"I myself have not seen my wife and cousin since I returned from my visit to your son in Switzerland.I am glad they were able to amuse themselves without waiting for me at a London hotel, though I should have preferred to have met them here."Sir Robert and Lady Mainwaring were courteous but slightly embarrassed.Lady Canterbridge, who had come to the station in bored curiosity,raised her clear blue eyes to his.He did not look like a fool, a complaisant or fashionably-cynical husband--this well-dressed,well-mannered, but quietly and sympathetically observant man.Did he really care for his selfish wife? was it perfect trust or some absurd Transatlantic custom?She did not understand him.It wearied her and she turned her eyes indifferently away.Bradley, a little irritated, he knew not why, at the scrutiny of this tall,handsome, gentlemanly-looking woman, who, however, in spite of her broad shoulders and narrow hips possessed a refined muliebrity superior to mere womanliness of outline, turned slightly towards Sir Robert."Lady Canterbridge, Frank's cousin," explained Sir Robert, hesitatingly, as if conscious of some vague awkwardness.
Bradley and Lady Canterbridge both bowed,--possibly the latter's salutation was the most masculine,--and Bradley, eventually forgetting her presence, plunged into an earnest, sympathetic, and intelligent account of the condition in which he found the invalid at St. Moritz.The old man at first listened with an almost perfunctory courtesy and a hesitating reserve; but as Bradley was lapsing into equal reserve and they drove up to the gates of the quadrangle, he unexpectedly warmed with a word or two of serious welcome.Looking up with a half-unconscious smile, Bradley met Lady Canterbridge's examining eyes.
The next morning, finding an opportunity to be alone with him,Bradley, with a tactful mingling of sympathy and directness informed his host that he was cognizant of the disaster that had overtaken the Bank, and delicately begged him to accept any service he could render him."Pardon me," he said, "if I speak as plainly to you as I would to your son: my friendship for him justifies an equal frankness to any one he loves; but I should not intrude upon your confidence if I did not believe that my knowledge and assistance might be of benefit to you.Although I did not sell my lands to Richardson or approve of his methods," he continued, "I fear it was some suggestion of mine that eventually induced him to form the larger and more disastrous scheme that ruined the Bank.So you see,"he added lightly, "I claim a right to offer you my services."
Touched by Bradley's sincerity and discreet intelligence, Sir Robert was equally frank.During the recital of his Californian investments--a chronicle of almost fatuous speculation and imbecile enterprise--Bradley was profoundly moved at the ***** ignorance of business and hopeless ingenuousness of this old habitue of a cynical world and an intriguing and insincere society, to whom no scheme had been too wild for acceptance.As Bradley listened with a half-saddened smile to the grave visions of this aged enthusiast,he remembered the son's unsophisticated simplicity: what he had considered as the "boyishness" of immaturity was the taint of the utterly unpractical Mainwaring blood.It was upon this blood, and others like it, that Oldenhurst had for centuries waxed and fattened.
Bradley was true to his promise of assistance, and with the aid of two or three of his brother-millionaires, whose knowledge of the resources of the locality was no less powerful and convincing than the security of their actual wealth, managed to stay the immediate action of the catastrophe until the affairs of the Sierran Land and Timber Company could be examined and some plan of reconstruction arranged.
During this interval of five months, in which the credit of Sir Robert Mainwaring was preserved with the secret of his disaster,Bradley was a frequent and welcome visitor to Oldenhurst.Apart from his strange and chivalrous friendship for the Mainwarings--which was as incomprehensible to Sir Robert as Sir Robert's equally eccentric and Quixotic speculations had been to Bradley--he began to feel a singular and weird fascination for the place.A patient martyr in the vast London house he had taken for his wife and cousin's amusement, he loved to escape the loneliness of its autumn solitude or the occasional greater loneliness of his wife's social triumphs.The handsome, thoughtful man who sometimes appeared at the foot of his wife's table or melted away like a well-bred ghost in the hollow emptiness of her brilliant receptions, piqued the languid curiosity of a few.A distinguished personage, known for his tactful observance of convenances that others forgot, had made a point of challenging this gentlemanly apparition, and had followed it up with courteous civilities, which led to exchange of much respect but no increase of acquaintance.He had even spent a week at Buckenthorpe, with Canterbridge in the coverts and Lady Canterbridge in the music-room and library.He had returned more thoughtful, and for some time after was more frequent in his appearances at home, and more earnest in his renewed efforts to induce his wife to return to America with him.
"You'll never be happy anywhere but in California, among those common people," she replied; "and while I was willing to share your poverty THERE," she added dryly, "I prefer to share your wealth among civilized ladies and gentlemen.Besides," she continued, "we must consider Louise.She is as good as engaged to Lord Dunshunner,and I do not intend that you shall make a mess of her affairs here as you did in California."
It was the first time he had heard of Lord Dunshunner's proposals;it was the first allusion she had ever made to Louise and Mainwaring.