“There is something else to be said in the meantime,” said Mr. Wentworth. “I must know precisely how it is that a state of affairs so different from anything Mr. Wodehouse could have intended has come about. The mere absence of a will does not seem to me to explain it. I should like to have Mr. Brown’s advice—for my own satisfaction, if nothing else.”
“The parson has got nothing to do with it, that I can see,” said Wodehouse, “unless he was looking for a legacy, or that sort of thing. As for the girls, I don’t see what right I have to be troubled; they took deuced little trouble with me. Perhaps they’d have taken me in as a sort of footman without pay—you heard what they said, Waters? By Jove! I’ll serve Miss Mary out for that,” said the vagabond. Then he paused a little, and, looking round him, moderated his tone. “I’ve been badly used all my life,” said the prodigal son. “They would never give me a hearing. They say I did heaps of things I never dreamt of. Mary aint above thinking of her own interest—”
Here Mr. Proctor came forward from the middle of the room where he had been standing in a perplexed manner since the ladies went away. “Hold—hold your tongue, sir!” said the late Rector; “haven’t you done enough injury already—” When he had said so much, he stopped as abruptly as he had begun, and seemed to recollect all at once that he had no title to interfere.
“By Jove!” said Wodehouse, “you don’t seem to think I know what belongs to me, or who belongs to me. Hold your tongue, Waters; I can speak for myself. I’ve been long enough snubbed by everybody that had a mind. I don’t mean to put up with this sort of thing any longer. Any man who pleases can consult John Brown. I recollect John Brown as well as anybody in Carlingford. It don’t matter to me what he says, or what anybody says. The girls are a parcel of girls, and I am my father’s son, as it happens. I should have thought the parson had enough on his hands for one while,” said the new heir, in the insolence of triumph. “He tried patronising me, but that wouldn’t answer. Why, there’s his brother, Jack Wentworth, his elder brother, come down here purposely to manage matters for me. He’s the eldest son, by Jove! and one of the greatest swells going. He has come down here on purpose to do the friendly thing by me. We’re great friends, by Jove! Jack Wentworth and I; and yet here’s a beggarly younger brother, that hasn’t a penny—”
“Wodehouse,” said Mr. Wentworth, with some contempt, “sit down and be quiet. You and I have some things to talk of which had better not be discussed in public. Leave Jack Wentworth’s name alone, if you are wise, and don’t imagine that I am going to bear your punishment. Be silent, sir!” cried the Curate, sternly; “do you suppose I ask any explanations from you? Mr. Waters, I want to hear how this has come about? When I saw you in this man’s interest some time ago, you were not so friendly to him. Tell me how it happens that he is now your client, and that you set him forth as the heir!”
“By Jove, the parson has nothing to do with it! Let him find it out,” muttered Wodehouse in his beard; but the words were only half audible, and the vagabond’s shabby soul was cowed in spite of himself. He gave the lawyer a furtive thrust in the arm as he spoke, and looked at him a little anxiously; for the position of a man standing lawfully on his natural rights was new to Wodehouse; and all his certainty of the facts did not save him from a sensation of habit which suggested that close examination was alarming, and that something might still be found out. As for Mr. Waters, he looked with placid contempt at the man, who was not respectable, and still had the instincts of a vagabond in his heart.
“I am perfectly ready to explain,” said the irreproachable solicitor, who was quite secure in his position. “The tone of the request, however, might be modified a little; and as I don’t, any more than Mr. Wodehouse, see exactly what right Mr. Wentworth has to demand—”
“I ask an explanation, not on my own behalf, but for the Miss Wodehouses, who have made me their deputy,” said the Curate, “for their satisfaction, and that I may consult Mr. Brown. You seem to forget that all he gains they lose; which surely justifies their representative in asking how did it come about?”
It was at this point that all the other gentlemen present pressed closer, and evinced an intention to take part. Dr. Marjoribanks was the first to speak. He took a pinch of snuff, and while he consumed it looked from under his grizzled sandy eyebrows with a perplexing mixture of doubt and respect at the Perpetual Curate. He was a man of
