Part 1, Chapter III
Mr Spencer Crichton

“Just in time to be too late.”

Hugh Crichton walked away from the musician’s apartments towards the railway station, where he had promised to meet his brother. His tweed suit and large white umbrella were objects as incongruous with the picturesque scene around him as the somewhat similar figure often introduced into the foreground of photographs of buildings or mountains; but his thoughts, possibly, were less unworthy of the soft and lovely land in which he found himself, were less taken up with the home news which he expected to receive than perhaps they should have been.

Hugh was scarcely eight and twenty, but the responsibilities of more advanced life had early descended on him, and he owed his present long holiday to a fall from his horse, from the effects of which, truth to tell, he had some time since entirely recovered. But busy men do not often reach Italy, and his friend, the English consul, was about to leave Civita Bella for a more lucrative appointment, and why should not Hugh see as much as possible, when he would never have another chance? “Never have another chance.” Those words echoed in Hugh’s ears and bore for him more than one meaning.

Some thirty years before, the Bank of Oxley, a large town not very far from London, with the old red-brick house belonging to it, had descended to a young James Spencer, who thenceforth held one of the best positions in the neighbourhood. For Oxley was a town of considerable importance, and the Spencers had been bankers there for generations, and had intermarried with half the families round. Nevertheless, when Miss Crichton, sole heiress of Redhurst House, refused Sir William Ribstone to marry Mr Spencer, it was said by her friends that she might have looked higher, and by his relations that no name, however aristocratic, should have been allowed to supersede the old Spencer, with all its honourable and respected associations. But Lily Crichton laughed and said that Sir William’s father had drunk himself to death, and had been known to throw a beef steak at the late Lady Ribstone, and she was afraid that the practices might be hereditary. Mr Spencer smiled and said that he hoped his friends would find Spencer Crichton as safe a name as Spencer had been before it, he would not refuse his wife’s estate because this condition was attached to it, and he could come into the Bank every day from Redhurst. And so, in Redhurst House, Mr and Mrs Spencer lived and loved each other, and their two sons, Hugh and James were born; while in course of time the banker’s younger brother died, and his three children, Arthur, Frederica, and George, were transferred to their uncle’s guardianship, and a little cousin of his wife’s, Marion or Mysie Crofton, was left with her eight thousand pounds in the same kind and efficient care.

These boys and girls, all grew up together in the careless freedom of so-called brother and sisterhood, till the sudden death of the father clouded their happiness, and, in the absence of near relations, left all these various guardianships to his wife and to his son Hugh.

It was a great honour for a young man of twenty-five to be so trusted, and a great burden; but Hugh was sensible and steady, his cousin Arthur was already nearly of age, and his mother, whose elastic spirits soon recovered more or less from the shock of grief, was, of course, practically responsible for the girls. Hugh’s own career at Rugby and at Oxford had been unexceptionable: he had no intention of making his office a sinecure. Conscientious and inflexible both in opinion and action, it would have been strange indeed if at twenty-five he had not been also rather hard and dictatorial; but the mischievous effects of these qualities was much modified by a certain clearness of judgment and power of understanding his own position and that of others which almost seemed to stand him in the stead of skilful tact, or even of gentle charity. He was really just, and, therefore, he saw difficulties as well as duties, and knew exactly where it would be foolish to strain an authority which he was too young to support, where it was wise to take the advice of others, and where it was necessary to depend on himself. He was often lenient in his judgment of others’ actions; but then he thought that there was not much to be expected of most people, and he was seldom made angry, because other people’s folly did not signify much as long as he was perfectly sure that he was acting rightly himself. If a man did do wrong he was a coward if he would not own it, even to a child. And so Hugh on the rare occasions when he was cross or unjust, invariably begged pardon. But he did not care at all whether he was forgiven. He had done his part, and if the other side cherished anger, that was their own look out.

