The Newcomes: Memoirs of a Most Respectable Family Part 54

I, for my part, thought Clive was making a very pretty drawing of my wife, and having affairs of my own to attend to, would often leave her at his chambers as a sitter, or find him at our lodgings visiting her.

They became the very greatest friends. I knew the young fellow could have no better friend than Laura; and not being ignorant of the malady under which he was labouring, concluded naturally and justly that Clive grew so fond of my wife, not for her sake entirely, but for his own, because he could pour his heart out to her, and her sweet kindness and compa.s.sion would soothe him in his unhappy condition.

Miss Ethel, I have said, also professed a great fondness for Mrs.

Pendennis; and there was that charm in the young lady's manner which speedily could overcome even female jealousy. Perhaps Laura determined magnanimously to conquer it; perhaps she hid it so as to vex me and prove the injustice of my suspicions: perhaps, honestly, she was conquered by the young beauty, and gave her a regard and admiration which the other knew she could inspire whenever she had the will.

My wife was fairly captivated by her at length. The untameable young creature was docile and gentle in Laura's presence; modest, natural, amiable, full of laughter and spirits, delightful to see and to hear; her presence cheered our quiet little household; her charm fascinated my wife as it had subjugated poor Clive. Even the reluctant Farintosh was compelled to own her power, and confidentially told his male friends, that, hang it, she was so handsome, and so clever, and so confoundedly pleasant and fascinating, and that--that he had been on the point of popping the fatal question ever so many times, by Jove. "And hang it, you know," his lordship would say, "I don't want to marry until I have had my fling, you know." As for Clive, Ethel treated him like a boy, like a big brother. She was jocular, kind, pert, pleasant with him, ordered him on her errands, accepted his bouquets and compliments, admired his drawings, liked to hear him praised, and took his part in all companies; laughed at his sighs, and frankly owned to Laura her liking for him and her pleasure in seeing him. "Why," said she, "should not I be happy as long as the sunshine lasts? To-morrow, I know, will be glum and dreary enough. When grandmamma comes back I shall scarcely be able to come and see you. When I am settled in life--eh! I shall be settled in life! Do not grudge me my holiday, Laura. Oh, if you knew how stupid it is to be in the world, and how much pleasanter to come and talk, and laugh, and sing, and be happy with you, than to sit in that dreary Eaton Place with poor Clara!"

"Why do you stay in Eaton Place?" asks Laura.

"Why? because I must go out with somebody. What an unsophisticated little country creature you are! Grandmamma is away, and I cannot go about to parties by myself."

"But why should you go to parties, and why not go back to your mother?"

says Mrs. Pendennis, gently.

"To the nursery, and my little sisters, and Miss Cann? I like being in London best, thank you. You look grave? You think a girl should like to be with her mother and sisters best? My dear mamma wishes me to be here, and I stay with Barnes and Clara by grandmamma's orders. Don't you know that I have been made over to Lady Kew, who has adopted me? Do you think a young lady of my pretensions can stop at home in a damp house in Warwickshire and cut bread-and-b.u.t.ter for little schoolboys? Don't look so very grave and shake your head so, Mrs. Pendennis! If you had been bred as I have, you would be as I am. I know what you are thinking, madam."

"I am thinking," said Laura, blushing and bowing her head--"I am thinking, if it pleases G.o.d to give me children, I should like to live at home at Fairoaks." My wife's thoughts, though she did not utter them, and a certain modesty and habitual awe kept her silent upon subjects so very sacred, went deeper yet. She had been bred to measure her actions by a standard which the world may nominally admit, but which it leaves for the most part unheeded. Worship, love, duty, as taught her by the devout study of the Sacred Law which interprets and defines it--if these formed the outward practice of her life, they were also its constant and secret endeavours and occupation. She spoke but very seldom of her religion, though it filled her heart and influenced all her behaviour.

Whenever she came to that sacred subject, her demeanour appeared to her husband so awful that he scarcely dared to approach it in her company, and stood without as this pure creature entered into the Holy of Holies.

