Mr. Scarborough's Family. Anthony TrollopeЧитать онлайн книгу.
on that head. She did not think that the man loved her; nor did she know what to say or to think of her own feelings. Were he, the other man, to come to her, she would only bid him go away; but why she should so bid him she had hardly known. But now this dark frowning captain, with his big mustache and his military look, and his general aspect of invincible power, threatened the other man.
"He came to Tretton as my friend," he said, "and by Heaven if he stands in my way, if he dare to cross between you and me, he shall answer it with his life!"
The name had not been mentioned; but this had been very terrible to Florence, and she could only weep.
He went away, refusing to stay to dinner, but said that on the following afternoon he would again return. In the street of the town he met one of his creditors, who had discovered his journey to Cheltenham, and had followed him.
"Oh, Captain Mountjoy, what is all dis that they are talking about in London?"
"What are they talking about?"
"De inheritance!" said the man, who was a veritable Jew, looking up anxiously in his face.
The man had his acceptance for a very large sum of money, with an assurance that it should be paid on his father's death, for which he had given him about two thousand pounds in cash.
"You must ask my father."
"But is it true?"
"You must ask my father. Upon my word, I can tell you nothing else. He has concocted a tale of which I for one do not believe a word. I never heard of the story till he condescended to tell it me the other day. Whether it be true or whether it be false, you and I, Mr. Hart, are in the same boat."
"But you have had de money."
"And you have got the bill. You can't do anything by coming after me. My father seems to have contrived a very clever plan by which he can rob you; but he will rob me at the same time. You may believe me or not as you please; but that you will find to be the truth."
Then Mr. Hart left him, but certainly did not believe a word the captain had said to him.
To her mother Florence would only disclose her persistent intention of not marrying her cousin. Mrs. Mountjoy, over whose spirit the glamour of the captain's prestige was still potent, said much in his favor. Everybody had always intended the marriage, and it would be the setting right of everything. The captain, no doubt, owed a large sum of money, but that would be paid by Florence's fortune. So little did the poor lady know of the captain's condition. When she had been told that there had been a great quarrel between the captain and his father, she declared that the marriage would set that all right.
"But, mamma, Captain Scarborough is not to have the property at all."
Then Mrs. Mountjoy, believing thoroughly in entails, had declared that all Heaven could not prevent it.
"But that makes no difference," said the daughter; "if I—I—I loved him I would marry him so much the more, if he had nothing."
Then Mrs. Mountjoy declared that she could not understand it at all.
On the next day Captain Scarborough came, according to his promise, but nothing that he could say would induce Florence to come into his presence. Her mother declared that she was so ill that it would be wicked to disturb her.
CHAPTER III.
HARRY ANNESLEY.
Together with Augustus Scarborough at Cambridge had been one Harry Annesley, and he it was to whom the captain in his wrath had sworn to put an end if he should come between him and his love. Harry Annesley had been introduced to the captain by his brother, and an intimacy had grown up between them. He had brought him to Tretton Park when Florence was there, and Harry had since made his own way to Cheltenham, and had endeavored to plead his own cause after his own fashion. This he had done after the good old English plan, which is said to be somewhat loutish, but is not without its efficacy. He had looked at her, and danced with her, and done the best with his gloves and his cravat, and had let her see by twenty unmistakable signs that in order to be perfectly happy he must be near her. Her gloves, and her flowers, and her other little properties were sweeter to him than any scents, and were more valuable in his eyes than precious stones. But he had never as yet actually asked her to love him. But she was so quick a linguist that she had understood down to the last letter what all these tokens had meant. Her cousin, Captain Scarborough, was to her magnificent, powerful, but terrible withal. She had asked herself a thousand times whether it would be possible for her to love him and to become his wife. She had never quite given even to herself an answer to this question till she had suddenly found herself enabled to do so by his over-confidence in asking her to confess that she loved him. She had never acknowledged anything, even to herself, as to Harry Annesley. She had never told herself that it would be possible that he should ask her any such question. She had a wild, dreamy, fearful feeling that, although it would be possible to her to refuse her cousin, it would be impossible that she should marry any other while he should still be desirous of making her his wife. And now Captain Scarborough had threatened Harry Annesley, not indeed by name, but still clearly enough. Any dream of her own in that direction must be a vain dream.
As Harry Annesley is going to be what is generally called the hero of this story, it is necessary that something should be said of the particulars of his life and existence up to this period. There will be found to be nothing very heroic about him. He is a young man with more than a fair allowance of a young man's folly;—it may also be said of a young man's weakness. But I myself am inclined to think that there was but little of a young man's selfishness, with nothing of falseness or dishonesty; and I am therefore tempted to tell his story.
He was the son of a clergyman, and the eldest of a large family of children. But as he was the acknowledged heir to his mother's brother, who was the squire of the parish of which his father was rector, it was not thought necessary that he should follow any profession. This uncle was the Squire of Buston, and was, after all, not a rich man himself. His whole property did not exceed two thousand a year, an income which fifty years since was supposed to be sufficient for the moderate wants of a moderate country gentleman; but though Buston be not very far removed from the centre of everything, being in Hertfordshire and not more than forty miles from London, Mr. Prosper lived so retired a life, and was so far removed from the ways of men, that he apparently did not know but that his heir was as completely entitled to lead an idle life as though he were the son of a duke or a brewer. It must not, however, be imagined that Mr. Prosper was especially attached to his nephew. When the boy left the Charter-house, where his uncle had paid his school-bills, he was sent to Cambridge, with an allowance of two hundred and fifty pounds a year, and that allowance was still continued to him, with an assurance that under no circumstances could it ever be increased. At college he had been successful, and left Cambridge with a college fellowship. He therefore left it with one hundred and seventy-five pounds added to his income, and was considered by all those at Buston Rectory to be a rich young man.
But Harry did not find that his combined income amounted to riches amid a world of idleness. At Buston he was constantly told by his uncle of the necessity of economy. Indeed, Mr. Prosper, who was a sickly little man about fifty years of age, always spoke of himself as though he intended to live for another half-century. He rarely walked across the park to the rectory, and once a week, on Sundays, entertained the rectory family. A sad occasion it generally was to the elder of the rectory children, who were thus doomed to abandon the loud pleasantries of their own home for the sober Sunday solemnities of the Hall. It was not that the Squire of Buston was peculiarly a religious man, or that the rector was the reverse: but the parson was joyous, whereas the other was solemn. The squire—who never went to church, because he was supposed to be ill—made up for the deficiency by his devotional