Fenn George Manville
The Story of Antony Grace

Chapter Fifty Three.
My Visitor

Two years of hard work rapidly passed away, during which, I suppose, I made rapid progress in my profession, and also had the satisfaction of seeing Hallett’s machine grow towards perfection.

It had progressed slowly, in spite of the energy brought to bear, for Hallett toiled at it patiently and well; but the work was for the most part out of his hands now.

I had introduced him to Mr Girtley, who at once took a great deal of interest in the scheme, but who rather damped us at first by pointing out weaknesses, not of principle, but of construction, and at once proposed that before the great machine itself was attempted, a working model, four times the size of that laboriously constructed by Hallett, should be made.

“It means time and expense, Mr Hallett,” he said, “but over new things we must be slow and sure. For instance, there will be great stress upon certain parts – here – here – and here. I can say to you now that these parts must be greatly strengthened, and I could make certain calculations, but we can only learn by experience what is to be done.”

There was so much good sense in this, that Hallett at once agreed, and Mr Jabez of course nodded approval; and though it took a long time, the trial of the little machine fully bore out Mr Girtley’s prophecies; so that great modifications had to be made.

“Yes,” said Mr Girtley, after the trial, “it is discouraging, certainly; but is it not better than having a breakdown just when your hopes are highest?”

“Yes, but new moulds can be made, and you will go on at once,” said Hallett eagerly.

“Yes, the moulds shall be made, and we will go on at once.”

“Mr Girtley thought me very impatient, Antony,” said Hallett, as we walked steadily back from Great George Street, where the little machine had been set up; “but there are bounds to every one’s patience, and I feel sometimes as if the idol I have been trying to set up will not be finished in my time.”

“Nonsense?” I cried cheerily, “I guarantee it shall be. I’m to have a lot of superintending to do, Hallett, and I’ll leave no stone unturned to get it on.”

“Thank you, Antony,” he said, “do your best. I grieve for poor Mr Jabez more than for myself. Two hundred and fifty pounds of his money gone, and he has nothing yet before him in return but an unsubstantial shadow.”

Miss Carr had been a good deal away from England during this time, visiting her sister, who twice over returned with her to stay at Westmouth Street. I had, however, kept her fully informed about the progress made by Hallett. In fact, she knew my innermost life, and as much of the Halletts’ as I knew myself. Those were pleasant days, though, when she was at home, much of my time being spent with her; and though I found that Lister had made several attempts to see her, and had written continually, he had never been successful.

I learned, too, that Mr Ruddle had interfered in concert with some distant relatives of Miss Carr, and they had pretty well coerced Lister into more reasonable behaviour.

He evidently, however, lived in the hope of yet resuming his old relationship with Miss Carr, little dreaming how well acquainted she was with his character, for, in no tale-bearing spirit, but in accordance with her wish, that she should know everything in connection with my daily life, I had told her of Lister’s continued underhanded pursuit of Linny, news which I afterwards found had come to her almost in company with imploring letters, full of love, passion and repentance.

When I look back upon that portion of my life, it all seems now like a dream of pleasure, that glided away as if by magic. I had no troubles – no cares of my own, save such as I felt by a kind of reflex action. I was young, active, and full of eagerness. Hallett’s enterprise seemed to be almost my own, and I looked forward to its success as eagerly as he did himself.

The house at Great Ormond Street was a far less solemn place now than it used to be, and many and bright were the evenings we spent together. Hallett seemed less sad and self-contained, as he saw his mother take a little interest in the group that used to form about her chair. For Mr Jabez appeared to have become quite a new man, and there were not many evenings that he did not spend at the Halletts’.

“Business, you see, Grace,” he used to say, with a dry chuckle. “I must be on the spot to talk over the machine with Hallett;” but somehow very little used to be said about business: for very often after the first introduction by the old man, there used to be a snug rubber at whist, in which he and Mrs Hallett would be partners against Linny and Tom Girtley.

