Читать книгу Court Netherleigh - Mrs. Henry Wood - Страница 8

It was a magnificent room, everything magnificent about it, as it was fitting the library of Chenevix House should be: a fine mansion overlooking Hyde Park. What good is there to be imagined—worldly good—that fortune, so capricious in her favours, had not showered down upon the owner of this house, the Earl of Acorn? None. With his majority he had come into a princely income, for his father, the late earl, died years before, and the estates had been well nursed. Better had it been, though, for the young Earl of Acorn that he had been born a younger son, or in an inferior rank of life. With that spur to exertion, necessity, he would have pushed on and exercised the talents which had been liberally bestowed on him; but gliding as he did into a fortune that seemed unlimited, he plunged into every extravagant folly of the day, and did his best to dissipate it. He was twenty-one then; he is walking about his library now—you may see him if you choose to enter it—with some five-and-thirty good years added to his life: pacing up and down in perplexity, and possessing scarcely a shilling that he can call his own. His six-and-fifty years have rendered his slender figure somewhat portly, and an expression of annoyance is casting its shade on his clear brow and handsome features; but no deeper lines of sorrow are marked there. Not upon these careless natures does the hand of care leave its sign.

But the earl is—to make the best of it—in a brown study, and he scowls his eyebrows, and purses his lips, and motions with his hands as he paces there, communing with himself. Not that he is so much perplexed as to how he shall escape his already great embarrassments, as he is to contriving the means to raise more money to rush into greater. The gratification of the present moment—little else ever troubled Lord Acorn.

A noise of a cab in the street, as it whirls along, and pulls up before the steps and stately pillars of Chenevix House; a knock and a ring that send their echoes through the mansion; and the earl strides forward and looks cautiously from the window, so as to catch a glimpse of the horse and vehicle. It was only a glimpse, for the window was high from the ground, its embrasures deep, and the cab close to the pavement; and, for a moment, he could not decide whether it belonged to friend or foe; but soon he drew away with an ugly word, crossed the room to unlatch the door, and stood with his ear at the opening. What! a peer condescend to play eavesdropper, in an attitude that befits a meaner man? Yes: and a prince has done the same, when in bodily fear of duns.

A few minutes elapsed. The indistinct sound of contention approaches his lordship's ear, in conjunction with a very uncomfortable stream of wind, and then the house-door closes loudly, the cab whirls off again, and the earl rings the library-bell.

"Jenkins, who was it?"

"That impudent Salmon again, my lord. I said you were out, and he vowed you were in. I believe he would have pushed his way up here, but John and the porter stood by, and I dare say he thought we three should be a match for him."

"Insolent!" muttered his lordship. "Has Mr. Grubb been here?"

"No, my lord."

"What can detain him?" spoke the earl to himself, irascibly. "I begged him to come today. Mind you are in the hall yourself, Jenkins; you know whom to admit and whom to deny."

"All right, my lord." And the butler, who had lived with the earl many years, and was a confidential servant devoted to his master's interests, closed the library-door and descended.

It was not until evening that Mr. Grubb came, and was shown into the library. Do not be prejudiced against him on account of his name, reader, but pay attention to him, for he is worthy of it, and plays a prominent part in this little history. He is thirty years of age, a tall, slender, noble-looking man, with intellect stamped on his ample forehead, and good feeling pervading his countenance. It is a very refined face, and its grey-blue eyes are simply beautiful. He is the son of that city merchant, Christopher Grubb, who married Catherine Grant. Christopher Grubb has been dead many years, and the son, Francis Charles Christopher, is the head of the house now, and the only one of the name living.

His acquaintanceship with Lord Acorn had commenced in this way. When that nobleman's only son, Viscount Denne, was at Christchurch, Francis Grubb was also there; and they became as intimate as two undergraduates of totally opposite pursuits and tastes can become. Lord Denne was wild, careless, and extravagant; more of a spendthrift (and that's saying a great deal) than his father had been before him. He fell into debt and difficulty; and Mr. Grubb, with his ample means, over and over again got him out of it. During their last term, when young Denne was in a maze of perplexity, and more deeply indebted to his friend than he cared to count, the accident occurred that deprived him of life. A mad race with another Oxonian, each of them in his own stylish curricle, the fashionable bachelor carriage of the day, resulted in the overturning of both vehicles, and in the fatal injury of Lord Denne. During the three days that he lingered Mr. Grubb never left him. Lord Acorn was summoned from London, but Lady Acorn and her daughters were abroad. The young man told his father how much money he owed to Francis Grubb, begging that it might be repaid, and the earl promised it should be. The death of this, his only son, was a terrible blow to him: he would have been nine-and-twenty this year.

