Braxton

“ Maltby might once more have been compared with Braxton. But Braxton was now forgotten. So was Maltby.
This was not kind. This was not just. Maltby’s first novel, and Braxton’s, had brought delight into many thousands of homes. People should have paused to say of Braxton “Perhaps his third novel will be better than his second,” and to say as much for Maltby. I blame people for having given no sign of wanting a third from either; and I blame them with the more zest because neither ‘A Faun on the Cotswolds’ nor ‘Ariel in Mayfair’ was a merely popular book: each, I maintain, was a good book. ”

“ Braxton, for all his arrogance, assiduous.
‘A Faun on the Cotswolds’ had no more eager eulogist than the author of ‘Ariel in Mayfair.’ When any one praised his work, Maltby would lightly disparage it in comparison with Braxton’s--‘Ah, if I could write like THAT!’ Maltby won golden opinions in this way. Braxton, on the other hand, would let slip no opportunity for sneering at Maltby’s work--‘gimcrack,’ as he called it. This was not good for Maltby. Different men, different methods. ”

“ The Colonel, however, saw very little of Elias or the stable-boys. Even his beloved horses no longer interested him. He passed the days walking the streets of Lexington, hoping by some chance to meet Miss Braxton, and it was not until late at night that he returned to the race-track, foot-sore and disappointed. He had been too deeply wounded and was too proud to make any further effort to visit the Elms, and he thought it would be unmanly and ungenerous to ask Miss Braxton to meet him away from her father's house. ”

“ But Cram was just back from Britain.
"Why, sir, look at the Life Guards! Look at the Horse Guards in London! Every officer and man wears the aiguillette." And Braxton was a Briton by birth and breeding, and that ended it,—at least so nearly ended it that Cram's diplomatic invitation to come up and try some Veuve Clicquot, extra dry, upon the merits of which he desired the colonel's opinion, had settled it for good and all. ”

“ A man of stronger nerve than mine, and of greater resourcefulness, might have coped successfully with Braxton from first to last--might have stayed on till Monday, making a very favourable impression on every one all the while. ”

“ Try as he would, he found the effort to push aside early convictions and early impressions a simple impossibility; and, notwithstanding these had been laid on the foundation of a far more literal interpretation of Scripture than the one to which he had just been listening, his maturer reason accepted the preacher's clear application of the law; and conscience, like an angel, went down into his heart, and troubled the waters which had been at peace.
Mr. Braxton was a man of thrift. He had started in life with a purpose, and that purpose he was steadily attaining. ”

“ In an apparently accidental way, Braxton, who had been scribbling aimlessly upon some pieces of paper that lay on the table, led the talk toward the subject of handwriting.
“It’s a gift to write a good hand,” he remarked. “It’s got to be born in you. Some men can do it naturally, others can’t. I’m one of the fellows that can’t. I’ll bet Horace Greeley himself never wrote a worse hand than I do.”
“I’ve heard that he was a weird writer,” smiled Joe.
“The worst ever,” rejoined Braxton. ”

“ Braxton disappeared through the common portal. His successor, Hawks, had a theory that the true mode of managing niggers was to overawe them by extreme severity at the start, and then taper off into clemency. He had been lord of the lash a week or two, when he was asked by Mr. Barnwell how he got along with Peek.
“Capitally!” replied Hawks. “I took care to put him through his paces at our first meeting,—took the starch right out of him. He’d score his own mother now if I told him to. He’s a thorough nigger—is Peek. A nigger must fear a white man before he can like him. ”

“ Braxton can only be explained by supposing her to be naturally endowed with a larger share of nerve and hardihood than usually falls to the lot of her sex. Some influence, too, must be ascribed to the peculiarly wild and free life that prevails in the southwest. ”

“ Braxton became a church member, and, so far as all Sabbath observances were concerned, a devout worshiper. Thus he made a truce with conscience, and conscience having gained so much, accepted for a period the truce, and left Mr. Braxton in good odor with himself.
A man who goes regularly to church, and reads his Bible, cannot fail to have questions and controversies about truths, duties, and the requirements of religion. The barest literal interpretation of Scripture will, in most cases, oppose the action of self-love ”

