Poor Miss Finch

by Wilkie Collins

  CHAPTER THE TWELFTH

  Mr. Finch smells Money

  A DOMESTIC alarm deferred for some hours our proposed walk to Browndown.

  The old nurse, Zillah, was taken ill in the night. She was so littlerelieved by such remedies as we were able to apply, that it becamenecessary to summon the doctor in the morning. He lived at some distancefrom Dimchurch; and he had to send back to his own house for themedicines required. As a necessary result of these delays, it was closeon one o'clock in the afternoon before the medical remedies had theireffect, and the nurse was sufficiently recovered to permit of our leavingher in the servant's care.

  We had dressed for our walk (Lucilla being ready long before I was), andhad got as far as the garden gate on our way to Browndown--when we heard,on the other side of the wall, a man's voice, pitched in superbly deepbass tones, pronouncing these words:

  "Believe me, my dear sir, there is not the least difficulty. I have onlyto send the cheque to my bankers at Brighton."

  Lucilla started, and caught hold of me by the arm.

  "My father!" she exclaimed in the utmost astonishment. "Who is he talkingto?"

  The key of the gate was in my possession. "What a grand voice your fatherhas got!" I said, as I took the key out of my pocket. I opened the gate.There, confronting us on the threshold, arm in arm, as if they had knowneach other from childhood, stood Lucilla's father, and--Oscar Dubourg!

  Reverend Finch opened the proceedings by folding his daughteraffectionately in his arms.

  "My dear child!" he said, "I received your letter--your most interestingletter--this morning. The moment I read it I felt that I owed a duty toMr. Dubourg. As pastor of Dimchurch, it was clearly incumbent on me tocomfort a brother in affliction. I really felt, so to speak, a longing tohold out the right hand of friendship to this sorely-tried man. Iborrowed my friend's carriage, and drove straight to Browndown. We havehad a long and cordial talk. I have brought Mr. Dubourg home with me. Hemust be one of us. My dear child, Mr. Dubourg must be one of us. Let meintroduce you. My eldest daughter--Mr. Dubourg."

  He performed the ceremony of presentation, with the most impenetrablegravity, as if he really believed that Oscar and his daughter now meteach other for the first time!

  Never had I set my eyes on a meaner-looking man than this rector. Inheight he barely reached up to my shoulder. In substance, he was somiserably lean that he looked the living picture of starvation. He wouldhave made his fortune in the streets of London, if he had only gone outand shown himself to the public in ragged clothes. His face was deeplypitted with the small-pox. His short grisly hair stood up stiff andstraight on his head like hair fixed in a broom. His small whitish-greyeyes had a restless, inquisitive, hungry look in them, indescribablyirritating and uncomfortable to see. The one personal distinction hepossessed consisted in his magnificent bass voice--a voice which had nosort of right to exist in the person who used it. Until one becameaccustomed to the contrast, there was something perfectly unbearable inhearing those superb big tones come out of that contemptible little body.The famous Latin phrase conveys, after all, the best description I cangive of Reverend Finch. He was in very truth--Voice, and nothing else.

  "Madame Pratolungo, no doubt?" he went on, turning to me. "Delighted tomake the acquaintance of my daughter's judicious companion and friend.You must be one of us--like Mr. Dubourg. Let me introduce you. MadamePratolungo--Mr. Dubourg. This is the old side of the rectory, my dearsir. We had it put in repair--let me see: how long since?--we had it putin repair just after Mrs. Finch's last confinement but one." (I soondiscovered that Mr. Finch reckoned time by his wife's confinements.) "Youwill find it very curious and interesting inside. Lucilla, my child! (Ithas pleased Providence, Mr. Dubourg, to afflict my daughter withblindness. Inscrutable Providence!) Lucilla, this is your side of thehouse. Take Mr. Dubourg's arm, and lead the way. Do the honors, my child.Madame Pratolungo, let me offer you my arm. I regret that I was notpresent, when you arrived, to welcome you at the rectory. Consideryourself--do pray consider yourself--one of us." He stopped, and loweredhis prodigious voice to a confidential growl. "Delightful person, Mr.Dubourg. I can't tell you how pleased I am with him. And what a sadstory! Cultivate Mr. Dubourg, my dear madam. As a favor to Me--cultivateMr. Dubourg!"

  He said this with an appearance of the deepest anxiety--and more, heemphasized it by affectionately squeezing my hand.

