A Dangerous Fortune(128)
Nick called, by appointment, at ten, while they were still sitting around the breakfast table. Hugh had asked him to come. Nick sat next to Dotty and took a cup of coffee. He was an intelligent young man, twenty-two years old, just down from Oxford where, unlike most young aristocrats, he had actually sat examinations and got a degree. He had typically English good looks, fair hair and blue eyes and regular features, and Dotty looked at him as if she wanted to eat him with a spoon. Hugh envied their simple, lustful love.
Hugh felt too young to be playing the role of head of the family, but he had asked for this meeting, so he plunged right in. “Dotty, your fiance and I have had several long discussions about money.”
Mama got up to leave, but Hugh stopped her. “Women are supposed to understand money nowadays, Mama—it’s the modern way.” She smiled at him as if he were being a foolish boy, but she sat down again.
Hugh went on: “As you all know, Nick had been planning a professional career, and thinking of reading for the bar, as the dukedom no longer provides a living.” As a banker Hugh understood exactly how Nick’s father had lost everything. The duke had been a progressive landowner, and in the agricultural boom of the midcentury he had borrowed money to finance improvements: drainage schemes, the grubbing up of miles of hedges, and expensive steam-powered machinery for threshing, mowing and reaping. Then in the 1870s had come the great agricultural depression which was still going on now in 1890. The price of farmland had slumped and the duke’s lands were worth less than the mortgages he had taken on them.
“However, if Nick could get rid of the mortgages that hang around his neck, and rationalize the dukedom, it could still generate a very considerable income. It just needs to be managed well, like any enterprise.”
Nick added: “I’m going to sell quite a lot of outlying farms and miscellaneous property, and concentrate on making the most of what’s left. And I’m going to build houses on the land we own at Sydenham in south London.”
Hugh said: “We’ve worked out that the finances of the dukedom can be transformed, permanently, with about a hundred thousand pounds. So that is what I’m going to give you as a dowry.”
Dotty gasped, and Mama burst into tears. Nick, who had known the figure in advance, said: “It is remarkably generous of you.” Dotty threw her arms around her fiance and kissed him, then came around the table and kissed Hugh. Hugh felt a little awkward, but all the same he was glad to be able to make them so happy. And he was confident that Nick would use the money well and provide a secure home for Dotty.
Nora came down dressed for the funeral in purple-and-black bombazine. She had taken breakfast in her room, as always. “Where are those boys?” she said irritably, looking at the clock. “I told that wretched governess to have them ready—”
She was interrupted by the arrival of the governess and the children: eleven-year-old Toby; Sam, who was six; and Sol, four. They were all in black morning coats and black ties and carried miniature top hats. Hugh felt a glow of pride. “My little soldiers,” he said. “What was the Bank of England’s discount rate last night, Toby?”
“Unchanged at two and a half percent, sir,” said Tobias, who had to look it up in The Times every morning.
Sam, the middle one, was bursting with news. “Mamma, I’ve got a pet,” he said excitedly.
The governess looked anxious. “You didn’t tell me….”
Sam took a matchbox from his pocket, held it out to his mother, and opened it. “Bill the spider!” he said proudly.
Nora screamed, knocked the box from his hand, and jumped away. “Horrible boy!” she yelled.
Sam scrabbled on the floor for the box. “Bill’s gone!” he cried, and burst into tears.
Nora turned on the governess. “How could you let him do such a thing!” she yelled.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t know—”
Hugh intervened. “There’s no harm done,” he said, trying to cool the temperature. He put an arm around Nora’s shoulders. “You were taken by surprise, that’s all.” He ushered her out into the hall. “Come on, everyone, it’s time to leave.”
As they left the house he put a hand on Sam’s shoulder. “Now, Sam, I hope you’ve learned that you must always take care not to frighten ladies.”
“I lost my pet,” Sam said miserably.
“Spiders don’t really like living in matchboxes anyway. Perhaps you should have a different kind of pet. What about a canary?”
He brightened immediately. “Could I?”
“You’d have to make sure it was fed and watered regularly, or it would die.”
“I would, I would!”
“Then we’ll look for one tomorrow.”
“Hooray!”
They drove to Kensington Methodist Hall in closed carriages. It was pouring rain. The boys had never been to a funeral. Toby, who was a rather solemn child, said: “Are we expected to cry?”
Nora said: “Don’t be so stupid.”
Hugh wished she could be more affectionate with the boys. She had been a baby when her own mother died, and he guessed that was why she found it so difficult to mother her own children: she had never learned how. All the same she might try harder, he thought. He said to Toby: “But you can cry if you feel like it. It’s allowed at funerals.”