Dr Thorne (88 page)

But she thought not only of Frank; dreamed not only of him. What had he not done for her, that uncle of hers, who had been more loving to her than any father! How was he, too, to be paid? Paid, indeed! Love can only be paid in its own coin: it knows of no other legal tender. Well, if her home was to be Greshamsbury, at any rate she would not be separated from him.

What the doctor dreamed of that night, neither he nor anyone ever knew. ‘Why, uncle, I think you've been asleep,' said Mary to him that evening, as he moved for a moment uneasily on the sofa. He had been asleep for the last three-quarters of an hour; – but Frank, his guest, had felt no offence. ‘No, I've not been exactly asleep,' said he; ‘but I'm very tired. I wouldn't do it all again, Frank, to double the money. You haven't got any more tea, have you, Mary?'

On the following morning, Beatrice was of course with her friend. There was no awkwardness between them in meeting. Beatrice had loved her when she was poor, and though they had not lately thought alike on one very important subject, Mary was too gracious to impute that to Beatrice as a crime.

‘You will be one now, Mary; of course you will.'

‘If Lady Arabella will let me come.'

‘Oh, Mary; let you! Do you remember what you once said about coming, and being near me? I have so often thought of it. And now, Mary, I must tell you about Caleb'; and the young lady settled herself on the sofa, so as to have a comfortable, long talk. Beatrice had been quite right. Mary was as meek with her, and as mild as a dove.

And then Patience Oriel came. ‘My fine, young, darling, magnificent, overgrown heiress,' said Patience, embracing her. ‘My breath deserted me, and I was nearly stunned when I heard of it. How small we shall all be, my dear! I am quite prepared to toady you immensely; but pray be a little gracious to me, for the sake of auld lang syne.'

Mary gave her a long, long kiss. ‘Yes, for auld lang syne, Patience; when you took me away under your wing to Richmond.' Patience also had loved her when she was in her trouble, and that love, too, should never be forgotten.

But the great difficulty was Lady Arabella's first meeting with her. ‘I think I'll go down to her after breakfast,' said her ladyship to Beatrice, as the two were talking over the matter while the mother was finishing her toilet.

‘I am sure she will come up if you like it, mamma.'

‘She is entitled to every courtesy – as Frank's accepted bride, you know,' said Lady Arabella. ‘I would not for worlds fail in any respect to her for his sake.'

‘He will be glad enough for her to come, I am sure,' said Beatrice. ‘I was walking with Caleb this morning, and he says –'

The matter was of importance, and Lady Arabella gave it her most mature consideration. The manner of receiving into one's family an heiress whose wealth is to cure all one's difficulties, disperse all one's troubles, give a balm to all the wounds of misfortune, must, under any circumstances, be worthy of much care. But when that heiress has been already treated as Mary had been treated!

‘I must see her, at any rate, before I go to Courcy,' said Lady Arabella.

‘Are you going to Courcy, mamma?'

‘Oh, certainly; yes, I must see my sister-in-law now. You don't seem to realise the importance, my dear, of Frank's marriage. He will be in a great hurry about it, and, indeed, I cannot blame him. I expect that they will all come here.'

‘Who, mamma? the De Courcys?'

‘Yes, of course. I shall be very much surprised if the earl does not come now. And I must consult my sister as to asking the Duke of Omnium.'

Poor Mary!

‘And I think it will perhaps be better,' continued Lady Arabella, ‘that we should have a larger party than we intended at your affair. The countess, I'm sure, would come now. We couldn't put it off for ten days; could we, dear?'

‘Put it off for ten days!'

‘Yes; it would be convenient.'

‘I don't think Mr Oriel would like that at all, mamma. You know he has made all his arrangements for his Sundays –'

Pshaw! The idea of the parson's Sundays being allowed to have any bearing on such matter as Frank's wedding would now become! Why, they would have – how much? Between twelve and fourteen thousand a year! Lady Arabella, who had made her calculations a dozen times during the night, had never found it to be much less than the larger sum. Mr Oriel's Sundays, indeed!

