"You expected that," said his sister.

"I don't see how that makes it any better; besides, I am not quite sure that I did expect it; at any rate I did not feel certain. There is no doubt now."

"It is better that there should be no doubt. It is much better that you should know on what ground you have to stand."

"I shall soon have no ground to stand on, none at least of my own,--not an acre," said the unhappy man, with great bitterness in his tone.

"You can't in reality be poorer now than you were last year. You have not spent anything to speak of. There can be no doubt that Chaldicotes will be ample to pay all you owe the duke."

"It's as much as it will; and what am I to do then? I almost think more of the seat than I do of Chaldicotes."

"You know what I advise," said Mrs. Smith. "Ask Miss Dunstable to advance the money on the same security which the duke holds. She will be as safe then as he is now. And if you can arrange that, stand for the county against him; perhaps you may be beaten."

"I shouldn't have a chance."

"But it would show that you are not a creature in the duke's hands.

That's my advice," said Mrs. Smith, with much spirit; "and if you wish, I'll broach it to Miss Dunstable, and ask her to get her lawyer to look into it."

"If I had done this before I had run my head into that other absurdity!"

"Don't fret yourself about that; she will lose nothing by such an investment, and therefore you are not asking any favour of her.

Besides, did she not make the offer? and she is just the woman to do this for you now, because she refused to do that other thing for you yesterday. You understand most things, Nathaniel; but I am not sure that you understand women; not, at any rate, such a woman as her."

It went against the grain with Mr. Sowerby, this seeking of pecuniary a.s.sistance from the very woman whose hand he had attempted to gain about a fortnight since; but he allowed his sister to prevail. What could any man do in such straits that would not go against the grain?

At the present moment he felt in his mind an infinite hatred against the duke, Mr. Fothergill, Gumption and Gagebee, and all the tribes of Gatherum Castle and South Audley Street; they wanted to rob him of that which had belonged to the Sowerbys before the name of Omnium had been heard of in the county, or in England! The great leviathan of the deep was anxious to swallow him up as a prey! He was to be swallowed up, and made away with, and put out of sight, without a pang of remorse! Any measure which could now present itself as the means of staving off so evil a day would be acceptable; and therefore he gave his sister the commission of making this second proposal to Miss Dunstable. In cursing the duke--for he did curse the duke l.u.s.tily--it hardly occurred to him to think that, after all, the duke only asked for his own.

As for Mrs. Harold Smith, whatever may be the view taken of her general character as a wife and a member of society, it must be admitted that as a sister she had virtues.

CHAPTER x.x.xIII.

CONSOLATION.

On the next day, at two o'clock punctually, Mark Robarts was at the "Dragon of Wantly," walking up and down the very room in which the party had breakfasted after Harold Smith's lecture, and waiting for the arrival of Mr. Sowerby. He had been very well able to divine what was the business on which his friend wished to see him, and he had been rather glad than otherwise to receive the summons. Judging of his friend's character by what he had hitherto seen, he thought that Mr. Sowerby would have kept out of the way, unless he had it in his power to make some provision for these terrible bills. So he walked up and down the dingy room, impatient for the expected arrival, and thought himself wickedly ill-used in that Mr. Sowerby was not there when the clock struck a quarter to three. But when the clock struck three, Mr. Sowerby was there, and Mark Robarts's hopes were nearly at an end.

"Do you mean that they will demand nine hundred pounds?" said Robarts, standing up and glaring angrily at the member of Parliament.

"I fear that they will," said Sowerby. "I think it is best to tell you the worst, in order that we may see what can be done."

"I can do nothing, and will do nothing," said Robarts. "They may do what they choose--what the law allows them."

And then he thought of f.a.n.n.y and his nursery, and Lucy refusing in her pride Lord Lufton's offer, and he turned away his face that the hard man of the world before him might not see the tear gathering in his eye.

"But, Mark, my dear fellow--" said Sowerby, trying to have recourse to the power of his cajoling voice.

Robarts, however, would not listen.