For this happened some nine or ten years ago; and during all that time Mr. Grubb had not been repaid.

Repaid! The debt had been only added to. For the earl had borrowed money on his own score, and increased it with a vengeance. He had borrowed it on the strength of some property that he was expecting yearly to fall to him through the death of an uncle: and Mr. Grubb, strictly honourable himself, had trusted to the earl's promises. The property, however, had at length fallen in; had fallen in a year ago; and Mr. Grubb had not been repaid one shilling. While Lord Acorn was yet still saying to him, I shall have the money tomorrow, or, I shall have it the next day, Mr. Grubb had now found out that he had had it months before, and had used it in repaying more pressing creditors. Francis Grubb did not like it.

"Ah, Grubb, how are you?" cried Lord Acorn, grasping his hand cordially. "I thought you were never coming."

"It is foreign post night; I could not get away earlier," was Mr. Grubb's answer, his voice a singularly pleasant one.

"Look here, Grubb: I am hard up, cleared down to the last gasp, and money I must have," began his lordship, as he paced the carpet restlessly. "I want you to advance me a little more."

"Not another farthing," spoke Mr. Grubb, in decisive tones. "It has just come to my knowledge, Lord Acorn, that you received the proceeds of your uncle's property long ago—and that you have spent them."

Remembering the deceit he had been practising, his lordship had the grace to feel ashamed of himself. His brow flushed.

"I could not help it, Grubb; I could not indeed. I did not like to tell you, and I have had the deuce's own trouble to keep my head above water."

"I am very sorry; very," said the merchant. "Had you dealt fairly and honourably with me, Lord Acorn, I would always have returned it in kind; always. Had you said to me, I have that money at last, but I cannot let you have it, for it must go elsewhere, I should never have pressed you for it. I must press now."

"Rubbish!" cried the earl, secure in the other's long-extended good feeling. "You will do nothing of the kind, I know, Grubb. You have a good hold yet on the Netherleigh estate. That must come to me."

"Not so sure. Lord Acorn, I must have my money repaid to me."

"Then you can't have it. And I want you to let me have two thousand pounds more. As true as that we are living, Grubb, if I don't get that in the course of a few hours, I shall be in Queer Street."

"Lord Acorn, I will not do it; and I will do the other. You should have dealt openly with me."

"Did you ever get blood from a stone?" asked the earl: and the careless apathy of his manner contrasted strongly with the earnestness of Mr. Grubb's. "There's no chance of your getting the money back until I am under here," stamping his foot on the ground, "and you know it: unless the Netherleigh estate falls in. I speak freely to you, Grubb, presuming on our long friendship. Come, don't turn crusty at last. You don't want the money: you are rich as Croesus, and you must wait. I wish my son had lived; we would have cut off the entail."

"The debt must be liquidated," returned Mr. Grubb, after a pause of regret, given to poor Lord Denne. And he spoke so coldly and determinedly that Lord Acorn wheeled sharply round in his walk, and looked at him.

"I don't know how the dickens it will be done, then. I suppose you won't proceed to harsh measures, and bring a hornets' nest about my head."

They faced one another, and a silence ensued. For once in his careless life, the good-looking face of Lord Acorn was troubled.

"There is one way in which your lordship can repay the debt," resumed Mr. Grubb. "And it will not cost you money."

"Ah!" laughed the earl, "how's that? If you mean by post-obit bonds, I'll sign a cart-load, if you like."

Mr. Grubb approached the earl in a sort of nervous agitation. "Give me your youngest daughter, Lord Acorn," he breathed. "Let me woo and win her! I will take her in lieu of all."

His lordship was considerably startled; the proud Chenevix blood rose, and dyed his forehead crimson. He had not been listening particularly, and he doubted whether he heard aright. In one respect he had not, for he thought the words had been your eldest daughter. Against Francis Grubb personally, nothing could be said; but against his standing a great deal. Many years had gone by since Catherine Grant lost caste by marrying a "City man," but opinions had not changed, for it was yet long antecedent to these tolerant days. Men in trade, no matter how high the class of trade, were still kept at a distance by the upper orders—not looked upon as being of the same race.

Therefore the demand was as a blow to Lord Acorn; and he dared not resent it as he would have liked to. His daughter descend from her own rank, and become one with this trader! Was the world coming to an end?

But as the two men stood gazing at one another, neither of them speaking, the earl began to revolve in his mind the pros of the matter, as well as the cons. Lady Grace was no longer young; she was growing thin and rather cross, for she had been before the world ten years, with no result. Would it be so bad a match for her?

