Phoebe, Junior · Chapter 44 (2/2)

“What I have to say is this. I will never consent to let my son Clarence marry you.” Here he was interrupted by a serious little bow of assent from Phoebe, which disconcerted and angered him strangely. “This being the case,” he resumed more hotly, “don’t you think we’d better come to terms, you and me? You are too sensible a girl, I’ll be bound, to marry a man without a penny, which is what he would be. He would be properly made an end of, Miss Phoebe, if he found out, after all his bravado last night, that you were the one to cast him off after all.”

“He cannot find that out,” said Phoebe with a smile; “unfortunately even if I could have done it under brighter circumstances my mouth is closed now. I desert him now, when he is in trouble! Of course you do not know me, so you are excused for thinking so, Mr. Copperhead.”

The rich man stared. She was speaking a language which he did not understand. “Look here, Miss Phoebe,” he said, “let’s understand each other. High horses don’t answer with me. As for deserting him when he’s in trouble, if you’ll give him up⁠—or desert him, as you call it⁠—he need never be in trouble at all. You can stop all that. Just you say no to him, and he’ll soon be on his knees to me to think no more of it. You know who I am,” Mr. Copperhead continued with a concealed threat. “I have a deal of influence in the connection, though I say it that shouldn’t, and I’m very well looked on in chapel business. What would the Crescent do without me? And if there should be an unpleasantness between the minister and the leading member, why, you know, Miss Phoebe, no one better, who it is that would go to the wall.”

She made no answer, and he thought she was impressed by his arguments. He went on still more strongly than before. “Such a clever girl as you knows all that,” said Mr. Copperhead, “and suppose you were to marry Clarence without a penny, what would become of you? What would you make of him? He is too lazy for hard work, and he has not brains enough for anything else. What would you make of him if you had him? That’s what I want to know.”

“And that is just what I can’t tell you,” said Phoebe smiling. “It is a very serious question. I suppose something will turn up.”

“What can turn up? You marry him because he is going into parliament, and could give you a fine position.”

“I confess,” said Phoebe with her usual frankness, “that I did think of his career; without that the future is much darker, and rather depressing.”

“Yes, you see that! A poor clod of a fellow that can’t work, and will be hanging upon you every day, keeping you from working⁠—that you will never be able to make anything of.”

“Mr. Copperhead,” said Phoebe sweetly, “why do you tell all this to me? Your mere good sense will show you that I cannot budge. I have accepted him being rich, and I cannot throw him over when he is poor. I may not like it⁠—I don’t like it⁠—but I am helpless. Whatever change is made, it cannot be made by me.”

He stared at her in blank wonder and dismay. For a moment he could not say anything. “Look here,” he faltered at last, “you thought him a great match, a rise in the world for you and yours; but he ain’t a great match any longer. What’s the use then of keeping up the farce? You and me understand each other. You’ve nothing to do but to let him off; you’re young and pretty, you’ll easily find someone else. Fools are plenty in this world,” he added, unable to refrain from that one fling. “Let him off and all will be right. What’s to prevent you? I’d not lose a moment if I were you.”

Phoebe laughed. She had a pretty laugh, soft yet ringing like a child’s. “You and I, I fear, are no rule for each other,” she said. “Mr. Copperhead, what prevents me is a small thing called honour, that is all.”

“Honour! that’s for men,” he said hastily, “and folly for them according as you mean it; but for women there’s no such thing, it’s sham and humbug; and look you here, Miss Phoebe,” he continued, losing his temper, “you see what your father will say to this when you get him into hot water with his people! There’s more men with sons than me; and if the Crescent ain’t too hot to hold him within a month⁠—Do you think I’ll stand it, a beggarly minister and his belongings coming in the way of a man that could buy you all up, twenty times over, and more!”

The fury into which he had worked himself took away Mr. Copperhead’s breath. Phoebe said nothing. She went on by his side with soft steps, her face a little downcast, the suspicion of a smile about her mouth.

“By George!” he cried, when he had recovered himself, “you think you can laugh at me. You think you can defy me, you, a bit of a girl, as poor as Job!”

“I defy no one,” said Phoebe. “I cannot prevent you from insulting me, that is all; which is rather hard,” she added, with a smile, which cost her an effort, “seeing that I shall have to drag your son through the world somehow, now that you have cast him off. He will not give me up, I know, and honour prevents me from giving him up. So I shall have hard work enough, without any insults from you. It is a pity,” said Phoebe, with a sort of sympathetic regret for herself so badly used. “I could have made a man of him. I could have backed him up to get on as well as most men; but it will certainly be uphill work now.”

