Shifting Winds - Robert Michael Ballantyne (poetry books to read TXT) 📗

nay, courted and toadied, because of his title.

My wife was seated opposite to Miss Eve Flouncer, who was one of the strong-minded women. Indeed, I think it is but just to say of her that she was one of the strongest-minded women in the town. In her presence the strength of Mrs Bingley's mind dwindled down to comparative weakness. In form she was swan-like, undulatory, so to speak. Her features were _prononce_; nose, aquiline; eyes, piercing; hair, black as night, and in long ringlets.

Miss Flouncer was, as I have said, an elderly spinster. Sir Richard was an elderly bachelor. Miss Flouncer thought of this, and often sighed. Sir Richard didn't think of it, and never sighed, except when, having finished a good dinner, he felt that he could eat no more. By the way, he also sighed at philanthropic meetings when cases of distress were related, such as sudden bereavement, coupled, perhaps, with sickness and deep poverty. But Sir Richard's sighs were all his contributions to the cause of suffering humanity. Sometimes, indeed, he gave it his blessing, though it would have puzzled the deepest philosopher to have said what that consisted in, but he never gave it his prayers, for this reason, that he never prayed for himself or anybody else. He held that this world was in a sufficiently satisfactory condition, and advised that men should let well alone, and contended that any attempt to interfere with its arrangements in the way of prayer was quite indefensible. He did indeed read his prayers in church on Sundays, in a very loud and distinct voice, to the great annoyance and distraction, not to say irritation, of all who sat within fifty yards of him, but this he regarded as a commendable institution of the country. But to return to Miss Flouncer.

This state of affairs between Sir Richard and herself did not augur much for her prospects; but then she was a very strong-minded woman, and had hopes; whereas Sir Richard was a very weak-minded man, and had no hopes of any kind worth mentioning, being perfectly satisfied--good, easy man--with things as they then stood.

Miss Martha Puff was niece to Miss Flouncer--age apparently sixteen. It struck me, as I sat looking at her placid face, that this young lady was well named. Her pink round visage was puffed up with something so soft that I could scarcely venture to call it fat. Her round soft arms were so puffy to look at, that one could not help fearing that an accidental prick from a pin would burst the skin and let them out. She seemed so like trifle in her pink muslin dress, that I could imagine a puff of wind blowing her away altogether. She could not be said to be puffed up with conceit, poor girl; but she dined almost exclusively on puff paste, to the evident satisfaction of my gallant son Gildart, who paid her marked attention during dinner.

Miss Puff never spoke except when spoken to, never asked for anything, never remarked upon anything, did not seem to care for anything, (puff paste excepted), and never thought of anything, as far as I could judge from the expression of her countenance. Gildart might as well have had a wax doll to entertain.

"To what unfortunate piece of good fortune does your brother refer, Miss Stuart?" asked Sir Richard when Miss Peppy had concluded her observations in regard to it.

"Is it possible that you have not heard of it?" exclaimed Miss Peppy in surprise. "Why, the town has been ringing with it for a fortnight at least, and those odious creatures, the gossips, (who never come near me, however, because they know I will not tolerate them), have got up all sorts of wild stories, showing that the man must have got the money by foul means, though I don't know, I'm sure, why he shouldn't have got a surprise as well as anybody else, for the unaccountable and astonishing way in which things _do_ happen in this world, at least to human beings, for I do not believe that cows or sheep or horses ever experience them; the want of expression on their faces shows that, at all events they never leave their offspring at people's doors, and then go away without--"

"You'd better tell Sir Richard what piece of news you refer to, my dear," interrupted Mr Stuart, somewhat testily.

"Ah yes, I was forgetting--(a little more fowl, Captain Bingley? May I trouble you _again_, Sir Richard? thank you--a leg, if you please, I know that the Captain prefers a leg)--well, as I was saying--let me see, what _was_ I saying?"

"You had only got the length of forgetting, ma'am," observed the baronet.

"Ah, to be sure, I was forgetting to tell you that Mrs Gaff has fallen heir to ten thousand pounds."

Sir Richard exclaimed, with an appearance of what might have been mistaken for surprise on his face, "Indeed!"

Miss Flouncer, to whom the news was also fresh, exclaimed, "You _don't_ say so!" with strong emphasis, and an immensely swan-like undulation of her body.

"Indeed I do," continued Miss Peppy with much animation; "Mrs Gaff, the fisherman's wife, has got a fortune left her amounting to ten thousand pounds, which, at five per something or other, as my brother tells me, yields an annual income of 500 pounds."

"But who left it to her, and how?" asked Sir Richard.

"Ah, who left it, and how?" echoed Miss Flouncer.

"What a jolly thing to be left five hundred a year!" whispered Gildart. "Wouldn't you like some one to leave that to you, Miss Puff?"

