Creepmouse. “In love a young man should climb—not stoop. Yes, sir, to a young man like Tom, marriage should be a ladder, not a pit.”

Retired from Business.

My uncle Dick amply vindicated his brother’s eulogium of his conversational powers. When, at the bank, I had beheld the stout, big form of my relative, and heard his bluff and highly familiar language, I believed him to be as nearly related to a boor as any man of his size and age can be. But my opinion of him underwent a very remarkable change when I listened to and watched him as he sat and talked at his brother’s dinner-table. His manner then was perfectly polite; positively there were certain points in his behaviour which my father might have beheld with envy and admiration. Added to this, he was exceedingly well read; talked French with a good accent, and quoted Latin with a happy applicability that robbed its employment of all flavour of pedantry.

I had nothing to say. I was eclipsed. His jokes kept us all in high spirits. His anecdotes (which I can appreciate better now than I could then) were uniformly excellent. He appeared to know everybody; spoke with a kind of dignified familiarity of noblemen of reputation, of famous actors, of celebrated authors. He had supped with Lamb and Elliston. He had been in Haydon’s studio when Scott had called; he had advised Southey on the purchase of some stocks; he had dined with Rogers, where he had met Sydney Smith, William Bankes, Luttrell, and many others, whose names I forget.

I am very much afraid, however, that we none of us listened to him with the interest he deserved. Speaking for myself, it would have given me more pleasure to have heard an account of a champion billiard-match or a boat-race, than the best of Talleyrand’s mots, or the smartest of Sydney Smith’s rejoinders. My aunt smiled occasionally, as much out of politeness as out of appreciation; and uncle Tom grew so soon tired of these stories—which I daresay he had often heard before—that he contrived to bring the conversation round to the Stock Exchange, the income tax, and the stamp duties, on which his brother talked as freely and sagaciously as if these matters had been his only studies all his life.

However, don’t suppose that I sat like a mute through that dinner. When my uncle addressed me I contrived to answer him in a style that, I had no doubt, maintained my credit with my aunt. One reply of mine—I forget what it was, and I am very glad I do—made the old gentleman burst into a tremendous roar of laughter, and from that moment he took a great deal of notice of me, encouraged my small attempts to exhibit my parts and wit, and took wine with me, nodding his head with a cordial smile, and crying out, before he put the glass to his lips, how he wished the major made one of us.

After my aunt and Conny had left the room, we three gentlemen grew really affectionate. The two brothers shook hands several times with each other, and several times with me, from no other reason whatever, than an overflowing impulse. Old days were recalled and old scenes re-enacted. While my uncle Dick fished one beaming recollection after another out of the grey tide of the past, my uncle Tom was watching him eagerly to observe when he stopped, in order to top the reminiscence with another. Some characteristic anecdotes of my father were repeated and roared over. Then my uncle Dick, having laughed himself grave, grew sentimental, spoke with hazy eyes of his dead wife, of his pet Teazer, who was dear to him as his right hand, as the apple of his eye; of departed friends, whose wit had often cheered, whose kindness had often soothed him. Never an ill word for dead or living fell from him.

A bright scene! a happy evening! a pleasant and gracious memory—when the world was younger with him who writes this—of cordiality and good will, of brotherly love as fresh and childlike still as ever it was in the old nursery days! Shall we believe, Eugenio, all that the cynics tell us? Do relations so universally hate one another as these gentlemen make out they do? You have told me of aunts who have been as faithful in the love of their dead sisters’ offspring as ever their mothers were; I have told you of brothers whose self sacrifices for one another would fill a volume with tales of deeper interest than could even be found in narratives of the most awful murders, or in minute accounts of the most unblushing bigamies. Should a cynic expectorate after tasting a glass of Madeira, would you accept his spittle as a sample of the wine he has drunk? Neither should you regard the instances he relates to you of family feuds as typical of the actual feelings that bind relations one to another.