“ Alan had his scholarship, seventy pounds a-year exhibition from a country foundation-school, and another fifty allowed him by his uncle. The disparity between the positions of the two young men was vast, but they were thoroughly attached to each other; and when Braxton had succeeded his father, and the old vicar of Havering died, Braxton Murray sent for Alan Prescott, then doing duty as a curate and usher in a suburban school, and presented him with the vicarage of Havering. ”

“ He had been the only child of his parents (neither of whom, alas, survived to take pleasure in their darling’s sudden fame) . He had now migrated from Twickenham and taken rooms in Ryder Street. Had he ever shared with Braxton the bread of adversity—but no, I think he would in any case have been pleasant. And conversely I cannot imagine that Braxton would in any case have been so.
No one seeing the two rivals together, no one meeting them at Mr. ”

“ There he had stood, just beside one of the women who travelled down in the same compartment as I; a very pretty woman in a pale blue dress; a tall woman--but I had noticed how small she looked beside Braxton. This woman was now walking to and fro, yonder, with M. de Soveral. I had seen Braxton beside her as clearly as I now saw M. de Soveral.
‘Lady Rodfitten was talking about India to a recent Viceroy. She seemed to have as firm a grip of India as of “Ariel.” I sat forgotten. I wanted to arise and wander off--in a vague search for Braxton. ”

“ He was roused to a realizing sense of his position by Major Cicero Johnson, editor of the Lexington Chronicle and president of the association, who was standing beside the barouche, saying, with that courtliness of manner and amplitude of rhetoric which made him a fixture in the legislative halls at Frankfort: “Colonel Bill, I want to present you to General Thomas Anderson Braxton, the hero of two wars, of whom as a Kentuckian you must be proud, and his sons Matt and Jack, and his daughter, Miss Sue, the Flower of the Blue-grass. ”

“ As God's ambassador, I must give the message; and it is this: If you, my brother, are not ministering to the wants of the hungry and thirsty, the stranger, the sick and in prison, you are of those who will have to go away."
And the minister shut the Book, and sat down. If, as we have intimated, the preacher had limited Christian duty to bodily needs, Mr. Braxton would not have been much exercised in mind.
He had found an easy way to dispose of these merely literal interpretations of Scripture. Now, his life was brought to the judgment of a more interior law, as expounded that day. ”

“ Braxton had complained of the literal application of this text, that term was hardly admissible, for the preacher waived the idea of a last general judgment, as involved in the letter of Scripture, and declared his belief in a spiritual signification as lying beneath the letter, and applicable to the inner life of every single individual at the period of departure from this world; adding, in this connection, briefly: "But do not understand me as in any degree waiving the strictness of judgment to which every soul will have to submit. ”

“ Then came the Duke and Duchess of Mull, followed by four lesser Peers (two of them Proconsuls, however) with their Peeresses, three Peers without their Peeresses, four Peeresses without their Peers, and a dozen bearers of courtesy-titles with or without their wives or husbands. The rear was brought up by ‘Mr. A. J. Balfour, Mr. Henry Chaplin, and Mr. Hilary Maltby.’
Youth tends to look at the darker side of things. I confess that my first thought was for Braxton.
I forgave and forgot his faults of manner. Youth is generous. It does not criticise a strong man stricken. ”

“ I'll inquire into this later."
"I know we're right, colonel; and as for the reason, you'll see it when you open ranks for review and we come to 'action front:' then our line will be exactly that of the infantry. Meantime, sir, it isn't for us to go ahead. We've gone as far as we can until your adjutant makes the next move."
But Braxton had ridden away disgusted before Cram wound up his remarks.
"Go on, Major Minor; just run this thing without reference to the battery. Damned if I understand their methods. Let Cram look after his own affairs; if he goes wrong, why—it's none of our concern." ”

“ Guy—not a bit! Handsomer than ever, sir.”
Braxfield was regaining his confidence, and his tongue. He wanted to talk, now.
“They say she’s a very wealthy young widow, Mr. Guy,” he went on. “Colonel Tretheroe, he left her everything—and he was a rich man, I’m told. Seems like it, too—she’s got a fine staff of servants, and she’s spent a lot of money on the house already, and is spending more. Got a house-party there just now—London people I believe. Seems inclined to enjoy herself, I think, sir.”
“Are there any children?” asked Guy.
“No children, sir,” replied Braxfield. ”

