The Veiled Hand, a novel of the sixties, the seventies, and the eighties, etc

Front matter

THE VEILED HAND, A NO VEL OF THE SIXTIES, THE SEVENTIES, AND THE EIGHTIES, BY FREDERICK WICKS. WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY JEAN DE PALEOLOGUE\ EDEN, REMINGTON & CO., LONDON & SYDNEY. MDCCCXCII. while the historian deals with the growth of peoples and the movement of nations, it is the province of the novelist to exhibit the domestic life of his con temporaries. HIS object should be to give pictures of the life of the day, reflecting the most striking phases and the most startling developments of social relationship, that the strength and weakness of the nation may be seen in the detail. in proportion as he does this, without exaggeration, and yet with sufficient colouring to mark with effect the characteristics HE pourtrays, he is successful. PAGE 10 IS 3 36 55 65 72 82 95 104 CONTENTS. FIRST PERIOD : THE SIXTIES.

THAF. I. When all the World was before Her, II. The Successors to the Pottingers, III. Amy Chippering is provoked to Envy, IV. Pursuits Various, .... V. Doctors' Commons, VI. An Improving Neighbourhood, SECOND PERIOD: THE LATTER PART OF THE SIXTIES. VII. The Delfoys, VIII. Luckross Castle and a Bull-Pup, IX. The Delfoys Dine, . X. The Affair of the Cleuch, XI. For the Honour ok the Family, XII. A Little Legacy, contents. THIRD PERIOD : THE SEVENTIES. CHAP. I'AGE XIII. Window Dressing in High Quarters, . . 117 XIV. Unusual Morality, . . . . .129 XV. The Girl Vickers, ..... 139 XVI. Concerning a Great Dragon, . . . 146 XVII. Nice and Opals, ..... 151 XVIII. The Rest ok the Notes, .... 156 XIX. For Value received, .... 162 XX. The Ground-Floor Lodger, . . . 167 FOURTH PERIOD : THE EIGHTIES. XXI.

The New Leaf, ..... 177 XXII. The Great Coradell, . . . .181 XXIII. The Solicitor, ..... 193 XXIV. The Aristocracy in the City, . . . 200 XXV. The Countess of Bolore very much at Home, 211 XXVI. Domesticity, . ..... 220 XXVII. A Party of Eight, ..... 234 XXVIII. The Bowdler Garden Party, . . .243 XXIX. City Matters, ..... 250 XXX. A Busy Day, ...... 259 XXXI. The Private Secretaries, .... 272 XXXII. Reaction, ...... 277 XXXIII. Several Sorts of Joy, .... 283 XXXIV. A Model Heir, ..... 291 XXXV. Bowdler's Mission, ..... 298 XXXVI. M. Blanche, ...... 307 XXXVII. M. Blanch*, takes a Bird's-Eye View, . . CONTENTS. IX CHAP. I' ',1 XXXVIII. The Relapse, ..... 320 XXXIX. Mr Mawt.l of Madrid, .... 328 XL. Suffering, ...... 337 XLI. No Surrender, ..... 342 XLII. The Autocrat of Labour, . . . 352 XLIII.

Chapter I. When All The World Was Before Her

Although the closing incidents of this story happened but the other day, in the midst of the ordinary conflict of com mercial and political antagonism, it is necessary to go back five-and-twenty years to discover what may be regarded as the initial cause of those passages of human strife that have so recently agitated "the world." It was a stolen interview at the close of a July evening in Charnock Park — a place of historic interest and rare solitude ; and surely the strength of the passion that had brought the lovers to the trysting-place had been severely strained, for there was a frown upon his face, and fear and doubt upon hers. There had been meetings before this ; and now a crisis had arisen. They were both very striking in appearance, and both young. He was not twenty-two, and she was still younger by nearly a year.

