Beauchamp; or, The Error.

by G. P. R. James

CHAPTER XXVI.

I do believe, from my very heart and soul, that there is not the slightest possible good in attempting to write a book regularly. I say with prime ministers and maid-servants, with philosophers and fools, "I've tried it, and surely I ought to know." It may be objected that the result entirely depends upon the way in which a thing is tried, and that a very simple experiment would fail or might fail in the hands of a fool or a maid-servant, which would succeed in those of a prime minister or a philosopher. Nevertheless, it is true that critics make rules which life will not conform to. Art says one thing, nature another; and, in such a case, a fig for art! Art may teach us how to embellish nature, or show us what to portray.

"Do not be continually changing the scene," says the critic, "do not run from character to character; introduce no personage who does not tend to bring about some result;" but in the course of human events the scene is always shifting; the characters which pass before our eyes, cross and return at every instant, and innumerable personages flit before us like shadows over a glass, leaving no trace of their having been. Others, indeed, appear for an instant not only on the limited stage of domestic life, but often on the great scene of the world, act their appointed part, produce some particular effect, and then like those strange visitants of our system, the comets, rush back into the depths from which they emerged but for an hour.

All this has been written to prove that it is perfectly right and judicious that I should introduce my beloved reader into the study of Mr. Wharton, or rather Abraham Wharton, Esq., solicitor, and attorney-at-law. Mr. Wharton was a small, spare, narrow man, of a tolerably gentlemanlike figure; and, to look at his back, one of those prepossessions which lead us all by the nose, made one believe that his face must be a thin, sharp, foxlike face, probably with a dark black beard, closely shaved, making the muzzle look blue.

On getting round in front, however, the surprise of the new acquaintance was great to see a red and blotchy countenance, with sharp black eyes, and very little beard at all. There was generally a secret simper upon his lips intended to be courteous, but that simper, like an exchequer bill, was very easily convertible, and a poor client, an inferior solicitor on the opposite side, or an unready debtor, soon found that it would be changed into heavy frowns or sarcastic grins.

Mr. Wharton was very proper and accurate in his dress. His coat was always black,--even when he went out to hunt, which was not a rare occurrence, he never sported the red jacket. In riding, he would occasionally indulge in leather, elsewhere than from the knee downwards; but the habiliment of the lower man was, upon all ordinary occasions, a pair of dark gray pantaloons. He was now so habited in his study, as he called the room behind that where seven clerks were seated, for the business he was engaged in was one in the ordinary course, though of extraordinary interest to Mr. Wharton. It was, in short, the consummation of plucking a poor bird which had been entrapped long before. Now it was not intended to leave him a feather, and yet Mr. Wharton was inclined to do the thing as decorously as possible. By decorously I do not mean tenderly--such an unnecessary delicacy never entered into Mr. Wharton's head. The decorum that he thought of was merely the seeming in the world's eyes, as a great deal of other decorum is, both male and female. He was about to be as hard, as relentless, as iron-hearted as a cannon-ball, but all with infinite professions of kindness and good feeling, and sorrow for the painful necessity, &c. &c. &c., for Mr. Wharton followed Dr. Kitchener's barbarous recipe for devouring oysters, and "tickled his little favourites before he ate them."

The lawyer was standing at a table with some papers before him--not too many--for he was not like those bankrupt attorneys of the capital who fill their rooms with brown tin cases, marked in large white letters "House of Lords," he preferred as little show of business as possible. His object now-a-days was not to get practice, but to make money. Practice enough he had; too much for the common weal.

A clerk--a sort of private secretary indeed--was sitting at the other end of the table, and the two had discussed one or two less important affairs, affecting a few hundred pounds, when Mr. Wharton at length observed, "I think to-morrow is the last day with Sir John Slingsby, Mr. Pilkington, is it not?"

He knew quite well that it was; but, it would seem, he wished to hear his clerk's opinion upon the subject.

"Yes, Sir," answered Mr. Pilkington, "I don't see a chance for him."

"Nor I either," answered Mr. Wharton; "I am afraid he is quite run out, poor man. The six months' notice of fore-closure was all right, and the interest now amounts to a large sum."

"A very large sum indeed, Sir, with the costs," answered Mr. Pilkington; "you don't think, Sir, he'll attempt to revise the costs or haggle about the interest."

