A Charming Fellow Volume Ii Part 10

It was really a very humble dwelling. But the rent of it was quite as large as Algernon would be able to afford. Mrs. Errington said, "I prefer a small place for them. If they took a more pretentious house, they would be expected to entertain. And you know, my dear sir," (or "madam," as the case might be) "that there is a great mixture in Whitford society; and that would not suit my daughter-in-law, of course.

You perceive that, don't you?" And then the person so addressed might flatter him or herself with the idea of belonging to the unmixed portion of society.

Indeed, this terrible accusation of being "mixed" was one which Mrs.

Errington was rather fond of bringing against the social gatherings in Whitford. And she had once been greatly offended, and a good deal puzzled, by Mr. Diamond's asking her what objection there could be to that; and challenging her to point out any good thing on earth, from a bowl of punch upwards, which was not "mixed!" But however this might be, no one believed at all that the mixture in Whitford society was the real reason for young Errington's inhabiting so small a house. They knew perfectly well that if Algernon's means had been larger, his house would have been larger also.

And yet, Mrs. Errington's flourish was not without its effect on some persons. They in their turn repeated her lamentations on the "mixture"

to such of their acquaintances as did not happen to be also her acquaintances. And as there were very few individuals in Whitford either so eccentric, or so courageous, as Mr. Diamond, this mysterious mixture was generally acknowledged, with shrugs and head-shakings, to be a very great evil indeed.

At the end of about a fortnight, old Max one day reappeared in his own house, and marched upstairs to Mrs. Errington's sitting-room.

"Well, ma'am," said he, without any preliminary greeting whatsoever, "I suppose you understood the written notice to quit, that I sent you? But as my son James informs me that you don't seem to be taking any steps in consequence of it, I've come to say that you will have to remove out of my abode on the twenty-seventh of this month, and not a day later. So you can act according to your judgment in finding another place to dwell in."

Mrs. Errington was inspecting the contents of a packing-case which had been sent from London by Lady Seely. It contained, as her ladys.h.i.+p said, "some odds and ends that would be useful to the young couple." The only article of any value in the whole collection was a porcelain vase, which had long stood in obscurity on a side-table in Lord Seely's study, and would not be missed thence. Lady Seely, at all events, would not miss it, as she seldom entered the room; and therefore she had generously added it to the odds and ends!

Mrs. Errington looked up, a little flushed with the exertion of stooping over the packing-case, and confronted Mr. Maxfield. Her round, red full-moon face contrasted in a lively manner with the old man's grey, lank, harsh visage. The years, as they pa.s.sed, did not improve old Max's appearance. And as soon as she beheld him, Mrs. Errington was convinced of the justice of Betty Grimshaw's remark, that her brother-in-law seemed to have grown closer and crustier than ever of late.

"Why, Mr. Maxfield," said the lady, condescendingly, "how do you do? I have been wanting to see you. Come, sit down, and let us talk matters over."

Old Max stood in the doorway glaring at her. "I don't know, ma'am, as there's any matters I want to talk over with you," he returned. "You had better understand that I mean what I say. You'll find it more convenient to believe me at once, and to act accordin'."

"Do you mean to say that you intend to turn me out, Mr. Maxfield?"

"I have given you a legal notice to quit, ma'am. You needn't call it turning you out, unless you like."

He had begun to move away, when Mrs. Errington exclaimed, "But I really don't comprehend this at all! What will Rhoda think of it?"

Maxfield stopped, hesitatingly, with his hand on the banisters at the top of the landing. "Rhoda?" said he gruffly. "Oh, Rhoda has nothing to say to it, one way or t'other."

"But I want to have something to say to her! I a.s.sure you it was a great disappointment to me not to find Rhoda here on my return. I'm very fond of her; and shall continue to be so, as long as she merits it. It is not her fault, poor girl, if--other people forget themselves."

Maxfield took his hand off the banisters and turned round. "Since you're so fond of Rhoda," he said, with a queer expression on his sour old face, "you'll be glad to know where she is, and the company she's in."

"I know that she is at the seaside with my friends, Mrs. and Miss Bodkin."

"She is at the seaside with _her_ friends, Mrs. and Miss Bodkin. Miss Minnie is a real lady, and she understands how to treat Rhoda, and knows that the Lord has made a lady of Rhoda by natur'."

Mrs. Errington stared in utter astonishment. The suspicion began to form and strengthen itself in her mind that the old man was positively out of his senses. If so, his insanity had taken an extremely unpleasant turn for her.

"I really was not prepared for being turned out of my lodgings after all these years," she said, reverting to the point that most nearly touched herself.

"I've not been prepared for a many things as have happened after all these years. But I'm ready to meet 'em when they come."

"Well, but now, Mr. Maxfield, let us see if we cannot make an arrangement. If you have any different views about the rent, I----"

"The rent! What do you think your bit of a rent matters to me? I want the rooms for the use of my daughter, Miss Maxfield, and there's an end of it."

"Oh, he certainly cannot be in his right senses to address me in this manner!" thought Mrs. Errington.

Maxfield went on, "I see you've got a box of rubbish there, littering about the place. I give you warning not to unpack any more here, for out everything 'll have to go on the twenty-seventh of this month, as sure as my name's Jonathan Maxfield!"

"Mr. Maxfield! You are certainly forgetting yourself. Rubbish, indeed!

These are a few--a very few--of the valuable wedding presents sent to my son and daughter by Lady Seely."

Old Max made a grating sound which was intended for a laugh, although his bushy grey eyebrows were drawn together in a heavy frown the while.

Then he suddenly burst out in a kind of cold fury. "Pooh!" he cried.