Her chief characteristics were gentleness and trust and self-devotion ; and his, imperious command and bitter resentment towards those who thwarted him. Commonplace people would have described these attributes of his as selfishness, and some others as evidence of a proper pride ; while all the world knows that a young girl, all tender ness and love and hope, is an enemy to herself when matched in. strife with daring egotism. He had thrown himself on the ground in a fit of petulance, A and was tearing up the grass in an appropriate spirit of de structiveness, while the girl stood leaning her back against a tree, with her hands clasped before her, and upon her face were signs of distress and doubt. Her anxiety gave character to a face that some might have said was too accurately modelled for everyday wear; and if the mists of passion had not obscured his sight he might have discovered in that look a key to the treasures of a heart whose nature he had never even sought to comprehend, much less to reflect in rougher characters, its passionate devotion and self-denial.

She was very beautiful. Her face was oval, and lighted with dark, lustrous eyes, that told of patience, endurance, and a capacity for self-immolation. Her dark brown hair, some what at variance with the fashion of pads, then prevailing, was plainly parted in the middle, and as plainly secured in a plait or knot behind. Her lips were inclined to fulness, and were strangers in expression to anything but sympathy and com passion. Her figure was slight, but of the medium height ; and her whole demeanour was that of one who loved with incomparable devotion, and hoped with an abounding con fidence that the love she longed for would be hers when the anger of the moment should have passed. It did not pass readily. He rose and strode about, wildly gesticulating and muttering imprecations as he shook his fist at the heavens.

Then, turning to his companion, who remained still in the same posture of anxious doubt, he cried : " Oh, Muriel, if you did but understand the injustice that confounds me at every point you would not be so cruel as to deny me the comfort of your companionship, the soothing influence of your love." And although these words were thrust at her reproachfully, and even with bitterness, she answered in fearful, appealing tones : " You have my love, Geoffrey, and must always have it." And then, in accents almost of despair, she cried : " Oh, how can I help but love you." The frown passed from his face to be replaced by a smile, not unmixed, however, with a sinister eagerness. Approaching her, he said : " Forgive me, Muriel. I am so very miserable, and your sympathy is such sweet temptation." He put his arm around her waist and kissed her tenderly, while she responded with a look of timid, trustful love.

WHEN ALL THE WORLD WAS BEFORE HER. 3 Thus the phrases and the action were more in keeping with the peaceful beauty of the surroundings — the balmy air, the golden glow of the sunset, the rich foliage of the unfrequented glade, and the perfect solitude — for there were none to witness their passion and their vows but the curious deer. He was elegant rather than handsome, with a profile that would not have been amiss sketched upon a Roman coin, but the colour and movement of life blurred the outline, and the physiognomist would have seen no beauty in a form marred by a shifting eye that fondness described as violet, and indiffer ence as grey, and marred still more by a thin and nervous lip, that assumed many forms, betokening with invariable precision the dominant passion of the moment. This peculiarity grew more pronounced in later life, but in his youth the die had not been cast for moulding his future, and it was as yet uncertain whether restraint should curb or licence aggravate the latent evil enclosed within this graceful example of poor human nature.

" Oh, Muriel," said he after a pause, " you who love me can do much for me — very much." He looked at her with the inquiring, longing smile of the lover, and she answered, with something of hope and rejoicing in her tones : " You have my love, Geoffrey, as you know, and may have all the help of which I am capable, but that I fear is very little." "And very little is needed — merely sympathy and en couragement — nothing more." " But you will want advice in your difficulties ? " she sug gested inquiringly, " and you have told me often girls cannot reason." " Nor can they," he answered decidedly, " all the world agrees on that, but they are moved to a conclusion by instinct, and your instinct is unerring. But why do we trifle ? Love is not a matter of argument, nor are the actions of love regulated by the rule of three.

You cannot love me, or you would give me your sympathy and your companionship." He flung from her again ; and she, all trembling, cried : " When the time comes, Geoffrey, I shall be yours always and for all time, but you must not claim me sooner ; and oh, Geoffrey," she pleaded, " you frighten me with your vehemence and your anger." " How can I refrain from anger ? " he cried. " Look at my position — my father a spendthrift, and me a younger son. What future have I, with a commission in one of the most extravagant regiments in the service and with the income of a valet ? They talk to me of ' the honour of the family,' and of 'the credit of our name,' and expect me to maintain these costly characteristics with the beggarly pittance they fling at me grudgingly, scornfully." "We must be patient, Geoffrey."