“And now, my boy,” said uncle Dick to me, “when are you coming to Thistlewood?”

“Name a day convenient to yourself,” I replied, “and then uncle Tom will perhaps give us his sense of the matter.”

“Never mind the bank,” exclaimed uncle Tom, “go whenever you like, and stop as long as you like.”

“I shall return from London on Thursday,” said uncle Dick, “and, if you’ll come to me on that day, say so, and I’ll send a telegram to Teazer to-morrow, to have a bed-room prepared for you.”

“Let me say Monday,” I answered. “That will give your daughter more time.”

“Very well. Tom will give you full directions as to the how and the where?” And this being settled, we got talking of other things.

I grew tired at last of sitting, and wanting to join Conny, hinted that my aunt might think us rather selfish, if we lingered much longer over our cigars.

“That’s true,” said uncle Tom, “so you go and join the ladies, and tell my wife, Dick and I will follow presently.”

Conny was reading a novel. My aunt knitted.

“What’s the name of your book?” I asked, going up to my cousin, and sitting down near her.

“‘Love and Sorrow,’” answered she. “They sent it this afternoon from the library. It is very interesting.”

I took up volume the second, and opening it, caught sight of a passage which I read aloud: “Their eyes met. In her’s was pride struggling with womanly desire. In his were blazing those wild passions which were the fruit of long years of agony and disappointment. ‘By heavens!’ he cried hoarsely, while the veins stood out upon his forehead, black and knotted, ‘I would rather take you by the throat and cast you dead at my feet, than see you Lord Algernon’s wife. Never,’ he hissed, ‘shall that virgin brow be defaced by a coronet; never shall that pure form be polluted by—by—,’ he paused, staggered, looked wildly round him, brushed off the salt dews that passion had distilled upon his broad and beautiful forehead with the back of his hand, and, uttering a low moan, fell prone upon the carpet. ‘I have killed him!’ poor Madeline shrieked, rushing to his side and raising his head and gazing with wild and piteous eyes upon the white lips and the convulsed cheeks. At that moment the door opened, and Lord Algernon entered.”

“What a queer story!” exclaimed my aunt, who was nevertheless growing interested.“It is beautifully written in parts,” said Conny.

“Are these your pencil-marks?” I asked, taking the volume from her lap.

“Yes.”

“Here is ‘beautiful!!!’ with three points of exclamation. ‘The silent stream that runs smoothly past us, checked in its course becomes a raging torrent.’ Very true. Here is a passage doubly underscored: ‘It is easy to love a woman, but difficult to find a woman worth loving.’”

“Oh, never mind those marks,” exclaimed Conny.

“Is the hero often afflicted with salt dews?” I inquired.

“You are laughing at me.” She snatched the book from my hand, and pouted.“I don’t often read novels,” said I, “but when I do, I must say I like a good gory story—something dripping or dank—with a yellow-haired heroine who loves to sit on her lover’s grave and braid her tresses by the light of the moon, and an Italian rival who stabs everybody in the forehead. If my hair doesn’t rise twice at least in every ten pages, I consider the author a muff. Domestic stories I hate. There is no need to subscribe to a library to hear people ask each other if they prefer brown bread to white, and muffins to crumpets, and to watch a curate take a flute in pieces out of his pocket and blow ‘Ye banks and braes’ to the pensive, flat-chested lady who works him slippers, and puts four lumps of sugar into his tea. Give me, I say, wounds and starting eye-balls, matted hair and clandestine meetings, streams of blood and gurgling yells. I don’t object to noblemen, but I think that money-lenders make the best villains. I also require that the heroine be supple and lightsome, and lissom and loose, with a tread like a panther, and a spring like—like——”

“A flea,” suggested my aunt.

“What a time you men always are over your wine,” said Conny. “What do you talk about?”

“I have received an invitation.”

“What! to Thistlewood?” asked my aunt.

“Yes, where I shall no doubt be shot.”

