‘That, after all, a senior wrangler was no great shakes. Any man might be one if he liked, but there were a lot of fellows that he knew who would be very sorry to go in for anything so slow.’
Molly thought the game never would end. She had no particular turn for gambling in her; and whatever her card might be, she regularly put on two counters, indifferent as to whether she won or lost. Cynthia, on the contrary, staked high, and was at one time very rich, but ended by being in debt to Molly something like six shillings. She had forgotten her purse, she said, and was obliged to borrow from the more provident Molly, who was aware that the round game of which Miss Browning had spoken to her was likely to require money. If it was not a very merry affair for all the individuals concerned, it was a very noisy one on the whole. Molly thought it was going to last till midnight; but punctually, as the clock struck nine, the little maidservant staggered in under the weight of a tray loaded with sandwiches, cakes, and jelly. This brought on a general move; and Roger, who appeared to have been on the watch for something of the kind, came and took a chair by Molly.
‘I am so glad to see you again—it seems such a long time since Christmas,’ said he, dropping his voice, and not alluding more exactly to the day when she had left the Hall.
‘It is a long time,’ she replied; ‘we are close to Easter now. I have so wanted to tell you how glad I was to hear about your honours at Cambridge. I once thought of sending you a message through your brother, but then I thought it might be making too much fuss, because I know nothing of mathematics, or of the value of a senior wranglership; and you were sure to have so many congratulations from people who did know.’
‘I missed yours though, Molly,’ said he, kindly. ‘But I felt sure you were glad for me.’
‘Glad and proud too,’ said she. ‘I should so like to hear something more about it. I heard you telling Cynthia———’
‘Yes. What a charming person she is! I should think you must be happier than we expected long ago.’
‘But tell me something about the senior wranglership, please,’ said Molly.
‘It’s a long story, and I ought to be helping the Miss Brownings to hand sandwiches—besides, you wouldn’t find it very interesting, it’s so full of technical details.’
‘Cynthia looked very much interested,’ said Molly.
‘Well! then I refer you to her, for I must go now. I can’t for shame go on sitting here, and letting those good ladies have all the trouble. But I shall come and call on Mrs. Gibson soon. Are you walking home to-night?’
‘Yes, I think so,’ replied Molly, eagerly foreseeing what was to come.
‘Then I shall walk home with you. I left my horse at the “Angel,” and that’s half-way. I suppose old Betty will allow me to accompany you and your sister? You used to describe her as something of a dragon.’
‘Betty has left us,’ said Molly., sadly. ‘She’s gone to live at a place at Ashcombe.’
He made a face of dismay, and then went off to his duties. The short conversation had been very pleasant, and his manner had had just the brotherly kindness of old times; but it was not quite the manner he had to Cynthia; and Molly half thought she would have preferred the latter. He was now hovering about Cynthia, who had declined the offer of refreshments from Willie Osborne. Roger was tempting her, and with playful entreaties urging her to take something from him. Every word they said could be heard by the whole room; yet every word was said, on Roger’s part at least, as if he could not have spoken it in that peculiar manner to any one else. At length, and rather more because she was weary of being entreated than because it was his wish, Cynthia took a macaroon, and Roger seemed as happy as though she had crowned him with flowers. The whole affair was as trifling and commonplace as could be in itself; hardly worth noticing; and yet Molly did notice it, and felt uneasy; she could not tell why. As it turned out, it was a rainy night, and Mrs. Gibson sent a fly for the two girls instead of old Betty’s substitute. Both Cynthia and Molly thought of the possibility of their taking the two Osborne girls back to their grandmother’s, and so saving them a wet walk; but Cynthia got the start in speaking about it; and the thanks and the implied praise for thoughtfulness were hers.
When they got home Mr. and Mrs. Gibson were sitting in the drawing-room, quite ready to be amused by any details of the evening.
Cynthia began—
‘Oh! it wasn’t very entertaining. One didn’t expect that,’ and she yawned wearily.