"I will settle an ample income upon her," spoke Mr. Grubb. "And your unpaid bonds—there are many of them, my lord—I will return into your hands: all of them. Thus your debt to me will be cancelled, and, so far as I am concerned, you are a free man again."

"I cannot be that. I am at my wits' end now for two thousand pounds."

"You shall have that."

"Egad, Grubb's a generous fellow!" cogitated the earl, "and it will be a famous thing for Grace: if she can only think so. Have you ever spoken to Grace of this," he asked, aloud.

"To Lady Grace? No."

"Do you think Grace likes you," continued Lord Acorn, remembering how attractive a man the merchant was. "Do you think she will accept you?"

"I am not speaking of Lady Grace."

"No!" repeated the earl, opening his eyes wider than usual. "Which of them is it, then?"

"Lady Adela."

If Lord Acorn had been startled when he thought the object of this proposal was Grace, he was considerably more startled now. Adela! young, beautiful, and haughty!—she would never have him. His first impulse was indignantly to reject the proposition; his second thought was, that he was trammelled and dared not do so.

"I cannot force Adela's inclinations," he said, after an awkward pause.

"Neither would I take a wife whose inclinations require to be forced," returned Mr. Grubb. "Pray understand that."

"My lord," cried a servant, entering the library, "her ladyship wishes to know how much longer she is to wait dinner?"

"Dinner!" exclaimed the earl. "By Jove! I did not know it was so late. Grubb, will you join us sans cérémonie?"

It was not the first time, by many, Mr. Grubb had dined there. He followed the earl into the drawing-room. Lady Acorn was in it, a little woman, all fire and impatience; especially just now, for if one thing put her out more than another, it was that of being kept waiting for her meals. The five daughters were there: they need not be described. Grace, little and plain, but nevertheless with a nice face, and eight-and-twenty, was the oldest; Adela, whom you have already seen, twenty now, and a very flower of beauty, was the youngest. Four daughters were between them. Sarah, next to Grace, and one year younger, had married Major Hope, and was in India; Mary, Harriet, and Frances; Adela coming last. Not a whit less beautiful was she than when we saw her a year ago at Court Netherleigh.

"Here's the grub again," whispered Harriet, for the girls were given to be flippant amongst themselves. Not that they disliked Mr. Grubb personally, or wished to cast derision on him, but they made a standing joke of his name. He was in trade—and all such people they had been taught to hold in contempt. The house, "Christopher Grubb and Son," was situated somewhere in the City, they believed: it did business with India, and the colonies, and ever so many more places; though what the precise business was the young ladies did not pretend to understand; but they did know that it was second to few houses in wealth, and that their father was a considerable debtor to it. While liking Mr. Grubb personally very well indeed, they yet held him to be of a totally different order from themselves.

"Dinner at once," cried the countess, impatiently, to the butler. "Of course it's all cold," she sharply added, for the especial benefit of her husband.

Mr. Grubb went to the upper end of the room after greeting the countess, and was speaking with the young ladies there; Lord Acorn bent over the back of his wife's chair, and began to whisper to her.

"Betsy, here's the strangest thing! Grubb wants to marry one of the girls."

"Absurd!" responded the wrathful little woman.

"So it appears, at the first blush. But when we come to look at the advantages—now do listen reasonably for a moment," he broke off, "you are as much interested in this as I am. He will settle hundreds of thousands upon her, and cancel all my debts to him besides."

"Did he say so?" quickly cried the countess, putting off her anger to a less interested moment.

"He did," replied the earl, forgetting that he had improvised the hundreds of thousands. "And in addition to putting me straight, he will give me a handsome sum down. You shall have five hundred pounds of it for your milliner, Madame Damereau, which will enable you all to get a new rig-out," concluded the wily man, conscious that if his self-willed better-half set her temper against the match, the Archbishop of Canterbury himself could never tie it into one.

"Which of them does he want?" inquired the countess, snappishly, as if wishing to intimate that, though she might have to say Yes, it should be done with an ill grace. "He's talking now with—which is it?—Mary."

"I thought it was Grace," began the earl, in a deprecatory tone; "I took that for granted——"

"Dinner, my lady," came the interruption, as the door was flung open: and the earl started up, and said not another word. He thought it well that his lady wife should digest the news so far, before proceeding further with it. The countess on her part, understood that all was told, and that the desired bride was Grace.