For Tom used to come a great, deal in those days to see me. He used to tell me, with a laughing light in his eye, that he was sure I must be very dull there of an evening, and that it was quite out of kindness to me. But, somehow or another, I suppose through my neglect, and the interest I took in Hallett’s work, he used to be driven upstairs, where his bright, hearty ways made him always welcome. For after what looked like dead opposition at first, Tom quite won Mr Jabez over to his side; and, save and excepting a few squabbles now and then, which Mrs Hallett took seriously, and which afforded Linny intense amusement, Mr Jabez and Tom became the best of friends.

“I don’t think he’s such a very bad sort of fellow, as boys go, Grace,” Mr Jabez said; “but look here, my boy, do you see how the land lies?”

“What do you mean, Mr Rowle?” I said laughing; “that Tom and Linny seem to be getting very fond of one another?”

“Yes,” he said, tapping me on the breast-bone with his snuff-box. “I spoke to Hallett about it last night, and he said he was not sorry.”

“Of course not. I am sure he likes Tom,” I said thoughtfully, as I saw how great an alteration had come about at the house, for Linny used to sing about the place now like a bird, and Mary watched over her like a dragon. In fact, Mary was a wonderful institution at Great Ormond Street, and even Mrs Hallett was afraid of her, in so much that Mary’s practical ways seemed quite to silence her murmurings, and make her take a more cheerful view of life.

“But look here, Grace,” said Mr Jabez, “don’t you be a young fool. You don’t want to grow into an old bachelor like I am.”

“I don’t know that I do,” I said.

“Then about Linny: does it suit your book for that big child to be coming here and cutting the ground from under your feet?”

“Cutting the ground from under my feet?” I said merrily. “Why, what do you mean, Mr Jabez?”

“I mean, don’t you be a young noodle, and play with your opportunities. Linny’s a very nice little girl, and I shouldn’t be a bit surprised if some day she had a few – perhaps a good many hundreds of her own. I tell you what it is, Grace, my boy, I shouldn’t be a bit displeased if you were to play your cards right, and make a match of it with that little girl.”

“And I hope, Mr Rowle, you would not be a bit displeased if I did not do anything of the sort?”

“H’m-m! No! I don’t know that I should, boy. But, hang it all, you are not. You have not any one else in your eye. You are not thinking about Miss Carr, are you, you puppy?”

I burst out into a hearty fit of laughter.

“No, Mr Rowle,” I said merrily. “I never think about such matters, and between ourselves,” I said with much severity, “I am surprised to find a quiet elderly gentleman like you taking to match-making.”

“Get out, you young dog!” he cried. “There, just as you like, only I thought I’d see how you felt about it, that’s all.”

Mr Rowle’s words set me thinking, and I could not help seeing that though there was no love-making, or anything out of the ordinary way in their every-day intercourse, Linny’s old sorrow had been completely swept away, and she evidently looked upon Tom as a very great friend.

I was in my own room one evening reporting progress to Hallett, who had just come in from the office where he still worked as an ordinary journeyman. Mr Jabez was upstairs with Tom Girtley, and a quiet rubber of whist was in progress, when Mary came up into the room to announce that there was some one downstairs who wanted to see me.

“Who is it, Mary?” I said.

Mary glanced at Hallett, who saw the look and rose to go.

“Don’t you run away, Hallett,” I cried. “I’ve no one to see me whom you need not know.”

I stopped there, for the thought flashed across my mind that it might be some one from Miss Carr, or perhaps it might be something to do with John Lister.

He saw my hesitation, and said quietly:

“I shall be upstairs if you want me, Antony. I think I will go now.”

He left the room.

“Well, Mary, who’s the mysterious stranger?” I said.

“Oh, Master Antony,” she cried excitedly, “whoever do you think it is? I hope it don’t mean trouble. Some one from the country.”

“Not Blakeford?” I exclaimed, with all my budding manhood seeming to be frozen down on the instant, and my boyish dread ready to return.

“No, my dear, not old Blakeford,” she said; “but that other old Mr Rowle.”