‘Who were there?’ asked Mr. Gibson. ‘Quite a young party—wasn’t it?’
‘They’d only asked Lizzie and Fanny Osborne, and their brother; but Mr. Roger Hamley had ridden over and called on Miss Brownings, and they had kept him to tea. No one else.’
‘Roger Hamley there!’ said Mr. Gibson. ‘He’s come home then. I must make time to ride over and see him.’
‘You’d much better ask him here,’ said Mrs. Gibson. ‘Suppose you invite him and his brother to dine here on Friday, my dear. It would be a very pretty attention, I think.’
‘My dear! these young Cambridge men have a very good taste in wine, and don’t spare it. My cellar won’t stand many of their attacks.’
‘I didn’t think you were so inhospitable, Mr. Gibson.’
‘I’m not inhospitable, I’m sure. If you’ll put “bitter beer” in the corner of your notes of invitation, just as the smart people put “quadrilles” as a sign of the entertainment offered, we’ll have Osborne and Roger to dinner any day you like. And what did you think of my favourite, Cynthia? You hadn’t seen him before, I think?’
‘Oh! he’s nothing like so handsome as his brother; nor so polished; nor so easy to talk to. He entertained me for more than an hour with a long account of some examination or other; but there’s something one likes about him,’
‘Well—and Molly,’ said Mrs. Gibson, who piqued herself on being an impartial stepmother, and who always tried hard to make Molly talk as much as Cynthia—‘what sort of an evening have you had?’
‘Very pleasant, thank you.’ Her heart a little belied her as she said this. She had not cared for the round game; and she would have cared for Roger’s conversation. She had had what she was indifferent to, and not had what she would have liked.
‘We’ve had our unexpected visitor, too,’ said Mr. Gibson. ‘Just after dinner who should come in but Mr. Preston. I fancy he’s having more of the management of the Hollingford property than formerly. Sheepshanks is getting an old man. And if so, I suspect we shall see a good deal of Preston. He’s “no blate,”bg as they used to say in Scotland, and made himself quite at home to-night. If I’d asked him to stay, or, indeed, if I’d done anything but yawn, he’d have been here now. But I defy any man to stay when I have a fit of yawning.’
‘Do you like Mr. Preston, papa?’ asked Molly.
‘About as much as I do half the men I meet. He talks well, and has seen a good deal. I know very little of him, though, except that he’s my lord’s steward, which is a guarantee for a good deal.’
‘Lady Harriet spoke pretty strongly against him that day I was with her at the Manor House.’
‘Lady Harriet’s always full of fancies: she likes persons to-day, and dislikes them to-morrow,’ said Mrs. Gibson, who was touched on her sore point whenever Molly quoted Lady Harriet, or said anything to imply ever so transitory an intimacy with her.
‘You must know a good deal about Mr. Preston, my dear. I suppose you saw a good deal of him at Ashcombe?’
Mrs. Gibson coloured, and looked at Cynthia before she replied. Cynthia’s face was set into a determination not to speak, however much she might be referred to.
‘Yes; we saw a good deal of him—at one time, I mean. He’s changeable, I think. But he always sent us game, and sometimes fruit. There were some stories against him, but I never believed them.’
‘What kind of stories?’ said Mr. Gibson, quickly.
‘Oh, vague stories, you know: scandal, I dare say. No one ever believed them. He could be so agr
eeable if he chose; and my lord, who is so very particular, would never have kept him as agent if they were true; not that I ever knew what they were, for I consider all scandal as abominable gossip.’
‘I’m very glad I yawned in his face,’ said Mr. Gibson. ‘I hope he’ll take the hint.’
‘If it was one of your giant-gapes, papa, I should call it more than a hint,’ said Molly. ‘And if you want a yawning chorus the next time he comes, I’ll join in; won’t you, Cynthia?’
