Sir Brook Fossbrooke, Volume I.

“We arrive by the 4.40 train on Saturday afternoon. If I see you at the door when we drive up, I shall take it as a sign I am forgiven.”

Beattie folded the letter slowly, and handed it to Lucy without a word. “Tell me,” said he, after they had walked on several seconds in silence, – “tell me, do you mean to-be at the door as she arrives?”

“I think not,” said she, in a very low voice.

“She has a humble estimate of doctors; but there is one touch of nature she must not deny them, – they are very sensitive about contagion. Now, Lucy, I wish with all my heart that you were not to be the intimate associate of this woman.”

“So do I, doctor; but how is it to be helped?”

He walked along silent and in deep thought.

“Shall I tell you, doctor, how it can be managed, but only by your help and assistance? I must leave this.”

“Leave the Priory! but for where?”

“I shall go and nurse Tom: he needs me, doctor, and I believe I need him; that is, I yearn after that old companionship which made all my life till I came here – Come now, don’t oppose this plan; it is only by your hearty aid it can ever be carried out. When you have told grandpapa that the thought is a good one, the battle will be more than half won. You see yourself I ought not to be here.”

“Certainly not here with Mrs. Sewell; but there comes the grave difficulty of how you are to be lodged and cared for in that wild country where your brother lives?”

“My dear doctor, I have never known pampering till I came here. Our life at home – and was it not happy! – was of the very simplest. To go back again to the same humble ways will be like a renewal of the happy past; and then Tom and I suit each other so well, – our very caprices are kindred. Do say you like this notion, and tell me you will forward it.”

“The very journey is an immense difficulty.”

“Not a bit, doctor; I have planned it all. From this to Marseilles is easy enough, – only forty hours; once there, I either go direct to Cagliari, or catch the Sardinian steamer at Genoa – ”

“You talk of these places as if they were all old acquaintances; but, my dear child, only fancy yourself alone in a foreign city. I don’t speak of the difficulties of a new language.”

“You might, though, my dear doctor. My French and Italian, which carry me on pleasantly enough with Racine and Ariosto, will expose me sadly with my ‘commissionnaire.’”

“But quite alone you cannot go, – that’s certain.”

“I must not take a maid, that’s as certain; Tom would only send us both back again. If you insist, and if grandpapa insists upon it, I will take old Nicholas. He thinks it a great hardship that he has not been carried away over seas to see the great world; and all his whims and tempers that tortured us as children will only amuse us now; his very tyranny will be good fun.”

“I declare frankly,” said the doctor, laughing, “I do not see how the difficulties of foreign travel are to be lessened by the presence of old Nicholas; but are you serious in all this?”

“Perfectly serious, and fully determined on it, if I be permitted.”

“When would you go?”

“At once! I mean as soon as possible. The Sewells are to be here on Saturday. I would leave on Friday evening by the mail-train from London. I would telegraph to Tom to say on what day he might expect me.”

“To-day is Tuesday; is it possible you could be ready?”

“I would start to-night, doctor, if you only obtain my leave.”

“It is all a matter of the merest chance how your grandfather will take it,” said Beattie, musing.

“But you approve? tell me you approve of it.”

“There is certainly much in the project that I like. I cannot bear to think of your living here with the Sewells; my experience of them is very brief, but it has taught me to know there could be no worse companionship for you; but as these are things that cannot be spoken of to the Chief, let us see by what arguments we should approach him. I will go at once. Haire is with him, and he is sure to see that what I suggest has come from you. If it should be the difficulty of the journey your grandfather objects to, Lucy, I will go as far as Marseilles with you myself, and see you safely embarked before I leave you.”

She took his hand and kissed it twice, but was not able to utter a word.

“There, now, my dear child, don’t agitate yourself; you need all your calm and all your courage. Loiter about here till I come to you, and it shall not be long.”

“What a true, kind friend you are!” said she, as her eyes grew dim with tears. “I am more anxious about this than I like to own, perhaps. Will you, if you bring me good tidings, make me a signal with your handkerchief?”

He promised this, and left her.

