The Absentee (9 page)

As soon as she rose from the card-table, and could speak to Mrs.
Broadhurst apart, she communicated her apprehensions.

'Seriously, my dear madam,' said she, 'I believe I have done very wrong
to admit Mr. Berryl just now, though it was on Grace's account I did
it. But, ma'am, I did not know Miss Broadhurst had an estate in
Cambridgeshire; their two estates just close to one another, I heard
them say. Lord bless me, ma'am! there's the danger of propinquity
indeed!'

'No danger, no danger,' persisted Mrs. Broadhurst. 'I know my girl
better than you do, begging your ladyship's pardon. No one thinks less
of estates than she does.'

'Well, I only know I heard her talking of them, and earnestly too.'

'Yes, very likely; but don't you know that girls never think of what
they are talking about, or rather never talk of what they are thinking
about? And they have always ten times more to say to the man they don't
care for, than to him they do.'

'Very extraordinary!' said Lady Clonbrony. 'I only hope you are right.'

'I am sure of it,' said Mrs. Broadhurst. 'Only let things go on, and
mind your cards, I beseech you, to-morrow night better than you
did to-night; and you will see that things will turn out just as I
prophesied. Lord Colambre will come to a point-blank proposal before the
end of the week, and will be accepted, or my name's not Broadhurst.
Why, in plain English, I am clear my girl likes him; and when that's the
case, you know, can you doubt how the thing will end?'

Mrs. Broadhurst was perfectly right in every point of her reasoning but
one. From long habit of seeing and considering that such an heiress as
her daughter might marry whom she pleased—from constantly seeing
that she was the person to decide and to reject—Mrs. Broadhurst had
literally taken it for granted that everything was to depend upon her
daughter's inclinations: she was not mistaken, in the present case, in
opining that the young lady would not be averse to Lord Colambre, if he
came to what she called a point-blank proposal. It really never occurred
to Mrs. Broadhurst that any man, whom her daughter was the least
inclined to favour, could think of anybody else. Quick-sighted in these
affairs as the matron thought herself, she saw but one side of the
question: blind and dull of comprehension as she thought Lady Clonbrony
on this subject, she was herself so completely blinded by her own
prejudices, as to be incapable of discerning the plain thing that was
before her eyes; VIDELICET, that Lord Colambre preferred Grace Nugent.
Lord Colambre made no proposal before the end of the week, but this
Mrs. Broadhurst attributed to an unexpected occurrence, which prevented
things from going on in the train in which they had been proceeding so
smoothly. Sir John Berryl, Mr. Berryl's father, was suddenly seized
with a dangerous illness. The news was brought to Mr. Berryl one
evening whilst he was at Lady Clonbrony's. The circumstances of domestic
distress, which afterwards occurred in the family of his friend,
entirely occupied Lord Colambre's time and attention. All thoughts
of love were suspended, and his whole mind was given up to the active
services of friendship. The sudden illness of Sir John Berryl spread an
alarm among his creditors which brought to light at once the disorder of
his affairs, of which his son had no knowledge or suspicion. Lady Berryl
had been a very expensive woman, especially in equipages; and Mordicai,
the coachmaker, appeared at this time the foremost and the most
inexorable of their creditors. Conscious that the charges in his account
were exorbitant, and that they would not be allowed if examined by
a court of justice; that it was a debt which only ignorance and
extravagance could have in the first instance incurred, swelled
afterwards to an amazing amount by interest, and interest upon interest;
Mordicai was impatient to obtain payment whilst Sir John yet lived, or
at least to obtain legal security for the whole sum from the heir. Mr.
Berryl offered his bond for the amount of the reasonable charges in his
account; but this Mordicai absolutely refused, declaring that now he had
the power in his own hands, he would use it to obtain the utmost penny
of his debt; that he would not let the thing slip through his fingers;
that a debtor never yet escaped him, and never should; that a man's
lying upon his deathbed was no excuse to a creditor; that he was not
a whiffler, to stand upon ceremony about disturbing a gentleman in
his last moments; that he was not to be cheated out of his due by such
niceties; that he was prepared to go all lengths the law would allow;
for that, as to what people said of him, he did not care a doit—'Cover
your face with your hands, if you like it, Mr. Berryl; you may be
ashamed for me, but I feel no shame for myself—I am not so weak.'
Mordicai's countenance said more than his words; livid with malice, and
with atrocious determination in his eyes, he stood. 'Yes, sir,' said
he, 'you may look at me as you please—it is possible I am in earnest.
Consult what you'll do now, behind my back or before my face, it comes
to the same thing; for nothing will do but my money or your bond, Mr.
Berryl. The arrest is made on the person of your father, luckily made
while the breath is still in the body. Yes—start forward to strike
me, if you dare—your father, Sir John Berryl, sick or well, is my
prisoner.'

