mr. Davenport Dunn. Lady Lackington’s invitation had not produced in him either those overwhelming sensations of astonishment or those excessive emotions of delight which she had so sanguinely calculated on. There was a time that a Viscountess asking him thus to dinner had been an event, the very fact being one requiring some effort on his part to believe; but these days were long past. Mr. Dunn had not only dined with great people since that, but had himself been their host and entertainer. Noble lords and baronets had sipped his claret, right honorables praised his sherry, and high dignitaries condescended to inquire where he got “that exquisite port.” The tremulous, faint-hearted, doubting spirit, the suspectful, self-distrusting, humble man, had gone, and in his place there was a bold, resolute nature, confident and able, daily testing his strength against some other in the ring, and as often issuing from the contest satisfied that he had little to fear from any antagonist. He was clever enough to see that the great objects in life are accomplished less by dexterity and address than by a strong, undeviating purpose. The failure of many a gifted man, and the high success of many a commonplace one, had not been without its lesson for him; and it was in the firm resolve to rise a winner that he sat down to the game of life.

Lady Lackington’s invitation was, therefore, neither a cause of pleasure nor astonishment. He remembered having met her somewhere, some time, and he approached the renewed acquaintance without any one of the sentiments her Ladyship had so confidently predicted. Indeed, so little of that flurry of anticipation did he experience, that he had to be reminded her Ladyship was waiting dinner for him, before he could remember the pleasure that was before him.

It may be a very ungallant confession for this true history to make, but we cannot blink saying that Lady Lack-ington and Lady Grace both evidenced by their toilette that they were not indifferent to the impression they were to produce upon their guest.

The Viscountess was dressed in the perfection of that French taste whose chief characteristic is freshness and elegance. She was light, gauzy, and floating, – a sweeping something of Valenciennes and white muslin, – but yet human withal, and very graceful. Her friend, in deep black, with a rich lace veil fastened on her head behind, and draped artistically over one shoulder, was a charming personification of affliction not beyond consolation. When they met, it was with an exchange of looks that said, “This ought to do.”

Lady Lackington debated with herself what precise manner of reception she would award to Mr. Dunn, – whether to impose by the haughty condescension of a fine lady, or fascinate by the graceful charm of an agreeable one. She was “equal to either fortune,” and could calculate on success, whichever road she adopted. While she thus hesitated, he entered.

If his approach had little or nothing of the man of fashion about it, it was still a manner wherein there was little to criticise. It was not bold nor timid, and, without anything like over-confidence, there was yet an air of self-reliance that was not without dignity.

At dinner the conversation ranged over the usual topics of foreign travel, foreign habits, collections, and galleries. Of pictures and statues he had seen much, and evidently with profit and advantage; of people and society he knew next to nothing, and her Ladyship quickly detected this deficiency, and fell back upon it as her stronghold.

“When hard-worked men like myself take a holiday,” said Dunn, “they are but too glad to escape from the realities of life by taking refuge amongst works of art. The painter and the sculptor suggest as much poetry as can consist with their stern notions, and are always real enough to satisfy the demand for fact.”

“But would not what you call your holiday be more pleasantly passed in making acquaintances? You could of course have easy access to the most distinguished society.”

“I’m a bad Frenchman, my Lady, and speak not a word of German or Italian.”

“English is very generally cultivated just now, – the persons best worth talking to can speak it.”

“The restraint of a strange tongue, like the novelty of a court dress, is a sad detractor from all naturalness. At least, in my own little experience with strangers, I have failed to read anything of a man’s character when he addressed me in a language not his own.”

“And was it essential you should have read it?” asked Lady Grace, languidly.

“I am always more at my ease when I know the geography of the land I live in,” said Dunn, smiling.

“I should say you have great gifts in that way, – I mean in deciphering character,” said Lady Lackington.

“Your Ladyship flatters me. I have no pretensions of the kind. Once satisfied of the sincerity of those with whom I come into contact, I never strive to know more, nor have I the faculties to attempt more.”

“But, in your wide-spread intercourse with life, do you not, insensibly as it were, become an adept in reading men’s natures?”

“I don’t think so, my Lady. The more one sees of life the simpler does it seem, not from any study of humanity, but by the easy fact that three or four motives sway the whole world. An unsupplied want of one kind or other – wealth, rank, distinction, affection, it may be – gives the entire impulse to a character, just as a passion imparts the expression to a face; and all the diversities of temperament, like those of countenance, are nothing but the impress of a want, – you may call it a wish. Now it may be,” added he, and as he spoke he stole a glance, quick as lightning, at Lady Grace, “that such experiences are more common to men like myself, – men, I mean, who are intrusted with the charge of others’ interests; but assuredly I have no clew to character save in that one feature, – a want.”

