MARIETTA'S MARRIAGE

Evening Star, Issue 10339, 12 June 1897, Page 1 (Supplement)

MARIETTA'S MARRIAGE

[By W. E. Nobris.]

[COPYEIOHT.]

CHAPTER XVII. THE NFAV REGIME.

Some of us who are quite the reverse of young remember that, in our schoolroom days, we were made to commit to memory a touching little poem, the opening stanza of which described her Most Gracious Majesty (to whom Heaven grant many more years r.f health!) as having " wept to wear a crown"; and, indeed, it must be owned that, eveu under a constitutional form of government, a crown is rather too heavy a head-gear to be comfortable. A coronet, on the other hand, may, as a rule, be made to fit ju?t as lightly and loosely as the wearer pleases, and as it is apt to be accompanied by numerous contingent advantages those who succeed thereto are seldom looked upon as fit subjects for pity by their friends. Nevertheless the wail of the extinguished politician has latterly made itself heard more than once from the lips of promoted heirs-apparenf, and if ever anybody had cause to lament his abrupt elevation to the Upper House assuredly that mm was Lionel Mallet.

Already rich and a large landed proprietor, he could gain nothing fiom the Middle wood estates, save additional worry; public life had begun to fascinate him j he had made such a start in it as, by common consent, justified him in looking forward to office at no distant date; and now, by the caprice of destiny, he found himself condemned on a sudden to a career of more or less dignified obscurity. When to this is added, what was the simple truth, that the loss of his father was a very real grief to bim, it will be perceived the many massaees of condolence which awaited him at Middlewood had not been despatched to the wrong address.

It was to Ludworth that he was summoned by telegraph ; but on the succeeding day ho, with his wife and his pister, moved *o the huge, gloomy house which was now his, and whither the remains of the late owner were at the same time transported. The obsequies which followed were attended by a vast assemblage of relatives and friends, most of whom had to be accommodated for a night, and there were, of course, many matters of business to be transacted ; so that it was not for some little time that the new Lady Middlewood (who, to tel! the truth, rather enjoyed the sensation of being a viscountess) found an opportunity fjr the quiet exchange of ideas with her husband.

"You look quite ill," she began one morning; " I should never have thought that you would take this so much to heart."

"Did you think that I shouldn't care?"' asked Lionel. 1

" Oh, I knew you would be sorry ; we are all very sorry—and it was so dreadfully sudden, too ! But—well, you are not much given to looking at the dark side of things, are you ? Vou haven't a great deal of sympathy with such unfortunate beings as I am, who sink into despondency upon the smallest provocation, or even without provocation at all. Not that I blame you for that; I only wish I were like you !" He understood that he was baing reproached for having neglected her, and lie made hasto to express penitence. "I ought not to have gone to Goodwood—Heaven knows I wish I hadn't!—and I am afraid I have been behaving all this time as if you were strong and well, whereas I nv'ght have known that you were io no state to bear all that has been laid upon your shoulders. But there have been such heaps i-f things to think about ! Are you feeling HI, Marietta!"

She was feeling quite well, and she said so; but she wanted seme little police to be taken of her, and she also wanted lier husband to l.iok a little less harassed and woe-begom. Her queer, eaprieiou 3 , jealous temperament led her to dtteet something like a personal slight in his grief; and Lionel scarcely mended matters when he explained that, considerations of naturd affection apart, the t>v<nt which had happened was a most unfortunate one for him.

"I really can'c see why it should make all that difference," she said, rather petulantly; "you will be in Parliament just the same, whether you sit in the House of Lords or the House of Commons ; Mid if you are si ambitious—bat it never seems to me that you have any real ambition—surely you arc a greater m.iu now than you were before poor Lord Middlswood died !" Lionel smiled and shook his head. , " Well, at all events, we are richer," she persisted, " and of higher rank." " We shall go into dinner for the future before some people whom we used to follow, no doubt. As for being richer, lam not so sure. You know, I suppose, that I only succeed to the entailed property; my father left everything that he could—aud quite rightly—to Betty." Marietta had not been aware of that, and the news did not altogether please ber. "Betty is a great heiress, then?" she said.

