Pattyreceived her two visitors without effusion, but with civility. Her demeanour was very different from all they had known of her before. She had been defiant and impertinent, anxious to offend and disgust, rather than to attract, with the most anxious desire to get rid of both, and to make them feel that they had no place nor standing in Greyshott. She had, indeed, been so frightened lest she herself should be overthrown, that all the “manners” in which Patty had been brought up deserted her, and she behaved like the barmaid dressed in a little brief and stolen authority, which they believed her to be. Indeed, the “manners” which Patty had been taught chiefly consisted in the inculcation of extreme respect to her “betters;” and her revolt from this, and conviction that she had now no betters in the world, carried her further in the opposite direction than if she had had no training at all. But in her calm tenure of authority for nearly a year, Patty had learned many things. She had learned that the mistress of a house does not need to stand upon her authority, and that a right, acknowledged and evident,does not require to be loudly asserted. It might have been supposed, however, that a certain awe of the heir-at-law—a humility more or less towards the man to whom shortly she must cede her keys, her place, and all the rights upon which she now stood, would have shown themselves in her. But this was not at all the case. She was quite civil to Colonel Piercey, but she treated him solely as a guest—her guest—without any relationship of his own towards the house in which she received him. To Margaret she was more friendly, but more careless in her civility. “I ordered them to get ready for you the room you used to have. I thought you would probably like that best,” she said. Colonel Piercey was lodged quite humbly in one of the “bachelor’s rooms,” no special attention of any kind being paid to him, which was a thing very surprising to him, though he could scarcely have told why. To be aware that you are very near being the head of the house, and to be treated as if you were a very ordinary and distant relation, is startling in a house which is full of the presence of death. That presence, when it brings with it no deep family sorrow, brings a sombre business and activity, a sense of suppressed preparations and watchfulness for the end, which is very painful to the sensitive mind, even when moved by no special feeling. Waiting for an old man to die, it is often difficult not to be impatient for that event, as for any other event which involves long waiting. Patty went about the house with this air of much business held back and suspended until something should happen. Shewas called away to have interviews with this person and that. She spoke of the “arrangements” she had to attend to. “Would it not be better that Colonel Piercey should relieve you of some part of the trouble?” said Margaret. “Oh, no; one should always do one’s own business. Outsiders never understand,” said Patty, with what would have been, had she been less dignified, a toss of her head in her widow’s cap.
Was Gerald Piercey an outsider in the house that must so soon be his own? He had given Margaret to understand during their long drive that his father would not change his home or his life, and that it was he, Gerald, who would occupy Greyshott. I think Colonel Piercey was of opinion that he had made something else clear, though it had not been spoken of in words—namely, that there was but one mistress possible for Greyshott in its new life; but Mrs. Osborne did not by any means clearly understand him, having her mind preoccupied by the belief that his feelings to her were not of an affectionate kind, and that his first object was to deprive her of her child. She felt, however, that he was kind—bewilderingly kind, and that there was something in him which wanted explanation; but all the more, Margaret was anxious and disturbed by this attitude of “outsider” attributed to him. If Gerald Piercey was an outsider in Greyshott on the eve of his uncle’s death, to whom he was natural heir, who else could have any right there? He did not remark this, as was natural. He was not surprised that Patty should hold him at arm’s length. It was quite to beexpected that she should feel deeply the mere fact that he was the heir. Poor girl! He wondered what provision had been made for her—if any; and if there should be none, promised himself that his father’s first act, as Sir Francis, should be to set this right. He was, in fact, very sorry for Mrs. Patty, whose ambitions and schemes had come to so summary an end. She should never require to go back to the alehouse, but should be fitly provided for as the wife of the once heir of Greyshott ought to be. He confided these intentions to Margaret at the very moment when Mrs. Osborne’s mind was full of Patty’s speech about the outsider. “You mean if Uncle Giles has not done so already,” Margaret said.
“It is very unlikely he should have done so. Of course there could be no settlement; and who was there to point out to him that such a thing was necessary?” Colonel Piercey was so strong in his conviction that Margaret did not like to suggest even that Patty might herself have pointed it out. But her own mind was full of vague suspicion and alarm. An outsider! Gerald Piercey, the natural heir of the house?
Late that night the two visitors were called to Sir Giles’ room. “He is awake and seems to know everybody; I should like you to see him now,” Patty said, going herself to Mrs. Osborne’s room to call her. Colonel Piercey was walking up and down in the hall, with an air of examining the old family pictures, which Patty had not thought it necessary to meddle with, though she had removed those that had been in thelibrary. He was not really looking at them, except as accessories to the scene—silent witnesses of the one that was passing away, and the other that was about to come. Gerald Piercey had a deep sadness in his heart, though he could not keep his thoughts from the new life that was before him. The very warmth of the rising of that new life and all its hopes made him feel all the more the deep disappointment and loss in which the other was ending. Poor Gervase would never have been a fit representative of the Pierceys, but as Margaret said, as she had always said, he was his father’s son, and the object of all the hopes of the old pair who had reigned so long in Greyshott. And now this branch was cut off, their line ended, and the old tree falling that had flourished so long. He wondered if it would really be any comfort to poor old Sir Giles, dying alone in his desolate house, that there were still Pierceys to come after him: the same blood and race, though not drawn from his source. It seemed questionable how far he would be comforted by this; perhaps not at all, perhaps rather embittered by the fact that it was a cousin’s son and not his own, who should now be the head of the house.
“Come now, come now,” cried Patty eagerly, “as long as he is so conscious and awake. He sleeps most of his time, and it’s quite a chance—quite a chance. I want you to see with your own eyes that he’s all himself, and has his faculties still.” She had an air of excitement about her perhaps not quite appropriate to the moment, as if her nerves were allin motion, and she could scarcely keep her fingers still or subdue the quiver in her head and over all her frame. She led the way hurriedly, opening the doors one after another in an excited way, and pushing into the sick room with a “Look, dear papa, who I’ve brought to see you.” Sir Giles was sitting up in his bed, his large ashy face turned towards the door, his dim sunken eyes looking out from fold upon fold of heavy eyelid, his under-lip hanging as that of poor Gervase had done. “Ah,” he stammered, “let ’em come in—to the light, my dear. I’m not in a state—to see strangers; but to please you—my dear.”
“Uncle Giles,” said Margaret, with an exclamation of pain, “surely you know me?”
“Eh? let her stand—in the light—in the light; why, why, why—Meg: it’s Meg,—that’s Meg.” She kissed him, and he made an effort to turn his feeble head, and with his large moist lips he gave a tremulous kiss in the air. “I’m—I’m glad to see you, Meg. You were the first to—tell me—to tell me: I’ll be always grateful to you—for that.”
“For what, dear uncle? It is I who owe everything to you. Oh, Uncle Giles, if I could only tell you how much and how often I think of it! you were always kind, always kind; and dear Aunt Piercey; you gave me my home, the only home I ever had.”
“Eh! eh! What is she saying, my dear? You’ll—you’ll look after Meg—never let her come to want. She was the first to tell me. The greatest news that has come—to Greyshott. You remember, Meg—andOsy, bless him, how he cheered! There’s—there’s something for Osy. He cheered like a little trump, and he gave—he gave my boy his only wedding present, the—the only one. Dunning, where is my purse? Osy must have a tip—two tips for that.”