"Why patient? I will not be patient. Nothing can be got by patience. You do not understand ; you have not studied the evils of our social system, the tyranny of social custom, the harshness of a father, the brutal arrogance of an elder brother. Why should I be patient ? " He regarded her with animosity as he put the question, and she, trembling as she listened, was struck dumb with apprehension, not for herself but for him, so wild and heedless did he carry himself. "Ah, Muriel," he added bitterly, as if reproaching her for her silence, " you know little of the injustice of the world and the need for mutual help or you would not regard my sufferings with such indifference." She looked at him amazed and even horrified. No sign was written on his face of the love and sympathy he claimed of her.

His eyes flashed, his lips were drawn, and his hair lay disordered on his temples. He was possessed with an impotent rage — or was he acting ? The change in his companion from blank amazement to a sense of weakness and distress was quickly followed by com plete dejection. She buried her face in her hands, and sink ing to the ground, she gave vent to her misery in violent sobs, made more distressing by her efforts to control them. The next instant he was at her side comforting her, and again an expression of sinister triumph crossed his face before he lifted her fair forehead to the light and kissed it with every mark of passionate fervour. What could she do but nestle in his arms, and at his bidding stay the ready tears ? It was not for her to question or withstand his bold, defiant manner.

She wept without anger in her weakness and distress, and forgave the pain and injustice without resentment. She was only glad the storm was over, and was content to believe his protestations when he attributed his excitement to the fears he had for their future happiness if his efforts proved unavailing to exact justice from his family. And then she listened with growing pride to his brave defiance of custom, as is the _^y^_> .^xu^Ae^tv WHEN ALL THE WORLD WAS BEFORE HER. 7 manner of young philosophers who are also younger sons, and thought how grand it would be to see him, as he promised he would be, in Parliament, reforming abuses and righting wrongs, and doing all the noble things that youth inspires and vested interests deny. So, step by step, he reassured her and renewed her simple faith, and bore her, as by gentle leading, back to the point whence all the mischief had arisen.

They must make haste to fly from uncongenial surroundings, harsh relatives and faithless friends, and make a new world of their own — a glorious world made still more glorious by their good deeds. The prospect was enchanting, and they set themselves to work devising ways and means, the time and manner of departure, and the destination. They would be married in London : they would journey to Paris : and they would ask nobody's permission. Said he : " Let me urge you, Muriel, in the name of our ambition in well-doing, to listen to my pleadings ! Do not let us risk success by taking others into our confidence." " May I not tell my aunt ? " she asked. " Why should you ? She has no love for you." " I think she loves me in her way." "Then it's not a nice way. She would only tell your uncle, and then there would be an end to our arrange ments."

Muriel became concerned, and her companion went on : " Our course is very clear. You have to settle what day we shall go to London, and we have nothing to do but go. Next day I will get a licence, and after that we will be married whenever you please." She shook her head. She could not give her reason, but she doubted. Instantly he rose to his feet, and a slight tremor of annoyance passed over his face and hovered round his mouth. The movement was far more dangerous than the more violent demonstration of passion, because it was altogether real. He turned to her and said in slow measured and masterful tones : " I am sorry, Muriel, if it cannot be ; but it can be no other way than I say. I will not meet your uncle nor your aunt. You say you do not wish to meet them in the future, therefore you can have no regard for them.

You have no other relatives. You are your own mistress. Come, THE VEILED HAND. and the future shall be as you wish it. Refuse, and let us both be miserable. Is it to be farewell ? " Again she buried her face in her hands. The unerring instinct with which he had credited her and all other women was wrestling desperately within her; and like a poor hunted thing, as indeed she was, she searched her weary mind if haply in the tumult of her passion she could And some manner of escape if only for a time ; but another and a stronger power pressed her forward with irresistible force, and in defiance of the instinct of self-preservation, regardless of conventional barriers and in sheer desperation, she thrust out her arms and cried, but still with her head averted and half bowed down : " Oh, Geoffrey, deal mercifully with me ; I cannot help but love you !