"He can't, Mr. Pilkington," replied Mr. Wharton, drily, "the costs are all secured by bond and accounts passed, and it was a client of mine who advanced him the money at seven-and-a-half to pay the interest every six months on my mortgage. I had nothing to do with the transaction."

Mr. Pilkington smiled, and Mr. Wharton proceeded.

"Why you know quite well, Pilkington, that it was Dyer who advanced the money, and his bankruptcy brought the bonds into my hands."

"I thought there was only one bond, Sir," answered Mr. Pilkington; "you told me to have a fresh bond every six months for the running interest and the arrears, and the interest upon former advances, to guard against loss."

Mr. Wharton now smiled and nodded his head, saying, for he was vain of his shrewdness, and vanity is a weak passion, "True, true, Pilkington, but last half-year I saw that things were coming to a close, and therefore thought it better to have two bonds. It looks more regular, though the other is the most convenient mode."

"And besides it secures the interest on the last half-year's interest," said Pilkington; but to this observation Mr. Wharton made no reply, turning to another part of the same subject.

"Just bid Raymond to step down to Mr. Wittingham's," said the lawyer, "and tell him with my compliments I should be glad to speak with him for a minute. I must give him a hint of what is going on."

"Why, Sir," said Mr. Pilkington, hesitating "you know he has a bond too, out on the same day, and he'll be sure to go before you, having also a bill of sale."

"I know, I know," answered Mr. Wharton, "but I should like him to be the first, Pilkington."

"Will there be enough to cover all?" asked the clerk, doubtfully.

"Ample," answered his great man; "besides, the whole sum coming thundering down at once will ensure that no one will be fool enough to help. I have heard, indeed, something about a friend who would advance money to pay Wittingham's bond. Let him!--all the better, that cannot supersede my debt. Wittingham will get his money, and Sir John won't easily find much more on any security he has to offer. Besides, when some one begins, it gives the very best reason for others going on, and Wittingham won't be slow, depend upon it. Tell Mr. Raymond to fetch him."

The clerk retired, not venturing to urge any more objections; but when he returned again, Mr. Wharton himself continued the conversation thus,

"Wittingham is a curious person to deal with; one does not always know what can be his objects."

Mr. Wharton had always an object himself, and, therefore, he fancied that no man could act without one. He never took the impulse of passion, or the misdirection of folly, or the pigheadedness of obstinacy into account. However, with Mr. Wittingham he was in some degree right, as to his generally having an object; but he was in some degree wrong also, for all the other causes of human wrong-going, passion, folly, and pigheadedness, had their share in the modes, methods, and contrivances by which the worthy magistrate sought his ends.

"Now, what can be the meaning," continued Mr. Wharton, "of his opposing so strongly all steps against this Mr. Beauchamp and that Captain Hayward, who were engaged in the duel with his son?"

"They say he had quarrelled with Harry Wittingham and disinherited him," replied the clerk; "and old Mrs. Billiter, the housekeeper, is quite furious about it. She declares that it is all old Wittingham's fault; that if it had not been for him, nothing of the kind would have happened; and that he murdered the young man. I do not know what it all means; but they say she will nurse Harry Wittingham through it after all."

Mr. Wharton mused for a minute or two, and then said,

"You do not mean, he is out of danger?"

"Oh dear, no, Sir," answered Mr. Pilkington, who perceived a slightly dissatisfied twang in his superior's question; "Mr. Slattery, the surgeon, said he might sink at anytime for the next ten days."

"Humph," said Mr. Wharton, "that is all right. It will keep the others out of the way for some time to come; and a very good thing, too, for Mr. Beauchamp himself. He it is who is treating for the Moreton Hall estate; there is a little hitch in the business, which will be soon removed; but he seems to me just the sort of man who would take Sir John Slingsby's mortgage as an investment, as soon as the other. At all events, he might create difficulties in a business which had better be settled as soon as possible for all parties, and might burn his own fingers, poor man, into the bargain. You had the bills posted up, Pilkington?"

"Oh, yes, Sir," replied the clerk, "for twenty miles round, offering a reward. There is no fear, Sir. They are safe enough--most likely in France by this time."