Mr. Grubb gave his arm to Lady Acorn, and sat down at her right hand. Lady Grace was next him on the other side. He was an agreeable man, of easy manners. Could they ignore the City house, and had he boasted of ancestry and a high-sounding name, they could not have wished for a companion who was more thoroughly the gentleman. Unusually agreeable he was this evening, for he now believed that no bar would be thrown in the way of his winning the Lady Adela. He had long admired her above all women; he had long loved her, and he saw no reason why any bar should be thrown: what incompatibility ought to exist between the portionless daughter of a ruined peer and a British merchant of high character and standing and next to unlimited wealth? The ruined peer, however, had he heard this argument, might have said the merchant reasoned only in accordance with his merchant-origin; that he could not be expected to understand distinctions which were above him.

Lady Acorn rose from table early. She had been making up her mind to the match, during dinner: like her husband, she discovered, on reflection, its numerous advantages, and she was impatient to disclose the matter to Grace. Mr. Grubb held the door open as they filed out, for which the countess thanked him by a bow more cordial than she had ever bestowed on him in her life. Whether it had ever occurred to Lady Acorn that this City man was probably the son of Catherine Grant, cannot be told. She had never alluded to it. Catherine had offended them all too greatly to be recalled even by name: and, so far as Lord Acorn went, he did not know such a person as Catherine had ever existed.

The girls gathered their chairs round the fire in the autumn evening, and began grumbling. "Engagements"—he did not say of what nature—had been Lord Acorn's plea for remaining in town when every one else had left it. Adela was especially bitter.

"Papa never does things like other people. When we ought to be away, we are boxed up in town; and when every one else is in town, we are kept in the country. I'm sick of it."

"It's a pity, girls, you haven't husbands to cater for you, as you are sick of your father's rule," tartly spoke their mother. "You don't go off; any of you."

"It is Grace's turn to go first," cried Lady Harriet.

"Yes, it is—and one wedding in a family often leads to another," observed the wily countess. "I should like to see Grace well settled. With a fine place of her own, where we could go and visit her, and a nice town mansion; and a splendid income to support it all."

"And a box at the opera," suggested Frances.

"And a herd of deer, and a pack of hounds, and the crown diamonds," interrupted Adela, with irony in her tone, and a spice of scorn in her eye, as she glanced up from her book. "Don't you wish we had Aladdin's lamp? It might come to pass then."

"But if I tell you that it will come to pass without it," said Lady Acorn, "that it has come to pass, what should you say? Look up, Grace, my dear; there's luck in store for you yet."

Their mother's manner was so pointedly significant, that all were silent from amazement. The colour mounted to the cheeks of Grace, and her lips parted: could it be that she was no longer to remain Lady Grace Chenevix?

"Grace, child," continued the countess, "the time has gone by for you to pick and choose. You are now getting on for thirty, and have never had the ghost of a chance——"

"That is more than you ought to say, mamma," interrupted Grace, her face flushing, perhaps at her mother's assertion telling home. "I may have had—I did have a chance, as you call it, but——"

"Well, not that we ever knew of; let us amend the sentence in that way. What I was going to observe is, that you must not be over-particular now."

"Has Grace got an offer?" inquired Harriet, breathlessly.

"Yes, she has, and you need not all look so incredulous. It is a good offer too, plenty of substance about it. She will abound in such wealth that she'll be the envy of all the girls in London, and of you four in particular. She will have her town and country mansions, crowds of servants, dresses at will—everything, in short, that money can purchase." For, in her maternal anxiety for the acceptance of the offer, her ladyship thought she could not make too much of its advantages.

"Why, for all that, Grace would marry a chimney-sweep," laughed the plain-speaking Lady Frances.

"Grace has had it in her head to turn serious," added Harriet; "she may put that off now. I think Aladdin's lamp has been at work."

"Of course there are some disadvantages attending the proposed match," said Lady Acorn, with deprecation; "no marriage is without them, I can tell you that. Grace will have every real and substantial good; but the gentleman, in birth and position, is—rather obscure. But he is not a chimney-sweep: it's not so bad as that."

"Good Heavens, mamma!" interrupted Lady Grace. "'So bad as that'?"

"Pray do not make any further mystery, mamma," said Mary. "Who is it that has fallen in love with Grace?"

"Mr. Grubb."

"Mr.——Grubb!" was echoed by the young ladies in every variety of astonishment, and Grace thought that of all the men in the world she should have guessed him last; but she did not say so. She was of a cautious nature, and rarely spoke on impulse.

The silence of surprise was broken by a ringing laugh from Adela, one laugh following upon another. It seemed as though she could not cease. When had they seen Adela so merry?

"I cannot help it," she said apologetically, "but it did strike me as sounding so absurd. 'Lady Grace Grubb!' Forgive me, Gracie."

"It will not bear so aristocratic a sound as Lady Grace Chenevix," retorted the mother, tartly, "but remember the old saying, 'What's in a name?' It is you who are absurd, Adela."