to СНАР. ХІ. A WAR OF WITS. BY MISS PARDOE. "And so this is to be the end of all;" mused Mr. Reginald Lyle, as he sat with the Morning Post in his hand beside the remnants of his breakfast. "Well, I shall be quoted in the newspapers as a pious and worthy man, so alive to the misery of my fellow-beings, that I felt it to be my duty to endow hospitals, enrich ragged schools, found alms-houses, and purchase my place in paradise by bestowing upon the poor and the afflicted what I was no longer able either enjoy, or to carry with me. A notable triumph truly, to be lauded for a posthumous charity which entails no single sacrifice on the giver! Out upon such dilatory munificence, which to my eyes only conveys the miserable impression that the superb benefactor of his species was a being so cut off from the sympathies and affections of his fellows, that he had passed through life uncared for and unloved; that no heart had been linked with his; no fond hand smoothed his pillow; no smile lighted up his path; that he was one who had earned no gratitude, and paid none; but had been a mere floating atom, driven hither and thither, with no congenial resting-place or ultimate purpose. And yet, to have toiled and striven for such as these! To pay at their anticipated price the false endearments, the hollow flatteries, and the feigned respect of a group of mercenary worldlings; truly, the alternative is a pleasant one! I begin now to feel that my whole existence has been one gross mistake. I might have had a home and a family; a wife to cling to me in my old age, and children to reverence my grey hairs. But such regrets are vain. As I have sown, so must I reap. Not one of them, not one, can fill up the void. I could have honoured honest poverty; I could have tolerated even modest wealth; but what have I found to recompense me for a long life of toil and exile? Vapouring self-sufficiency, arrogant prosperity, assumed importance, inane affectation, and insolent defiance. And yet I had hoped better from that boy-and why should I not still hope? He is young and reckless; he has been the scapegoat of his more fortunate relations; he has been rendered desperate by ill-fortune. I will not despair even now. Who knows? I must see him again. There is something highspirited and independent in his resolution to tempt this last struggle with the world. But I will not forego my resolution. I will do all or nothing. I must know more of his actual resources. They tell me that he has no employment, no prospects; and yet he lives on, and wears at least the external appearance of a gentleman. I cannot solve the mystery. Can it be that poor Pen, out of her paltry pittance, enables him thus to drag on a dreary and precarious existence? It must be so; for I have read the lying merchant and the sordid clerk beyond all possibility of doubt, as well as the stately and selfish mother of those two insufferable idiots, my fashionable great-nephews. No, no; he has had no help there. Poor Pen! she has assuredly a claim upon me. She is the only memory left to me of the home of my boyhood; a cold and a cheerless home, it is true, but still the only one that I ever had. I have carried her in my arms as a lad, and pressed my lips to her cheek, and called her sister. She cannot remember this, it was too long ago; but she may have heard of it, and been pained by the churlish recognition of the cynical old man, who refused to renew those close ties of kindred and affection. Well, Brunton will shortly be here, and I must talk to him of this. But this boy, this boy, who amid his presumed poverty has been the only one to assert his independence, and to set me and my money-bags at nought; he troubles me An orphan, and bearing my own name too! Not trailing it in the mire like Percival, but it may be, as anxious as myself to uphold its respectability. Still I must do nothing rashly; he may be as false as the rest, and have simply evinced more tact than they had wit to display. I must be wary for my own sake; at my age the gold so earnestly coveted by others is of comparatively little worth to myself; but I would not lose the lingering hope that there may be at least one example left of lofty high-mindedness in this grasping and greedy world. But this very hope must make me cautious; for were I to be cheated by a stripling, I should cease altogether to have faith in my fellow-creatures. K Human nature is tenacious of wrong; the thorn of treachery having once entered the heart, inflicts a festering wound which never closes; and even while we bring ourselves to forgive the hand that smites us, we despise the will which guides it; and neither faith nor affection can exist with contempt. Our hearts may remain warm, but the warmth is ungenial; and a blighted blossom never produces a healthful fruit." Mr. Lyle closed his eyes, let the paper fall from his hand, and sank into a still deeper reverie. For the first time since his return to England he felt thoroughly disheartened. The change of climate was too violent at his age; it had told painfully upon him, and he was aware of it. The season of procrastination was passing rapidly; he had a heavy duty to fulfil; but still he clung to the caprice by which he had amused so many years of his life; it had become an idiosyncracy too powerful to be resisted; and it mastered him like a vital disease. As he had anticipated, the lawyer was shortly afterwards announced. Mr. Lyle shook his head. "It is a fact, I assure you. Everything has been terminated without a single important difficulty. The cargo of the Firefly' has been sold most advantageously; and I have, according to your instructions, already invested the proceeds. The few bills which I have been compelled to accept are undeniable, and may be turned into money at any moment, with very little sacrifice; and, altogether, I feel the greatest confidence in your approval of every step that I have taken." "You have a right to do so; but we will not examine all those documents at present, so replace them in your pocket for awhile. I have been musing in my solitude, and have no head for business this morning. Besides, I am sick of this eternal routine of pounds, shillings, and pence, which it irritates one's temper to lose, and hardens one's heart to gain." The lawyer glanced up in astonishment. 