Luttrell Of Arran Part 5

"It would be a mistake, Vyner, a great mistake, take my word for it,"

said the other. "To the man who a.s.sumes the incognito, all attempt at recognition is offensive. Besides, what is it to lead to? You can't imagine he'll want to talk over the past, and for such a man there is no speculation in the future."

"But the idea of being on the very island with him, knowing that he was within a mile of me, and that I never went to see him! It sounds very heartless, and I feel it would be so."

"I have nothing to say when you put the question on the ground of a sentiment. I can only discuss it as a matter of expediency, or the reverse. You don't charge a man with the opinions you find in an anonymous book, because, even supposing they are his, he has not thought proper to avow them; well, you owe exactly the same deference to him who lives under an incognito, or retires to some secluded, unfrequented spot. His object is to escape notice; under what plea do you drag him forth into the broad noonday?"

"I am certain my wife wouldn't forgive me if I left without even an effort to see him."

"As to that, I can say nothing. I never was married, and I do not pretend to know what are the 'cases of conscience' discussed connubially."

"You see, Grenfell," said the other, confidentially, "we all feel, as we have a right to feel, that we have done this man a great wrong. There has not been one single calamity of his life, from the day we broke with him, that is not traceable to us. His unfortunate line in politics, his low political a.s.sociates, the depraved life some a.s.sert that he lived, and, worse than all, his wretched marriage with a poor uneducated peasant girl."

"And do you fancy that a morning call from you is the reparation for all this?"

"Come, come, that is not the fair way to put it. Luttrell and I were once great friends. I was, I well know, very much his inferior in knowledge and power, but in worldliness and tact I was more than his match, and he gave way to me on every question of this sort. It may be--I'd like to think it might prove the case---that this old sentiment has not died out of his heart, that, as he used to say long ago, and people laughed when he said it, 'Let us hear what Vyner says.' Now, if this were so, I might even yet do something, if not for him, for that fine boy there."

"Leave that fine boy alone, Vyner, that's my advice to you. I never saw a fellow of his years with such an overweaning self-confidence. There is, I don't deny it, a certain 'gentleman' element in him, but it is dashed with something which I neither understand, nor could venture to say what it may lead to; but I repeat, leave him alone."

Vyner shook his head dissentingly, but did not speak.

"Besides, let us be practical. What could you do for him? You'd not adopt him, I take it?" Vyner was silent, and he continued: "Well, then, you'd cut off the one tie he has in life, and not subst.i.tute another.

Besides, don't you remember what old Scott said at the Huxleigh steeple-chase: 'I never back the half-bred 'uns, no matter how well they look in training.'"

"What a stickler for blood you have become," said Vyner, laughing; and it was only as he saw the crimson flush in the other's cheek that he bethought him how the remark might have offended.

"Take your own line, then," said Grenfell, angrily; "it doesn't signify to me personally a bra.s.s farthing. Our dinner company with old Crab and the German Fran can scarcely but be improved, even though it be by the admixture of a little rebellion through it."

"For all that, you'd like Luttrell immensely if you met him."

"I like none but men of the world--men who know the people, the places and the things one is daily connected with--who can take up the game of society where it left off last night, and have not to read themselves up in daily life the way fellows read their history out of the _Annual Register_."

"Well, I'll write him a note," said Vyner, following out his own thoughts; "I'll tell him, in a few words, how I chanced to come here, and I'll ask if he will receive me, or, better still,-if he'll come and dine with us to-morrow."

"I know the answer you'll get as well as if I had written it."

"Well, what will it be?"

"See you hanged first!"

"What is all this going on below? Are you quarrelling, children?" cried Vyner, as a great uproar burst forth from the cabin.

"Oh no, papa; but Robinson is so droll; he put baby-doll into a boat and had her shipwrecked, and saved by the little negro; and now they are going to be married. Just come and see it all."

"Tell me, Harry," said Vyner, "what would papa say if I were to write him a note and say that I have detained you here to dinner, and wouldn't let you go?"

"He'd say I could have jumped overboard," said the boy, reddening at what he thought was an imputation on his personal prowess.

"I don't exactly mean by force, my dear boy; I intended to say, by persuasion."

Either the view now submitted to him was not very clear, or that it was combined with other element, but he made no reply.

"I will put it this wise: I'll say I have made Harry's acquaintance this morning-by a lucky accident, and I hope you will not be displeased if he should stay and dine with us. I have a little girl of his own age who is delighted to have his company, and I feel certain you will not deprive her of so agreeable a playfellow."

"Papa will not know," said the boy, moodily.

"Not know what, my little man?"

"Papa will not care," said he; and a slight tremor shook his voice.

"Not care for what?"

"I mean," said he, resolutely, "that I often go away at daybreak and never come back till late at night, and papa does not mind it--he never asks for me."

As he spoke, Ada drew nigh her father, and clasped his hand in her own, while her tearful eyes turned alternately from her father to the child, the sense of her own happy lot, loved and cherished as she was, blending with a deep pity for one so desolate and friendless.

"That's the way boys are made independent and bold-hearted," said Vyner, hastily. "Men like their sons to be trained up in the free habits they enjoyed themselves. So, then, my note is not necessary--you can remain without it?"

"Would you like it?" said he, turning to Ada.

"Oh, how much!" cried she, eagerly.

"Then I'll stay!" As he spoke, he leaned back in his chair, and, who knows with what thoughts, sighed faintly, while two heavy tears rolled slowly down his cheeks. Vyner saw it, but turned away and went on deck.

"I can gather from what that boy has just said," said he to Gren-fell, "that his father is almost indifferent about him; he never knows of his coming or going, nor ever looks for him at meal-times."

"I should be surprised if it were otherwise," said Grenfell.

"Demoralisation never works by halves. When a man begins to go down hill, he never takes any other road. What could remain of your great scholar and double first man after years of a.s.sociation with brutal companionship and a peasant for a wife! How could it be possible for him to retain any one of the habits of his own cla.s.s amidst the daily frictions of that vulgar existence!"

"I begin to fear as much myself," said Vyner, sorrowfully. As he spoke, he felt Ada's hand in his own; she drew him to one side, and whispered, "Harry is crying, papa. He says he must go home, but he won't tell me why."

"Perhaps I can guess, darling. Let me speak with him alone. Vyner went down into the cabin by himself, but whatever pa.s.sed between him and the boy, the result, so far as persuading him to stay, was not successful, and young Luttrell came on deck along with him.

"Man a boat, there," said Vyner, "and take this young gentleman on sh.o.r.e. I will write one line to your father, Harry."

The two children stood hand in hand while Vyner wrote. They wore each of them a look of sorrow at parting; but the boy's face had a flush of shame as well as sorrow. They never uttered a word, however.

Vyner's note was in these words:

"My dear Luttrell,--Will you allow an old friend to see you, when he calls himself?

"Affectionately yours,

"Gervais Vyner."

He did not show this note to Grenfell, but handed it to the boy at once.

"He won't take the books, papa," whispered Ada, "nor anything else I offered him."