Complete Novels of Maria Edgeworth

by Maria Edgeworth

  “Give me leave to consider, sir” ——

  “Yes; I wish you would consider, uncle. If you think it not wrong in me to use the money you would have given for my expedition in the Zephyr for paying this young man’s debts, I shall think nothing of my own disappointment. I shall only have more time, and I will work the harder to prepare myself for Oxford; that is all.”

  “But why should you throw away so much money for a tight-rope dancer, a strolling player?” said his uncle.

  “I hope it will not be throwing away the money, uncle,” replied Walter. “It is surely worth trying the experiment, and giving the power to this unfortunate young man to redeem his character, and to support his poor mother; to save her life, we may say, and make her happy and comfortable for the rest of her days. Oh, my dear uncle, if you had seen her misery as I did! I would have given anything! But I had nothing of my own to give; I could only give up this little amusement; and amply repaid I shall feel if I can put Orlando in a way to save his mother.”

  “Let us ask your mother what she thinks of it,” said his uncle.

  “Do, uncle!” cried Walter eagerly. “I know that my mother will like to have me at home, instead of in the Mediterranean; and she will feel for that poor woman, and think of her happiness in having her son again; she will consider any sum well spent to help a repentant poor wretch just at the turn of life: to take him off the rack of remorse, oh, my mother will consent I am sure!”

  “Well, come and ask her,” said his uncle; “and do not keep your repentant sinner on the rack any longer.”

  While Walter pleaded Orlando’s cause to his indulgent mother, she thought more of her son’s kind-heartedness and generous feelings than of Orlando’s debts and misdemeanours. She thought that nothing could be more natural to a good mind at Walter’s age than the wish to save this young man, in whom there was so much talent and so much affectionate feeling. But hers was not that sort of foolish indulgence which yields blindly to the first impulse either of sympathy or of maternal approbation. She was very much pleased by her son’s proposal of giving up one of his own most ardent wishes to pay Orlando’s debts, and to restore him to his deserted dying parent; but she saw that it was essential to effecting this object, and to secure Walter from making a useless sacrifice, that there should be a time of probation fixed upon, and that the promise to pay should be only conditional. She was even more cautious and strict than Walter’s uncle might have been. He had named six months; she advised a full year of trial, as the youth was evidently of a changeable temper. Even to test his adherence to the solemn promise he had already made, she was of opinion that this was requisite.

  Amy and Bessy, after listening with eager interest both to Orlando’s history and to their brother’s proposal, were of divided judgments as to the term of probation. To Bessy, six months appeared an unconscionably long trial, almost interminable; she represented, and not without some show of sense, as her uncle allowed, that Orlando’s poor mother might die in the meantime, and there would be an end of the matter for him. Amy, on the other hand, maintained that even if the poor mother should not hold out, which she nevertheless hoped, and was almost sure, with their care, she would, yet it would not be Walter’s fault to have made this trial; but, on the contrary, if they did not make this condition, Orlando was so changeable, as mamma said, that he might turn out bad after all, and be the death of his mother at last, and Walter would have made his generous sacrifice for nothing.

  In consequence of these arguments, it was at last ruled, without even little Bessy’s dissentient voice, that a full twelvemonth from this day — this day of his pledge — should be Orlando’s term of probation. “My uncle,” who had means of information — having correspondence all over Ireland where this company intended to exhibit for many ensuing months — undertook to have watchful eyes kept upon him, and there was no reason to doubt that constant and correct accounts of his conduct would be obtained.

  “Then Orlando is to go by the coach this evening to his tyrant manager — is he, or is he not?” asked Amy, who was always exact as to the matter of fact and of business.

  “To be sure he must,” replied her uncle. “It is his duty. He is engaged so to do. He has been very wrong in the delay he has already made, and will suffer for it. The sooner he puts himself right the better.”

