"By the way, Captain Wallingford," cut in Jane, at one of Sarah's breathing intervals, that reminded me strongly of the colloquial Frenchman's "s'il crache il est perdu," "You know something of poor Mrs. Bradfort, I believe?"
I assented by a bow.
"It was just as we told you," cried Sarah, taking her revenge. "The poor woman is dead! and, no doubt, of that cancer. What a frightful disease! and how accurate has our information been, in all that affair!"
"I think her will the most extraordinary of all," added Mr. Brigham, who, as a man, kept an eye more to the main chance. "I suppose you have heard all about her will, Captain Wallingford?"
I reminded the gentleman that this was the first I had ever heard of the lady's death.
"She has left every dollar to young Mr. Hardinge, her cousin's son;" added Jane, "cutting off that handsome, genteel, young lady his sister, as well as her father, without a cent"—in 1803, they just began to speak of cents, instead of farthings—"and everybody says it was so cruel!"
"That is not the worst of it," put in Sarah. "They do say, Miss Merton, the English lady that made so much noise in New York—let me see, Mr. Brigham, what Earl's grand-daughter did we hear she was?—"
This was a most injudicious question, as it gave the husband an opportunity to take the word out of her mouth.
"Lord Cumberland's, I believe, or some such person—but, no matter whose. It is quite certain, General Merton, her father, consents to let her marry young Mr. Hardinge, now Mrs. Bradfort's will is known; and, as for the sister, he declares he will never give her a dollar."
"He will have sixteen thousand dollars a year," said Jane, with emphasis.
"Six, my dear, six"—returned the brother, who had reasonably accurate notions touching dollars and cents, or he never would have been travelling in Italy; "six thousand dollars a year, was just Mrs. Bradfort's income, as my old school-fellow Upham told me, and there isn't another man in York, who can tell fortunes as true as himself. He makes a business of it, and don't fail one time in twenty."
"And is it quite certain that Mr. Rupert Hardinge gets all the fortune of Mrs. Bradfort?" I asked, with a strong effort to seem composed.
"Not the least doubt of it, in the world. Everybody is talking about it; and there cannot well be a mistake, you know, as it was thought the sister would be an heiress, and people generally take care to be pretty certain about that class. But, of course, a young man with that fortune will be snapped up, as a swallow catches a fly. I've bet Sarah a pair of gloves we hear of his marriage in three months."
The Brighams talked an hour longer, and made me promise to visit them at their hotel, a place I could not succeed in finding. That evening, I left Florence for Leghorn, writing a note of apology, in order not to be rude. Of course, I did not believe half these people had told me; but a part, I made no doubt, was true. Mrs. Bradfort was dead, out of all question; and I thought it possible she might not so far have learned to distinguish between the merit of Lucy, and that of Rupert, to leave her entire fortune to the last. As for the declaration of the brother that he would give his sister nothing, that seemed to me to be rather strong for even Rupert. I knew the dear girl too well, and was certain she would not repine; and I was burning with the desire to be in the field, now she was again penniless.
What a change was this! Here were the Hardinges, those whom I had known as poor almost as dependants on my own family, suddenly enriched. I knew Mrs. Bradfort had a large six thousand a year, besides her own dwelling-house, which stood in Wall Street, a part of the commercial emporium that was just beginning to be the focus of banking, and all other monied operations, and which even then promised to become a fortune of itself. It is true, that old Daniel M'Cormick still held his levees on his venerable stoop, where all the heavy men in town used to congregate, and joke, and buy and sell, and abuse Boney; and that the Winthrops, the Wilkeses, the Jaunceys, the Verplancks, the Whites, the Ludlows, and other families of mark, then had their town residences in this well-known street; but coming events were beginning "to cast their shadows before," and it was easy to foresee that this single dwelling might at least double Rupert's income, under the rapid increase of the country and the town. Though Lucy was still poor, Rupert was now rich.