" Very much so; for it may be taken as certain that she will inherit my grandmother's money. I wish she were not obliged to turn out of her old home and go to Chelton, poor child ! But that, I am afraid, is unavoidable."

Marietta did not respond to the appeal which was visible in her husband's eyes. She was fond of Betty, but she knew the young lady to be of a masterful disposition, and there would be obvious objections to her remaining in a house where she had once borne rule.

For the rest, those objections were perfectly patent to Betty, whose common sense did not need to be reinforced by the behests of Lady Maria. " I should be in everybody's way, including my own, here," she told her brother; " and I shall be a posit : ve godsend to franny, who is so lonely and miserable that do believe she would end by marrying Mr Grace if 6he were left to her own devices. So you see I owe it to myself to go and keep her under proper control." Betty, after the first violence of her grief had spent itself, strove gallantly to resume the style of speech and bearing to which all who knew her were accustomed; but her efforts were not rewarded with any striking success, and it was a very sad and sobered little lady who presently set forth for Cheltou to open a fresh chapter in life. That her father's will had made her rich, and would in a few years render her magnificently independent, was no sort of consolation to her. She had always had as much money as she wanted, and the liberty which even her governesses had scarce'y attempted to restrict was now, as she well knew, about to be seriously threatened. " The first thing to be done," she mused, " will be to get rid of old Grace. Otherwise there will be trouble ; for he will certainly disapprove of my ways of going on, and he is far too dense and self-satisfied to abstain from saying so. I wonder whether Lionel couldn't get him the offer of a colonial bishopric." The new Viscount Middlewood, had such a suggestion been addressed to him, would have replied that he had no longer influence enough to procure the offer of anything for anybody. St. Quintin, who deplored his removal from the Lower House as much as he did, assured him by post that he must by bo means regard his political career as closed; but his own conviction was that it might as well be so regarded, and the thought saddened him, for he was full of life and energy, and had of lato begun to suspect himself of possessing some measure of ability into the bargain. He would have to stick to sport, he supposed ; after all, the turf offers an honest and able man plenty of scope for the employment of surplus energy. Meanwhile, the twelfth of August was at hand, and what was to be done about the moors? The invitations sent out by his father had, of course, been cancelled, and the entertainment of anything resembling a house party was not to be thought of; still grouse must be shot, just as meals must to eaten, whether one is in mourning or not. " Three guns will do," he told his wife. "I think I will get St Quintin to come down—and perhaps Btrahan. Would you onind having Strahan ?" "Not in the least," answered Marietta. u Why should 1 mind!" " Well, you say that you dislike him and •diiiruat him."

"I may have said so; I am not sure that I say so now. At any rate, if he shoots as well as he rides there will be no need to distrust him in the capacity for whioh he is wanted." _. , "Oh, he can shoot," answered Lionel. " He is one of those lucky beggars who can do anything that they want to do." So a note was despatched to Mr Strahan, who replied by return of post that he believed he could manage to give himself a holiday of a week or ten days. St. Quintin and he arrived together on the eve of the twelfth, and the former had not been a quarter of an hour in the house before he candidly told Marietta that he was not precisely enchanted at finding himself under the same roof with the latter. " I have never half liked that fellow, and I never shall," he said. "I wish Lionel wouldn't make a friend of him." " You don't think well of the Australian Company ?" asked Marietta. "I certainly shouldn't if I had only Strahan's word for its prospects; but lam told that it is going to be a sucoess, and he has influential people at his back—Lionel amongst others. The Australian Company will pay good dividends, I dare say ; it's the personal company of the secretary that I don't see auy particular need for. However, I don't suppose you agree with me." She was all the less" inclined to agree with him because her feminine instinct had warned her from the outset against the subject of their disparaging remarks. She took Strahan's p»rt; she wanted to hear in plain terms what there was to be urged to his d!s id vantage, and, on being told that there was nothing, she observed that, under those circumstances, it was scarcely fair or generous to run him down.

