The Newcomes: Memoirs of a Most Respectable Family Part 81

I hardly made a bow to the ladies, so eager was I to communicate with Colonel Newcome. "I have just been to your quarters at Grey Friars, sir," said I. "That is----"

"You have been to the Hospital, sir! You need not be ashamed to mention it, as Colonel Newcome is not ashamed to go there," cried out the Campaigner. "Pray speak in your own language, Clive, unless there is something not fit for ladies to hear." Clive was growling out to me in German that there had just been a terrible scene, his father having, a quarter of an hour previously, let slip the secret about Grey Friars.

"Say at once, Clive!" the Campaigner cried, rising in her might, and extending a great strong arm over her helpless child, "that Colonel Newcome owns that he has gone to live as a pauper in a hospital! He who has squandered his own money. He who has squandered my money. He who has squandered the money of that darling helpless child--compose yourself, Rosey my love!--has completed the disgrace of the family, by his present mean and unworthy--yes, I say, mean and unworthy and degraded conduct.

Oh, my child, my blessed child! to think that your husband's father should have come to a workhouse!" Whilst this maternal agony bursts over her, Rosa, on the sofa, bleats and whimpers amongst the faded chintz cushions.

I took Clive's hand, which was cast up to his head striking his forehead with mad impotent rage, whilst this fiend of a woman lashed his good father. The veins of his great fist were swollen, his whole body was throbbing and trembling with the helpless pain under which he writhed.

"Colonel Newcome's friends, ma'am,", I said, "think very differently from you; and that he is a better judge than you, or any one else, of his own honour. We all, who loved him in his prosperity, love and respect him more than ever for the manner in which he bears his misfortune. Do you suppose that his n.o.ble friend, the Earl of H----, would have counselled him to a step unworthy of a gentleman; that the Prince de Moncontour would applaud his conduct as he does, if he did not think it admirable?" I can hardly say with what scorn I used this argument, or what depth of contempt I felt for the woman whom I knew it would influence. "And at this minute," I added, "I have come from visiting the Gray Friars with one of the Colonel's relatives, whose love and respect for him is boundless; who longs to be reconciled to him, and who is waiting below, eager to shake his hand, and embrace Clive's wife."

"Who is that?" says the Colonel, looking gently up, as he pats Boy's head.

"Who is it, Pen?" says Clive. I said in a low voice, "Ethel;" and starting up and crying "Ethel! Ethel!" he ran from the room.

Little Mrs. Rosa started up too on her sofa, clutching hold of the table-cover with her lean hand, and the two red spots on her cheeks burning more fiercely than ever. I could see what pa.s.sion was beating in that poor little heart. "Heaven help us! what a resting-place had friends and parents prepared for it! for shame!"

"Miss Newcome, is it? My darling Rosa, get on your shawl!" cried the Campaigner, a grim smile lighting her face.

"It is Ethel; Ethel is my niece. I used to love her when she was quite a little girl," says the Colonel, patting Boy on the head; "and she is a very good, beautiful little child--a very good child." The torture had been too much for that kind old heart: there were times when Thomas Newcome pa.s.sed beyond it. What still maddened Clive, excited his father no more; the pain yonder woman inflicted, only felled and stupefied him.

As the door opened, the little white-headed child trotted forward towards the visitor, and Ethel entered on Clive's arm, who was as haggard and pale as death. Little Boy, looking up at the stately lady, still followed beside her, as she approached her uncle, who remained sitting, his head bent to the ground. His thoughts were elsewhere.

Indeed he was following the child, and about to caress it again.

"Here is a friend, father!" says Clive, laying a hand on the old man's shoulder. "It is I, Ethel, uncle!" the young lady said, taking his hand; and kneeling down between his knees, she flung her arms round him, and kissed him, and wept on his shoulder.

His consciousness had quite returned ere an instant was over. He embraced her with the warmth of his old affection, uttering many brief words of love, kindness, and tenderness, such as men speak when strongly moved.

The little boy had come wondering up to the chair whilst this embrace took place, and Clive's tall figure bent over the three. Rosa's eyes were not good to look at, as she stared at the group with a ghastly smile. Mrs. Mackenzie surveyed the scene in haughty state, from behind the sofa cushions. She tried to take one of Rosa's lean hot hands. The poor child tore it away, leaving her rings behind her; lifted her hands to her face: and cried, cried as if her little heart would break. Ah me! what a story was there! what an outburst of pent-up feeling! what a pa.s.sion of pain! The ring had fallen to the ground; the little boy crept towards it, and picked it up, and came towards his mother, fixing on her his large wondering eyes. "Mamma crying. Mamma's ring!" he said, holding up the circle of gold. With more feeling than I had ever seen her exhibit, she clasped the boy in her wasted arms. Great Heaven! what pa.s.sion, jealousy, grief, despair, were tearing and trying all these hearts, that but for fate might have been happy?

