Маргарет Олифант
Brownlows
CHAPTER XXXIX.
COMPOUND INTEREST
Mr. Brownlow and his son were a long time together. They talked until the autumn day darkened, and they had no more light for their calculations. Mr. Brownlow had been very weary, even stupefied. He had entered upon the conversation because he could not resist Jack’s eagerness, and the decided claim he made to know fully a business which so much concerned him. He had a right to know, which his father could not dispute; but nevertheless all the events of the past twenty-four hours had worn Mr. Brownlow out. He was stupefied; he did not know what had happened; he could not recollect the details. When his attention was fully arrested, a certain habit of business kept him on, and his mind was clear enough when they went into figures, and when he had to make his son aware of the magnitude of the misfortune which had almost thrown his own mind off its balance. The facts were beyond all comment. It was simple ruin; but such was the nature of the men, and their agreement in it, that they both worked out their reckoning unflinchingly, and when they saw what it was, did not so much as utter an exclamation. They laid down, the one his pen and the other his pencil, as the twilight darkened round them. There was no controversy between them. It was nobody’s fault. Jack might have added a sting to every thing by reproaching his father for the ignorance in which he had been brought up, but he had no mind for any such useless exasperation. Things were as bad as bad could be; therefore they brought their calculations to an end very quietly, and came to the same conclusion as the darkness closed over them. They sat for a minute on opposite sides of the table, not looking at each other, with their papers before them, and their minds filled with one sombre thought. Whether it was that or the mere fall of day which was closing round them neither could have told—only that under this dull oppression there was in Jack’s mind a certain wild suppressed impatience, an overwhelming sense of all that was included in the crisis; while his father in the midst of it could not repress a strange longing to throw himself down upon the sofa, to close his eyes, to be alone in the silence and darkness. Rest was his most imperative want. The young man’s mind was thrilling with a desire to be up and at his troubles, to fight and make some head against them. But then things were new to Jack; whereas to Mr. Brownlow, who had already made a long and not guiltless struggle, the only thing apparent and desirable was rest—to lie down and be quiet for a little, to have no question asked him, nothing said to him, or, if it should please God, to sleep.
Jack, however, was not the man, under the circumstances, to let his father get either sleep or rest. After they had made all the calculations possible, and said every thing that was to be said, he did not go away, but sat silent, biting his nails and pondering much in his mind. They had been thus for about half an hour without exchanging a word, when he suddenly broke into speech.
“It must go into Chancery, I suppose?” he said. “She has got to prove her identity, and all that. You will have time at least to realize all your investments. Too much time perhaps.”
“She is an old woman,” said Mr. Brownlow. He was thinking of nothing beyond the mere matter of fact, and there was no meaning in his voice, but yet it startled his son. “And you were to marry her daughter. I had almost forgotten that. You were very decided on the subject last time you spoke to me. In that case every thing would be yours.”
“I hope she may live forever!” said Jack, getting up from his chair; “and she has no intention of giving me her daughter now—not that her intention matters much,” he said to himself, half muttering, as he stood with his hand on the table. The change was bewildering. He would have his Pamela still, whatever any body might say; but to run away with his pretty penniless darling, and work for her and defy the world for her, was very different from running away with the little heiress who had a right to every penny he had supposed his own. It was very hard upon him; but all the same he had no intention of giving in. No idea of self-sacrifice ever crossed his mind. It made the whole matter more confusing, more disagreeable—but any body’s intention mattered very little, father or mother; he meant to have his love and his way all the same.
