"My dear Lady Myrtle," he said, "if I am blunt or rough, forgive me. It is just this. I cannot agree to what I think wrong, and I could never feel it right to agree to what you propose. I am still young enough and strong enough to work for my family in my profession, and the day I began to lead an idle, or even a comparatively idle life, would see me a miserable man. If you are so good as to continue your interest in my children--Jacinth especially--by asking them to visit you sometimes, we shall be _most_ grateful. If--if you like to leave Jacinth some little sum of money in your will which would help or increase any provision I can make for her, I would be foolish and ungracious in the extreme to object. But more than this--no, my dear friend, no. For--and here I must crave your pardon beforehand for what must seem impertinence and intrusion--not only have we, we Mildmays, _no_ claim upon you, but--there are those who have."
CHAPTER XVI.
A BITTER DISAPPOINTMENT.
There was an awful pause. Such at least it seemed to poor Mrs Mildmay, who, now that she was not called upon to act for herself, and felt under the protection of her husband, dared to tremble! Then came Lady Myrtle"s reply, short, cold, and decisive.
"I deny it," she said.
Colonel Mildmay did not speak.
The old lady glanced at him. His eyes were fixed on the table beside which he was seated; he tapped it lightly with a paper-cutter which he held in his hand. And after a moment"s waiting she spoke again.
"I know what you refer to," she said. "It would be nonsense to pretend I do not. And I can--even--understand how to you it may seem that the claim you allude to exists. But, if you have talked together about these--these people, as no doubt you have done, has not Eugenia told you what I have told her, that on a certain day my father and I shook ourselves free from the bonds which had become shackles of shame; that from that time Bernard Harper and all belonging to him ceased to be more to us than any stranger we might brush against in the street?"
Colonel Mildmay raised his head and looked at her quietly.
"It could not be done; the bonds do exist and must exist," he said. "The great thing is that, however cruelly they may have torn and wounded you in the past, they may now be to you a cause of happiness and satisfaction."
But Lady Myrtle shook her head.
"I will never acknowledge even the possibility of my recognising these descendants of my former brother as anything to me," she said. And the quietness with which she spoke was very impressive. "I have given them a.s.sistance because I believe them to be worthy people in sore need. I may even do so again if you tell me their need continues. But that is all. I should be false to my dead father if I did otherwise.
"Still, the late Lord Elvedon--your father, I mean--looked forward to his _elder_ son"s children being reinstated," Colonel Mildmay ventured to say. "Why then, in the actual circ.u.mstances of his _younger_ grandchildren being to the full as worthy and in far greater need, why treat them so differently?"
Lady Myrtle hesitated, for half a second only, but even that was something.
"My father could not have contemplated the _possibility_ of Bernard"s descendants being--of their wiping out his disgrace," she said at last confusedly.
"Exactly," Colonel Mildmay replied quickly. "And it was only natural.
But as he did _not_ contemplate a state of things which has actually come to pa.s.s, how can his directions affect you with regard to these facts?"
Lady Myrtle again shook her head. She had grown very pale, but otherwise she was completely self-controlled.
"I cannot argue in that way. I do not even pretend to be logical," she said. "I can only repeat--so it is. So now you understand. If I did not leave that part of my property which I conscientiously believe to be at my own disposal to the one I have chosen--the child who it seemed to me had been sent to brighten in some measure the loneliness of my old age;"
and here her firm clear voice trembled, "then--my will must stand as it is, and all destined for Jacinth, and in a sense for you yourselves, shall go to the two hospitals I have selected as the most worthy of help. I will have no compromises, no half measures."
Colonel Mildmay bowed.
"Then let it be so," he said. "It is certainly not for me to dictate to you, dear Lady Myrtle."
She seemed a little perplexed by his manner.
"Why should I give in to you?" she said inconsequently. "Why should I not leave my fortune to Jacinth all the same? Why do you take for granted that I shall not do so? should she be punished for your--your obstinacy and quixotry?" and in spite of herself a smile crept over the old lady"s face.
