"What do you think about my money, Sir--the loan to Mr. Dolly, I mean?"
"It"s not a choice investment, Fisk--at least, there are securities I would certainly prefer to it."
"Three years" wages and perquisites, Sir!" cried he, mournfully.
"Well, your master will probably have five years to ruminate over the wrong he has done you."
"At the galleys? Do you really mean the galleys, Sir?"
"I really mean at the galleys, Fisk; and if he be not a more amusing companion there than I have found him in ordinary life, I can only say I do not envy the man he will be chained to."
Mr. Fisk grinned a very hearty concurrence with the sentiment, and took a respectful leave, and withdrew.
CHAPTER LX. MR. M"KINLAY IN THE TOILS
Mr. M"KINLAY was too acute an observer not to see that his arrival at the Boschetto was matter of general satisfaction, and his welcome peculiarly cordial. The Vyners had just escaped from a heavy calamity, and were profuse of grateful emotions to all who had a.s.sisted them in their troubles.
Now, M"Kinlay had not been extravagant in his offices of friendship, but, with a sort of professional instinct, he had always contemplated the possibility of a restoration, and had never betrayed by his manner any falling off from his old terms of loyalty and devotion.
The Vyners, however, had their acute attack of grat.i.tude, and they felt very warmly towards him, and even went so far as to designate by the word "delicacy" the cold reserve which he had once or twice manifested.
Vyner gave him up his own room, and the little study adjoining it, and Georgina--the haughty Georgina--vouchsafed to look over its internal economies, and see that it was perfect in all its comforts. She went further; she actually avowed to him the part she had taken in his reception, and coquettishly engaged him to remember how much of his accommodation had depended on _her_ foresight.
Mr. M"Kinlay was delighted; he had not been without certain misgivings, as he journeyed along over the Alps, that he might have shown himself a stronger, stauncher friend to Vyner in his hour of adversity. He had his doubts as to whether he had not been betrayed once or twice into a tone of rebuke or censure, and he knew he had a.s.sumed a manner of more freedom than consorted with their former relations. Would these lapses he remembered against him now? Should he find them all colder, stiffer, haughtier than ever?
What a relief to him was the gracious, the more than gracious, reception he met with! How pleasant to be thanked most enthusiastically for the long journey he had come, with the consciousness he was to be paid for it as handsomely afterwards! How lightly he took his fatigues, how cheerily he talked of everything, slyly insinuating now and then that if they would look back to his letters, they would see that he always pointed to this issue to the case, and for his part never felt that the matter was so serious as they deemed it. "Not that I ever permitted myself to hold out hopes which might prove delusive," added he, "for I belong to a profession whose first maxim is, "Nothing is certain.""
Nor was it merely kind or complimentary they were; they were confidential. Vyner would sit down at the fire with him, and tell all the little family secrets that are usually reserved for the members themselves; and Georgina would join him in the garden, to explain how she long foresaw the infatuation of her brother-in-law, but was powerless to arrest it; and even Lady Vyner--the cold and distant Lady Vyner--informed him, in the strictest secresy, that her dear mother had latterly taken a fondness for Malaga, and actually drank two full gla.s.ses of it every day more than the doctor permitted. What may not the man do in the household who is thus accepted and trusted? So, certainly, thought Mr. M"Kinlay, and as he strolled in the garden, apparently deep in thought over the Vyner complications, his real cares were, How was he himself to derive the fullest advantage of "the situation"?
"It is while towing the wreck into harbour the best bargain can be made for salvage," muttered M"Kinlay. "I must employ the present moments well, since, once reinstated in their old prosperity, the old pride is sure to return." He hesitated long what course to take. Prudence suggested the slow, cautious, patient approach; but then Miss Courtenay was one of those capricious natures whose sudden turns disconcert all regular siege. And, on the other hand, if he were to attempt a "surprise," and failed, he should never recover it. He had ascertained that her fortune was safe; he had also learned that Mrs. Courtenay had made a will in her favour, though to what precise amount he could not tell; and he fancied--nor was it mere fancy--that she inclined far more to his society than heretofore, and seemed to encourage him to a greater frankness than he had yet dared to employ in his intercourse with her.
Partly because of the arduous task of investigating Vyner"s accounts, and partly that he was a man who required abundant time and quiet before he could make up his mind on any difficulty, he breakfasted alone in his own room, and rarely mixed with the family before dinner-hour. He knew well how all this seeming industry redounded to his credit; the little entreaties to him to take some fresh air, to take a walk or a drive, were all so many a.s.surances of friendly interest in his behalf; and when Vyner would say, "Have a care, M"Kinlay; remember what"s to become of _us_ if you knock up," Lady Vyner"s glance of grat.i.tude, and Miss Courtenay"s air of half confusion, were an incense that positively intoxicated him with ecstasy.
