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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/4450.txt b/4450.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..cab408a --- /dev/null +++ b/4450.txt @@ -0,0 +1,3647 @@ +The Project Gutenberg Etext Adventures of Harry Richmond, by Meredith, v7 +#56 in our series by George Meredith + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the +copyright laws for your country before distributing this or any other +Project Gutenberg file. + +We encourage you to keep this file, exactly as it is, on your +own disk, thereby keeping an electronic path open for future +readers. Please do not remove this. + +This header should be the first thing seen when anyone starts to +view the etext. 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Hart +and may be reprinted only when these Etexts are free of all fees.] +[Project Gutenberg is a TradeMark and may not be used in any sales +of Project Gutenberg Etexts or other materials be they hardware or +software or any other related product without express permission.] + +*END THE SMALL PRINT! FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS*Ver.10/04/01*END* + + + + + +This etext was produced by David Widger <widger@cecomet.net> + + + + + +THE ADVENTURES OF HARRY RICHMOND + +By George Meredith + + + +BOOK 7. + +XLV. WITHIN AN INCH OF MY LIFE . +XLVI. AMONG GIPSY WOMEN +XLVII. MY FATHER ACTS THE CHARMER AGAIN +XLVIII. THE PRINCESS ENTRAPPED +XLIX. WHICH FORESHADOWS A GENERAL GATHERING +L. WE ARE ALL IN MY FATHER'S NET +LI. AN ENCOUNTER SHOWING MY FATHER'S GENIUS IN A STRONG LIGHT + + + +CHAPTER XLV + +WITHIN AN INCH OF MY LIFE + +A single tent stood in a gully running from one of the gravel-pits of the +heath, near an iron-red rillet, and a girl of Kiomi's tribe leaned over +the lazy water at half length, striking it with her handkerchief. At a +distance of about twice a stone's-throw from the new carriage-road +between Durstan and Bulsted, I fancied from old recollections she might +be Kiomi herself. This was not the time for her people to be camping on +Durstan. Besides, I feared it improbable that one would find her in any +of the tracks of her people. The noise of the wheels brought the girl's +face round to me. She was one of those who were babies in the tents when +I was a boy. We were too far apart for me to read her features. I lay +back in the carriage, thinking that it would have been better for my poor +little wild friend if I had never crossed the shadow of her tents. A +life caught out of its natural circle is as much in danger of being lost +as a limb given to a wheel in spinning machinery; so it occurred to me, +until I reflected that Prince Ernest might make the same remark, and +deplore the damage done to the superior machinery likewise. + +My movements appeared to interest the girl. She was up on a mound of the +fast-purpling heath, shading her eyes to watch me, when I called at +Bulsted lodge-gates to ask for a bed under Julia's roof that night. Her +bare legs twinkled in a nimble pace on the way to Durstan Hall, as if she +was determined to keep me in sight. I waved my hand to her. She +stopped. A gipsy's girl's figure is often as good an index to her mind +as her face, and I perceived that she had not taken my greeting +favourably; nor would she advance a step to my repeated beckonings; I +tried hat, handkerchief, purse, in vain. My driver observed that she was +taken with a fit of the obstinacy of 'her lot.' He shouted, 'Silver,' and +then 'Fortune.' She stood looking. The fellow discoursed on the nature +of gipsies. Foxes were kept for hunting, he said; there was reason in +that. Why we kept gipsies none could tell. He once backed a gipsy +prizefighter, who failed to keep his appointment. 'Heart sunk too low +below his belt, sir. You can't reckon on them for performances. And +that same man afterwards fought the gamest fight in the chronicles o' the +Ring! I knew he had it in him. But they're like nothing better than the +weather; you can't put money on 'em and feel safe.' Consequently he saw +no good in them. + +'She sticks to her post,' he said, as we turned into the Durstan grounds. +The girl was like a flag-staff on the upper line of heathland. + +Heriot was strolling, cigar in mouth, down one of the diminutive alleys +of young fir in this upstart estate. He affected to be prepossessed by +the case between me and Edbury, and would say nothing of his own affairs, +save that he meant to try for service in one of the Continental armies; +he whose susceptible love for his country was almost a malady. But he +had given himself to women it was Cissy this, Trichy that, and the wiles +of a Florence, the spites of an Agatha, duperies, innocent-seemings, +witcheries, reptile-tricks of the fairest of women, all through his +conversation. He had so saturated himself with the resources, evasions, +and desperate cruising of these light creatures of wind, tide, and +tempest, that, like one who has been gazing on the whirligoround, he saw +the whole of women running or only waiting for a suitable partner to run +the giddy ring to perdition and an atoning pathos. + +I cut short one of Heriot's narratives by telling him that this picking +bones of the dish was not to my taste. He twitted me with turning +parson. I spoke of Kiomi. Heriot flushed, muttering, 'The little +devil!' with his usual contemplative relish of devilry. We parted, +feeling that severe tension of the old links keeping us together which +indicates the lack of new ones: a point where simple affection must bear +the strain of friendship if it can. Heriot had promised to walk half-way +with me to Bulsted, in spite of Lady Maria's childish fears of some +attack on him. He was now satisfied with a good-bye at the hall-doors, +and he talked ostentatiously of a method that he had to bring Edbury up +to the mark. I knew that same loud decreeing talk to be a method on his +own behalf of concealing his sensitive resentment at the tone I had +adopted: Lady Maria's carriage had gone to fetch her husband from a +political dinner. My portmanteau advised me to wait for its return. +Durstan and Riversley were at feud, however, owing to some powerful rude +English used toward the proprietor of the former place by the squire; so +I thought it better to let one of the grooms shoulder my luggage, and +follow him. + +The night was dark; he chose the roadway, and I crossed the heath, +meeting an exhilarating high wind that made my blood race: Egoism is not +peculiar to any period of life; it is only especially curious in a young +man beginning to match himself against his elders, for in him it suffuses +the imagination; he is not merely selfishly sentient, or selfishly +scheming: his very conceptions are selfish. I remember walking at my +swiftest pace, blaming everybody I knew for insufficiency, for want of +subordination to my interests, for poverty of nature, grossness, +blindness to the fine lights shining in me; I blamed the Fates for +harassing me, circumstances for not surrounding me with friends worthy of +me. The central 'I' resembled the sun of this universe, with the +difference that it shrieked for nourishment, instead of dispensing it. + +My monstrous conceit of elevation will not suffer condensation into +sentences. What I can testify to is, that for making you bless the legs +you stand on, a knockdown blow is a specific. I had it before I knew +that a hand was up. I should have fancied that I had run athwart a tree, +but for the recollection, as I was reeling to the ground, of a hulk of a +fellow suddenly fronting me, and he did not hesitate with his fist. I +went over and over into a heathery hollow. The wind sang shrill through +the furzes; nothing was visible but black clumps, black cloud. +Astonished though I was, and shaken, it flashed through me that this was +not the attack of a highwayman. He calls upon you to stand and deliver: +it is a foe that hits without warning. The blow took me on the forehead, +and might have been worse. Not seeing the enemy, curiosity was almost as +strong in me as anger; but reflecting that I had injured no one I knew +of, my nerves were quickly at the right pitch. Brushing some spikes of +furze off my hands, I prepared for it. A cry rose. My impression seemed +to be all backward, travelling up to me a moment or two behind time. I +recognised a strange tongue in the cry, but too late that it was Romany +to answer it. Instantly a voice was audible above the noisy wind: 'I +spot him.' Then began some good and fair fighting. I got my footing on +grass, and liked the work. The fellow facing me was unmistakably gipsy- +build. I, too, had length of arm, and a disposition to use it by hitting +straight out, with footing firm, instead of dodging and capering, which +told in my favour, and is decidedly the best display of the noble art on +a dark night. + +My dancer went over as neatly as I had preceded him; and therewith I +considered enough was done for vengeance. The thrill of a salmon on the +gut is known to give a savage satisfaction to our original nature; it is +but an extension and attenuation of the hearty contentment springing from +a thorough delivery of the fist upon the prominent features of an +assailant that yields to it perforce. Even when you receive such perfect +blows you are half satisfied. Feeling conqueror, my wrath was soothed; I +bent to have a look at my ruffian, and ask him what cause of complaint +gipsies camping on Durstan could find against Riversley. A sharp stroke +on the side of my neck sent me across his body. He bit viciously. In +pain and desperation I flew at another of the tawny devils. They +multiplied. I took to my heels; but this was the vainest of stratagems, +they beat me in nimbleness. Four of them were round me when I wheeled +breathless to take my chance at fighting the odds. Fiery men have not +much notion of chivalry: gipsies the least of all. They yelled disdain +of my summons to them to come on one by one: 'Now they had caught me, now +they would pay me, now they would pound me; and, standing at four +corners, they commended me to think of becoming a jelly. Four though +they were, they kept their positions; they left it to me to rush in for a +close; the hinder ones held out of arms' reach so long as I was +disengaged. I had perpetually to shift my front, thinking--Oh, for a +stick! any stout bit of timber! My fists ached, and a repetition of +nasty dull knocks on back and neck, slogging thumps dealt by men getting +to make sure of me, shattered my breathing. + +I cried out for a pause, offered to take a couple of them at a time: I +challenged three-the fourth to bide. I was now the dancer: left, right, +and roundabout I had to swing, half-stunned, half-strangled with gorge. +Those terrible blows in the back did the mischief. Sickness threatened +to undermine me. Boxers have breathing-time: I had none. Stiff and +sick, I tried to run; I tottered, I stood to be knocked down, I dropped +like a log-careless of life. But I smelt earth keenly, and the damp +grass and the devil's play of their feet on my chin, chest, and thighs, +revived a fit of wrath enough to set me staggering on my legs again. +They permitted it, for the purpose of battering me further. I passed +from down to up mechanically, and enjoyed the chestful of air given me in +the interval of rising: thought of Germany and my father, and Janet at +her window, complacently; raised a child's voice in my throat for mercy, +quite inaudible, and accepted my punishment. One idea I had was, that I +could not possibly fail as a speaker after this--I wanted but a minute's +grace to fetch breath for an oration, beginning, 'You fools!' for I +guessed that they had fallen upon the wrong man. Not a second was +allowed. Soon the shrewd physical bracing, acting momentarily on my +brain, relaxed; the fitful illumination ceased: all ideas faded out-clung +about my beaten body-fled. The body might have been tossed into its +grave, for aught I knew. + + + + +CHAPTER XLVI + +AMONG GIPSY WOMEN + +I cannot say how long it was after my senses had gone when I began to +grope for them on the warmest of heaving soft pillows, and lost the +slight hold I had on them with the effort. Then came a series of +climbings and fallings, risings to the surface and sinkings fathoms +below. Any attempt to speculate pitched me back into darkness. Gifted +with a pair of enormous eyes, which threw surrounding objects to a +distance of a mile away, I could not induce the diminutive things to +approach; and shutting eyes led to such a rolling of mountains in my +brain, that, terrified by the gigantic revolution, I lay determinedly +staring; clothed, it seemed positive, in a tight-fitting suit of sheet- +lead; but why? I wondered why, and immediately received an extinguishing +blow. My pillow was heavenly; I was constantly being cooled on it, and +grew used to hear a croon no more musical than the unstopped reed above +my head; a sound as of a breeze about a cavern's mouth, more soothing +than a melody. Conjecture of my state, after hovering timidly in dread +of relapses, settled and assured me I was lying baked, half-buried in an +old river-bed; moss at my cheek, my body inextricable; water now and then +feebly striving to float me out, with horrid pain, with infinite +refreshingness. A shady light, like the light through leafage, I could +see; the water I felt. Why did it keep trying to move me? I questioned +and sank to the depths again. + +The excruciated patient was having his wet bandages folded across his +bruises, and could not bear a motion of the mind. + +The mind's total apathy was the sign of recovering health. Kind nature +put that district to sleep while she operated on the disquieted lower +functions. I looked on my later self as one observes the mossy bearded +substances travelling blind along the undercurrent of the stream, +clinging to this and that, twirling absurdly. + +Where was I? Not in a house. But for my condition of absolute calm, +owing to skilful treatment, open air, and physical robustness, the scene +would have been of a kind to scatter the busy little workmen setting up +the fabric of my wits. A lighted oil-cup stood on a tripod in the middle +of a tent-roof, and over it the creased neck and chin of a tall old +woman, splendid in age, reddened vividly; her black eyes and grey brows, +and greyishblack hair fell away in a dusk of their own. I thought her +marvellous. Something she held in her hands that sent a thin steam +between her and the light. Outside, in the A cutting of the tent's +threshold, a heavy-coloured sunset hung upon dark land. My pillow +meantime lifted me gently at a regular measure, and it was with +untroubled wonder that I came to the knowledge of a human heart beating +within it. So soft could only be feminine; so firm still young. The +bosom was Kiomi's. A girl sidled at the opening of the tent, peeping in, +and from a mufed rattle of subpectoral thunder discharged at her in quick +heated snaps, I knew Kiomi's voice. After an altercation of their +monotonous gipsy undertones, the girl dropped and crouched outside. + +It was morning when I woke next, stronger, and aching worse. I was lying +in the air, and she who served for nurse, pillow, parasol, and bank of +herbage, had her arms round beneath mine cherishingly, all the fingers +outspread and flat on me, just as they had been when I went to sleep. + +'Kiomi!' + +'Now, you be quiet.' + +'Can I stand up a minute or two?' + +'No, and you won't talk.' + +I submitted. This was our duel all day: she slipped from me only twice, +and when she did the girl took her place. + +I began to think of Bulsted and Riversley. + +'Kiomi, how long have I been here?' + +'You 'll be twice as long as you've been.' + +'A couple of days?' + +'More like a dozen.' + +'Just tell me what happened.' + +'Ghm-m-m,' she growled admonishingly. + +Reflecting on it, I felt sure there must have been searching parties over +the heath. + +'Kiomi, I say, how was it they missed me?' + +She struck at once on my thought. + +'They're fools.' + +'How did you cheat them?' + +'I didn't tie a handkercher across their eyes.' + +'You half smothered me once, in the combe.' + +'You go to sleep.' + +'Have you been doctor?' + +The growling tigerish 'Ghm-m-m' constrained me to take it for a lullaby. + +'Kiomi, why the deuce did your people attack me?' She repeated the sound +resembling that which sometimes issues from the vent of a mine; but I +insisted upon her answering. + +'I 'll put you down and be off,' she threatened. + +'Brute of a girl! I hate you!' + +'Hate away.' + +'Tell me who found me.' + +'I shan't. You shut your peepers.' + +The other and younger girl sung out: 'I found you.' + +Kiomi sent a volley at her. + +'I did,' said the girl; 'yes, and I nursed you first, I did; and mother +doctored you. Kiomi hasn't been here a day.' + +The old mother came out of the tent. She felt my pulse, and forthwith +squatted in front of me. 'You're hard to kill, and oily as a bean,' said +she. 'You've only to lie quiet in the sun like a handsome gentleman; I'm +sure you couldn't wish for more. Air and water's the doctor for such as +you. You've got the bound in you to jump the ditch: don't you fret at +it, or you'll lose your spring, my good gentleman.' + +'Leave off talking to me as a stranger,' I bawled. 'Out with it; why +have you kept me here? Why did your men pitch into me?' + +'OUR men, my good gentleman!' the old woman ejaculated. There was +innocence indeed! sufficient to pass the whole tribe before a bench of +magistrates. She wheedled: 'What have they against a handsome gentleman +like you? They'd run for you fifty mile a day, and show you all their +tricks and secrets for nothing.' + +My despot Kiomi fired invectives at her mother. The old mother retorted; +the girl joined in. All three were scowling, flashing, showing teeth, +driving the wordy javelin upon one another, indiscriminately, or two to +one, without a pause; all to a sound like the slack silver string of the +fiddle. + +I sang out truce to them; they racked me with laughter; and such +laughter!--the shaking of husks in a half-empty sack. + +Ultimately, on a sudden cessation of the storm of tongues, they agreed +that I must have my broth. + +Sheer weariness, seasoned with some hope that the broth would give me +strength to mount on my legs and walk, persuaded me to drink it. Still +the old mother declared that none of her men would ever have laid hands +on me. Why should they? she asked. What had I done to them? Was it +their way? + +Kiomi's arms tightened over my breast. The involuntary pressure was like +an illumination to me. + +No longer asking for the grounds of the attack on a mistaken person, +and bowing to the fiction that none of the tribe had been among my +assailants, I obtained information. The girl Eveleen had spied me +entering Durstan. Quite by chance, she was concealed near Bulsted Park +gates when the groom arrived and told the lodge-keeper that Mr. Harry +Richmond was coming up over the heath, and might have lost his way. +'Richmond!' the girl threw a world of meaning into the unexpected name. +Kiomi clutched me to her bosom, but no one breathed the name we had in +our thoughts. + +Eveleen and the old mother had searched for me upon the heath, and having +haled me head and foot to their tent, despatched a message to bring Kiomi +down from London to aid them in their desperate shift. They knew Squire +Beltham's temper. He would have scattered the tribe to the shores of the +kingdom at a rumour of foul play to his grandson. Kiomi came in time to +smuggle me through an inspection of the tent and cross-examination of its +ostensible denizens by Captain Bulsted, who had no suspicions, though he +was in a state of wonderment. Hearing all this, I was the first to say +it would be better I should get out of the neighbourhood as soon as my +legs should support me. The grin that goes for a laugh among gipsies +followed my question of how Kiomi had managed to smuggle me. Eveleen was +my informant when the dreaded Kiomi happened to be off duty for a minute. +By a hasty transformation, due to a nightcap on the bandages about the +head, and an old petticoat over my feet, Captain William's insensible +friend was introduced to him as the sore sick great-grandmother of the +tribe, mother of Kiomi's mother, aged ninety-one. The captain paid like +a man for doctor and burial fees; he undertook also to send the old lady +a pound of snuff to assist her to a last sneeze or two on the right side +of the grave, and he kept his word; for, deeming it necessary to paint +her in a characteristic, these prodigious serpents told him gravely that +she delighted in snuff; it was almost the only thing that kept her alive, +barring a sip of broth. Captain William's comment on the interesting +piece of longevity whose well-covered length and framework lay exposed to +his respectful contemplation, was, that she must have been a devilish +fine old lady in her day. 