Felix Holt

by George Eliot

  Harold might not have grieved much at a small riot in Treby, even if it had caused some expenses to fall on the county; but the turn which the riot had actually taken, was a bitter morsel for rumination, on more grounds than one. However the disturbances had arisen and been aggravated – and probably no one knew the whole truth on these points – the conspicuous, gravest incidents had all tended to throw the blame on the Radical party, that is to say, on Transome and on Transome’s agents; and so far the candidateship and its results had done Harold dishonour in the county: precisely the opposite effect to that which was a dear object of his ambition. More than this, Harold’s conscience was active enough to be very unpleasantly affected by what had befallen Felix Holt. His memory, always good, was particularly vivid in its retention of Felix Holt’s complaint to him about the treating of the Sproxton men, and of the subsequent irritating scene in Jermyn’s office, when the personage with the inauspicious name of Johnson had expounded to him the impossibility of revising an electioneering scheme once begun, and of turning your vehicle back when it had already begun to roll downhill. Remembering Felix Holt’s words of indignant warning about hiring men with drink in them to make a noise, Harold could not resist the urgent impression that the offences for which Felix was committed were fatalities, not brought about by any willing co-operation of his with the rioters, but arising probably from some ill-judged efforts to counteract their violence. And this impression, which insisted on growing into a conviction, became in one of its phases an uneasy sense that he held evidence which would at once tend to exonerate Felix, and to place himself and his agents in anything but a desirable light. It was likely that some one else could give equivalent evidence in favour of Felix – the little talkative Dissenting preacher, for example; but, anyhow, the affair with the Sproxton men would be ripped open and made the worst of by the opposite parties. The man who has failed in the use of some indirectness, is helped very little by the fact that his rivals are men to whom that indirectness is a something human, very far from being alien. There remains this grand distinction, that he has failed, and that the jet of light is thrown entirely on his misdoings.

  In this matter Harold felt himself a victim. Could he hinder the tricks of his agents? In this particular case he had tried to hinder them, and had tried in vain. He had not loved the two agents in question, to begin with; and now at this later stage of events he was more innocent than ever of bearing them anything but the most sincere ill-will. He was more utterly exasperated with them than he would probably have been if his one great passion had been for public virtue. Jermyn, with his John Johnson, had added this ugly dirty business of the Treby election to all the long-accumulating list of offences, which Harold was resolved to visit on him to the utmost. He had seen some handbills carrying the insinuation that there was a discreditable indebtedness to Jermyn on the part of the Transomes. If any such notions existed apart from electioneering slander, there was all the more reason for letting the world see Jermyn severely punished for abusing his power over the family affairs, and tampering with the family property. And the world certainly should see this with as little delay as possible. The cool confident assuming fellow should be bled to the last drop in compensation, and all connection with him be finally got rid of. Now that the election was done with, Harold meant to devote himself to private affairs, till everything lay in complete order under his own supervision.

  This morning he was seated as usual in his private room, which had now been handsomely fitted up for him. It was but the third morning after the first Christmas he had spent in his English home for fifteen years, and the home looked like an eminently desirable one. The white frost lay on the broad lawn, on the many-formed leaves of the evergreens, and on the giant trees at a distance. Logs of dry oak blazed on the hearth; the carpet was like warm moss under his feet; he had breakfasted just according to his taste, and he had the interesting occupations of a large proprietor to fill the morning. All through the house now, steps were noiseless on carpets or on fine matting; there was warmth in hall and corridors; there were servants enough to do everything, and to do it at the right time. Skilful Dominic was always at hand to meet his master’s demands, and his bland presence diffused itself like a smile over the household, infecting the gloomy English mind with the belief that life was easy, and making his real predominance seem as soft and light as a down quilt. Old Mr Transome had gathered new courage and strength since little Harry and Dominic had come, and since Harold had insisted on his taking drives. Mrs Transome herself was seen on a fresh background with a gown of rich new stuff. And if, in spite of this, she did not seem happy, Harold either did not observe it, or kindly ignored it as the necessary frailty of elderly women whose lives have had too much of dulness and privation. Our minds get tricks and attitudes as our bodies do, thought Harold, and age stiffens them into unalterableness. ‘Poor mother! I confess I should not like to be an elderly woman myself. One requires a good deal of the purring cat for that, or else of the loving grandame. I wish she would take more to little Harry. I suppose she has her suspicions about the lad’s mother, and is as rigid in those matters as in her Toryism. However, I do what I can; it would be difficult to say what there is wanting to her in the way of indulgence and luxury to make up for the old niggardly life.’

  And certainly Transome Court was now such a home as many women would covet. Yet even Harold’s own satisfaction in the midst of its elegant comfort needed at present to be sustained by the expectation of gratified resentment. He was obviously less bright and enjoying than usual, and his mother, who watched him closely without daring to ask questions, had gathered hints and drawn inferences enough to make her feel sure that there was some storm gathering between him and Jermyn. She did not dare to ask questions, and yet she had not resisted the temptation to say something bitter about Harold’s failure to get returned as a Radical, helping, with feminine self-defeat, to exclude herself more completely from any consultation by him. In this way poor women, whose power lies solely in their influence, make themselves like music out of tune, and only move men to run away.

