CHAPTER XLIII.MR. KINCTON KNOX RECEIVES A SUMMONSMr. Kincton Knox, with a couple of dogs at his heels, was tranquilly consulting his chief commissioner of woods and forests, when he was summoned from his sylvan discourses by a loud tapping on his study window, within whose frame he saw, like a full-length portrait of Mrs. Siddons, on a signboard, if such a thing exists, the commanding figure of his wife, who was beckoning him imperiously.The window at which she stood was in fact a glass door opening upon two steps, to which the peaceable old gentleman of sixty-two wonderingly drew near.“Come in,” she exclaimed, beckoning again grimly, and superadding a fierce nod.So up went the sash, and the little hatch which simulated a window-sill was pulled open by the old gentleman, who was vexed somewhat at the interruption.She read this in his honest countenance, and said, as he entered—“I don’t mean to detain you, Mr. Kincton Knox, I shan’t keep you more than five minutes away from your timber; but I think, for once, you may give that time to yourfamily. It’s becoming a little too much for me, perfectly unaided as I’ve always been.”“Well, I’m sorry you’re annoyed. Something has happened, I suppose. What do you wish me to do?” said that accommodating gentleman in the gray tweed and copious white waistcoat.“I told you, Mr. Kincton Knox, if you remember, when your friend, Doctor Sprague, of whose character, recollect,Iknow nothing, except from your representations—Itold you distinctlymy impression when that gentleman was persuading you to accept the person who’s here in the capacity of tutor, under a feigned name. I then stated my conviction that there was danger in disguise. I declared myself unable to assign any creditable reason for such a step. Wiser people, however, thought differently—my scruples were overruled by you and your friend Doctor—Doctor—what’shis name?”“Sprague—eh?” said her husband.“Yes—Sprague. It is not the first time that my warning voice has been disregarded. It does not in this case signify much—fortunately very little; but it is not pleasant to have one’s house made a scene of duplicity to please Dr. Sprague, or to convenience some low young puppy.”“I thought you said he was the son of my friend Maubray—Sir Richard, you know?”“It signifies very little whose son he is; but he’s not—I simply conjectured he might, and certainly everything was, artfully or not I can’t say, laid in train to induce that belief on my part; but he’s not—I thought it best to clear it up. He says he’s some relation—goodness knows; but in point of everything else he’s a mere pretender—the merest adventurer, and the sooner we part with him the better.”“And what do you wish me to do?” said Mr. Kincton Knox, with some little vehemence.“I’ve given you my views,” replied the lady.“Yes, but you like to do everything yourself, and you always say I’m wrong whatever I say ordo,” said the old gentleman, sonorously, flushing a little, and prodding the point of his stick on the floor.“See the young man and dismiss him,” said his wife, peremptorily.“Well, that’s easily done, of course. But what has hedone? there ought to be area-son.”“The reason is that I’m tired of disguises. We can’t go on in that absurd manner. It never was known at Kincton, and I⸺”Suddenly Mrs. Kincton Knox paused in her sentence, and with a great rustling hurried to the study window, where she began to knock with a vehemence which alarmed her husband for the safety of his panes.The object of the summons was Miss Clara in that exquisitely becoming black velvet cloak and little bonnet which was so nearly irresistible, all grace and radiance, and smiling—upon whom? Why, upon that odious tutor, to whom she was pointing out some of those flowers which she claimed to have planted and tended with her own fingers.Her mother beckoned fiercely.“Assist me, if you please, Mr. Kincton Knox; open this horrid window, no one else can.”So it was opened, and she called rather huskily to Clara to come in.“I want to say a word to you, please.”And without condescending to perceive William Maubray, who had raised his hat, she said, with an appearance of excitement not of a pleasant kind, and in presence of which somehow the young lady’s heart sunk with a sudden misgiving—“We’ll go up, my dear, to my room, I’ve a word to say, and I think Mr. Kincton Knox, as you ask me what you shall do, you may as well, in this instance, as usual, donothing. I’ll write. I’ll do it myself. Come, Clara.”So, suspending questions until the apartment up stairs was reached, the young lady, in silence and with a very grave face, accompanied her mother.