Lady Berryl and Mr. Berryl's sisters, in an agony of grief, rushed into
the room.

'It's all useless,' cried Mordicai, turning his back upon the ladies;
'these tricks upon creditors won't do with me; I'm used to these scenes;
I'm not made of such stuff as you think. Leave a gentleman in peace in
his last moments. No! he ought not, nor shan't die in peace, if he don't
pay his debts; and if you are all so mighty sorry, ladies, there's the
gentleman you may kneel to; if tenderness is the order of the day, it's
for the son to show it, not me. Ay, now, Mr. Berryl,' cried he, as Mr.
Berryl took up the bond to sign it, 'you're beginning to know I'm not a
fool to be trifled with. Stop your hand, if you choose it, sir—it's all
the same to me; the person, or the money, I'll carry with me out of this
house.'

Mr. Beryl signed the bond, and threw it to him.

'There, monster!—quit the house!'

'Monster is not actionable—I wish you had called me rascal,'
said Mordicai, grinning a horrible smile; and taking up the bond
deliberately, returned it to Mr. Berryl. 'This paper is worth nothing to
me, sir—it is not witnessed.'

Mr. Berryl hastily left the room, and returned with Lord Colambre.
Mordicai changed countenance and grew pale, for a moment, at sight of
Lord Colambre.

'Well, my lord, since it so happens, I am not sorry that you should be
witness to this paper,' said, he; 'and indeed not sorry that you should
witness the whole proceeding; for I trust I shall be able to explain to
you my conduct.'

'I do not come here, sir,' interrupted Lord Colambre, 'to listen to any
explanations of your conduct, which I perfectly understand;—I come to
witness a bond for my friend Mr. Berryl, if you think proper to extort
from him such a bond.'

'I extort nothing, my lord. Mr. Berryl, it is quite a voluntary act,
take notice, on your part; sign or not, witness or not, as you please,
gentlemen,' said Mordicai, sticking his hands in his pockets, and
recovering his look of black and fixed determination.

'Witness it, witness it, my dear lord,' said Mr. Berryl, looking at his
mother and weeping sisters; 'witness it, quick!'

'Mr. Berryl must just run over his name again in your presence, my lord,
with a dry pen,' said Mordicai, putting the pen into Mr. Berryl's hand.

'No, sir,' said Lord Colambre, 'my friend shall never sign it.'

'As you please, my lord—the bond or the body, before I quit this
house,' said Mordicai.

'Neither, sir, shall you have; and you quit this house directly.'

'How! how!—my lord, how's this?'

'Sir, the arrest you have made is as illegal as it is inhuman.'

'Illegal, my lord!' said Mordicai, startled.

'Illegal, sir. I came into this house at the moment when your bailiff
asked and was refused admittance. Afterwards, in the confusion of the
family above stairs, he forced open the house door with an iron bar—I
saw him—I am ready to give evidence of the fact. Now proceed at your
peril.'

Mordicai, without reply snatched up his hat, and walked towards the
door; but Lord Colambre held the door open—the door was immediately
at the head of the stairs—and Mordicai, seeing his indignant look and
proud form, hesitated to pass; for he had always heard that Irishmen are
'quick in the executive part of justice.'

'Pass on, sir,' repeated Lord Colambre, with an air of ineffable
contempt; 'I am a gentleman—you have nothing to fear.'

Mordicai ran downstairs; Lord Colambre, before he went back into the
room, waited to see Mordicai and his bailiff out of the house. When
Mordicai was fairly at the bottom of the stairs, he turned, and, white
with rage, looked up at Lord Colambre.

'Charity begins at home, my lord,' said he. 'Look at home—you shall pay
for this,' added he, standing half-shielded by the house door, for Lord
Colambre moved forward as he spoke the last words; 'and I give you this
warning, because I know it will be of no use to you—Your most obedient,
my lord.'

The house door closed after Mordicai.

'Thank Heaven!' thought Lord Colambre, 'that I did not horsewhip that
mean wretch! This warning shall be of use to me. But it is not time to
think of that yet.'

