The Vicar Of Bullhampton Part 51

"And why not? I cannot see what disgrace there is in coming forward handsomely and telling the truth. When the land was given we thought it was our own. There has come up a shadow of a doubt, and sooner than be in the wrong, we give another site and take all the expense.

I think that would be the right sort of thing to do."

Lord Saint George returned to town two days afterwards, and the Marquis was left with the dilemma on his mind. Lord Saint George, though he would frequently interfere in matters connected with the property in the manner described, would never dictate and seldom insist. He had said what he had got to say, and the Marquis was left to act for himself. But the old lord had learned to feel that he was sure to fall into some pit whenever he declined to follow his son's advice. His son had a painful way of being right that was a great trouble to him. And this was a question which touched him very nearly. It was not only that he must yield to Mr. Fenwick before the eyes of Mr. Puddleham and all the people of Bullhampton; but that he must confess his own ignorance as to the borders of his own property, and must abandon a bit of land which he believed to belong to the Stowte estate. Now, if there was a point in his religion as to which Lord Trowbridge was more staunch than another, it was as to the removal of landmarks. He did not covet his neighbour's land; but he was most resolute that no stranger should, during his reign, ever possess a rood of his own.

CHAPTER XLIV.

THE MARRABLES OF DUNRIPPLE.

"If I were to go, there would be n.o.body left but you. You should remember that, Walter, when you talk of going to India." This was said to Walter Marrable at Dunripple, by his cousin Gregory, Sir Gregory's only son.

"And if I were to die in India, as I probably shall, who will come next?"

"There is n.o.body to come next for the t.i.tle."

"But for the property?"

"As it stands at present, if you and I were to die before your father and uncle John, the survivor of them would be the last in the entail.

If they, too, died, and the survivor of us all left no will, the property would go to Mary Lowther. But that is hardly probable. When my grandfather made the settlement, on my father's marriage, he had four sons living."

"Should my father have the handling of it I would not give much for anybody's chance after him," said Walter.

"If you were to marry there would, of course, be a new settlement as to your rights. Your father could do no harm except as your heir,--unless, indeed, he were heir to us all. My uncle John will outlive him, probably."

"My uncle John will live for ever, I should think," said Walter Marrable.

This conversation took place between the two cousins when Walter had been already two or three weeks at Dunripple. He had come there intending to stay over two or three days, and he had already accepted an invitation to make the house his home as long as he should remain in England. He had known but little of his uncle and nothing of his cousin, before this visit was made. He had conceived them to be unfriendly to him, having known them to be always unfriendly to his father. He was, of course, aware,--very well aware now, since he had himself suffered so grievously from his father's dishonesty,--that the enmity which had reached them from Dunripple had been well deserved. Colonel Marrable had, as a younger brother, never been content with what he was able to extract from the head of the family, who was, in his eyes, a milch cow that never ought to run dry. With Walter Marrable there had remained a feeling adverse to his uncle and cousin, even after he had been forced to admit to himself how many and how grievous were the sins of his own father. He had believed that the Dunripple people were stupid, and prejudiced, and selfish; and it had only been at the instance of his uncle, the parson, that he had consented to make the visit. He had gone there, and had been treated, at any rate, with affectionate consideration. And he had found the house to be not unpleasant, though very quiet. Living at Dunripple there was a Mrs. Brownlow, a widowed sister of the late Lady Marrable, with her daughter, Edith Brownlow. Previous to this time Walter Marrable had never even heard of the Brownlows, so little had he known about Dunripple; and when he arrived there it had been necessary to explain to him who these people were.

He had found his uncle, Sir Gregory, to be much such a man as he had expected in outward appearance and mode of life. The baronet was old and disposed to regard himself as ent.i.tled to all the indulgences of infirmity. He rose late, took but little exercise, was very particular about what he ate, and got through his day with the a.s.sistance of his steward, his novel, and occasionally of his doctor.

He slept a great deal, and was never tired of talking of himself.

Occupation in life he had none, but he was a charitable, honourable man, who had high ideas of what was due to others. His son, however, had astonished Walter considerably. Gregory Marrable the younger was a man somewhat over forty, but he looked as though he were sixty. He was very tall and thin, narrow in the chest, and so round in the shoulders as to appear to be almost humpbacked. He was so short-sighted as to be nearly blind, and was quite bald. He carried his head so forward that it looked as though it were going to fall off. He shambled with his legs, which seemed never to be strong enough to carry him from one room to another; and he tried them by no other exercise, for he never went outside the house except when, on Sundays and some other very rare occasions, he would trust himself to be driven in a low pony-phaeton. But in one respect he was altogether unlike his father. His whole time was spent among his books, and he was at this moment engaged in revising and editing a very long and altogether unreadable old English chronicle in rhyme, for publication by one of those learned societies which are rife in London. Of Robert of Gloucester, and William Langland, of Andrew of Wyntown and the Lady Juliana Berners, he could discourse, if not with eloquence, at least with enthusiasm. Chaucer was his favourite poet, and he was supposed to have read the works of Gower in English, French, and Latin. But he was himself apparently as old as one of his own black-letter volumes, and as unfit for general use. Walter could hardly regard him as a cousin, declaring to himself that his uncle the parson, and his own father were, in effect, younger men than the younger Gregory Marrable. He was never without a cough, never well, never without various ailments and troubles of the flesh,--of which, however, he himself made but slight account, taking them quite as a matter of course. With such inmates the house no doubt would have been dull, had there not been women there to enliven it.

