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CHAPTER XXIII. MAURICE SCANLAN ADVISES WITH “HIS COUNSEL”

Jack Massingbred sat in expectation of Mr. Merl’s arrival till nigh ten o’clock; and if not manifesting any great degree of impatience at the delay, still showing unmistakable signs of uneasiness, as though the event were not destitute of some cause for anxiety. At last a note arrived to say that a sudden and imperative necessity to start at once for England would prevent Mr. Merl from keeping his appointment. “I shall be in town by Tuesday,” continued the writer, “and if Captain Martin has any communication to make to me respecting his affairs, let it be addressed to Messrs. Twining and Scape’s, solicitors, Furnival’s Inn. I hope that with regard to your own matter, you will make suitable provision for the acceptance due on the ninth of next month. Any further renewal would prove a great inconvenience to yours

“Very sincerely and to command,

“Herman Merl.”

“Negotiations have ended ere they were opened, and war is proclaimed at once,” said Massingbred, as he read over this brief epistle. “You may come forth, Master Scanlan,” added he, opening the door of his bedroom, and admitting that gentleman. “Our Hebrew is an overmatch for us. He declines to appear.”

“Why so? How is that?” asked Scanlan.

“There ‘s his note,” said the other; “read and digest it.”

“This smacks of suspicion,” said Scanlan. “He evidently suspects that we have concerted some scheme to entangle him, and he is resolved not to be caught.”

“Precisely; he ‘ll do nothing without advice. Well, well, if he but knew how unprepared we are, how utterly deficient not only in resources, but actually in the commonest information of our subject, he might have ventured here in all safety.”

“Has Captain Martin not put you in possession of the whole case, then?”

“Why, my good Scanlan, the Captain knows nothing, actually nothing, of his difficulties. He has, it is true, a perfect conviction that he is out of his depth; but whether he be in five fathom water or fifty, he doesn’t know; and, what ‘s stranger, he does n’t care!”

“After all, if it be over his head, I suppose it’s pretty much the same thing,” said Scanlan, with a bitter laugh.

“I beg to offer my dissent to that doctrine,” said Mas-singbred, gently. “Where the water is only just out of a man’s depth, the shore is usually not very distant. Now, if we were quite certain such were the case here, we might hope to save him. If, on the contrary, he has gone down out of all sight of land – ” He stopped, gazed steadily at Scanlan for a few seconds, and then in a lower tone, not devoid of a touch of anxiety, said, “Eh, do you really know this to be so?”

“I’ll tell you all I know, Mr. Massingbred,” said he, as having turned the key in the door, he took his seat at the table. “And I ‘ll tell you, besides, how I came by the knowledge, and I ‘ll leave it to your own judgment to say what his chance is worth. When Merl was stopping at Kilkieran, he left there a little pocket-book, with memorandums of all his secret transactions. Mighty nice doings they were, – and profitable, too, – as you ‘ll perceive when you look over it.”

“You have it, then,” cried Jack, eagerly.

“Here it is,” said he, producing the precious volume, and laying his hand firmly on it. “Here it is now. I got it under a pledge to hand it to himself, which I need n’t tell you I never had the slightest intention of performing. It’s not every day in the week one has the good luck to get a peep into the enemy’s brief, and this is exactly what you ‘ll find here.”

Massingbred stretched out his hand to take the book, but Scanlan quietly replaced it in his pocket, and, with a dry and very peculiar smile, said, – “Have a little patience, sir. We must go regularly to work here. You shall see this book – you shall examine it – and even retain it – but it must be on conditions.” “Oh, you may confide in me, Scanlan. Even if Mr. Merl were my friend, – which I assure you he is not, – I could not venture to betray you.”

“That’s not exactly what I ‘m thinking of, Mr. Massingbred. I ‘m certain you ‘d say nothing to Merl of what you saw here. My mind is easy enough upon that score.”

“Well, then, in what direction do your suspicions point?”

“They ‘re not suspicions, sir,” was the dry response.

“Fears, – hesitations, – whatever you like to call them.”

