Miss Mackenzie Part 43

CHAPTER XXI

Mr Maguire Goes to London on Business

Mr Maguire made up his mind to go to London, to look after his lady-love, but when he found himself there he did not quite know what to do. It is often the case with us that we make up our minds for great action,--that in some special crisis of our lives we resolve that something must be done, and that we make an energetic start; but we find very soon that we do not know how to go on doing anything. It was so with Mr Maguire. When he had secured a bed at a small public house near the Great Western railway station,--thinking, no doubt that he would go to the great hotel on his next coming to town, should he then have obtained the lady's fortune,--he scarcely knew what step he would next take. Margaret's last letter had been written to him from the Cedars, but he thought it probable that she might only have gone there for a day or two. He knew the address of the house in Gower Street, and at last resolved that he would go boldly in among the enemy there; for he was a.s.sured that the family of the lady's late brother were his special enemies in this case. It was considerably past noon when he reached London, and it was about three when, with a hesitating hand, but a loud knock, he presented himself at Mrs Mackenzie's door.

He first asked for Miss Mackenzie, and was told that she was not staying there. Was he thereupon to leave his card and go away? He had told himself that in this pursuit of the heiress he would probably be called upon to dare much, and if he did not begin to show some daring at once, how could he respect himself, or trust to himself for future daring? So he boldly asked for Mrs Mackenzie, and was at once shown into the parlour. There sat the widow, in her full lugubrious weeds, there sat Miss Colza, and there sat Mary Jane, and they were all busy hemming, darning, and clipping; turning old sheets into new ones; for now it was more than ever necessary that Mrs Mackenzie should make money at once by taking in lodgers. When Mr Maguire was shown into the room each lady rose from her chair, with her sheet in her hands and in her lap, and then, as he stood before them, at the other side of the table, each lady again sat down.

"A gentleman as is asking for Miss Margaret," the servant had said; that same cook to whom Mr Grandairs had been so severe on the occasion of Mrs Mackenzie's dinner party. The other girl had been unnecessary to them in their poverty, and had left them.

"My name is Maguire, the Rev. Mr Maguire, from Littlebath, where I had the pleasure of knowing Miss Mackenzie."

Then the widow asked him to take a chair, and he took a chair.

"My sister-in-law is not with us at present," said Mrs Mackenzie.

"She is staying for a visit with her aunt, Lady Ball, at the Cedars, Twickenham," said Mary Jane, who had contrived to drop her sheet, and hustle it under the table with her feet, as soon as she learned that the visitor was a clergyman.

"Lady Ball is the lady of Sir John Ball, Baronet," said Miss Colza, whose good nature made her desirous of standing up for the honour of the family with which she was, for the time, domesticated.

"I knew she had been at Lady Ball's," said the clergyman, "as I heard from her from thence; but I thought she had probably returned."

"Oh dear, no," said the widow, "she ain't returned here, nor don't mean. We haven't the room for her, and that's the truth. Have we, Mary Jane?"

"That we have not, mamma; and I don't think aunt Margaret would think of such a thing."

Then, thought Mr Maguire, the b.a.l.l.s must have got hold of the heiress, and not the Mackenzies, and my battle must be fought at the Cedars, and not here. Still, as he was there, he thought possibly he might obtain some further information; and this would be the easier, if, as appeared to be the case, there was enmity between the Gower Street family and their relative.

"Has Miss Mackenzie gone to live permanently at the Cedars?" he asked.

"Not that I know of," said the widow.

"It isn't at all unlikely, mamma, that it may be so, when you consider everything. It's just the sort of way in which they'll most likely get over her."

"Mary Jane, hold your tongue," said her mother; "you shouldn't say things of that sort before strangers."

"Though I may not have the pleasure of knowing you and your amiable family," said Mr Maguire, smiling his sweetest, "I am by no means a stranger to Miss Mackenzie."

Then the ladies all looked at him, and thought they had never seen anything so terrible as that squint.

"Miss Mackenzie is making a long visit at the Cedars," said Miss Colza, "that is all we know at present. I am told the b.a.l.l.s are very nice people, but perhaps a little worldly-minded; that's to be expected, however, from people who live out of the west-end from London. I live in Finsbury Square, or at least, I did before I came here, and I ain't a bit ashamed to own it. But of course the west-end is the nicest."

Then Mr Maguire got up, saying that he should probably do himself the pleasure of calling on Miss Mackenzie at the Cedars, and went his way.

"I wonder what he's after," said Mrs Mackenzie, as soon as the door was shut.

"Perhaps he came to tell her to bear it all with Christian resignation," said Miss Colza; "they always do come when anything's in the wind like that; they like to know everything before anybody else."