Lord Colambre turned from his own affairs to those of his friend, to
offer all the assistance and consolation in his power. Sir John Berryl
died that night. His daughters, who had lived in the highest style in
London, were left totally unprovided for. His widow had mortgaged her
jointure. Mr. Berryl had an estate now left to him, but without any
income. He could not be so dishonest as to refuse to pay his father's
just debts; he could not let his mother and sisters starve. The scene of
distress to which Lord Colambre was witness in this family made a still
greater impression upon him than had been made by the warning or the
threats of Mordicai. The similarity between the circumstances of his
friend's family and of his own struck him forcibly.

All this evil had arisen from Lady Berryl's passion for living in
London and at watering-places. She had made her husband an ABSENTEE—an
absentee from his home, his affairs, his duties, and his estate. The
sea, the Irish Channel, did not, indeed, flow between him and his
estate; but it was of little importance whether the separation was
effected by land or water—the consequences, the negligence, the
extravagance, were the same.

Of the few people of his age who are capable of profiting by the
experience of others, Lord Colambre was one. 'Experience,' as an elegant
writer has observed, 'is an article that may be borrowed with safety,
and is often dearly bought.'

In the meantime, Lady Clonbrony had been occupied with thoughts very
different from those which passed in the mind of her son. Though she
had never completely recovered from her rheumatic pains, she had become
inordinately impatient of confinement to her own house, and weary of
those dull evenings at home, which had, in her son's absence, become
insupportable. She told over her visiting tickets regularly twice a
day, and gave to every card of invitation a heartfelt sigh. Miss Pratt
alarmed her ladyship, by bringing intelligence of some parties given by
persons of consequence, to which she was not invited. She feared that
she should be forgotten in the world, well knowing how soon the world
forgets those they do not see every day and everywhere. How miserable
is the fine lady's lot who cannot forget the world, and who is forgot by
the world in a moment! How much more miserable still is the condition
of a would-be fine lady, working her way up in the world with care and
pains! By her, every the slightest failure of attention, from persons
of rank and fashion, is marked and felt with jealous anxiety, and with a
sense of mortification the most acute—an invitation omitted is a matter
of the most serious consequence, not only as it regards the present, but
the future; for if she be not invited by Lady A, it will lower her in
the eyes of Lady B, and of all the ladies of the alphabet. It will form
a precedent of the most dangerous and inevitable application. If she has
nine invitations, and the tenth be wanting, the nine have no power to
make her happy. This was precisely Lady Clonbrony's case—there was to
be a party at Lady St. James's, for which Lady Clonbrony had no card.

'So ungrateful, so monstrous, of Lady St. James!—What! was the gala so
soon forgotten, and all the marked attentions paid that night to Lady
St. James!—attentions, you know, Pratt, which were looked upon with a
jealous eye, and made me enemies enough, I am told, in another quarter!
Of all people, I did not expect to be slighted by Lady St. James!'

Miss Pratt, who was ever ready to undertake the defence of any person
who had a title, pleaded, in mitigation of censure, that perhaps Lady
St. James might not be aware that her ladyship was yet well enough to
venture out.

'Oh, my dear Miss Pratt, that cannot be the thing; for, in spite of my
rheumatism, which really was bad enough last Sunday, I went on purpose
to the Royal Chapel, to show myself in the closet, and knelt close to
her ladyship. And, my dear, we curtsied, and she congratulated me, after
church, upon my being abroad again, and was so happy to see me look
so well, and all that—Oh! it is something very extraordinary and
unaccountable!'

'But, I daresay, a card will come yet,' said Miss Pratt.

Upon this hint, Lady Clonbrony's hope revived; and, staying her anger,
she began to consider how she could manage to get herself invited.
Refreshing tickets were left next morning at Lady St. James's with their
corners properly turned up; to do the thing better, separate tickets for
herself and for Miss Nugent were left for each member of the family;
and her civil messages, left with the footman, extended to the utmost
possibility of remainder. It had occurred to her lady-ship that for
Miss Somebody, THE COMPANION, of whom she had never in her life thought
before, she had omitted to leave a card last time, and she now left a
note of explanation; she further, with her rheumatic head and arm out of
the coach-window, sat, the wind blowing keen upon her, explaining to the
porter and the footman, to discover whether her former tickets had
gone safely up to Lady St. James; and on the present occasion, to make
assurance doubly sure, she slid handsome expedition money into the
servant's hand—'Sir, you will be sure to remember.'—'Oh certainly,
your ladyship!'