Lucy sat down under a large elm-tree, resolving to wait there patiently for his return; but her fevered anxiety was such that she could not rest in one place, and was forced to rise and walk rapidly up and down. She imagined to herself the interview, and fancied she heard her grandfather’s stern question, – whether she were not satisfied with her home? What could he do more for her comfort or happiness than he had done? Oh, if he were to accuse her of ingratitude, how should she bear it? Whatever irritability he might display towards others, to herself he had always been kind and thoughtful and courteous.

She really loved him, and liked his companionship, and she felt that if in leaving him she should consign him to solitude and loneliness, she could scarcely bring herself to go; but he was now to be surrounded with others, and if they were not altogether suited to him by taste or habit, they would, even for their own sakes, try to conform to his ways and likings.

Once more she bethought her of the discussion, and how it was faring. Had her grandfather suffered Beattie to state the case fully, and say all that he might in its favor? or had he, as was sometimes his wont, stopped him short with a peremptory command to desist? And then what part had Haire taken? Haire, for whose intelligence the old Judge entertained the lowest possible estimate, had somehow an immense influence over him, just as instincts are seen too strong for reason. Some traces of boyish intercourse yet survived and swayed his mind with his consciousness of its power.

“How long it seems!” murmured she. “Does this delay augur ill for success, or is it that they are talking over the details of the plan? Oh, if I could be sure of that! My poor dear Tom, how I long to be near you – to care for you – and watch you!” and as she said this, a cold sickness came over her, and she muttered aloud: “What perfidy it all is! As if I was not thinking of myself, and my own sorrows, while I try to believe I am but thinking of my brother.” And now her tears streamed fast down her cheeks, and her heart felt as if it would burst. “It must be an hour since he left this,” said she, looking towards the house, where all was still and motionless. “It is not possible that they are yet deliberating. Grandpapa is never long in coming to a decision. Surely all has been determined on before this, and why does he not come and relieve me from my miserable uncertainty?”

At last the hall door opened, and Haire appeared; he beckoned to her with his hand to come, and then re-entered the house. Lucy knew not what to think of this, and she could scarcely drag her steps along as she tried to hasten back. As she entered the hall, Haire met her, and, taking her hand cordially, said, “It is all right; only be calm, and don’t agitate him. Come in now;” and with this she found herself in the room where the old Judge was sitting, his eyes closed and his whole attitude betokening sleep. Beattie sat at his side, and held one hand in his own. Lucy knelt down and pressed her lips to the other hand, which hung over the arm of the chair. Gently drawing away the hand, the old man laid it on her head, and in a low faint voice said: “I must not look at you, Lucy, or I shall recall my pledge. You are going away!”

The young girl turned her tearful eyes towards him, and held her lips firmly closed to repress a sob, while her cheeks trembled with emotion.

“Beattie tells me you are right,” continued he, with a sigh; and then, with a sort of aroused energy, he added; “But old age, amongst its other infirmities, fancies that right should yield to years. ‘Ce sont les droits de la decrepitude,’ as La Rochefoucauld calls them. I will not insist upon my ‘royalties,’ Lucy, this time. You shall go to your brother.” His hand trembled as it lay on her head, and then fell heavily to his side. Lucy clasped it eagerly, and pressed it to her cheek, and all was silent for some seconds in the room.

At last the old man spoke, and it was now in a clear distinct voice, though weak. “Beattie will tell you everything, Lucy; he has all my instructions. Let him now have yours. To-morrow we shall, both of us, be calmer, and can talk over all together. To-morrow will be Thursday?”

“Wednesday, grandpapa.”

“Wednesday, – all the better, my dear child; another day gained. I say, Beattie,” cried he in a louder tone, “I cannot have fallen into the pitiable condition the newspapers describe, or I could never have gained this victory over my selfishness. Come, sir, be frank enough to own that where a man combats himself, he asserts his identity. Haire will go out and give that as his own,” muttered he; and as he smiled, he lay back, his breathing grew heavier and longer, and he sank into a quiet sleep.

CHAPTER XXXIX. SOME CONJUGAL COURTESIES

“You have not told me what she wrote to you,” said Sewell to his wife, as he smoked his cigar at one side of the fire while she read a novel at the other. It was to be their last evening at the Nest; on the morrow they were to leave it for the Priory. “Were there any secrets in it, or were there allusions that I ought not to see?”

