Fordham's Feud Part 25

"In that case I should be prepared to allow the people--ar--something to go on with."

"What do you mean precisely by 'something to go on with,' Mr Glover?"

"Well--really now--ar--Mr Fordham. You must excuse my saying so, but you are--ar--I mean this is--"

"Taking a great liberty? I quite understand," was the perfectly unruffled rejoinder. "But then you must remember this, Mr Glover. You broached the subject. You called me into consultation, so to say. You asked me to use my influence with Philip in this matter. I need hardly tell you I have no interest in it one way or the other. We will drop the subject altogether if you like."

"I think you mistake me," said the other, hurriedly. "I did not--ar-- say the words you were good enough to put into my mouth."

"Well, then, you must allow me, Mr Glover, to keep an eye upon my friend's interests. He is very young, remember, a mere thoughtless boy.

Now we, as men of the world, are bound to look at everything from a practical point of view. Let us talk plainly then. How much are you prepared to settle in the event of Philip--er--fulfilling the engagement into which you say he has entered?"

"I should be, as I said before, prepared to make them a fairly liberal allowance," he jerked forth, with the air of a man who has just had a tooth drawn and has found the process less painful than he had expected.

But Fordham shook his head.

"The 'allowance' system is an unsatisfactory one," he said. "I have known people let into queer quandaries by trusting to it. Allowances may be cut off at the mere caprice of the allower. Now, don't be offended," he added, with the shadow of a smile. "We agreed to speak plainly and as men of the world. No--the thing must be a _settlement_.

Now what are you prepared to settle?"

"I think I may say this. I will settle four hundred a year upon them now. At my death of course--Why what is the matter? Is that not enough?"

The last in an astonished and indignant tone. For an almost derisive shake of the head on the part of the other had cut short his words.

"Most certainly not. It is, in fact, ridiculous."

"Many a young couple has begun life on less."

"And many a man has ruined his life by beginning on far more. No. I think my young friend will rate himself at a far higher value than that.

Why there are shoals of women with six times that income who would jump at him."

"And are truth and honour to go for nothing?" spluttered old Glover, swelling himself out with virtuous wrath until the expanse of the white waistcoat was so tight that you could hear the seams crack. "Truth and honour and good faith--and a sweet girl's broken heart?" he repeated, working up a highly effective sniffle.

"My dear sir, you can't run a household, and a milliner, and a dressmaker, and a butcher and baker, and a pocket doctor, and a lawyer-- in fact, an unlimited liability, upon truth and honour; nor can you pay the Queen's taxes with a sweet girl's mended heart. Now, can you?"

"You have a most--ar--peculiar way of putting things, I must say, Mr Fordham. Well, I'll tell you what I'll do--I'll make it five hundred.

There!"

"You might just as well make it five hundred pence, Mr Glover. I can't advise my friend to throw himself away."

"I consider five hundred a year ample," said old Glover, magisterially inserting his thumbs in the arm-holes of his waistcoat. "If he wants more let him work for it. Let him go into some business."

"Why should he? He is young, and has the world at his feet. Why should he grind away at some dingy and uncongenial money-grubbing mill just for the fun of supporting your, or any other man's, daughter. It isn't good enough, and I tell you so candidly. And remember this: he has everything to lose and nothing to gain by the transaction, and with yourselves it is the other way about."

"And what amount would meet your friend's views, Mr Fordham?" was the rejoinder, quick spoken, and with cutting irony.

"He will have a position and t.i.tle to keep up by and by," answered Fordham, tranquilly. "I should say, a capital sum representing three thousand a year--not one farthing less."

Old Glover sprang to his feet with a snort and an activity one would hardly have credited him with. He stared wildly at Fordham, gasped for breath and snorted again. Then he spluttered forth.

"I never heard anything so monstrous--such an outrageous piece of impertinence in my life."

"But, my dear sir, surely I've put the case plain enough--"

"Don't talk to me any more about it, sir," interrupted the other furiously, "I won't hear of such a preposterous suggestion."

"Do I understand that you refuse the condition, then?"

"Most emphatically you may understand that very thing. Three thousand a year--ha--ha! He must be mad! But I tell you what it is, sir," he blared forth, stung by Fordham's cool and indifferent demeanour. "That young scoundrel--yes--that young scoundrel, I say," with a stamp of the foot, "shall be _made_ to fulfil his engagement--shall be made to, I say."

"Shall he? Excuse my reminding you of the old proverb concerning the horse which may be taken to the water."

"Sha'n't he! I'll sue him for breach of promise. I'll claim such swinging damages as never were asked for in a court of law yet. I'll ruin him--yes, I'll ruin him, by G.o.d!"

"You may obtain a few hundreds at the outside. But you said something just now about your daughter's heart being broken. Do you propose to heal that fractured organ by exposing the young lady to the jeers of a not over particular crowd in a public court, and making her the laughing stock of every newspaper reader in the kingdom for the sake of a few hundred pounds?"