'Six foot' was given as her measurement. + +One pound of snuff, a bottle of rum, and five sovereigns were the fruits +of the captain's sensibility. I shattered my ribs with laughter over the +story. Eveleen dwelt on the triumph, twinkling. Kiomi despised laughter +or triumph resulting from the natural exercise of craft in an emergency. +'But my handsome gentleman he won't tell on us, will he, when we've +nursed him and doctored him, and made him one of us, and as good a stick +o' timber as grows in the forest?' whined the old mother. I had to swear +I would not. + +'He!' cried Kiomi. + +'He may forget us when he's gone,' the mother said. She would have liked +me to kiss a book to seal the oath. Anxiety about the safety of their +'homes,' that is, the assurance of an untroubled reception upon their +customary camping-ground, is a peculiarity of the gipsies, distinguishing +them, equally with their cleanliness and thriftiness, from mumpers and +the common wanderers. + +It is their tribute to civilization, which generally keeps them within +the laws. + +Who that does not know them will believe that under their domestic system +I had the best broth and the best tea I have ever tasted! They are very +cunning brewers and sagacious buyers too; their maxims show them to +direct all their acuteness upon obtaining quality for their money. A +compliment not backed by silver is hardly intelligible to the pretty +ones: money is a really credible thing to them; and when they have it, +they know how to use it. Apparently because they know so well, so +perfectly appreciating it, they have only vague ideas of a corresponding +sentiment on the opposite side to the bargain, and imagine that they fool +people much more often than they succeed in doing. Once duped +themselves, they are the wariest of the dog-burnt; the place is notched +where it occurred, and for ever avoided. On the other hand, they repose +implicit faith in a reputation vouched for by their experience. I was +amused by the girl Eveleen's dotting of houses over the breadth of five +counties, where for this and that article of apparel she designed to +expend portions of a golden guinea, confident that she would get the very +best, and a shilling besides. The unwonted coin gave her the joy of +supposing she cheated the Mint of that sum. This guinea was a present to +the girl (to whom I owed my thrashing, by the way) that excused itself +under cover of being a bribe for sight of a mirror interdicted by the +implacable Kiomi. I wanted to have a look at my face. Now that the +familiar scenes were beginning to wear their original features to me, my +dread of personal hideousness was distressing, though Eveleen declared +the bad blood in my cheeks and eyes 'had been sucked by pounds of red +meat.' I wondered, whether if I stood up and walked to either one of the +three great halls lying in an obtuse triangle within view, I should +easily be recognized. When I did see myself, I groaned verily. With the +silence of profound resignation, I handed back to Eveleen the curious +fragment of her boudoir, which would have grimaced at Helen of Troy. + +'You're feeling your nose--you've been looking at a glass!' Kiomi said, +with supernatural swiftness of deduction on her return. + +She added for my comfort that nothing was broken, but confessed me to be +still 'a sight'; and thereupon drove knotty language at Eveleen. The +girl retorted, and though these two would never acknowledge to me that +any of their men had been in this neighbourhood recently, the fact was +treated as a matter of course in their spiteful altercation, and each +saddled the other with the mistake they had committed. Eveleen snatched +the last word. What she said I did not comprehend, she must have hit +hard. Kiomi's eyes lightened, and her lips twitched; she coloured like +the roofing smoke of the tent fire; twice she showed her teeth, as in a +spasm, struck to the heart, unable to speak, breathing in and out of a +bitterly disjoined mouth. Eveleen ran. I guessed at the ill-word +spoken. Kiomi sat eyeing the wood-ashes, a devouring gaze that shot +straight and read but one thing. They who have seen wild creatures die +will have her before them, saving the fiery eyes. She became an ashen- +colour, I took her little hand. Unconscious of me, her brown fingers +clutching at mine, she flung up her nostrils, craving air. + +This was the picture of the woman who could not weep in her misery. + +'Kiomi, old friend!' I called to her. I could have cursed that other +friend, the son of mischief; for she, I could have sworn, had been +fiercely and wantonly hunted. Chastity of nature, intense personal +pride, were as proper to her as the free winds are to the heaths: they +were as visible to dull divination as the milky blue about the iris of +her eyeballs. She had actually no animal vileness, animal though she +might be termed, and would have appeared if compared with Heriot's +admirable Cissies and Gwennies, and other ladies of the Graces that run +to fall, and spend their pains more in kindling the scent of the huntsman +than in effectively flying. + +There was no consolation for her. + +The girl Eveleen came in sight, loitering and looking, kicking her idle +heels. + +Kiomi turned sharp round to me. + +'I'm going. Your father's here, up at Bulsted. I'll see him. He won't +tell. He'll come soon. You'll be fit to walk in a day. You're sound as +a nail. Goodbye--I shan't say good-bye twice,' she answered my attempt +to keep her, and passed into the tent, out of which she brought a small +bundle tied in a yellow handkerchief, and walked away, without nodding or +speaking. + +'What was that you said to Kiomi?' I questioned Eveleen, who was quickly +beside me. + +She replied, accurately or not: 'I told her our men'd give her as good as +she gave me, let her wait and see.' + +Therewith she pouted; or, to sketch her with precision, 'snouted' would +better convey the vivacity of her ugly flash of features. It was an +error in me to think her heartless. She talked of her aunt Kiomi +affectionately, for a gipsy girl, whose modulated tones are all addressed +to the soft public. Eveleen spoke with the pride of bated breath of the +ferocious unforgivingness of their men. Perhaps if she had known that I +traced the good repute of the tribes for purity to the sweeter instincts +of the women, she would have eulogized her sex to amuse me. Gipsy girls, +like other people, are fond of showing off; but it would have been a +victory of education to have helped her to feel the distinction of the +feminine sense of shame half as awfully and warmly as she did the +inscrutable iron despotism of the males. She hinted that the mistake of +which I had been the victim would be rectified. + +'Tell your men I'll hunt them down like rats if I hear of it,' said I. + +While we were conversing my father arrived. Eveleen, not knowing him, +would have had me accept the friendly covering of a mat. + +'Here 's a big one! he's a clergyman,' she muttered to herself, and ran +to him and set up a gipsy whine, fronting me up to the last step while +she advanced; she only yielded ground to my outcry. + +My father bent over me. Kiomi had prepared him for what he saw. I +quieted his alarm by talking currently and easily. Julia Bulsted had +despatched a messenger to inform him of my mysterious disappearance; but +he, as his way was, revelling in large conjectures, had half imagined me +seized by a gust of passion, and bound for Germany. 'Without my +luggage?' I laughed. + +'Ay, without your luggage, Richie,' he answered seriously. His conceit +of a better knowledge of me than others possessed, had buoyed him up. +'For I knew,' he said, 'we two do nothing like the herd of men. +I thought you were off to her, my boy. Now!' he looked at me, and this +look of dismay was a perfect mirror. I was not a presentable object. + +He stretched his limbs on the heather and kept hold of my hand, looking +and talking watchfully, doctor-like, doubting me to be as sound in body +as I assured him I was, despite aches and pains. Eveleen hung near. + +'These people have been kind to you?' he said. + +'No, the biggest brutes on the earth,' said I. + +'Oh! you say that, when I spotted you out in the dark where you might +have lied to be eaten, and carried you and washed your bloody face, and +watched you, and never slept, I didn't, to mother you and wet your head!' +cried the girl. + +My father beckoned to her and thanked her appreciably in the yellow +tongue. + +'So these scoundrels of the high road fell upon you and robbed you, +Richie?' + +I nodded. + +'You let him think they robbed you, and you had your purse to give me a +gold guinea out of it!' Eveleen cried, and finding herself in the wrong +track, volubly resumed: 'That they didn't, for they hadn't time, whether +they meant to, and the night black as a coal, whoever they were.' + +The mystery of my not having sent word to Bulsted or to Riversley +perplexed my father. + +'Comfortable here!' he echoed me, disconsolately, and glanced at the +heath, the tent, the black circle of the broth-pot, and the wild girl. + + + + +CHAPTER XLVII + +MY FATHER ACTS THE CHARMER AGAIN + +Kiomi's mother was seen in a turn of the gravel-cutting, bearing +purchases from Durstan village. She took the new circumstances in with a +single cast up of her wary eyelids; and her, and her skill in surgery and +art in medicine, I praised to lull her fears, which procured me the +denomination of old friend, as well as handsome gentleman: she went so +far as to add, in a fit of natural warmth, nice fellow; and it is the +truth, that this term effected wonders in flattering me: it seemed to +reveal to me how simple it was for Harry Richmond, one whom gipsies could +think a nice fellow, to be the lord of Janet's affections--to be her +husband. My heart throbbed; yet she was within range of a mile and a +half, and I did not wish to be taken to her. I did wish to smell the +piney air about the lake-palace; but the thought of Ottilia caused me no +quick pulsations. + +My father remained an hour. He could not perceive the drift of my +objection to go either to Bulsted or to Riversley, and desire that my +misadventure should be unknown at those places. However, he obeyed me, +as I could always trust him to do scrupulously, and told a tale at +Bulsted. In the afternoon he returned in a carriage to convey me to the +seaside. When I was raised I fainted, and saw the last of the camp on +Durstan much as I had come to it first. Sickness and swimming of the +head continued for several days. I was persecuted with the sensation of +the carriage journey, and an iteration of my father's that ran: 'My son's +inanimate body in my arms,' or 'Clasping the lifeless body of my sole +son, Harry Richmond,' and other variations. I said nothing about it. +He told me aghast that I had spat blood. A battery of eight fists, +having it in the end all its own way, leaves a deeper indentation on its +target than a pistol-shot that passes free of the vital chords. My +convalescence in Germany was a melody compared with this. I ought to +have stopped in the tent, according to the wise old mother's advice, +given sincerely, for prudence counselled her to strike her canvas and be +gone. There I should have lain, interested in the progress of a bee, the +course of a beetle or a cloud, a spider's business, and the shaking of +the gorse and the heather, until good health had grown out of +thoughtlessness. The very sight of my father was as a hive of humming +troubles. + +His intense anxiety about me reflected in my mind the endless worry I had +concerning him. It was the intellect which condemned him when he wore a +joyful air, and the sensations when he waxed over-solicitous. Whether or +not the sentences were just, the judges should have sometimes shifted +places. I was unable to divine why he fevered me so much. Must I say +it?--He had ceased to entertain me. Instead of a comic I found him a +tragic spectacle; and his exuberant anticipations, his bursting hopes +that fed their forcing-bed with the blight and decay of their +predecessors, his transient fits of despair after a touch at my pulses, +and exclamation of 'Oh, Richie, Richie, if only I had my boy up and +well!'--assuming that nothing but my tardy recovery stood in the way of +our contentment--were examples of downright unreason such as +contemplation through the comic glass would have excused; the tragic +could not. I knew, nevertheless, that to the rest of the world he was a +progressive comedy: and the knowledge made him seem more tragic still. +He clearly could not learn from misfortune; he was not to be contained. +Money I gave him freely, holding the money at my disposal his own; I +chafed at his unteachable spirit, surely one of the most tragical things +in life; and the proof of my love for him was that I thought it so, +though I should have been kinder had he amused me, as in the old days. + +Conceive to yourself the keeping watch over a fountain choked in its +spouting, incessantly labouring to spin a jet into the air; now for a +moment glittering and towering in a column, and once more straining to +mount. My father appeared to me in that and other images. He would have +had me believe him shooting to his zenith, victorious at last. I +likewise was to reap a victory of the highest kind from the attack of the +mysterious ruffians; so much; he said, he thought he could assure me of. +He chattered of an intimidated Government, and Dettermain and Newson; +duchesses, dukes, most friendly; innumerable invitations to country +castles; and among other things one which really showed him to be capable +of conceiving ideas and working from an initiative. But this, too, +though it accomplished a temporary service, he rendered illusory to me by +his unhappy manner of regarding it as an instance of his now permanent +social authority. He had instituted what he called his JURY OF HONOUR +COURT, composed of the select gentlemen of the realm, ostensibly to weigh +the causes of disputes between members of their class, and decree the +method of settlement: but actually, my father admitted, to put a stop to +the affair between Edbury and me. + +'That was the origin of the notion, Richie. I carried it on. I dined +some of the best men of our day. I seized the opportunity when our +choicest "emperor" was rolling on wheels to propound my system. I +mention the names of Bramham DeWitt, Colonel Hibbert Segrave, Lord Alonzo +Carr, Admiral Loftus, the Earl of Luton, the Marquis of Hatchford, Jack +Hippony, Monterez Williams,--I think you know him?--and little Dick +Phillimore, son of a big-wig, a fellow of a capital wit and discretion; +I mention them as present to convince you we are not triflers, dear boy. +My argument ran, it is absurd to fight; also it is intolerable to be +compelled to submit to insult. As the case stands, we are under a +summary edict of the citizens, to whom chivalry is unknown. Well, well, +I delivered a short speech. Fighting, I said, resembled butting,-- +a performance proper to creatures that grow horns instead of brains . . +not to allude to a multitude of telling remarks; and the question "Is man +a fighting animal?" my answer being that he is not born with spurs on +his heels or horns to his head and that those who insisted on fighting +should be examined by competent anatomists, "ologists" of some sort, to +decide whether they have the excrescences, and proclaim them . . . +touching on these lighter parts of my theme with extreme delicacy. But-- +and here I dwelt on my point: Man, if not a fighting animal in his +glorious--I forgot what--is a sensitive one, and has the idea of honour. +"Hear," from Colonel Segrave, and Sir Weeton Slaterhe was one of the +party. In fine, Richie, I found myself wafted into a breathing oration. +I cannot, I confess it humbly, hear your "hear, hear," without going up +and off, inflated like a balloon. "Shall the arbitration of the +magistracy, indemnifications in money awarded by the Law-courts, succeed +in satisfying,"--but I declare to you, Richie, it was no platform speech. +I know your term--"the chaincable sentence." Nothing of the kind, +I assure you. Plain sense, as from gentlemen to gentlemen. We require, +I said, a protection that the polite world of Great Britain does not now +afford us against the aggressions of the knave, the fool, and the brute. +We establish a Court. We do hereby--no, no, not the "hereby"; quite +simply, Richie--pledge ourselves--I said some other word not "pledge" to +use our utmost authority and influence to exclude from our circles +persons refusing to make the reparation of an apology for wanton common +insults: we renounce intercourse with men declining, when guilty of +provoking the sentiment of hostility, to submit to the jurisdiction of +our Court. All I want you to see is the notion. We raise the shield +against the cowardly bully which the laws have raised against the bloody +one. "And gentlemen,"' my father resumed his oration, forgetting my +sober eye for a minute--'"Gentlemen, we are the ultimate Court of Appeal +for men who cherish their honour, yet abstain from fastening it like a +millstone round the neck of their common-sense." Credit me, Richie, +the proposition kindled. We cited Lord Edbury to appear before us, +and I tell you we extracted an ample apology to you from that young +nobleman. And let me add, one that I, that we, must impose it upon an +old son to accept. He does! Come, come. And you shall see, Richie, +society shall never repose an inert mass under my leadership. I cure it; +I shake it and cure it.' + +He promenaded the room, repeating: 'I do not say I am possessed of a +panacea,' and bending to my chin as he passed; 'I maintain that I can and +do fulfil the duties of my station, which is my element, attained in the +teeth of considerable difficulties, as no other man could, be he prince +or Prime Minister. Not one,' he flourished, stepping onward. 