The Way We Live Now (106 page)

But on that side too there would be terrible bitterness. How would she have fallen from her greatness when, barely forgiven by her father and mother for the vile sin which she had contemplated, she should consent to fill a common bridesmaid place at the nuptials of George Whitstable! And what would then be left to her in life? This episode of the Jew would make it quite impossible for her again to contest the question of the London house with her father. Lady Pomona and Mrs George Whitstable would be united with him against her. There would
be no ‘season' for her, and she would be nobody at Caversham. As for London, she would hardly wish to go there! Everybody would know the story of the Jew. She thought that she could have plucked up courage to face the world as the Jew's wife, but not as the young woman who had wanted to marry the Jew and had failed. How would her future life go with her, should she now make up her mind to retire from the proposed alliance? If she could get her father to take her abroad at once, she would do it; but she was not now in a condition to make any terms with her father. As all this gradually passed through her mind, she determined that she would so far take Mr Brehgert's advice as to postpone her answer till she had well considered the matter.

She slept upon it, and the next day she asked her mother a few questions. ‘Mamma, have you any idea what papa means to do?'

‘In what way, my dear?' Lady Pomona's voice was not gracious, as she was free from that fear of her daughter's ascendancy which had formerly affected her.

‘Well; – I suppose he must have some plan.'

‘You must explain yourself. I don't know why he should have any particular plan.'

‘Will he go to London next year?'

‘That will depend upon money, I suppose. What makes you ask?'

‘Of course I have been very cruelly circumstanced. Everybody must see that. I'm sure you do, mamma. The long and the short of it is this – if I give up my engagement, will he take us abroad for a year?'

‘Why should he?'

‘You can't suppose that I should be very comfortable in England. If we are to remain here at Caversham, how am I to hope ever to get settled?'

‘Sophy is doing very well.'

‘Oh, mamma, there are not two George Whitstables – thank God.' She had meant to be humble and supplicating, but she could not restrain herself from the use of that one shaft. ‘I don't mean but what Sophy may be very happy, and I am sure that I hope she will. But that won't do me any good. I should be very unhappy here.'

‘I don't see how you are to find any one to marry you by going abroad,' said Lady Pomona, ‘and I don't see why your papa is to be taken away from his own home. He likes Caversham.'

‘Then I am to be sacrificed on every side,' said Georgey, stalking out of the room. But still she could not make up her mind what letter she would write to Mr Brehgert, and she slept upon it another night.

On the next day after breakfast she did write her letter, though when she sat down to her task she had not clearly made up her mind what she would say. But she did get it written, and here it is.

‘Caverrbam, Monday
.

‘MY DEAR MR BREHGERT,

‘As you told me not to hurry, I have taken a little time to think about your letter. Of course it would be very disagreeable to quarrel with papa and mamma and everybody. And if I do do so, I'm sure somebody ought to be very grateful. But papa has been very unfair in what he has said. As to not asking him, it could have been of no good, for of course he would be against it. He thinks a great deal of the Longestaffe family, and so, I suppose, ought I. But the world does change so quick that one doesn't think of anything now as one used to do. Any way, I don't feel that Fm bound to do what papa tells me just because he says it. Though I'm not quite so old as you seem to think, I'm old enough to judge for myself, – and I mean to do so. You say very little about affection, but I suppose I am to take all that for granted.

‘I don't wonder at papa being annoyed about the loss of the money. It must be a very great sum when it will prevent your having a house in London – as you agreed. It does make a great difference, because, of course, as you have no regular place in the country, one could only see one's friends in London. Fulham is all very well now and then, but I don't think I should like to live at Fulham all the year through. You talk of three years, which would be dreadful. If as you say it will not have any lasting effect, could you not manage to have a house in town? If you can do it in three years, I should think you could do it now. I should like to have an answer to this question. I do think so much about being the season in town!

‘As for the other parts of your letter, I knew very well beforehand that papa would be unhappy about it But I don't know why I'm to let that stand in my way when so very little is done to make me happy. Of course you will write to me again, and I hope you will say something satisfactory about the house in London.

‘Yours always sincerely,

‘GEORGIANA LONGESTAFFE.'

It probably never occurred to Georgey that Mr Breghert would under any circumstances be anxious to go back from his engagement. She so fully recognized her own value as a Christian lady of high birth and
position giving herself to a commercial Jew, that she thought that under any circumstances Mr Brehgert would be only too anxious to stick to his bargain. Nor had she any idea that there was anything in her letter which could probably offend him. She thought that she might at any rate make good her claim to the house in London; and that as there were other difficulties on his side, he would yield to her on this point But as yet she hardly knew Mr Brehgert He did not lose a day in sending to her a second letter. He took her letter with him to his office in the City, and there answered it without a moment's delay.

‘
No.7, St Cutbbert's Court, London
,
‘
Tuesday, July 16, 18
—.

‘
MY DEAR MISS LONGESTAFFE,

‘You say it would be very disagreeable to you to quarrel with your papa and mamma; and as I agree with you, I will take your letter as concluding our intimacy. I should not, however, be dealing quite fairly with you or with myself if I gave you to understand that I felt myself to be coerced to this conclusion simply by your qualified assent to your parents' views. It is evident to me from your letter that you would not wish to be my wife unless I can supply you with a house in town as well as with one in the country. But this for the present is out of my power. I would not have allowed my losses to interfere with your settlement because I had stated a certain income; and must therefore to a certain extent have compromised my children. But I should not have been altogether happy till I had replaced them in their former position, and must therefore have abstained from increased expenditure till I had done so. But of course I have no right to ask you to share with me the discomfort of a single home. I may perhaps add that I had hoped that you would have looked to your happiness to another source, and that I will bear my disappointment as best I may.

