Sir Brook Fossbrooke Volume I Part 12

"Well, I suspect that, so far as mere wildness goes,--extravagance and that sort of thing,--he has had enough of it; but there are mistakes that a young fellow may make in life--mistakes in judgment--which will damage him more irreparably than all his derelictions against morality."

"That I deny,--totally, entirely deny. I know what you mean,--that is, I think I know what you mean; and if I guess aright, I am distinctly at issue with you on this matter."

"Perhaps I could convince you, notwithstanding. Here's a letter which I have no right to show you; it is marked 'Strictly confidential and private.' You shall read it,--nay, you must read it,--because you are exactly the man to be able to give advice on the matter. You like Traflford, and wish him well. Read that over carefully, and tell me what you would counsel."

Fossbrooke took out his spectacles, and, having seated himself comfortably, with his back to the light, began in leisurely fas.h.i.+on to peruse the letter. "It's his mother who writes," said he, turning to the signature,--"one of the most worldly women I ever met. She was a Lascelles. Don't you know how she married Trafford?"

"I don't remember, if I ever heard."

"It was her sister that Trafford wanted to marry, but she was ambitious to be a peeress; and as Bradbrook was in love with her, she told Sir Hugh, 'I have got a sister so like me n.o.body can distinguish between us.

She 'd make an excellent wife for you. She rides far better than me, and she is n't half so extravagant. I 'll send for her.' She did so, and the whole thing was settled in a week."

"They have lived very happily together."

"Of course they have. They didn't 'go in,' as the speculators say, for enormous profits; they realized very fairly, and were satisfied. I wish her handwriting had been more cared for. What's this she says here about a subscription?"

"That 's supervision,--the supervision of a parent."

"Supervision of a fiddlestick! the fellow is six feet one inch high, and seven-and-twenty years of age; he's quite beyond supervision. Ah!

brought back all his father's gout, has he? When will people begin to admit that their own tempers have something to say to their maladies?

I curse the cook who made the mulligatawny, but I forget that I ate two platefuls of it. So it's the doctor's daughter she objects to. I wish she saw her. I wish _you_ saw her, Cave. You are an old frequenter of courts and drawing-rooms. I tell you you have seen nothing like this doctor's daughter since Laura Bedingfield was presented, and that was before your day."

"Every one has heard of the Beauty Bedingfield; but she was my mother's contemporary."

"Well, sir, her successors have not eclipsed her! This doctor's daughter, as your correspondent calls her, is the only rival of her that I have ever seen. As to wit and accomplishments, Laura could not compete with Lucy Lendrick."

"You know her, then?" asked the Colonel; and then added, "Tell me something about the family."

"With your leave, I will finish this letter first. Ah! here we have the whole secret. Lionel Trafford is likely to be that precious prize, an eldest son. Who could have thought that the law of entail could sway a mother's affections? 'Contract no ties inconsistent with his station.'

This begins to be intolerable, Cave. I don't think I can go on."

"Yes, yes; read it through."

"She asks you if you know any one who knows these Hendrichs or Lendrichs; tell her that you do; tell her that your friend is one of those men who have seen a good deal of life, heard more, too, than he has seen. She will understand that, and that his name is Sir Brook Fossbrooke, who, if needed, will think nothing of a journey over to Lincolns.h.i.+re to afford her all the information she could wish for.

Say this, Cave, and take my word for it, she will put very few more questions to you."

"That would be to avow I had already consulted with you. No, no; I must not do that."

"The wind-up of the epistle is charming. 'I have certainly no reason to love Ireland.' Poor Ireland! here is another infliction upon you. Let us hope you may never come to know that Lady Trafford cannot love you."

"Come, come, Fossbrooke, be just, be fair; there is nothing so very unreasonable in the anxiety of a mother that her son, who will have a good name and a large estate, should not share them both with a person beneath him."

"Why must she a.s.sume that this is the case,--why take it for granted that this girl must be beneath him? I tell you, sir, if a prince of the blood had fallen in love with her, it would be a reason to repeal the Royal Marriage Act."

"I declare, Fossbrooke, I shall begin to suspect that your own heart has not escaped scathless," said Cave, laughing.

The old man's face became crimson, but not with anger. As suddenly it grew pale; and in a voice of deep agitation he said, "When an old man like myself lays his homage at her feet, it is not hard to believe how a young man might love her."

"How did you come to make this acquaintance?" said Cave, anxious to turn the conversation into a more familiar channel.

"We chanced to fail in with her brother on the river. We found him struggling with a fish far too large for his tackle, and which at last smashed his rod and got away. He showed not alone that he was a perfect angler, but that he was a fine-tempered fellow, who accepted his defeat manfully and well; he had even a good word for his enemy, sir, and it was that which attracted me. Trafford and he, young-men-like, soon understood each other; he came into our boat, lunched with us, and asked us home with him to tea. There 's the whole story. As to the intimacy that followed, it was mostly my own doing. I own to you I never so much as suspected that Trafford was smitten by her; he was always with her brother, scarcely at all in her company; and when he came to tell me he was in love, I asked him how he caught the malady, for I never saw him near the infection. Once that I knew of the matter, however, I made him write home to his family."

