Magnum Bonum

CHAPTER XXVIII. THE TURN OF THE WHEEL.

Is there, for honest poverty, That hangs his head and a' that, The coward slave, we pass him by, A man's a man for a' that. Burns.

Thinking and acting were alike impossible to Caroline for the remainder of the day when her daughter left her, but night brought power of reflection, as she began to look forward to the new day, and its burthen.

Her headache was better, but she let Barbara again go down to breakfast without her, feeling that she could not face her sons at once, and that she needed another study of the document before she could trust herself with the communication. She felt herself too in need of time to pray for right judgment and steadfast purpose, and that the change might so work with her sons that it might be a blessing, not a curse. Could it be for nothing that the finding of Magnum Bonum had wrought the undoing of this wrong? That thought, and the impulse of self-bracing, made her breakfast well on the dainty little meal sent up to her by the Infanta, and look so much refreshed, that the damsel exclaimed-

"You are much better, mother! You will be able to see Jock before he goes-"

"Fetch them all, Babie; I have something to tell you-"

"Writs issued for a domestic parliament," said Allen, presently entering. "To vote for the grant to the Princess Royal on her marriage? Do it handsomely, I say, the Athenian is better than might be expected, and will become prosperity better than adversity."

"Being capable of taking others in besides Janet," said the opposition in the person of Bobus. "He seemed so well satisfied with the Gracious Lady house-mother that I am afraid she has been making him too many promises."

"That was impossible. It was not about Janet that I sent for you, boys. It was to think what we are to do ourselves. You know I always thought there must be another will. Look there!"

She laid it on the table, and the young men stood gazing as if it were a venomous reptile which each hesitated to touch.

"Is it legal, Bobus?" she presently asked.

"It looks-rather so-" he said in an odd, stunned voice.

"Elvira, by all that's lucky!" exclaimed Jock. "Well done, Allen, you are still the Lady Clare!"

"Not till she is of age," said Allen, rather gloomily.

"Pity you didn't marry her at Algiers," said Jock.

"Where did this come from?" said Bobus, who had been examining it intently.

"Out of the old bureau."

"Mother!" cried out Barbara, in a tone of horror, which perhaps was a revelation to Bobus, for he exclaimed-

"You don't mean that Janet had had it, and brought it out to threaten you?"

"Oh, no, no! it was not so dreadful. She found it long ago, but did not think it valid, and only kept it out of sight because she thought it would make me unhappy."

"It is a pity she did not go a step further," observed Bobus. "Why did she produce it now?"

"I found it. Boys, you must know the whole truth, and consider how best to screen your sister. Remember she was very young, and fancied a thing on a common sheet of paper, and shut up in an unfastened table drawer could not be of force, and that she was doing no harm." Then she told of her loss and recovery of what she called some medical memoranda of their father, which she knew Janet wanted, concluding-"It will surely be enough to say I found it in his old bureau."

"That will hardly go down with Wakefield," said Bobus; "but as I see he stands here as trustee for that wretched child, as well as being yours, there is no fear but that he will be conformable. Shall I take it up and show it to him at once, so that if by any happy chance this should turn out waste paper, no one may get on the scent?"

"Your uncle! I was so amazed and stupefied yesterday that I don't know whether I told him, and if I did, I don't think he believed me."

"Here he comes," said Barbara, as the wheels of his dog-cart were heard below the window.

"Ask him to come up. It will be a terrible blow to him. This place has been as much to him as to any of us, if not more."

"Mother, how brave you are!" cried Jock.

"I have known it longer than you have, my dear. Besides, the mere loss is nothing compared with that which led to it. The worst of it is the overthrow of all your prospects, my dear fellow."

"Oh," said Jock, brightly, "it only means that we have something and somebody to work for now;" and he threw his arms round her waist and kissed her.

"Oh! my dear, dear boy, don't! Don't upset me, or your uncle will think it is about this."

"And don't, for Heaven's sake, talk as if it were all up with us," cried Bobus.

