The Way We Live Now (98 page)

‘And he would – if he had the spirit to take it,' answered Marie.

This was another reason for sticking to the Nidderdale plan. He would no doubt lose the immediate income, but in doing so he would secure the marquis. He was therefore induced, on weighing in his nicest-balanced scales the advantages and disadvantages, to leave the Longestaffes unpaid and to let Nidderdale have the money. Not that he
could make up his mind to such a course with any conviction that he was doing the best for himself. The dangers on all sides were very great! But at the present moment audacity recommended itself to him, and this was the boldest stroke. Marie had now said that she would accept Nidderdale – or the sweep at the crossing.

On Monday morning – it was on the preceding Thursday that he had made his famous speech in Parliament – one of the Bideawhiles had come to him in the City. He had told Mr Bideawhile that all the world knew that just at the present moment money was very ‘tight' in the City. ‘We are not asking for payment of a commercial debt,' said Mr Bide-awhile, ‘but for the price of a considerable property which you have purchased.' Mr Melmotte had suggested that the characteristics of the money were the same, let the sum in question have become due how it might Then he offered to make the payment in two bills at three and six months' date, with proper interest allowed. But this offer Mr Bide-awhile scouted with indignation, demanding that the title-deeds might be restored to them.

‘You have no right whatever to demand the title-deeds,' said Melmotte. ‘You can only claim the sum due, and I have already told you how I propose to pay it.'

Mr Bideawhile was nearly beside himself with dismay. In the whole course of his business, in all the records of the very respectable firm to which he belonged, there had never been such a thing as this. Of course Mr Longestaffe had been the person to blame – so at least all the Bideawhiles declared among themselves. He had been so anxious to have dealings with the man of money that he had insisted that the title-deeds should be given up. But then the title-deeds had not been his to surrender. The Pickering estate had been the joint property of him and his son. The house had been already pulled down, and now the purchaser offered bills in lieu of the purchase money! ‘Do you mean to tell me, Mr Melmotte, that you have not got the money to pay for what you have bought, and that nevertheless the title-deeds have already gone out of your hands?'

‘I have property to ten times the value, twenty times the value, thirty times the value,' said Melmotte proudly; ‘but you must know I should think by this time that a man engaged in large affairs cannot always realize such a sum as eighty thousand pounds at a day's notice.' Mr Bideawhile without using language that was absolutely vituperative gave Mr Melmotte to understand that he thought that he and his client had been robbed, and that he should at once take whatever severest steps the
law put in his power. As Mr Melmotte shrugged his shoulders and made no further reply, Mr Bideawhile could only take his departure.

The attorney, although he was bound to be staunch to his own client, and to his own house in opposition to Mr Squercum, nevertheless was becoming doubtful in his own mind as to the genuineness of the letter which Dolly was so persistent in declaring that he had not signed. Mr Longestaffe himself, who was at any rate an honest man, had given it as his opinion that Dolly had not signed the letter. His son had certainly refused to sign it once, and as far as he knew could have had no opportunity of signing it since. He was all but sure that he had left the letter under lock and key in his own drawer in the room which had latterly become Melmotte's study as well as his own. Then, on entering the room in Melmotte's presence – their friendship at the time having already ceased – he found that his drawer was open. This same Mr Bideawhile was with him at the time. ‘Do you mean to say that I have opened your drawer?' said Mr Melmotte. Mr Longestaffe had become very red in the face and had replied by saying that he certainly made no such accusation, but as certainly he had not left the drawer unlocked. He knew his own habits and was sure that he had never left that drawer open in his life. ‘Then you must have changed the habits of your life on this occasion,' said Mr Melmotte with spirit Mr Longestaffe would trust himself to no other word within the house, but, when they were out in the street together, he assured the lawyer that certainly that drawer had been left locked, and that to the best of his belief the letter unsigned had been left within the drawer. Mr Bideawhile could only remark that it was the most unfortunate circumstance with which he had ever been concerned.