Mr. Wharton seemed satisfied; and, after a few minutes, worthy Mr. Wittingham entered the office, and was thence ushered into the study; but, alas! it was no longer the Mr. Wittingham of former days. The somewhat fresh complexion; the stiff, consequential carriage; the vulgar swagger, were all gone; and Mr. Wittingham looked a very sick old gentleman, indeed; weak in the knees, bent in the back, and sallow in the face. The wig was ill-adjusted, the Melton coat a world too wide; you could have put a finger between the knee-bands of the breeches and the stockings; and the top-boots slipped down almost to the ancles. It was marvellous how one who had been so tall and thin before, could have become, to the eye, so much taller and thinner. The great Prince of Parma, wrote despatches, reviewed troops, and conducted a negotiation, within one hour before a long and lingering malady terminated in death. He knew he was dying, and yet went through all his ordinary business, as if he had only to dress and go out to a party instead of into his grave. This was a wonderful instance of the persistence of character under bodily infirmity, or rather of its triumph over corporeal decay. But that of Mr. Wittingham was more remarkable. The external Wittingham was wofully changed: his oldest friend would not have known him; but the internal Wittingham was still the same; there was not a tittle of difference. He was not in the least softened, he was not in the least brightened: his was one of those granite natures, hard to cut, and impossible to polish. Although he had very little of the diamond in him, yet, as the diamond can only be shaped by the powder of the diamond, nothing but Wittingham could touch Wittingham. His own selfishness was the only means by which he was accessible.

"Ah, Mr. Wharton," he said, "you sent for me; what is in the wind now? Not about these two young men any more, I trust. That account is closed. I will have nothing to do with it. Henry Wittingham called out this Captain Hayward; Captain Hayward was fool enough to go out with Henry Wittingham. They each had a shot, and the balance struck was a pistol-ball against Henry Wittingham. Perhaps, if all the items had been reckoned, the account might have been heavier, but I am not going to open the books again, I should not find any thing to the credit of my son, depend upon it."

"Oh, no, my good friend," said Mr. Wharton, in the most amiable tone possible; "I knew the subject was disagreeable to you, and therefore never returned to the business again. The other magistrates did what they thought their duty required, in offering a reward, &c., but as you had a delicacy in meddling where your son was concerned, the matter was not pressed upon you."

"Delicacy! fiddlesticks' ends!" retorted Mr. Wittingham. "I never had a delicacy in my life!--I did not choose! That is the proper word. But if it was not about this, why did you send for me?"

"Why, my dear Sir," said Mr. Wharton, "I thought it due in honour to give you a hint--as I know you are a large creditor of Sir John Slingsby--that matters are not going altogether well there."

"I have known that these six years," answered the magistrate; "honour, indeed! You have a great deal to do with honour, and delicacy, and all that; but I am a man of business, and look to things as matters of business. Speak more plainly, Wharton, what is there going worse than usual at the Park? Does he want to borrow more money?

"He did a fortnight ago, and could not get it," replied Mr. Wharton, drily; for the most impudent rogue in the world does not like to feel himself thoroughly understood. "But the short and the long of the matter is this, my good Sir:--Sir John can go on no longer. Six months' notice of fore-closure is out tomorrow; other steps must be taken immediately; large arrears of interest are due; two or three bonds with judgment are hanging over our poor friend; and you had better look after yourself."

"Well, well, there is time enough yet," said Mr. Wittingham, in a much less business-like tone than Mr. Wharton expected; "the preliminaries of the law are somewhat lengthy, Mr. Wharton? fi-fas and ca-sas take some time; and I will think of the matter."

"As you please, my good friend," answered Wharton; "only just let me hint, that all the preliminaries have been already gone through. An execution will be put in early to-morrow; there are a good many creditors, and there may be a sort of scramble, as the school-boys have it, where the quickest runner gets the biggest nut. I thought it but kind and fair to tell you, as a neighbour and a friend, especially as your debt is no trifle, I think."

"An execution early to-morrow!" exclaimed Mr. Wittingham; "won't the estate pay all?"

"About two-thirds, I imagine," said Wharton, telling, as was his wont, a great lie with the coolest face possible.

"And what will Sir John do?" said the magistrate, "and poor Miss Slingsby?"

