"Oh! quite, madam!" said Tom. "What passes for history these days is extraordinary. Kings who are remembered more for their long dull speeches than for any thing they did upon the battlefield, governments full of fat old men with grey hair, all looking the same – who cares about such stuff? But if you are speaking of real history, true history – by which of course I mean the spirited description of heroic personages of ancient times – Why! there is nothing which delights me more!"
"Lady Anne Lutterell," said Mr Winstanley, taking no notice of either of them, "was a rich widow who lived at Ossington." (Mrs Winstanley looked down at her folded hands in her lap.) "There is a picture of her ladyship between that little writing table and the longcase clock. It was widely known that she intended to leave a large sum of money as an act of piety to build a bridge in this exact spot. The bridge was promised and in anticipation of this promise the town of Thoresby was built. But at the last moment she changed her mind and built a chantry instead. I dare say, Mr Montefiore, you will not know what that is. A chantry is a sort of chapel where priests say mass for the dead. Such – though I am ashamed to admit it – were the superstitious practices of our ancestors."
"Queen Elizabeth," said Pewley Witts, winking at David and Tom. It was becoming clear how he revenged himself for all the slights and insults which he received from Mr Winstanley. It seemed unlikely that Mr Winstanley would have made quite so many foolish speeches without Witts to encourage him.
"Queen Elizabeth indeed, Witts," said Mr Winstanley pleasantly.
"Queen Elizabeth!" cried Mrs Winstanley in alarm. "Oh! But she was a most disagreeable person! If we must talk of queens, there are several more respectable examples. What do you say to Matilda? Or Anne?"
Tom leant as closely as he conveniently could to Mrs Winstanley. His face shewed that he had a great many opinions upon Queen Matilda and Queen Anne which he wished to communicate to her immediately, but before he could begin, Mr Winstanley said, "You will find Elizabeth, Mr Brightwind, between the window and the looking-glass. In Elizabeth 's time the people of Thoresby earned their living by making playing-cards. But the Queen granted a Royal Patent for a monopoly for the manufacture of playing-cards to a young man. He had written a poem praising her beauty. She was, I believe, about sixty-five years old at the time. As a consequence no one in England was allowed to make playing-cards except for this young man. He became rich and the people of Thoresby became destitute."
Mr Winstanley continued his little history of people who might have built a bridge at Thoresby and had not done so, or who had injured the town in some other way. His wife tried to hide his foolishness as much as was in her power by protesting vigorously at the introduction of each fresh character, but he paid her not the slightest attention.
His special contempt was reserved for Oliver Cromwell whose picture hung in pride of place over the mantelpiece. Oliver Cromwell had contemplated fighting an important battle at Thoresby but had eventually decided against it, thereby denying Thoresby the distinction of being blown up and laid to waste by two opposing armies.
"But surely," said David at last, "your best course is to build the bridge yourself."
"Ah!" smiled Mr Winstanley. "You would think so, wouldn't you? And I have spoken to two gentlemen who are in the habit of lending money to other gentlemen for their enterprises. A Mr Blackwell of London and a Mr Crumfield of Bath. Mr Witts and I described to both men the benefits that would accrue to them were they to build my bridge, the quite extraordinary amounts of money they would make. But both ended by declining to lend me the money." Mr Winstanley glanced up at an empty space on the wall as if he would have liked to see it graced by portraits of Mr Blackwell and Mr Crumfield and so complete his museum of failure.
"But it was a very great sum," said Mrs Winstanley. "You do not tell Mr Brightwind and Mr Montefiore what a very great sum it was. I do not believe I ever heard such a large figure named in my life before."
"Bridges are expensive," agreed David.
Then Mrs Winstanley, who seemed to think that the subject of bridges had been exhausted among them, asked David several questions about himself. Where had he studied medicine? How many patients had he? Did he attend ladies as well as gentlemen? From speaking of professional matters David was soon led to talk of his domestic happiness – of his wife and four little children.
"And are you married, sir?" Mrs Winstanley asked Tom. "Oh no, madam!" said Tom.
"Yes," David reminded him. "You are, you know."
