The Lovels of Arden Part 34

"Nonsense, child; one man does not dance attendance upon another like that--crying off from important dinner-parties in order to drink tea with his neighbour, and that kind of thing. The case has been clear enough from the beginning, and you must have known how it was--especially as Granger made some declaration to you the first time you went to the Court. He told me what he had done, in a most honourable manner. It is preposterous to pretend, after that, you could mistake his intentions. I have never worried you about the business; it seemed to me wisest and best to let matters take their natural course; and I am the last of men to play the domestic tyrant in order to force a rich husband upon my daughter; but I never for a moment doubted that you understood Mr. Granger's feelings, and were prepared to reward his patience."

"It can never be, papa," Clarissa said decisively; "I would not commit such a sin as to marry a man I could not love. I am grateful to Mr. Granger, of course, and very sorry that he should think so much more of me than I deserve, but----"

"For G.o.d's sake don't preach!" cried her father fretfully. "You won't have him; that's enough. The only road there was to extrication from my difficulties is shut up. The sheriff's officers can come to-morrow. I'll write no more humbugging letters to those attorneys, trying to stave off the crisis. The sooner the crash comes the better; I can drag out the rest of my existence somehow, in Bruges or Louvain. It is only a question of a year or two, I daresay."

The dreary sigh with which Mr. Lovel concluded this speech went to Clarissa's heart. It can scarcely be said that she loved him very dearly, but she pitied him very much. To his mind, no doubt, it seemed a hard thing that she should set her face against a change of fortune that would have ensured ease and comfort for his declining years. She knew him weighed down by embarra.s.sments which were very real--which had been known to her before Daniel Granger's appearance as a wooer. There was no pretence about the ruin that menaced them; and it was not strange that her father, who had been loath to move beyond the very outskirts of his lost domain, should shrink with a shuddering dread from exile in a dismal Belgian town.

After that one bitter speech and that one dreary sigh, Mr. Lovel made no overt attempt to influence his daughter's decision. He had a more scientific game to play, and he knew how to play it. Peevish remonstrances might have availed nothing; threats or angry speeches might have provoked a spirit of defiance. Mr. Lovel neither complained nor threatened; he simply collapsed. An air of settled misery fell upon him, an utter hopelessness, that was almost resignation, took possession of him. There was an unwonted gentleness in his manner to his daughter; he endured the miseries of weakness and prostration with unaccustomed patience; meekness pervaded all his words and actions, but it was the meekness of despair. And so--and so--this was how the familiar domestic drama came to be acted once more--the old, old story to be repeated. It was Robin Gray over again. If the cow was not stolen, the sheriff's officers were at the door, and, for lack of a broken arm, Marmaduke Lovel did not want piteous silent arguments. He was weak and ill and despairing, and where threats or jesuitical pleading would have availed little, his silence did much; until at last, after several weary weeks of indecision, during which Mr. Granger had come and gone every evening without making any allusion to his suit, there came one night when Clarissa fell on her knees by her father's sofa, and told him that she could not endure the sight of his misery any longer, and that she was willing to be Daniel Granger's wife. Marmaduke Lovel put his feeble arms round his daughter's neck, and kissed her as he had never kissed her before; and then burst into tears, with his face hidden upon her shoulder.

"It was time, Clarissa," he said at last. "I could not have kept the brokers out another week. Granger has been offering to lend me money ever since he began to suspect my embarra.s.sments, but I could not put myself under an obligation to him while I was uncertain of your intentions: it will be easy to accept his help now; and he has made most liberal proposals with regard to your marriage settlements. Bear witness, Clary, that I never mentioned that till now. I have urged no sordid consideration upon you to bring about this match; although, G.o.d knows, it is the thing I desire most in this world."

"No, no, papa, I know that," sobbed Clarissa. And then the image of George Fairfax rose before her, and the memory of those bitter words, "It means Arden Court."

What would he think of her when he should come to hear that she was to be Daniel Granger's wife? It would seem a full confirmation of his basest suspicions. He would never know of her unavailing struggles to escape this doom--never guess her motives for making this sacrifice. He would think of her, in all the days to come, only as a woman who sold herself for the sake of a goodly heritage.

Once having given her promise, there was no such thing as drawing back for Clarissa, even had she been so minded. Mr. Lovel told the anxious lover that his fate was favourably decided, warning him at the same time that it would be well to refrain from any hazardous haste, and to maintain as far as possible that laudable patience and reserve which had distinguished his conduct up to this point.

