The Claverings. Anthony TrollopeЧитать онлайн книгу.

can't say I did; but I think I had given them some ground to expect it. I fancy they all knew what I was about. But it's over now, and I don't know that we need say anything more about it."

"Certainly not. Nothing can be said that would be of any use; but I do not think I have done anything that you should resent."

"Resent is a strong word. I don't resent it, or, at any rate, I won't; and there may be an end of it." After this, Harry was more gracious with Mr. Saul, having an idea that the curate had made some sort of apology for what he had done. But that, I fancy, was by no means Mr. Saul's view of the case. Had he offered to marry the daughter of the Archbishop of Canterbury, instead of the daughter of the Rector of Clavering, he would not have imagined that his doing so needed an apology.

The day after his return from London Lady Clavering sent for Harry up to the house. "So you saw my sister in London?" she said.

"Yes," said Harry blushing; "as I was in town, I thought that I might as well meet her. But, as you said, Lady Ongar is able to do without much assistance of that kind. I only just saw her."

"Julia took it so kindly of you; but she seems surprised that you did not come to her the following day. She thought you would have called."

"Oh, dear, no. I fancied that she would be too tired and too busy to wish to see any mere acquaintance."

"Ah, Harry, I see that she has angered you," said Lady Clavering; "otherwise you would not talk about mere acquaintance."

"Not in the least. Angered me! How could she anger me? What I meant was that at such a time she would probably wish to see no one but people on business—unless it was some one near to her, like yourself or Hugh."

"Hugh will not go to her."

"But you will do so; will you not?"

"Before long I will. You don't seem to understand, Harry—and, perhaps, it would be odd if you did—that I can't run up to town and back as I please. I ought not to tell you this, I dare say, but one feels as though one wanted to talk to some one about one's affairs. At the present moment, I have not the money to go—even if there were no other reason." These last words she said almost in a whisper, and then she looked up into the young man's face, to see what he thought of the communication she had made him.

"Oh, money!" he said. "You could soon get money. But I hope it won't be long before you go."

On the next morning but one a letter came by the post for him from Lady Ongar. When he saw the handwriting, which he knew, his heart was at once in his mouth, and he hesitated to open his letter at the breakfast-table. He did open it and read it, but, in truth, he hardly understood it or digested it till he had taken it away with him up to his own room. The letter, which was very short, was as follows:—

Dear Friend,

I felt your kindness in coming to me at the station so much!—the more, perhaps, because others, who owed me more kindness, have paid me less. Don't suppose that I allude to poor Hermione, for, in truth, I have no intention to complain of her. I thought, perhaps, you would have come to see me before you left London; but I suppose you were hurried. I hear from Clavering that you are to be up about your new profession in a day or two. Pray come and see me before you have been many days in London. I shall have so much to say to you! The rooms you have taken are everything that I wanted, and I am so grateful!

Yours ever,

J. O.

When Harry had read and had digested this, he became aware that he was again fluttered. "Poor creature!" he said to himself; "it is sad to think how much she is in want of a friend."

CHAPTER VII.

Table of Contents

SOME SCENES IN THE LIFE OF A COUNTESS.

bout the middle of January Harry Clavering went up to London, and settled himself to work at Mr. Beilby's office. Mr. Beilby's office consisted of four or five large chambers, overlooking the river from the bottom of Adam Street in the Adelphi, and here Harry found a table for himself in the same apartment with three other pupils. It was a fine old room, lofty, and with large windows, ornamented on the ceiling with Italian scrollwork, and a flying goddess in the centre. In days gone by the house had been the habitation of some great rich man, who had there enjoyed the sweet breezes from the river before London had become the London of the present days, and when no embankment had been needed for the Thames. Nothing could be nicer than this room, or more pleasant than the table and seat which he was to occupy near a window; but there was something in the tone of the other men towards him which did not quite satisfy him. They probably did not know that he was a fellow of a college, and treated him almost as they might have done had he come to them direct from King's College, in the Strand, or from the London University. Down at Stratton, a certain amount of honour had been paid to him. They had known there who he was, and had felt some deference for him. They had not slapped him on the back, or poked him in the ribs, or even called him old fellow, before some length of acquaintance justified such appellation. But up at Mr. Beilby's, in the Adelphi, one young man, who was certainly his junior in age, and who did not seem as yet to have attained any high position in the science of engineering, manifestly thought that he was acting in a friendly and becoming way by declaring the stranger to be a lad of wax on the second day of his appearance. Harry Clavering was not disinclined to believe that he was a "lad of wax," or "a brick," or "a trump," or "no small beer." But he desired that such complimentary and endearing appellations should be used to him only by those who had known him long enough to be aware that he deserved them. Mr. Joseph Walliker certainly was not as yet among this number.

There was a man at Mr. Beilby's who was entitled to greet him with endearing terms, and to be so greeted himself, although Harry had never seen him till he attended for the first time at the Adelphi. This was Theodore Burton, his future brother-in-law, who was now the leading man in the London house;—the leading man as regarded business, though he was not as yet a partner. It was understood that this Mr. Burton was to come in when his father went out; and in the meantime he received a salary of a thousand a year as managing clerk. A very hard-working, steady, intelligent man was Mr. Theodore Burton, with a bald head, a high forehead, and that look of constant work about him which such men obtain. Harry Clavering could not bring himself to take a liking to him, because he wore cotton gloves and had an odious habit of dusting his shoes with his pocket-handkerchief. Twice Harry saw him do this on the first day of their acquaintance, and he regretted it exceedingly. The cotton gloves too were offensive, as were also the thick shoes which had been dusted; but the dusting was the great sin.

And there was something which did not quite please Harry in Mr. Theodore Burton's manner, though the gentleman had manifestly intended to be very kind to him. When Burton had been speaking to him for a minute or two, it flashed across Harry's mind that he had not bound himself to marry the whole Burton family, and that, perhaps, he must take some means to let that fact be known. "Theodore," as he had so often heard the younger Mr. Burton called by loving lips, seemed to claim him as his own, called him Harry, and upbraided him with friendly warmth for not having come direct to his—Mr. Burton's—house in Onslow Crescent. "Pray feel yourself at home there," said Mr. Burton. "I hope you'll like my wife. You needn't be afraid of being made to be idle if you spend your evenings there, for we are all reading people. Will you come and dine to-day?" Florence had told him that she was her brother Theodore's favourite sister, and that Theodore as a husband and a brother, and a man, was perfect. But Theodore had dusted his boots with his handkerchief, and Harry Clavering would not dine with him on that day.

And then it was painfully manifest to him that every one in the office knew his destiny with reference to old Burton's daughter. He had been one of the Stratton men, and no more than any other had he gone unscathed through the Stratton fire. He had been made to do the regular thing, as Granger, Scarness, and others had done it. Stratton would be safer ground now, as Clavering

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