By this time the Colonel's ponderous tread was near, and Caroline met him with an apology for giving him the trouble of the ascent, but said that she had wanted to see him in private.

"Is this in private?" asked the Colonel, looking at the five young people.

"Yes. They have a right to know all. Here it is, Robert."

He sat down, deliberately put on his spectacles, took the will, read it once, and groaned, read it twice, and groaned more deeply, and then said-

"My poor dear sister! This is a bad business! a severe reverse! a very severe reverse!"

"He has hit on his catch-word," thought Caroline, and Jock's arm still round her gave a little pressure, as if the thought had occurred to him. The moment of amusement gave a cheerfulness to her voice as she said-

"We have been doing sad injustice all this time; that is the worst of it. For the rest, we shall be no worse off than we were before."

"It will be in Allen's power to make up to you a good deal. That is a fortunate arrangement, but I am afraid it cannot take place till the girl is of age."

"You are all in such haste," said Bobus. "It would take a good deal to make me accept such an informal scrap as this. No doubt one could drive a coach and horses through it."

"That would not lessen the injustice," said his mother.

"Could there not be a compromise?" said Allen.

"That is nonsense," said his uncle. "Either _this_ will stand, or _that_, and I am afraid this is the later. April 18th. Was that the time of that absurd practical joke of yours?"

"Too true," said Allen. "You recollect the old brute said I should remember it."

"Witnesses-? There's Gomez, the servant who was drowned on his way out after his dismissal-Elizabeth Brook-is it-servant. -Who is to find her out?"

"Richards may know."

"It is not our business to hunt up the witnesses. That's the look- out of the other party," said Bobus impatiently.

"You don't suppose I mean to contest it?" said his mother. "It is bad enough to go on as we have been doing these eight years. I only want to know what is right and truth, and if this be a real will."

"Where did it come from?" asked the Colonel, coming to the critical question. "Did you say you found it yourself, Caroline?"

"Yes."

"Where?"

"In the old bureau."

"What! the one that stood in his study? You don't say so! I saw Wakefield turn the whole thing out, and look for any secret drawer before I would take any steps; I could have sworn that not the thickness of that sheet of paper escaped us. I should like, if only out of curiosity, to see where it was."

"Just as I said, mother," said Bobus; "there's no use in trying to blink it to any one who knows the circumstances."

"You do not insinuate that there was any foul play!" said his uncle hotly.

"I don't know what else it can be called," said Caroline, faintly; "but please, Robert, and all the rest, don't expose her. Poor Janet found the thing in the back of the bedside table-drawer, fancied it a mere rough draft, and childlike, put it out of sight in the bureau, where I lighted on it in looking for something else. Surely there is no need to mention her?"

"Not if you do not contest the will," replied the Colonel, who looked thunderstruck; "but if you did, it must all come out to exonerate us, the executors, from shameful carelessness. Well, we shall see what Wakefield says! A severe reverse! a very severe reverse!"

When he found that Bobus meant to go in search of the lawyer that afternoon, he decided on accompanying him. And with a truly amazing burst of intuition, he even suggested carrying off Elvira to spend the day with Essie and Ellie, and even that an invitation might arise to stay all night, or as long as the first suspense lasted. Then muttering to himself, "A severe reverse-a most severe reverse!" he took his leave. Caroline went down stairs with him, as thinking she could the most naturally administer the invitation to Elvira, and the two eldest sons proceeded to make arrangements for the time of meeting and the journey.

"A severe reverse!" said Jock, finding himself alone with the younger ones. "When one has a bitter draught, it is at least a consolation to have labelled it right."

"Shall we be very poor, Jock?" asked Barbara.

"I don't know what we were called before," he said; "but from what I remember, I fancy we had about what I have been using for my private delectation. Just enough for my mother and you to be jolly upon."

"That's all you think of!" said Armine.

"All that a man need think of," said Jock; "as long as mother and Babie are comfortable, we can do for ourselves very well."

"Ourselves!" said Armine, bitterly. "And how about this wretched place that we have neglected shamefully all these years!"