  Walter could not deny that “it was Orlando’s duty, and must be done, to be sure, at whatever expense.” A servant came into the room and told him that one wanted to speak with him. — It was Orlando. — He said he was to start in half an hour. He had set his watch by the coachman’s, and looked at it sorrowfully as he spoke. Walter spoke directly to the point of duty.

  “To be sure” — Orlando faintly and doubtingly said, as if his thoughts were absent.

  Walter hastened to tell him the plan for relieving him from all his embarrassments, and the conditions on which his uncle and his mother would give him their consent “And I hope, Orlando,” said he —— It was quite unnecessary for him to add another word, for that “hope” was turned into certainty by the instant change to joy and gratitude in Orlando’s countenance. He fell on his knees, lifting up his hands and eyes to Heaven. Not a word was heard, but Walter understood the fervent blessing implored. But when Orlando rose from his knees, that radiant expression of joy and gratitude was gone, and in its stead a pale, embarrassed look, and his eyes could not meet Walter’s.

  “What can be the matter?” said Walter. “Are you afraid of yourself? — afraid that you shall not be able to fulfil the conditions? Have more confidence in yourself. You can, if you will” ——

  “I can, and I will in future,” said Orlando. “But — now, since I saw you — something has occurred.”

  “Impossible! You cannot have broken your engagement?” cried Walter, absolutely starting back from him.

  “You cannot think so ill of me,” replied Orlando.

  “No, I did not believe,” said Walter. “I thought, as I said, it was impossible. But then what else can be now the matter?”

  Orlando did not immediately answer, but took from his waistcoat pocket two notes, on which his eyes fixed for some moments; then looking up at Walter, as if he wished to show them to him, but could not bring himself to do so, Walter held out his hand to receive them.

  “I cannot, yet I must — yes, I must — must be so mean, so detestably mean! — and after all you have done for me! Oh to what meanness one is brought by money distress — how low! I could never have believed it of myself, though I have seen it so in others, and despised them coming to borrow or beg from me; and now I am doing it myself — and must” ——

  He put the notes — the bills, for each note contained a bill — into Walter’s hand with desperate anger or contempt of himself as he did so. Then, while Walter was reading them, he forced himself to explain that they had been just now delivered to him, or, as it seemed, served upon him by an attorney, who was one of the passengers in the coach, and who had watched his opportunity. He had duplicates of the bills, which he was commissioned to show to the manager so soon as he should arrive at Castletown-Bellevue. One of the bills was from the apothecary, who had been called in at the last town the company were at during that terrible seizure, and physician’s fees were charged. The other was from the hotel-keeper for the supper, the treat he had given to his revelling, his roisterous companions, as he now called them; who had used him abominably, as first they had agreed to club. “Then,” continued Orlando, “Jack Clinton — the very personification of shabbiness Jack Clinton, pretending to be so generous, off-hand, and so forth — offered to pay half if I would pay the other half of the damages, or toss up for the whole. And when it came to the toss up, he cheated, as Soden saw, and left it all on me, who could tell nothing about it more than Nebuchadnezzar at the time. More shame for me! — thousand shames for me! — a gentleman born, and partly bred — to come to such a pass! And so now I am come to —— What shall I do? — What can I do? Can you lend me? — No, I will not sa
y lend. Heaven knows when I can ever repay —— And to ask you to give more after all you have done — oh!”

  That “oh!” was a real groan of remorse. “Hush!” said Walter; “I am considering what can be done. The two bills together come to seven guineas. I should not like to ask my uncle. . . . . I have but two guineas left of my pocket-money this quarter; that will go but a little way” ——

  “And would rob you of your last penny!”

  “Only promise me that you will not borrow from anybody else,” said Walter, “and I will try what I can do.”

  Orlando promised.

  “Then wait for my return,” said Walter. “I cannot be certain that I shall succeed, but I think I see a way; and ‘wherever there is a will there is a way,’ you know; and if a good will, a good way.” So saying, he ran off.