"I do not take it for granted," said Colonel Mildmay. "I know that you would not act towards Jacinth in such a way as to place her in opposition to her parents. I know that you respect our way of viewing the matter, however you may disagree with it."
Lady Myrtle seemed mollified.
"You judge me rightly," she said. "If one feeling is stronger than another in me, it is respect for parental authority and influence. You are right. I would not so act to your child as to sow discord and disunion between her and those nearest and dearest to her after I am gone. But, let me ask you one thing--is your present decision quite irreversible?"
Colonel Mildmay sat silent for a minute considering deeply.
"Yes," he said; "I do not see any choice. I cannot take the London appointment--to live in reality, my dear lady, on your bounty. For that is what it would be. And even if such a position had been possible for me--and I confess I cannot conceive its being so--still less possible would it be now that you know our mind as to the ultimate disposal of things, and that we have been forced to thwart your more than generous, your unprecedented goodness to us."
"Then you will go to Barmettle?"
Colonel Mildmay bent his head.
"Ah well," said Lady Myrtle, "another dream vanished!"
Mrs Mildmay started up at this.
"Oh, dear Lady Myrtle, dear, dear friend," she said, and the tears were in her eyes, "don"t speak like that. I cannot bear it. You say there can be no sort of compromise, but surely there can be of one kind; you will not, you cannot expect us to leave off looking to you and feeling to you as our best and dearest friend?"
And she threw her arms round the old lady as Francie might have done, and was not repulsed.
"You will let me have Jacinth sometimes?" whispered Lady Myrtle.
"Of course, of course; whenever you like and as much as you like," said Mrs Mildmay eagerly.
"I will not be unreasonable," the old lady said with one of the half-wistful smiles that were so touching. "Even if--if everything had been going to be as I hoped, I would never have wished or expected anything which could have interfered with her home ties and duties. And I need scarcely say I will never come upon this subject that we have been discussing, with her. I will leave it entirely to you, her parents, to tell her what you think right, though I own I should like her to realise how I have been thinking of her."
[Ill.u.s.tration: "Ah well!" said Lady Myrtle, "another dream vanished!"]
"That she certainly shall," exclaimed Mrs Mildmay impulsively. And though a moment afterwards she was tempted to murmur to herself "at all costs," she did not repent of her promise. "It would not be fair to Lady Myrtle for Jacinth to be told nothing," she reflected. "And scarcely indeed fair to the child herself. For I cannot but believe she will see it all as we do."
So that afternoon Colonel Mildmay wrote to accept the appointment offered him up at gloomy, smoky Barmettle in the dreary north country.
"I doubt if we have done much to forward the poor Harpers" cause," said his wife as she watched him closing and sealing the big blue official envelope.
"Very possibly not," he replied calmly. "But we have, I hope and believe, done _right_. And so we must not feel over much concern for the poor Harpers" future any more than for that of our own children, my dear Eugenia."
And though Mrs Mildmay agreed with him, she was human enough, and woman enough, to sigh a little at certain visions of what might have been, which _would_ intrude themselves!
"But what," she began again after a little pause, "what are we to say to Jacinth?"
It is to be confessed that Colonel Mildmay"s reply was not quite so ready this time.
"We must consider well about that," he said. "Of course we must tell her soon about Barmettle. It would not be treating her fairly, for she is a remarkably sensible girl, and has behaved excellently in rather difficult circ.u.mstances. Alison"s little house and odd ways must have been somewhat trying after the liberal easy-going life at Stannesley. It would not be treating Jacinth as she deserves, not to take her into our confidence as to our plans."
"And the mere mention of Barmettle will lead on to the whole," said Mrs Mildmay. "Frank, you must help me to put it to her wisely. I fear, though very little has been said about it, that Ja.s.sie has an intense dislike to the idea of Barmettle; and I fear still more, that in spite of Lady Myrtle"s good sense and extreme wish to cause no trouble, she has somehow or other allowed some hint of her intentions to escape her."
Colonel Mildmay looked very grave at this; graver than he had yet done.