“Dear papa,” cried Patty, “don’t disturb yourself; oh, don’t disturb yourself! I’ll see to it.”
“My—my purse, Dunning!” The purse was procured while they all stood by, and the old man fumbling, got with difficulty, one after another, two sovereigns, which fell out of his trembling fingers upon the bed. “One for—for cheering; and one for—for the other thing. Give ’em to Osy, Meg, bless him; and my blessing. When It comes and all’s right, that’ll be a friend for Osy—always a friend, better than an old man.”
“Dear papa,” cried Patty, pushing forward again, “here is some one else to see you—Colonel Piercey, dear, don’t you remember? Colonel Piercey—Gerald—that once paid you a long visit; I know you’ll remember if you try. Here,” she said, seizing his arm, pulling him forward, “stand in the light that he may see you.”
She was vibrating with excitement like a creature on wires. The touch of her hand on Gerald’s arm was like an electric cord; and to be pushed forward thus, and accounted for as if he had been an absolute stranger, to be brought with difficulty to the mind of the dying man, was to Gerald Piercey, as may well be supposed, an insupportable sensation. He drewback, saying hastily, “I cannot disturb him. I will not have him disturbed for me—let him alone, let him alone.”
“Eh? what? who’s that? somebody else? Gerald?” said Sir Giles. He held out his hand vaguely into the air, not seeing where his attention was called, the large old limp grey hand, with so little volition or power left in it. “Ah, Gerald, come to see the end of the old man? that’s kind! that’s kind! My poor wife and I used to think if our first boy had lived, don’t you know, he might have been a man like you. Well, Gerald, I’ve nothing to give you, but my blessing—but my blessing. You won’t mind if your nose is put out of joint, you know, as the old folks say. And you’ll stand by It, Gerald, a—a good fellow like you.”
“Dear papa, I think they’ll go now; it’s late, and you ought to go to sleep.”
“Not yet,” said Sir Giles, who had fallen into the old strain of faint sobbing and laughing; “plenty—plenty of time for sleep. Thousands of years, don’t you know, till it’s all—all over. Where are they? eh, Meg. I scarcely see you; eh!” he kissed the air again with his hanging, lifeless lips, “good-night; and t’other man. Gerald, be kind to her, my boy; a good girl, Meg, a good girl. She’s been married, which some might think a drawback; but if you’re fond of her, and she’s fond of you. Eh, Dunning? well I’m not tired, not tired a bit—let him be the god-father, my dear; and good-night to you, good-night to you—all.”
He died in the night.
The third funeral within a year from Greyshott! What a melancholy record was that—father and mother, and the only child! Sir Giles was the only one of the three who could be said to have been beloved. His wife had always been an imperious woman, his son had been a fool; but the old man was full of gentleness and kindness, and had been a model country gentleman in his day, known to everybody, and always genial to rich and poor. Once more the avenue was full of carriages, and the house of mourners, and there were some tears, and many kind recollections, and a great deal of talk about him as they carried him away. “It will be a long time before we see the like of him again,” the country folk and tenants said, while the gentlemen of the county congratulated themselves that the old name was not to be extinct nor the land transferred to other hands. The new baronet was not there; he was also an old man, and not fond of much movement, but Colonel Piercey was his representative, and an excellent representative, a man of whom the whole district might be proud. He was looked to by every one, pointed out to those who did not know him, and surrounded by a subtle atmosphere of suspended congratulation and welcome, notwithstanding the universal grief for Sir Giles. The old man’s dying words had not made a very deep impression on Colonel Piercey, except those which concerned Margaret. He had not understood the allusions, nor indeed thought of them, save as the wanderings of weakness. Itseemed all of a piece to him—the thought that Sir Giles’ firstborn, the boy dead some thirty years ago, might have grown such a man as he, and his nose being put out of joint, and the petition that he should be good to some one, and stand by it. All these wild and wandering words Gerald Piercey put out of his head as meaning nothing. It was, perhaps, the “first boy,” whom he had never heard of before, whom he was to be good to, yet who would put his nose out of joint. It was all a muddle, and Gerald did not attempt to grope his way through it. He was deeply impressed and touched by the image of the old man dying; but he had no doubt as to his own prospects, and thought of no disaster. How could there be any doubt? If there had been a new will made since the death of Gervase, no doubt the estate had been charged with an adequate provision for Gervase’s wife; if there had been no will made, his father and he, as the next-of-kin and heir-at-law, would of course take that into their own hands, and secure it at once. Beyond this and the natural legacies, Gerald suspected no new thing.
Margaret, on the other hand, had been deeply alarmed and startled by what she heard. She did not remember what she had said on the occasion to which her uncle referred, but she remembered his outburst of cheering, and Osy, with his legs wide apart and his hat waving in his hand, giving forth his hip, hip, hurrah. Was it possible that the old man had made out to himself some fiction of what might be going tohappen, some illusion which buoyed him up with false hopes? Was it possible that Patty——? Margaret did not know what to think. She would fain have confided her alarm to Gerald, and taken counsel with him; but those other words of Sir Giles had been too broadly significant, and he was the last person in the world to whom she could talk on any subject that would recall them. She had avoided Gerald, indeed, since that scene, and it had not been referred to again between them. But her mind was full of perplexity and doubt. The bearing of Patty (alwaysdigne, always just what a daughter-in-law’s chastened grief should be,—not too demonstrative), so confident, so authoritative, so determined to do everything herself, without assistance from an “outsider,” increased this sensation of alarm and uncertainty in Margaret’s mind. She did not know in the least what was coming. But it seemed to her certain that something was coming which was not in the course of nature, or according to the common expectation. Her mind grew more and more confused, yet more and more certain of this as the crisis approached; for Patty never had been so independent, so confident, so sure of being the head of everything, as on the funeral day.
Yet Patty had her troubles, too, which she had to bear alone, and without any aid at this crisis of her career. Miss Hewitt, whose indignation at her reception on her first visit had been so great that she had made a vow never to see her ungrateful niece again, had, by the time that Sir Giles’ dangerous condition had becomepublicly known, got over her fury. She had been paid her fifty pounds, and she had begun to believe in Patty’s continued success and in her cleverness and power. There had been a pause of alarm in the family after the death of Gervase, when they had all feared (little knowing her spirit) that Patty would be sent back on their hands. But when that alarm was well over and Patty was found to hold her own, the admiration of her relations was doubled. Her father was the first to claim a renewal of friendship; but his reception was so alarming, and his daughter poured forth upon his head such torrents of wrath, telling him that, but for the exposure of family affairs, she would have him tried for manslaughter, that the landlord of the Seven Thorns slunk off completely cowed and without a word to say. This added to Miss Hewitt’s regard for her brave and victorious niece, who feared no one, and she had in the meantime made many attempts to obtain a footing at Greyshott. Partly to impress still more sensibly upon her father her utter and unchangeable hostility, and partly because some one to speak to became a necessity, Patty had admitted her aunt on various occasions; and now Miss Hewitt demanded, with a persistence which all Patty’s spare moments had been spent in resisting, first an interview with Sir Giles, and then a place in the carriage which conveyed her niece to his funeral. Patty had not yielded in respect to the first, but in the extreme state of mental excitement in which she was, her resolution gave way before the second prayer.It had not been her intention to “mix herself up with any of the Hewitts,” but in face of the scene which she anticipated at the reading of the will, it gradually came to appear more and more desirable to her to have some one to stand by her, some one to be dazzled by her position and good fortune, and to take her part whatever opposition she might meet with. Patty did not know what might happen at the reading of the will. She had a prevision, but not even now any absolute certainty, what the will was. And if it were as she believed, she did not know what powers might be brought into action against her, or what might be done. She decided at last that to have her aunt, who at bottom was a thoroughly congenial spirit, to defend and stand by her, would be an advantage. And this was how it was that Miss Hewitt attained the lugubrious triumph of her life, the satisfaction of following her former lover in his old carriage, his wife’s carriage, whom she considered her triumphant rival, to his grave.
