It certainly is essential for respectability that something should be set apart from a man"s income for his wearing apparel; and though the money was, perhaps, improperly so designated, Dolly would not have objected had she not thought that it had already gone to the race-course,--in company with the green trousers. She had her own means of obtaining information as to the Carroll family. It was very necessary that she should do so, if the family was to be kept on its legs at all.
"I don"t think any good can come from discussing what my uncle does with the money." This was Dolly"s first speech. "If he is to have it, let him have it, but let him have as little as possible."
"I never heard anybody so cross as you always are to papa," said Sophy.
"Your cousin Dorothy is very fortunate," said Mrs. Carroll. "She does not know what it is to want for anything."
"She never spends anything--on herself," said her father. "It is Dolly"s only fault that she won"t."
"Because she has it all done for her," said Amelia.
Dolly had gone back to her book, and disdained to make any farther reply. Her father felt that quite enough had been said about it, and was prepared to give the twenty pounds, under the idea that he might be thought to have made a stout fight upon the subject. "He does want them very badly--for decency"s sake," said the poor wife, thus winding up her plea. Then Mr. Grey got out his check-book and wrote the check for twenty pounds. But he made it payable, not to Mr. but to Mrs. Carroll.
"I suppose, papa, nothing can be done about Mr. Carroll." This was said by Dolly as soon as the family had withdrawn.
"In what way "done," my dear?"
"As to settling some farther sum for himself."
"He"d only spend it, my dear."
"That would be intended," said Dolly.
"And then he would come back just the same."
"But in that case he should have nothing more. Though they were to declare that he hadn"t a pair of trousers in which to appear at a race-course, he shouldn"t have it."
"My dear," said Mr. Grey, "you cannot get rid of the gnats of the world.
They will buzz and sting and be a nuisance. Poor Jane suffers worse from this gnat than you or I. Put up with it; and understand in your own mind that when he comes for another twenty pounds he must have it. You needn"t tell him, but so it must be."
"If I had my way," said Dolly, after ten minutes" silence, "I would punish him. He is an evil thing, and should be made to reap the proper reward. It is not that I wish to avoid my share of the world"s burdens, but that justice should be done. I don"t know which I hate the worst,--Uncle Carroll or Mr. Scarborough."
The next day was Sunday, and Dolly was very anxious before breakfast to induce her father to say that he would go to church with her; but he was inclined to be obstinate, and fell back upon his usual excuse, saying that there were Scarborough papers which it would be necessary that he should read before he started for Tretton on the following day.
"Papa, I think it would do you good if you came."
"Well, yes; I suppose it would. That is the intention; but somehow it fails with me sometimes."
"Do you think that you hate people when you go to church as much as when you don"t?"
"I am not sure that I hate anybody very much."
"I do."
"That seems an argument for your going."
"But if you don"t hate them it is because you won"t take the trouble, and that again is not right. If you would come to church you would be better for it all round. You"d hate Uncle Carroll"s idleness and abominable self-indulgence worse than you do."
"I don"t love him, as it is, my dear."
"And I should hate him less. I felt last night as though I could rise from my bed and go and murder him."
"Then you certainly ought to go to church."
"And you had pa.s.sed him off just as though he were a gnat from which you were to receive as little annoyance as possible, forgetting the influence he must have on those six unfortunate children. Don"t you know that you gave her that twenty pounds simply to be rid of a disagreeable subject?"
"I should have given it ever so much sooner, only that you were looking at me."
"I know you would, you dear, sweet, kind-hearted, but most un-Christian, father. You must come to church, in order that some idea of what Christianity demands of you may make its way into your heart. It is not what the clergyman may say of you, but that your mind will get away for two hours from that other reptile and his concerns." Then Mr. Grey, with a loud, long sigh, allowed his boots, and his gloves, and his church-going hat, and his church-going umbrella to be brought to him. It was, in fact, his aversion to these articles that Dolly had to encounter.
It may be doubted whether the church services of that day did Mr. Grey much good; but they seemed to have had some effect upon his daughter, from the fact that in the afternoon she wrote a letter in kindly words to her aunt: "Papa is going to Tretton, and I will come up to you on Tuesday. I have got a frock which I will bring with me as a present for Potsey; and I will make her sew on the b.u.t.tons for herself. Tell Minna I will lend her that book I spoke of. About those boots--I will go with Georgina to the boot-maker." But as to Amelia and Sophy she could not bring herself to say a good-natured word, so deep in her heart had sunk that sin of which they had been guilty with reference to Prince Chitakov.
On that night she had a long discussion with her father respecting the affairs of the Scarborough family. The discussion was held in the dining-room, and may, therefore, be supposed to have been premeditated.
Those at night in Mr. Grey"s own bedroom were generally the result of sudden thought. "I should lay down the law to him--" began Dolly.
"The law is the law," said her father.
"I don"t mean the law in that sense. I should tell him firmly what I advised, and should then make him understand that if he did not follow my advice I must withdraw. If his son is willing to pay these money-lenders what sums they have actually advanced, and if by any effort on his part the money can be raised, let it be done. There seems to be some justice in repaying out of the property that which was lent to the property when by Mr. Scarborough"s own doing the property was supposed to go into the eldest son"s hands. Though the eldest son and the money-lenders be spendthrifts and profligates alike, there will in that be something of fairness. Go there prepared with your opinion. But if either father or son will not accept it, then depart, and shake the dust from your feet."
"You propose it all as though it were the easiest thing in the world."
