Castle Richmond by Anthony Trollope (good story books to read .txt) 📖

Sometimes they would call her Johnny, and sometimes the Duchess; but doubtless they and Mrs. Jones thoroughly understood each other. By the whole establishment Mrs. Jones was held in great respect, and by the younger portion in extreme awe. Her breakfast and tea she had in a little sitting-room by herself; but the solitude of this was too tremendous for her to endure at dinner-time. At that meal she sat at the head of the table in the servants' hall, though she never troubled herself to carve anything except puddings and pies, for which she had a great partiality, and of which she was supposed to be the most undoubted and severe judge known of anywhere in that part of the country.

She was supposed by all her brother and sister servants to be a very Crœsus for wealth; and wondrous tales were told of the money she had put by. But as she was certainly honest, and supposed to be very generous to certain poor relations in Dorsetshire, some of these stories were probably mythic. It was known, however, as a fact, that two Castle Richmond butlers, one out-door steward, three neighbouring farmers, and one wickedly ambitious coachman, had endeavoured to tempt her to matrimony—in vain. "She didn't want none of them," she told her mistress. "And, what was more, she wouldn't have none of them." And therefore she remained Mrs. Jones, with brevet rank.

It seemed, from what Lady Fitzgerald said, that Mrs. Jones's manner had been somewhat mysterious about this man, Mollett. She had endeavoured to reassure and comfort her mistress, saying that nothing would come of it as nothing had come of that other Tenby visit, and giving it as her counsel that the ladies should allow the whole matter to pass by without further notice. But at the same time Lady Fitzgerald had remarked that her manner had been very serious when she first said that she had seen the man before.

"Jones," Lady Fitzgerald had said to her, very earnestly, "if you know more about this man than you are telling me, you are bound to speak out, and let me know everything."

"Who—I, my lady? what could I know? Only he do look to me like the same man, and so I thought it right to say to your ladyship."

Lady Fitzgerald had seen that there was nothing more to be gained by cross-questioning, and so she had allowed the matter to drop. But she was by no means satisfied that this servant whom she so trusted did not know more than she had told. And then Mrs. Jones had been with her in those dreadful Dorsetshire days, and an undefined fear began to creep over her very soul.

"God bless you, my child!" said Lady Fitzgerald, as her son got up to leave her. And then she embraced him with more warmth even than was her wont. "All that we can do at present is to be gentle with him, and not to encourage people around him to talk of his illness."

On the next morning Lady Fitzgerald did not come down to breakfast, but sent her love to Clara, and begged her guest to excuse her on account of headache. Sir Thomas rarely came in to breakfast, and therefore his absence was not remarkable. His daughters, however, went up to see him, as did also his sister; and they all declared that he was very much better.

"It was some sudden attack, I suppose?" said Clara.

"Yes, very sudden; he has had the same before," said Herbert. "But they do not at all affect his intellect or bodily powers. Depression is, I suppose, the name that the doctors would call it."

And then at last it became noticeable by them that Lady Clara did not use her left arm. "Oh, Clara!" said Emmeline, "I see now that you are hurt. How selfish we have been! Oh dear, oh dear!" And both Emmeline and Mary immediately surrounded her, examining her arm, and almost carrying her to the sofa.

"I don't think it will be much," said Clara. "It's only a little stiff."

"Oh, Herbert, what shall we do? Do look here; the inside of her arm is quite black."

Herbert, gently touching her hand, did examine the arm, and declared his opinion that she had received a dreadfully violent blow. Emmeline proposed to send for a doctor to pronounce whether or no it were broken. Mary said that she didn't think it was broken, but that she was sure the patient ought not to be moved that day, or probably for a week. Aunt Letty, in the mean time, prescribed a cold-water bandage with great authority, and bounced out of the room to fetch the necessary linen and basin of water.

"It's nothing at all," continued Clara. "And indeed I shall go home to-day; indeed I shall."

"It might be very bad for your arm that you should be moved," said Herbert.

"And your staying here will not be the least trouble to us. We shall all be so happy to have you; shall we not, Mary?"

"Of course we shall; and so will mamma."

"I am so sorry to be here now," said Clara, "when I know you are all in such trouble about Sir Thomas. But as for going, I shall go as soon as ever you can make it convenient to send me. Indeed I shall." And so the matter was discussed between them, Aunt Letty in the mean time binding up the bruised arm with cold-water appliances.

Lady Clara was quite firm about going, and, therefore, at about twelve she was sent. I should say taken, for Emmeline insisted on going with her in the carriage. Herbert would have gone also, but he felt that he ought not to leave Castle Richmond that day, on account of his father. But he would certainly ride over, he said, and learn how her arm was the next morning.

"And about Clady, you know," said Clara.

"I will go on to Clady also. I did send a man there yesterday to see about the flue. It's the flue that's wrong, I know."