“Old Mr Rowle!” I cried excitedly, as, like a flash, all my former intercourse with him darted back – the day when he came and took possession of our dear home; our meals together; the bit of dinner in the summer-house; and his kindly help with money and advice when I was about to run away. Why, I felt that it was to him that I owed all my success in life, and my heart smote me as I thought of my ingratitude, and how I seemed to have forgotten him since I had become so prosperous and well-to-do.

“Yes,” said Mary, “old Mr Rowle. He’s standing at the door, my dear; he said he was so shabby he wouldn’t come in.”

Thank God, I was only a boy still, and full of youthful freshness and enthusiasm! I forgot all my dandyism and dress, everything, in the excitement of seeing the old man again; and almost before Mary had done speaking, I was bounding down the stairs to rush through the big hall and catch hold of the little old man standing on the steps.

He seemed to have shrunk; or was it that I had sprung up from the little boy into a young man? I could not tell then. I did not want to tell then; all I knew was that the childish tears were making my eyes dim, that there was a hot choking sensation in my throat, and that I dragged the old man in. We had a struggle over every mat, where he would stop to rub his shoes. I could not speak, only keep on shaking both his hands; and I seemed to keep on shaking them till I had him thrust down by the fire in the easy-chair.

“Why, young ’un,” he said at last, “how you have grown!”

“Why, Mr Rowle,” I said, as soon as I could speak, “I am – I am glad to see you.”

“Are you – are you, young ’un?” he said, getting up out of his chair, picking his hat off the floor, where he had set it down, and putting it on again, while in a dreamy way he ran his eye all over the room, making a mental inventory of the furniture, just as I remembered him to have done of old.

He seemed to be very little, and yellow, and withered, and he was very shabbily dressed, too; but I realised the fact that he was not much altered, as he fixed his eyes once more on me, and repeated:

“Why, young ’un, how you have grow’d!”

“Have I, Mr Rowle?” I said, laughing through my weak tears; for his coming seemed to have brought back so much of the past.

“Wonderful!” he said. “I shouldn’t have know’d you, that I shouldn’t. Why, you’ve grow’d into quite a fine gentleman, that you have, and you used to be about as high as sixpen’orth o’ ha’pence.”

“I was a little fellow,” I said, laughing.

“But you’d got a ’awful lot o’ stuff in you, young ’un,” he said. “But, I say, are you – are you really glad to see me, young ’un – I mean, Mr Grace?”

“Glad to see you?” I cried. “I can’t tell you how glad. But sit down. Here, give me your hat.”

“Gently, young ’un, there’s something in it. Pr’aps I’d better keep it on.”

“No, no,” I cried, catching it from his hands, and forcing him back into the easy-chair.

“Gently, young ’un,” he said, thrusting one hand up the cuff of his long brown coat, which, with its high collar, almost seemed to be the same as the one in which I saw him first – “gently, young ’un,” he said; “you’ve broke my pipe.”

I burst out laughing, and, weak as it may sound, the tears came to my eyes again, as I saw him draw from up his sleeve a long clay pipe broken in three, and once more the old scenes in the deserted rifled house came back.

“Never mind the pipe, Mr Rowle,” I cried. “You shall have a dozen if you like, twice as long as that. But you must be hungry and tired. I am glad to see you.”

“Thankye, young ’un,” he said, smiling; and the old man’s lip quivered a little as he shook my hand. “I didn’t expect it of you, but I thought I’d come and see if you’d forgotten me.”

I ran to the bell, and Mary came up directly, and smiled and nodded at my visitor.

“Mary,” I said, “let’s have some supper directly – a bit of something hot. And, I say, bring up that long pipe of Revitts’ – the churchwarden, you know. I’ve got some tobacco.”

“I’ve got a bit of tobacco,” said Mr Rowle, “and – you’ve taken my hat away – there’s something in it. Thankye. I thought, maybe, they might come in useful. They’re quite fresh.”

As he spoke he took out a great yellow silk handkerchief, and from underneath that, fitting pretty tightly in the hat, a damp-looking paper parcel, that proved to contain a couple of pounds of pork sausages, which Mary bore away, and returned directly with a kettle of hot water and a long churchwarden clay pipe, which Mr Rowle proceeded to fill from my tobacco-jar, lit, sat bolt-upright in his chair, and began to smoke.

