Arminell, a social romance/Chapter 51
CHAPTER LI
A PATCH OF BLUE SKY.
About the same time that Jingles was situation-hunting, Arminell was engaged in house-hunting. She had made up her mind to take a cottage on the south coast. Mrs. Welsh had, at length, got a cook who did passably. She had fits occasionally and frothed at the mouth; she also kicked out with her legs convulsively on these occasions and kicked over every little table near her, regardless of what was on it—a glass custard-dish, a sugar-bowl, or, indeed, anything smashable. However, between her fits she was a good plain cook, and the fits did not come on every day. When they did, Mrs. Welsh telegraphed to her husband to dine at a restaurant, and she satisfied herself on scraps. Consequently, the inconvenience was not serious, and as cooks are rare as capercailzies, Mrs. Welsh was glad to have one even with the disadvantage of epileptic attacks.
Mr. Welsh placed himself and his time at the service of Arminell. He went with her to Brighton, St. Leonards, Worthing, Littlehampton, Bournemouth; and finally Arminell decided on purchasing a small house at the last-named place—a pretty villa among the pines, with a view of the sea, a garden, a conservatory. The girl had scruples about troubling the journalist so much, but he insisted that his excursions with her gave him pleasure, and he did everything he could for her, and did it in the most cheery, considerate and hearty manner.
Welsh was a shrewd man of business, and he fought hard over the terms before he bought, and keenly scrutinised the title.
Then ensued the furnishing, and in this Arminell did not trust Mr. Welsh. His ambition was to do all his purchases cheaply. He would have ordered her sets for her several rooms in Tottenham Court Road, and gloried in having got them at an extraordinarily low figure. Arminell took Mrs. Welsh with her when making her purchases; not that she placed any value on that lady's taste, but because she was well aware that by so doing she was giving to her hostess the richest treat she could devise. There is, undoubtedly, positive enjoyment in spending money, and next to the pleasure of spending money oneself, is that of accompanying another shopping who spends money. After a day's shopping and the expenditure of a good many pounds, unquestionably one feels morally elevated. And one is conscious of having done meritoriously when one acts as a goad to a companion, urging her to more lavish outlay, spurring her on when her heart fails at the estimation of the cost. How mean you think your friend if she buys material at twopence-three-farthings instead of that which is superior at threepence. How vehemently you impress on her the mistake of purchasing only five-and-a-half yards instead of six. Margin, you urge, should always be given. It is false economy to cut your cloth too close. With what rigidity of spinal marrow do you sit on your tall chair and scorn the woman on your left who asks for cheaper Swiss embroidery at threepence-farthing, when your friend on your right is buying hers at a shilling. With what an approving glow of conscience do you smile when you hear your companion's bill reckoned up as over fifteen pounds; and then you snatch the opportunity to secure a remnant or a piece of tarnished material, with a haughty air, and bid that it be put in with the rest—it will serve for a charity in which you are interested: to wit—but you do not add this—the charity that begins and ends with home.
Next to the enjoyment of shopping with a friend, who is lavish of her money, comes the luxury of discussing the purchases after, of debating whether this stamped velvet was, after all, the right thing, and whether that tapestry silk would not have been better; whether the carpet and the curtains will harmonise, and the paper for the wall accord with both.
It was a disappointment to Mrs. Welsh that Arminell did not have a dado with water-reeds and sunflowers, and storks flying or standing on one leg. "It is the fashion, I assure you," said she, "as you may see in our drawing-room at Shepherd's Bush." But then, it was a shock of surprise and adoring admiration that came on Tryphœna Welsh, when, after having advised jute for curtains and sofa-covers, because so extraordinarily cheap, Arminell had deliberately turned to stamped velvet.
"Dear me!" said Mrs. Welsh to her husband one night, when they were alone, "how you do worship Miss Inglett. Not that I'm jealous. Far be it from me, for I admire her as much as I love her; but I am surprised at it in you—and she related to the nobility. It is inconsistent, Welsh, with your professions, as inconsistent as it would be for Mr. Spurgeon to be found crossing himself in a Roman Catholic chapel."
