Plain Living. Rolf Boldrewood
a quick end, in the harbour, of the misery which was becoming unendurable. It shows that a man should never despair. There are always chances. Hundreds, as poor Hubert said. But shall I ever forget Barrington Hope and his kindness? No, or may God forget me in my need. And what a grand fellow he seems to be!”
Having satisfactorily finished his soliloquy, Mr. Stamford bethought himself that he would make a parting call upon his friends, the Grandisons. He was going home in a day or two now and should be tolerably busy, he knew by experience, what with commissions and other matters which he was but too apt to put off till the last moment.
The ladies were engaged. Mr. Grandison was, however, at home, and, as it turned out, not in that cheerful frame of mind which befitted so rich a man. He had the world’s goods in profusion, but as Stamford marked his anxious brow and perturbed countenance, he saw that something had gone wrong.
“Oh, it’s you, is it?” Mr. Grandison said. “I was afraid it was a young fellow just out from home – got letters to us – the Honourable Mr. Devereux; he’s not a bad chap, but I don’t feel up to talking to a youngster I never saw before and won’t see again after next week. Come into my den and have a yarn, Harold. I want to talk to you. And, I say, stop and have a quiet tête-à-tête dinner. They’re going out – Josie and her mother – to one of Ketten’s recitals, as they call it. I’m in no humour for musical humbug, I can tell you. I’m worried to death about that eldest boy of mine, Carlo. Stay, like a good fellow, and you can advise me. I’m fairly puzzled.”
This was a matter of charity, and old friendship besides. Stamford’s heart was touched at the spectacle of his old comrade troubled and in distress. He forgot the obtrusive magnificence, and thought of the long past days when they rode together beneath burning sky or winter storm, before one had found the road to fortune and the other had taken the bye-path which had only ended in happiness. “All right, Bob,” he answered. “You shall have all the help I can offer. I’m sorry you’ve cause to be uneasy about the boy. We must hope for the best though. Youthful imprudence is not so uncommon.”
“It’s worse than that,” said Mr. Grandison, gloomily – with a portentous shake of his head.
CHAPTER V
Just as dinner was announced, the carriage behind the grand three hundred guinea browns – perhaps the best pair in Sydney – rolled up to the door. Mrs. Grandison and Miss Josie fluttered down the stairs a few minutes afterwards in the full glory of evening costume. As host and guest stood in the hall, the lady of the house vouchsafed a slight explanation, mingled with faint regret that the latter was not coming with them.
“You know, Mr. Stamford, this is one of that dear Ketten’s last recitals. We really could not afford to miss it – especially as our friends, the Cranberrys, will be there. Lady C. sent a private message to Josie that she must go. I wanted to stop, for we really are miserable about that wicked boy Carlo; but Josie said it couldn’t make any difference to him, and why should we punish ourselves because he chose to be selfish and extravagant.”
Mr. Stamford could not wholly assent to these philosophical propositions. He thought of what Laura’s pleasure in hearing the musical magnate would have been on the same evening that Hubert had been declared a defaulter as to play debts, and was socially, if not legally, under a cloud.
He simply bowed coldly. Then he saw the pained maternal expression in Mrs. Grandison’s face, in spite of her worldliness and frivolity, and his heart smote him.
“My dear Mrs. Grandison,” he said, taking her hand, “I feel for you most deeply.”
Then suddenly came a voice from the carriage, in which Miss Josie had ensconced herself. “Mamma, I shall catch cold if we wait one moment longer. Hadn’t you better postpone your interesting talk with Mr. Stamford?”
Mrs. Grandison started, and then recovering herself, shook Mr. Stamford’s hand. “You will talk it over with Robert, won’t you? You are old friends, you know. Don’t let him be too hard on poor Carlo. I’m sure he has a good heart. Pray come and see us again before you leave.”
The portly form of his hostess moved off at a swifter rate than her appearance denoted. The footman banged the carriage door, and the grand equipage rattled out over the mathematically accurate curves of the drive. The dinner gong commenced to resound after a warlike and sudden fashion, and caused Mr. Stamford to betake himself hurriedly to the drawing-room. There he found Mr. Grandison standing by the fire-place in a meditative position.
Mr. Grandison turned at his friend’s entrance. “Seen Mrs. Grandison? Has she told you about it? Well, they’re gone now, and we can talk it over quietly. Come in to dinner. I’ve no appetite, God knows! but I want something to steady my nerves.”
The dinner, somewhat restricted for the occasion, was extremely good, though his host ate little, confining himself to a cutlet and some wonderful brown sherry. Not until the dessert was placed before them and they were alone did he begin the subject which lay so near to his heart.
“Of course I know, Stamford, that young fellows like my boy can’t be expected to live in a town like Sydney upon a screwy allowance – at any rate not if they are to be seen in good company. Therefore I’ve always said to Carlo, ‘Let me see you make your mark, and live like a gentleman. That’s all I ask of you, and you sha’n’t want for a hundred or two.’ I hadn’t got it to spend when I was his age – you know that, Harold; but if I like my youngster to be a bit different in some things, that’s my own affair, isn’t it, as long as I am willing to pay for it? Well that’s all right, you say. Take some of this claret, it won’t hurt you. It’s my own importation from Bordeaux. Of course I didn’t want the boy to slave in an office, nor yet to live in the bush year after year with nothing but station hands to talk to. If Mrs. Grandison had done what I wanted her to do, while the children were young, and lived quietly at Banyule, it might have been different. There we could have had everything comfortable; nearly as good as here. It would have been better for me, and them too, I expect. But she wouldn’t see it, and that’s why we’ve always lived in town.”
“Still,” interposed Stamford, “though you have been well enough off to afford to live where you pleased, I can’t imagine why Carlo should not keep the course and run straight, even in Sydney, like other young men of his age.”
Mr. Grandison sighed and filled his glass. “Some do, and some don’t, that’s about the size of it. I don’t know why the lad shouldn’t have enjoyed himself in reason like young Norman McAllister, Jack Staunton, Neil O’Donnell, and others that we know. They’ve always had lots of money, too; they’ve been home to the Old Country and knocked about by themselves, and I never heard that they’ve got into rows or overrun the constable. How my boy should have made such a fool of himself with a father that’s always stuck well to him, I can’t think. I’m afraid we’ve thought too much of his swell friends’ names and families, and not enough of their principles. I’ve told my wife that before now.”
“But what has he done?” asked Stamford. “If it’s a matter of a few thousands, you can settle that easily enough – particularly now we’ve had rain,” continued he, introducing the pleasantry as a slight relief to his friend’s self-reproachful strain.
“Yes, of course, I can do that, thank God! rain or no rain, though it made a matter of thirty thousand profit to me on those back Dillandra blocks – more than that. I shouldn’t care if the money was all; but this is how it is. I may as well bring it straight out. It seems that Carlo and Captain Maelstrom (d – n him! – I never liked a bone in his body) and some others were playing loo last week with a young fellow whose father had just died and left him a lot of money. The stakes ran up high – a deal higher than the club committee would have allowed if they’d known about it. Well, just at first they had it all their own way. This young chap was a long way to the bad – thousands, they say. Then the luck turned, and after that they never held a card. He played a bold game, and the end of it was that Carlo and the Captain were ten thousand out, and of course neither of them able to pay up. The Captain managed to get time, but Carlo, like a fool, went straight off and said nothing about it. He was afraid to come to me, it seems, as we’d had a row last time; so he did the very worst thing he could