“What was it that took away his heart?” said Rowland; “the old reason—want of money, I suppose?” It revived a little spirit in him, and the impulse of wealth to plume itself on its own advantages when he heard of this. It pleased him to think that he could do so easily without feeling it at all, what had cost Lord Clydesdale an effort which he no longer cared to take.
The Deans, husband and wife, regarded the other pair before them with that mild disdain which people in society feel for those who do not know everything that everybody knows about the families and persons who form the “world.” They were not perhaps exactly in society themselves, but they did know at least about the Clydesdale family and all that had happened to them. “It was not precisely want of money,” Mr. Dean said cautiously, “though we all know, more’s the pity, that they are not rich.”
“Oh! nonsense, Alexander,” said his wife, “as if everybody didn’t know the whole story! It might be a struggle, but they always held up their heads, and never made a poor mouth. What it was that took the heart out of the Earl was a great disappointment in his family. Young Lord Gourock was a very fine boy: you would never have thought it of him, but he just fell into the hands of some woman. That’s the great danger with young lads of family. You must surely have heard of it?”
“You forget that we have been in India, both of us, for years,” Evelyn said quickly.
“Ah! that would account for it: but even in India these things are known, among——” Mrs. Dean was about to say the right kind of people—but she remembered to have heard that Mrs. Rowland was a lady—one of the Somethings of Northamptonshire—and forbore. “At all events,” she said, “it was well known here. I wonder you have not heard the whole story from Miss Eliza. She is a very clever person at finding out, and she always knows every detail, but all in the kindest spirit. I have always had a warm heart for poor young Gourock myself. He was such a nice boy! I believe his father and Lady Jean don’t even know where he is,” she added in a lower voice.
“Oh,” said the minister, “they will easily find out where he is when he is wanted. You can always trace a man with a handle to his name.”
“When he has to come to take up the succession—which will be great comfort to his poor father!” said Mrs. Dean scornfully. “But this,” she added, “is but a melancholy kind of conversation; and your ball was just beyond everything—such luxury—and the decorations—and the band—and——”
Even Evelyn could scarcely bear any more, and Rowland did not even pretend to pay any attention; he put away the scones (though they were excellent) with a gesture that looked like disgust, and listened most impatiently to something the minister had to say about the Teinds, and the earnest need of an augmentation, and the objections of the heritors to do anything. He had a vague sense that money was wanted, and that he himself might get free if he made a large offer. “If there is anything I can do, command me,” he said. “I may not be of much use in other ways, but so far as money goes—Evelyn, don’t you think we should go before the rain comes on?”
“But you have had no tea!” said the minister’s wife, “and the sky is clearing beautifully over the hills, which is just the quarter the rain comes from. Let Mrs. Rowland finish her tea.”
“We must be going,” said Rowland, and he went out first, leaving his wife to follow. He said nothing till they had walked far along the edge of the bay, and were once more in Rosmore woods, in a path overhung with low trees, from which occasionally came a big cold drop on their faces or on their shoulders. He had put his arm within his wife’s according to his usual fashion, and half-pushed her before him in the preoccupation of his thoughts. At last he spoke. He had made little or no reply to her remarks, scarcely wishing, it seemed, to hear them as they came along.