"I dare say not, and if so, I mean nothing particular as to your intelligence. He, at any rate, is a scoundrel. Mountjoy--you know Mountjoy?"
"Never saw him in my life."
"I don"t think he is a scoundrel,--not all round. He has gambled when he has not had money to pay. That is bad. And he has promised when he wanted money, and broken his word as soon as he had got it, which is bad also. And he has thought himself to be a fine fellow because he has been intimate with lords and dukes, which is very bad. He has never cared whether he paid his tailor. I do not mean that he has merely got into debt, which a young man such as he cannot help; but he has not cared whether his breeches were his or another man"s. That too is bad. Though he has been pa.s.sionately fond of women, it has only been for himself, not for the women, which is very bad. There is an immense deal to be altered before he can go to heaven."
"I hope the change may come before it is too late," said Merton.
"These changes don"t come very suddenly, you know. But there is some chance for Mountjoy. I don"t think that there is any for Augustus." Here he paused, but Merton did not feel disposed to make any remark. "You don"t happen to know a young man of the name of Annesley,--Harry Annesley?"
"I have heard his name from your son."
"From Augustus? Then you didn"t hear any good of him, I"m sure. You have heard all the row about poor Mountjoy"s disappearance?"
"I heard that he did disappear."
"After a quarrel with that Annesley?"
"After some quarrel. I did not notice the name at the time."
"Harry Annesley was the name. Now, Augustus says that Harry Annesley was the last person who saw Mountjoy before his disappearance,--the last who knew him. He implies thereby that Annesley was the conscious or unconscious cause of his disappearance."
"Well, yes."
"Certainly it is so. And as it has been thought by the police, and by other fools, that Mountjoy was murdered,--that his disappearance was occasioned by his death, either by murder or suicide, it follows that Annesley must have had something to do with it. That is the inference, is it not?"
"I should suppose so," said Merton.
"That is manifestly the inference which Augustus draws. To hear him speak to me about it you would suppose that he suspected Annesley of having killed Mountjoy."
"Not that, I hope."
"Something of the sort. He has intended it to be believed that Annesley, for his own purposes, has caused Mountjoy to be made away with. He has endeavored to fill the police with that idea. A policeman, generally, is the biggest fool that London, or England, or the world produces, and has been selected on that account. Therefore the police have a beautifully mysterious but altogether ignorant suspicion as to Annesley. That is the doing of Augustus, for some purpose of his own. Now, let me tell you that Augustus saw Mountjoy after Annesley had seen him, that he knows this to be the case, and that it was Augustus, who contrived Mountjoy"s disappearance. Now what do you think of Augustus?" This was a question which Merton did not find it very easy to answer. But Mr. Scarborough waited for a reply. "Eh?" he exclaimed.
"I had rather not give an opinion on a point so raised."
"You may. Of course you understand that I intend to a.s.sert that Augustus is the greatest blackguard you ever knew. If you have anything to say in his favor you can say it."
"Only that you may be mistaken. Living down here, you may not know the truth."
"Just that. But I do know the truth. Augustus is very clever; but there are others as clever as he is. He can pay, but then so can I. That he should want to get Mountjoy out of the way is intelligible. Mountjoy has become disreputable, and had better be out of the way. But why persistently endeavor to throw the blame upon young Annesley? That surprises me;--only I do not care much about it. I hear now for the first time that he has ruined young Annesley, and that does appear to be very horrible. But why does he want to pay eighty thousand pounds to these creditors? That I should wish to do so,--out of a property which must in a very short time become his,--would be intelligible. I may be supposed to have some affection for Mountjoy, and, after all, am not called upon to pay the money out of my own pocket. Do you understand it?"
"Not in the least," said Merton, who did not, indeed, very much care about it.
"Nor do I;--only this, that if he could pay these men and deprive them of all power of obtaining farther payment, let who would have the property, they at any rate would be quiet. Augustus is now my eldest son. Perhaps he thinks he might not remain so. If I were out of the way, and these creditors were paid, he thinks that poor Mountjoy wouldn"t have a chance. He shall pay this eighty thousand pounds. Mountjoy hasn"t a chance as it is; but Augustus shall pay the penalty."
Then he threw himself back on the bed, and Mr. Merton begged him to spare himself the trouble of the letter for the present. But in a few minutes he was again on his elbow and took some farther medicine. "I"m a great a.s.s," he said, "to help Augustus in playing his game. If I were to go off at once he would be the happiest fellow left alive. But come, let us begin." Then he dictated the letter as follows:
"DEAR MR. GREY,--I have been thinking much of what pa.s.sed between us the other day. Augustus seems to be in a great hurry as to paying the creditors, and I do not see why he should not be gratified, as the money may now be forthcoming. I presume that the sales, which will be completed before Christmas, will nearly enable us to stop their mouths.
I can understand that Mountjoy should be induced to join with me and Augustus, so that in disposing of so large a sum of money the authority of all may be given, both of myself and of the heir, and also of him who a short time since was supposed to be the heir. I think that you may possibly find Mountjoy"s address by applying to Augustus, who is always clever in such matters.
"But you will have to be certain that you obtain all the bonds. If you can get Tyrrwhit to help you you will be able to be sure of doing so.
The matter to him is one of vital importance, as his sum is so much the largest. Of course he will open his mouth very wide; but when he finds that he can get his princ.i.p.al and nothing more, I think that he will help you. I am afraid that I must ask you to put yourself in correspondence with Augustus. That he is an insolent scoundrel I will admit; but we cannot very well complete this affair without him. I fancy that he now feels it to be his interest to get it all done before I die, as the men will be clamorous with their bonds as soon as the breath is out of my body.--
"Yours sincerely, JOHN SCARBOROUGH."
"That will do," he said, when the letter was finished. But when Mr.
Merton turned to leave the room Mr. Scarborough detained him. "Upon the whole, I am not dissatisfied with my life," he said.
"I don"t know that you have occasion," rejoined Mr. Merton. In this he absolutely lied, for, according to his thinking, there was very much in the affairs of Mr. Scarborough"s life which ought to have induced regret. He knew the whole story of the birth of the elder son, of the subsequent marriage, of Mr. Scarborough"s fraudulent deceit which had lasted so many years, and of his later return to the truth, so as to save the property, and to give back to the younger son all of which for so many years he, his father, had attempted to rob him.
All London had talked of the affair, and all London had declared that so wicked and dishonest an old gentleman had never lived. And now he had returned to the truth simply with the view of cheating the creditors and keeping the estate in the family. He was manifestly an old gentleman who ought to be, above all others, dissatisfied with his own life; but Mr.
Merton, when the a.s.sertion was made to him, knew not what other answer to make.
"I really do not think I have, nor do I know one to whom heaven with all its bliss will be more readily accorded. What have I done for myself?"
"I don"t quite know what you have done all your life."
"I was born a rich man, and then I married,--not rich as I am now, but with ample means for marrying."
"After Mr. Mountjoy"s birth," said Merton, who could not pretend to be ignorant of the circ.u.mstance.
"Well, yes. I have my own ideas about marriage and that kind of thing, which are, perhaps, at variance with yours." Whereupon Merton bowed. "I had the best wife in the world, who entirely coincided with me in all that I did. I lived entirely abroad, and made most liberal allowances to all the agricultural tenants. I rebuilt all the cottages;--go and look at them. I let any man shoot his own game till Mountjoy came up in the world and took the shooting into his own hands. When the people at the pottery began to build I a.s.sisted them in every way in the world. I offered to keep a school at my own expense, solely on the understanding that what they call Dissenters should be allowed to come there. The parson spread abroad a rumor that I was an atheist, and consequently the School was kept for the Dissenters only. The School-board has come and made that all right, though the parson goes on with his rumor. If he understood me as well as I understand him, he would know that he is more of an atheist than I am. I gave my boys the best education, spending on them more than double what is done by men with twice my means. My tastes were all simple, and were not specially vicious. I do not know that I have ever made any one unhappy. Then the estate became richer, but Mountjoy grew more and more expensive. I began to find that with all my economies the estate could not keep pace with him, so as to allow me to put by anything for Augustus. Then I had to bethink myself what I had to do to save the estate from those rascals."
"You took peculiar steps."
"I am a man who does take peculiar steps. Another would have turned his face to the wall in my state of health, and have allowed two dirty Jews such as Tyrrwhit and Samuel Hart to have revelled in the wealth of Tretton. I am not going to allow them to revel. Tyrrwhit knows me, and Hart will have to know me. They could not keep their hands to themselves till the breath was out of my body. Now I am about to see that each shall have his own shortly, and the estate will still be kept in the family."
"For Mr. Augustus Scarborough?"
"Yes, alas, yes! But that is not my doing. I do not know that I have cause to be dissatisfied with myself, but I cannot but own that I am unhappy. But I wished you to understand that though a man may break the law, he need not therefore be accounted bad, and though he may have views of his own as to religious matters, he need not be an atheist. I have made efforts on behalf of others, in which I have allowed no outward circ.u.mstances to control me. Now I think I do feel sleepy."
CHAPTER XXII.
HARRY ANNESLEY IS SUMMONED HOME.
"Just now I am triumphant," Harry Annesley had said to his hostess as he left Mrs. Armitage"s house in the Paragon, at Cheltenham. He was absolutely triumphant, throwing his hat up into the air in the abandonment of his joy. For he was not a man to have conceived so well of his own parts as to have flattered himself that the girl must certainly be his.
There are at present a number of young men about who think that few girls are worth the winning, but that any girl is to be had, not by asking,--which would be troublesome,--but simply by looking at her. You can see the feeling in their faces. They are for the most part small in stature, well made little men, who are aware that they have something to be proud of, wearing close-packed, shining little hats, by which they seem to add more than a cubit to their stature; men endowed with certain gifts of personal--dignity I may perhaps call it, though the word rises somewhat too high. They look as though they would be able to say a clever thing; but their spoken thoughts seldom rise above a small, acrid sharpness. They respect no one; above all, not their elders. To such a one his horse comes first, if he have a horse; then a dog; and then a stick; and after that the mistress of his affections. But their fault is not altogether of their own making. It is the girls themselves who spoil them and endure their inanity, because of that a.s.sumed look of superiority which to the eyes of the outside world would be a little offensive were it not a little foolish. But they do not marry often.
Whether it be that the girls know better at last, or that they themselves do not see sufficiently clearly their future dinners, who can say? They are for the most part younger brothers, and perhaps have discovered the best way of getting out of the world whatever sc.r.a.ps the world can afford them. Harry Annesley"s faults were altogether of another kind. In regard to this young woman, the Florence whom he had loved, he had been over-modest. Now his feeling of glory was altogether redundant. Having been told by Florence that she was devoted to him, he walked with his head among the heavens. The first instinct with such a young man as those of whom I have spoken teaches him, the moment he has committed himself, to begin to consider how he can get out of the sc.r.a.pe. It is not much of a sc.r.a.pe, for when an older man comes this way, a man verging toward baldness, with a good professional income, our little friend is forgotten and he is pa.s.sed by without a word. But Harry had now a conviction,--on that one special night,--that he never would be forgotten and never would forget. He was filled at once with an unwonted pride. All the world was now at his feet, and all the stars were open to him. He had begun to have a glimmering of what it was that Augustus Scarborough intended to do; but the intentions of Augustus Scarborough were now of no moment to him. He was clothed in a panoply of armor which would be true against all weapons. At any rate, on that night and during the next day this feeling remained the same with him.
Then he received a summons from his mother at Buston. His mother pressed him to come at once down to the parsonage. "Your uncle has been with your father, and has said terrible things about you. As you know, my brother is not very strong-minded, and I should not care so much for what he says were it not that so much is in his hands. I cannot understand what it is all about, but your father says that he does nothing but threaten. He talks of putting the entail on one side.
Entails used to be fixed things, I thought; but since what old Mr.
Scarborough did n.o.body seems to regard them now. But even suppose the entail does remain, what are you to do about the income? Your father thinks you had better come down and have a little talk about the matter."
This was the first blow received since the moment of his exaltation.