Trevor

“ Trevor I am in no fear. Had he one sinister design, he never could have imagined the conduct he has so nobly pursued. But to suppose the possibility of such a thing in him would be a most unpardonable injustice. The man who should teach me to distrust him, as a lover, could never inspire me with admiration and confidence, as a husband. But different indeed has been the lesson I have learned from Mr. Trevor.
'"Oh that Mr. Evelyn! What a godlike morality has he adopted! How rational! How full of benefit to others, and of happiness to himself! ”

“ Trevor's chief Eton friend, young Maitland, a good, high-principled, clever boy, a little older, who had valued him for what he was, while passing Alured by as a foolish, idle little swell, took pity upon him in the grief and dejection of his loss—did for him all and more than Trevor could do, and has been the friend and blessing of his life, aiding the depth and earnestness that seemed to pass into our dear child as he hung over the dying lad. Yes, Trevor Lea and John Maitland did for our Trevorsham what all our love and care had never been able to do. ”

“ He exhibited one of the variety of cards of which Trevor had already seen two specimens. Trevor explained briefly the style and nature of the League, and mentioned that his study also had been wrecked.
“Your study? Why, what have they got against you?”
“I don’t know,” said Trevor. Nothing was to be gained by speaking of the letters he had received.
“Did they cut up your photographs?”
“Every one.”
“I tell you what it is, Trevor, old chap,” said Milton, with great solemnity, “there’s a lunatic in the school. That’s what I make of it. A lunatic whose form of madness is wrecking studies.” ”

“ I never see you but you say that at least once and would like to say it twice, and I can’t help thinking that it’s a kind of parlour-game peculiar to the house of Trevor. I feel I ought to slap you on the shoulder twice and say “Bo,” and then you’ll tell me where you’ve hidden something....”
“Ass,” said Trevor.
“Age,” meditated Ivor gravely, “can’t matter in a man. I haven’t as yet the faintest idea what does matter in a man, but I’m sure age doesn’t. Consider how many children of ten are their father’s ancestors! ”

“ Trevor's dark eye glanced alternately the one from the other, with the wary suspicious glare of an angry animal—Eugene entered, prepared for the worst, with a dogged indifference of countenance and threw himself upon a chair behind his father.
"Well, Sir, and what is this I hear of you?" Mr. Trevor commenced. "Lost a thousand pounds! a pretty story truly; and want me to give you the money. Really one would think you were heir to twenty thousand a-year, instead of a younger son," with a significant glance towards the window, "totally and entirely dependent on my bounty." ”

“ Trevor; and I have something to say to you about that matter. But I am a little drowsy at present. Ring for my night cap, niece! If you will be with me to-morrow morning at ten o'clock, Mr. Trevor, we'll talk the thing over.'
I then bade the lady and his lordship good night, and returned to Bruton-street, with my brain swimming with cogitations concerning bishops, nieces, deans, articles, sound divines, the church, the sons of the church, sensuality, obscenity, and innumerable associating but discordant ideas, that bred a strange confusion and darkness of intellect. ”

“ But I was so eager for an explanation that I had scarcely time for augury. He continued—
'You have been to Oxford, Mr. Trevor, and you have studied. I was at Oxford, and I studied, and read Greek, and the fathers, and the schoolmen, and other matters: but all that there won't do alone, Mr. Trevor. A young man must be prudent. I was prudent, or I should never have been this day what I am now sitting here, nor what it may happen I may be. But all that is as things shall happen to come to pass. We have all of us a right to look forward; and so I would have you look forward, Mr. Trevor. ”

“ Trevor, like a man. And so, madam, finding as you have been told a parcel of trumpery tales, I hope in God you will be kind enough not to believe one of them; now that you see they are all false. For if there be a gentleman on the face of the earth that loves a lady to desperation, why, Mr. Trevor is he; as you would have been satisfied, if you had set by his bedside when as he was down in the fever ”

“ The aged man—for even then, though scarce past sixty, Mr. Trevor from appearance might have been so denominated—that old, old heart having long imparted the influence of years to his character and demeanour, he seemed by this fervent recognition of his unjust—indeed, under the circumstances of the case—iniquitous indulgence, to be spurred on to an effusion of warmth towards his favourite, almost monomaniacal in its extent. ”

“ Trevor stared at the stony thing that watched him, and then he thought of Jen, of Hugh lying dead with a dead hawk in the dust, and the strangeness left him, and his bitter passion flared again.
"So you hate me as well as fear me, little human? You would destroy me?" There was a gentle laughter inside Trevor's mind. "I have watched generations of humans die so swiftly. ”

“ Brinkley—Mrs. Trevor's lovely house would inspire me to it.”
“Two birds with one stone—thank you, Mrs. Pasmer, for my part of the compliment. Pick yourself up, Mr. Trevor.”
“Oh, thank you, I'm all right,” said Trevor, panting after the ladies' meanings, as a man must. “I suppose thinking and talking in the dark is a good deal like smoking in the dark.”
“No; thinking and talking are not at all like smoking under any conditions. ”