The marriage with Nidderdale would upon the whole be the best thing, if it could only be accomplished. The reader must understand that though Mr Melmotte had allowed himself considerable poetical licence in that statement as to property thirty times as great as the price which he ought to have paid for Pickering, still there was property. The man's speculations had been so great and so wide that he did not really know what he owned, or what he owed. But he did know that at the present moment he was driven very hard for large sums. His chief trust for immediate money was in Cohenlupe, in whose hands had really been the manipulation of the shares of the Mexican railway. He had trusted much to Cohenlupe – more than it had been customary with him to trust to any man. Cohenlupe assured him that nothing could be done with the railway shares at the present moment. They had fallen under
the panic almost to nothing. Now in the time of his trouble Melmotte wanted money from the great railway, but just because he wanted money the great railway was worth nothing. Cohenlupe told him that he must tide over the evil hour – or rather over an evil month. It was at Cohenlupe's instigation that he had offered the two bills to Mr Bide-awhile. ‘Offer 'em again,' said Cohenlupe. ‘He must take the bills sooner or later.'

On the Monday afternoon Melmotte met Lord Nidderdale in the lobby of the House. ‘Have you seen Marie lately?' he said. Nidderdale had been assured that morning, by his father's lawyer, in his father's presence, that if he married Miss Melmotte at present he would undoubtedly become possessed of an income amounting to something over £5,000 a year. He had intended to get more than that – and was hardly prepared to accept Marie at such a price; but then there probably would be more. No doubt there was a difficulty about Pickering. Melmotte certainly had been raising money. But this might probably be an affair of a few weeks. Melmotte had declared that Pickering should be made over to the young people at the marriage. His father had recommended him to get the girl to name a day. The marriage could be broken off at the last day if the property were not forthcoming.

‘I'm going up to your house almost immediately,' said Nidderdale.

‘You'll find the women at tea to a certainty between five and six,' said Melmotte.

‘Have you been thinking any more about it?' Lord Nidderdale said to the girl as soon as Madame Melmotte had succeeded in leaving them alone together.

‘I have thought ever so much more about it,' said Marie.

‘And what's the result?'

‘Oh – I'll have you.'

‘That's right,' said Nidderdale, throwing himself on the sofa close to her, so that he might put his arm around her waist.

‘Wait a moment, Lord Nidderdale,' she said.

‘You might as well call me John.'
¹

‘Then wait a moment – John. You think you might as well marry me, though you don't love me a bit.'

‘That's not true, Marie.'

‘Yes, it is – it's quite true. And I think just the same – that I might as well marry you, though I don't love you a bit.'

‘But you will.'

‘I don't know. I don't feel like it just at present. You had better know the exact truth, you know. I have told my father that I did not think you'd ever come again, but that if you did I would accept you. But I'm not going to tell any stories about it. You know who I've been in love with.'

‘But you can't be in love with him now.'

‘Why not' I can't marry him. I know that. And if he were to come to me, I don't think that I would. He has behaved bad.'

‘Have I behaved bad?'

‘Not like him. You never did care, and you never said you cared.'

‘Oh yes – I have.'

‘Not at first. You say it now because you think that I shall like it. But it makes no difference now. I don't mind about your arm being there if we are to be married, only it's just as well for both of us to look on it as business.'

‘How very hard you are, Marie.'

‘No, I ain't. I wasn't hard to Sir Felix Carbury, and so I tell you. I did love him.'

‘Surely you have found him out now.'

‘Yes, I have,' said Marie. ‘He's a poor creature.'

‘He has just been thrashed, you know, in the streets – most horribly.' Marie had not been told of this, and started back from her lover's arms. ‘You hadn't heard it?'

‘Who has thrashed him?'

‘I don't want to tell the story against him, but they say he has been cut about in a terrible manner.'

‘Why should anybody beat him? Did he do anything?'

‘There was a young lady in the question, Marie.'