“But I want fifty thousand things,” said Lady Lacking-ton. “I want a deal of money; I want that beautiful villa near Palermo, the ‘Serra Novena;’ I want that Arab pony Kratuloff rides in the park; I want, in short, everything that pleases me every hour of the day.”

“These are not wants that make impulses, no more than a passing shower makes a climate,” said Dunn. “What I speak of is that unceasing, unwearied desire that is with us in joy or sadness, that journeys with us and lives with us, mingling in every action, blending with every thought, and presenting to our minds a constant picture of ourselves under some wished-for aspect different from all we have ever known, where we are surrounded with other impulses and swayed by other passions, and yet still identically ourselves. Lady Grace apprehends me.”

“Perhaps, – at least partly,” said she, fanning herself and concealing her face.

“There are very few exempt from a temptation of this sort, or, if they be, it is because their minds are dissipated on various objects.”

“I hate things to be called temptations, and snares, and the rest of it,” said Lady Lackington; “it is a very tiresome cant. You may tell me while I am waiting for my fish-sauce at dinner, it is a temptation; but if you wish me really to understand the word, tell me of some wonderful speculation, some marvellous scheme for securing millions. Oh, dear Mr. Dunn, you who really know the way, will you just show me the road to – I will be moderate – about twenty thousand pounds?”

“Nothing easier, my Lady, if you are disposed to risk forty.”

“But I am not, sir. I have not the slightest intention to risk one hundred. I ‘m not a gambler.”

“And yet what your Ladyship points at is very like gambling.”

“Pray place that word along with temptation, in the forbidden category; it is quite hateful to me.”

“Have you the same dislike to chance, Lady Grace?” said he, stealing a look at her face with some earnestness.

“No,” said she, in a low voice; “it is all I have to look for.”

“By the way, Mr. Dunn, what are they doing in Parliament about us? Is there not something contemplated by which we can insist upon separate maintenance, or having a suitable settlement, or – ”

“Separation – divorce,” said Lady Grace, solemnly.

“No, my Lady, the law is only repairing an old road, not making a new one. The want of the age is cheapness, – cheap literature, cheap postage, and cheap travelling, and why not cheap divorce? Legislation now professes as its great aim to extend to the poor all the comforts of the rich; and as this is supposed to be one of them – ”

“Have you any reason to doubt it, sir?” asked Lady Grace.

“Luxuries cease to be luxuries when they become common. Cheap divorce will be as unfashionable as cheap pine-apple when a coal-heaver can have it,” said Lady Lackington.

“You mistake, it seems to me, what constitutes the luxury,” interposed Lady Grace. “Every day of the year sees men liberated from prison, yet no one will pretend that the sense of freedom is less dear to every creature thus delivered.”

“Your figure is but too like,” said Dunn. “The divorced wife will be to the world only too much a resemblance of the liberated prisoner. Dark or fair, guilty or innocent, she will carry with her the opprobrium of a public trial, a discussion, and a verdict. Now, how few of us would go through an operation in public for the cure of a malady! Would we not rather hug our sorrows and our sufferings in secrecy than accept health on such conditions?”

“Not when the disease was consuming your very vitals, – not when a perpetual fever racked your brain and boiled in your blood. You’d take little heed of what is called exposure then. The cry of your heart would be, ‘Save me! save me!’” As she spoke, her voice grew louder and wilder, till it became almost a shriek, and, as she ended, she lay back, flushed and panting, in her chair.

“You have made her quite nervous, Mr. Dunn,” said Lady Lackington, as she arose and fanned her.

“Oh, no. It’s nothing. Just let me have a little fresh air, – on the terrace. Will you give me your arm?” said Lady Grace, faintly. And Dunn assisted her as she arose and walked out. “How very delicious this is!” said she, as she leaned over the balcony, and gazed down upon the placid water, streaked with long lines of starlight. “I conclude,” said she, after a little pause, “that scenes like this – moments as peacefully tranquil – are as dear to you, hard-worked men of the world, as they are to the wearied hearts of us poor women, all whose ambitions are so humble in comparison.”

“We are all of us striving for the same goal, I believe,” said he, – “this same search after happiness, the source of so much misery!”

“You are not married, I believe?” said she, in an accent whose very softness had a tone of friendship.

“No; I am as much alone in the world as one well can be,” rejoined he, sorrowfully.

“And have you gone through life without ever meeting one with whom you would have been content to make partnership, – taking her, as those solemn words say, ‘for better, for worse’?”

“They are solemn words,” said he, evading her question; “for they pledge that for which it is so hard to promise, – the changeful moods which time and years bring over us. Which of us at twenty can say what he will be at thirty, – still less at fifty? The world makes us many things we never meant to be.”

“So, then, you are not happy?” said she, in the same low voice.

“I have not said so much,” said he, smiling sadly; “are you?”

