Jane nodded. “That, and nothing less. He looks after the estate and is paid a hundred pounds a-year salary, and we live rent free. Lately he has taken something else, something different; the agency of some new patent agricultural implements.”
Oliver Preen looked very blank. He had been living the life of a gentleman, was imbued with a gentleman’s notions, and this news brought him the most intense mortification.
“He will expect you to help him in the Buttery,” continued Jane.
“In the what?”
“The Buttery,” laughed Jane. “It is the room where papa keeps his accounts and writes his letters. Letters come in nearly every morning now, inquiring about the new agricultural implements; papa has to answer them, and wants some of his answers copied.”
“And he has only a hundred a year!” murmured Oliver, unable to get over that one item of information. “Aunt Emily had from eight to nine hundred, and lived up to her income.”
“The worst is that we cannot spend all the hundred. Papa has back debts upon him. Have you brought home any money, Oliver?”
“None to speak of,” he answered; “there was none to bring. Aunt Emily’s next quarter’s instalment would have been due this week; but she died first, you see. She lived in a furnished house; and as to the few things she had of her own, and her personal trinkets, Aunt Margaret Preen came down and swooped upon them. Jane, how have you managed to put up with the lively state of affairs here?”
“And this lively spot—the fag-end of the world. It was Emma Paul first called it so. I put up with it because I can’t help myself, Oliver.”
“Who is Emma Paul?”
“The daughter of Lawyer Paul, of Islip.”
“Oh,” said Oliver, slightingly.
“And the nicest girl in the world,” added Jane. “But I can tell you this much, Oliver,” she continued, after a pause: “when we came first to Duck Brook it seemed to me as a haven of refuge. Our life in Jersey had become intolerable, our life here was peaceful—no angry creditors, no daily applications for debts that we could not pay. Here we were free and happy, and it gave me a liking for the place. It is dull, of course; but I go pretty often to see Emma Paul, or to take tea at Mrs. Jacob Chandler’s, and at Crabb Cot when the Todhetleys are staying there. Sam brings the gig for me in the evening, when I don’t walk home. You will have to bring it for me now.”
“Oh, there’s a gig, is there?”
“Papa has to keep that for his own use in going about the land: sometimes he rides.”
“Are the debts in Jersey paid, Jane?”
A shadow passed over her face, and her voice dropped to a whisper.
“No. It makes me feel very unhappy sometimes, half-frightened. Of course papa hopes he shall not be found out here. But he seems to have also two or three old debts in this neighbourhood, and those he is paying off.”
The sun, setting right before them in a sea of red clouds, fell upon their faces and lighted up the sadness of Oliver’s. Then the red ball sank, on its way to cheer and illumine another part of the world, leaving behind it the changes which set in after sunset. The bright stream became grey, the osiers bordering it grew dark. Oliver shook himself. The whole place to him wore a strange air of melancholy. It was early evening yet, for the month was only February; but the spring had come in with a kindly mood, and the weather was bright.
Rising from the bench, they slowly walked up the nearest Inlet, side by side, and gained the high road just as a pony-chaise was passing by, an elderly gentleman and a young lady in it; Mr. and Miss Paul.
“Oh, papa, please pull up!” cried the girl. “There’s Jane Preen.”
She leaped out, almost before the pony had stopped, and ran to the pathway with outstretched hands.
“How pleasant that we should meet you, Jane! Papa has been taking me for a drive this afternoon.”
Oliver stood apart, behind his sister, looking and listening. The speaker was one of the prettiest girls he had ever seen, with a blushing, dimpled face, a smiling mouth displaying small white teeth, shy blue eyes, and bright hair. Her straw hat had blue ribbons and her dress was one of light silk. Never in his life, thought Oliver, had he seen so sweet a face or heard so sweet a voice.
“Have you been for a walk?” she asked of Jane.
“No,” answered Jane. “We have been down the Inlet, and sitting to watch the sun set. This is my brother, Emma, of whom you have heard. He arrived this afternoon, and has left Tours. Will you allow me to introduce him to you? Oliver, this is Miss Paul.”