“Through the heart,” warbled Conny, with a sly laugh.“Teazer, I am told, pulls a deadly trigger,” said I, looking at Conny.

“When do you go?” inquired my aunt.

“On Monday.”

“They seem in a great hurry to have you,” with a toss of the head.

“The invitation was hearty and irresistible. Yet I am so perfectly happy at Grove End, that I have no wish to leave it even for a day.”

“You must make haste to come back,” said my aunt.

“If Teazer will let you,” laughed Conny.

I whispered, “Would you care if Teazer didn’t let me?”

She hung her head and smiled. Her mamma was looking at us; having, I believe, overheard my question.“Do you mean yes or no, Conny?”

She honoured me with a look; a full, deep, inscrutable look. The blue of her eyes was as fathomless as the blue of the heavens—and as expressionless. However, my heart found the meaning it wanted in them; and if my aunt hadn’t been watching, I should have grown demonstrative.

My uncles were a long time absent. “What can they be doing?” my aunt kept on exclaiming.

“Talking over business matters, no doubt,” I replied.

Conny went to the piano and began to play; and when she was in the middle of one of those fantasias, which you can only submit to listen to when they are played by the girl you love, the two old gentlemen entered. My aunt challenged them pretty briskly, and sarcastically expressed her surprise to see them.

“Really,” said she, “I quite expected every moment to hear you ring for breakfast.”

“Tut, tut!” cried my uncle Dick, who was in boisterous good spirits. “We have been settling the affairs of nations, and arranging the succession of dynasties.”

And going up to Conny, he asked her if she knew “Tom Bowling.”

“No.”

“Then I’ll sing it for you,” and down he sat, and sang the song excellently. It was curious that this big stout man, whose voice when he talked was a bass, rose into a thin clear tenor the moment he began to sing. “Those are the songs I like,” said he, nodding his thanks for our applause. “Give me ‘The Ivy Green,’ and ‘Pray Goody,’ and ‘I’m afloat,’ before all your later trumpery of words and music, fit only for cats to wail their loves with. If the songs of a country are, as they ought to be, the expression of the national character, what will our grand-children think of the age that could produce and enjoy the namby-pamby you now-a-days hear in concerts and drawing-rooms? Go back to my young days, and look into the songs we used to sing. There is a manliness even in the most sentimental of Moore’s ballads—a delicate reference to heroic actions and Irish spirit, which gives them a flavour you’ll look for in vain in your modern verselets. We sang Burns then, and Campbell, and Byron, and Scott, and that was the age of Waterloo and Navarino. You should have heard Incledon sing ‘Tom Moody,’ or Bannister sing ‘Lovely Nan.’ You’d have been content to put wadding in your ears for the remainder of your lives.”

And so saying, he wheeled round upon the music-stool, and played a queer piece of dance music, which, he said, was called “Go to the Devil and shake yourself.”

We passed the rest of the evening pleasantly, in hearing Conny sing, or listening to uncle Dick’s stories, or arguing good-humouredly on a variety of topics until ten o’clock struck, when uncle Dick said he must go to bed; he had to be up early to catch the train for London, and wanted to fortify himself for a hot and fatiguing day. He shook my hand very warmly after bidding the others good-night, and said, “I shall expect you on Monday. I daresay Teazer will meet you, if you let her know what train you arrive by. If not, our house isn’t a mile from the station, and you won’t be able to miss it after getting into the high road.”

I now thought it about time that I should be making my way home: but uncle Tom, seeing me prepare to leave, came up to me, and said, “What’s your hurry? I have something to say to you. The night is fine, and the longer you stay, the more brightly the moon will light you home.”

He then turned to his wife, who was watching us, and said, “My dear, I have something of importance to talk over with Charlie, and we mean to shut ourselves up in the library. You need not sit up. Send us in the whiskey, and we’ll strive our utmost to console ourselves for your absence.”

“What a quantity of talking you will have had before you go to bed!” exclaimed his wife. “Pray what is all this mighty mystery about?”

