He Knew He Was Right, Anthony Trollope [children's ebooks free online .TXT] 📗

way to make the proposed transfer of his share of

the bank business, she, Miss Stanbury, would hand over to him, for his

life, a certain proportion of the Burgess property which lay in the

city, the income of which would exceed that drawn by him from the

business. Would he, at his time of life, take that for doing nothing

which he now got for working hard? That was the meaning of it. And

then, too, as far as the portion of the property went, and it extended

to the houses owned by Miss Stanbury on the bank side of the Close, it

would belong altogether to Barty Burgess for his life. ‘It will simply

be this, Mr Burgess, that Brooke will be your heir as would be natural.’

 

‘I don’t know that it would be at all natural,’ said he. ‘I should

prefer to choose my own heir.

 

‘No doubt, Mr Burgess, in respect to your own property,’ said Miss

Stanbury.

 

At last he said that he would think of it, and consult his partner; and

then he got up to take his leave. ‘For myself,’ said Miss Stanbury, ‘I

would wish that all animosities might be buried.’

 

‘We can say that they are buried,’ said the grim old man ‘but nobody

will believe us.’

 

‘What matters if we could believe it ourselves?’

 

‘But suppose we didn’t. I don’t believe that much good can come from

talking of such things, Miss Stanbury. You and I have grown too old to

swear a friendship. I will think of this thing, and if I find that it

can be made to suit without much difficulty, I will perhaps entertain

it.’ Then the interview was over, and old Barty made his way

downstairs, and out of the house. He looked over to the tenements in

the Close which were offered to him, every circumstance of each one of

which he knew, and felt that he might do worse. Were he to leave the

bank, he could not take his entire income with him, and it had been

long said of him that he ought to leave it. The Croppers, who were his

partners and whom he had never loved, would be glad to welcome in his

place one of the old family who would have money; and then the name

would be perpetuated in Exeter, which, even to Barty Burgess, was

something.

 

On that night the scheme was divulged to Dorothy, and she was in

ecstasies. London had always sounded bleak and distant and terrible to

her; and her heart had misgiven her at the idea of leaving her aunt. If

only this thing might be arranged! When Brooke spoke the next morning

of returning at once to his office, he was rebuked by both the ladies.

What was the Ecclesiastical Commission Office to any of them, when

matters of such importance were concerned? But Brooke would not be

talked out of his prudence. He was very willing to be made a banker at

Exeter, and to go to school again and learn banking business; but he

would not throw up his occupation in London till he knew that there was

another ready for him in the country. One day longer he spent in

Exeter, and During that day he was more than once with his uncle. He

saw also the Messrs Cropper, and was considerably chilled by the manner

in which they at first seemed to entertain the proposition. Indeed, for

a couple of hours he thought that the scheme must be abandoned. It was

pointed out to him that Mr Barty Burgess’s life would probably be

short, and that he, Barty, had but a small part of the business at his

disposal. But gradually a way to terms was seen, not quite so simple as

that which Miss Stanbury had suggested; and Brooke, when he left

Exeter, did believe it possible that he, after all, might become the

family representative in the old banking-house of the Burgesses.

 

‘And how long will it take, Aunt Stanbury?’ Dorothy asked.

 

‘Don’t you be impatient, my dear.’

 

‘I am not the least impatient; but of course I want to tell mamma and

Priscilla. It will be so nice to live here and not go up to London. Are

we to stay here in this very house?’

 

‘Have you not found out yet that Brooke will be likely to have an

opinion of his own on such things?’

 

‘But would you wish us to live here, aunt?’

 

‘I hardly know, dear. I am a foolish old woman, and cannot say what I

would wish. I cannot bear to be alone.’

 

‘Of course we will stay with you.’

 

‘And yet I should be jealous if I were not mistress of my own house.’

 

‘Of course you will be mistress.’

 

‘I believe, Dolly, that it would be better that I should die. I have

come to feel that I can do more good by going out of the world than by

remaining in it.’ Dorothy hardly answered this in words, but sat close

by her aunt, holding the old woman’s hand and caressing it, and

administering that love of which Miss Stanbury had enjoyed so little

during her life and which had become so necessary to her.

 

The news about the bank arrangements, though kept of course as a great

secret, soon became common in Exeter. It was known to be a good thing

for the firm in general that Barty Burgess should be removed from his

share of the management. He was old-fashioned, unpopular, and very

stubborn; and he and a certain Mr Julius Cropper, who was the leading

man among the Croppers, had not always been comfortable together. It

was at first hinted that old Miss Stanbury had been softened by sudden

twinges of conscience, and that she had confessed to some terrible

crime in the way of forgery, perjury, or perhaps worse, and had

relieved herself at last by making full restitution. But such a rumour

as this did not last long or receive wide credence. When it was hinted

to such old friends as Sir Peter Mancrudy and Mrs MacHugh, they laughed

it to scorn, and it did not exist even in the vague form of an

undivulged mystery for above three days. Then it was asserted that old

Barty had been found to have no real claim to any share in the bank,

and that he was to be turned out at Miss Stanbury’s instance that he

was to be turned out, and that Brooke had been acknowledged to be the

owner of the Burgess share of her business. Then came the fact that old

Barty had been bought out, and that the future husband of Miss

Stanbury’s niece was to be the junior partner. A general feeling

prevailed at last that there had been another great battle between Miss

Stanbury and old Barty, and that the old maid had prevailed now, as she

had done in former days. Before the end of July the papers were in the

lawyer’s hands, and all the terms had been fixed. Brooke came down

again and again, to Dorothy’s great delight, and displayed considerable

firmness in the management of his own interest. If Fate intended to

make him a banker in Exeter instead of a clerk in the Ecclesiastical

Commission Office, he would be a banker after a respectable fashion.

There was more than one little struggle between him and Mr Julius

Cropper, which ended in accession of respect on the part of Mr Cropper

for his new partner. Mr Cropper had thought that the establishment

might best be known to the commercial world of the West of England as

“Croppers’ Bank”; but Broke had been very firm in asserting that if he

was to have anything to do with it the old name should be maintained.

 

‘It’s to be “Cropper and Burgess,” he said to Dorothy one afternoon.

‘They fought hard for “Cropper, Cropper, and Burgess” but I wouldn’t

stand more than one Cropper.’

 

‘Of course not,’ said Dorothy, with something almost of scorn in her

voice. By this time Dorothy had gone very deeply into banking business.