The Talleyrand Maxim

by J. S. Fletcher

Nesta, who was conscious of her betrayal of more than she cared to show just then, tried to speak calmly.

"But—isn't it an awful disappointment?" she said. "You were looking forward so to going there, weren't you?"

"Can't be helped," replied Collingwood. "All these affairs are—provisional. I thought I'd tell you at once, however—so that you'll know—if you ever want me—that I shall be somewhere round about. In fact, as it's quite comfortable there, I shall stop at the inn until I've got rooms in the town."

Then, not trusting himself to remain longer, he went off to Barford, certain that he was now definitely pledged in his own mind to Nesta Mallathorpe, and not much less that when the right time came she would not be irresponsive to him. And on that, like a cold douche, came the remembrance of her actual circumstances—she was what Eldrick had said, one of the wealthiest young women in Yorkshire. The thought of her riches made Collingwood melancholy for a while—he possessed a curious sort of pride which made him hate and loathe the notion of being taken for a fortune-hunter. But suddenly, and with a laugh, he remembered that he had certain possessions of his own—ability, knowledge, and perseverance. Before he reached Eldrick's office, he had had a vision of the Woolsack.

Eldrick received Collingwood's news with evident gratification. He immediately suggested certain chambers in an adjacent building; he volunteered information as to where the best rooms in the town were to be had. And in proof of his practical interest in Collingwood's career, he there and then engaged his professional services for two cases which were to be heard at a local court within the following week.

"Pratt shall deliver the papers to you at once," he said. "That is, as soon as he's back from Normandale this afternoon. I sent him there again to make himself useful."

"I saw him this morning," remarked Collingwood. "He appears to be a very useful person."

"Clever chap," asserted Eldrick, carelessly. "I don't know what'll be done about that stewardship that he was going to apply for. Everything will be altered now that young Mallathorpe's dead. Of course, I, personally, shouldn't have thought that Pratt would have done for a job like that, but Pratt has enough self-assurance and self-confidence for a dozen men, and he thought he would do, and I couldn't refuse him a testimonial. And as he's made himself very useful out there, it may be that if this steward business goes forward, Pratt will get the appointment. As I say, he's a smart chap."

Collingwood offered no comment. But he was conscious that it would not be at all pleasing to him to know that Linford Pratt held any official position at Normandale. Foolish as it might be, mere inspiration though it probably was, he could not get over his impression that Eldrick's clerk was not precisely trustworthy. And yet, he reflected, he himself could do nothing—it would be utter presumption on his part to offer any gratuitous advice to Nesta Mallathorpe in business matters. He was very certain of what he eventually meant to say to her about his own personal hopes, some time hence, when all the present trouble was over, but in the meantime, as regarded anything else, he could only wait and watch, and be of service to her if she asked him to render any.

Some time went by before Collingwood was asked to render service of any sort. At Normandale Grange, events progressed in apparently ordinary and normal fashion. Harper Mallathorpe was buried; his mother began to make some recovery from the shock of his death; the legal folk were busied in putting Nesta in possession of the estate, and herself and her mother in proprietorship of the mill and the personal property. In Barford, things went on as usual, too. Pratt continued his round of duties at Eldrick & Pascoe's; no more was heard—by outsiders, at any rate—of the stewardship at Normandale. As for Collingwood, he settled down in chambers and lodgings and, as Eldrick had predicted, found plenty of work. And he constantly went out to Normandale Grange, and often met Nesta elsewhere, and their knowledge of each other increased, and as the winter passed away and spring began to show on the Normandale woods and moors, Collingwood felt that the time was coming when he might speak. He was professionally engaged in London for nearly three weeks in the early part of that spring—when he returned, he had made up his mind to tell Nesta the truth, at once. He had faced it for himself—he was by that time so much in love with her that he was not going to let monetary considerations prevent him from telling her so.