The Way We Live Now Part 31

Sir Felix wished himself at the Beargarden. He certainly had come about business,--business of a particular sort; but Marie had told him that of all days Sunday would be the best, and had also told him that her father was more likely to be in a good humour on Sunday than on any other day. Sir Felix felt that he had not been received with good humour. "I didn't mean to intrude, Mr. Melmotte," he said.

"I dare say not. I only thought I'd tell you. You might have been going to speak about that railway."

"Oh dear no."

"Your mother was saying to me down in the county that she hoped you attended to the business. I told her that there was nothing to attend to."

"My mother doesn't understand anything at all about it," said Sir Felix.

"Women never do. Well;--what can I do for you, now that you are here?"

"Mr. Melmotte, I'm come,--I'm come to;--in short, Mr. Melmotte, I want to propose myself as a suitor for your daughter's hand."

"The d---- you do!"

"Well, yes; and we hope you'll give us your consent."

"She knows you're coming, then?"

"Yes;--she knows."

"And my wife,--does she know?"

"I've never spoken to her about it. Perhaps Miss Melmotte has."

"And how long have you and she understood each other?"

"I've been attached to her ever since I saw her," said Sir Felix. "I have indeed. I've spoken to her sometimes. You know how that kind of thing goes on."

"I'm blessed if I do. I know how it ought to go on. I know that when large sums of money are supposed to be concerned, the young man should speak to the father before he speaks to the girl. He's a fool if he don't, if he wants to get the father's money. So she has given you a promise?"

"I don't know about a promise."

"Do you consider that she's engaged to you?"

"Not if she's disposed to get out of it," said Sir Felix, hoping that he might thus ingratiate himself with the father. "Of course, I should be awfully disappointed."

"She has consented to your coming to me?"

"Well, yes;--in a sort of a way. Of course she knows that it all depends on you."

"Not at all. She's of age. If she chooses to marry you she can marry you. If that's all you want, her consent is enough. You're a baronet, I believe?"

"Oh, yes, I'm a baronet."

"And therefore you've come to your own property. You haven't to wait for your father to die, and I dare say you are indifferent about money."

This was a view of things which Sir Felix felt that he was bound to dispel, even at the risk of offending the father. "Not exactly that,"

he said. "I suppose you will give your daughter a fortune, of course."

"Then I wonder you didn't come to me before you went to her. If my daughter marries to please me, I shall give her money, no doubt. How much is neither here nor there. If she marries to please herself, without considering me, I shan't give her a farthing."

"I had hoped that you might consent, Mr. Melmotte."

"I've said nothing about that. It is possible. You're a man of fas.h.i.+on and have a t.i.tle of your own,--and no doubt a property. If you'll show me that you've an income fit to maintain her, I'll think about it at any rate. What is your property, Sir Felix?"

What could three or four thousand a year, or even five or six, matter to a man like Melmotte? It was thus that Sir Felix looked at it. When a man can hardly count his millions he ought not to ask questions about trifling sums of money. But the question had been asked, and the asking of such a question was no doubt within the prerogative of a proposed father-in-law. At any rate, it must be answered. For a moment it occurred to Sir Felix that he might conveniently tell the truth. It would be nasty for the moment, but there would be nothing to come after. Were he to do so he could not be dragged down lower and lower into the mire by cross-examinings. There might be an end of all his hopes, but there would at the same time be an end of all his misery. But he lacked the necessary courage. "It isn't a large property, you know," he said.

"Not like the Marquis of Westminster's, I suppose," said the horrid, big, rich scoundrel.

"No;--not quite like that," said Sir Felix, with a sickly laugh.

"But you have got enough to support a baronet's t.i.tle?"

"That depends on how you want to support it," said Sir Felix, putting off the evil day.

"Where's your family seat?"

"Carbury Manor, down in Suffolk, near the Longestaffes, is the old family place."

"That doesn't belong to you," said Melmotte, very sharply.

"No; not yet. But I'm the heir."

Perhaps if there is one thing in England more difficult than another to be understood by men born and bred out of England, it is the system under which t.i.tles and property descend together, or in various lines. The jurisdiction of our Courts of Law is complex, and so is the business of Parliament. But the rules regulating them, though anomalous, are easy to the memory compared with the mixed anomalies of the peerage and primogeniture. They who are brought up among it, learn it as children do a language, but strangers who begin the study in advanced life, seldom make themselves perfect in it. It was everything to Melmotte that he should understand the ways of the country which he had adopted; and when he did not understand, he was clever at hiding his ignorance. Now he was puzzled. He knew that Sir Felix was a baronet, and therefore presumed him to be the head of the family. He knew that Carbury Manor belonged to Roger Carbury, and he judged by the name it must be an old family property. And now the baronet declared that he was heir to the man who was simply an Esquire. "Oh, the heir are you? But how did he get it before you?

You're the head of the family?"

"Yes, I am the head of the family, of course," said Sir Felix, lying directly. "But the place won't be mine till he dies. It would take a long time to explain it all."

"He's a young man, isn't he?"

"No;--not what you'd call a young man. He isn't very old."

"If he were to marry and have children, how would it be then?"

Sir Felix was beginning to think that he might have told the truth with discretion. "I don't quite know how it would be. I have always understood that I am the heir. It's not very likely that he will marry."

"And in the meantime what is your own property?"

"My father left me money in the funds and in railway stock,--and then I am my mother's heir."

"You have done me the honour of telling me that you wish to marry my daughter."

"Certainly."

"Would you then object to inform me the amount and nature of the income on which you intend to support your establishment as a married man? I fancy that the position you a.s.sume justifies the question on my part." The bloated swindler, the vile city ruffian, was certainly taking a most ungenerous advantage of the young aspirant for wealth.

It was then that Sir Felix felt his own position. Was he not a baronet, and a gentleman, and a very handsome fellow, and a man of the world who had been in a crack regiment? If this surfeited sponge of speculation, this crammed commercial cormorant, wanted more than that for his daughter why could he not say so without asking disgusting questions such as these,--questions which it was quite impossible that a gentleman should answer? Was it not sufficiently plain that any gentleman proposing to marry the daughter of such a man as Melmotte, must do so under the stress of pecuniary embarra.s.sment? Would it not be an understood bargain that, as he provided the rank and position, she would provide the money? And yet the vulgar wretch took advantage of his a.s.sumed authority to ask these dreadful questions! Sir Felix stood silent, trying to look the man in the face, but failing;--wis.h.i.+ng that he was well out of the house, and at the Beargarden. "You don't seem to be very clear about your own circ.u.mstances, Sir Felix. Perhaps you will get your lawyer to write to me."

"Perhaps that will be best," said the lover.