Wilfrid Cumbermede Part 43

I made no reply, thinking of my uncle.

'I did not know you were down,' he resumed. 'I was calling at my father's, and seeing your light across the park, thought it possible you might be here, and rode over to see. May I take the liberty of asking what your plans are?' he added, seating himself by the fire.

'I have hardly had time to form new ones; but I mean to stick to my work, anyhow.'

'You mean your profession?'

'Yes, if you will allow me to call it such. I have had success enough already to justify me in going on.'

'I am more pleased than surprised to hear it,' he answered.

'But what will you do with the old nest?'

'Let the old nest wait for the old bird, Mr Coningham--keep it to die in.'

'I don't like to hear a young fellow talking that way,' he remonstrated. 'You've got a long life to live yet--at least I hope so.

But if you leave the house untenanted till the period to which you allude, it will be quite unfit by that time even for the small service you propose to require of it. Why not let it--for a term of years? I could find you a tenant, I make no doubt.'

'I won't let it. I shall meet the world all the better if I have a place of my own to take refuge in.'

'Well, I can't say but there's good in that fancy. To have any spot of your own, however small--freehold, I mean--must be a comfort. At the same time, what's the world for, if you're to meet it in that half-hearted way? I don't mean that every young man--there are exceptions--must sow just so many bushels of _avena fatua_. There are plenty of enjoyments to be got without leading a wild life--which I should be the last to recommend to any young man of principle. Take my advice, and let the place. But pray don't do me the injustice to fancy I came to look after a job. I shall be most happy to serve you.'

'I am exceedingly obliged to you,' I answered. 'If you could let the farm for me for the rest of the lease, of which there are but a few years to run, that would be of great consequence to me. Herbert, my uncle's foreman, who has the management now, is a very good fellow, but I doubt if he will do more than make both ends meet without my aunt, and the accounts would bother me endlessly.'

'I shall find out whether Lord Inglewold would be inclined to resume the f.a.g-end. In such case, as the lease has been a long one, and land has risen much, he would doubtless pay a part of the difference. Then there's the stock, worth a good deal, I should think. I'll see what can be done. And then there's the stray bit of park?'

'What do you mean by that?' I asked. 'We have been in the way of calling it the _park_, though why I never could tell. I confess it does look like a bit of Sir Giles's that had wandered beyond the gates.'

'There _is_ some old story or other about it, I believe. The possessors of the Moldwarp estate have, from time immemorial, regarded it as properly theirs. I know that.'

'I am much obliged to them, certainly. _I_ have been in the habit of thinking differently.'

'Of course, of course,' he rejoined, laughing. 'But there may have been some--mistake somewhere. I know Sir Giles would give five times its value for it.'

'He should not have it if he offered the Moldwarp estate in exchange,'

I cried indignantly; and the thought flashed across me that this temptation was what my uncle had feared from the acquaintance of Mr Coningham.

'Your sincerity will not be put to so great a test as that,' he returned, laughing quite merrily. 'But I am glad you have such a respect for real property. At the same time--how many acres are there of it?'

'I don't know,' I answered, curtly and truly.

'It is of no consequence. Only if you don't want to be tempted, don't let Sir Giles or my father broach the subject. You needn't look at me.

_I_ am not Sir Giles's agent. Neither do my father and I run in double harness. He hinted, however, this very day, that he believed the old fool wouldn't stick at 500 an acre for this bit of gra.s.s--if he couldn't get it for less.'

'If that is what you have come about, Mr Coningham,' I rejoined, haughtily I dare say, for something I could not well define made me feel as if the dignity of a thousand ancestors were perilled in my own,' I beg you will not say another word on the subject, for sell this land I _will not_.'

He was looking at me strangely. His eye glittered with what, under other circ.u.mstances, I might have taken for satisfaction; but he turned his face away and rose, saying with a curiously altered tone, as he took up his hat,

'I'm very sorry to have offended you, Mr c.u.mbermede. I sincerely beg your pardon. I thought our old--friends.h.i.+p may I not call it?--would have justified me in merely reporting what I had heard. I see now that I was wrong. I ought to have shown more regard for your feelings at this trying time. But again I a.s.sure you I was only reporting, and had not the slightest intention of making myself a go-between in the matter. One word more: I have no doubt I could _let_ the field for you--at good grazing rental. That I think you can hardly object to.'

'I should be much obliged to you,' I replied--'for a term of not more than seven years--but without the house, and with the stipulation expressly made that I have right of way in every direction through it.'

'Reasonable enough,' he answered.

'One thing more,' I said: 'all these affairs must be pure matters of business between us.'

'As you please,' he returned, with, I fancied, a shadow of disappointment, if not of displeasure, on his countenance. 'I should have been more gratified if you had accepted a friendly office; but I will do my best for you, notwithstanding.'