“ Fransemmery’s sentiments, Mrs. Braxfield,” added Blick with a bow. “Precisely what I was thinking!”
“Well, I’ve worn very well,” said Mrs. Braxfield complacently. “We all do—and as I say, my daughter has inherited the family good looks. And as for her accomplishments—well, if she isn’t a well-educated young woman, it’s her own fault. She went to the Girl’s High School at Selcaster from being ten until she was fifteen; then she’d two years at the very best boarding-school I could hear of in London, and she finished off with twelve months in Paris. ”

“ Braxfield, with suspicious calmness. “All right!—and you’ll be more than sorry for it, as you’ll see! Very well—I suppose I can go upstairs and make ready?”
“No!” said the Chief Constable. “Not out of my sight, now! You’ve a woman in the house—you can ring for her, and tell her to get all you want. Then—we’ve a cab outside.”
“Ah!” remarked Mrs. Braxfield maliciously. “You’re only doing what you meant to do! All right, Mr. Chief Constable, and the other two of you—you’ll be sorry for this!”
But the Chief Constable silently motioned to Blick to ring the bell for the charwoman. ”

“ I mind him well enough: a red-faced gentleman.”
“Older than herself?” asked Valencia.
“Old enough to be her father, miss. But a very wealthy gentleman. They were married here in our church, soon after that, and a bit later the regiment was ordered out to India, and, of course, she went with her husband. Queer, isn’t it, miss,” continued Braxfield, with a shy glance at his young mistress, “that these people which knew each other well in the old days, Mrs. Tretheroe and the two gentlemen, Mr. Guy and Mr. Harborough, should all turn up again—here—about the same time? ”

“ Braxfield is the sort of person who will either have her own way or make things very disagreeable if she doesn't get it! That's the situation—and don't you think, Mr. Fransemmery, that as you know all of us, you might see Mrs. Braxfield, tonight, and persuade her to listen to reason? I don 't want any scenes tomorrow."
"I will go!" said Mr. Fransemmery. "I will talk to Mrs. Braxfield. But—do I understand that your brother's intention——"
"Harry's intention is to announce his marriage as soon as the funeral is over," said Valencia. "I am not going to the church—there will only be men there. ”

“ Mrs. Braxfield was in her tidy kitchen next morning at half-past eight o'clock, giving orders to the charwoman who always came to Woodland Cottage on Mondays, when a knock sounded on her front door. She opened the door herself, and confronted Blick, the Chief Constable, and another man—in plain clothes, but obviously a policeman. The three men, all watching her keenly, saw her start, frown, and turn pale. ”

“ Harry, sir, and Miss Valencia,” replied Braxfield, “have taken the matter in the best way possible. The little gentleman—Sir Guy, of course—has been welcomed in the warmest fashion; he is already made as much of by his uncle and aunt as if they’d known him from his cradle. Family feeling, sir, is strong in such houses as ours!”
“I suppose Mr. Harry was fond of his father, Sir Anthony?” asked the Chief Constable, with an almost imperceptible side-glance at Blick. ”

“ Braxfield with unmistakable asperity. "It strikes me that some folk, when they say 'between ourselves' mean a good deal of the very opposite. I believe some of you"—here she gave Blick an indignant glance—"some of you have been talking about me, behind my back! Here's my charwoman just come up from the village, and she says there's talk going on down there about me and the murder! ”

“ Braxfield like that, after trying to get her to incriminate herself? Come—come! You don’t really mean to tell me, either of you, that you think it at all likely that Mrs. Braxfield would be such a fool as to murder a man to whom she’d just become related by marriage—a Markenmore, too! Really, I’m surprised——”
“Look you here, Chilford!” interrupted the Chief Constable, getting a little red about the ears, “you can be as surprised as you like! Mrs. Braxfield has only herself to blame, and she’s only gone out of here on sufferance. Let her be thankful if we don’t fetch her back—and keep her!” ”

“ Guy—your father?” said the old butler. “He can’t last long, sir. And—the title—and the estates, Mr. Guy!”
“I can’t help succeeding to the baronetcy, Braxfield, though I don’t care twopence about it,” answered Guy; “and as for the estates, they can be managed well enough without my help or presence. As a matter of fact, I don’t want ’em! I’m a well-to-do man—I’ve been on the Stock Exchange, Braxfield, for over six years, and made a pot of money. But now look here,” he continued, interrupting the old butler’s congratulations, “you say that Harry is acting as a sort of steward; does he do well?” ”