Toilers of Babylon: A Novel. Farjeon Benjamin Leopold
Читать онлайн книгу.
You are my only child, and will be my heir if everything is right between us. You will come into an enormous fortune, greater than you have any idea of, and by its means and a suitable marriage you will rise to power. There are few men who would not jump at the proposition I have made, which, plainly explained, means your coming into everything that can make life desirable. If I were asking you to marry a lady who was ugly or had some deformity I could understand your hesitation. Do you still refuse to give me the promise I ask?"
"I cannot give it to you, father."
"Why?" demanded Mr. Manners, in a stern voice; but he did not give Kingsley time to reply. "Listen further to me before you speak." He took a pocket-book from his pocket, and drew from it a paper which he consulted. "I can make excuses for slight faults of conduct, but will not pardon an opposition which threatens to destroy the most earnest wish of my life. You are acquainted with a person of the name of Loveday."
"I have the honor of his acquaintance," said Kingsley, nerving himself for the contest which he saw impending, and considerably surprised at his father's acquaintance with the name.
"He is a person of no character," said Mr. Manners.
"He is a gentleman," interrupted Kingsley.
"That is news to me," said Mr. Manners, "and is not in accordance with the information I have received."
"Have you been playing the spy upon me?" asked Kingsley, with some warmth.
"I should require to be in two places at once to have done that. This time last week I was in Russia."
"Then you have been paying some one to watch me. By what right, father?"
"You jump too hastily at conclusions. You make a statement which is not true, and you proceed to question me upon it."
"I beg your pardon; but you must have obtained your information from some source."
"Quite so."
"Will you tell me from whom?
"I may or I may not before we part to-night. You refused to give me a promise; I refuse to give you one. I might well take offence at the imputation that I have paid a spy to watch you."
"I withdrew the imputation, father."
"The suspicion was in itself an offence. I have allowed you to go your way, Kingsley, in the belief and hope that your way and mine were one, and that you would do nothing to disgrace me."
"I have done nothing to disgrace you."
"We may take different views. As a young man you have had what is called your 'fling.' I made you a most liberal allowance-"
"For which I have always been deeply grateful, father," said Kingsley, hoping to turn the current of his father's wrath. It smote him with keen apprehension, for Nansie's sake and his own, that the anger his father displayed when he first mentioned the name of Loveday should be no longer apparent, and that Mr. Manners spoke in his usual calm and masterful voice.
"I made you a most liberal allowance," repeated Mr. Manners, "which you freely spent. I did not demur to that; it pleased me that you should be liberal and extravagant, and prove yourself the equal in fortune, as you are in education and manners, of those with whom you mixed. You committed some follies, which I overlooked-and paid for."
"It is the truth, father. I got into debt and you cleared me."
"Did I reproach you?"
"No, sir."
"If I am not mistaken-and in figures I seldom am-I paid your debts for you on three occasions."
"It is true, sir."
"And always cheerfully."
"Always, sir."
"I am not wishful to take undue credit to myself by reminding you of this; it is only that I would have you bear in mind that I have endeavored to make your life easy and pleasurable, and to do my duty by you. Nor will I make any comparison between your career as a young man and mine at the same age. I am satisfied, and I suppose you are the same."
"I think, father," said Kingsley, "that I should have been content to work as you did."
"Not as I did, because we started from different standpoints. Pounds, shillings, and pence were of great importance to me, and I used to count them very jealously. I value money now perhaps as little as you do, but I know its value better than you, and what it can buy in a large way-in the way I have already explained to you. For that reason, and for no other, it is precious to me. There are men who have risen to wealth by discreditable means; that is not my case; what I possess has been fairly worked for and fairly earned. All through my life I have acted honorably and straightforwardly."
"All through my life, father," said Kingsley, with spirit, "I shall do the same."
"Well and good. I have a special reason, Kingsley, in speaking of myself in the way I have done."
"Will you favor me with your reason, father?"
"Yes. It is to put a strong emphasis upon what you will lose if you cut yourself away from me."
"Is there any fear of that, father?" asked Kingsley, with a sinking heart.
"It will be for you, not for me, to answer that question; and it will be answered, I presume, more in acts than in words. I return to the Mr. Loveday, who is described to me as a person of no character, and whom you describe as a gentleman."
"He is one, father, believe me," said Kingsley, earnestly.
"Do gentlemen travel about the country in caravans, sleeping in them by the roadsides?"
Kingsley could not help smiling. "Not generally, father, but some men are whimsical."
"Let us keep to the point, Kingsley. According to your account we are speaking of a gentleman."
"We are," said Kingsley, somewhat nettled at this pinning down.
"Then you mean that some gentlemen are whimsical?"
"I mean that."
"In what respect is this Mr. Loveday a gentleman? Does he come of an old family?"
"I do not know."
"Do you know anything of his family?"
"Nothing."
"Is he a man of means?"
"No."
"A poor man, then?"
"Yes."
"Very poor?"
"Very poor."
"And travels about in a broken-down caravan, and you wish me to believe he is a gentleman. I would prefer to take your word, Kingsley, against that of my informant, but in this instance I cannot do so. It would be stretching the limits too far."
"We will not argue it out, father."
"Very well. But Mr. Loveday does not travel alone in this caravan; he has a person he calls his daughter with him."
"It is coming," thought Kingsley, and he set his teeth fast, and said': "His daughter, a lady, travels with him."
"So far, then, my facts are indisputable. This young woman is described to me as an artful, designing person who has used all her arts to entangle you-because you have a rich father."
"Who dares say that?" cried Kingsley, starting up with flashing eyes.
"My informant. I understand, also, that some months since she contracted secretly a disreputable marriage, and that her husband-do not interrupt me for a moment, Kingsley-has conveniently disappeared in order to give her time to bleed you, through your rich father. To go through the ceremony again would be a light matter with her."
"It is a horrible calumny," cried Kingsley, in great excitement.
"Although," pursued Mr. Manners, exhibiting no agitation in his voice or manner, "the circumstances of my own private life have not made me personally familiar with the tricks of adventuresses, I have in the course of my experiences learned sufficient of them to make me abhor them. How much deeper must be my abhorrence now when such a woman steps in between me and my son to destroy a cherished design