“Not that I remember,” said she, carelessly.

“What about our coming? Does the old man seem to wish for it? – how does she herself take it?”

“She says nothing on the subject, beyond her regret at not being there to meet us.”

“And why can’t she? – where will she be?”

“At sea, probably, by that time. She goes off to Sardinia to her brother.”

“What! do you mean to that fellow who is living with Fossbrooke? Why did n’t you tell me this before?”

“I don’t think I remembered it; or, if I did, it’s possible I thought it could not have much interest for you.”

“Indeed, Madam! do you imagine that the only things I care for are the movements of your admirers? Where ‘s this letter? I ‘d like to see it.”

“I tore it up. She begged me to do so when I had read it.”

“How honorable! I declare you ladies conduct your intercourse with an integrity that would be positively charming to think of if only your male friends were admitted to any share of the fair dealing. Tell me so much as you can remember of this letter.”

“She spoke of her brother having had a fever, and being now better, but so weak and reduced as to require great care and attention, and obliged to remove for change of air to a small island off the coast.”

“And Fossbrooke, – does she mention him?”

“Only that he is not with her brother, except occasionally: his business detains him near Cagliari.”

“I hope it may continue to detain him there! Has this-young woman gone off all alone on this journey?”

“She has taken no maid. She said it might prove inconvenient to her brother; and has only an old family servant she calls Nicholas with her.”

“So, then, we have the house to ourselves so far. She ‘ll not be in a hurry back, I take it. Anything would be better than the life she led with her grandfather.”

“She seems sorry to part with him, and recurs three or four times to his kindness and affection.”

“His kindness and affection! His vanity and self-love are nearer the mark. I thought I had seen something of conceit and affectation, but that old fellow leaves everything in that line miles behind. He is, without exception, the greatest bore and the most insupportable bully I ever encountered.”

“Lucy liked him.”

“She did not, – she could not. It suits you women to say these things, because you cultivate hypocrisy so carefully that you carry on the game with each other! How could any one, let her be ever so abject, like that incessant homage this old man exacted, – to be obliged to be alive to his vapid jokes and his dreary stories, to his twaddling reminiscences of college success or House of Commons – Irish House too – triumphs? Do you think if I wasn’t a beggar I ‘d go and submit myself to such a discipline?”

To this she made no reply, and for a while there was a silence in the room. At last he said, “You’ll have to take up that line of character that she acted. You’ll have to ‘swing the incense’ now. I’ll be shot if I do.”

She gave no answer, and he went on: “You ‘ll have to train the brats too to salute him, and kiss his hand and call him – what are they to call him – grandpapa? Yes, they must say grandpapa. How I wish I had not sent in my papers! If I had only imagined I could have planted you all here, I could have gone back to my regiment and served out my time.”

“It might have been better,” said she, in a low voice.

“Of course it would have been better; each of us would have been free, and there are few people, be it said, take more out of their freedom, – eh, Madam?”

She shrugged her shoulders carelessly, but a slight, a very slight, flush colored her cheek.

“By the way, now we’re on that subject, have you answered Lady Trafford’s letter?”

“Yes,” said she; and now her cheek grew crimson.

“And what answer did you send?”

“I sent back everything.”

“What do you mean? – your rings and trinkets, the bracelet with the hair – mine, of course, – it could be no one’s but mine.”

“All, everything,” said she, with a gulp.

“I must read the old woman’s letter over again. You have n’t burnt that, I hope?”

“No; it’s upstairs in my writing-desk.”

“I declare,” said he, rising and standing with his back to the fire, “you women, and especially fine ladies, say things to each other that men never would dare to utter to other men. That old dame, for instance, charged you with what we male creatures have no equivalent for, – cheating at play would be mild in comparison.”

“I don’t think that you escaped scot-free,” said she, with an intense bitterness, though her tone was studiously subdued and low.

“No,” said he, with a jeering laugh. “I figured as the accessory or accomplice, or whatever the law calls it. I was what polite French ladies call le mari complaisant, – a part I am so perfect in, Madam, that I almost think I ought to play it for my Benefit.’ What do you say?”

“Oh, sir, it is not for me to pass an opinion on your abilities.”