'And mind +you, Richie, this,' he swung round, conscious as ever of the critic in +me, though witless to correct his pomp of style, 'this is not self- +glorification. I point you facts. I have a thousand schemes--projects. +I recognize the value of early misfortune. The particular misfortune of +princes born is that they know nothing of the world--babies! I grant +you, babies. Now, I do. I have it on my thumbnail. I know its wants. +And just as I succeeded in making you a member of our Parliament in +assembly, and the husband of an hereditary princess--hear me--so will I +make good my original determination to be in myself the fountain of our +social laws, and leader. I have never, I believe--to speak +conscientiously--failed in a thing I have once determined on.' + +The single wish that I might be a boy again, to find pleasure in his +talk, was all that remained to combat the distaste I had for such +oppressive deliveries of a mind apparently as little capable of being +seated as a bladder charged with gas. I thanked him for getting rid of +Edbury, and a touch of remorse pricked me, it is true, on his turning +abruptly and saying: 'You see me in my nakedness, Richie. To you and my +valet, the heart, the body!' He was too sympathetic not to have a keen +apprehension of a state of hostility in one whom he loved. If I had +inclined to melt, however, his next remark would have been enough to +harden me: 'I have fought as many battles, and gained as startling +victories as Napoleon Buonaparte; he was an upstart.' The word gave +me a jerk. + +Sometimes he would indulge me transparently in a political controversy, +confessing that my dialectical dexterity went far to make a Radical of +him. I had no other amusement, or I should have held my peace. I tried +every argument I could think of to prove to him that there was neither +honour, nor dignity, nor profit in aiming at titular distinctions not +forced upon us by the circumstances of our birth. He kept his position +with much sly fencing, approaching shrewdness; and, whatever I might say, +I could not deny that a vile old knockknee'd world, tugging its forelock +to the look of rank and chink of wealth, backed him, if he chose to be +insensible to radical dignity. + +'In my time,' said he, 'all young gentlemen were born Tories. The doctor +no more expected to see a Radical come into the world from a good family +than a radish. But I discern you, my dear boy. Our reigning Families +must now be active; they require the discipline I have undergone; and I +also dine at aldermen's tables, and lay a foundation-stone--as Jorian +says--with the facility of a hen-mother: that should not suffice them. +'Tis not sufficient for me. I lay my stone, eat my dinner, make my +complimentary speech--and that is all that is expected of us; but I am +fully aware we should do more. We must lead, or we are lost. Ay, and-- +to quote you a Lord Mayor's barge is a pretty piece of gilt for the +festive and luxurious to run up the river Thames in and mark their swans. +I am convinced there is something deep in that. But what am I to do? +Would you have me frown upon the people? Richie, it is prudent-- +I maintain it righteous, nay, it is, I affirm positively, sovereign +wisdom--to cultivate every flower in the British bosom. Riposte me--have +you too many? Say yes, and you pass my guard. You cannot. I fence you +there. This British loyalty is, in my estimation, absolutely beautiful. +We grow to a head in our old England. The people have an eye! I need no +introduction to them. We reciprocate a highly cordial feeling when they +line the streets and roads with respectful salutations, and I acknowledge +their demonstrative goodwill. These things make us a nation. By heaven, +Richie, you are, on this occasion, if your dad may tell you so, wrong. +I ask pardon for my bluntness; but I put it to you, could we, not +travelling as personages in our well-beloved country, count on civility +to greet us everywhere? Assuredly not. My position is, that by +consenting to their honest enthusiasm, we the identical effect you are +perpetually crying out for--we civilize them, we civilize them. +Goodness!--a Great Britain without Royalty!' + +He launched on a series of desolate images. In the end, he at least +persuaded himself that he had an idea in his anxiety to cultivate the +primary British sentiment. + +We moved from town to town along the South coast; but it was vain to hope +we might be taken for simple people. Nor was he altogether to blame, +except in allowing the national instinct for 'worship and reverence' to +air itself unrebuked. I fled to the island. Temple ran down to meet me +there, and I heard that Janet had written to him for news of me. He +entered our hotel a private person; when he passed out, hats flew off +before him. The modest little fellow went along a double line of +attentive observers on the pier, and came back, asking me in astonishment +who he was supposed to be. + +'I petitioned for privacy here!' exclaimed my father. It accounted for +the mystery. + +Temple knew my feelings, and did but glance at me. + +Close upon Temple's arrival we had a strange couple of visitors. +'Mistress Dolly Disher and her husband,' my father introduced them. She +called him by one of his Christian names inadvertently at times. The +husband was a confectioner, a satisfied shade of a man who reserved the +exercise of his will for his business, we learnt; she, a bustling, fresh- +faced woman of forty-five, with still expressive dark eyes, and, I +guessed, the ideal remainder of a passion in her bosom. The guess was no +great hazard. She was soon sitting beside me, telling me of the 'years' +she had known my father, and of the most affectionate friend and perfect +gentleman he was of the ladies who had been in love with him; 'no +wonder': and of his sorrows and struggles, and his beautiful voice, and +hearts that bled for him; and of one at least who prayed and trusted he +would be successful at last. + +Temple and the pallid confectioner spent the day on board a yacht with my +father. Mrs. Dolly stayed to nurse me and persuade me to swallow +medicine. She talked of her youth, when, as a fashionable bootmaker's +daughter, she permitted no bills to be sent in to Mr. Richmond, alleging, +as a sufficient reason for it to her father, that their family came from +Richmond in Yorkshire. Eventually, the bills were always paid. She had +not been able to manage her husband so well; and the consequence was, +that (she breathed low) an execution was out; 'though I tell him,' +she said tremulously, 'he 's sure to be paid in the long run, if only +he'll wait. But no; he is you cannot think how obstinate in his +business. And my girl Augusta waiting for Mr. Roy Richmond, the wish of +our hearts! to assist at her wedding; and can we ask it, and have an +execution hanging over him? And for all my husband's a guest here, he's +as likely as not to set the officers at work, do what I will, to-morrow +or any day. Your father invited us, Mr. Harry. I forced my husband to +come, hoping against hope; for your papa gave the orders, relying on me, +as he believed he might, and my husband undertook them, all through me. +There it stops; he hears reports, and he takes fright: in goes the bill: +then it's law, and last Oh! I'm ashamed.' + +Mr. Disher's bill was for supplying suppers to the Balls. He received my +cheque for the amount in full, observing that he had been confident his +wife was correct when she said it would be paid, but a tradesman's +business was to hasten the day of payment; and, for a penance, he himself +would pacify the lawyers. + +On hearing of the settlement of Mr. Disher's claim, my father ahem'd, +speechless, which was a sign of his swallowing vexation. He remarked +that I had, no doubt with the best intentions, encroached on his liberty. +'I do not like to have my debts disturbed.' He put it to me, whether a +man, carrying out a life-long plan, would not be disconcerted by the +friendliest intervention. This payment to Disher he pronounced fatal in +policy. 'You have struck a heavy blow to my credit, Richie. Good little +Mistress Dolly brought the man down here--no select addition to our +society--and we were doing our utmost to endure him, as the ladies say, +for the very purpose . . . but the error stands committed! For the +future, friend Disher will infallibly expect payments within the year. +Credit for suppers is the guarantee of unlimited entertainments. And I +was inspiring him with absolute confidence for next year's campaign. +Money, you are aware, is no longer a question to terrify me. I hold +proofs that I have conclusively frightened Government, and you know it. +But this regards the manipulation of the man Disher. He will now dictate +to me. A refresher of a few hundreds would have been impolitic to this +kind of man; but the entire sum! and to a creditor in arms! You reverse +the proper situations of gentleman and tradesman. My supperman, in +particular, should be taught to understand that he is bound up in my +success. Something frightened him; he proceeded at law; and now we have +shown him that he has frightened us. An execution? My dear boy, I have +danced an execution five years running, and ordered, consecutively, at +the same house. Like other matters, an execution depends upon how you +treat it. The odds are that we have mortally offended Mistress Dolly.' +He apologized for dwelling on the subject, with the plea that it was an +essential part of his machinery of action, and the usual comparison of +'the sagacious General' whose forethought omitted no minutiae. I had to +listen. + +The lady professed to be hurt. The payment, however, put an end to the +visit of this couple. Politic or not, it was a large sum to disburse, +and once more my attention became fixed on the probable display of +figures in my bankers' book. Bonds and bills were falling due: the +current expenses were exhausting. I tried to face the evil, and take a +line of conduct, staggering, as I did on my feet. Had I been well +enough, I believe I should have gone to my grandfather, to throw myself +on his good-nature; such was the brain's wise counsel: but I was all +nerves and alarms, insomuch that I interdicted Temple's writing to Janet, +lest it should bring on me letters from my aunt Dorothy, full of advice +that could no longer be followed, well-meant cautions that might as well +be addressed to the mile-posts behind me. Moreover, Janet would be +flying on the wind to me, and I had a craving for soft arms and the look +of her eyebrows, that warned me to keep her off if I intended to act as +became a man of good faith. + +Fair weather, sunny green sea-water speckled with yachts shooting and +bounding, and sending me the sharp sense of life there is in dashed-up +fountains of silvery salt-spray, would have quickened my blood sooner but +for this hot-bed of fruitless adventure, tricksy precepts, and wisdom +turned imp, in which my father had again planted me. To pity him seemed +a childish affectation. His praise of my good looks pleased me, for on +that point he was fitted to be a judge, and I was still fancying I had +lost them on the heath. Troops of the satellites of his grand parade +surrounded him. I saw him walk down the pier like one breaking up a +levee. At times he appeared to me a commanding phantasm in the midst of +phantasm figures of great ladies and their lords, whose names he told off +on his return like a drover counting his herd; but within range of his +eye and voice the reality of him grew overpowering. It seduced me, and, +despite reason, I began to feel warm under his compliments. He was like +wine. Gaiety sprang under his feet. Sitting at my window, I thirsted to +see him when he was out of sight, and had touches of the passion of my +boyhood. + +I listened credulously, too, as in the old days, when he repeated, 'You +will find I am a magician, and very soon, Richie, mark me.' His manner +hinted that there was a surprise in store. 'You have not been on the +brink of the grave for nothing.' He resembled wine in the other +conditions attached to its rare qualities. Oh for the choice of having +only a little of him, instead of having him on my heart! The unfilial +wish attacked me frequently: he could be, and was, so ravishing to +strangers and light acquaintances. Did by chance a likeness exist +between us? My sick fancy rushed to the Belthams for a denial. There +did, of some sort, I knew; and the thought partitioned my dreamy ideas, +of which the noblest, taking advantage of my physical weakness, compelled +me to confess that it was a vain delusion for one such as I to hope for +Ottilia. This looking at the roots of yourself, if you are possessed of +a nobler half that will do it, is a sound corrective of an excessive +ambition. Unfortunately it would seem that young men can do it only in +sickness. With the use of my legs, and open-air breathing, I became +compact, and as hungry and zealous on behalf of my individuality, as +proud of it as I had ever been: prouder and hungrier. + +My first day of outing, when, looking at every face, I could reflect on +the miraculous issue of mine almost clear from its pummelling, and above +all, that my nose was safe--not stamped with the pugilist's brand-- +inspired a lyrical ebullition of gratitude. Who so intoxicated as the +convalescent catching at health? + +I met Charles Etherell on the pier, and heard that my Parliamentary seat +was considered in peril, together with a deal of gossip about my +disappearance. + +My father, who was growing markedly restless, on the watch for letters +and new arrivals, started to pay Chippenden a flying visit. He begged me +urgently to remain for another few days, while he gathered information, +saying my presence at his chief quarters did him infinite service, and I +always thought that possible. I should find he was a magician, he +repeated, with a sort of hesitating fervour. + +I had just waved my hand to him as the boat was bearing him away from the +pier-head, when a feminine voice murmured in my ear, 'Is not this our +third meeting, Mr. Harry Richmond?--Venice, Elbestadt, and the Isle of +Wight?' She ran on, allowing me time to recognize Clara Goodwin. 'What +was your last adventure? You have been ill. Very ill? Has it been +serious?' + +I made light of it. 'No: a tumble.' + +'You look pale,' she said quickly. + +'That's from grieving at the loss of my beauty, Miss Goodwin.' + +'Have you really not been seriously ill?' she asked with an astonishing +eagerness. + +I told her mock-loftily that I did not believe in serious illnesses +coming to godlike youth, and plied her in turn with inquiries. + +'You have not been laid up in bed?' she persisted. + +'No, on my honour, not in bed.' + +'Then,' said she, 'I would give much to be able to stop that boat.' + +She amazed me. 'Why?' + +'Because it's going on a bad errand,' she replied. + +'Miss Goodwin, you perplex me. My father has started in that boat.' + +'Yes, I saw him.' She glanced hastily at the foam in a way to show +indifference. 'What I am saying concerns others . . . who have heard +you were dangerously ill. I have sent for them to hasten across.' + +'My aunt and Miss Ilchester?' + +'No.' + +'Who are they? Miss Goodwin, I'll answer any question. I've been +queerish, that's true. Now let me hear who they are, when you arrived, +when you expect them. Where are they now?' + +'As to me,' she responded with what stretched on my ears like an +insufferable drawl, 'I came over last night to hire a furnished house or +lodgings. Papa has an appointment attached to the fortifications yonder. +We'll leave the pier, if you please. You draw too much attention on +ladies who venture to claim acquaintance with so important a gentleman.' + +We walked the whole length of the pier, chatting of our former meetings. + +'Not here,' she said, as soon as I began to question. + +I was led farther on, half expecting that the accessories of time and +place would have to do with the revelation. + +The bitter creature drew me at her heels into a linendraper's shop. +There she took a seat, pitched her voice to the key of a lady's at a +dinner-table, when speaking to her cavalier of the history or attire of +some one present, and said, 'You are sure the illness was not at all +feigned?' + +She had me as completely at her mercy in this detestable shop as if I had +been in a witness-box. + +'Feigned!' I exclaimed. + +'That is no answer. And pray remember where you are.' + +'No, the illness was not feigned.' + +'And you have not made the most of it?' + +'What an extraordinary thing to say!' + +'That is no answer. And please do not imagine yourself under the +necessity of acting every sentiment of your heart before these people.' + +She favoured a shopman with half-a-dozen directions. + +'My answer is, then, that I have not made the most of it,' I said. + +'Not even by proxy?' + +'Once more I'm adrift.' + +'You are certainly energetic. I must address you as a brother, or it +will be supposed we are quarrelling. Harry, do you like that pattern?' + +'Yes. What's the meaning of proxy?' + +'With the accent you give it, heaven only knows what it means. I would +rather you did not talk here like a Frenchman relating his last love- +affair in company. + +Must your voice escape control exactly at the indicatory words? Do you +think your father made the most of it?' + +'Of my illness? Oh! yes; the utmost. I should undoubtedly think so. +That's his way.' + +'Why did you permit it?' + +'I was what they call "wandering" half the time. Besides, who could keep +him in check? I rarely know what he is doing.' + +'You don't know what he wrote?' + +'Wrote?' + +'That you were dying.' + +'Of me? To whom?' + +She scrutinized me, and rose from her chair. 'I must try some other +shop. How is it, that if these English people cannot make a "berthe" fit +to wear, they do not conceive the idea of importing such things from +Paris? I will take your arm, Harry.' + +'You have bought nothing,' I remarked. + +'I have as much as I went for,' she replied, and gravely thanked the +assistant leaning on his thumbs across the counter; after which, dropping +the graceless play of an enigma, she inquired whether I had forgotten the +Frau von Dittmarsch. + +I had, utterly; but not her maiden name of Sibley. + +'Miss Goodwin, is she one of those who are coming to the island?' + +'Frau von Dittmarsch? Yes. She takes an interest in you. She and I +have been in correspondence ever since my visit to Sarkeld. It reminds +me, you may vary my maiden name with the Christian, if you like. Harry, +I believe you are truthful as ever, in spite--' + +'Don't be unjust,' said I. + +'I wish I could think I was!' she rejoined. 'Frau von Dittmarsch was at +Sarkeld, and received terrible news of you. She called on me, at my +father's residence over the water yonder, yesterday afternoon, desiring +greatly to know--she is as cautious as one with a jewel in her custody-- +how it fared with you, whether you were actually in a dying state. I +came here to learn; I have friends here: you were not alone, or I should +have called on you. The rumour was that you were very ill; so I hired a +furnished place for Frau von Dittmarsch at once. But when I saw you and +him together, and the parting between you, I began to have fears; +I should have countermanded the despatch I sent by the boat, had it been +possible.' + +'It has gone! And tell me the name of the other.' + +'Frau von Dittmarsch has a husband.' + +'Not with her now. Oh! cruel! speak: her name?' + +'Her name, Harry?' Her title is Countess von Delzenburg.' + +'Not princess?' + +'Not in England.' + +Then Ottilia was here! + +My father was indeed a magician! + + + + +CHAPTER XLVIII + +THE PRINCESS ENTRAPPED + +'Not princess in England,' could betoken but one thing--an incredible act +of devotion, so great that it stunned my senses, and I thought of it, and +of all it involved, before the vision of Ottilia crossing seas took +possession of me. + +'The Princess Ottilia, Miss Goodwin?' + +'The Countess of Delzenburg, Harry.' + +'To see me? She has come!' + +'Harry, you talk like the boy you were when we met before you knew her. +Yes and yes to everything you have to say, but I think you should spare +her name.' + +'She comes thinking me ill?' + +'Dying.' + +'I'm as strong as ever I was.' + +'I should imagine you are, only rather pale.' + +'Have you, tell me, Clara, seen her yourself? Is she well?' + +'Pale: not unwell: anxious.' + +'About me?' + +'It may be about the political affairs of the Continent; they are +disturbed.' + +'She spoke of me?' + +'Yes.' + +'She is coming by the next boat?' + +'It's my fear that she is.' + +'Why do you fear?' + +'Shall I answer you, Harry? It is useless now. Well, because she has +been deceived. That is why. You will soon find it out.' + +'Prince Ernest is at Sarkeld?' + +'In Paris, I hear.' + +'How will your despatch reach these ladies in time for them to come over +by the next boat?' + +'I have sent my father's servant. The General--he is promoted at last, +Harry--attends the ladies in person, and is now waiting for the boat's +arrival over there, to follow my directions.' + +'You won't leave me?' + +Miss Goodwin had promised to meet the foreign ladies on the pier. We +quarrelled and made it up a dozen times like girl and boy, I calling her +aunt Clara, as in the old days, and she calling me occasionally son +Richie: an imitation of my father's manner of speech to me when we formed +acquaintance first in Venice. But I was very little aware of what I was +saying or doing. The forces of my life were yoked to the heart, and +tumbled as confusedly as the world under Phaethon charioteer. We walked +on the heights above the town. I looked over the water to the white line +of shore and batteries where this wonder stood, who was what poets dream +of, deep-hearted men hope for, none quite believe in. Hardly could I; +and though my relenting spinster friend at my elbow kept assuring me it +was true that she was there, my sceptical sight fixed on the stale +prominences visible in the same features which they had worn day after +empty day of late. This deed of hers was an act of devotion great as +death. I knew it from experience consonant to Ottilia's character; but +could a princess, hereditary, and bound in the league of governing +princes, dare so to brave her condition? Complex of mind, simplest in +character, the uncontrollable nobility of her spirit was no sooner +recognized by me than I was shocked throughout by a sudden light, +contrasting me appallingly with this supreme of women, who swept the +earth aside for truth. I had never before received a distinct intimation +of my littleness of nature, and my first impulse was to fly from thought, +and then, as if to prove myself justly accused, I caught myself +regretting--no, not regretting, gazing, as it were, on a picture of +regrets--that Ottilia was not a romantic little lady of semi-celestial +rank, exquisitely rash, wilful, desperately enamoured, bearing as many +flying hues and peeps of fancy as a love-ballad, and not more roughly +brushing the root-emotions. + +If she had but been such an one, what sprightly colours, delicious +sadness, magical transformations, tenderest intermixture of earth and +heaven; what tears and sunbeams, divinest pathos: what descents from +radiance to consolatory twilight, would have surrounded me for poetry and +pride to dwell on! What captivating melody in the minor key would have +been mine, though I lost her--the legacy of it all for ever! Say a +petulant princess, a star of beauty, mad for me, and the whisper of our +passion and sorrows traversing the flushed world! Was she coming? Not +she, but a touchstone, a relentless mirror, a piercing eye, a mind severe +as the Goddess of the God's head: a princess indeed, but essentially a +princess above women: a remorseless intellect, an actual soul visible in +the flesh. She was truth. Was I true? Not so very false, yet how far +from truth! The stains on me (a modern man writing his history is +fugitive and crepuscular in alluding to them, as a woman kneeling at the +ear-guichet) burnt like the blood-spots on the criminal compelled to +touch his victim by savage ordinance, which knew the savage and how to +search him. And these were faults of weakness rather than the sins of +strength. I might as fairly hope for absolution of them from Ottilia as +from offended laws of my natural being, gentle though she was, and +charitable. + +Was I not guilty of letting her come on to me hoodwinked at this moment? +I had a faint memory of Miss Goodwin's saying that she had been deceived, +and I suggested a plan of holding aloof until she had warned the princess +of my perfect recovery, to leave it at her option to see me. + +'Yes,' Miss Goodwin assented: 'if you like, Harry.' + +Her compassion for me only tentatively encouraged the idea. 