Itwas a strange triumph, and yet it was one. Miss Hewitt closely followed her niece, once more wrapt in a new extravagance of crape; and these ladies had the satisfaction of seeing Mrs. Osborne quietly take her place opposite to them on the front seat of the carriage. This gave both to Patty and her aunt an acute sensation of pleasure, which would have been greater, however, had the victim seemed in any way conscious of it. But Margaret was full of many thoughts, recollections, and anticipations. She, too, looked forward to the disclosure of her uncle’s will with a curiosity and anxiety which had nothing to do with any expectations of her own. She had put away the two sovereigns so tremulously extracted from his purse by the dying man with a half smile and a tear. That, she concluded, was all that Osy would ever have from his great-uncle, who might so easily have made a provision for the boy. She had never expected it, she said to herself, but that was a different thing from this certainty that it never would be; still there was a tender familiarity about the “tip” for the child which went toMargaret’s heart. Poor old uncle! If he had been left to himself, if he had been able to think, he would have acted differently. She put away the two pieces of money for Osy without any grudge, with a tender thought of the old man who had been as good as a father to her all her life. And now was this the end of Greyshott so far as she was concerned? or was there a strange something looming out of the clouds, another life of which she would not think, which she could not understand, to which she did not consent? She put all thought out of her mind of anything that concerned herself, or tried her best to do so—but the family was dear to her still. Was there any plot threatening the name, the race, the old, old dwelling of the Pierceys? There was a subdued triumph in Patty’s look, a confidence in her voice and step, and the authoritative orders she gave, which did not look like a woman who after to-day would have no real authority in Sir Francis Pierce’s house. She could not imagine what it could mean; but the advent of the elder woman, also in crape, and full of ostentatious sympathy and regret, strengthened all her apprehensions, though she did not know of what she was afraid.
One or two of the oldest friends remained for the reading of the will. It was felt on all sides that the grief which attended Sir Giles to his tomb was of a modified kind. No one except Mrs. Osborne could be supposed to regard the old gentleman with filial love or sorrow, and the party which assembled roundthe luncheon table was serious, but put on no affectation of woe. Patty took her place at the head of the table with a quiet assurance to which nobody objected. She had too much sense to talk of “dear papa” before all these people, and if she showed the composure of an authorised and permanent mistress of the house, it was probably because she had been accustomed to do so. Lord Hartmore, if his sympathies were not so much aroused as on the day of Gervase’s funeral, still retained a sort of partisan feeling for the young widow. She was hisprotégée. His wife had not fallen in with his views, except in the most moderate way, merely to honour the promise he had made for her. Lady Hartmore did not attempt to improve her acquaintance with Patty. She was quite at her ease at the other end of the table by the side of Colonel Piercey, who now wasde facto, in her assured belief, the master of the house. Margaret was not present at the luncheon, and Miss Hewitt, who was elated beyond expression by finding herself seated among all the great people, on the other side of Lord Hartmore, felt herself the principal person at table, and demeaned herself accordingly. “To think,” she said, “my lord, that I should find myself ’ere on such an occasion; me that once thought to be the mistress; but oh! the ideas of the young is different from what comes to pass in life. ’Im as we have laid in his grave, dear gentleman, was once—— Well, Patty, love, as you say, this ain’t a time to talk of such things. Still, it do come upon me sitting at ’is table, and ’imnot ’ere to bid me welcome. But it’s a mournful satisfaction to see the last of ’im all the same.”
“Aunt was an old friend of my dear father-in-law,” Patty explained, curtly. “I believe, Lord Hartmore, that you know more of Margaret Osborne than I do. Margaret Osborne has not shown very much sympathy to me, and all this winter I have never been able to get out for such a purpose as making calls. I couldn’t have taken a three hours’ drive to be away so long, not if it had been a matter of life and death. That means almost a whole day, and dear Sir Giles never liked to let me out of his sight.”
“Ah, ’e always knew them that were really fond of ’im,” said Miss Hewitt. “You couldn’t blind ’im, my lord, with pretences. I was kep’ back by my family, and thoughts of what the world might say; but ’e knew that Patty was the same stuff like, and ’e took to her the double of what ’e would have done on that account. Oh, your lordship, what a man ’e was! You’re too young to remember ’im at ’is best: ’andsome is as ’andsome does, folk say—but a gentleman like ’im can’t always act as ’e would like to. You must know that from yourself, my lord. Sometimes the ’eart don’t go where the ’and ’as to be given.”
“Well, that is certainly sometimes the case,” said Lord Hartmore, with a subdued laugh, “though I don’t think I know it by myself.”
“Aunt’s so full of her old times,” cried Patty. “If there was anything that was ever wanted for the littleOsborne boy, Lord Hartmore, I should always be pleased to help. He got too much for my dear father-in-law latterly, being noisy, and such a spoiled little thing; but he was fond of him, and spoke of him at the very last.” “I can never forget that,” said Patty, putting her handkerchief lightly to her eyes. “And if there should be need of a little help for his education, or setting him out in life—but I should have a delicacy in saying so to Margaret Osborne, unless you’d be so good as to do it for me.”
“Oh, you’re very kind, Mrs. Piercey,” said Lord Hartmore, confused. “Our dear Meg is rather a formidable person to approach with such a proposal.”
“Yes, isn’t she formidable?” cried Patty, eagerly. “That’s just the word; one is frightened to offer to do her a good turn.”
“Let us hope,” said Lord Hartmore, “that her good uncle has left her beyond the need of help.”
“Oh, I don’t know about that,” said Patty, with a very serious face.
“I feel sure of it,” said Lord Hartmore, with genial confidence. “He was far too good a man, and too kind an uncle. Mrs. Piercey, I see my friend Gerald looking this way, and Mr. Pownceby wriggling in his chair, as if——” He made a slight movement as if to rise—which perhaps was not the highest breeding in Lord Hartmore; but it was very slight and accompanied by a look of deference, suggesting a signal on her part.
“Mr. Gerald Piercey is not master here, nor is Mr.Pownceby,” said Patty, with dignity. “They may look as they please, but in my own house it’s my part to say when people are to leave the table.”
“She do have a spirit, Patty does,” Miss Hewitt murmured under her breath.
Lord Hartmore settled himself in his chair again, abashed. “I beg your pardon,” he said; and then, in a subdued tone, “Most likely Pownceby has a train to catch.”
“In that case I don’t mind stretching a point,” said the lady of the house, “though Mr. Pownceby is no more than a hired servant paid for his time, and it is no business of his to interfere.”
