Thornleigh House: a North-country story

Front matter

A NORTH-COUNTRY STORY. BY W. EDWARD CHADWICK, AUTHOR OF IN* FELLOWSHIP, ETC. LONDON : SUTTON, DROWLEY & CO., 11, LUDGATE HILL, E.C. CONTENTS. CHAPTER PAGE I. TWO SISTERS AND A BROTHER 7 II. A SMALL DINNER-PARTY - - - - - 14 III. LOCAL GOSSIP ..... 28 IV. RICHARD HEPWORTH - - - - - 39 V. GEORGE ARMITAGE - - - - - - 49 VI. SUSPICIOUS CIRCUMSTANCES - - - - 58 VII. A LUNCHEON AT HIGHFIELD - - - - 68 VIII. AN AFTERNOON ON THE MOORS - - - - 80 IX. MR. SCHOFIELD'S WORRIES - - - - 89 X. CARRIE RAMSDEN ------ 100 XI. THE DEMON OF SUSPICION .... HO XII. MR. SCHOFIELD AND HIS SON - - . . 119 XIII. AN UNFORTUNATE MEETING - - - - 129 XIV. A CURIOUS COINCIDENCE - - - - - 138 XV. FURTHER LOCAL GOSSIP - - - - - 150 XVI. GEORGE ARMITAGE RETURNS - 158 XVII. THE MAYOR'S CONVERSAZIONE - - - -167 XVIII. ARMITAGE SEEKS COUNSEL -. - - CONTENTS.

VI CHAPTEI3 l'AGK XIX. BINUHAM's LOVE-MAKING- - - * 183 XX. ARMITAGE AND HILDA ----- 192 xxi. Hilda's decision .... - 202 XXII. AN INTERVIEW INTERRUPTED - 211 XXm. MR. SCHOFIELD IN LONDON .... 221 XXIV. THE BREAKING OF THE BANK . - - - 228 xxv. carrie's confession ----- 239 XXVI. A CONDITIONAL OFFER ----- 247 XXVII. MR. SCHOFIELD'S DEFEAT .... 256 XXVIII. SHORT AND SWEET ..... 264 XXIX. CONCLUSION - ... THORNLEIGH HOUSE.

Chapter I. Two Sisters And

A BROTHER. About six o'clock one Saturday evening in October a young lady was sitting in a deep, well-padded wicker chair in front of the fire in the morning-room of Thorn leigh House. An afternoon tea-table, upon which was placed an exquisite service of silver and most costly china, stood beside her ; the tray had been prepared for four, but three of the cups remained unused. The room had not been lighted, and a large bay-window, the blinds of which remained undrawn, looked westwards over a valley of no very great dimensions, and then across one low range of hills after another, each rising a little higher than the preceding ; behind the furthest of these the sun had not long set, and now the sky was like one sea of emerald and gold, upon which floated light fleecy clouds of purple, whose under surfaces were tinged with brilliant crimson fire.

But the young lady was not look ing at the sunset, though, without moving her chair, she might have watched much of its glorious and ever- THORNLELGH HOUSE. changing beauty. Her magnificent rich brown eyes seemed to be steadily fixed upon the glowing embers of the tire ; yet the expression of her face told you she was no more conscious of them than she was of the beauties of the sunset. Her thoughts were really far away from either. But whatever the subject of Frances Schofield's reverie may have been, it was interrupted by the entrance of her only sister, whose dress, as well as the rich, healthy glow upon her features, showed she had just returned from a walk. ' All alone, Fanny ? Where is father '?' asked the latter, as she entered the room. ' What are you doing to miss such a glorious sunset ?' ' I have not seen father since lunch,' replied Frances ; ' he said he had some work to do at the office.' ' And what have you been doing with yourself all the afternoon ?' asked her sister, taking a chair near the window and gazing out on the sunset as she leisurely removed her hat and gloves and unhooked her rich seal skin jacket. ' After lunch I tried to read that magazine article about " the means of improving the condition of the working classes " which you got into such raptures about last evening, but I fear I nearly went to sleep over it; then I drove the ponies almost into Moortown.