  Yet with all the good will that could be, the way Walter took was difficult and painful to him, though it was, nevertheless, a good way. He stood in his mother’s dressing-room before he well knew that he was there, and placed himself full in front of his two sisters, his hands behind his back, and firmly standing, yet most anxiously, timidly looking at them, from one to the other, without speaking. Amy was winding a skein of silk from her silk-winders; the rollers dropped as she looked at him, the ball remaining in her hand. Bessy was pouring out water for the dog, which he was fast lapping; but the water ceased to pour; and she, jug in hand, and Amy, ball in hand, stood, as it were, turned into little statues, gorgoned by Walter’s look. They had not even the power to say “What is the matter?” or “Do speak!” Walter spoke, and said —

  “My dear sisters, I am come to ask a great favour from you — a great sacrifice!”

  “A great favour! Oh what, Walter? I hope we can do it,” cried Bessy.

  “A great sacrifice! Nothing can be a great sacrifice if it is for you. What is it?” said Amy.

  “To give up for me the pleasure of going to the play,” said Walter.

  —— —— —— —— There was a blank look of amazement and dismay. But after a pause of a moment, Amy answered—”If that is all, that is easy enough for you, Walter, if you ask it.”

  “Yes; but why?” said Bessy. “So odd for you, Walter, who were so eager about it, and took so much pains to get that great pleasure for us, should now come to ask us to give it up for you?”

  “It is strange — odd as you say, Bessy, my dear; but I will explain to you as well as I can,” said Walter.

  But it was not easy to make her comprehend how their giving up going to the play would be of any use to Orlando; for she naturally said —

  “If he wants money, as you say he does, Walter, to pay some debt, then surely the money that we shall pay him for our places at the play — I mean for our tickets, or whatever you call them — would just do the business, and we should have the pleasure into the bargain of seeing the play. Nay, Walter, I am not foolish now, am I?”

  “Not at all — very sensible — and quite right so far as you know, my dear Bessy. Only one thing you do not know — that the money which we should pay for our places would not go to Orlando, not one farthing of it, but all to another actor of the name of Jack Clinton, whose benefit night it is.”

  “Benefit night?” said Bessy — and thick darkness came upon her. — She gave up understanding about benefit nights, and kindly, if not wisely, satisfied herself, as Amy advised, with knowing that “Walter must know best.”

  Walter did not further attempt explanation: he was in haste to report progress to his uncle and his mother; and as he left the room, Bessy took up her jug again, and continued to pour water out for the dog, patting him for his patience.

  “It is a great sacrifice, Amy, that is the truth,” said she. “I so longed to see Orlandino and the royal tiger!”

  “Not more — you could not long more, Bessy, than I did to see ‘Fairy Cap,’ and to hear the wonderful tune in the lion’s musical head. But it is for Walter! and you know Walter has to give up a great great deal himself. He has to give up Murat king of Naples! and the Cossacks! and that grand double theatre about which he was so particularly curious.”

  “Very true,” said Bessy. There was not another sigh.

  Walter, meanwhile, with his uncle’s consent, added the five sovereigns destined for the expedition to Castletown-Bellevue with his own two, and put the purse into Orlando’s hand without saying a word. Orlando felt it as he ought; and the less he said, the better was Walter satisfied — the more hopes he had that the feelings not wasted in words would strengthen good resolution. Thus they parted. Orlando had put his engagement in writing while the negotiation for the supplies had been going on: and when Walter gave this paper, regularly signed, to his mother, she looked at him with her hope-the-best smile, that delightful encouragement to good, and locked up the engagement in a drawer of her ivory cabinet “till this day next year.”

  “And now it is to be hoped, my dear Walter,” said his uncle, “that your young” ——

  “Don’t say scamp, uncle,” interrupted Walter.

  “Well, your young ‘Child of Promise,’” continued his uncle, “will in due time turn into the ‘Child of Performance.’”

  The playbill announcement circulated

  Orlandino at home with the Royal Tiger —

  Orlandino abroad with the King of the Cossacks —

  Orlandino at Paris —

  Orlandino at Moscow in Flames —

  Orlandino in Ireland —

  “Sweet gem of the Ocean!” &c.

