CHAPTER XI.
“And now, as oft in some distempered state, On one nice trick depends the general fate.”—POPE.
That old politician, the cardinal of Lorraine, used to say, that “a lie believed but for one hour doth many times in a nation produce effects of seven years’ continuance.” At this rate what wonderful effects might our heroine have produced, had she practised in public life, instead of confining her genius to family politics! The game seemed now in her own hands. The day, the important day, on which all her accounts with her son were to be settled; the day when Mr. Palmer’s will was to be signed, the last day he was to stay in England, arrived. Mr. Beaumont’s birthday, his coming of age, was of course hailed with every possible demonstration of joy. The village bells rang, the tenants were invited to a dinner and a dance, and an ox was to be roasted whole; and the preparations for rejoicing were heard all over the house. Mr. Palmer’s benevolent heart was ever ready to take a share in the pleasures of his fellow-creatures, especially in the festivities of the lower classes. He appeared this morning in high good humour. Mrs. Beaumont, with a smile on her lips, yet with a brow of care, was considering how she could make pleasure subservient to interest, and how she could get business done in the midst of the amusements of the day. Most auspiciously did her day of business begin by Mr. Palmer’s declaring to her that his will was actually made; that with the exception of certain legacies, he had left his whole fortune to her during her life, with remainder to her son and daughter. “By this arrangement,” continued he, “I trust I shall ultimately serve my good friends the Walsinghams, as I wish: for though I have not seen as much of that family as I should have been glad to have done, yet the little I have seen convinces me that they are worthy people.”
“The most worthy people upon earth. You know I have the greatest regard for them,” said Mrs. Beaumont.
“I am really sorry,” pursued Mr. Palmer, “that I have not been able to make acquaintance with Captain Walsingham. Mr. Walsingham told me his whole history yesterday, and it has prepossessed me much in his favour.”
“He is, indeed, a charming, noble-hearted young hero,” said Mrs. Beaumont; “and I regret, as much as you do, that you cannot see him before you leave England.”
“However,” continued Mr. Palmer, “as I was saying, the Walsinghams will, I trust, be the better sooner or later by me; for I think I foresee that Captain Walsingham, if a certain Spanish lady were out of the question, would propose for Amelia, and would persuade her to give up this foolish fancy of hers for that baronet.”
Mrs. Beaumont shook her head, as if she believed this could not possibly be done.
“Well, well, if it can’t be, it can’t. The girl’s inclination must not be controlled. I don’t wonder, however, that you are vexed at missing such a husband for her as young Walsingham. But, my good madam, we must make the best of it—let the girl marry her baronet. I have left a legacy of some thousands to Captain Walsingham, as a token of my esteem for his character; and I am sure, my dear Mrs. Beaumont, his interests are in good hands when I leave them in yours. In the mean time, I wish you, as the representative of my late good friend, Colonel Beaumont, to enjoy all I have during your life.”
Mrs. Beaumont poured forth such a profusion of kind and grateful expressions, that Mr. Palmer was quite disconcerted. “No more of this, my dear madam, no more of this. But there was something I was going to say, that has gone out of my head. Oh, it was, that the Walsinghams will, I think, stand a good chance of being the better for me in another way.”
“How?”
“Why you have seen so much more of them than I have—don’t you, my dear madam, see that Miss Walsingham has made a conquest of your son? I thought I was remarkably slow at seeing these things, and yet I saw it.”
“Miss Walsingham is a prodigious favourite of mine. But you know Edward is so young, and men don’t like, now-a-days, to marry young,” said Mrs. Beaumont.
“Well, let them manage their affairs their own way,” said Mr. Palmer; “all I wish upon earth is to see them happy, or rather to hear of their happiness, for I shall not see it you know in Jamaica.”
“Alas!” said Mrs. Beaumont, in a most affectionate tone, and with a sigh that seemed to come from her heart; “alas! that is such a melancholy thought.”
Mr. Palmer ended the conversation by inquiring whom he had best ask to witness his will. Mrs. Beaumont proposed Captain Lightbody and Dr. Wheeler. The doctor was luckily in the house, for he had been sent for this morning, to see her poor Amelia, who had caught cold yesterday, and had a slight feverish complaint.
This was perfectly true. The anxiety that Amelia had suffered of late—the fear of being forced or ensnared to marry a man she disliked—apprehensions about the Spanish incognita, and at last the certainty that Captain Walsingham would not arrive before Mr. Palmer should have left England, and that consequently the hopes she had formed from this benevolent friend’s interference were vain—all these things had overpowered Amelia; she had passed a feverish night, and was really ill. Mrs. Beaumont at any other time would have been much alarmed; for, duplicity out of the question, she was a fond mother: but she now was well contented that her daughter should have a day’s confinement to her room, for the sake of keeping her safe out of the way. So leaving poor Amelia to her feverish thoughts, we proceed with the business of the day.
