in the first fortnight of miss mackenzie's sojourn at littlebath, four persons called upon her; but though this was a success as far as it went, those fourteen days were very dull. during her former short visit to the place she had arranged to send her niece to a day school which had been recommended to her as being very genteel, and conducted under moral and religious auspices of most exalted character. hither susanna went every morning after breakfast, and returned home in these summer days at eight o'clock in the evening. on sundays also, she went to morning church with the other girls; so that miss mackenzie was left very much to herself.
mrs pottinger was the first to call, and the doctor's wife contented herself with simple offers of general assistance. she named a baker to miss mackenzie, and a dressmaker; and she told her what was the proper price to be paid by the hour for a private brougham or for a public fly. all this was useful, as miss mackenzie was in a state of densest ignorance; but it did not seem that much in the way of amusement would come from the acquaintance of mrs pottinger. that lady said nothing about the assembly rooms, nor did she speak of the stumfoldian manner of life. her husband had no doubt explained to her that the stranger was not as yet a declared disciple in either school. miss mackenzie had wished to ask a question about the assemblies, but had been deterred by fear. then came mr stumfold in person, and, of course, nothing about the assembly rooms was said by him. he made himself very pleasant, and miss mackenzie almost resolved to put herself into his hands. he did not look sour at her, nor did he browbeat her with severe words, nor did he exact from her the performance of any hard duties. he promised to find her a seat in his church, and told her what were the hours of service. he had three "sabbath services," but he thought that regular attendance twice every sunday was enough for people in general. he would be delighted to be of use, and mrs stumfold should come and call. having promised this, he went his way. then came mrs stumfold, according to promise, bringing with her one miss baker, a maiden lady. from mrs stumfold our friend got very little assistance. mrs stumfold was hard, severe, and perhaps a little grand. she let fall a word or two which intimated her conviction that miss mackenzie was to become at all points a stumfoldian, since she had herself invoked the countenance and assistance of the great man on her first arrival; but beyond this, mrs stumfold afforded no comfort. our friend could not have explained to herself why it was so, but after having encountered mrs stumfold, she was less inclined to become a disciple than she had been when she had seen only the great master himself. it was not only that mrs stumfold, as judged by externals, was felt to be more severe than her husband evangelically, but she was more severe also ecclesiastically. miss mackenzie thought that she could probably obey the ecclesiastical man, but that she would certainly rebel against the ecclesiastical woman.
there had been, as i have said, a miss baker with the female minister, and miss mackenzie had at once perceived that had miss baker called alone, the whole thing would have been much more pleasant. miss baker had a soft voice, was given to a good deal of gentle talking, was kind in her manner, and prone to quick intimacies with other ladies of her own nature. all this miss mackenzie felt rather than saw, and would have been delighted to have had miss baker without mrs stumfold. she could, she knew, have found out all about everything in five minutes, had she and miss baker been able to sit close together and to let their tongues loose. but miss baker, poor soul, was in these days thoroughly subject to the female stumfold influence, and went about the world of littlebath in a repressed manner that was truly pitiable to those who had known her before the days of her slavery.
but, as she rose to leave the room at her tyrant's bidding, she spoke a word of comfort. "a friend of mine, miss mackenzie, lives next door to you, and she has begged me to say that she will do herself the pleasure of calling on you, if you will allow her."
the poor woman hesitated as she made her little speech, and once cast her eye round in fear upon her companion.
"i'm sure i shall be delighted," said miss mackenzie.
"that's miss todd, is it?" said mrs stumfold; and it was made manifest by mrs stumfold's voice that mrs stumfold did not think much of miss todd.
