CHAPTER IV. The Return.
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The impatience of the wealthy India Merchant and also of the `Countess
Ale-mare,' increased as the time drew nigh, when judging from the
length of their `poor relation's' absence they might reasonably expect some
news. The more the former reflected upon the difficulty of substantiating
such a claim in the Lord Chancellor's Court, the more assured was he that
he would (should he even be the true heir) fail of succeeding to the princely
inheritance; while his wife grew more and more sanguine. Henry
Decker had now been ten weeks away and of late Peter had been observed
very attentively examining the London files.
`You have a ship expected into the Thames, Mr. Dalton, I suspect?' said
a Central Wharf merchant who had observed him closely examining the
files of the Times brought by the last arrival.
`No,' replied Peter starting and coloring as if caught doing something
wrong; `but I—that is, the state of the London market is very interesting
just now.' And Peter smiled and half-bowed as he turned away to look at
a New York paper.
This feverish interest to hear of the `Schoolmaster' (for he expected any
step taken in such an important matter would be made public and put into
the prints) grew upon him daily, and made him so nervous that the words
`London' or `England' which he chanced to meet with in any of the city
morning papers made him start with a quicker beating of the pulse. His
wife on the contrary, grew more and more confident every day, and committed
a hundred ridiculous follies in anticipation of her cousin's success.
One day Peter came in cross from having heard ill news from one of his
ships, and as dinner was not ready he sat down grumbling by the centre
table and began to turn over a book of prints. From the leaves a parcel
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of freshly embossed cards fell out and his astonished gaze was rivetted on
the name,
`The Countess of Alemare, Collonade Row.'
`What in the infernal name is this?' he exclaimed addressing her `ladyship'
herself, who was reclining at her length on the sofa reading `Byron.'
`My card,' she said slightly turning pale at his stern looks, but speaking
with considerable confidence.
`Your card!' he repeated with indignant contempt; and taking them he
tossed them into the grate and then by way of enforcing the act flung the
book of prints after them! `I wish your cousin had been at the devil! You
are making a fool of yourself and of me too! Let me tell you once for all
there is no chance for success. Lawyer — may whistle for his five hundred
dollars. Now mark my word!'
`But,' interposed the lady with timid hesitation have you any doubts of
Henry's being the heir?'
`I confess I have very little,' he said candidly after having made a short
pause.
`Then whether he get it or not I am clearly discarded from this noble
family of Alemare and it is becoming in me to assert my dignity. If he
fails, it will not effect my descent; and I shall not be backward in letting
some upstart people here in Boston know who I am! Not I!'
`They will set you dawn as a fool! Take my advice and let the matter
alone! If your cousin succeeds you will have honor; if he fails the least
you say about it the better.' Thus giving his opinion Peter sat down to
dinner,—the Countess Appollonia Ale-mare in the sulks!
Week after week passed by and Henry Decker had been absent four
months, when hearing nothing from him, and the lawyer of whom they
would have inquired being a member of Congress and absent in Washington,
they both quietly gave up the subject. Mrs. Dalton gradually settled
down into her former state, content with her present condition, (though not
without a second hope) and Peter ceased to examine the files of the London
Times. His opinion was that Henry had failed and privately returned and
gone back to his village and school to bury there his disappointment and
disgrace. And he secretly cherished this hope.
At length when six months had elapsed and Henry Decker was almost
forgotten, the merchant was electrified by opening his morning paper full
upon the following paragraph:
`We learn by the London Times received by yesterday's packet that
there is at present in England an American gentleman, who lays claim to
the title and estates of the late Lord Aylmer. `This person,' says the
Times, is a well bred man and has a highly intellectual look, combined
with a pleasing amiability of manners. He is said to be poor. His claims
are reported to be very strong, and the Court which is engaged in
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examining his proofs of heirship will shortly decide upon the merits of his claim
to succeed to this ancient title and vast possessions. We suspend our own
full opinion, but there is more probability that the estate will escheat than
pass in succession to the claimant.' `We know something' adds the Boston
paper, `of the merits of the claims of this gentleman, having been informed
of them some months since by his attorney here; and in our opinion
as well as in that of this eminent lawyer, his claims to the succession
are incontrovertible, and he can only be ousted by an act of flagrant injustice,
by a tyrannical abuse of power.'
The merchant having read the paragraph to its close exclaimed emphatically,
`And to this abuse of power will he become the victim, just as I prophesied!
Well, he has really gone into the lists with the Chancellor! He
deserves credit for his perseverance. I am reconciled to myself now that
it is clear that he will be ousted, for not lending him the money! He will
come back penniless and I should never have seen a dollar of my money
more! This paper says that the decision was to have been given in a few
days. I may then expect Henry Decker back in the next packet, if he does
not shoot himself, or can get money to pay his passage! It is just as certain,
as the London paper hints, that his claim will not be recognized as
that he will come to me when he lands to borrow ten dollars to take him
down home to Framingham!'