" He stepped forward and raised her gently by the hand. So the victory was won, and drying her tears in silence, she rested her head upon his shoulder, with all resistance to his will for ever at an end. The day, the place, the very hour were all determined in a few minutes, for the waning sun had warned them Muriel was late. And away she ran, hurrying as if for dear life and in fear of rebuke at home, but full of hope and promise of great joy ; and now and then, as she skurried over the uneven ground, she looked back for yet another last glimpse of Geoffrey, waving his hat as much in triumph as in encouragement and farewell. She loved him and she had promised, and therefore had no more room for doubts. She thought as little of his motives as the wondering deer, far away up the glade : nor perhaps did he, except that he must needs have his way when he had set his heart upon a thing.

He had never asked himself, not even once, how much of truth and honesty were in his purpose, how much the juvenile philosophy of the Oxford Union had distorted his brain and dressed black selfishness in the garb of personal devotion or patriotic ambition. And what could she tell ? His words, when he declaimed of social wrongs, seemed full of ripe experience, and were eloquently spoken in tones that to her were the very perfection of music. Thus Muriel hurried on, with her full heart and her boundless devotion, to a place that was no home for love, and to kindred whose sordid aspect and companionship formed qnly a gloomy background for the picture she would WHEN ALL THE WORLD WAS BEFORE HER. 9 draw of her lover's character and ambition. Everything that was brilliant in hope and heroic in promise was his ; and these, with the grand projects of his life, were now not only his but hers.

Chapter II. The Successors To The Pottingers

Mr. Chippering, the eminent haberdasher, waited in the hall of The Beeches, watch in hand, a model of punctuality and an expert in the art of rebuke, for his niece Muriel was late for prayers. The Beeches was the name of a mansion that might with propriety be described as magnificent. The auctioneer who had put it up to knock it down to Mr. Alfred Chippering said it was " an ancient demesne and the ancestral home of the Pottingers." It was a Gothic building in good preservation, and the park in which it stood was admirably wooded. Why the Pottingers had given up their " an cestral home " and Mr. Alfred Chippering had taken it, was due to the fact that the Pot tingers had not attended to their business, which was landowning, and that Mr. Chip pering, wholesale haberdasher and warehouseman, had attended to his.

The rise and progress of the Chipperings was coincident with the decay and fall of the Pottingers. When Mr. Chip pering, a raw, ungainly youth of penurious habits, was re joicing in the pride of an employment producing three-and sixpence a week, as messenger to a suburban draper, the last of the Pottingers was acting on the truly Pottinger theory that it was his duty to himself, his family and society, to spend ten thousand a year, regardless of his revenues ; and when, in the plenitude of his commercial successes, Mr. Chippering was entering into possession of The Beeches, the contemporary Pottinger was perambulating Pall Mall, the Park and Picca dilly, a pensioner of some less prodigal branch of the family. Here, and in the clubs, which he still frequented, he day by THE SUCCESSORS TO THE POTTINGERS. 11 day deplored the decadence of the Empire, as exemplified by the special circumstance of his being no longer the possessor of revenues he had dissipated.

And so the wheel of fortune revolves upon its axis, and with inexorable justice illustrates the consequences of folly and the triumphs of thrift. Chippering was a little man, bald on the forehead and crown of the head, with a frill of whisker and beard round his face, but otherwise clean shaven. He wore a high collar, a satin necktie of complicated design, with a diamond pin in it, a white waistcoat, and a black frock coat, very long in the skirt. He was a shopwalker, every inch of him, but he had supplanted the Pottingers, as shopwalkers who attend to their business do. The accumulation of money is not difficult, if men would but keep to simple methods and eschew ambition. To concentrate the mind, the heart, and the very soul, within the simple square of the multiplication table, and avoid the fascination of geometrical progression as represented by the fables of the Stock Exchange ; to restrict one's dissipation to the pursuit of knowledge in the suburban lecture hall, and subdue the tendency to encourage social aspirations are the leading principles with which the huckster guides himself with petty steps to fortune ; and then he dies with the glorious knowledge that he is worth so much.