"My dear Tryphœna," said James Welsh, "I do not deny that the British aristocracy has its good qualities—for one, its want of stuck-upedness. For another, its readiness to adapt itself to circumstances. It is part of their education, and it is not part of ours, and I don't pretend to that which I have not got. They used to make wooden dolls with a peg through their joints, so that they would move their limbs forward and backward, and that was all. Now there is another contrivance introduced, the ball and socket system for the joints, and dolls can now move their legs and arms in all directions, describe circles with them, do more with them than I can with mine. It is the same with the faculties of the aristocracy, there is a flexibility and a pliability in them that shows they are on the ball and socket system, and not upon the peg arrangement. I don't mean to say that there are not to be found elsewhere faculties so variable and adaptable, but it is exceptional elsewhere; among the upper classes the whole educational system is directed towards making the mental joints revolve in their sockets, and getting rid of all woodenness and pegishness. Look at Miss Inglett. She was ready to be just what you wanted—cook, nurse, butler, seamstress—and yet never for a second has ceased to be what she is, a tip-top lady."
"You talk, James, in a different way from what you used to talk."
"I'll tell you what stands in the way with us. Even if we be gifted with faculties on the ball and socket system, we are afraid of using them except as is allowed by fashion, and is supposed to be elegant. We are ever considering whether we shall not lose respect if we employ them in this way, set them at that angle, fold them in such a manner, turn them about in such another. I know once," continued Mr. Welsh, "I had burst my boot over the toe, just before I went for an important interview with an editor. I cut a sorry figure in his presence, because I was considering the hole in my boot, and whether my stocking showed through. I put my foot under the chair as far back as I could, then drew it forward and set the other foot on it. Then I hid it behind my hat, then curled it over in an ungainly fashion, so as to expose only the sole; and all the while I was with the editor, I had no thought for what we were talking about; I could not take my attention from the hole in my boot. And it is the same with us who haven't an all-round and complete culture—we are conscious of burst seams, and splits, and exposures, and are anxious to be screening them, and so are never at our ease."
When Mr. Welsh began to talk, he liked to talk on uninterruptedly. His wife knew this, and humoured him.
"Connected with this subject, Tryphœna, is the way in which the aristocracy manage their trains."
"Their trains, James?"
"Exactly—their trains or skirts. You know how that it is not possible for you to be in a crowd without having your skirts trodden on and ripped out of the gathers. There used to be a contrivance, Tryphœna, I remember you had it once, like a pair of bell-ropes. You put your fingers into rings, and up came your train in a series of loops and folds, on the principle of the Venetian blind. But somehow you were always pulling up your skirt just too late, after it had been be-trampled and be-muddled. Now from what I have observed, the skirts and trains of the aristocracy are imbued with an imparted vitality from their persons, for all the world like the tail of a peacock, which it elevates when it steps about in the dirt. Their skirts shrink and rise of themselves, whenever a rude foot approaches, or they tread where the soil may bespatter."
"Now, really, James—how can human beings lift their tails?"
"My dear, I am speaking figuratively. If you do not understand—remain in ignorance. There is, as the clown says in 'Twelfth Night,' no darkness like ignorance. I suppose you know, my dear, what it is to be pressed upon and trampled on by those just behind you in the social ball? Well, some persons manage so cleverly that they do not get their trains crumpled; and others are in constant alarm and suspicion of everyone who approaches within a pace of theirs."
Welsh lighted a cigar.
"Don't you mistake me and think that I have given up my opinions. Nothing of the sort. I notice the difference between the aristocracy and ourselves, but I do not say that I do not estimate the middle class above theirs. On the contrary, I think our order of the nobility is the most honourable. To us belongs the marquisate."
"James, how can you talk such nonsense?"
"It is a fact, Tryphœna, that the marquis or margrave takes, or rather took, his title from the debatable ground he held. He was the earl who watched the marches against the barbarians; he protected civilization from overthrow. It was because he stood with drawn sword on the confines, armed cap-à-pie, that the counts and viscounts and the barons sat in clover at home and grew fat and wanton. We, Tryphœna, guard the marches, we occupy the debatable ground, and we have to be perpetually on the alert, to make blaze of beacons, blow cow's-horns, and rattle drums at the least approach or signs of approach of barbarism. Of course we are touchy, tenacious of our right, sensitive about our skirts, and must bluster and deal blows to protect them. We hold the banat, the military frontier between culture and savagery, and it is because of us that the noblemen and gentlemen of England can dwell at home at ease. Of course our hands are rough with grip of the lance and sword, and our boots smell of the stable. Heigh-ho!—here comes my Lady Fair—and not looking herself."
He stood up, and threw away his cigar into the grate and then went to the window and threw up the sash. Arminell entered in her bonnet; her face was sad, and her eyes were red as though she had been crying.
