George Fenn - The Haute Noblesse - A Novel

“Why, Vic,” he cried; “I thought you were in town.”

“How are you, my Trojan?” cried the visitor boisterously. “I was in town, but I’ve come back. I say, cheerful work this for Monsieur le Comte Henri des Vignes!”

“Don’t chaff a fellow,” said Harry angrily. “What brought you down?”

“Two things.”

“Now, look here, Vic. Don’t say any more about that. Perhaps after a time I may get her to think differently, but now – ”

“I was not going to say anything about your sister, my dear boy. I can wait and bear anything. But I suppose I may say something about you?”

“About me?”

“Yes. I’ve got a splendid thing on. Safe to make money – heaps of it.”

“Yes; but your schemes always want money first.”

“Well, hang it all, lad! you can’t expect a crop of potatoes without planting a few bits first. It wouldn’t want much. Only about fifty pounds. A hundred would be better, but we could make fifty do.”

Harry shook his head.

“Come, come; you haven’t heard half yet. I’ve the genuine information. It would be worth a pile of money. It’s our chance now – such a chance as may never occur again.”

“No, no; don’t tempt me, Vic,” said Harry, after a long whimpered conversation.

“Tempt? I feel disposed to force you, lad. It makes me half wild to see you degraded to such work as this. Why, if we do as I propose you will be in a position to follow out your aunt’s instructions, engage lawyers to push on your case, and while you obtain your rights, I shall be in a position to ask your sister’s hand without the chance of a refusal. I tell you the thing’s safe.”

“No, no,” said Harry, shaking his head; “it’s too risky. We should lose and be worse off than ever.”

“With a horse like that, and me with safe private information about him!”

“No,” said Harry, “I won’t. I’m going to keep steadily on here, and, as the governor calls it, plod.”

“That you’re not, if I know it,” cried Pradelle indignantly. “I won’t stand it. It’s disgraceful. You shan’t throw yourself away.”

“But I’ve got no money, old fellow.”

“Nonsense! Get some of the old man.”

“No; I’ve done it too often. He won’t stand it now.”

“Well, of your aunt.”

“She hasn’t a penny but what my father lets her have.”

“Your sister. Come, she would let you have some.”

Harry shook his head.

“No, I’m not going to ask her. It’s no good, Vic; I won’t.”

“Well,” said Pradelle, apostrophising an ingot of tin as it lay at his feet glistening with iridescent hues, “if any one had told me, I wouldn’t have believed it. Why, Harry, lad, you’ve only been a month at this mill-horse life, and you’re quite changed. What have they been doing to you, man?”

“Breaking my spirit, I suppose, they’d call it,” said the young man bitterly.

“Nonsense! yours isn’t a spirit to be broken in to a beggarly trade. Think of what your aunt has said to you, as well as to me. Your estates, your title, the woman you are to marry. Why, Harry, lad, you don’t think I’m going to sit still and see you break down without a word?”

Harry shook his head.

“Get out! I won’t have it. You want waking up,” said Pradelle in a low, earnest voice. “Think, lad, a few pounds placed as I could place ’em, and there’s fortune for in both, without reckoning on what you could do in France. As your aunt say, there’s money and a title waiting for you if you’ll only stretch out your hand to take ’em. Come, rouse yourself. Harry Vine isn’t the lad to settle down to this drudgery. Why, I thought it was one of the workmen when I came up.”

“It’s of no use,” said Harry gloomily, as he seated himself on the ingots of tin. “A man must submit to his fate.”

“Bah! a man’s fate is what he makes it. Look here; fifty or a hundred borrowed for a few days, and then repaid.”

“But suppose – ”

“Suppose!” cried Pradelle mockingly; “a business man has no time to suppose, he strikes while the iron’s hot. You’re going to strike iron, not tin.”

“How? Where’s the money?”

“Where’s the money?” said Pradelle mockingly. “You want fifty or a hundred for a few days, when you would return it fifty times over; and you say, where’s the money?”

“Don’t I tell you I have no one I could borrow from?” said Harry angrily.

“Yes, you have,” said Pradelle, sinking his voice. “It’s easy as easy. Only for a few days. A temporary loan. Look here.”

He bent down, and whispered a few words in the young man’s ear, words which turned him crimson, and then deadly pale.

“Pradelle!” he cried, in a hoarse whisper; “are you mad?”

“No. I was thinking of coming over to Auvergne to spend a month with my friend, the Count. By-and-by, dear lad – by-and-by.”

“No, no; it is impossible,” said Harry hoarsely, and he gave a hasty glance round.

“No,” whispered Pradelle, “no; it is not impossible, but as simple as A B C.”

“But,” faltered Harry, who was trembling now.

“Hush! some one coming. No; you need not mind,” said Pradelle with a sneer; “only two ladies walking up the road. Now, I wonder whom they’ve come to see.”

“No, no,” said Harry in a husky whisper, as his companion’s last words seemed unheeded; “I couldn’t do that.”

“You could,” said Pradelle, and then to himself: “and, if I know you, Harry Vine, you shall.”

Breakfast-time, with George Vine quietly partaking of his toast, and giving furtive glances at a Beloe in a small squat bottle. He was feeding his mind at the same time that he supplied the wants of his body. Now it was a bite of toast, leaving in the embrowned bread such a mark as was seen by the dervish when the man asked after the lost camel: for the student of molluscous sea life had lost a front tooth. Now it was a glance at the little gooseberry-shaped creature, clear as crystal, glistening in the clear water with iridescent hues, and trailing behind it a couple of filaments of an extreme delicacy and beauty that warranted the student’s admiration.

Louise was seated opposite, performing matutinal experiments, so it seemed, with pots, cups, an urn, and various infusions and crystals.

Pradelle was reading the paper, and Harry was dividing his time between eating some fried ham and glancing at the clock, which was pointing in the direction of the hour when he should be at Van Heldre’s.

“More tea, Louie; too sweet,” said the head of the house, passing his cup, via Pradelle.

The cup was filled up and passed back, Louise failing to notice that Pradelle manoeuvred to touch her hand as he played his part in the transfer. Then the door opened, and Liza, the brown-faced, black-haired Cornish maid, entered, bearing a tray with an untouched cup of tea, a brown piece of ham on its plate, and a little covered dish of hot toast.

“Please, ’m, Miss Vine says she don’t want no breakfast this morning.”

The Beloe bottle dropped back into George Vine’s pocket.

“Eh? My sister ill?” he said anxiously.

“No, sir; she seems quite well, but she was gashly cross with me, and said why didn’t Miss Louie bring it up.”

“Liza, I forbade you to use that foolish word – ‘gashly,’” said Louise, pouring out a fresh cup of tea, and changing it for the one cooling on the tray.

“Why don’t you take up auntie’s breakfast as you always do? You know she doesn’t like it sent up.”

Louise made no reply to her brother, but turned to Pradelle.

“You will excuse me for a few minutes, Mr Pradelle,” she said as she rose.