The Palliser Novels (245 page)

And, moreover, it was absolutely necessary that he and Lizzie Eustace should understand each other as to that mutual pledge of truth which had passed between them.

In the meantime he received the following letter from Messrs. Camperdown: —
 

62, New Square, Lincoln’s Inn,
15 September, 18––

Dear Sir
,

After what passed in our chambers the other day, we think it best to let you know that we have been instructed by the executor of the late Sir Florian Eustace to file a bill in Chancery against the widow, Lady Eustace, for the recovery of valuable diamonds. You will oblige us by making the necessary communication to her ladyship, and will perhaps tell us the names of her ladyship’s solicitors.

We are, dear sir,
Your very obedient servants,

Camperdown & Son
.

F. Greystock, Esq., M.P.
 

A few days after the receipt of this letter Frank started for Scotland.

On this occasion Frank Greystock went down to Portray Castle with the intention of staying at the house during the very short time that he would remain in Scotland. He was going there solely on his cousin’s business, — with no view to grouse-shooting or other pleasure, and he purposed remaining but a very short time, — perhaps only one night. His cousin, moreover, had spoken of having guests with her, in which case there could be no tinge of impropriety in his doing so. And whether she had guests, or whether she had not, what difference could it really make? Mr. Andrew Gowran had already seen what there was to see, and could do all the evil that could be done. He could, if he were so minded, spread reports in the neighbourhood, and might, perhaps, have the power of communicating what he had discovered to the Eustace faction, — John Eustace, Mr. Camperdown, and Lord Fawn. That evil, if it were an evil, must be encountered with absolute indifference. So he went direct to the castle, and was received quietly, but very graciously, by his cousin Lizzie.

There were no guests then staying at Portray; but that very distinguished lady, Mrs. Carbuncle, with her niece, Miss Roanoke, had been there; as had also that very well-known nobleman, Lord George de Bruce Carruthers. Lord George and Mrs. Carbuncle were in the habit of seeing a good deal of each other, though, as all the world knew, there was nothing between them but the simplest friendship. And Sir Griffin Tewett had also been there, a young baronet who was supposed to be enamoured of that most gorgeous of beauties, Lucinda Roanoke. Of all these grand friends, — friends with whom Lizzie had become acquainted in London, — nothing further need be said here, as they were not at the castle when Frank arrived. When he came, whether by premeditated plan or by the chance of circumstances, Lizzie had no one with her at Portray, — except the faithful Macnulty.

“I thought to have found you with all the world here,” said Frank, — the faithful Macnulty being then present.

“Well, — we have had people, but only for a couple of days. They are all coming again, but not till November. You hunt; — don’t you, Frank?”

“I have no time for hunting. Why do you ask?”

“I’m going to hunt. It’s a long way to go, — ten or twelve miles generally; but almost everybody hunts here. Mrs. Carbuncle is coming again, and she is about the best lady in England after hounds; — so they tell me. And Lord George is coming again.”

“Who is Lord George?”

“You remember Lord George Carruthers, whom we all knew in London?”

“What, — the tall man with the hollow eyes and the big whiskers, whose life is a mystery to every one? Is he coming?”

“I like him, just because he isn’t a ditto to every man one meets. And Sir Griffin Tewett is coming.”

“Who is a ditto to everybody.”

“Well; — yes; poor Sir Griffin! The truth is, he is awfully smitten with Mrs. Carbuncle’s niece.”

“Don’t you go match-making, Lizzie,” said Frank. “That Sir Griffin is a fool, we will all allow; but it’s my belief he has wit enough to make himself pass off as a man of fortune, with very little to back it. He’s at law with his mother, at law with his sisters, and at law with his younger brother.”

“If he were at law with his great-grandmother, it would be nothing to me, Frank. She has her aunt to take care of her, and Sir Griffin is coming with Lord George.”

“You don’t mean to put up all their horses, Lizzie?”

“Well, not all. Lord George and Sir Griffin are to keep theirs at Troon, or Kilmarnock, or somewhere. The ladies will bring two apiece, and I shall have two of my own.”

“And carriage-horses and hacks?”

“The carriage-horses are here, — of course.”

