It was impossible that the Duke should be made to understand exactly what had occurred. That Silverbridge had taken Mary he did understand, and that they had together gone to Lord Grex’s house. He understood also that the meeting had taken place in the presence of Silverbridge and of Lady Mabel. “No doubt it was all an accident,” Lady Cantrip wrote. How could it be an accident?
“You had Mary up in town on Friday,” he said to his son on the following Sunday morning.
“Yes, sir.”
“And that friend of yours came in?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Do you not know what my wishes are?”
“Certainly I do;—but I could not help his coming. You do not suppose that anybody had planned it?”
“I hope not.”
“It was simply an accident. Such an accident as must occur over and over again—unless Mary is to be locked up.”
“Who talks of locking anybody up? What right have you to speak in that way?”
“I only meant that of course they will stumble across each other in London.”
“I think I will go abroad,” said the Duke. He was silent for awhile, and then repeated his words. “I think I will go abroad.”
“Not for long, I hope, sir.”
“Yes;—to live there. Why should I stay here? What good can I do here? Everything I see and everything I hear is a pain to me.” The young man of course could not but go back in his mind to the last interview which he had had with his father, when the Duke had been so gracious and apparently so well pleased.
“Is there anything else wrong—except about Mary?” Silverbridge asked.
“I am told that Gerald owes about fifteen hundred pounds at Cambridge.”
“So much as that! I knew he had a few horses there.”
“It is not the money, but the absence of principle—that a young man should have no feeling that he ought to live within certain prescribed means! Do you know what you have had from Mr. Moreton?”
“Not exactly, sir.”
“It is different with you. But a man, let him be who he may, should live within certain means. As for your sister, I think she will break my heart.” Silverbridge found it to be quite impossible to say anything in answer to this. “Are you going to church?” asked the Duke.
“I was not thinking of doing so particularly.”
“Do you not ever go?”
“Yes;—sometimes. I will go with you now, if you like it, sir.”
“I had thought of going, but my mind is too much harassed. I do not see why you should not go.”
But Silverbridge, though he had been willing to sacrifice his morning to his father—for it was, I fear, in that way that he had looked at it—did not see any reason for performing a duty which his father himself omitted. And there were various matters also which harassed him. On the previous evening, after dinner, he had allowed himself to back the Prime Minister for the Leger to a very serious amount. In fact he had plunged, and now stood to lose some twenty thousand pounds on the doings of the last night. And he had made these bets under the influence of Major Tifto. It was the remembrance of this, after the promise made to his father, that annoyed him the most. He was imbued with a feeling that it behoved him as a man to “pull himself together,” as he would have said himself, and to live in accordance with certain rules. He could make the rules easily enough, but he had never yet succeeded in keeping any one of them. He had determined to sever himself from Tifto, and, in doing that, had intended to sever himself from affairs of the turf generally. This resolution was not yet a week old. It was on that evening that he had resolved that Tifto should no longer be his companion; and now he had to confess to himself that because he had drunk three or four glasses of champagne he had been induced by Tifto to make those wretched bets.
And he had told his father that he intended to ask Mabel Grex to be his wife. He had so committed himself that the offer must now be made. He did not specially regret that, though he wished that he had been more reticent. “What a fool a man is to blurt out everything!” he said to himself. A wife would be a good thing for him; and where could he possibly find a better wife than Mabel Grex? In beauty she was no doubt inferior to Miss Boncassen. There was something about Miss Boncassen which made it impossible to forget her. But Miss Boncassen was an American, and on many accounts out of the question. It did not occur to him that he would fall in love with Miss Boncassen; but still it seemed hard to him that this intention of marriage should stand in his way of having a good time with Miss Boncassen for a few weeks. No doubt there were objections to marriage. It clipped a fellow’s wings. But then, if he were married, he might be sure that Tifto would be laid aside. It was such a great thing to have got his