"It's my belief he's after her money," said Mrs Mackenzie.

"With such a squint as that!" said Mary Jane; "I wouldn't have him though he was made of money, and I hadn't a farthing."

"Beauty is but skin deep," said Miss Colza.

"And it's manners to wait till you are asked," said Mrs Mackenzie.

Mary Jane chucked up her head with disdain, thereby indicating that though she had not been asked, and though beauty is but skin deep, still she held the same opinion.

Mr Maguire, as he went away to a clerical advertising office in the neighbourhood of Exeter Hall, thought over the matter profoundly.

It was clear enough to him that the Mackenzies of Gower Street were not interfering with him; very probably they might have hoped and attempted to keep the heiress among them; that a.s.sertion that there was no room for her in the house--as though they were and ever had been averse to having her with them--seemed to imply that such was the case. It was the natural language of a disappointed woman. But if so, that hope was now over with them. And then the young lady had plainly exposed the suspicions which they all entertained as to the b.a.l.l.s. These grand people at the Cedars, this baronet's family at Twickenham, must have got her to come among them with the intention of keeping her there. It did not occur to him that the baronet or the baronet's son would actually want Miss Mackenzie's money. He presumed baronets to be rich people; but still they might very probably be as dogs in the manger, and desirous of preventing their relative from doing with her money that active service to humanity in general which would be done were she to marry a deserving clergyman who had nothing of his own.

He made his visit to the advertising office, and learned that clergymen without cures were at present drugs in the market. He couldn't understand how this should be the case, seeing that the newspapers were constantly declaring that the supply of university clergymen were becoming less and less every day. He had come from Trinity, Dublin and after the success of his career at Littlebath, was astonished that he should not be snapped at by the retailers of curacies.

On the next day he visited Twickenham. Now, on the morning of that very day Margaret Mackenzie first woke to the consciousness that she was the promised wife of her cousin John Ball. There was great comfort in the thought.

It was not only, nor even chiefly, that she who, on the preceding morning, had awakened to the remembrance of her utter dest.i.tution, now felt that all those terrible troubles were over. It was not simply that her great care had been vanquished for her. It was this, that the man who had a second time come to her asking for her love, had now given her all-sufficient evidence that he did so for the sake of her love. He, who was so anxious for money, had shown her that he could care for her more even than he cared for gold. As she thought of this, and made herself happy in the thought, she would not rise at once from her bed, but curled herself in the clothes and hugged herself in her joy.

"I should have taken him before, at once, instantly, if I could have thought that it was so," she said to herself; "but this is a thousand times better."

Then she found that the pillow beneath her cheek was wet with her tears.

On the preceding evening she had been very silent and demure, and her betrothed had also been silent. There had been no words about the tea-making, and Lady Ball had been silent also. As far as she knew, Margaret was to go on the following day, but she would say nothing on the subject. Margaret, indeed, had commenced her packing, and did not know when she went to bed whether she was to go or not. She rather hoped that she might be allowed to go, as her aunt would doubtless be disagreeable; but in that, and in all matters now, she would of course be guided implicitly by Mr Ball. He had told her to be firm, and of her own firmness she had no doubt whatever. Lady Ball, with all her anger, or with all her eloquence, should not talk her out of her husband. She could be firm, and she had no doubt that John Ball could be firm also.

Nevertheless, when she was dressing, she did not fail to tell herself that she might have a bad time of it that morning,--and a bad time of it for some days to come, if it was John's intention that she should remain at the Cedars. She was convinced that Lady Ball would not welcome her as a daughter-in-law now as she would have done when the property was thought to belong to her. What right had she to expect such welcome? No doubt some hard things would be said to her; but she knew her own courage, and was sure that she could bear any hard things with such a hope within her breast as that which she now possessed. She left her room a little earlier than usual, thinking that she might thus meet her cousin and receive his orders. And in this she was not disappointed; he was in the hall as she came down, and she was able to smile on him, and press his hand, and make her morning greetings to him with some tenderness in her voice. He looked heavy about the face, and almost more careworn than usual, but he took her hand and led her into the breakfast-room.

"Did you tell your mother, John?" she said, standing very close to him, almost leaning upon his shoulder.

He, however, did not probably want such signs of love as this, and moved a step away from her.

"Yes," said he, "I told both my father and my mother. What she says to you, you must hear, and bear it quietly for my sake."

"I will," said Margaret.

"I think that she is unreasonable, but still she is my mother."

"I shall always remember that, John."

"And she is old, and things have not always gone well with her. She says, too, that you have been impertinent to her."

Margaret's face became very red at this charge, but she made no immediate reply.

"I don't think you could mean to be impertinent."

"Certainly not, John; but, of course, I shall feel myself much more bound to her now than I was before."