She did not look at the furious father as she spoke. She was quite calm, treating it reflectively, regretfully, as a thing past and over. Mr. Copperhead tried to burst forth again in threats and objurgations; but in spite of himself, and though she never said another word, the big, rich, noisy man was silenced. He went away, threatening to appeal to her father, which Phoebe, with a last effort, begged him smilingly to do. But this was the last of which she was capable. When she had closed the door after him, she rushed upstairs to her room, and cried bitterly. Everything was very dark to her. If he did appeal to her father, the appeal would spread confusion and dismay through the pastor’s heart and family; and what was to become of herself, with Clarence on her hands, who could do nothing that was useful, and could earn neither his own living nor hers? All this was very terrible to Phoebe, and for a moment she contemplated the unheard of step of having a headache, and staying upstairs. But she reflected that her poor old grandfather had done his duty, at no small sacrifice, according to her bidding, yesterday; and she bathed her eyes heroically, and collected her strength and went down to breakfast as usual. It was her duty, which she must do.

As for Mr. Copperhead, he took a long walk, to reflect upon all the circumstances, which were complicated enough to cause him much trouble. He could not give up his cherished scheme, his Member of Parliament, his crown of glory. It was what he had been looking forward to for years. He tried to realize the failure of his hopes, and could not⁠—nay, would not, feeling it more than he could bear. No; without his gentleman son, his University man, his costly, useless production, who was worth so much money to him, yet brought in nothing, he felt that he must shrink in the opinion of all his friends, even of his own sons, the “first family,” who had so envied, sneered at, undervalued Clarence, yet had been forced to be civil to him, and respect their father’s imperious will as he chose that it should be respected. What a sorry figure he should cut before all of them if he cast off Clarence, and had to announce himself publicly as foiled in all his plans and hopes! He could not face this prospect; he shrank from it as if it had involved actual bodily pain. The men who would laugh at his failure were men of his own class, to whom he had bragged at his ease, crowing and exulting over them, and he felt that he could not face them if all his grand anticipations collapsed. There was nothing for it but to give in. And on the other hand this girl Phoebe was a very clever girl, able not only to save the expense of coaches, but to cram the boy, and keep him up better than any coach could do. She could make his speeches for him, like enough, Mr. Copperhead thought, and a great many reasons might be given to the world why she had been chosen instead of a richer wife for the golden boy. Golden girls, as a general rule, were not of so much use. “Fortune ain’t worth thinking of in comparison with brains. It was brains I wanted, and I’ve bought ’em dear; but I hope I can afford it,” he almost heard himself saying to an admiring, envious assembly; for Mr. Copperhead so far deserved his success that he could accept a defeat when it was necessary, and make the best of it. When he had nearly ended his walk, and had reached in his thoughts to this point, he met his son, who was walking up from the Parsonage to No. 6 in the Lane. Clarence looked cheerful enough as he walked along, whistling under his breath, towards his love; but when he saw his father, a change came over his face. Once more his eyelids drooped over his eyes, and those muddy brown orbs got fixed in dull obstinacy; once more his upper lip shut down sullen and fast upon the lower. The entire expression of his face changed. Mr. Copperhead saw this afar off, from the moment his son perceived him, and the sight gave to all his thinking that force which reality gives to imagination; the risk he was running became doubly clear.

“Good morning, Clarence,” he said.

“Good morning, sir,” responded the other, with lowering brows and close-shut mouth.

“I suppose you were coming to the George to me? Come along, I’ve had no breakfast; and let’s hope, my boy, that you’re in a better mind than last night.”

“Look here, sir,” said Clarence; “you might as well ask one of those houses to walk with you to the George, and show a better mind. I’m of one mind, and one only. I’ll marry Phoebe Beecham, whether you like it or not, and no other woman in this world.”

“Is that your last word?” said the father, curiously repeating, without being aware of it, his question of the previous night.

“That’s my last word,” said the son, contemplating his father sullenly from under the heavy lids of his obstinate eyes.

“Very well,” said Mr. Copperhead; “then come along to breakfast, for I’m hungry, and we can talk it over there.”