The Martins Of Cro' Martin, Vol. I (of II). Lever Charles James

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СКАЧАТЬ was but one individual alone in presence of whom he in reality felt his own inferiority deeply and painfully; strange to say, that was Miss Martin! At first sight this would seem almost unintelligible. She was not either a haughty beauty, presuming on the homage bestowed upon her by high and distinguished admirers, nor was she any greatly gifted and cultivated genius dominating over lesser intelligences by the very menace of her acquirements. She was simply a high-spirited, frank, unaffected girl, whose good breeding and good sense seemed alike instinctive, and who read with almost intuition the shallow artifices by which such natures as Scanlan’s impose upon the world. She had seen him easily indolent with her uncle, obsequiously deferential to my Lady, all in the same breath, while the side-look of tyranny he could throw a refractory tenant appeared just as congenial to his nature.

      It was some strange consciousness which told him he could not deceive her, that made Scanlan ever abashed in her presence, and by the self-same impulse was it that she was the only one in the world for whose good esteem he would have sacrificed all he possessed.

      While he waited for her coming, he took a leisurely survey of the room. The furniture, less costly and rich than at Cro’ Martin, was all marked by that air of propriety and comfort so observable in rich men’s houses. There were the hundred appliances of ease and luxury that show how carefully the most trifling inconveniences are warded off, and the course of daily life rendered as untroubled as mere material enjoyments can secure. Scanlan sighed deeply, for the thought crossed his mind how was a girl brought up in this way ever to stoop to ally her fortune to a man like him? Was it, then, possible that he nourished such a presumption? Even so. Maurice was of an aspiring turn; he had succeeded in twenty things that a dozen years past he had never dared to dream of. He had dined at tables and driven with men whose butlers and valets he once deemed very choice company; he had been the guest at houses where once his highest ambition had been to see the interior as a matter of curiosity. “Who could say where he might be at last?” Besides this, he knew from his own knowledge of family matters that she had no fortune, that her father was infinitely more likely to leave debts than an inheritance behind him, and that her uncle was the last man in the world ever to think of a marriage-portion for one he could not afford to part with. There was, then, no saying what turn of fortune might present him in an admissible form as a suitor. At all events, there was no rival in the field, and Maurice had seen many a prize won by a “walk over” purely for want of a competitor in the race.

      Notwithstanding all these very excellent and reassuring considerations, Maurice Scanlan could not overcome a most uncomfortable sense of awkwardness as Mary Martin entered the room, and saluting him with easy familiarity, said, “I’m quite ashamed of having made you wait, Mr. Scanlan; but I was in the village when I got my uncle’s message. I find that he is not well enough to receive you, and if I can – ”

      “I’m sure it’s only too much honor you do me, Miss Mary; I never expected to have the pleasure of this interview; indeed, it will be very hard for me to think of business, at all, at all.”

      “That would be most unfortunate after your coming so far on account of it,” said she, half archly, while she seated herself on a sofa at some distance from him.

      “If it were a question about the estate, Miss Mary,” said he, in his most obsequious manner, “there’s nobody equal to yourself; or if it were anything at all but what it is, I know well that you’d see your way out of it; but the present is a matter of politics, – it ‘s about the borough.”

      “That weary borough,” said she, sighing; “and are we about to have another election?”

      “That ‘s it, Miss Mary; and Lord Kilmorris writes me to say that he ‘ll be over next week, and hopes he ‘ll find all his friends here as well disposed towards him as ever.”

      “Has he written to my uncle?” asked Mary, hastily.

      “No; and that’s exactly what I came about. There was a kind of coldness, – more my Lady’s, I think, than on Mr. Martin’s part, – and Lord Kilmorris feels a kind of delicacy; in fact, he doesn’t rightly know how he stands at Cro’ Martin.” Here he paused, in hopes that she would help him by even a word; but she was perfectly silent and attentive, and he went on. “So that, feeling himself embarrassed, and at the same time knowing how much he owes to the Martin interest – ”

      “Well, go on,” said she, calmly, as he came a second time to a dead stop.

      “It isn’t so easy, then, Miss Mary,” said he, with a long sigh, “for there are so many things enter into it, – so much of politics and party and what not, – that I quite despair of making myself intelligible, though, perhaps, if I was to see your uncle, he ‘d make out my meaning.”

      “Shall I try and induce him to receive you, then?” said she, quietly.

      “Well, then, I don’t like asking it,” said he, doubtfully; “for, after all, there’s nobody can break it to him as well as yourself.”

      “Break it to him, Mr. Scanlan?” said she, in astonishment.

      “Faith, it ‘s the very word, then,” said he; “for do what one will, say what they may, it will be sure to surprise him, if it does no worse.”

      “You alarm me, sir; and yet I feel that if you would speak boldly out your meaning, there is probably no cause for fear.”

      “I’ll just do so, then, Miss Mary; but at the same time I ‘d have you to understand that I ‘m taking a responsibility on myself that his Lordship never gave me any warrant for, and that there is not another – ” Mr. Scanlan stopped, but only in time; for, whether it was the fervor in which he uttered these words, or that Miss Martin anticipated what was about to follow, her cheek became scarlet, and a most unmistakable expression of her eyes recalled the worthy practitioner to all his wonted caution. “The matter is this, Miss Martin,” said he, with a degree of deference more marked than before, “Lord Kilmorris is dissatisfied with the way your uncle supported him at the last election. He complains of the hard conditions imposed upon him as to his line of conduct in the House; and, above all, he feels insulted by a letter Lady Dorothea wrote him, full of very harsh expressions and hard insinuations. I never saw it myself, but that’s his account of it, – in fact, he’s very angry.”

      “And means to throw up the borough, in short,” broke in Mary.

      “I’m afraid not, Miss Mary,” said the other, in a half whisper.

      “What then? – what can he purpose doing?”

      “He means to try and come in on his own interest,” said Scanlan, who uttered the words with an effort, and seemed to feel relief when they were out.

      “Am I to understand that he would contest the borough with us?”

      Scanlan nodded an affirmative.

      “No, no, Mr. Scanlan, this is some mistake, – some misapprehension on your part. His Lordship may very possibly feel aggrieved, – he may have some cause, for aught I know, – about something in the last election, but this mode of resenting it is quite out of the question, – downright impossible.”

      “The best way is to read his own words. Miss Martin. There’s his letter,” said he, handing one towards her, which, however, she made no motion to take.

      “If you won’t read it, then, perhaps you will permit me to do so. It’s very short, too, for he says at the end he will write more fully to-morrow.” Mr. Scanlan here muttered over several lines of the epistle, until he came to the following: “I am relieved from any embarrassment I should have felt at breaking with the Martins by reflecting over the altered conditions СКАЧАТЬ