If he were to find that by persevering in this course he would doom her to death, or perchance to madness—what then? If it were right, he must still do it. He must still do it, if the weakness incident to his human nature did not rob him of the necessary firmness. If every foolish girl were indulged, all restraint would be lost, and there would be an end to those rules as to birth and position by which he thought his world was kept straight. And then, mixed with all this, was his feeling of the young man’s arrogance in looking for such a match. Here was a man without a shilling, whose manifest duty it was to go to work so that he might earn his bread, who instead of doing so, had hoped to raise himself to wealth and position by entrapping the heart of an unwary girl! There was something to the Duke’s thinking base in this, and much more base because the unwary girl was his own daughter. That such a man as Tregear should make an attack upon him and select his rank, his wealth, and his child as the stepping-stones by which he intended to rise! What could be so mean as that a man should seek to live by looking out for a wife with money? But what so impudent, so arrogant, so unblushingly disregardful of propriety, as that he should endeavour to select his victim from such a family as that of the Pallisers, and that he should lay his impious hand on the very daughter of the Duke of Omnium?
But together with all this there came upon him moments of ineffable tenderness. He felt as though he longed to take her in his arms and tell her, that if she were unhappy, so would he be unhappy too—to make her understand that a hard necessity had made this sorrow common to them both. He thought that, if she would only allow it, he could speak of her love as a calamity which had befallen them, as from the hand of fate, and not as a fault. If he could make a partnership in misery with her, so that each might believe that each was acting for the best, then he could endure all that might come. But, as he was well aware, she regarded him as being simply cruel to her. She did not understand that he was performing an imperative duty. She had set her heart upon a certain object, and having taught herself that in that way happiness might be reached, had no conception that there should be something in the world, some idea of personal dignity, more valuable to her than the fruition of her own desires! And yet every word he spoke to her was affectionate. He knew that she was bruised, and if it might be possible he would pour oil into her wounds—even though she would not recognise the hand which relieved her.
They slept one night in town—where they encountered Silverbridge soon after his retreat from the Beargarden. “I cannot quite make up my mind, sir, about that fellow Tifto,” he said to his father.
“I hope you have made up your mind that he is no fit companion for yourself.”
“That’s over. Everybody understands that, sir.”
“Is anything more necessary?”
“I don’t like feeling that he has been ill-used. They have made him resign the club, and I fancy they won’t have him at the hunt.”
“He has lost no money by you?”
“Oh no.”
“Then I think you may be indifferent. From all that I hear I think he must have won money—which will probably be a consolation to him.”
“I think they have been hard upon him,” continued Silverbridge. “Of course he is not a good man, nor a gentleman, nor possessed of very high feelings. But a man is not to be sacrificed altogether for that. There are so many men who are not gentlemen, and so many gentlemen who are bad fellows.”
“I have no doubt Mr. Lupton knew what he was about,” replied the Duke.
On the next morning the Duke and Lady Mary went down to Matching, and as they sat together in the carriage after leaving the railway the father endeavoured to make himself pleasant to his daughter. “I suppose we shall stay at Matching now till Christmas,” he said.
“I hope so.”
“Whom would you like to have here?”
“I don’t want anyone, papa.”
“You will be very sad without somebody. Would you like the Finns?”
“If you please, papa. I like her. He never talks anything but politics.”
“He is none the worse for that, Mary. I wonder whether Lady Mabel Grex would come.”
“Lady Mabel Grex!”
“Do you not like her?”
“Oh yes, I like her;—but what made you think of her, papa?”
“Perhaps Silverbridge would come to us then.”
Lady Mary thought that she knew a great deal more about that than her father did. “Is he fond of Lady Mabel, papa?”
“Well—I don’t know. There are secrets which should not be told. I think they are very good friends. I would not have her asked unless it