“It does matter,” said Mr. Brownlow. “It had much better never go into Chancery at all. I never had any objections to the girl—you need not be impatient. I always liked the girl. She is like your mother. I never knew what it was—” Then Mr. Brownlow made a little pause. “Poor Bessie!” he said, though it was an exclamation that did not seem called for. It was this fortune that had first made him think of Bessie. It was for her sake—for the sake of making a very foolish marriage—that he had made use of the money which at first was nothing but a plague and burden to him. Somehow she seemed to come up before him now it was melting away, and he knew that the charm of Pamela’s dewy eyes and fresh face had been their resemblance to Bessie. The thought softened his heart, and yet made it sting and ache. “This matter is too important for temper or pride,” he went on, recovering himself. “If we are to treat as enemies, of course I must resist, and it will be a long suit, and perhaps outlive us all. But if you are to be her daughter’s husband, the question is different. You are the natural negotiator between us.”
“I can’t be; it is impossible,” cried Jack; and then he sat down again in his chair in a sort of sullen fury with himself. Of course he was the natural negotiator. It was weakness itself to think of flinching from so plain a duty; and yet he would rather have faced a battery or led a forlorn hope.
“You must be,” said Mr. Brownlow. “We are all excited at this present moment; but there can be no doubt of what your position entails. You are my son, and you are, against my will, contrary to my advice, engaged to her daughter. Unless you mean to throw off the girl you love because she has suddenly become an heiress—”
“I mean nothing of the sort,” cried Jack, angrily. “I shall never throw her off.”
“Then you can’t help having an interest in her fortune;—and doing the best you can for her,” said his father, after a pause.
Then again silence fell upon the two. It was natural and reasonable, but it was utterly repugnant, even though one of them thus urged it, to both. A thing may be recommended by good sense, and by all the force of personal interest, and yet may be more detestable than if it was alike foolish and wicked. This was how it seemed to Jack; and for Mr. Brownlow, in the whirl of ruin which had sucked him in, it was as yet but a poor consolation that his son might get the benefit. Acting by the dictates of nature he would rather have kept his son at his side to share his fortune and stand by him. Yet it was his duty to advise Jack to go over to the other side and take every thing he had from him, and negotiate the transfer of his fortune—to “do the best he could,” in short, for his father’s adversary. It was not an expedient agreeable to either, and yet it was a thing which reason and common sense demanded should be done.
While they sat thus gloomily together, the household went on in a strangely uncomfortable way outside. The men came straggling in from their shooting, or whatever they had been doing; and, though Sara was with the ladies, every body knew by instinct, as it seemed, that her father and brother were consulting together over something very serious, shut up in the library, Mr. Brownlow neglecting his business and Jack his pleasure. If it had only been business that was neglected, nobody would have been surprised; but when things were thus pushed beyond that natural regard for appearances which is born with Englishmen, they must be serious indeed. Then, of course, to make matters worse, the gentlemen came in earlier than usual. It was their curiosity, the elder ladies said to each other, for every body knows that it is men who are the true gossips and ferret every thing out; but, however that might be, it threw additional embarrassment upon Sara, who stood bravely at her post—a little flushed, perhaps, and unnaturally gay, but holding out with dauntless courage. She had every thing to take on her own shoulders. That night, as it happened by unlucky chance, there was to be a dinner-party. Sir Charles Motherwell and his mother were coming, and were to stay all night; and the rector was coming, he who knew the house better than any body else, and would be most quick of all to discover the difference in it. The recollection of the gathering in the evening had gone out of Mr. Brownlow’s mind and even Jack had forgotten all about it. “Like men!” Sara said to herself, indignantly. She had every thing to do, though she had not slept all night, and had not escaped her share of the excitement of the day. She had to give all the orders and make all the arrangements, and now sat dauntless pouring out the tea, keeping every body at bay, acknowledging the importance of the crisis only by unusual depth of color on her cheek, and an unusual translucent sheen in her big eyes. They did not flash or sparkle as other eyes might have done, but shone like globes full of some weird and visionary light. She had an answer ready for every body, and yet all the while she was racking her mind to think what could they be doing down stairs, what decision could they be coming to? She was doing her part stoutly in ignorance and patience, spreading her pretty draperies before them, as it were, and keeping the world at arm’s length. “Oh, yes, the Motherwells are coming,” she said, “but they will come dressed for dinner, which none of us are as yet. They are only at Ridley—they have not very far to come. Yes, I think we had better have a dance. Jack is not good for much in that way. He never was. He was always an out-of-doors sort of boy.”
