by D. J. Taylor
‘What’s them then?’ Captain Raff was short-sighted.
‘Two bills of Davenant’s. The man that owns Tiberius. One for two hundred at three months, the other for three at four.’
‘The deuce! How much did you pay for them, eh?’
‘Not much over half. They are very shy of Davenant’s bills in the City just now. They think he is going to go smash.’
‘And you’re set to help him. Ain’t that the case?’
Mr Happerton gave his companion a sidelong glance, acknowledging that he might in some manner be beholden to him but contriving to suggest, by the way in which he shifted in his chair and glanced out of the window, where the rain had begun to fall over Thavies Inn, that Captain Raff would be prudent not to push this advantage too far. He wondered if he was not a little tired of Captain Raff. The bills were back in his pocket now, snug against an Astley’s ticket and a note from his saddle-maker’s. Captain Raff, meanwhile, had returned to an earlier subject.
‘This Miss Gresham. Uncommon good-looking girl ain’t she?’
‘Well – I don’t know about that. Dresses well, you know. Always wearing the new thing. Devil of an allowance the old fellow must give her.’
‘There’s no one like those doting old men to spoil a girl,’ Captain Raff admitted.
‘And as for looks, well she’d make ten of that Miss Tanqueray that Jackson swore he’d carry off to Gretna only her father had the coach stopped at Turnham Green.’
‘But there’s something not quite right, you say?’
‘I wouldn’t go so far as that. But I tell you what it is, Raff’ – here Mr Happerton flung his arm conspiratorially around his friend’s shoulder once more. ‘There are times when I can’t get to the bottom of her. You can come upon her sometimes and think that butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth. But there’s a look on her face now and again that reminds me of – who was that queen who rode in the chariot with the knives sticking out?’
‘Boudicea?’ Captain Raff wondered.
‘That’s the one. Now I like a woman to be imperious, no one better. The world’s full of simpering chits. But I draw the line at a girl who looks as if she’s about to ask me to go and see if the carriage is back from the stables.’
‘That would change, I should think,’ said Captain Raff, who was a bachelor, ‘when you were married.’
‘Perhaps it would.’
‘And you’ll need more than a pair of Davenant’s bills at three and four if you’re going to bring it off. You’ll have to decide, you know. Famous frontal development’s all very well, but what if she turns out to be a shrew?’
‘See here, Raff. I have asked this young lady to marry me. Do you think I want her spoken of in terms such as that?’
‘Upon my word, I didn’t mean to give offence,’ said Captain Raff, quite alarmed now. ‘It’s just that I never like to see a man throw himself away, you know.’
A gleam of light from the fire shone off Mr Happerton’s top-boot. Captain Raff’s wretched highlows were gathered up in shadow. Mr Happerton thought that he was very tired of Captain Raff.
‘Never mind Miss Gresham for a moment,’ he said. ‘What about that fellow we are to send to Boulogne?’
There was no one but the two of them in the room, but even so Captain Raff was careful to lower his voice while telling him about the man who was to be sent to Boulogne and what he might find there, while the fire burned low and the rain fell over the darkening streets beyond the window. In Thavies Inn the trees dripped miserably onto the gravel thoroughfares, and little melancholy whispers of wind ran in and out of the doorways and through the ancient wainscoting, and Mr Happerton, looking down on it from his eyrie in the Blue Riband Club, grew a little frightened, thought of all the demons that this visit to Boulogne might release from their box, and determined that, whatever he might do, and whoever he might marry, and whichever horse might bear his name at the Derby, he would, above all things, keep his head.
*
Mr Gresham’s chambers were at the top of an immense echoing staircase in Stone Buildings and presided over by an old clerk in an ante-room whose especial task it was to repel unwanted visitors. He had very nearly repelled Mr Happerton, but the ornament of the Blue Riband Club had a way of dealing with underlings and doorkeepers. Whether it was that he excelled in deferential small-talk or merely hinted at sovereigns no one quite knew, but there he was, rather to Mr Gresham’s horror, advancing over his carpet and holding out his hand to be shaken. The old lawyer took the hand, but the expression on his face showed what he thought of the man who offered it.
