"Would you like to see her?" he asked.
"I wouldn't mind," she replied.
"Come along with me, then," he said. "I'll take you to her."
[CHAPTER XLIV.]
Mr. Manners experienced a great sense of relief when Mark Inglefield had taken his departure. The presence of that person had hampered not only his movements, but his will. Now that he was alone, he felt himself absolutely free. He exchanged a few words with Mr. Parkinson, in which he expressed again his good intentions towards the distracted father, and he spoke also to two or three other of the working-men, who, when he moved away from them, looked after him with marked favor. It chimed with his humor not to be known, and he was pleased that Mr. Parkinson had not made free with his name. The reminiscences attaching to him, from a working-man's point of view, would have caused him to be followed and gazed at with curiosity. The name of Manners was a name to conjure with; the great fortune he had made caused him to be regarded as a king among the class from which he sprang, and it was to his credit that he had amassed his wealth fairly, according to the conditions of things. Perhaps in the not far-off future these conditions will be changed, and it will be recognized that labor has a right to a larger proportion of its profits than at present falls to its lot. Meanwhile it may be noted that, despite the private wrong which lay at the door of Mr. Manners, and which he was happily stirred now to set right, despite the fact that in his business relations he had driven hard bargains, his public career was one of which he might be justly proud. Hard as were the bargains he had driven, he had not ground his workmen down; if they did a fair day's work they received a fair day's wage; he had made no attempt to filch them of their just due. In contrast with many a hundred employers of labor, who grind the men and women they employ down to starvation point, Mr. Manners stood forth a shining example. As for his private affairs, they were his, and his alone, to settle. Whatever changes for the better may come over society in the coming years, the purely human aspect of life will never be altered. There will always be private wrongs and private injustices; and although it is to be hoped that the general inequalities of mankind may be lessened, the frailties of our common nature will ever remain the same.
Mr. Manners strolled slowly through streets and narrow ways with which, in his youth, he had been familiar, and he derived a sad pleasure in renewing his acquaintance with the aspects of life which characterized them. He noted the changes which had taken place. Here, a well-known street had disappeared; rows of private dwellings had been turned into shops; but for the main part things were as they used to be. He searched for a certain house in which he had resided as a boy, and, finding it, gazed upon its old walls as he would have gazed upon the face of an old friend who had long since passed out of his life. He recalled himself as he had been in the past, a brisk, stirring, hard-working lad, taking pleasure in his work, eager to get along in the world, keen for chances of promotion, industriously looking about for means to improve himself. Between that time and the present was a bridge which memory re-created, and over that bridge he walked in pensive thought, animated by tenderer feelings than he had experienced for many, many years. Once more he felt an interest in the ways and doings of his fellowmen, and it seemed to him as if he had long been living a dead life. The crust of selfishness in which he had been as it were entombed was melting away, and even in these humble thoroughfares the sun was shining more brightly for him. Such a simple thing as a geranium blooming in a pot on the window-sill of his old home brought an unwonted moisture to his eyes. He knocked at the door, conversed with the woman who opened it, ascertained her position, listened to what she had to say about her children, wrote down their names, and left behind him some small tokens for them from one who once was as they were now.
"You shall hear from me again," he said to the surprised woman; and as he left her he felt new channels of pleasure and sweetness were opening out to him. He was becoming human.
When he started with Mark Inglefield from his home in the west of the city, he had formed no plan as to the means by which he should approach Kingsley and Nansie; but after some time spent in wandering among the thoroughfares and seeking old landmarks, he resolved not to present himself to them until evening. It would be a more favorable hour for what he purposed to do. Until then he could profitably employ himself in ascertaining how they stood in the neighborhood, and whether Mr. Parkinson's report of them was correct. It was three o'clock in the afternoon before he felt the necessity of eating, and then he entered a common eating-house and sat down to a humble meal. It was strange how he enjoyed it, and how agreeable he felt this renewal of old associations. When he had finished, he took out his pocket-book and made some rough calculations. The poverty of the neighborhood had impressed itself upon him, and he thought how much good the expenditure of money he could well spare would do for the children who were growing into men and women. He remembered the want of rational enjoyment he had experienced occasionally in his boyhood. He had not then many spare hours; but there had come upon him at odd times the need for social relaxation. There was only one means of satisfying this need--the public-house--and that way, as he knew, led to ruin. From what Mr. Parkinson had told him, Nansie was untiring in her efforts to ameliorate and smooth the hard lot of the wretched and poverty-stricken; and, poor as she was, had succeeded in shedding light upon weary hearts. If, in her position, she could do so much, how vast was the field before him to do more!
He made his calculations, and was surprised to find, when the figures were before him, that he was richer than he had supposed himself to be. In former days he was in the habit of making such calculations; but for a long while past he had not troubled himself about them--a proof how truly valueless his great store of wealth was to him, and how scanty was the enjoyment he derived from it. Supposing that Mark Inglefield justified and cleared himself in this affair of Mary Parkinson--of which, notwithstanding all that had transpired, Mr. Manners was not yet completely satisfied--half of his fortune should go to the redeeming of his promises to that person in respect of the expectations held out to him. The remaining half would be ample for the carrying out of schemes as yet unformed, in the execution of which, if all went well, Kingsley and Nansie would assist him.
Issuing from the eating-house with a light step, he proceeded to make his inquiries respecting his son's family. What he heard made him even more humble and remorseful. Every person to whom he spoke had affectionate words for them; nothing but good was spoken of them. They were not only respected, but beloved.