Part 35 (2/2)
”Are you to hear again from Mr Slow?” he said.
”I am to go to him this day week.”
”And then it will be decided?”
”John, it is decided now; I am sure of it. I feel that it is all gone. A careful man like that would never have spoken as he did, unless he was sure. It will be all yours, John.”
”So would have been that which your brother had,” said he.
”I suppose so. It is dreadful to think of; very dreadful. I can only promise that I will spend nothing till it is decided. John, I wish you would take from me what I have, lest it should go.” And she absolutely had her hand upon her purse in her pocket.
”No,” said he slowly, ”no; you need think of nothing of that sort.”
”But what am I to do? Where am I to go while this week pa.s.ses by?”
”You will stay where you are, of course.”
”Oh John! if you could understand! How am I to look my aunt in the face. Don't you know that she would not wish to have me there at all if I was a poor creature without anything?” The poor creature did not know herself how terribly heavy was the accusation she was bringing against her aunt. ”And what will she say when she knows that the money I have spent has never really been my own?”
Then he counselled her to say nothing about it to her aunt till after her next visit to Mr Slow's and made her understand that he, himself, would not mention the subject at the Cedars till the week was pa.s.sed.
He should go, he said, to his own lawyer, and tell him the whole story as far as he knew it. It was not that he in the least doubted Mr Slow's honesty or judgment, but it would be better that the two should act together. Then when the week was over, he and Margaret would once more go to Lincoln's Inn Fields.
”What a week I shall have!” said she.
”It will be a nervous time for us both,” he answered.
”And what must I do after that?” This question she asked, not in the least as desirous of obtaining from him any a.s.surance of a.s.sistance, but in the agony of her spirit, and in sheer dismay as to her prospects.
”We must hope for the best,” he said. ”G.o.d tempers the wind to the shorn lamb.” He had often thought of the way in which he had been shorn, but he did not, at this moment, remember that the shearing had never been so tempered as to be acceptable to his own feelings.
”And in G.o.d only can I trust,” she answered. As she said this, her mind went away to Littlebath, and the Stumfoldians, and Mr Maguire.
Was there not great mercy in the fact, that this ruin had not found her married to that unfortunate clergyman? And what would they all say at Littlebath when they heard the story? How would Mrs Stumfold exult over the downfall of the woman who had rebelled against her!
how would the nose of the coachmaker's wife rise in the air! and how would Mr Maguire rejoice that this great calamity had not fallen upon him! Margaret Mackenzie's heart and spirit had been sullied by no mean feeling with reference to her own wealth. It had never puffed her up with exultation. But she calculated on the meanness of others, as though it was a matter of course, not, indeed, knowing that it was meanness, or blaming them in any way for that which she attributed to them. Four gentlemen had wished to marry her during the past year. It never occurred to her now, that any one of these four would on that account hold out a hand to help her. In losing her money she would have lost all that was desirable in their eyes, and this seemed to her to be natural.
They were still walking round Lincoln's Inn Fields. ”John,” she exclaimed suddenly, ”I must go to them in Gower Street.”
”What, now, to-day?”
”Yes, now, immediately. You need not mind me; I can get back to Twickenham by myself. I know the trains.”
”If I were you, Margaret, I would not go till all this is decided.”
”It is decided, John; I know it is. And how can I leave them in such a condition, spending money which they will never get? They must know it some time, and the sooner the better. Mr Rubb must know it too. He must understand that he is more than ever bound to provide them with an income out of the business.”
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