A Drake by George! Part 12

Mrs. Drake was simple enough to believe George was preparing himself for the duties of station-master, and he more than suggested this was indeed the case; having the impudence to hint at negotiations for various stations where it would be his business to receive all manner of royalties; but the letters he received were of such a confidential nature that he was not at liberty to show them to his aunt. He convinced her they were all typewritten, and this was quite sufficient for his purpose, because the old-fashioned woman supposed letters written by machinery could emanate only from departments under the immediate control of Ministers of State.

The cold-blooded George had drawn up a programme of his career under such items as Courtship of Nellie, Annihilation of Sidney, Conciliation of Aunt, Guarding of the Furniture, Departure of Aunt Sophy, Contract with Nellie, Departure of Aunt, Marriage and Retirement. With fine prophetic instinct a date was appended to each one of these events: Miss Yard had but a single year of life remaining, while three more years were allotted to Mrs. Drake. So far the programme was well ahead of time, owing to the visit of Mrs. Stanley.

The careful mind of George was troubled concerning his forthcoming marriage and subsequent retirement. He asked himself frequently whether it could be prudent to enter into a matrimonial alliance with Nellie, or indeed with any girl; was a wife preferable on the whole to a housekeeper? George sought the opinion of the Dismal Gibcat, who replied that the house presided over by a wife was bound to be respectable, while the house ruled by spinster or widow was not; besides, a housekeeper could not be scowled at with impunity, whereas a wife might easily be taught all the accomplishments of her husband: that was to say, if the husband found it necessary to slander another man, or to deprive some woman of her character, the partner of his joys and sorrows would slander these persons too; whereas a housekeeper might find it her duty to defend them.

Then George consulted the Yellow Leaf, who was of the decidedly robust opinion that men and women should not only marry as early as possible, but should keep on doing it as often as the law allowed; and even if they did offend against the law sometimes it was better to err upon the right side. He alluded to his own brilliant example of marrying at eighteen, with the happy result that the entire population of the village were more or less related to him; and he went on to declare he had already appointed a successor to his present wife, who had been bedridden for some years.

Although George had some doubts remaining, he arrived sorrowfully at the conclusion that it would be his duty to make Nellie happy, if the ladies of Windward House should respect his programme and depart from the world according to scheduled time. The question of his retirement remained the only point to be disposed of. Should he conclude a life of usefulness as the most respected parishioner of Highfield, or favour a wider circle?

Certainly it would be more agreeable to retire in a village, where respect came automatically, than to run the risk of being dishonoured in some town, where standing at corners or musing beside lamp posts might be wrongly construed as revealing instability of character.

It might, he feared, become necessary to commence his retirement within the next few months, for Mrs. Drake was clearly in a restless frame of mind, and the impending failure of his negotiations with the railway company might induce her to issue the expulsion order which Percy would be called upon to execute. In such case George decided his health would be forced to suffer a breakdown, although it might be possible, now Mrs.

Drake's powers were growing defective, to a.s.sure her his career upon the railway was finished; but, unfortunately, owing to his inability to serve full time, he enjoyed no pension.

A wet day a.s.sisted George in making a discovery which, although not altering his programme, seemed to promise an extension of the indefinite time limit.

"I want to go to the sea. Aunt Sophy worries so about her friends, and I can't make her believe she hasn't got any. She will forget all about them if we go away. When are you going to your station?" asked Mrs.

Drake, while Miss Yard looked up plaintively and wanted to know what she had done now.

"Oh, nothing. I'm telling George we are going to the seaside directly he is ready to leave."

"I think you had better not wait," said George warningly.

"You promised to go this month," his aunt said fretfully.

"Changes have occurred, with the result that I have now broken off the negotiations."

"Then I have done with you!"

"I'm so glad somebody else has broken something," said Miss Yard happily.

George left the room, and returned presently with an armful of plans and diagrams.

"I knew they existed, and at last I have found them," he remarked triumphantly.

"Take away your rubbish!" said Mrs. Drake.

"My uncle made these plans. These diagrams were the solace of his closing years," said George; and directly he had spoken his aunt's face softened, and she fumbled for her spectacles.

"My dear uncle charged me to carry out the work if he should not live to complete it. These are his plans for a railway to link up the scattered parishes of this moorland region. It is my earnest hope," said George, "that I may be permitted to undertake the work which is to give Dartmoor a railway and Highfield a station."

"I had forgotten all about it," Mrs. Drake murmured.