66 "Aye," pursued his companion, in the same depressedtone; "I see your surprise; but reflect for an instant, and you will cease to wonder at what I say. Can you tell me of one single hour of happiness for which I am indebted to this gold which I have been heaping up for nearly half a century?" "It will afford you many whenever you care to secure them." That is the old story; the fable by which we are all fooled; and I believed it, like the rest, until the period of trial came; but now I tell you, and tell you advisedly, that I do not anticipate any such result in my own case. think that I value the flatteries of Mr. Percival Lyle as tributes to my personal virtues ?" Do you "You owe him more than compliments;" said Brunton with a light laugh. "True, true;" and the eyes of the old merchant twinkled in their turn; "you allude to the Madeira. And it is come, sir; it is safely lodged beneath my roof; sundered for ever from the residue of the "immense stock" in the cellars of Bedford-square. How much per dozen, think you, that I am expected to pay for that choice vintage?" "I rather imagine that he never anticipated its acceptance." "Of course he did not, or he would not have made the offer. Had I believed otherwise, I would rather have drank your Thames water unfiltered than have given house-room to a pint of it; and I would, at this present moment, risk the value of the contents of every bin that he possesses, that he could not repeat the present whole prowere it to secure the reversion of my perty. Brunton, I loathe that man; loathe and despise him. He is knave as well as fool, or I am no true man; and it delights me to take him in his own toils. But we will talk no more of him." "You have not, I suppose, seen anything of your unfortunate nephew Octavius?" "Nothing;" said Mr. Lyle, raising himself in his chair, and fixing an earnest look on his companion; "what have you to tell me? Is he still resolved to leave England?" "So Miss Penelope assures me; and it is really a pity; for, with ail his imprudence, he is a fine young fellow, and worthy of a better fate." starve." "He wears a better coat than I do," said the host, who, with the extraordinary affectation of many wealthy men, appeared to take an inex his servants. plicable pride in appearing less well-dressed than "That fact proves nothing;" replied the lawyer: "he must have made a great effort to appear before you in a becoming manner." "Which means that he is indebted to the long suffering of his tailor for the trimness of his ap parel. I am sorry for him, for the day of reck oning must come." Mr. Brunton moved uneasily upon his chair. "I had half-promised him a stool in my office," he said hesitatingly. "Well?" "Well, Mr. Lyle, I changed my mind, and refused it." "You were afraid to trust him?" "By no means." May I then ask your reason?" "A caprice; a fancy; I thought he should aspire to something better." "And what was the impediment?" Brunton shrugged his shoulders. "Mr. Percival Lyle has an expensive family; his commercial transactions are extensive; his name is not to be lightly risked. In short he declined." The old merchant clenched his hands, and looked fiercely into the fire, but he did not utter a syllable. "Disappointed, though not discouraged;" pursued his companion;-" But I am telling my tale loosely, and must begin with the beginning. The first application made by your nephew was to his bachelor-cousin, Mr. Joseph Lancaster." "And what said he?" "He said, and with great truth, that a prudent man never affixes his name to any document by which his credit may be impaired, or his honour involved." 46 دوو 'Had he then any suspicion of the young man's honesty?" Certainly not; for he followed up his refusal by offering him, as he himself lately informed you, a hundred pounds out of his own hoards, if he would consent to emigrate to Australia in a vessel then about to sail." "So this emigration scheme was really his, then ?"" "It was; nor has he misled you upon a single point, for not only did he engage to provide the promised sum, but he also induced Miss Penelope, to whom the project was especially distasteful, to make a similar promise." Poor Pen!" "All this, however, upon a stated condition." "What condition ?" “That he should sail in the next ship.” And he consented?" Ha; he is then himself of opinion that he has given me offence?" "I believe that such is his impression. But may I venture to ask, Mr. Lyle, whether you really would have met his views in this instance if he had hazarded the request?" 66 'Why not? I could have become one of his sureties myself, and have authorized you to act as the other?" "And will you still do so? "No. I never force a favour upon any man. I wash my hands of the affair." "That is unfortunate; for yesterday the poor boy had a fresh glimmer of hope. The friend of Miss Penelope, Miss Hallingford, the lady with whom she has lived for years, aware that his aunt was powerless to assist him, offered her self as one of his securities, in the event of his being enabled to procure a second." "And you still refused, Brunton ?" "I did." Mr. Lyle fidgetted upon his seat, and appeared about to speak, but he refrained. "Thus you see, my dear sir," continued the pertinacious lawyer, "that unless you put forth a helping hand, he has no alternative but to follow the advice of his two cousins, and to emigrate." 66 I have nothing to do with it." Decidedly not, unless such should be your pleasure. Your nephew has no legal claim on you whatever." "He has no claim upon me, either legal or moral. But enough of this verbal skirmishing. Tell me candidly, for as his relative it behoves me to know this, how is he now supporting himself? Or rather, who is supporting him?” Brunton looked distressed, but he was prompt in his reply. "He employs his evenings in keeping the books of a tradesman in the neighbourhood of his lodging." The hot blood rose to the very brow of the old merchant. "And his days," he asked; "to what does he devote them?" "To the education of the son of my headclerk, who, in return, provides him with a chamber in his house; and in endeavouring to procure some more lucrative employment.' 66 66 So, sir" said Reginald Lyle sternly, we have now lodged him, and it may be partially clothed him; but he cannot live on air. Who feeds him?"" "Trevor does his best, I believe; but I am really ignorant of the details of his existence." |