第10章

He was certainly a man of whom men were generally afraid.At the whist-table no one would venture to scold him.In the court no one ever contradicted him.In his own house, though he was very quiet, the servants dreaded to offend him, and were attentive to his slightest behests.When he condescended to ride with any acquaintance in the park, it was always acknowledged that old Wharton was to regulate the pace.His name was Abel, and all his life he had been known as able Abe,--a silent, far-seeing, close-fisted, just old man, who, was not, however, by any means deficient in sympathy either with the sufferings or with the joys of humanity.

It was Easter time, and the courts were not sitting, but Mr Wharton was in his chamber as a matter of course at ten o'clock.

He knew no real homely comforts elsewhere,--unless at the whist-table at the Eldon.He ate and drank and slept in his own house in Manchester Square, but he could hardly be said to live there.

It was not there that his mind was awake, and the powers of the man were exercised.When he came up from the dining-room to join his daughter after dinner, he would get her to sing him a song, and would then seat himself with a book.But he never read in his own house, invariably falling into a sweet and placid slumber, from which he was never disturbed till his daughter kissed him as she went to bed.Then he would walk about the room and look at his watch, and shuffle uneasily through half an hour, till his conscience allowed him to take himself to his chamber.

He was a man of no pursuits in his own house.But from ten in the morning til five, or often six, in the evening, his mind was active in some work.It was not now all law, as it used to be.

In the drawer of the old piece of furniture which stood just at the right hand of his own arm-chair there were various books hidden away, which he was sometimes ashamed to have seen by his clients,--poetry and novels, and even fairy tales.For there was nothing Mr Wharton could not read in his chambers, though there was nothing that he could read in his own house.He had a large pleasant room in which to sit, looking out from the ground floor of Stone Buildings on to the gardens belonging to the Inn, --and her, in the centre of the metropolis, but in perfect quiet as far as the outside world was concerned, he had lived and still lived his life.

At about noon on the day following that on which Lopez had made his sudden swoop on Mr Parker and had then dined with Everett Wharton, he called at Stone Buildings, and was shown into the lawyer's room.His quick eye at once discovered the book which Mr Wharton half hid away, and saw upon it Mr Mudie's suspicious ticket.Barristers certainly never get their law books from Mudie, and Lopez at once knew that his hoped-for father-in-law had been reading a novel.He had not suspected such weakness, but argued well from it for the business he had in hand.There must be a soft spot to be found about the heart of an old lawyer who spent his mornings in such occupation.'How do you do, sir?'

said Mr Wharton rising from his seat.'I hope you are well, sir.' Though he had been reading a novel his tone and manner were very cold.Lopez had never been in Stone Buildings before, and was not quite sure that he might not have committed some offence in coming there.'Take a seat, Mr Lopez.Is there anything I can do for you in my way?'

There was a great deal that could be done 'in his way' as father, --but how was it to be introduced and the case made clear? Lopez did not know whether the old man had as yet ever suspected such a feeling as that which he now intended to declare.He had been intimate at the house at Manchester Square, and had certainly ingratiated himself very closely with a certain Mrs Roby, who had been Mr Wharton's sister and constant companion, who lived in Berkeley Street, close round the corner from Manchester Square, and spent very much of her time with Emily Wharton.They were together daily, as though Mrs Roby had assumed the part of a second mother, and Lopez was well aware that Mrs Roby knew of his love.If there was a real confidence between Mrs Roby and the old man, the old lawyer knew about it also;--but as to that Lopez felt that he was in the dark.

The task of speaking to an old father is not unpleasant when the lover knows that he has been smiled upon, and, in fact, approved for the last six months.He is going to be patted on the back, and made much of, and received in the family.He is to be told that his Mary or his Augusta has been the best daughter in the world, and will therefore certainly be the best wife, and he himself will probably on that special occasion be spoken of with unqualified praise,--and all will be pleasant.But the subject is one very difficult to broach when no previous light has been thrown on it.Ferdinand Lopez, however, was not the man to stand shivering on the brink when a plunge was necessary,--and therefore he made his plunge.'Mr Wharton, I have taken the liberty to call upon you, because I want to speak to you about your daughter.'

'About my daughter!' The old man's surprise was quite genuine.

Of course when he had given himself a moment to think, he knew what must be the nature of his visitor's communication.But up to that moment he had never mixed his daughter and Ferdinand Lopez in his thoughts together.And now, the idea having come upon him, he looked at the aspirant with severe and unpleasant eyes.It was manifest to the aspirant that the first flash of the thing was painful to the father.

'Yes, sir.I know how great is my presumption.But, yet having ventured, I will hardly say to entertain any hope, but to have come to such a state that I can only by happy by hoping, I have thought it best to come to you at once.'

'Does she know anything of this?'

'Of my visit to you? Nothing.'

'Of your intentions;--of your suit generally? Am I to understand that this has any sanction from her?'

'None at all.'

'Have you told her anything of it?'

'Not a word.I come to ask you for your permission to address her.'