The Way We Live Now Part 89

This last word she wrote very rapidly, but largely, determined that there should be no lack of courage apparent in the letter.

--He is a very wealthy man, and his business is about banking and what he calls finance. I understand they are among the most leading people in the City. He lives at present at a very handsome house at Fulham. I don't know that I ever saw a place more beautifully fitted up. I have said nothing to papa, nor has he; but he says he will be willing to satisfy papa perfectly as to settlements. He has offered to have a house in London if I like,--and also to keep the villa at Fulham or else to have a place somewhere in the country. Or I may have the villa at Fulham and a house in the country. No man can be more generous than he is. He has been married before, and has a family, and now I think I have told you all.

I suppose you and papa will be very much dissatisfied. I hope papa won't refuse his consent. It can do no good. I am not going to remain as I am now all my life, and there is no use waiting any longer. It was papa who made me go to the Melmottes, who are not nearly so well placed as Mr.

Brehgert. Everybody knows that Madame Melmotte is a Jewess, and n.o.body knows what Mr. Melmotte is. It is no good going on with the old thing when everything seems to be upset and at sixes and sevens. If papa has got to be so poor that he is obliged to let the house in town, one must of course expect to be different from what we were.

I hope you won't mind having me back the day after to-morrow,--that is to-morrow, Wednesday. There is a party here to-night, and Mr. Brehgert is coming. But I can't stay longer with Julia, who doesn't make herself nice, and I do not at all want to go back to the Melmottes. I fancy that there is something wrong between papa and Mr. Melmotte.

Send the carriage to meet me by the 2.30 train from London,--and pray, mamma, don't scold when you see me, or have hysterics, or anything of that sort. Of course it isn't all nice, but things have got so that they never will be nice again. I shall tell Mr. Brehgert to go to papa on Wednesday.

Your affectionate daughter,

G.

When the morning came she desired the servant to take the letter away and have it posted, so that the temptation to stop it might no longer be in her way.

About one o'clock on that day Mr. Longestaffe called at Lady Monogram's. The two ladies had breakfasted upstairs, and had only just met in the drawing-room when he came in. Georgiana trembled at first, but soon perceived that her father had as yet heard nothing of Mr. Brehgert. She immediately told him that she proposed returning home on the following day. "I am sick of the Melmottes," she said.

"And so am I," said Mr. Longestaffe, with a serious countenance.

"We should have been delighted to have had Georgiana to stay with us a little longer," said Lady Monogram; "but we have but the one spare bedroom, and another friend is coming." Georgiana, who knew both these statements to be false, declared that she wouldn't think of such a thing. "We have a few friends corning to-night, Mr.

Longestaffe, and I hope you'll come in and see Georgiana." Mr.

Longestaffe hummed and hawed and muttered something, as old gentlemen always do when they are asked to go out to parties after dinner. "Mr.

Brehgert will be here," continued Lady Monogram with a peculiar smile.

"Mr. who?" The name was not at first familiar to Mr. Longestaffe.

"Mr. Brehgert." Lady Monogram looked at her friend. "I hope I'm not revealing any secret."

"I don't understand anything about it," said Mr. Longestaffe.

"Georgiana, who is Mr. Brehgert?" He had understood very much. He had been quite certain from Lady Monogram's manner and words, and also from his daughter's face, that Mr. Brehgert was mentioned as an accepted lover. Lady Monogram had meant that it should be so, and any father would have understood her tone. As she said afterwards to Sir Damask, she was not going to have that Jew there at her house as Georgiana Longestaffe's accepted lover without Mr. Longestaffe's knowledge.

"My dear Georgiana," she said, "I supposed your father knew all about it."

"I know nothing. Georgiana, I hate a mystery. I insist upon knowing.

Who is Mr. Brehgert, Lady Monogram?"

"Mr. Brehgert is a--very wealthy gentleman. That is all I know of him.

Perhaps, Georgiana, you will be glad to be alone with your father."

