Hester · Chapter 21 (1/2)

XXI

Warning

“I think, if you will let me, I will send down Emma for a little fresh air and to make your acquaintance, grandmother. She is rather of the butterfly order of girls, but there is no harm in her. And as it is likely that I shall have a good deal to do with the Vernons⁠—”

“What do you want with the Vernons? Why should you have a good deal to do with them?” asked Captain Morgan, hastily, and it must be added rather testily, for the old man’s usually placid humour had been disturbed of late.

“In the most legitimate way,” said Ashton. “You can’t wish me, now that I am just launched in business, to shut my eyes to my own advantage. It will be for their advantage too. They are going to be customers of mine. When you have a man’s money to invest you have a good deal to do with him. I shall have to come and go in all likelihood often.”

“Your customers⁠—and their money to invest⁠—what do mean by that? I hope you haven’t taken advantage of my relationship with Catherine Vernon to draw in those boys of hers⁠—”

“Grandfather,” said Roland, with an air digne which it was impossible not to respect, “if you think a little you will see how injurious your words are. I cannot for a moment suppose you mean them. Catherine Vernon’s boys, as you call them, are nearly as old, and I suppose as capable of judging what is for their advantage, as I am. If they choose to entrust me with their business, is there any reason why I should refuse it? I am glad to get everything I can.”

“Yes, sir, there is a reason,” said Captain Morgan. “I know what speculation is. I know what happens when a hotheaded young fellow gets a little bit of success, and the gambling fever gets into his veins. Edward Vernon is just the sort of fellow to fall a victim. He is a morose, ill-tempered, bilious being⁠—”

“Stop,” said Roland; “have a little consideration, sir. There is no question of any victim.”

“You are just a monomaniac, Rowley, my old man,” said Mrs. Morgan.

“I know everything you can say,” said the old captain. “All that jargon about watching the market, and keeping a cool head, and running no unnecessary risks⁠—I know it all. You think you can turn over your money, as you call it, always to your advantage, and keep risk at arm’s length.”

“I do not say so much as that; but risk may be reduced to a minimum, and profit be the rule, when one gives one’s mind to it⁠—which it is my business to do.”

“Oh, I know everything you can say,” said the old man. “Give your mind to it! Give your mind to an honest trade, that’s my advice to you. What is it at the best but making money out of the follies of your fellow-creatures? They take a panic and you buy from them, to their certain loss, and then they take a freak of enthusiasm and you sell to them, to their certain loss. Somebody must always lose in order that you should gain. It is a devilish trade⁠—I said so when I heard you had gone into it; but for God’s sake, Roland Ashton, keep that for the outside world, and don’t bring ruin and misery here.”

“What can I say?” said the young man. He rose up from the table where he had been taking his last meal with the old people. He kept his temper beautifully, Mrs. Morgan thought, with great pride in him. He grew pale and a little excited, as was natural, but never forgot his respect for his grandfather, who, besides that venerable relationship, was an old man. “What can I say? To tell you that I consider my profession an honourable one would be superfluous, for you can’t imagine I should have taken it up had I thought otherwise.”

“Rowley, my old man,” said Mrs. Morgan, “you are just as hotheaded as when you were a boy. But, Roland, you must remember that we have suffered from it; and everybody says when you begin to gamble in business, it is worse than any other kind of gambling.”

“When you begin; but there is no need ever to begin, that I can see.”

“And then, my dear⁠—I am not taking up your grandfather’s view, but just telling you what he means⁠—then, my dear, Catherine Vernon has been very kind to him and me. She is fond of us, I really believe. She trusts us, which to her great hurt, poor thing, she does to few⁠—”

“Catherine Vernon is a noble character. She has a fine nature. She has a scorn of meanness and everything that is little⁠—”

The old lady shook her head, “That is true,” she said; “but it is her misfortune, poor thing, that she gets her amusement out of all that, and she believes in few. You must not, Roland,” she said, laying her hand upon his arm, “you must not, my dear lad⁠—Oh, listen to what my old man says! You must not be the means of leading into imprudence or danger anyone she is fond of⁠—she that has been so kind to him and to me!”