The ownership of the bank had descended to him, and he lived with his mother and helped her to manage the Redhurst property, which would some day be his own, fulfilling all his various offices with much credit to himself, and, on the whole, much advantage to other people. For if he thought most of what was due to himself, his view of his own duty included great attention to the interests of others, even to self-sacrifice on their behalf. Indeed, as his cousin Arthur said, “although the old saying might have been parodied with regard to Hugh, that —

“Though he never did a cruel thing, He never said a kind one.”

“Neither did he ever say anything unkind, so they might all be thankful. Most likely old Hugh thought them all prodigies if they could only see into his heart.”

“You never were more mistaken in your life, Arthur,” said Hugh with perfect truth and much coolness.

“Now, why won’t you take the credit of having some fine feelings to repress?” said Arthur, who was often guilty of trying to get a rise out of Hugh for the benefit of the younger ones.

But Hugh was so unmoved that he did not even reply that he did not care about credit.

“You’ll get a scratch some day, Arthur,” said James, who nearest in age to Hugh, and exempt from his authority might say what he pleased.

“Oh no, he won’t,” said Hugh, with a not unpleasant smile. “At least, if he does, I shall be much ashamed of myself.”

“What?” said Arthur, “I should respect myself for ever if I could put Hugh in a rage.”

“People should never be in a rage,” said Hugh – “they should control themselves.”

“If they can,” said Arthur, conscious of the minor triumph of having caused Hugh to be very sententious.

Hugh was silent. It is one thing to have a theory of life, and quite another to mould your character and tame your passions into accordance with it. Years before, when Hugh was at Oxford and James had just left school for a public office; they, in the curious repetition and reversal of human events, had come across a certain Miss Ribstone, the daughter of their mother’s old admirer, to whose many charms Hugh, then scarcely twenty, fell a victim. For one whole long vacation he had ridden, danced, talked fun and sentiment with her, until the whole thing had been put an end to by the announcement of her engagement to – somebody else. Then Hugh’s pride and self-control proved weak defences against the sudden shock, and he met the girl and her half-saucy, half-sentimental demand for congratulations with such passionate reproaches as she never forgot. Probably she deserved them, but the mortification of having so betrayed himself, almost killed regret in Hugh’s bosom. “It was not my fault, I was not to blame,” he said to his brother. “I should have remembered that,” and as he spoke he made a holocaust of all the notes and flowers and ribbons he had hitherto cherished.

“Dear me,” said sentimental James, “what a pity, I keep dozens of them.”

“I’ll never have another,” said Hugh.

The incident was only remembered as “Hugh’s old flirtation with Nelly Ribstone,” but Hugh forswore fine ladies and folly, and never forgot that he had once lost all control of his own words and actions. But all that was long ago when he had been a mere boy, not a shadow of sentiment hung over the recollection of it, and Hugh awaited his brother’s arrival at Civita Bella with a certain self-consciousness and desire to appear specially pleased to see him, which perhaps he had not experienced since his relations had been wont to wonder “what Hugh could be doing again at Ribstone House.” He had not left himself much time to wait, for as he came up to the station, a slender little man in a velvet coat, with a conspicuously long, silky light brown beard, advanced to meet him.

“Ah, Hugh, there you are yourself.”

“How d’ye do, Jem? I never knew the train so punctual. I thought I’d ten minutes to spare. I’m so glad you have got your holiday.”

James Spencer would have been a much handsomer man than his brother if he had not been on so small a scale; as it was, the delicacy of his features, and the fairness of his complexion, gave him something of a finicking aspect; which was not diminished by the evident pains taken with his dress, hair, and beard; which were arranged with a view to the picturesque, rather trying to the patience of an ordinary observer. But on a close inspection, he had a good-tempered and kindly expression, which showed that he combined appreciation of other things and people with admiration for himself. And though he was very fond of talking Bohemianism, he went to his office every morning, and to church every Sunday with the regularity of a Philistine.