“Are we on honor here, Mr. Massingbred?” said Scanlan, after a pause.

“For myself, I say decidedly so,” was the firm reply.

“That will do, sir. I ask only one pledge, and I ‘m sure you ‘ll not refuse it: if you should think, on reflection, that what I propose to you this evening is neither practicable nor advisable, – that, in fact, you could neither concur in it nor aid it, – that you’ll never, so long as you live, divulge it to any one, – man, woman, or child. Have I that promise?”

“I think I may safely say that.”

“Ay, but do you say it?”

“I do; here is my promise.”

“That will do. I don’t ask a word more. Now, Mr. Massingbred,” said he, replacing the book on the table, “I ‘ll tell you in the fewest words I can how the case stands, – and brevity is essential, for we have not an hour to lose. Merl is gone to London about this business, and we ‘ll have to follow him. He ‘d be very glad to be rid of the affair to-morrow, and he ‘ll not waste many days till he is so. Read that bit there, sir,” said he, pointing to a few closely written lines in the note-book.

“Good heavens!” cried Jack, “this is downright impossible. This is a vile falsehood, devised for some infernal scheme of roguery. Who ‘d believe such a trumpery piece of imposition? Ah, Scanlan, you are not the wily fellow I took you for. This same precious note-book was dropped as a decoy, as I once knew a certain noble lord to have left his betting-book behind him. An artful device, that can only succeed once, however. And you really believed all this?”

“I did, and I do believe it,” said Scanlan, firmly.

“If you really say so, we must put the matter to the test. Captain Martin is here, – we ‘ll send for him, and ask him the question; but I must say I don’t think your position will be a pleasant one after that reply is given.”

“I must remind you of your promise already, it seems,” said Scanlan. “You are pledged to say nothing of this, if you cannot persuade yourself to act along with me in it.”

“Very true,” said Massingbred, slowly; “but I never pledged myself to credit an impossibility.”

“I ask nothing of the kind. I only claim that you should adhere to what you have said already. If this statement be untrue, all my speculations about it fall to the ground at once. I am the dupe of a stale trick, and there’s an end of it.”

“Ay, so far all well, Master Scanlan; but I have no fancy to be associated in the deception. Can’t you see that?”

“I can, sir, and I do. But perhaps there may be a readier way of satisfying your doubts than calling for the Captain’s evidence. There is a little page in this same volume devoted to one Mr. Massingbred. You surely may have some knowledge about his affairs. Throw your eye over that, sir, and say what you think of it.”

Massingbred took the book in his hand and perused the place pointed out to him.

“By Jove! this is very strange,” said he, after a pause. “Here is my betting-book on the St. Hubert all transcribed in full, – however the Jew boy got hold of it; and here ‘s mention of a blessed hundred-pound note, which, in less than five years, has grown to upwards of a thousand!”

“And all true? All fact?”

“Perfectly true, – most lamentable fact, Master Scanlan! How precise the scoundrel is in recording this loan as ‘after supper at Dubos’!’ Ay, and here again is my unlucky wager about Martingale for the ‘Chester,’ and the handicap with Armytage. Scanlan, I recant my rash impression. This is a real work of its great author! Aut Merl – aut Diabolus.”

“I could have sworn it,” said Scanlan.

“To be sure you could, man, and have done, ere this time o’ day, fifty other things on fainter evidence. But let me tell you it requires strong testimony to make one believe that there should live such a consummate fool in the world as would sell his whole reversionary right to a splendid state of some twelve thousand – ”

“Fifteen at the lowest,” broke in Scanlan.

“Worse again. Fifteen thousand a year for twenty-two thousand seven hundred and sixty-four pounds sterling.”

“And he has done it.”

“No, no; the thing is utterly incredible, man. Any one must see that if he did want to make away with his inheritance, that he could have obtained ten, twenty times that sum amongst the tribe of Merl.”