‘I don’t know,’ replied the latter, shortly, as she lighted her bed-candle. The two girls had usually some nightly conversation in one or other of their bedrooms; but to-night Cynthia said something or other about being terribly tired, and hastily shut her door.
The very next day, Roger came to pay his promised call. Molly was out in the garden with Williams, planning the arrangement of some new flower-beds, and deep in her employment of placing pegs upon the lawn to mark out the different situations, when, standing up to mark the effect, her eye was caught by the figure of a gentleman, sitting with his back to the light, leaning forwards and talking, or listening, eagerly. Molly knew the shape of the head perfectly, and hastily began to put off her brown-holland gardening apron, emptying the pockets as she spoke to Williams.
‘You can finish it now, I think,’ said she. ‘You know about the bright-coloured flowers being against the privet-hedge, and where the new rose-bed is to be?’
‘I can’t justly say as I do,’ said he. ‘Mebbe, you’ll just go o’er it all once again, Miss Molly. I’m not so young as I oncst was, and my head is not so clear nowadays, and I’d be loth to make mistakes when you’re so set upon your plans.’
Molly gave up her impulse in a moment. She saw that the old gardener was really perplexed, yet that he was as anxious as he could be to do his best. So she went over the ground again, pegging and explaining till the wrinkled brow was smooth again, and he kept saying, ‘I see, miss. All right, Miss Molly, I’se getten it in my head as clear as patch-work now.’
So she could leave him, and go in. But just as she was close to the garden door, Roger came out. It really was for once a case of virtue its own reward, for it was far pleasanter to her to have him in a tête-à-tête, however short, than in the restraint of Mrs. Gibson’s and Cynthia’s presence.
‘I only just found out where you were, Molly. Mrs. Gibson said you had gone out, but she didn’t know where; and it was the greatest chance that I turned round and saw you.’
‘I saw you some time ago, but I couldn’t leave Williams. I think he was unusually slow to-day; and he seemed as if he couldn’t understand my plans for the new flower-beds.’
‘Is that the paper you’ve got in your hand? Let me look at it, will you? Ah, I see! you’ve borrowed some of your ideas from our garden at home, haven’t you? This bed of scarlet geraniums, with the border of young oaks, pegged down! That was a fancy of my dear mother’s.’
They were both silent for a minute or two. Then Molly said—
‘How is the squire? I’ve never seen him since.’
‘No, he told me how much he wanted to see you, but he couldn’t make up his mind to come and call. I suppose it would never do now for you to come and stay at the Hall, would it? It would give my father so much pleasure: he looks upon you as a daughter, and I’m sure both Osborne and I shall always consider you are like a sister to us, after all my mother’s love for you, and your tender care of her at last. But I suppose it wouldn’t do.’
‘No! certainly not,’ said Molly, hastily.
‘I fancy if you could come it would put us a little to rights. You know, as I think I once told you, Osborne has behaved differently to what I should have done, though not wrongly—only what I call an error of judgment. But my father, I’m sure, has taken up some notion of——never mind; only the end of it is that he holds Osborne still in tacit disgrace, and is miserable himself all the time. Osborne, too, is sore and unhappy, and estranged from my father. It is just what my mother would have put right very soon, and perhaps you could have done it—unconsciously, I mean—for this wretched mystery that Osborne preserves about his affairs is at the root of it all. But there’s no use talking about it; I don’t know why I began.’ Then, with a wrench, changing the subject, while Molly still thought of what he had been telling her, he broke out—‘I can’t tell you how much I like Miss Kirkpatrick, Molly. It must be a great pleasure to you, having such a companion!’
‘Yes,’ said Molly, half smiling. ‘I’m very fond of her; and I think I like her better every day I know her. But how quickly you have found out her virtues!’
‘I didn’t say “virtues,” did I?’ asked he, reddening, but putting the question in all good faith. ‘Yet I don’t think one could be deceived in that face. And Mrs. Gibson appears to be a very friendly person—she has asked Osborne and me to dine here on Friday.’