Mr. Oliver Preen was about to execute a deep bow at a respectful distance, after the manner of the fashionable blades of Tours, and swung off his hat to begin with; but Emma Paul, who was not fashionable at all, but sociable, inexperienced and unpretending, held out her hand. She liked his looks; a slender young fellow, in deep mourning, with a fair, mild, pleasing face.
“Papa,” she said, turning to the gig, which had drawn up close to the foot-path, “this is Mr. Oliver Preen, from France. He has come home, Jane says.”
John Paul, a portly, elderly gentleman, with iron-grey hair and a face that looked stern to those who did not know him, bent forward and shook hands with the stranger.
Emma began plunging into all sorts of gossip, for she liked nothing better than to talk. Jane liked it too.
“I have been telling Oliver we call Duck Brook the fag end of the world, and that it was you who first said it,” cried Jane.
“Oh, how could you?” laughed Emma, turning her beaming face upon Oliver. And they might have gone on for ever, if left alone; but Mr. Paul reminded his daughter that it was growing late, and he wanted to get home to dinner. So she lightly stepped into the low chaise, Oliver Preen assisting her, and they drove off, Emma calling to Jane not to forget that they were engaged to drink tea at North Villa on the morrow.
“What’s Preen going to do with that young fellow?” wondered the lawyer, as he drove on.
“I’m sure I don’t know, papa,” said Emma. “Take him into the Buttery, perhaps.”
Old Paul laughed a little at the idea. “Not much more work there than Preen can do himself, I expect.”
“When I last saw Jane she said she thought her brother might be coming home. It may be only for a visit, you know.”
Old Paul nodded, and touched up the pony.
Oliver stood in the pathway gazing after the chaise until it was out of sight. “What a charming girl!” he cried to his sister. “I never saw one so unaffected in all my life.”
II
If the reader has chanced to read the two papers entitled “Chandler and Chandler,” he may be able to recall North Villa, and those who lived in it.
It stood in the Islip Road—hardly a stone’s throw from Crabb Cot. Jacob Chandler’s widow lived in it with her three daughters. She was empty-headed, vain, frivolous, always on the high ropes when in company, wanting to give people the impression that she had been as good as born a duchess: whereas everyone knew she had sprung from small tradespeople in Birmingham. The three daughters, Clementina, Georgiana, Julietta, took after her, and were as fine as their names.
But you have heard of them before—and of the wrong inflicted by their father, Jacob Chandler, upon his brother’s widow and son. The solicitor’s business at Islip had been made by the elder brother, Thomas Chandler; he had taken Jacob into partnership, and given him a half share without cross or coin of recompense: and when Thomas died from an accident, leaving his only son Tom in the office to succeed him when he should be of age, Jacob refused to carry out the behest. Ignoring past obligations, all sense of right or wrong, he made his own son Valentine his partner in due course of time, condemning Tom, though a qualified solicitor, to remain his clerk.
It’s true that when Jacob Chandler lay on his death-bed, the full sense of what he had done came home to him: any glaring injustice we may have been committing in our lives does, I fancy, often take hold of the conscience at that dread time: and he enjoined his son Valentine to give Tom his due—a full partnership. Valentine having his late father’s example before him (for Jacob died), did nothing of the kind. “I’ll raise your salary, Tom,” said he, “but I cannot make you my partner.” So Tom, thinking he had put up with injustice long enough, quitted Valentine there and then. John Paul, the other Islip lawyer, was only too glad to secure Tom for his own office; he made him his manager and paid him a good salary.
About two years had gone on since then. Tom Chandler, a very fine young fellow, honest and good-natured, was growing more and more indispensable to Mr. Paul; Valentine was growing (if the expression may be used) downwards. For Valentine, who had been an indulged son, and only made to work when he pleased, had picked up habits of idleness, and other habits that we are told in our copy-books idleness begets. Gay, handsome, pleasant-mannered, with money always in his pocket, one of those young men sure to be courted, Valentine had grown fonder of pleasure than of work: he liked his game at billiards; worse than that, he liked his glass. When a client came in, ten to one but a clerk had to make a rush to the Bell Inn opposite, to fetch his master; and it sometimes happened that Valentine would not return quite steady. The result was, that his practice was gradually leaving him, to be given to Mr. Paul. All this was telling upon Valentine’s mother; she had an ever-haunting dread of the poverty which might result in the future, and was only half as pretentious as she used to be.
