Chapter 3

A LULL.

_Allcraft, Bellamy, Brammel, and Planner_. It was a goodly ship that bore the name, and fair she looked at the launching; her sails well set, her streamers flying, and the music of men's voices cheering her on her career. Happy and prosperous be her course! We think not of winter's cold in the fervent summer time, and wreck and ruin seem impossible on the smooth surface of the laughing sea; yet cold and winter come, and the smiling, sweet-tempered ripple can awaken from slumber, and battle and storm with the heavens. Never had bark left haven with finer promises of success. We will follow her from the port, and keep watchfully in the good ship's wake.

Michael formed a just conclusion when he reckoned upon increase of business. His own marriage, and the immense wealth of his lady, had inspired the world with unbounded confidence. The names of two of his partners were household words in the county, and stood high amongst the best. A convulsion of nature may destroy the world in half an hour, as love, it is said, _may_ transform a man into an oyster; but either of these contingencies was as remote as the possibility of Allcraft's failure. Silently and successfully the house went on. For a quarter of a year the sun shone brightly, and profit, and advantage, and honour, looked Michael in the face. Thriving abroad, happy at home, what did he need more? His spirit became buoyant--his heart carefree and light. He congratulated himself upon the prudence and success of his measures, and looked for his reward in the brilliant future which he had created for himself and earned. His soul was calmed; and so are the elements, fearfully and oppressively, sometimes an hour before the tempest and the storm.

At the end of three months, Michael deemed it necessary to go abroad. The heaviest of his father's debts had been contracted with a house in Lyons, and notices as to payment had been conveyed to him--notices as full of politeness as they were of meaning. The difficulties in which he had found himself at the death of his parent--the seriousness of his engagements--and the wariness which he had been compelled to exercise--had gone far to sober down the impetuous youth, and to endue him with the airs and habits of a man of business. He had attended to his duties at the banking-house faithfully and punctually. He had entered into its affairs with the energy and resolution of a practical and working mind. He had given his heart to the work, and had put his shoulder to the wheel, honestly and earnestly. Whatsoever may have been his faults previously to his connexion with his partners, it is due to him to say that he was no sluggard afterwards, and that he grudged neither time nor labour that could be in any way productive to the house--could add a shilling to its profits, or a breath of reputation to its name. To pay his father's debts from the earnings of the bank--to keep those debts a secret--and to leave the fortune of his wife untouched, were the objects for which he lived, and soon began to slave. Believing that a favourable arrangement could be effected with his father's creditors, he determined to visit them in person. He had not been absent from the bank even for a day; and now, before he could quit it with comfort, he deemed it necessary to have a few parting words with his right hand and factotum, Planner.

Planner was the only member of the firm who lived in the establishment. His specimens, his bottles, his maps, and drawings, had been removed to a spacious apartment over the place of business, and he rejoiced in the possession of an entire first floor. His bed-room had now a distinct existence. He had not enjoyed it for a week, before the water with which he performed his daily ablutions was insinuated by a cunning contrivance through the ceiling, and dismissed afterwards, as cleverly, through the floor. Hot water came through the wall at any hour of the day, and a constant artificial ventilation was maintained around his bed by night and day. There was no end to the artifices which the chamber exhibited. Michael, although he lived at a considerable distance from the bank, was always the first at his post, after Planner himself. He arrived unusually early on the day fixed for his visit to the Continent. Planner and he sat for an hour together, and in the course of their conversation, words to the following effect escaped them:--

"You will be careful and attentive, Planner. Let me hear from you by every post. Do not spare ink and paper."

"Trust me. I shall not forget it. But don't you miss the opportunity, Allcraft, of doing something with those mines. Your father wouldn't touch them--but he repented it. I tell you, Michael, if we bought them, and worked them ourselves, we might coin money! I'd go abroad and see the shafts sunk. I could save a fortune in merely setting them to rights."

"It is rather strange, Planner, that Brammel is so long absent. He should come home, and settle down to work. It isn't well to be away. It hasn't a fair appearance to the world. You saw his father yesterday. What said he?"

"Oh, that young Brammel had a good many things to arrange in Oxford and in the neighbourhood, and would soon be back now. But never mind him, Allcraft. Between ourselves, he is better where he is; he is a horrible ass."

"Hush. So he is, Planner, but he must not run wild. We must keep him at home. He has been a rackety one, and I fear he is not much better now. I question whether I should have received him here, if I had known as much of him at first as I have heard lately. But his father deceived me."

"Queer old man that, Michael! How he takes the boy's part always, and how frightened he seems lest you should think too badly of him. Young Brammel will have every farthing of the old man's money at his death. A pretty sum, too. A hundred thousand pounds, isn't it?"

"Well, Planner, let me know when he returns. That was a curious report about his marriage. Can it be true?"

"His father denies it, but you mustn't trust the old sinner when he talks about his son. He'll lie through thick and thin for him. They do say he lived with the girl at the time he was at college, and married her at last because her brother threatened to kick him."

"Nonsense, Planner."

"Why nonsense? More than half the marriages you hear of are scarcely a whit better. What are the rules for a correct match? Who obeys them? Where do you ever hear, now-a-days, of a proper marriage? People are inconsistent in this respect as in other things. A beauty marries a beast. A philosopher weds a fool. They can't tell you why, but they do it. It's the perversity of human nature."

"I shall look sharp after Brammel."

"Take my advice, Michael, and look after the mines. Brammel can take care of himself, or his wife and brother-in-law can do it. The timber on the property will realize the purchase money."

"Well, we shall see; but here is Mr Bellamy. Mind you write to me, and be explicit and particular."

"I shall do it, Michael."

"And mark, Planner; prudence--prudence."

And so saying, Michael advanced to Bellamy with a smiling countenance. An hour afterwards, both he and his lovely bride were comfortably seated in a post-chaise and four, admiring the garden-land of Kent, and speeding to Dover fast as their horses could carry them.