Tom made a motion with his hand to suggest that it was a situation susceptible to different interpretations.
The truth was that he had a Christian wife. At fifteen she had had a wicked little face, almond-shaped eyes and a most capricious nature. Tom had constantly compared her to a kitten. In her twenties she had been a swan; in her thirties a vixen; and then in rapid succession a bitch, a viper, a cockatrice and, finally, a pig. What animals he might have compared her to now no one knew. She was well past ninety now and for forty years or more she had been confined to a set of apartments in a distant part of the Castel des Tours saunz Nowmbre under strict instructions not to shew herself, while her husband waited impatiently for someone to come and tell him she was dead.
By now Tom and David had given the half hour to the Winstanleys which politeness demanded and David began to think of Mr Monkton in Lincoln and of his anxiousness to reach him. But Mr Winstanley could not quite bring himself to accept that his two new friends were about to leave him and he made several speeches urging them to stay for a week or two. It was left to Mrs Winstanley to bid them farewell in a more rational manner.
They were not, however, able to leave immediately. There was some delay about fetching the horses and while they were waiting in the yard Lucy came out and looked nervously from one to the other. "If you please, sir, Mrs Winstanley wishes to speak to you privately!"
"Ah ha!" said Tom, as if he half-expected such a summons.
"No, sir! Not you, sir!" Lucy curtsied her apologies. "It is the Jewish doctor that is wanted."
Mrs Winstanley was waiting in her bed-chamber. The room was large, but somewhat sparsely furnished. It contained nothing but a chair, a chest and a large four-poster bed with green brocade hangings. Mrs Winstanley stood by the bed. Everything about her – rigid bearing, strained look, the way in which she continually twisted her hands together – betrayed the greatest uneasiness.
She apologised for troubling him.
"It is no trouble," said David, "not the least in the world. There is something you wish to ask me?"
She looked down. "Mr Winstanley and I have been married for four years, but as yet we have no children."
"Oh!" He thought for a moment. "And there is no dislike upon either side to the conjugal act?"
"No." Mrs Winstanley sighed. "No. That is one duty at least that my husband does not shirk."
So David asked all the usual questions that a physician generally asks in such a situation and she answered without any false shame.
"There is nothing wrong as far as I can see," David told her. "There is no reason why you should not bear a child. Be in good health, Mrs Winstanley. That is my advice to you. Be cheerful and then…"
"Oh! But I had hoped that…" she hesitated. "I had hoped that, as a foreign gentleman, you might know something our English doctors do not. I am not the least afraid of any thing you might suggest. I can bear any pain for the sake of a child. It is all I ever think of. Lucy thinks that I ought to eat carrots and parsnips that have odd shapes, and that I ought to persuade Mr Winstanley to eat them too."
"Why?"
"Because they look like little people."
"Oh! Yes, of course. I see. Well, I suppose it can do no harm."
David took as affectionate a leave of Mrs Winstanley as was consistent with so brief an acquaintance. He pressed her hand warmly and told her how sincerely he hoped she might soon have everything she wished for. He was sure that no one could deserve it more.
Tom
was seated upon his horse. David's horse stood at his side. "Well?" said Tom. "What did she want?"
"It is a lack of children," said David.
"What is?"
"That afflicts the lady. The reason she never smiles."
"Children are a great nuisance," said Tom, reverting immediately to his own concerns.
"To you, perhaps. But a human woman feels differently. Children are our posterity. Besides, all women, fairy, Christian or Jew, crave a proper object to love. And I do not think she can love her husband."
David was in the act of mounting his horse as he said this, an operation which invariably cost him a little trouble. He was somewhat surprized, on arriving upon the horse's back, to discover that Tom was nowhere to be seen.
"Now wherever has he gone?" he wondered. "Well, if he expects me to wait for him, he will be disappointed! I have told him half a dozen times today that I must go to Lincoln!"
David set off in the direction of Lincoln, but just as he reached the end of the town he heard a sound behind him and he looked round, expecting to see Tom.