“Some of these days you shall hear,” replied her husband, with a good-natured laugh. “Now then, Charlie, bid your aunt and Conny good-night, and follow me.”

On entering the library, whither he had preceded me by some minutes, as I had chosen to linger a little whilst I wished Conny good-night, I found the lamp lighted, glasses upon the table, and my uncle seated in an arm-chair near the open window. High overhead rode the brilliant moon; the soft night-wind rustled the leaves of the trees; and the wide grounds lay mottled with moonshine, and the shadows of bush and plant. I drew a chair to the window, lighted a cigar, and, as I felt the cool air breathing upon my face, exclaimed, “A Turk would call this paradise.”

“And so might a Christian,” answered my uncle. “We ought to be happy. We ought to be grateful. I hope, I believe, I am. Few men have better reason to be satisfied with life than myself. I enjoy good health; my wife is the best of women; my girl is dutiful and loving; my brothers are spared to delight me with their society whenever they choose to see me, and,” he added, leaning forward and grasping my hand, “I have a nephew who is a thoroughly good fellow, and to whom I am as much attached as if he were my son.”I thanked him in warm and affectionate terms.

“And now what do you think of Dick?” he asked.

“I think him a very fine fellow, and a very fine gentleman, which I did not think him this morning.”

“Ay, truly, he’s a gentleman in a much higher sense than mere behaviour and the power of talking well imply. He is charitable to a fault; so soft-hearted that he refused to be a magistrate because he said the position would cost him more than he was worth, as he never could agree to a conviction without endowing the families of the men he helped to send to gaol. He and I have been having a long talk about you, and I am delighted to say that he thinks well of my scheme.”“I hope,” said I, “that I didn’t offend him by my somewhat cool reception of him at the bank this morning?”

“Not at all. He likes you, and believes he will like you better when he knows you better, which is the best assurance of future friendship a man can hold out.... I suppose you know that he is worth about forty thousand pounds?”

“I think my father mentioned something of the kind to me.”

“That is a great deal of money for a man to possess whose tastes are inexpensive, and who has only one child. His daughter’s name, as you know, is Theresa. She spent a few days with me some months ago, and I’ll bet you a hat that when you see her you’ll think her as handsome a girl as is anywhere to be met.”“What’s her age?”

“One-and-twenty.”

“Fair or dark?“

“Neither. But don’t ask me to catalogue her charms, you shall judge for yourself. Now, my boy, I’ll tell you what I want you to do. Dick is anxious to see Teazer married. He feels himself growing old, and has been rendered uneasy lately by some kind friend telling him that he looks an apoplectic subject. He told me tonight, that on the day of his daughter’s marriage he will give her ten thousand pounds. My scheme—the scheme he thoroughly relishes—is for you to marry her, bring the money into the bank, and I’ll make you a partner.”

I pulled my cigar out of my mouth, and stared at him.

“Marry her!” I gasped.“Certainly,” replied my uncle. “Of course you will have to get her to love you; but that,” he added with a laugh, “is what you call in France a fait entendu.”

“But—but—I’m not sure—I think—in fact I would rather not marry her,” I stammered.

“Nay, don’t say that until you’ve seen her,” said my uncle, with a deprecating wave of the hand.

“I don’t want to see her.”

“My dear boy, pray consider your position. Outside of my bank you have no prospects. You must admit that. I never meant you to be a clerk. The moment I received your father’s letter, the idea of a marriage between you and Theresa occurred to me, and I was delighted with a notion that could not fail to make both my brothers happy. Of course I could not unfold my scheme until I had consulted with Dick, and watched your progress. But Dick, I tell you, likes the proposal immensely, and you are now sufficiently acquainted with business to qualify you for a partnership. You have still much to learn, indeed; but you can pick the whole thing up by degrees.”

“My dear uncle,” I cried, interrupting him, “I appreciate your generosity, I am overcome, at least with one view of your liberal intentions—but it is too late.”

