The Way We Live Now I
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THE WAY WE LIVE NOW
room, and he had determined to obey the behest. But he would not tell her of his intention, because he had drunk too much wine, and was sulky.
At about three on Sunday he knocked at the door in Grosvenor Square and asked for the ladies. Up to the moment of his knocking, — even after he had knocked, and when the big porter was opening the door, — he intended to ask for Mr. Melmotte; but at the last his courage failed him, and he was shown up into the drawing-room. There he found Madame Melmotte, Marie, Georgiana Longestaffe, and — Lord Nidderdale. Marie looked anxiously into his face, thinking that he had already been with her father. He slid into a chair close to Madame Melmotte, and endeavoured to seem at his ease. Lord Nidderdale continued his flirtation with Miss Longestaffe, — a flirtation which she carried on in a half whisper, wholly indifferent to her hostess or the young lady of the house. “We know what brings you here,” she said.
“I came on purpose to see you.”
“I’m sure, Lord Nidderdale, you didn’t expect to find me here.”
“Lord bless you, I knew all about it, and came on purpose. It’s a great institution; isn’t it?”
“It’s an institution you mean to belong to, — permanently.” “No, indeed. I did have thoughts about it as fellows do when they talk of going into the army or to the bar; but I couldn’t pass. That fellow there is the happy man. I shall go on coming here, because you’re here. I don’t think you’ll
like it a bit, you know.”
“I don’t suppose I shall, Lord Nidderdale.”
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After a while Marie contrived to be alone with her lover near one of the windows for a few seconds. “Papa is downstairs in the book-room,” she said. “Lord Alfred was told when he came that he was out.” It was evident to Sir Felix that everything was prepared for him. “You go down,” she continued, “and ask the man to show you into the book-room.”
“Shall I come up again?”
“No; but leave a note for me here under cover to Madame Didon.” Now Sir Felix was sufficiently at home in the house to know that Madame Didon was Madame Melmotte’s own woman, commonly called Didon by the ladies of the family. “Or send it by post, — under cover to her. That will be better. Go at once, now.” It certainly did seem to Sir Felix that the very nature of the girl was altered. But he went, just shaking hands with Madame Melmotte, and bowing to Miss Longestaffe.
In a few moments he found himself with Mr. Melmotte in the chamber which had been dignified with the name of the book-room. The great financier was accustomed to spend his Sunday afternoons here, generally with the company of Lord Alfred Grendall. It may be supposed that he was meditating on millions, and arranging the prices of money and funds for the New York, Paris, and London Exchanges. But on this occasion he was waked from slumber, which he seemed to have been enjoying with a cigar in his mouth. “How do you do, Sir Felix?” he said. “I suppose you want the ladies.”
“I’ve just been in the drawing-room, but I thought I’d look in on you as I came down.” It immediately occurred to Melmotte that the baronet had come about his share of the plunder out of the railway, and he at once resolved to be
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stern in his manner, and perhaps rude also. He believed that he should thrive best by resenting any interference with him in his capacity as financier. He thought that he had risen high enough to venture on such conduct, and experience had told him that men who were themselves only half-plucked, might easily be cowed by a savage assumption of superiority. And he, too, had generally the advantage of understanding the game, while those with whom he was concerned did not, at any rate, more than half understand it. He could thus trade either on the timidity or on the ignorance of his colleagues. When neither of these sufficed to give him undisputed mastery, then he cultivated the cupidity of his friends. He liked young associates because they were more timid and less greedy than their elders. Lord Nidderdale’s suggestions had soon been put at rest, and Mr. Melmotte anticipated no greater difficulty with Sir Felix. Lord Alfred he had been obliged to buy.
“I’m very glad to see you, and all that,” said Melmotte, assuming a certain exaltation of the eyebrows, which they who had many dealings with him often found to be very disagreeable; “but this is hardly a day for business, Sir Felix, nor, — yet a place for business.”
Sir Felix wished himself at the Beargarden. He certainly had come about business, — business of a particular sort; but Marie had told him that of all days Sunday would be the best, and had also told him that her father was more likely to be in a good humour on Sunday than on any other day. Sir Felix felt that he had not been received with good humour. “I didn’t mean to intrude, Mr. Melmotte,” he said.
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“I dare say not. I only thought I’d tell you. You might have been going to speak about that railway.”