‘As you may perhaps under these circumstances be unwilling that I should wear the ring you gave me, I return it by post. I trust you will be good enough to keep the trifle you were pleased to accept from me, in remembrance of one who will always wish you well.

‘Yours sincerely,
‘
EZEKIEL BREHGERT.
'

And so it was all over! Georgey, when she read this letter, was very indignant at her lover's conduct She did not believe that her own letter had at all been of a nature to warrant it She had regarded herself as
being quite sure of him, and only so far doubting herself, as to be able to make her own terms because of such doubts. And now the Jew had rejected her! She read this last letter over and over again, and the more she read it the more she felt that in her heart of hearts she had intended to marry him. There would have been inconveniences no doubt, but they would have been less than the sorrow on the other side. Now she saw nothing before her but a long vista of Caversham dulness, in which she would be trampled upon by her father and mother, and scorned by Mr and Mrs George Whitstable.

She got up and walked about the room thinking of vengeance. But what vengeance was possible to her? Everybody belonging to her would take the part of the Jew in that which he had now done. She could not ask Dolly to beat him; nor could she ask her father to visit him with the stern frown of paternal indignation. There could be no revenge. For a time – only for a few seconds – she thought that she would write to Mr Brehgert and tell him that she had not intended to bring about this termination of their engagement. This, no doubt, would have been an appeal to the Jew for mercy – and she could not quite descend to that. But she would keep the watch and chain he had given her, and which somebody had told her had not cost less than a hundred and fifty guineas. She could not wear them, as people would know whence they had come; but she might exchange them for jewels which she could wear.

At lunch she said nothing to her sister, but in the course of the afternoon she thought it best to inform her mother. ‘Mamma,' she said, ‘as you and papa take it so much to heart, I have broken off everything with Mr Brehgert.'

‘Of course it must be broken off,' said Lady Pomona. This was very ungracious – so much so that Georgey almost flounced out of the room. ‘Have you heard from the man?' asked her ladyship.

‘I have written to him, and he has answered me; and it is all settled. I thought that you would have said something kind to me.' And the unfortunate young woman burst out into tears.

‘It was so dreadful,' said Lady Pomona – ‘so very dreadful. I never heard of anything so bad. When young what's-his-name married the tallow-chandler's daughter I thought it would have killed me if it had been Dolly; but this was worse than that. Her father was a methodist.'

‘They had neither of them a shilling of money,' said Georgey through her tears.

‘And your papa says this man was next door to a bankrupt But it's all over?'

‘Yes, mamma.'

‘And now we must all remain here at Caversham till people forget it. It has been very hard upon George Whitstable, because of course everybody has known it through the county. I once thought he would have been off, and I really don't know that we could have said anything.' At that moment Sophy entered the room. ‘It's all over between Georgiana and the – man,' said Lady Pomona, who hardly saved herself from stigmatizing him by a further reference to his religion.

‘I knew it would be,' said Sophia.

‘Of course it could never have really taken place,' said their mother.

‘And now I beg that nothing more may be said about it,' said Georgiana. ‘I suppose, mamma, you will write to papa?'

‘You must send him back his watch and chain, Georgey,' said Sophia.

‘What business is that of yours?'

‘Of course she must. Her papa would not let her keep it.'

To such a miserable depth of humility had the younger Miss Longe-staffe been brought by her ill-considered intimacy with the Melmottes! Georgiana, when she looked back on this miserable episode in her life, always attributed her grief to the scandalous breach of compact of which her father had been guilty.

Our poor old honest friend John Crumb was taken away to durance vile after his performance in the street with Sir Felix, and was locked up for the remainder of the night. This indignity did not sit so heavily on his spirits as it might have done on those of a quicker nature. He was aware that he had not killed the baronet, and that he had therefore enjoyed his revenge without the necessity of ‘swinging for it at Bury'. That in itself was a comfort to him. Then it was a great satisfaction to think that he had ‘served the young man out' in the actual presence of his Ruby. He was not prone to give himself undue credit for his capability and willingness to knock his enemies about; but he did think that Ruby must have observed on this occasion that he was the better man of the two. And, to John, a night in the station-house was no great personal
inconvenience. Though he was very proud of his four-post bed at home, he did not care very much for such luxuries as far as he himself was concerned. Nor did he feel any disgrace from being locked up for the night. He was very good-humoured with the policeman, who seemed perfectly to understand his nature, and was as meek as a child when the lock was turned upon him. As he lay down on the hard bench, he comforted himself with thinking that Ruby would surely never care any more for the ‘baronite' since she had seen him go down like a cur without striking a blow. He thought a good deal about Ruby, but never attributed any blame to her for her share in the evils that had befallen him.

The next morning he was taken before the magistrates, but was told at an early hour of the day that he was again free. Sir Felix was not much the worse for what had happened to him, and had refused to make any complaint against the man who had beaten him. John Crumb shook hands cordially with the policeman who had had him in charge, and suggested beer. The constable, with regrets, was forced to decline and bade adieu to his late prisoner with the expression of a hope that they might meet again before long. ‘You come down to Bungay,' said John, ‘and I'll show you how we live there.'

From the police-office he went direct to Mrs Pipkin's house, and at once asked for Ruby. He was told that Ruby was out with the children, and was advised both by Mrs Pipkin and Mrs Hurtle not to present himself before Ruby quite yet. ‘You see,' said Mrs Pipkin, ‘she's a thinking how heavy you were upon that young gentleman.'

‘But I wasn't – not particular. Lord love you, he ain't a hair the wuss.'

‘You let her alone for a time,' said Mrs Hurtle. ‘A little neglect will do her good.'