He had not learned to put out his left hand-he only made a sharp nod, as James, with tender and humble respect, approached, feeling that, how his grandmother was gone, this frail old man, his father's brother, was the last who claimed by right his filial love and gratitude. How different from the rancour and animosity with which he had met his former advances!
He ventured gently on kindly hopes that his uncle was better, and they were not ill taken, though not without fretfulness. Presently Oliver said, 'Come to look after your sister? that's right-good girl, good girl!'
'That she is!' exclaimed James, heartily.
'Too hasty! too great hurry,' resumed Oliver; 'she had better have waited, saved the old place,-never mind what became of the old man, one-half dead already.'
'She would not have been a Clara good for much, if she had treated you after that fashion, sir,' said James, smiling.
He gave his accustomed snort. 'The mischief a girl let alone can do in three days, when once she's of age, and one can't stop her! Women ought never to come of age, ain't fit for it, undo all the work of my lifetime with a stroke of her pen!'
'For your sake, sir!'
'Pshaw! Pity but she'd been safe married-tied it up well with settlements then out of her power. Can't think what that young Fitzjocelyn was after-it ain't the old affair. Ponsonby writes me that things are to be settled as soon as Ward comes back.'
'Indeed!'
'Aye, good sort of fellow-no harm to have him in our concerns-I hope he'll look into the accounts, and find what Robson is at. After all, I shall soon be out there myself, and make Master Robson look about him. Mad to allow myself to stay-but I'll wait no longer. Morrison may put the fellows off'-I'll give him a hint; we'll save the place, after all, when I once get out to Lima. If only I knew what to do with that girl!'
James could not look at him without a conviction that he would never recover the use of his hand and foot; but this was no time to discourage his spirits, and the answer was-'My sister's natural home would be with me.'
'Ha! the child would like it, I suppose. I'd make a handsome allowance for her. I shall manage that when my affairs are in my own hands; but I may as well write to the mountains as to Ponsonby. Aye, aye! Clara might go to you. She'll have enough any way to be quite worth young Fitzjocelyn's while, you may tell him. That mine in the San Benito would retrieve all, and I'll not forget. Pray, how many children have you by this time?'
'Four little girls, sir,' said James, restraining the feeling which was rising in the contact with his uncle, revealing that both were still the same men.
'Hm! No time lost, however! Well, we shall see! Any way, an allowance for Clara's board won't hurt. What's your notion?'
James's notion was profound pity for the poor old man. 'Indeed, sir,' he said, 'Clara is sure to be welcome. All we wish is, that you would kindly bring her to us at once. Perhaps you would find the baths of service; we would do our utmost to make you comfortable, and we are not inhabiting half the house, so that there would be ample space to keep the children from inconveniencing you.'
'Clara is set on it, I'll warrant.'
'Clara waits to be guided by your wishes; but my wife and I should esteem it as the greatest favour you could do us.'
'Ha! we'll see what I can manage. I must see Morrison'-and he fell into meditation, presently breaking from it to say fretfully, 'I say, Roland, would you reach me that tumbler?'
Never had James thought to be grateful for that name! He would gladly have been Roland Dynevor for the rest of his days, if he could have left behind him the transgressions of James Frost! But the poor man's shattered thoughts had been too long on the stretch; and, without further ceremony, Jane came in and dismissed his nephew.
Clara hardly trusted her ears when she was told shortly after, by her uncle, that they were to go to Northwold. Roland wished it; and, poor fellow! the board and lodging were a great object to him. He seemed to have come to his senses now it was too late; and if Clara wished it, and did not think it dull, there she might stay while he himself was gone to Lima.
'A great object the other way,' Clara had nearly cried, in her indignation that James could not be supposed disinterested in an invitation to an old man, who probably was destitute.
Brother and uncle appeared to have left her out of the consultation; but she was resolved not to let him be a burthen on those who had so little already, and she called her old friend Jane to take counsel with her, whether it would not be doing them an injury to carry him thither at all. So much of Jane's heart as was not at Cheveleigh was at Dynevor Terrace, and her answer was decided.
'To be sure, Miss Clara, nothing couldn't be more natural.'
'Nothing, indeed, but I can't put them to trouble and expense.'
'I'll warrant,' said Jane, 'that I'll make whatever they have go twice as far as Charlotte ever will. Why, you know I keeps myself; and for the rest, it will be a mere saving to have me in the kitchen! There's no air so good for Master Oliver.'
'I see you mean to go, Jane,' said Clara. 'Now, I have to look out for myself.'
'Bless me, Miss Clara, don't you do nothing in a hurry. Go home quiet and look about you.'
Jane had begun to call Northwold home; and, in spite of her mournings over the old place, Clara thought she had never been so happy there as in her present dominion over Master Oliver, and her prospects of her saucepans and verbenas at No. 5.
Poor Oliver! what a scanty measure of happiness had his lifelong exertions produced! Many a human sacrifice has been made to a grim and hollow idol, failing his devotees in time of extremity. Had it not been thus with Oliver Dynevor's self-devotion to the honour of his family?
CHAPTER XIX. FAREWELL TO GREATNESS.
Soon from the halls my fathers reared Their scutcheons must descend. Scott
Mr. Holdsworth contrived to set James at liberty for a fortnight, and he was thus enabled to watch over the negotiation, and expedite matters for the removal. The result was, that the resignation of the estate, furniture, and of Clara's jewels, honourably cleared off the debts contracted in poor Mr. Dynevor's eagerness to reinstate the family in all its pristine grandeur, and left him totally dependent on whatever might be rescued in Peru. He believed this to be considerable, but the brother and sister founded little hopes on the chance; as, whatever there might be, had been entangled in the Equatorial Company, and nothing could be less comprehensible than Mr. Robson's statements.
Clara retained her own seventy pounds per annum, which, thrown into the common stock, would, James assured her, satisfy him, in a pecuniary point of view, that he was doing no wrong to his children; though he added, that even if there had been nothing, he did not believe they would ever be the worse for what might be spent on their infirm old uncle.
Notice was sent to Isabel to prepare, and she made cordial reply that the two rooms on the ground-floor were being made ready for Mr. Dynevor, and Clara's own little room being set in order; Miss Mercy Faithfull helping with all her might, and little Kitty stamping about, thinking her services equally effectual.
Oliver was in haste to leave a place replete with disappointment and failure, and was so helpless and dependent as to wish for his nephew's assistance on the journey; and it was, therefore, fixed for the end of James's second week. No one called to take leave, except the Curate and good Mr. Henderson, who showed Clara much warm, kind feeling, and praised her to her brother.
She begged James to walk with her for a farewell visit to her grandmother's other old friend. Great was her enjoyment of this expedition; she said she had not had a walk worth having since she was at Aix-la-Chapelle, and liberty and companionship compensated for all the heat and dust in the dreary tract, full of uncomfortable shabby-genteel abodes, and an unpromising population.