Mr. Chippering was approaching sixty, with the happy consciousness that he had become rich without a stain upon his commercial character. He was one of the first haberdashers who had discovered the enticing properties of elevenpence three farthings as compared with the unbroken shilling, and he had once been known to give utterance to a smart saying : " Don't talk to me of the nimble ninepence," said he, " give me the frolicsome farthing," and the pursuit of the frolicsome farthing became the passion of his life. Although in the early days the influence of the multiplication table was tried upon the frolicsome farthing in a single establishment, the Pottinger mansion would not have been won without more extensive operations. Chippering, however, had always an eye for encouraging pushing young men ; and the pushing young men used to go forth from the Chippering warehouse and settle in improving towns — some as partners of existing haberdashers, and some as newly established ware housemen, whose stock was Chippering's, and whose profits mainly became Chippering's ; and the frolicsome farthing in the case of failure was the principal creditor.

It became, in course of time, a question in the Chippering mind whether failure was not more profitable than the success of those pushing young men, for after one misfortune they always began again on harder terms, resulting in more abundant accumulations to the parent establishment, which in time became a sort of octopus, so far-reaching, tenacious, and ravenous were its habits. Thus it had come to pass that Alfred Chippering was able to absorb The Beeches, and in the hall of The Beeches he waited, in a white waistcoat and long frock coat, precisely as if he had been walking the shop, and quite unlike an ancestral Pottinger, but withal a paragon of punctuality, eager to do his duty by his niece on this July evening, and remonstrate with her as became an uncle who was not a Pottinger. Mrs. Chippering was in the drawing-room, tall and angular, with side curls and combs of imitation tortoiseshell, sur mounted by a lace cap, decorated with lilac, and wearing a dark green alpaca dress of severe cut, for Mrs. Chippering had been all her life engaged in restraining the frolicsome farthing within the barrier of the Chippering threshold.

Miss Chippering was there too, aged twenty-five, and still romantic, for although her mouth was large and straight,- and her cheeks were a little puffy, she had a glistening grey eye that sparkled at the mere mention of knights in armour or their modern equivalent, and looked forward to an elopement as the hope of her life. She had been theoretically familiar with ladies' bowers, guitars and silken ladders, from early childhood ; and had nurtured a poetic nature on current literature in three volumes and penny numbers. She was even now, as they waited Muriel for prayers, reading "The Last Love " with painful shudderings. Her name was Amy. She was short of stature, after her father, with light brown hair, after her mother, and she was given to much sighing, being still unsought. But Mr. Chippering waited in vain : for Muriel had found her way through the by-paths into the conservatory, put her hat upon a chair, and stood just outside the drawing-room entrance to the conservatory, waiting the summons for prayers.

And this had happened because austerity breeds cunning and mechanical devotion subterfuge and dissimulation. The frolicsome farthings had opened the Pottinger portals, but they were still commonplace copper. Among the expedients had recourse to by Mrs. Chippering for restraining the frolicsome farthings within the Chippering coffers had been the newspaper, daily or weekly. It was THE SUCCESSORS TO THE POTTINGERS. 13 cheaper as a covering material even than job lots, for no matter how " enormous " the sacrifice of the haberdasher they were poor job lots that did not fetch three farthings a yard. So newspapers were used to cover the drawing-room pictures, and protect the paint of the Venetian blinds, and save the mantel board from being marked by the ornaments ; and every morning and evening when summoned to prayers the three domestics each bore her own newspaper to sit upon, that the garments of the kitchen should not soil the chairs of the drawing-room The patience of Mr. Chippering being exhausted, the bell was rung and the three bearers of newspapers appeared at one door, as Muriel entered at the other, to the confusion of the head of the house and her own complete evasion of all questioning.

In a very few minutes she escaped to her own room to look out on the night and dream of the morrow. Who can describe for the comprehension of man the marvellous beauty of the horizon looked upon by a girl whose tender feet are just stepping on the threshold of the great world ? It is all golden, just veiled by an azure mist — an atmosphere suggestive of the opal, iridescent, fugitive, dazzling. It is nothing definite, nothing tangible, nothing even dimly visible to be spoken of in common speech, but much that for beauty is incomparable, for purity immaculate, for hope in delible. It is all without blemish ; it is essentially to be de sired ; it is a haven from all distresses, a rest from all fatigue, a glorious sanctuary, perchance for indolence, for the laving of hands in fragrant waters, for the inhaling of sweet odours.