By degrees, too, and not by slow degrees, the new comer found that he was treated as one of the family,--found that, after a certain fas.h.i.+on, he was treated as the heir to the family. Between him and the t.i.tle and the estate there were but the lives of four old men.

Why had he not known that this was so before he had allowed himself to be separated from Mary Lowther? But he had known nothing of it,--had thought not at all about it. There had been another Marrable, of the same generation with himself, between him and the succession, who might marry and have children, and he had not regarded his heirs.h.i.+p as being likely to have any effect, at any rate upon his early life. It had never occurred to him that he need not go to India, because he would probably outlive four old gentlemen and become Sir Walter Marrable and owner of Dunripple.

Nor would he have looked at the matter in that light now had not his cousin forced the matter upon him. Not a word was said to him at Dunripple about Mary Lowther, but very many words were said about his own condition. Gregory Marrable strongly advised him against going to India,--so strongly that Walter was surprised to find that such a man would have so much to say on such a subject. The young captain, in such circ.u.mstances, could not very well explain that he was driven to follow his profession in a fas.h.i.+on so disagreeable to him because, although he was heir to Dunripple, he was not near enough to it to be ent.i.tled to any allowance from its owner; but he felt that that would have been the only true answer when it was proposed to him to stay in England because he would some day become Sir Walter Marrable. But he did plead the great loss which he had encountered by means of his father's ill-treatment of him, and endeavoured to prove to his cousin that there was no alternative before him but to serve in some quarter of the globe in which his pay would be sufficient for his wants.

"Why should you not sell out, or go on half-pay, and remain here and marry Edith Brownlow?" said his cousin.

"I don't think I could do that," said Walter, slowly.

"Why not? There is nothing my father would like so much." Then he was silent for awhile, but, as his cousin made no further immediate reply, Gregory Marrable went on with his plan. "Ten years ago, when she was not much more than a little girl, and when it was first arranged that she should come here, my father proposed--that I should marry her."

"And why didn't you?"

The elder cousin smiled and shook his head, and coughed aloud as he smiled. "Why not, indeed? Well; I suppose you can see why not.

I was an old man almost before she was a young woman. She is just twenty-four now, and I shall be dead, probably, in two years' time."

"Nonsense."

"Twice since that time I have been within an inch of dying. At any rate, even my father does not look to that any longer."

"Is he fond of Miss Brownlow?"

"There is no one in the world whom he loves so well. Of course an old man loves a young woman best. It is natural that he should do so. He never had a daughter; but Edith is the same to him as his own child.

Nothing would please him so much as that she should be the mistress of Dunripple."

"I'm afraid that it cannot be so," said Walter.

"But why not? There need be no India for you then. If you would do that you would be to my father exactly as though you were his son.

Your father might, of course, outlive my father, and no doubt will outlive me, and then for his life he will have the place, but some arrangement could be made so that you should continue here."

"I'm afraid it cannot be so," said Walter. Many thoughts were pa.s.sing through his mind. Why had he not known that these good things were so near to him before he had allowed Mary Lowther to go off from him?

And, had it chanced that he had visited Dunripple before he had gone to Loring, how might it have been between him and this other girl?

Edith Brownlow was not beautiful, not grand in her beauty as was Mary Lowther; but she was pretty, soft, lady-like, with a sweet dash of quiet pleasant humour,--a girl who certainly need not be left begging about the world for a husband. And this life at Dunripple was pleasant enough. Though the two elder Marrables were old and infirm, Walter was allowed to do just as he pleased in the house. He was encouraged to hunt. There was shooting for him if he wished it. Even the servants about the place, the gamekeeper, the groom, and the old butler, seemed to have recognised him as the heir. There would have been so comfortable an escape from the dilemma into which his father had brought him,--had he not made his visit to Loring.

"Why not?" demanded Gregory Marrable.

"A man cannot become attached to a girl by order, and what right have I to suppose that she would accept me?"

"Of course she would accept you. Why not? Everybody around her would be in your favour. And as to not falling in love with her, I declare I do not know a sweeter human being in the world than Edith Brownlow."