Peter withheld the paper from his wife, for now that her Countess-mania
had cleverly passed by, he did not choose to revive it; for he knew a spark
would rekindle it.
He now watched very closely the lists of passengers on the arrival of any
packet from England. But several weeks passed in fruitless expectation,
when one morning as he was going down State Street, a Liverpool packet
was telegraphed as being upon the beach beneath the lower light. The
evening paper as he opened it in his counting room gave the following item
of intelligence.
`The ship `L'Abri,' twenty-five days from Liverpool, went ashore on—
beach at day-light this morning. She will be lightened and got off without
material injury. Her passengers will be brought up to town by a steamer
that has been despatched to her. Passengers; Robert Eckhart, and lady;
Henry Deland, lady and servant; B. A. Davis; Charles P. Dewitt; J. Drummond;
Capt. Dresback, Guards; Mr. Hornbook; Mr. Ackerman; Mr.
Deckar; Mr. Flemming; George Robinson, bearer of Despatches; the
Earl of Elliston; The Hon. Capt Crockford, British Army; Lieut. Blakeley,
and twenty-nine in the steerage.'
`As I thought,' exclaimed the merchant so emphatically as to make all
his clerks stare; `he has come back as he went, or worse, for he had a
debt on his shoulders he'll never pay. I knew it! I was as sure he would
not succeed as I am sitting here! It is well I have not to lament the loss
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of five hundred dollars, as of my wife of her expected nobility. Not but
I feel sorry for the loss of it too! It would have been a feather in my cap
to be the husband of the cousin of a lord! It would have opened all the
best society to us, and made Isaac and the children hold up their heads with
the best. Besides, there was a chance of Isaac's inheriting! Well the
thing's up now! Here's the schoolmaster come back again schoolmaster!'
It must be he thought the printer has made a mistake in the spelling of the
e. `Now I hope Mrs. Dalton will rest content and tease me no more with
her relationship! I shall perhaps have a visit from her cousin! but he
don't get a dollar from me, I'll assure him. I wonder how he managed to
pay his passage! There was quite a respectable lot of them too, and he
came in the cabin! Poor and proud! But set a beggar on horseback he'll
ride to the devil! The Earl of Elliston! Here's a true nobleman for you
after all! though the schoolmaster didn't come back one. This will take off
the wire edge of my wife's disappointment; it is something to be in the
same city with a live lord!
A faint footstep interrupted the India merchant in the midst of his meditations
and looking up he beheld standing before him Mr. Henry Decker!
He had expected him, but he was taken by surprise as well as astonished at
his boldness in coming unannounced, into the sacred inner counting room
which the merchant was then occupying alone. The schoolmaster
stood before him in proper person, holding respectfully in his hand the
same seedy hat, and habited in the same thread-bare, greyish black suit.
He had not changed a particle save that his complexion was browner and
healthier from the sea-voyage, and his pantaloons something more worn in
the knees.
`So, Mr. Decker you have come back,' said the merchant coldly; `I just
saw the announcement of your name among the passengers of the L'Abri.'
`Yes sir, I came in her! I hope you are well, sir, and my cousin Appollonia
also,' said Henry humbly, and blushingly withdrawing his hand which
had held out to the merchant but which the other did not seem to see; for
he kept his own in his pockets, and threw himself back upon the hind legs
of his chair in a pompous way he had when he wished to repel undue familiarity.
`Mrs. Dalton is well,' responded Peter with an emphasis on the hymenial
designation of his better half, as if meaning thereby to resent the poor
schoolmaster's familiarity. He deigned no reply to the inquiry after his
own health.
`I suppose,' ventured Henry Decker, `that you would like to know how
I succeeded in my matter.'
`I have no need to inquire,' retorted Peter, eyeing significantly the threadbare
suit of his wife's relation; `sometimes eyes are as useful as ears.'
`Yes, sir,' responded Henry quietly sliding himself into a chair and
placing his hat deferently upon his knees. The merchant stared. `I hope
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you will excuse the liberty I take in sitting down unasked, Mr. Dalton,' he
added, apologising for his freedom, `but I have not quite got my land legs
on yet, and I find it is quite fatiguing to stand on shore!'
`I dare say,' growled Peter devising in his mind some way of relieving
himself of him. `I am sorry you have not succeeded Mr. Decker; and
now the result is as it is, you must acquit me of being unfriendly in refusing
to loan you the money.'
`Oh, yes sir,' answered Henry.
`I presume you have not brought much back with you.'