“He does not seem to care for out-of-doors either,” said one of the young ladies; “and, Sara, I wonder what has happened to him. He always looks as if he were thinking of something else.”
“Something else than—what?” said Sara. “He has something else than us to think of—if that is what you mean. He is not one of your idle people—” which speech was met by a burst of laughter.
“Oh no; he is very diligent; he loves business,” said young Keppel. “We are all aware of that.”
“He is not at the bar, you know,” retorted the dauntless Sara. “He has not briefs pouring in upon him like—some people. But it is very good of you to take so much notice of us between the circuits—is that the right word? And to reward you, you shall manage the dance? Does Sir Charles dance? I suppose so—all common people do.”
“Sara, my love, don’t speak so,” said one of the matrons. “The Motherwells are one of the best families in the country. I don’t know what you mean by common people.”
“I mean people who are just like other people,” said Sara, “as we all are. If we did not wear different colored dresses and have different-colored hair and eyes, I don’t see how we could be told from each other. As for gentlemen generally, you know one never knows which is which!” she cried, appealing to the candor of her friends. “We pretend to do it, to please them. Half of them have light beards and half of them have dark, and one never gets any farther; except with those whom one has the honor to know,” said Sara, rising and making a courtesy to the young men who were round her. Then, amid laughter and remonstrances, they all went fluttering away—too early, as most of the young people thought—to their rooms to dress. And some of them thought Sara “really too bad;” and some were sure the gentlemen did not like it. The gentlemen, however, did not seem to mind. They said to each other, “By Jove! how pretty she was to-night;” and some of them wondered how much money she would have; and some supposed she would marry Charley Motherwell after all. And, for the moment, what with dinner approaching and the prospect of the dance after, both the ladies and the men forgot to wonder what could be the matter with the family, and what Mr. Brownlow was saying to Jack.
But as for Sara, she did not forget. Though she was first to move, she was still in the drawing-room when they all went away, and came pitifully up to the big fire which sent gleams of light about through all the dark room, and knelt down on the hearth and warmed her hands, and shivered, not with cold, but excitement. Her eyes were big and nervous and dilated; but though her tears came easily enough on ordinary occasions, to-night she did not cry. She knelt before the fire and held out her hands to it, and then wrung them hard together, wondering how she should ever be able to go through the evening, and what they were doing down stairs, and whether she should not go and remind them of the dinner. It seemed to her as if for the moment she had got rid of her enemies, and had time to think; but she was too restless to think, and every moment seemed an hour to her. As soon as the steps and voices of the guests became inaudible on the stairs, she got up, and went down to seek them out in the library. There were two or three servants in the hall, more than had any right to be there, and Willis, who was standing at the foot of the stairs, came up to her in a doubtful, hesitating way. A gentleman had come up from the office, he said; but he did not like to disturb Master, as was a-talking with Mr. John in the library. The gentleman was in the dining-room. Would Miss Sara see him, or was her papa to be told? Sara was so much excited already, that she saw in this visitor only some new trouble, and jumped at the idea of meeting it herself, and perhaps saving her father something. “I will see him,” she said; and she called up all her resolution, and went rapidly, with the haste of desperation, into the dining-room. The door had closed behind her, and she had glided past the long, brilliant, flower-decked table to where somebody was standing by the fire-place ere she really thought what she was doing. When the stranger started and spoke, Sara woke up as from a dream; and when she found it was Powys who was looking at her—looking anxious, wistful, tender, not like the other people—the poor girl’s composure failed her. She gave him one glance, and then all the tears that had been gathering in her eyes suddenly burst forth. “Oh, Mr. Powys, tell me what it is all about!” she cried, holding out her hands to him. And he, not knowing what he was doing, not thinking of himself or of his love, only penetrated to the heart by her tears, sprang forward and took her into his arms and comforted her. There was one moment in which neither of them knew. For that brief instant they clung to each other unwitting, and then they fell apart, and stood and looked at each other, and trembled, not knowing in their confusion and consciousness and trouble what to say.