“No doubt, if he were free to negotiate the transaction. But you ‘ll see, on looking over these pages, in what a network of debt he was involved, – how, as early as four years ago, at the Cape, he owed Merl large sums, lost at play, and borrowed at heavy interest. So that, at length, this same twenty-two thousand, assumed as paid for the reversion, was in reality but the balance of an immense demand for money lost, bills renewed, sums lent, debts discharged, and so on. But to avoid the legal difficulty of an ‘immoral obligation,’ the bale of the reversion is limited to this simple payment of twenty-two thousand – ”

“Seven hundred and sixty-four pounds, sir. Don’t let us diminish the price by a fraction,” said Massingbred. “Wonderful people ye are, to be sure; and whether in your talent for savings, or dislike for sausages, alike admirable and praiseworthy! What a strange circle do events observe, and how irrevocable is the law of the material, the stern rule of the moral world, decay, decomposition, and regeneration following on each other; and as great men’s ashes beget grubs, so do illustrious houses generate in their rottenness the race of Herman Merls.”

Scanlan tried to smile at the rhapsodical conceit, but for some private reason of his own he did not relish nor enjoy it.

“So, then, according to the record,” said Massingbred, holding up the book, “there is an end of the ‘Martins of Cro’ Martin’?”

“That’s it, sir, in one word.”

“It is too shocking – too horrible to believe,” said Mas-singbred, with more of sincerity than his manner usually displayed. “Eh, Scanlan, – is it not so?” added he, as waiting in vain for some show of concurrence.

“I believe, however,” said the other, “it’s the history of every great family’s downfall: small liabilities growing in secrecy to become heavy charges, severe pressure exerted by those out of whose pockets came eventually the loans to meet the difficulties, – shrewdness and rapacity on one side, folly and wastefulness on the other.”

“Ay, ay; but who ever heard of a whole estate disposed of for less than two years of its rental?”

“That’s exactly the case, sir,” said he, in the same calm tone as before; “and what makes matters worse, we have little time to look out for expedients. Magennis will put us on our title at the new trial next assizes. Merl will take fright at the insecurity of his claim, and dispose of it, – Heaven knows to whom, – perhaps to that very league now formed to raise litigation against all the old tenures.”

“Stop, stop, Scanlan! There is quite enough difficulty before us, without conjuring up new complications,” cried Massingbred. “Have you anything to suggest? What ought to be done here?”

Scanlan was silent, and leaning his head on his hand seemed lost in thought.

“Come, Scanlan, you ‘ve thought over all this ere now. Tell me, man, what do you advise?”

Scanlan was silent.

“Out with it, Scanlan. I know, I feel that you have a resource in store against all these perils! Out with it, man.”

“Have I any need to remind you of your promise, Mr. Massingbred?” asked the other, stealthily.

“Not the slightest, Scanlan. I never forget a pledge.”

“Very well, sir; that’s enough,” said Scanlan, speaking rapidly, and like one anxious to overcome his confusion by an effort. “We have just one thing to do. We must buy out Merl. Of course as reasonably as we can, but buy him out we must. What between his own short experiences of Ireland, and the exposure that any litigation is sure to bring with it, he’s not likely to be hard to deal with, particularly when we are in possession, as I suppose we may be, through your intimacy with the Captain, of all the secret history of these transactions. I take it for granted that he ‘ll be as glad of a settlement that keeps all ‘snug,’ as ourselves. Less than the twenty-two thousand we can’t expect he’ll take.”

“And how are we to raise that sum without Mr. Martin’s concurrence?”

“I wish that was the only difficulty,” said Scanlan.

“What do you mean?”

“Just this: that in his present state no act of his would stand. Sure his mind is gone. There isn’t a servant about him could n’t swear to his fancies and imaginations. No, sir, the whole thing must be done amongst ourselves. I have eight thousand some hundred pounds of my own available at a moment; old Nelligan would readily – for an assignment of the Brewery and the Market Square – advance us ten thousand more; – the money, in short, could be had – more if we wanted it – the question – ”

“As to the dealing with Merl?” broke in Jack.

“No, sir, not that, though of course it is a most important consideration.”

“Well, what then?”

“As to the dealing with Maurice Scanlan, sir,” said he, making a great effort. “There’s the whole question in one word.”

