Castle Richmond Part 24

Some misfortune was impending over them, and there had been that in her own early history which filled her with dismay as she thought of this.

She had ardently desired to caution her son in this respect,--to guard him, if possible, against future disappointment and future sorrow. But she could not do so without obtaining in some sort her husband's a.s.sent to her doing so. She resolved that she would talk it over with Sir Thomas. But the subject was one so full of pain, and he was so ill, and therefore she had put it off.

And now she saw that the injury was done. Nevertheless, she said nothing either to Emmeline or to Herbert. If the injury were done, what good could now result from talking? She doubtless would hear it all soon enough. So she sat still, watching them.

On the following morning Sir Thomas did not come out to breakfast.

Herbert went into his room quite early, as was always his custom; and as he left it for the breakfast-parlour he said, "Father, I should like to speak to you just now about something of importance."

"Something of importance, Herbert; what is it? Anything wrong?" For Sir Thomas was nervous, and easily frightened.

"Oh dear, no; nothing is wrong. It is nothing that will annoy you; at least I think not. But it will keep till after breakfast. I will come in again the moment breakfast is over." And so saying he left the room with a light step.

In the breakfast-parlour it seemed to him as though everybody was conscious of some important fact. His mother's kiss was peculiarly solemn and full of solicitude; Aunt Letty smirked as though she was aware of something--something over and above the great Protestant tenets which usually supported her; and Mary had no joke to fling at him.

"Emmeline," he whispered, "you have told."

"No, indeed," she replied. But what mattered it? Everybody would know now in a few minutes. So he ate his breakfast, and then returned to Sir Thomas.

"Father," said he, as soon as he had got into the arm-chair, in which it was his custom to sit when talking with Sir Thomas, "I hope what I am going to tell you will give you pleasure. I have proposed to a young lady, and she has--accepted me."

"You have proposed, and have been accepted!"

"Yes, father."

"And the young lady--?"

"Is Lady Clara Desmond. I hope you will say that you approve of it.

She has no fortune, as we all know, but that will hardly matter to me; and I think you will allow that in every other respect she is--"

Perfect, Herbert would have said, had he dared to express his true meaning. But he paused for a moment to look for a less triumphant word; and then paused again, and left his sentence incomplete, when he saw the expression of his father's face.

"Oh, father! you do not mean to say that you do not like her?"

But it was not dislike that was expressed in his father's face, as Herbert felt the moment after he had spoken. There was pain there, and solicitude, and disappointment; a look of sorrow at the tidings thus conveyed to him; but nothing that seemed to betoken dislike of any person.

"What is it, sir? Why do you not speak to me? Can it be that you disapprove of my marrying?"

Sir Thomas certainly did disapprove of his son's marrying, but he lacked the courage to say so. Much misery that had hitherto come upon him, and that was about to come on all those whom he loved so well, arose from this lack of courage. He did not dare to tell his son that he advised him for the present to put aside all such hopes. It would have been terrible for him to do so; but he knew that in not doing so he was occasioning sorrow that would be more terrible.

And yet he did not do it. Herbert saw clearly that the project was distasteful to his father,--that project which he had hoped to have seen received with so much delight; but nothing was said to him which tended to make him alter his purpose.

"Do you not like her?" he asked his father, almost piteously.

"Yes, yes; I do like her, we all like her, very much indeed, Herbert."

"Then why--"

"You are so young, my boy, and she is so very young, and--"

"And what?"

"Why, Herbert, it is not always practicable for the son even of a man of property to marry so early in life as this. She has nothing, you know."

"No," said the young man, proudly; "I never thought of looking for money."

"But in your position it is so essential if a young man wishes to marry."

Herbert had always regarded his father as the most liberal man breathing,--as open-hearted and open-handed almost to a fault. To him, his only son, he had ever been so, refusing him nothing, and latterly allowing him to do almost as he would with the management of the estate. He could not understand that this liberality should be turned to parsimony on such an occasion as that of his son's marriage.

"You think then, sir, that I ought not to marry Lady Clara?" said Herbert very bitterly.

"I like her excessively," said Sir Thomas. "I think she is a sweet girl, a very sweet girl, all that I or your mother could desire to see in your wife; but--"

"But she is not rich."

"Do not speak to me in that tone, my boy," said Sir Thomas, with an expression that would have moved his enemy to pity, let alone his son. His son did pity him, and ceased to wear the angry expression of face which had so wounded his father.

"But, father, I do not understand you," he said. "Is there any real objection why I should not marry? I am more than twenty-two, and you, I think, married earlier than that."

In answer to this Sir Thomas only sighed meekly and piteously.

"If you mean to say," continued the son, "that it will be inconvenient to you to make me any allowance--"

"No, no, no; you are of course ent.i.tled to what you want, and as long as I can give it, you shall have it."

"As long as you can give it, father!"

"As long as it is in my power, I mean. What can I want of anything but for you--for you and them?"

After this Herbert sat silent for a while, leaning on his arm. He knew that there existed some mischief, but he could not fathom it. Had he been prudent, he would have felt that there was some impediment to his love; some evil which it behoved him to fathom before he allowed his love to share it; but when was a lover prudent?

"We should live here, should we not, father? No second establishment would be necessary."

"Of course you would live here," said Sir Thomas, glad to be able to look at the subject on any side that was not painful. "Of course you would live here. For the matter of that, Herbert, the house should be considered as your own if you so wished it."

Against this the son put in his most violent protest. Nothing on earth should make him consider himself master of Castle Richmond as long as his father lived. Nor would Clara,--his Clara, wish it. He knew her well, he boasted. It would amply suffice to her to live there with them all. Was not the house large enough? And, indeed, where else could he live, seeing that all his interests were naturally centred upon the property?

And then Sir Thomas did give his consent. It would be wrong to say that it was wrung from him. He gave it willingly enough, as far as the present moment was concerned. When it was once settled, he a.s.sured his son that he would love Clara as his daughter. But, nevertheless--

The father knew that he had done wrong; and Herbert knew that he also, he himself, had done wrongly. He was aware that there was something which he did not understand. But he had promised to see Clara either that day or the next, and he could not bring himself to unsay all that he had said to her. He left his father's room sorrowful at heart, and discontented. He had expected that his tidings would have been received in so far other a manner; that he would have been able to go from his father's study up stairs to his mother's room with so exulting a step; that his news, when once the matter was ratified by his father's approval, would have flown about the house with so loud a note of triumph. And now it was so different! His father had consented; but it was too plain that there was no room for any triumph.

"Well, Herbert!" said Emmeline, jumping up to meet him as he returned to a small back drawing-room, through which he had gone to his father's dressing-room. She had calculated that he would come there, and that she might thus get the first word from him after the interview was over.

But there was a frown upon his brow, and displeasure in his eyes.

There was none of that bright smile of gratified pride with which she had expected that her greeting would have been met. "Is there anything wrong?" she said. "He does not disapprove, does he?"

"Never mind; and do leave me now. I never can make you understand that one is not always in a humour for joking." And so saying, he put her aside, and pa.s.sed on.

Joking! That was indeed hard upon poor Emmeline, seeing that her thoughts were so full of him, that her heart beat so warmly for his promised bride. But she said nothing, shrinking back abashed, and vanis.h.i.+ng out of the way. Could it be possible that her father should have refused to receive Lady Clara Desmond as his daughter-in-law?