Doctor Thorne by Anthony Trollope (interesting books to read TXT) 📖

CHAPTER XVIII

The Rivals

 

The intimacy between Frank and Miss Dunstable grew and prospered.

That is to say, it prospered as an intimacy, though perhaps hardly

as a love affair. There was a continued succession of jokes between

them, which no one else in the castle understood; but the very fact

of there being such a good understanding between them rather stood

in the way of, than assisted, that consummation which the countess

desired. People, when they are in love with each other, or even when

they pretend to be, do not generally show it by loud laughter. Nor is

it frequently the case that a wife with two hundred thousand pounds

can be won without some little preliminary despair. Now there was no

despair at all about Frank Gresham.

 

Lady de Courcy, who thoroughly understood that portion of the world

in which she herself lived, saw that things were not going quite as

they should do, and gave much and repeated advice to Frank on the

subject. She was the more eager in doing this, because she imagined

Frank had done what he could to obey her first precepts. He had not

turned up his nose at Miss Dunstable’s curls, nor found fault with

her loud voice: he had not objected to her as ugly, nor even shown

any dislike to her age. A young man who had been so amenable to

reason was worthy of further assistance; and so Lady de Courcy did

what she could to assist him.

 

“Frank, my dear boy,” she would say, “you are a little too noisy, I

think. I don’t mean for myself, you know; I don’t mind it. But Miss

Dunstable would like it better if you were a little more quiet with

her.”

 

“Would she, aunt?” said Frank, looking demurely up into the

countess’s face. “I rather think she likes fun and noise, and that

sort of thing. You know she’s not very quiet herself.”

 

“Ah!—but Frank, there are times, you know, when that sort of thing

should be laid aside. Fun, as you call it, is all very well in its

place. Indeed, no one likes it better than I do. But that’s not the

way to show admiration. Young ladies like to be admired; and if

you’ll be a little more soft-mannered with Miss Dunstable, I’m sure

you’ll find it will answer better.”

 

And so the old bird taught the young bird how to fly—very

needlessly—for in this matter of flying, Nature gives her own

lessons thoroughly; and the ducklings will take the water, even

though the maternal hen warn them against the perfidious element

never so loudly.

 

Soon after this, Lady de Courcy began to be not very well pleased

in the matter. She took it into her head that Miss Dunstable was

sometimes almost inclined to laugh at her; and on one or two

occasions it almost seemed as though Frank was joining Miss Dunstable

in doing so. The fact indeed was, that Miss Dunstable was fond of

fun; and, endowed as she was with all the privileges which two

hundred thousand pounds may be supposed to give to a young lady,

did not very much care at whom she laughed. She was able to make a

tolerably correct guess at Lady de Courcy’s plan towards herself;

but she did not for a moment think that Frank had any intention

of furthering his aunt’s views. She was, therefore, not at all

ill-inclined to have her revenge on the countess.

 

“How very fond your aunt is of you!” she said to him one wet morning,

as he was sauntering through the house; now laughing, and almost

romping with her—then teasing his sister about Mr Moffat—and then

bothering his lady-cousins out of all their propriety.

 

“Oh, very!” said Frank: “she is a dear, good woman, is my Aunt de

Courcy.”

 

“I declare she takes more notice of you and your doings than of any

of your cousins. I wonder they ain’t jealous.”

 

“Oh! they’re such good people. Bless me, they’d never be jealous.”

 

“You are so much younger than they are, that I suppose she thinks you

want more of her care.”

 

“Yes; that’s it. You see she’s fond of having a baby to nurse.”

 

“Tell me, Mr Gresham, what was it she was saying to you last night? I

know we had been misbehaving ourselves dreadfully. It was all your

fault; you would make me laugh so.”

 

“That’s just what I said to her.”

 

“She was talking about me, then?”

 

“How on earth should she talk of any one else as long as you are

here? Don’t you know that all the world is talking about you?”

 

“Is it?—dear me, how kind! But I don’t care a straw about any world

just at present but Lady de Courcy’s world. What did she say?”

 

“She said you were very beautiful—”

 

“Did she?—how good of her!”

 

“No; I forgot. It—it was I that said that; and she said—what was

it she said? She said, that after all, beauty was but skin deep—and

that she valued you for your virtues and prudence rather than your

good looks.”

 

“Virtues and prudence! She said I was prudent and virtuous?”

 

“Yes.”

 

“And you talked of my beauty? That was so kind of you. You didn’t

either of you say anything about other matters?”

 

“What other matters?”

 

“Oh! I don’t know. Only some people are sometimes valued rather for

what they’ve got than for any good qualities belonging to themselves

intrinsically.”

