Roland Yorke / A Sequel to "The Channings"

by Mrs. Henry Wood

And so, recalling these visions and promises, Roland, for very disappointment and shame, was not in a hurry to go back, but rather lingered on in Port Natal, struggling manfully with his ill-luck, as he called it. Pride and good-feeling alike prevented him. To appear before Lady Augusta, poor, starving, hatless, and bootless, would be undoubtedly a worse blow to her than that other alternative which he (forgetting his height and weight) had laid before her view: the one, he said, might happen if he did not get to Port Natal--the riding as a jockey on Helstonleigh race-course, in a pink silk jacket and yellow breeches.

No. He did try heartily with all his might and main; tried at it for four mortal years. Beyond a scrap of writing he now and again sent home, in which he always said he was "well, and happy, and keeping straight, and getting on," but which never contained a request for home news, or an address to which it might be sent, Lady Augusta heard nothing. Nobody else heard. One letter, indeed, reached a bosom friend of his, Arthur Channing, which was burnt when read, as requested, and Arthur looked grieved for a month after. He had told Arthur the truth; that he was not getting on; but under an injunction of secrecy, and giving no details. Beyond that, no news reached home of Roland.

His fourth year of trial at Port Natal was drawing to a close when illness seized hold of him, and for the first time Roland felt as if he were losing heart. It was not serious illness, only such as is apt to attack visitors to the country, and from which Roland's strength of frame, sound constitution, and good habits--for he had no bad ones, unless a great appetite might be called such--had hitherto preserved him. But, what with the wear and tear of his chequered life, its uncertain food, a plentiful dinner today, bread and beans tomorrow, nothing the following one, and its harassing and continuous disappointments, Roland felt the illness as a depressing calamity; and he began to say he could not make head against the tide any longer, and must get away from it. He might have to eat humble-pie on landing in England; but humble-pie seems tolerable or nauseous according to the existing state of mind; and it is never utterly poisonous to one of the elastic temperament of Roland Yorke. In a fit of impulse he went down to the ships and made the best bargain for getting home that circumstances allowed. He had been away more than four years, and never once, during that time, had he written home for money.

And so, behold him, out at pocket (except for ninepence) and out at elbows, but wonderfully improved in tone and physique, arriving in London early one rainy morning from Port Natal, and landing in the docks.

The first thing he did was to divide the ninepence with one who was poorer than he; the second was to get a cup of coffee and a slice of bread at a street coffee-stall; the third was to hasten to Lord Carrick's tailor--and a tremendous walk it was, but that was nothing to Roland--and get rigged out in any second-hand suit of clothes returned on hand that might be decent. There ill news awaited him; it was the time of year when Lord Carrick might, as a rule, be found in London; but he had not come; he was, the tailor believed, in Ireland. Roland at once knew, as sure as though it had been told him, that his uncle was in some kind of pecuniary hot water. Borrowing the very smallest amount of money that would take him to Ireland, he went off down the Thames in a return cattleboat that very day.

Since that period, hard upon three years, he had been almost equally "knocking about," and experienced nearly as many ups and downs in Ireland as at Port Natal. Sometimes living in clover with Lord Carrick, at others thrown on his own resources and getting on somehow. Lord Carrick's will was good to help him, but not always his ability; now and again it had happened that his lordship (who was really more improvident than his nephew, and had to take flights to the Continent on abrupt emergencies and without a day's warning) was lost to society for a time, even to Roland. Roland hired himself out as a kind of overlooker to some absentee's estate, but he could not get paid for it. This part of his career need not be traced; on the whole, he did still strive to do something for himself as strenuously as he had at Port Natal, and not to be a burthen to anybody, even to Lord Carrick.

To this end he came over to London, and presented himself one day to his late father's brother, Sir Richard Yorke, and boldly asked him if he could not "put him into something." The request caused Sir Richard (an old gentleman with a fat face) to stare immensely; he was very poor and very selfish, and had persistently held himself aloof from his late brother's needy family, keeping them always at arm's length. His son and heir had been content to do the same: in truth, the cousins did not know each other by sight. Sir Richard's estate was worth four thousand a-year, all told; and as he was wont to live at the rate of six, it will be understood that he was never in funds. Neither had he patronage or influence in anyway. To be thus summarily applied to by a stalwart young man, who announced himself as his nephew, took the baronet aback; and if he did not exactly turn Roland out of the house, his behaviour was equivalent to it "I'll be shot if I ever go near him again," cried Roland. "I'd rather cry hot pies in Poplar streets."

A day or two previously, in sauntering about parts of London least frequented by men of the higher class--for when we are very much down in the world we don't exactly choose the region of St. James's for our promenades, or the sunny side of Regent Street--Roland had accidentally met one of the steerage passengers with whom he had voyaged home from Port Natal. Ever open-hearted, he had frankly avowed the reason of being unable to treat his friend; namely, empty pockets: he was not sure, he added, but he must take to crossing-sweeping for a living; he heard folks made fortunes at it. Upon this the gentleman, who wore no coat and very indifferent pantaloons, confided to him the intelligence that there was a first-rate opening in the perambulating hot-pie trade, down in Poplar, for an energetic young man with a sonorous voice. Roland, being great in the latter gift, thought he might entertain it.

Things were at a low ebb just then with Roland. Lord Carrick, as usual, was totally destitute of ready money; and Roland, desperately anxious though he was to get along of his own accord, was fain to write to his mother for a little temporary help. One cannot live upon air in London, however that desirable state of things may be accomplished at Port Natal. But the application was made at an inopportune moment. Every individual boy Lady Augusta possessed was then tugging at her purse-strings; and she returned a sharp answer to Roland, telling him he ought to be ashamed of himself not to be helping her, now that he was the eldest, instead of wanting her to keep him. George, the eldest son, had died in India, which brought Roland first.

"It's true," said Roland, in a reflective mood, "I ought to be helping her. I wonder if Carrick could put me into anything, as old Dick won't. Once let me get a start, I'm bound to go on, and the mother should be the first to benefit by it."