“I don’t see that there can be any grave obstacle against that. You know the property.”

“Every acre of it.”

“You know how you’d like your advance to be secured to you – on what part of the estate. The conditions, I am certain, might be fairly left in your own hands; I feel assured you’d not ask nor expect anything beyond what was equitable and just.”

“Mr. Massingbred, we might talk this way a twelvemonth, and never be a bit nearer our object than when we began,” said Scanlan, resolutely. “I want two things, and I won’t take less than the two together. One is to be secured in the agency of the estate, under nobody’s control whatever but the Martins themselves. No Mister Repton to say ‘Do this, sign that, seal the other.’ I ‘ll have nobody over me but him that owns the property.”

“Well, and the other condition?”

“The other – the other – ” said Scanlan, growing very red – “the other, I suppose, will be made the great difficulty – at least, on my Lady’s side. She ‘ll be bristling up about her uncle the Marquis, and her half-cousin the Duke, and she’ll be throwing in my teeth who I am, and what I was, and all the rest of it, forgetting all the while where they ‘ll be if they reject my terms, and how much the most noble Viceroy will do for her when she has n’t a roof over her head, and how many letters his Grace will write when she has n’t a place to address them to, – not to say that the way they’re treating the girl at this very moment shows how much they think of her as one of themselves, living with old Catty Broon, and cantering over the country without as much as a boy after her. Sure, if they were n’t Pride itself, it’s glad they might be that a – a – a respectable man, that is sure to be devoted to their own interests forever, and one that knows the estate well, and, moreover than that, that doesn’t want to be going over to London, – no, nor even to Dublin, – that doesn’t care a brass farthing for the castle and the lodge in the park, – that, in short, Mr. Massingbred, asks nothing for anybody, but is willing to trust to his industry and what he knows of life – There it is now, – there’s my whole case,” said he, stammering, and growing more and more embarrassed. “I haven’t a word to add to it, except this: that if they’d rather be ruined entirely, left without stick or stone, roof or rafter in the world, than take my offer, they ‘ve nothing to blame but themselves and their own infernal pride!” And with this peroration, to deliver which cost him an effort like a small apoplexy, Maurice Scanlan sat down at the table, and crossed his arms on his breast like one prepared to await his verdict with a stout heart.

At last, and with the start of one who “suddenly bethought him of a precaution that ought not to be neglected,” he said, – “Of course, this is so far all between ourselves, for if I was to go up straight to my Lady, and say, ‘I want to marry your niece,’ I think I know what the answer would be.”

Although Massingbred had followed this rambling and incoherent effort at explanation with considerable attention, it was only by the very concluding words that he was quite certain of having comprehended its meaning. If we acknowledge that he felt almost astounded by the pretension, it is but fair to add that nothing in his manner or air betokened this feeling. Nay, he even by a slight gesture of the head invited the other to continue; and when the very abrupt conclusion did ensue, he sat patiently, as it were revolving the question in his own mind.

Had Scanlan been waiting for the few words which from a jury-box determine a man’s fate forever, he could not have suffered more acute anxiety than he felt while contemplating the other’s calm and unmoved countenance. A bold, open rejection of his plan, a defiant repudiation of his presumption, would not probably have pained him more, if as much as the impassive quietness of Jack’s demeanor.

“If you think that this is a piece of impudence on my part, Mr. Massingbred, – if it’s your opinion that in aspiring to be connected with the Martins I’m forgetting my place and my station, just say so at once. Tell it to me frankly, and I’ll know how to bear it,” said he, at last, when all further endurance had become impossible.

“Nothing of the kind, my dear Scanlan,” said Jack, smiling blandly. “Whatever snobbery once used to prevail on these subjects, we have come to live in a more generous age. The man of character, the man who unites an untarnished reputation to very considerable abilities, with talent to win any station, and virtues to adorn it, such a man wants no blazonry to illustrate his name, and it is mainly by such accessions that our English aristocracy, refreshed and invigorated as it is, preserves its great acknowledged superiority.”