What must the world appear to such a person? Its ambitious rewards, disappointments, pleasures, worth how much? Compared to the possession of that priceless treasure and happiness unspeakable, a perfect faith, what has Life to offer? I see before me now her sweet grave face, as she looks out from the balcony of the little Richmond villa we occupied during the first happy year after our marriage, following Ethel Newcome, who rides away, with a staid groom behind her, to her brother's summer residence, not far distant. Clive had been with us in the morning, and had brought us stirring news. The good Colonel was by this time on his way home. "If Clive could tear himself away from London," the good man wrote (and we thus saw he was acquainted with the state of the young man's mind), "why should not Clive go and meet his father at Malta?" He was feverish and eager to go; and his two friends strongly counselled him to take the journey. In the midst of our talk Miss Ethel came among us. She arrived flushed and in high spirits; she rallied Clive upon his gloomy looks; she turned rather pale, as it seemed to us, when she heard the news. Then she coldly told him she thought the voyage must be a pleasant one, and would do him good: it was pleasanter than that journey she was going to take herself with her dreary grandmother, to those German springs which the old Countess frequented year after year. Mr.

Pendennis having business, retired to his study, whither presently Mrs.

Laura followed, having to look for her scissors, or a book she wanted, or upon some pretext or other. She sate down in the conjugal study; not one word did either of us say for a while about the young people left alone in the drawing-room yonder. Laura talked about our own home at Fairoaks, which our tenants were about to vacate. She vowed and declared that we must live at Fairoaks; that Clavering, with all its t.i.ttle-tattle and stupid inhabitants, was better than this wicked London. Besides, there were some new and very pleasant families settled in the neighbourhood. Clavering Park was taken by some delightful people--"and you know, Pen, you were always very fond of fly-fishing, and may fish the Brawl, as you used in old days, when--" The lips of the pretty satirist who alluded to these unpleasant bygones were silenced as they deserved to be by Mr. Pendennis. "Do you think, sir, I did not know," says the sweetest voice in the world, "when you went out on your fishing excursions with Miss Amory?" Again the flow of words is checked by the styptic previously applied.

"I wonder," says Mr. Pendennis, archly, bending over his wife's fair hand--"I wonder whether this kind of thing is taking place in the drawing-room?"

"Nonsense, Arthur. It is time to go back to them. Why, I declare, I have been three-quarters of an hour away!"

"I don't think they will much miss you, my dear," says the gentleman.

"She is certainly very fond of him. She is always coming here. I am sure it is not to hear you read Shakspeare, Arthur; or your new novel, though it is very pretty. I wish Lady Kew and her sixty thousand pounds were at the bottom of the sea."

"But she says she is going to portion her younger brothers with a part of it; she told Clive so," remarks Mr. Pendennis.

"For shame! Why does not Barnes Newcome portion his younger brothers? I have no patience with that----Why! Goodness! There is Clive going away, actually! Clive! Mr. Newcome!" But though my wife ran to the study-window and beckoned our friend, he only shook his head, jumped on his horse, and rode away gloomily.

"Ethel had been crying when I went into the room," Laura afterwards told me. "I knew she had; but she looked up from some flowers over which she was bending, began to laugh and rattle, would talk about nothing but Lady Hautboi's great breakfast the day before, and the most insufferable Mayfair jargon; and then declared it was time to go home and dress for Mrs. Booth's dejeuner, which was to take place that afternoon."

And so Miss Newcome rode away--back amongst the roses and the rouges--back amongst the fiddling, flirting, flattery, falseness--and Laura's sweet serene face looked after her departing. Mrs. Booth's was a very grand dejeuner. We read in the newspapers a list of the greatest names there. A Royal Duke and d.u.c.h.ess; a German Highness, a Hindoo Nabob, etc.; and, amongst the Marquises, Farintosh; and, amongst the Lords, Highgate; and Lady Clara Newcome, and Miss Newcome, who looked killing, our acquaintance Captain Crackthorpe informs us, and who was in perfectly stunning spirits. "His Imperial Highness the Grand Duke of Farintosh is wild about her," the Captain said, "and our poor young friend Clive may just go and hang himself. Dine with us at the Gar and Starter? Jolly party. Oh! I forgot! married man now!" So saying, the Captain entered the hostelry near which I met him, leaving this present chronicler to return to his own home.