“Oh dear no.”
“Your mother was saying to me down in the country that she hoped you attended to the business. I told her that there was nothing to attend to.”
“My mother doesn’t understand anything at all about it,” said Sir Felix.
“Women never do. Well; — what can I do for you, now that you are here?”
“Mr. Melmotte, I’m come, — I’m come to; — in short, Mr. Melmotte, I want to propose myself as a suitor for your daughter’s hand.”
“The d — — you do!”
“Well, yes; and we hope you’ll give us your consent.” “She knows you’re coming then?”
“Yes; — she knows.”
“And my wife; — does she know?”
“I’ve never spoken to her about it. Perhaps Miss Melmotte has.”
“And how long have you and she understood each other?” “I’ve been attached to her ever since I saw her,” said Sir Felix. “I have indeed. I’ve spoken to her sometimes. You know
how that kind of thing goes on.”
“I’m blessed if I do. I know how it ought to go on. I know that when large sums of money are supposed to be concerned, the young man should speak to the father before he speaks to the girl. He’s a fool if he don’t, if he wants to get the father’s money. So she has given you a promise?”
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“I don’t know about a promise.”
“Do you consider that she’s engaged to you?”
“Not if she’s disposed to get out of it,” said Sir Felix, hoping that he might thus ingratiate himself with the father. “Of course, I should be awfully disappointed.”
“She has consented to your coming to me?”
“Well, yes; — in a sort of a way. Of course she knows that it all depends on you.”
“Not at all. She’s of age. If she chooses to marry you, she can marry you. If that’s all you want, her consent is enough. You’re a baronet, I believe?”
“Oh, yes, I’m a baronet.”
“And therefore you’ve come to your own property. You haven’t to wait for your father to die, and I dare say you are indifferent about money.”
This was a view of things which Sir Felix felt that he was bound to dispel, even at the risk of offending the father. “Not exactly that,” he said. “I suppose you will give your daughter a fortune, of course.”
“Then I wonder you didn’t come to me before you went to her. If my daughter marries to please me, I shall give her money, no doubt. How much is neither here nor there. If she marries to please herself, without considering me, I shan’t give her a farthing.”
“I had hoped that you might consent, Mr. Melmotte.” “I’ve said nothing about that. It is possible. You’re
a man of fashion and have a title of your own, — and no doubt a property. If you’ll show me that you’ve an income
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fit to maintain her, I’ll think about it at any rate. What is your property, Sir Felix?”
What could three or four thousand a year, or even five or six, matter to a man like Melmotte? It was thus that Sir Felix looked at it. When a man can hardly count his millions he ought not to ask questions about trifling sums of money. But the question had been asked, and the asking of such a question was no doubt within the prerogative of a proposed father- in-law. At any rate, it must be answered. For a moment it occurred to Sir Felix that he might conveniently tell the truth. It would be nasty for the moment, but there would be nothing to come after. Were he to do so he could not be dragged down lower and lower into the mire by cross-examinings. There might be an end of all his hopes, but there would at the same time be an end of all his misery. But he lacked the necessary courage. “It isn’t a large property, you know,” he said.
“Not like the Marquis of Westminster’s, I suppose,” said the horrid, big, rich scoundrel.
“No; — not quite like that,” said Sir Felix, with a sickly laugh.
“But you have got enough to support a baronet’s title?” “That depends on how you want to support it,” said Sir Fe-
lix, putting off the evil day. “Where’s your family seat?”
“Carbury Manor, down in Suffolk, near the Longestaffes, is the old family place.”
“That doesn’t belong to you,” said Melmotte, very sharply. “No; not yet. But I’m the heir.”
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Perhaps if there is one thing in England more difficult than another to be understood by men born and bred out of England, it is the system under which titles and property descend together, or in various lines. The jurisdiction of our Courts of Law is complex, and so is the business of Parliament. But the rules regulating them, though anomalous, are easy to the memory compared with the mixed anomalies of the peerage and primogeniture. They who are brought up among it, learn it as children do a language, but strangers who begin the study in advanced life, seldom make themselves perfect in it. It was everything to Melmotte that he should understand the ways of the country which he had adopted; and when he did not understand, he was clever at hiding his ignorance. Now he was puzzled. He knew that Sir Felix was a baronet, and therefore presumed him to be the head of the family. He knew that Carbury Manor belonged to Roger Carbury, and he judged by the name it must be an old family property. And now the baronet declared that he was heir to the man who was simply an Esquire. “Oh, the heir are you? But how did he get it before you? You’re the head of the family?”