"It was by your advice, then, that he wrote that letter?"

"Certainly; I not only advised, I insisted on it,--I read it, too, before it was sent off. It was such a letter as, if I had been the young fellow's father, would have made me prouder than to hear he had got the thanks of Parliament."

"You and I, Fossbrooke, are old bachelors; we are scarcely able to say what we should have done if we had had sons."

"I am inclined to believe it would have made us better, not worse," said Fossbrooke, gravely.

"At all events, as it was at your instigation this letter was written, I can't well suggest your name as an impartial person in the transaction,--I mean, as one who can be referred to for advice or information."

"Don't do so, sir, or I shall be tempted to say more than may be prudent. Have you never noticed, Cave, the effect that a doctor's presence produces in the society of those who usually consult him,--the reserve,--the awkwardness,--the constraint,--the apologetic tone for this or that little indiscretion,--the sitting in the draught or the extra gla.s.s of sherry? So is it, but in a far stronger degree, when an old man of the world like myself comes back amongst those he formerly lived with,--one who knew all their past history, how they succeeded here, how they failed there,--what led the great man of fas.h.i.+on to finish his days in a colony, and why the Court beauty married a bishop.

Ah, sir, we are the physicians who have all these secrets in our keeping. It is ours to know what sorrow is covered by that smile, how that merry laugh has but smothered the sigh of a heavy heart. It is only when a man has lived to my age, with an unfailing memory too, that he knows the real hollowness of life,--all the combinations falsified, all the hopes blighted,--the clever fellows that have turned out failures, or worse than failures,--the lovely women that have made s.h.i.+pwreck through their beauty. It is not only, however, that he knows this, but he knows how craft and cunning have won where ability and frankness have lost,--how intrigue and trick have done better than genius and integrity. With all this knowledge, sir, in their heads, and stout hearts within them, such men as myself have their utility in life. They are a sort of walking conscience that cannot be ignored. The railroad millionnaire talks less boastfully before him who knew him as an errand-boy; the _grande dame_ is less superciliously insolent in the presence of one who remembered her in a very different character. Take my word for it, Cave, Nestor may have been a bit of a bore amongst the young Greeks of fas.h.i.+on, but he had his utility too."

"But how am I to answer this letter? What advice shall I give her?"

"Tell her frankly that you have made the inquiry she wished; that the young lady, who is as well born as her son, is without fortune, and if her personal qualities count for nothing, would be what the world would call a 'bad match.'"

"Yes, that sounds practicable. I think that will do."

"Tell her, also, that if she seriously desires that her son should continue in the way of that reformation he has so ardently followed for some time back, and especially so since he has made the acquaintance of this family, such a marriage as this would give her better reasons for confidence than all her most crafty devices in match-making and settlements."

"I don't think I can exactly tell her that," said Caver smiling.

"Tell her, then, that if this connection be not to her liking, to withdraw her son at once from this neighborhood before this girl should come to care for him; for if she should, by heavens! he shall marry her, if every acre of the estate were to go to a cousin ten times removed!"

"Were not these people all strangers to you t' other day, Fossbrooke?"

said Cave, in something like a tone of reprehension.

"So they were. I had never so much as heard of them; but she, this girl, has a claim upon my interest, founded on a resemblance so strong that when I see her, I live back again in the long past, and find myself in converse with the dearest friends I ever had. I vow to Heaven I never knew the bitterness of want of fortune till now! I never felt how powerless and insignificant poverty can make a man till I desired to contribute to this girl's happiness; and if I were not an old worthless wreck,--shattered and unseaworthy,--I 'd set to work to-morrow to refit and try to make a fortune to bestow on her."

If Cave was half disposed to banter the old man on what seemed little short of a devoted attachment, the agitation of Fossbrooke's manner--his trembling lip, his shaking voice, his changing color--all warned him to forbear, and abstain from what might well have proved a perilous freedom.

"You will dine with us at mess, Fossbrooke, won't you?"

"No; I shall return at once to Killaloe. I made Dr. Lendrick's acquaintance just as I started by the train. I want to see more of him. Besides, now that I know what was the emergency that called young Trafford up here, I have nothing to detain me."

"Shall you see him before you go?"

"Of course. I am going over to his quarters now."

"You will not mention our conversation?"

"Certainly not."

"I 'd like to show you my letter before I send it off. I 'd be glad to think it was what you recommended."

"Write what you feel to be a fair statement of the case, and if by any chance an inclination to partiality crosses you, let it be in favor of the young. Take my word for it, Cave, there is a selfishness in age that needs no ally. Stand by the sons; the fathers and mothers will take care of themselves. Good-bye."