After much doubt, Lady Arabella acceded to her daughter's suggestion, that Mary should be received at Greshamsbury instead of being called on at the doctor's house. ‘If you think she won't mind the coming up first,' said her ladyship, ‘I certainly could receive her better here. I should be more – more – more able, you know, to express what I feel. We had better go into the big drawing-room today, Beatrice. Will you remember to tell Mrs Richards?'

‘Oh, certainly,' was Mary's answer, when Beatrice, with a voice a little trembling, proposed to her to walk up to the house. ‘Certainly, I will, if Lady Arabella will receive me; – only one thing, Trichy.'

‘What's that, dearest?'

‘Frank will think that I come after him.'

‘Never mind what he thinks. To tell you the truth, Mary, I often call upon Patience for the sake of finding Caleb. That's all fair now, you know.'

Mary very quietly put on her straw bonnet, and said she was ready to go up to the house. Beatrice was a little fluttered, and showed it. Mary was, perhaps, a good deal fluttered, but she did not show it. She had thought a good deal of her first interview with Lady Arabella, of her first return to the house; but she had resolved to carry herself as though the matter were easy to her. She would not allow it to be seen that she felt that she brought with her to Greshamsbury, comfort, ease, and renewed opulence.

So she put on her straw bonnet and walked up with Beatrice. Everybody about the place had already heard the news. The old woman at the lodge curtsied low to her; the gardener, who was mowing the lawn. The butler, who opened the front-door – he must have been watching Mary's approach – had manifestly put on a clean white neckcloth for the occasion.

‘God bless you once more, Miss Thorne!' said the old man, in a half-whisper. Mary was somewhat troubled, for everything seemed, in a manner, to bow down before her. And why should not everything bow down before her, seeing that she was in very truth the owner of Greshamsbury?

And then a servant in livery would open the big drawing-room door. This rather upset both Mary and Beatrice. It became almost impossible for Mary to enter the room just as she would have done two years ago; but she got through the difficulty with much self-control.

‘Mamma, here's Mary,' said Beatrice.

Nor was Lady Arabella quite mistress of herself, although she had studied minutely how to bear herself.

‘Oh Mary, my dear Mary; what can I say to you?' and then, with a handkerchief to her eyes, she ran forward and hid her face on Miss Thorne's shoulders. ‘What can I say – can you forgive me my anxiety for my son?'

‘How do you do, Lady Arabella?' said Mary.

‘My daughter! my child! my Frank's own bride! Oh, Mary! oh, my child! If I have seemed unkind to you, it has been through love to him.'

‘All these things are over now,' said Mary. ‘Mr Gresham told me yesterday that I should be received as Frank's future wife; and so, you see, I have come.' And then she slipped through Lady Arabella's arms and sat down, meekly down, on a chair. In five minutes she had escaped with Beatrice into the school-room, and was kissing the children, and turning over the new trousseau. They were, however, soon interrupted, and there was, perhaps, some other kissing besides that of the children.

‘You have no business in here at all, Frank,' said Beatrice. ‘Has he, Mary?'

‘None in the world, I should think.'

‘See what he has done to my poplin; I hope you won't have
your things treated so cruelly. He'll be careful enough about them.'

‘Is Oriel a good hand at packing up finery – eh, Beatrice?' asked Frank.

‘He is, at any rate, too well behaved to spoil it.' Thus Mary was again made at home in the household of Greshamsbury.

Lady Arabella did not carry out her little plan of delaying the Oriel wedding: Her idea had been to add some grandeur to it, in order to make it a more fitting precursor of that other greater wedding which was to follow so soon in its wake. But this, with the assistance of the countess, she found herself able to do without interfering with poor Mr Oriel's Sunday arrangements. The countess herself, with the Ladies Alexandrina and Margaretta, now promised to come, even to this first affair; and for the other, the whole De Courcy family would turn out, count and countess, lords and ladies, Honourable Georges and Honourable Johns. What honour, indeed, could be too great to show to a bride who had fourteen thousand a year in her own right, or to a cousin who had done his duty by securing such a bride to himself!

‘If the duke be in the country, I am sure he will be happy to come,' said the countess. ‘Of course, he will be talking to Frank about politics. I suppose the squire won't expect Frank to belong to the old school now.'

‘Frank, of course, will judge for himself, Rosina; – with his position, you know!' And so things were settled at Courcy Castle.

