That Unfortunate Marriage Volume Ii Part 19

"Does my father know?" he asked in a low voice.

"There, I confess, I am puzzled," said Dr. Hatch. "I have never told him his danger in plain words; but he is too clever a man to be hoodwinked.

My own impression is, that your father suspects his state to be critical, but shrinks from admitting it even to himself. I think there must be some private reason for this," added the doctor, leaning forward and peering into Theodore's face as he stood in the moonlight: the moonlight which at that same moment was s.h.i.+ning in May's eyes, looking at her young lover. "It certainly does not arise from cowardice. Your father is one of the manliest men I have ever known."

If Theodore knew, or guessed, that his father had any secret reason for anxiety, he did not betray it.

"I have observed increasing weakness of character in him lately," he said.

The words might have been uttered so as to convey perfect filial tenderness. But there was a subtle something in the tone suggestive of contempt; or at least of remoteness from sympathy, which jarred painfully on Dr. Hatch. He said "Good night" abruptly, and gave his coachman the order to drive on.

After this conversation, it somewhat surprised the doctor to learn that Theodore meant to leave home at the beginning of October, although he was not to enter on his practical career as a barrister until the winter. He had accepted one or two invitations to country houses during the pheasant shooting; and gave, as his reason for going at that time, that his health required change of air.

"_His_ health!" growled Dr. Hatch, when Mrs. Bransby gave him this piece of news. "I should have thought he might stay and be of some use to his father in business."

"Oh, we are rather glad he is going," exclaimed Mrs. Bransby impulsively. Then she said apologetically, "Martin does not want him at home. Theodore has never taken any interest in office matters; and Tuckey manages capitally. Tuckey is Martin's right hand."

Mr. Tuckey was the confidential head clerk in the office which still retained the name of the firm, "Cadell and Bransby," although Cadell had departed this life twenty years ago, and the business had been, ever since that time, wholly in the hands of Martin Bransby.

Mrs. Bransby did not hint at one motive for Theodore's departure which her woman's wit had revealed to her; namely, that Miss Cheffington would be leaving Oldchester about the same time. It was true that Theodore had calculated on this; and also on the fact that Owen Rivers would be safely out of the way across the Pyrenees. But there was another motive which lay deeper; and, indeed, formed a part of the very texture of Theodore's temperament:--he shrank from the idea of being present during his father's last illness.

It has already been stated that he was subject to the dread of having inherited his mother's consumptive tendency, and he shunned all suggestions of sickness and death with the sort of instinct which makes an animal select its food. The very mention of death produced the effect of a physical chill on his nervous system. He was not without affection for his father; although it had been much weakened by Mr. Bransby's second marriage. Many persons who knew Theodore's tastes for gentility, a.s.sumed that Miss Louisa Lutyer's descent from a good old family would be gratifying to him, and help to make him accept the marriage good-humouredly. But the fact was quite otherwise. Theodore constantly suspected his step-mother of vaunting the superiority of her birth over that of her predecessor. He had never seen either of his maternal grandparents, and did not know all the details which Mrs. Dobbs could have given him about the history of "Old Rabbitt." But he knew enough to be aware that his mother had been a person of humble extraction. And he could more easily have forgiven his father had the latter chosen a person still humbler for his second wife. It was chiefly his ever-present consciousness that Louisa was a gentlewoman by birth and breeding, which made him jealously resent the luxuries with which his father surrounded her, and even the fastidious elegance of her dress.

And, apart from all other considerations, it would have given him sincere satisfaction to marry a wife who should have the undoubted right to walk out of a drawing-room before Mrs. Martin Bransby.

One of the many points of antagonism between Owen and Theodore was the opposite feeling with which each regarded Mrs. Bransby. Owen had a chivalrous devotion for her; Theodore was nothing less than chivalrous.

Owen's admiration was made tender and protecting by a large infusion of pity; Theodore held that in marrying his father Miss Louisa Lutyer had met with good fortune beyond her merits. As to his step-brothers and sisters, Theodore's feeling towards them was one of cool repulsion, with the single exception of little Enid, the youngest, whom he would have petted, could he have separated her in all things from the rest.

As soon as Owen's engagement with Mr. Bragg was a.s.sured, Owen called at the Bransbys' to tell his news in person. On inquiring for Mrs. Bransby, he was told that she was with her husband in the garden, and, being a familiar visitor, the servant left him to find his way to them unannounced.

It was a warm September afternoon; everything in the old garden--the lichen-tinted brick walls, the autumnal flowers, the deep velvet of the turf, the foliage slightly touched with red and gold--looked mellow and peaceful. Under the shadow of a tall elm-tree, whose topmost boughs were swaying with the movement, and resounding with the caw of rooks, Martin Bransby reclined on a long chair, and his wife sat on a garden bench a yard or two away. When she saw Owen approaching, Mrs. Bransby laid her finger on her lips, and then Owen saw that Mr. Bransby was asleep.