Clive went round, and with the utmost sweetness and tenderness hanging round his child and wife, soothed her with words of consolation, that in truth I scarce heard, being ashamed almost of being present at this sudden scene. No one, however, took notice of the witnesses; and even Mrs. Mackenzie's voice was silent for the moment. I dare say Clive's words were incoherent; but women have more presence of mind; and now Ethel, with a n.o.ble grace which I cannot attempt to describe, going up to Rosa, seated herself by her, spoke of her long grief at the differences between her dearest uncle and herself; of her early days, when he had been as a father to her; of her wish, her hope that Rosa should love her as a sister; and of her belief that better days and happiness were in store for them all. And she spoke to the mother about her boy so beautiful and intelligent, and told her how she had brought up her brother's children, and hoped that this one too would call her Aunt Ethel. She would not stay now, might she come again? Would Rosa come to her with her little boy? Would he kiss her? He did so with a very good grace; but when Ethel at parting embraced the child's mother, Rosa's face wore a smile ghastly to look at, and the lips that touched Ethel's cheeks, were quite white.

"I shall come and see you again to-morrow, uncle, may I not? I saw your room to-day, sir, and your housekeeper; such a nice old lady, and your black gown. And you shall put it on to-morrow, and walk with me, and show me the beautiful old buildings of that old hospital. And I shall come and make tea for you, the housekeeper says I may. Will you come down with me to my carriage? No, Mr. Pendennis must come;" and she quitted the room, beckoning me after her. "You will speak to Clive now, won't you?" she said, "and come to me this evening, and tell me all before you go to bed?" I went back, anxious in truth to the messenger of good tidings to my dear old friends.

Brief as my absence had been, Mrs. Mackenzie had taken advantage of that moment again to outrage Clive and his father, and to announce that Rosa might go to see this Miss Newcome, whom people respected because she was rich, but whom she would never visit; no, never! "An insolent, proud, impertinent thing! Does she take me for a housemaid?" Mrs. Mackenzie had inquired.

"Am I dust to be trampled beneath her feet? Am I a dog that she can't throw me a word?" Her arms were stretched out, and she was making this inquiry as to her own canine qualities as I re-entered the room, and remembered that Ethel had never once addressed a single word to Mrs.

Mackenzie in the course of her visit.

I affected not to perceive the incident, and presently said that I wanted to speak to Clive in his studio. Knowing that I had brought my friend one or two commissions for drawings, Mrs. Mackenzie was civil to me, and did not object to our colloquies.

"Will you come too, and smoke a pipe, father?" says Clive.

"Of course your father intends to stay to dinner?" says the Campaigner, with a scornful toss of her head. Clive groaned out as we were on the stair, "that he could not bear this much longer, by heavens he could not."

"Give the Colonel his pipe, Clive," said I. "Now, sir, down with you in the sitter's chair, and smoke the sweetest cheroot you ever smoked in your life! My dear, dear old Clive! you need not bear with the Campaigner any longer; you may go to bed without this nightmare to-night if you like; you may have your father back under your roof again."

"My dear Arthur! I must be back at ten, sir, back at ten, military time; drum beats; no--bell tolls at ten, and gates close;" and he laughed and shook his old head. "Besides, I am to see a young lady, sir; and she is coming to make tea for me, and I must speak to Mrs. Jones to have all things ready--all things ready;" and again the old man laughed as he spoke.

His son looked at him and then at me with eyes full of sad meaning. "How do you mean, Arthur," Clive said, "that he can come and stay with me, and that that woman can go?"

Then feeling in my pocket for Mr. Luce's letter, I grasped my dear Clive by the hand and bade him prepare for good news. I told him how providentially, two days since, Ethel, in the library at Newcome, looking into Orme's History of India, a book which old Mrs. Newcome had been reading on the night of her death, had discovered a paper, of which the accompanying letter enclosed a copy, and I gave my friend the letter.

He opened it, and read it through. I cannot say that I saw any particular expression of wonder in his countenance, for somehow, all the while Clive perused this doc.u.ment, I was looking at the Colonel's sweet kind face. "It--it is Ethel's doing," said Clive, in a hurried voice.

"There was no such letter."

"Upon my honour," I answered, "there was. We came up to London with it last night, a few hours after she had found it. We showed it to Sir Barnes Newcome, who--who could not disown it. We took it to Mr. Luce, who recognised it at once, who was old Mrs. Newcome's man of business, and continues to be the family lawyer, and the family recognises the legacy and has paid it, and you may draw for it to-morrow, as you see.

What a piece of good luck it is that it did not come before the B. B. C.

time! That confounded Bundelcund Bank would have swallowed up this like all the rest."

"Father! father! do you remember Orme's History of India?" cries Clive.

"Orme's History! of course I do, I could repeat whole pages of it when I was a boy," says the old man, and began forthwith. "'The two battalions advanced against each other cannonading, until the French, coming to a hollow way, imagined that the English would not venture to pa.s.s it.

But Major Lawrence ordered the sepoys and artillery--the sepoys and artillery to halt and defend the convoy against the Morattoes'--Morattoes Orme calls 'em. Ho! ho! I could repeat whole pages, sir."

