“Sir Roger was unlike every other gentleman I ever lived with, sir,” said he. “He was never in high spirits except when he was hard up for money. Put him down in a little country inn to wait for his remittances, and live on a few francs a day till they arrived, and I never saw his equal for good humor. He 'd play with the children; he 'd work in the garden. I 've seen him harness the donkey, and go off for a load of firewood. There's nothing he would not do to oblige, and with a kind word and a smile for every one all the while; but if some morning he 'd get up with a dark frown on his face, and say, 'La Grange, get in your bills here, and pay them; we must get away from this dog-hole,' I knew well the banker's letter had come, and that whatever he might want, it would not be money.”
“And had my Lady—Madame, I mean—no influence over him?”
“None, sir, or next to none; he was all ceremony with her; took her in to dinner every day with great state, showed her every attention at table, left her at liberty to spend what money she liked. If she fancied an equipage, it was ordered at once. If she liked a bracelet, it was sent home. As to toilette, I believe there are queens have not as many dresses to change. We had two fourgons of her luggage alone, when we came to the Schloss, and she was always saying there was something she was longing for.”
“Did not this irritate my father?”
“No, sir; he would simply say, 'Don't wish, but write for it.' And I verily believe this indifference piqued her,—she saw that no sacrifice of money cost him anything, and this thought wounded her pride.”
“So that there was not much happiness between them?”
“There was none, sir! Something there was that Sir Roger would never consent to, but which she never ceased to insist on, and I often wondered how she could go on, to press a man of his dangerous temper, as she did, and at times she would do so to the very verge of a provocation. Do you know, sir,” said he, after a short silence,—“if I was to be on my oath to-morrow, I 'd not say that he was not seeking his death when he met it? I never saw a man so sick of life,—he was only puzzled how to lay it down without dishonor.”
I motioned him to leave me as he said this, and of my father I never spoke to him more.