'It would, +perhaps, be right. You are the judge. If you can do it. You are acting +bravely.' She must have laughed at me in her heart. + +The hours wore on. My curse of introspection left me, and descending +through the town to the pier, amid the breezy blue skirts and bonnet- +strings, we watched the packet-boat approaching. There was in advance +one of the famous swift island wherries. Something went wrong with it, +for it was overtaken, and the steamer came in first. I jumped on board, +much bawled at. Out of a crowd of unknown visages, Janet appeared: my +aunt Dorothy was near her. The pair began chattering of my paleness, and +wickedness in keeping my illness unknown to them. They had seen Temple +on an excursion to London; he had betrayed me, as he would have betrayed +an archangel to Janet. + +'Will you not look at us, Harry?' they both said. + +The passengers were quitting the boat, strangers every one. + +'Harry, have we really offended you in coming?' said Janet. + +My aunt Dorothy took the blame on herself. + +I scarcely noticed them, beyond leading them on to the pier-steps and +leaving them under charge of Miss Goodwin, who had, in matters of luggage +and porterage, the practical mind and aplomb of an Englishwoman that has +passed much of her time on the Continent. I fancied myself vilely duped +by this lady. The boat was empty of its passengers; a grumbling pier- +man, wounded in his dignity, notified to me that there were fines for +disregard of the Company's rules and regulations. His tone altered; he +touched his hat: 'Didn't know who you was, my lord.' Janet overheard him, +and her face was humorous. + +'We may break the rules, you see,' I said to her. + +'We saw him landing on the other side of the water,' she replied; so +spontaneously did the circumstance turn her thoughts on my father. + +'Did you speak to him?' + +'No.' + +'You avoided him?' + +'Aunty and I thought it best. He landed . . . there was a crowd.' + +Miss Goodwin interposed: 'You go to Harry's hotel?' + +'Grandada is coming down to-morrow or next day,' Janet prompted my aunt +Dorothy. + +'If we could seek for a furnished house; Uberly would watch the luggage,' +Dorothy murmured in distress. + +'Furnished houses, even rooms at hotels, are doubtful in the height of +the season,' Miss Goodwin remarked. 'Last night I engaged the only +decent set of rooms I could get, for friends of Harry's who are coming.' + +'No wonder he was disappointed at seeing us--he was expecting them!' said +Janet, smiling a little. + +'They are sure to come,' said Miss Goodwin. + +Near us a couple of yachtsmen were conversing. + +'Oh, he'll be back in a day or two,' one said. 'When you 've once tasted +that old boy, you can't do without him. I remember when I was a +youngster--it was in Lady Betty Bolton's day; she married old Edbury, you +know, first wife--the Magnificent was then in his prime. He spent his +money in a week: so he hired an eighty-ton schooner; he laid violent +hands on a Jew, bagged him, lugged him on board, and sailed away.' + +'What the deuce did he want with a Jew?' cried the other. + +'Oh, the Jew supplied cheques for a three months' cruise in the +Mediterranean, and came home, I heard, very good friends with his pirate. +That's only one of dozens.' + +The unconscious slaughterers laughed. + +'On another occasion'--I heard it said by the first speaker, as they +swung round to parade the pier, and passed on narrating. + +'Not an hotel, if it is possible to avoid it,' my aunt Dorothy, with +heightened colour, urged Miss Goodwin. They talked together. + +'Grandada is coming to you, Harry,' Janet said. 'He has business in +London, or he would have been here now. Our horses and carriages follow +us: everything you would like. He does love you! he is very anxious. +I'm afraid his health is worse than he thinks. Temple did not say your +father was here, but grandada must have suspected it when he consented to +our coming, and said he would follow us. So that looks well perhaps. +He has been much quieter since your money was paid back to you. If they +should meet . . . no, I hope they will not: grandada hates noise. +And, Harry, let me tell you: it may be nothing: if he questions you, do +not take fire; just answer plainly: I'm sure you understand. One in a +temper at a time I'm sure 's enough: you have only to be patient with +him. He has been going to London, to the City, seeing lawyers, bankers, +brokers, and coming back muttering. Ah! dear old man. And when he +ought to have peace! Harry, the poor will regret him in a thousand +places. I write a great deal for him now, and I know how they will. +What are you looking at?' + +I was looking at a man of huge stature, of the stiffest build, whose +shoulders showed me their full breadth while he stood displaying +frontwards the open of his hand in a salute. + +'Schwartz!' I called. Janet started, imagining some fierce interjection. +The giant did not stir. + +But others had heard. A lady stepped forward. 'Dear Mr. Harry Richmond! +Then you are better? We had most alarming news of you.' + +I bowed to the Frau von Dittmarsch, anciently Miss Sibley. + +'The princess?' + +'She is here.' + +Frau von Dittmarsch clasped Miss Goodwin's hand. I was touching +Ottilia's. A veil partly swathed her face. She trembled: the breeze +robbed me of her voice. + +Our walk down the pier was almost in silence. Miss Goodwin assumed the +guardianship of the foreign ladies. I had to break from them and provide +for my aunt Dorothy and Janet. + +'They went over in a little boat, they were so impatient. Who is she?' +Dorothy Beltham asked. + +'The Princess Ottilia,' said Janet. + +'Are you certain? Is it really, Harry?' + +I confirmed it, and my aunt said, 'I should have guessed it could be no +other; she has a foreign grace.' + +'General Goodwin was with them when the boat came in from the island,' +said Janet. 'He walked up to Harry's father, and you noticed, aunty, +that the ladies stood away, as if they wished to be unobserved, as we +did, and pulled down their veils. They would not wait for our boat. We +passed them crossing. People joked about the big servant over-weighing +the wherry.' + +Dorothy Beltham thought the water too rough for little boats. + +'She knows what a sea is,' I said. + +Janet gazed steadily after the retreating figures, and then commended me +to the search for rooms. The end of it was that I abandoned my father's +suite to them. An accommodating linen-draper possessed of a sea-view, +and rooms which hurled the tenant to the windows in desire for it, gave +me harbourage. + +Till dusk I scoured the town to find Miss Goodwin, without whom there was +no clue to the habitation I was seeking, and I must have passed her +blindly again and again. My aunt Dorothy and Janet thanked me for my +consideration in sitting down to dine with them; they excused my haste to +retire. I heard no reproaches except on account of my not sending them +word of my illness. Janet was not warm. She changed in colour and voice +when I related what I had heard from Miss Goodwin, namely, that 'some +one' had informed the princess I was in a dying state. I was obliged to +offer up my father as a shield for Ottilia, lest false ideas should +tarnish the image of her in their minds. Janet did not speak of him. +The thought stood in her eyes; and there lies the evil of a sore subject +among persons of one household: they have not to speak to exhibit their +minds. + +After a night of suspense I fell upon old Schwartz and Aennchen out in +the earliest dawn, according to their German habits, to have a gaze at +sea, and strange country and people. Aennchen was all wonder at the +solitary place, Schwartz at the big ships. But when they tried to direct +me to the habitation of their mistress, it was discovered by them that +they had lost their bearings. Aennchen told me the margravine had been +summoned to Rippau just before they left Sarkeld. Her mistress had +informed Baroness Turckems of her intention to visit England. Prince +Ernest was travelling in France. + +The hour which brought me to Ottilia was noon. The arrangements of the +ladies could only grant me thirty minutes, for Janet was to drive the +princess out into the country to view the island. She and my aunt +Dorothy had been already introduced. Miss Goodwin, after presenting +them, insisted upon ceremoniously accompanying me to the house. Quite +taking the vulgar view of a proceeding such as the princess had been +guilty of, and perhaps fearing summary audacity and interestedness in the +son of a father like mine, she ventured on lecturing me, as though it lay +with me to restrain the fair romantic head, forbear from calling up my +special advantages, advise, and stand to the wisdom of this world, and be +the man of honour. The princess had said: 'Not see him when I have come +to him?' I reassured my undiscerning friend partly, not wholly. + +'Would it be commonly sensible or civil, to refuse to see me, having +come?' + +Miss Goodwin doubted. + +I could indicate forcibly, because I felt, the clear-judging brain and +tempered self-command whereby Ottilia had gained her decision. + +Miss Goodwin nodded and gave me the still-born affirmative of politeness. +Her English mind expressed itself willing to have exonerated the rash +great lady for visiting a dying lover, but he was not the same person now +that he was on his feet, consequently her expedition wore a different +aspect:--my not dying condemned her. She entreated me to keep the fact +of the princess's arrival unknown to my father, on which point we were +one. Intensely enthusiastic for the men of her race, she would have me, +above all things, by a form of adjuration designed to be a masterpiece of +persuasive rhetoric, 'prove myself an Englishman.' I was to show that +'the honour, interests, reputation and position of any lady (demented or +not,' she added) 'were as precious to me as to the owner': that 'no woman +was ever in peril of a shadow of loss in the hands of an English +gentleman,' and so forth, rather surprisingly to me, remembering her off- +hand manner of the foregoing day. But the sense of responsibility thrown +upon her ideas of our superior national dignity had awakened her fervider +naturalness--made her a different person, as we say when accounting, in +our fashion, for what a little added heat may do. + +The half hour allotted to me fled. I went from the room and the house, +feeling that I had seen and heard her who was barely of the world of +humankind for me, so strongly did imagination fly with her. I kissed her +fingers, I gazed in her eyes, I heard the beloved voice. All passed too +swift for happiness. Recollections set me throbbing, but recollection +brought longing. She said, 'Now I have come I must see you, Harry.' +Did it signify that to see me was a piece of kindness at war with her +judgement? She rejoiced at my perfect recovery, though it robbed her of +the plea in extenuation of this step she had taken. She praised me for +abstaining to write to her, when I was stammering a set of hastily- +impressed reasons to excuse myself for the omission. She praised my step +into Parliament. It did not seem to involve a nearer approach to her. +She said, 'You have not wasted your time in England.' It was for my +solitary interests that she cared, then. + +I brooded desperately. I could conceive an overlooking height that made +her utterance simple and consecutive: I could not reach it. Topics which +to me were palpitating, had no terror for her. She said, 'I have +offended my father; I have written to him; he will take me away.' +In speaking of the letter which had caused her to offend, she did not +blame the writer. I was suffered to run my eyes over it, and was +ashamed. It read to me too palpably as an outcry to delude and draw her +hither:--pathos and pathos: the father holding his dying son in his arms, +his sole son, Harry Richmond; the son set upon by enemies in the night: +the lover never daring to beg for a sight of his beloved ere he passed +away:--not an ill-worded letter; read uncritically, it may have been +touching: it must have been, though it was the reverse for me. +I frowned, broke down in regrets, under sharp humiliation. + +She said, 'You knew nothing of it. A little transgression is the real +offender. When we are once out of the way traced for us, we are in +danger of offending at every step; we are as lawless as the outcasts.' +That meant, 'My turning aside to you originally was the blameable thing.' +It might mean, 'My love of you sets my ideas of duty at variance with my +father's.' + +She smiled; nothing was uttered in a tone of despondency. Her high +courage and breeding gave her even in this pitfall the smoothness which +most women keep for society. Why she had not sent me any message or +tidings of herself to Riversley was not a matter that she could imagine +to perplex me: she could not imagine my losing faith in her. The least +we could do, I construed it, the religious bond between us was a faith in +one another that should sanctify to our souls the external injuries it +caused us to commit. But she talked in no such strain. Her delight in +treading English ground was her happy theme. She said, 'It is as young +as when we met in the forest'; namely, the feeling revived for England. +How far off we were from the green Devonshire coast, was one of her +questions, suggestive of our old yacht-voyage lying among her dreams. +Excepting an extreme and terrorizing paleness, there was little to fever +me with the thought that she suffered mortally. Of reproach, not a word; +nor of regret. At the first touch of hands, when we stood together, +alone, she said, 'Would hearing of your recovery have given me peace?' +My privileges were the touch of hands, the touch of her fingers to my +lips, a painless hearing and seeing, and passionate recollection. She +said, 'Impatience is not for us, Harry': I was not to see her again +before the evening. These were the last words she said, and seemed the +lightest until my hot brain made a harvest of them transcending thrice- +told vows of love. Did they not mean, 'We two wait': therefore, 'The +years are bondmen to our stedfastness.' Could sweeter have been said? +They might mean nothing! + +She was veiled when Janet drove her out; Janet sitting upright in +her masterly way, smoothing her pet ponies with the curl of her whip, +chatting and smiling; the princess slightly leaning back. I strode up +to the country roads, proud of our land's beauty under a complacent sky. +By happy chance, which in a generous mood I ascribed to Janet's good +nature, I came across them at a seven miles' distance. They were talking +spiritedly: what was wonderful, they gave not much heed to me: they +seemed on edge for one another's conversation: each face was turned to +the other's, and after nodding an adieu, they resumed the animated +discourse. I had been rather in alarm lest Ottilia should think little +of Janet. They passed out of sight without recurring to a thought of me +behind them. + +In the evening I was one among a group of ladies. I had the opportunity +of hearing the running interchange between Ottilia and Janet, which +appeared to be upon equal terms; indeed, Janet led. The subjects were +not very deep. Plain wits, candour, and an unpretending tongue, it +seemed, could make common subjects attractive, as fair weather does our +English woods and fields. The princess was attracted by something in +Janet. I myself felt the sway of something, while observing Ottilia's +rapt pleasure in her talk and her laughter, with those funny familiar +frowns and current dimples twisting and melting away like a play of +shadows on the eddies of the brook. + +'I 'm glad to be with her,' Janet said of Ottilia. + +It was just in that manner she spoke in Ottilia's presence. Why it +should sound elsewhere unsatisfactorily blunt, and there possess a +finished charm, I could not understand. + +I mentioned to Janet that I feared my father would be returning. + +She contained herself with a bridled 'Oh!' + +We were of one mind as to the necessity for keeping him absent, if +possible. + +'Harry, you'll pardon me; I can't talk of him,' said she. + +I proposed half-earnestly to foil his return by going to London at once. + +'That's manly; that's nice of you,' Janet said. + +This was on our walk from the house at night. My aunt Dorothy listened, +pressing my arm. The next morning Janet urged me to go at once. 'Keep +him away, bring down grandada, Harry. She cannot quit the island, +because she has given Prince Ernest immediate rendezvous here. You must +not delay to go. Yes, the Countess of Delzenburg shall have your +excuses. And no, I promise you I will run nobody down. Besides, if I +do, aunty will be at hand to plead for the defence, and she can! She has +a way that binds one to accept everything she says, and Temple ought to +study with her for a year or two before he wears his gown. Bring him +back with you and grandada. He is esteemed here at his true worth. I +love him for making her in love with English boys. I leave the men for +those who know them, but English boys are unrivalled, I declare. +Honesty, bravery, modesty, and nice looks! They are so nice in their +style and their way of talking. I tell her, our men may be shy and +sneering,--awkward, I daresay; but our boys beat the world. Do bring +down Temple. I should so like her to see a cricket-match between two +good elevens of our boys, Harry, while she is in England! We could have +arranged for one at Riversley.' + +I went, and I repressed the idea, on my way, that Janet had manoeuvred by +sending me off to get rid of me, but I felt myself a living testimony to +her heartlessness: for no girl of any heart, acting the part of friend, +would have allowed me to go without a leave-taking of her I loved few +would have been so cruel as to declare it a duty to go at all, especially +when the chances were that I might return to find the princess wafted +away. Ottilia's condescension had done her no good. 