My Friend Prospero

by Henry Harland

  V

  John sat in his room, absorbed in contemplation of a tiny lace-edgedpocket-handkerchief. He spread it out upon his knee, and laughed. Hecrumpled it up in his palm, and pressed it to his face, and drank deepof its faint perfume,--faint, but powerfully provocative of visions andemotions. He had found it during the night on the floor of thesick-room, and had captured and borne it away like a treasure. He spreadit out on his knee again, and was again about to laugh at its small sizeand gauzy texture, when his eye was caught by something in its corner.He held it nearer to the window. The thing that had caught his eye was acypher surmounted by a crown, embroidered so minutely as almost to callfor a magnifying glass. But without a glass he could see that the cypherwas composed of the initials M and D, and that the crown was not acoronet, but a closed crown, of the pattern worn by mediatised princes.

  "What on earth can be the meaning of this?" he wondered, frowning, andbreathing quick.

  But he was stopped from further speculation for the moment by a knock atthe door. The postman entered with two letters, for one of which, as itwas registered, John had to sign. When he had tipped the postman and wasalone again, he put his registered letter on the dressing-table (with aview to disciplining curiosity and exercising patience, possibly) andturned his attention to the other. In a handsome, high old hand, thatsomehow reminded him of the writer's voice, it ran as follows:--

  "DEAR JOHN,

  "I was heart-broken not to see you when I drove over to say good-bye this afternoon, but chance favoured me at least to the extent of letting me see your miller's daughter, and you may believe that I was glad of an opportunity to inspect her at close quarters. My dear boy, she is no more a miller's daughter than you are. Her beauty--there's _race_ in it. Her manner and carriage, her voice, accent, her way of dressing, (I'd give a sovereign for the name of her dressmaker), the fineness of her skin, her hair, everything--there's race in 'em all, race and consciousness of race, pride, dignity, distinction. These things don't come to pass in a generation. I'm surprised at your lack of perspicacity. And those blue eyes of yours look so sharp, too. But perhaps your wish was father to your thought. You felt (well, and so to some extent did I) that it would be more _romantic_. She's probably a very great swell indeed, and I expect the Frau What's-her-name she's staying with will turn out to be her old governess or nurse or something. When those Austrians _can_ show quarterings, (of course you must bar recent creations--they're generally named Cohen), they can show them to some effect. They think nothing of thirty-two. All of which, _au fond_, rather rejoices me, for if she really had been a miller's daughter, it would have seemed a good deal like throwing yourself away, and who knows what your rusty, crusty old uncle B. might have said? I've long had a rod in pickle for _him_, and t'other day I applied it. _Attendez_.

  "Don't forget the pig you purchased--so gallantly and confidingly. I would not to the marriage of true minds admit impediments--your pig will gobble 'em up. You should by this have received a communication from my solicitors. Remember, you have pledged your sacred promise. There must be no question of trying to shirk or burke it. Remember that I am quite outrageously rich. I have no children of my own, and no very near relatives, (and my distant ones are intensely disagreeable), and I can't help looking upon the heir of the Blanchemains as a kind of spiritual son. In your position there's no such thing as having too much money. Take all that comes, and never mind the quarter whence. They're Plymouth Brethren, and send me tracts.

  "Good-bye now till August, if not before. For of course in August you must come to me at Fring. Will you bring your bride? When and where the wedding? I suppose they'll want it in Austria. Beware of long engagements--or of too short ones. The autumn's the time,--the only pretty ring-time. You see, you'll need some months for the preparation of your trousseau. I love a man to be smart. Well, good-bye. I was so sorry about that child's illness, but thankful to hear she was mending.

  "Yours affectionately,

  "LINDA BLANCHEMAIN."

  And his registered letter, when at last he opened it, ran thus:--

  "DEAR SIR:--Pursuant to instructions received from our client Lady Blanchemain, we beg to hand you herewith our cheque for Seven hundred and fifty pounds (L750 stg.), and to request the favour of your receipt for the same, together with the address of your bankers, that we may pay in quarterly a like sum to your account, it being her ladyship's intention, immediately upon her return to England, to effect a settlement upon yourself and heirs of L100,000 funded in Bk. of Eng. stock.

  "We are further to have the pleasure to inform you that by the terms of a will just prepared by us, and to be executed by Lady Blanchemain at the earliest possible date, you are constituted her residuary legatee.

  "With compliments and respectful congratulations,

  "We have the honour, dear Sir, to be,

  "Your obedient servants,

  "FARROW, BERNSCOT, AND TISDALE."

  And then there came another tap at the door, and it was the postman whohad returned, with a third letter which, like the true Italian postmanthat he was, he had forgotten,--and I fancy, if it hadn't been for thattip still warm in his pocket, the easy-going fellow would have allowedit to stand over till to-morrow. He made, at any rate, a great virtue ofhaving discovered it and of having retraced his steps.

  The letter was written in black, angular, uncompromising characters,that looked rather like sabre-thrusts and bayonets. It read:--

  "DEAR JACK:--I have received the enclosure from Linda Lady Blanchemain. She is an exceedingly impertinent and meddlesome old woman. But she is right about the allowance. I don't know why I never thought of it myself. I don't know why you never suggested it. I extremely regret it. As next in succession, you are certainly entitled to an annuity from the estate. I have to-day remitted L500 to your bankers, and am instructing my agents to pay in a like amount quarterly.

  "I hope I shall soon be seeing you at Ventmere. We are having a grand lambing season, but there's a nasty spread of swine-fever, and the whole country's papered with handbills. I got a goodish bit of hunting down at Wilsborough during the winter. Now there's nothing to do but play golf. I never could find any fun in shooting rooks.

  "Your affectionate uncle,

  "B of V."

  And the enclosure:--

  "Linda Lady Blanchemain presents her compliments to Lord Blanchemain of Ventmere, and begs to apprise him that she has lately had the pleasure of meeting his lordship's nephew John, and has discovered to her amazement that his lordship makes him no allowance. This situation, for the heir to the barony of Blanchemain, is of course absurd, and must, Lady Blanchemain is sure, be due entirely to an oversight on his lordship's part. She ventures, therefore, with all respect, to bring it to his notice."

  So! Here sat a young man with plenty to think about; a young man, whoseincome, yesterday a bare six hundred, had sprung up over night tosomething near six thousand. Six thousand a year isn't opulence, if youlike, but a young man possessing it can hardly look upon himself asquite empty-handed, either. This young man, however, had other things aswell to think of. What of that embroidered handkerchief? What of thoseshrewd suspicions of Lady Blanchemain's? What of his miller's daughter?

  And there was another thing still. What of his proud old honest Spartanof an unimaginative uncle? He thought of him, and "Oh, the poor oldboy," he cried. "Not for ten times the money would I have had the dearold woman write to him like that. How hard it must have hit him!"

  "M, D, and a princely crown," he reflected. "I wish I had an Almanach deGotha."