第94章

As he had dined at the Eldon every day since his daughter had left him, and had played on an average a dozen rubbers of whist daily, he was not justified in complaining the loneliness of London.

The letter seemed to Emily herself to be very cold, and had not her husband rejoiced over it so warmly she would have considered it to be unsatisfactory.No doubt the 3,000 pounds would be given; but that, as far as she could understand her father's words, was to be the whole of her fortune.She had never known anything of her father's affairs or his intentions, but she had certainly supposed that her fortune would be very much more than this.She had learned in some indirect way that a large sum of money would have gone with her hand to Arthur Fletcher, could she have brought herself to marry that suitor favoured by her family.

And now, having learned, as she had learned, that money was of vital importance to her husband, she was dismayed at what seemed to her to be parental parsimony.But he was overjoyed,--so much so that for a while he lost that restraint over himself which was habitual to him.He ate his breakfast in a state of exultation, and talked,--not alluding specially to this 3,000 pounds,--as though he had the command of almost unlimited means.He ordered a carriage and drove her out, and bought presents for her,--things as to which they had both before decided that they should not be bought because of the expense.'Pray don't spend your money for me,' she said to him.'It's nice to have you giving me things, but it would be nicer to me even than that to think that I could save you expense.'

But he was not in a mood to be denied.'You don't understand,'

he said.'I don't want to be saved from little extravagances of this sort.Owing to circumstances, your father's money was at this moment of importance to me,--but he has answered to the whip and the money is there, and the trouble is over.We can enjoy ourselves now.Other troubles will spring up, no doubt, before long.'

She did not quite like being told that her father 'had answered to the whip',--but she was willing to believe that it was a phrase common among men to which it would be prudish to make objection.There was, also, something in her husband's elation which was distasteful to her.Could it be that reverses of fortune with reference to moderate sums of money, such as this which was now coming into his hands, would always affect him in the same way? Was it not almost unmanly, or at any rate was it not undignified? And yet she tried to make the best of it, and lent herself to his holiday mood as well as she was able.'Shall I write and thank papa?' she said that evening.

'I have been thinking of that,' he said.'You can write if you like, and of course you will.But I shall also write, and had better do so a post or two before you.As he has come round Isuppose I ought to show myself civil.What he says about the rest of his money is of course absurd.I shall ask him nothing about it, but no doubt after a bit he will make permanent arrangements.' Everything in the business wounded her more or less.She now perceived that he regarded this 3,000 pounds only as the first instalment of what he might get, and that his joy was due simply to this temporary success.And then he called her father absurd to her face.For a moment she thought that she would defend her father; but she could not as yet bring herself to question her husband's words even on such a subject as that.

He did write to Mr Wharton, but in doing so he altogether laid aside that flighty manner which for a while had annoyed her.He thoroughly understood that the wording of the letter might be very important to him, and he took much trouble with it.It must be now the great work of his life to ingratiate himself with this old man, so that, at any rate at the old man's death, he might possess at least half of the old man's money.He must take care that there should be no division between his wife and her father of such a nature as to make the father think that his son ought to enjoy any special privilege of primogeniture or of male inheritance.And if it could be so managed that the daughter should before the old man's death, become his favourite child, that also would be well.He was therefore very careful about the letter, which was as follows:

MY DEAR MR WHARTON