The Eustace Diamonds (78 page)

‘Good-bye, Lizzie.'

‘Mr Camperdown, I have the honour to wish you good morning.' And Lizzie made a low curtsey to the lawyer, and was then attended to her carriage by the lawyer's clerk. She had certainly come forth from the interview without fresh wounds.

‘The barrister who will have the cross-examining of her at the Central Criminal Court,' said Mr Camperdown, as soon as the door was closed behind her, ‘will have a job of work on his hand. There's nothing a pretty woman can't do when she has got rid of all sense of shame.'

‘She is a very great woman,' said John Eustace – ‘a very great woman; and, if the sex could have its rights, would make an excellent lawyer.' In the meantime Lizzie Eustace returned home to Hertford Street in triumph.

*       *       *       

‘This was to be the last week of her sojourn in town, and then she was to go down and bury herself at Portray, with no other companionship than that of the faithful Macnulty, who had been left in Scotland for the last three months as nurse-in-chief to the little heir! She must go and give her evidence before the magistrate on Friday, as to which she had already received an odious slip of paper; – but Frank would accompany her. Other misfortunes had passed off so lightly that she hardly dreaded this. She did not quite understand why she was to be so banished, and thought much on the subject. She had submitted herself to Frank's advice when first she had begun to fear that her troubles would be insuperable. Her troubles were now disappearing; and, as for Frank – what was Frank to her, that she should obey him? Nevertheless her trunks were being already packed, and she knew that she must go. He was to accompany her on her journey, and she would still have one more chance with him.

As she was thinking of all this, Mr Emilius, the clergyman, was announced. In her loneliness she was delighted to receive any visitor, and she knew that Mr Emilius would be at least courteous to her. When he had seated himself, he at once began to talk about the misfortune of the unaccomplished marriage, and in a very low voice hinted that, from beginning to end, there had been something wrong. He had always feared that an alliance based on a footing that was so openly ‘pecuniary' – he declared that the word pecuniary expressed his meaning better than any other epithet – could not lead to matrimonial happiness. ‘We all know,' said he, ‘that our dear friend, Mrs Carbuncle, had views of her own quite distinct from her niece's happiness. I have the greatest possible respect for Mrs Carbuncle – and I may say esteem; but it is impossible to live long in any degree of intimacy with Mrs Carbuncle without seeing that she is – mercenary.'

‘Mercenary; – indeed she is,' said Lizzie.

‘You have observed it? Oh yes; it is so, and it casts a shadow over a character which otherwise has so much to charm.'

‘She is the most insolent and the most ungrateful woman that I ever heard of!' exclaimed Lizzie, with energy. Mr Emilius opened his eyes, but did not contradict her assertion. ‘As you have mentioned her name, Mr Emilius, I must tell you. I have done everything for that woman. You know how I treated her down in Scotland.'

‘With a splendid hospitality,' said Mr Emilius.

‘Of course she did not pay for anything there.'

‘Oh no.' The idea of anyone being called upon to pay for what one ate and drank at a friend's house, was peculiarly painful to Mr Emilius.

‘And I have paid for everything here. That is to say, we have made an arrangement, very much in her favour. And she has borrowed large sums of money from me.'

‘I am not at all surprised at that,' said Mr Emilius.

‘And when that unfortunate girl, her niece, was to be married to poor Sir Griffin Tewett, I gave her a whole service of plate.'

‘What unparalleled generosity!'

‘Would you believe she has taken the whole for her own base purposes? And then what do you think she has done?'

‘My dear Lady Eustace, hardly anything would astonish me.'

Lizzie suddenly found a difficulty in describing to her friend the fact that Mrs Carbuncle was endeavouring to turn her out of the house, without also alluding to her own troubles about the robbery. ‘she has actually told me,' she continued, ‘that I must leave the house without a day's warning. But I believe the truth is, that she has run so much into debt that she cannot remain.'

‘I know that she is very much in debt, Lady Eustace.'

‘But she owed me some civility. Instead of that, she has treated me with nothing but insolence. And why, do you think? It is all because I would not allow her to take that poor insane young woman to Portray Castle.'

‘You don't mean that she asked to go there?'

'she did, though.'

‘I never heard such impertinence in my life – never,' said Mr Emilius, again opening his eyes and shaking his head.