"Mr. Sowerby," said he, with an attempt at calmness which betrayed itself at every syllable, "it seems to me that you have robbed me. That I have been a fool, and worse than a fool, I know well; but--but--but I thought that your position in the world would guarantee me from such treatment as this."

Mr. Sowerby was by no means without feeling, and the words which he now heard cut him very deeply--the more so because it was impossible that he should answer them with an attempt at indignation. He had robbed his friend, and, with all his wit, knew no words at the present moment sufficiently witty to make it seem that he had not done so.

"Robarts," said he, "you may say what you like to me now; I shall not resent it."

"Who would care for your resentment?" said the clergyman, turning on him with ferocity. "The resentment of a gentleman is terrible to a gentleman; and the resentment of one just man is terrible to another.

Your resentment!"--and then he walked twice the length of the room, leaving Sowerby dumb in his seat. "I wonder whether you ever thought of my wife and children when you were plotting this ruin for me!" And then again he walked the room.

"I suppose you will be calm enough presently to speak of this with some attempt to make a settlement?"

"No; I will make no such attempt. These friends of yours, you tell me, have a claim on me for nine hundred pounds, of which they demand immediate payment. You shall be asked in a court of law how much of that money I have handled. You know that I have never touched--have never wanted to touch--one shilling. I will make no attempt at any settlement. My person is here, and there is my house. Let them do their worst."

"But, Mark--"

"Call me by my name, sir, and drop that affectation of regard. What an a.s.s I have been to be so cozened by a sharper!"

Sowerby had by no means expected this. He had always known that Robarts possessed what he, Sowerby, would have called the spirit of a gentleman. He had regarded him as a bold, open, generous fellow, able to take his own part when called on to do so, and by no means disinclined to speak his own mind; but he had not expected from him such a torrent of indignation, or thought that he was capable of such a depth of anger.

"If you use such language as that, Robarts, I can only leave you."

"You are welcome. Go. You tell me that you are the messenger of these men who intend to work nine hundred pounds out of me. You have done your part in the plot, and have now brought their message. It seems to me that you had better go back to them. As for me, I want my time to prepare my wife for the destiny before her."

"Robarts, you will be sorry some day for the cruelty of your words."

"I wonder whether you will ever be sorry for the cruelty of your doings, or whether these things are really a joke to you."

"I am at this moment a ruined man," said Sowerby. "Everything is going from me,--my place in the world, the estate of my family, my father's house, my seat in Parliament, the power of living among my countrymen, or, indeed, of living anywhere;--but all this does not oppress me now so much as the misery which I have brought upon you."

And then Sowerby also turned away his face, and wiped from his eyes tears which were not artificial.

Robarts was still walking up and down the room, but it was not possible for him to continue his reproaches after this. This is always the case. Let a man endure to heap contumely on his own head, and he will silence the contumely of others--for the moment. Sowerby, without meditating on the matter, had had some inkling of this, and immediately saw that there was at last an opening for conversation.

"You are unjust to me," said he, "in supposing that I have now no wish to save you. It is solely in the hope of doing so that I have come here."

"And what is your hope? That I should accept another brace of bills, I suppose."

"Not a brace; but one renewed bill for--"

"Look here, Mr. Sowerby. On no earthly consideration that can be put before me will I again sign my name to any bill in the guise of an acceptance. I have been very weak, and am ashamed of my weakness; but so much strength as that, I hope, is left to me. I have been very wicked, and am ashamed of my wickedness; but so much right principle as that, I hope, remains. I will put my name to no other bill; not for you, not even for myself."

"But, Robarts, under your present circ.u.mstances that will be madness."

"Then I will be mad."

"Have you seen Forrest? If you will speak to him I think you will find that everything can be accommodated."

"I already owe Mr. Forrest a hundred and fifty pounds, which I obtained from him when you pressed me for the price of that horse, and I will not increase the debt. What a fool I was again there.

Perhaps you do not remember that, when I agreed to buy the horse, the price was to be my contribution to the liquidation of these bills."