It was Pewley Witts mounted on a horse which seemed to have been chosen for its great resemblance to himself in point of gauntness, paleness and ugliness. "Mr Montefiore!" he said. "Mr Winstanley is most anxious that you and Mr Brightwind should see his property and he has appointed me your guide. I have just spoken to Mr Brightwind, but he has something important to do in Thoresby and cannot spare the time. He says that you will go for both!"
"Oh, does he indeed?" said David.
Pewley Witts smiled confidentially. "Mr Winstanley thinks that you will build his bridge for him!"
"Why in the world should he think that?"
"Come, come! What sort of fools do you take us for in Thoresby? An English lord and a Jew travelling about the country together! Two of the richest devils in all creation! What can you be doing, but seeking opportunities to lengthen your long purses?"
"Well, I fear you will be disappointed. He is not an English lord and I am the wrong sort of Jew. And I am not travelling about the country, as you put it. I am going to Lincoln."
"As you wish. But it so happens that Mr Winstanley's property lies on either side of the Lincoln road. You cannot help but see it, if you go that way." He grinned and said helpfully, "I will come with you and point out the places of interest."
In Mr Winstanley's fields the weeds stood as thick as the corn. A number of thin, sad-looking men, women and children were scaring the birds away.
"Poor wretches!" thought David. "They do indeed suffer for other people's moral failings. How I wish that I could persuade Tom to build the bridge for their sakes! But what hope is there of that? I cannot even persuade him into loving his own children."
While David indulged these gloomy reflections, Pewley Witts named the yields of Mr Winstanley's lands (so many bushels per acre) and described how those yields would be doubled and tripled should Mr Winstanley ever trouble to drain his waterlogged fields or enrich his soil with manure.
A little further on Pewley Witts pointed out some grassy hillocks beneath which, he said, was a thick layer of clay. He described how Mr Winstanley could, if he wished, establish a manufactory to make pots and vases out of the clay.
"I believe," said Pewley Witts, "that earthenware pots and vases are quite the thing nowadays and that some gentlemen make a great deal of money from their manufacture."
"Yes," said David with a sigh, "I have heard that."
In another place they looked at a thin wood of birch trees on a windblown, sunny hillside. Pewley Witts said that there was a rich seam of coal beneath the wood, and Mr Winstanley could, if he felt at all inclined to it, mine the coal and sell it in Nottingham or London.
"Answer me this then!" cried David in exasperation. "Why does he not do these things? Sell the coal! Make the pots! Grow more corn! Why does he do nothing?"
"Oh!" said Pewley Witts with his malicious smile. "I have advised him against it. I have advised him that until the bridge is built he ought not to attempt any thing. For how would he carry the corn or pots or coal to the people who wanted them? He would lose half his profit to carriers and barge-owners."
The more David saw of Mr Winstanley's neglected lands, the more he began to doubt the propriety of going to Lincoln.
"After all," he thought, "Mr Monkton already has two doctors to attend him – not counting the Irish wizard. Whereas the poor souls of Thoresby have no one at all to be their friend. Do I not perhaps have a superior duty to stay and help them if I can by convincing Tom to build the bridge? But what in the world could I say to make him do it?"
To this last question he had no answer just at present, but in the meantime: "Mr Witts!" he cried. 'We must go back. I too have something important to do in Thoresby!"
As soon as they arrived at Mickelgrave House David jumped off his horse and set about looking for Tom. He was walking down one of the empty stone passageways, when he happened to notice, through an open door, Mrs Winstanley and Lucy in the garden. They appeared to be in a state of some excitement and were exclaiming to each other in tones of amazement. David, wondering what in the world the matter could be, went out into the garden, and arrived there just as Lucy was climbing up upon a stone bench in order to look over the wall.
"It has reached Mr Witts' house!" she said.
"What is it? What is wrong?" cried David.
"We have just had a visit from three little boys!" said Mrs Winstanley, in a wondering tone.
"They were singing," said Lucy.