CHAPTER LI. An Old Friend

I might open the present chapter as a contemporary writer of Romance is occasionally in the habit of commencing his tales of Chivalry, by a description of a November afternoon falling leaves, tawny forests, gathering storms, and other autumnal phenomena; and two hors.e.m.e.n winding up the romantic road which leads from--from Richmond Bridge to the Star and Garter. The one rider is youthful, and has a blonde moustache. The cheek of the other has been browned by foreign suns; it is easy to see by the manner in which he bestrides his powerful charger that he has followed the profession of arms. He looks as if he had faced his country's enemies on many a field of Eastern battle. The cavaliers alight before the gate of a cottage on Richmond Hill, where a gentleman receives them with eager welcome. Their steeds are accommodated at a neighbouring hostelry,--I pause in the midst of the description, for the reader has made the acquaintance of our two hors.e.m.e.n long since. It is Clive returned from Malta, from Gibraltar, from Seville, from Cadiz, and with him our dear old friend the Colonel. His campaigns are over, his sword is hung up, he leaves Eastern suns and battles to warm younger blood. Welcome back to England, dear Colonel and kind friend! How quickly the years have pa.s.sed since he has been gone! There is a streak or two more silver in his hair. The wrinkles about his honest eyes are somewhat deeper, but their look is as steadfast and kind as in the early, almost boyish days when first we knew them.

We talk a while about the Colonel's voyage home, the pleasures of the Spanish journey, the handsome new quarters in which Clive has installed his father and himself, my own altered condition in life, and what not.

During the conversation a little querulous voice makes itself audible above-stairs, at which noise Mr. Clive begins to laugh, and the Colonel to smile. It is for the first time in his life Mr. Clive listens to the little voice; indeed, it is only since about six weeks that that small organ has been heard in the world at all. Laura Pendennis believes its tunes to be the sweetest, the most interesting, the most mirth-inspiring, the most pitiful and pathetic, that ever baby uttered; which opinions, of course, are backed by Mrs. Hokey, the confidential nurse. Laura's husband is not so rapturous; but, let us trust, behaves in a way becoming a man and a father. We forgo the description of his feelings as not pertaining to the history at present under consideration. A little while before the dinner is served, the lady of the cottage comes down to greet her husband's old friends.

And here I am sorely tempted to a third description, which has nothing to do with the story, to be sure, but which, if properly his off might fill half a page very prettily. For is not a young mother one of the sweetest sights which life shows us? If she has been beautiful before, does not her present pure joy give a character of refinement and sacredness almost to her beauty, touch her sweet cheeks with fairer blushes, and impart I know not what serene brightness to her eyes? I give warning to the artist who designs the pictures for this veracious story, to make no attempt at this subject. I never would be satisfied with it were his drawing ever so good.

When Sir Charles Grandison stepped up and made his very beautifullest bow to Miss Byron, I am sure his gracious dignity never exceeded that of Colonel Newcome's first greeting to Mrs. Pendennis. Of course from the very moment they beheld one another they became friends. Are not most of our likings thus instantaneous? Before she came down to see him, Laura had put on one of the Colonel's shawls--the crimson one, with the red palm-leaves and the border of many colours. As for the white one, the priceless, the gossamer, the fairy web, which might pa.s.s through a ring, that, every lady must be aware, was already appropriated to cover the cradle, or what I believe is called the ba.s.sinet, of Master Pendennis.

So we all became the very best of friends; and during the winter months whilst we still resided at Richmond, the Colonel was my wife's constant visitor. He often came without Clive. He did not care for the world which the young gentleman frequented, and was more pleased and at home by my wife's fireside than at more noisy and splendid entertainments.

And, Laura being a sentimental person interested in pathetic novels and all unhappy attachments, of course she and the Colonel talked a great deal about Mr. Clive's little affair, over which they would have such deep confabulations that even when the master of the house appeared, Pater Familias, the man whom, in the presence of the Rev. Dr. Portman, Mrs. Laura had sworn to love and honour these two guilty ones would be silent, or change the subject of conversation, not caring to admit such an unsympathising person as myself into their conspiracy.