Her daughters did not allow their minds to be disturbed by anxiety as yet; the young are less anxious than the old. When she dropped a word of apprehension in their hearing, they good-humouredly said mamma was fidgety—Valentine would be all right; if a little gay now it was only what other young men were. It was a pleasant house to visit, for the girls were gay and hospitable; though they did bedeck themselves like so many peacocks, and put on airs and graces.
Jane Preen found it pleasant; had found it so long ago; and she introduced Oliver to it, who liked it because he sometimes met Emma Paul there. It took a very short time indeed after that first meeting by the Inlets for him to be over head and ears in love with her. Thus some weeks went on.
More pure and ardent love than that young fellow’s for Emma was never felt by man or woman. It filled his every thought, seemed to sanctify his dreary days at Duck Brook, and made a heaven of his own heart. He would meet her at North Villa, would encounter her sometimes in her walks, now and then saw her at her own house at Islip. Not often—old Mr. Paul did not particularly care for the Preens, and rarely gave Emma leave to invite them.
Emma did not care for him. She had not found out that he cared for her. A remarkably open, pleasant girl in manner, to him as to all the world, she met him always with frank cordiality—and he mistook that natural cordiality for a warmer feeling. Had Emma Paul suspected his love for her she would have turned from it in dismay; she was no coquette, and all the first love of her young heart was privately given to someone else.
At this time there was a young man in Mr. Paul’s office named Richard MacEveril. He was a nephew of Captain MacEveril of Oak Mansion—a pretty place near Islip. Captain MacEveril—a retired captain in the Royal Navy—had a brother settled in Australia. When this brother died, his only son, Richard, came over to his relatives, accompanied by a small income, about enough to keep him in coats and waistcoats.
The arrival very much put out Captain MacEveril. He was a good-hearted man, but afflicted with gout in the feet, and irascible when twinges took him. Naturally the question arose to his mind—how was he to put Richard in the way of getting bread and cheese. Richard seemed to have less idea of how it was to be done than his uncle and aunt had. They told him he must go back to Australia and find a living there. Richard objected; said he had only just left it, and did not like Australia. Upon the captain’s death, whenever that should take place, Richard would come into a small estate of between two and three hundred a-year, of which nothing could deprive him; for Captain MacEveril had no son; only a daughter, who would be rich through her mother.
Richard was a gay-mannered young fellow and much liked, but he was not very particular. He played billiards at the Bell Inn with Valentine Chandler, with young Scott, and with other idlers; he hired horses, and dashed across country on their backs; he spent money in all ways. When his own ready money was gone he went into debt, and people came to the Captain to ask him to liquidate it. This startled and angered the old post-captain as no twinge of gout had ever yet done.
“Something must be done with Dick,” said Mrs. MacEveril.
“Of course it must,” her husband wrathfully retorted; “but what the deuce is it to be?”
“Can’t you get John Paul to take him into his office as a temporary thing? It would keep him out of mischief.”
Mrs. MacEveril’s suggestion bore fruit. For the present, until something eligible should “turn up,” Dick was placed in the lawyer’s office as a copying clerk. Mr. Paul made a favour of taking him in; but he and Captain MacEveril had been close friends for many a year. Dick wrote a bold, clear hand, good for copying deeds.
He and Oliver became intimate. It is said that a fellow-feeling makes us wondrous kind, and they could feel for one another. Both were down in life, both had poverty-stricken pockets. They were of the same age, twenty-one, and in appearance were not dissimilar—fair of face, slight in person.