'Turn to the right, +that's your path; on.' She seemed to speak in this style, much as she +made her touch of the reins understood by her ponies. 'I 'll take every +care of the princess,' she said. Her conceit was unbounded. I revelled +in contemptuous laughter at her assumption of the post of leader with +Ottilia. However, it was as well that I should go: there was no trusting +my father. + + + + +CHAPTER XLIX + +WHICH FORESHADOWS A GENERAL GATHERING + +At our Riversley station I observed the squire, in company with Captain +Bulsted, jump into a neighbouring carriage. I joined them, and was +called upon to answer various inquiries. The squire gave me one of his +short tight grasps of the hand, in which there was warmth and shyness, +our English mixture. The captain whispered in my ear: 'He oughtn't to be +alone.' + +'How's the great-grandmother of the tribe?' said I. + +Captain Bulsted nodded, as if he understood, but was at sea until I +mentioned the bottle of rum and the remarkable length of that old lady's +measurement. + +'Ay, to be sure! a grand old soul,' he said. 'You know that scum of +old, Harry.' + +I laughed, and so did he, at which I laughed the louder. + +'He laughs, I suppose, because his party's got a majority in the House,' +said the squire. + +'We gave you a handsome surplus this year, sir.' + +'Sweated out of the country's skin and bone, ay!' + +'You were complimented by the Chancellor of the Exchequer.! + +'Yes, that fellow's compliments are like a cabman's, and cry fool:--he +never thanks you but when he's overpaid.' + +Captain Bulsted applauded the sarcasm. + +'Why did you keep out of knowledge all this time, Hal?' my grandfather +asked. + +I referred him to the captain. + +'Hang it,' cried Captain Bulsted, 'do you think I'd have been doing duty +for you if I'd known where to lay hold of you.' + +'Well, if you didn't shake hands with me, you touched my toes,' said I, +and thanked him with all my heart for his kindness to an old woman on the +point of the grave. I had some fun to flavour melancholy with. + +My grandfather resumed his complaint: 'You might have gone clean off, and +we none the wiser.' + +'Are we quite sure that his head's clean on?' said the mystified captain. + +'Of course we should run to him, wherever he was, if he was down on his +back,' the squire muttered. + +'Ay, ay, sir; of course,' quoth Captain William, frowning to me to +reciprocate this relenting mood. 'But, Harry, where did you turn off +that night? We sat up expecting you. My poor Julia was in a terrible +fright, my lad. Eh? speak up.' + +I raised the little finger. + +'Oh, oh,' went he, happily reassured; but, reflecting, added: 'A bout of +it?' + +I dropped him a penitent nod. + +'That's bad, though,' said he. + +'Then why did you tip me a bottle of rum, Captain William?' + +'By George, Harry, you've had a crack o' the sconce,' he exclaimed, more +sagaciously than he was aware of. + +My grandfather wanted to keep me by his side in London until we two +should start for the island next day; but his business was in the city, +mine toward the West. We appointed to meet two hours after reaching the +terminus. + +He turned to me while giving directions to his man. + +'You 've got him down there, I suppose?' + +'My father's in town, sir. He shall keep away,' I said. + +'Humph! I mayn't object to see him.' + +This set me thinking. + +Captain Bulsted--previously asking me in a very earnest manner whether I +was really all right and sound--favoured me with a hint: + +'The squire has plunged into speculations of his own, or else he is +peeping at somebody else's. No danger of the dad being mixed up with +Companies? Let's hope not. Julia pledged her word to Janet that I would +look after the old squire. I suppose I can go home this evening? My +girl hates to be alone.' + +'By all means,' said I; and the captain proposed to leave the squire at +his hotel, in the event of my failing to join him in the city. + +'But don't fail, if you can help it,' he urged me; 'for things somehow, +my dear Harry, appear to me to look like the compass when the needle +gives signs of atmospheric disturbance. My only reason for saying so is +common observation. You can judge for yourself that he is glad to have +you with him.' + +I told the captain I was equally glad; for, in fact, my grandfather's +quietness and apparently friendly disposition tempted me to petition for +a dower for the princess at once, so that I might be in the position to +offer Prince Ernest on his arrival a distinct alternative; supposing-- +it was still but a supposition--Ottilia should empower me. Incessant +dialogues of perpetually shifting tendencies passed between Ottilia and +me in my brain--now dark, now mildly fair, now very wild, on one side at +least. Never, except by downright force of will, could I draw from the +phantom of her one purely irrational outcry, so deeply-rooted was the +knowledge of her nature and mind; and when I did force it, I was no +gainer: a puppet stood in her place--the vision of Ottilia melted out in +threads of vapour. + +'And yet she has come to me; she has braved everything to come.' I might +say that, to liken her to the women who break rules and read duties by +their own light, but I could not cheat my knowledge of her. Mrs. Waddy +met me in the hall of my father's house, as usual, pressing, I regretted +to see, one hand to her side. 'Her heart,' she said, 'was easily set +pitty-pat now.' She had been, by her master's orders, examined by two of +the chief physicians of the kingdom, 'baronets both.' They advised total +rest. As far as I could apprehend, their baronetcies and doings in high +regions had been of more comfort than their prescriptions. + +'What I am I must be,' she said, meekly; 'and I cannot quit his service +till he's abroad again, or I drop. He has promised me a monument. I +don't want it; but it shows his kindness.' + +A letter from Heriot informed me that the affair between Edbury and me +was settled: he could not comprehend how. + +'What is this new Jury of Honour? Who are the jurymen?' he asked, and +affected wit. + +I thanked him for a thrashing in a curt reply. + +My father had left the house early in the morning. Mrs. Waddy believed +that he meant to dine that evening at the season's farewell dinner of the +Trump-Trick Club: 'Leastways, Tollingby has orders to lay out his +gentlemen's-dinners' evening-suit. Yesterday afternoon he flew down to +Chippenden, and was home late. To-day he's in the City, or one of the +squares. Lady Edbury's--ah! detained in town with the jaundice or +toothache. He said he was sending to France for a dentist: or was it +Germany, for some lady's eyes? I am sure I don't know. Well or ill, so +long as you're anything to him, he will abound. Pocket and purse! You +know him by this time, Mr. Harry. Oh, my heart!' + +A loud knock at the door had brought on the poor creature's palpitations. + +This visitor was no other than Prince Ernest. The name on his card was +Graf von Delzenburg, and it set my heart leaping to as swift a measure as +Mrs. Waddy's. + +Hearing that I was in the house, he desired to see me. + +We met, with a formal bow. + +'I congratulate you right heartily upon being out of the list of the +nekron,' he said, civilly. 'I am on my way to one of your watering- +places, whither my family should have preceded me. Do you publish the +names and addresses of visitors daily, as it is the custom with us?' + +I relieved his apprehensions on that head: 'Here and there, rarely; and +only at the hotels, I believe.' The excuse was furnished for offering +the princess's address. + +'Possibly, in a year or two, we may have the pleasure of welcoming you at +Sarkeld,' said the prince, extending his hand. 'Then, you have seen the +Countess of Delzenburg?' + +'On the day of her arrival, your Highness. Ladies of my family are +staying on the island.' + +'Ah?' + +He paused, and invited me to bow to him. We bowed thus in the room, in +the hall, and at the street-door. + +For what purpose could he have called on my father? To hear the worst at +once? That seemed likely, supposing him to have lost his peculiar +confidence in the princess, of which the courtly paces he had put me +through precluded me from judging. + +But I guessed acutely that it was not his intention to permit of my +meeting Ottilia a second time. The blow was hard: I felt it as if it had +been struck already, and thought I had gained resignation, until, like a +man reprieved on his road to execution, the narrowed circle of my heart +opened out to the breadth of the world in a minute. Returning from the +city, I hurried to my father's house, late in the afternoon, and heard +that he had started to overtake the prince, leaving word that the prince +was to be found at his address in the island. No doubt could exist +regarding the course I was bound to take. I drove to my grandfather, +stated my case to him, and by sheer vehemence took the wind out of his +sails; so that when I said, 'I am the only one alive who can control my +father,' he answered mildly, 'Seems t' other way,' and chose a small +snort for the indulgence of his private opinion. + +'What! this princess came over alone, and is down driving out with my +girl under an alias?' he said, showing sour aversion at the prospect of a +collision with the foreign species, as expressive as the ridge of a cat's +back. + +Temple came to dine with us, so I did not leave him quite to himself, and +Temple promised to accompany him down to the island. + +'Oh, go, if you like,' the fretted old man dismissed me: + +'I've got enough to think over. Hold him fast to stand up to me within +forty-eight hours, present time; you know who I mean; I've got a question +or two for him. How he treats his foreign princes and princesses don't +concern me. I'd say, like the Prevention-Cruelty-Animal's man to the +keeper of the menagerie, "Lecture 'em, wound their dignity, hurt their +feelings, only don't wop 'em." I don't wish any harm to them, but what +the deuce they do here nosing after my grandson! . . . There, go; we +shall be having it out ha' done with to-morrow or next day. I've run the +badger to earth, else I'm not fit to follow a scent.' + +He grumbled at having to consume other than his Riversley bread, butter, +beef, and ale for probably another fortnight. One of the boasts of +Riversley was, that while the rest of the world ate and drank poison, +the Grange lived on its own solid substance, defying malefactory Radical +tricksters. + +Temple was left to hear the rest. He had the sweetest of modest wishes +for a re-introduction to Ottilia. + + + + +CHAPTER L + +WE ARE ALL IN MY FATHER'S NET + +Journeying down by the mail-train in the face of a great sunken sunset +broken with cloud, I chanced to ask myself what it was that I seriously +desired to have. My purpose to curb my father was sincere and good; but +concerning my heart's desires, whitherward did they point? I thought of +Janet--she made me gasp for air; of Ottilia, and she made me long for +earth. Sharp, as I write it, the distinction smote me. I might have +been divided by an electrical shot into two halves, with such an equal +force was I drawn this way and that, pointing nowhither. To strangle the +thought of either one of them was like the pang of death; yet it did not +strike me that I loved the two: they were apart in my mind, actually as +if I had been divided. I passed the Riversley station under sombre +sunset fires, saddened by the fancy that my old home and vivacious Janet +were ashes, past hope. I came on the smell of salt air, and had that +other spirit of woman around me, of whom the controlled seadeeps were an +image, who spoke to my soul like starlight. Much wise counsel, and +impatience of the wisdom, went on within me. I walked like a man with a +yawning wound, and had to whip the sense of passion for a drug. Toward +which one it strove I know not; it was blind and stormy as the night. + +Not a boatman would take me across. The lights of the island lay like a +crown on the water. I paced the ramparts, eyeing them, breathing the +keen salt of thundering waves, until they were robbed of their magic by +the coloured Fast. + +It is, I have learnt, out of the conflict of sensations such as I then +underwent that a young man's brain and morality, supposing him not to +lean overmuch to sickly sentiment, becomes gradually enriched and +strengthened, and himself shaped for capable manhood. I was partly +conscious of a better condition in the morning; and a sober morning it +was to me after my long sentinel's step to and fro. I found myself +possessed of one key--whether the right one or not--wherewith to read the +princess, which was never possible to me when I was under stress of +passion, or of hope or despair; my perplexities over what she said, how +she looked, ceased to trouble me. I read her by this strange light: that +she was a woman who could only love intelligently--love, that is, in the +sense of giving herself. She had the power of passion, and it could be +stirred; but he who kindled it wrecked his chance if he could not stand +clear in her intellect's unsparing gaze. Twice already she must have +felt herself disillusioned by me. This third time, possibly, she blamed +her own fatally credulous tenderness, not me; but it was her third +awakening, and could affection and warmth of heart combat it? Her +child's enthusiasm for my country had prepared her for the impression +which the waxen mind of the dreamy invalid received deeply; and so, aided +by the emotional blood of youth, she gave me place in her imagination, +probing me still curiously, as I remembered, at a season when her sedate +mind was attaining to joint deliberations with the impulsive overgenerous +heart. + +Then ensued for her the successive shocks of discernment. She knew the +to have some of the vices, many follies, all the intemperateness of men +who carve a way for themselves in the common roads, if barely they do +that. And resembling common men (men, in a judgement elective as hers, +common, however able), I was not assuredly to be separated by her from my +associations; from the thought of my father, for example. Her look at +him in the lake-palace library, and her manner in unfolding and folding +his recent letter to her, and in one or two necessitated allusions, +embraced a kind of grave, pitiful humour, beyond smiles or any outward +expression, as if the acknowledgement that it was so quite obliterated +the wonder that it should be so--that one such as he could exercise +influence upon her destiny. Or she may have made her reckoning +generally, not personally, upon our human destinies: it is the more +likely, if, as I divine, the calm oval of her lifted eyelids contemplated +him in the fulness of the recognition that this world, of which we hope +unuttered things, can be shifted and swayed by an ignis-fatuus. The +father of one now seen through, could hardly fail of being transfixed +himself. It was horrible to think of. I would rather have added a vice +to my faults than that she should have penetrated him. + +Nearing the island, I was reminded of the early morning when I landed on +the Flemish flats. I did not expect a similar surprise, but before my +rowers had pulled in, the tall beaconhead of old Schwartz notified that +his mistress might be abroad. Janet walked with her. I ran up the steps +to salute them, and had Ottilia's hand in mine. + +'Prince Ernest has arrived?' + +'My father came yesterday evening.' + +'Do you leave to-day?' + +'I cannot tell; he will decide.' + +It seemed a good omen, until I scanned Janet's sombre face. + +'You will not see us out for the rest of the day, Harry,' said she. + +'That is your arrangement?' + +'It is.' + +'Your own?' + +'Mine, if you like.' + +There was something hard in her way of speaking, as though she blamed me, +and the princess were under her protection against me. She vouchsafed no +friendly significance of look and tone. + +In spite of my readiness to criticize her (which in our language means +condemn) for always assuming leadership with whomsoever she might be, I +was impressed by the air of high-bred friendliness existing between her +and the princess. Their interchange was pleasant to hear. Ottilia had +caught the spirit of her frank manner of speech; and she, though in a +less degree, the princess's fine ease and sweetness. They conversed, +apparently, like equal minds. On material points, Janet unhesitatingly +led. It was she who brought the walk to a close. + +'Now, Harry, you had better go and have a little sleep. I should like to +speak to you early.' + +Ottilia immediately put her hand out to me. + +I begged permission to see her to her door. + +Janet replied for her, indicating old Schwartz: 'We have a protector, you +see, six feet and a half.' + +An hour later, Schwartz was following her to the steps of her hotel. She +saw me, and waited. For a wonder, she displayed reluctance in +disburdening herself of what she had to say. 'Harry, you know that he +has come? He and Prince Ernest came together. Get him to leave the +island at once: he can return to-morrow. Grandada writes of wishing to +see him. Get him away to-day.' + +'Is the prince going to stay here?' I asked. + +'No. I daresay I am only guessing; I hope so. He has threatened the +prince.' + +'What with?' + +'Oh! Harry, can't you understand? I'm no reader of etiquette, but even +I can see that the story of a young princess travelling over to England +alone to visit . . . and you . . ., and her father fetching her +away! The prince is almost at his mercy, unless you make the man behave +like a gentleman. This is exactly the thing Miss Goodwin feared!' + +'But who's to hear of the story?' said I. + +Janet gave an impatient sigh. + +'Do you mean that my father has threatened to publish it, Janet?' + +'I won't say he has. He has made the prince afraid to move: that I think +is true.' + +'Did the princess herself mention it to you?' + +'She understands her situation, I am sure.' + +'Did she speak of "the man," as you call him?' + +'Yes: not as I do. You must try by-and-by to forgive me. Whether he set +a trap or not, he has decoyed her--don't frown at words--and it remains +for you to act as I don't doubt you will; but lose no time. Determine. +Oh! if I were a man!' + +'You would muzzle us?' + +'Muzzle, or anything you please; I would make any one related to me +behave honourably. I would give him the alternative . . .' + +'You foolish girl! suppose he took it?' + +'I would make him feel my will. He should not take it. Keep to the +circumstances, Harry. If you have no control over him--I should think I +was not fit to live, in such a position! No control over him at a moment +like this? and the princess in danger of having her reputation hurt! +Surely, Harry! But why should I speak to you as if you were undecided!' + +'Where is he?' + +'At the house where you sleep. He surrendered his rooms here very +kindly.' + +'Aunty has seen him?' + +Janet blushed: I thought I knew why. It was for subtler reasons than I +should have credited her with conceiving. + +'She sent for him, at my request, late last night. She believed her +influence would be decisive. So do I. She could not even make the man +perceive that he was acting--to use her poor dear old-fashioned word-- +reprehensibly in frightening the prince to further your interests. From +what I gathered he went off in a song about them. She said he talked so +well! And aunty Dorothy, too! I should nearly as soon have expected +grandada to come in for his turn of the delusion. How I wish he was +here! Uberly goes by the first boat to bring him down. I feel with Miss +Goodwin that it will be a disgrace for all of us--the country's disgrace. +As for our family! . . . Harry, and your name! Good-bye. Do your +best.' + +I was in the mood to ask, 'On behalf of the country?' She had, however, +a glow and a ringing articulation in her excitement that forbade +trifling; a minute's reflection set me weighing my power of will against +my father's. I nodded to her. + +'Come to us when you are at liberty,' she called. + +I have said that I weighed my power of will against my father's. +Contemplation of the state of the scales did not send me striding to meet +him. Let it be remembered--I had it strongly in memory that he +habitually deluded himself under the supposition that the turn of all +events having an aspect of good fortune had been planned by him of old, +and were offered to him as the legitimately-won fruits of a politic life. +While others deemed him mad, or merely reckless, wild, a creature living +for the day, he enjoyed the conceit of being a profound schemer, in which +he was fortified by a really extraordinary adroitness to take advantage +of occurrences: and because he was prompt in an emergency, and quick to +profit of a crisis, he was deluded to imagine that he had created it. +Such a man would be with difficulty brought to surrender his prize. + +Again, there was his love for me. 