"Clarissa is very young," said her father; "and I do not pretend to tell you that she is able to reciprocate, as fully as I might wish, the ardour of your attachment. One could hardly expect that all at once."

"No, one could hardly expect that," Mr. Granger echoed with a faint sigh.

"As a man of the world, you would not, I am sure, my dear Granger, overlook the fact of the very wide difference in your ages, or expect more than is reasonable. Clarissa admires and esteems you, I am sure, and is deeply grateful for a devotion to which she declares herself undeserving. She is not a vain frivolous girl, who thinks a man's best affection only a tribute due to her attractions. And there is a kind of regard which grows up in a girl's heart for a sensible man who loves her, and which I believe with all my soul to be better worth having than the romantic nonsense young people take for the grand pa.s.sion. I make no profession, you see, my dear Granger, on my daughter's part; but I have no fear but that Clarissa will learn to love you, in good time, as truly as you can desire to be loved."

"Unless I thought that she had some affection for me, I would never ask her to be my wife," said Mr. Granger.

"Wouldn't you?" thought Mr. Lovel. "My poor Granger, you are farther gone than you suppose!"

"You can give me your solemn a.s.surance upon one point, eh, Lovel?" said the master of Arden Court anxiously; "there is no one else in the case? Your daughter's heart is quite free? It is only a question as to whether I can win it?"

"Her heart is entirely free, and as pure as a child's. She is full of affection, poor girl, only yearning to find an outlet for it. She ought to make you a good wife, Daniel Granger. There is nothing against her doing so."

"G.o.d grant she may!" replied Mr. Granger solemnly; "G.o.d knows how dearly I love her, and what a new thing this love is to me!"

He took heed of his future father-in-law's counsel, and said nothing more about his hopes to Clarissa just yet awhile. It was only by an undefinable change in his manner--a deeper graver tenderness in his tone--that she guessed her father must have told him her decision.

From this day forth all clouds vanished from the domestic sky at Mill Cottage. Mr. Lovel's debts were paid; no more threatening letters made his breakfast-table a terror to him; there were only agreeable-looking stamped doc.u.ments in receipt of payment, with little apologetic notes, and entreaties for future favours.

Mr. Granger's proposals respecting a settlement were liberal, but, taking into consideration the amount of his wealth, not lavish. He offered to settle a thousand a year upon his wife--five hundred for her own use as pin-money, five hundred as an annuity for her father. He might as easily have given her three thousand, or six thousand, as it was for no lack of generous inclination that he held his hand; but he did not want to do anything that might seem like buying his wife. Nor did Marmaduke Lovel give the faintest hint of a desire for larger concessions from his future son-in-law: he conducted the business with the lofty air of a man above the consideration of figures. Five hundred a year was not much to get from a man in Granger's position; but, added to his annuity of three hundred, it would make eight--a very decent income for a man who had only himself to provide for; and then of course there would be no possibility of his ever wanting money, with such a son-in-law to fall back upon.

Mr. Granger did not lose any time in making his daughter acquainted with the change that was about to befall her. He was quite prepared to find her adverse to his wishes, and quite prepared to defend his choice; and yet, little subject as he was to any kind of mental weakness, he did feel rather uncomfortable when the time came for addressing Miss Granger.

It was after dinner, and the father and daughter were sitting alone in the small gothic dining-room, sheltered from possible draughts by mediaeval screens of stamped leather and brazen scroll-work, and in a glowing atmosphere of mingled fire and lamp light, making a pretty cabinet-picture of home life, which might have pleased a Flemish painter.

"I think, Sophia," said Mr. Granger,--"I think, my dear, there is no occasion for me to tell you that there is a certain friend and neighbour of yours who is something more to me than the ordinary young ladies of your acquaintance."

Miss Granger seemed as if she were trying to swallow some hard substance--a knotty little bit of the pineapple she had just been eating, perhaps--before she replied to this speech of her father's.

"I am sure, papa, I am quite at a loss to comprehend your meaning," she said at last. "I have no near neighbour whom I can call my friend, unless you mean Mrs. Patterly, the doctor's wife, who has taken such a warm interest in my clothing-club, and who has such a beautiful mind. But you would hardly call her a young lady."

"Patterly's wife! no, I should think not!" exclaimed Mr. Granger impatiently: "I was speaking of Clarissa Lovel."

Miss Granger drew herself up suddenly, and pinched her lips together as if they were never to unclose again. She did open them nevertheless, after a pause, to say in an icy tone,--

"Miss Lovel is my acquaintance, but not my friend."

