‘It was entailed until my father’s time. He and your great-grandfather agreed to cut it off.’
‘Did they? Why?’
‘Because the estate was thoroughly embarrassed, and deep in debt, and they wanted to restore it.’
‘Then they succeeded?’ asked Jerome, to whom this was news, but who concluded that they must have succeeded. Had there been embarrassments, surely he would have heard of them before now.
‘No; they did not. Neither of them had the faintest notion of business’—it is to be presumed that Mr. Wellfield was conscious of himself possessing business talents of a superior order. ‘They got money, but that wasn’t improving the estate. They did not retrench, and they spent nothing on improvements. When I came into possession, I was worse off than any Wellfield had ever been before.’
‘I had no idea of that,’ said Jerome.
‘Of course you had not. How could you have? It is a fact, nevertheless. I went through some bitter experiences. I had all their pride, and none of their resources. I saw no way out of it. Your mother once saw the place, and screamed at the very idea of living there. She said she would die if she had to live out of Italy. It was therefore impossible for me to live on my estate, and retrench, as almost any other man might have done under the circumstances. Knowing this, I kept you as much away from the place as possible, lest you should get fond of it. Things got worse and worse. After your sister’s mother died, my own health failed, and it became impossible for me to live in England. I saw ruin staring me in the face. I saw you, whom I wished never to be troubled with sordid cares and anxieties, growing up utterly unconscious of the kind of lot that was hanging over you. I seemed to see Avice, your sister, stinted of common comforts, and perhaps reduced, as she grew up, to earn her living as a governess, she—ordered about by strange people, and breaking her heart with fretting.’
‘Good God, sir! What must you have gone through! And why did you not confide in me? Anything in my power——’
‘But there was nothing in your power—that is exactly it. I did the only thing that could be done. I looked my circumstances full in the face, and the sight was not inspiriting. Presently came a man with what I wanted—money—any amount of money. I—I sold Wellfield.’
‘Sold it!’ echoed the young man, in a voice of horror and incredulity combined, as he started from his chair, and looked into his father’s face. ‘You are dreaming. You are delirious. Let me call Sister Ursula—you——’