"Armine!" cried Jock, indignantly. "Why, you are talking of mother!"

"Mother says so herself."

"You went on raging about it; and, just like her, she did not defend herself. I am sure she has given away loads of money."

"But see what is wanting! The curate, and the school chapel, and the cottages; and if the school is not enlarged, they will have a school board. And what am I to say to Miss Parsons? I promised to bring mother's answer about the curate this afternoon at latest."

"If she has the sense of a wren, she must know that a cataclysm like Janet's may account for a few trifling omissions."

"That's true," said Babie! "She can't expect it. Do you know, I am rather sorry we are not poorer? I hoped we should have to live in a very small way, and that I should have to work like you-for mother."

"Not like us, for pity's sake, Infanta!" cried Jock. "We have had enough of that. The great use of you is to look after mother; and keep her from galloping the life out of herself, and this chap from worrying it out of her."

"Jock!" cried Armine, indignantly.

"Yes, you will, if you go on moaning about these fads, and making her blame herself for them. I don't say we have all done the right thing with this money, I'm sure I have not, and most likely it serves us right to lose it, but to have mother teased about what, after all, was chiefly owing to her absence, is more than I will stand. The one duty in hand is to make the best of it for her. I shall run down again as soon as I hear how this is likely to turn out-for Sunday, perhaps. Keep up a good heart, Babie Bunting, and whatever you do, don't let him worry mother. Good-bye, Armie! What's the use of being good, if you can't hold up against a thing like this?"

"Jock doesn't know," said Armine, as the door closed. "Fads indeed!"

"Jock didn't mean that," pleaded Babie. "You know he did not; dear, good Jock, he could not!"

"Jock is a good fellow, but he lives a frivolous, self-indulgent life, and has got infected with the spirit and the language," said Armine, "or he would understand that myself or my own loss is the very last thing I am troubled about. No, indeed, I should never think of that! It is the ruin of these poor people and all I meant to have done for them. It is very strange that we should only be allowed to waken to a sense of our opportunities to have them taken away from us!"

No one would have expected Armine, always regarded as the most religious of the family, to be the most dismayed, and neither he nor Barbara could detect how much of the spoilt child lay at the bottom of his regrets; but his little sister's sympathy enabled him to keep from troubling his mother with his lamentations.

Indeed Allen was usually in presence, and nobody ever ventured on what might bore Allen. He was in good spirits, believing that the discovery would put an end to all trifling on Elvira's part, and that he and she would thus together be able to act the beneficent genii of the whole family. Even their mother had a sense of relief. She was very quiet, and moved about softly, like one severely shaken and bruised; but there was a calm in knowing the worst, instead of living in continual vague suspicion.

The Colonel returned with tidings that Mr. Wakefield had no doubt of the validity of the will, though it might be possible to contest it if Elizabeth Brook, the witness, could not be found; but that would involve an investigation as to the manner of the loss, and the discovery. It was, in truth, only a matter of time; and on Monday Mr. Wakefield would come down and begin to take steps. That was the day on which the family were to have gone to London, but Caroline's heart failed her, and she was much relieved when a kind letter arrived from Mrs. Evelyn, who was sure she could not wish to go into society immediately after Janet's affair, and offered to receive Elvira for as long as might be convenient, and herself-as indeed had been already arranged-to present her at court with Sydney. It was a great comfort to place her in such hands during the present crisis, all the more that Ellen was not at all delighted with her company for Essie and Ellie. She rushed home on Saturday evening to secure Delrio, and superintend her packing up, with her head a great deal too full of court dresses and ball dresses, fancy costumes, and Parisian hats, to detect any of the tokens of a coming revolution, even in her own favour.

Jock too came home that same evening, as gay and merry apparently as ever, and after dinner, claimed his mother for a turn in the garden.

"Has Drake written to you, mother?" he asked. "I met him the other day at Mrs. Lucas's, and it seems his soul is expanding. He wants to give up the old house-you know the lease is nearly out-and to hang out in a more fashionable quarter."