'Pater est, Pamphile;--difficile est.' +How was this vast conceit of a not unreal paternal love to be +encountered? The sense of honour and of decency might appeal to him +personally; would either of them get a hearing if he fancied them to be +standing in opposition to my dearest interests? I, unhappily, as the +case would be sure to present itself to him, appeared the living example +of his eminently politic career. After establishing me the heir of one +of the wealthiest of English commoners, would he be likely to forego any +desperate chance of ennobling me by the brilliant marriage? His dreadful +devotion to me extinguished the hope that he would, unless I should +happen to be particularly masterful in dealing with him. I heard his +nimble and overwhelming volubility like a flood advancing. That could be +withstood, and his arguments and persuasions. But by what steps could I +restrain the man himself? I said 'the man,' as Janet did. He figured in +my apprehensive imagination as an engine more than as an individual. +Lassitude oppressed me. I felt that I required every access of strength +possible, physical besides moral, in anticipation of our encounter, and +took a swim in sea-water, which displaced my drowsy fit, and some +alarming intimations of cowardice menacing a paralysis of the will: I had +not altogether recovered from my gipsy drubbing. And now I wanted to +have the contest over instantly. It seemed presumable that my father had +slept at my lodgings. There, however, the report of him was, that he had +inspected the rooms, highly complimented the owner of them, and vanished. + +Returning to the pier, I learnt that he had set sail in his hired yacht +for the sister town on the Solent, at an early hour:--for what purpose? +I knew of it too late to intercept it. One of the squire's horses +trotted me over; I came upon Colonel Hibbert Segrave near the Club-house, +and heard that my father was off again: + +'But your German prince and papa-in-law shall be free of the Club for the +next fortnight,' said he, and cordially asked to have the date of the +marriage. My face astonished him. He excused himself for speaking of +this happy event so abruptly. A sting of downright anger drove me back +at a rapid canter. It flashed on me that this Prince Ernest, whose suave +fashion of depressing me, and philosophical skill in managing his +daughter, had induced me to regard him as a pattern of astuteness, was +really both credulous and feeble, or else supremely unsuspecting: and I +was confirmed in the latter idea on hearing that he had sailed to visit +the opposite harbour and docks on board my father's yacht. Janet shared +my secret opinion. + +'The prince is a gentleman,' she said. + +Her wrath and disgust were unspeakable. My aunt Dorothy blamed her for +overdue severity. 'The prince, I suppose, goes of his own free will +where he pleases.' + +Janet burst out, 'Oh! can't you see through it, aunty? The prince goes +about without at all knowing that the person who takes him--Harry sees +it--is making him compromise himself: and by-and-by the prince will +discover that he has no will of his own, whatever he may wish to resolve +upon doing.' + +'Is he quite against Harry?' asked my aunt Dorothy. + +'Dear aunty, he 's a prince, and a proud man. He will never in his +lifetime consent to . . . to what you mean, without being hounded +into it. I haven't the slightest idea whether anything will force him. +I know that the princess would have too much pride to submit, even to +save her name. But it 's her name that 's in danger. Think of the +scandal to a sovereign princess! I know the signification of that now; I +used to laugh at Harry's "sovereign princess." She is one, and thorough! +there is no one like her. Don't you understand, aunty, that the +intrigue, plot--I don't choose to be nice upon terms--may be perfectly +successful, and do good to nobody. The prince may be tricked; the +princess, I am sure, will not.' + +Janet's affectation of an intimate and peculiar knowledge of the princess +was a show of her character that I was accustomed to: still, it was +evident they had conversed much, and perhaps intimately. I led her to +tell me that the princess had expressed no views upon my father. 'He +does not come within her scope, Harry.' 'Scope' was one of Janet's new +words, wherewith she would now and then fall to seasoning a serviceable +but savourless outworn vocabulary of the common table. In spite of that +and other offences, rendered prominent to me by the lifting of her lip +and her frown when she had to speak of my father, I was on her side, not +on his. Her estimation of the princess was soundly based. She discerned +exactly the nature of Ottilia's entanglement, and her peril. + +She and my aunt Dorothy passed the afternoon with Ottilia, while I +crossed the head of the street, looking down at the one house, where the +princess was virtually imprisoned, either by her father's express +injunction or her own discretion. And it was as well that she should not +be out. The yachting season had brought many London men to the island. +I met several who had not forgotten the newspaper-paragraph assertions +and contradictions. Lord Alton, Admiral Loftus, and others were on the +pier and in the outfitters' shops, eager for gossip, as the languid +stretch of indolence inclines men to be. The Admiral asked me for the +whereabout of Prince Ernest's territory. He too said that the prince +would be free of the Club during his residence, adding: + +'Where is he?'--not a question demanding an answer. The men might have +let the princess go by, but there would have been questions urgently +demanding answers had she been seen by their women. + +Late in the evening my father's yacht was sighted from the pier. Just as +he reached his moorings, and his boat was hauled round, the last steamer +came in. Sharp-eyed Janet saw the squire on board among a crowd, and +Temple next to him, supporting his arm. + +'Has grandada been ill?' she exclaimed. + +My chief concern was to see my father's head rising in the midst of the +crowd, uncovering repeatedly. Prince Ernest and General Goodwin were +behind him, stepping off the lower pier-platform. The General did not +look pleased. My grandfather, with Janet holding his arm, in the place +of Temple, stood waiting to see that his man had done his duty by the +luggage. + +My father, advancing, perceived me, and almost taking the squire into his +affectionate salutation, said: + +'Nothing could be more opportune than your arrival, Mr. Beltham.' + +The squire rejoined: 'I wanted to see you, Mr. Richmond; and not in +public.' + +'I grant the private interview, sir, at your convenience.' + +Janet went up to General Goodwin. My father talked to me, and lost a +moment in shaking Temple's hand and saying kind things. + +'Name any hour you please, Mr. Beltham,' he resumed; 'meantime, I shall +be glad to effect the introduction between Harry's grandfather and his +Highness Prince Ernest of Eppenwelzen-Sarkeld.' + +He turned. General Goodwin was hurrying the prince up the steps, the +squire at the same time retreating hastily. I witnessed the spectacle of +both parties to the projected introduction swinging round to make their +escape. My father glanced to right and left. He covered in the airiest +fashion what would have been confusion to another by carrying on a jocose +remark that he had left half spoken to Temple, and involved Janet in it, +and soon--through sheer amiable volubility and his taking manner--the +squire himself for a minute or so. + +'Harry, I have to tell you she is not unhappy,' Janet whispered rapidly. +'She is reading of one of our great men alive now. She is glad to be on +our ground.' Janet named a famous admiral, kindling as a fiery beacon to +our blood. She would have said more: she looked the remainder; but she +could have said nothing better fitted to spur me to the work she wanted +done. Mournfulness dropped on me like a cloud in thinking of the bright +little princess of my boyhood, and the Ottilia of to-day, faithful to her +early passion for our sea-heroes and my country, though it had grievously +entrapped her. And into what hands! Not into hands which could cast one +ray of honour on a devoted head. The contrast between the sane service-- +giving men she admired, and the hopping skipping social meteor, weaver of +webs, thrower of nets, who offered her his history for a nuptial +acquisition, was ghastly, most discomforting. He seemed to have +entangled us all. + +He said that he had. He treated me now confessedly as a cipher. The +prince, the princess, my grandfather, and me--he had gathered us +together, he said. I heard from him that the prince, assisted by him in +the part of an adviser, saw no way of cutting the knot but by a marriage. +All were at hand for a settlement of the terms:--Providence and destiny +were dragged in. + +'Let's have no theatrical talk,' I interposed. + +'Certainly, Richie; the plainest English,' he assented. + +This was on the pier, while he bowed and greeted passing figures. I +dared not unlink my arm, for fear of further mischief. I got him to my +rooms, and insisted on his dining there. + +'Dry bread will do,' he said. + +My anticipations of the nature of our wrestle were correct. But I had +not expected him to venture on the assertion that the prince was for the +marriage. He met me at every turn with this downright iteration. 'The +prince consents: he knows his only chance is to yield. I have him fast.' + +'How?' I inquired. + +'How, Richie? Where is your perspicuity? I have him here. I loosen a +thousand tongues on him. I--' + +'No, not on him; on the princess, you mean.' + +'On him. The princess is the willing party; she and you are one. On +him, I say. 'Tis but a threat: I hold it in terrorem. And by heaven, +son Richie, it assures me I have not lived and fought for nothing. "Now +is the day and now is the hour." On your first birthday, my boy, I swore +to marry you to one of the highest ladies upon earth: she was, as it +turns out, then unborn. No matter: I keep my oath. Abandon it? pooh! +you are--forgive me--silly. Pardon me for remarking it, you have not +that dashing courage--never mind. The point is, I have my prince in his +trap. We are perfectly polite, but I have him, and he acknowledges it; +he shrugs: love has beaten him. Very well. And observe: I permit no +squire-of-low-degree insinuations; none of that. The lady--all earthly +blessings on her!--does not stoop to Harry Richmond. I have the +announcement in the newspapers. I maintain it the fruit of a life of +long and earnest endeavour, legitimately won, by heaven it is! and with +the constituted authorities of my native land against me. Your grandad +proposes formally for the princess to-morrow morning.' + +He maddened me. Merely to keep him silent I burst out in a flux of +reproaches as torrent-like as his own could be; and all the time I was +wondering whether it was true that a man who talked as he did, in his +strain of florid flimsy, had actually done a practical thing. + +The effect of my vehemence was to brace him and make him sedately +emphatic. He declared himself to have gained entire possession of the +prince's mind. He repeated his positive intention to employ his power +for my benefit. Never did power of earth or of hell seem darker to me +than he at that moment, when solemnly declaiming that he was prepared to +forfeit my respect and love, die sooner than 'yield his prince.' He wore +a new aspect, spoke briefly and pointedly, using the phrases of a +determined man, and in voice and gesture signified that he had us all in +a grasp of iron. The charge of his having plotted to bring it about he +accepted with exultation. + +'I admit,' he said, 'I did not arrange to have Germany present for a +witness besides England, but since he is here, I take advantage of the +fact, and to-morrow you will see young Eckart down.' + +I cried out, as much enraged at my feebleness to resist him, as in +disgust of his unscrupulous tricks. + +'Ay, you have not known me, Richie,' said he. 'I pilot you into harbour, +and all you can do is just the creaking of the vessel to me. You are in +my hands. I pilot you. I have you the husband of the princess within +the month. No other course is open to her. And I have the assurance +that she loses nothing by it. She is yours, my son.' + +'She will not be. You have wrecked my last chance. You cover me with +dishonour.' + +'You are a youngster, Richie. 'Tis the wish of her heart. Probably +while you and I are talking it over, the prince is confessing that he has +no escape. He has not a loophole! She came to you; you take her. I am +far from withholding my admiration of her behaviour; but there it is--she +came. Not consent? She is a ruined woman if she refuses!' + +'Through you, through you!--through my father!' + +'Have you both gone mad?' + +'Try to see this,' I implored him. 'She will not be subjected by any +threats. The very whisper of one will make her turn from me . . .' + +He interrupted. 'Totally the contrary. The prince acknowledges that you +are master of her affections.' + +'Consistently with her sense of honour and respect for us.' + +'Tell me of her reputation, Richie.' + +'You pretend that you can damage it!' + +'Pretend? I pretend in the teeth of all concerned to establish her +happiness and yours, and nothing human shall stop me. I have you +grateful to me before your old dad lays his head on his last pillow. +And that reminds me: I surrender my town house and furniture to you. +Waddy has received the word. By the way, should you hear of a good +doctor for heart-disease, tell me: I have my fears for the poor soul.' + +He stood up, saying, 'Richie, I am not like Jorian, to whom a lodging- +house dinner is no dinner, and an irreparable loss, but I must have air. +I go forth on a stroll.' + +It was impossible for me to allow it. I stopped him. + +We were in the midst of a debate as to his right of personal freedom, +upon the singularity of which he commented with sundry ejaculations, when +Temple arrived and General Goodwin sent up his card. Temple and I left +the general closeted with my father, and stood at the street-door. He +had seen the princess, having at her request been taken to present his +respects to her by Janet. How she looked, what she said, he was dull in +describing; he thought her lively, though she was pale. She had +mentioned my name, 'kindly,' he observed. And he knew, or suspected, the +General to be an emissary from the prince. But he could not understand +the exact nature of the complication, and plagued me with a mixture of +blunt inquiries and the delicate reserve proper to him so much that I had +to look elsewhere for counsel and sympathy. Janet had told him +everything; still he was plunged in wonder, tempting me to think the +lawyer's mind of necessity bourgeois, for the value of a sentiment seemed +to have no weight in his estimation of the case. Nor did he appear +disinclined to excuse my father. Some of his remarks partly swayed me, +in spite of my seeing that they were based on the supposition of an 'all +for love' adventure of a mad princess. They whispered a little hope, +when I was adoring her passionately for being the reverse of whatever +might have given hope a breath. + +General Goodwin, followed by my father, came down and led me aside after +I had warned Temple not to let my father elude him. The General was +greatly ruffled. 'Clara tells me she can rely on you,' he said. 'I am +at the end of my arguments with that man, short of sending him to the +lock-up. You will pardon me, Mr. Harry; I foresaw the scrapes in store +for you, and advised you.' + +'You did, General,' I confessed. 'Will you tell me what it is Prince +Ernest is in dread of?' + +'A pitiable scandal, sir; and if he took my recommendation, he would find +instant means of punishing the man who dares to threaten him. You know +it.' + +I explained that I was aware of the threat, not of the degree of the +prince's susceptibility; and asked him if he had seen the princess. + +'I have had the honour,' he replied, stiffly. 'You gain nothing with her +by this infamous proceeding.' + +I swallowed my anger, and said, 'Do you accuse me, General?' + +'I do not accuse you,' he returned, unbendingly. 'You chose your path +some ten or twelve years ago, and you must take the consequences. +I foresaw it; but this I will say, I did not credit the man with his +infernal cleverness. If I speak to you at all, I must speak my mind. +I thought him a mere buffoon and spendthrift, flying his bar-sinister +story for the sake of distinction. He has schemed up to this point +successfully: he has the prince in his toils. I would cut through them, +as I have informed Prince Ernest. I daresay different positions lead to +different reasonings; the fellow appears to have a fascination over him. +Your father, Mr. Harry, is guilty now--he is guilty, I reiterate, now of +a piece of iniquity that makes me ashamed to own him for a countryman.' + +The General shook himself erect. 'Are you unable to keep him in?' he +asked. + +My nerves were pricking and stinging with the insults I had to listen to, +and conscience's justification of them. + +He repeated the question. + +'I will do what I can,' I said, unsatisfactorily to myself and to him, +for he transposed our situations, telling me the things he would say and +do in my place; things not dissimilar to those I had already said and +done, only more toweringly enunciated; and for that reason they struck me +as all the more hopelessly ineffectual, and made me despair. + +My dumbness excited his ire. 'Come,' said he; 'the lady is a spoilt +child. She behaved foolishly; but from your point of view you should +feel bound to protect her on that very account. Do your duty, young +gentleman. He is, I believe, fond of you, and if so, you have him by a +chain. I tell you frankly, I hold you responsible.' + +His way of speaking of the princess opened an idea of the world's, in the +event of her name falling into its clutches. + +I said again, 'I will do what I can,' and sang out for Temple. + +He was alone. My father had slipped from him to leave a card at the +squire's hotel. General Goodwin touched Temple on the shoulder kindly, +in marked contrast to his treatment of me, and wished us good-night. +Nothing had been heard of my father by Janet, but while I was sitting +with her, at a late hour, his card was brought up, and a pencilled +entreaty for an interview the next morning. + +'That will suit grandada,' Janet said. 'He commissioned me before going +to bed to write the same for him.' + +She related that the prince was in a state of undisguised distraction. +From what I could comprehend--it appeared incredible--he regarded his +daughter's marriage as the solution of the difficulty, the sole way out +of the meshes. + +'Is not that her wish?' said Temple; perhaps with a wish of his own. + +'Oh, if you think a lady like the Princess Ottilia is led by her wishes,' +said Janet. Her radiant perception of an ideal in her sex (the first she +ever had) made her utterly contemptuous toward the less enlightened. + +We appointed the next morning at half-past eleven for my father's visit. + +'Not a minute later,' Janet said in my ear, urgently. 