There was a brief pause in the state-room of the Maypole, as Mr
Haredale tried the lock to satisfy himself that he had shut the door securely,
and, striding up the dark chamber to where the screen inclosed a little patch of
light and warmth, presented himself, abruptly and in silence, before the smiling
guest.
If the two had no greater sympathy in their inward thoughts than in their
outward bearing and appearance, the meeting did not seem likely to prove a very
calm or pleasant one. With no great disparity between them in point of years,
they were, in every other respect, as unlike and far removed from each other as
two men could well be. The one was soft-spoken, delicately made, precise, and
elegant; the other, a burly square-built man, negligently dressed, rough and
abrupt in manner, stern, and, in his present mood, forbidding both in look and
speech. The one preserved a calm and placid smile; the other, a distrustful
frown. The new-comer, indeed, appeared bent on showing by his every tone and
gesture his determined opposition and hostility to the man he had come to meet.
The guest who received him, on the other hand, seemed to feel that the contrast
between them was all in his favour, and to derive a quiet exultation from it
which put him more at his ease than ever.
'Haredale,' said this gentleman, without the least appearance of
embarrassment or reserve, 'I am very glad to see you.'
'Let us dispense with compliments. They are misplaced between us,' returned
the other, waving his hand, 'and say plainly what we have to say. You have asked
me to meet you. I am here. Why do we stand face to face again?'
'Still the same frank and sturdy character, I see!'
'Good or bad, sir, I am,' returned the other, leaning his arm upon the
chimney-piece, and turning a haughty look upon the occupant of the easy-chair,
'the man I used to be. I have lost no old likings or dislikings; my memory has
not failed me by a hair's-breadth. You ask me to give you a meeting. I say, I am
here.'
'Our meeting, Haredale,' said Mr Chester, tapping his snuff-box, and
following with a smile the impatient gesture he had made-- perhaps
unconsciously--towards his sword, 'is one of conference and peace, I hope?'
'I have come here,' returned the other, 'at your desire, holding myself bound
to meet you, when and where you would. I have not come to bandy pleasant
speeches, or hollow professions. You are a smooth man of the world, sir, and at
such play have me at a disadvantage. The very last man on this earth with whom I
would enter the lists to combat with gentle compliments and masked faces, is Mr
Chester, I do assure you. I am not his match at such weapons, and have reason to
believe that few men are.'
'You do me a great deal of honour Haredale,' returned the other, most
composedly, 'and I thank you. I will be frank with you--'
'I beg your pardon--will be what?'
'Frank--open--perfectly candid.'
'Hab!' cried Mr Haredale, drawing his breath. 'But don't let me interrupt
you.'
'So resolved am I to hold this course,' returned the other, tasting his wine
with great deliberation; 'that I have determined not to quarrel with you, and
not to be betrayed into a warm expression or a hasty word.'
'There again,' said Mr Haredale, 'you have me at a great advantage. Your
self-command--'
'Is not to be disturbed, when it will serve my purpose, you would
say'--rejoined the other, interrupting him with the same complacency. 'Granted.
I allow it. And I have a purpose to serve now. So have you. I am sure our object
is the same. Let us attain it like sensible men, who have ceased to be boys some
time.-- Do you drink?'
'With my friends,' returned the other.
'At least,' said Mr Chester, 'you will be seated?'
'I will stand,' returned Mr Haredale impatiently, 'on this dismantled,
beggared hearth, and not pollute it, fallen as it is, with mockeries. Go on.'
'You are wrong, Haredale,' said the other, crossing his legs, and smiling as
he held his glass up in the bright glow of the fire. 'You are really very wrong.
The world is a lively place enough, in which we must accommodate ourselves to
circumstances, sail with the stream as glibly as we can, be content to take
froth for substance, the surface for the depth, the counterfeit for the real
coin. I wonder no philosopher has ever established that our globe itself is
hollow. It should be, if Nature is consistent in her works.'
'YOU think it is, perhaps?'
'I should say,' he returned, sipping his wine, 'there could be no doubt about
it. Well; we, in trifling with this jingling toy, have had the ill-luck to
jostle and fall out. We are not what the world calls friends; but we are as good
and true and loving friends for all that, as nine out of every ten of those on
whom it bestows the title. You have a niece, and I a son--a fine lad, Haredale,
but foolish. They fall in love with each other, and form what this same world
calls an attachment; meaning a something fanciful and false like the rest,
which, if it took its own free time, would break like any other bubble. But it
may not have its own free time--will not, if they are left alone--and the
question is, shall we two, because society calls us enemies, stand aloof, and
let them rush into each other's arms, when, by approaching each other sensibly,
as we do now, we can prevent it, and part them?'
'I love my niece,' said Mr Haredale, after a short silence. 'It may sound
strangely in your ears; but I love her.'
'Strangely, my good fellow!' cried Mr Chester, lazily filling his glass
again, and pulling out his toothpick. 'Not at all. I like Ned too--or, as you
say, love him--that's the word among such near relations. I'm very fond of Ned.