Dr. Wheeler, Captain Lightbody, and Mr. Twigg witnessed the will; it was executed, and a copy of it deposited with Mrs. Beaumont. This was one great point gained. The next object was her jointure. She had employed her convenient tame man[3], Captain Lightbody, humbly to suggest to her son, that some increase of jointure would be proper; and she was now in anxiety to know how these hints, and others which had been made by more remote means, would operate. As she was waiting to see Mr. Lightbody in her dressing-room, to hear the result of his suggestions, the door opened.
“Well, Lightbody! come in—what success?”
She stopped short, for it was not Captain Lightbody, it was her son. Without taking any notice of what she said, he advanced towards her, and presented a deed.
“You will do me the favour, mother, to accept of this addition to your jointure,” said he. “It was always my intention to do this, the moment it should be in my power; and I had flattered myself that you would not have thought it necessary to suggest to me what I knew I ought to do, or to hint to me your wishes by any intermediate person.”
Colouring deeply, for it hurt her conscience to be found out, Mrs. Beaumont was upon the point of disavowing her emissary, but she recollected that the words which she had used when her son was coming into the room might have betrayed her. On the other hand, it was not certain that he had heard them. She hesitated. From the shame of a disavowal, which would have answered no purpose, but to sink her lower in her son’s opinion, she was, however, saved by his abrupt sincerity.
“Don’t say any thing more about it, dear mother,” cried he, “but pardon me the pain I have given you at a time when indeed I wished only to give pleasure. Promise me, that in future you will let me know your wishes directly, and from your own lips.”
“Undoubtedly—depend upon it, my dearest son. I am quite overpowered. The fact was, that I could not, however really and urgently necessary it was to me, bring myself to mention with my own lips what, as a direct request from me, I knew you could not and would not refuse, however inconvenient it might be to you to comply. On this account, and on this account only, I wished you not to know my wants from myself, but from an intermediate friend.”
“Friend!”—Mr. Beaumont could not help repeating with an emphasis of disdain.
“Friend, I only said by courtesy; but I wished you to know my wants from an intermediate person, that you might not feel yourself in any way bound, or called upon, and that the refusal might be implied and tacit, as it were, so that it could lead to no unpleasant feelings between us.”
“Ah! my dear mother,” said Mr. Beaumont, “I have not your knowledge of the world, or of human nature; but from all I have heard, seen, and felt, I am convinced that more unpleasant feelings are created in families, by these false delicacies, and managements, and hints, and go-between friends by courtesy, than ever would have been caused by the parties speaking directly to one another, and telling the plain truth about their thoughts and wishes. Forgive me if I speak too plainly at this moment; as we are to live together, I hope, many years, it may spare us many an unhappy hour.”
Mrs. Beaumont wiped her eyes. Her son found it difficult to go on, and yet, upon his own principles, it was right to proceed.
“Amelia, ma’am! I find she is ill this morning.”
“Yes—poor child!”
“I hope, mother—”
“Since,” interrupted Mrs. Beaumont, “my dear son wishes always to hear from me the plain and direct truth, I must tell him, that, as the guardian of his sister, I think myself accountable to no one for my conduct with respect to her; and that I should look upon any interference as an unkind and unjustifiable doubt of my affection for my daughter. Rest satisfied with this assurance, that her happiness is, in all I do, my first object; and as I have told her a thousand times, no force shall be put on her inclinations.”
“I have no more to say, no more to ask,” said Mr. Beaumont. “This is a distinct, positive declaration, in which I will confide, and, in future, not suffer appearances to alarm me. A mother would not keep the word of promise to the ear, and break it to the hope.”
Mrs. Beaumont, feeling herself change countenance, made an attempt to blow her nose, and succeeded in hiding her face with her handkerchief.
“With respect to myself,” continued Mr. Beaumont, “I should also say, lest you should be in any doubt concerning my sentiments, that though I have complied with your request to delay for a few weeks—”
“That you need not repeat, my dear,” interrupted Mrs. Beaumont. “I understand all that perfectly.”
“Then at the end of this month I shall—and, I hope, with your entire approbation, propose for Miss Walsingham.”
“Time enough,” said Mrs. Beaumont, smiling, and tapping her son playfully on the shoulder, “time enough to talk of that when the end of the month comes. How often have I seen young men like you change their minds, and fall in and out of love in the course of one short month! At any rate,” continued Mrs. Beaumont, “let us pass to the order of the day; for we have time enough to settle other matters; but the order of the day—a tiresome one, I confess—is to settle accounts.”
“I am ready—”
“So am I.”
“Then let us go with the accounts to Mr. Palmer, who is also ready, I am sure.”
“But, before we go,” said Mrs. Beaumont, whispering, “let us settle what is to be said about the debts—your debts you know. I fancy you’ll agree with me, that the less is said about this the better; and that, in short, the best will be to say nothing.”
“Why so, madam? Surely you don’t think I mean to conceal my debts from our friend Mr. Palmer, at the very moment when I profess to tell him all my affairs, and to settle accounts with him and you, as my guardians!”
“With him? But he has never acted, you know, as one of the guardians; therefore you are not called upon to settle accounts with him.”
“Then why, ma’am, did you urge him to come down from London, to be present at the settlement of these accounts?”
“As a compliment, and because I wish him to be present, as your father’s friend; but it is by no means essential that he should know every detail.”
“I will do whichever you please, ma’am; I will either settle accounts with or without him.”
“Oh! with him, that is, in his presence, to be sure.”
“Then he must know the whole.”
“Why so? Your having contracted such debts will alter his opinion of your prudence and of mine, and may, perhaps, essentially alter—alter—”
“His will? Be it so; that is the worst that can happen. As far as I am concerned, I would rather a thousand times it were so, than deceive him into a better opinion of me than I deserve.”
“Nobly said! so like yourself, and like every thing I could wish: but, forgive me, if I did for you, what indeed I would not wish you to do for yourself. I have already told Mr. Palmer that you had no embarrassments; therefore, you cannot, and I am sure would not, unsay what I have said.”
Mr. Beaumont stood fixed in astonishment.
“But why, mother, did not you tell him the whole?”
“My dear love, delicacy prevented me. He offered to relieve you from any embarrassments, if you had any; but I, having too much delicacy and pride to let my son put himself under pecuniary obligations, hastily answered, that you had no debts; for there was no other reply to be made, without offending poor Palmer, and hurting his generous feelings, which I would not do for the universe: and I considered too, that as all Palmer’s fortune will come to us in the end—”
“Well, ma’am,” interrupted Mr. Beaumont, impatient of all these glosses and excuses, “the plain state of the case is, that I cannot contradict what my mother has said; therefore I will not settle accounts at all with Mr. Palmer.”
“And what excuse can I make to him, after sending for him express from London?”
“That I must leave to you, mother.”
“And what reason can I give for thus withdrawing our family-confidence from such an old friend, and at the very moment when he is doing so much for us all?”
“That I must leave to you, mother. I withdraw no confidence. I have pretended none—I will break none.”
“Good Heavens! was not all I did and said for your interest?”
“Nothing can be for my interest that is not for my honour, and for yours, mother. But let us never go over the business again. Now to the order of the day.”
“My dear, dear son,” said Mrs. Beaumont, “don’t speak so roughly, so cruelly to me.”
Suddenly softened, by seeing the tears standing in his mother’s eyes, he besought her pardon for the bluntness of his manner, and expressed his entire belief in her affection and zeal for his interests; but, on the main point, that he would not deceive Mr. Palmer, or directly or indirectly assert a falsehood, Mr. Beaumont was immoveable. In the midst of her entreaties a message came from Mr. Palmer, to say that he was waiting for the accounts, which Mrs. Beaumont wished to settle. “Well,” said she, much perplexed, “well, come down to him—come, for it is impossible for me to find any excuse after sending for him from London; he would think there was something worse than there really is. Stay—I’ll go down first, and sound him; and if it won’t do without the accounts, do you come when I ring the bell; then all I have for it is to run my chance. Perhaps he may never recollect what passed about your debts, for the dear good old soul has not the best memory in the world; and if he should obstinately remember, why, after all, it’s only a bit of false delicacy, and a white lie for a friend and a son, and we can colour it.”
Down went Mrs. Beaumont to sound Mr. Palmer; but though much might be expected from her address, yet she found it unequal to the task of convincing this gentleman’s plain good sense that it would fatigue him to see those accounts, which he came so many miles on purpose to settle. Perceiving him begin to waken to the suspicion that she had some interest in suppressing the accounts, and hearing him, in an altered tone, ask, “Madam, is there any mystery in these accounts, that I must not see them?” she instantly rang the bell, and answered, “Oh, none; none in the world; only we thought—that is, I feared it might fatigue you too much, my dear friend, just the day before your journey, and I was unwilling to lose so many hours of your good company; but since you are so very kind—here’s my son and the papers.”