Mattie:-A Stray Volume I Part 26

"Well, never having seen him before, it is difficult to say. But I have no doubt that there's a difference in him since you met last."

"Let me see--it's five-and-twenty years ago, come next February.

Twenty-five years to nurse a quarrel, and bear enmity in one's heart against him. What a time!"

"He was anxious to tell me the story of that quarrel, sir, but I declined to listen to it."

"I hope you weren't rude."

"Oh! no, sir."

"You have a most unpleasant habit of blurting out anything that comes uppermost. That's your great failing, Sid."

"I like to speak out, sir."

"And after all, perhaps if we had spoken out less--he and I--we should not have been all these years at arm's length, and you might have been the better for that. There's no telling, things turn out so strangely.

And it wasn't so much his refusal to lend me, his only brother, ten thousand pounds--ten drops of water to him--but the way in which he refused, the bitterness of his words, the gall and wormwood instead of brotherly sympathy. I was half mad with my losses, and he stung me with his cool and insolent taunts, and cast me off to beggary--Sid, would you forgive that?"

Mr. Hinchford had realized the scene again; through the mists of five-and-twenty years, it shone forth vividly; his cheek flushed, and his hand smote the table heavily, and made the tea things jump again.

Sidney cooled him by a few words.

"He has been cautious with his money, and you might have shown signs of being reckless with yours, at that time. Possibly you both were heated, and said more than you intended. It don't appear to me to have been a very serious affair, after all."

"Did he ever seek me out again, or care whether I was alive or dead, until to-day?--was that kind?"

"Did you ever seek _him_ out!"

"He was the rich man, and I the poor, Sid."

"Ah! that makes a difference!"

"What would you have done?" he asked anxiously.

"Kept away; not because it was right or politic, but because I inherit my father's pride."

"It's an odd legacy, Sid," remarked the father, mournfully.

"I told him to-night we did not care about his patronage, and could work our way in the world--that at so late an hour, when the worst was over, we would prefer to thank ourselves for the result. I don't say that I was right, father," he added; "but there was a satisfaction in saying so, and in showing that we did not jump at any favour he might think it friendly to concede."

"You're a brave lad," remarked the father, relapsing into thought again; "and perhaps it is as well to show we don't care for him. He talked about my turn next, you say?"

"Yes."

"That means, that he'll never come here again, or make another effort to be friends. Oh! he's as hard as iron when he says a thing, Sid."

"Shall I tell you what I have thought, sir?--it goes against the foolish oath you took, but I think you'll be forgiven for it."

"What have you thought?" he asked with eagerness.

"That it shall be our turn some day--some early day, I hope--to visit him, and say:--'We are in a good position in life, and above all help, shall we be friends again?'"

"To walk into his counting-house, and surprise him?" cried the father; "for me to say:--'I owe all to my son's energy and cleverness, and can afford to face you, without being suspected of wanting your money.'

Well, we ought to bear and forbear; I don't think it would be so very hard to make it up with him!"

It was a subject that discomposed Mr. Hinchford--that kept him restless and disturbed. His son detected this, and brushed all the papers into a heap, thrust them into the recesses of his desk, and began hunting about for the backgammon-board. The past had been ever a subject kept in the background, and of late years his father had not seemed capable of hearing any news, good or bad, with a fair semblance of composure. The change in him had been a matter of regret with Sidney; far off in the distance, perhaps, there might loom a great trouble for him--he almost fancied so at times. Meanwhile, there were troubles nearer than that fancied one--man is born unto them, as the sparks fly upwards.

CHAPTER IV.

PERPLEXITY.

Harriet Wesden had spoken more than once to Mattie of the Eveleighs, a family which plays no part in these pages, although, from Harriet's knowledge of it, every after page of this story will be influenced. A Miss Eveleigh, an only daughter, and a spoiled one, had been a schoolfellow of Harriet's; an intimacy had existed between them in the old days, and when school days were ended for good, a correspondence was kept up, which resulted, eventually, in flying visits to each other's houses--the house in Camberwell, and Miss Eveleigh's residence at New Cross.

Harriet, during the last week or two, had been spending her time at New Cross with the Eveleighs, much to the desolateness of the Camberwell domicile, and the dulness of Master Sidney Hinchford. But the visit was at an end on the morning of the day alluded to in our last chapter, and had it not been for his father's excitability, Sidney, who had mapped his plans out, would have abandoned the backgammon board and a-wooing gone.

It was as well that he did not, for Harriet Wesden at half-past seven in the evening entered the stationer's shop, and surprised Mattie by her late visit.

"Good gracious!" was Mattie's truly feminine e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n, "who would have thought of seeing you to-night? How well you are looking--how glad I am that you have come back--what a colour you have got!"

"Have I?" she said; "ah! it's the sharp frost that's in the streets to-night. Let me deliver father's message, and hurry back before he gets fidgety about me."

Harriet Wesden and Mattie went into the parlour, Mattie taking up her position by the door, so as to command the approach from the street, Harriet sitting by the fire with her head against the chimney-piece. The message was delivered, sundry little account books were wanted at once, and Harriet was to take them back with her; Mattie had to find them in the shop, and make them up into a little parcel for our heroine.

When she returned, Harriet was in the same position, staring very intently at the fire.

"Is anything the matter?" asked our heroine.

"Oh! no--what should be the matter, dear?"

"You're very thoughtful, and it's not exactly your look, Miss Harriet."

"Fancies again, Mattie," remarked Harriet; "I'm only a little tired, having walked from Camberwell."

"I hope you'll not walk back--it's getting late. Unless," she added, archly, "Mr. Sidney up-stairs is to see you safely home. That must be one of the nicest parts of courts.h.i.+p, to go arm-in-arm together about the streets--to feel yourself safe with _him_ at your side."

Harriet's thoughtful demeanour vanished; she gave a merry laugh at the gravity with which Mattie delivered this statement, taunted Mattie with having thoughts of a lover running in her head, darted from that subject to the pleasant fortnight she had been spending with the Eveleighs at New Cross, detailed the particulars of her visit, the people to whom she had been introduced, and lively little incidents connected with them--finally caught up her parcel and bade Mattie good night.

"Ah! you'll wait till I call down Mr. Sidney, I'm sure."

"He'll think that I have called for him. No, I'm going home alone to-night."

"Why, what will he say?"

"Tell him that I was in a hurry, going home by omnibus to save time, and appease father's nervousness about me. I will not have any danglers in my train to-night. I'm in a bad temper--nervous, irritable and excitable--I shall only offend him."

"Then something has----"