All the intervening years seemed to have slipped away as I saw the old man sitting there, a wonderfully exact counterpart of Mr Jabez in shabby clothes; and, as his eyes once more wandered round the place, I half expected to see him get up and go all over the house, smoking in each room, and mentally making his inventory of the goods under his charge.

I went to a little cellaret, got out the glasses, spirit-stand, and sugar, and mixed the old man a steaming tumbler, which he took, nodded, and sipped with great satisfaction. Then, puffing contentedly away at his pipe, he said:

“Not all your own, is it?” And his eyes swept over the furniture.

“Yes, to be sure,” I said, laughing at his question, for I took a good deal of pride in my rooms, which were really well furnished.

“You’ve grow’d quite a swell, young ’un,” he said at last; and then stopped smoking suddenly. “I ain’t no right here,” he said. “I hope you don’t mind the pipe.”

“I’m going to have a cigar with you presently,” I said, laughing, “only we’ll have some supper first.”

“Only fancy,” he said; “just a bit of a slip as you was when you made up your mind to cut, and now grow’d up. I should have liked to have seen what come between. You are glad to see me, then?”

“Glad? Of course,” I cried; and then Mary came bustling in to lay the cloth.

“She’s altered, too,” said the old man, who went on smoking away placidly. “Got crummier; and she don’t speak so sharp. Think o’ you two living in the same house.”

“Mary’s my landlady,” I said. “But this is a surprise.”

“Ah! Yes,” he said; “I’ve often thought I’d come up and see Jabez, and look you up same time. I had a bit of a job to find you, for Jabez wasn’t at home.”

“Mr Jabez is here,” I said.

“Yes; they said he’d come to see you, and they wouldn’t give me the address at first. I’d lost it, or forgotten it, but here I am.”

“I’ll go up and tell him you are here,” I cried; and before my visitor could say a word, I had run upstairs and completely upset all Mr Jabez Rowle’s calculations, which might or might not have ended in his gaining the odd trick, and was soon taking him downstairs on the plea or important business.

“Anything the matter, Grace?” he said – “anything wrong with Hallett?”

“No,” I said; “he’s in his bedroom. Come in here.”

If I had expected to startle or surprise Mr Jabez, I should have been disappointed, for, upon entering my room, where his brother was composedly smoking the long clay pipe, with his yellow silk handkerchief spread over his knees, he only said:

“Hallo, Peter, you here?” and went and sat down on the other side of the fire.

“How do, Jabez?” said my old friend, without taking his pipe out of his mouth; and then there was silence, which I did not care to break, but sat down, too, and looked on.

“Come up to-day, Peter?” said Mr Jabez.

“Yes.”

“When are you going back?”

“Don’t know.”

“Oh!”

Then there was a pause.

“Stick to your pipe still,” said Mr Jabez, taking a loud pinch of snuff.

“Yes; never could manage snuff.”

“Oh!”

Here there was another pause, broken once more by Mr Jabez.

“Where are you going to stay?”

“Long o’ you.”

“Oh!”

A great many puffs of smoke followed here, and several pinches of snuff, as the two old men sat on either side of the fire and stared hard at each other, their likeness being now wonderful, as far as their heads were concerned.

“Hard up?” said Mr Jabez at last.

“No. Want to borrow a sov?”

“No,” said Mr Jabez shortly; and there was again a silence.

“I’ll have a drop of gin and water, Grace,” said Mr Jabez, after a very long and awkward pause for me.

I mixed it for him with alacrity.

“You two friendly?” said Mr Peter at last, making a strenuous effort to thrust one finger into the bowl of his pipe without removing the waxed end from his lips, but finding it impossible, without apparently swallowing a goodly portion, from the length of the stem.

“Friendly? of course we are. Can’t you see?” replied Mr Jabez snappishly.

“No! How should I know? Like him to know anything about your affairs?” said Mr Peter, turning to me.

“Oh yes,” I said. “Mr Jabez Rowle is a very great friend of mine.”