A hired servant! Old Pownceby, who had all the secrets of the county in his hands, and most of its business! Lord Hartmore grew pale with awe at this daring speech. He looked straight before him, not to see the signals of his wife telegraphing to him from Gerald Piercey’s side. “I’ll have nothing to do with it,” he said to himself; and, indeed, in his consternation, Lord Hartmore was the last to get up when the movement of the chairs convinced him that Mrs. Piercey had condescended to move. He offered that lady his arm humbly, on an indication from her that this was expected. “I suppose we shall see Mrs. Osborne in the library?” he said.
“Oh, Margaret! I suppose she’d better be there for form’s sake, though I don’t suppose it matters much. Aunt, will you tell Margaret Osborne to come directly, please? I have never,” said Patty, with asmile, “got into the way of calling her Meg, as you all do.”
Lord Hartmore could scarcely dissimulate the little start of consternation with which he heard this. The forlorn young widow, for whom he had been so sorry, was appearing in a new light; but, of course, it was only her ignorance, he said to himself. The party had all assembled in the library when the voice of Miss Hewitt was heard outside calling to some one who seemed to be following: “This way, Margaret—this way. They’re all in the library. I don’t know the ’ouse so well as I might, but this is the way. Come along please, quick, and don’t keep the company waiting,” Miss Hewitt said.
Gerald Piercey started forward to open the door, for which Miss Hewitt rewarded him with an “Oh! thank you, but I’m quite at ’ome, quite at ’ome.” Margaret came in in the wake of that bustling figure, pale, and with an air of suspense. “Was it necessary to send for me in that way?” she said to Gerald. He had placed a chair for her beside Lady Hartmore. “Oh, Heaven knows what is necessary!” said that lady. “You know the proverb about beggars on horseback.” She was not so careful to subdue her voice as she might have been, but in the commotion it was not observed. Gerald Piercey stood with his hand on the back of his cousin’s chair. They were the family, the only persons present of the Piercey blood. The old friends of the house stood near them. At the upper end of the room were Patty and her aunt. Mr. Pownceby stood in front of the large fireplace with a paper in his hand.
“I must explain,” he said, “how the will I have to read is so very succinct a document. Sir Giles had made his will like other men, and as there was a good deal to leave, there were a number of bequests. The late Mr. Gervase Piercey was, of course, the heir, under trustees, as he was not much—acquainted with business. Sir Giles thought fit to change this, as was to be expected, after his son’s death. He sent for me hastily one day, and gave me instructions which surprised me. I begged him to allow me to take these back with me in order that the new will should be properly written out, proposing to come back next day to execute it, and, in short, hoping that he might reconsider the matter; but he would hear of no delay. This document I will now read.”
Gerald Piercey stood quite undisturbed, with his hand on the back of Margaret’s chair. He was not anxious. It had not occurred to him that the house of his fathers could be alienated from him, and short of that, his poor old uncle’s wishes would, he sincerely felt, be sacred whatever they were. He was glad to hear that there was a new will made, which, no doubt, provided for Mrs. Piercey; and waited with an easy mind to hear what it was. As for Margaret, the event about to happen began to dawn clearly upon her. She saw it in Patty’s eyes, in her pose, sitting up defiant in Lady Piercey’s chair. She looked up at her cousin with an eager desire to warn him, to supporthim, but was daunted by the calm of his look, fearing no evil. “Gerald, Gerald,” she said, instinctively. The lines of his face melted suddenly; he looked down upon her with an encouraging, protecting smile, and took her hand for a moment, saying “Meg!” and no more. He thought she was appealing to him for his care and protection in face of a probable disappointment to herself.
Mr. Pownceby cleared his throat and waved his hand. He ran over the exordium, name, and formula, of sound mind, etc., etc., to which everybody listened impatiently, “do give and bequeath the whole of my estates, property, real and personal, etc., to——” here he paused a little, as if his own throat were dry—“Patience Piercey, my daughter-in-law, and companion for the last six months, to be at her entire disposal as it may be best for the interests of the family, and in remainder to her child. This I do, believing it to be best for meeting all difficulties, and in view of any contingency that might arise.
“Signed, Giles Piercey,” added the lawyer, “and dated Greyshott, 16th June, just a fortnight ago.”
There was a pause. Even now it did not seem to have struck Colonel Piercey what it meant. He listened with a half smile. “And——?” he said, waiting as if for more.
“That is all, Colonel Piercey, every word. The house, estates, money, everything. Even the servants are cut out. He said she’d look after them. Mrs. Piercey takes everything—house, lands, money, plate,everything. It is a very unusual and surprising will, but that is all.”
And then there was another pause, and a general deep-drawn breath.
“It is a very surprising will indeed,” said Lord Hartmore.
It was a sort of remark to himself, forced from him by the astonishment of the moment; but in the silence of the room it sounded as if addressed like an oration to all who were there.
“Pardon me,” cried Colonel Piercey, “but Greyshott? Do you mean that Greyshott, the original home of the family——?”
“I represented that to Sir Giles, but he would hear nothing. It is Mrs. Piercey’s with all the rest.”
“It is the most iniquitous thing I ever heard,” cried Lady Hartmore, rising quickly to her feet. “What! not a word of anybody belonging to him, nothing of Meg and her boy, nothing of his natural heirs, nothing of old Dunning even, and the old servants?—The man must have been mad.”
Here Patty rose and advanced to the conflict. She was very nervous, but collected. “Mr. Pownceby can bear me witness that I knew nothing about it,” she said. “I wasn’t there.”
“No, you were not there,” said the lawyer.
“I thought it right I should have a provision,” said Patty, “and so it was right; and if my dear father-in-law thought that the one that stood by him, and nursed him through all his illness, when everybody else forsook him, was the one that ought to have it, who’s got anything to say against that? I didn’t want it; but now that I’ve got it, I’ll stick to it,” cried Patty defiantly, confronting Lady Hartmore, who had been the only one to speak.
“I have no doubt of it,” cried that lady, “but if I were Colonel Piercey, I shouldn’t stand it; no, not for a moment! Why, the old man was in his dotage, no more equal to making a will than—— than his son would have been.”
“Mary!” cried her husband in dismay.
“Well!” said Lady Hartmore, suddenly brought to herself by the consciousness of having said more than she ought to have said, “I am glad, I am quite glad, Hartmore, for one thing, that you’ll now see things in their proper light.”
“And a very just will, too,” cried Miss Hewitt, coming to her niece’s side,—“just like ’im, as was a very right-thinking man. Patty was an angel to ’im, that she was, night and day. And it is nothing but what was to be expected, that ’e should give ’er all as ’e had to give. And not too much, neither, to the only one as nursed ’im, and did for ’im, and gave up everything. Oh! I always said it—’e was a right-thinking man.”
