"Though it be songe of old and yonge, That I sholde be to blame, Theyrs be the charge, that spoke so large In hurtynge of my name."--The Not-browne Mayde.
It was just after the Lords had thrown out the Reform Bill:
that explains how Mr. Cadwallader came to be walking on the slope of the lawn near the great conservatory at Freshitt Hall, holding the "Times" in his hands behind him, while he talked with a trout-fisher's dispassionateness about the prospects of the country to Sir James Chettam. Mrs. Cadwallader, the Dowager Lady Chettam, and Celia were sometimes seated on garden-chairs, sometimes walking to meet little Arthur, who was being drawn in his chariot, and, as became the infantine Bouddha, was sheltered by his sacred umbrella with handsome silken fringe.
The ladies also talked politics, though more fitfully.
Mrs. Cadwallader was strong on the intended creation of peers:
she had it for certain from her cousin that Truberry had gone over to the other side entirely at the instigation of his wife, who had scented peerages in the air from the very first introduction of the Reform question, and would sign her soul away to take precedence of her younger sister, who had married a baronet. Lady Chettam thought that such conduct was very reprehensible, and remembered that Mrs. Truberry's mother was a Miss Walsingham of Melspring.
Celia confessed it was nicer to be "Lady" than "Mrs.," and that Dodo never minded about precedence if she could have her own way.
Mrs. Cadwallader held that it was a poor satisfaction to take precedence when everybody about you knew that you had not a drop of good blood in your veins; and Celia again, stopping to look at Arthur, said, "It would be very nice, though, if he were a Viscount--and his lordship's little tooth coming through! He might have been, if James had been an Earl.""My dear Celia," said the Dowager, "James's title is worth far more than any new earldom. I never wished his father to be anything else than Sir James.""Oh, I only meant about Arthur's little tooth," said Celia, comfortably. "But see, here is my uncle coming."She tripped off to meet her uncle, while Sir James and Mr. Cadwallader came forward to make one group with the ladies. Celia had slipped her arm through her uncle's, and he patted her hand with a rather melancholy "Well, my dear!" As they approached, it was evident that Mr. Brooke was looking dejected, but this was fully accounted for by the state of politics; and as he was shaking hands all round without more greeting than a "Well, you're all here, you know,"the Rector said, laughingly--
"Don't take the throwing out of the Bill so much to heart, Brooke;you've got all the riff-raff of the country on your side.""The Bill, eh? ah!" said Mr. Brooke, with a mild distractedness of manner. "Thrown out, you know, eh? The Lords are going too far, though. They'll have to pull up. Sad news, you know.
I mean, here at home--sad news. But you must not blame me, Chettam.""What is the matter?" said Sir James. "Not another gamekeeper shot, I hope? It's what I should expect, when a fellow like Trapping Bass is let off so easily.""Gamekeeper? No. Let us go in; I can tell you all in the house, you know," said Mr. Brooke, nodding at the Cadwalladers, to show that he included them in his confidence. "As to poachers like Trapping Bass, you know, Chettam," he continued, as they were entering, "when you are a magistrate, you'll not find it so easy to commit.
Severity is all very well, but it's a great deal easier when you've got somebody to do it for you. You have a soft place in your heart yourself, you know--you're not a Draco, a Jeffreys, that sort of thing."Mr. Brooke was evidently in a state of nervous perturbation.
When he had something painful to tell, it was usually his way to introduce it among a number of disjointed particulars, as if it were a medicine that would get a milder flavor by mixing He continued his chat with Sir James about the poachers until they were all seated, and Mrs. Cadwallader, impatient of this drivelling, said--"I'm dying to know the sad news. The gamekeeper is not shot:
that is settled. What is it, then?"
"Well, it's a very trying thing, you know," said Mr. Brooke.
"I'm glad you and the Rector are here; it's a family matter--but you will help us all to bear it, Cadwallader. I've got to break it to you, my dear." Here Mr. Brooke looked at Celia--"You've no notion what it is, you know. And, Chettam, it will annoy you uncommonly--but, you see, you have not been able to hinder it, any more than I have. There's something singular in things:
they come round, you know."
"It must be about Dodo," said Celia, who had been used to think of her sister as the dangerous part of the family machinery.
She had seated herself on a low stool against her husband's knee.
"For God's sake let us hear what it is!" said Sir James.
"Well, you know, Chettam, I couldn't help Casaubon's will:
it was a sort of will to make things worse.""Exactly," said Sir James, hastily. "But WHAT is worse?""Dorothea is going to be married again, you know," said Mr. Brooke, nodding towards Celia, who immediately looked up at her husband with a frightened glance, and put her hand on his knee. Sir James was almost white with anger, but he did not speak.
"Merciful heaven!" said Mrs. Cadwallader. "Not to YOUNG Ladislaw?"Mr. Brooke nodded, saying, "Yes; to Ladislaw," and then fell into a prudential silence.
"You see, Humphrey!" said Mrs. Cadwallader, waving her arm towards her husband. "Another time you will admit that I have some foresight;or rather you will contradict me and be just as blind as ever.
YOU supposed that the young gentleman was gone out of the country.""So he might be, and yet come back," said the Rector, quietly"When did you learn this?" said Sir James, not liking to hear any one else speak, though finding it difficult to speak himself.
"Yesterday," said Mr. Brooke, meekly. "I went to Lowick.