"Easy or difficult. I would not discuss anything of which the justice may hereafter be disputed."
What was the result of the consultation on Mr. Grey"s mind he did not declare, but he resolved to take his daughter"s advice in all that she said to him.
CHAPTER XIX.
MR. GREY GOES TO TRETTON.
Mr. Grey went down to Tretton with a great bag of papers. In fact, though he told his daughter that he had to examine them all before he started, and had taken them to Fulham for that purpose, he had not looked at them. And, as another fact, the bag was not opened till he got home again. They had been read;--at any rate, what was necessary. He knew his subject. The old squire knew it well.
Mr. Grey was going down to Tretton, not to convey facts or to explain the law, but in order that he might take the side either of the father or of the son. Mr. Scarborough had sent for the lawyer to support his view of the case; and the son had consented to meet him in order that he might the more easily get the better of his father.
Mr. Grey had of late learned one thing which had before been dark to him,--had seen one phase of this complicated farrago of dishonesty which had not before been visible to him. Augustus suspected his father of some farther treachery. That he should be angry at having been debarred from his birthright so long,--debarred from the knowledge of his birthright,--was, Mr. Grey thought, natural. A great wrong had been, at least, intended; and that such a man should resent it was to have been expected. But of late Mr. Grey had discovered that it was not in that way that the son"s mind worked. It was not anger but suspicion that he showed; and he used his father"s former treatment of him as a justification for the condemnation implied in his thoughts. There is no knowing what an old man may do who has already acted as he had done. It was thus that he expressed himself both by his words and deeds, and did so openly in his father"s presence, Mr. Grey had not seen them together, but knew from the letters of both of them that such was the case. Old Mr. Scarborough scorned his son"s suspicions, and disregarded altogether any words that might be said as to his own past conduct. He was willing, or half willing, that Mountjoy"s debts should be, not paid, but settled.
But he was willing to do nothing toward such a step except in his own way. While the breath was in his body the property was his, and he chose to be treated as its only master. If Augustus desired to do anything by "post-obits," let him ruin himself after his own fashion. "It is not very likely that Augustus can raise money by post obits, circ.u.mstanced as the property is," he had written to Mr. Grey, with a conveyed sneer and chuckle as to the success of his own villany. It was as though he had declared that the money-lenders had been too well instructed as to what tricks Mr. Scarborough could play with his property to risk a second venture.
Augustus had, in truth, been awaiting his father"s death with great impatience. It was unreasonable that a man should live who had acted in such a way and who had been so cut about by the doctors. His father"s demise had, in truth, been promised to him, and to all the world. It was an understood thing, in all circles which knew anything, that old Mr.
Scarborough could not live another month. It had been understood some time, and was understood at the present moment; and yet Mr. Scarborough went on living,--no doubt, as an invalid in the last stage of probable dissolution, but still with the full command of his intellect and mental powers for mischief. Augustus, suspecting him as he did, had begun to fear that he might live too long. His brother had disappeared, and he was the heir. If his father would die,--such had been his first thought,--he could settle with the creditors immediately, before any tidings should be heard of his brother. But tidings had come. His brother had been seen by Mr. Hart at Monte Carlo; and though Mr. Hart had not yet sent home the news to the other creditors, the news had been sent at once to Augustus Scarborough by his own paid attendant upon his brother. Of Mr. Hart"s "little game" he did not yet know the particulars; but he was confident that there was some game.
Augustus by no means gave his mother credit for the disgraceful conduct imputed to her in the story as now told by her surviving husband. It was not that he believed in the honesty of his mother, whom he had never known, and for whose memory he cared little, but that he believed so fully in the dishonesty of his father. His father, when he had thoroughly understood that Mountjoy had enveloped the property in debt, so that nothing but a skeleton would remain when the bonds were paid, had set to work, and by the ingenuity of his brain had resolved to redeem, as far as the Scarboroughs were concerned, their estate from its unfortunate position.
It was so that Augustus believed; this was the theory existing in his mind. That his father should have been so clever, and Mr. Grey so blind, and even Mr. Hart and Mr. Tyrrwhit so easily hoodwinked, was remarkable.
But so it was,--or might probably be so. He felt no a.s.surance, but there was ever present to him the feeling of great danger. But the state of things as arranged by his father might be established by himself. If he could get these creditors to give up their bonds while his father"s falsehood was still believed, it would be a great thing. He had learned by degrees how small a proportion of the money claimed had, in fact, been advanced to Mountjoy, and had resolved to confine himself to paying that. That might now probably be accepted with grat.i.tude. The increasing value of the estate might bear that without being crushed. But it should be done at once, while Mountjoy was still absent and before Mr. Tyrrwhit at any rate knew that Mountjoy had not been killed. Then had happened that accidental meeting with Mr. Hart at Monte Carlo. That idiot of a keeper of his had been unable to keep Mountjoy from the gambling-house.
But Mr. Hart had as yet told nothing. Mr. Hart was playing some game of his own, in which he would a.s.suredly be foiled. The strong hold which Augustus had was in the great infirmity of his father and in the blindness of Mr. Grey, but it would be settled. It ought to have been well that the thing should be settled already by his father"s death.
Augustus did feel strongly that the squire ought to complete his work by dying. Were the story, as now told by him, true, he ought certainly to die, so as to make speedy atonement for his wickedness. Were it false, then he ought to go quickly, so that the lie might be effectual. Every day that he continued to live would go far to endanger the discovery.
Augustus felt that he must at once have the property in his own hands, so as to buy the creditors and obtain security.