"Miss Inglett! I shall kill myself for having lit a cigar," said Welsh, "I am vexed beyond measure. I did not think you were going to favour us with your company. As for Tryphœna, she loves smoke as a salamander loves fire. But—what is the matter? You remind me of a certain river I have read about in Bohn's translation of 'Herodotus.' The river flowed sweet from its source for many miles, but finally a tiny rill of bitterness entered it, and throughout the rest of its course to the sea the waters had lost their freshness."
"Not so, Mr. Welsh," said Arminell with a smile. "At least, I trust not. May I not rather have reached the point to which the tide mounts. It is not bitterness that is in me, but just a smack of the salt of the mighty far-off ocean that runs up the estuary of life, and qualifies sooner or later the water of every soul?"
"What has troubled you? I'm sure something has gone wrong."
"I have been with Thomasine to see your nephew."
"What—Jingles! you should not have done that."
"Thomasine had paid a visit to Mrs. Bankes, the landlady of the house where Mrs. Saltren lodged before she married and departed; and the good woman told the girl something about Mr. Saltren that made me uneasy. So I went to see him."
"You have acted inconsiderately," said James Welsh.
"I do not say that it was a proper and prudent thing to do, and yet, under the circumstances, justifiable, and I have no doubt you will forgive me."
"You must make a full confession before I pronounce the absolution," said the journalist.
"Thomasine goes occasionally to see the good woman of the lodgings and her servant, and she heard so sad an account of your nephew that she communicated it to me."
"What is the matter with him? I have not seen the cock-sparrow for three months, and what is more, I do not want to see him; I can never forgive him for what he has done."
"He knows how you regard him, and that is the reason why he has not been to see you, and told you how he was situated."
"But—what has happened? Has he been run over at crossing? He is fool enough for even that to befall him."
"No, Mr. Welsh; I will tell you all I know, and then you will think more kindly and judge more leniently of Mr. Saltren. The landlady spoke to Thomasine because she was uneasy about him, and she is a good-hearted creature. It seems that when Mrs. Saltren married, Mr. Saltren was left without any means whatever."
"He had plenty of money. He sold Chillacot."
"He made over the whole proceeds to his mother. She has not left him a penny of it. From what I learn, she has given it to Captain Tubb to invest for her in a water-wheel and a pump."
"Marianne is fool enough for anything—except to speak the truth. What next?"
"After she had departed as Mrs. Tubb, your nephew was left absolutely without resources. He did everything that lay in his power to obtain a situation, first in one capacity, then in another. He even—he even"—Arminell's voice quivered—"he even offered himself as a shop assistant and was rejected. Disappointments, repeated day by day and week by week, told on his spirits and on his health. As he was without means, he frankly informed his hostess about his circumstances, and asked for leave to occupy an attic bedroom, promising to pay her directly he got employment. She did not like to turn him out, and I daresay she thought she would get her rent in the end from Mrs. Tubb, so she consented. But he has been living for many weeks on nothing but bread and a little thin tea without milk. He has sold his books and everything he could part with, and is now reduced to dire distress. He goes out every day in the desperate endeavour to find work, but his superior education, and his gentlemanly feelings stand in his way. Now his health is failing, he looks too delicate for work, and no one will have him on that account. He does not complain. He goes on trying, but his daily disappointments have broken his spirit. It does seem a hopeless venture for a man of good education and exceptional abilities to find work in London."
"Sans interest," added Welsh. "Of old, interest was in the hands of the upper classes. Now it is in the hands of the lower."
"I heard a good deal of this from Thomasine," continued Arminell. "I could not bear it. I ran off to Bloomsbury to see Mrs. Bankes, and found her to be a very kind, feeling, and willing woman. She told me everything—how underfed Mr. Saltren was, how thin and shabby his clothes had become, what a bad cough he had got, and how long it was since she had been paid for her lodging."
"I made sure Mrs. Bankes would not omit to mention that."
"She is a most considerate woman. She said she had done him an egg of late, every morning, and charged him nothing for it, though eggs are at nine for a shilling, and he had had sixteen in all; so that she was, as she said, beside the cost of his lodging, nearly two shillings to the bad through these eggs—but she is a good honest soul, she told me he had worn out the soles of his boots and could not afford a new pair, and they let in the wet." Arminell stopped, she was choking.
Presently she went on, "Whilst we were talking, he came in at the house door, and I heard him cough; and then he went upstairs, with his hand on the bannisters, dragging his tired feet and his springless weight up the steep steps. He halted at each landing; he was weary and his breath failed. I listened till he had reached the very top of the house, and gone into his little attic-room where he sleeps, and reads, and eats, and dreams over his disappointments."