"yes; miss todd. you see she is so close a neighbour," said miss baker, apologetically.
mrs stumfold shook her head, and then went away without further speech.
miss mackenzie became at once impatient for miss todd's arrival, and was induced to keep an eye restlessly at watch on the two neighbouring doors in the paragon, in order that she might see miss todd at the moment of some entrance or exit. twice she did see a lady come out from the house next her own on the right, a stout jolly-looking dame, with a red face and a capacious bonnet, who closed the door behind her with a slam, and looked as though she would care little for either male stumfold or female. miss mackenzie, however, made up her mind that this was not miss todd. this lady, she thought, was a married lady; on one occasion there had been children with her, and she was, in miss mackenzie's judgment, too stout, too decided, and perhaps too loud to be a spinster. a full week passed by before this question was decided by the promised visit,—a week during which the new comer never left her house at any hour at which callers could be expected to call, so anxious was she to become acquainted with her neighbour; and she had almost given the matter up in despair, thinking that mrs stumfold had interfered with her tyranny, when, one day immediately after lunch—in these days miss mackenzie always lunched, but seldom dined—when one day immediately after lunch, miss todd was announced.
miss mackenzie immediately saw that she had been wrong. miss todd was the stout, red-faced lady with the children. two of the children, girls of eleven and thirteen, were with her now. as miss todd walked across the room to shake hands with her new acquaintance, miss mackenzie at once recognised the manner in which the street door had been slammed, and knew that it was the same firm step which she had heard on the pavement half down the paragon.
"my friend, miss baker, told me you had come to live next door to me," began miss todd, "and therefore i told her to tell you that i should come and see you. single ladies, when they come here, generally like some one to come to them. i'm single myself, and these are my nieces. you've got a niece, i believe, too. when the popes have nephews, people say all manner of ill-natured things. i hope they ain't so uncivil to us."
miss mackenzie smirked and smiled, and assured miss todd that she was very glad to see her. the allusion to the popes she did not understand.
"miss baker came with mrs stumfold, didn't she?" continued miss todd. "she doesn't go much anywhere now without mrs stumfold, unless when she creeps down to me. she and i are very old friends. have you known mr stumfold long? perhaps you have come here to be near him; a great many ladies do."
in answer to this, miss mackenzie explained that she was not a follower of mr stumfold in that sense. it was true that she had brought a letter to him, and intended to go to his church. in consequence of that letter, mrs stumfold had been good enough to call upon her.
"oh yes: she'll come to you quick enough. did she come with her carriage and horses?"
"i think she was on foot," said miss mackenzie.
"then i should tell her of it. coming to you, in the best house in the paragon, on your first arrival, she ought to have come with her carriage and horses."
"tell her of it!" said miss mackenzie.
"a great many ladies would, and would go over to the enemy before the month was over, unless she brought the carriage in the meantime. i don't advise you to do so. you haven't got standing enough in the place yet, and perhaps she could put you down."
"but it makes no difference to me how she comes."
"none in the least, my dear, or to me either. i should be glad to see her even in a wheelbarrow for my part. but you mustn't suppose that she ever comes to me. lord bless you! no. she found me out to be past all grace ever so many years ago."
"mrs stumfold thinks that aunt sally is the old gentleman himself," said the elder of the girls.
"ha, ha, ha," laughed the aunt. "you see, miss mackenzie, we run very much into parties here, as they do in most places of this kind, and if you mean to go thoroughly in with the stumfold party you must tell me so, candidly, and there won't be any bones broken between us. i shan't like you the less for saying so: only in that case it won't be any use our trying to see much of each other."
miss mackenzie was somewhat frightened, and hardly knew what answer to make. she was very anxious to have it understood that she was not, as yet, in bond under mrs stumfold—that it was still a matter of choice to herself whether she would be a saint or a sinner; and she would have been so glad to hint to her neighbour that she would like to try the sinner's line, if it were only for a month or two; only miss todd frightened her! and when the girl told her that miss todd was regarded, ex parte stumfold, as being the old gentleman himself, miss mackenzie again thought for an instant that there would be safety in giving way to the evangelico-ecclesiastical influence, and that perhaps life might be pleasant enough to her if she could be allowed to go about in couples with that soft miss baker.
"as you have been so good as to call," said miss mackenzie, "i hope you will allow me to return your visit."