“It will cost you a great deal of money, Lizzie.”

“That’s just what I tell her,” said Miss Macnulty.

“I’ve been living here, not spending one shilling, for the last two months,” said Lizzie, “and all for the sake of economy; yet people think that no woman was ever left so rich. Surely I can afford to see a few friends for one month in the year. If I find I can’t afford so much as that, I shall let the place, and go and live abroad somewhere. It’s too much to suppose that a woman should shut herself up here for six or eight months and see nobody all the time.”

On that, the day of Frank’s arrival, not a word was said about the necklace, nor of Lord Fawn, nor of that mutual pledge which had been taken and given down among the rocks. Frank, before dinner, went out about the place, that he might see how things were going on, and observe whether the widow was being ill-treated and unfairly eaten up by her dependants. He was, too, a little curious as to a matter as to which his curiosity was soon relieved. He had hardly reached the out-buildings which lay behind the kitchen-gardens on his way to the Portray woods, before he encountered Andy Gowran. That faithful adherent of the family raised his hand to his cap and bobbed his head, and then silently, and with renewed diligence, applied himself to the job which he had in hand. The gate of the little yard in which the cow-shed stood was off its hinges, and Andy was resetting the post and making the fence tight and tidy. Frank stood a moment watching him, and then asked after his health. “‘Deed am I nae that to boost about in the way of bodily heelth, Muster Greystock. I’ve just o’er mony things to tent to, to tent to my ain sell as a prudent mon ought. It’s airly an’ late wi’ me, Muster Greystock; and the lumbagy just a’ o’er a mon isn’t the pleasantest freend in the warld.” Frank said that he was sorry to hear so bad an account of Mr. Gowran’s health, and passed on. It was not for him to refer to the little scene in which Mr. Gowran had behaved so badly and had shaken his head. If the misbehaviour had been condoned by Lady Eustace, the less that he said about it the better. Then he went on through the woods, and was well aware that Mr. Gowran’s fostering care had not been abated by his disapproval of his mistress. The fences had been repaired since Frank was there, and stones had been laid on the road or track over which was to be carried away the under-wood which it would be Lady Eustace’s privilege to cut during the coming winter.

Frank was not alone for one moment with his cousin during that evening, but in the presence of Miss Macnulty all the circumstances of the necklace were discussed. “Of course it is my own,” said Lady Eustace, standing up, — “my own to do just what I please with. If they go on like this with me, they will almost tempt me to sell it for what it will fetch, — just to prove to them that I can do so. I have half a mind to sell it, and then send them the money, and tell them to put it by for my little Flory. Would not that serve them right, Frank?”

“I don’t think I’d do that, Lizzie.”

“Why not? You always tell me what not to do, but you never say what I ought!”

“That is because I am so wise and prudent. If you were to attempt to sell the diamonds they would stop you, and would not give you credit for the generous purpose afterwards.”

“They wouldn’t stop you if you sold the ring you wear.” The ring had been given to him by Lucy after their engagement, and was the only present she had ever made him. It had been purchased out of her own earnings, and had been put on his finger by her own hand. Either from accident or craft he had not worn it when he had been before at Portray, and Lizzie had at once observed it as a thing she had never seen before. She knew well that he would not buy such a ring. Who had given him the ring? Frank almost blushed as he looked down at the trinket, and Lizzie was sure that it had been given by that sly little creeping thing, Lucy. “Let me look at the ring,” she said. “Nobody could stop you if you chose to sell this to me.”

“Little things are always less troublesome than big things,” he said.

“What is the price?” she asked.

“It is not in the market, Lizzie. Nor should your diamonds be there. You must be content to let them take what legal steps they may think fit, and defend your property. After that you can do as you please; but keep them safe till the thing is settled. If I were you I would have them at the bankers.”

“Yes; — and then when I asked for them be told that they couldn’t be given up to me, because of Mr. Camperdown or the Lord Chancellor. And what’s the good of a thing locked up? You wear your ring; — why shouldn’t I wear my necklace?”

“I have nothing to say against it.”

“It isn’t that I care for such things. Do I, Julia?”

“All ladies like them, I suppose,” said that stupidest and most stubborn of all humble friends, Miss Macnulty.