The old hand was heavy on his arm, bending him down towards her with an imperative clasp, and this sudden appeal was so unexpected from the placid old woman, who seemed to have outgrown all impassioned feeling and lived only to soothe and reconcile opposing influences, that both the young man and the old were impressed by it. Roland Ashton stooped, and kissed his grandmother’s forehead. He had a great power in him of response to every call of emotion.

“Dear old mother,” he said, “if I were a villain and meant harm, I don’t see how I could carry on with it after that. But I want you to believe that I am not a villain,” he said, with a half-laugh of feeling.

Old Captain Morgan was so touched by the scene that in the weakness of old age and the unexpectedness of this interposition the tears stood in his eyes.

“When you do put your shoulder to the wheel, Mary,” he said, with a half-laugh too, and holding out a hand to Roland, with whom for the first time he found himself in perfect sympathy, “you do it like a hero. I’ll add nothing to what she has said, my boy. Even at the risk of losing a profit, or failing in a stroke of business, respect the house that has sheltered your family. That’s what we both say.”

“And I have answered, sir,” said Roland, “that even if I were bent on mischief I could not persist after such an appeal⁠—and I am not bent on mischief,” he added, this time with a smile; and so fell into easy conversation about his sister, and the good it would do her to pay the old people a visit. “I am out all day, and she is left to herself. It is dull for her in a little house at Kilburn, all alone⁠—though she says she likes it,” he went on, glad, as indeed they all were, to get down to a milder level of conversation.

The old captain had not taken kindly to the idea of having Emma; but after the moment of sympathetic emotion which they had all passed through, there was no rejecting so very reasonable a petition. And on the whole, looking back upon it, now that the young man’s portmanteau stood packed in the hall, and he himself was on the eve of departure, even the captain could not deny that there had been on the whole more pleasure in Roland’s visit than he had at all expected. However he might modify the account of his own sensations, it had certainly been agreeable to meet a young fellow of his own blood, his descendant, a man among the many women with whom he was surrounded, and one who, even when they disagreed, could support his opinions, and was at least intelligent, whatever else. He had received him with unfeigned reluctance, almost forgetting who his mother was in bitter and strong realisation that he was his father’s son and bore his father’s name. But personal encounter had so softened everything, that though Roland actually resembled his objectionable father, the captain parted from him with regret. And, after all, why should not Emma come? She was a girl, which in itself softened everything (notwithstanding that the captain had recognised as a distinct element in Roland’s favour that he was a man, and so a most desirable interruption to the flood of womankind⁠—but nobody is bound to be consistent in these matters). It was good of her brother, as soon as he was afloat in the world, to take upon himself the responsibility of providing for Emma, and on the whole the captain, always ready to be kind, saw no reason for refusing to be kind to this lonely girl because she was of his own flesh and blood. He drew much closer to his grandson during these last few hours than he had done yet. He went out with him to make his adieux to Mrs. John and her daughter. And Hester came forward to give them her hand with that little enlargement about the eyes, which was a sure sign of some emotion in her mind. She had seen a great deal of Roland, and his going away gave her a pang which she scarcely explained to herself. It was so much life subtracted from the scanty circle. She too, like Edward, felt that she wanted air, and the departure of one who had brought so much that was new into her restricted existence was a loss⁠—that was all. She had assured herself so half-a-dozen times this morning⁠—therefore no doubt it was true. As for Roland, it was not in him to part from such a girl without an attempt at least to intensify this effect. He drew her towards the window, apart from the others, to watch, as he said, for the coming of the slow old fly from Redborough which was to convey him away.

“My sister is coming,” he said, “and I hope you will be friends. I will instruct her to bring in my name on every possible occasion, that you may not altogether forget me.”

“There is no likelihood that we shall forget you; we see so few people here.”

“And you call that a consolatory reason! I shall see thousands of people, but I shall not forget you.” It was Roland’s way to use no name. He said you as if there was nobody but yourself who owned that pronoun, with an inference that in thinking of the woman before him, whoever she might be, he, in his heart, identified her from all women.

