第245章

There was to be one more sitting for the picture, as the reader will remember, and the day for that sitting had arrived. Conway Dalrymple had in the meantime called at Mrs Van Siever's house, hoping that he might be able to see Clara, and make his offer there. But he had failed in his attempt to reach her. He had found it impossible to say all that he had to say in the painting-room during the very short intervals which Mrs Broughton left to him. A man should be allowed to be alone more than fifteen minutes with a young lady on the occasion in which he offers her his hand and his heart; but hitherto he had never had more than fifteen minutes at his command; and then there had been the turban! He had also in the meantime called in Mrs Broughton with the intention of explaining to her that if she really intended to favour his views in respect to Miss Van Siever, she ought to give him a little more liberty for expressing himself. Mrs Broughton found it necessary during this meeting to talk almost exclusively about herself and her own affairs. 'Conway,' she had said, directly she saw him, 'I am so glad you have come. I think I should have gone mad if I had not seen someone who cares for me.' This was early in the morning, not much after eleven, and Mrs Broughton, hearing first his knock at the door, and then his voice, had met him in the hall and taken him into the dining-room.

'Is anything the matter?' he asked.

'Oh, Conway!'

'What is it? Has anything gone wrong with Dobbs?'

'Everything has gone wrong with him. He is ruined.'

'Heaven and earth! What do you mean?'

'Simply what I say. But you must not speak a word of it. I do not know it from himself.'

'How do you know it?'

'Wait a moment. Sit down there, will you?--and I will sit by you. No, Conway; do not take my hand. It is not right. There;--so. Yesterday Mrs Van Siever was here. I need not tell you all that she said to me, even if I could. She was very harsh and cruel, saying all manner of things about Dobbs. How can I help it, if he drinks? I have not encouraged him.

And as for expensive living, I have been as ignorant as a child. I have never asked for anything. When we were married somebody told me how much we should have to spend. It was either two thousand, or three thousand, or four thousand, or something like that. You know, Conway, how ignorant I am about money;--that I am like a child. Is it not true?' She waited for an answer and Dalrymple was obliged to acknowledge that it was true.

And yet he had known the times in which his dear friend had been very sharp in her memory with reference to a few pounds. 'And now she says that Dobbs owes her money which he cannot pay her, and that everything must be sold. She says that Musselboro must have the business, and Dobbs must shift for himself elsewhere.'

'Do you believe that she has the power to decide that things shall go this way or that--as she pleases?'

'How am I to know? She says so, and she says it is because he drinks.

He does drink. That at least is true; but how can I help it? Oh, Conway, what am I to do? Dobbs did not come home at all last night, but sent for his things--saying that he must stay in the City. What am I to do if they come and take the house, and sell the furniture, and turn me out into the street?' Then the poor creature began to cry in earnest, and Dalrymple had to console her as best he might. 'How I wish I had known you first,' she said. To this Dalrymple was able to make no direct answer. He was wise enough to know that a direct answer might possible lead him into terrible trouble. He was by no means anxious to find himself 'protecting' Mrs Dobbs Broughton from the ruin which her husband had brought upon her.

Before he left her she had told him a long story, partly of matters of which he had known something before, and partly made up of that which she had heard from the old woman. It was settled, Mrs Broughton said, that Mr Musselboro was to marry Clara Van Siever. But it appeared, as far as Dalrymple could learn, that this was a settlement made simply between Mrs Van Siever and Musselboro. Clara, as he thought, was not a girl likely to fall into such a settlement without having an opinion of her own. Musselboro was to have the business, and Dobbs Broughton was to be 'sold up' and then look for employment in the City. From her husband the wife had not heard a word on the matter, and the above story was simply what had been told to Mrs Broughton by Mrs Van Siever. 'For myself it seems that there can be but one fate,' said Mrs Broughton.

Dalrymple, in his tenderest voice, asked what that one fate must be.

'Never mind,' said Mrs Broughton. 'There are some things which one cannot tell even to such a friend as you.' He was sitting near her and had all but got his arm behind her waist. He was, however, able to be prudent. 'Maria,' he said, getting up on his feet, 'if it should really come about that you should want anything, you will send to me. You will promise me that, at any rate?' She rubbed a tear from her eye and said that she did not know. 'There are moments in which a man must speak plainly,' said Conway Dalrymple;--'in which it would be unmanly not to do so, however prosaic it may seem. I need hardly tell you that my purse shall be yours if you want it.' But just at that moment she did not want his purse, nor must it be supposed that she wanted to run away with him and to leave her husband to fight the battle with Mrs Van Siever. The truth was that she did not know what she wanted, over and beyond an assurance from Conway Dalrymple that she was the most ill-used, the most interesting, and the most beautiful woman ever heard of, either in history or romance. Had he proposed to her to pack up a bundle and go off with him in a cab to the London Chatham, and Dover railway station, I do not for a moment think that she would have packed up her bundle.