Colonel Piercey said nothing after that exclamation of “Greyshott!” but he retired with the lawyer into a corner as soon as the spell of consternation was broken by the sudden sound of these passionate voices. He had seized Margaret by the arm and drawn her withhim. “We are the representatives of the family,” he said, hurriedly; and Mrs. Osborne was too much startled (though she had foreseen it), too sympathetic, and too much excited, to object to the manner in which he had drawn her hand within his arm. “Our interests are the same,” he said, briefly, with a hurried nod to Mr. Pownceby; and they stood talking for some minutes, while a wonderful interchange of artillery went on behind. This was concluded by a sudden clear sound of Patty’s voice in the air, ringing with passion and mastery. “I believe,” she said, “Lord Hartmore’s carriage is at the door.” And then there arose a laugh of sharp anger from the other side. “We are turned out,” cried Lady Hartmore, “turned out of Greyshott, where we were familiar before that chit was born.” It was a little like scolding, but it was the voice of nature all the same.
“And I think,” said Colonel Piercey, “Meg, that you and I had better go, too.”
“Oh, as you please!” cried Patty; “Meg can stay if she likes, and I’ve already said I shouldn’t mind giving any reasonable help to educate the little boy. And as for you, Gerald Piercey, you can do what you like, and I can see you are bursting with envy. You can’t touch me!”
Itwas thus in wrath and in consternation that the party dispersed. Patty stood in the hall, flushed and fierce, with defiance in every look, supported by her aunt, who stood behind her, and gave vent from time to time to murmurs of sympathy and snorts of indignation. Patty had almost forgotten, in her mingled triumph and rage, the anxiously chastened demeanour which she had of late imposed upon herself. She was a great deal more like Patty of the Seven Thorns than she had ever been since her marriage. The opposition and scorn of Lady Hartmore had awakened all her combative tendencies, and made her for the moment careless of consequences. What did she care for those big wigs who looked down upon her? Was she not as good as any of them, herself a county magnate, the lady of Greyshott? better than they were! For the Hartmores were not so rich as comported with their dignity; and Patty was now rich, to her own idea enormously rich, and as great a lady as any in England. Was she not Mrs. Piercey of Greyshott, owning no superior anywhere? Itis curious that this conviction should have swept away for the moment all her precautions of behaviour, and restored her to the native level of the country barmaid, as ready to scold as any fishwife, to defy every rule of respect or even politeness. She waited to see Lady Hartmore to the door, having swept out of the room before that astonished lady with a bosom bursting with rage. Truth to tell, Lady Hartmore was much disposed to fight, too. She would have liked, above all things, to give the little upstart what humbler persons call a piece of her mind. Her pulses, too, were beating high, and a flood of words were pressing to her lips. It was intolerable to her to accept the insult to herself and the wrong to her friends without saying anything—without laying the offender low under the tempest of her wrath. As for Lord Hartmore, it must be owned that he was frightened, and only anxious to get his wife away. He held her arm tightly in his, and gave it an additional pressure as he led her past the fierce little adversary who, no doubt, had a greater command of appropriate language than even Lady Hartmore had, whose style was probably less trenchant, though more refined. “Now, Mary, now, my dear,” he said soothingly. The sight of the carriage at the door was delightful to him as a safe port to a sailor. And though the first thing Lady Hartmore did when safely ensconced in her corner, was to turn upon him the flood of her suppressed wrath with a “So this is your interesting little widow, Hartmore!” he was too glad to get away from the sphere of combat to attempt anyself-defence. He, too, was saying “the little demon!” under his breath.
Patty still stood there, when Margaret, who had hastily collected the few things she had brought with her, came down to join Colonel Piercey in the hall. He had been standing, as he had been on a previous occasion, carefully examining one of the old portraits. It was not a very interesting portrait, nor was he, I suppose, specially interested in it; but his figure, wrapt in silence and abstraction, made a curious contrast to that of Patty, thrilling with fire and movement. It was evident that she could not long restrain herself, and when Margaret appeared coming down the great stairs, the torrent burst forth.
“Oh, you are there, Meg Osborne: I wonder you didn’t go with your great friends, the first people in the county, as you all think, insulting me in my own house! Ah, and I’ll teach you all it’s my own house! I won’t have nobody here turning their backs to me, or going out and in of my place without as much as a thank you! You’re studying my pictures, Colonel Piercey, are you? They’re my pictures, they’re not yours; and I’ll have you to know that nobody sha’n’t even look at them without my consent.”
Colonel Piercey turned round, almost angry with himself for the fury he felt. “I beg your pardon,” he said, very gravely, yet with a sort of smile.
“Oh, you beg my pardon! and you laugh as if it were a joke! I can tell you it’s no joke. They’re all mine, willed by him as knew best who he wantedthem to go to; and I’ll keep them, that I will, against all the beggarly kinsfolk in the world; coming here a-looking as soon as the old man’s in his grave for what they can devour!”
“Are you ready, Margaret?” Colonel Piercey said.
“Don’t you turn it off to her, sir: speak to me! It’s me that has to be considered first. You are going off mighty high: no civility to the head of the house, though I’ve taken you in and given you lodging in my house, at least Meg there, near a week? Oh, you laugh again, do you? And who is the head of the house if it’s not me? I’m Mrs. Piercey of Greyshott. The pictures are mine, and the name’s mine, as well as everything else; and you are nothing but the son of the younger brother, and not got as much to do with it as Pownceby there, the lawyer.”
“My dear Mrs. Piercey,” said Mr. Pownceby, “however much you may despise Pownceby the lawyer, he knows a little more on that subject than you do: a lady is rarely, if ever, the head of a house, and certainly never one who belongs to the family only by marriage. One word, if you please: Colonel Piercey’s father, now Sir Francis Piercey, is the undoubted head of the house.”
“Oh, you’ll say anything, of course, to back them up; you think they’re your only friends and will pay you best. But you’ll find that’s a mistake, Mr. Pownceby the lawyer, just as they’ll find it’s a mistake. What do you want here, Dunning? What business has servants, except my footman to open the door, here?You’ve been a deal too much petted in your time, and you’ll find out the difference now.”
“Mr. Pownceby, sir,” said Dunning, who had suddenly appeared on the scene, exceedingly dark and lowering, “Is it true, sir, what I hear, that none of us old servants, not me, sir, that looked after him night and day, is named in my old master’s will?”
“I am sorry to say it is quite true, Dunning,” Mr. Pownceby said; “but I don’t doubt that Mrs. Piercey will remember your long service, as Sir Giles wished her to do.”
“How do you know what Sir Giles wished? I know best what Sir Giles said I was to do,” cried Patty. “As for long service, yes, if holding on like grim death and taking as little trouble as possible is what you mean.”
“Me take little trouble!” cried Dunning, foaming. “I’ve not had a night’s rest, not an unbroken night, since Lady Piercey died—not one. Oh, I knowed how it would be! when she come about him, flattering him and slavering him, and the poor dear old gentleman thought it was good for Mr. Gervase; and then after, didn’t she put it upon him as she was in the family-way, and she never was in the family-way, no more than I was. Hoh! ask the women! Hoh! look at her where she stands! He thought as there was an heir coming, and there ain’t no more of an heir coming than——”
“Let us go, please, let us go,” cried Margaret, in distress. “Cousin Gerald, Mr. Pownceby, we havenothing, nothing surely, to do with this. Oh, let us get away.”
“Put that fellow out of my house!” cried Patty, “put him out of my house! You’re a nice gentleman, Gerald Piercey, to stand there and encourage a man like that to insult a lady. Robert, take that man by the shoulders and put him out.”
