_ CHAPTER XLIV. MR. MAYNE ORDERS A BASIN OF GRUEL
On the following morning Mr. Mayne did open his lips to address a word to his son:
"I shall be obliged to you, Dick, if you will postpone your intended visit to town, for this day at least;" for Dick had an "ABC" beside him, and was picking out a fast train while he ate his breakfast.
"All right," replied Dick: "I can wait another four-and-twenty hours." But though he yielded the point graciously enough, he did not look at his father, or say anything more on the subject; and as soon as his appetite was satisfied, he took up the "Times," and lounged into his den. Shortly afterwards they heard him whistling to his dogs, and knew that he would not appear until luncheon.
Mrs. Mayne wished that her husband would follow his example; but he had put on his slippers, and showed no inclination to leave the fireside. He read his paper and dozed a good deal, and snapped up Bessie if she spoke to him: so, on the whole, Mrs. Mayne had rather a dull morning. When the luncheon-bell rang, he chose to put on invalid airs, and ordered a basin of gruel to be brought to him in the library. Mrs. Mayne who knew he was not ill, and that his indisposition was purely mental and imaginary, was yet wise enough to fall in with his whim.
"Your master would like his gruel nicely flavored, James," she said to the footman. "Please ask Mrs. Simpkins to prepare it in the way he likes." And then she placed his favorite little table beside him, and stirred the fire into a more cheerful blaze.
"Your father does not feel himself well enough to come in to luncheon, Dick," she said to her son, probably for the benefit of the servant, who was waiting to remove the covers; and Dick, for the same reason, testified a proper amount of sympathy.
"He takes too long walks for a man of his age," he said, applying himself vigorously to the dismemberment of a chicken. "Mother, I will trouble you for some of that game-pie." And then he told her another anecdote about Vigo.
After luncheon Dick again disappeared, and Mrs. Mayne, who dreaded an afternoon's
tete-a-tete with her husband in his present mood, went up to her own room, for some feminine business, or to take a nap. Mr. Mayne, a little mollified by the gruel, which had been flavored exactly to his liking with a
soupcon of rum, was just composing himself for another doze, when he was roused by the loud pealing of the hall bell, and the next moment the door was flung open by James, and Sir Henry Challoner was announced.
It was a dark wintry afternoon, and the library was somewhat sombre: the fire had died down, owing to Mr. Mayne's drowsiness. In the dim light Sir Harry's big burly figure looked almost gigantic. Mr. Mayne, with his little lean shoulders and sharp face, looked beside him much as a small gray-hound would beside a mastiff.
"How do you do?" began Sir Harry, in his loud voice. "I must apologize for my intrusion; but I think my name is well known to you, and needs no introduction. I have often heard of Mr. Mayne, I can assure you."
"You do me too much honor," returned that gentleman, stiffly; and he glanced at the card in his hand. There it was, "Sir Henry Challoner." "But what the----" And here his favorite expletive rose to his lips.
"We can scarcely see each other's faces," observed Sir Harry, cheerfully. "Will you allow me to take the liberty, though I have not known you for seven years--and hardly for seven minutes!" And then he seized the poker, and broke up an obstinate piece of coal.
"Actually, in my own house, and before my own eyes," as Mr. Mayne told his wife afterwards.
"There, now! I have made a glorious blaze. These are first-rate coals. Now we can have our talk comfortably together. You do not know me personally; but I dare say you have heard of my father,--Sir Francis Challoner? Poor old fellow! I am afraid too many people heard of him in his time."
"Yes, sir: but, as it is hardly becoming of me to say to his son, I have never heard much good of him. If I remember rightly, he did poor Challoner a bad turn once."
"Hush, my good friend!" And Sir Harry's ruddy face looked a little disturbed. "I thought no one but myself and Aunt Catherine knew that story. It is rather hard on a man to have this sort of things brought up. And the poor old governor is dead now: so, if you will permit me to observe, bygones had better be bygones on that subject."
"Oh, by all means, Sir Harry; but you introduced the matter yourself."