“Charming day—sweet day—we shall soon have the storms, though—they must come; we had them ten days earlier last year. Will you come with me to the Farm-road plantation, and give me your ideas about what I’m going to do?”And the old gentleman came down the two steps from the glass door upon the closely-shorn grass, looking a little red, but smiling kindly, for he saw no reason for what his wife intended, and thought the young man was about to be treated unfairly, and felt a liking for him.“No; she can’t come down again; I know her mother wants her, so you may as well come with me.”So off they set together, and I dare say William liked that ramble better than he would have done the other. The old man was sociable, genial, and modest, and had taken rather late in life, tempted thereto, no doubt, by solitude, to his books, some of which, such as “Captain Lemuel Gulliver’s Travels,” were enigmatical, and William was able to throw some lights which were new to the elderly student, who conceived a large and honest admiration for his young friend, and would have liked to see a great deal more of him than he was quite sure Mrs. Kincton Knox would allow.In the course of their walk, William Maubray observed that he seemed even more than usually kindly, and once or twice talked a little mysteriously of women’s caprices, and told him not to mind them; and told him also whenhe was at Oxford he had got once or twice a little dipped—young fellows always do—and he wanted to know—he was not, of course, to say a word about it—if fifty pounds would be of any use to him—he’d be so happy, and he could pay him any time, in ten years or twenty for that matter, for the old gentleman dimly intended to live on indefinitely.But William did not need this kindly help, and when his pleasant ramble with the old man and his dogs was over, and he returned to the “school-room,” William found a note awaiting him on the table, in the large-hand of Mrs. Kincton Knox.
CHAPTER XLIII.
MR. KINCTON KNOX RECEIVES A SUMMONS
MR. KINCTON KNOX RECEIVES A SUMMONS
MR. KINCTON KNOX RECEIVES A SUMMONS
Mr. Kincton Knox, with a couple of dogs at his heels, was tranquilly consulting his chief commissioner of woods and forests, when he was summoned from his sylvan discourses by a loud tapping on his study window, within whose frame he saw, like a full-length portrait of Mrs. Siddons, on a signboard, if such a thing exists, the commanding figure of his wife, who was beckoning him imperiously.
The window at which she stood was in fact a glass door opening upon two steps, to which the peaceable old gentleman of sixty-two wonderingly drew near.
“Come in,” she exclaimed, beckoning again grimly, and superadding a fierce nod.
So up went the sash, and the little hatch which simulated a window-sill was pulled open by the old gentleman, who was vexed somewhat at the interruption.
She read this in his honest countenance, and said, as he entered—
“I don’t mean to detain you, Mr. Kincton Knox, I shan’t keep you more than five minutes away from your timber; but I think, for once, you may give that time to yourfamily. It’s becoming a little too much for me, perfectly unaided as I’ve always been.”
“Well, I’m sorry you’re annoyed. Something has happened, I suppose. What do you wish me to do?” said that accommodating gentleman in the gray tweed and copious white waistcoat.
“I told you, Mr. Kincton Knox, if you remember, when your friend, Doctor Sprague, of whose character, recollect,Iknow nothing, except from your representations—Itold you distinctlymy impression when that gentleman was persuading you to accept the person who’s here in the capacity of tutor, under a feigned name. I then stated my conviction that there was danger in disguise. I declared myself unable to assign any creditable reason for such a step. Wiser people, however, thought differently—my scruples were overruled by you and your friend Doctor—Doctor—what’shis name?”
“Sprague—eh?” said her husband.
“Yes—Sprague. It is not the first time that my warning voice has been disregarded. It does not in this case signify much—fortunately very little; but it is not pleasant to have one’s house made a scene of duplicity to please Dr. Sprague, or to convenience some low young puppy.”
