"Do you think that these ills can fall on you alone, Paul? Am I not your wife? If disgrace be your portion, must not I share it? Yes, and as freely as I have shared your better days' love, for the disgrace will be unmerited. Do I not know that my decision will be canvassed by all, blamed by the many?"
"Then why expose yourself to this blame?"
"For our children's sakes. You did not require this money when it was settled on me and them; they do now, and you may."
"I!—I will never degrade myself by a farthing of it; so do not make me your excuse for your selfishness. You have chosen, you say; take care how it may end."
A bankruptcy ensued, and Paul survived it. People who threaten not to live, seldom keep that promise. At the worst he could only be charged with over-speculation. His dividend was excellent, his embarrassments clearly attributable to a year of panic, and the failure of some other houses doing business with him. Barbara had truly said, there might be imprudence but there was no disgrace attached to his name, and he obtained a certificate of the first class.
What was the poor wife's suffering meanwhile? As she expected, many and harsh comments were passed on her conduct; her summer friends looked coldly on her; her servants were disposed to be insolent.
Paul too, who, in spite of all evidence, persisted in asserting and believing that Barbara's property would have saved him, was almost savage in his ill-temper. Ostentatiously economical, but requiring the same comforts and attendance he had enjoyed with more than double their present income, nothing but devoted affection and a reliance in his innate good qualities could have preserved his wife's last comfort, a reliance on him, a respect for her husband. The wife who ceases to look up is indeed alone and miserable. In the pettish recklessness of his grief, he had chosen to make a parade of giving up every thing; not an indignity was spared his family; and many comforts they might have honorably retained, were cast from them, that Barbara might more fully feel the enormity of her fault. The children could but half understand the change; and their innocent murmurs, their cowed looks, their gentle pity for "poor mamma" were so many daggers to her heart.
Paul Chepstowe's credit was so good that he might have recommenced life; he was offered a capital on the security of his wife's fortune; but he scorned a boon emanating from that source, and preferred taking a subordinate clerkship in a mercantile house. Some people have a pleasure in "cutting off the nose to spite the face," and our hero was of that class. Like Mawworm, "he liked to be despised;" for some time it literally did his heart good to come home and say he had been treated with supercilious pride and incivility, and thus maunder over his troubles. He was almost sorry to find that home still neat and comfortable, to see his children flourishing in mind and body, to feel that some of their old connections yet considered his wife their equal. Time and the hour, however, will wear through the longest day; and Paul gradually accustomed himself to his happiness, and to look upon himself once more as a respectable member of society.
The illusion, however, was dispelled, and this time it was Barbara who meditated sacrifices and talked of "disgrace." Their eldest child, a girl, was now fifteen years old, when, to the father's horror, he discovered a plan for sending her as governess pupil to a school. He disapproved, remonstrated, scolded, talked of "candle-end savings," and "ridiculous economy with their income," but to no purpose. Once he had given up the reins from pique, and now his wife chose to drive, and would not relinquish them; so Annie did as her mother had decided, and was placed in a way of earning her own livelihood. She was a clever, ardent girl, and was soon enabled to add her mite to the general hoard, as a younger sister was received in return for her services. Their only boy remained longer on their hands; he was a persevering, keen lad, with a decided turn for mechanics, and was apprenticed at his own request to an engineer. His more ambitious father wished first to give him the benefit of a college education, to send him to mathematical Cambridge; but Mrs. Chepstowe strenuously opposed this plan. "We can not afford to give Harry a suitable income," she said, "and he shall never with my consent be exposed to the miseries and temptations of a dubious position. No, Harry has his way to fight in the world; he can not begin too soon; we have no right to mislead him as to his situation, or to fetter his right arm with the trammels of gentility."
"And so you have treasured up your uncle's money just to make your son a mechanic, and his sisters governesses! I expected that, at all events, our children would have benefited by that miserable bequest."