'Don't--don't let +him move out of your sight, Harry! The princess is convinced you are +not to blame.' + +I asked her whether she had any knowledge of the squire's designs. + +'I have not, on my honour,' she answered. 'But I hope . . . It is so +miserable to think of this disgraceful thing! She is too firm to give +way. She does not blame you. I am sure I do not; only, Harry, one +always feels that if one were in another's place, in a case like this, +I could and would command him. I would have him obey me. One is not +born to accept disgrace even from a father. I should say, "You shall not +stir, if you mean to act dishonourably." One is justified, I am sure, in +breaking a tie of relationship that involves you in dishonour. Grandada +has not spoken a word to me on the subject. I catch at straws. This +thing burns me! Oh, good-night, Harry. I can't sleep.' + +'Good-night,' she called softly to Temple on the stairs below. I heard +the poor fellow murmuring good-night to himself in the street, and +thought him happier than I. He slept at a room close to the hotel. + +A note from Clara Goodwin adjured me, by her memory of the sweet, brave, +gracious fellow she loved in other days, to be worthy of what I had been. +The General had unnerved her reliance on me. + +I sat up for my father until long past midnight. When he came his +appearance reminded me of the time of his altercation with Baroness +Turckems under the light of the blazing curtains: he had supped and drunk +deeply, and he very soon proclaimed that I should find him invincible, +which, as far as insensibility to the strongest appeals to him went, he +was. + +'Deny you love her, deny she loves you, deny you are one--I knot you +fast!' + +He had again seen Prince Ernest; so he said, declaring that the Prince +positively desired the marriage; would have it. 'And I,' he dramatized +their relative situations, 'consented.' + +After my experience of that night, I forgive men who are unmoved by +displays of humour. Commonly we think it should be irresistible. His +description of the thin-skinned sensitive prince striving to run and +dodge for shelter from him, like a fever-patient pursued by a North- +easter, accompanied by dozens of quaint similes full of his mental +laughter, made my loathing all the more acute. But I had not been an +equal match for him previous to his taking wine; it was waste of breath +and heart to contend with him. I folded my arms tight, sitting rigidly +silent, and he dropped on the sofa luxuriously. + +'Bed, Richie!' he waved to me. 'You drink no wine, you cannot stand +dissipation as I do. Bed, my dear boy! I am a God, sir, inaccessible to +mortal ailments! Seriously, dear boy, I have never known an illness in +my life. I have killed my hundreds of poor devils who were for imitating +me. This I boast--I boast constitution. And I fear, Richie, you have +none of my superhuman strength. Added to that, I know I am watched over. +I ask--I have: I scheme the tricks are in my hand! It may be the doing +of my mother in heaven; there is the fact for you to reflect on. "Stand +not in my way, nor follow me too far," would serve me for a motto +admirably, and you can put it in Latin, Richie. Bed! You shall turn +your scholarship to account as I do my genius in your interest. On my +soul, that motto in Latin will requite me. Now to bed.' + +'No,' said I. 'You have got away from me once. I shall keep you in +sight and hearing, if I have to lie at your door for it. You will go +with me to London to-morrow. I shall treat you as a man I have to guard, +and I shall not let you loose before I am quite sure of you.' + +'Loose!' he exclaimed, throwing up an arm and a leg. + +'I mean, sir, that you shall be in my presence wherever you are, and I +will take care you don't go far and wide. It's useless to pretend +astonishment. I don't argue and I don't beseech any further: I just sit +on guard, as I would over a powder-cask.' + +My father raised himself on an elbow. 'The explosion,' he said, +examining his watch, 'occurred at about five minutes to eleven--we are +advancing into the morning--last night. I received on your behalf the +congratulations of friends Loftus, Alton, Segrave, and the rest, at that +hour. So, my dear Richie, you are sitting on guard over the empty +magazine.' + +I listened with a throbbing forehead, and controlled the choking in my +throat, to ask him whether he had touched the newspapers. + +'Ay, dear lad, I have sprung my mine in them,' he replied. + +'You have sent word--?' + +'I have despatched a paragraph to the effect, that the prince and +princess have arrived to ratify the nuptial preliminaries.' + +'You expect it to appear this day?' + +'Or else my name and influence are curiously at variance with the +confidence I repose in them, Richie.' + +'Then I leave you to yourself,' I said. 'Prince Ernest knows he has to +expect this statement in the papers?' + +'We trumped him with that identical court-card, Richie.' + +'Very well. To-morrow, after we have been to my grandfather, you and I +part company for good, sir. It costs me too much.' + +'Dear old Richie,' he laughed, gently. 'And now to bye-bye! My blessing +on you now and always.' + +He shut his eyes. + + + + +CHAPTER LI + +AN ENCOUNTER SHOWING MY FATHER'S GENIUS IN A STRONG LIGHT + +The morning was sultry with the first rising of the sun. I knew that +Ottilia and Janet would be out. For myself, I dared not leave the house. +I sat in my room, harried by the most penetrating snore which can ever +have afflicted wakeful ears. It proclaimed so deep-seated a peacefulness +in the bosom of the disturber, and was so arrogant, so ludicrous, and +inaccessible to remonstrance, that it sounded like a renewal of our +midnight altercation on the sleeper's part. Prolonged now and then +beyond all bounds, it ended in the crashing blare whereof utter +wakefulness cannot imagine honest sleep to be capable, but a playful +melody twirled back to the regular note. He was fast asleep on the +sitting-room sofa, while I walked fretting and panting. To this twinship +I seemed condemned. In my heart nevertheless there was a reserve of +wonderment at his apparent astuteness and resolution, and my old love for +him whispered disbelief in his having disgraced me. Perhaps it was +wilful self-deception. It helped me to meet him with a better face. + +We both avoided the subject of our difference for some time: he would +evidently have done so altogether, and used his best and sweetest manner +to divert me: but when I struck on it, asking him if he had indeed told +me the truth last night, his features clouded as though with an effort of +patience. To my consternation, he suddenly broke away, with his arms up, +puffing and stammering, stamping his feet. He would have a truce--he +insisted on a truce, I understood him to exclaim, and that I was like a +woman, who would and would not, and wanted a master. He raved of the +gallant down-rightedness of the young bloods of his day, and how +splendidly this one and that had compassed their ends by winning great +ladies, lawfully, or otherwise. For several minutes he was in a state of +frenzy, appealing to his pattern youths of a bygone generation, as to +moral principles--stuttering, and of a dark red hue from the neck to the +temples. I refrained from a scuffle of tongues. Nor did he excuse +himself after he had cooled. His hand touched instinctively for his +pulse, and, with a glance at the ceiling, he exclaimed, 'Good Lord!' and +brought me to his side. 'These wigwam houses check my circulation,' said +he. 'Let us go out-let us breakfast on board.' + +The open air restored him, and he told me that he had been merely +oppressed by the architect of the inferior classes, whose ceiling sat on +his head. My nerves, he remarked to me, were very exciteable. 'You +should take your wine, Richie,--you require it. Your dear mother had a +low-toned nervous system.' I was silent, and followed him, at once a +captive and a keeper. + +This day of slackened sails and a bright sleeping water kept the +yachtsmen on land; there was a crowd to meet the morning boat. Foremost +among those who stepped out of it was the yellow-haired Eckart, little +suspecting what the sight of him signalled to me. I could scarcely greet +him at all, for in him I perceived that my father had fully committed +himself to his plot, and left me nothing to hope. Eckart said something +of Prince Hermann. As we were walking off the pier, I saw Janet +conversing with Prince Ernest, and the next minute Hermann himself was +one of the group. I turned to Eckart for an explanation. + +'Didn't I tell you he called at your house in London and travelled down +with me this morning!' said Eckart. + +My father looked in the direction of the princes, but his face was for +the moment no index. They bowed to Janet, and began talking hurriedly in +the triangle of road between her hotel, the pier, and the way to the +villas: passing on, and coming to a full halt, like men who are not +reserving their minds. My father stept out toward them. He was met by +Prince Ernest. Hermann turned his back. + +It being the hour of the appointment, I delivered Eckart over to Temple's +safe-keeping, and went up to Janet. 'Don't be late, Harry,' she said. + +I asked her if she knew the object of the meeting appointed by my +grandfather. + +She answered impatiently, 'Do get him away from the prince.' And then: +'I ought to tell you the princess is well, and so on--pardon me just now: +Grandada is kept waiting, and I don't like it.' + +Her actual dislike was to see Prince Ernest in dialogue with my father, +it seemed to me; and the manner of both, which was, one would have said, +intimate, anything but the manner of adversaries. Prince Ernest appeared +to affect a pleasant humour; he twice, after shaking my father's hand, +stepped back to him, as if to renew some impression. Their attitude +declared them to be on the best of terms. Janet withdrew her attentive +eyes from observing them, and threw a world of meaning into her +abstracted gaze at me. My father's advance put her to flight. + +Yet she gave him the welcome of a high-bred young woman when he entered +the drawing-room of my grandfather's hotel-suite. She was alone, and she +obliged herself to accept conversation graciously. He recommended her to +try the German Baths for the squire's gout, and evidently amused her with +his specific probations for English persons designing to travel in +company, that they should previously live together in a house with a +collection of undisciplined chambermaids, a musical footman, and a mad +cook: to learn to accommodate their tempers. 'I would add a touch of +earthquake, Miss Ilchester, just to make sure that all the party know one +another's edges before starting.' This was too far a shot of nonsense +for Janet, whose native disposition was to refer to lunacy or stupidity, +or trickery, whatsoever was novel to her understanding. 'I, for my +part,' said he, 'stipulate to have for comrade no man who fancies himself +a born and stamped chieftain, no inveterate student of maps, and no dog +with a turn for feeling himself pulled by the collar. And that reminds +me you are amateur of dogs. Have you a Pomeranian boar-hound?' + +'No,' said Janet; 'I have never even seen one' + +'That high.' My father raised his hand flat. + +'Bigger than our Newfoundlands!' + +'Without exaggeration, big as a pony. You will permit me to send you +one, warranted to have passed his distemper, which can rarely be done for +our human species, though here and there I venture to guarantee my man as +well as my dog.' + +Janet interposed her thanks, declining to take the dog, but he dwelt on +the dog's charms, his youth, stature, appearance, fitness, and grandeur, +earnestly. I had to relieve her apprehensions by questioning where the +dog was. + +'In Germany,' he said. + +It was not improbable, nor less so that the dog was in Pomerania +likewise. + +The entry of my aunt Dorothy, followed by my grandfather, was silent. + +'Be seated,' the old man addressed us in a body, to cut short particular +salutations. + +My father overshadowed him with drooping shoulders. + +Janet wished to know whether she was to remain. + +'I like you by me always,' he answered, bluff and sharp. + +'We have some shopping to do,' my aunt Dorothy murmured, showing she was +there against her will. + +'Do you shop out of London?' said my father; and for some time he +succeeded in making us sit for the delusive picture of a comfortable +family meeting. + +My grandfather sat quite still, Janet next to him. 'When you've +finished, Mr. Richmond,' he remarked. + +'Mr. Beltham, I was telling Miss Beltham that I join in the abuse of +London exactly because I love it. A paradox! she says. But we seem to +be effecting a kind of insurance on the life of the things we love best +by crying them down violently. You have observed it? Denounce them-- +they endure for ever! So I join any soul on earth in decrying our dear +London. The naughty old City can bear it.' + +There was a clearing of throats. My aunt Dorothy's foot tapped the +floor. + +'But I presume you have done me the honour to invite me to this +conference on a point of business, Mr. Beltham?' said my father, +admonished by the hint. + +'I have, sir,' the squire replied. + +'And I also have a point. And, in fact, it is urgent, and with your +permission, Mr. Beltham, I will lead the way.' + +'No, sir, if you please. + +I'm a short speaker, and go to it at once, and I won't detain you a +second after you've answered me.' + +My father nodded to this, with the conciliatory comment that it was +business-like. + +The old man drew out his pocket-book. + +'You paid a debt,' he said deliberately, 'amounting to twenty-one +thousand pounds to my grandson's account.' + +'Oh! a debt! I did, sir. Between father and boy, dad and lad; debts! +. . . but use your own terms, I pray you.' + +' I don't ask you where that money is now. I ask you to tell me where +you got it from.' + +'You speak bluntly, my dear sir.' + +'You won't answer, then?' + +'You ask the question as a family matter? I reply with alacrity, to the +best of my ability: and with my hand on my heart, Mr. Beltham, let me +assure you, I very heartily desire the information to be furnished to me. +Or rather--why should I conceal it? The sources are irregular, but a +child could toddle its way to them--you take my indication. Say that I +obtained it from my friends. My friends, Mr. Beltham, are of the kind +requiring squeezing. Government, as my chum and good comrade, Jorian +DeWitt, is fond of saying, is a sponge--a thing that when you dive deep +enough to catch it gives liberal supplies, but will assuredly otherwise +reverse the process by acting the part of an absorbent. I get what I get +by force of arms, or I might have perished long since.' + +'Then you don't know where you got it from, sir?' + +'Technically, you are correct, sir.' + +'A bird didn't bring it, and you didn't find it in the belly of a fish.' + +'Neither of these prodigies. They have occurred in books I am bound to +believe; they did not happen to me.' + +'You swear to me you don't know the man, woman, or committee, who gave +you that sum?' + +'I do not know, Mr. Beltham. In an extraordinary history, extraordinary +circumstances! I have experienced so many that I am surprised at +nothing.' + +'You suppose you got it from some fool?' + +'Oh! if you choose to indict Government collectively?' + +'You pretend you got it from Government?' + +'I am termed a Pretender by some, Mr. Beltham. The facts are these: I +promised to refund the money, and I fulfilled the promise. There you +have the only answer I can make to you. Now to my own affair. I come to +request you to demand the hand of the Princess of Eppenwelzen-Sarkeld on +behalf of my son Harry, your grandson; and I possess the assurance of the +prince, her father, that it will be granted. Doubtless you, sir, are of +as old a blood as the prince himself. You will acknowledge that the +honour brought to the family by an hereditary princess is considerable: +it is something. I am prepared to accompany you to his Highness, or not, +as you please. It is but a question of dotation, and a selection from +one or two monosyllables.' + +Janet shook her dress. + +The squire replied: 'We 'll take that up presently. I haven't quite +done. Will you tell me what agent paid you the sum of money?' + +'The usual agent--a solicitor, Mr. Beltham; a gentleman whose business +lay amongst the aristocracy; he is defunct; and a very worthy old +gentleman he was, with a remarkable store of anecdotes of his patrons, +very discreetly told: for you never heard a name from him.' + +'You took him for an agent of Government, did you? why?' + +'To condense a long story, sir, the kernel of the matter is, that almost +from the hour I began to stir for the purpose of claiming my rights-- +which are transparent enough this old gentleman--certainly from no +sinister motive, I may presume--commenced the payment of an annuity; not +sufficient for my necessities, possibly, but warrant of an agreeable sort +for encouraging my expectations; although oddly, this excellent old Mr. +Bannerbridge invariably served up the dish in a sauce that did not agree +with it, by advising me of the wish of the donator that I should abandon +my Case. I consequently, in common with my friends, performed a little +early lesson in arithmetic, and we came to the one conclusion open to +reflective minds--namely, that I was feared.' + +My aunt Dorothy looked up for the first time. + +'Janet and I have some purchases to make,' she said. + +The squire signified sharply that she must remain where she was. + +'I think aunty wants fresh air; she had a headache last night,' said +Janet. + +I suggested that, as my presence did not seem to be required, I could +take her on my arm for a walk to the pier-head. + +Her face was burning; she would gladly have gone out, but the squire +refused to permit it, and she nodded over her crossed hands, saying that +she was in no hurry. + +'Ha! I am,' quoth he. + +'Dear Miss Beltham !' my father ejaculated solicitously. 'Here, sir, +oblige me by attending to me,' cried the squire, fuming and blinking. +'I sent for you on a piece of business. You got this money through a +gentleman, a solicitor, named Bannerbridge, did you?' + +'His name was Bannerbridge, Mr. Beltham.' + +'Dorothy, you knew a Mr. Bannerbridge?' + +She faltered: 'I knew him .... Harry was lost in the streets of London +when he was a little fellow, and the Mr. Bannerbridge I knew found him +and took him to his house, and was very kind to him.' + +'What was his Christian name?' + +I gave them: 'Charles Adolphus.' + +'The identical person!' exclaimed my father. + +'Oh! you admit it,' said the squire. 'Ever seen him since the time +Harry was lost, Dorothy?' + +'Yes,' she answered. 'I have heard he is dead: + +'Did you see him shortly before his death?' + +'I happened to see him a short time before.! + +'He was your man of business, was he?' + +'For such little business as I had to do.' + +'You were sure you could trust him, eh?' + +'Yes.' + +My aunt Dorothy breathed deeply. + +'By God, ma'am, you're a truthful woman!' + +The old man gave her a glare of admiration. + +It was now my turn to undergo examination, and summoned by his apostrophe +to meet his eyes, I could appreciate the hardness of the head I had to +deal with. + +'Harry, I beg your pardon beforehand; I want to get at facts; I must ask +you what you know about where the money came from?' + +I spoke of my attempts to discover the whence and wherefore of it. + +'Government? eh?' he sneered. + +'I really can't judge whether it came from that quarter,' said I. + +'What do you think?--think it likely?' + +I thought it unlikely, and yet likelier than that it should have come +from an individual. + +'Then you don't suspect any particular person of having sent it in the +nick of time, Harry Richmond?' + +I replied: 'No, sir; unless you force me to suspect you.' + +He jumped in his chair, astounded and wrathful, confounded me for +insinuating that he was a Bedlamite, and demanded the impudent reason of +my suspecting him to have been guilty of the infernal folly. + +I had but the reason to instance that he was rich and kind at heart. + +'Rich! kind!' he bellowed. 