"oh, dear, yes—shall be quite delighted to see you. you can't hurt me, you know. the question is, whether i shan't ruin you. not that i and mr stumfold ain't great cronies. he and i meet about on neutral ground, and are the best friends in the world. he knows i'm a lost sheep—a gone 'coon, as the americans say—so he pokes his fun at me, and we're as jolly as sandboys. but st stumfolda is made of sterner metal, and will not put up with any such female levity. if she pokes her fun at any sinners, it is at gentlemen sinners; and grim work it must be for them, i should think. poor mary baker! the best creature in the world. i'm afraid she has a bad time of it. but then, you know, perhaps that is the sort of thing you like."
"you see i know so very little of mrs stumfold," said miss mackenzie.
"that's a misfortune will soon be cured if you let her have her own way. you ask mary baker else. but i don't mean to be saying anything bad behind anybody's back; i don't indeed. i have no doubt these people are very good in their way; only their ways are not my ways; and one doesn't like to be told so often that one's own way is broad, and that it leads—you know where. come, patty, let us be going. when you've made up your mind, miss mackenzie, just you tell me. if you say, 'miss todd, i think you're too wicked for me,' i shall understand it. i shan't be in the least offended. but if my way isn't—isn't too broad, you know, i shall be very happy to see you."
hereupon miss mackenzie plucked up courage and asked a question.
"do you ever go to the assembly rooms, miss todd?"
miss todd almost whistled before she gave her answer. "why, miss mackenzie, that's where they dance and play cards, and where the girls flirt and the young men make fools of themselves. i don't go there very often myself, because i don't care about flirting, and i'm too old for dancing. as for cards, i get plenty of them at home. i think i did put down my name and paid something when i first came here, but that's ever so many years ago. i don't go to the assembly rooms now."
as soon as miss todd was gone, miss mackenzie went to work to reflect seriously upon all she had just heard. of course, there could be no longer any question of her going to the assembly rooms. even miss todd, wicked as she was, did not go there. but should she, or should she not, return miss todd's visit? if she did she would be thereby committing herself to what miss todd had profanely called the broad way. in such case any advance in the stumfold direction would be forbidden to her. but if she did not call on miss todd, then she would have plainly declared that she intended to be such another disciple as miss baker, and from that decision there would be no recall. on this subject she must make up her mind, and in doing so she laboured with all her power. as to any charge of incivility which might attach to her for not returning the visit of a lady who had been so civil to her, of that she thought nothing. miss todd had herself declared that she would not be in the least offended. but she liked this new acquaintance. in owning all the truth about miss mackenzie, i must confess that her mind hankered after the things of this world. she thought that if she could only establish herself as miss todd was established, she would care nothing for the stumfolds, male or female.
but how was she to do this? an establishment in the stumfold direction might be easier.
in the course of the next week two affairs of moment occurred to miss mackenzie. on the wednesday morning she received from london a letter of business which caused her considerable anxiety, and on the thursday afternoon a note was brought to her from mrs stumfold,—or rather an envelope containing a card on which was printed an invitation to drink tea with that lady on that day week. this invitation she accepted without much doubt. she would go and see mrs stumfold in her house, and would then be better able to decide whether the mode of life practised by the stumfold party would be to her taste. so she wrote a reply, and sent it by her maid-servant, greatly doubting whether she was not wrong in writing her answer on common note-paper, and whether she also should not have supplied herself with some form or card for the occasion.
the letter of business was from her brother tom, and contained an application for the loan of some money,—for the loan, indeed, of a good deal of money. but the loan was to be made not to him but to the firm of rubb and mackenzie, and was not to be a simple lending of money on the faith of that firm, for purposes of speculation or ordinary business. it was to be expended in the purchase of the premises in the new road, and miss mackenzie was to have a mortgage on them, and was to receive five per cent for the money which she should advance. the letter was long, and though it was manifest even to miss mackenzie that he had written the first page with much hesitation, he had waxed strong as he had gone on, and had really made out a good case. "you are to understand," he said, "that this is, of course, to be done through your own lawyer, who will not allow you to make the loan unless he is satisfied with the security. our landlords are compelled to sell the premises, and unless we purchase them ourselves, we shall in all probability be turned out, as we have only a year or two more under our present lease. you could purchase the whole thing yourself, but in that case you would not be sure of the same interest for your money." he then went on to say that samuel rubb, junior, the son of old rubb, should run down to littlebath in the course of next week, in order that the whole thing might be made clear to her. samuel rubb was not the partner whose name was included in the designation of the firm, but was a young man,—"a comparatively young man,"—as her brother explained, who had lately been admitted to a share in the business.