It was all this and more in the dream of Muriel, looking out upon the hazy landscape, where the distant trees broke the starry sky line. Even her lover's passion, anger, distress, in justice, all were glozed over with a sheen of glorious exultation, for were these invectives and declamations not strong and great, were they not grand, and hers ? Were not these dread emotions provoked by her and because of her, and was not she alone of all the world the only one who could allay the passion of her lover's heart? In very deed it was so; and all these upheavings of a strong man's soul were hers — her possession, her creation — and she was proud, and gloried in the resplendent future. It is so the mirage attracts, for the colours are strong and sometimes brilliant, although perhaps a little garish to the sober and the blase in their splendid flickerings and gyrations. i5

CHAPTER I

I I AMY CHIPPERING IS PROVOKED TO ENVY Mr. Chippering was shaving when next morning the partner of his triumphs and his cares invaded the sanctuary of the razor, with trouble writ upon her countenance, and bearing a paper in her hand. There is scarcely anything in the whole conglomerate of human affairs associated with so many emotions as the act of shav ing. It is dangerous and troublesome, yet it is one of the earliest ambitions of youth, and few who have experienced its miseries ever relinquish the fascination it exercises. It is a solemn, serious, and in many cases a secret rite. It is always a silent function, and inopportune intrusion is frequently fol lowed by a catastrophe, anathema, and even blood. It is not, therefore, amazing that Mr. Alfred Chippering was startled by the reflection in his glass of a wild-looking head decorated with curl-papers and a frilled nightcap, that he cut himself, that he used bad language when he was able to speak, and that Mrs. Chippering exhibited a ready penitence.

" My dear Mrs. Chip, why do you do these things ? " he asked querulously. " You know I cannot bear anyone near me when I'm shaving." " Well, dear, I couldn't help it." "My dear, don't be absurd ; you could help it." " I couldn't, dear ; Muriel's run away." " Well, that's some consolation," said the haberdasher, fitting on a piece of court plaster. " My dear, how can you say it's a consolation ? " " How ? Why, if she's run away, she's off our hands, isn't she ? Surely that's a blessing. We've no more responsibility." He made this remark holding on to his chin, with the piece of court plaster under his forefinger. " But think of the example to Amy, dear." " Don't trouble yourself, she won't follow it. What's the girl run away for?" "To be married, she says." " Excellent ! Any address ? " " Not a hint."

" Very good. Thank God that's off our minds." "Wretch !" exclaimed the lady, and left the room. " Now, Mrs. Chip's a curious sort of woman," soliloquised her spouse, still holding on to the sticking-plaster, but withal in a kindly and cheerful humour. " What can she mean by starting these curious feelings towards the girl ? She's nothing to do with her. The girl is on my side of the house, and I'm the person to have feelings about her disappearance, but I haven't, not a rap. No ! " The soliloquy was interrupted by the process of dressing. Mr. Chippering took up his necktie. It was a curious structure. Striped silk stretched on canvas and contrived to represent a knot, in which a pin was placed under the pretence that it was holding it together, while as a matter of fact the whole arrange ment was a modern make-believe necktie, designed to conceal flannel shirts, and made by the gross with rigid accuracy.

The thing seemed to please the haberdasher, however, and gave his thoughts a new turn. He balanced it in his hand and called it "a good line," which in the language of his kind means a large order or a successful piece of business. " Ah ! " said he. " I wish I had as many guineas as I have sold neckties." Then, continuing his ruminations, he said : " So, she's gone. Gone to be married. Gone for good. That's all right. Now, Mrs. Chip is queer, but I suppose she don't know." " What she did not know was that a little matter of three thousand pounds had come into her husband's hands with his niece, without writing or obligation, and while on the one hand the three thousand pounds had proved very useful in business, it had justified the commercial conscience of Mr. Chippering in treating his niece as one of his own household equally with his daughter.