‘Tremendous lot of stairs to climb up you have here,’ Mr Happerton said. He had a way of casting his eye round a room, inspecting the shine of its curtains and the lustre of the invitation cards on its mantelpiece, that infuriated Mr Gresham. ‘But here I am again.’
‘Indeed, although I don’t recall inviting you, Mr Happerton.’
‘Well – perhaps not.’ As he looked round the chamber, with its cases full of dull, legal books, the back-numbers of the Law Gazette piled neatly on a damask-covered chair and the old lawyer’s stuff gown hanging from a hook by the door, Mr Happerton thought that he was not in the least frightened of Mr Gresham. ‘You see, I am pretty persistent when I put my mind to it.’
Mr Gresham thought that he was a persistent man too. ‘What can I do for you, Mr Happerton?’
Mr Happerton knew that Mr Gresham hated his insouciance, but somehow he could not prevent himself from falling into the blithe, easy tones that he used with Captain Raff and others of his acquaintance. ‘Well, it is the same old story. Young hearts are not to be parted, you know, as the poet says. It may be that you doubt my constancy.’
Mr Gresham knew he doubted more than that, but could not quite bring himself to say so. He was profoundly annoyed. In coming to see him at his chambers, Mr Happerton had dressed himself with all the decorum a man needs in the presence of his prospective father-in-law, but still, looking at him as he stood on the carpet, Mr Gresham saw through him. Mr Happerton’s sober coat could have been spangled motley for all the good it did him.
‘I know nothing about your constancy, Mr Happerton,’ he said, ‘but it is quite out of the question.’
‘May I sit down, sir?’ Mr Gresham could hardly let a visitor to his chambers remain standing, and waved him into a chair. ‘Why is it out of the question?’
‘I don’t think, Mr Happerton, that I am obliged by law to explain my decisions to you.’
‘But why not, sir?’ Mr Happerton’s expression, as he said this, was one of ingratiating good humour. ‘A man is in love with a young woman. He discovers that this affection is – well – reciprocated. And yet the door is slammed in his face and her father won’t say a word. Surely that is a little hard?’
Mr Gresham, who had resumed his usual chair on the far side of his desk, told himself that it was hard. He had an idea that all manner of things – custom, etiquette, propriety – entitled a young man to take his chance with a woman, provided he had the means to support her. But custom and propriety had not said anything about such a one as Mr Happerton. He acknowledged to himself – for he was a fair-minded man – that his dislike of Mr Happerton was merely personal, that he disliked his horsey pins, his casual air and his probable origins, and the small part of him that remembered the grandfather who had sold hay at Smithfield Market was faintly ashamed of this. When he opened his mouth again, consequently, he was somewhat more gracious.
‘You must forgive me for speaking plainly, Mr Happerton. These things throw a man out of kilter. But the fact is – I know nothing at all about you.’
‘Well, then’ – again, nothing could have been more frank and good-natured than Mr Happerton’s expression – ‘let me tell you some of the things you wish to know.’
‘There could be no point in such an interrogation – as you will understand if you think about it.’
‘And why not, sir? It is tantamount to saying that whichever way I jum
p there shall be a ditch waiting to receive me. You say that your objection to my marrying your daughter is that you know nothing about me. I offer to explain myself and you tell me that the interrogation would have no point. That is hardly fair to me, and it is hardly fair to Miss Gresham.’
‘I would prefer that my daughter married a man whose family I knew and with whose profession I was thoroughly conversant.’
‘As to that, I can tell you all that is to be said. My father managed an estate in the north of England – near Hexham, I believe – although he died just after I was born, and my mother was governess to a family in Lancashire.’ This was actually very near the truth. ‘For myself, I have lately been employed in the discounting line by Messrs Rivington.’
Mr Happerton had heard of Messrs Rivington, but this did not make him like Mr Happerton any the better.
‘As a partner?’
‘Well – it amounts to the same thing.’
‘But you derive a part of your income from the turf?’
‘You mustn’t think me impertinent, sir, if I say that so do half the noblemen in England.’