"Oh! Boys like to sing," said David. "My own two little sons – Ishmael and Jonah – know a comic song about a milkmaid and a cow which…"
"Yes, I dare say," interrupted Mrs Winstanley. "But this was quite different! These boys had wings growing out of their backs. They were sailing through the air in a tiny gilded ship rigged with silken ribbons and they were casting out rose petals on either hand."
David climbed up beside Lucy and looked over the wall. Far off in a bright blue sky, a small golden ship was just sailing out of sight behind the church tower. David made out three little figures with lutes in their hands; their heads were thrown back in song.
"What were they singing?" he asked.
"I do not know," said Mrs Winstanley, in perplexity. "It was in a language I did not know. Italian I think."
In the drawing-room the curtains had been pulled across the windows to shut out the golden light of early evening. Mr Winstanley was lying upon the sopha, with his hand thrown across his eyes.
"Mr Winstanley!" cried his wife. "The most extraordinary thing…"
Mr Winstanley opened his eyes and smiled to see David before him. "Ah! Mr Montefiore!" he said.
"Lucy and I were in the garden when…"
"My love," said Mr Winstanley in tones of mild reproach, "I am trying to speak to Mr Montefiore." He smiled at David. "And how did you enjoy your ride? I confess that I think our surroundings not unattractive. Witts said he believed you were mightily entertained."
"It was most… enlightening. Where is Mr Brightwind?"
The door was suddenly flung open and Tom walked in.
"Mr Winstanley," he said, "I have decided to build your bridge!"
Tom was always fond of amazing a roomful of people and of having everyone stare at him in speechless wonder, and upon this particular occasion he must have been peculiarly gratified.
Then Mr Winstanley began to speak his joy and his gratitude. "I have looked into the matter," he said, "or rather Mr Witts has done it on my account – and I believe that you can expect a return on your investment of so many per cent – that is to say, Mr Witts can tell you all about it…" He began to leaf rapidly through some papers which David was quite certain he had never looked at before.
"You may spare yourself the trouble," said Tom. "I have no thought of any reward. Mr Montefiore has been lecturing me today upon the necessity of providing useful employment for one's children and it occurs to me, Mr Winstanley, that unless this bridge
is built your descendants will have nothing to do. They will be idle. They will never achieve that greatness of spirit, that decisiveness of action which ought to have been theirs."
"Oh, Indeed! Quite so!" said Mr Winstanley. "Then all that remains is to draw up plans for the bridge. I have made sketches of my ideas. I have them somewhere in this room. Witts estimates that two years should be enough to complete the work – perhaps less!"
"Oh!" said Tom. "I have no patience for a long undertaking. I shall build the bridge tonight between midnight and sunrise. I have just one condition." He held up a long finger. "One. Mr Winstanley, you and all your servants, and Mr Montefiore too, must go and stand upon the riverbank tonight and witness the building of my bridge."
Mr Winstanley eagerly assured him that not only he and Mrs Winstanley and all their servants would be there, but the entire population of the town.
As soon as Mr Winstanley had stopped talking, David took the opportunity to tell Tom of how glad he was that Tom was going to build the bridge, but Tom (who was generally very fond of being thanked for things) did not seem greatly interested. He left the room almost immediately, pausing only to speak to Mrs Winstanley. David heard him say in a low voice, "I hope, madam, that you liked the Italian music!"
As David was now obliged to stay in Thoresby until the following morning, Mr Winstanley sent one of his servants to Lincoln to tell Mr Monkton that Mr Montefiore was on his way and would be at his house the next day.
Just before midnight the people of Thoresby gathered at The Wheel of Fortune. In honour of the occasion Mr Winstanley had got dressed. Oddly enough he was somehow less impressive in his clothes. The air of tragedy and romance which he commonly possessed, seemed to have disappeared entirely when he put his coat and breeches on. He stood upon a three-legged stool and told the wretched, ragged crowd how grateful they should be to the great, good and generous gentleman who was going to build them a bridge. This gentleman, said Mr Winstanley, would soon appear among them to receive their thanks.
But Tom did not appear. Nor was Mrs Winstanley present, which made her husband very angry and so he sent Lucy back to Mickelgrave House to fetch her.
The Ladies of Grace Adieu Page 16
