Part 8 (2/2)
Soon after breakfast he mounted his good horse, Albemarle, and early in the afternoon he arrived at the widow Keswick's gate. He had looked for a stormy reception, in which the thunder-bolts of rage should burst around him, and he was surprised, therefore, to be received with the frigidity of the North Pole.
”I never expected,” she said, without any previous courtesy, ”to see one of your people under my roof, and it is not very long ago since I would have gone away from it the moment any one of you came near it.”
”I am happy, madam,” said Mr Brandon, in his most courteous manner, ”that that day is past.”
”My staying won't do you any good,” said the old lady, whose purple sun-bonnet seemed to heave with the uprisal of her hair, ”except, perhaps, to get you a better meal than the servants would have given you. But I want a lawyer, and I can't afford to pay for one either, and when I saw you coming I just made up my mind to get something out of you, and if I do it, it'll be the first red mark for my side of the family.”
Mr Brandon a.s.sured her that nothing would give him more pleasure than to a.s.sist her in any way in his power.
”Very well, then,” said Mrs Keswick, ”just sit down on that bench, and, when we have got through, your horse can be taken, and you can rest a while, though it seems a very curious thing that you should want to stop here to rest.”
”Well, madam,” said Mr Brandon, seating himself as comfortably as possible on a wooden bench, ”I shall be happy to hear anything you have to say.”
The old lady did not sit down, but stood up in front of him, leaning on her umbrella, with which faithful companion she had been about to set out on her walk. ”When my son Junius came home a while ago--” she began.
”Do you still call him your son?” interrupted Mr Brandon.
”Indeed I do!” was the very prompt answer. ”That's just what he is. And, as I was going to say, when he wrote me a short time ago that he was coming here, I believed, from his letter, that he had some scheme on hand in regard to your niece, and I made up my mind I wouldn't stay in the house to hear anything more said on that subject. I had told him that I never wanted him to say another word about it; and it made my blood boil, sir, to think that he had come again to try to cozen me into the vile compact.”
”Madam!” exclaimed Mr Brandon.
”The next day,” continued Mrs Keswick, ”a lady arrived; and as soon as I saw her drive into the gate I felt sure it was Roberta March, and that the two had hatched up a plot to come and work on my feelings, and so I wouldn't come near the house.”
”Madam!” exclaimed Mr Brandon, ”how could you dream such a thing of my niece? You don't know her, madam.”
”No,” said the old lady, ”I don't know her, but I knew she belonged to your family, and so I was not to be surprised at anything she did. But I found out I was mistaken. An old negro woman recognized this young person as the daughter of my younger sister you know there were three of us. The child was born and raised here, but I have not seen and have scarcely heard of her since she was eight years old.”
”That's very extraordinary, madam,” said Mr Brandon.
”No, it isn't, when you consider the stubbornness, the obstinacy, and the wickedness of some people. My sister sickened when the child was about six years old, and her husband, Harvey Peyton--”
”I have frequently heard of him, madam,” said Mr Brandon.
”And I wish I never had,” said she. ”Well, he was travelling most of the time, a thing my sister couldn't do; but he came here then and stayed, off and on, till she died. And not long afterward, just because I told him that I intended to consider the child as my child, and that she should have the name of Keswick instead of his name, and should know me as her mother, and live with me always, he got angry and flared up, and actually took the child away. I gave it to him hot, I can tell you, before he left, and I never saw him again. He was so eaten up with rage because I wanted to take the little Annie for my own, that he filled her mind with such prejudices against me that when he died a year or two ago, she actually went to work to get her own living instead of applying to me for help. But now she has come down here, and I was really filled with joy to have her again and carry out the plan on which my heart had long been set--that is to marry her to her cousin Junius, and let them have this farm when I am gone,----?”
At this Mr Brandon raised his eyebrows, and lowered the corners of his mouth.
”But I suddenly discover,” continued the old, lady, ”that the little wretch is married--actually married.”
At this Mr Brandon lowered his eyebrows and raised the corners of his mouth. ”Did her husband come with her?” he asked, pleasantly. And he gave a few long, free breaths as if he had just pa.s.sed in safety a very dangerous and unsuspected rock.
”No, he didn't,” replied the old lady. ”I don't know where he is, and, from what I can make out, he is an utterly good-for-nothing fellow, allowing his wife to go where she pleases, and take care of herself. Now this abominable marriage stands square in the way of the plan which again rose up in my mind the moment I heard that the girl was in my house. If Junius and she should marry, there would be no more dangers for me to look out for.”
”But the existence of a husband,” said Mr Brandon blandly, ”puts an end to all thoughts of such an alliance.”
”No it don't,” said the old lady, bringing her umbrella down with force on the porch. ”Not a bit of it. Such an outrageous marriage should not be suffered to exist. They should be divorced. He does nothing for her, and neglects and deserts her absolutely. There's every ground for a divorce, or enough grounds, at any rate. All that's necessary is for a lawyer to take it up. I don't know any lawyers, and when I saw you riding up from the road gate I said to myself: 'Here's the very man I want,--and it's full time I should get something from people who have taken nearly everything from me.'”
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