"Dear old house!"

"Now, mother, here's my notion. Why should not we hide our diminished heads there? You could keep house while the Monk and I go through the lectures and hospitals, and King's College might not be too far off for Armine."

"You, Jock, my dear."

"You see, it is a raving impossibility for me to stay where I am."

"I am afraid so; but you might exchange into the line."

"There would be no great good in that. I should have stuck to the Guards because there I am, and I have no opinion of fellows changing about for nothing-and because of Evelyn and some capital fellows besides. But I found out long ago that it had been a stupid thing to go in for. When one has mastered the routine, it is awfully monotonous; and one has nothing to do with one's time or one's brains. I have felt many a time that I could keep straight better if I had something tougher to do."

"Tell me, just to satisfy my mind, my dear, you have no debts."

"I don't owe forty pounds in the world, mother; and I shall not owe that, when I can get my tailor to send in his bill. You have given me as jolly an allowance as any man in the corps, and I've always paid my way. I've got no end of things about my rooms, and my horses and cab, but they will turn into money. You see, having done the thing first figure, I should hate to begin in the cheap and nasty style, and I had much rather come home to you, Mother Carey. I'm not too old, you know-not one-and-twenty till August. I shall not come primed like the Monk, but I'll try to grind up to him, if you'll let me, mother."

"Oh, Jock, dear Jock!" she cried, "you little know the strength and life it gives me to have you taking it so like a young hero."

"I tell you I'm sick of drill and parade," said Jock, "and heartily glad of an excuse to turn to something where one can stretch one's wits without being thought a disgrace to humanity. Now, don't you think we might be very jolly together?"

"Oh, to think of being there again! And we can have the dear old furniture and make it like home. It is the first definite notion any one has had. My dear, you have given me something to look forward to. You can't guess what good you have done me! It is just as if you had shown me light at the end of the thicket; ay, and made yourself the good stout staff to lead me through!"

"Mother, that's the best thing that ever was said to me yet; worth ever so much more than all old Barnes's money-bags."

"If the others will approve! But any way it is a nest egg for my own selfish pleasure to carry me through. Why, Jock, to have your name on the old door would be bringing back the golden age!"

Nobody but Jock knew what made this such a cheerful Sunday with his mother. She was even heard making fun, and declaring that no one knew what a relief it would be not to have to take drives when all the roads were beset with traction engines. She had so far helped Armine out of the difficulties his lavish assurances had brought him into, that she had written a note to the Vicar, Mr. Parsons, telling him that she should be better able to reply in a little while; but Armine, knowing that he must not speak, and afraid of betraying the cause of his unhappiness and of the delay, was afraid to stir out of reach of the others lest Miss Parsons should begin an inquiry.

The Vicar of Woodside was, in fact, as some people mischievously called her, the Reverend Petronella Parsons. Whether she wrote her brother's sermons was a disputed question. She certainly did other things in his name which she had better have let alone. He was three or four years her junior, and had always so entirely followed her lead, that he seemed to have no personal identity; but to be only her male complement. That Armine should have set up a lady of this calibre for the first goddess of his fancy was one of the comical chances of life, but she was a fine, handsome, fresh-looking woman of five-and-thirty, with a strong vein of sentiment-ecclesiastical and poetic-just ignorant enough to gush freely, and too genuine to be _always_ offensive. She had been infinitely struck with Armine, had hung a perfect romance of renovation on him, sympathised with his every word, and lavished on him what perhaps was not quite flattery, because she was entirely in earnest, but which was therefore all the worse for him.

Barbara had a natural repulsion from her, and could not understand Armine's being attracted, and for the first time in their lives this was creating a little difference between the brother and sister. Babie had said, in rather an uncalled-for way, that Miss Parsons would draw back when she knew the truth, and Armine had been deeply offended at such an ungenerous hint, and had reduced her to a tearful declaration that she was very sorry she had said anything so uncalled for.