‘Bitter beer’ came into Molly’s mind; but what she said was, ‘And are you coming?’
‘Certainly, I am, unless my father wants me; and I’ve given Mrs.
Gibson a conditional promise for Osborne, too. So I shall see you all very soon again. But I must go now. I have to keep an appointment seven miles from here in half an hour’s time. Good luck to your flower-garden, Molly.’
CHAPTER 22
The Old Squire’s Troubles
Affairs were going on worse at the Hall than Roger had liked to tell. Moreover, very much of the discomfort there arose from ‘mere manner,’ as people express it, which is always indescribable and indefinable. Quiet and passive as Mrs. Hamley had always been in appearance, she was the ruling spirit of the house as long as she lived. The directions to the servants, down to the most minute particulars, came from her sitting-room, or from the sofa on which she lay. Her children always knew where to find her; and to find her, was to find love and sympathy. Her husband, who was often restless and angry from one cause or another, always came to her to be smoothed down and put right. He was conscious of her pleasant influence over him, and became at peace with himself when in her presence; just as a child is at ease when with some one who is both firm and gentle. But the keystone of the family arch was gone, and the stones of which it was composed began to fall apart. It is always sad when a sorrow of this kind seems to injure the character of the mourning survivors. Yet, perhaps, this injury may be only temporary or superficial; the judgments so constantly passed upon the way people bear the loss of those whom they have deeply loved, appear to be even more cruel, and wrongly meted out, than human judgments generally are. To careless observers, for instance, it would seem as though the squire was rendered more capricious and exacting, more passionate and authoritative, by his wife’s death. The truth was, that it occurred at a time when many things came to harass him, and some to bitterly disappoint him; and she was no longer there to whom he used to carry his sore heart for the gentle balm of her sweet words, if the sore heart ached and smarted intensely; and often, when he saw how his violent conduct affected others, he could have cried out for their pity, instead of their anger and resentment: ‘Have mercy upon me, for I am very miserable.’bh How often have such dumb thoughts gone up from the hearts of those who have taken hold of their sorrow by the wrong end, as prayers against sin! And when the squire saw that his servants were learning to dread him, and his first-born to avoid him, he did not blame them. He knew he was becoming a domestic tyrant; it seemed as if all circumstances conspired against him, and as if he was too weak to struggle with them; else, why did everything indoors and out of doors go so wrong just now, when all he could have done, had things been prosperous, was to have submitted, in very imperfect patience, to the loss of his wife. But just when he needed ready-money to pacify Osborne’s creditors, the harvest had turned out remarkably plentiful, and the price of corn had sunk down to a level it had not touched for years. The squire had insured his life at the time of his marriage for a pretty large sum. It was to be a provision for his wife, if she had survived him, and for their younger children. Roger was
the only representative of these interests now; but the squire was unwilling to lose the insurance by ceasing to pay the annual sum. He would not, if he could, have sold any part of the estate which he inherited from his father; and, besides, it was strictly entailed. He had sometimes thought how wise a step it would have been could he have sold a portion of it, and with the purchase-money have drained and reclaimed the remainder; and at length, learning from some neighbour that Government would make certain advances for drainage, &c., at a very low rate of interest, on condition that the work was done, and the money repaid within a given time, his wife had urged him to take advantage of the proffered loan. But now that she was no longer there to encourage him, and take an interest in the progress of the work, he grew indifferent to it himself, and cared no more to go out on his stout roan cob, and sit square on his seat, watching the labourers on the marshy land all overgrown with rushes; speaking to them from time to time in their own strong nervous country dialect; but the interest to Government had to be paid all the same, whether the men worked well or ill. Then the roof of the Hall let in the melted snow-water this winter; and, on examination, it turned out that a new roof was absolutely required. The men who had come about the advances made to Osborne by the London money-lender, had spoken disparagingly of the timber on the estate—‘Very fine trees—sound, perhaps, too, fifty years ago, but gone to rot now; had wanted lopping and clearing. Was there no woodranger or forester? They were nothing like the value young Mr. Hamley had represented them to be of.’ The remarks had come round to the squire’s ears. He had loved the trees he had played under as a boy as if they were living creatures; that was on the romantic side of his nature. Merely looking at them as representing so many pounds sterling, he had esteemed them highly, and had had, until now, no opinion of another by which to correct his own judgment. So these words of the valuers cut him sharp, although he affected to disbelieve them, and tried to persuade himself that he did so. But, after all, these cares and disappointments did not touch the root of his deep resentment against Osborne. There is nothing like wounded affection for giving poignancy to anger. And the squire believed that Osborne and his advisers had been making calculations based upon his own death. He hated the idea so much—it made him so miserable—that he would not face it, and define it, and meet it with full inquiry and investigation. He chose rather to cherish the morbid fancy that he was useless in this world—born under an unlucky star—that all things went badly under his management. But he did not become humble in consequence. He put his misfortunes down to the score of Fate—not to his own; and he imagined that Osborne saw his failures, and that his first-born grudged him his natural term of life. All these fancies would have been set to rights could he have talked them over with his wife; or even had he been accustomed to mingle much in the society of those whom he esteemed his equals; but, as has been stated, he was inferior in education to those who should have been his mates; and perhaps the jealousy and mauvaise hontebi that this inferiority had called out long ago, extended itself in some measure to the feelings he entertained towards his sons—less to Roger than to Osborne, though the former was turning out by far the most distinguished man. But Roger was practical; interested in all out-of-door things, and he enjoyed the details, homely enough, which his father sometimes gave him of the everyday occurrences which the latter had noticed in the woods and the fields. Osborne, on the contrary, was what is commonly called ‘fine’; delicate almost to effeminacy in dress and in manner; careful in small observances. All this his father had been rather proud of in the days when he looked forward to a brilliant career at Cambridge for his son; he had at that time regarded Osborne’s fastidiousness and elegance as another stepping-stone to the high and prosperous marriage which was to restore the ancient fortunes of the Hamley family. But now that Osborne had barely obtained his degree; that all the boastings of his father had proved vain; that the fastidiousness had led to unexpected expenses (to attribute the most innocent cause to Osborne’s debts), the poor young man’s ways and manners became a subject of irritation to his father. Osborne was still occupied with his books and his writings when he was at home; and this mode of passing the greater part of the day gave him but few subjectsin common with his father when they did meet at meal-times, or in the evenings. Perhaps if Osborne had been able to have more out-of-door amusements it would have been better; but he was short-sighted, and cared little for the carefully observant pursuits of his brother; he knew but few young men of his own standing in the county; his hunting even, of which he was passionately fond, had been curtailed this season, as his father had disposed of one of the two hunters he had been hitherto allowed. The whole stable establishment had been reduced; perhaps because it was the economy which told most on the enjoyment of both the squire and Osborne, and which, therefore, the former took a savage pleasure in enforcing. The old carriage—a heavy family coach bought in the days of comparative prosperity—was no longer needed after madam’s death, and fell to pieces in the cobwebbed seclusion of the coach-house. The best of the two carriage-horses was taken for a gig which the squire now set up; saying many a time to all who might care to listen to him that it was the first time for generations that the Hamleys of Hamley had not been able to keep their own coach. The other carriage-horse was turned out to grass; being too old for regular work. Conqueror used to come whinnying up to the park palings whenever he saw the squire, who had always a piece of bread, or some sugar, or an apple for the old favourite and would make many a complaining speech to the dumb animal, telling him of the change of times since both were in their prime. It had never been the squire’s custom to encourage his boys to invite their friends to the Hall. Perhaps this, too, was owing to his mauvaise honte, and also to an exaggerated consciousness of the deficiencies of his establishment as compared with what he imagined these lads were accustomed to at home. He explained this once or twice to Osborne and Roger when they were at Rugby.
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