A Rich Man's Relatives (Vol. 3 of 3)

by Robert Cleland

CHAPTER II.

[A CONFIDANTE].

The day came for the Misses Stanley's return to the country. Muriel's classes were over, and the streets grown hot and dusty past endurance. Life was a burden under the all-pervading glare shot from the vault overhead, and the two miles breadth of glassy river, the acres on acres of shining tin-roofs, and the heated face of limestone pavements. The breeze felt withering like breath from a furnace, hotter even than the air at rest, and cool was attainable only by ingenious contrivance, and in twilight darkness.

"Ah!" said Considine; he had been lingering in town till now, and had suddenly found out that it was time to take his yearly villagiatura at St. Euphrase, his plans coinciding with those of his friends so closely, that when the ladies reached the railway station he was already on the platform to assist them about tickets and baggage as well as to join them in the parlour car; which Miss Penelope considered quite remarkable, but most fortunate and "very nice." "Ah!" said Considine, raising a window as the train rolled into the country, "what a different air to breathe! It smells and feels of the country already."

"Yes," said Miss Matilda, "I feel myself absorbing new vitality from the verdure as we pass along. Do the woods not look seductive after the baking and withering we have suffered of late? One grudges even the delay of railway speed. What will it not be this afternoon to sit among the trees, with coolness rustling softly through the foliage--just to sit and feel one's self alive--with every breath a new deliciousness, and the sense of rest and freshness making one happy and new down to the finger-tips. You will find it delightful at Podevin's to-day, so close by the river. I can imagine you will get into a boat immediately, and go out in the stream and drift, and smoke your cigar, I dare say; you gentlemen seem always doing that, though it must spoil the flavour of a day so exquisite as this, it seems to me."

"As Podevin, whose house is full, has fitted me up the room over the boat-house for my chamber, I imagine I shall have my share of any coolness stirring; yet it would, I dare say, be pleasant to make a beginning of the freshness at full strength by getting into a boat. However, I shall not stay long, and if you will permit me, when the afternoon heat grows moderate, I will walk up to your house and learn if you and Miss Stanley are still alive--and my young friend Muriel also, though indeed, the weather appears to suit her well enough."

And truly at that moment Muriel was in perfect comfort, sitting a little apart with an escort of her own--her friend Gerald who had deserted the cares of business for her sweet company. Not that he found her difficult of access at other times, for they often met; but there is a privacy in a public railway carriage when the rumbling of the wheels drowns conversation for every ear other than the one addressed, and a safety from intrusion and interruption while the journey lasts, not easily to be found elsewhere.

Muriel sat in one corner of a sofa, with Gerald in the other, listening to his purring, and purring softly back. It may have been owing to the heat of the day, but their talk seemed less lively than at other times, and their glances drooped shyly on the ground instead of seeking and meeting each other's as they were wont. Gerald drew closer as they talked, and by-and-by his hands secured one of hers, and held it in possession. He would have slipped his hand behind her waist, perhaps, if her position in the corner of the sofa had not been beyond his reach; and as it was, she used some effort to liberate the imprisoned hand, and regained it at last. Hushing and growing pale the while in her fear of having become grouped with her companion into a tableau too interesting to escape notice. And then her eyes rose shyly to his face, and shining with a light they had not held before, and her lips parted tremulously to smile, and faltered out words which were lost in the roar and hubbub of the rattling wheels, and Gerald could not hear them; but the eyes which had looked in his a moment, the rosy flushing and the tremulous smile, were proof the unheard answer was not "no," and he was happy. When the train reached St. Euphrase Muriel was "engaged," while still it wanted a week of her sixteenth birthday.

It is not very remarkable, if, in view of his success, young Gerald stepped on the platform with something of the victor in his mein--his head thrown back, and his coat unbuttoned, flapping away from the expanded chest, while his eyes looked forth on the world at large, with the broad imperial gaze of a new-crowned conqueror, while Muriel leaned on his arm perhaps a shade more clingingly than she was aware. It struck Betsey Bunce, at least, who, according to her custom, was awaiting the city train, to espy the new arrivals, and pick up any fragments of news dropped by her acquaintance--it struck Betsey that summer day, that Gerald was a far finer and handsomer fellow than theretofore she had thought him. She bowed and waved her hand with much empressement; she even stepped forward to welcome him to St. Euphrase at that unusual hour; but Gerald did not see her. His head was in the clouds, and he inhaling that upper ether where swim the stars and the souls of the most blest, to whom the gods have granted all their desire. He was dazzled by the brightness of his own felicity--alas, that the felicity should be as fleeting as its power to dazzle--and saw little of what passed around him. Only he felt, and felt only the pressure of a slender hand resting on his arm. And so, unwittingly, he strode past Betsey Bunce; and Muriel, too, being with him, and somewhat overcome, looking down, and with her mind disturbed with new and confusing thoughts, and feelings which, if not so altogether new, were yet now first acknowledgedly to herself permitted to harbour there.