“Don’t be angry with me!” he cried; “I did not know what I was doing—I did not mean—forgive me!—you were crying, and I could not bear it; how could I stand still and see you cry?”
“I am not angry,” said Sara, softly. Never in her life had she spoken so softly before. “I know you did not mean it; I am in such terrible trouble; and they never told me it was you.”
Then Powys crept closer once more, poor young fellow, knowing he ought not, but too far gone for reason. “But it is I,” he said, softly touching the hand with which she leaned on the mantle piece,—“to serve you—to do any thing—any thing! only tell me what there is that I can do?”
Then she looked up with her big lucid eyes, and two big tears in them, and smiled at him though her heart felt like to burst, and put out her hands again, knowing this time what she was doing; and he took them, half-crazed with the joy and the wickedness. “I came up with some papers,” he said; “I came against my will; I never thought, I never hoped to see you; and your father will think I have done it dishonorably on purpose; tell me, oh, tell me, what I can do.”
“I don’t think you can do any thing,” said Sara, “nor any body else. I should not speak to you, but I can’t help it. We are in great trouble. And then you are the only one I could speak to,” said the girl, with unconscious self-betrayal. “I think we have lost every thing we have in the world.”
“Lost every thing!” said Powys; his eyes began to dance, and his cheek to burn—“lost every thing!” It was he now who trembled with eagerness, and surprise, and joy. “I don’t want to be glad,” he cried, “but I could work for you, slave for you—I shouldn’t mind what I did—”
“Oh, hush!” cried Sara, interrupting him, “I think I hear papa: it might not matter for us, but it is him we ought to think of. We have got people coming, and I don’t know what to do—I must go to papa.”
Then the young man stood and looked at her wistfully. “I can’t help you with that,” he said, “I can’t be any good to you—the only thing I can do is to go away; but, Sara! you have only to tell me; you know—”
“Yes,” she said, lifting her eyes to him once more, and the two big tears fell, and her lips quivered as she tried to smile; she was not angry—“yes,” she said, “I know;” and then there were sounds outside, and in a moment this strange, wild, sweet surprise was over. Sara rushed out to the library without another word, and Powys, tingling to the very points of his fingers, gave his bundle of papers to Willis to be given to Mr. Brownlow, and said he would come back, and rushed out into the glare of Lady Motherwell’s lamps as her carriage came sweeping up the avenue. He did not know who the little old lady was, nor who the tall figure with the black mustache might be in the corner of the carriage; but they both remarked him as he came down the steps at a bound. It gave them their first impression of something unusual about the house. “It is seven now,” Lady Motherwell said, “and dinner ought to be in half an hour—what an odd moment to go away.” She was still more surprised to see no one but servants when she entered, and to be shown into the deserted drawing-room where there was not a sign of any one about. “I don’t know what they mean by it, Charley,” Lady Motherwell said; “Mr. Brownlow or somebody was always here to receive us before.” Sir Charles did not say any thing, but he pulled his mustache, and he, too, thought it was rather queer.
When Sara rushed into the library not five minutes before Lady Motherwell’s arrival, the consultation there had been broken up. Jack, notwithstanding his many preoccupations, had yet presence of mind enough to remember that it was time to dress, as well as to perceive that all had been said that could be said. Mr. Brownlow was alone. He had stolen to the sofa for which he had been longing all the afternoon, and had laid himself down on it. The room was very dimly lighted by a pair of candles on the mantle-piece. It was a large room, and the faint twinkle of those distant lights made it look ghostly, and it was a very strange sight to see Mr. Brownlow lying on a sofa. He roused himself when Sara came in, but it was with an effort, and he was very reluctant to be disturbed. “Seven o’clock!” he said—“is it seven o’clock? but leave me a little longer, my darling; ten minutes is enough for dress.”
