"just now i am triumphant," harry annesley had said to his hostess as he left mrs. armitage's house in the paragon, at cheltenham. he was absolutely triumphant, throwing his hat up into the air in the abandonment of his joy. for he was not a man to have conceived so well of his own parts as to have flattered himself that the girl must certainly be his.
there are at present a number of young men about who think that few girls are worth the winning, but that any girl is to be had, not by asking,—which would be troublesome,—but simply by looking at her. you can see the feeling in their faces. they are for the most part small in stature, well made little men, who are aware that they have something to be proud of, wearing close-packed, shining little hats, by which they seem to add more than a cubit to their stature; men endowed with certain gifts of personal—dignity i may perhaps call it, though the word rises somewhat too high. they look as though they would be able to say a clever thing; but their spoken thoughts seldom rise above a small, acrid sharpness. they respect no one; above all, not their elders. to such a one his horse comes first, if he have a horse; then a dog; and then a stick; and after that the mistress of his affections. but their fault is not altogether of their own making. it is the girls themselves who spoil them and endure their inanity, because of that assumed look of superiority which to the eyes of the outside world would be a little offensive were it not a little foolish. but they do not marry often. whether it be that the girls know better at last, or that they themselves do not see sufficiently clearly their future dinners, who can say? they are for the most part younger brothers, and perhaps have discovered the best way of getting out of the world whatever scraps the world can afford them. harry annesley's faults were altogether of another kind. in regard to this young woman, the florence whom he had loved, he had been over-modest. now his feeling of glory was altogether redundant. having been told by florence that she was devoted to him, he walked with his head among the heavens. the first instinct with such a young man as those of whom i have spoken teaches him, the moment he has committed himself, to begin to consider how he can get out of the scrape. it is not much of a scrape, for when an older man comes this way, a man verging toward baldness, with a good professional income, our little friend is forgotten and he is passed by without a word. but harry had now a conviction,—on that one special night,—that he never would be forgotten and never would forget. he was filled at once with an unwonted pride. all the world was now at his feet, and all the stars were open to him. he had begun to have a glimmering of what it was that augustus scarborough intended to do; but the intentions of augustus scarborough were now of no moment to him. he was clothed in a panoply of armor which would be true against all weapons. at any rate, on that night and during the next day this feeling remained the same with him.
then he received a summons from his mother at buston. his mother pressed him to come at once down to the parsonage. "your uncle has been with your father, and has said terrible things about you. as you know, my brother is not very strong-minded, and i should not care so much for what he says were it not that so much is in his hands. i cannot understand what it is all about, but your father says that he does nothing but threaten. he talks of putting the entail on one side. entails used to be fixed things, i thought; but since what old mr. scarborough did nobody seems to regard them now. but even suppose the entail does remain, what are you to do about the income? your father thinks you had better come down and have a little talk about the matter."
this was the first blow received since the moment of his exaltation. harry knew very well that the entail was fixed, and could not be put aside by mr. prosper, though mr. scarborough might have succeeded with his entail; but yet he was aware that his present income was chiefly dependent on his uncle's good-will. to be reduced to live on his fellowship would be very dreadful. and that income, such as it was, depended entirely on his celibacy. and he had, too, as he was well aware, engendered habits of idleness during the last two years. the mind of a young man so circumstanced turns always first to the bar, and then to literature. at the bar he did not think that there could be any opening for him. in the first place, it was late to begin; and then he was humble enough to believe of himself that he had none of the peculiar gifts necessary for a judge or for an advocate. perhaps the knowledge that six or seven years of preliminary labor would be necessary was somewhat of a deterrent.
the rewards of literature might be achieved immediately. such was his idea. but he had another idea,—perhaps as erroneous,—that this career would not become a gentleman who intended to be squire of buston. he had seen two or three men, decidedly bohemian in their modes of life, to whom he did not wish to assimilate himself. there was quaverdale, whom he had known intimately at st. john's, and who was on the press. quaverdale had quarrelled absolutely with his father, who was also a clergyman, and having been thrown altogether on his own resources, had come out as a writer for the coming hour. he made his five or six hundred a year in a rattling, loose, uncertain sort of fashion, and was,—so thought harry annesley,—the dirtiest man of his acquaintance. he did not believe in the six hundred a year, or quaverdale would certainly have changed his shirt more frequently, and would sometimes have had a new pair of trousers. he was very amusing, very happy, very thoughtless, and as a rule altogether impecunious. annesley had never known him without the means of getting a good dinner, but those means did not rise to the purchase of a new hat. putting quaverdale before him as an example, annesley could not bring himself to choose literature as a profession. thinking of all this when he received his mother's letter, he assured himself that florence would not like professional literature.