I met the five o'clock train at Thornleigh Station on my way back. I felt sure you would come by that.' ' We fully intended to do so, but we did not lunch till two ; then it was nearly half -past three before we got to the new Working Men's Club. We spent half an hour inspecting it, and then Alice would not hear of me coming away without giving my opinion as to the refreshment department. That meant a delicious afternoon-tea TWO SISTERS AND A BROTHER. 9 in one corner of the kitchen, and when we came out the air felt so fresh and bracing I persuaded Fred to walk back over the hills.' ' How are they all at Stonedale ?' ' They are all very well. Mrs. Hepworth sent her love to you. She was very much disappointed you could not come, but I explained that we did not all like to leave father.' ' Are they all at home ?' asked Frances. ' Yes, they were all there to-day.

Richard had come over last night to hear a lecture Mr. Armitage gave at the club, but he goes back to his work at St. Jude's this evening.' ' And what do you think of the club, Hilda ?' ' I'm simply charmed with it. Not that there is any thing very grand about it. They have certainly kept the idea of utility foremost. It has been well, but not at all extravagantly built and furnished. I should think it must prove most useful to the village people, and cannot fail to do good.' ' I have only seen it from the outside, and that was before it was finished. It seemed a large building.' ' On the ground-floor there is a reading-room and smoke-room, and two small rooms that can be used for classes or committee-meetings ; and behind these is a capital kitchen and a refreshment-bar, where the men can get tea and coffee and light refreshments, and where they can prepare for tea-parties or suppers.

Upstairs there is a large room for public meetings, which will hold about two hundred and fifty, and then there is a billiard room with two good tables.' ' It sounds very complete. It certainly ought to be a boon to the village.' ' Both Richard and Mr. Armitage told me their idea iu building it and making all arrangements for conducting it was to try and strike a happy mean between being too strict, which frightens men away, and too lax, which simply gives them the same temptations they have in other places, such as the public-houses and small ordinary working men's clubs. They don't have any intoxicants, and, though they have billiards, they don't permit any gambling. I wish we could have a similar institution for our people in Thornleigh.

I really don't see any insuperable difficulties.' ' What is Hilda saying about insuperable difficulties ?' asked a man's voice from the doorway, as a tall, slightly built young fellow of some two or three and twenty years of age entered the room. ' It is something new to hear you recognise such very ordinary, matter-of-fact, every day experiences as far as other people are concerned,' he added, as he took a chair opposite Frances and stretched out his feet towards the fire. ' I don't say that I don't see difficulties, Fred,' replied Hilda. ' What I say is, that most difficulties are not absolutely insuperable.' ' Such as, for instance ' I was telling Frances about the Stonedale club.' ' And you were suggesting to her that it would be very well if Thornleigh could boast of a similar institution, and what an excellent counter-attraction it would prove to the allurements of the Red Lion and the King's Arms.' ' Have you ever suggested the idea to father ?' asked Frances. ' Never directly ; but now that I have seen the Stone dale club, and how likely it seems to be a boon to the working men, I think I shall ask him to see if some thing of the same kind could not be arranged for our own people.' TWO SLSTERS AND A BROTHER. 11 ' Where's the money coming from, Hilda ?' asked Fred. ' I don't think you will find father particularly anxious to invest a large sum at the present time in a scheme from which he sees no prospect of any immediate return.' ' Where did the money come from at Stonedale ?' ' Ah, there's a mystery about that !

I asked Richard, and he said something about a generous anonymous benefactor ; but we don't find many folks of that sort knocking about in Thornleigh.' ' I should think it is probably Mr. Hepworth himself, who does not care for his name to appear too prominently in the subscription-list.' ' Well, you must talk to father about it. I will do what I can to help the scheme on, for, certainly, it would do a lot of our men good. There is sadly too much drunken ness and gambling in the village. I fancy Thornleigh is worse than most places at present.' ' I don't wonder, when there is so little done for the people,' said Hilda. ' I feel sure that if we provided some pleasant, attractive means for the workpeople to spend their time when they were not working, we should see a great diminution in the wrong-doing now so preva lent.