"Oh, thank you; I am so much obliged to you," said Clara. And then the carriage drove off, and Herbert returned into the morning sitting-room with his sister Mary.

"I'll tell you what it is, Master Herbert," said Mary.

"Well—what is it?"

"You are going to fall in love with her young ladyship."

"Am I? Is that all you know about it? And who are you going to fall in love with pray?"

"Oh! his young lordship, perhaps; only he ought to be about ten years older, so that I'm afraid that wouldn't do. But Clara is just the age for you. It really seems as though it were all prepared ready to your hand."

"You girls always do think that those things are ready prepared;" and so saying, Herbert walked off with great manly dignity to some retreat among his own books and papers, there to meditate whether this thing were in truth prepared for him. It certainly was the fact that the house did seem very blank to him now that Clara was gone; and that he looked forward with impatience to the visit which it was so necessary that he should make on the following day to Clady.

The house at Castle Richmond was very silent and quiet that day. When Emmeline came back, she and her sister remained together. Nothing had been said to them about Mollett's visit, and they had no other idea than that this lowness of spirits on their father's part, to which they had gradually become accustomed, had become worse and more dangerous to his health than ever.

Aunt Letty talked much about it to Herbert, to Lady Fitzgerald, to Jones, and to her brother, and was quite certain that she had penetrated to the depth of the whole matter. That nasty city property, she said, which had come with her grandmother, had always given the family more trouble than it was worth. Indeed, her grandmother had been a very troublesome woman altogether; and no wonder, for though she was a Protestant herself, she had had Papist relations in Lancashire. She distinctly remembered to have heard that there was some flaw in the title of that property, and she knew that it was very hard to get some of the tenants to pay any rent. That she had always heard. She was quite sure that this man was some person laying a claim to it, and threatening to prosecute his claim at law. It was a thousand pities that her brother should allow such a trifle as this,—for after all it was but a trifle, to fret his spirits and worry him in this way. But it was the wretched state of his health: were he once himself again, all such annoyances as that would pass him by like the wind.

It must be acknowledged that Aunt Letty's memory in this respect was not exactly correct; for, as it happened, Sir Thomas held his little property in the city of London by as firm a tenure as the laws and customs of his country could give him; and seeing that his income thence arising came from ground rents near the river, on which property stood worth some hundreds of thousands, it was not very probable that his tenants should be in arrear. But what she said had some effect upon Herbert. He was not quite sure whether this might not be the cause of his father's grief; and if the story did not have much effect upon Lady Fitzgerald, at any rate it did as well as any other to exercise the ingenuity and affection of Aunt Letty.

Sir Thomas passed the whole of that day in his own room; but during a great portion of the day either his wife, or sister, or son was with him. They endeavoured not to leave him alone with his own thoughts, feeling conscious that something preyed upon his mind, though ignorant as to what that something might be.

He was quite aware of the nature of their thoughts; perfectly conscious of the judgment they had formed respecting him. He knew that he was subjecting himself, in the eyes not only of his own family but of all those around him, to suspicions which must be injurious to him, and yet he could not shake off the feeling that depressed him.

But at last he did resolve to make an attempt at doing so. For some time in the evening he was altogether alone, and he then strove to force his mind to work upon the matter which occupied it,—to arrange his ideas, and bring himself into a state in which he could make a resolution. For hours he had sat,—not thinking upon this subject, for thought is an exertion which requires a combination of ideas and results in the deducing of conclusions from premises; and no such effort as that had he hitherto made,—but endeavouring to think while he allowed the matter of his grief to lie ever before his mind's eye.

He had said to himself over and over again, that it behoved him to make some great effort to shake off this incubus that depressed him; but yet no such effort had hitherto been even attempted. Now at last he arose and shook himself, and promised to himself that he would be a man. It might be that the misfortune under which he groaned was heavy, but let one's sorrow be what it may, there is always a better and a worse way of meeting it. Let what trouble may fall on a man's shoulders, a man may always bear it manfully. And are not troubles when so borne half cured? It is the flinching from pain which makes pain so painful.

This truth came home to him as he sat there that day, thinking what he should do, endeavouring to think in what way he might best turn himself. But there was this that was especially grievous to him, that he had no friend whom he might consult in this matter. It was a sorrow, the cause of which he could not explain to his own family, and in all other troubles he had sought assistance and looked for counsel there and there only. He had had one best, steadiest, dearest, truest counsellor, and now it had come to pass that things were so placed that in this great trouble he could not go to her.

And now a friend was so necessary to him! He felt that he was not fit to judge how he himself should act in this terrible emergency; that it was absolutely necessary for him that he should allow himself to be guided by some one else. But to whom should he appeal?

"He is a cold man," said he to himself, as one name did occur to him, "very cold, almost unfeeling; but he is honest and just." And then again he sat and