He's an amazingly good fellow, and a handsome fellow--foolish and weak as yet;
that's all. But the thing is, Haredale--for I'll be very frank, as I told you I
would at first--independently of any dislike that you and I might have to being
related to each other, and independently of the religious differences between
us--and damn it, that's important--I couldn't afford a match of this
description. Ned and I couldn't do it. It's impossible.'
'Curb your tongue, in God's name, if this conversation is to last,' retorted
Mr Haredale fiercely. 'I have said I love my niece. Do you think that, loving
her, I would have her fling her heart away on any man who had your blood in his
veins?'
'You see,' said the other, not at all disturbed, 'the advantage of being so
frank and open. Just what I was about to add, upon my honour! I am amazingly
attached to Ned--quite doat upon him, indeed--and even if we could afford to
throw ourselves away, that very objection would be quite insuperable.--I wish
you'd take some wine?'
'Mark me,' said Mr Haredale, striding to the table, and laying his hand upon
it heavily. 'If any man believes--presumes to think-- that I, in word or deed,
or in the wildest dream, ever entertained remotely the idea of Emma Haredale's
favouring the suit of any one who was akin to you--in any way--I care not
what--he lies. He lies, and does me grievous wrong, in the mere thought.'
'Haredale,' returned the other, rocking himself to and fro as in assent, and
nodding at the fire, 'it's extremely manly, and really very generous in you, to
meet me in this unreserved and handsome way. Upon my word, those are exactly my
sentiments, only expressed with much more force and power than I could use--you
know my sluggish nature, and will forgive me, I am sure.'
'While I would restrain her from all correspondence with your son, and sever
their intercourse here, though it should cause her death,' said Mr Haredale, who
had been pacing to and fro, 'I would do it kindly and tenderly if I can. I have
a trust to discharge, which my nature is not formed to understand, and, for this
reason, the bare fact of there being any love between them comes upon me
to-night, almost for the first time.'
'I am more delighted than I can possibly tell you,' rejoined Mr Chester with
the utmost blandness, 'to find my own impression so confirmed. You see the
advantage of our having met. We understand each other. We quite agree. We have a
most complete and thorough explanation, and we know what course to take.--Why
don't you taste your tenant's wine? It's really very good.'
'Pray who,' said Mr Haredale, 'have aided Emma, or your son? Who are their
go-betweens, and agents--do you know?'
'All the good people hereabouts--the neighbourhood in general, I think,'
returned the other, with his most affable smile. 'The messenger I sent to you
to-day, foremost among them all.'
'The idiot? Barnaby?'
'You are surprised? I am glad of that, for I was rather so myself. Yes. I
wrung that from his mother--a very decent sort of woman-- from whom, indeed, I
chiefly learnt how serious the matter had become, and so determined to ride out
here to-day, and hold a parley with you on this neutral ground.--You're stouter
than you used to be, Haredale, but you look extremely well.'
'Our business, I presume, is nearly at an end,' said Mr Haredale, with an
expression of impatience he was at no pains to conceal. 'Trust me, Mr Chester,
my niece shall change from this time. I will appeal,' he added in a lower tone,
'to her woman's heart, her dignity, her pride, her duty--'
'I shall do the same by Ned,' said Mr Chester, restoring some errant faggots
to their places in the grate with the toe of his boot. 'If there is anything
real in this world, it is those amazingly fine feelings and those natural
obligations which must subsist between father and son. I shall put it to him on
every ground of moral and religious feeling. I shall represent to him that we
cannot possibly afford it--that I have always looked forward to his marrying
well, for a genteel provision for myself in the autumn of life--that there are a
great many clamorous dogs to pay, whose claims are perfectly just and right, and
who must be paid out of his wife's fortune. In short, that the very highest and
most honourable feelings of our nature, with every consideration of filial duty
and affection, and all that sort of thing, imperatively demand that he should
run away with an heiress.'
'And break her heart as speedily as possible?' said Mr Haredale, drawing on
his glove.
'There Ned will act exactly as he pleases,' returned the other, sipping his
wine; 'that's entirely his affair. I wouldn't for the world interfere with my
son, Haredale, beyond a certain point. The relationship between father and son,
you know, is positively quite a holy kind of bond.--WON'T you let me persuade
you to take one glass of wine? Well! as you please, as you please,' he added,
helping himself again.
'Chester,' said Mr Haredale, after a short silence, during which he had eyed
his smiling face from time to time intently, 'you have the head and heart of an
evil spirit in all matters of deception.'
'Your health!' said the other, with a nod. 'But I have interrupted you--'
'If now,' pursued Mr Haredale, 'we should find it difficult to separate these
young people, and break off their intercourse--if, for instance, you find it
difficult on your side, what course do you intend to take?'
'Nothing plainer, my good fellow, nothing easier,' returned the other,
shrugging his shoulders and stretching himself more comfortably before the fire.