If family connection, that all-important and magical influence, could make so broad a distinction between us, while I was comparatively wealthy, and Lucy had nothing, what, to regard the worst side of the picture, might I not expect from it, when the golden scale preponderated on her side. That Andrew Drewett would still marry her, I began to fear again. Well, why not? I had never mentioned love to the sweet girl, fondly, ardently as I was attached to her; and what reason had I for supposing that one in her situation could reserve her affections for a truant sailor? I am afraid I was unjust enough to regret that this piece of good fortune should have befallen Rupert. He must do something for his sister, and every dollar seemed to raise a new barrier between us.
From that hour, I was all impatience to get home. Had not the freight been engaged, I think I should have sailed in ballast. By urging the merchants, however, we got to sea May 15th, with a full cargo, a portion of which I had purchased on my own account, with the money earned by the ship, within the last ten months. Nothing occurred worthy of notice, until the Dawn neared the Straits of Gibraltar. Here we were boarded by an English frigate, and first learned the declaration of a new war between France and England; a contest that, in the end, involved in it all the rest of christendom. Hostilities had already commenced, the First Consul having thrown aside the mask, just three days after we left port. The frigate treated us well, it being too soon for the abuses that followed, and we got through the pass without further molestation.
As soon as in the Atlantic, I took care to avoid everything we saw, and nothing got near us, until we had actually made the Highlands of Navesink. An English sloop-of-war, however, had stood into the angles of the coast, formed by Long Island and the Jersey shore, giving us a race for the Hook. I did not know whether I ought to be afraid of this cruiser, or not, but my mind was made up, not to be boarded if it could be helped. We succeeded in passing ahead, and entered the Hook, while he was still a mile outside of the bar. I got a pilot on the bar, as was then very usual, and stood up towards the town with studding-sails set, it being just a twelvemoth, almost to an hour, from the day when I passed up the bay in the Crisis. The pilot took the ship in near Coenties slip, Marble's favourite berth, and we had her secured, and her sails unbent before the sun set.
Chapter XXVII
*
"With look like patient Job's, eschewing evil;
With motions graceful as a bird's in air;
Thou art, in sober truth, the veriest devil
That ere clinched fingers in a captive's hair."
HALLECK.
There was about an hour of daylight, when I left the compting-house of the consignees, and pursued my way up Wall Street to Broadway. I was on my way to the City Hotel, then, as now, one of the best inns of the town. On Trinity Church walk, just as I quitted the Wall Street crossing, whom should I come plump upon in turning, but Rupert Hardinge? He was walking down the street in some little haste, and was evidently much surprised, perhaps I might say startled, at seeing me. Nevertheless, Rupert was not easily disconcerted, and his manner at once became warm, if not entirely free from embarrassment. He was in deep mourning; though otherwise dressed in the height of the fashion.
"Wallingford!" he exclaimed—it was the first time he did not call me "Miles,"—"Wallingford! my fine fellow, what cloud did you drop from?—We have had so many reports concerning you, that your appearance is as much a matter of surprise, as would be that of Bonaparte, himself. Of course, your ship is in?"
"Of course," I answered, taking his offered hand; "you know I am wedded to her, for better, for worse, until death or shipwreck doth us part."
"Ay, so I've always told the ladies—'there is no other matrimony in Wallingford,' I've said often, 'than that which wi
ll make him a ship's husband.' But you look confoundedly well—the sea agrees with you, famously."
"I make no complaint of my health—but tell me of that of our friends and families? Your father—"
"Is up at Clawbonny, just now—you know how it is with him. No change of circumstances will ever make him regard his little smoke-house looking church, as anything but a cathedral, and his parish as a diocese. Since the great change in our circumstances, all this is useless, and I often think—you know one wouldn't like to say as much to him—but I often think, he might just as well give up preaching, altogether."
"Well, this is good, so far—now for the rest of you, all. You meet my impatience too coldly."
"Yes, you were always an impatient fellow. Why, I suppose you need hardly be told that I have been admitted to the bar."
"That I can very well imagine—you must have found your sea-training of great service on the examination."