“I have less bashfulness,” said he, fiercely. “I ‘ll venture to say a word on yours. I ‘ve told you scores of times – I told you in India, I told you at the Cape, I told you when we were quarantined at Trieste, and I tell you now – that you never really captivated any man much under seventy. When they are tottering on to the grave, bald, blear-eyed, and deaf, you are perfectly irresistible; and I wish – really I say it in all good faith – you would limit the sphere of your fascinations to such very frail humanities. Trafford only became spooney after that smash on the skull; as he grew better, he threw off his delusions, – did n’t he?”

“So he told me,” said she, with perfect calm.

“By Jove! that was a great fluke of mine,” cried he, aloud. “That was a hazard I never so much as tried. So that this fellow had made some sort of a declaration to you?”

“I never said so.”

“What was it then that you did say, Madam? Let us understand each other clearly.”

“Oh, I am sure we need no explanations for that,” said she, rising, and moving towards the door.

“I want to hear about this before you go,” said he, standing between her and the door.

“You are not going to pretend jealousy, are you?” said she, with an easy laugh.

“I should think not,” said he, insolently. “That is about one of the last cares will ever rob me of my rest at night. I ‘d like to know, however, what pretext I have to send a ball through your young friend.”

“Oh, as to that peril, it will not rob me of a night’s rest,” said she, with such a look of scorn and contempt as seemed actually to sicken him, for he staggered back as though about to fall and she passed out ere he could recover himself.

“It is to be no quarter between us then! Well, be it so,” cried he, as he sank heavily into a seat. “She’s playing a bold game when she goes thus far.” He leaned his head on the table, and sat thus so long that he appeared to have fallen asleep; indeed, the servant who came to tell him that tea was served, feared to disturb him, and retired without speaking. Far from sleeping, however, his head was racked with a maddening pain, and he kept on muttering to himself, “This is the second time – the second time she has taunted me with cowardice. Let her beware! Is there no one will warn her against what she is doing?”

“Missis says, please, sir, won’t you have a cup of tea?” said the maid timidly at the door.

“No; I’ll not take any.”

“Missis says too, sir, that Miss Blanche is tuk poorly, and has a shiverin’ over her, and a bad headache, and she hopes you ‘ll send in for Dr. Tobin.”

“Is she in bed?”

“Yes, sir, please.”

“I’ll go up and see her;” and with this he arose and passed up the little stair that led to the nursery. In one bed a little dark-haired girl of about three years old lay fast asleep; in the adjoining bed a bright blue-eyed child of two years or less lay wide awake, her cheeks crimson, and the expression of her features anxious and excited. Her mother was bathing her temples with cold water as Sewell entered, and was talking in a voice of kind and gentle meaning to the child.

“That stupid woman of yours said it was Blanche,” said Sewell, pettishly, as he gazed at the little girl.

“I told her it was Cary; she has been heavy all day, and eaten nothing. No, pet, – no, darling,” said she, stooping over the sick child, “pa is not angry; he is only sorry that little Cary is ill.”

“I suppose you’d better have Tobin to see her,” said he, coldly. “I ‘ll tell George to take the tax-cart and fetch him out. It’s well it was n’t Blanche,” muttered he, as he sauntered out of the room. His wife’s eyes followed him as he went, and never did a human face exhibit a stronger show of repressed passion than hers, as, with closely compressed lips and staring eyes, she watched him as he passed out.

“The fool frightened me, – she said it was Blanche,” were the words he continued to mutter as he went down the stairs.

Tobin arrived in due time, and pronounced the case not serious, – a mere feverish attack that only required a day or two of care and treatment.

“Have you seen Colonel Sewell?” said Mrs. Sewell, as she accompanied the doctor downstairs.

“Yes; I told him just what I ‘ve said to you.”

“And what reply did he make?”

“He said, ‘All right! I have business in town, and must start to-morrow. My wife and the chicks can follow by the end of the week.’”

“It’s so like him! – so like him!” said she, as though the pent-up passion could no longer be restrained.

CHAPTER XL. MR. BALFOUR’S OFFICE

On arriving in Dublin, Sewell repaired at once to Balfour’s office in the Castle yard; he wanted to “hear the news,” and it was here that every one went who wanted to “hear the news.” There are in all cities, but more especially in cities of the second order, certain haunts where the men about town repair; where, like the changing-houses of bankers, people exchange their “credits,” – take up their own notes, and give up those of their neighbors.