Petronella herself had been much vexed at Armine's three days' defection, which was ascribed to the worldly and anti-ecclesiastical influences of the rest of the family. She wanted her brother to preach a sermon about Lot's wife; but Jemmie, as she called him, had on certain occasions a passive force of his own, and she could not prevail. She regretted it the less when Armine and Babie duly did the work they had undertaken in the Sunday-school, though they would not come in for any intermediate meals.

"What did Mrs. Brownlow tell you in her note?" she asked of her brother while giving him his tea before the last service.

"That in a few days she shall be able to answer me."

"Ah, well! Do you know there is a belief in the parish that something has happened-that a claim is to be set up to the whole property, and that the whole family will be reduced to beggary?"

"I never heard of an estate to which there was not some claimant in obscurity."

"But this comes from undoubted authority." Mr. Parsons smiled a little. "One can't help it if servants _will_ hear things. Well! any way it will be overruled for good to that dear boy-though it would be a cruel stroke on the parish."

It was the twilight of a late spring evening when the congregation streamed out of Church, and Elvira, who had managed hitherto to avoid all intercourse with the River Hollow party, found herself grappled by Lisette without hope of rescue. "My dear, this is a pleasure at last; I have so much to say to you. Can't you give us a day?"

"I am going to town to-morrow," said Elvira, never gracious to any Gould.

"To-morrow! I heard the family had put off their migration."

"I go with Lucas. I am to stay with Mrs, Evelyn, Lord Fordham's mother, you know, who is to present me at the Drawing-room," said Elvira, magnificently.

"Oh! if I could only see you in your court dress it would be memorable," cried Mrs. Gould. "A little longer, my dear, our paths lie together."

"I must get home. My packing-"

"And may I ask what you wear, my dear? Is your dress ordered?"

"O yes, I had it made at Paris. It is white satin, with lilies-a kind of lily one gets in Algiers." And she expatiated on the fashion till Mrs. Gould said-

"Well, my love, I hope you will enjoy yourself at the Honourable Mrs. Evelyn's. What is the address, in case I should have occasion to write?"

"I shall have no time for doing commissions."

"That was not my meaning," was the gentle answer; "only if there be anything you ought to be informed of-"

"They would write to me from home. Why, what do you mean?" asked the girl, her attention gained at last.

"Did it never strike you why you are sent up alone?"

"Only that Mrs. Brownlow is so cut up about Janet."

"Ah! youth is so sweetly unconscious. It is well that there are those who are bound to watch for your interests, my dear."

"I can't think what you mean."

"I will not disturb your happy innocence, my love. It is enough for your uncle and me to be awake, to counteract any machinations. Ah! I see your astonishment! You are so simple, my dear child, and you have been studiously kept in the dark."

"I can't think what you are driving at," said Elvira, impatiently. "Mrs. Brownlow would never let any harm happen to me, nor Allen either. Do let me go."

"One moment, my darling. I must love you through all, and you will know your true friends one day. Are you-let me ask the question out of my deep, almost maternal, solicitude-are you engaged to Mr. Brownlow?"

"Of course I am!"

"Of course, as you say. Most ingenuous! Ah? well, may it not be too late!"

"Don't be so horrid, Lisette! Allen is not half a bad fellow, and frightfully in love with me."

"Exactly, my dear unsuspicious dove. There! I see you are impatient. You will know the truth soon enough. One kiss, for your mother's sake."

But Elvira broke from her, and rejoined Allen.

"I have sounded the child," said Lisette to her husband that evening, "and she is quite in the dark, though the very servants in the house are better informed."

"Better informed than the fact, may be," said Mr. Gould (for a man always scouts a woman's gossip).

"No, indeed. Poor dear child, she is blinded purposely. She never guessed why she was sent to Kencroft while the old Colonel was called in, and they all agreed that the will should be kept back till the wedding with Mr. Allen should be over, and he could make up the rest. So now the child is to be sent to town, and surrounded with Mrs. Brownlow's creatures to prey upon her innocence. But you have no care for your own niece-none!"