And Lady Monogram left the room.

Was there ever cruelty equal to this! But now the poor girl was forced to speak,--though she could not speak as boldly as she had written. "Papa, I wrote to mamma this morning, and Mr. Brehgert was to come to you to-morrow."

"Do you mean that you are engaged to marry him?"

"Yes, papa."

"What Mr. Brehgert is he?"

"He is a merchant."

"You can't mean the fat Jew whom I've met with Mr. Melmotte;--a man old enough to be your father!" The poor girl's condition now was certainly lamentable. The fat Jew, old enough to be her father, was the very man she did mean. She thought that she would try to brazen it out with her father. But at the present moment she had been so cowed by the manner in which the subject had been introduced that she did not know how to begin to be bold. She only looked at him as though imploring him to spare her. "Is the man a Jew?" demanded Mr.

Longestaffe, with as much thunder as he knew how to throw into his voice.

"Yes, papa," she said.

"He is that fat man?"

"Yes, papa."

"And nearly as old as I am?"

"No, papa,--not nearly as old as you are. He is fifty."

"And a Jew?" He again asked the horrid question, and again threw in the thunder. On this occasion she condescended to make no further reply. "If you do, you shall do it as an alien from my house. I certainly will never see him. Tell him not to come to me, for I certainly will not speak to him. You are degraded and disgraced; but you shall not degrade and disgrace me and your mother and sister."

"It was you, papa, who told me to go to the Melmottes."

"That is not true. I wanted you to stay at Caversham. A Jew! an old fat Jew! Heavens and earth! that it should be possible that you should think of it! You;--my daughter,--that used to take such pride in yourself! Have you written to your mother?"

"I have."

"It will kill her. It will simply kill her. And you are going home to-morrow?"

"I wrote to say so."

"And there you must remain. I suppose I had better see the man and explain to him that it is utterly impossible. Heavens on earth;--a Jew! An old fat Jew! My daughter! I will take you down home myself to-morrow. What have I done that I should be punished by my children in this way?" The poor man had had rather a stormy interview with Dolly that morning. "You had better leave this house to-day, and come to my hotel in Jermyn Street."

"Oh, papa, I can't do that."

"Why can't you do it? You can do it, and you shall do it. I will not have you see him again. I will see him. If you do not promise me to come, I will send for Lady Monogram and tell her that I will not permit you to meet Mr. Brehgert at her house. I do wonder at her. A Jew! An old fat Jew!" Mr. Longestaffe, putting up both his hands, walked about the room in despair.

She did consent, knowing that her father and Lady Monogram between them would be too strong for her. She had her things packed up, and in the course of the afternoon allowed herself to be carried away.

She said one word to Lady Monogram before she went. "Tell him that I was called away suddenly."

"I will, my dear. I thought your papa would not like it." The poor girl had not spirit sufficient to upbraid her friend; nor did it suit her now to acerbate an enemy. For the moment, at least, she must yield to everybody and everything. She spent a lonely evening with her father in a dull sitting-room in the hotel, hardly speaking or spoken to, and the following day she was taken down to Caversham. She believed that her father had seen Mr. Brehgert in the morning of that day;--but he said no word to her, nor did she ask him any question.

That was on the day after Lady Monogram's party. Early in the evening, just as the gentlemen were coming up from the dining-room, Mr. Brehgert, apparelled with much elegance, made his appearance. Lady Monogram received him with a sweet smile. "Miss Longestaffe," she said, "has left me and gone to her father."

"Oh, indeed."

"Yes," said Lady Monogram, bowing her head, and then attending to other persons as they arrived. Nor did she condescend to speak another word to Mr. Brehgert, or to introduce him even to her husband.

He stood for about ten minutes inside the drawing-room, leaning against the wall, and then he departed. No one had spoken a word to him. But he was an even-tempered, good-humoured man. When Miss Longestaffe was his wife things would no doubt be different;--or else she would probably change her acquaintance.

CHAPTER LXVI.