“Too late! what do you mean?”

“I am already in love.”

“Come, come! you are joking.”

“I am already deeply in love.”

“Deeply in love!”

“Yes—with your daughter.”“Eh!” he exclaimed, giving a little jump in his chair, “you don’t mean—what?—in love with Conny?”

I nodded.

“No, no!” he cried, with great impetuosity; “that’s impossible—that’s out of the question. You can’t marry her. You’re not suited for each other. Consider, my dear boy, how could you support her?”

“I have considered nothing. All that I know is, I love her.”

“And what does she say?”

“She asks for time.”

“What!” he cried, lost in amazement, “have you proposed?”

“Yes,” I gasped, “and she asked me to give her time.”

“Does my wife know?”

“I believe she does.”“And she has never dropped me a hint. Upon my word, this is not the first time things have happened in my house, right under my nose, which all the world has seen but me. But it’s out of the question. My plans are formed, and they don’t include your marriage with Conny. No. Your wife must be Theresa. You are made for each other. When I die, who do I leave behind me to keep the bank going? This has been on my mind for years. But when I got your father’s letter I instantly saw my way. You should marry Theresa, who would bring you a fortune to put into the concern, and Conny should wait until some eligible young man offered for her hand, and then I’d make him a partner. You two would carry on the business after my death. Conny is sure to marry sooner or later, she is too pretty to remain single. As to the objections you could make against marrying a woman for her money, I can anticipate them all by simply showing you that your partnership will be a handsome equivalent for the fortune she brings.”

“Too late! too late!” I muttered, looking at the moon.

“Why the deuce didn’t my wife speak to me about this nonsense?” asked my uncle, who was evidently fretting over her secret share in the matter. “But all women are alike. No matter which way the current runs, you’ll find them rowing against it. Why, surely she can’t see her way in your marriage with Conny?”

“For God’s sake don’t poo-pooh me,” I cried. “You don’t know how I love her.”“I don’t want to know. I would much rather not hear. The thing’s a mistake. I never expected it. It must end. You’re a fine fellow, and I would as soon see you Conny’s husband as another man. But there are obstacles not to be got over under a larger sum of money than you possess. Don’t disappoint me. Don’t object and argue. My scheme is perfect. I maintain it is a magnificent scheme. It assures your fortune; it assures the permanency of the bank; it increases our capital; it gratifies my brother, and will please your father.”

I puffed furiously at my cigar, too much overcome to speak. I suppose he must have seen how completely upset I was, for dropping his somewhat energetic and expostulatory tone, he said in his kindest manner,“Well, Charlie, we won’t discuss the subject any further tonight. It is only reasonable, after all, that it should take you by surprise. I have a sound confidence in your good sense, and have no doubt whatever, that after you have turned the matter over once or twice in your mind, you will agree with me in thinking my plan a remarkably fine one.”

“Never!” I muttered to myself. “Never!”

“Or what is better,” he continued, “instead of disturbing yourself with reflections, wait until you have met Theresa. If she doesn’t bring you to her feet, may this glass be my poison!”

“You don’t consider my feelings,” I said, bitterly. “You forget that I am already in love.”“Well, well, wait till you have met Theresa.”

“I’ll wait,” said I, grimly.

“You think my scheme a splendid one, don’t you?”

“It is like selling your soul to the devil, to marry a woman only for her money!” I burst out.

“You’ll marry her for love—mark my words.”

“Love! how many hearts do you think I have? but no matter—I’ll wait.”

Here I got up, for I was really afraid of growing hysterical.

“Your father will jump for joy when he hears of this,” said my uncle, squeezing my hand.

Now, whether I was hysterical, or whether my sense of the ridiculous was deeply stirred by the ludicrous image of my tall and stately father jumping for joy, I burst into a loud laugh, in which my uncle joined; and half choking with a fit of merriment that was really made ghastly by its approximation to the most morbid and passionate thoughts, I rushed away from the house.