"Yes," said Miss Puff.

"Have you any rich East Indian uncle or aunt who is likely to do it?" inquired Gildart with a desperate attempt at jocularity.

"No," answered Miss Puff.

These two words--yes and no--were the utmost extent to which Miss Puff had yet ventured into the dreaded sea of conversation. I could perceive by the fagged expression of his face that the middy was beginning to lose heart.

"Brother," said Miss Peppy, "you had better tell Sir Richard how it happened. I have _such_ a memory--I really don't remember the details. I never _could_ remember details of anything. Indeed I have often wondered why details were sent into this world to worry one so. It _is_ so surprising and unaccountable. Surely we might have got on quite well without them."

"Well, you know," observed Gildart in a burst of reckless humour, "we could not get on very well, Miss Stuart, without some sorts of details. Ox-tails, for instance, are absolutely necessary to the soup which we have just enjoyed so much. So, in like manner, are pig-tails to Chinamen."

"Ay, and coat-tails to puppies," added Kenneth slyly, alluding to a bran new garment which the middy had mounted that day for the first time.

"Perhaps," interposed Miss Flouncer, "after such bright coruscations of wit, Mr Stuart may be allowed to go on with his--"

"Wittles," whispered Gildart in Miss Puff's ear, to the alarm of that young lady, who, being addicted to suppressed laughter, was in horror lest she should have a fit.

"Allowed to go on," repeated Miss Flouncer blandly, "with his tale of this unfortunate piece of good fortune, which I am sure Sir Richard is dying to hear."

"It can hardly be called a tale," said Mr Stuart, "but it is a curious enough circumstance. You remember Stephen Gaff, Sir Richard?"

"Perfectly. He is the man who appeared in the village of Cove rather mysteriously some months ago, is he not?"

"The same," returned Mr Stuart; "and it was he who accompanied Haco Barepoles in my sloop, which he persists in naming the `Coffin,' although its proper name is the `Betsy Jane,' on that memorable voyage when Haco sailed her into port on the larboard tack after she had been cut down to the water's edge on the starboard side. Well, it seems that Gaff went with him on that occasion in consequence of having received a letter from a London lawyer asking him to call, and he would hear something to his advantage.

"You all know the way in which the people were taken out of the sloop by the steamer which ran into her, and how they were all landed safely except Gaff and his son William, who were carried away to sea. You are aware, also, that the steamer has since then returned to England, telling us that Gaff and his boy were put on board a barque bound for Liverpool, and that this vessel has never made its appearance, so that we have reason to believe that it has perished in one of the great storms which occurred about that time.

"Well," continued Mr Stuart, helping Mrs Bingley to a glass of sherry, "not long ago I had occasion to send Haco Barepoles to London, and he bethought him of the lawyer who had written to Gaff, so he called on him and told him of his friend's disappearance. The lawyer then asked if Gaff's wife was alive, and on being informed that she was, he told Haco that Gaff had had a brother in Australia who had been a very successful gold digger, but whose health had broken down owing to the severity of the work, and he had left the diggings and gone to Melbourne, where he died. Before his death this brother made a will, leaving the whole of his fortune to Stephen. The will stated that, in the event of Stephen being dead, or at sea on a long voyage, the money should be handed over unconditionally to his wife. About three weeks ago the lawyer came here to see Mrs Gaff, and make arrangements and inquiries, and in the course of a short time this poor woman will be in possession of ten thousand pounds."

"It will be the ruin of her, I fear," said Sir Richard.

"No doubt of it," observed Miss Flouncer, emphatically.

"It is always the way," said my wife.

"D'ye think it would ruin _you_?" whispered Gildart.

This being an impertinent question, Miss Puff blushed, and made no reply.

"You need not be at all afraid of Mrs Gaff being ruined by prosperity," said Lizzie Gordon, with sudden animation. "I have seen a good deal of her during her recent sorrows, and I am quite sure that she is a good sensible woman."

"What sorrows do you refer to, Miss Gordon?" asked Sir Richard.

"To her husband and son's sudden disappearance, and the death of her brother-in-law John Furby," replied Lizzie. "Uncle, you can tell more about the matter than I can."

"Yes," said I; "it has been my lot to witness a good many cases of distress in my capacity of agent for the Shipwrecked Mariners' Society, and I can answer for it that this has been a very severe one, and the poor woman has borne up against it with Christian fortitude."

"How did it happen? Pray _do_ tell us about it," cried Miss Flouncer, with an undulating smile.

"How does it happen, Miss Flouncer, that you are not already acquainted with these things?"

"Because I have been absent from home for more than two months, and, if I mistake not, Sir Richard's ignorance rests on somewhat similar foundation."

Miss Flouncer smiled and undulated towards the baronet, who, being thus pointedly appealed to, smiled and bowed in return, and begged that I would