this letter put miss mackenzie into a twitter. like all other single ladies, she was very nervous about her money. she was quite alive to the beauty of a high rate of interest, but did not quite understand that high interest and impaired security should go hand in hand together. she wished to oblige her brother, and was aware that she had money as to which her lawyers were looking out for an investment. even this had made her unhappy, as she was not quite sure whether her lawyers would not spend the money. she knew that lone women were terribly robbed sometimes, and had almost resolved upon insisting that the money should be put into the three per cents. but she had gone to work with figures, and having ascertained that by doing so twenty-five pounds a year would be docked off from her computed income, she had given no such order. she now again went to work with her figures, and found that if the loan were accomplished it would add twenty-five pounds a year to her computed income. mortgages, she knew, were good things, strong and firm, based upon landed security, and very respectable. so she wrote to her lawyers, saying that she would be glad to oblige her brother if there were nothing amiss. her lawyers wrote back, advising her to refer mr rubb, junior, to them. on the day named in her brother's letter, mr samuel rubb, junior, arrived at littlebath, and called upon miss mackenzie in the paragon.
miss mackenzie had been brought up with contempt and almost with hatred for the rubb family. it had, in the first instance, been the work of old samuel rubb to tempt her brother tom into trade; and he had tempted tom into a trade that had not been fat and prosperous, and therefore pardonable, but into a trade that had been troublesome and poor. walter mackenzie had always spoken of these rubbs with thorough disgust, and had persistently refused to hold any intercourse with them. when, therefore, mr samuel rubb was announced, our heroine was somewhat inclined to seat herself upon a high horse.
mr samuel rubb, junior, came upstairs, and was by no means the sort of person in appearance that miss mackenzie had expected to see. in the first place, he was, as well as she could guess, about forty years of age; whereas she had expected to see a young man. a man who went about the world especially designated as junior, ought, she thought, to be very young. and then mr rubb carried with him an air of dignity, and had about his external presence a something of authority which made her at once seat herself a peg lower than she had intended. he was a good-looking man, nearly six feet high, with great hands and feet, but with a great forehead also, which atoned for his hands and feet. he was dressed throughout in black, as tradesmen always are in these days; but, as miss mackenzie said to herself, there was certainly no knowing that he belonged to the oilcloth business from the cut of his coat or the set of his trousers. he began his task with great care, and seemed to have none of the hesitation which had afflicted her brother in writing his letter. the investment, he said, would, no doubt, be a good one. two thousand four hundred pounds was the sum wanted, and he understood that she had that amount lying idle. their lawyer had already seen her lawyer, and there could be no doubt as to the soundness of the mortgage. an assurance company with whom the firm had dealings was quite ready to advance the money on the proposed security, and at the proposed rate of interest, but in such a matter as that, rubb and mackenzie did not wish to deal with an assurance company. they desired that all control over the premises should either be in their own hands, or in the hands of someone connected with them.
by the time that mr samuel rubb had done, miss mackenzie found herself to have dismounted altogether from her horse, and to be pervaded by some slight fear that her lawyers might allow so favourable an opportunity for investing her money to slip through their hands.
then, on a sudden, mr rubb dropped the subject of the loan, and miss mackenzie, as he did so, felt herself to be almost disappointed. and when she found him talking easily to her about matters of external life, although she answered him readily, and talked to him also easily, she entertained some feeling that she ought to be offended. mr rubb, junior, was a tradesman who had come to her on business, and having done his business, why did he not go away? nevertheless, miss mackenzie answered him when he asked questions, and allowed herself to be seduced into a conversation.