  Nothing was to be heard of for fifteen days and nights successively but “Orlandino the Child of Promise eclipsed;” “the Child of Performance indeed,” was repeated by all who had been, and by all who were about to go, to the grand amphitheatre at Castletown-Bellevue, to see this wonderfully fine exhibition.

  Walter, Amy, and Bessy every day heard of it from all their mother’s and uncle’s acquaintances, and from all their own young friends; and great was the wonder, and incessant the questions, “Why they did not go? Or how upon earth they could possibly refrain from going to this delightful exhibition! and when such things so seldom come in our way in this country place?” — It was concluded by some that mamma did not like the expense, or could not well go, as she had no horses. A rich good-natured lady, who had an old roomy coach, offered “to take charge of all the family, bag and baggage,” to Castletown-Bellevue, for the last night this season of the performance, if they could coax uncle to give them tickets to see “Orlandino,” which, if they missed, they would, as she said, “regret all their lives.”

  It was a great trial; but Amy and Bessy, hand in hand, stood it admirably. To the questions, “Why? Or how upon earth?” they simply answered that they had a very good reason for not going to this play, or a reason that they thought was good enough, though they did not choose to tell what it was. And they thanked the good old lady; but assured her that mamma and their uncle would have given them leave to go, and tickets too, if they had chosen to go.

  “Very odd!” the old lady said; and she, and all the younger ones, with hands uplifted, marvelled much, and went away to marvel more at their next gossipping rendezvous. This was of little consequence to Amy or Bessy, and of none to Walter, who never cared what was said of him when he knew he was doing what was right.

  The old lady’s coachful passed by their gate that night, and young heads looked up at their windows, wondering or pitying as they passed; and when all who were going to the play had passed, then Amy and Bessy had at home an entertainment as good, and which they enjoyed in unreproved pleasure free, with self-approving pleasure happy. They went to a play too; and had, perhaps, as much enjoyment in hearing a play well read, as any could have in seeing one well acted. Their mother and their uncle read remarkably well; and every night, during the fifteen representations of Orlandino, read a play to them, by particular desire; and each night, by turns, each chose their play. Amy had, instead of “Fairy Cap,” the pretty little fairy entertainment of “Cinderella.”


  And “my uncle” made Walter laugh with the farce of “Chrononhotonthologos,” and the indignation of that great general at being offered cold pork for supper —

  — —”Shall Chrononhotonthologos Be fed on swine flesh, and at second-hand?”

  While Walter mimicked the solemn intonation of this remonstrance, Bessy as successfully practised the female attendant’s mode of announcing to royalty that tea is ready —

  “The water bubbles, and the tea-cups skip In eager haste to kiss your royal lip.”

  She was almost as happy as if she had been seeing “the glasses with a wish come nigh, and with a wish retire.”

  “But how very extraordinary it is — almost magical,” said Amy, “that we can really believe we see before our eyes what we don’t see! — and that we can believe the persons and everything before us to be quite different from what they really are! When Walter speaks in that odd, bombastical way, I never think of him as being really my brother Walter; he seems as if, for that minute, he was Chrononhotonthologos. And when mamma spoke as ‘Queen of the Rose,’ or as ‘The Blind Woman of Spa’ she really made me feel as if the very people were then speaking to me.”

  “That is exactly what I mean, Amy,” cried Bessy, “when I say that hearing mamma read a play is as good as going to a play.”

  Walter, looking very thoughtful, allowed that, as Amy said, It is strange that one can so believe or conceive that things and people are so different from what they really are — things and people who are actually before our eyes. “But a greater wonder, the greatest wonder of all,” said he, taking up the book from which his mother had been reading—”the greatest wonder of all is, that these little black marks,” pointing to the printed letters and words, “can tell mamma what to say, and how to make us believe, and think, and feel! Is not this most wonderful? This is real magic!”

  “Most wonderful!” said Amy. Bessy stood with lips apart — not to say mouth open. — Then, half yawning, said —