Hester was embarrassed by his eyes and his tone, but not displeased. He had pleased her from the first. There is a soft and genial interest excited in the breasts of women by such a man, at which everybody smiles and which few acknowledge, yet which is not the less dangerous for that. It rouses a prepossession in his favour, whatever may come of it afterwards; and he had done his best to fill up all his spare moments, when he was not doing something else, in Hester’s company. It would be vain to say that this homage had not been sweet, and it had been entertaining, which is so great a matter. It had opened out a new world to her, and expanded all her horizon. With his going all these new outlets into life would be closed again. She felt a certain terror of the place without Roland. He had imported into the air an excitement, an expectation. The prospect of seeing him was a prospect full of novelty and interest, and even when he did not come, there had always been that expectation to brighten the dimness. Now there could be no expectation, not even a disappointment; and Hester’s eyes were large, and had a clearness of emotion in them. She might have cried⁠—indeed, it seemed very likely that she had cried at the thought of his going away, and would cry again.

“Though I don’t know,” he added, leaning against the recess of the window, and so shutting her in where she stood looking out, “why I should leave so many thoughts here, for I don’t suppose they will do me any good. They tell me that your mind will be too fully, and, alas, too pleasantly occupied. Yes, I say alas! and alas again! I am not glad you will be so pleasantly occupied. I had rather you were dull a little, that you might have time now and then to remember me.”

“You are talking a great deal of nonsense, Mr. Ashton⁠—but that is your way. And how am I to be so pleasantly occupied? I am glad to hear it, but I certainly did not know. What is going to happen?”

“Is this hypocrisy, or is it kindness to spare me? Or is it⁠—? They tell me that I ought to⁠—congratulate you,” said Roland with a sigh.

“Congratulate me? On what? I suppose,” said Hester, growing red, “there is only one thing upon which girls are congratulated: and that does not exist in my case.”

“May I believe you?” he said, putting his hands together with a supplicating gesture, “may I put faith in you? But it seemed on such good authority. Your cousin Edward⁠—”

“Did Edward tell you so?” Hester grew so red that the flush scorched her. She was angry and mortified and excited. Her interest changed, in a moment, from the faint interest which she had felt in the handsome young deceiver before her, to a feeling more strong and deeply rooted, half made out of repulsion, half bitter, half injured, yet more powerful in attraction than any other sentiment of her mind. Roland was ill-pleased that he was superseded by this other feeling. It was a sensation quite unusual to him, and he did not like it. “He had no right to say so,” said Hester; “he knew it was not true.”

“All is fair in love and war,” said Roland; “perhaps he wished it to be⁠—not true.”

“I do not know what he wishes, and I do not care!” Hester cried, after a pause, with a passion which did not carry out her words. “He has never been a friend to me,” she said hastily. “He might have helped me, he might have been kind⁠—not that I want his help or anyone’s,” cried the girl, her passion growing as she went on. Then she came to a dead stop, and gave Roland a rapid look, to see how much he had divined of her real feelings. “But he need not have said what was not true,” she added in a subdued tone.

“I forgive him,” said Roland, “because it is not true. If it had been true it would not have been so easy to forgive. I am coming back again, and I should have seen you⁠—changed. It was too much. Now I can look forward with unmingled pleasure. It is one’s first duty, don’t you think, to minister to the pleasure of one’s grandparents? they are old; one ought to come often, as often as duty will permit.”

Hester looked up to him with a little surprise, the transition was so sudden; and, to tell the truth, the tumult in her own mind was not so entirely subdued that she could bestow her full attention upon Roland’s double entendre.

He laughed. “One would think, by your look, that you did not share my fine sense of duty,” he said; “but you must not frown upon it. I am coming soon, very soon, again. A fortnight ago the place was only a name to me; but now it is a name that I shall remember forever,” he added with fervour.

Hester looked at him this time with a smile upon her mouth. She had recovered herself and come back to the diversion of his presence, the amusement and novelty he had brought. A half sense of the exaggeration and sentimental nonsense of his speech was in her smile; and he was more or less conscious of it too. When their eyes met they both laughed; and yet she was not displeased, nor he untouched by some reality of feeling. The exaggeration was humorous, and the sentiment not altogether untrue.

“Do you say that always when you leave a place?” Hester said.

“Very often,” he acknowledged; and they both laughed again, which, to her at least, was very welcome, as she had been doubly on the verge of tears⁠—for anger and for regret. “But seldom as I do now,” he added, “you may believe me. The old people are better and kinder than I had dreamt of; it does one good to be near them; and then I have helped myself on in the world by this visit, but that you will not care for. And then⁠—”

Here Roland broke off abruptly, and gazed, as his fashion was, as feeling the impotence of words to convey all that the heart would say.