Joan Haste - H. Rider Haggard (fiction books to read .TXT) 📗

get it over.” Then he added aloud, “Will you sit down, mother? I

am sorry that I cannot rise to receive you.”

 

“My boy,” she said in a low voice, “I have been thinking a great deal

of the sad scene which took place in connection with your dear

father’s death, and of my subsequent conduct towards you, and I have

come to apologise to you. I do not know the exact circumstances that

led you to act as you have done—I may even say that I scarcely wish

to know them; but on reflection I feel that nothing but the strongest

reasons of considerations of honour would have induced you to refuse

your father’s last request, and that I have therefore no right to

judge you harshly. This came home to me when I saw you leaving the

room yonder a few nights since, and your face showed me what you were

suffering. But at that time my heart was too frozen with grief, and, I

fear, also too much filled with resentment against you to allow me to

speak. If you can tell me anything that will give me a better

understanding of the causes of all this dreadful trouble, I shall be

grateful to you; for then we may perhaps consult together and find

some way out of it. But I repeat that I do not come to force your

confidence. I come, Henry, to express my regret, and to mourn with you

over a husband and a father whom we both loved dearly,”—and, moved by

a sudden impulse of affection, she bent down and kissed her son upon

the forehead.

 

He returned the embrace, and said, “Mother, those are the first kind

words that I have heard for a long while from any member of my family;

and I can assure you that I am grateful for them, and shall not forget

them, for I thought that you had come here to revile me like everybody

else. You say that you do not ask my confidence, but fortunately a man

can speak out to his mother without shame, even when he has cause to

be ashamed of what he must tell her. Now listen, mother: as you know,

I never was a favourite in this house; I dare say through my own

fault, but so it is. From boyhood everybody more or less looked down

upon me, and, with the exception of yourself, I doubt if anybody cared

for me much. Well, I determined to make my own way in the world and to

show you all that there was something in me, and to a certain extent I

succeeded. I worked hard to succeed too; I denied myself in many ways,

and above all I kept myself clear from the vices that most young men

fall into in one shape or another. Then came this dreadful business of

my brother’s death, and just as I was beginning really to get on I was

asked to leave the profession which was everything to me. From the

letters that reached me I gathered that in some mysterious way it lay

in my power, and in mine alone, to pull the family affairs out of the

mire if I returned home. So I retired from the Service and I came,

because I thought that it was my duty, for hitherto I have tried to do

my duty when I could see any way to it. On the first night of my

arrival here I learned the true state of affairs from Ellen, and I

learned also what it was expected that I should do to remedy

it—namely, that I should marry a young lady with whom I had but a

slight acquaintance, but who, as it chances, is the owner of the

mortgages on this estate.”

 

“It was most indiscreet of Ellen to put the matter like that,” said

Lady Graves.

 

“Ellen is frequently indiscreet, mother; but doubtless it never

occurred to her that I should object to doing what she is ready to do

for herself—marry for money. I am glad you see, however, that her

method was not exactly calculated to prepossess any man in favour of a

marriage, of which he did not happen to have thought for himself.

Still the young lady came, and I liked her exceedingly; I liked her

more than any woman that I had met before, the one inexplicable thing

about her to my mind being—why on earth she should wish to marry me,

as I understand is, or was, the case.”

 

“You foolish boy!” said Lady Graves, smiling a little; “do you not

understand that she had become fond of you during that week when you

were here together the year before last?”

 

“I can’t say that I understand it, mother, for I had not much to do

with her. But even if it is so, it does not satisfactorily explain why

her father should be equally anxious for this match. Of course I know

that he has given lots of reasons, but I cannot help thinking that

there is something behind them all. However, that is neither here nor

there.”

 

“I fancy, Henry, that the only thing behind Mr. Levinger’s reasons is

an earnest desire for the happiness of a daughter to whom he is much

attached.”

 

“Well, mother, as I was saying, I took a great fancy to the girl, and

though I did not like at all the idea of making advances to a lady to

whom we are under such obligations, I determined to put my pride in my

pocket, and, if I still continued to admire her after further

acquaintance, to ask her if she would allow me to share her fortune,

for I think that is an accurate way of putting it. So I went off to

stay at Monk’s Lodge, and the chapter of troubles began. The girl who

indirectly was the cause of my accident became my nurse, and it seems

that—she grew attached to me, and—I grew attached to her. It was not

wonderful: you know her; she is very beautiful, she has a good heart,

and in most ways she is a lady. In short, she is a woman who in any

less prejudiced country would certainly be received into society if

she had the means to enter it. Well, so things went on without

anything remarkable happening, until recently.” And he repeated to her

fairly and fully all that had passed between himself and Joan.