'I shall then exert those powers on which you flatter me so highly--though, upon
my word, I don't deserve your compliments to their full extent--and resort to a
few little trivial subterfuges for rousing jealousy and resentment. You see?'
'In short, justifying the means by the end, we are, as a last resource for
tearing them asunder, to resort to treachery and--and lying,' said Mr Haredale.
'Oh dear no. Fie, fie!' returned the other, relishing a pinch of snuff
extremely. 'Not lying. Only a little management, a little diplomacy, a
little--intriguing, that's the word.'
'I wish,' said Mr Haredale, moving to and fro, and stopping, and moving on
again, like one who was ill at ease, 'that this could have been foreseen or
prevented. But as it has gone so far, and it is necessary for us to act, it is
of no use shrinking or regretting. Well! I shall second your endeavours to the
utmost of my power. There is one topic in the whole wide range of human thoughts
on which we both agree. We shall act in concert, but apart. There will be no
need, I hope, for us to meet again.'
'Are you going?' said Mr Chester, rising with a graceful indolence. 'Let me
light you down the stairs.'
'Pray keep your seat,' returned the other drily, 'I know the way. So, waving
his hand slightly, and putting on his hat as he turned upon his heel, he went
clanking out as he had come, shut the door behind him, and tramped down the
echoing stairs.
'Pah! A very coarse animal, indeed!' said Mr Chester, composing himself in
the easy-chair again. 'A rough brute. Quite a human badger!'
John Willet and his friends, who had been listening intently for the clash of
swords, or firing of pistols in the great room, and had indeed settled the order
in which they should rush in when summoned--in which procession old John had
carefully arranged that he should bring up the rear--were very much astonished
to see Mr Haredale come down without a scratch, call for his horse, and ride
away thoughtfully at a footpace. After some consideration, it was decided that
he had left the gentleman above, for dead, and had adopted this stratagem to
divert suspicion or pursuit.
As this conclusion involved the necessity of their going upstairs forthwith,
they were about to ascend in the order they had agreed upon, when a smart
ringing at the guest's bell, as if he had pulled it vigorously, overthrew all
their speculations, and involved them in great uncertainty and doubt. At length
Mr Willet agreed to go upstairs himself, escorted by Hugh and Barnaby, as the
strongest and stoutest fellows on the premises, who were to make their
appearance under pretence of clearing away the glasses.
Under this protection, the brave and broad-faced John boldly entered the
room, half a foot in advance, and received an order for a boot-jack without
trembling. But when it was brought, and he leant his sturdy shoulder to the
guest, Mr Willet was observed to look very hard into his boots as he pulled them
off, and, by opening his eyes much wider than usual, to appear to express some
surprise and disappointment at not finding them full of blood. He took occasion,
too, to examine the gentleman as closely as he could, expecting to discover
sundry loopholes in his person, pierced by his adversary's sword. Finding none,
however, and observing in course of time that his guest was as cool and
unruffled, both in his dress and temper, as he had been all day, old John at
last heaved a deep sigh, and began to think no duel had been fought that night.
'And now, Willet,' said Mr Chester, 'if the room's well aired, I'll try the
merits of that famous bed.'
'The room, sir,' returned John, taking up a candle, and nudging Barnaby and
Hugh to accompany them, in case the gentleman should unexpectedly drop down
faint or dead from some internal wound, 'the room's as warm as any toast in a
tankard. Barnaby, take you that other candle, and go on before. Hugh! Follow up,
sir, with the easy-chair.'
In this order--and still, in his earnest inspection, holding his candle very
close to the guest; now making him feel extremely warm about the legs, now
threatening to set his wig on fire, and constantly begging his pardon with great
awkwardness and embarrassment--John led the party to the best bedroom, which was
nearly as large as the chamber from which they had come, and held, drawn out
near the fire for warmth, a great old spectral bedstead, hung with faded
brocade, and ornamented, at the top of each carved post, with a plume of
feathers that had once been white, but with dust and age had now grown
hearse-like and funereal.
'Good night, my friends,' said Mr Chester with a sweet smile, seating
himself, when he had surveyed the room from end to end, in the easy-chair which
his attendants wheeled before the fire. 'Good night! Barnaby, my good fellow,
you say some prayers before you go to bed, I hope?'
Barnaby nodded. 'He has some nonsense that he calls his prayers, sir,'
returned old John, officiously. 'I'm afraid there an't much good in em.'
'And Hugh?' said Mr Chester, turning to him.
'Not I,' he answered. 'I know his'--pointing to Barnaby--'they're well
enough. He sings 'em sometimes in the straw. I listen.'
'He's quite a animal, sir,' John whispered in his ear with dignity. 'You'll
excuse him, I'm sure. If he has any soul at all, sir, it must be such a very
small one, that it don't signify what he does
or doesn't in that way. Good night, sir!'
The guest rejoined 'God bless you!' with a fervour that was quite affecting;
and John, beckoning his guards to go before, bowed himself out of the room, and
left him to his rest in the Maypole's ancient bed.
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