‘She proposed that I should ask them both down to Portray, for – for – of course it would have been almost for ever. I don't know how I should have got rid of them. And that poor young woman is mad, you know; – quite mad. She never recovered herself after that morning. Oh – what I have suffered about that unhappy marriage, and the cruel, cruel way in which Mrs Carbuncle urged it on. Mr Emilius, you can't conceive the scenes which have been acted in this house during the last month. It has been dreadful. I wouldn't go through such a time again for anything that could be offered to me. It has made me so ill that I am obliged to go down to Scotland to recruit my health.'

‘I heard that you were going to Scotland, and I wished to have an opportunity of saying – just a word to you, in private, before you go.' Mr Emilius had thought a good deal about this interview, and had prepared himself for it with considerable care. He knew, with tolerable accuracy, the whole story of the necklace, having discussed it with Mrs Carbuncle, who, as the reader will remember, had been told the tale by Lord George. He was aware of the
engagement with Lord Fawn, and of the growing intimacy which had existed between Lord George and Lizzie. He had been watchful, diligent, patient, and had at last become hopeful. When he learned that his beloved was about to start for Scotland, he felt that it would be well that he should strike a blow before she went. As to a journey down to Ayrshire, that would be nothing to one so enamoured as was Mr Emilius; and he would not scruple to show himself at the castle door without invitation. Whatever may have been his deficiencies, Mr Emilius did not lack the courage needed to carry such an enterprise as this to a happy conclusion. As far as pluck and courage might serve a man, he was well served by his own gifts. He could, without a blush or a quiver in his voice, have asked a duchess to marry him, with ten times Lizzie's income. He had now considered deeply whether, with the view of prevailing, it would be better that he should allude to the lady's trespasses in regard to the diamonds, or that he should pretend to be in ignorance; and he had determined that ultimate success might, with most probability, be achieved by a bold declaration of the truth. ‘I know how desperately you must be in want of some one to help you through your troubles, and I know also that your grand lovers will avoid you because of what you have done, and therefore you had better take me at once. Take me, and I'll bring you through everything. Refuse me, and I'll help to crush you.' Such were the arguments which Mr Emilius had determined to use, and such the language – of course, with some modifications. He was now commencing his work, and was quite resolved to leave no stone unturned in carrying it to a successful issue. He drew his chair nearer to Lizzie as he announced his desire for a private interview, and leaned over towards her with his two hands closed together between his knees. He was a dark, hookey-nosed, well-made man, with an exuberance of greasy hair, who would have been considered handsome by many women, had there not been something, almost amounting to a squint, amiss with one of his eyes. When he was preaching, it could hardly be seen, but in the closeness of private conversation it was disagreeable.

‘Oh – indeed!' said Lizzie, with a look of astonishment, perfectly
well assumed. She had already begun to consider whether, after all, Mr Emilius – would do.

‘Yes; – Ladv Eustace; it is so. You and I have known each other now for many months, and I have received the most unaffected pleasure from the acquaintance – may I not say from the intimacy which has sprung up between us?' Lizzie did not forbid the use of the pleasant word, but merely bowed. ‘I think that, as a devoted friend and a clergyman, I shall not be thought to be intruding on private ground in saying that circumstances have made me aware of the details of the robberies by which you have been so cruelly persecuted.' So the man had come about the diamonds, and not to make an offer! Lizzie raised her eyebrows and bowed her head, with the slightest possible motion.

‘I do not know how far your friends or the public may condemn you, but –'

‘My friends don't condemn me at all, sir.'

‘I am so glad to hear it!'

‘Nobody has dared to condemn me, except this impudent woman here, who wants an excuse for not paying me what she owes me.'

‘I am delighted. I was going to explain that although I am aware you have infringed the letter of the law, and made yourself liable to proceedings which may, perhaps, be unpleasant –'

‘I ain't liable to anything unpleasant at all, Mr Emilius.'

‘Then my mind is greatly relieved. I was about to remark, having heard in the outer world that there were those who ventured to accuse you of – of perjury –'

‘Nobody has dared to accuse me of anything. What makes you come here and say such things?'

‘Ah – Lady Eustace. It is because these calumnies are spoken so openly behind your back.'

‘Who speaks them? Mrs Carbuncle, and Lord George Car-ruthers; – my enemies.'