And Betsey believed herself to have been slighted, and her wrath grew hot against the young man, and her envy greener-eyed against the girl, who continued to secure so many things which in justice should have been hers; but having a "spirit," as she considered, she only tossed her head, and walked forward through the arriving passengers in search of other acquaintance.

It was the same train which carried home the directors of the mining association after their board meeting. Podevin was the first to alight. He appeared a happier man than when setting out in the morning. With him was Belmore, who had sunk through the whole gamut from confidence to despair, and whose barometer of feeling had again risen to "tranquil." His golden hopes for the future, indeed, had vanished, but he expected under Stinson's direction to sell out without loss, and by aid of the village notary to make everything snug in case of after litigation. Joe Webb alone looked troubled and oppressed. The dangers to his investment, and of his position as director, had now for the first time been disclosed to him, and he was at a loss how to act; and yet to take professional advice seemed to his scrupulous mind to be a breach of confidence towards his fellow directors, while to act with them appeared dishonest to the shareholders and the general public. It was useless to open his mind to Belmore and Podevin; they were resolved to save themselves at whatever cost to other people. He felt that he must not breathe a word among his neighbours, and at home he was a lonely bachelor with only his faithful pipe to soothe counsel and console him. It was with something akin to gratitude, therefore, that he received the friendly greeting of Betsey Bunce. Had his dog been near to lick his hand in that hour of darkness he would have been thankful; how much more when human sympathy and goodwill were offered him.

"You are back from town early to-day, Mr. Joe," cried Betsey, holding out her hand with demonstrative cordiality. She had felt snubbed before the eyes of all St. Euphrase by her "cousin Gerald," as she called him when out of hearing, not having noticed her, and she owed it to herself, she fancied, to show that she did not care, and had plenty of other young men to speak to.

"Yes," said Joe with a sigh, clasping the proffered hand as a drowning man lays hold on a straw. Anything is good to catch at when one is sinking.

"And you look tired," she added with plaintive sympathy.

"Worried, any way. Those town folks, you know. Miss Betsey, ain't like us here in the country."

"Ah! worried. I know the feeling so well; when one does not quite know, perhaps, what it is one wants, and yet is quite sure that what they would have is what we don't want. I know it, and town folks are so selfish."

It is marvellous how some big broad-shouldered fellow, with a fist of his own and the will to use it, who ruffles it among his peers and holds unabated his manly front before odds, opposition, and misfortune, will wilt and weaken into drivelling self-pity for a few soft words, spoken, mayhap, in doubtful sincerity, by some insignificant dot of a woman, and one for whom he feels no more than friendship. Is it a survival of the habit in childhood of bringing his pains and troubles to his mother's lap? Or is it that man needs woman to complete his being?--drawing courage from her sympathy in his hour of darkness, even as she needs the protection of his strength in hers? It is a fact, at least, that the bands which knit him in his pride, soften like wax before her, and bully Bottom lays his honest ass's head contentedly upon any Titania's knee, smiling in fatuous content as she twiddles his long ears between her dainty fingers.

"Town folks are very selfish," said Betsey again.

"If they were honest one would not mind that. We country folk do the best we can for ourselves, and would have both hands under, too, every time, if only we could get it."

"You are generous, Mr. Joe. I always said it of you."

"I try to be fair," he answered, looking pleased.

"And some people don't know what fairness means," rejoined Betsey, with fervour, and a glance of appreciation into his face. She did not know what she meant or was speaking about, but her companion did, and approved her sentiments, which did just as well. She had begun the conversation merely with a general desire to be pleasant, but now she was growing interested in his evident depression, and curious to learn its cause. He was not in love, that seemed certain--love always struck our tender Betsey as the trouble most natural to a fine young man. He would not be so ready, surely, to indulge his "dumps," for some other girl in her company; and if it were herself, there was no ground for dumps at all; he might have her for the asking, she half suspected, though she would not demean herself in her own eyes by considering the point until the gentleman brought it properly under her notice. Wherefore Miss Betsey went a fishing, and baiting her hook with a gentle enthusiasm, she spoke again:

"There's nothing so rare, I think, as fairness. Only the manly men are ever fair, and women never."

"I want to do what's fair. Miss Betsey, and I guess I have managed slick enough so far; but now it's a teaser to know which way to turn. Is a man bound, think you, to harm himself to save his neighbours?"

"I guess not, Mr. Webb; leastways, you know well enough they wouldn't harm themselves to benefit you--not by a good deal, and you know it."

"But what is a fellow to do? If I hold my tongue and let them walk into a trap they will be sure to say it was me ensnared them--that I being a director knew all about it."

"Director? Mr. Webb. Surely it's not your mining company you are talking about?"