So that Oliver Preen needed no plea for haunting Islip three or four times a week. “He went over to see Dick MacEveril,” would have been his answer had any inquisitive body inquired what he did there: while, in point of fact, he went hoping to see Emma Paul—if by delightful chance he might obtain that boon.
Thus matters were going on: Oliver, shut up the earlier part of the day in the Buttery with his father, answering letters, and what not; in the latter part of it he would be at Islip, or perhaps with Jane at North Villa. Sometimes they would walk home together; or, if they could have the gig, Oliver drove his sister back in it. But for the love he bore Emma, he would have found his life intolerable; nothing but depression, mortification, disappointment: but when Love takes up its abode in the heart the dreariest lot becomes one of sunshine.
III
The garden attached to North Villa was large and very old-fashioned: a place crowded with trees and shrubs, intersected with narrow paths and homely flowers. The Malvern hills could be seen in the distance, as beautiful a sight in the early morning, with the lights and shadows lying upon them, as the world can show.
It was summer now, nearly midsummer. The garish day was fading, the summer moon had risen, its round shield so delicately pale as to look like silver; and Valentine Chandler was pacing the garden with Jane Preen in the moonlight. They had been singing a duet together at the piano, “I’ve wandered in dreams,” and he had taken the accompaniment. He played well; and never living man had sweeter voice than he. They were wandering in dreams of their own, those two, had been for some time now.
Silence between them as they paced the walk; a sort of discomforting, ominous silence. Valentine broke it.
“Why don’t you reproach me, Jane?”
“Do I ever reproach you?” she answered.
“No. But you ought to do so.”
“If you would only keep your promises, Valentine!”
Young Mr. Valentine Chandler, having stayed his steps while they spoke, backed against the corner of the latticed arbour, which they were just then passing. The same arbour in which his aunt, Mrs. Mary Ann Cramp, had sat in her copper-coloured silk gown to convict her brother Jacob, Valentine’s father, of his sins against Tom Chandler, one Sunday afternoon, not so very long gone by.
Val did not answer. He seemed to be staring at the moon, to investigate what it was made of. In reality he saw no moon; neither moon, nor sky above, nor any earthly thing beneath; he only saw his own reckless folly in his mind’s clouded mirror.
“You know you do make promises, Valentine!”
“And when I make them I fully mean to keep them; but a lot of idle fellows get hold of me, and—and—I can’t,” said he, in a savage tone.
“But you might,” said Jane. “If I made promises I should keep them to you—whatever the temptation.”
“I cannot think who it is that comes tattling to you about me, Jane! Is it Oliver?”
“Oliver! Never. Oliver does not know, or suspect—anything.”
“Then it must be those confounded girls indoors!”
“Nor they, either. It is not anyone in particular, Valentine; but I hear one and another talking about you.”
“I should like to know what they say. You must tell me, Jane.”
Jane caught her breath, as if she did not like to answer. But Valentine was waiting.
“They say you are not steady, Val,” she spoke in a whisper; “that you neglect your business; that unless you pull up, you will go to the bad.”
For a few moments Valentine remained quite still; you might have thought he had gone to sleep. Then he put out his hand, drew Jane gently to him, and bent down his head to her with a long-drawn sigh.
“I will pull up, Jane. It is not as bad as story-tellers make out. But I will pull up; I promise you; and I’ll begin from this day.”
Jane Preen did not like to remind him that he had said the same thing many times before; rather would she trust to his renewed word. When a girl is in love, she has faith in modern miracles.
Valentine held her to him very closely. “You believe me, don’t you, my darling?”
“Yes,” she whispered.
Down came a voice to them from some remote path near the house, that was anything but a whisper. “Jane! Jane Preen! Are you in the garden? or are you upstairs with Julietta?”
Jane stole swiftly forward. “I am here, Clementina—it is cool and pleasant in the night air. Do you want me?”
“Your boy is asking how long he is to wait. The horse is fresh this evening, and won’t stand.”
“Has the gig come!” exclaimed Jane, as she met Miss Clementina. “And has Sam brought it! Why not Oliver?”