“Yes, I am the head of the family, of course,” said Sir Felix, lying directly. “But the place won’t be mine till he dies. It would take a long time to explain it all.”
“He’s a young man, isn’t he?”
“No, — not what you’d call a young man. He isn’t very old.” “If he were to marry and have children, how would it be
then?”
Sir Felix was beginning to think that he might have told the truth with discretion. “I don’t quite know how it would be.
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I have always understood that I am the heir. It’s not very likely that he will marry.”
“And in the meantime what is your own property?”
“My father left me money in the funds and in railway stock, — and then I am my mother’s heir.”
“You have done me the honour of telling me that you wish to marry my daughter.”
“Certainly.”
“Would you then object to inform me the amount and nature of the income on which you intend to support your establishment as a married man? I fancy that the position you assume justifies the question on my part.” The bloated swindler, the vile city ruffian, was certainly taking a most ungenerous advantage of the young aspirant for wealth. It was then that Sir Felix felt his own position. Was he not a baronet, and a gentleman, and a very handsome fellow, and a man of the world who had been in a crack regiment? If this surfeited sponge of speculation, this crammed commercial cormorant, wanted more than that for his daughter, why could he not say so without asking disgusting questions such as these, — questions which it was quite impossible that a gentleman should answer? Was it not sufficiently plain that any gentleman proposing to marry the daughter of such a man as Melmotte, must do so under the stress of pecuniary embarrassment? Would it not be an understood bargain that as he provided the rank and position, she would provide the money? And yet the vulgar wretch took advantage of his assumed authority to ask these dreadful questions! Sir Felix stood silent, trying to look the man in the face, but failing; — wishing that he was well
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out of the house, and at the Beargarden. “You don’t seem to be very clear about your own circumstances, Sir Felix. Perhaps you will get your lawyer to write to me.”
“Perhaps that will be best,” said the lover.
“Either that, or to give it up. My daughter, no doubt, will have money; but money expects money.” At this moment Lord Alfred entered the room. “You’re very late to-day, Alfred. Why didn’t you come as you said you would?”
“I was here more than an hour ago, and they said you were out.”
“I haven’t been out of this room all day, — except to lunch. Good morning, Sir Felix. Ring the bell, Alfred, and we’ll have a little soda and brandy.” Sir Felix had gone through some greeting with his fellow Director, Lord Alfred, and at last succeeded in getting Melmotte to shake hands with him before he went. “Do you know anything about that young fellow?” Melmotte asked as soon as the door was closed.
“He’s a baronet without a shilling; — was in the army and had to leave it,” said Lord Alfred as he buried his face in a big tumbler.
“Without a shilling! I supposed so. But he’s heir to a place down in Suffolk; — eh?”
“Not a bit of it. It’s the same name, and that’s about all. Mr. Carbury has a small property there, and he might give it to me to-morrow. I wish he would, though there isn’t much of it. That young fellow has nothing to do with it whatever.”
“Hasn’t he now?” Mr. Melmotte as he speculated upon it, almost admired the young man’s impudence.
CHAPTER XXIV
MILES GRENDALL’S TRIUMPH
Sir Felix as he walked down to his club felt that he had been checkmated, — and was at the same time full of wrath at the insolence of the man who had so easily beaten him out of the field. As far as he could see, the game was over. No doubt he might marry Marie Melmotte. The father had told him so much himself, and he perfectly believed the truth of that oath which Marie had sworn. He did not doubt but that she’d stick to him close enough. She was in love with him, which was natural; and was a fool, — which was perhaps also natural. But romance was not the game which he was playing. People told him that when girls succeeded in marrying without their parents’ consent, fathers were always constrained to forgive them at last. That might be the case with ordinary fathers. But Melmotte was decidedly not an ordinary father. He was, — so Sir Felix declared to himself, — perhaps the greatest brute ever created. Sir Felix could not but remember that elevation of the eyebrows, and the brazen forehead, and the hard mouth. He had found himself quite unable to stand up against Melmotte, and now he cursed and swore at the man as he was carried down to the Beargarden in a cab.
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