Part 35 (2/2)
Do men agree whether Charles Stuart was a liar or a martyr? For how many ages have we believed Nero a monster! A writer now asks, as if demonstrating a problem, what real historian could doubt that Nero was a paragon? The patriarchs of Scripture have been declared by modern philosophy to be a series of astronomical hieroglyphs; and, with greater show of truth, we are a.s.sured that the patriot Tell never existed!
Posterity! the word has gulled men enough without my adding to the number. I, who loathe the living, can scarcely venerate the unborn.
Lucy, believe me that no man can mix largely with men in political life, and not despise everything that in youth he adored! Age leaves us only one feeling,--contempt!”
”Are you belied, then?” said Lucy, pointing to a newspaper, the organ of the party opposed to Brandon: ”are you belied when you are here called 'ambitious'? When they call you 'selfish' and 'grasping,' I know they wrong you; but I confess that I have thought you ambitious; yet can he who despises men desire their good opinion?”
”Their good opinion!” repeated Brandon, mockingly: ”do we want the bray of the a.s.ses we ride? No!” he resumed, after a pause. ”It is power, not honour; it is the hope of elevating oneself in every respect, in the world without as well as in the world of one's own mind: it is this hope which makes me labour where I might rest, and will continue the labour to my grave. Lucy,” continued Brandon, fixing his keen eyes on his niece, ”have you no ambition,--have power and pomp and place no charm for your mind?”
”None!” said Lucy, quietly and simply.
”Indeed! yet there are times when I have thought I recognized my blood in your veins. You are sprung from a once n.o.ble, but a fallen race. Are you ever susceptible to the weakness of ancestral pride?”
”You say,” answered Lucy, ”that we should care not for those who live after us; much less, I imagine, should we care for those who have lived ages before!”
”Prettily answered,” said Brandon, smiling. ”I will tell you at one time or another what effect that weakness you despise already once had, long after your age, upon me. You are early wise on some points; profit by my experience, and be so on all.”
”That is to say, in despising all men and all things!” said Lucy, also smiling.
”Well, never mind my creed,--you may be wise after your own; but trust one, dearest Lucy, who loves you purely and disinterestedly, and who has weighed with scales balanced to a hair all the advantages to be gleaned from an earth in which I verily think the harvest was gathered before we were put into it,--trust me, Lucy, and never think love, that maiden's dream, so valuable as rank and power: pause well before you yield to the former; accept the latter the moment they are offered you. Love puts you at the feet of another, and that other a tyrant; rank puts others at your feet, and all those thus subjected are your slaves!”
Lucy moved her chair so that the new position concealed her face, and did not answer; and Brandon, in an altered tone, continued,--
”Would you think, Lucy, that I once was fool enough to imagine that love was a blessing, and to be eagerly sought for? I gave up my hopes, my chances of wealth, of distinction,--all that had burned from the years of boyhood into my very heart. I chose poverty, obscurity, humiliation; but I chose also love. What was my reward? Lucy Brandon, I was deceived,--deceived!”
Brandon paused; and Lucy took his hand affectionately, but did not break the silence. Brandon resumed:--
”Yes, I was deceived! But I in my turn had a revenge, and a fitting revenge; for it was not the revenge of hatred, but” (and the speaker laughed sardonically) ”of contempt. Enough of this, Lucy! What I wished to say to you is this,--grown men and women know more of the truth of things than ye young persons think for. Love is a mere bauble, and no human being ever exchanged for it one solid advantage without repentance. Believe this; and if rank ever puts itself under those pretty feet, be sure not to spurn the footstool.”
So saying, with a slight laugh, Brandon lighted his chamber candle, and left the room for the night.
As soon as the lawyer reached his own apartment, he indited to Lord Mauleverer the following epistle:
”Why, dear Mauleverer, do you not come to town? I want you, your party wants you; perhaps the K--g wants you; and certainly, if you are serious about my niece, the care of your own love-suit should induce you yourself to want to come hither. I have paved the way for you; and I think, with a little management, you may antic.i.p.ate a speedy success. But Lucy is a strange girl; and, perhaps, after all, though you ought to be on the spot, you had better leave her as much as possible in my hands. I know human nature, Mauleverer, and that knowledge is the engine by which I will work your triumph. As for the young lover, I am not quite sure whether it be not better for our sake that Lucy should have experienced a disappointment on that score; for when a woman has once loved, and the love is utterly hopeless, she puts all vague ideas of other lovers altogether out of her head; she becomes contented with a husband whom she can esteem!