It would have required a more acute critic than Maurice Scanlan to have detected the spirit in which this rhapsody was uttered. The apparent earnestness of the manner did not exactly consort with a certain pomposity of enunciation and an over-exactness in the tone of the declamation. On the whole Maurice did not like it. It smacked to his ears very like what he had often listened to in the Four Courts at the close of a “junior’s” address; and there was a Nisi Prius jingle in it that sounded marvellously unlike conviction.

“If, then,” resumed Massingbred, “they who by the accidents of fortune, or the meritorious services of their forefathers, represent rather in their elevation the gratitude of their country than – ”

“I ‘m sorry to interrupt you, sir, – indeed, I’m ashamed of myself for doing it, – for your remarks are beautiful, downright eloquent; but the truth is, this is a case touches me too closely to make me care for a grand speech about it. I ‘d rather have just a few words – to the evidence, as one might say, – or a simple answer to a plain question, Can this thing be done?”

“There’s where you beat us, Scanlan. There’s where we cannot approach you. You are practical. You reduce a matter at once to the simple dimension of efficacy first, then possibility, and with these two conditions before you you reject the fifty extraneous considerations, outlying contingencies, that distract and embarrass such fellows as me.

“I have no pretension to abilities like yours, Mr. Massingbred,” said Scanlan, with unassumed modesty.

“Ah, Scanlan, yours are the true gifts, take my word for it! – the recognized currency by which a man obtains what he seeks for; and there never was an era in which such qualities bore a higher value. Our statesmen, our diplomatists, our essay-writers, – nay, our very poets, addressing themselves as they do to the correction of social wrongs and class inequalities, – they are all ‘practical’! That is the type of our time, and future historians will talk of this as the ‘Age of Fact’!”

If one were to judge from Maurice Scanlan’s face during the delivery of this peroration, it might be possibly inferred that he scarcely accepted the speech as an illustration in point, since anything less practical he had never listened to.

“When I think,” resumed he, “what a different effect I should have produced in the ‘House’ had I possessed this requisite! You, possibly, may be under the impression that I achieved a great success?”

“Well, I did hear as much,” said Scanlan, half doggedly.

“Perhaps it was so. A first speech, you are aware, is always listened to indulgently; not so a second, especially if a man rises soon after his first effort. They begin to suspect they have got a talkative fellow, eager and ready to speak on every question; they dread that, and even if he be clever, they ‘ll vote him a bore!”

“Faith! I don’t wonder at it!” said Maurice, with a hearty sincerity in the tone.

“Yet, after all, Scanlan, let us be just! How in Heaven’s name, are men to become debaters, except by this same training? You require men not alone to be strong upon the mass of questions that come up in debate, but you expect them to be prompt with their explanations, always prepared with their replies. Not ransacking history, or searching through ‘Hansard,’ you want a man who, at the spur of the moment, can rise to defend, to explain, to simplify, or mayhap to assail, to denounce, to annihilate. Is n’t that true?”

“I don’t want any such thing, sir!” said Scanlan, with a sulky determination that there was no misunderstanding.

“You don’t. Well, what do you ask for?”

“I’ll tell you, sir, and in very few words, too, what I do not ask for! I don’t ask to be humbugged, listening to this, that, and the other, that I have nothing to say to; to hear how you failed or why you succeeded; what you did or what you could n’t do. I put a plain case to you, and I wanted as plain an answer. And as to your flattering me about being practical, or whatever you call it, it’s a clean waste of time, neither less nor more!”

“The agency and the niece!” said Massingbred, with a calm solemnity that this speech had never disconcerted.

“Them ‘s the conditions!” said Scanlan, reddening over face and forehead.

“You ‘re a plucky fellow, Scanlan, and by Jove I like you for it!” said Massingbred. And for once there was a hearty sincerity in the way he spoke. “If a man is to have a fall, let it be at least over a ‘rasper,’ not be thrown over a furrow in a ploughed field! You fly at high game, but I’m far from saying you’ll not succeed.” And with a jocular laugh he turned away and left him.