“You have made her no promise?”
“My dear Clara, this is a matter in which I must use my own judgment.”
“But the family, Frederic?”
“I do not think that any member of our family has a just right to complain of my conduct since I have had the honour of being its head. I have endeavoured so to live that my actions should encounter no private or public censure. If I fail to meet with your approbation, I shall grieve; but I cannot on that account act otherwise than in accordance with my own judgment.”
Mrs. Hittaway knew her brother well, and was not afraid of him. “That’s all very well; and I am sure you know, Frederic, how proud we all are of you. But this woman is a nasty, low, scheming, ill-conducted, dishonest little wretch; and if you make her your wife you’ll be miserable all your life. Nothing would make me and Orlando so unhappy as to quarrel with you. But we know that it is so, and to the last minute I shall say so. Why don’t you ask her to her face about that man down in Scotland?”
“My dear Clara, perhaps I know what to ask her and what not to ask her better than you can tell me.”
And his brother-in-law was quite as bad. “Fawn,” he said, “in this matter of Lady Eustace, don’t you think you ought to put your conduct into the hands of some friend?”
“What do you mean by that?”
“I think it is an affair in which a man would have so much comfort in being able to say that he was guided by advice. Of course, her people want you to marry her. Now, if you could just tell them that the whole thing was in the hands of—say me—or any other friend, you would be relieved, you know, of so much responsibility. They might hammer away at me ever so long, and I shouldn’t care twopence.”
“If there is to be any hammering, it cannot be borne vicariously,” said Lord Fawn—and as he said it, he was quite pleased by his own sharpness and wit.
He had, indeed, put himself beyond protection by vicarious endurance of hammering when he promised to write to Lady Eustace, explaining his own conduct and giving reasons. Had anything turned up in Scotland Yard which would have justified him in saying—or even in thinking—that Lizzie had stolen her own diamonds, he would have sent word to her that he must abstain from any communication till that matter had been cleared up; but since the appearance of that mysterious paragraph in the newspapers, nothing had been heard of the robbery, and public opinion certainly seemed to be in favour of Lizzie’s innocence. He did think that the Eustace faction was betraying him, as he could not but remember how eager Mr. Camperdown had been in asserting that the widow was keeping an enormous amount of property and claiming it as her own, whereas, in truth, she had not the slightest title to it. It was, in a great measure, in consequence of the assertions of the Eustace faction, almost in obedience to their advice, that he had resolved to break off the match; and now they turned upon him, and John Eustace absolutely went out of his way to write him a letter which was clearly meant to imply that he, Lord Fawn, was bound to marry the woman to whom he had once engaged himself! Lord Fawn felt that he was ill-used, and that a man might have to undergo a great deal of bad treatment who should strive to put himself right in the eye of the public.
At last he wrote his letter—on a Wednesday, which with him had something of the comfort of a half-holiday, as on that day he was not required to attend Parliament.
India Office, 28th March, 18—.
My dear Lady Eustace,
In accordance with the promise which I made to you when I did myself the honour of waiting upon you in Hertford Street, I take up my pen with the view of communicating to you the result of my deliberations respecting the engagement of marriage which, no doubt, did exist between us last summer.
Since that time I have no doubt taken upon myself to say that that engagement was over; and I am free to admit that I did so without any assent or agreement on your part to that effect. Such conduct no doubt requires a valid and strong defence. My defence is as follows:—
I learned that you were in possession of a large amount of property, vested in diamonds, which was claimed by the executors under your late husband’s will as belonging to his estate; and as to which they declared, in the most positive manner, that you had no right or title to it whatever. I consulted friends and I consulted lawyers, and I was led to the conviction that this property certainly did not belong to you. Had I married you in these circumstances, I could not but have become a participator in the lawsuit which I was assured would be commenced. I could not be a participator with you, because I believed you to be in the wrong. And I certainly could not participate with those who would in such case be attacking my own wife.
In this condition of things I requested you—as you must, I think, yourself own, with all deference and good feeling—to give up the actual possession of the property, and to place the diamonds in neutral hands—
Lord Fawn was often called upon to be neutral in reference to the condition of outlying Indian principalities,
—till the law should have decided as to their ownership. As regards myself, I neither coveted nor rejected the possession of that wealth for my future wife. I desired simply to be free from an embarrassment which would have overwhelmed me. You declined my request—not only positively, but perhaps I may add peremptorily; and then I was