The old man lay with his head supported on a crimson cus.h.i.+on, against which his abundant silver hair was strongly relieved. The brows above the closed eyelids were still dark. The placidity of repose enhanced the beauty of his finely moulded features; but he was very pale, and his cheeks and temples looked worn and thin. Mrs. Bransby welcomed Owen with a smile and an outstretched hand. At the first glance he had thought that she, too, looked pale and suffering, but the little glow of animation in her face when she spoke effaced this impression.

"Am I disturbing you?" asked Owen in a whisper.

"No, no; sit down. You need not whisper, it is enough to speak low; he sleeps heavily. I am so glad to see him sleep, for his nights have been restless lately." As Mrs. Bransby spoke, she pushed aside a heap of gay-coloured silks with which she was embroidering a rich velvet cus.h.i.+on, and made room for Owen on the garden-seat beside her. "I know your news already," she continued, "and I must congratulate you, although you will be sadly missed. My boys will be in despair; we shall all miss you."

"I am glad, at all events, that you seem to approve of the step I have taken."

"Of course. All your friends must approve it.

"Well, they are not so numerous as to make their unanimity absolutely impossible."

Then, after a short silence, during which Mrs. Bransby resumed her embroidery, and Owen thoughtfully raked together some fallen leaves with his stick, he said--

"But you don't know the extent of my good fortune. There is a chance--rather a remote one, but still a chance--that this employment may lead to more, and that I may get some work to do in South America."

She started, and the gay embroidery fell from her hands on to the gra.s.s, as she exclaimed with plaintive, down-drawn lips, like those of a child, "Oh, not to South America! Don't go so far away!"

He merely shook his head.

"Oh, that is terrible!" she said. "I never thought of that! But, perhaps, you will not go."

"Very much, 'perhaps.' It would be better luck than I could expect."

"And you really could have the heart to leave us all, and go off to the other side of the globe? Oh, I can't bear to think of it!"

"Don't speak so kindly! You will take away all my courage," he said, looking for a moment at the beautiful eyes fixed on his face.

"Ah, I am very selfish. Of course you ought to go, if going will lead to a career for you. Although one can't help feeling that you will be, somehow wasted in mere commercial pursuits. Yes, yes, of course, I am wrong!" she added, hastily antic.i.p.ating his rejoinder. "It is all very proper and Spartan, no doubt. But I am not in the least Spartan, you know."

"People usually find it easy to be Spartan for their friends. Very few keep their stoicism for themselves, and their soft-heartedness for others--as you do!"

He glanced involuntarily at Martin Bransby, as he spoke; and she followed his glance with instant quickness of understanding.

"How do you think he is looking? You do not think he seems worse, do you?" she said.

"No, indeed, no!"

"I was afraid, when you talked about stoicism----"

"No, I only meant that you always show great courage when Mr. Bransby is ill."

"I don't think I am naturally courageous. But love gives courage."

"Yes,--the genuine sort of love."

"Although it makes one frightened, too, in one way. I am sometimes very uneasy about him." She turned a gaze of profound tenderness on her husband's sleeping face.

"I trust your uneasiness is needless," said Owen. "Mr. Bransby seems to be going on well, does he not?"

"Oh yes, I hope so. But he does not gain strength. His rest is very troubled, and he talks in his sleep. And I think his spirits are much less cheerful than they were. He has a great regard for you. He will approve of what you are doing, I know. But he will be as sorry as the rest of us to think of your going so far away."

She said all this in her usual sweet voice, and with her usual soft grace of manner. Then all at once she broke down in a sudden pa.s.sion of tears, and burying her face in her handkerchief, she sobbed out, "If you go to South America he will never see you again;--never, never! I know his days are numbered. They think they keep me in ignorance; but I know it, I know it!"

Owen was melted by her grief. In the eyes of sound-hearted manhood, beauty, while it attracts, adds a sort of sacredness to a pure woman. To see that lovely face convulsed with weeping made an impression on his senses, such as he might have felt at seeing an exquisite work of art defaced or mutilated. And beyond that, there was the warm human sympathy, and the feeling of compa.s.sionate protection due to her s.e.x.

"Dearest Mrs. Bransby," he said, looking at her piteously, "pray, pray take comfort. Oh, how I wish that I could give you any help or comfort!"

She continued to weep softly and silently for a little while longer.

Then she wiped away her tears, and spoke with calmness. "Forgive me! It was selfish to distress you," she said. "But it has relieved my heart to cry a little. And you have always been so friendly. I have as great reliance on you as if I had known you all my life."

"As far as the will goes, you cannot over-rate my friends.h.i.+p. But the power, alas! is small; or rather none."

"No; don't say that. Whenever I have forced myself to look forward to the great sorrow which may soon come upon me, I have said to myself, 'I know Mr. Rivers would be good to me and the children, and would help us with honest advice.' I have no one belonging to me--of my own family--left to rely on. The boys and I would be very desolate and forlorn, if we were left to guide ourselves by our own wisdom."

"There is Theodore," said Owen. But he said it with dry awkwardness, as though there were something in the words to be ashamed of.

"Theodore does not love us," returned Mrs. Bransby quickly. "You were praising me just now for caring about my friends. But you see how selfish my thoughts were all the time! It does seem so dreary to imagine you far away out of our reach!"