Mr. Scarborough's Family

by Anthony Trollope

"They'll have no means of recovering anything."

"Not a shilling. The wonder is that they should have got three hundred thousand pounds. They never would have had it unless the squire had wished to pave the way back for Mountjoy. And then he made Augustus do it for him! In my mind he has been so clever that he ought to be forgiven all his rascality. There has been, too, no punishment for him, and no probability of punishment. He has done nothing for which the law can touch him. He has proposed to cheat people, but before he would have cheated them he might be dead. The money-lenders will have been swindled awfully, but they have never had any ground of tangible complaint against him. 'Who are you?' he has said. 'I don't know you.' They alleged that they had lent their money to his eldest son. 'That's as you thought,' he replied. 'I ain't bound to come and tell you all the family arrangements about my marriage.' If you look at it all round it was uncommonly well done."

When Mr. Barry got back he found that it was generally admitted at the Chambers that the business had been well done. Everybody was prepared to allow that Mr. Scarborough had not left a screw loose in the arrangement,—though he was this moment on his death-bed, and had been under surgical tortures and operations, and, in fact, slowly dying, during the whole period that he had been thus busy. Every one concerned in the matter seemed to admire Mr. Scarborough except Mr. Grey, whose anger, either with himself or his client, became the stronger the louder grew the admiration of the world.

A couple of barristers very learned in the law were consulted, and they gave it as their opinion that from the evidence as shown to them there could be no doubt but that Mountjoy was legitimate. There was no reason in the least for doubting it, but for that strange episode which had occurred when, in order to get the better of the law, Mr. Scarborough had declared that at the time of Mountjoy's birth he had not been married. They went on to declare that on the squire's death the Rummelsburg marriage must of course have been discovered, and had given it as their opinion that the squire had never dreamed of doing so great an injustice either to his elder or his younger son. He had simply desired, as they thought, to cheat the money-lenders, and had cheated them beautifully. That Mr. Tyrrwhit should have been so very soft was a marvel to them; but it only showed how very foolish a sharp man of the world might be when he encountered one sharper.

And Augustus, through an attorney acting on his own behalf, consulted two other barristers, whose joint opinion was not forthcoming quite at once, but may have to be stated. Augustus was declared by them to have received at his father's hands a most irreparable injury to such an extent that an action for damages would, in their opinion, lie.

He had, by accepting his father's first story, altered the whole course of his life, abandoned his profession, and even paid large sums of money out of his own pocket for the maintenance of his elder brother. A jury would probably award him some very considerable sum,—if a jury could get hold of his father while still living. No doubt the furniture and other property would remain, and might be held to be liable for the present owner's laches. But these two learned lawyers did not think that an action could be taken with any probability of success against the eldest son, with reference to his tables and chairs, when the Tretton estates should have become his. As these learned lawyers had learned that old Mr. Scarborough was at this moment almost in articulo mortis, would it not be better that Augustus should apply to his elder brother to make him such compensation as the peculiarities of the case would demand? But as this opinion did not reach Augustus till his father was dead, the first alternative proposed was of no use.

"I suppose, sir, we had better communicate with Mr. Scarborough?" Mr. Barry said to his partner, on his return.

"Not in my name," Mr. Grey replied. "I've put Mr. Scarborough in such a state that he is not allowed to see any business letter. Sir William Brodrick is there now." But communications were made both to Mountjoy and to Augustus. There was nothing for Mountjoy to do; his case was in Mr. Barry's hands; nor could he take any steps till something should be done to oust him from Tretton. Augustus, however, immediately went to work and employed his counsel, learned in the law.

"You will do something, I suppose, for poor Gus?" the old man said to his son one morning. It was the last morning on which he was destined to awake in the world, and he had been told by Sir William and by Mr. Merton that it would probably be so. But death to him had no terror. Life to him, for many weeks past, had been so laden with pain as to make him look forward to a release from it with hope. But the business of life had pressed so hard upon him as to make him feel that he could not tell what had been accomplished.

The adjustment of such a property as Tretton required, he thought, his presence, and, till it had been adjusted, he clung to life with a pertinacity which had seemed to be oppressive. Now Mountjoy's debts had been paid, and Mountjoy could be left a bit happier. Having achieved so much, he was delighted to think that he might. But there had come latterly a claim upon him equally strong,—that he should wreak his vengeance upon Augustus. Had Augustus abused him for keeping him in the dark so long, he would have borne it patiently. He had expected as much. But his son had ridiculed him, laughed at him, made nothing of him, and had at last told him to die out of the way. He would, at any rate, do something before he died.