Before the hunting season was over Captain Marrable had abandoned his intention of going to India, and had made arrangements for serving for awhile with his regiment in England. This he did after a discussion of some length with his uncle, Sir Gregory. During that discussion nothing was said about Edith Brownlow, and of course, not a word was said about Mary Lowther. Captain Marrable did not even know whether his uncle or his cousin was aware that that engagement had ever existed. Between him and his uncle there had never been an allusion to his marriage, but the old man had spoken of his nearness to the property, and had expressed his regret that the last heir, the only heir likely to perpetuate the name and t.i.tle, should take himself to India in the pride of his life. He made no offer as to money, but he told his nephew that there was a home for him if he would give up his profession, or a retreat whenever his professional duties might allow him to visit it. Horses should be kept for him, and he should be treated in every way as a son of the family.

"Take my father at his word," said Gregory Marrable. "He will never let you be short of money."

After much consideration Walter Marrable did take Sir Gregory at his word, and abandoned for ever all idea of a further career in India.

As soon as he had done this he wrote to Mary Lowther to inform her of his decision. "It does seem hard," he said in his letter, "that an arrangement which is in so many respects desirable, should not have been compatible with one which is so much more desirable." But he made no renewed offer. Indeed he felt that he could not do so at the present moment, in honesty either to his cousin or to his uncle, as he had accepted their hospitality and acceded to the arrangements which they had proposed without any word on his part of such intention. A home had been offered to him at Dunripple,--to him in his present condition, but certainly not a home to any wife whom he might bring there, nor a home to the family which might come afterwards. He thought that he was doing the best that he could with himself by remaining in England, and the best also towards a possible future renewal of his engagement with Mary Lowther. But of that he said nothing in his letter to her. He merely told her the fact as it regarded himself, and told that somewhat coldly. Of Edith Brownlow, and of the proposition in regard to her, of course he said nothing.

It was the intention both of Sir Gregory and his son that the new inmate of the house should marry Edith. The old man, who, up to a late date had with weak persistency urged the match upon his son, had taken up the idea from the very first arrival of his nephew at Dunripple. Such an arrangement would solve all the family difficulties, and would enable him to provide for Edith as though she were indeed his daughter. He loved Edith dearly, but he could not bear that she should leave Dunripple, and it had grieved him sorely when he reflected that in coming years Dunripple must belong to relatives of whom he knew nothing that was good, and that Edith Brownlow must be banished from the house. If his son would have married Edith, all might have been well, but even Sir Gregory was at last aware that no such marriage as that could take place. Then had come the quarrel between the Colonel and the Captain, and the latter had been taken into favour. Colonel Marrable would not have been allowed to put his foot inside Dunripple House, so great was the horror which he had created. And the son had been feared too as long as the father and son were one. But now the father, who had treated the whole family vilely, had treated his own son most vilely, and therefore the son had been received with open arms. If only he could be trusted with Edith,--and if Edith and he might be made to trust each other,--all might be well. Of the engagement between Walter and Mary Lowther no word had ever reached Dunripple. Twice or thrice in the year a letter would pa.s.s between Parson John and his nephew, Gregory Marrable, but such letters were very short, and the parson was the last man in the world to spread the t.i.ttle-tattle of a love-story. He had always known that that affair would lead to nothing, and that the less said about it the better.

Walter Marrable was to join his regiment at Windsor before the end of April. When he wrote to Mary Lowther to tell her of his plans he had only a fortnight longer for remaining in idleness at Dunripple.

The hunting was over, and his life was simply idle. He perceived, or thought that he perceived, that all the inmates of the house, and especially his uncle, expected that he would soon return to them, and that they spoke of his work of soldiering as of a thing that was temporary. Mrs. Brownlow, who was a quiet woman, very reticent, and by no means inclined to interfere with things not belonging to her, had suggested that he would soon be with them again, and the housekeeper had given him to understand that his room was not to be touched. And then, too, he thought that he saw that Edith Brownlow was specially left in his way. If that were so it was necessary that the eyes of some one of the Dunripple party should be opened to the truth.

He was walking home with Miss Brownlow across the park from church one Sunday morning. Sir Gregory never went to church; his age was supposed to be too great, or his infirmities too many. Mrs. Brownlow was in the pony carriage driving her nephew, and Walter Marrable was alone with Edith. There had been some talk of cousins.h.i.+p,--of the various relations.h.i.+ps of the family, and the like,--and of the way in which the Marrables were connected. They two, Walter and Edith, were not cousins. She was related to the family only by her aunt's marriage, and yet, as she said, she had always heard more of the Marrables than of the Brownlows.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Sunday Morning at Dunripple.]

"You never saw Mary Lowther?" Walter asked.

"Never."

"But you have heard of her?"