Demos. George Gissing

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СКАЧАТЬ nay, since his grandfather’s time. That grandfather—his name Hubert—had combined strong intellectual tendencies with the extravagant tastes which gave his already tottering house the decisive push. The large collection of superbly-bound books which this room contained were nearly all of his purchasing, for prior to his time the Eldons had not been wont to concern themselves with things of the mind. Hubert, after walking to the window and looking out for a moment on the side lawn, pushed a small couch near to the fireplace, and threw himself down at full length, his hands beneath his head. In a moment his position seemed to have become uneasy; he turned upon his side, uttering an exclamation as if of pain. A minute or two and again he moved, this time with more evident impatience. The next thing he did was to rise, step to the bell, and ring it violently.

      The same servant appeared.

      ‘Isn’t the bath ready?’ Hubert asked. His former mode of speaking had been brief and decided; he was now almost imperious.

      ‘I believe it will be in a moment, sir,’ was the reply, marked, perhaps, by just a little failure in the complete subservience expected.

      Hubert looked at the man for an instant with contracted brows, but merely said—‘Tell them to be quick.’

      The man returned in less than three minutes with a satisfactory announcement, and Eldon went upstairs to refresh himself.

      Two hours later he had dined, with obvious lack of appetite, and was deriving but slight satisfaction from a cigar, when the servant entered with a message from Mrs. Eldon: she desired to see her son.

      Hubert threw his cigar aside, and made a gesture expressing his wish to be led to his mother’s room. The man conducted him to the landing at the head of the first flight of stairs; there a female servant was waiting, who, after a respectful movement, led the way to a door at a few yards’ distance. She opened it and drew back. Hubert passed into the room.

      It was furnished in a very old-fashioned style—heavily, richly, and with ornaments seemingly procured rather as evidences of wealth than of taste; successive Mrs. Eldons had used it as a boudoir. The present lady of that name sat in a great chair near the fire. Though not yet fifty, she looked at least ten years older; her hair had streaks of white, and her thin delicate features were much lined and wasted. It would not be enough to say that she had evidently once been beautiful, for in truth she was so still, with a spiritual beauty of a very rare type. Just now her face was set in a sternness which did not seem an expression natural to it; the fine lips were much more akin to smiling sweetness, and the brows accepted with repugnance anything but the stamp of thoughtful charity.

      After the first glance at Hubert she dropped her eyes. He, stepping quickly across the floor, put his lips to her cheek; she did not move her head, nor raise her hand to take his.

      ‘Will you sit there, Hubert?’ she said, pointing to a chair which was placed opposite hers. The resemblance between her present mode of indicating a wish and her son’s way of speaking to the servant below was very striking; even the quality of their voices had much in common, for Hubert’s was rather high-pitched. In face, however, the young man did not strongly evidence their relation to each other: he was not handsome, and had straight low brows, which made his aspect at first forbidding.

      ‘Why have you not come to me before this?’ Mrs. Eldon asked when her son had seated himself, with his eyes turned upon the fire.

      ‘I was unable to, mother. I have been ill.’

      She cast a glance at him. There was no doubting the truth of what he said; at this moment he looked feeble and pain-worn.

      ‘Where did your illness come upon you?’ she asked, her tone unsoftened.

      ‘In Germany. I started only a few hours after receiving the letter in which you told me of the death.’

      ‘My other letters you paid no heed to?’

      ‘I could not reply to them.’

      He spoke after hesitation, but firmly, as one does who has something to brave out.

      ‘It would have been better for you if you had been able, Hubert. Your refusal has best you dear.’

      He looked up inquiringly.

      ‘Mr. Mutimer,’ his mother continued, a tremor in her voice, ‘destroyed his will a day or two before he died.’

      Hubert said nothing. His fingers, looked together before him, twitched a little; his face gave no sign.

      ‘Had you come to me at once,’ Mrs. Eldon pursued, ‘had you listened to my entreaties, to my commands’—her voice rang right queenly—‘this would not have happened. Mr. Mutimer behaved as generously as he always has. As soon as there came to him certain news of you, he told me everything. I refused to believe what people were saying, and he too wished to do so. He would not write to you himself; there was one all sufficient test, he held, and that was a summons from your mother. It was a test of your honour, Hubert—and you failed under it.’

      He made no answer.

      ‘You received my letters?’ she went on to ask. ‘I heard you had gone from England, and could only hope your letters would be forwarded. Did you get them?’

      ‘With the delay of only a day or two.’

      ‘And deliberately you put me aside?’

      ‘I did.’

      She looked at him now for several moments. Her eyes grew moist. Then she resumed, in a lower voice—

      ‘I said nothing of what was at stake, though I knew. Mr. Mutimer was perfectly open with me. “I have trusted him implicitly,” he said, “because I believe him as staunch and true as his brother. I make no allowances for what are called young man’s follies: he must be above anything of that kind. If he is not—well, I have been mistaken in him, and I can’t deal with him as I wish to do.” You know what he was, Hubert, and you can imagine him speaking those words. We waited. The bad news was confirmed, and from you there came nothing. I would not hint at the loss you were incurring; of my own purpose I should have refrained from doing so, and Mr. Mutimer forbade me to appeal to anything but your better self. If you would not come to me because I wished it, I could not involve you and myself in shame by seeing you yield to sordid motives.’

      Hubert raised his head. A choking voice kept him silent for a moment only.

      ‘Mother, the loss is nothing to you; you are above regrets of that kind; and for myself, I am almost glad to have lost it.’

      ‘In very truth,’ answered the mother, ‘I care little about the wealth you might have possessed. What I do care for is the loss of all the hopes I had built upon you. I thought you honour itself; I thought you high-minded. Young as you are, I let you go from me without a fear. Hubert, I would have staked my life that no shadow of disgrace would ever fall upon your head! You have taken from me the last comfort of my age.’

      He uttered words she could not catch.

      ‘The purity of your soul was precious to me,’ she continued, her accents struggling against weakness; ‘I thought I had seen in you a love of that chastity without which a man is nothing; and I ever did my best to keep your eyes upon a noble ideal of womanhood. You have fallen. The simpler duty, the point of every-day honour, I could not suppose that you would fail in. From the day when you came of age, when Mr. Mutimer spoke to you, saying that in every respect you would be as his son, and you, for your part, accepted what he offered, you owed it to him to respect the СКАЧАТЬ