“He had just best try,” said Dunning, squaring his shoulders. But Robert, who was young and slim, knew better than to try. He stood sheepishly fumbling by the door, opening it for the party who were going out. Dunning was not an adversary to be lightly encountered. Colonel Piercey, however, not insensible to the appeal made to him, laid his hand on Dunning’s shoulder.
“This lady is right,” he said; “we must not insult a woman, Dunning. You had better come with us in the meantime. It will do you no good to stay here.”
“Ah, go with them and plot, do,” cried Patty; “I knew that’s how it would end. He knows I can expose him and all his ways—neglecting my dear old father-in-law; he knows he’ll never get another place if people hear what I’ve got to say of him! Oh, yes, go with ’em, do! They thought they were to have it all their own way, and turn me out. But all of you, every one, will just learn the difference. If he had behaved like a gentleman and her like a lady, I might have given them their old rubbish of pictures. I don’t care for that trash; they’re no ornament to the place. I intend to have them all taken down and carted off to the first auction there is anywhere. I don’t believe they’d bring above a few shillings; but all the same they are mine, and I’ll have no strangers meddling with them,” Patty cried. “Oh, for goodness’ sake, Aunt Patience, hold your tongue, and let me manage my affairs myself.”
“The only thing is just this, ladies and gentlemen,” said Miss Hewitt. “She’s got put out, poor thing, and I don’t wonder, seeing all as she’s ’ad to do; but she don’t mean more than a bit of temper, and she’ll soon come round if you’ll have a little patience. This is the gentleman that come to me, and that I first told as my niece was married to Gervase Piercey, and no mistake. ’E is a very civil gentleman, Patty, and, Lord, why should you go and make enemies of ’im and of this lady, as I should say was a-going to be ’isgood lady, and both belonging to the family! Nor I would not go and make an enemy of Mr. Pownceby, as ’as all the family papers in his ’ands and knows a deal, and could be of such use to you. I’d ask them all to stay, if I was you, to a nice bit of family dinner, and talk things over. Whatisthe good of making enemies when being friends would be so much more use to you?” said Miss Hewitt, with triumphant logic. But Patty, who had heard with impatience and many attempts to interrupt, turned away before her oration was over, and, turning her back upon her recent guests, walked away as majestically as was possible, with her long train sweeping over the carpet, to the drawing-room, where she shut herself in, slamming the door. Miss Hewitt threw up her hands and eyes. “That’s just ’er,” she cried, “just ’er! Thinks of nothing when ’er temper’s up; but I ’ope you won’t think nothing of it neither. She’ll be as good friends in a hour as if nothing had ’appened; and I’ll go and give her a good talking to,” the aunt said.
When Miss Hewitt reached the drawing-room she found Patty thrown upon the sofa in the second stage of her passion, which was, naturally, tears. But these paroxysms did not last long. “I let you talk, Aunt Patience,” she said. “It pleased you, and it looked well enough. But I know my affairs better than you. Enemies! of course they’re all my enemies, and I don’t blame them. What I said I said on purpose, not in a temper. I had them here on purpose to see the old gentleman before he died, so that they might know for themselves that he was in his right mind, and all that; and old Pownceby knows; and I wanted to show them that I wasn’t afraid of them, not a bit. However, that’s all over, and you needn’t trouble your head about it. I have a deal to do before the trial——”
“The trial!” said Miss Hewitt, in consternation. “Is there going to be a trial?”
“Of course there will be a trial. They won’t let Greyshott go without a try for it, and you’ll see me in all the papers, and the whole story, and I don’t know that there’s anything to be ashamed of. The thing I’ve got to find out now is who to have for my lawyers. I want to have the best—the very best; and some one that will make it all into a story, and tell all I did for the poor old man. I was good to him,” said Patty, with an admiration of herself which was very genuine—“I was indeed. Many a time I’ve wanted to get a little pleasure like other folks—to enjoy myself a bit. Oh, there was one night! when Roger Pearson was here and had been at a dance, and I knew all the girls were at it, and all as jolly as——, and me cooped up, playing backgammon with the old gentleman, and—and worse beside.”
“Good Lord, Patty!” cried Miss Hewitt. “Roger Pearson! where ever did you see Roger Pearson? I thoughtthatwas all over and done with!”
“What did you please to mean by that remark?” said Patty, with great dignity. “It doesn’t matter where I saw him. I did see him; and there’s not many girls would have gone on with the backgammon and—the rest, as I did, just that night. Aunt Patience, you may know a few things, but you don’t know the trials of a married woman.”
“The trials!” said Miss Hewitt. “I’ve known a many that have boasted of the advantage it was. But trials—no. You’ll be very willing, I shouldn’t wonder, to have ’em again.”
“That depends upon many things; but I think not,” said Patty.
“You mightn’t be lucky the first time, and yet be lucky the second,” said her aunt; “but it can’t be said to be unlucky, Patty, when it leaves you here, not twenty-five yet, with this grand property all to yourself. Lord! I thought you was lucky at the first, when you got ’im; for I knew they couldn’t put ’im out of’is rights, Softy or no Softy; but just think the luck you’ve had since; ’is mother dead afore you come home, and that was a blessing, and then ’imself just a blessed release, and then——”
“I’ll thank you, Aunt Patience, not to speak of my husband in that way. A release! Who’d have dared to say a word if Gervase had been here? Oh!” she said, springing up from her seat, and stamping her foot upon the carpet, “and here I am for ever and ever just what I am now, when I would have been my lady all my life, and nobody to stop me, if he had lived but six months more!”
“Dear, and that’s true,” said Miss Hewitt deeply struck with the tragedy of the event. “I do pity you, my pet! my poor darling! That’s true, that’s true!”
While this scene was going on in Greyshott, Gerald and Margaret were jogging on towards Chillfold in their hired chaise. They had a great deal to say, and yet there were long silences between them. Gerald was more angry, Margaret more sad.
“I should have minded nothing else,” the Colonel said, “if he had kept the old house for us, the house that has produced us all—Greyshott, that has never belonged but to a Piercey; and, Meg, if he had done justice to you.”
“There was no justice owing to me,” she said. “I left the house at my own free will. I belong to another house and another name——”
“That might have been true,” said Colonel Piercey, with something of his old stiffness and severity, “if——”
“It is true,” she said, “I am of the family of my child.”
“Oh,” he cried, “what folly, at your age! I was angry to have lost you; but now, I can’t tell how it is, you are Meg Piercey again.”
“You have got used to my changed looks,” she said. “You have accepted the fact that I am no longer in my teens. But this is not worth discussing when there is so much more to think of. What shall you do? or, indeed, what can you do?”
“Fight it, certainly,” he said. “As soon as I have taken you home, I am to meet old Pownceby, and lay the whole case before the best man we can get. Thank Heaven, I am not without means to fight it out. Poor Uncle Giles! It is hard to call him up to a reckoning before all the world; but he could not have meant it; he could never have meant it.”
“I have his little tip for Osy,” said Margaret, with tears in her eyes.
“His little tip! when he ought to have provided for the boy!”
“Poor Uncle Giles! He was never very strong: and I believe she was very kind to him, and he was fond of her.”
“Do you want me to accept this absurd will, this loss to the race, because she was kind to him (granting that)—and an old man, in his dotage, was fond of a scheming woman?”