"Why should she not be your friend? She is a very charming girl."

"Oh, yes, I have no doubt of that, papa, from your point of view; that is to say, she is very pretty, and thinks a great deal of dress, and is quite ready to flirt with any one who likes to flirt with her--I'm sure you must have seen _that_ at Hale Castle--and fills her sc.r.a.p-book with portraits of engaged men; witness all those drawings of Mr. Fairfax. I have no doubt she is just the kind of person gentlemen call charming; but she is no friend of mine, and she never will be."

"I am sorry to hear that," said her father sternly; "for she is very likely to be your stepmother."

It was a death-blow, but one that Sophia Granger had antic.i.p.ated for a long time.

"You are going to marry Miss Lovel, papa--a girl two years younger than I am?"

"Yes, I am going to marry Miss Lovel, and I am very proud of her youth and beauty; but I do not admit her want of more solid charms than those, Sophia. I have watched her conduct as a daughter, and I have a most perfect faith in the goodness and purity of her heart."

"Oh, very well, papa. Of course you know what is best for your own happiness. It is not for me to presume to offer an opinion; I trust I have too clear a sense of duty for that." And here Miss Granger gave a sigh expressive of resignation under circ.u.mstances of profound affliction.

"I believe you have, Sophy," answered her father kindly. "I believe that, however unwelcome this change may be to you at first--and I suppose it is only natural that it should be unwelcome--you will reconcile your mind to it fully when you discover that it is for my happiness. I am not ashamed to confess to you that I love Clarissa very fondly, and that I look forward to a happy future when she is my wife."

"I hope, papa, that your life has not been unhappy hitherto--that I have not in any manner failed in my duties as a daughter."

"Oh, dear no, child; of course not. That has nothing to do with the question."

"Will it--the marriage--be very soon, papa?" asked Miss Granger, with another gulp, as if there were still some obstructive substance in her throat.

"I hope so, Sophy. There is no reason, that I can see, why it should not be very soon."

"And will Mr. Lovel come to live with us?"

"I don't know; I have never contemplated such a possibility. I think Mr.

Lovel is scarcely the kind of person who would care to live in another man's house."

"But this has been his own house, you see, papa, and will seem to belong to him again when his daughter is the mistress of it. I daresay he will look upon us as interlopers."

"I don't think so, Sophia. Mr. Lovel is a gentleman, and a sensible man into the bargain. He is not likely to have any absurd ideas of that kind."

"I suppose he is very much pleased at having secured such a rich husband for his daughter," Miss Granger hazarded presently, with the air of saying something agreeable.

"Sophia!" exclaimed her father angrily, "I must beg that the question of money may never be mooted in relation to Miss Lovel and myself--by you above all people. I daresay there may be men and women in the world malignant enough to say--mean enough to suppose--that this dear girl can only consent to marry me because I am a rich man. It is my happiness to know her to be much too n.o.ble to yield to any sordid consideration of that kind. It is my happiness to know that her father has done nothing to urge this marriage upon her. She gives herself to me of her own free-will, not hurried into a decision by any undue persuasion of mine, and under no pressure from outer circ.u.mstances."

"I am very glad to hear it, papa. I think I should have broken my heart, if I had seen you the dupe of a mercenary woman."

Mr. Granger got up from his seat with an impatient air, and began to pace the room. His daughter had said very little, but that little had been beyond measure irritating to him. It galled him to think that this marriage should seem to her an astonis.h.i.+ng--perhaps even a preposterous--thing. True that the woman he was going to marry was younger, by a year or two, than his own daughter. In his own mind there was so little sense of age, that he could scarcely understand why the union should seem discordant. He was not quite fifty, an age which he had heard men call the very meridian of life; and he felt himself younger now than he had ever been since he first a.s.sumed the cares of manhood--first grew grave with the responsibilities involved in the disposal of a great fortune. Was not this newly-born love, this sudden awakening of a heart that had slumbered so long, a renewal of youth? Mr. Granger glanced at his own reflection in a gla.s.s over a buffet, as he paced to and fro. The figure that he saw there bore no sign of age.

It was a relief to him to discover that--a thing he had never thought of till that moment.

"Why should she not love me?" he asked himself. "Are youth and a handsome face the only high-road to a woman's heart? I can't believe it. Surely constancy and devotion must count for something. Is there another man in the world who would love her as well as I? who could say, at fifty years of age, This is my first love?"