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

man would never accuse himself of bigamy for that. Besides, you should have seen the women, Die."

"Seen the women! Tsh—tsh—tsh; I have seen enough of them, young and old, to know that a clean apron and a humble tone and a down-turned eye don't always go with a true tongue and an honest heart. Women are now the most successful swindlers of the age! That profession at any rate is not closed against them."

"You will not find these women to be swindlers; at least I think not."

"Ah! but we want to be sure, Prendergast;" and then Mr. Die finished the letter, very leisurely, as Herbert thought.

When he had finished it, he folded it up and gave it back to Mr. Prendergast. "I don't think but what you've a strong primâ facie case; so strong that perhaps you are right to explain the whole matter to our young friend here, who is so deeply concerned in it. But at the same time I should caution him that the matter is still enveloped in doubt."

Herbert eagerly put out his hand for the letter. "You may trust me with it," said he: "I am not of a sanguine temperament, nor easily excited; and you may be sure that I will not take it for more than it is worth." So saying, he at last got hold of the letter, and managed to read it through much more quickly than Mr. Die had done. As he did so he became very red in the face, and too plainly showed that he had made a false boast in speaking of the coolness of his temperament. Indeed, the stakes were so high that it was difficult for a young man to be cool while he was playing the game: he had made up his mind to lose, and to that he had been reconciled; but now again every pulse of his heart and every nerve of his body was disturbed. "Was never his wife," he said out loud when he got to that part of the letter. "His real wife living now in Spinny Lane! Do you believe that Mr. Prendergast?"

"Yes, I do," said the attorney.

"Lentè, lentè, lentè," said the barrister, quite oppressed by his friend's unprofessional abruptness.

"But I do believe it," said Mr. Prendergast: "you must always understand, Herbert, that this new story may possibly not be true—"

"Quite possible," said Mr. Die, with something almost approaching to a slight laugh.

"But the evidence is so strong," continued the other, "that I do believe it heartily. I have been to that house, and seen the man, old Mollett, and the woman whom I believe to be his wife, and a daughter who lives with them. As far as my poor judgment goes," and he made a bow of deference towards the barrister, whose face, however, seemed to say, that in his opinion the judgment of his friend Mr. Prendergast did not always go very far—"As far as my poor judgment goes, the women are honest and respectable. The man is as great a villain as there is unhung—unless his son be a greater one; but he is now so driven into a corner, that the truth may be more serviceable to him than a lie."

"People of that sort are never driven into a corner," said Mr. Die; "they may sometimes be crushed to death."

"Well, I believe the matter is as I tell you. There at any rate is Mollett's assurance that it is so. The woman has been residing in the same place for years, and will come forward at any time to prove that she was married to this man before he ever saw—before he went to Dorsetshire: she has her marriage certificate; and as far as I can learn there is no one able or willing to raise the question against you. Your cousin Owen certainly will not do so."

"It will hardly do to depend upon that," said Mr. Die, with another sneer. "Twelve thousand a year is a great provocative to litigation."

"If he does we must fight him; that's all. Of course steps will be taken at once to get together in the proper legal form all evidence of every description which may bear on the subject, so that should the question ever be raised again, the whole matter may be in a nutshell."

"You'll find it a nutshell very difficult to crack in five-and-twenty years' time," said Mr. Die.

"And what would you advise me to do?" asked Herbert.

That after all was now the main question, and it was discussed between them for a long time, till the shades of evening came upon them, and the dull dingy chambers became almost dark as they sat there. Mr. Die at first conceived that it would be well that Herbert should still stick to the law. What indeed could be more conducive to salutary equanimity in the mind of a young man so singularly circumstanced, than the study of Blackstone, of Coke, and of Chitty? as long as he remained there, at work in those chambers, amusing himself occasionally with the eloquence of the neighbouring courts, there might be reasonable hope that he would be able to keep his mind equally poised, so that neither success nor failure as regarded his Irish inheritance should affect him injuriously. Thus at least argued Mr. Die. But at this point Herbert seemed to have views of his own: he said that in the first place he must be with his mother; and then, in the next place, as it was now clear that he was not to throw up Castle Richmond—as it would not now behove him to allow any one else to call himself master there,—it would be his duty to reassume the place of master. "The onus probandi will now rest with them," he said, repeating Mr. Prendergast's words; and then he was ultimately successful in persuading even Mr. Die to agree that it would be better for him to go to Ireland than to remain in London, sipping the delicious honey of Chancery buttercups.

"And you will assume the title, I suppose?" said Mr. Die.

"Not at any rate till I get to Castle Richmond," he said, blushing. He had so completely abandoned all thought of being Sir Herbert Fitzgerald, that he had now almost felt ashamed of saying that he should so far presume as to call himself by that name.

