Sevenoaks: A Story of Today

by J. G. Holland

IN WHICH MR. BELCHER VISITS NEW YORK, AND BECOMES THE PROPRIETOR OF "PALGRAVE'S FOLLY."

The shadow of a mystery hung over Sevenoaks for many months. Handbills advertising the fugitives were posted in all directions throughout the country, but nothing came of them but rumors. The newspapers, far and near, told the story, but it resulted in nothing save such an airing of the Sevenoaks poor-house, and the county establishment connected with the same, that Tom Buffum, who had lived for several years on the border-land of apoplexy, passed suddenly over, and went so far that he never returned to meet the official inquiry into his administration. The Augean stables were cleansed by the Hercules of public opinion; and with the satisfied conscience and restored self-complacency procured by this act, the people at last settled down upon the conviction that Benedict and his boy had shared the fate of old Tilden—that they had lost themselves in the distant forest, and met their death alike beyond help and discovery.

Mr. Belcher found himself without influence in the adjustment of the new administration. Sevenoaks turned the cold shoulder to him. Nobody went to him with the reports that connected him with the flight and fate of the crazed inventor, yet he knew, through instincts which men of his nature often possess in a remarkable degree, that he was deeply blamed for the causes of Benedict's misfortunes. It has already been hinted that at first he was suspected of knowing guiltily more about the disappearance of the fugitives than he would be willing to tell, but there were only a few minds in which the suspicion was long permitted to linger. When the first excitement passed away and men began to think, it was impossible for them to imagine motives sufficiently powerful to induce the rich proprietor to pursue a lunatic pauper to his death.

Mr. Belcher never had encouraged the neighborly approaches which, in an emergency like this, might have given him comfort and companionship. Recognizing no equals in Sevenoaks—measuring his own social position by the depth of his purse and the reach of his power—he had been in the habit of dispensing his society as largess to the humble villagers. To recognize a man upon the street, and speak to him in a familiar way, was to him like the opening of his purse and throwing the surprise of a dollar into a beggar's hat. His courtesies were charities; his politeness was a boon; he tossed his jokes into a crowd of dirty employes as he would toss a handful of silver coin. Up to this time he had been sufficient unto himself. By money, by petty revenges, by personal assumption, he had managed to retain his throne for a long decade; and when he found his power partly ignored and partly defied, and learned that his personal courtesies were not accepted at their old value, he not only began to feel lonesome, but he grew angry. He held hot discussions with his image in the mirror night after night, in his lonely library, where a certain measure which had once seemed a distant possibility took shape more and more as a purpose. In some way he would revenge himself upon the people of the town. Even at a personal sacrifice, he would pay them off for their slight upon him; and he knew there was no way in which he could so effectually do this as by leaving them. He had dreamed many times, as he rapidly accumulated his wealth, of arriving at a point where he could treat his splendid home as a summer resort, and take up his residence in the great city among those of his own kind. He had an uneasy desire for the splendors of city life, yet his interests had always held him to Sevenoaks, and he had contented himself there simply because he had his own way, and was accounted "the principal citizen." His village splendors were without competition. His will was law. His self-complacency, fed and flourishing in his country home, had taken the place of society; but this had ceased to be all-sufficient, even before the change occurred in the atmosphere around him.

It was six months after the reader's first introduction to him that, showily dressed as he always was, he took his place before his mirror for a conversation with the striking-looking person whom he saw reflected there.

"Robert Belcher, Esquire," said he, "are you played out? Who says played out? Did you address that question to me, sir? Am I the subject of that insulting remark? Do you dare to beard the lion in his den? Withdraw the dagger that you have aimed at my breast, or I will not hold myself responsible for the consequences. Played out, with a million dollars in your pocket? Played out, with wealth pouring in in mighty waves? Whose name is Norval still? Whose are these Grampian Hills? In yonder silent heavens the stars still shine, printing on boundless space the words of golden promise. Will you leave Sevenoaks? Will you go to yonder metropolis, and there reap, in honor and pleasure, the rewards of your enterprise? Will you leave Sevenoaks howling in pain? Will you leave these scurvy ministers to whine for their salaries and whine to empty air? Ye fresh fields and pastures new, I yield, I go, I reside! I spurn the dust of Sevenoaks from my feet. I hail the glories of the distant mart. I make my bow to you, sir. You ask my pardon? It is well! Go!"

The next morning, after a long examination of his affairs, in conference with his confidential agent, and the announcement to Mrs. Belcher that he was about to start for New York on business, Phipps took him and his trunk on a drive of twenty miles, to the northern terminus of a railroad line which, with his connections, would bear him to the city of his hopes.

It is astonishing how much room a richly dressed snob can occupy in a railway car without receiving a request to occupy less, or endangering the welfare of his arrogant eyes. Mr. Belcher occupied always two seats, and usually four. It was pitiful to see feeble women look at his abounding supply, then look at him, and then pass on. It was pitiful to see humbly dressed men do the same. It was pitiful to see gentlemen put themselves to inconvenience rather than dispute with him his right to all the space he could cover with his luggage and his feet. Mr. Belcher watched all these exhibitions with supreme satisfaction. They were a tribute to his commanding personal appearance. Even the conductors recognized the manner of man with whom they had to deal, and shunned him. He not only got the worth of his money in his ride, but the worth of the money of several other people.

Arriving at New York, he went directly to the Astor, then the leading hotel of the city. The clerk not only knew the kind of man who stood before him recording his name, but he knew him; and while he assigned to his betters, men and women, rooms at the top of the house, Mr. Belcher secured, without difficulty, a parlor and bedroom on the second floor. The arrogant snob was not only at a premium on the railway train, but at the hotel. When he swaggered into the dining-room, the head waiter took his measure instinctively, and placed him as a figure-head at the top of the hall, where he easily won to himself the most careful and obsequious service, the choicest viands, and a large degree of quiet observation from the curious guests. In the office, waiters ran for him, hackmen took off their hats to him, his cards were delivered with great promptitude, and even the courtly principal deigned to inquire whether he found everything to his mind. In short, Mr. Belcher seemed to find that his name was as distinctly "Norval" in New York as in Sevenoaks, and that his "Grampian Hills" were movable eminences that stood around and smiled upon him wherever he went.

Retiring to his room to enjoy in quiet his morning cigar and to look over the papers, his eye was attracted, among the "personals," to an item which read as follows: