Ralph the Heir

Ralph the Heir.

by Anthony Trollope.

CHAPTER I.

SIR THOMAS.

There are men who cannot communicate themselves to others, as there are also men who not only can do so, but cannot do otherwise. And it is hard to say which is the better man of the two. We do not specially respect him who wears his heart upon his sleeve for daws to peck at, who carries a crystal window to his bosom so that all can see the work that is going on within it, who cannot keep any affair of his own private, who gushes out in love and friendship to every chance acquaintance; but then, again, there is but little love given to him who is always wary, always silent as to his own belongings, who b.u.t.tons himself in a suit of close reserve which he never loosens. Respect such a one may gain, but hardly love. It is natural to us to like to know the affairs of our friends; and natural also, I think, to like to talk of our own to those whom we trust. Perhaps, after all that may be said of the weakness of the gushing and indiscreet babbler, it is pleasanter to live with such a one than with the self-constrained reticent man of iron, whose conversation among his most intimate friends is solely of politics, of science, of literature, or of some other subject equally outside the privacies of our inner life.

Sir Thomas Underwood, whom I, and I hope my readers also, will have to know very intimately, was one of those who are not able to make themselves known intimately to any. I am speaking now of a man of sixty, and I am speaking also of one who had never yet made a close friend,--who had never by unconscious and slow degrees of affection fallen into that kind of intimacy with another man which justifies and renders necessary mutual freedom of intercourse in all the affairs of life. And yet he was possessed of warm affections, was by no means misanthropic in his nature, and would, in truth, have given much to be able to be free and jocund as are other men. He lacked the power that way, rather than the will. To himself it seemed to be a weakness in him rather than a strength that he should always be silent, always guarded, always secret and dark. He had lamented it as an acknowledged infirmity;--as a man grieves that he should be short-sighted, or dull of hearing; but at the age of sixty he had taken no efficient steps towards curing himself of the evil, and had now abandoned all idea of any such cure.

Whether he had been, upon the whole, fortunate or unfortunate in life shall be left to the reader"s judgment. But he certainly had not been happy. He had suffered cruel disappointments; and a disappointment will crush the spirit worse than a realised calamity. There is no actual misfortune in not being Lord Mayor of London;--but when a man has set his heart upon the place, has worked himself into a position within a few feet of the Mansion House, has become alderman with the mayoralty before him in immediate rotation, he will suffer more at being pa.s.sed over by the liverymen than if he had lost half his fortune. Now Sir Thomas Underwood had become Solicitor-General in his profession, but had never risen to the higher rank or more a.s.sured emoluments of other legal offices.

We will not quite trace our Meleager back to his egg, but we will explain that he was the only son of a barrister of moderate means, who put him to the Bar, and who died leaving little or nothing behind him. The young barrister had an only sister, who married an officer in the army, and who had pa.s.sed all her latter life in distant countries to which her husband had been called by the necessity of living on the income which his profession gave him. As a Chancery barrister, Mr. Underwood,--our Sir Thomas,--had done well, living on the income he made, marrying at thirty-five, going into Parliament at forty-five, becoming Solicitor-General at fifty,--and ceasing to hold that much-desired office four months after his appointment.

Such cessation, however, arising from political causes, is no disappointment to a man. It will doubtless be the case that a man so placed will regret the weakness of his party, which has been unable to keep the good things of Government in its hands; but he will recognise without remorse or sorrow the fact that the Ministry to which he has attached himself must cease to be a Ministry;--and there will be nothing in his displacement to gall his pride, or to create that inner feeling of almost insupportable mortification which comes from the conviction of personal failure. Sir Thomas Underwood had been Solicitor-General for a few months under a Conservative Prime Minister; and when the Conservative Minister went out of office, Sir Thomas Underwood followed him with no feeling of regret that caused him unhappiness. But when afterwards the same party came back to power, and he, having lost his election at the borough which he had represented, was pa.s.sed over without a word of sympathy or even of a.s.sumed regret from the Minister, then he was wounded. It was true, he knew, that a man, to be Solicitor-General, should have a seat in Parliament. The highest legal offices in the country are not to be attained by any amount of professional excellence, unless the candidate shall have added to such excellence the power of supporting a Ministry and a party in the House of Commons. Sir Thomas Underwood thoroughly understood this;--but he knew also that there are various ways in which a lame dog may be helped over a stile,--if only the lame dog be popular among dogs. For another ex-Solicitor-General a seat would have been found,--or some delay would have been granted,--or at least there would have been a consultation, with a suggestion that something should be tried. But in this case a man four years his junior in age, whom he despised, and who, as he was informed, had obtained his place in Parliament by gross bribery, was put into the office without a word of apology to him. Then he was unhappy, and acknowledged to himself that his spirit was crushed.

But he acknowledged to himself at the same time that he was one doomed by his nature to such crushing of the spirit if he came out of the hole of his solitude, and endeavoured to carry on the open fight of life among his fellow-men. He knew that he was one doomed to that disappointment, the bitterest of all, which comes from failure when the prize has been all but reached. It is much to have become Solicitor-General, and that he had achieved;--but it is worse than nothing to have been Solicitor-General for four months, and then to find that all the world around one regards one as having failed, and as being, therefore, fit for the shelf. Such were Sir Thomas Underwood"s feelings as he sat alone in his chambers during those days in which the new administration was formed,--in which days he was neither consulted nor visited, nor communicated with either by message or by letter. But all this,--this formation of a Ministry, in which the late Solicitor-General was not invited to take a part,--occurred seven years before the commencement of our story.

During those years in which our lawyer sat in Parliament as Mr.

Underwood,--at which time he was working hard also as a Chancery barrister, and was, perhaps, nearer to his fellow-men than he had ever been before, or was ever destined to be afterwards,--he resided, as regarded himself almost nominally, at a small but pretty villa, which he had taken for his wife"s sake at Fulham. It was close upon the river, and had well-arranged, though not extensive, shrubbery walks, and a little lawn, and a tiny conservatory, and a charming opening down to the Thames. Mrs. Underwood had found herself unable to live in Half-moon Street; and Mr. Underwood, not unwillingly, had removed his household G.o.ds to this retreat. At that time his household G.o.ds consisted of a wife and two daughters;--but the wife had died before the time came at which she could have taken on herself the name of Lady Underwood. The villa at Fulham was still kept, and there lived the two girls, and there also Sir Thomas, had he been interrogated on the subject, would have declared that he also was domiciled. But if a man lives at the place in which he most often sleeps, Sir Thomas in truth lived at his chambers at Southampton Buildings. When he moved those household G.o.ds of his to the villa, it was necessary, because of his duties in Parliament, that he should have some place in town wherein he might lay his head, and therefore, I fear not unwillingly, he took to laying his head very frequently in the little bedroom which was attached to his chambers.

It is not necessary that we should go back to any feelings which might have operated upon him during his wife"s lifetime, or during the period of his parliamentary career. His wife was now dead, and he no longer held a seat in Parliament. He had, indeed, all but abandoned his practice at the Bar, never putting himself forward for the ordinary business of a Chancery barrister. But, nevertheless, he spent the largest half of his life in his chambers, breakfasting there, reading there, writing there, and sleeping there. He did not altogether desert the lodge at Fulham, and the two girls who lived there. He would not even admit to them, or allow them to a.s.sert that he had not his home with them. Sometimes for two nights together, and sometimes for three, he would be at the villa,--never remaining there, however, during the day. But on Sundays it may almost be said that he was never at home. And hence arose the feeling that of all, this went the nearest to create discord between the father and the daughters. Sir Thomas was always in Southampton Buildings on Sundays.

Did Sir Thomas go to church? The Miss Underwoods did go to church very regularly, and thought much of the propriety and necessity of such Sunday exercises. They could remember that in their younger days their father always had been there with them. They could remember, indeed, that he, with something of sternness, would require from them punctuality and exactness in this duty. Now and again,--perhaps four times in the year,--he would go to the Rolls Chapel. So much they could learn, But they believed that beyond that his Sundays were kept holy by no attendance at divine service. And it may be said at once that they believed aright.

Sir Thomas"s chambers in Southampton Buildings, though they were dull and dingy of aspect from the outside, and were reached by a staircase which may be designated as lugubrious,--so much did its dark and dismantled condition tend to melancholy,--were in themselves large and commodious. His bedroom was small, but he had two s.p.a.cious sitting-rooms, one of which was fitted up as a library, and the other as a dining-room. Over and beyond these there was a clerk"s room;--for Sir Thomas, though he had given up the greater part of his business, had not given up his clerk; and here the old man, the clerk, pa.s.sed his entire time, from half-past eight in the morning till ten at night, waiting upon his employer in various capacities with a sedulous personal attention to which he had probably not intended to devote himself when he first took upon himself the duties of clerk to a practising Chancery barrister. But Joseph Stemm and Sir Thomas were not unlike in character, and had grown old together with too equal a step to admit of separation and of new alliance. Stemm had but one friend in the world, and Sir Thomas was that friend. I have already said that Sir Thomas had no friend;--but perhaps he felt more of that true intimacy, which friendship produces, with Stemm than with any other human being.

Sir Thomas was a tall thin man, who stooped considerably,--though not from any effect of years, with a face which would perhaps have been almost mean had it not been rescued from that evil condition by the a.s.surance of intelligence and strength which is always conveyed by a certain cla.s.s of ugliness. He had a nose something like the great Lord Brougham"s,--thin, long, and projecting at the point. He had quick grey eyes, and a good forehead;--but the component parts of his countenance were irregular and roughly put together. His chin was long, as was also his upper lip;--so that it may be taken as a fact that he was an ugly man. He was hale, however, and strong, and was still so good a walker that he thought nothing of making his way down to the villa on foot of an evening, after dining at his club.

It was his custom to dine at his club,--that highly respectable and most comfortable club situated at the corner of Suffolk Street, Pall Mall;--the senior of the two which are devoted to the well-being of scions of our great Universities. There Sir Thomas dined, perhaps four nights in the week, for ten months in the year. And it was said of him in the club that he had never been known to dine in company with another member of the club. His very manner as he sat at his solitary meal,--always with a pint of port on the table,--was as well known as the figure of the old king on horseback outside in the street, and was as unlike the ordinary manner of men as is that unlike the ordinary figures of kings. He had always a book in his hand,--not a club book, nor a novel from Mudie"s, nor a magazine, but some ancient and hard-bound volume from his own library, which he had brought in his pocket, and to which his undivided attention would be given. The eating of his dinner, which always consisted of the joint of the day and of nothing else, did not take him more than five minutes;--but he would sip his port wine slowly, would have a cup of tea which he would also drink very slowly,--and would then pocket his book, pay his bill, and would go. It was rarely the case that he spoke to any one in the club. He would bow to a man here and there,--and if addressed would answer; but of conversation at his club he knew nothing, and hardly ever went into any room but that in which his dinner was served to him.

In conversing about him men would express a wonder how such a one had ever risen to high office,--how, indeed, he could have thriven at his profession. But in such matters we are, all of us, too apt to form confident opinions on apparent causes which are near the surface, but which, as guides to character, are fallacious. Perhaps in all London there was no better lawyer, in his branch of law, than Sir Thomas Underwood. He had worked with great diligence; and though he was shy to a degree quite unintelligible to men in general in the ordinary intercourse of life, he had no feeling of diffidence when upon his legs in Court or in the House of Commons. With the Lord Chancellor"s wife or daughters he could not exchange five words with comfort to himself,--nor with his lordship himself in a drawing-room; but in Court the Lord Chancellor was no more to him than another lawyer whom he believed to be not so good a lawyer as himself. No man had ever succeeded in browbeating him when panoplied in his wig and gown; nor had words ever been wanting to him when so arrayed. It had been suggested to him by an attorney who knew him in that way in which attorneys ought to know barristers, that he should stand for a certain borough;--and he had stood and had been returned. Thrice he had been returned for the same town; but at last, when it was discovered that he would never dine with the leading townsmen, or call on their wives in London, or a.s.sist them in their little private views, the strength of his extreme respectability was broken down,--and he was rejected. In the meantime he was found to be of value by the party to which he had attached himself. It was discovered that he was not only a sound lawyer, but a man of great erudition, who had studied the experience of history as well as the wants of the present age. He was one who would disgrace no Government,--and he was invited to accept the office of Solicitor-General by a Minister who had never seen him out of the House of Commons. "He is as good a lawyer as there is in England,"

said the Lord Chancellor. "He always speaks with uncommon clearness,"

said the Chancellor of the Exchequer. "I never saw him talking with a human being," said the Secretary to the Treasury, deprecating the appointment. "He will soon get over that complaint with your a.s.sistance," said the Minister, laughing. So Mr. Underwood became Solicitor-General and Sir Thomas;--and he so did his work that no doubt he would have returned to his office had he been in Parliament when his party returned to power. But he had made no friend, he had not learned to talk even to the Secretary of the Treasury;--and when the party came back to power he was pa.s.sed over without remorse, and almost without a regret.

He never resumed the active bustle of his profession after that disappointment. His wife was then dead, and for nearly a twelvemonth he went about, declaring to attorneys and others that his professional life was done. He did take again to a certain cla.s.s of work when he came back to the old chambers in Southampton Buildings; but he was seen in Court only rarely, and it was understood that he wished it to be supposed that he had retired. He had ever been a moderate man in his mode of living, and had put together a sum of money sufficient for moderate wants. He possessed some twelve or fourteen hundred a year independent of anything that he might now earn; and, as he had never been a man greedy of money, so was he now more indifferent to it than in his earlier days. It is a mistake, I think, to suppose that men become greedy as they grow old. The avaricious man will show his avarice as he gets into years, because avarice is a pa.s.sion compatible with old age,--and will become more avaricious as his other pa.s.sions fall off from him. And so will it be with the man that is open-handed. Mr. Underwood, when struggling at the Bar, had fought as hard as any of his compeers for comfort and independence;--but money, as money, had never been dear to him;--and now he was so trained a philosopher that he disregarded it altogether, except so far as it enabled him to maintain his independence.

On a certain Friday evening in June, as he sat at dinner at his club, instead of applying himself to his book, which according to his custom he had taken from his pocket, he there read a letter, which as soon as read he would restore to the envelope, and would take it out again after a few moments of thought. At last, when the cup of tea was done and the bill was paid, he put away letter and book together and walked to the door of his club. When there he stood and considered what next should he do that evening. It was now past eight o"clock, and how should he use the four, five, or perhaps six hours which remained to him before he should go to bed? The temptation to which he was liable prompted him to return to his solitude in Southampton Buildings. Should he do so, he would sleep till ten in his chair,--then he would read, and drink more tea, or perhaps write, till one; and after that he would prowl about the purlieus of Chancery Lane, the Temple, and Lincoln"s Inn, till two or even three o"clock in the morning;--looking up at the old dingy windows, and holding, by aid of those powers which imagination gave him, long intercourse with men among whom a certain weakness in his physical organisation did not enable him to live in the flesh. Well the policemen knew him as he roamed about, and much they speculated as to his roamings. But in these night wanderings he addressed no word to any one; nor did any one ever address a word to him. Yet the world, perhaps, was more alive to him then than at any other period in the twenty-four hours.

But on the present occasion the temptation was resisted. He had not been at home during the whole week, and knew well that he ought to give his daughters the countenance of his presence. Whether that feeling alone would have been sufficient to withdraw him from the charms of Chancery Lane and send him down to the villa may be doubted; but there was that in the letter which he had perused so carefully which he knew must be communicated to his girls. His niece, Mary Bonner, was now an orphan, and would arrive in England from Jamaica in about a fortnight. Her mother had been Sir Thomas"s sister, and had been at this time dead about three years. General Bonner, the father, had now died, and the girl was left an orphan, almost penniless, and with no near friend unless the Underwoods would befriend her. News of the General"s death had reached Sir Thomas before;--and he had already made inquiry as to the fate of his niece through her late father"s agents. Of the General"s means he had known absolutely nothing,--believing, however, that they were confined to his pay as an officer. Now he was told that the girl would be at Southampton in a fortnight, and that she was utterly dest.i.tute. He declared to himself as he stood on the steps of the club that he would go home and consult his daughters;--but his mind was in fact made up as to his niece"s fate long before he got home,--before he turned out of Pall Mall into St. James"s Park. He would sometimes talk to himself of consulting his daughters; but in truth he very rarely consulted any human being as to what he would do or leave undone. If he went straight, he went straight without other human light than such as was given to him by his own intellect, his own heart, and his own conscience. It took him about an hour and a half to reach his home, but of that time four-fifths were occupied, not in resolving what he would do in this emergency, but in deep grumblings and regrets that there should be such a thing to be done at all. All new cares were grievous to him. Nay;--old cares were grievous, but new cares were terrible. Though he was bold in deciding, he was very timid in looking forward as to the results of that decision. Of course the orphan girl must be taken into his house;--and of course he must take upon himself the duty of a father in regard to her.

CHAPTER II.

POPHAM VILLA.

Popham Villa was the name of the house at Fulham,--as was to be seen by all men pa.s.sing by, for it was painted up conspicuously on the pillars through which the gate led into the garden. Mr. Underwood, when he had first taken the place, had wished to expunge the name, feeling it to be c.o.c.kneyfied, pretentious, and unalluring. But Mrs.

Underwood had rather liked it, and it remained. It was a subject of ridicule with the two girls; but they had never ventured to urge its withdrawal, and after his wife"s death Sir Thomas never alluded to the subject. Popham Villa it was, therefore, and there the words remained. The house was unpretentious, containing only two sitting-rooms besides a small side closet,--for it could hardly be called more,--which the girls even in their mother"s lifetime had claimed as their own. But the drawing-room was as pretty as room could be, opening on to the lawn with folding windows, and giving a near view of the bright river as it flowed by, with just a glimpse of the bridge. That and the dining-room and the little closet were all on the ground floor, and above were at any rate as many chambers as the family required. The girls desired no better house,--if only their father could be with them. But he would urge that his books were all in London; and that, even were he willing to move them, there was no room for them in Popham Villa.

It was sad enough for the two girls,--this kind of life. The worst of it, perhaps, was this; that they never knew when to expect him. A word had been said once as to the impracticability of having dinner ready for a gentleman, when the gentleman would never say whether he would want a dinner. It had been an unfortunate remark, for Sir Thomas had taken advantage of it by saying that when he came he would come after dinner, unless he had certified to the contrary beforehand. Then, after dinner, would come on him the temptation of returning to his chambers, and so it would go on with him from day to day.

On this Friday evening the girls almost expected him, as he rarely let a week pa.s.s without visiting them, and still more rarely came to them on a Sat.u.r.day. He found them out upon the lawn, or rather on the brink of the river, and with them was standing a young man whom he knew well. He kissed each of the girls, and then gave his hand to the young man. "I am glad to see you, Ralph," he said. "Have you been here long?"

"As much as an hour or two, I fear. Patience will tell you. I meant to have got back by the 9.15 from Putney; but I have been smoking, and dreaming, and talking, till now it is nearly ten."

"There is a train at 10.30," said the eldest Miss Underwood.

"And another at 11.15," said the young man.

Sir Thomas was especially anxious to be alone with his daughters, but he could not tell the guest to go. Nor was he justified in feeling any anger at his presence there,--though he did experience some p.r.i.c.k of conscience in the matter. If it was wrong that his daughters should be visited by a young man in his absence, the fault lay in his absence, rather than with the young man for coming, or with the girls for receiving him. The young man had been a ward of his own, and for a year or two in former times had been so intimate in his house as to live with his daughters almost as an elder brother might have done.

But young Ralph Newton had early in life taken rooms for himself in London, had then ceased to be a ward, and had latterly,--so Sir Thomas understood,--lived such a life as to make him unfit to be the trusted companion of his two girls. And yet there had been nothing in his mode of living to make it necessary that he should be absolutely banished from the villa. He had spent more money than was fitting, and had got into debt, and Sir Thomas had had trouble about his affairs. He too was an orphan,--and the nephew and the heir of an old country squire whom he never saw. What money he had received from his father he had nearly spent, and it was rumoured of him that he had raised funds by post-obits on his uncle"s life. Of all these things more will be told hereafter;--but Sir Thomas,--though he had given no instruction on the subject, and was averse even to allude to it,--did not like to think that Ralph Newton was at the villa with the girls in his absence. His girls were as good as gold. He was sure of that.