"Excuse me, Mr. Mayne," rather haughtily, "I introduced myself. I am the son of Sir Francis. Well, if you know so much, you will understand the sort of interest I take in my cousins and how I consider it my duty to make up to them for what they have lost."
"Very proper, I am sure."
"As to that, duty is a pleasure. They are such awfully jolly girls, and so uncommonly plucky, that I am as proud of them as though they were my own sisters. Nan is so confoundedly pretty, too. I don't wonder at your son's taste. He must be a lucky fellow who gets Nan."
"Sir!" vociferated Mr. Mayne; and Sir Harry immediately changed his tactics:
"That is a tidy place opposite you,--Gilsbank, I mean. I have been over there settling about the purchase. I am afraid Crauford is rather a screw: he wanted to drive too close a bargain. But I said, 'No; you shall have your money down, right and tight, but not a farthing over.' And I insisted on my right to change the name if I like. I have half a mind to call it 'Challoner Place.'"
Mr. Mayne was wide awake now; his astonishment knew no bounds.
"You are going to buy Gilsbank!"
"I have bought it," was the cool response; "and I am now in treaty for Glen Cottage. My aunt has a fancy for her old home; and, though it is not much of a place, it is big enough for her and the girls; and Ibbetson has done a good deal to improve it. You look surprised, Mr. Mayne; but I suppose a man must live somewhere!"
"Of course it is none of my business; but I thought Sir Francis was as poor as a church mouse. Mrs. Challoner was my informant; and she always led me to suppose so."
"She was perfectly right. The poor old man never could keep money in his pocket: it always seemed to slip through his fingers. But that is not my case. I have been a lucky fellow all my life. I roughed it a bit in the colonies at first; but it did me no harm. And then we made a splendid hit out in Sydney,--coined money, in fact. I would not like to tell you what I made in one year: it seems blowing one's trumpet, somehow. But I soon got sick of making it; and here I am, with a tidy fortune,--plenty for myself, and enough to set up my aunt and the girls comfortably without feeling the loss. And now, Mr. Mayne when they are back at Glen Cottage, I want to know what you will do about your son."
To do Mr Mayne justice, he was far too perplexed to answer off-hand; in fact, he was almost rendered dumb by excessive astonishment. To borrow his own forcible expression, used to his wife afterwards, "he hardly knew where he was, things were so topsy-turvy."
In the old days, before Dick had produced that wonderful moustache that was so long in growing, Mr. Mayne had been very partial to his neighbors at Glen Cottage. It is always pleasant to a man to patronize and befriend a pretty woman; and Mrs. Challoner was an exceedingly pretty woman. It was quite an occupation to a busy man like the master of Longmead to superintend their garden and give his advice on all subjects that belong to a man's province.
But for the last year, since Dick had so greatly developed in mental culture, his father had been growing very weary even of the name of Challoner; it had become a habit with him to decry them on every possible occasion. "What is in a name?" he would say, when some person would lament the dead-and-gone glories of Challoner Place. "There is not a soul belonging to them, except that disreputable Sir Francis; and he is as good as a beggar."
But since Glen Cottage had given way to the Friary, and the dressmaking scheme had been carried out, his opposition had become perfectly frantic: he could have sworn at Dick for his senselessness, his want of pride, his lamentable deficiency in ambition. "Never, as long as my name is Richard Mayne, will I give in to that boy," he had vowed inwardly.
And now there had suddenly started up, like a piece of gilded clap-trap, this amazing man of inches, calling himself their cousin, Sir Henry Challoner; a man who was absolutely tired of making money,--who called Gilsbank, a far finer house than Longmead, a tidy little place, and who could throw in Glen Cottage, that bijou residence, as a sort of dower-house for widowed Challoners; a man who would soon be talked about in Hadleigh, not because he was rich,--most of the Hadleigh families were rich,--but because he was restoring an ancient name to something of its old respectability.
