Can You Forgive Her? Part 67

"Yes, I do."

"But when?"

"When I've married Mrs. Greenow,--and, therefore, I expect your a.s.sistance in that little scheme. Let us drink her health. We shall always be delighted to see you at our house, Cheesy, my boy, and you shall be allowed to hack the hams just as much as you please."

"You shall be made to pay for this," said Cheesacre, gasping with anger;--gasping almost more with dismay than he did with anger.

"All right, old fellow; I'll pay for it,--with the widow's money.

Come; our half-hour is nearly over; shall we go up-stairs?"

"I'll expose you."

"Don't now;--don't be ill-natured."

"Will you tell me where you mean to sleep to-night, Captain Bellfield?"

"If I sleep at Oileymead it will only be on condition that I have one of the mahogany-furnitured bedrooms."

"You'll never put your foot in that house again. You're a rascal, sir."

"Come, come, Cheesy, it won't do for us to quarrel in a lady's house.

It wouldn't be the thing at all. You're not drinking your wine. You might as well take another gla.s.s, and then we'll go up-stairs."

"You've left your traps at Oileymead, and not one of them you shall have till you've paid me every s.h.i.+lling you owe me. I don't believe you've a s.h.i.+rt in the world beyond what you've got there."

"It's lucky I brought one in to change; wasn't it, Cheesy? I shouldn't have thought of it only for the hint you gave me. I might as well ring the bell for Jeannette to put away the wine, if you won't take any more." Then he rang the bell, and when Jeannette came he skipped lightly up-stairs into the drawing-room.

"Was he here before to-day?" said Cheesacre, nodding his head at the doorway through which Bellfield had pa.s.sed.

"Who? The Captain? Oh dear no. The Captain don't come here much now;--not to say often, by no means."

"He's a confounded rascal."

"Oh, Mr. Cheesacre!" said Jeannette.

"He is;--and I ain't sure that there ain't others nearly as bad as he is."

"If you mean me, Mr. Cheesacre, I do declare you're a wronging me; I do indeed."

"What's the meaning of his going on in this way?"

"I don't know nothing of his ways, Mr. Cheesacre; but I've been as true to you, sir;--so I have;--as true as true." And Jeannette put her handkerchief up to her eyes.

He moved to the door, and then a thought occurred to him. He put his hand to his trousers pocket, and turning back towards the girl, gave her half-a-crown. She curtsied as she took it, and then repeated her last words. "Yes, Mr. Cheesacre,--as true as true." Mr. Cheesacre said nothing further, but followed his enemy up to the drawing-room. "What game is up now, I wonder," said Jeannette to herself, when she was left alone. "They two'll be cutting each other's throatses before they've done, and then my missus will take the surwiver." But she made up her mind that Cheesacre should be the one to have his throat cut fatally, and that Bellfield should be the survivor.

Cheesacre, when he reached the drawing-room, found Bellfield sitting on the same sofa with Mrs. Greenow looking at a book of photographs which they both of them were handling together. The outside rim of her widow's frill on one occasion touched the Captain's whisker, and as it did so the Captain looked up with a gratified expression of triumph. If any gentleman has ever seen the same thing under similar circ.u.mstances, he will understand that Cheesacre must have been annoyed.

"Yes," said Mrs. Greenow, waving her handkerchief, of which little but a two-inch-deep border seemed to be visible. Bellfield knew at once that it was not the same handkerchief which she had waved before they went down to dinner. "Yes,--there he is. It's so like him." And then she apostrophized the _carte de visite_ of the departed one. "Dear Greenow; dear husband! When my spirit is false to thee, let thine forget to visit me softly in my dreams. Thou wast unmatched among husbands. Whose tender kindness was ever equal to thine? whose sweet temper was ever so constant? whose manly care so all-sufficient?"

While the words fell from her lips her little finger was touching Bellfield's little finger, as they held the book between them.

Charlie Fairstairs and Mr. Cheesacre were watching her narrowly, and she knew that they were watching her. She was certainly a woman of great genius and of great courage.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "Dear Greenow; dear husband!"]