“Well, you look uncommonly jolly,” he said. “The Mum was afraid that as you had made so few expeditions, your back was not strong yet.”

Hugh despised excuses, so we will not suppose that this ready-made one offered him any temptation as he answered —

“Oh no; I was quite well a week after I got here. There is plenty to see here, I assure you.”

“I believe you,” said James ecstatically. “Were ever such colours and such a sky? Look there,” seizing his brother’s arm, “there’s a girl in a red petticoat – under that arch in the shadow – white on her head – oh!”

“You will have to get used to girls under archways in red petticoats,” returned Hugh.

“How were they all at Oxley?”

“Oh, very well; the mother was groaning after you. She said she couldn’t get the fences mended, and Jones’ cow had eaten the geraniums. Oh, and she wants to have a garden-party.”

“Well,” said Hugh, “what should hinder her having a dozen if she likes?”

“She can’t do it without you.”

“Isn’t Arthur there?”

“Arthur? yes. But it isn’t worth while asking the Miss Clintons to meet Arthur.”

“I should think that chattering Katie Clinton was just the girl he would admire.”

“Should you?” said Jem, rather meaningly. “However, Hugh, when are you coming home?”

“As soon as you do.”

“I have only a fortnight.”

“Then we can go back together. That church is considered very fine. Look at the spire.”

James looked with undisguised and genuine delight at the fair proportions and exquisite colouring of the building before him, and after various half-finished and inarticulate expressions of delight, exclaimed: “It’s intoxicating! Can’t we go in?”

“Not now. Mrs Tollemache will be waiting for us. There are a dozen such churches, besides the cathedral, and there’s an old amphitheatre, at least the remains of one.”

“Perish Oxley and its garden-parties in the ruins of its new town-hall and its detestable station,” cried James, mock-heroically, and striking an attitude.

“Then there’s a very good opera,” said Hugh – “and oh, wouldn’t the great singing-class be in your line to-morrow.”

“What singing-class?”

“Why, there’s a certain Signor Mattei here. He is first violin in the opera orchestra, and a very fine musician. I believe he followed music entirely from choice in the first instance.”

“Then I respect him,” said James. “What could he do better?”

“Exactly. I thought you would say so. Well, he has a great singing-class – more, I suppose, what would be called a choral society.”

“Yes,” said Jem; “I belong to the Gipsy Singers, and to Lady Newington’s Glee Society, and sometimes I run down to help the choir of that church at Richmond. I took you there once.”

“Well, Signor Mattei’s class is the popular one here. Tollemache takes his little sister, and having nothing better to do, I joined it. To-morrow is the last of the course, so you can go if you like.”

“I should like it immensely. Quite a new line for you though.”

“I don’t see why I should not sing as well as you or Arthur. I mean why I should not attempt it: of course I am no musician,” said Hugh, who had rather a morbid horror of boasting.

“No,” said Jem, “I have a theory that people’s lives are divided by too sharp lines. They should run into each other. Let each give something out, and each will get light and warmth and colour. Nobody knows how much there is in other people’s worlds till they get a peep at them. I should like to teach everybody something of what was most antipathetic to them, and show everyone a little of the society to which he was not born, whatever that may be.”

“There’s a great deal in what you say,” said Hugh, so meekly that Jem, on whose theories the sledge hammer of practice was commonly wont to fall, was quite astonished.

“Why, how mild and mellow Italian sunshine is making you. You’re a case in point. We shall have you getting that precious town-hall painted in fresco, and giving a concert in it, at which you’ll sing the first solo!”

And James burst into a hearty laugh, in which Hugh joined more joyously and freely than was often his wont. “Don’t you be surprised whatever I do,” he said. “See if I can’t catch some Italian sunshine and bring it home to Oxley! But here we are, come in, and you’ll see Mrs Tollemache.” James followed his brother; but an expression of unmitigated astonishment came over his face.

“Hallo! there’s something up,” he ejaculated under his breath. “Is it Miss Tollemache?”