‘That is their affair. I don’t propose to marry my daughter to one of them.’
‘I believe, sir, that I once read in Bell’s Life that you advised the Duke of Grafton on a bloodstock case involving one of His Grace’s horses.’
Now Mr Gresham had made a small fortune in the case of Ariadne, the duke’s prize mare, supposedly got by Prince Regent from Josephine, but whose ancestry was eventually proved to be not much superior to a carthorse’s. He had been as proud to advise the duke in the affair as he was enraged to be reminded of it.
‘I think, Mr Happerton, that how I conduct myself in professional affairs is no concern of yours.’
‘But, if you will forgive me for saying so, my professional affairs are of the very greatest concern to yourself, and yet we are not to be judged by the same measure.’
Mr Happerton knew that he was playing a dangerous game. ‘Of course her father is as stiff as an old clothes-horse,’ he had said to Captain Raff, rather late on the previous evening. ‘But they say he is scrupulous. Wouldn’t have a fellow hanged if there was a doubt, and so forth.’ Mr Happerton had set himself to mine that vein of scrupulousness and he thought that, despite Mr Gresham’s annoyance, he was succeeding. For his own part, Mr Gresham was thoroughly upset. He disliked Mr Happerton and knew that he would always dislike him, but he also knew that he was behaving badly.
In the silence that followed, Mr Happerton got up from his chair and walked over to the mantelpiece. There were a number of invitation cards placed there – legal entertainments, mostly, of the driest and most forbidding sort – but he browsed through them with the greatest affability, while Mr Gresham goggled at him. There were judges, Attorney-Generals, even, who would not have cared to sit in his chambers and start quizzing his invitations.
‘So you see, sir,’ Mr Happerton said eventually – and no one could have said that his words lacked respect. ‘It is quite straightforward. I am sincerely attached to the young lady. The young lady is, as I hope and trust, sincerely attached to me. I have an income on which to support us – there’s an accountant in Red Lion Square who’ll be happy to show you the books, sir, whenever you care to step round. No doubt it’s a pity that my father managed an estate in Northumberland and my mother taught little girls their letters, but it can’t be helped.’
Now Mr Gresham, still seated in his chair, knew that there was something in this. He still disliked Mr Happerton – dislike was hardly a strong enough word – but he feared that a man with an income and the regard of the lady he proposed to marry was perfectly entitled to make that request. But did Mr Happerton really possess his daughter’s regard? Then again, he knew – and he was honest enough to admit this – that there might be certain advantages in seeing his daughter married and gone from his house. Her presence reminded him of his disappointment. If the person could be removed, then might not the disappointment follow? Seeing something of his perplexity, Mr Happerton went on:
‘But we are neglecting what ought to be the main point of a conversation such as this. What has Miss Gresham to say about it?’
Mr Gresham thought this was intolerable. ‘I don’t think that is a question I have to answer.’
‘Oh, but I think it is. That is, with the greatest respect, Mr Gresham, what has Miss Gresham said about me?’
And here Mr Gresham simply gasped. Anything in the world would have been preferable to him than the sight of Mr Happerton in his chambers, reading his legal invitations and eyeing up his curtains like a draper’s assistant. Even the marrying of his daughter, he thought, would be preferable to this. But he did not know what to say. He could have Mr Happerton pitched out into the street, but that would not stop the man paying court to his daughter. And so he sat there, resolving that he would say something sharp and inflexible – something unyielding and adamantine – but somehow not saying it. Whereupon Mr Happerton said, almost casually:
‘I think, Mr Gresham, that we won’t get much further with this. We won’t indeed. It may be that you entertain some personal dislike for me. If that’s the case then I’m very sorry – truly. But if you doubt my – my ability to provide for your daughter, then I think you ought to consult someone who could tell you more about myself than you are prepared to hear from my own mouth.’
‘Who is there?’ Mr Gresham did not know why he said this.
‘There is Mr Rivington, perhaps.’
And rather to his surprise Mr Gresham found himself agreeing to consult Mr Rivington about the bona fides of his daughter’s suitor. The old clerk, sitting in the ante-room beyond with Mr Happerton’s sovereign in his fist, wondered at the time that had gone by.
