Anthony’s share was to be a junior partnership. It was Mr. Mowbray who was the more impatient. Anthony promised to be through before the long vacation.
“If dear Ted comes back,” said Mr. Mowbray, “he’ll be glad to find you here. If God is hard on me for my sins we must make our fortune for Betty’s sake.”
Edward had gone to Switzerland for the summer. Anthony had hoped to see him before he went, but examinations had interfered; and Edward himself had been more hopeful. He had written that in spite of all he felt he was going to live. His mind was getting lighter. He was forming plans for the future. And then suddenly there had come a three-word telegram:
“I want Betty.”
Mr. Mowbray was away when it came. He had gone, without saying a word to any one, the day before, and had not as usual left Anthony any address. He did not return until the end of the week, and then it was all over. Betty had wired that she was bringing the body back with her. Mr. Mowbray broke down completely when Anthony told him, throwing himself upon his knees and sobbing like a child.
“Betty will hate me,” he moaned through his tears, “and it will serve me right. I seem to do nothing but hurt those I love. I loved my wife and I broke her heart. There is no health in me.”
Edward was buried in St. Aldys’ Churchyard beside his mother. Anthony had seen the ex-governess and made all things clear to her. Mr. Mowbray seemed inclined to settle down to business a reformed character. Anthony had taken out his articles and had been admitted into partnership, though the firm would still remain Mowbray and Cousins.
It was an evening in late September. Mr. Mowbray and Betty had gone abroad. Anthony, leaving the office earlier than usual, climbed the hill to the moors. He took the road he had climbed with his mother when he was a child and had thought he was going to see God. He could see the vision of his own stout little legs pounding away in front of him and his mother’s stooping back and her short silk jacket, remnant of better days, that she had always worn on these occasions. If his aunt’s theories were correct, then surely the Lord must have approved of him and of all his ways from his youth upwards. At school, in the beginning, he had put himself out to make a friend of Edward Mowbray, foreseeing the possible advantages. So also with Betty. He had tried to make her like him. It had not been easy at first, but he had studied her. The love for Edward that had come to him had been an aftergrowth. It belonged to Anthony the dreamer rather than to the real Anthony.
With Betty also he had succeeded. She liked him, cared for him. That she did not love him he was glad. If she had loved him he would have hesitated, deeming it an unfair bargain. As it was, he could with a clear conscience ask her to be his wife. And she would consent; he had no doubt of that. Old Mr. Mowbray would welcome the match. He was reckoning on it as assuring Betty’s future. Anthony would succeed to the business, and behind him there would be the old man’s money to help forward the plans with which his brain was teeming for the benefit of Millsborough and himself. The memory of what Edward had written him about love came back to him. But Edward had always been a dreamer. Life was a business. One got on better by keeping love and religion out of it. He and Betty liked each other. They would get on together. Her political enthusiasms did not frighten him. All that would be in his own hands. When success had arrived—when his schemes had matured and had brought him wealth and power—then it would be time enough to venture on experiments. Prudently planned, they need not involve much risk. They would bring him fame, honour. To the successful business man all prizes were within reach.
His walk had brought him to The Abbey, now untenanted. The fancy that one day it might be his home had often come to him. His mother had been a parlourmaid there. He pictured the perfect joy that it would give her to sit in its yellow drawing-room and reach out her hand to ring the bell.