Joe looked confused. He had let his cat out of the bag without meaning it. He had begun by thinking aloud, or rather by letting the oozing of his thoughts escape into his talk. Then it had occurred to him that while "naming no names," he might be able to draw a sort of sample opinion in the abstract, and learn therefrom how his position must appear in the eyes of others; and here he found himself on the brink of a full disclosure, with an extremely compromising admission already past recall, and confided to the doubtful secrecy of a woman--the most talkative woman, perhaps, in the village.

"Oh, no. Miss Betsey, you are quite mistaken, I assure you," he faltered forth, with the shame-faced effrontery of one unused to deception, and who scarcely expects his falsehood to succeed.

"No, you don't, Mr. Joe Webb. You don't fool me with your assurances. I know quite well when a gentleman means what he says. You may just as well trust me with the whole story. You know you can depend on my discretion."

"And you will promise not to say a word to any living soul? And you will give me your hand on it? Honour bright?"

"My hand on it, Mr. Webb. Honour bright," and she looked her winningest up into his face. "Who knew?" she thought, "here she was giving a first solemn promise to handsome Joe Webb, and sharing a secret with him, who knew but that she might make him another promise yet?--and what the purport of that promise might be?"

"And I may really trust you?"

"Mr. Webb!"

"Well! It is something to have any kind of fellow bein' one may let out one's breath to. I've 'most 'bust, these last few hours, for want of a soul I could speak to; but now I feel relieved like, and think I can bear up. But I'll be round and see you. Miss Betsey, and we'll have a talk about it if ever I feel nigh busting again." In fact, Betsey's glances had been too deeply laden with expression. She had forgotten the advice of wise King Solomon, and the wary bird had descried in time the net so flagrantly spread out within his view.

"Then it's nothing at present you've been so anxious to confide to me, Mr. Webb?" cried Betsey just a little tartly. "I wondered at your precautions, and, really, they frightened me; and I am very glad you have changed your mind and are going to keep them to yourself. So you give me back my promise and my 'honour bright?' I can breathe free again----" "What you told me," she added after a pause, and with just a suspicion of mischief twinkling under her eyelids, "about your directorship and the company's going soon to smash, don't count, of course, for that was before we said 'honour bright.'"

"How you do run on, Miss Betsey. Of course I hold you to your promise, and it covers everything we have said since we met. If I do not tell you a lot, it is only because there isn't a lot to tell. But really you must not talk about the mining company, or there will be the d---- to pay. Fact is, old Herkimer has not been acting on the square."

"I can believe that," cried Betsey eagerly. Gerald's offence was too recent to be forgotten or forgiven yet awhile.

"He made us declare a div-- at the meeting to-day, though he knows there is nothing to divide, and that most all the metal in the mine has been dug out already. He expects to get shut of his shares that way without losing money, and he don't care what becomes of the concern after that, and he is just using us directors as cats-paws to save his chestnuts."

"Quite likely. They are deep scheming men, both father and son. Just look at Gerald there, and the way he is going on with poor little Muriel! See how the little fool is hanging to his arm."

"She's a fine little girl, Miss Muriel Stanley, and I can excuse anything a fellow does to win her, if only he is good to her afterwards. You think he's after the aunts' money I guess, Miss Betsey? That would be mean, but he can't help liking, the sweet little thing herself all the same."

"Sweet little humbug! And she isn't a Stanley after all! and not the Stanleys' niece. She's nobody's child, that I tell you, and nobody's niece. She was found inside a paper parcel. And as for their money, it's me and my uncle should get it by right, when they are done with it, and they won't sleep easy in their graves if they leave it past us that are their proper flesh and blood; and what's more, I mean to give them a bit of my mind about it, and that right smartly. I'd after them at once, but there's that old fool Considine holding the sunshade over Matilda's head, and we'd best keep family matters at home. Just look at the old thing! Faugh! It makes me sick to see a woman of her age, that should be at home making her soul, philandering about the country with an old dandy like that! Her sunshade lined with rose-coloured silk and no less, to mend her old complexion--while young girls like me must go without--and her curls like sausages flapping about half-way down to her waist. Ha! There they go in at auntie's door to get a drink of ice-water or something. I'll to them there. Good-bye, Mr. Webb! You may depend on me, and trust me fully;" and she hastened away with the "bit of her mind" she had spoken of already on her tongue tip waiting to be launched.

The launching was scarcely a success, however, or so Joe Webb inferred, when, having claimed his horse at the stable, he rode past the rectory on his homeward way. The Misses Stanley were just then leaving the house, looking flushed and indignant, the wife following them to the door with deprecatory looks which changed into dismay as they departed without a sign of leave-taking, and Betsey in the background, too crushed and ashamed to be aware even that it was Joe as he went by.

Whatever unpleasantness occurred passed harmlessly by Muriel. She was walking with Gerald down by the river's bank--her very first walk with an acknowledged lover, for hitherto they had kept up the boy and girl traditions of their earlier friendship, and these now were discarded for the first time as the petals fall from the blossom when their work is done, and they can lend no more assistance to the forming fruit. She missed the altercation, and her aunts took care that she should not hear of it.