Now she rose in haste from her chair, and pushed the fortunate dish–cloth, with a very expressive air, into her pretty work–basket, and drew the strings loudly over it.
“What are you going for, Georgie? You need not leave the room, I am sure.”
“Yes, uncle dear, I must. You are so clear and so honest, I know; and most likely I take it from you. But I could not have anything to do with any secret dealings, uncle, even though you wished it, which I am sure you never could. I never could keep a secret, uncle, because I am so shallow. Whenever secrecy is requested, I feel as if there was something dishonest, either done or contemplated. Very foolish of me, I know, but my nature is so childishly open. And of course Mr. Rosedew has a perfect right, and is indeed very wise, to conceal his scheme with respect to his daughter.”
“Georgie, stay in this room, if you please; he is not coming here.”
“But that poor simple Amy will, if he has brought her with him. Well, I will stay here and lecture her, uncle, about her behaviour to you.”
After all this the old man set forth, in some little irritation, to receive his once–loved friend. He entered the black oak parlour in a cold and stately manner, and bowed without a word to John, who had crossed the room to meet him. The parson held out his hand, as a lover and preacher of peace should do; but the offer, ay, and the honour too, not being at all appreciated, he withdrew it with a crimson blush all over his bright clear cheeks, as deep as his daughterʼs would have been.
Then Sir Cradock Nowell, trying to seem quite calm and collected, addressed his visitor thus:
“Sir, I am indebted to you for the honour of this visit. I apologize for receiving you in a room without a fire. Pray take a chair. I have no doubt that your intentions are kind towards me.”
“I thank you,” replied the parson, speaking much faster than usual, and with the frill of his shirt–front rising; “I thank you, Sir Cradock Nowell; but I will not sit down in the house of a gentleman who declines to take my hand. I am here much against my own wishes, and only because I supposed that it was my duty to come. I am here on behalf of your son, a noble but most unfortunate youth, and now in great trouble of mind.”
If he had only said “in great bodily danger,” it might have made a difference.
“Your interest in him is very kind; and I trust that he will be grateful, which he never was to me. He has left his home in defiance of me. I can do nothing for him until he comes back, and is penitent. But surely the question concerns me rather than you, Mr. Rosedew.”
“I am sorry to find,” answered John, quite calmly, “that you think me guilty of impertinent meddling. But even that I would bear, as becomes my age and my profession,” – here he gave Sir Cradock a glance, which was thoroughly understood, because they had been at school together, – ”and more than that I would do, Cradock Nowell, for a man I have loved like you, sir.”
That “sir” came out very oddly. John poked it in, as a retractation for having called him “Cradock Nowell,” and as a salve to his own self–respect, lest he should have been too appealing. And to follow up this view of the subject, he made a bow such as no man makes to one from whom he begs anything. But Sir Cradock Nowell lost altogether the excellence of the bow. The parson had put up his knee in a way which took the old man back to Sherborne. His mind was there playing cob–nut as fifty years since, with John Rosedew. Once more he saw the ruddy, and then pugnacious, John bringing his calf up, and priming his knee, for the cob–nut to lie upon it. This he always used to do, and not care a flip for the whack upon it, instead of using his blue cloth cap, as all the rest of the boys did; because his father and mother were poor, and could only afford him one cap in a year.
And so the grand bow was wasted, as most formalities are: but if John had only known when to stop, it might have been all right after all, in spite of Georgie Corklemore. But urged by the last infirmity (except gout) of noble minds, our parsons never do know the proper time to stop. Excellent men, and admirable, they make us shrink from eternity, by proving themselves the type of it. Mr. Rosedew spoke well and eloquently, as he was sure to do; but it would have been better for his cause if he had simply described the sonʼs distress, and left the rest to the fatherʼs heart. At one time, indeed, poor old Sir Cradock, who was obstinate and misguided, rather than cold and unloving, began to relent, and a fatherly yearning fluttered in his grey–lashed eyes.
But at this critical moment, three little kicks at the door were heard, and the handle rattled briskly; then a shrill little voice came through the keyhole:
“Oh pease let Fore tum in. Pease do, pease do, pease do. Me ‘ost me ummy top. Oh you naughty bad door!”
Then another kick was administered by small but passionate toe–toes. Of course your mother did not send you, innocent bright–haired popples, and with a lie so pat and glib in that pouting pearl–set mouth. Foolish mother, if she did, though it seal Attalic bargain!
Sir Cradock went to the door, and gently ordered the child away. But the interruption had been enough —ibi omnis effusus labor. When he returned and faced John Rosedew the manner of his visage was altered. The child had reminded him of her mother, and that graceful, gushing, loving nature, which tried so hard not to doubt the minister. So he did what a man in the wrong generally does instinctively; he swept back the tide of war into his adversaryʼs country.
“You take a very strong interest, sir, in one whose nearest relations have been compelled to abandon him.”
“I thought that your greatest grievance with him was that he had abandoned you.”
“Excuse me; I cannot split hairs. All I mean is that something has come to my knowledge – not through the proper channel, not from those who ought to have told me – something which makes your advocacy seem a little less disinterested than I might have supposed it to be.”
“Have the kindness to tell me what it is.”
“Oh, perhaps a mere nothing. But it seems a significant rumour.”
“What rumour, if you please?”
“That my – that Cradock Nowell is attached to your daughter, who behaved so ill to me. Of course, it is not true?”
“Perfectly true, every word of it.” And John Rosedew looked at Sir Cradock Nowell as proudly as ever a father looked. Amy, in his opinion, was peeress for any mortal. And perhaps he was not presumptuous.
“Ah!” was the only reply he received: an “ah” drawn out into half an ell.
“Why, I would have told you long ago, the moment that I knew it, but for your great trouble, and your bitterness towards him. You have often wished that a son of yours should marry my daughter Amy. Surely you will not blame him for desiring to do as you wished?”
“No, because he is young and foolish; but I may blame you for encouraging it, now that he is the only one.”
“Do you dare to think that I am in any way influenced by interested motives?”
“I dare to think what I please. No bullying here, John, if you please. We all know how combative you are. And, now you have forced me to it, I will tell you what will be the conviction, ay, and the expression of every one in this county, except those who are afraid of you. ‘Mr. Rosedew has entrapped the future Sir Cradock Nowell, hushed up the crime, and made all snug for his daughter at Nowelhurst Hall.’”
Sir Cradock did not mean half his words, any more than the rest of us do, when hurt; and he was bitterly sorry for them the moment they were uttered. They put an impassable barrier between him and John Rosedew, between him