From many a talk which they have had together since the Colonel and his son embraced at Malta, Clive's father had been led to see how strongly the pa.s.sion which our friend had once fought and mastered, had now taken possession of the young man. The unsatisfied longing left him indifferent to all other objects of previous desire or ambition. The misfortune darkened the sunshine of his spirit, and clouded the world before his eyes. He pa.s.sed hours in his painting-room, though he tore up what he did there. He forsook his usual haunts, or appeared amongst his old comrades moody and silent. From cigar-smoking, which I own to be a reprehensible practice, he plunged into still deeper and darker dissipation; for I am sorry to say, he took to pipes and the strongest tobacco, for which there is no excuse. Our young man was changed. During the last fifteen or twenty months, the malady had been increasing on him, of which we have not chosen to describe at length the stages; knowing very well that the reader (the male reader at least) does not care a fig about other people's sentimental perplexities, and is not wrapped up heart and soul in Clive's affairs like his father, whose rest was disturbed if the boy had a headache, or who would have stripped the coat off his back to keep his darling's feet warm.

The object of this hopeless pa.s.sion had, meantime, returned to the custody of the dark old duenna, from which she had been liberated for a while. Lady Kew had got her health again, by means of the prescriptions of some doctors, or by the efficacy of some baths; and was again on foot and in the world, tramping about in her grim pursuit of pleasure. Lady Julia, we are led to believe, had retired upon half-pay, and into an inglorious exile at Brussels, with her sister, the outlaw's wife, by whose bankrupt fireside she was perfectly happy. Miss Newcome was now her grandmother's companion, and they had been on a tour of visits in Scotland, and were journeying from country-house to country-house about the time when our good Colonel returned to his native sh.o.r.es.

The Colonel loved his nephew Barnes no better than before, perhaps, though we must say that since his return from India the young Baronet's conduct had been particularly friendly. "No doubt marriage had improved him; Lady Clara seemed a good-natured young woman enough; besides," says the Colonel, wagging his good old head knowingly, "Tom Newcome, of the Bundelcund Bank, is a personage to be conciliated; whereas Tom Newcome, of the Bengal Cavalry, was not worth Master Barnes's attention. He has been very good and kind on the whole; so have his friends been uncommonly civil. There was Clive's acquaintance, Mr. Belsize that was, Lord Highgate who is now, entertained our whole family sumptuously last week--wants us and Barnes and his wife to go to his country-house at Christmas--is as hospitable, my dear Mrs. Pendennis, as man can be. He met you at Barnes's, and as soon as we are alone," says the Colonel, turning round to Laura's husband, "I will tell you in what terms Lady Clara speaks of your wife. Yes. She is a good-natured, kind little woman, that Lady Clara." Here Laura's face a.s.sumed that gravity and severeness, which it always wore when Lady Clara's name was mentioned, and the conversation took another turn.

Returning home from London one afternoon, I met the Colonel, who hailed me on the omnibus, and rode on his way towards the City, I knew, of course, that he had been colloquying with my wife; and taxed that young woman with these continued flirtations. "Two or three times a week, Mrs. Laura, you dare to receive a Colonel of Dragoons. You sit for hours closeted with the young fellow of sixty; you change the conversation when your own injured husband enters the room, and pretend to talk about the weather, or the baby. You little arch hypocrite, you know you do.

Don't try to humbug me, miss; what will Richmond, what will society, what will Mrs. Grundy in general say to such atrocious behaviour?"

"Oh! Pen," says my wife, closing my mouth in a way which I do not choose further to particularise; "that man is the best, the dearest, the kindest creature. I never knew such a good man; you ought to put him into a book. Do you know, sir, that I felt the very greatest desire to give him a kiss when he went away; and that one which you had just now, was intended for him.

"Take back thy gift, false girl!" says Mr Pendennis; and then, finally, we come to the particular circ.u.mstance which had occasioned so much enthusiasm on Mrs. Laura's part.

Colonel Newcome had summoned heart of grace, and in Clive's behalf had regularly proposed him to Barnes, as a suitor to Ethel, taking an artful advantage of his nephew Barnes Newcome, and inviting that Barnes to a private meeting, where they were to talk about the affairs of the Bundelcund Banking Company.

