Algernon himself was rather hopeful since that interview with Rhoda. It could not be, after all, that Jonathan Maxfield would actually cause him, Algernon Errington, any personal inconvenience for the sake of a sum which was really a mere trifle to Maxfield, and which appeared very trifling to Algernon under every aspect except that of being called upon to pay it.
He had learned not long previously that certain bills he had given, backed by the name of that solid capitalist, the Honourable Jack Price, had found their way into old Max's hands. This startled him considerably, for he had no reason to count on the old man's forbearance. The time was drawing nigh when the bills would become due.
About a month ago some other bills had fallen due, and had been duly honoured. They had been given to a London wine merchant, who would certainly not have scrupled to take any strong measure for getting his money. And even the name of Jack Price was no talisman to charm away this grasping tradesman's determination to be paid for goods delivered; the wine merchant in question doing a large City business, and feeling no anxiety as to the opinion entertained by the Honourable Mr. Price's fashionable connection about himself or his wares. Under the pressure of this disagreeable conviction, the money had been found to honour the bills held by the wine merchant.
For the discharge of the liabilities represented by the bills now in Maxfield's hands, Algernon had reckoned on Castalia's extracting some money from her uncle. Algernon did not abandon the hope that she might yet succeed in doing so. Castalia must be urged to make new and stronger representations of their necessities to Lord Seely. But it could not be denied that my lord's last letter had been a very heavy blow; and that, moreover, a number of slight embarrassments, which Algernon had hitherto looked on as mere gossamer threads, to be broken when he pleased, had recently exhibited a disconcerting toughness and power of constraining his actions and destroying his comfort.
The thought not infrequently occurred to him that, if he were alone in the world, unhampered by a wife who had no flexibility of character, and who had recently displayed a stubborn kind of obtuseness, showing itself in such remarks as that if they had not money to pay for luxuries, they must do without luxuries, and that if they were poor, it would be better to seem poor, and the like dull commonplaces, which were peculiarly distasteful to Algernon's vivacious intelligence—if, he thought, he had no wife, or a different wife, things would undoubtedly go better with him. He was too quick not to perceive that his marriage, far from improving his social position, had been eminently unpopular amongst his friends and acquaintances. To be sure he had never intended to return to Whitford after allying himself with the family of Lord Seely. He had meant to shake the dust of the sleepy little town from his feet for ever. He reckoned up the advantages he had expected to gain by marrying Castalia, and set the real result against each one in his mind.
He had expected to get into the diplomatic service. He was a provincial postmaster!
He had expected to live in some splendid metropolis. He found himself in the obscure town which, of all others, he wished to avoid!
He had expected to be courted and caressed by wealthy, noble, and distinguished persons. He was looked coldly or shyly upon by even the insignificant middle-class society of a county town!
All this seemed peculiarly hard and unjust, because Algernon had always intended to bear his honours gracefully, without stiffness or arrogance. He would cut nobody; he would turn the cold shoulder to nobody. He had pictured himself sometimes making a meteoric reappearance in Whitford some day; flashing with brief brilliancy across the horizon of that remote neighbourhood, affably shaking hands with old acquaintance, occupying the best rooms in the "Blue Bell," and scattering largesse among the servants, rattling through the streets side by side with some county magnate, whose companionship should by no means chill his recognition of such local stars of the second or third magnitude as the Pawkinses of Pudcombe Hall. He was inclined by taste and temperament to be thoroughly "bon prince."
Such fancies may seem childish, but it was a fact that Algernon had indulged in them. With all his tact, he had a considerable strain of his mother's Ancramism in his blood. And the contrast between those former day-dreams and the present reality was so terrible, so mortifying, so ridiculous (direst and most soul-chilling word of all to Algernon!) that he was unable to face it. Some way out must be found. It was impossible, on any tenable theory of society, that he should be permanently consigned to oblivion and the daily round of inglorious duties.