'Just excuse me--I must ask for the purpose +of my inquiry;--there, tell me, how much do you believe you 've got of +that money remaining? None o' that Peterborough style of counting in the +back of your pate. Say!' + +There was a dreadful silence. + +My father leaned persuasively forward. + +'Mr. Beltham, I crave permission to take up the word. Allow me to remind +you of the prize Harry has won. The prince awaits you to bestow on him +the hand of his daughter--' + +'Out with it, Harry,' shouted the squire. + +'Not to mention Harry's seat in Parliament,' my father resumed, 'he has a +princess to wife, indubitably one of the most enviable positions in the +country! It is unnecessary to count on future honours; they may be +alluded to. In truth, sir, we make him the first man in the country. +Not necessarily Premier: you take my meaning: he possesses the +combination of social influence and standing with political achievements, +and rank and riches in addition--' + +'I 'm speaking to my grandson, sir,' the squire rejoined, shaking himself +like a man rained on. 'I 'm waiting for a plain answer, and no lie. +You've already confessed as much as that the money you told me on your +honour you put out to interest; psh!--for my grandson was smoke. Now +let's hear him.' + +My father called out: 'I claim a hearing! The money you speak of was put +out to the very highest interest. You have your grandson in Parliament, +largely acquainted with the principal members of society, husband of an +hereditary princess! You have only at this moment to propose for her +hand. I guarantee it to you. With that money I have won him everything. +Not that I would intimate to you that princesses are purchaseable. The +point is, I knew how to employ it.' + +'In two months' time, the money in the Funds in the boy's name--you told +me that.' + +'You had it in the Funds in Harry Richmond's name, sir.' + +'Well, sir, I'm asking him whether it's in the Funds now.' + +'Oh! Mr. Beltham.' + +'What answer's that?' + +The squire was really confused by my father's interruption, and lost +sight of me. + +'I ask where it came from: I ask whether it's squandered?' he continued. + +'Mr. Beltham, I reply that you have only to ask for it to have it; do so +immediately.' + +'What 's he saying?' cried the baffled old man. + +'I give you a thousand times the equivalent of the money, Mr. Beltham.' + +'Is the money there?' + +'The lady is here.' + +'I said money, sir.' + +'A priceless honour and treasure, I say emphatically.' My grandfather's +brows and mouth were gathering for storm. Janet touched his knee. + +'Where the devil your understanding truckles, if you have any, I don't +know,' he muttered. 'What the deuce--lady got to do with money!' + +'Oh!' my father laughed lightly, 'customarily the alliance is, they say, +as close as matrimony. Pardon me. To speak with becoming seriousness, +Mr. Beltham, it was duly imperative that our son should be known in +society, should be, you will apprehend me, advanced in station, which I +had to do through the ordinary political channel. There could not but be +a considerable expenditure for such a purpose.' + +'In Balls, and dinners!' + +'In everything that builds a young gentleman's repute.' + +'You swear to me you gave your Balls and dinners, and the lot, for Harry +Richmond's sake?' + +'On my veracity, I did, sir!' + +'Please don't talk like a mountebank. I don't want any of your +roundabout words for truth; we're not writing a Bible essay. I try my +best to be civil.' + +My father beamed on him. + +'I guarantee you succeed, sir. Nothing on earth can a man be so +absolutely sure of as to succeed in civility, if he honestly tries at it. +Jorian DeWitt,--by the way, you may not know him--an esteemed old friend +of mine, says--that is, he said once--to a tolerably impudent fellow whom +he had disconcerted with a capital retort, "You may try to be a +gentleman, and blunder at it, but if you will only try to be his humble +servant, we are certain to establish a common footing." Jorian, let me +tell you, is a wit worthy of our glorious old days.' + +My grandfather eased his heart with a plunging breath. + +'Well, sir, I didn't ask you here for your opinion or your friend's, and +I don't care for modern wit.' + +'Nor I, Mr. Beltham, nor I! It has the reek of stable straw. We are of +one mind on that subject. The thing slouches, it sprawls. It--to quote +Jorian once more--is like a dirty, idle, little stupid boy who cannot +learn his lesson and plays the fool with the alphabet. You smile, Miss +Ilchester: you would appreciate Jorian. Modern wit is emphatically +degenerate. It has no scintillation, neither thrust nor parry. I +compare it to boxing, as opposed to the more beautiful science of +fencing.' + +'Well, sir, I don't want to hear your comparisons,' growled the squire, +much oppressed. 'Stop a minute . . .' + +'Half a minute to me, sir,' said my father, with a glowing reminiscence +of Jorian DeWitt, which was almost too much for the combustible old man, +even under Janet's admonition. + +My aunt Dorothy moved her head slightly toward my father, looking on the +floor, and he at once drew in. + +'Mr. Beltham, I attend to you submissively.' + +'You do? Then tell me what brought this princess to England?' + +'The conviction that Harry had accomplished his oath to mount to an +eminence in his country, and had made the step she is about to take less, +I will say, precipitous: though I personally decline to admit a pointed +inferiority.' + +'You wrote her a letter.' + +'That, containing the news of the attack on him and his desperate +illness, was the finishing touch to the noble lady's passion.' + +'Attack? I know nothing about an attack. You wrote her a letter and +wrote her a lie. You said he was dying.' + +'I had the boy inanimate on my breast when I despatched the epistle.' + +'You said he had only a few days to live.' + +'So in my affliction I feared.' + +'Will you swear you didn't write that letter with the intention of +drawing her over here to have her in your power, so that you might +threaten you'd blow on her reputation if she or her father held out +against you and all didn't go as you fished for it?' + +My father raised his head proudly. + +'I divide your query into two parts. I wrote, sir, to bring her to his +side. I did not write with any intention to threaten.' + +'You've done it, though.' + +'I have done this,' said my father, toweringly: 'I have used the power +placed in my hands by Providence to overcome the hesitations of a +gentleman whose illustrious rank predisposes him to sacrifice his +daughter's happiness to his pride of birth and station. Can any one +confute me when I assert that the princess loves Harry Richmond?' + +I walked abruptly to one of the windows, hearing a pitiable wrangling on +the theme. My grandfather vowed she had grown wiser, my father protested +that she was willing and anxious; Janet was appealed to. In a strangely- +sounding underbreath, she said, 'The princess does not wish it.' + +'You hear that, Mr. Richmond?' cried the squire. + +He returned: 'Can Miss Ilchester say that the Princess Ottilia does not +passionately love my son Harry Richmond? The circumstances warrant me in +beseeching a direct answer.' + +She uttered: 'No.' + +I looked at her; she at me. + +'You can conduct a case, Richmond,' the squire remarked. + +My father rose to his feet. 'I can conduct my son to happiness and +greatness, my dear sir; but to some extent I require your grandfatherly +assistance; and I urge you now to present your respects to the prince and +princess, and judge yourself of his Highness's disposition for the match. +I assure you in advance that he welcomes the proposal.' + +'I do not believe it,' said Janet, rising. + +My aunt Dorothy followed her example, saying: 'In justice to Harry the +proposal should be made. At least it will settle this dispute.' + +Janet stared at her, and the squire threw his head back with an amazed +interjection. + +'What! You're for it now? Why, at breakfast you were all t' other way! +You didn't want this meeting because you pooh-poohed the match.' + +'I do think you should go,' she answered. 'You have given Harry your +promise, and if he empowers you, it is right to make the proposal, and +immediately, I think.' + +She spoke feverishly, with an unsweet expression of face, that seemed to +me to indicate vexedness at the squire's treatment of my father. + +'Harry,' she asked me in a very earnest fashion, 'is it your desire? +Tell your grandfather that it is, and that you want to know your fate. +Why should there be any dispute on a fact that can be ascertained by +crossing a street? Surely it is trifling.' + +Janet stooped to whisper in the squire's ear. + +He caught the shock of unexpected intelligence apparently; faced about, +gazed up, and cried: 'You too! But I haven't done here. I 've got to +cross-examine . . . Pretend, do you mean? Pretend I'm ready to go? +I can release this prince just as well here as there.' + +Janet laughed faintly. + +'I should advise your going, grandada.' + +'You a weathercock woman!' he reproached her, quite mystified, and fell +to rubbing his head. 'Suppose I go to be snubbed?' + +'The prince is a gentleman, grandada. Come with me. We will go alone. +You can relieve the prince, and protect him.' + +My father nodded: 'I approve.' + +'And grandada--but it will not so much matter if we are alone, though,' +Janet said. + +'Speak out.' + +'See the princess as well; she must be present.' + +'I leave it to you,' he said, crestfallen. + +Janet pressed my aunt Dorothy's hand. + +'Aunty, you were right, you are always right. This state of suspense is +bad all round, and it is infinitely worse for the prince and princess.' + +My aunt Dorothy accepted the eulogy with a singular trembling wrinkle of +the forehead. + +She evidently understood that Janet had seen her wish to get released. + +For my part, I shared my grandfather's stupefaction at their +unaccountable changes. It appeared almost as if my father had won them +over to baffle him. The old man tried to insist on their sitting down +again, but Janet perseveringly smiled and smiled until he stood up. She +spoke to him softly. He was one black frown; displeased with her; +obedient, however. + +Too soon after, I had the key to the enigmatical scene. At the moment I +was contemptuous of riddles, and heard with idle ears Janet's promptings +to him and his replies. 'It would be so much better to settle it here,' +he said. She urged that it could not be settled here without the whole +burden and responsibility falling upon him. + +'Exactly,' interposed my father, triumphing. + +Dorothy Beltham came to my side, and said, as if speaking to herself, +while she gazed out of window, 'If a refusal, it should come from the +prince.' She dropped her voice: 'The money has not been spent? Has it? +Has any part of it been spent? Are you sure you have more than three +parts of it?' + +Now, that she should be possessed by the spirit of parsimony on my behalf +at such a time as this, was to my conception insanely comical, and her +manner of expressing it was too much for me. I kept my laughter under to +hear her continue: 'What numbers are flocking on the pier! and there is +no music yet. Tell me, Harry, that the money is all safe; nearly all; it +is important to know; you promised economy.' + +'Music did you speak of, Miss Beltham?' My father bowed to her gallantly. +'I chanced to overhear you. My private band performs to the public at +midday.' + +She was obliged to smile to excuse his interruption. + +'What's that? whose band?' said the squire, bursting out of Janet's +hand. 'A private band?' + +Janet had a difficulty in resuming her command of him. The mention of +the private band made him very restive. + +'I 'm not acting on my own judgement at all in going to these foreign +people,' he said to Janet. 'Why go? I can have it out here and an end +to it, without bothering them and their interpreters.' + +He sang out to me: 'Harry, do you want me to go through this form for +you?--mn'd unpleasant!' + +My aunt Dorothy whispered in my ear: 'Yes! yes!' + +'I feel tricked!' he muttered, and did not wait for me to reply before he +was again questioning my aunt Dorothy concerning Mr. Bannerbridge, and my +father as to 'that sum of money.' But his method of interrogation was +confused and pointless. The drift of it was totally obscure. + +'I'm off my head to-day,' he said to Janet, with a sideshot of his eye at +my father. + +'You waste time and trouble, grandada,' said she. + +He vowed that he was being bewildered, bothered by us all; and I thought +I had never seen him so far below his level of energy; but I had not seen +him condescend to put himself upon a moderately fair footing with my +father. The truth was, that Janet had rigorously schooled him to bridle +his temper, and he was no match for the voluble easy man without the +freest play of his tongue. + +'This prince!' he kept ejaculating. + +'Won't you understand, grandada, that you relieve him, and make things +clear by going?' Janet said. + +He begged her fretfully not to be impatient, and hinted that she and he +might be acting the part of dupes, and was for pursuing his inauspicious +cross-examination in spite of his blundering, and the 'Where am I now?' +which pulled him up. My father, either talking to my aunt Dorothy, to +Janet, or to me, on ephemeral topics, scarcely noticed him, except when +he was questioned, and looked secure of success in the highest degree +consistent with perfect calmness. + +'So you say you tell me to go, do you?' the squire called to me. 'Be +good enough to stay here and wait. I don't see that anything's gained by +my going: it's damned hard on me, having to go to a man whose language I +don't know, and he don't know mine, on a business we're all of us in a +muddle about. I'll do it if it's right. You're sure?' + +He glanced at Janet. She nodded. + +I was looking for this quaint and, to me, incomprehensible interlude to +commence with the departure of the squire and Janet, when a card was +handed in by one of the hotel-waiters. + +'Another prince!' cried the squire. 'These Germans seem to grow princes +like potatoes--dozens to a root! Who's the card for? Ask him to walk +up. Show him into a quiet room. Does he speak English?' + +'Does Prince Hermann of--I can't pronounce the name of the place--speak +English, Harry?' Janet asked me. + +'As well as you or I,' said I, losing my inattention all at once with a +mad leap of the heart. + +Hermann's presence gave light, fire, and colour to the scene in which my +destiny had been wavering from hand to hand without much more than +amusedly interesting me, for I was sure that I had lost Ottilia; I knew +that too well, and worse could not happen. I had besides lost other +things that used to sustain me, and being reckless, I was contemptuous, +and listened to the talk about money with sublime indifference to the +subject: with an attitude, too, I daresay. But Hermann's name revived my +torment. Why had he come? to persuade the squire to control my father? +Nothing but that would suffer itself to be suggested, though conjectures +lying in shadow underneath pressed ominously on my mind. + +My father had no doubts. + +'A word to you, Mr. Beltham, before you go to Prince Hermann. He is an +emissary, we treat him with courtesy, and if he comes to diplomatize we, +of course, give a patient hearing. I have only to observe in the most +emphatic manner possible that I do not retract one step. I will have +this marriage: I have spoken! It rests with Prince Ernest.' + +The squire threw a hasty glare of his eyes back as he was hobbling on +Janet's arm. She stopped short, and replied for him. + +'Mr. Beltham will speak for himself, in his own name. We are not +concerned in any unworthy treatment of Prince Ernest. We protest against +it.' + +'Dear young lady!' said my father, graciously. 'I meet you frankly. +Now tell me. I know you a gallant horsewoman: if you had lassoed the +noble horse of the desert would you let him run loose because of his +remonstrating? Side with me, I entreat you! My son is my first thought. +The pride of princes and wild horses you will find wonderfully similar, +especially in the way they take their taming when once they feel they are +positively caught. We show him we have him fast--he falls into our paces +on the spot! For Harry's sake--for the princess's, I beg you exert your +universally--deservedly acknowledged influence. Even now--and you frown +on me!--I cannot find it in my heart to wish you the sweet and admirable +woman of the world you are destined to be, though you would comprehend me +and applaud me, for I could not--no, not to win your favourable opinion! +--consent that you should be robbed of a single ray of your fresh +maidenly youth. If you must misjudge me, I submit. It is the price I +pay for seeing you young and lovely. Prince Ernest is, credit me, not +unworthily treated by me, if life is a battle, and the prize of it to the +General's head. I implore you'--he lured her with the dimple of a +lurking smile--'do not seriously blame your afflicted senior, if we are +to differ. I am vastly your elder: you instil the doubt whether I am by +as much the wiser of the two; but the father of Harry Richmond claims to +know best what will ensure his boy's felicity. Is he rash? Pronounce me +guilty of an excessive anxiety for my son's welfare; say that I am too +old to read the world with the accuracy of a youthful intelligence: call +me indiscreet: stigmatize me unlucky; the severest sentence a judge'--he +bowed to her deferentially--'can utter; only do not cast a gaze of rebuke +on me because my labour is for my son--my utmost devotion. And we know, +Miss Ilchester, that the princess honours him with her love. I protest +in all candour, I treat love as love; not as a weight in the scale; it is +the heavenly power which dispenses with weighing! its ascendancy . . .' + +The squire could endure no more, and happily so, for my father was losing +his remarkably moderated tone, and threatening polysyllables. He had +followed Janet, step for step, at a measured distance, drooping toward +her with his winningest air, while the old man pulled at her arm to get +her out of hearing of the obnoxious flatterer. She kept her long head +in profile, trying creditably not to appear discourteous to one who +addressed her by showing an open ear, until the final bolt made by the +frenzied old man dragged her through the doorway. His neck was shortened +behind his collar as though he shrugged from the blast of a bad wind. +I believe that, on the whole, Janet was pleased. I will wager that, left +to herself, she would have been drawn into an answer, if not an argument. +Nothing would have made her resolution swerve, I admit. + +They had not been out of the room three seconds when my aunt Dorothy was +called to join them. She had found time to say that she hoped the money +was intact. + + + + +ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS: + +All passed too swift for happiness +He clearly could not learn from misfortune +Intimations of cowardice menacing a paralysis of the will +Like a woman, who would and would not, and wanted a master +One in a temper at a time I'm sure 's enough +Simple affection must bear the strain of friendship if it can +Stand not in my way, nor follow me too far +Tension of the old links keeping us together +The thought stood in her eyes +They have not to speak to exhibit their minds +Tight grasps of the hand, in which there was warmth and shyness +To the rest of the world he was a progressive comedy +Was I true? Not so very false, yet how far from truth! +Who so intoxicated as the convalescent catching at health? + + + + +End of this Project Gutenberg Etext of Adventures of Harry Richmond, v7 +by George Meredith + diff --git a/4450.zip b/4450.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..693e6dc --- /dev/null +++ b/4450.zip diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. 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