"Presents! Valuable presents! You don't deceive anybody by that! Look here--if the old carpet or any of the furniture in this room would be of any a.s.sistance to you, you can take it! I'll give it to you--a free gift! The place is going to be done up and new furnished for Miss Maxfield. Furnished handsome, fit for a young lady of property. Fit for a young lady that will have a sum o' money on the day she marries--if I'm pleased with her choice--as 'll make some folks' mouths water. It won't be reckoned by twenties, nor yet by hundreds, won't Miss Maxfield's fortin'! You can take the old carpet, and mahogany table, and the high-backed chairs, and put 'em among your valuable presents.

They're too old-fas.h.i.+oned for Miss Maxfield's drawing-room!" And with a repet.i.tion of the grating laugh, old Max tramped heavily downstairs, and was heard to bang the door of his own parlour.

Mrs. Errington sat motionless for nearly a quarter of an hour, staring at the open door. "Mad!" she exclaimed at length, drawing a long breath.

"Quite mad! But I wonder if there is any truth in what he says about Rhoda's money? Dear me, why she'll be quite a catch!"

CHAPTER VIII.

Meanwhile Rhoda, at Duckwell Farm, supposed herself to be too unhappy to care much for anything. She did not have a fever, nor fall into a consumption, nor waste away visibly; but she pa.s.sed hours crying alone in her own room, or sitting idle-handed, whilst her thoughts languidly retraced the past, or strove to picture what sort of a lady Algernon's wife might be. Headaches, pallid cheeks, and red eyes resulted from these solitary hours. Mrs. Seth Maxfield wondered what had come to the girl, having no suspicion that young Errington's marriage could be more to Rhoda than an interesting subject for gossip.

Old Jonathan went over to Duckwell immediately after receiving the first newspaper, sent by Mrs. Errington from Westmoreland.

The announcement of the intended wedding had taken him wholly by surprise. It would be hard to say whether wrath or amazement predominated in his mind, on first reading the paragraph which Mrs.

Errington had so complacently marked with red ink. But it is not at all hard to say which feeling predominated within an hour after having read it.

According to old Max's judgment, there was not one extenuating circ.u.mstance in Algernon's behaviour; not one plea to be urged on his behalf. Utter vindictive anger filled the old man's soul as he read. He had been deceived, played upon, laughed at by this boy! That was the first, and, perhaps, the most venomous of his mortifications. But many other stinging thoughts rankled in his mind. David Powell had been right! That was almost unendurable. As to Rhoda, old Max could not, in the mood he was then in, contemplate her being bowed down by grief and disappointment. He would have her raise her head, and revenge herself on her faithless lover. He would have her successful, admired, and prosperous. He would have her trample on Algernon's pride and poverty with all the insolence of wealth. Even his beloved money, so hardly earned, so eagerly h.o.a.rded, seemed to him, for the first time in his life, to be of small account in comparison with a sentiment.

He took his Bible, and gloated over menaces of vengeance and threats of destruction. Future condemnation was, no doubt, in store for Algernon Errington. But that was too vague and too distant a prospect to appease old Max's stomach for revenge. He wanted to see his enemy in the dust, and that his enemy should be seen there by others. In the midst of his reading, he suddenly recollected the acknowledgment he held of Algernon's debt to him, and jumped up and ran to his strong-box to feast his eyes on it. It seemed almost like a clear leading from on High that the I.O.U. should come into his head just then, old Max thought. He was not the first, nor the worst man who has wrested Scripture into the service of his own angry pa.s.sions.

Then he sent to order a gig from the "Blue Bell," and set out for Duckwell Farm.

"I hope your father isn't sickening for any disease, or going to get a stroke, or something," said Betty Grimshaw to her nephew James. "But I never see anybody's face such a colour out of their coffin. It's a greeny grey, that's what it is. And he was frowning like thunder."

But Jonathan Maxfield's disorder was not of the body. He arrived at Duckwell unexpectedly, but his arrival did not cause any particular surprise. He had business transactions to discuss with his son Seth, to whom he had advanced money on mortgage. And then there was Rhoda staying at the farm, and, of course, her father would like to see Rhoda.

Rhoda was called from her own room, and came down, pale and nervous.

She dreaded meeting her father. Did he, or did he not, know the news from Westmoreland? It had only come to Duckwell Farm by means of Mr.

Pawkins's servants. It might possibly not yet have reached Whitford.

On his side, old Max took care to say nothing about the _Applethwaite Advertiser_. He had destroyed that journal before leaving home, placing it in the heart of the kitchen fire, and holding it there with the poker, until the remains of it fluttered up the chimney in black, impalpable fragments.

But old Max had brought another doc.u.ment in his pocket, which had been placed in his hand just as he was starting in the gig. It was a letter directed to Miss Rhoda Maxfield, High Street, Whitford. And this he pulled out almost immediately on seeing Rhoda. A glance at her face sufficed to show him that she was unhappy and dispirited. "She has heard it!" he thought. And something like an anathema upon Algernon followed the thought in his mind.

The old man's countenance was not so clearly read by his daughter; indeed, she hardly raised her eyes to his, but received his kiss in silence.

"I'm afraid, father, you'll not find Rhoda's looks doing us credit,"

said Mrs. Seth. "Why or wherefore I don't know, but these last days she has been as peaky as can be."

"It's the heat, maybe," said old Max shortly and withdrew his own and Mrs. Seth's attention from the girl, as she read the letter he handed to her. Rhoda was grateful for this forbearance on her father's part, although it fluttered her, too, a little, as proving that he was aware of the cause of her dejection, and anxious to s.h.i.+eld it from observation.