Sewell arrived before the usual time when people dropped in, and found Balfour alone and at breakfast. The Under-Secretary’s manner was dry, so much Sewell saw as he entered; he met him as though he had seen him the day before, and this, when men have not seen each other for some time, has a certain significance. Nor did he ask when he had come up, nor in any way recognize that his appearance was matter of surprise or pleasure.

“Well, what’s going on here?” said Sewell, as he flung himself into an easy-chair, and turned towards the fire. “Anything new?”

“Nothing particular. I don’t suppose you care for the Cattle Show or the Royal Irish Academy?”

“Not much, – at least, I can postpone my inquiries about them. How about my place here? Are you going to give me trouble about it?”

“Your place, – your place?” muttered the other, once or twice; and then, standing up with his back to the fire, and his skirts over his arms, he went on. “Do you want to hear the truth about this affair, or are we only to go on sparring with the gloves, eh?”

“The truth, of course, if such a novel proceeding should not be too much of a shock to you.”

“No, I suspect not. I do a little of everything every day just to keep my hand in.”

“Well, go on now, out with this truth.”

“Well, the truth is, – I am now speaking confidentially, – if I were you I ‘d not press my claim to that appointment, – do you perceive?”

“I do not; but perhaps I may when you have explained yourself a little more fully.”

“And,” continued he, in the same tone, and as though no interruption had occurred, “that’s the opinion of Halkett, and Doyle, and Jocelyn, and the rest.”

“Confidentially, of course,” said Sewell, with a sneer so slight as not to be detected.

“I may say confidentially, because it was at dinner we talked it over, and we were only the household, – no guests but Byam Herries and Barrington.”

“And you all agreed?”

“Yes, there was not a dissentient voice but Jocelyn’s, who said, if he were in your place, he’d insist on having all the papers and letters given up to him. His view is this: ‘What security have I that the same charges are not to be renewed again and again? I submit now, but am I always to submit? Are my Indian’ – (what shall I call them? I forget what he called them; I believe it was escapades) – ‘my Indian escapades to declare me unfit to hold anything under the Crown?’ He said a good deal in that strain, but we did not see it. It was hard, to be sure, but we did not see it. As Halkett said, ‘Sewell has had his innings already in India. If, with a pretty wife and a neat turn for billiards, he did not lay by enough to make his declining years comfortable, I must say that he was not provident.’ Doyle, however, remarked that after that affair with Loftus up at Agra – wasn’t it Agra?” – Sewell nodded – “it was n’t so easy for you to get along as many might think, and that you were a devilish clever fellow to do what you had done. Doyle likes you, I think.” Sewell nodded again, and, after a slight pause, Balfour proceeded: “And it was Doyle, too, said, ‘Why not try for something in the colonies? There are lots of places a man can go and nothing be ever heard of him. If I was Sewell, I ‘d say, Make me a barrackmaster in the Sandwich Islands, or a consul in the Caraccas.’

“They all concurred in one thing, that you never did so weak a thing in your whole life as to have any dealings with Trafford. It was his mother went to the Duke – ay, into the private office at the Horse Guards – and got Clifford’s appointment cancelled, just for a miserable five hundred pounds Jack won off the elder brother, – that fellow who died last year at Madeira. She’s the most dangerous woman in Europe. She does not care what she says, nor to whom she says it. She ‘d go up to the Queen at a drawing-room and make a complaint as soon as she ‘d speak to you or me. As it is, she told their Excellencies here all that went on in your house, and I suppose scores of things that did not go on either, and said, ‘And are you going to permit this man to be’ – she did not remember what, but she said – ‘a high official under the Crown? and are you going to receive his wife amongst your intimates?’ What a woman she is! To hear her you ‘d think her ‘dear child,’ instead of being a strapping fellow of six feet two, was a brat in knickerbockers, with a hat and feather. The fellow himself must be a consummate muff to be bullied by her; but then the estate is not entailed, they say, and there’s a younger brother may come into it all. His chances look well just now, for Lionel has got a relapse, and the doctors think very ill of him.”