 

“That can never be the case with Miss Dunstable; especially not at

Courcy Castle,” said Frank, bowing easily from the corner of the sofa

over which he was leaning.

 

“Of course not,” said Miss Dunstable; and Frank at once perceived

that she spoke in a tone of voice differing much from that

half-bantering, half-good-humoured manner that was customary with

her. “Of course not: any such idea would be quite out of the question

with Lady de Courcy.” She paused for a moment, and then added

in a tone different again, and unlike any that he had yet heard

from her:—“It is, at any rate, out of the question with Mr Frank

Gresham—of that I am quite sure.”

 

Frank ought to have understood her, and have appreciated the good

opinion which she intended to convey; but he did not entirely do so.

He was hardly honest himself towards her; and he could not at first

perceive that she intended to say that she thought him so. He knew

very well that she was alluding to her own huge fortune, and was

alluding also to the fact that people of fashion sought her because

of it; but he did not know that she intended to express a true

acquittal as regarded him of any such baseness.

 

And did he deserve to be acquitted? Yes, upon the whole he did;—to

be acquitted of that special sin. His desire to make Miss Dunstable

temporarily subject to his sway arose, not from a hankering after her

fortune, but from an ambition to get the better of a contest in which

other men around him seemed to be failing.

 

For it must not be imagined that, with such a prize to be struggled

for, all others stood aloof and allowed him to have his own way

with the heiress, undisputed. The chance of a wife with two hundred

thousand pounds is a godsend which comes in a man’s life too seldom

to be neglected, let that chance be never so remote.

 

Frank was the heir to a large embarrassed property; and, therefore,

the heads of families, putting their wisdoms together, had thought it

most meet that this daughter of Plutus should, if possible, fall to

his lot. But not so thought the Honourable George; and not so thought

another gentleman who was at that time an inmate of Courcy Castle.

 

These suitors perhaps somewhat despised their young rival’s efforts.

It may be that they had sufficient worldly wisdom to know that so

important a crisis of life is not settled among quips and jokes, and

that Frank was too much in jest to be in earnest. But be that as it

may, his love-making did not stand in the way of their love-making;

nor his hopes, if he had any, in the way of their hopes.

 

The Honourable George had discussed the matter with the Honourable

John in a properly fraternal manner. It may be that John had also

an eye to the heiress; but, if so, he had ceded his views to his

brother’s superior claims; for it came about that they understood

each other very well, and John favoured George with salutary advice

on the occasion.

 

“If it is to be done at all, it should be done very sharp,” said

John.

 

“As sharp as you like,” said George. “I’m not the fellow to be

studying three months in what attitude I’ll fall at a girl’s feet.”

 

“No: and when you are there you mustn’t take three months more to

study how you’ll get up again. If you do it at all, you must do it

sharp,” repeated John, putting great stress on his advice.

 

“I have said a few soft words to her already, and she didn’t seem to

take them badly,” said George.

 

“She’s no chicken, you know,” remarked John; “and with a woman like

that, beating about the bush never does any good. The chances are she

won’t have you—that’s of course; plums like that don’t fall into a

man’s mouth merely for shaking the tree. But it’s possible she may;

and if she will, she’s as likely to take you to-day as this day six

months. If I were you I’d write her a letter.”

 

“Write her a letter—eh?” said George, who did not altogether dislike

the advice, for it seemed to take from his shoulders the burden of

preparing a spoken address. Though he was so glib in speaking about

the farmers’ daughters, he felt that he should have some little

difficulty in making known his passion to Miss Dunstable by word of

mouth.

 

“Yes; write a letter. If she’ll take you at all, she’ll take you that

way; half the matches going are made up by writing letters. Write her

a letter and get it put on her dressing-table.” George said that he

would, and so he did.

 

George spoke quite truly when he hinted that he had said a few soft

things to Miss Dunstable. Miss Dunstable, however, was accustomed to

hear soft things. She had been carried much about in society among

fashionable people since, on the settlement of her father’s will, she

had been pronounced heiress to all the ointment of Lebanon; and many

men had made calculations respecting her similar to those which were

now animating the brain of the Honourable George de Courcy. She was

already quite accustomed to being the target at which spendthrifts

and the needy rich might shoot their arrows: accustomed to being shot

at, and tolerably accustomed to protect herself without making scenes

in the world, or rejecting the advantageous establishments offered

to her with any loud expressions of disdain. The Honourable George,

therefore, had been permitted to say soft things very much as a

matter of course.

 

And very little more outward fracas arose from the correspondence

which followed than had arisen from the soft things so said. George

wrote the letter, and had it duly conveyed to Miss Dunstable’s

bed-chamber. Miss Dunstable duly received it, and had her answer