have long been open to the truth.I know. They say that my dear child Claire is to elope to-night withSir Harry Payne. I had a letter from some busybody to that effect; butit is not true. I say it is not true."
"No, Mr Denville, it is not true," cried Mrs Barclay warmly. "Ourdear Claire--your dear Claire--is too good a girl, and the wretches whoput this about ought to be punished. It is not dear Claire who isbelieved to be going to-night, but--"
"You'll pardon me," cried Denville, turning greyer, and with a curioussunken look about his eyes. "Not a word, please. The scandal isagainst some one else? I will not hear it, ma'am. Mrs Barclay, I willnot know. Life is too short to mix ourselves up with these miserablescandals. I will not wait, Barclay. It is growing late. I shallprobably meet my daughter, and take her back. If I do not, and sheshould come here, might I ask you to see her home?"
"Yes, Denville, yes; but, look here, we have something to tell you.Wife, it is more a woman's work. You can do it more kindly than I."
"You'll pardon me," said Denville, looking from one to the other, andsmiling feebly. "Some fresh story about my daughter? Is it not so,Mrs Barclay?"
"Yes, yes, Mr Denville," she whispered; "and you ought to know, thoughI was going to leave my Jo-si-ah to tell you."
"Always good and kind to me and my family, dear Mrs Barclay," saidDenville, smiling, and bending over the plump hand he took, to kiss it,with chivalrous respect. "But no--no more tales, my dear madam; thechronicles of Saltinville are too full of scandals. No, no, my dearMrs Barclay; my unfortunate house can live it down."
He drew himself up, took a pinch of snuff with all the refined style andair of the greatest buck of the time, and handed his box to Barclay, whotook it, mechanically helped himself noisily, and handed it back.
"The old man's half mad," he muttered, as he looked at him.
"But Mr Denville," cried Mrs Barclay pleadingly; "you ought to know--you must know."
"Nonsense, madam, nonsense!" cried Denville, with his most artificialmanner reigning supreme, as he flicked away a tiny speck of dust fromhis frill. "We can laugh at these things--we elderly people, and treatthem as they deserve."
"But, Mr Denville--"
"No, dear madam, no; I protest," he continued, almost playfully.
"Jo-si-ah, time's flying," cried Mrs Barclay, in a pathetic manner thatwas absolutely comic. "What _am_ I to say to this man?"
"Tell him," said Barclay sternly.
"Ah!" ejaculated Mrs Barclay, with a long sigh, as if she shrank fromher task. "It must be done. Dear Mr Denville, I don't like tellingyou, but Mrs Burnett--"
Denville reeled, and caught at Barclay's arm.
"Hold up, old fellow! Be a man," cried the money-lender, supportinghim.
The old man recovered himself, and stood up very erect, turning for amoment resentfully on Barclay, as if angry that he should have dared totouch him. Then, looking fiercely at Mrs Barclay:
"Hush, ma'am!" he cried. "Shame, shame! How can you--you who are sotrue and tender-hearted--let yourself be the mouthpiece of this wretchedcrew?"
"But indeed, Mr Denville--"
"Oh, hush, ma'am, hush! You, who know the people so well. MrsBurnett--my dear sweet child, May--the idol of my very life--to be madethe butt now at which these wretches shoot their venomous shafts.Scandals, madam; scandals, Barclay. Coinages from the very pit. Atrue, sweet lady, sir. Bright as a bird. Sweet as some opening flower.And they dare to malign her with her bright, merry, innocent ways--thatsweet young girl wife. Oh, shame! Shame upon them! Shame!"
"Oh, Denville, Denville," said Barclay softly, as he laid his hand uponthe old man's shoulder.
"Ah!" he cried, "even you pity me for this. Dear Mrs Barclay, I oughtto be angry with you: but no, I will not. You mean so well. But it isall I have--in a life so full of pain and suffering that I wonder how Ilive--the love of my daughters--them to defend against the world.Madam, you are mistaken. My daughter--an English lady--as pure asheaven. But I thank you--I am not angry--you mean well. Always kindand helpful to my dear child, Claire. Ha, ha, ha!"