He told himself over and over again that were it not so, he would not have left them so constantly without his own care. Patience, the elder, was a marvel among young women for prudence, conduct, and proper feeling; and Clarissa, whom he had certainly ever loved the better of the two, was as far as he knew faultless;--a little more pa.s.sionate, a little warmer, somewhat more fond of pleasure than her sister; but on that account only the more to be loved. Nothing that he could do would make them safer than they would be by their own virtue. But still he was not pleased to think that Ralph Newton was often at the villa. When a man such as Sir Thomas has been entrusted with the charge of a young man with great expectations, he hardly wishes his daughter to fall in love with his ward, whether his ward be prudent or imprudent in his manner of life.

Sir Thomas was hot and tired after his walk, and there was some little fuss in getting him soda-water and tea. And as it was plain to see that things were not quite comfortable, Ralph Newton at last took his departure, so as to catch the earlier of the two trains which had been mentioned. It was, nevertheless, past ten when he went;--and then Sir Thomas, sitting at the open window of the drawing-room, again took out the letter. "Patience," he said, addressing his elder daughter as he withdrew the enclosure from the envelope, "Mary Bonner will be in England in a fortnight. What shall we do for her?" As he spoke he held the letter in a manner which justified the girl in taking it from his hand. He allowed it to go to her, and she read it before she answered him.

It was a very sad letter, cold in its language, but still full of pathos. Her friends in the West Indies,--such friends as she had,--had advised her to proceed to England. She was given to understand that when her father"s affairs should be settled there would be left to her not more than a few hundred pounds. Would her uncle provide for her some humble home for the present, and a.s.sist her in her future endeavours to obtain employment as a governess? She could, she thought, teach music and French, and would endeavour to fit herself for the work of tuition in other respects. "I know," she said, "how very slight is my claim upon one who has never seen me, and who is connected with me only by my poor mother;--but perhaps you will allow me to trouble you so far in my great distress."

"She must come here, of course, papa," said Patience, as she handed the letter to Clarissa.

"Yes, she must come here," said Sir Thomas.

"But I mean, to stay,--for always."

"Yes,--to stay for always. I cannot say that the arrangement is one to which I look forward with satisfaction. A man does not undertake new duties without fears;--and especially not such a duty as this, to which I can see no end, and which I may probably be quite unable to perform."

"Papa, I am sure she will be nice," said Clarissa.

"But why are you sure, my dear? We will not argue that, however. She must come; and we will hope that she will prove to be what Clarissa calls nice. I cannot allow my sister"s child to go out into the world as a governess while I have a home to offer her. She must come here as one of our household. I only hope she will not interfere with your happiness."

"I am sure she will not," said Clarissa.

"We will determine that she shall add to it, and will do our best to make her happy," said Patience.

"It is a great risk, but we must run it," said Sir Thomas; and so the matter was settled. Then he explained to them that he intended to go himself to Southampton to receive his niece, and that he would bring her direct from that port to her new home. Patience offered to accompany him on the journey, but this he declined as unnecessary.

Everything was decided between them by eleven o"clock,--even to the room which Mary Bonner should occupy, and then the girls left their father, knowing well that he would not go to bed for the next four hours. He would sleep in his chair for the next two hours, and would then wander about, or read, or perhaps sit and think of this added care till the night would be half over. Nor did the two sisters go to bed at once. This new arrangement, so important to their father, was certainly of more importance to them. He, no doubt, would still occupy his chambers, would still live practically alone in London, though he was in theory the presiding genius of the household at Fulham; but they must take to themselves a new sister; and they both knew, in spite of Clarissa"s enthusiasm, that it might be that the new sister would be one whom they could not love. "I don"t remember that I ever heard a word about her," said Clarissa.

"I have been told that she is pretty. I do remember that," said Patience.

"How old is she? Younger than we, I suppose?" Now Clarissa Underwood at this time was one-and-twenty, and Patience was nearly two years her senior.

"Oh, yes;--about nineteen, I should say. I think I have been told that there were four or five older than Mary, who all died. Is it not strange and terrible,--to be left alone, the last of a large family, with not a relation whom one has ever seen?"

"Poor dear girl!"

"If she wrote the letter herself," continued Patience, "I think she must be clever."