"I did not forget," said George reprovingly. "I should have acted long ago, if I could have found these precious plans. Here is the prospectus in dear uncle's writing. He shows how simple and inexpensive it would be to build a railway across the Dartmoor, without a single viaduct, tunnel, embankment, or cutting. It was his intention to make Highfield Station a terminus, as he could not see his way to surmount the steep drop into the valley without going to considerable expense. Now you can understand why it is no longer my intention to occupy the poorly paid position of station-master. I aim at higher things. I mean to be a railway magnate."

"What can you do?" asked Mrs. Drake, much impressed by those relics of her husband.

"I shall communicate with my railway friends; I shall float a company, and appoint a Board of Directors; I shall pa.s.s a Bill through Parliament."

"Whatever is George doing?" inquired Miss Yard.

"Making a railway," replied her sister.

"I wish I could do something half as useful," sighed Miss Yard.

George borrowed five pounds for postage stamps, converted his bedroom into an office, and fed the village with false news which percolated into the ears of Mrs. Drake by means of Robert the dripping tap and Kezia the filter. George had antic.i.p.ated this, and, knowing the truthful ways of the village, was not greatly astonished when Robert informed him in confidence how engineers had already been seen taking the level of the Dartmoor heights; while the parishioners had sworn to tear up the railway as fast as it was made, unless they received ample compensation for this cynical infringement of their rights.

What he had not antic.i.p.ated was the action taken by his aunt. Left to herself she would have remained credulous to the end; but Kezia declared Mr. George was not spending his days letter writing; while Bessie stated the postmistress had told her Mr. George had bought no stamps lately.

"I have looked into his room and seen him writing," said Mrs. Drake despairingly.

"He wur doing poetry, mum," said Kezia sadly.

"Oh, I'm sure he's not so bad as that," cried the lady.

"I don't want to say too much, mum, and I ain't going to say anything against Mr. George, whom you might call a member of the family,"

continued Kezia in the voice of doom, "but I saw a lot of the paper he had wrote some of his poetry on."

"I saw it too, mum," chimed in Bessie.

"And, mum, at the end of the first line wur six kisses."

"Crosses, mum," exclaimed Bessie, as an expert in this form of literature.

"And the second line--oh, mum, I don't know as how I can say it."

"Shall I do it vor ye?" asked Bessie eagerly.

"No, Bess, I'll do it. He said, mum, his heart wur all jelly."

"Think of that, mum!" gasped Bessie.

"Oh no! Not jelly again. We had yesterday," cried Miss Yard, who liked to be consulted concerning the bill of fare.

"I do hope the poor creature isn't going off his head," said Mrs. Drake.

"Don't you see, mum, that word wur meant to sound like the word at the end of the first line what he wrote in crosses. And you know, mum, there's someone in this house whose name do have the same sort of sound as jelly."

"Ah, but she b'ain't so soft," added Bessie. "And he wrote she was so bewitching, drinking cocoa in the kitchen. That was a rhyme, mum."

"I have heard quite enough," said Mrs. Drake wearily. "I wish to goodness I had never seen the fellow," she murmured.

The following week she visited the Captain's grave, staying longer than usual, and scribbling industriously on sc.r.a.ps of paper the whole evening. Next day the exodus took place, Kezia and Nellie accompanying the ladies to the seaside, while George remained in solitary possession.

As any pretence of industry was no longer necessary, he settled down to enjoy a honeymoon with indolence, until a letter arrived to waken him completely.

It appeared that Mrs. Drake had written to Percy, informing him of all George had said and not done; also asking for information about the floating of companies and the construction of railways, as, she explained, George had decided to build one across Dartmoor, and was inviting Miss Yard and herself to become debenture holders.

Percy's answer had crushed the poor lady entirely. He explained that, as George of course was perfectly well aware, to obtain a position as station-master it would be necessary to enter the service of the railway company as a clerk, and work upwards gradually. As for building a railway, that was not the recreation of a single individual, but a superhuman undertaking, which in the first place would require to be discussed by some of the greatest financial magnates upon earth for half a century--at least such was his own impression--before Parliament could even be approached; and then another half century would probably be demanded for the arrangement of preliminary details; and after that a new generation would have to begin the work all over again. While the suggestion of a railway across Dartmoor could appeal only to a Parliament with a sense of humour.

Accordingly Mrs. Drake disowned her nephew. She ordered him to depart from Highfield, declaring also her intention of not returning to Windward House while he remained there. For his maintenance she was prepared to allow the sum of ten shillings weekly so long as she might live. Should he delay in taking his departure, Percy would instruct some gentleman learned in the law to hasten the eviction. And if he took anything in the house away with him, he would thereby forfeit all benefits under her will.