And I think that, as our large mills have brought so many people into the village, the least we can do is to try and find them some means of rational amusement and harmless recreation.' ' I suppose you know that Bingham and the Fuller tons are coming to dinner at seven o'clock,' said Fred, looking at the clock on the mantelpiece, ' and it is now nearly half -past six.' On this, Hilda left the room. As Frances was pre paring to follow her, Fred stopped her, saying : ' Did father say anything about our going to Stone dale?' ' Not directly ; but I could see he did not like it. He seemed preoccupied at lunch, and did not say much; and he went down to the mills directly afterwards. I hear Mr. Armitage was at the Hepworths'.' ' He generally lunches there on a Saturday. I don't see anything in the man to object to ; but father knows his own business best.' ' I am only sorry for Hilda.

Though she says very little, even to me, I know she feels very strongly father's dislike to our going to Stonedale.' ' I think there is a great deal to be said for father's view of the matter ; and then we must remember he is not one to commit himself too readily, especially on a subject with regard to which he feels it difficult to give what may appear to others a satisfactory reason. And you may feel sure he knows more than he cares to tell.' ' Do you know anything against Mr. Armitage ?' asked Frances rather bluntly. ' I know very little about him in any way. Both you and Hilda have probably seen more of him than I have. If you want my candid opinion, I can't make the fellow out ; and, as you know, I don't as a rule feel attracted to people who seem determined to envelop themselves in a self-made fog.' ' That is what father is always hinting at.

You don't think we imagine the mystery is thicker than it really is, do you ?' ' When a man comes into a neighbourhood as a perfect stranger, and commences to pay somewhat pointed attention to your daughter, the least he can do is to let you know something about his antecedents, to give you some idea of who he is and where he comes from ; but for all we know about Armitage he might have dropped from the clouds.' TWO SISTERS AND A BROTHER. 13 ' But, surely, unless he was quite respectable and honest, Mr. Hepworth would not have taken him into his business and allowed him to be so familiar with his own family ?' 'That is just what bothers father. If Hepworth knows all about the man, why does he not say who he is? But it's time to dress, Fanny,' said Fred, rising and pushing back his chair. ' I am only son*)' for Hilda's sake,' said Frances, as she left the room.

Chapter II

A SMALL DINNER-PARTY. In the somewhat brilliantly lighted drawing-room, where the two sisters were awaiting the arrival of the guests, we can more satisfactorily introduce them to the reader than by the flickering firelight of the morning-room. Hilda and Frances Schofield were the daughters of a North-Country manufacturer — the owner of extensive mills situated in a valley not far from the borderland of Lancashire and Yorkshire. Thomas Schofield, their father, was not an uncommon example of the men in his position of life — generally shrewd, though occasionally the victim of a prejudice ; always industrious, with boundless perseverance and will-power; keen as a hawk where he fancied his own interests were concerned, though occasionally misled as to the true nature of men and things ; ambitious to a fault, and sadly too much inclined to judge everything in life by a very material standard ; usually a just, if a somewhat exacting and rather unsympathetic master; not in all respects the wisest of parents, and indulgent to a degree so long as his children ministered to his pride.

His grandfather had owned a small farm in the valley, and to the ordinary work of a yeoman farmer had added the business of hand-loom weaving on a very small scale, the wool being mainly spun by the wives and daughters A SMALL DLNNER-PARTY. 15 of the adjacent cottagers. His father had made the farming entirely a secondary consideration to the manufacturing, and had built a small mill which had been enlarged from time to time. Thomas Schofield was an only child. After receiving a fair education at a grammar school in the immediate neighbourhood, he became asso ciated with his father in the business, and the two worked hard together. His father was not a very amiable man, and for some reason or other, when Thomas was about three or four and twenty, they had a quarrel; at any rate, such was the reason, the village gossips of those days declared, why he left his father, and for a time became an employe in a merchant's office in London.