St. Quintin admitted that it was not, and had no rejoinder to make when Lady Middlewood resumed rather severely: " It seems to me that you are too fond of running down people about whom you do not know much. There was a time not so long ago, I think, when you used to run o'own my father and me." Well, at least, Mr Strahan's prowess upon the moors was not to be disputed by Sf. Quintin or anybody else. He returned, fresh and smiling, after a long and very hot day, having walked his companions clean off their legs, and claiming thirty-two brace to his own gun, which, in that part of the world, had to be accounted a highly creditable performance over dogs. He had, moreover, so thoroughly enjoyed his tramp over the heathery moorland that it was impossible to help being infected by his good humor.

" We all wanted cheering up," remarked Marietta, after dinner, " and you have given us what we wanted."

To which he replied briskly: "It's everybody's duty to be cheerful, Lidy Middlewood. Personally, I" don't find that a difficult duty to discharge." , * "But it seems that you never find anything difficult." " Oh, excuse me ! It isn't half as easy as might be supposed to persuade Mr Sitwell that two and two make four ; it hasn't been by any meaua easy to secure the friendly support of old Hicks ; least of all is it easy to secure yours."

" Yet lalways fight your battles. If you were to speak of Mr St. Quintin's friendly support, for instance " " Ah, that's not to bs had ; I am endeavoring to get on as well as 1 can without it. Is it with him that you have been waging battle on my behalf?"

As she did not reply, he resumed : "It is delightful, anyhow, to hear that you sometimes spea'-t a good word for me when my back is turnad. Do ycu know, Lady Middlewood, I would rather have one good word from you than twenty from—shall we sav, vour very important and powerful husband ?"

'•Lionel pretends that he has lost all p.T.ver and importance by succeeding to the title. D_> you think that I can be of more use to you than he, then ?"

" I didn't say that that was my reason," answered Strahan. " You still set me down as a man whose eyes are steadily and consistently fixed upon the main chance, I see." His eyes were at that moment gazing straight into hers, from which they were not very far distant. Seated on a low chair by her side, he was leaning forward with his elbows on his knees. Lionel and St. Quintin, dead sleepy after their long day's work, had gone off to keep themselves awake, if possible, with a game of billiards r the long room waß silent and dimly lighted ; if Mr Strahan was not making love to his host's wife—and indeed he was not—he had a good deal the appearance of being so engaged. Possibly this struck him, for he suddenly pushed his chair back, and added, in a somewhat altered voice :

" Well, you're perfectly right; the main chance is just what I'm bound to keep perpetually bt-fore me. I remember telling you once that, case hardened as I am, there are vulnerable places about me; but it doesn't do to talk of them—or think of them. Let it be agreed that, if I value your friendship, it is chiefly because the friendship of a great lady must be valuable to a poor devil with his fortune to make. After all, even that view of thing 3 ought to give you a sort of interest in me."

Marietta replied composedly that she had always felt a great interest in Mr Strahan. It would be greater, of course, if she knew a little more accurately than she did what his immediate aspirations were. He had not the least objection to telling her. He leant back in his chair, stretched his leg out, and drew a quick, graphic outline of the career at which he aimed. He did not want money only—although ho did want that, and meant to have it. His ambition was to be the practical creator of a dependency, as yet sparsely inhabited and almost unknown in the Mother Country, which should become one of the most important of British colonies ; he wished, in short, to be amongst the great ones of the earth while his life should last, and he wiehed that life to be full, combative, and exciting. " Well, that's all," he concluded. "At least, there's just one thing more that I, as a rather lonely and friendless man, not much given to making confidences, should like to have ; but I don't suppose I shall get it."

" Oh, you have it," she answered, smiling. " If my sympathy is of any use, you have

For the truth was that he flattered her immensely by choosing her as the recipient of this confidential statement. How unlike he was to Lionel, who, to be sure, had ambition of a kind, but who so evidently preferred being ordinary to extraordinary, and who, besides, seemed very well able to dispense with her sympathy. An incident, which was significant or trivial according to the light in which it might happen to be regarded, occurred a few days later, and confirmed her in her irritated impression that Lionel did not deem her an adviser worth consulting. Lady Maria Halsted, who had driven over from Chelton, unaccompanied by her granddaughter, to take possession of certain trinkets which had been bequeathed to her by the late Lord Middlewood, remarked oasually that she had met the sportsmen on her way, and had had a short talk with them.