And then he and Mr. Prendergast went away and dined together, leaving Mr. Die to complete his legal work for the day. At this he would often sit till nine or ten, or even eleven in the evening, without any apparent ill results from such effects, and then go home to his dinner and port wine. He was already nearly seventy, and work seemed to have no effect on him. In what Medea's caldron is it that the great lawyers so cook themselves, that they are able to achieve half an immortality, even while the body still clings to the soul? Mr. Die, though he would talk of his bald head, had no idea of giving way to time. Superannuated! The men who think of superannuation at sixty are those whose lives have been idle, not they who have really buckled themselves to work. It is my opinion that nothing seasons the mind for endurance like hard work. Port wine should perhaps be added.

It was not till Herbert once more found himself alone that he fully realized this new change in his position. He had dined with Mr. Prendergast at that gentleman's club, and had been specially called upon to enjoy himself, drinking as it were to his own restoration in large glasses of some special claret, which Mr. Prendergast assured him was very extraordinary.

"You may be as satisfied as that you are sitting there that that's 34," said he; "and I hardly know anywhere else that you'll get it."

This assertion Herbert was not in the least inclined to dispute. In the first place, he was not quite clear what 34 meant, and then any other number, 32 or 36, would have suited his palate as well. But he drank the 34, and tried to look as though he appreciated it.

"Our wines here are wonderfully cheap," said Mr. Prendergast, becoming confidential; "but nevertheless we have raised the price of that to twelve shillings. We'll have another bottle."

During all this Herbert could hardly think of his own fate and fortune, though, indeed, he could hardly think of anything else. He was eager to be alone, that he might think, and was nearly broken-hearted when the second bottle of 34 made its appearance. Something, however, was arranged in those intercalary moments between the raising of the glasses. Mr. Prendergast said that he would write both to Owen Fitzgerald and to Mr. Somers; and it was agreed that Herbert should immediately return to Castle Richmond, merely giving his mother time to have notice of his coming.

And then at last he got away, and started by himself for a night walk through the streets of London. It seemed to him now to be a month since he had arrived there; but in truth it was only on the yesterday that he had got out of the train at the Euston Station. He had come up, looking forward to live in London all his life, and now his London life was over,—unless, indeed, those other hopes should come back to him, unless he should appear again, not as a student in Mr. Die's chamber, but as one of the council of the legislature assembled to make laws for the governance of Mr. Die and of others. It was singular how greatly this episode in his life had humbled him in his own esteem. Six months ago he had thought himself almost too good for Castle Richmond, and had regarded a seat in Parliament as the only place which he could fitly fill without violation to his nature. But now he felt as though he should hardly dare to show himself within the walls of that assembly. He had been so knocked about by circumstances, so rudely toppled from his high place,—he had found it necessary to put himself so completely into the hands of other people, that his self-pride had all left him. That it would in fact return might be held as certain, but the lesson which he had learned would not altogether be thrown away upon him.

At this moment, as I was saying, he felt himself to be completely humbled. A lie spoken by one of the meanest of God's creatures had turned him away from all his pursuits, and broken all his hopes; and now another word from this man was to restore him,—if only that other word should not appear to be the greater lie! and then that there should be such question as to his mother's name and fame—as to the very name by which she should now be called! that it should depend on the amount of infamy of which that wretch had been guilty, whether or no the woman whom in the world he most honoured was entitled to any share of respect from the world around her! That she was entitled to the respect of all good men, let the truth in these matters be where it might, Herbert knew, and all who heard the story would acknowledge. But respect is of two sorts, and the outer respect of the world cannot be parted with conveniently.

He did acknowledge himself to be a humbled man,—more so than he had ever yet done, or had been like to do, while conscious of the loss which had fallen on him. It was at this moment when he began to perceive that his fortune would return to him, when he became aware that he was knocked about like a shuttlecock from a battledore, that his pride came by its first fall. Mollett was in truth the great man,—the Warwick who was to make and unmake the kings of Castle Richmond. A month ago, and it had pleased Earl Mollett to say that Owen Fitzgerald should reign; but there had been a turn upon the cards, and now he, King Herbert, was to be again installed.

He walked down all alone through St. James's Street, and by Pall Mall and Charing Cross, feeling rather than thinking of all this. Those doubts of Mr. Die did not trouble him much. He fully believed that he should regain his title and property; or rather that he should never lose them. But he thought that he could never show himself about the country again as he had done before all this was known. In spite of his good fortune he was sad at heart, little conscious of the good that all this would do him.

He went on by the Horse Guards and Treasury Chambers into Parliament Street, and so up to the new Houses of Parliament, and sauntered into Westminster