It was a curious laugh, full of affectation; and he took snuff againwith all the old ceremony; but he did not close the box with a loudsnap, and as his hand fell to his side, the brown powder dropped inpatches and flakes here and there upon the carpet.
"Ha, ha, ha!" he laughed again. "Calumnies, madam--I say it as I takemy leave--the calumnies of false fribbles and envious women. Busy againwith my dear children's names. But we must live it down. Elopement!Pshaw! The coxcombs! The Jezebels! My child! Oh, I cannot mentionher sweet, spring-flower name in connection with such a horror. It isatrocious."
"Denville," said Barclay, in answer to an appealing look from his wife.
"No, no! Not a word, sir, not a word," cried Denville, raising hishand. "It is too absurd--too villainous. Madam, it is from your goodheart that this warning comes. I thank you, ma'am, you meant to put meon my guard. Barclay, adieu, my good friend. You'll shake hands.You'll take no notice of this slight emotion--this display of a father'sindignation on hearing such a charge. Mrs Barclay, if I have spokenharshly, you'll forgive me. I don't blame you, dear madam. _Aurevoir_! No, no; don't ring, I beg. I pray you will not come down.You'll banish all this--from your thoughts--"
He stopped short and reeled again, dropping snuff-box, hat, and cane ashe clasped his hands to his head, staring wildly before him. The feebleaffected babble ceased suddenly, and it was another voice that seemed tocome from his lips as he exclaimed loudly in hot anger:
"It is a lie! You--May! The girl I've loved so well--you! When my cupof suffering is brimming over. A lie--a lie, I say. Ah!"
His manner changed again; and now it was soft and full of wild appeal,as he cried:
"May--May! My darling! God help me, poor broken dotard that I am!Shall I be in time?"
He made a dash for the door, but staggered, and would have fallen hadnot Barclay caught him and helped him to a chair, where he sat gazingbefore him as if at some scene passing before his eyes.
"Blood," he whispered at last, "to the head. Help me, Barclay, or Ishall be too late."
"No, stay here. I'll go and do all I can."
"No!" cried Denville fiercely. "I am her father, Barclay; we may saveher--if I go too."
He rose with nervous energy now, and gripping the money-lender's armthey went together out into the dark street, where, indignantly refusingfurther help, the old man strode off, leaving Barclay watching him.
"I don't hardly know what to do," he said musingly. "Ah! who are you?"
"His lordship's man, sir," said a livery servant. "Lord Carboro' sayscould you make it convenient to come to him directly?"
"No, I'm busy. Well, yes, I will. Is he at home?"
"No, sir; at the reading-room."
"Go on, then," said Barclay. "Tell his lordship I'll be theredirectly."
The man went off, and Barclay hurried indoors to speak with his wife,and came out five minutes later to join the old nobleman at thereading-room that answered the purpose of a club.
Volume Three, Chapter VI.
ON THE DOWNS.
High up on the Downs behind the town lay a patch of wood, dwarfed andstunted in its growth by the sharp breezes that came off the sea. Thesoil in which they grew, too, was exceedingly shallow; and, as the chalkbeneath was not very generous in its supply of nutriment, the trees senttheir roots along the surface, and their low-spreading branches inland,with a few shabby twigs seaward to meet the cutting blasts.
Right through this patch of thick low wood ran the London Road, andacross it the coast road, going west, while a tall finger-post that hadonce been painted stood with outstretched arms, bending over a littleold grey milestone, as if it were blessing it for being so humble and sosmall.
It was along this road that Richard Linnell, Mellersh, and James Bellhad cantered, and then turned off at the cross, on the night of theirpursuit, and the chalky way looked much the same beneath twink
ling starson the night succeeding the day when Louis Gravani had had his interviewwith Claire, as on that of Mrs Pontardent's party.
The similarity was increased by the presence of a yellow post-chaise;but it was not drawn up at the back of Mrs Pontardent's garden, buthere on the short turf close up to the trees and opposite thefinger-post.
The chaise, an old yellow weather-beaten affair, seemed to be misty, andthe horses indistinct in the darkness, looking quite the ghost of avehicle that might be expected to fade away like a trick of theimagination, everything was so still. The
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