‘You’ll write, then?’ Mr Happerton enquired.
‘Well – perhaps I shall.’
‘And you will give my compliments to Miss Gresham?’
To this Mr Gresham merely inclined his head. Whereupon the two men shook hands, Mr Happerton with great affability, the man whom he hoped to call his father-in-law with an expression of the gravest regret.
*
Mr Gresham, who had had some slight professional dealings with Mr Rivington, hastened to renew his acquaintance with that gentleman. Not much more than twenty-four hours later he could be found in Messrs Rivington & Co.’s offices in Gutter Lane – rather cramped, if truth be known, and next door to a tanner’s yard – asking their principal: what did he think of Mr Happerton?
‘Mr Happerton?’ Mr Rivington was a cautious, hawk-like and rather austere man of sixty who looked as if he might have been the founding partner of a society got up to suppress light nonsense. ‘You won’t mind if I close that winder, Mr Gresham? It’s uncommon strong this morning. Mr Happerton’s a very useful man, I should say. At any rate we have found him so on a number of occasions.’
‘He was a partner in the firm I think?’
‘Well no – he did not find it convenient. And besides, I don’t think his capital was always at his disposal.’
‘Wasn’t it?’
‘There was talk of his dealing in foreign loans. My partner, Mr Scrimgeour, could certainly tell you.’
‘No, no, I should not trouble Mr Scrimgeour for the world. The thing is, Mr Rivington …’ And with a certain amount of hesitation that might have been taken for shame, choosing his words with great care and not liking to catch Mr Rivington’s eye, Mr Gresham told his tale. Mr Rivington, for his part, grew steadily less austere. Now that the subject was not financial expertise but the question of somebody’s daughter, he became almost worldly in his attitudes.
‘So that is how it is,’ he pronounced. In fact, Mr Rivington knew exactly how it was, Mr Happerton having called upon him a couple of days before. ‘Well, he is a wide-awake young fellow enough.’
‘I thought him – clever.’
‘Yes, he is that, certainly. I don’t think he is what you might call – a gentleman.’
‘I don’t
know that I care so very much about that,’ Mr Gresham said, who on the contrary cared very much.
‘Let me tell you how I see it, Mr Gresham. You must understand that we have not been so very intimate as that, but he has dined at my house and the women – that is to say, my wife – liked him.’
Mr Gresham nodded his head.
‘He is one of those thrusting young men that we hear about. He mayn’t make a very great fortune, but I don’t suppose he’ll lose one either. The money will always be there, and I don’t believe you’ll have them turn up on your doorstep with a pair of carriage trunks and a nursemaid, as happened to poor old Jones who married his daughter to Lord Plinlimmon’s son.’
‘But what about his’ – again Mr Gresham did not quite know how to frame the words – ‘personal conduct?’
‘As to that, young men will be young men I take it. You won’t care for those boots of his, I daresay. The people here thought him rather loud, but I don’t think I ever heard anything disreputable of him.’
‘The world has changed very much since you and I were young, Mr Rivington.’
‘No doubt it has,’ said Mr Rivington, who did not quite see why he should be bracketed with a man fifteen years his senior. ‘No doubt it has. As I say, the money will be there and I don’t suppose you’ll have much to complain of.’
*
‘Well, I have done my best,’ Mr Rivington said, meeting Mr Happerton later that night at a West End club of which they were both members, ‘although I don’t know what good it will do you.’
‘I’m awfully obliged to you. How did he seem to take it?’
‘Heaven knows how he took it. I take it he don’t approve of you.’ Mr Rivington’s glance, as he said this, declared a rather greater intimacy than he had proposed to Mr Gresham. ‘Now, one good turn deserves another you know.’
‘Ah well, if you mean Tiberius, I am working at that. But let us say the thing is conditional.’
‘Conditional on what?’ said Mr Rivington, who had a cigar in his mouth and the air of one who is enjoying the fruit of his labours, and whose slowness of uptake could in these circumstances perhaps be forgiven him.