Clementina Chandler shook her head and the yellow ribbons which adorned it, intimating that she did not know anything about Oliver. It was the servant boy, Sam, who had brought the gig.
Jane hastily put on her bonnet and scarf, said good night, and was helped into the gig by Valentine—who gave her hand a tender squeeze as they drove off.
“Where is Mr. Oliver?” she inquired of Sam.
“Mr. Oliver was out, Miss Jane. As it was getting late, the missis told me to get the gig ready, and bring it.”
After that, Jane was silent, thinking about Valentine and his renewed promises. It might be that the air was favourable to love catching: anyway, both the young Preens had fallen desperately into it; Jane with Valentine Chandler and Oliver with Emma Paul.
Duck Brook was soon reached, for the horse was swift that evening. On the opposite side of the road to the Inlets, was a large field, in which the grass was down and lying in cocks, the sweet smell of the hay perfuming the air of the summer night. Leaping across this field and then over its five-barred gate into the road, came Oliver Preen. Jane, seeing him, had no need to wonder where he had been.
For across this field and onwards, as straight as the crow flies, was a near way to Islip. Active legs, such as Oliver’s, might get over the ground in twenty minutes, perhaps in less. But there was no path, or right of way; he had to push through hedges and charge private grounds, with other impediments attending. Thomas Chandler, Conveyancer and Attorney-at-law, had laughingly assured Oliver that if caught using that way, he would of a surety be had up before the justices of the peace for trespass.
“Stop here, Sam,” said Jane. “I will get out now.”
Sam stopped the gig, and Jane got down. She joined her brother, and the boy drove on to the stables.
“It was too bad, Oliver, not to come for me!” she cried.
“I meant to be home in time; I did indeed, Jane,” he answered; “but somehow the evening slipped on.”
“Were you at Mr. Paul’s?”
“No; I was with MacEveril.”
“At billiards, I suppose!—and it’s very foolish of you, Oliver, for you know you can’t afford billiards.”
“I can’t afford anything, Janey, as it seems to me,” returned Oliver, kicking up the dust in the road as they walked along. “Billiards don’t cost much; it’s only the tables: anyway, MacEveril paid for all.”
“Has MacEveril talked any more about going away?”
“He talks of nothing else; is full of it,” answered Oliver. “His uncle says he is not to go; and old Paul stopped him at the first half-word, saying he could not be spared from the office. Dick says he shall start all the same, leave or no leave.”
“Dick will be very silly to go just now, when we are about to be so gay,” remarked Jane, “There’s the picnic coming off; and the dance at Mrs. Jacob Chandler’s; and no end of tea-parties.”
For just now the neighbourhood was putting on a spurt of gaiety, induced to it perhaps by the lovely summer sunshine. Oliver’s face wore a look of gloom, and he made no answer to Jane’s remark. Several matters, cross and contrary, were trying Oliver Preen; not the least of them that he seemed to make no way whatever with Miss Emma.
When we left school for the midsummer holidays that year, Mr. and Mrs. Todhetley were staying at Crabb Cot. We got there on Friday, the eleventh of June.
On the following Monday morning the Squire went to his own small sitting-room after breakfast to busy himself with his accounts and papers. Presently I heard him call me.
“Have you a mind for a walk, Johnny?”
“Yes, sir; I should be glad of one.” Tod had gone to the Whitneys for a couple of days, and without him I felt like a fish out of water.
“Well, I want you to go as far as Massock’s. He is a regular cheat; that man, Johnny, needs looking after– What is it, Thomas?”
For old Thomas had come in, a card between his fingers. “It’s Mr. Gervais Preen, sir,” he said, in answer, putting the card on the Squire’s table. “Can you see him?”
“Oh, yes, I can see him; show him in. Wait a bit, though, Thomas,” broke off the Squire. “Johnny, I expect Preen has come about that pony. I suppose we may as well keep him?”
“Tod said on Saturday, sir, that we should not do better,” I answered. “He tried him well, and thinks he is worth the price.”
“Ay; ten pounds, wasn’t it? We’ll keep him, then. Mr. Preen can come in, Thomas.”