“I thought you said he was the son of my friend Maubray—Sir Richard, you know?”
“It signifies very little whose son he is; but he’s not—I simply conjectured he might, and certainly everything was, artfully or not I can’t say, laid in train to induce that belief on my part; but he’s not—I thought it best to clear it up. He says he’s some relation—goodness knows; but in point of everything else he’s a mere pretender—the merest adventurer, and the sooner we part with him the better.”
“And what do you wish me to do?” said Mr. Kincton Knox, with some little vehemence.
“I’ve given you my views,” replied the lady.
“Yes, but you like to do everything yourself, and you always say I’m wrong whatever I say ordo,” said the old gentleman, sonorously, flushing a little, and prodding the point of his stick on the floor.
“See the young man and dismiss him,” said his wife, peremptorily.
“Well, that’s easily done, of course. But what has hedone? there ought to be area-son.”
“The reason is that I’m tired of disguises. We can’t go on in that absurd manner. It never was known at Kincton, and I⸺”
Suddenly Mrs. Kincton Knox paused in her sentence, and with a great rustling hurried to the study window, where she began to knock with a vehemence which alarmed her husband for the safety of his panes.
The object of the summons was Miss Clara in that exquisitely becoming black velvet cloak and little bonnet which was so nearly irresistible, all grace and radiance, and smiling—upon whom? Why, upon that odious tutor, to whom she was pointing out some of those flowers which she claimed to have planted and tended with her own fingers.
Her mother beckoned fiercely.
“Assist me, if you please, Mr. Kincton Knox; open this horrid window, no one else can.”
So it was opened, and she called rather huskily to Clara to come in.
“I want to say a word to you, please.”
And without condescending to perceive William Maubray, who had raised his hat, she said, with an appearance of excitement not of a pleasant kind, and in presence of which somehow the young lady’s heart sunk with a sudden misgiving—
“We’ll go up, my dear, to my room, I’ve a word to say, and I think Mr. Kincton Knox, as you ask me what you shall do, you may as well, in this instance, as usual, donothing. I’ll write. I’ll do it myself. Come, Clara.”
So, suspending questions until the apartment up stairs was reached, the young lady, in silence and with a very grave face, accompanied her mother.
“Charming day—sweet day—we shall soon have the storms, though—they must come; we had them ten days earlier last year. Will you come with me to the Farm-road plantation, and give me your ideas about what I’m going to do?”
And the old gentleman came down the two steps from the glass door upon the closely-shorn grass, looking a little red, but smiling kindly, for he saw no reason for what his wife intended, and thought the young man was about to be treated unfairly, and felt a liking for him.
“No; she can’t come down again; I know her mother wants her, so you may as well come with me.”
So off they set together, and I dare say William liked that ramble better than he would have done the other. The old man was sociable, genial, and modest, and had taken rather late in life, tempted thereto, no doubt, by solitude, to his books, some of which, such as “Captain Lemuel Gulliver’s Travels,” were enigmatical, and William was able to throw some lights which were new to the elderly student, who conceived a large and honest admiration for his young friend, and would have liked to see a great deal more of him than he was quite sure Mrs. Kincton Knox would allow.
In the course of their walk, William Maubray observed that he seemed even more than usually kindly, and once or twice talked a little mysteriously of women’s caprices, and told him not to mind them; and told him also whenhe was at Oxford he had got once or twice a little dipped—young fellows always do—and he wanted to know—he was not, of course, to say a word about it—if fifty pounds would be of any use to him—he’d be so happy, and he could pay him any time, in ten years or twenty for that matter, for the old gentleman dimly intended to live on indefinitely.
But William did not need this kindly help, and when his pleasant ramble with the old man and his dogs was over, and he returned to the “school-room,” William found a note awaiting him on the table, in the large-hand of Mrs. Kincton Knox.