he wrote to say that he would be down at buston in five days' time. it does not become a son who is a fellow of a college and the heir to a property to obey his parents too quickly. but he gave up the intermediate days to thinking over the condition which bound him to his uncle, and to discussing his prospects with quaverdale, who, as usual, was remaining in town doing the editor's work for the coming hour. "if he interfered with me i should tell him to go to bed," said quaverdale. the allusion was, of course, made to mr. prosper.
"i am not on those sort of terms with him."
"i should make my own terms, and then let him do his worst. what can he do? if he means to withdraw his beggarly two hundred and fifty pounds, of course he'll do it."
"i suppose i do owe him something, in the way of respect."
"not if he threatens you in regard to money. what does it come to? that you are to cringe at his heels for a beggarly allowance which he has been pleased to bestow upon you without your asking. 'very well, my dear fellow,' i should say to him, 'you can stop it the moment you please. for certain objects of your own,—that your heir might live in the world after a certain fashion,—you have bestowed it. it has been mine since i was a child. if you can reconcile it to your conscience to discontinue it, do so.' you would find that he would have to think twice about it."
"he will stop it, and what am i to do then? can i get an opening on any of these papers?" quaverdale whistled,—a mode of receiving the overture which was not pleasing to annesley. "i don't suppose that anything so very super-human in the way of intellect is required." annesley had got a fellowship, whereas quaverdale had done nothing at the university.
"couldn't you make a pair of shoes? shoemakers do get good wages."
"what do you mean? a fellow never can get you to be serious for two minutes together.
"i never was more serious in my life."
"that i am to make shoes?"
"no, i don't quite think that. i don't suppose you can make them. you'd have first to learn the trade and show that you were an adept."
"and i must show that i am an adept before i can write for the coming hour." there was a tone of sarcasm in this which was not lost on quaverdale.
"certainly you must; and that you are a better adept than i who have got the place, or some other unfortunate who will have to be put out of his berth. the coming hour only requires a certain number. of course there are many newspapers in london, and many magazines, and much literary work going. you may get your share of it, but you have got to begin by shoving some incompetent fellow out. and in order to be able to begin you must learn the trade."
"how did you begin?"
"just in that way. while you were roaming about london like a fine gentleman i began by earning twenty-four shillings a week."
"can i earn twenty-four shillings a week?"
"you won't because you have already got your fellowship. you had a knack at writing greek iambics, and therefore got a fellowship. i picked up at the same time the way of stringing english together. i also soon learned the way to be hungry. i'm not hungry now very often, but i've been through it. my belief is that you wouldn't get along with my editor."
"that's your idea of being independent."
"certainly it is. i do his work, and take his pay, and obey his orders. if you think you can do the same, come and try. there's not room here, but there is, no doubt, room elsewhere. there's the trade to be learned, like any other trade; but my belief is that even then you could not do it. we don't want greek iambics."
harry turned away disgusted. quaverdale was like the rest of the world, and thought that a peculiar talent and a peculiar tact were needed for his own business. harry believed that he was as able to write a leading article, at any rate, as quaverdale, and that the greek iambics would not stand in his way. but he conceived it to be probable that his habits of cleanliness might do so, and gave up the idea for the present. he thought that his friend should have welcomed him with an open hand into the realms of literature; and, perhaps, it was the case that quaverdale attributed too much weight to the knack of turning readable paragraphs on any subject at any moment's notice.