`Expenses in England are very great, and my passage was high and I
must confess it is pretty low with me just at this moment, he, he!' And the
schoolmaster laughed as if he had said a very witty thing. But Peter could
not see any thing in what he said to laugh at, and looked very stern and
dignified.
`I hope you have got enough to take you to Framingham,' said the merchant
loftily.
`Why, cousin—
`I beg, Mr. Decker, that you will be so good as to drop that term altogether,
interrupted the merchant severely and frowning a thunderbolt.
`I beg ten thousand pardons,' cried the schoolmaster hurriedly and
seeming much mortified, `but I quite forgot myself, Mr. Dalton.'
The merchant was mollified by the profound humility of the apology,
and said kindly, or what he meant to be so,
`I should be glad to invite you home to tea but we are going out this
evening.'
`Oh, it makes but little difference, I can amuse myself with the children,'
said the schoolmaster meekly; `you and coz—I mean Mrs. Dalton needn't
make a stranger of me. I can find a book to read till bed-time!'
The merchant opened his eyes and suspected his ears! Did the `poor
cousin' mean to go home with him!
`By the by, England is a great country, Mr. Dalton,' suddenly exclaimed
Mr. Decker in quite a self-complacent tone, as if there had existed the best
understanding between them. `The sea also is much wider than I had
conceived, and the king is like any other man only a little portly like and
well-fed. But this reminds me of my supper. The sea sharpens one's
appetite amazingly.'
The merchant was confounded at this audacity of a `poor relation,' and
all too with such a meek look and deferential manner, fumbling his greasy
hat between his knees and looking so awed and timid.
`This is the top-touch of impudence,' he said to himself; `the fellow is
without means and intends to cousin on me for tea and lodging, hoping I'll
let him have money to get rid of him. But he'll find himself mistaken.—
Not a dollar of mine will he finger.'
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`You seem to have grown something fleshy, cousin, since I left,' said
Henry Decker, interrupting his thoughts, and, as if getting bolder, he threw
one leg across the other, and gave at the same time such a confident ahem
for a poor man that the India merchant's astonishment and displeasure
were complete. He rose up and said sternly,
`Mr. Decker, I am engaged and must go to my house. I have told you
I cannot invite you to tea.'
`Oh, very well, I'll come and dine with you to-morrow, as I should like
to see Appollonia before I leave town.'
Mr. Dalton it so happened was to give a dining party the next day to several
India merchants, three or four aldermen and even the mayor was to
be a guest. He therefore turned round to the schoolmaster and with decision
commensurate with this circumstance, said,
`To-morrow I am to have a select party of gentlemen to dine, and it will
be impossible for me to receive you. It seems your voyage to England has
not improved your modesty. I never was so annoyed, sir. I have little regard
for people that invite themselves. I wish to lock my door and bid
you a good day, sir.'
Here the merchant went out, and Mr. Decker, very meekly as became a
poor relation rose and followed him, and slowly passed out to the street,
while the merchant was giving some instructions to his clerk. In a few
moments Peter came out, thinking him gone, and encountered him on the
side-walk.
`I was waiting for you,' said the schoolmaster, quietly.
`The devil you were! I thought you had taken the hint I gave you.—
Now once for all Mr. Decker, I do not wish to have you a guest at my
house. I am used to better dressed men, rather! You presume too much
on being a cousin of Mrs. Dalton. She would be mortified to own you as
a relation and you know it! Once for all I do not want you at my house.'
`Oh, I am sorry to have incurred your displeasure, Mr. Dalton, indeed I
am;' replied the schoolmaster abashed; `I thought Appollonia might like
to see me, as I have just got back from England. `I've got some little
presents for each of the children—they did'nt cost a great deal but coming
from England, I thought they might be pleased with 'em.'
Peter was too close to buy toys for his children, but had no objection to
other person's making them presents. The holidays were at hand and he
had that very morning been importuned by them to buy them something.
The word `presents' spoken by the schoolmaster, therefore, vibrated not
unpleasant upon his ear, and the idea to him that if they got these presents,
it would be quite unnecessary for him to purchase any, and so much
would be saved.
`Presents, ah? Are they pretty?'
`Yes, I think the children will like them. If you will permit me to call
to-morrow some time I will bring them with me.'
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`Oh, very well. Let me see—we dine at four—do not come then or near
that hour. Say one o'clock; the children will then be at home from school
and Mrs. Dalton will no doubt be glad to have you spend a quarter of an
hour at the house, for relationship's sake.
The schoolmaster was plainly made happy by this permission, and cheerfully
bidding the merchant good day he let him proceed alone towards his
mansion, not a little gratified to get so cleverly rid of his poor relation,
whom he began to believe had determined, through a persevering impudence
which feigned humility, upon him for a home.