And then Beatrice was wedded and carried off to the Lakes. Mary, as she had promised, did stand near her; but not exactly in the gingham frock of which she had once spoken. She wore on that occasion – But it will be too much, perhaps, to tell the reader what she wore as Beatrice's bridesmaid, seeing that a couple of pages, at least, must be devoted to her own marriage-dress, and seeing, also, that we have only a few pages to finish everything; the list of visitors, the marriage settlements, the dress, and all included.

It was in vain that Mary endeavoured to repress Lady Arabella's ardour for grand doings. After all, she was to be married from the doctor's house, and not from Greshamsbury, and it was the doctor who should have invited the guests; but, in this matter, he did not choose to oppose her ladyship's spirit, and she had it all her own way.

‘What can I do?' said he to Mary. ‘I have been contradicting her in everything for the last two years. The least we can do is to let her have her own way now in a trifle like this.'

But there was one point on which Mary would let nobody have his or her own way; on which the way to be taken was very manifestly to be her own. This was touching the marriage settlements. It must not be supposed, that if Beatrice were married on a Tuesday, Mary could be married on the Tuesday week following. Ladies with twelve thousand a year cannot be disposed of in that way: and bridegrooms who do their duty by marrying money often have to be kept waiting. It was spring, the early spring, before Frank was made altogether a happy man.

But a word about the settlements. On this subject the doctor thought he would have been driven mad. Messrs Slow & Bideawhile, as the lawyers of the Greshamsbury family – it will be understood that Mr Gazebee's law business was of quite a different nature, and his work, as regarded Greshamsbury, was now nearly over – Messrs Slow & Bideawhile declared that it would never do for them to undertake alone to draw out the settlements. An heiress, such as Mary, must have lawyers of her own; half a dozen at least, according to the apparent opinion of Messrs Slow & Bideawhile. And so the doctor had to go to other lawyers, and they had again to consult Sir Abraham, and Mr Snilam on a dozen different heads.

If Frank became tenant in tail, in right of his wife, but under his father, would he be able to grant leases for more than twenty-one years? and, if so, to whom would the right of trover belong? As to flotsam and jetsam – there was a little property, Mr Critic, on the seashore – that was a matter that had to be left unsettled at the last. Such points as these do take a long time to consider. All this bewildered the doctor sadly, and Frank himself began to make accusations that he was to be done out of his wife altogether.

But, as we have said, there was one point on which Mary would have her own way. The lawyers might tie up as they would on her behalf all the money, and shares, and mortgages which had belonged to the late Sir Roger, with this exception, all that had ever appertained to Greshamsbury should belong to Greshamsbury again; not in perspective, not to her children, or to her children's children, but at once. Frank should be lord of Boxall Hill in his
own right; and as to those other
liens
on Greshamsbury, let Frank manage that with his father as he might think fit. She would only trouble herself to see that he was empowered to do as he did think fit.

‘But,' argued the ancient, respectable family attorney to the doctor, ‘that amounts to two-thirds of the whole estate. Two-thirds, Dr Thorne! It is preposterous; I should almost say impossible.' And the scanty hairs on the poor man's head almost stood on end as he thought of the outrageous manner in which the heiress prepared to sacrifice herself.

‘It will all be the same in the end,' said the doctor, trying to make things smooth. ‘Of course, their joint object will be to put the Greshamsbury property together again.'

‘But, my dear sir,' – and then, for twenty minutes, the lawyer went on proving that it would by no means be the same thing; but, nevertheless, Mary Thorne did have her own way.

In the course of the winter, Lady de Courcy tried very hard to induce the heiress to visit Courcy Castle, and this request was so backed by Lady Arabella, that the doctor said he thought she might as well go there for three or four days. But here, again, Mary was obstinate.

‘I don't see it at all,' she said. ‘If you make a point of it, or Frank, or Mr Gresham, I will go; but I can't see any possible reason.' The doctor, when so appealed to, would not absolutely say that he made a point of it, and Mary was tolerably safe as regarded Frank or the squire. If she went, Frank would be expected to go, and Frank disliked Courcy Castle almost more than ever. His aunt was now more than civil to him, and, when they were together, never ceased to compliment him on the desirable way in which he had done his duty by his family.