A short stroll in the garden he at last permitted himself to take, and of this brief period of relaxation he made a little daily history--one of those small jokes great men weave out of some little personal detail, which they have a conscious sense, perhaps, history will yet deal with more pompously.
"Five times from the orangery to the far summer-house to-day! There"s dissipation for you," would he say, as he entered the drawing-room before dinner. "Really I feel like a pedestrian training for a race."
And how pleasantly would they laugh at his drollery, as we all do laugh every day at some stupid attempt at fun by those whose services we stand in need of, flattering ourselves the while that our sycophancy is but politeness.
Vyner was absent one day, and Mr. M"Kinlay took the head of the table, and did the honours with somewhat more pretension than the position required, alluding jocularly to his high estate and its onerous responsibilities, but the ladies liked his pleasantry, and treasured up little details of it to tell Sir Gervais on his return.
When they left him to his coffee and his cigar on the terrace, his feeling was little less than triumphant. "Yes," thought he, "I have won the race; I may claim the cup when I please." While he thus revelled, he saw, or fancied he saw, the flutter of a muslin dress in the garden beneath. Was it Georgina? Could it be that she had gone there designedly to draw him on to a declaration? If Mr. M"Kinlay appear to my fair readers less gallant than he might be, let them bear in mind that his years were not those which dispose to romance, and that he was only a "solicitor" by profession.
"Now or never, then," said he, finishing a second liqueur-gla.s.s of brandy, and descending the steps into the garden.
Though within a few days of Christmas, the evening was mild and even genial, for Chiavari is one of those sheltered nooks where the oranges live out of doors through the winter, and enjoy a climate like that of Naples. It was some time before he could detect her he was in search of, and at last came suddenly to where she was gathering some fresh violets for a bouquet.
"What a climate--what a heavenly climate this is, Miss Courtenay!" said he, in a tone purposely softened and subdued for the occasion; and she started and exclaimed:
"Oh! how you frightened me, my dear Mr. M"Kinlay. I never heard you coming. I am in search of violets; come and help me, but only take the deep blue ones."
Now, if Mr. M"Kinlay had been perfectly sure--which he was not--that her eyes were blue, he would have adventured on a pretty compliment, but, as a lawyer, he knew the consequences of "misdescription," and he contented himself with expressing all the happiness he felt at being a.s.sociated with her in any pursuit.
"Has my sister told you what Gervais has gone about?" asked she, still stooping to cull the flowers.
"Not a word of it."
"Then I will, though certainly you scarcely deserve such a proof of my confidence, seeing how very guarded you are as to your own secrets."
"I, my dear Miss Courtenay? _I_ guarded! and towards _you!_ I pray you tell me what you allude to."
"By-and-by, perhaps; for the present, I want to speak of our own mysteries. Know, then, that my brother has gone to Genoa to bring back with him the young gentleman through whose means much of our late discovery has been made, and who turns out to be Mr. Luttrell. He was here for a couple of days already, but so overwhelmed by the news of his father"s death, that we scarcely saw anything of him. He then left us to go back and nurse his wounded friend the captain, who insists, it seems, on being treated in the public hospital."
"Luttrell--Luttrell! You mean one of that family who lived on the rock off the Irish coast?"
"His son."
"The boy I remember having rescued at the peril of my own life! I wonder will his memory recal it? And why is Sir Gervais----"
He stopped; he was about to ask what interest could attach to any one so devoid of fortune, friends, or station, and she saw the meaning of his question, and said, though not without a certain confusion:
"My brother-in-law and this young man"s father were once on a time very intimate; he used to be a great deal with us--I am speaking of very long ago--and then we lost sight of him. A remote residence and an imprudent marriage estranged him from us, and the merest accident led my brother to where he lived--the barren island you spoke of--and renewed in some sort their old friendship--in so far, at least, that Gervais promised to be the guardian of his friend"s son----"
"I remember it all; I took a part in the arrangement."
"But it turns out there is nothing to take charge of. In a letter that my brother got from Mr. Grenfell some time since, we find that Mr.
Luttrell has left everything he possessed to a certain niece or daughter. Which was she, Mr. M"Kinlay?"
"Niece, I always understood."
"Which did you always believe?" said she, looking at him with a steady, unflinching stare.
"Niece, certainly."
"Indeed?"
"On my word of honour."
"And all this wonderful story about her beauty and captivation, and the running away and the secret marriage, how much of _that_ does Mr.
M"Kinlay believe?"
"I don"t know one word of what you allude to."
"Oh, Mr. M"Kinlay, this is more than lawyer-like reserve!"
"I will swear it, if you desire."
"But surely you"ll not say that you did not dine with Sir Within Wardle at the Hotel Windsor, as you came through Paris?"