She stopped. She had clasped her hands on her lap, and was twisting, plaiting, and pulling her fingers.
"Then you came away to tell me," said Mr. Welsh.
"No, I did not."
"What next?"
"My heart was full. I went out into the lobby and stood there, and I began to cry. And then, all at once, I ran upstairs."
"What—to his room?"
"Yes—I went after him, I could not help it. He was so utterly lonely and so unhappy. Mrs. Bankes said that no one ever came to see him, he had no friends. It is dreadful to think of being alone in London for months without any one to speak to, that is, any one who feels for you, and knows about persons and things and places you have loved. I ran upstairs after him, and tapped at his door, and dashed right in on him."
The colour rose and fell on her cheek.
"I should have been happy for the occasion to have a talk with him, only the circumstances were so sad. My heart came into my throat when I saw him, and I held out my hand to him—no, in honour bright—I held out both hands to him. He was surprised. I sat down there and made him tell me everything. He did not complain, he was very brave, but he had lost hope, and he plodded on as in a treadmill, trying for work because it was a duty to seek it, not because he was sanguine of getting it. I do not know how long I was there; I insisted on having tea with him, and quite a nice little tea we had, and a chop—no, two chops with it. I ordered them, and I would have them, and, of course, Mrs. Bankes brought up Worcester sauce as well. Who ever knew a lodging-house without Worcester sauce? I am obstinate when I take an idea into my head. You know that. He was quite happy, I do believe, happier than he has been for months, sitting there with me, taking tea, and milk in the tea, and talking about old times, and Orleigh—dear Orleigh!—and my brother Giles and papa." Her heart was beating fast, so fast that it stopped her flow of words.
Mr. Welsh said nothing, nor did Mrs. Welsh, who looked at her husband questioningly, and then at Arminell.
"Once or twice I made him laugh, and the colour came again into his white face, and the brightness into his dull eyes. But when he laughed it brought on a fit of coughing."
"Why did not the fellow come to me?" asked Welsh. "I have no patience with his pride—it was nothing but pride which kept him away."
"Self-respect, perhaps, and resolve to make a way for himself if possible. You had discouraged him from attempting literature, and he had lost all faith in politics. Besides, he kept away from this house because I was in it, and he felt he had no right to come here whilst I lived with you."
She began again to plait her fingers, and looked down at them with a little confusion in her face. Presently she looked at the miniature of the marine officer, Mrs. Welsh's father, and said, with a laugh, "Do you know, Mr. Welsh, that Mrs. Saltren imposed on the landlady, and made her believe that she was going to marry an Admiral of the Blue. When Mrs. Bankes found out the truth, Mrs. Saltren, I mean Mrs. Tubb, said she had heard men-of-war so constantly spoken of as tubs, and nothing but tubs, and as her husband was a Tubb, she considered she had a right to speak of him as a naval officer. It is a shame to tell the story, but——"
"It is too good not to be told. Marianne all over."
"And, Mr. Welsh, there was a doctor lodging on the first floor at Mrs. Bankes', and he happened to see your nephew on the stairs, and hear him cough, so he made him step into his room and he examined his chest."
"What did he say?"
"That there was constitutional delicacy, and that unless he went for a couple of winters to the south of Europe, and after that wintered at Penzance, Torquay, or Bournemouth, he would be a dead man. But, if he took proper care of himself and lived well, drank cod-liver oil and old port, kept out of east winds and from getting wet, he might yet make old bones."
"That is out of the question," said Welsh; "he shall have De Jongh's cod-liver oil, and inhale carbolic acid, and wear Dr. Jaeger's all-wool—to go to the south of Europe is impracticable."
"Not at all."
"My dear Miss Inglett, not another word. I will do all I can for the rascal. But I cannot afford that."
"But I can."
"I won't allow it. I am very sorry for the boy, and will do my duty by him as his uncle; but I can't send him to the Riviera."
"But it is settled that he is going."
"How? When?"
"Directly, and with me."
"Nonsense, Miss Inglett."
"And I have a house at Bournemouth."
"That is true; but——"
"But I am going to marry him, so as to be able to nurse him and carry him off to Bordighera, and give him De Jongh's cod-liver oil myself."
"Miss Inglett, in reason!"
"It is settled. I settled it. I have paid Mrs. Bankes for the eggs and all the rest. When we are off together we can talk at our leisure about Orleigh."