  I have met with a great many audacious people in my time. But theaudacity of Reverend Finch--persisting to our faces in the assumptionthat he had been the first to discover our neighbor, and that Lucilla andI were perfectly incapable of understanding and appreciating Oscar,unassisted by him--was entirely without a parallel in my experience. Iasked myself what his conduct in this matter--so entirely unexpected byLucilla, as well as by me--could possibly mean. My knowledge of hischaracter, obtained through his daughter, and my memory of what we heardhim say on the other side of the wall, suggested that his conduct mightmean--Money.

  We assembled in the sitting-room.

  The only person among us who was quite at his ease was Mr. Finch. Henever let his daughter and his guest alone for a single moment. "Mychild, show Mr. Dubourg this; show Mr. Dubourg that. Mr. Dubourg, mydaughter possesses this; my daughter possesses that." So he went on, allround the room. Oscar appeared to feel a little daunted by theoverwhelming attentions of his new friend. Lucilla was, as I could see,secretly irritated at finding herself authorized by her father to paythose attentions to Oscar which she would have preferred offering to himof her own accord. As for me, I was already beginning to weary of thepatronizing politeness of the little priest with the big voice. It was arelief to us all, when a message on domestic affairs arrived in the midstof the proceedings from Mrs. Finch, requesting to see her husbandimmediately on the rectory side of the house.

  Forced to leave us, Reverend Finch made his farewell speech; takingOscar's hand into a kind of paternal custody in both his own hands. Hespoke with such sonorous cordiality, that the china and glass ornamentson Lucilla's chiffonier actually jingled an accompaniment to his boomingbass notes.

  "Come to tea, my dear sir. Without ceremony. To-night at six. We mustkeep up your spirits, Mr. Dubourg. Cheerful society, and a little music.Lucilla, my dear child, you will play for Mr. Dubourg, won't you? MadamePratolungo will do the same--at My request--I am sure. We shall make evendull Dimchurch agreeable to our new neighbor before we have done. Whatdoes the poet say? 'Fixed to no spot is happiness sincere; 'tis nowhereto be found, or everywhere.' How cheering! how true! Good day; good day."

  The glasses left off jingling. Mr. Finch's wizen little legs took him outof the room.

  The moment his back was turned, we both assailed Oscar with the samequestion. What had passed at the interview between the rector andhimself? Men are all alike incompetent to satisfy women, when thequestion between the sexes is a question of small details. A woman, inOscar's position, would have been able to relate to us, not only thewhole conversation with the rector, but every little trifling incidentwhich had noticeably illustrated it. As things were, we could onlyextract from our unsatisfactory man the barest outline of the interview.The coloring and the filling-in we were left to do for ourselves.

  Oscar had, on his own confession, acknowledged his visitor's kindness, byopening his whole heart to the sympathizing rector, and placing that warypriest and excellent man of business in possession of the completestknowledge of all his affairs. In return, Reverend Finch had spoken in thefrankest manner, on his side. He had drawn a sad picture of thepoverty-stricken condition of Dimchurch, viewed as an ecclesiasticalendowment; and he had spoken in such feeling terms of the neglectedcondition of the ancient and interesting church, that poor simple Oscar,smitten with pity, had produced his cheque-book, and had subscribed onthe spot towards the Fund for repairing the ancient round tower. They hadbeen still occupied with the subject of the tower and the subscription,when we had opened the garden gate and had let them in. Hearing this, Inow understood the motives under which
our reverend friend was acting aswell as if they had been my own. It was plain to my mind that the rectorhad taken his financial measure of Oscar, and had privately satisfiedhimself, that if he encouraged the two young people in cultivating eachother's society, money (to use his own phrase) might come of it. He had,as I believed, put forward "the round tower," in the first instance, as afeeler; and he would follow it up, in due time, by an appeal of a morepersonal nature to Oscar's well-filled purse. Brief, he was, in myopinion, quite sharp enough (after having studied his young friend'scharacter) to foresee an addition to his income, rather than asubtraction from it, if the relations between Oscar and his daughterended in a marriage.

  Whether Lucilla arrived, on her side, at the same conclusion as mine, iswhat I cannot venture positively to declare. I can only relate that shelooked ill at ease as the facts came out; and that she took the firstopportunity of extinguishing her father, viewed as a topic ofconversation.

  As for Oscar, it was enough for him that he had already secured his placeas friend of the house. He took leave of us in the highest spirits. I hadmy eye on them when he and Lucilla said good-bye. She squeezed his hand.I saw her do it. At the rate at which things were now going on, I beganto ask myself whether Reverend Finch would not appear at tea-time in hisrobes of office, and celebrate the marriage of his "sorely-tried" youngfriend between the first cup and the second.

  At our little social assembly in the evening, nothing passed worthy ofmuch remark.