'I had no intention of being unfriendly, Mr Coningham,' I said. 'But when I think of it, I fear I may have been rude, for the bare proposal of selling this Naboth's vineyard of mine would go far to make me rude to any man alive. It sounds like an invitation to dishonour myself in the eyes of my ancestors.'

'Ah! you do care about your ancestors?' he said, half musingly, and looking into his hat.

'Of course I do. Who is there does not?'

'Only some ninety-nine hundredths of the English nation.'

'I cannot well forget,' I returned, 'what my ancestors have done for me.'

'Whereas most people only remember that their ancestors can do no more for them. I declare I am almost glad I offended you. It does one good to hear a young man speak like that in these degenerate days, when a buck would rather be the son of a rich brewer than a decayed gentleman.

I will call again about the end of the week--that is if you will be here--and report progress.'

His manner, as he took his leave, was at once more friendly and more respectful than it had yet been--a change which I attributed to his having discovered in me more firmness than he had expected, in regard, if not of my rights, at least of my social position.

CHAPTER x.x.xI.

ARRANGEMENTS.

My custom at this time, and for long after I had finally settled down in the country, was to rise early in the morning--often, as I used when a child, before sunrise, in order to see the first burst of the sun upon the new-born world. I believed then, as I believe still, that, lovely as the sunset is, the sunrise is more full of mystery, poetry, and even, I had almost said, pathos. But often ere he was well up I had begun to imagine what the evening would be like, and with what softly mingled, all but imperceptible, gradations it would steal into night.

Then, when the night came, I would wander about my little field, vainly endeavouring to picture the glory with which the next day's sun would rise upon me. Hence the morning and evening became well known to me; and yet I shrink from saying it, for each is endless in the variety of its change. And the longer I was alone, I became the more enamoured of solitude, with the labour to which, in my case, it was so helpful; and began, indeed, to be in some danger of losing sight of my relation to 'a world of men,' for with that world my imagination and my love for Charley were now my sole recognizable links.

In the fore-part of the day I read and wrote; and in the after-part found both employment and pleasure in arranging my uncle's books, amongst which I came upon a good many treasures, whereof I was now able in some measure to appreciate the value--thinking often, amidst their ancient dust and odours, with something like indignant pity, of the splendid collection, as I was sure it must be, mouldering away in utter neglect at the neighbouring Hall.

I was on my knees in the midst of a pile which I had drawn from a cupboard under the shelves, when Mrs Herbert showed Mr Coningham in. I was annoyed, for my uncle's room was sacred; but as I was about to take him to my own, I saw such a look of interest upon his face that it turned me aside, and I asked him to take a seat.

'If you do not mind the dust,' I said.

'Mind the dust!' he exclaimed, '--of old books! I count it almost sacred. I am glad you know how to value them.'

What right had he to be glad? How did he know I valued them? How could I but value them? I rebuked my offence, however, and after a little talk about them, in which he revealed much more knowledge than I should have expected, it vanished. He then informed me of an arrangement he and Lord Inglewold's factor had been talking over in respect of the farm; also of an offer he had had for my field. I considered both sufficiently advantageous in my circ.u.mstances, and the result was that I closed with both.

A few days after this arrangement I returned to London, intending to remain for some time. I had a warm welcome from Charley, but could not help fancying an unacknowledged something dividing us. He appeared, notwithstanding, less oppressed, and, in a word, more like other people. I proceeded at once to finish two or three papers and stories, which late events had interrupted. But within a week London had grown to me stifling and unendurable, and I longed unspeakably for the free air of my field and the loneliness of my small castle. If my reader regard me as already a hypochondriac, the sole disproof I have to offer is, that I was then diligently writing what some years afterwards obtained a hearty reception from the better cla.s.s of the reading public. Whether my habits were healthy or not, whether my love of solitude was natural or not, I cannot but hope from this that my modes of thinking were. The end was that, after finis.h.i.+ng the work I had on hand, I collected my few belongings, gave up my lodging, bade Charley good-bye, receiving from him a promise to visit me at my own house if possible, and took my farewell of London for a season, determined not to return until I had produced a work which my now more enlarged judgment might consider fit to see the light. I had laid out all my spare money upon books, with which, in a few heavy trunks, I now went back to my solitary dwelling. I had no care upon my mind, for my small fortune, along with the rent of my field, was more than sufficient for my maintenance in the almost anch.o.r.etic seclusion in which I intended to live, and hence I had every advantage for the more definite projection and prosecution of a work which had been gradually shaping itself in my mind for months past.

Before leaving for London, I had already spoken to a handy lad employed upon the farm, and he had kept himself free to enter my service when I should require him. He was the more necessary to me that I still had my mare Lilith, from which nothing but fate should ever part me. I had no difficulty in arranging with the new tenant for her continued accommodation at the farm; while, as Herbert still managed its affairs, the services of his wife were available as often as I required them.

But my man soon made himself capable of doing everything for me, and proved himself perfectly trustworthy.