He had not been gone very long, however, before his father sent for him back again. This invitation the young man was ready enough to accept, and for the rest of his father's lifetime the two worked well together. Conjointly they built up a successful business, and, current report stated, made a very large sum of money. While he was in London Thomas Schofield had married. His wife was the only child of an officer. Both her parents had died in India, and she had been brought up in the house of the merchant in whose employ Schofield had been. Mrs. Schofield was neither by tradition nor education particularly well fitted to mix among the circle to whom her husband introduced her on his return to his native place. Whether the fault was his or hers, the two very soon got a reputation for considering themselves very much superior to their neighbours, a reputation which Mr. and Mrs. Schofield apparently showed no particular desire to lose — the only people with whom they remained on very intimate terms in the immediate neighbourhood being the Hepworths of THORNLELGH HOUSE. 16 Stonedale.

Mr. Hepworth was, like Mr. Schofield, a large manufacturer, Mrs. Hepworth being the daughter of a clergyman in the South of England. After Mr. Schofield married and settled down in Thornleigh, he and his father purchased another small farm about half a mile further down the village, not far from the railway-station, and upon it proceeded to erect an enormous mill with every modern appliance for manufacturing purposes, the old mill being still used for dyeing and finishing. A few years later he purchased a plot of land above the village on the hillside, and there built for himself a very large and handsome house, to which he had made extensive additions from time to time. At the time our story opens Mr. Schofield had been a widower nearly five years. For some years before her death Mrs. Schofield had been in a delicate state of health, and had passed a considerable portion of every winter abroad, whither one or both of her daughters had always accompanied her.

Since his wife's death Mr. Schofield had gone very little into'society. His , friends thought him growing more and more self-contained. He worked hard at his business, but, except for the sake of his children, saw very little company. Both his son and daughters had received the very best education that money could procure. The former had been for several years at one of the best English public schools, and the latter, both in England and abroad, had had the advan tages of the best instruction that could be obtained. In the two daughters many of the best characteristics of their parents were reproduced. From their father they had inherited firmness of will and a certain quiet tenacity of purpose. This strength of character, com bined with a refinement of feeling and gentleness of manner inherited from their mother, and heightened by mixing, through the friends they had made at school, in some first-rate society, had produced a disposition which was capable of exercising a power of fascination in almost an unusual degree.

But while there was a striking similarity between the sisters — not in form or feature, but in character — there was also a still more marked individuality. Both were undoubtedly what is termed good-looking ; but of the two, perhaps, Frances carried the palm — a any rate, as far as vital beauty is concerned. She was less studious and naturally much more active than her elder sister, hving more in the open air, and was now almost a perfect type of a thoroughly happy, healthy North-Country young Englishwoman. Her natural abilities were excellent, her shrewdness of judgment and power of facile, if somewhat severe expression, being proverbial among her friends. She was a trifle shorter than Hilda, and slightly stouter, though lithe and active as a well-trained athlete. The elder sister was tall and fair, very quiet in bearing, and almost serious in manner, in consequence of which she was generally taken for at least eight or nine and twenty, though she was only just twenty-five.

Hilda was one who read and studied much ; her face told you that. She was rather given to theorizing, whereas her sister's knowledge was far more practical, being generally gained not from books, but from an un usually quick observation of men and things. The different occupation of the two girls as they waited in the drawing-room was typical. Hilda sat deeply engrossed in the study of the last few pages of that same magazine article over which Frances had fallen asleep, while Frances was bending over a collection of remarkably sine chrysanthemums, evidently meditating which particular bloom would add a further perfection to the small bouquet of flowers pinned at her breast. At this moment their first visitor was announced. ' How are you, Mr. Bingham ?' said Hilda, rising. ' My father will be down in a few minutes.' ' What a lovely afternoon we have had !' he remarked ; and then, turning to Frances, he added as he shook hands, ' I thought I saw you out with the ponies not far from the village.' ' I had been down to the station to meet Fred and Hilda ; they have been lunching at Stonedale.' Then Mr. Schofield and Fred came down, and soon afterwards Mr. and Miss Fullerton, the son and daughter of the principal banker in Moortown, entered the room. ' I have not seen you for the last few days,' remarked Fred to Mr. Bingham, after he had spoken to the Fullertons. ' I have been away for a fortnight having a little shooting at Lord Eastwood's place.