Now this Bundelcund Banking Company, in the Colonel's eyes, was in reality his son Clive. But for Clive there might have been a hundred banking companies established, yielding a hundred per cent, in as many districts of India, and Thomas Newcome, who had plenty of money for his own wants, would never have thought of speculation. His desire was to see his boy endowed with all the possible gifts of fortune. Had he built a palace for Clive, and been informed that a roc's egg was required to complete the decoration of the edifice, Tom Newcome would have travelled to the world's end in search of the wanting article. To see Prince Clive ride in a gold coach with a princess beside him, was the kind old Colonel's ambition; that done, he would be content to retire to a garret in the prince's castle, and smoke his cheroot there in peace. So the world is made. The strong and eager covet honour and enjoyment for themselves; the gentle and disappointed (once, they may have been strong and eager, too) desire these gifts for their children. I think Clive's father never liked or understood the lad's choice of a profession. He acquiesced in it as he would in any of his son's wishes. But, not being a poet himself, he could not see the n.o.bility of that calling; and felt secretly that his son was demeaning himself by pursuing the art of painting. "Had he been a soldier, now," thought Thomas Newcome, "(though I prevented that) had he been richer than he is, he might have married Ethel, instead of being unhappy as he now is, G.o.d help him! I remember my own time of grief well enough: and what years it took before my wound wound was scarred over."

So with these things occupying his brain Thomas Newcome artfully invited Barnes, his nephew, to dinner under pretence of talking of the affairs of the great B. B. C. With the first gla.s.s of wine at dessert, and according to the Colonel's good old-fashioned custom of proposing toasts, they drank the health of the B. B. C. Barnes drank the toast with all his generous heart. The B. B. C. sent to Hobson Brothers and Newcome a great deal of business, was in a most prosperous condition, kept a great balance at the bank, a balance that would not be overdrawn, as Sir Barnes Newcome very well knew. Barnes was for having more of these bills, provided there were remittances to meet the same. Barnes was ready to do any amount of business with the Indian bank, or with any bank, or with any individual, Christian or heathen, white or black, who could do good to the firm of Hobson Brothers and Newcome. He spoke upon this subject with great archness and candour: of course as a City man he would be glad to do a profitable business anywhere, and the B. B. C.'s business was profitable. But the interested motive which he admitted frankly as a man of the world, did not prevent other sentiments more agreeable. "My dear Colonel," says Barnes, "I am happy, most happy, to think that our house and our name should have been useful, as I know they have been, in the establishment of a concern in which one of our family is interested; one whom we all so sincerely respect and regard."

And he touched his gla.s.s with his lips and blushed a little, as he bowed towards his uncle. He found himself making a little speech, indeed; and to do so before one single person seems rather odd. Had there been a large company present Barnes would not have blushed at all, but have tossed off his gla.s.s, struck his waistcoat possibly, and looked straight in the face of his uncle as the chairman; well, he did very likely believe that he respected and regarded the Colonel.

The Colonel said--"Thank you, Barnes, with all my heart. It is always good for men to be friends, much more for blood relations, as we are."

"A relationship which honours me, I'm sure!" says Barnes, with a tone of infinite affability. You see, he believed that Heaven had made him the Colonel's superior.

"And I am very glad," the elder went on, "that you and my boy are good friends."

"Friends! of course. It would be unnatural if such near relatives were otherwise than good friends."

"You have been hospitable to him, and Lady Clara very kind, and he wrote to me telling me of your kindness. Ahem! this is tolerable claret. I wonder where Clive gets it?"

"You were speaking about that indigo, Colonel!" here Barnes interposes.

"Our house has done very little in that way, to be sure but I suppose that our credit is about as good as Battie's and Jolly's, and if----"

but the Colonel is in a brown study.

"Clive will have a good bit of money when I die," resumes Clive's father.

"Why, you are a hale man--upon my word, quite a young man, and may marry again, Colonel," replies the nephew fascinatingly.

"I shall never do that," replies the other. "Ere many years are gone, I shall be seventy years old, Barnes."

"Nothing in this country, my dear sir! positively nothing. Why, there was t.i.tus, my neighbour in the country--when will you come down to Newcome?--who married a devilish pretty girl, of very good family, too, Miss Burgeon, one of the Devonshire Burgeons. He looks, I am sure, twenty years older than you do. Why should not you do likewise?"

"Because I like to remain single, and want to leave Clive a rich man.

Look here, Barnes, you know the value of our bank shares, now?"