"I rather like that Strahan man," she said ; " he is a shrewd fellow and, I should think, less unscrupulous than people of that class generally are." " What class?" Marietta inquired. " There is no actual name for it; but one recognises its members when one comes across them. The pushing class the political colonial commercial class, I mean. I made a point of asking him whether he was prepared to support the Aborigines Protection Society, and he assured me that he certainly would, if there were any aborigines in his colony to protect. So far as it went, that was satisfactory ; and I understood him to promise that in the event of his going into Parliament he would oppose those shocking little African : wars which are so discreditable to us as a nation. He says the time has come for us to turn our attention to Australia, which is already ours, instead of robbing these poor black creatures of the territory, upon the chance of gold being found in it." " But surely Mr Strahan has no idea of going into Parliament," said Marietta. "Dear me, yes! Didn't you know that there is a probability of his standing for your husband's vacant seat? Lionel is very anxious that he should; the only question seems to be whether the Australians who sent him over here will consent. But he has telegraphed for instructions, I believe." Marietta was a good deal mortified. Why

had she been kept in the dark as to aproject whioh had apparently been mentioned with* out any thought- of seorecy to a lady whose lack of discretion was notorious? "Did they tell you all that this morning ?" ahe asked. "Oh, no," answered Lady Maria; • I heard it from Lionel a day or two ago. Of course, it is advisable, before taking any definite step, to find out how Mr Strahan's candidature would be likely to be received by the constituency. That was why I asked him about the aborigines and the Church Missionary Society and so on. Many of my tenants, I am gkd to say, are God-fearing persons." This explanation scarcely mended matters. " I suppoße," said Marietta, " they did not tell me because they knew what a matter of absolute indifference the whole thing would be to me. I have never been able, and I never shall be able, to pretend to the faintest interest in politics." Lady Maria thought it her duty to remonstrate. A good wife, she pointed out, is always interested—or, at the very least, pretends to bo interested—in what interests her husband. "I do assure you that in my poor, dear Halsted's time I used toread the money article in the newspaper every morning, just in order to be able to talk intelli- j gently to him about it." "And did you talk intelligently ?' Marietta inquired. "Perhapsnot; for most of it, I confess, seemed to me to be downright gibberish. Still, he appreciated the effort, and he enjoyed setting me right when I was wrong. One must make these little sacrifices ; otherwise all sorts of distressing things are liable to happen." » It says something for Marietta's selfcontrol that the old lady departed, shortly afterwards, without having been told to mind her own business ; but less forbearance was manifested towards Lionel when he returned from shooting and was beckoned by his wife into the great, deserted library. "Do you think," said ahe, "that the first news I have of your affairs ought to come to me from outsiders? Do you think that anybody is likely to respect ma much when it is seen that you consider that kind of treatment good enough for me ?" He was completely taken aback; nor was his surprise diminished aftor the nature of her grievance had been unfolded to him. " My dear girl," he exclaimed, " how was I to guess that you would take my silence as a slight? One doesn't talk about 4,hese things, because they are best not talked about until some decision has been taken; but of course you are welcome toknowasmuch. as we know—which is very little. Strahan has not at all made up his mind to stand. Indeed, if old Blathwayt, who has been approached, consents to oome forward, he won't even be asked."

" Yet you told Lady Maria." " Well, yea ; I did tell granny ; and I dare say it was rather imprudent of me. But she has ways of getting at the voters which are not open to me, and I thought we might obtain some idea through her of how the land lay." "Ob, I quite understand," answered Marietta. "She may be useful, whereas I am useless." "I think you must know that that is nonsense, Marietta," said Lionel, his face clouding over a little. " Aud if it is?" she returned, making for the door. "You wouldn't wonder at my taking refuge in nonsense if you knew how sick I am of living in a perpetual atmosphere of Eober common sense !" (To be continued.)