Sweet canter! But you, Mauleverer, want Lucy to love you! And so she will--after you have married her! She will love you partly from the advantages she derives from you, partly from familiarity (to say nothing of your good qualities). For my part, I think domesticity goes so far that I believe a woman always inclined to be affectionate to a man whom she has once seen in his nightcap.
However, you should come to town; my poor brother's recent death allows us to see no one,--the coast will be clear from rivals; grief has softened my niece's heart; in a word, you could not have a better opportunity. Come!
”By the way, you say one of the reasons which made you think ill of this Captain Clifford was your impression that in the figure of one of his comrades you recognized something that appeared to you to resemble one of the fellows who robbed you a few months ago. I understand that at this moment the police are in active pursuit of three most accomplished robbers; nor should I be at all surprised if in this very Clifford were to be found the leader of the gang, namely, the notorious Lovett. I hear that the said leader is a clever and a handsome fellow, of a gentlemanlike address, and that his general a.s.sociates are two men of the exact stamp of the worthies you have so amusingly described to me. I heard this yesterday from Nabbem, the police-officer with whom I once sc.r.a.ped acquaintance on a trial; and in my grudge against your rival, I hinted at my suspicion that he, Captain Clifford, might not impossibly prove this Rinaldo Rinaldini of the roads. Nabbem caught at my hint at once; so that, if it be founded on a true guess, I may flatter my conscience as well as my friends.h.i.+p by the hope that I have had some hand in hanging this Adonis of my niece's. Whether my guess be true or not, Nabbem says he is sure of this Lovett; for one of his gang has promised to betray him. Hang these aspiring dogs!
I thought treachery was confined to politics; and that thought makes me turn to public matters, in which all people are turning with the most edifying celerity....”
Sir William Brandon's epistle found Mauleverer in a fitting mood for Lucy and for London. Our worthy peer had been not a little chagrined by Lucy's sudden departure from Bath; and while in doubt whether or not to follow her, the papers had informed him of the squire's death.
Mauleverer, being then fully aware of the impossibility of immediately urging his suit, endeavoured, like the true philosopher he was, to reconcile himself to his hope deferred. Few people were more easily susceptible of consolation than Lord Mauleverer. He found an agreeable lady, of a face more unfaded than her reputation, to whom he intrusted the care of relieving his leisure moments from ennui; and being a lively woman, the confidante discharged the trust with great satisfaction to Lord Mauleverer, for the s.p.a.ce of a fortnight, so that he naturally began to feel his love for Lucy gradually wearing away, by absence and other ties; but just as the triumph of time over pa.s.sion was growing decisive, the lady left Bath in company with a tall guardsman, and Mauleverer received Brandon's letter. These two events recalled our excellent lover to a sense of his allegiance; and there being now at Bath no particular attraction to counterbalance the ardour of his affection, Lord Mauleverer ordered the horses to his carriage, and attended only by his valet, set out for London.
Nothing, perhaps, could convey a better portrait of the world's spoiled darling than a sight of Lord Mauleverer's thin, fastidious features, peering forth through the closed window of his luxurious travelling-chariot; the rest of the outer man being carefully enveloped in furs, half-a-dozen novels strewing the seat of the carriage, and a lean French dog, exceedingly like its master, sniffing in vain for the fresh air, which, to the imagination of Mauleverer, was peopled with all sorts of asthmas and catarrhs! Mauleverer got out of his carriage at Salisbury, to stretch his limbs, and to amuse himself with a cutlet.
Our n.o.bleman was well known on the roads; and as n.o.body could be more affable, he was equally popular. The officious landlord bustled into the room, to wait himself upon his lords.h.i.+p and to tell all the news of the place.
”Well, Mr. Cheerly,” said Mauleverer, bestowing a penetrating glance on his cutlet, ”the bad times, I see, have not ruined your cook.”
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