`Has Henry Decker been here with the children's presents?' inquired
Peter on coming from his counting-room at three o'clock the next day.
`Yes,' said the wife scornfully, `and pitiful presents they were too! A
tin whistle for Isaac, and a sugar rooster for each of the other children!'
`The whole not the value of a fourpence, I dare say.'
`No: but what better could be expected? He had on the same thread-bare
suit you said he had and looked as poor as a church mouse? He
boasted too, he was acquainted with that great Earl the paper this morning
says has taken rooms at the Tremont, as if an Earl would speak to him!
He deserves to die in the poor house or in the jail, as he will, if this lawyer
he owes sues him, for making me think I was a Countess!'
`Did he tell you that he could not prove himself the heir?'
`No, did he say so to you?'
`Not in so many words. The fact is I believe he is no more one of the
Bouillies than I am a Mooley. I should like to have seen him when the
Lord Chancellor gave him his quietus! But he has the impudence of a
highwayman with all his seeming bashfulness, and would have spunged on
me yesterday if I would have let him.'
`I had hard work to get rid of him to-day, and was afraid he would stay
he lingered so—'
`Was you speaking of the poor gentleman who was here to-day, marm?'
interposed the nurse who came into the parlor at the moment.
`Yes.'
`Well, he asks Thomas, he does, at the door, if there is to be a dinner
party, and Thomas says yes. He then asks the hour, and when Thomas
says four, he said he believed he would `drop in,' he did, marm.'
`He did, did he!' almost screamed Mrs. Dalton.
`Let me catch him,' retorted Peter, putting his thumb and finger significantly
together if he had a man by the ear.
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`The imperence!' murmured Mrs. Dalton with rage.
`The beggarly pedagogue!' thundered Peter.
Mrs. Dalton bolted from the room to give Thomas orders, on pain of losing
his place, not to let him in; which orders Peter came out and reiterated
with the additional penalty of having a broken head. Thomas of
course promised faithfully and with that sincerity which became a footman
who stood in fear of a broken head and dismission from service.
The lady was at length composed again, for as she was already in full
dress for her expected guests, it being half an hour to four, she was too discreet
to let her face get flushed with anger; and taking a seat where she
could conveniently superinted the preparations for dinner, while Peter at
a mirror near by rolled up his `pudding' into a new white neckcloth, she
said rather in a soliloquy than absolutely addressing her husband,
`I should feel proud enough if I could have this earl to dinner with the
mayor and the rest. It would be a triumph! An earl and a mayor and
three aldermen, besides half a dozen rich India merchants! But there is
not time now—and it would require management to get him as the bigbugs
will be fighting for him. But if he stays here long enough I'll make
a party for him, and it shall be a splendid one. He puts up at the Tremont.
Dalton shall call on him and leave his card. I wonder if he has a wife with
him. No, or it would have been mentioned. Dalton shall call on him first
and I'll secure him to my party. It is done!' she said emphatically.
`What is done, wife?' asked the merchant, turning with surprise at the
emphasis with which she closed her monologue.
`That I give a party to the English Earl! It will make me the tip of the
ton if I can get him to come. You must manage to get at him. Such great
folks I know keep very close and are hard to get introduced to! But you
must try and find out who is going to call, and call with him. I must have
him here, that is settled.'
`I am willing. I should like to know an Earl. I have never seen one.—
It would be a grand operation to have him here to a party, I agree with
you!'
`Yes, and I am glad I thought of it. I shall then choose my society!
I shant invite the —, nor the —, nor —, and they will be mad
enough. Let them try and play aristocrat above me, and their children
above my children. I am not going to be second to any of your Boston
families!'
There was in Boston a coterie comprising several old families of high
breeding and great refinement, whose names were associated with the ancient
noblesse of the colony, and which added lustre to the literature of the
day, from which the Daltons were to their infinite annoyance rigidly excluded;
an aristocracy of mind united with birth, to which money could purchase
no ticket of admission. It was to individuals of the exclusive set to
whieh the merchant's wife alluded.
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Peter was about to make some remark which had reference to the probability
of any of the guests soon dropping in, when a ring at the door bell
announced, as a glance through the curtains told Mrs. Dalton, no less a person
than his Honor the Mayor himself, accompanied by one of the Aldermen.
Peter hurried and blundered at the tie of his neckcloth; Mrs. Dalton
took a peep into the mirror and then seated herself in great state in a
scarlet velvet arm chair which she filled, though her neck being something
short, her head did not quite come up to the top of the back; and the next
moment the distinguished guests were announced.
But we leave the account of this great dinner and its events to another
portion of our story.
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Ingraham, J. H. (Joseph Holt), 1809-1860 [1846], The odd fellow, or, The secret association, and foraging Peter (United States Publishing Company, Boston) [word count] [eaf201].