"It is the best book that ever was written," calls out Clive. The Colonel said he had not read it, but he was informed Mr. Mill's was a very learned history; he intended to read it. "Eh! there is plenty of time now," said the good Colonel. "I have all day long at Grey Friars,--after chapel, you know. Do you know, sir, when I was a boy I used what they call to tib out and run down to a public-house in Cistercian Lane--the Red Cowl sir,--and buy rum there? I was a terrible wild boy, Clivy. You weren't so, sir, thank Heaven! A terrible wild boy, and my poor father flogged me, though I think it was very hard on me. It wasn't the pain, you know: it wasn't the pain, but----" Here tears came into his eyes and he dropped his head on his hand, and the cigar from it fell on to the floor, burnt almost out, and scattering white ashes.

Clive looked sadly at me. "He was often so at Boulogne, Arthur," he whispered; "after a scene with that--that woman yonder, his head would go: he never replied to her taunts; he bore her infernal cruelty without an unkind word--Oh! I pay her back, thank G.o.d I can pay her! But who shall pay her," he said, trembling in every limb, "for what she has made that good man suffer?"

He turned to his father, who still sate lost in his meditations. "You need never go back to Grey Friars, father!" he cried out.

"Not go back, Clivy? Must go back, boy, to say Adsum, when my name is called. Newcome! Adsum! Hey! that is what we used to say--we used to say!"

"You need not go back, except to pack your things, and return and live with me and Boy," Clive continued, and he told Colonel Newcome rapidly the story of the legacy. The old man seemed hardly to comprehend it.

When he did, the news scarcely elated him; when Clive said "they could now pay Mrs. Mackenzie," the Colonel replied, "Quite right, quite right," and added up the sum, princ.i.p.al and interest, in which they were indebted to her--he knew it well enough, the good old man. "Of course we shall pay her, Clivy, when we can!" But in spite of what Clive had said he did not appear to understand the fact that the debt to Mrs. Mackenzie was now actually to be paid.

As we were talking, a knock came to the studio door, and that summons was followed by the entrance of the maid, who said to Clive, "If you please, sir, Mrs. Mackenzie says, how long are you a-going to keep the dinner waiting?"

"Come, father, come to dinner!" cries Clive; "and, Pen, you will come too, won't you?" he added; "it may be the last time you dine in such pleasant company. Come along," he whispered hurriedly. "I should like you to be there, it will keep her tongue quiet." As we proceeded to the dining-room, I gave the Colonel my arm; and the good man prattled to me something about Mrs. Mackenzie having taken shares in the Bundelcund Banking Company, and about her not being a woman of business, and fancying we had spent her money. "And I have always felt a wish that Clivy should pay her, and he will pay her, I know he will," says the Colonel; "and then we shall lead a quiet life, Arthur; for, between ourselves, some women are the deuce when they are angry, sir." And again he laughed, as he told me this sly news, and he bowed meekly his gentle old head as we entered the dining-room.

That apartment was occupied by little Boy already seated in his high chair, and by the Campaigner only, who stood at the mantelpiece in a majestic att.i.tude. On parting with her, before we adjourned to Clive's studio, I had made my bow and taken my leave in form, not supposing that I was about to enjoy her hospitality yet once again. My return did not seem to please her. "Does Mr. Pendennis favour us with his company to dinner again, Clive?" she said, turning to her son-in-law. Clive curtly said, Yes, he had asked Mr. Pendennis to stay.

"You might at least have been so kind as to give me notice," says the Campaigner, still majestic, but ironical. "You will have but a poor meal, Mr. Pendennis; and one such as I'm not accustomed to give my guests."

"Cold beef! what the deuce does it matter;" says Clive, beginning to carve the joint, which, hot, had served our yesterday's Christmas table.

"It does matter, sir! I am not accustomed to treat my guests in this way Maria! who had been cutting that beef? Three pounds of that beef have been cut away since one o'clock to-day," and with flashing eyes, and a finger twinkling all over with rings, she pointed towards the guilty joint.

Whether Maria had been dispensing secret charities, or kept company with an occult policeman partial to roast-beef, I do not know; but she looked very much alarmed, and said, Indeed, and indeed, mum, she had not touched a morsel of it!--not she.

"Confound the beef!" says Clive, carving on.

"She has been cutting it!" cries the Campaigner, bringing her fist down with a thump upon the table. "Mr. Pendennis! you saw the beef yesterday; eighteen pounds it weighed, and this is what comes up of it! As if there was not already ruin enough in the house!"

"D--n the beef!" cries out Clive.

"No! no! Thank G.o.d for our good dinner! Benedicti benedicamus, Clivy my boy," says the Colonel, in a tremulous voice.

"Swear on, sir! let the child hear your oaths! Let my blessed child, who is too ill to sit at table and picks her bite! sweetbread on her sofa,--which her poor mother prepares for her, Mr. Pendennis,--which I cooked it, and gave it to her with these hands,--let her hear your curses and blasphemies, Clive Newcome! They are loud enough."

"Do let us have a quiet life," groans out Clive; and for me, I must confess, I kept my eyes steadily down upon my plate, nor dared to lift them until my portion of cold beef had vanished.