  This morning Harold had ordered his letters to be brought to him at the breakfast-table, which was not his usual practice. His mother could see that there were London business letters about which he was eager, and she had found out that the letter brought by a clerk the day before was to make an appointment with Harold for Jermyn to come to Transome Court at eleven this morning. She observed Harold swallow his coffee and push away his plate with an early abstraction from the business of breakfast which was not at all after his usual manner. She herself ate nothing; her sips of tea seemed to excite her; her cheeks flushed, and her hands were cold. She was still young and ardent in her terrors; the passions of the past were living in her dread.

  When Harold left the table she went into the long drawing-room, where she might relieve her restlessness by walking up and down, and catch the sound of Jermyn’s entrance into Harold’s room, which was close by. Here she moved to and fro amongst the rose-coloured satin of chairs and curtains – the great story of this world reduced for her to the little tale of her own existence – dull obscurity everywhere, except where the keen light fell on the narrow track of her own lot, wide only for a woman’s anguish. At last she heard the expected ring and footstep, and the opening and closing door. Unable to walk about any longer, she sank into a large cushioned chair, helpless and prayerless. She was not thinking of God’s anger or mercy, but of her son’s. She was thinking of what might be brought, not by death, but by life.

  CHAPTER XXXV

  M. Check to your queen!

  N. Nay, your own king is bare,

  And moving so, you give yourself checkmate.

  When Jermyn entered the room, Harold, who was seated at his library table examining papers, with his back towards the light and his face towards the door, moved his head coldly. Jermyn said an ungracious ‘Good-morning’ – as little as possible like a salutation to one who might regard himself as a patron. O
n the attorney’s handsome face there was a black cloud of defiant determination, slightly startling to Harold, who had expected to feel that the overpowering weight of temper in the interview was on his own side. Nobody was ever prepared beforehand for this expression of Jermyn’s face, which seemed as strongly contrasted with the cold impenetrableness which he preserved under the ordinary annoyances of business as with the bland radiance of his lighter moments.

  Harold himself did not look amiable just then, but his anger was of the sort that seeks a vent without waiting to give a fatal blow; it was that of a nature more subtly mixed than Jermyn’s – less animally forcible, less unwavering in selfishness, and with more of high-bred pride. He looked at Jermyn with increased disgust and secret wonder.

  ‘Sit down,’ he said, curtly.

  Jermyn seated himself in silence, opened his greatcoat, and took some papers from a side-pocket.

  ‘I have written to Makepiece,’ said Harold, ‘to tell him to take the entire management of the election expenses. So you will transmit your accounts to him.’

  ‘Very well. I am come this morning on other business.’

  ‘If it’s about the riot and the prisoners, I have only to say that I shall enter into no plans. If I am called on, I shall say what I know about that young fellow Felix Holt. People may prove what they can about Johnson’s damnable tricks, or yours either.’

  ‘I am not come to speak about the riot. I agree with you in thinking that quite a subordinate subject.’ (When Jermyn had the black cloud over his face, he never hesitated or drawled, and made no Latin quotations.)

  ‘Be so good, then, as to open your business at once,’ said Harold, in a tone of imperious indifference.

  ‘That is precisely what I wish to do. I have here information from a London correspondent that you are about to file a bill against me in Chancery.’ Jermyn, as he spoke, laid his hand on the papers before him, and looked straight at Harold.

  ‘In that case the question for you is, how far your conduct as the family solicitor will bear investigation. But it is a question which you will consider quite apart from me.’

  ‘Doubtless. But prior to that there is a question which we must consider together.’

  The tone in which Jermyn said this gave an unpleasant shock to Harold’s sense of mastery. Was it possible that he should have the weapon wrenched out of his hand?

  ‘I shall know what to think of that,’ he replied, as haughtily as ever, ‘when you have stated what the question is.’

  ‘Simply, whether you will choose to retain the family estates, or lay yourself open to be forthwith legally deprived of them.’

  ‘I presume you refer to some underhand scheme of your own, on a par with the annuities you have drained us by in the name of Johnson,’ said Harold, feeling a new movement of anger. ‘If so, you had better state your scheme to my lawyers, Dymock and Halliwell.’

  ‘No. I think you will approve of my stating in your own ear first of all, that it depends on my will whether you remain an important landed proprietor in North Loamshire, or whether you retire from the county with the remainder of the fortune you have acquired in trade.’

  Jermyn paused, as if to leave time for this morsel to be tasted.

  ‘What do you mean?’ said Harold, sharply.

  ‘Not any scheme of mine; but a state of the facts, resulting from the settlement of the estate made in 1729: a state of the facts which renders your father’s title and your own title to the family estates utterly worthless as soon as the true claimant is made aware of his right.’

  ‘And you intend to inform him?’

