Page:Once a Week Volume 7.djvu/107

19, 1862.]

former chapters may be looked upon somewhat in the light of an introduction to what is to follow. It was necessary to relate the events recorded in them, but we must take a leap of not far short of two years from the date of their occurrence.

John Massingbird and his attendant, Luke Roy, had arrived safely at Melbourne in due course. Luke had written home one letter to his mother, and there his correspondence ended: but John Massingbird wrote frequently, both to Mrs. Verner and to his brother Frederick. John, according to his own account, appeared to be getting on all one way: the money he took out had served him well: he had made good use of it, and was accumulating a fortune rapidly. Such was his statement: but whether implicit reliance might be placed upon it was a question. Gay John was apt to deceive himself; was given to look on the bright side, and imbue things with a tinge of couleur de rose; when, for less sanguine eyes, the tinge would have shone out decidedly yellow. His last account told of a “glorious nugget” he had picked up at the diggings. “Almost as big as his head:” a “fortune in itself,” ran some of the phrases in his letters: and his intention was to go down himself to Melbourne and “realise the thousands” for it. His letter to Frederick was especially full of this; and he strongly recommended his brother to go out and pick up nuggets on his own score. Frederick Massingbird appeared very much inclined to take the hint.

“Were I only sure it was all gospel, I’d go to-morrow,” observed Frederick Massingbird to Lionel Verner, one day that the discussion of the contents of John’s letter had been renewed, a month or two subsequent to its arrival. “A year’s luck, such as this, and a man might come home a millionaire. I wish I knew whether to put entire faith in it.”

“Why should John deceive you?” asked Lionel.

“He’d not deceive me wilfully. He has no cause to deceive me. The question is, is he deceived himself? Remember what grand schemes he would now and then become wild upon here, saying and thinking he had found the philosopher’s stone. And how would they turn out? This may be one of the same calibre. I wonder we did not hear again by the last month’s mail.”

“There’s a mail due now.”

“I know there is,” said Frederick. “Should it bring news to confirm this, I shall go out to him.”

“The worst is, those diggings appear to be all a lottery,” remarked Lionel. “Where one gets his pockets lined, another starves: nay, ten—fifty—more, for all we know, starve for the one lucky one. I should not myself feel inclined to risk the journey to them.”

“You! It’s not likely you would,” was the reply of Frederick Massingbird. “Everybody was not born heir to Verner’s Pride.”

Lionel laughed pleasantly. They were pacing the terrace in the sunshine of a winter’s afternoon: a crisp, cold, bright day in January. At that moment Tynn came out of the house and approached them.

“My master is up, sir, and would like the paper read to him,” said he, addressing Frederick Massingbird.

“Oh, bother, I can’t stop now,” broke from that gentleman, involuntarily. “Tynn, you need not say that you found me here. I have an appointment, and I must hasten to keep it.”

Lionel Verner looked at his watch.

“I can spare half an hour,” he observed to himself: and he proceeded to Mr. Verner’s room.

The old study that you have seen before. And there sat Mr. Verner in the same arm-chair, cushioned and padded more than it had used to be. What a change there was in him! Shrunken, wasted, drawn: surely there would be no place very long in this world for Mr. Verner.

He was leaning forward in his chair, his back bowed, his hands resting on his stick, which was stretched out before him. He lifted his head when Lionel entered, and an expression, partly of displeasure, partly of pain, passed over his countenance.

“Where’s Frederick?” he sharply asked.

“Frederick has an appointment out, sir. I will read to you.”

“I thought you were going down to your mother’s,” rejoined Mr. Verner, his accent not softening in the least.

“I need not go for this half hour yet,” replied Lionel, taking up the “Times,” which lay on a table near Mr. Verner. “Have you looked at the headings of the news, sir, or shall I go over them for you, and then you can tell me what you wish read.”

“I don’t want anything read by you,” said Mr. Verner. “Put the paper down.”

Lionel did not immediately obey. A shade of mortification had crossed his face.

“Do you hear me, Lionel? Put the paper down. You know how it fidgets me to hear those papers ruffled, when I am not in a mood for reading.”

Lionel rose, and stood before Mr. Verner. “Uncle, I wish you would let me do something for you. Better send me out of the house altogether, than treat me with this estrangement. Will it be of any use my asking you, for the hundredth time, what I did to displease you?”

“I tell you I don’t want the paper read,” said Mr. Verner. “And if you’d leave me alone I should be glad. Perhaps I shall get a wink of sleep. All night, all night, and my eyes were never closed! It’s time I was gone.”

The concluding sentences were spoken as in