"Ah! my dear Wallingford—what a simpleton I was! But one is so apt to take up strange conceits in boyhood, that he is compelled to look back at them in wonder, in after life. But, which way are you walking?"—slipping an arm in mine—"if up, I'll take a short turn with you. There's scarce a soul in town, at this season; but you'll see prodigiously fine girls in Broadway, at this hour, notwithstanding —those that belong to the other sets, you know; those that belong to families that can't get into the country among the leaves. Yes, as I was saying, one scarce knows himself, after twenty. Now, I can hardly recall a taste, or an inclination, that I cherished in my teens, that has not flown to the winds. Nothing is permanent in boyhood—we grow in our persons, and our minds, sentiments, affections, views, hopes, wishes, and ambition; all take new directions."
"This is not very flattering, Rupert, to one whose acquaintance with you may be said to be altogether boyish."
"Oh! of course I don't mean that. Habit keeps all right in such matters; and I dare say I shall always be as much attached to you, as I was in childhood. Still, we are on diverging lines, now, and cannot for ever remain boys."
"You have told me nothing of the rest," I said, half choked, in my eagerness to hear of the girls, and yet unaccountably afraid to ask. I believe I dreaded to hear that Lucy was married. "How, and where is Grace?"
"Oh! Grace!—yes, I forgot her, to my shame, as you would naturally wish to inquire. Why, my dear Captain, to be as frank as one ought with so old an acquaintance, your sister is not in a good way, I'm much afraid; though I've not seen her in an age. She was down among us in the autumn, but left town for the holidays, for them she insisted on keeping at Clawbonny, where she said the family had always kept them, and away she went. Since then, she has not returned, but I fear she is far from well. You know what a fragile creature Grace ever has been—so American!—Ah! Wallingford! our females have no constitutions—charming as angels, delicate as fairies, and all that; but not to be compared to the English women in constitutions."
I felt a torrent of fire rushing through my blood, and it was with difficulty I refrained from hurling the heartless scoundrel who leaned on my arm, into the ditch. A moment of reflection, however, warned me of the precipice on which I stood. He was Mr. Hardinge's son, Lucy's brother; and I had no proofs that he had ever induced Grace to think he loved her. It was so easy for those who had been educated as we four had been, to be deceived on such a point, that I felt it unsafe to do anything precipitately. Friendship, habit, as Rupert expressed it, might so easily be mistaken for the fruits of passion, that one might well be deceived. Then it was all-important to Grace's self-respect, to her feelings, in some measure to her character, to be careful, that I suppressed my wrath, though it nearly choked me.
"I am sorry to hear this," I answered, after a long pause, the deep regret I felt at having such an account of my sister's health contributing to make my manner seem natural; "very, very sorry to hear it. Grace is one that requires the tenderest care and watching; and I have been making passage after passage in pursuit of money, when I am afraid I should have been at Clawbonny, discharging the duties of a brother. I can never forgive myself!"
"Money is a very good thing, Captain," answered Rupert, with a smile that appeared to mean more than the tongue expressed—"a surprisingly good thing is money! But you must not exaggerate Grace's illness, which I dare say is merely constitutional, and will lead to nothing. I hope your many voyages have produced their fruits?"
"And Lucy?" I resumed, disregarding his question concerning my own success as an owner. "Where and how is she?"
"Miss Hardinge is in town—in her own—that is, in our house—in Wall Street, though she goes to the place in the morning. No one who can, likes to remain among these hot bricks, that has a pleasant country-house to fly to, and open to receive him. But I forgot—I have supposed you to know what it is very likely you have never heard?"
"I learned the death of Mrs. Bradfort while in Italy, and, seeing you in black, at once supposed it was for her."
"Yes, that's just it. An excellent woman has been taken from us, and, had she been my own mother, I could not have received greater kindnesses from her. Her end, my dear Wallingford, was admitted by all the clergy to be one of the most edifying known in the place for years."
"And Mrs. Bradfort has left you her heir? It is now time to congratulate you on your good fortune. As I un-understand her estate came through females to her, and from a common ancestor of hers and yours, there is not the slightest reason why you should not be gratified by the bequest. But Lucy—I hope she was not altogether forgotten?"