"That's _my_ business, sir--that's _my_ business," was the savage reply.

"Even then you will have to prove any specific promise at all. Under the circ.u.mstances this will be a matter of some difficulty, I imagine.

Why not think over the terms I have stated?"

"Never, sir I never! Such unheard-of impudence?" And he fairly danced at the idea.

"Well, then, I've no more to say. In my opinion a man is a fool who ties himself to any woman. A lion might as well make himself the slave of a cat. But when he is expected to embrace the exhilarating career of a mill-horse in order that the dear creature may own a conveniently supporting slave--if he does so, I say, he deserves to be hung on sight.

I shall certainly advise Phil Orlebar not to marry anybody on a cent less than three thousand a year, and I believe he will take my advice."

"Very well, sir. We shall see--we shall see. And, by the way, Mr-- ar--Fordham"--and the trade mind of the successful huckster again rose to the surface--"you are really a most clever advocate, and I must--ar-- congratulate you. But 'nothing for nothing,' you know. Now how much of this fabulous income was to have found its way into your pocket if obtained? Commission, you understand."

There was such a lurid look in Fordham's dark face as he quickly rose to his feet, that even old Glover, dancing with rage, quailed and stepped back a pace or two.

"I must congratulate _you_, Mr Glover, on your good fortune in being an _old_ man at this moment. However," and his tone resumed its normal sarcastic ring. "However, there are no witnesses present so we may as well speak our minds to each other. It is abundantly obvious that you have laid yourselves out to hook young Philip Orlebar, and have done it deucedly clumsily too--so clumsily, that luckily for himself the bird has seen the limed twig in time. Anyhow, to rush him as you have done, and bestow the paternal blessing before it was asked for--in public too--is just the way to choke off irrevocably a youngster of his stamp.

I don't know that there's anything more to be said, except this. Bring your action by all means, but you will find it as hard a matter to prove a specific promise, as you will to persuade any jury that it is not a clear case of trying to entrap the son of a man of position and superior birth."

To convey any idea of old Glover's state as he listened to this harangue, would be impossible. At first he was speechless, and Fordham began to think he was on the verge of apoplexy. Eventually he found his tongue, and the great cliff in the background fairly echoed to the sound of a volley of strange and gurgling oaths. Then the full torrent of his wrath burst forth. He would sue the delinquent Phil--would ruin him-- would sue them both--for conspiracy, libel--what not. There was nothing, in fact, that he would not do--shooting--horse-whipping--every form of violence was enumerated. He should rue the day--every one concerned should rue the day, etc, etc.

But Fordham, lighting a fresh pipe, leaned comfortably back against the rock, and waited with perfect unconcern until this human boiler should have blown off all its steam--or burst--it didn't matter which.

CHAPTER TWENTY.

ON THE SUMMIT.

A narrow apex of solid rock, surrounded by a little cairn of stones and four human figures. And around--what a panorama! Everywhere rolling billowy summits, snowy and hump-like, or rearing up sharp and defined in craggy pinnacles--everywhere they rise--north, south, east, or west, the eye wanders confused over a vast sea of them. Below, a mighty array of snowfields, great ice rivers flowing silently down between their rock-bound walls--divided, separated from each other by stupendous ramparts of cliff and snow. Further down still--far, far beneath the region of ice and snow--a confused labyrinth of tortuous valleys, green, and sprinkled here and there with cl.u.s.ters of brown specks, haply representing a town or village, the faintly glittering star above which resolves itself under the lens of the telescope into the metal-sheathed cupola of a church tower. The very immensity of the panorama is overwhelming in its bewildering vastness. The eye, the senses, are burdened with it--can hardly take it in. The whole world seems to lie spread out around and beneath, for this apex of rock soaring up in mid-air seems in very truth to tower above the rest of the world. It is the summit of the Rothhorn.

The two guides--good representatives of their cla.s.s--with their thoughtful bronzed faces and h.o.r.n.y hands, their quasi-uniform attire of grey frieze, and black-c.o.c.k feather adorned hat--are busily engaged in examining the contents of a bottle, which they have extracted from its snug hiding-place in the heart of the cairn aforesaid--not in the hope of finding it to contain liquid refreshment, let us hasten to explain-- nor are the contents precisely of a solid nature. They are calculated to appeal to the mind rather than the body, for they happen to consist, for the most part, of an a.s.sortment of visiting cards, bearing the names of such climbers as have hitherto gained this alt.i.tude, together with those of their guides, and any other remarks their owners may have seen fit to pencil thereon by way of record.

"Well, Phil? Think my prescription was good enough, eh?" says Fordham, cheerfully. "Worth while undergoing something to get such a view as this?"

But there is no cheerfulness about Philip Orlebar to-day, nor does he seem to take any interest in the view. Sprawling on his back, on the hard rock, with his hands behind his head, he is staring up at the sky-- a phase of observation equally well undertaken at the bottom of a valley, thinks his companion. He merely growls in reply, and relapses into his abstraction.