“Don’t call names,” said Margaret. “He was not in his dotage. We saw him——”
“Ah—called on purpose, that we might help toestablish the fact,” said Colonel Piercey, fiercely. “What do you call it but dotage—that tip over which you are inclined to weep; and the reason alleged for it, that you had been the first to tell him something? Yes, I know what that means. Pownceby told me. That’s—how long since? But he believed it, just the same as ever, in the same kind of distant hope. What is that but dotage, Meg?”
“And must it all, everything—the mere foolish hope I expressed to please him, and anything she may have said—must it all be dragged before the public, and poor Uncle Giles’ foolish hopes?”
“Would you like me to throw it all over, and leave that woman to enjoy her ill-gotten gains? Do you say I am to do that, Meg?”
“I—say? Oh, no. What right have I? No, Cousin Gerald, I do not think you should give up your claim. I think”—she paused a moment, and her face lighted up, the words seemed to drop from her lips. Other thoughts flashed up in her eyes—an expectation, the light of happiness and peace. The carriage had turned a corner, and Chillfold, with her cottage in it, and her boy, brought the relief and ease of home to Margaret’s face. Her companion watched her eagerly. He saw the change that came over her. His thoughts followed hers with a quick revulsion of sympathy. He laid his hand upon hers.
“Meg,” he said, “do you know there has never been anybody in the world whose face has lighted up like that for me?”
“You had a mother, Gerald,” she said quickly, almost ashamed of her self-revelation; “but you forget—as Osy also will forget.”
“At my age one wants something different from a mother,” he said, “and one does not forget.”
She did not say anything. She did not meet his look; but she gave a little pressure, scarcely perceptible, to the hand that held hers. Their long duel had come, at least, to peace—if nothing more.
Pattyhad a great deal to do before the trial; for it is needless to say that no time was lost in bringing the matter to a trial. It was in some respects an unequal contest, for, clever as she was, she knew no more to whom she should apply, or in whose hands she should place her cause, than any other person of her original position. Mr. Pownceby was the only representative of law with whom she was acquainted, he and the shabby attorney of the village, who was the resort of litigious country folk. And Mr. Pownceby, whom she had insulted, was, as she had foreseen, on the other side. There was no help to be found in Miss Hewitt for any such need, except in so far that after many years’ strenuous reading of all the trials in the papers, the names of certain distinguished advocates in variouscauses célèbresand otherwise were at that lady’s finger ends. The idea of the two women was to carry their business at once, without any intervention of an intermediate authority, to one of the very greatest of these great men, with whom, indeed, Patty herself managed to obtain an interview, with the boldness ofignorance. The great man was much amused by Patty, but he did not undertake her case. He even suggested to her that it would be a good thing to compromise matters, and agree with her adversary in the way, which did not at all commend itself to Mrs. Piercey. She would rather, she declared, spend to the half of her kingdom than tamely compromise her “rights,” and leave Greyshott to the heir-at-law. The Solicitor-General (I think it was that functionary) was very kind. He was amused by her story, by her youth and good looks, by her fierce determination and her ignorance. It was seldom that he had so genuine a study of human nature before him, and that instinct of human nature which makes our own cause always seem the one that is most just and right. He was moved to advise her to avoid litigation rather from a desire to keep that piquant story for his private gratification, instead of casting it abroad to all the winds, than from any higher motive. And yet he did a great deal for her, telling her who were the solicitors in whose hands she ought to place herself, with a sense that Mrs. Piercey would not be too particular about the means used to secure her success; and suggesting counsel with something of the same idea, and a somewhat malicious amusement and delighted expectation of what would be made of the case by such advocates. He would no more have suggested either the one or the other to Margaret Osborne, than he could have justified himself on moral grounds for recommending them to Mrs. Piercey. Like clients like advisers, he said to himself.He felt that Patty in the witness-box, manipulated by his learned brother, would be a sight for the—— well, not perhaps for the gods, unless it were the gods of the shilling gallery, whom such an advocate would cause to weep over the young widow’s woes—but for the delectation of the observant and cynical spectator. How wicked and wrong this was it is needless to say; and yet in the mingled issues of human concerns it was very kind to Patty, who was not, as he divined, particular about the modes to be employed in her campaign.
I will not enter into all those preparations for the trial which brightened life immensely to Mrs. Piercey, and made her feel that she had scarcely lived before, and that, however the trial might turn out, this crowded hour of glorious life was worth the age without a name which would have been her fate had all been peaceful and undisturbed. She had constant visits from her solicitors or their emissaries; constant correspondence; a necessity often recurring for running up to town, which opened to her many new delights. No expense was spared in these preliminaries, the lawyers, to whom the speculative character of the whole proceedings was clearly apparent, thinking it well (they were, as has been said, not scrupulous members of their class) to make as much out of it in the meantime as possible; and Patty herself having, in a different degree, something of the same feeling. She was ready, as has been said, to sacrifice half of her kingdom in order to win her plea, and, at the same time, she indulged freely inthe pleasure of spending, with the idea before her that even in the event of losing, that pleasure could not be taken from her. Whatever she acquired now would, in that respect, be pure gain. Therefore there can be no doubt that she enjoyed her life during this interval. She had committed one or two imprudencies, which her advisers much regretted and gently condemned. She had made an enemy of Dunning for one thing, which they blamed greatly, and she had alienated the sympathies of her neighbours by her behaviour in the first flush of her triumph, which Lady Hartmore did not fail to publish. But if the client were not foolish sometimes, to what good would be the cleverness of her guides and counsellors? Patty, for her part, declared that she had no fear of Dunning. What could Dunning say that could affect her position? He could describe Sir Giles’ hopes, which, it was evident, must have been mistaken; but she could swear, with a good conscience, that she had never said anything about those hopes to Sir Giles. Patty’s modesty, the instinct that had made her really incapable of taking advantage of Sir Giles’ delusion, had, it is to be feared, by this time, by dint of familiarity with the subject, become much subdued. She had shrunk with a blush from any such discussion, even with her old father-in-law; but she was not afraid now of the ordeal of being examined and cross-examined on the subject before all the world. She was not, indeed, at all afraid of the examination which nowadays frightens most people out of their wits. This, no doubt, waspartly ignorance, but it was partly also a happy confidence in her own power to encounter and discomfit any man who should stand up to question her. This confidence has been seen in various cases of young women who have encountered jauntily an ordeal in which it is difficult for the strongest not to come to grief; but an ignorant girl often believes in her own sharp answers more than in any inquisition in the world.
Except these advisers-at-law, however, and her aunt, whom she by no means permitted to be always with her, Patty had actually no supporters or sympathisers. She lived in her great house alone: nobody entering it save one of these advisers; nobody sitting at her table with her; nobody taking any share in the excitement of her life. She had indeed waylaid the rector one day, and compelled him to come to her carriage door to speak to her, which he did with great reluctance, being openly and avowedly on the other side. “What have I ever done to you that you should be against me?” she said; “you used to be my friend once——”
“I hope I am everybody’s friend—who does well,” said the rector.
“And haven’t I done well? If to nurse old Sir Giles night and day, and lay myself out in everything to please him wasn’t doing well, why, then I must have been taught my duty very badly, for I thought it was ‘I was sick and ye—— ’ ”
“Oh! that is how people force a text and put theirown meaning to it,” said the rector, with a gesture of impatience. “But,” he added, in a more subdued tone, “nobody denies, Mrs. Piercey, that you were kind to the old man.”