“Can you ask me? Is not the very confidence wherewith I treat you – strangers as we were an hour back to each other – the best evidence that it is from the very depth of my misery I appeal to you?”

“Make no rash confidences, Lady Grace,” said he, seriously. “They who tell of their heart’s sorrows to the world are like those who count their gold before robbers. I have seen a great deal of life, and the best philosophy I have learned from it is to ‘bear.’ Bear everything that can be borne. You will be surprised what a load you will carry by mere practice of endurance.”

“It is so easy to say to one in pain, ‘Have patience,’” said she, bitterly.

“I have practised what I teach for many a year. Be assured of one thing, – the Battle of Life is waged by all. The most favored by fortune – the luckiest, as the world calls them – have their contest and their struggle. It is not for existence, but it is often for what makes existence valuable.”

She sighed deeply, and, after a pause, he went on, —

“We pity the poor, weary, heart-sick litigant, wearing out life in the dreary prosecution of a Chancery suit, dreaming at night of that fortune he is never to see, and waking every day to the same dull round of pursuit. As hope flickers in his heart, suffering grows a habit; his whole nature imbibes the conflicting character of his cause; he doubts and hesitates and hopes and fears and wishes, till his life is one long fever. But infinitely more painful is the struggle of the heart whose affections have been misplaced. These are the suits over which no hope ever throws a ray. It is a long, dreary path, without a halting-place or a goal.”

As he spoke, she covered her face with her handkerchief; but he could perceive that she was weeping.

“I am speaking of what I know,” said he. “I remember once coming closely into relations with a young nobleman whose station, fortune, and personal advantages combined to realize all that one could fancy of worldly blessings. He was just one of those types a novelist would take to represent the most favored class of the most favored land of Europe. He had an ancient name, illustrious in various ways, a splendid fortune, was singularly endowed with abilities, highly accomplished, and handsome, and, more than all, he was gifted with that mysterious power of fascination by which some men contrive to make themselves so appreciated by others that their influence is a sort of magic. Give him an incident to relate, – let him have a passing event to tell, wherein some emotion of pity, some sentiment of devotion played a part, – and without the slightest touch of artifice, without the veriest shade of ingenuity, he could make you listen breathlessly, and hang in rapture on his words. Well, this man – of whom, if I suffer myself to speak, I shall grow wearisome in the praise – this man was heart-broken. Before he succeeded to his title, he was very poor, a subaltern in the army, with little beyond his pay. He fell in love with a very beautiful girl – I never heard her name, but I know that she was a daughter of one of the first houses in England. She returned his affection, and there was one of those thousand cases wherein love has to combat all the odds, and devotion subdue every thought that appeals to worldly pride and vanity.

“She accepted the contest nobly; she was satisfied to brave humble fortune, obscurity, exile, – everything for him – at least she said so, and I believe she thought she could keep her word. When the engagement took place – which was a secret to their families – the London season had just begun.

“It is not for me to tell you what a period of intoxicating pleasure and excitement that is, nor how in that wondrous conflict of wealth, splendor, beauty, and talent, all the fascination of gambling is imparted to a scene where, of necessity, gain and loss are alternating. It demands no common power of head and heart to resist these temptations. Apparently she had not this self-control. The gorgeous festivities about her, the splendor of wealth, and more than even that, the esteem in which it was held, struck her forcibly. She saw that the virtues of humble station met no more recognition than the false lustre of mock gems, – that ordinary gifts, illustrated by riches, became actual graces. She could not shut out the contrast between her lover, poor, unnoticed, and unregarded, and the crowd of fashionable and distinguished youths whose princely fortunes gave them place and pre-eminence. In fact, as he himself told me, – for Allington excused her – Good Heavens! are you ill?” cried be, as with a low, faint cry she sank to the ground.

“Is she dying? Good God! is she dead?” cried Lady Lackington, as she lifted the powerless arm, and held the cold hands within her own.

Lanfranchi was speedily sent for, and saw that it was merely a fainting fit.

“She was quite well previously, was she not?” asked he of Dunn.

“Perfectly so. We were chatting of indifferent matters, – of London, and the season, – when she was seized,” said he. “Is there anything in the air here that disposes to these attacks?”

Lanfranchi looked at him without reply. Possibly they understood each other, for they parted without further colloquy.

CHAPTER XI. “A CONSULTATION.”

It was late in the night as Lord Lackington and his friends reached the villa, a good deal wearied, very jaded, and, if the confession may be made, a little sick of each other; they parted pretty much as the members of such day-long excursions are wont to do, – not at all sorry to have reached home again, and brought their trip of pleasure to an end. Twining, of course, was the same happy-natured, gay, volatile creature that he set out in the morning. Everything went well with him, the world had but one aspect, which was a pleasant one, and he laughed and muttered, “What fun!” as in half-dogged silence the party wended their way through the garden towards the house.