The sport was not much, but we had a pleasant house-party.' ' I was to have gone out with Fullerton this afternoon,' said Fred ; ' but I found my sister had made an engagement to lunch with the Hepworths, and she rather wished me to go with her. She is much interested in the new club they have built at Stonedale.' ' I saw from this morning's paper that Mr. Armitage had been giving a lecture there last night.' At this point dinner was announced. As they went towards the dining-room, Bingham, who was taking Hilda in, said : ' I hear you are much interested in the Stonedale club ?' ' I have been to see it to-day. I have long felt that we wanted something of the kind here, and now I feel more convinced than ever.' ' I should think it would be very useful for the work people.' ' My daughter thinks we want a counter-attraction to our two not very well conducted public-houses,' said Mr. Schofield, when they were seated at the table. ' I am only afraid, Miss Schofield,' said Fullerton, ' that if you erect a club here you will make the work people more independent than ever.

They think sadly too much of themselves at present.' ' A good deal depends on what you mean by in dependence,' remarked Hilda very quietly; 'if it is coupled with self-respect, I am not sure that it is not one of the best qualities a working man can possess.' ' My daughter, not being a large employer of labour,' remarked Mr. Schofield, ' is apt to regard these questions from a different standpoint to the one from which I am, from an almost daily experience, and that usually a most unpleasant one, compelled to regard them.' ' Talking of independence, Hilda,' remarked Fred with a somewhat mischievous smile, ' I saw your latest protege only yesterday in anything but an independent condition. In fact, he was very much dependent on the services of two friends who were doing their best to bring him home.' ' You don't mean Sam Oates ?' ' I don't mean anybody else.' ' I was afraid you would find your generosity mis placed there, Hilda,' said Mr. Schofield. ' Oates' loom was standing idle all yesterday morning.

Such conduct is most annoying, especially when I remember my power is running and my customers are waiting for the goods.' ' I feel sorry for the wife and children,' pleaded Hilda. 2—2 ' I have given no money, only a few old things to clothe the little ones.' ' If my information is correct, Mrs. Oates is not a very estimable person,' remarked Mr. Schofield. ' I am afraid it's a case of " as the husband is, the wife is." ' ' I suppose she might plead as her excuse the fact that " she is mated with a clown," ' said Frances, with a glance towards Hilda. ' I would not have anything more to do with them,' said Mr. Schofield. ' My belief is that when you step in to prevent people suffering the just penalty of their folly, you are only encouraging them to continue in their evil ways.' ' You think the influence of a club might be a powerful one for good, Miss Schofield ?' said Mr. Bingham to Hilda, as if anxious slightly to turn the direction of the conversation. ' I really do,' she replied ; ' I feel sorry for the men.

They have so few resources in themselves and so few attractions at home, and we always notice the temptation seems to be more powerful when the hours of work are shorter.' ' I hear there is some little mystery connected with the Stonedale club,' remarked Mr. Fullerton — ' some thing in the shape of a generous anonymous benefactor.' ' I hardly thought Hepworth could have borne the whole cost,' said Mr. Schofield ; ' I fancy their firm has been doing well lately, but two thousand pounds is a large outlay upon a wholly unremunerative object.' ' But Hilda's contention is that it would pay for itself, father,' said Frances. Have you caught the club fever, my dear?' ' You are not generally regarded as a susceptible subject, I should think,' said Miss Fullerton to Frances, laughing. ' By no means ; but when I do get an attack I generally get a very bad one, and ever since Hilda came home this afternoon I have felt the infection.' It was by no means the first time that Frances had come to the rescue in this way.