  Lucilla and I (I cannot resist recording this) were both beautifullydressed, in honor of the occasion; Mrs. Finch serving us to perfection,by way of contrast. She had made an immense effort--she was half dressed.Her evening costume was an ancient green silk skirt (with traces of pastbabies visible on it to an experienced eye), topped by the everlastingblue merino jacket. "I lose everything belonging to me," Mrs. Finchwhispered in my ear. "I have got a body to this dress, and it can't befound anywhere." The rector's prodigious voice was never silent: thepompous and plausible little man talked, talked, talked, in deeper anddeeper bass, until the very teacups on the table shuddered under theinfluence of him. The elder children, admitted to the family festival,ate till they could eat no more; stared till they could stare no more;yawned till they could yawn no more--and then went to bed. Oscar got onwell with everybody. Mrs. Finch was naturally interested in him as one oftwins--though she was also surprised and disappointed at hearing that hismother had begun and ended with his brother and himself. As for Lucilla,she sat in silent happiness, absorbed in the inexhaustible delight ofhearing Oscar's voice. She found as many varieties of expression inlistening to her beloved tones, as the rest of us find in looking at ourbeloved face. We had music later in the evening--and I then heard, forthe first time, how charmingly Lucilla played. She was a born musician,with a delicacy and subtlety of touch such as few even of the greatest_virtuosi_ possess. Oscar was enchanted. In a word, the evening was asuccess.

  I contrived, when our guest took his departure, to say my contemplatedword to him in private, on the subject of his solitary position atBrowndown.

  Those doubts of Oscar's security in his lonely house, which I havedescribed as having been suggested to me by the discovery of the tworuffians lurking under the wall, still maintained their place in my mind;and still urged me to warn him to take precautions of some sort, beforethe precious metals which he had sent to London to be melted, came backto him again. He gave me the opportunity I wanted, by looking at hiswatch, and apologizing for protracting his visit to a terribly late hour,for the country--the hour of midnight.

  "Is your servant sitting up for you?" I asked, assuming to be ignorant ofhis domestic arrangements.

  He pulled out of his pocket a great clumsy key.

  "This is my only servant at Browndown," he said. "By four or five in theafternoon, the people at the inn have done all for me that I want. Afterthat time, there is nobody in the house but myself."

  He shook hands with us. The rector escorted him as far as the front door.I slipped out while they were saying their last words, and joined Oscar,when he advanced alone into the garden.

  "I want a breath of fresh air," I said. "I'll go with you as far as thegate."

  He began to talk of Lucilla directly. I surprised him by returningabruptly to the subject of his position at Browndown.

  "Do you think it's wise," I asked, "to be all by yourself at night insuch a lonely house as yours? Why don't you have a manservant?"

  "I detest strange servants," he answered. "I infinitely prefer being bymyself."

  "When do you expect your gold and silver plates to be returned to you?"

  "In about a week."

  "What would be the value of them, in money--at a rough guess?"

  "At a rough guess--about seventy or eighty pounds."

  "In a week's time then," I said, "you will have seventy or eighty pounds'worth of property at Browndown. Property which a thief need only put intothe melting-pot, to have no fear of its being traced into his hands."

  Oscar stopped, and looked at me.

  "What _can_ you be thinking of!" he asked. "There are no thieves in thisprimitive place."

  "There are thieves in other places," I answered. "And they may come here.Have you forgotten those two men whom we caught hanging about Browndownyesterday?"

  He smiled. I had recalled to him a humourous association--nothing more.

  "It was not we who caught them," he said. "It was that strange child.What do you say to my having Jicks to sleep in the house and take care ofme?"

  "I am not joking," I rejoined. "I never met with two more ill-lookingvillains in my life. The window was open when you were telling me aboutthe necessity for melting the plates again. They may know as well as wedo, that your gold and silver will be returned to you after a time."

  "What an imagination you have got!" he exclaimed. "You see a couple ofshabby excursionists from Brighton, who have wandered to Dimchurch--andyou instantly transform them into a pair of housebreakers in a conspiracyto rob and murder me! You and my brother Nugent would just suit eachother. His imagination runs away with him, exactly like yours."

  "Take my advice," I answered gravely. "Don't persist in sleeping atBrowndown without a living creature in the house with you."

  He was in wild good spirits. He kissed my hand, and thanked me in hisvoluble exaggerated way for the interest that I took in him. "All right!"he said, as he opened the gate. "I'll have a living creature in the housewith me. I'll get a dog."

  We parted. I had told him what was on my mind. I could do no more. Afterall, it might be quite possible that his view was the right one, and minethe wrong.