“And wasn’t that my duty?” said Patty, triumphantly; but though she silenced her spiritual instructor she did not convince him that it was his duty to support her. No text about the wrongs of the widow had any effect upon him. He stood and looked down at the summer dust in which his feet were planted, and shook his head. It is a great thing to have the enthusiasm of a cause to prop you up, and to have lawyers coming and going from town, and a great deal of business on hand; but to have nobody to speak to, nobody to give you either help or sympathy at home, is hard. When Patty came home from London, after one of the expeditions in which she had been more or less enjoying herself, the blank of the house, in which there was not a soul who cared whether she won or lost, whether she lived or died, was sometimes more than she could bear. One evening, late in July, she went out for a walk, which was a very unusual thing with her, upon the great stretch of common land which lay outside the beech avenue. Patty had begun by this time to grow so much accustomed to the use of a carriage, that she no longer felt it the most delightful mode of conveyance. She had at first, when she came into the possession of that luxury, felt it impossible to walk half a dozen steps without her carriage at her heels; but now she became a little bored bythe necessity of a daily drive, and loved to escape for a little walk. She had been in town all day, and it had been hot and uncomfortable. Patty had nowhere to go to in town for a little lunch and refreshment, as ladies have generally. It seemed a wrong to her that ladies had that; that they went in twos and threes enjoying their shopping and their little expedition, laughing and talking to each other, as some did who had gone to town in the same carriage with her, and again had travelled with her coming down, full of news and chatter and purchases. Patty had no one to go with her—there was no house in town where there were friends who expected to see her at lunch; and when she came back, though she might have bought the most charming things in the world, though there might be diamonds in her little bag, there was nobody to wish to see them, to exclaim over their beauty, and envy their happy possessor. These ladies sometimes spoke to her when they did not know her, but often looked askance and whispered to each other; and anyhow, the contrast they made with herself inflamed her very soul with anger. They could wander out, too, in the cool of the evening, still talking, laughing over their adventures, while she was always alone. It was soothing to see that many of them drove home from the station in a bit of a pony carriage or shabby little waggonette with one horse, while her carriage waited for her in lonely grandeur. Sometimes, even, they walked, carrying their parcels, while Patty looked down upon them with immeasurable contempt. But a carriageis not good for everything, and Patty sometimes strayed out alone, thinking the exercise would be good for her, but in reality hoping to escape a little from herself.
It was seldom that she met any one on that lonely moor, but on this particular evening there came towards her, with the glow behind him of the setting sun, a figure, which Patty felt to be, somehow, familiar; though as she did not expect to meet with any one here equal to her quality, she was not at all curious, but even contemptuous of any pedestrian who was not, like herself, walking for pleasure, but might probably be obliged to walk. He carried a long cricket-bag in his hand, and was in white flannels, which made a little brightening in the dimness of the evening, and had a light cap of a bright colour on his head. A well-made, manly figure, slim but strong, and a long swinging step clearing the intervening distance swiftly, made Patty think of some one who had been like that, who would not have let her, in other days, be alone if he could have helped it. She remembered very clearly who that was, and with a little shiver how she had last seen him, and the dance he had been to, and how the thought of that dance moved her to the depths. But this could not be Roger. He had always been fond of cricket—too fond, the village said—liking that better than steady work. But to be dressed like this, in flannels, and a cap of a “colour,” was not for common men like him; that was the dress gentlemen put on for the play which was their only work to so many. Indeed, Patty was close upon him before she saw thatit was indeed Roger, who took off his cap when he saw her, and would have passed on with that respectful salutation had, not Patty stopped almost without meaning it, in the start of recognition. “Is it you?” she said in her surprise, upon which Roger took off his cap again.
“Seems as if I’d risen in the world,” he said, “but it’s more seeming than fact. I’ve been playing for the county,” he added, with scarcely concealed pride. “It don’t do a man much good, perhaps, but we’re pleased enough all the same.”
“It’s a long time since I have seen you,” said Patty, scarcely knowing what she said. “I—I took you for one of the gentlemen.”
“And it’s a long time since I’ve seen you—and I’d like to say that I’m sorry, Pa——, Mrs. Piercey, for all that’s happened—and for the trouble, if it is a trouble, you’re in now.”
“It is no trouble,” said Patty, hotly. “I’m going to defend my rights, if that’s what you mean.”
“Well, I hope that’s what it is,” said Roger, “but I don’t like to hear of any one I care for beginning with the law. It just skins you alive and wastes good money that might be spent far better—bring you in a deal more pleasure, I mean.”
“You don’t know very much, Roger, about the pleasure money brings in!”
“Oh, don’t I, Patty! Well, if one of us remembers the old days the other must, too. Cricketing about all over the place as I’m doing, runs througha good lot, I can tell you, if it didn’t bring a little more in.”
“Don’t you do anything but cricket, nowadays?” she said.
“Not much; but it pays well enough,” said Roger, pushing back his cap from his forehead.
The evening, it is true, was getting a little dim, though not dark; but didn’t he look a gentleman! No one would have guessed he wasn’t a gentleman, was the thought that passed through Patty’s mind like a dart.
“And I live a lot among the swells, now,” he said, “and I hear what they say; I don’t want to offend you, Patty, far from it—but ain’t it a bore living all by yourself in that big lonesome house, with all the deaths and things that have happened in it?”
“You forget it’s my home,” said Patty, drawing herself up.
“Well, is it your home? All right if it had been your husband’s or if there had been an heir; but I don’t hold myself with a place going out of the family like that—that has been in it for hundreds of years. I don’t like the thoughts of the Seven Thorns even going out o’ the name of ’Ewitt. It’s no concern of mine, but I don’t.”
“Perhaps you think I should go back there, out of my own place, and keep it up!”
“I don’t say as I meant that,” said Roger, turning his cap, which he had taken off, round and round in his hands, “but I wouldn’t be the one to take it out of the family if it was me. I’d say, Look here now,what’ll you give me? You be happy in your way, and I’ll be happy in mine.”
“Well, I shall take your advice, Mr. Pearson. I’ll be happy in my own way. It’s not yours, and never will be. But that don’t matter, seeing we’ve nothing on earth to do with each other, and are in quite different ranks of life. I wish you good-night, and I hope the cricketing business will be a good one and pay, or else I might say, ‘Mind, there’s the winter coming on'—if a lady could take upon her to give advice to a sporting man.”
“Patty,” he cried, calling after her, “don’t part with a fellow like this; I didn’t mean to offend you—far from it. I only thought I’d warn you what folks said.”
“Folks is fools for the most part,” cried Patty fiercely, using a much-cited sentiment, which she had never heard of, by the light of nature, “and I don’t want to hear what they say. Mr. Pearson, I wish you good-night.”
“There! I’ve been and put my foot in it—I knew I should,” Roger said. He stood, the image of despondency, in the middle of the moor, his white figure standing out against the western light as Patty turned at a sharp angle to go home. She could see him with the corner of her eye without looking at him. He stood there silent for a moment, and then dashed his fist into the air with a profane exclamation. “That’s not what I meant at all,” he said, and lifted his cricket-bag and sped away.