"I am afraid we must touch Sir John's person," replied the lawyer, with a sneer; "and as to poor Miss Slingsby, I see nothing for it, but that she should go out as a governess. But do not let us talk nonsense, Wittingham. You are a man of sense and of business. I have given you a caution, and you will act upon it. That is all I have to do with the matter."

To Mr. Wharton's surprise, however, he did not find Mr. Wittingham so ready to act in the way he hinted as had been anticipated. The old gentleman hesitated, and doubted, and seemed so uneasy that the solicitor began to fear he had mistaken his character totally, to apprehend that, after all, he might be a kind-hearted, benevolent old gentleman. The reader, however, who has duly remarked the conversation between the magistrate on his sick-bed, and worthy Dr. Miles, may, perhaps, perceive other causes for Mr. Wittingham's hesitation. He had found that Sir John Slingsby possessed a secret which might hang his son. Now, although I do not mean at all to say that Mr. Wittingham wished his son to die, in any way, or that he would not have been somewhat sorry for his death, by any means, yet he would have much preferred that the means were not those of strangulation. To have his son hanged, would be to have his own consideration hanged. In short, he did not at all wish to be the father of a man who had been hanged; and consequently he was somewhat afraid of driving Sir John Slingsby into a corner. But each man, as Pope well knew, has some ruling passion, which is strong even in death. Sir John Slingsby owed Mr. Wittingham five thousand pounds; and Mr. Wittingham could not forget that fact. As he thought of it, it increased, swelled out, grew heavy, like a nightmare. To lose five thousand pounds at one blow! What was any other consideration to that? What was the whole Newgate-calendar, arranged as a genealogical tree and appended to his name either as ancestry or posterity? Nothing, nothing! Dust in the balance! A feather in an air-pump! Mr. Wittingham grew exceedingly civil to his kind friend, Mr. Wharton; he compassionated poor Sir John Slingsby very much; he was sorry for Miss Slingsby; but he did not in the least see why, when other people were about to help themselves, he should not have his just right. He chatted over the matter with Mr. Wharton, and obtained an opinion from him, without a fee, as to the best mode of proceeding--and Mr. Wharton's opinions on such points were very sound; but in this case particularly careful. Then Mr. Wittingham went home, sent for his worthy solicitor, Mr. Bacon, whom he had employed for many years, as cheaper and safer than Mr. Wharton, and gave him instructions, which set the poor little attorney's hair on end.

Mr. Bacon knew Mr. Wittingham, however; he had been accustomed to manage him at petty sessions; and he was well aware that it was necessary to set Mr. Wittingham in opposition to Mr. Wittingham, before he could hope that any one's opinion would be listened to. When those two respectable persons had a dispute together, there was some chance of a third being attended to who stepped in as an umpire.

But, in the present case, Mr. Bacon was mistaken. He did not say one word of the pity, and the shame, and the disgrace of taking Sir John Slingsby quite by surprise; but he started various legal difficulties, and, indeed, some formidable obstacles to the very summary proceedings which Mr. Wittingham contemplated. But that gentleman was as a gun loaded with excellent powder and well-crammed down shot, by Mr. Wharton; and the priming was dry and fresh. Mr. Bacon's difficulties were swept away in a moment; his obstacles leaped over; and the solicitor was astonished at the amount of technical knowledge which his client had obtained in a few hours.

There was nothing to be done but obey. Mr. Wittingham was too good a card to throw out: Sir John Slingsby was evidently ruined beyond redemption; and with a sorrowful heart--for Mr. Bacon was, at bottom, a kind and well-disposed man--he took his way to his office with his eyes roaming from one side of the street to the other, as if he were looking for some means of escaping from a disagreeable task. As they thus roamed, they fell upon Billy Lamb, the little deformed pot-boy. The lawyer eyed him for a minute or so as he walked along, compared him in imagination with one of his own clerks, a tall, handsome-looking fellow, with a simpering face; thought that Billy would do best, though he was much more like a wet capon, than a human being, and beckoning the boy into his office, retired with him into an inner room, where Mr. Bacon proceeded so cautiously and diffidently, that, had not Billy Lamb's wits been as sharp as his face, he would have been puzzled to know what the solicitor wanted him to do.