She had a happy knack of lubricating the not always too smoothly running machinery of hfe. After this the conversation drifted into other channels until the ladies left the dining-room. After they had gone, Mr. Schofield turned to Fullerton : ' I cannot quite see how what you have heard about that club of Hepworth's can be true. It is so palpably in connection with the firm ; it is hardly likely that an outsider would build an institution of that kind under the very shadow of another man's mill.' ' Of course, I was only repeating a morsel of local gossip, and you know what the value of such matter generally is.' Although Mr. Schofield had pooh-poohed the idea of Mr. Hepworth having received any extraneous help, he evidently did not feel quite satisfied, for a few minutes later he turned to Fred with the question : ' Fred, did you hear what Fullerton was saying?' ' What was that ?' ' That the Hepworths did not bear the whole cost of that new club of theirs.' ' I have heard something about it, but no sum was mentioned ; yet since I was over the place this afternoon I have felt puzzled as to how they were able, just at present, to invest so much money in a scheme of that kind.

I did not know that they were finding business so much more profitable than other people. Besides, Richard Hepworth told me he was hoping to have a similar institution in his parish — on a smaller scale, of course — but still, anyone who knows his place knows that much of what is done has to be done either by himself or his family.' ' What do you think of Miss Schofield's argument as to the moral effect on the workpeople?' asked Bingham. ' I must say this,' replied Mr. Schofield, who seemed pleased at the reference to Hilda's opinion, ' that I can not remember the time when I had one of Hepworth's hands before me on the bench ; and I fear that is more than your father could say of mine, Arthur ?' he added, turning to Fullerton. ' I have not heard him say much about magisterial work lately — in fact, I think he has been a httle irregular in his attendance.' ' I know he has other claims upon his time, especially since he entered Parliament,' said Mr. Schofield ; ' but had we not better join the ladies ?' When they arrived at the drawing-room they found it empty. ' They must be in the billiard-room,' said Fred ; ' they have probably remembered your challenge, Bingham.' ' I had forgotten it,' he replied ; ' but I am quite ready if you are.

How many points was it to be ?' ' I'll leave that to you.' The billiard-room was one of the most recent additions to Mr. Schofield's now extensive establishment, and since it had been finished, especially when they had only a few friends, it had been generally used in preference to the drawing-room after dinner. There the gentlemen could smoke, and a small piano not far from the fire made the girls quite reconciled to the change. Here the gentlemen found Frances and Miss Fullerton. ' Where is Hilda?' asked Fred. ' She said something about her Sunday-school class,' replied Frances. ' I don't think she will be long.' ' My mother wants you and Fred to come over for a few days to our box in Warwickshire,' said Fullerton, going up to Frances. ' The hunting will begin in about a fortnight. I hope you will be able to join us.' 'Thanks; you know my fancy for a good run,' she replied. ' Fred and I went out a few times last winter ; but the nearest meet is such a long way from here.' ' We shall be delighted to see you, and you must fix your own time ; only the earlier the better — there is less chance of being stopped by the frost.' ' Now, Fanny, we are waiting for a song,' said Mr. Schofield.

As she moved towards the piano Fullerton followed her to turn over the pages. ' Have you that new hunting song ?' he asked, as she began to turn over her music. ' I know what you mean, but I am not altogether sure that I like it ; the music is good, but I fear the moral is not of the best.' ' I should like to hear it again — I have only heard it once — perhaps I can then form a better opinion.' ' I must sing it, then, before Hilda comes down. She has conceived the strongest aversion to it.' The song was one in which the opening words of the refrain to each verse began : ' Away in the morning of life, O'er the hills, through the vales of my fancy.' ' Thanks,' he said as she finished it. ' I don't see anything to object to, and your sister has not returned.' ' Hilda is so good, I never like to vex her.