“Oh, papa,” said Sara, “it is dreadful to think of dress at all, or any thing so trifling, on such a day; but we must do it—people will think—; I am sure even already they may be thinking—”
“Yes,” said Mr. Brownlow, vaguely—“I don’t think it matters—I would rather have five minutes’ sleep.”
“Papa,” said Sara in desperation, “I have just seen Mr. Powys—he has come with some papers—that is, I think he has gone away. He came to—to—I mean he told me he was sent to—I did not understand what it was, but he has gone away—”
“Ah, he has gone away,” said Mr. Brownlow, sitting up; “that is all right—all right. And there are the Motherwells coming. Sara, I think Charles Motherwell is a very honest sort of man.”
“Yes, papa,” said Sara. She was too much excited and disturbed to perceive clearly what he meant, and yet the contrast of the two names struck her dimly. At such a moment what was Charles Motherwell to her?
“I think he’s a very good fellow,” said Mr. Brownlow, rising; and he went and stirred the smoldering fire. Then he came up to where she stood, watching him. “We shall have to go and live in the house at Masterton,” he said, with a sigh. “It will be a strange place for such a creature as you.”
“I don’t see why it should be strange for me,” said Sara; and then her face blazed suddenly with a color her father did not understand. “Papa, I shall have you all to myself,” she said, hurriedly, feeling in her heart more than half a hypocrite. “There will be no troublesome parties like this, and nobody we don’t want to see.”
Mr. Brownlow looked at her half suspiciously; but he did not know what had happened in those two minutes beside the fruit and flowers in the dining-room. He made a desperate effort to recover himself, and to take courage and play out his part steadily to the end.
“We must get through it to-night,” he said. “We must keep up for to-night. Go and put on all your pretty things, my darling. You have had to bear the brunt of every thing to-day.”
“No, papa; it does not matter,” said Sara, smothering the longing she had to cry, and tell him—tell him?—she did not know what. And then she turned and put her one question. “Is it true?—have we nothing? Is it all as that terrible woman said?”
Mr. Brownlow put his hand on her arm and leaned upon her, slight prop as she was. “You were born in the old house in Masterton,” he said, with a certain tone of appeal in his voice; “your mother lived in it. It was bright enough once.” Then he stopped and led her gently toward the door. “But, Sara, don’t forget,” he said hurriedly, “I think a great deal of Charles Motherwell—I am sure he is kind and honest and true.”
“He has nothing to do with us!” said Sara, with a thrill of fear.
“I don’t know,” said Mr. Brownlow, almost humbly. “I don’t know—if it might be best for you—”
And then he kissed her and sent her away. Sara flew to her own room with her heart beating so loud that it almost choked her. So many excitements all pressing on her together—so many things to think of—was almost more than an ordinary brain could bear. And to dress in all her bravery and go down and look as if nothing had happened—to sit at the head of the table just there where she had been standing half an hour before—to smile and talk and look her best as if every thing was steady under her feet, and she knew of no volcano! And then, to crown all, Sir Charles Motherwell! In the height of her excitement it was perhaps a relief to her to think how at least she would crush that one pretendant. If it should be the last act of her reign at Brownlows, there would be a certain poetic justice in it. If he was so foolish, if he was so persistent, Sara savagely resolved that she would let him propose this time. And then! But then she cried, to Angelique’s great discomfiture, without any apparent reason. What was to be done with a young lady who left herself but twenty minutes to dress in, and wept in an unprovoked and exasperating way in the middle of it? Sara was so shaken and driven about by emotion and by self-restraint that she was humble to Angelique in the midst of all her own tumults of soul.