Mr Emilius was beginning to feel that he was not making progress. ‘I was on the point of observing to you that according to the view of the matter which I, as a clergyman, have taken, you were altogether justified in the steps which you took for the
protection of property which was your own, but which had been attacked by designing persons.'

‘Of course I was justified,' said Lizzie.

‘You know best, Lady Eustace, whether any assistance I can offer will avail you anything.'

‘I don't want any assistance – Mr Emilius – thank you.'

‘I certainly have been given to understand that they who ought to stand by you with the closest devotion have, in this period of what I may, perhaps, call – tribulation, deserted your side with cold selfishness.'

‘But there isn't any tribulation, and nobody has deserted my side.'

‘I was told that Lord Fawn –'

‘Lord Fawn is an idiot.'

‘Quite so; – no doubt.'

‘And I have deserted him. I wrote to him this very morning, in answer to a pressing letter from him to renew our engagement, to tell him that that was out of the question. I despise Lord Fawn, and my heart never can be given where my respect does not accompany it.'

‘A noble sentiment, Lady Eustace, which I reciprocate completely. And now, to come to what I may call the inner purport of my visit to you this morning, the sweet cause of my attendance on you, let me assure you that I should not now offer you my heart, unless with my heart went the most perfect respect and esteem which any man ever felt for a woman.' Mr Emilius had found the necessity of coming to the point by some direct road, as the lady had refused to allow him to lead up to it in the manner he had proposed to himself. He still thought that what he had said might be efficacious, as he did not for a moment believe her assertions as to her own friends, and the non-existence of any trouble as to the oaths which she had falsely sworn. But she carried the matter with a better courage than he had expected to find, and drove him out of his intended line of approach. He had, however, seized his opportunity without losing much time.

‘What on earth do you mean, Mr Emilius?' she said.

‘I mean to lay my heart, my hand, my fortunes, my profession,
my career at your feet. I make bold to say of myself that I have, by my own unaided eloquence and intelligence, won for myself a great position in this swarming metropolis. Lady Eustace, I know your great rank. I feel your transcendent beauty – ah, too acutely. I have been told that you are rich. But I, myself, who ventured to approach you, as a suitor for your hand, am also somebody in the world. The blood that runs in my veins is as illustrious as your own, having descended to me from the great and ancient nobles of my native country. The profession which I have adopted is the grandest which ever filled the heart of man with aspirations. I have barely turned my thirty-second year, and I am known as the greatest preacher of my day, though I preach in a language which is not my own. Your House of Lords would be open to me as a spiritual peer, would I condescend to come to terms with those who crave the assistance which I could give them. I can move the masses. I can touch the hearts of men. And in this great assemblage of mankind which you call London, I can choose my own society among the highest of the land. Lady Eustace, will you share with me my career and my fortunes? I ask you, because you are the only woman whom my heart has stooped to love.'

The man was a nasty, greasy, lying, squinting Jew preacher; an impostor, over forty years of age, whose greatest social successes had been achieved when, through the agency of Mrs Carbuncle, he made his way into Portray Castle. He was about as near an English mitre as had been that great man of a past generation, the Deputy Shepherd.
²
He was a creature to loathe – because he was greasy, and a liar, and an impostor. But there was a certain manliness in him. He was not afraid of the woman; and in pleading his cause with her he could stand up for himself courageously. He had studied his speech, and having studied it, he knew how to utter the words. He did not blush, nor stammer, nor cringe. Of grandfather or grandmother belonging to himself he had probably never heard, but he could so speak of his noble ancestors as to produce belief in Lizzie's mind. And he almost succeeded in convincing her that he was, by the consent of mankind, the greatest preacher of the day. While he was
making his speech she almost liked his squint. She certainly liked the grease and nastiness. Presuming, as she naturally did, that something of what he said was false, she liked the lies. There was a dash of poetry about him; and poetry, as she thought, was not compatible with humdrum truth. A man, to be a man in her eyes, should be able to swear that all his geese are swans; – should be able to reckon his swans by the dozen, though he have not a feather belonging to him, even from a goose's wing. She liked his audacity; and then, when he was making love, he was not afraid of talking out boldly about his heart. Nevertheless he was only Mr Emilius, the clergyman; and she had means of knowing that his income was not generous. Though she admired his manner and his language, she was quite aware that he was in pursuit of her money. And from the moment in which she first understood his object, she was resolved that she would never become the wife of Mr Emilius as long as there was a hope as to Frank Greystock.