Bellfield, moved by the eloquence of her words, looked with some interest at the photograph. There was represented there before him, a small, grey-looking, insignificant old man, with pig's eyes and a toothless mouth,--one who should never have been compelled to submit himself to the cruelty of the sun's portraiture! Another widow, even if she had kept in her book the photograph of such a husband, would have scrambled it over silently,--would have been ashamed to show it.

"Have you ever seen it, Mr. Cheesacre?" asked Mrs. Greenow. "It's so like him."

"I saw it at Yarmouth," said Cheesacre, very sulkily.

"That you did not," said the lady with some dignity, and not a little of rebuke in her tone; "simply because it never was at Yarmouth. A larger one you may have seen, which I always keep, and always shall keep, close by my bedside."

"Not if I know it," said Captain Bellfield to himself. Then the widow punished Mr. Cheesacre for his sullenness by whispering a few words to the Captain; and Cheesacre in his wrath turned to Charlie Fairstairs.

Then it was that he spake out his mind about the Captain's rank, and was snubbed by Charlie,--as was told a page or two back.

After that, coffee was brought to them, and here again Cheesacre in his ill-humour allowed the Captain to out-manoeuvre him. It was the Captain who put the sugar into the cups and handed them round. He even handed a cup to his enemy. "None for me, Captain Bellfield; many thanks for your politeness all the same," said Mr. Cheesacre; and Mrs. Greenow knew from the tone of his voice that there had been a quarrel.

Cheesacre sitting then in his gloom, had resolved upon one thing,--or, I may perhaps say, upon two things. He had resolved that he would not leave the room that evening till Bellfield had left it; and that he would get a final answer from the widow, if not that night,--for he thought it very possible that they might both be sent away together,--then early after breakfast on the following morning.

For the present, he had given up any idea of turning his time to good account. He was not perhaps a coward, but he had not that special courage which enables a man to fight well under adverse circ.u.mstances. He had been cowed by the unexpected impertinence of his rival,--by the insolence of a man to whom he thought that he had obtained the power of being always himself as insolent as he pleased.

He could not recover his ground quickly, or carry himself before his lady's eye as though he was unconscious of the wound he had received.

So he sat silent, while Bellfield was discoursing fluently. He sat in silence, comforting himself with reflections on his own wealth, and on the poverty of the other, and promising himself a rich harvest of revenge when the moment should come in which he might tell Mrs.

Greenow how absolutely that man was a beggar, a swindler, and a rascal.

And he was astonished when an opportunity for doing so came very quickly. Before the neighbouring clock had done striking seven, Bellfield rose from his chair to go. He first of all spoke a word of farewell to Miss Fairstairs; then he turned to his late host; "Good night, Cheesacre," he said, in the easiest tone in the world; after that he pressed the widow's hand and whispered his adieu.

"I thought you were staying at Oileymead?" said Mrs. Greenow.

"I came from there this morning," said the Captain.

"But he isn't going back there, I can tell you," said Mr. Cheesacre.

"Oh, indeed," said Mrs. Greenow; "I hope there is nothing wrong."

"All as right as a trivet," said the Captain; and then he was off.

"I promised mamma that I would be home by seven," said Charlie Fairstairs, rising from her chair. It cannot be supposed that she had any wish to oblige Mr. Cheesacre, and therefore this movement on her part must be regarded simply as done in kindness to Mrs. Greenow. She might be mistaken in supposing that Mrs. Greenow would desire to be left alone with Mr. Cheesacre; but it was clear to her that in this way she could give no offence, whereas it was quite possible that she might offend by remaining. A little after seven Mr. Cheesacre found himself alone with the lady.

"I'm sorry to find," said she, gravely, "that you two have quarrelled."

"Mrs. Greenow," said he, jumping up, and becoming on a sudden full of life, "that man is a downright swindler."

"Oh, Mr. Cheesacre."

"He is. He'll tell you that he was at Inkerman, but I believe he was in prison all the time." The Captain had been arrested, I think twice, and thus Mr. Cheesacre justified to himself this a.s.sertion. "I doubt whether he ever saw a shot fired," he continued.

"He's none the worse for that."

"But he tells such lies; and then he has not a penny in the world.

How much do you suppose he owes me, now?"