Part 10 (1/2)
I am not writing a novel.
The next morning, about ten o'clock, I arose and went down to breakfast. As I sat at the littered table which every one else had left, dreading to attack my cold coffee and toast, I caught sight of the morning papers, and received some little consolation from them. There was the Argus with its three columns and a half of ”Important from South America,” while none of the other papers had a square of any intelligibility excepting what they had copied from the Argus the day before. I felt a grim smile creeping over my face as I observed this signal triumph of our paper, and ventured to take a sip of the black broth as I glanced down my own article to see if there were any glaring misprints in it. Before I took the second sip, however, a loud peal at the door-bell announced a stranger, and, immediately after, a note was brought in for me which I knew was in Julia's handwriting.
”DEAR GEORGE:--Don't be angry; it was not my fault, really it was not. Grandfather came home just as I was leaving last night, and was so angry, and said I should not go to the party, and I had to sit with him all the evening. Do write to me or let me see you; do something--”
What a load that note took off my mind! And yet, what must the poor girl have suffered! Could the old man suspect? Singleton was true to me as steel, I knew. He could not have whispered,--nor Barry; but that Jane, Barry's wife. O woman! woman! what newsmongers they are! Here were Julia and I, made miserable for life, perhaps, merely that Jane Barry might have a good story to tell. What right had Barry to a wife? Not four years out of college, and hardly settled in his parish. To think that I had been fool enough to trust even him with the particulars of my all-important secret! But here I was again interrupted, coffee-cup still full, toast still untasted, by another missive.
”Tuesday morning.
”SIR:--I wish to see you this morning. Will you call upon me, or appoint a time and place where I may meet you?
”Yours, JEDEDIAH WENTWORTH.”
”Send word by the bearer.”
”Tell Mr. Wentworth I will call at his house at eleven o'clock.”
The cat was certainly out; Mrs. Barry had told, or some one else had, who I did not know and hardly cared. The scene was to come now, and I was almost glad of it. Poor Julia! what a time she must have had with the old bear!
At eleven o'clock I was ushered into Mr. Wentworth's sitting-room. Julia was there, but before I had even spoken to her the old gentleman came bustling across the room, with his ”Mr. Hackmatack, I suppose”; and then followed a formal introduction between me and her, which both of us bore with the most praiseworthy fort.i.tude and composure, neither evincing, even by a glance, that we had ever seen or heard of each other before. Here was another weight off my mind and Julia's. I had wronged poor Mrs. Barry. The secret was not out--what could he want? It very soon appeared.
After a minute's discussion of the weather, the snow, and the thermometer, the old gentleman drew up his chair to mine, with ”I think, sir, you are connected with the Argus office?”
”Yes, sir; I am its South American editor.”
”Yes!” roared the old man, in a sudden rage. ”Sir, I wish South America was sunk in the depths of the sea!”
”I am sure I do, sir,” replied I, glancing at Julia, who did not, however, understand me. I had not fully pa.s.sed out of my last night's distress.
My sympathizing zeal soothed the old gentleman a little, and he said more coolly, in an undertone: ”Well, sir, you are well informed, no doubt; tell me, in strict secrecy, sir, between you and me, do you--do you place full credit--entire confidence in the intelligence in this morning's paper?”
”Excuse me, sir; what paper do you allude to? Ah! the Argus, I see.
Certainly, sir; I have not the least doubt that it is perfectly correct.”
”No doubt, sir! Do you mean to insult me?--Julia, I told you so; he says there is no doubt it is true. Tell me again there is some mistake, will you?” The poor girl had been trying to soothe him with the constant remark of uninformed people, that the newspapers are always in the wrong. He turned from her, and rose from his chair in a positive rage.
She was half crying. I never saw her more distressed. What did all this mean? Were one, two, or all of us crazy?
It soon appeared. After pacing the length of the room once or twice, Wentworth came up to me again, and, attempting to appear cool, said between his closed lips: ”Do you say you have no doubt that Rio Janeiro is strictly blockaded?”
”Not the slightest in the world,” said I, trying to seem unconcerned.
”Not the slightest, sir? What are you so impudent and cool about it for?
Do you think you are talking of the opening of a rose-bud or the death of a mosquito? Have you no sympathy with the sufferings of a fellow-creature? Why, sir!” and the old man's teeth chattered as he spoke, ”I have five cargoes of flour on their way to Rio, and their captains will--d.a.m.n it, sir, I shall lose the whole venture.”
The secret was out. The old fool had been sending flour to Rio, knowing as little of the state of affairs there as a child.
”And do you really mean, sir,” continued the old man, ”that there is an embargo in force in Monte Video?”