‘A young lady! What young lady? I don't believe it But it's nothing to me. I don't care about anything, Lord Nidderdale – not a bit. I suppose you've made up all that out of your own head.'

‘Indeed, no. I believe he was beaten, and I believe it was about a young woman. But it signifies nothing to me, and I don't suppose it signifies much to you. Don't you think we might fix a day, Marie?'

‘I don't care the least,' said Marie. ‘The longer it's put off the better I shall like it – that's all.'

‘Because I'm so detestable?'

‘No – you ain't detestable. I think you are a very good fellow; only you don't care for me. But it is detestable not being able to do what one wants. It's detestable having to quarrel with everybody and never to be good friends with anybody. And it's horribly detestable having nothing on earth to give one any interest.'

‘You couldn't take any interest in me?'

‘Not the least.'

‘Suppose you try. Wouldn't you like to know anything about the place where we live?'

‘It's a castle, I know.'

‘Yes – Castle Reekie; ever so many hundred years old.'

‘I hate old places. I should like a new house, and a new dress, and a new horse every week – and a new lover. Your father lives at the castle. I don't suppose we are to go and live there too.'

‘We shall be there sometimes. When shall it be?'

‘The year after next.'

‘Nonsense, Marie.'

‘To-morrow.'

‘You wouldn't be ready.'

‘You may manage it all just as you like with papa. Oh yes – kiss me; of course you may. If I'm to belong to you what does it matter? No; – I won't say that I love you. But if ever I do say it, you may be sure it will be true. That's more than you can say of yourself –John.'

So the interview was over, and Nidderdale walked back to the House thinking of his lady love, as far as he was able to bring his mind to any operation of thinking. He was fully determined to go on with it. As far as the girl herself was concerned, she had, in these latter days, become much more attractive to him than when he had first known her. She certainly was not a fool. And, though he could not tell himself that she was altogether like a lady, still she had a manner of her own which made him think that she would be able to live with ladies. And he did think that, in spite of all she said to the contrary, she was becoming fond of him – as he certainly had become fond of her. ‘Have you been up with the ladies?' Melmotte asked him.

‘Oh yes.'

‘And what does Marie say?'

‘That you must fix the day.'

‘We'll have it very soon then – some time next month. You'll want to get away in August. And to tell the truth so shall I. I never was worked so hard in my life as I've been this summer. The election and that horrid dinner had something to do with it. And I don't mind telling you that I've had a fearful weight on my mind in reference to money. I never had to find so many large sums in so short a time! And I'm not quite through it yet.'

‘I wonder why you gave the dinner then.'

‘My dear boy' – it was very pleasant to him to call the son of a marquis his dear boy – ‘as regards expenditure that was a flea-bite. Nothing that I could spend myself would have the slightest effect upon my condition – one way or the other.'

‘I wish it could be the same way with me,' said Nidderdale.

‘If you choose to go into business with me instead of taking Marie's money out, it very soon would be so with you. But the burden is very great. I never know whence these panics arise, or why they come, or whither they go. But when they do come, they are like a storm at sea. It is only the strong ships that can stand the fury of the winds and waves. And then the buffeting which a man gets leaves him only half the man he was. I've had it very hard this time.'

‘I suppose you are getting right now.'

‘Yes; – I am getting right. I am not in any fear, if you mean that I don't mind telling you everything, as it is settled now that you are to be Marie's husband. I know that you are honest, and that if you could hurt me by repeating what I say you wouldn't do it'.

‘Certainly I would not'.

‘You see I've no partner – nobody that is bound to know my affairs. My wife is the best woman in the world, but is utterly unable to understand anything about it. Of course I can't talk freely to Marie. Cohenlupe whom you see so much with me is all very well – in his way – but I never talk over my affairs with him. He is concerned with me in one or two things – our American railway for instance, but he has no interest generally in my house. It is all on my own shoulders, and I can tell you the weight is a little heavy. It will be the greatest comfort to me in the world if I can get you to have an interest in the matter.'