  ‘That depends. I am the only person who has the requisite knowledge. It rests with you to decide whether I shall use that knowledge against you; or whether I shall use it in your favour – by putting an end to the evidence that would serve to oust you in spite of your “robust title of occupancy”.’1

  Jermyn paused again. He had been speaking slowly, but without the least hesitation, and with a bitter definiteness of enunciation. There was a moment or two before Harold answered, and then he said abruptly,

  ‘I don’t believe you.’

  ‘I thought you were more shrewd,’ said Jermyn, with a touch of scorn. ‘I thought you understood that I had had too much experience to waste my time in telling fables to persuade a man who has put himself into the attitude of my deadly enemy.’

  ‘Well, then, say at once what your proofs are,’ said Harold, shaken in spite of himself, and getting nervous.

  ‘I have no inclination to be lengthy. It is not more than a few weeks since I ascertained that there is in existence an heir of the Bycliffes, the old adversaries of your family. More curiously, it is only a few days ago – in fact, only since the day of the riot – that the Bycliffe claim has become valid, and that the right of remainder accrues to the heir in question.’2

  ‘And how, pray?’ said Harold, rising from his chair, and making a turn in the room, with his hands thrust in his pockets. Jermyn rose too, and stood near the hearth facing Harold, as he moved to and fro.

  ‘By the death of an old fellow who got drunk, and was trampled to death in the riot. He was the last of that Thomas Transome’s line, by the purchase of whose interest your family got its title to the estate. Your title died with him. It was supposed that the line had become extinct before – and on that supposition the old Bycliffes founded their claim. But I hunted up this man just about the time the last suit was closed. His death would have been of no consequence to you if there had not been a Bycliffe in existence; but I happen to know that there is, and that the fact can be legally proved.’

  For a minute or two Harold did not speak, but continued to pace the room, while Jermyn kept his position, holding his hands behind him. At last Harold said, from the other end of the room, speaking in a scornful tone,

  ‘That sounds alarming. But it is not to be proved simply by your statement.’

  ‘Clearly. I have here a document, with a copy, which will back my statement. It is the opinion given on the case more than twenty years ago, and it bears the signature of the Attorney-General and the first conveyancer of the day.’3

  Jermyn took up the papers he had laid on the table, opening them slowly and coolly as he went on speaking, and as Harold advanced towards him.

  ‘You may suppose that we spared no pains to ascertain the state of the title in the last suit against Maurice Christian Bycliffe, which threatened to be a hard run. This document is the result of a consultation; it gives an opinion which must be taken as a final authority. You may cast your eyes over that, if you please; I will wait your time. Or you may read the summing-up here,’ Jermyn ended, holding out one of the papers to Harold, and pointing to a final passage.

  Harold took the paper, with a slight gesture of impatience. He did not choose to obey Jermyn’s indication, and confine himself to the summing-up. He ran through the document. But in truth he was too much excited really to follow the details, and was rather acting than reading, till at length he threw himself into his chair and consented to bend his attention on the passage to which Jermyn had pointed. The attorney watched him as he read and twice re-read: –

  To sum up … we are of opinion that the title of the present possessors of the Transome estates can be strictly proved to rest solely upon a base fee created under the original settlement of 1729, and to be good so long only as issue exists of the tenant in tail by whom that base fee was created. We feel satisfied by the evidence that such issue exists in the person of Thomas Transome, otherwise Trounsem, of Littleshaw. But upon his decease without issue we are of opinion that the right in remainder of the Bycliffe family will arise, which right would not be barred by any statute of limitation.4

  When Harold’s eyes were on the signatures to this document for the third time, Jermyn said,

  ‘As it turned out, the case being closed by the death of the claimant, we had no occasion for producing Thomas Transome, who was the old fellow I tell you of. The inquiries about him set him a
gog, and after they were dropped he came into this neighbourhood, thinking there was something fine in store for him. Here, if you like to take it, is a memorandum about him. I repeat, that he died in the riot. The proof is ready. And I repeat, that, to my knowledge, and mine only, there is a Bycliffe in existence; and that I know how the proof can be made out.’

  Harold rose from his chair again, and again paced the room. He was not prepared with any defiance.

  ‘And where is he – this Bycliffe?’ he said at last, stopping in his walk, and facing round towards Jermyn.

  ‘I decline to say more till you promise to suspend proceedings against me.’

  Harold turned again, and looked out of the window, without speaking for a moment or two. It was impossible that there should not be a conflict within him, and at present it was a very confused one. At last he said,

  ‘This person is in ignorance of his claim?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Has been brought up in an inferior station?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Jermyn, keen enough to guess part of what was going on in Harold’s mind. ‘There is no harm in leaving him in ignorance. The question is a purely legal one. And, as I said before, the complete knowledge of the case, as one of evidence, lies exclusively with me. I can nullify the evidence, or I can make it tell with certainty against you. The choice lies with you.’

  ‘I must have time to think of this,’ said Harold, conscious of a terrible pressure.

  ‘I can give you no time unless you promise me to suspend proceedings.’