Mr. Mayne was essentially a shrewd, far-sighted man. Like other self-made men, he attached great importance to good blood. In a moment he realized that Nan Challoner of the Friary was a very different person from Nan Challoner of Glen Cottage, the cousin of Sir Henry Challoner. Under the latter circumstances she would be received on equal terms at Fitzroy Lodge and at the other houses of the aristocracy. In marrying her, Dick would be at once on an intimate footing with those very people who only just tolerated his father.
"Well," observed Sir Harry, after a lengthy pause, "what do you say about the matter, eh? Though I have accumulated a pretty sum of money, I do not pretend to be a millionaire; and of course, as I may settle down some day and have a family of my own, I must not treat my cousins as though they were my sisters. I think of allowing my aunt a sufficient income during her lifetime to keep up Glen Cottage, and I do not mind paying the girls three thousand pounds down on their wedding-day just for pin-money; but more than that cannot be expected of me."
"Of course not," returned Mr. Mayne; and then he hesitated. Three thousand pounds was not much of a fortune. Why, the girl he wanted for Dick had fifteen thousand, at least; but then Dick would not look at her; and even three thousand was better than nothing. "I had hoped better things for my son," he went on, stiffly. "I always meant Dick to marry money."
"Oh, true, money is very good in its way; but then, you see, young fellows are not always to be coerced. I believe there is a very strong attachment between your son and my cousin Nan."
"It has cost me a great deal of vexation," replied Mr. Mayne very testily,--all the more that his resolution was wavering. "I do not wish to hurt your feelings, Sir Henry, but this confounded dressmaking of theirs----" But here Sir Harry stopped him by a most extraordinary facial contraction, which most certainly resembled a wink.
"Hush!" he exclaimed, in a very loud whisper. "It does not matter to me, of course; but if I were you, I would not mention this little fact to any one else. Girls are girls, and they will have their fling. A good steady husband, that is what they want, the best of them, to sober them when the right time comes. I mean to put a stop to this nonsense; but after all, a little bit of larking like that with a lot of high-spirited generous creatures, what does it matter in the long run? You just settle things with me off-hand, and I will come to terms with the young ladies. I am the head of the family, as they know." And Sir Harry threw out his big chest with a sudden movement of importance and pride. "I am the head of the family: they will be pleased to remember that," he repeated pompously.
It was just at this moment, when victory lay within his grasp, that Dick sauntered lazily into the room.
Dick was in an execrable humor: he was tired and worried, and his boots were muddy. And what was the use of being still contumacious, unless his obstinacy were to be a spectacle to men and gods,--unless he were to flaunt his ill humor in the face of his tyrant, and make his father's soul wretched within him? Such is youthful reasoning, that hates to veil its feelings unobserved.
Dick had not perceived Sir Harry's card, so he stared at the intruder a little coolly. Sir Harry returned his look with a glance of mingled surprise and amusement.
"Is this the young gentleman in question?" he asked, in a tone that roused Dick's ire. To tell the truth, he was a little disappointed by Nan's choice. It was not so much Dick's want of good looks, but in Sir Harry eyes he appeared somewhat insignificant; and then a scowl is not always becoming to a face. Dick's bright genial expression was wanting; he looked a little too like his father at this moment for Sir Harry's taste.
"Do you mean me?" observed Dick, in a magnificent tone. "Is it I who am the young gentleman in question?--Father, will you have the goodness to introduce me to this gentleman with whom you have been talking me over?" And Dick twirled his moustache angrily.
Mr. Mayne looked at his son's moody face, and his feelings underwent a sudden revulsion; but before he could speak Sir Harry stepped in nimbly before him:
"Well now, I like spirit--no one cares to be talked about behind one's back. Supposing we shake hands, you and I, as we are to be so nearly related. I am Nan's guardian, her next of kin,--Sir Harry Challoner, at your service; and Nan sends her love and you are a lucky fellow, that is what you are!" exclaimed Sir Harry, genially, as he struck Dick a sounding blow on his shoulder. But Dick did not wince; and, though the diamond ring cut into his hand as they exchanged that grasp, no expression of pain crossed his face, which became all at once quite radiant.
Sir Harry hailed the metamorphosis with delight. Here was the real Dick emerging like a young sun-god from the clouds.