“Right!” said that individual, giving his head a nod.

“I didn’t come up on purpose to see you, Jabez,” said Mr Peter.

“Who said you did?” snapped Mr Jabez. “What did you come for? About what you said?”

“Yes.”

There was another awkward pause, fortunately broken by Mary, who entered with a tray odorous with hot rump-steak and onions: and as soon as he smelt it, Mr Peter stood his pipe up in the corner of the fireplace, and softly rubbed his hands.

His brother made no scruple about joining the meal, and as the brothers rose, Mr Jabez held out his hand with —

“Well, how are you, Peter?”

“Tidy,” said Mr Peter, and they shook hands as if they were cross with each other, and then they each made a hearty meal.

“Got a latchkey, Jabez?” said Mr Peter, as, after supper, we all drew up round the fire and the visitor from Rowford refilled and lit his pipe, causing Mr Jabez to draw off from him as far as was possible.

“Yes,” he said shortly.

“That’s right,” said Mr Peter; “don’t want to go to bed, do you, young ’un?”

“Oh, no,” I said; “I’m too glad to see you again.”

The old man’s eyes twinkled, as he looked at me fixedly.

“Been a good boy, Jabez?” he said at last.

“Who? – me?”

“No, no; young ’un here.”

“Oh, yes. Can’t you see?”

“Thought he would be, or I shouldn’t have sent him.”

“Humph!”

I wanted to talk, but I found that it would be of no use now, so I contented myself with studying the brothers, and, just then, Tom Girtley came in.

“Won’t disturb you,” he said quickly; “just off. Good-night, Mr Rowle, good-night, Tony.”

“Who’s he?” said Mr Peter, as the door closed.

“A friend of mine – a young solicitor.”

“Any good? – Trust him?” said Mr Peter quickly.

“Yes, he is very clever in his profession,” I said wonderingly.

“Call him back, then,” said Mr Peter. “I’ve got something for him to hear.”

Chapter Fifty Four.
Peter Rowle’s Bargain

I was just in time to call Tom Girtley back as he reached the corner of the street, and he came up into my room, wondering, for the hour was getting late; but he took a chair quietly, and waited for what Mr Peter had to say.

“Well, it ain’t much,” said the latter; “but it may mean a good deal. S’pose, sir, you just cast your eye over them there?” He took a packet of papers, tied with red tape, and docketed, out of his pocket, and passed them over to Tom Girtley, who immediately opened them in a very business-like way, and proceeded rapidly to mentally summarise their contents.

This took him some little time, during which we all sat very still, Mr Peter giving me a very knowing look or two in the interval.

“These are very important documents, sir,” said Tom Girtley quietly. “I must, of course, warn you that I am only a young member of my profession, and wanting in experience; but, as far as I can judge, these are the private memoranda and certain deeds and documents of Mr Edward Grace, of – ”

“My father!” I exclaimed excitedly. “How did you get these papers, Mr Rowle?”

“Bought ’em,” said the old gentleman quietly.

“You bought them?”

“To be sure I did. Old Blakeford thought he’d taken possession of all your father’s papers, my boy, after his death, but he didn’t.”

“How did you get them, then?” said Mr Jabez sharply.

“Bought ’em, I tell you. It was like this: old Blakeford put me in possession at the house of a man who had borrowed money of him, and he was going to sell him up – you know his ways, young ’un – I mean Mr Grace. Well, I went there one night, and very wild the poor fellow was, and he went straight to a bureau, that I seemed to have seen before, and began to go over his papers, tying up some and burning others, and going on and calling old Blakeford names all the while. ‘Ah,’ he says, all at once, ‘I bought this writing-table and drawers at Grace’s sale, when Blakeford sold the furniture. Look here,’ he said, ‘this lot of papers was in one of the back drawers. They belonged to old Grace, I suppose,’ and he was about to pitch them into the fire with his own letters and things, of which there was quite a heap.

“‘Don’t do that,’ I says; ‘they may be of value.’