but what should he do down at buston? there were three persons there with whom he would have to contend,—his father, his mother, and his uncle. with his father he had always been on good terms, but had still been subject to a certain amount of gentle sarcasm. he had got his fellowship and his allowance, and so had been lifted above his father's authority. his father thoroughly despised his brother-in-law, and looked down upon him as an absolute ass. but he was reticent, only dropping a word here and there, out of deference, perhaps, to his wife, and from a feeling lest his son might be deficient in wise courtesy, if he were encouraged to laugh at his benefactor. he had said a word or two as to a profession when harry left cambridge, but the word or two had come to nothing. in those days the uncle had altogether ridiculed the idea, and the mother, fond of her son, the fellow and the heir, had altogether opposed the notion. the rector himself was an idle, good-looking, self-indulgent man,—a man who read a little and understood what he read, and thought a little and understood what he thought, but who took no trouble about anything. to go through the world comfortably with a rather large family and a rather small income was the extent of his ambition. in regard to his eldest son he had begun well. harry had been educated free, and had got a fellowship. he had never cost his father a shilling. and now the eldest of two grown-up daughters was engaged to be married to the son of a brewer living in the little town of buntingford. this also was a piece of good-luck which the rector accepted with a thankful heart. there was another grown-up girl, also pretty, and then a third girl not grown up and the two boys who were at present at school at royston. thus burdened, the rev. mr. annesley went through the world with as jaunty a step as was possible, making but little of his troubles, but anxious to make as much as he could of his advantages. of these, the position of harry was the brightest, if only harry would be careful to guard it. it was quite out of the question that he should find an income for harry if the squire stopped the two hundred and fifty pounds per annum which he at present allowed him.
then there was harry's mother, who had already very frequently discounted the good things which were to fall to harry's lot. she was a dear, good, motherly woman, all whose geese were certainly counted to be swans. and of all swans harry was the whitest; whereas, in purity of plumage, mary, the eldest daughter, who had won the affections of the young buntingford brewer, was the next. that harry's allowance should be stopped would be almost as great a misfortune as though mr. thoroughbung were to break his neck out hunting with the puckeridge hounds,—an amusement which, after the manner of brewers, he was much in the habit of following. mrs. annesley had lived at buston all her life, having been born at the hall. she was an excellent mother of a family, and a good clergyman's wife, being in both respects more painstaking and assiduous than her husband. but she did maintain something of respect for her brother, though in her inmost heart she knew that he was a fool. but to have been born squire of buston was something, and to have reached the age of fifty unmarried, so as to leave the position of heir open to her own son, was more. to such a one a great deal was due; but of that deal harry was but little disposed to pay any part. he must be talked to, and very seriously talked to, and if possible saved from the sin of offending his easily-offended uncle. a terrible idea had been suggested to her lately by her husband. the entail might be made altogether inoperative by the marriage of her brother. it was a fearful notion, but one which if it entered into her brother's head might possibly be carried out. no one before had ever dreamed of anything so dangerous to the annesley interests, and mrs. annesley now felt that by due submission on the part of the heir it might be avoided.
but the squire himself was the foe whom harry most feared. he quite understood that he would be required to be submissive, and, even if he were willing, he did not know how to act the part. there was much now that he would endure for the sake of florence. if mr. prosper demanded that after dinner he should hear a sermon, he would sit and hear it out. it would be a bore, but might be endured on behalf of the girl whom he loved. but he much feared that the cause of his uncle's displeasure was deeper than that. a rumor had reached him that his uncle had declared his conduct to mountjoy scarborough to have been abominable. he had heard no words spoken by his uncle, but threats had reached him through his mother, and also through his uncle's man of business. he certainly would go down to buston, and carry himself toward his uncle with what outward signs of respect would be possible. but if his uncle accused him, he could not but tell his uncle that he knew nothing of the matter of which he was talking. not for all buston could he admit that he had done anything mean or ignoble. florence, he was quite sure, would not desire it. florence would not be florence were she to desire it. he thought that he could trace the hands,—or rather the tongues,—through which the calumny had made its way down to the hall. he would at once go to the hall, and tell his uncle all the facts. he would describe the gross ill-usage to which he had been subjected. no doubt he had left the man sprawling upon the pavement, but there had been no sign that the man had been dangerously hurt; and when two days afterward the man had vanished, it was clear that he could not have vanished without legs. had he taken himself off,—as was probable,—then why need harry trouble himself as to his vanishing? if some one else had helped him in escaping,—as was also probable,—why had not that some one come and told the circumstances when all the inquiries were being made? why should he have been expected to speak of the circumstances of such an encounter, which could not have been told but to captain scarborough's infinite disgrace? and he could not have told of it without naming florence mountjoy.
his uncle, when he heard the truth, must acknowledge that he had not behaved badly. and yet harry, as he turned it all in his mind was uneasy as to his own conduct. he could not quite acquit himself in that he had kept secret all the facts of that midnight encounter in the face of the inquiries which had been made, in that he had falsely assured augustus scarborough of his ignorance. and yet he knew that on no consideration would he acknowledge himself to have been wrong.