“I don’t like them at all, and you know I don’t. I hate them. They have been the misery of my life. Oh, how they have tormented me! Even when I am asleep I dream about them, and think that people steal them. They have never given me one moment’s happiness. When I have them on I am always fearing that Camperdown and Son are behind me and are going to clutch them. And I think too well of myself to believe that anybody will care more for me because of a necklace. The only good they have ever done me has been to save me from a man who I now know never cared for me. But they are mine; — and therefore I choose to keep them. Though I am only a woman I have an idea of my own rights, and will defend them as far as they go. If you say I ought not to sell them, Frank, I’ll keep them; but I’ll wear them as commonly as you do that gage d’amour which you carry on your finger. Nobody shall ever see me without them. I won’t go to any old dowager’s tea-party without them. Mr. John Eustace has chosen to accuse me of stealing them.”

“I don’t think John Eustace has ever said a word about them,” said Frank.

“Mr. Camperdown, then; — the people who choose to call themselves the guardians and protectors of my boy, as if I were not his best guardian and protector! I’ll show them at any rate that I’m not ashamed of my booty. I don’t see why I should lock them up in a musty old bank. Why don’t you send your ring to the bank?” Frank could not but feel that she did it all very well. In the first place she was very pretty in the display of her half-mock indignation. Though she used some strong words, she used them with an air that carried them off and left no impression that she had been either vulgar or violent. And then, though the indignation was half mock, it was also half real, and her courage and spirit were attractive. Greystock had at last taught himself to think that Mr. Camperdown was not justified in the claim which he made, and that in consequence of that unjust claim Lizzie Eustace had been subjected to ill-usage. “Did you ever see this bone of contention,” she asked; — “this fair Helen for which Greeks and Romans are to fight?”

“I never saw the necklace, if you mean that.”

“I’ll fetch it. You ought to see it, as you have to talk about it so often.”

“Can I get it?” asked Miss Macnulty.

“Heaven and earth! To suppose that I should ever keep them under less than seven keys, and that there should be any of the locks that anybody should be able to open except myself!”

“And where are the seven keys?” asked Frank.

“Next to my heart,” said Lizzie, putting her hand on her left side. “And when I sleep they are always tied round my neck in a bag, and the bag never escapes from my grasp. And I have such a knife under my pillow, ready for Mr. Camperdown should he come to seize them!” Then she ran out of the room, and in a couple of minutes returned with the necklace hanging loose in her hand. It was part of her little play to show by her speed that the close locking of the jewels was a joke, and that the ornament, precious as it was, received at her hands no other treatment than might any indifferent feminine bauble. Nevertheless within those two minutes she had contrived to unlock the heavy iron case which always stood beneath the foot of her bed. “There,” she said, chucking the necklace across the table to Frank, so that he was barely able to catch it. “There is ten thousand pounds’ worth, as they tell me. Perhaps you will not believe me when I say that I should have the greatest satisfaction in the world in throwing them out among those blue waves yonder, did I not think that Camperdown and Son would fish them up again.”

Frank spread the necklace on the table, and stood up to look at it, while Miss Macnulty came and gazed at the jewels over his shoulder. “And that is worth ten thousand pounds,” said he.

“So people say.”

“And your husband gave it you just as another man gives a trinket that costs ten shillings!”

“Just as Lucy Morris gave you that ring.”

He smiled, but took no other notice of the accusation. “I am so poor a man,” said he, “that this string of stones, which you throw about the room like a child’s toy, would be the making of me.”

“Take it and be made,” said Lizzie.

“It seems an awful thing to me to have so much value in my hands,” said Miss Macnulty, who had lifted the necklace off the table. “It would buy an estate; wouldn’t it?”

“It would buy the honourable estate of matrimony if it belonged to many women,” said Lizzie, — “but it hasn’t had just that effect with me; — has it, Frank?”

“You haven’t used it with that view yet.”

“Will you have it, Frank?” she said. “Take it with all its encumbrances and weight of cares. Take it with all the burthen of Messrs. Camperdown’s lawsuits upon it. You shall be as welcome to it as flowers were ever welcomed in May.”