Some few days before this the Squire had happened to say in Preen’s hearing that he wanted a pony for the two children to ride, Hugh and Lena. Preen caught up the words, saying he had one for sale—a very nice pony, sound and quiet. So the pony had been sent to Crabb Cot upon trial, and we all liked him. His name was Taffy.
Mr. Preen came into the room, his small face cool and dark as usual; he had driven from Duck Brook. “A fine morning,” he remarked, as he sat down; but it would be fiery hot by-and-by, too hot for the middle of June, and we should probably pay for it later. The Squire asked if he would take anything, but he declined.
“What of the pony—Taffy—Squire?” went on Mr. Preen. “Do you like him?”
“Yes, we like him very well,” said the Squire, heartily, “and we mean to keep him, Preen.”
“All right,” said Mr. Preen. “You will not repent it.”
Then they fell to talking of horses in general, and of other topics. I stayed on, sitting by the window, not having received the message for Massock. Mr. Preen stayed also, making no move to go away; when it suddenly occurred to the Squire—he mentioned it later—that perhaps Preen might be waiting for the money.
“Ten pounds, I think, was the price agreed upon,” observed the Squire with ready carelessness. “Would you like to be paid now?”
“If it does not inconvenience you.”
The Squire unlocked his shabby old bureau, which stood against the wall, fingered his stock of money, and brought forth a ten-pound bank-note. This he handed to Preen, together with a sheet of paper, that he might give a receipt.
When the receipt was written, Mr. Preen took up the note, looked at it for a moment or two, and then passed it back again.
“Would you mind writing your name on this note, Squire?”
The Squire laughed gently. “Not at all,” he answered; “but why should I? Do you think it is a bad one? No fear, Preen; I had it from the Old Bank at Worcester.”
“No, I do not fear that,” said Preen, speaking quietly. “But since a disagreeable trouble which happened to me some years ago, I have always liked, when receiving a bank-note, to get, if possible, the donor’s name upon it in his own handwriting.”
“What was the trouble?”
“I was playing cards at the house of a man of fashion, who was brother to an earl, and lived in a fashionable square at the West End of London, and I had a ten-pound note paid me, for I won, by a man who, I understood, had recently retired with honours from the army, a Major D–. I will not give you his name. The next day, or next but one, I paid this note away to a tradesman, and it was found to be forged; cleverly forged,” repeated Preen, with emphasis.
“What did you do?” asked the Squire.
“I got Major D.’s address from the house where we had played, carried the note to him, and inquired what it meant and whence he got it. Will you believe, Mr. Todhetley,” added the speaker, with slight agitation, “that the man utterly repudiated the note, saying–”
“But how could he repudiate it?” interrupted the Squire, interested in the tale.
“He said it was not the note he had paid me; he stood it out in the most impudent manner. I told him, and it was the pure truth, that it was impossible there could be any mistake. I was a poor man, down on my luck just then, and it was the only note I had had about me for some time past. All in vain. He held to it that it was not the note, and there the matter ended. I could not prove that it was the note except by my bare word. It was my word against his, you see, and naturally I went to the wall.”
The Squire nodded. “Who was at the loss of the money?”
“I was. Besides that, I had the cold shoulder turned upon me. Major D. was believed; I was doubted; some people went so far as to say I must have trumped up the tale. For some time after that I would not take a bank-note from any man unless he put his signature to it, and it has grown into a habit with me. So, if you don’t mind, Squire–”
The Squire smiled goodnaturedly, drew the bank-note to him, and wrote upon the back in a corner, “J. Todhetley.”
“There, Preen,” said he, returning it, “I won’t repudiate that. Couldn’t if I would.”
Mr. Preen put the note into his pocket-book, and rose to leave. We strolled with him across the front garden to the gate, where his gig was waiting.
“I have to go as far as Norton; and possibly after that on to Stoulton,” he remarked, as he took the reins in his hand and got in.
“You will have a hot drive of it,” said the Squire.
“Yes; but if one undertakes business it must be attended to,” said Preen, as he drove off.