 

“Now, mother,” he said, “I have made my confession to you, and perhaps

you will understand how it came about that, fresh from such scenes,

and taken as I was utterly by surprise, I was unable to promise what

my father asked. I do not know what your judgment of my conduct may

be; probably you cannot think of it more harshly than I do myself, and

in excuse of it I can only say that the circumstances were strange,

and, as I have discovered, I love the woman. What, therefore, is my

duty towards her?”

 

“Did you ever promise to marry her, Henry?”

 

“Promise? Yes, I said that I would; for, as you know, I am a bit of a

puritan, although I have little right to that title now, and it seemed

to me that marriage was the only way out of the trouble.”

 

“Does she expect you to marry her, then?”

 

“Certainly not. She declares that she would not allow it on any

consideration. But this goes for nothing, for how can I take advantage

of her inexperience and self-sacrificing folly? You have the whole

facts: what do you think that I should do?”

 

“Henry, I am older than you are; I have seen a great deal of life, and

perhaps you, who are curiously unworldly, may think me the reverse. I

accept your story as it stands, well knowing that you have told me the

exact truth, without hiding anything which would weigh against

yourself; and on the face of that story, I cannot say that I consider

it to be your duty to marry this poor girl, with whom, through your

own weakness and folly, you have placed yourself in such false

relations—though undoubtedly it is your duty to do everything in your

power to provide for her. If you had deliberately set yourself to lead

her astray, the case might be different; only, were you capable of

such conduct—which I know that you are not—you would not now be

tormented by doubts as to your duty towards her. You talk of Joan

Haste’s ‘inexperience.’ Are you sure that this is so? The whole

history of her conduct seems to show experience, and even art, or at

any rate a knowledge, very unusual in a girl of her age and position,

of how best to work upon a man’s tenderness and to move his feelings.

That art may have been unconscious, an art which Nature gave her; and

that knowledge may have been intuitive, for of course all things are

possible, and I can only judge of what is probable. At least it is

clear that she never expected that you would marry her, because she

knew that such an act would bring you to ruin, and I respect her for

her honesty in this particular.”

 

“Should a man shrink from his duty because duty means disaster,

mother?”

 

“Not if it is his duty, perhaps, Henry; but in the present case

that, to say the least of it, is not proved. I will answer your

question by another: Should a man neglect many undoubted duties, among

them that of obeying the dying petition of his father, in order to

indulge his conscience with the sense that he has fulfilled one which

is open to doubt? Henry, I do not wish to push you about this matter,

for I see that, even if you do not love Joan Haste so much as you

think, at the least you are strongly attracted to her; also I see that

your self-questionings are honest, and that you are anxious to do what

is right, independently of the possible consequences to yourself. But

I do pray of you not to be led away, and, if you can avoid it, not to

see this girl again at present. Take time to consider: one month, two,

three, as you like; and in the meanwhile do not commit yourself beyond

redemption. Remember all that is at stake; remember that a man in your

position is not entirely his own master. Of myself I will not speak.

Why should I? I am old, and my day is done; such years as remain to me

I can drag out in obscurity without repining, for my memories are

enough for me, and I have little care left for any earthly advantage.

But of your family I do venture to speak. It has been here so long,

and your father loved this place so well, that it breaks my heart to

think of its going to the hammer—after three centuries,”—and the old

lady turned her head and wiped her eyes furtively, then added: “And it

will go to the hammer—it must. I know Mr. Levinger well; he is a

curious man, and whatever his real reasons may be, his mind is set

upon this marriage. If he is disappointed about it, he will certainly

take his remedy; indeed, he is bound to do so, for the money at stake

is not his, but his daughter’s.”

 

“You tell me to take three months to consider, mother; but, looking at

the matter from the family point of view, how am I to do this? It

seems that we have scarcely a sixpence in the world, and a heavy

accumulation of debt. Where is the money to come from to enable us to

carry