CHAPTER III
The backbone of our country is that band of civic heroes who, when turmoil rages and disaster threatens, are the last men to desert the desk. In this glorious company Andrew Walkingshaw was numbered. His father might tear up and down the country like a disreputable whirlwind, his widowed relative fume and plot, his sister disgrace the family by an unsuitable engagement, his betrothed leave his affectionate letters unanswered, his own soul writhe in decorous anguish at these calamities, but Casabianca himself was not more faithful to his post than he. It is true, indeed, that he had once tried the alternative policy and chased that cyclone, but he had taken to heart the lesson, and thenceforth closed his ears to disquieting rumors, his eyes to distressing symptoms, and went about his work, if possible, more conscientiously than ever. That was the proper way to get through business—conscientiously. He was sickened with the people (clients of some eminence, but evidently with a screw loose) who kept deferring their more important concerns till the senior partner returned with his infernal headlong methods. Let them wait if they liked! Let them take their business elsewhere if they were such fools! Deliberately and calmly he had washed his hands of his senior partner. That was the end of him so far as he was concerned, said Andrew to himself. But alas! you may wash your hands of a tornado, but supposing it retorts by blowing down your house?
It was about nine in the evening, and he sat by himself, severely scrutinizing the pleadings drawn up by his clerk for a forthcoming case, connected with so large a sum of money that it was a pleasure merely to read the imposing figures. The ladies were upstairs in the drawing-room. So long as Mrs. Dunbar was among them, he was not likely to show his face there.
The door opened, and he turned, frowning at the interruption, and then sprang up with a troubled eye. It was his father certainly; but what a remarkable change since he had seen him last! For the first time Andrew realized the full enormity of his conduct in growing younger. His very appearance had become a crying scandal.
"Sweating away at your old papers?" inquired Heriot pleasantly.
Andrew stiffly resumed his seat.
"Yes, I am busy," he replied, and took up the pleadings again.
But his father ignored the hint. Straddling comfortably before the fire, he remarked—
"Frank and I have been up to Perthshire."
Andrew looked up quickly, but merely answered—
"Oh, indeed?"
"We've been seeing Ellen."
"What about?"
Mr. Walkingshaw threw himself into a chair.
"My boy," said he, with the air of friendly commiseration which he felt that the occasion undoubtedly demanded, "I find I was right about your rival."
Andrew remained calm, though not quite so calm as before.
"Do you mean there's some one else after her?"
"He's got her."
The calm departed.
"Got! What the deuce d'ye mean?"
"She has chosen another, Andrew."
"Chosen! But she's no choice left her. She's engaged to me."
"She was engaged to you. She's now engaged to him."
"To him? Who the dev—er—what are you driving at? Who's the man?"
"Frank."
"Frank!"
Andrew stared at his father incredulously.
"I don't believe a word of it."
"Well, you may ask Frank if you like; but I assure you you can take my word for it."
It was characteristic of Andrew's robust mind that, instead of wasting time in noisy vaporings and sentimental sorrow, it seized at once the weak point in the case.
"But he can't afford to marry."
"Oh, I'll see to that."
"You'll see!" shouted Andrew. "Do you mean to say you've had a finger in the pie?"
"Four fingers and a thumb," smiled his parent.
Once more Andrew, without waste of words in expostulation or commentary, summarized the situation in a sentence—
"This is fair damnable!"
"Come, come, my dear fellow," said Mr. Walkingshaw soothingly. "I owe you an explanation, of course, but when you've heard it, I know you'll agree I've done the right thing."
"An explanation!" exclaimed Andrew sardonically. "Go on, let's hear it."
"I can give you the gist of it in a sentence: she loves Frank, and she doesn't love you. Now, in that case, which of you ought she to marry?"
"That's nothing to do with it—"
"What! love's nothing to do with marriage?"
"When a woman's once engaged, she's got to implement her promise."
"Whether it makes her happy or miserable?"
"Who was miserable, I'd like to know?"
"Ellen."
"It's the first I've heard of it."
"Do you mean to say you couldn't see it for yourself?"
"No, I could not; and even if she was, there's not the shadow of an excuse for your conduct. You're just making a mess of everything you meddle with. Getting me jilted like this! What do you suppose people will say? What'll they be thinking of me? Oh, good Lord!"
The unhappy young man brooded somberly. Mr. Walkingshaw lit a cigar, and then settled himself down to remove by gentle argument the cloud that temporarily obscured his son's serenity.
"Just look at the thing for a moment in a quiet and reasonable light, Andrew. Happiness, as you are well aware, is the chief aim of humanity. Damn it, our religion teaches us that—or practically that. A kind of warm and amiable gleefulness—that's the ideal. Now, how can a young girl like Ellen be happy or gleeful married to a sober old codger like you, eh? Man, the thing's clean impossible. She's no more suited to you than a lace cover to a coal-scuttle. Well, then what's the obvious thing to do? Hand her over to a brisk young fellow who can do her justice, of course. Besides, just think of your own brother pining away in the—what do they call it?—torrid zone, all for love of a girl who's pining away for love of him. The thing's totally illogical. A society of hedgehogs would have more sense than to allow an arrangement like that. You see my point now, don't you?"
"I've heard you say with your own lips," retorted Andrew, "that all a girl required was a comfortable home and a husband who knew his own mind."
"But you must remember," explained his father, "I was an old fool then."
Andrew sprang to his feet with a wry and bitter face.
"You certainly haven't the qualities of age now. I never heard such daft-like rubbish in my life. For Heaven's sake, just try to use any common sense you've got left. Frank will never have enough money to keep her properly."
"Ah, but naturally I mean to alter my arrangements."
Gradually the full possibilities of the situation were revealing themselves to the well-regulated mind of the junior partner.
"You mean to change your will?"
"I do."
Yet another horrid possibility showed its head.
"And are you going to alter Jean's share too, so that this precious Vernon fellow may have something to squander?"
"Something respectable to live on," corrected his parent. "You mustn't starve art, you know."
Andrew stared at him in silence, and when he spoke, it was with the air of a much-wronged worm which has deliberately resolved to turn at last.
"I'm not wanting any of your Ellen Berstouns. If she's played this trick on me, that's enough of her. But I tell you plainly I'm not going to let you rob me to keep a pack of worthless painters and people out of the gutter, without taking some steps. I warn you of that."
"My dear Andrew," said his father reproachfully, "that's hardly the attitude of a professing Christian. Just think, now; is it? You'll easily find a decent, quiet woman with a bit of money and no objection to hearing every day for an hour or two how you've been worried by your clients and swindled by your father, and I do honestly believe you'll get as near happiness as you're capable of. That's common sense, now; isn't it?"
The slamming of the door answered him.
"What a sulky fellow he is!" said Heriot to himself.
Yet so conscious was he of the rectitude of his intentions, and so confiding had his disposition grown, that it never crossed his mind to beware of an infuriated lawyer. Besides, when Andrew had slept over it, he would surely realize how unanswerable were his father's arguments.
"We'll see the old stick-in-the-mud dancing at Frank's wedding!" thought he. "There's no vice in Andrew; only a bit of obstinacy. It's all bark and no bite with him."
With these amiable reflections he speedily consoled himself for the discomfort of any little temporary friction. And then the door opened gently.