“‘Not they,’ he says; ‘if they’d been worth anything old Blakeford wouldn’t have left them. They aren’t worth tuppence!’

“‘I’ll give you tuppence for them,’ I says.

“‘Pay up,’ he says, and I handed him the twopence, and took the papers. I’ve read ’em, and think they’re worth the money.”

“Worth the money!” cried Tom Girtley; “why, they may be worth ten thousand pounds; but I can say nothing till I have gone into the case; and I daresay it would be necessary to make Mr Blakeford supply some of the connecting links.”

“Which he won’t do,” said Mr Peter quietly.

“Unless he’s obliged,” said Tom Girtley. “There are means of making even a solicitor speak, Mr Rowle,” he continued. “Will you take these papers?”

“No,” said Mr Peter; “give ’em to Mr Grace there. They were his father’s. Blakeford’s pitched me over, because I got old and useless, so I shan’t try to screen him in the least.”

Tom Girtley folded and tied up the papers, and handed them to me but I refused to take them.

“Keep them and study them,” I said; “perhaps they will not prove to be so valuable when you have given them a fresh perusal.”

He nodded and placed the packet in his breast-pocket, all three then rising to go, for it was past twelve, and as Tom Girtley and I stood at the door, we saw the two old men go down the street, arm-in-arm, till they passed by the lamp-post and disappeared. Then, after a hearty good-night, Tom Girtley took his departure, and I went up to bed, to lie for hours thinking about my life with Mr Blakeford, and wondering whether he had defrauded me over the question of my father’s property. I had always felt that I was in his debt, and meant some day to repay him all he said that my father owed; in fact, Miss Carr had been so liberal to me in the way of pocket-money, that I had forty pounds saved up for that purpose; but now this came like a revelation, and there was a delightful feeling of triumph in the idea that I might perhaps bring a thorough scoundrel to book. Then all at once I began to think about Hetty – pretty, gentle little Hetty, who had been so kind to me when I was a miserable unhappy boy, and the hours when I saw her seemed like gleams of light, amongst so much darkness.

What would Hetty be like after all these years, I wondered; and then I began to blame myself for not asking Mr Rowle more about her, and at last, with the memory of the bright affectionate child filling my thoughts, I dropped off to sleep, to dream once more about Mr Blakeford, and that I was on the road, with him in full chase.

It was quite a treat to get out of bed and away from the nightmare-like dreams of the past, and after a sharp walk and breakfast, I made my way round by Mr Jabez Rowle’s lodgings, to have a few words with Mr Peter, before going to Lambeth.

I found the old man alone, smoking a long pipe with his hat on, and his brother gone.

His face lit up as he saw me, and after a little conversation about the past —

“When are you going back to Rowford?” I said.

“Want to get rid of me?” he replied.

“No, no, of course not.”

“Don’t know that I’m going back at all,” he said. “Jabez and I haven’t seen much of each other lately. Think I shall stay.”

“Did – have – did you ever see much of Miss Blakeford?” I said, feeling conscious as I spoke that I was growing hot.

“Often,” said the old man, looking at me intently. “She often asked about you.”

“About me?” I said.

“Yes: how you got on, and whether you were coming back.”

“What is she like now?” I said. “Of course she is not a little girl now.”

“Little girl? No: I should think not. Grow’d into an angel, that’s what she is.”

I could not ask any more, but promising to go in and see him in the evening, I hurried off to the works, thinking that I should very much like to see Hetty Blakeford again, and wondering whether she would see much change in me.

In another hour Rowford was forgotten, and I was deep in the preparations for Hallett’s machine, which was rapidly approaching completion; while a fortnight later I was dining with Miss Carr, and bearing her the news of the successful point to which Hallett had climbed, making her flush with pleasure, as I told her that the machine was to be set up at Mr Ruddle’s place of business, and be tried there.

“Send me word the day and hour of the trial, Antony,” she said, in a low voice.

“Will you come?” I said eagerly.

“No, Antony, no,” she said softly. “I could not come, but I shall pray for a triumphant success.”

She spoke warmly, for she seemed off her guard, and then hurriedly changed the conversation.