"Come, that is first-rate; I like the look of you better now," he said, with an appreciative nod.
"Father, what does this mean?" faltered Dick.
"It means," growled Mr. Mayne, for he could not get quite amiable all at once, though his heart was lightening in his bosom, "it means that I am an old fool, Dick, and that you are a young one."
"No, father,--not really,--does it?" And Dick beamed still more.
"And it means that you are not to plague me any more about the City. But there! though you have behaved so badly to me, Dick, I forgive you. Sir Harry and I have been talking over things, and if you will work hard for your degree your mother shall ask the girl down here, and we will see about it, and that is all I can say at present. And so we may as well shake hands upon it too."
But Dick did more than that; he threw his arm over his father's shoulder with a movement that was almost caressing.
"Thank you, pater; you are a brick and no mistake!" was all the undemonstrative Briton's tongue could say. But Mr. Mayne, as he looked in his boy's face and felt that pressure on his shoulder, thought them sufficiently eloquent.
"There! get along with you, and have it out with your mother," he growled. But, in spite of his surly tone, Mr. Mayne felt an amount of relief that astonished himself: to see Dick's face happy again, to have no cloud between them, to know that no domestic discord would harass his soul and render gruel necessary to his well-being, was restoring him to his old self again. Sir Harry longed to throw back his head and indulge in a good laugh as he witnessed this little scene of reconciliation.
Mrs. Mayne, who was sitting somewhat sadly by her own fireside, thinking over that day's discomfort, was quite taken aback by hearing Dick coming upstairs in his old way--three steps at a time--and then bursting into the room after a hasty knock at the door.
"Mother," he cried, breathlessly, "Sir Harry Challoner is in the library--and pater wants you to come down and give them some tea--and Sir Henry is going to stop to dinner--and the woodcock is to be cooked--and you are to get the best room ready. But first of all--like the dear, darling mother you are--you are to sit down and write a letter to Nan."
But the letter was not written then; for how could Bessie keep her husband and his guest waiting for their tea after such an urgent message? And had she not first of all to listen to Dick's incoherent story, which she heard better from Sir Harry afterwards, who took great pains to explain it to the poor bewildered woman?
Mr. Mayne thought he had never seen Bessie look so handsome since the days he courted her, as she sat smiling at the head of the table in her velvet gown. And Sir Harry, too, was quite charmed with the soft, comely creature.
Later on, while the two elder gentlemen were chatting confidentially over their cigars and whisky-and-water, she did manage to write a few lines to Nan. But it was not much of a letter; for how was she to construct a decent sentence with that torment Dick hanging over the back of her chair and interrupting her every moment? But Nan was not ill pleased by the missive when she received it.
* * * * *
"My own dear girl," it said,--"my dearest girl,--for no daughter could ever be so dear to me as you will be, Nan, for my boy's sake, and because he loves you so." ("You are right there, mother!" struck in Dick, in a tone of ecstasy.) "Everything has come right, through Sir Henry's intercession and my Richard's goodness." ("Humph!" coughed Dick. "Well, it is not for the like of me to contradict you.")
"You are to come to us--at once--at once,"--underlined,--"for Dick will be going back to Oxford, so there is no time to lose; and you have not got any good of your engagement yet." ("Only just at that last moment," muttered her son at this.)
"My precious boy looks so happy that I could cry with joy to see him." ("Oh, shut up, mother! Nan knows all that.") "And his dear father looks as pleased as possible, and he sends his love." ("He did indeed, Dick," as an incredulous sound broke from his lips), "and he says bygones are bygones. And you are on no account to feel yourself awkward as regards him, for of course Dick's fiancee" ("Are you sure that is spelt right, Dick?") "will bring her own welcome. Is not that a sweet speech for my Richard to say? So you will come, my dear, will you not? And I remain, just what I always was, my Nan's loving friend,
"Bessie Mayne."
* * * * *
And then the letter was carefully consigned to Dick's pocket, and in due course of time was delivered into Nan's fair hands. _