"yes, upon my honour," he said, looking out of the window into the montpelier gardens, "a very nice situation indeed. how much better they do these things in such a place as this than we do up in london! what dingy houses we live in, and how bright they make the places here!"
"they are not crowded so much, i suppose," said miss mackenzie.
"it isn't only that. the truth is, that in london nobody cares what his house looks like. the whole thing is so ugly that anything not ugly would be out of place. now, in paris—you have been in paris, miss mackenzie?"
in answer to this, miss mackenzie was compelled to own that she had never been in paris.
"ah, you should go to paris, miss mackenzie; you should, indeed. now, you're a lady that have nothing to prevent your going anywhere. if i were you, i'd go almost everywhere; but above all, i'd go to paris. there's no place like paris."
"i suppose not," said miss mackenzie.
by this time mr rubb had returned from the window, and had seated himself in the easy chair in the middle of the room. in doing so he thrust out both his legs, folded his hands one over the other, and looked very comfortable.
"now i'm a slave to business," he said. "that horrid place in the new road, which we want to buy with your money, has made a prisoner of me for the last twenty years. i went into it as the boy who was to do the copying, when your brother first became a partner. oh dear, how i did hate it!"
"did you now?"
"i should rather think i did. i had been brought up at the merchant taylors' and they intended to send me to oxford. that was five years before they began the business in the new road. then came the crash which our house had at manchester; and when we had picked up the pieces, we found that we had to give up university ideas. however, i'll make a business of it before i'm done; you see if i don't, miss mackenzie. your brother has been with us so many years that i have quite a pleasure in talking to you about it."
miss mackenzie was not quite sure that she reciprocated the pleasure; for, after all, though he did look so much better than she had expected, he was only rubb, junior, from rubb and mackenzie's; and any permanent acquaintance with mr rubb would not suit the line of life in which she was desirous of moving. but she did not in the least know how to stop him, or how to show him that she had intended to receive him simply as a man of business. and then it was so seldom that anyone came to talk to her, that she was tempted to fall away from her high resolves. "i have not known much of my brother's concerns," she said, attempting to be cautious.
then he sat for another hour, making himself very agreeable, and at the end of that time she offered him a glass of wine and a biscuit, which he accepted. he was going to remain two or three days in the neighbourhood, he said, and might he call again before he left? miss mackenzie told him that he might. how was it possible that she should answer such a question in any other way? then he got up, and shook hands with her, told her that he was so glad he had come to littlebath, and was quite cordial and friendly. miss mackenzie actually found herself laughing with him as they stood on the floor together, and though she knew that it was improper, she liked it. when he was gone she could not remember what it was that had made her laugh, but she remembered that she had laughed. for a long time past very little laughter had come to her share.
when he was gone she prepared herself to think about him at length. why had he talked to her in that way? why was he going to call again? why was rubb, junior, from rubb and mackenzie's, such a pleasant fellow? after all, he retailed oilcloth at so much a yard; and little as she knew of the world, she knew that she, with ever so much good blood in her veins, and with ever so many hundreds a year of her own, was entitled to look for acquaintances of a higher order than that. she, if she were entitled to make any boast about herself—and she was by no means inclined to such boastings—might at any rate boast that she was a lady. now, mr rubb was not a gentleman. he was not a gentleman by position. she knew that well enough, and she thought that she had also discovered that he was not quite a gentleman in his manners and mode of speech. nevertheless she had liked him, and had laughed with him, and the remembrance of this made her sad.
that same evening she wrote a letter to her lawyer, telling him that she was very anxious to oblige her brother, if the security was good. and then she went into the matter at length, repeating much of what mr rubb had said to her, as to the excellence of mortgages in general, and of this mortgage in particular. after that she dressed herself with great care, and went out to tea at mrs stumfold's. this was the first occasion in her life in which she had gone to a party, the invitation to which had come to her on a card, and of course she felt herself to be a little nervous.
