"I am afraid," said Agnes, unfolding a letter that she had received in the morning, "that things go far from satisfactorily at Cadover."The three were alone at supper. It was the June of Rickie's second year at Sawston.
"Indeed?" said Herbert, who took a friendly interest. "In what way?
"Do you remember us talking of Stephen--Stephen Wonham, who by an odd coincidence--""Yes. Who wrote last year to that miserable failure Varden. Ido."
"It is about him."
"I did not like the tone of his letter."
Agnes had made her first move. She waited for her husband to reply to it. But he, though full of a painful curiosity, would not speak. She moved again.
"I don't think, Herbert, that Aunt Emily, much as I like her, is the kind of person to bring a young man up. At all events the results have been disastrous this time.""What has happened?"
"A tangle of things." She lowered her voice. "Drink.""Dear! Really! Was Mrs. Failing fond of him?""She used to be. She let him live at Cadover ever since he was a little boy. Naturally that cannot continue."Rickie never spoke.
"And now he has taken to be violent and rude," she went on.
"In short, a beggar on horseback. Who is he? Has he got relatives?""She has always been both father and mother to him. Now it must all come to an end. I blame her--and she blames herself--for not being severe enough. He has grown up without fixed principles. He has always followed his inclinations, and one knows the result of that"Herbert assented. "To me Mrs. Failing's course is perfectly plain. She has a certain responsibility. She must pay the youth's passage to one of the colonies, start him handsomely in some business, and then break off all communications.""How funny! It is exactly what she is going to do.""I shall then consider that she has behaved in a thoroughly honourable manner." He held out his plate for gooseberries. "His letter to Varden was neither helpful nor sympathetic, and, if written at all, it ought to have been both. I am not in the least surprised to learn that he has turned out badly. When you write next, would you tell her how sorry I am?""Indeed I will. Two years ago, when she was already a little anxious, she did so wish you could undertake him.
"I could not alter a grown man." But in his heart he thought he could, and smiled at his sister amiably. "Terrible, isn't it?" he remarked to Rickie. Rickie, who was trying not to mind anything, assented. And an onlooker would have supposed them a dispassionate trio, who were sorry both for Mrs. Failing and for the beggar who would bestride her horses' backs no longer. A new topic was introduced by the arrival of the evening post Herbert took up all the letters, as he often did.
"Jackson?" he exclaimed. "What does the fellow want?" He read, and his tone was mollified, "'Dear Mr. Pembroke,--Could you, Mrs.
Elliot, and Mr. Elliot come to supper with us on Saturday next? Ishould not merely be pleased, I should be grateful. My wife is writing formally to Mrs. Elliot'--(Here, Agnes, take your letter),--but I venture to write as well, and to add my more uncouth entreaties.'--An olive-branch. It is time! But (ridiculous person!) does he think that we can leave the House deserted and all go out pleasuring in term time?--Rickie, a letter for you.""Mine's the formal invitation," said Agnes. "How very odd! Mr. Ansell will be there. Surely we asked him here! Did you know he knew the Jacksons?""This makes refusal very difficult," said Herbert, who was anxious to accept. "At all events, Rickie ought to go.""I do not want to go," said Rickie, slowly opening his own letter. "As Agnes says, Ansell has refused to come to us. Icannot put myself out for him."
"Who's yours from?" she demanded.
"Mrs. Silt," replied Herbert, who had seen the handwriting.
"I trust she does not want to pay us a visit this term, with the examinations impending and all the machinery at full pressure.
Though, Rickie, you will have to accept the Jacksons' invitation."
"I cannot possibly go. I have been too rude; with Widdrington we always meet here. I'll stop with the boys--" His voice caught suddenly. He had opened Mrs. Silt's letter.
"The Silts are not ill, I hope?"
"No. But, I say,"--he looked at his wife,--"I do think this is going too far. Really, Agnes.""What has happened?"
"It is going too far," he repeated. He was nerving himself for another battle. "I cannot stand this sort of thing. There are limits."He laid the letter down. It was Herbert who picked it up, and read: "Aunt Emily has just written to us. We are so glad that her troubles are over, in spite of the expense. It never does to live apart from one's own relatives so much as she has done up to now.
He goes next Saturday to Canada. What you told her about him just turned the scale. She has asked us--""No, it's too much," he interrupted. "What I told her--told her about him--no, I will have it out at last. Agnes!""Yes?" said his wife, raising her eyes from Mrs. Jackson's formal invitation.
"It's you--it's you. I never mentioned him to her. Why, I've never seen her or written to her since. I accuse you."Then Herbert overbore him, and he collapsed. He was asked what he meant. Why was he so excited? Of what did he accuse his wife.
Each time he spoke more feebly, and before long the brother and sister were laughing at him. He felt bewildered, like a boy who knows that he is right but cannot put his case correctly. He repeated, "I've never mentioned him to her. It's a libel. Never in my life." And they cried, "My dear Rickie, what an absurd fuss!" Then his brain cleared. His eye fell on the letter that his wife had received from his aunt, and he reopened the battle.
"Agnes, give me that letter, if you please."
"Mrs. Jackson's?"
"My aunt's."
She put her hand on it, and looked at him doubtfully. She saw that she had failed to bully him.
"My aunt's letter," he repeated, rising to his feet and bending over the table towards her.
"Why, dear?"