The Way We Live Now, Anthony Trollope [good story books to read .txt] 📗

walked with the great man to the Board meeting. Melmotte was always very gracious in his manner to Lord Nidderdale, but had never, up to this moment, had any speech with his proposed son-in-law about business. “I wanted just to ask you something,” said the lord, hanging on the chairman’s arm.

“Anything you please, my lord.”

“Don’t you think that Carbury and I ought to have some shares to sell?”

“No, I don’t⁠—if you ask me.”

“Oh;⁠—I didn’t know. But why shouldn’t we as well as the others?”

“Have you and Sir Felix put any money into it?”

“Well, if you come to that, I don’t suppose we have. How much has Lord Alfred put into it?”

“I have taken shares for Lord Alfred,” said Melmotte, putting very heavy emphasis on the personal pronoun. “If it suits me to advance money to Lord Alfred Grendall, I suppose I may do so without asking your lordship’s consent, or that of Sir Felix Carbury.”

“Oh, certainly. I don’t want to make inquiry as to what you do with your money.”

“I’m sure you don’t, and, therefore, we won’t say anything more about it. You wait awhile, Lord Nidderdale, and you’ll find it will come all right. If you’ve got a few thousand pounds loose, and will put them into the concern, why, of course you can sell; and, if the shares are up, can sell at a profit. It’s presumed just at present that, at some early day, you’ll qualify for your directorship by doing so, and till that is done, the shares are allocated to you, but cannot be transferred to you.”

“That’s it, is it,” said Lord Nidderdale, pretending to understand all about it.

“If things go on as we hope they will between you and Marie, you can have pretty nearly any number of shares that you please;⁠—that is, if your father consents to a proper settlement.”

“I hope it’ll all go smooth, I’m sure,” said Nidderdale. “Thank you; I’m ever so much obliged to you, and I’ll explain it all to Carbury.”

XXIII “Yes;⁠—I’m a Baronet.”

How eager Lady Carbury was that her son should at once go in form to Marie’s father and make his proposition may be easily understood. “My dear Felix,” she said, standing over his bedside a little before noon, “pray don’t put it off; you don’t know how many slips there may be between the cup and the lip.”

“It’s everything to get him in a good humour,” pleaded Sir Felix.

“But the young lady will feel that she is ill-used.”

“There’s no fear of that; she’s all right. What am I to say to him about money? That’s the question.”

“I shouldn’t think of dictating anything, Felix.”

“Nidderdale, when he was on before, stipulated for a certain sum down; or his father did for him. So much cash was to be paid over before the ceremony, and it only went off because Nidderdale wanted the money to do what he liked with.”

“You wouldn’t mind having it settled?”

“No;⁠—I’d consent to that on condition that the money was paid down, and the income insured to me⁠—say £7,000 or £8,000 a year. I wouldn’t do it for less, mother; it wouldn’t be worth while.”

“But you have nothing left of your own.”

“I’ve got a throat that I can cut, and brains that I can blow out,” said the son, using an argument which he conceived might be efficacious with his mother; though, had she known him, she might have been sure that no man lived less likely to cut his own throat or blow out his own brains.

“Oh, Felix! how brutal it is to speak to me in that way.”

“It may be brutal; but you know, mother, business is business. You want me to marry this girl because of her money.”

“You want to marry her yourself.”

“I’m quite a philosopher about it. I want her money; and when one wants money, one should make up one’s mind how much or how little one means to take⁠—and whether one is sure to get it.”

“I don’t think there can be any doubt.”

“If I were to marry her, and if the money wasn’t there, it would be very like cutting my throat then, mother. If a man plays and loses, he can play again and perhaps win; but when a fellow goes in for an heiress, and gets the wife without the money, he feels a little hampered you know.”

“Of course he’d pay the money first.”

“It’s very well to say that. Of course he ought; but it would be rather awkward to refuse to go into church after everything had been arranged because the money hadn’t been paid over. He’s so clever, that he’d contrive that a man shouldn’t know whether the money had been paid or not. You can’t carry £10,000 a year about in your pocket, you know. If you’ll go, mother, perhaps I might think of getting up.”

Lady Carbury saw the danger, and turned over the affair on every side in her own mind. But she could also see the house in Grosvenor Square, the expenditure without limit, the congregating duchesses, the general acceptation of the people, and the mercantile celebrity of the man. And she could weigh against that the absolute pennilessness of her baronet-son. As he was, his condition was hopeless. Such a one must surely run some risk. The embarrassments of such a man as Lord Nidderdale were only temporary. There were the family estates, and the marquisate, and a golden future for him; but there was nothing coming to Felix in the future. All the goods he would ever have of his own, he had now;⁠—position, a title, and a handsome face. Surely he could afford to risk something! Even the ruins and wreck of such wealth as that displayed in Grosvenor Square would be better than the baronet’s present condition. And then, though it was possible that old Melmotte should be ruined some day, there could be no doubt as to his present means; and would it not be probable that he would make hay