Rupert fidgeted, and I could see that he was on tenter-hooks. As I afterwards discovered, he wished to conceal the real facts from the world; and yet he could not but foresee that I would probably learn them from his father. Under all the circumstances, therefore, he fancied it best to make me a confidant. We were strolling between Trinity and Paul's church walks, then the most fashionable promenade in town; and, before he would lay open his secret, my companion led me over by the Oswego Market, and down Maiden Lane, lest he might betray himself to the more fashionable stocks and stones. He did not open his lips until clear of the market, when he laid bare his budget of griefs in something that more resembled his old confidential manner, than he had seen fit to exhibit in the earlier part of our interview.
"You must know, Miles," he commenced, "that Mrs. Bradfort was a very peculiar woman—a very peculiar sort of a person, indeed. An, excellent lady, I am ready to allow, and one that made a remarkably edifying and; but one whose peculiarities, I have understood, she inherited with her fortune. Women do get the oddest conceits into their heads, you know, and American women before all others; a republic being anything but favourable to the continuation of property in the same line. Miss Merton, who is a girl of excellent sense, as you well know yourself, Miles, says, now, in England I should have succeeded, quite as a matter of course, to all Mrs. Bradfort's real estate."
"You, as a lawyer—a common law lawyer-can scarcely require the opinion of an Englishwoman to tell you what the English laws would do in a question of descent."
"Oh! they've a plaguey sight of statutes in that country, as well as ourselves. Between the two, the common law is getting to be a very uncommon sort of a law. But, to cut the matter short, Mrs. Bradfort made a will."
"Dividing her property equally between you and Lucy, I dare say, to Miss Merton's great dissatisfaction."
"Why, not just so, Miles—not exactly so; a very capricious, peculiar woman was Mrs. Bradfort—"
I have often remarked, when a person has succeeded in throwing dust into another's eyes, but is discarded on being found out, that the rejected of principle is very apt to accuse his former dupe of being capricious; when, in fact, he has only been deceived. As I said nothing, however, leaving Rupert to flounder on in the best manner he could, the latter, after a pause, proceeded—
"But her end was very admirable" he said, "and to the last degree edifying. You must know, she made a will, and in that will she left everything, eve
n to the town and country houses, to—my sister."
I was thunder-struck! Here were all my hopes blown again to the winds. After a long pause, I resumed the discourse.
"And whom did she leave as executor?" I asked, instantly foreseeing the consequences should that office be devolved on Rupert, himself.
"My father. The old gentleman has had his hands full, between your father and mother, and Mrs. Bradfort. Fortunately, the estate of the last is in a good condition, and is easily managed. Almost entirely in stores and houses in the best part of the town, well insured, a few thousands in stocks, and as much in bonds and mortgages, the savings from the income, and something like a year's rents in bank. A good seven thousand a year, with enough surplus to pay for repairs, collection and other charges."
"And all this, then, is Lucy's!" I exclaimed, feeling something like the bitterness of knowing that such an heiress was not for me.
"Temporarily; though, of course, I consider Lucy as only my trustee for half of it. You know how it is with the women; they fancy all us young men spendthrifts, and, so, between the two, they have reasoned in this way—'Rupert is a good fellow at bottom; but Rupert is young, and he will make the money fly—now, I'll give it all to you, Lucy, in my will, but, of course, you'll take care of your brother, and let him have half, or perhaps two-thirds, being a male, at the proper time, which will be, as soon as you come of age, and can convey. You understand Lucy is but nineteen, and cannot convey these two years."
"And Lucy admits this to be true?—You have proof of all this?"
"Proof! I'd take my own affidavit of it. You see it is reasonable, and what I had a right to expect. Everything tends to confirm it. Between ourselves, I had quite $2000 of debt; and yet, you see, the good lady did not leave me a dollar to pay even my honest creditors; a circumstance that so pious a woman, and one who made so edifying an end, would never think of doing, without ulterior views. Considering Lucy as my trustee, explains the whole thing."
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