Then at the end the governor said he’d send the beast a cheque for the amount. You know his way of finishing up, just like two fellows fighting;—when one has awfully punished the other he goes up and shakes hands with him. He did pitch into me—not abusing me, nor even saying a word about the money, which he at once promised to pay, but laying it on to gambling with a regular cat-o’-nine-tails. And then there was an end of it. He just asked the fellow’s address and said that he would send him the money. I will say this;—I don’t think there’s a greater brick than the governor out anywhere.
I am awfully sorry about Tregear. I can’t quite make out how it happened. I suppose you were too near him, and Melrose always does rush at his fences. One fellow shouldn’t be too near another fellow—only it so often happens that it can’t be helped. It’s just like anything else, if nothing comes of it then it’s all right. But if anybody comes to grief then he has got to be pitched into. Do you remember when I nearly cut over old Sir Simon Slobody? Didn’t I hear about it!
I am awfully glad you didn’t smash up Tregear altogether, because of Mary. I am quite sure it is no good anybody setting up his back against that. It’s one of the things that have got to be. You always have said that he is a good fellow. If so, what’s the harm? At any rate it has got to be.
LXVI
The Three Attacks
During the following week the communications between Harrington and Matching were very frequent. There were no further direct messages between Tregear and Lady Mary, but she heard daily of his progress. The Duke was conscious of the special interest which existed in his house as to the condition of the young man, but, after his arrival, not a word was spoken for some days between him and his daughter on the subject. Then Gerald went back to his college, and the Duke made his preparations for going up to town and making some attempt at parliamentary activity.
It was by no concert that an attack was made upon him from three quarters at once as he was preparing to leave Matching. On the Sunday morning during church time—for on that day Lady Mary went to her devotions alone—Mrs. Finn was closeted for an hour with the Duke in his study. “I think you ought to be aware,” she said to the Duke, “that though I trust Mary implicitly and know her to be thoroughly high principled, I cannot be responsible for her, if I remain with her here.”
“I do not quite follow your meaning.”
“Of course there is but one matter on which there can, probably, be any difference between us. If she should choose to write to Mr. Tregear, or to send him a message, or even to go to him, I could not prevent it.”
“Go to him!” exclaimed the horrified Duke.
“I merely suggest such a thing in order to make you understand that I have absolutely no control over her.”
“What control have I?”
“Nay; I cannot define that. You are her father, and she acknowledges your authority. She regards me as a friend—and as such treats me with the sweetest affection. Nothing can be more gratifying than her manner to me personally.”
“It ought to be so.”
“She has thoroughly won my heart. But still I know that if there were a difference between us she would not obey me. Why should she?”
“Because you hold my deputed authority.”
“Oh, Duke, that goes for very little anywhere. No one can depute authority. It comes too much from personal accidents, and too little from reason or law to be handed over to others. Besides, I fear, that on one matter concerning her you and I are not agreed.”
“I shall be sorry if it be so.”
“I feel that I am bound to tell you my opinion.”
“Oh yes.”
“You think that in the end Lady Mary will allow herself to be separated from Tregear. I think that in the end they will become man and wife.”
This seemed to the Duke to be not quite so bad as it might have been. Any speculation as to results were very different from an expressed opinion as to propriety. Were he to tell the truth as to his own mind, he might perhaps have said the same thing. But one is not to relax in one’s endeavours to prevent that which is wrong, because one fears that the wrong may be ultimately perpetrated. “Let that be as it may,” he said, “it cannot alter my duty.”
“Nor mine, Duke, if I may presume to think that I have a duty in this matter.”
“That you should encounter the burden of the duty binds me to you forever.”
“If it be that they will certainly be married one day—”
“Who has said that? Who has admitted that?”
“If it be so; if it seems