“ It is a lucky event! A prodigiously fine opportunity for an introduction to a nobleman! Be advised by me, and profit by it, Mr. Trevor. If you please, I will attend you to his lordship. You are a young man, and to be accompanied by a clergyman has a respectable look, and gives a sanction. You conceive me, Mr. Trevor?'
I had acuteness enough to conceive the selfishness of his motives, which was more than he intended; but I acceded to the proposal, for I was almost as averse to giving as to receiving pain: beside I was a stranger, and he would be my conductor. ”

“ Trevor consoled himself, though, by sitting down by pleasant Lady Rea, while Sir Hampton crackled at Pratt, talked politics to him, and his ideas of Parliament, and Aunt Matty fanned herself, as she treated Pepine to the sensation of lavender poplin as a couch.
“What a nice little man your friend is, Mr Trevor,” began Lady Rea; “I declare he’s the nicest, sensiblest man I ever met.” ”

“ Trevor's died, leaving twenty thousand pounds to his niece's second son, Eustace, his god-son; and the persecuted young man thus found himself, by this unexpected behest, placed in a position which rendered him to a degree independent of the tyranny and bondage to which he had been hitherto subjected by his father, and at liberty, if so had been his pleasure, to relinquish the profession which had in such an arbitrary manner been forced upon him. ”

“ Trevor has no jockey. Castor will carry weight, and there's not a rider in town over four and a half stone. Five would ride him; no less—eh, Vincent?" queried Paca, and Trevor nodded.
There was a short pause, in the midst of which a servant with the wine and sangaree appeared. The room drank with Trevor, and two or three afterwards turned to the pewter mugs which held the planter's favorite beverage. Claude had been listening intently to the talk concerning the race, and, his ear being well accustomed to the colonial accent, he had gathered the gist of all that was said. ”

“ He died at his house in Chancery Lane, May 20th, 1717, and was buried in the Rolls Chapel.
Trevor’s character, on the whole, is but a poor one; a selfish ambition appears to have made him consider the end, and not the means, the chief object of his care.
His circumstances, doubtless, compelled him to practise a rigid economy, which, as he advanced in years and position, grew into meanness. But it would be unjust not to mention the redeeming points in his career. ”

“ He thanked his father with earnest emotion, and repeated protestations of never again requiring such beneficence at his hands.
Mr. Trevor waved him away. He had done the deed—he had shown forth his own perfect independence of will and power—satisfied his own bad feelings towards the object of his unnatural aversion, and mortified—as seemed his constant aim—the partial feelings, as he deemed them of his gentle wife towards her second son. And now the ruling passion began again to struggle into power. ”

“ Trevor, Art’s father, had been for six weeks attending to legal business in London. For several days his return had been eagerly anticipated. Art’s only hope lay in his father’s jovial disposition, his love of outdoor sports and, above all, his unusual interest in the pleasures of boys. In this respect Mr. Trevor was different from most men. ”

“ Then he became serious. Literature was not a thing to be trifled with.
Thus it was tonight. For five minutes Trevor filled the room with the roaring of his own laughter and the echoes of his own vociferous voice. He was telling a story—a funny story, about what Rosella, with her thoughts on "Patroclus," could not for the life of her have said, and she must needs listen in patience and with perfunctory merriment while the narrative was conducted to its close with all the accompaniment of stamped feet and slapped knees. ”

“ Mr. Trevor, his son Eugene, and a third person, who, with pen in hand, with parchment opened before him, looked what he really was—a lawyer. He wrote some time in silence, the old man rocking himself backwards and forwards in his chair, as if nervous and weary; and the other leaning over the table, watching the proceedings of the scribe with anxious interest plainly revealed in his dark, but handsome countenance. At length, finishing with a flourish, the man of business looked up, and asked for the witnesses. ”

“ As it turned out it was just as well that I did so, for that afternoon, not altogether unexpectedly I must confess, was destined to prove the truth of the old saying that the course of true love never runs smooth. Miss Trevor, with the Duke on one side and my wife on the other, was slowly passing across the great square, when a man suddenly appeared before us from one of the shops on our right. This individual was none other than the Don Josè de Martinos, who raised his hat politely to the ladies and expressed his delight at seeing Miss Trevor abroad once more. ”

“ I've heard such a lot about it from Aunt Philippa already. And why shouldn't I talk to my pals? You wouldn't like it if I didn't talk to you sometimes."
"Is he that sort of pal?" asked Jack.
She nodded. "Just that sort. And Trevor knows all about it and understands. I've just had a line from him to tell me so."
"Have you, though?" said Jack. "Then all I can say is Trevor is a brick—a very special kind of brick—and I hope you realize it."
"He's just the sweetest man in the world," said Chris with enthusiasm.
"He is never horrid about things, and he never thinks what isn't." ”

“ Trevor is very sensible to you, and I am heartily sorry for you. One cannot live any time, and not perceive the world slip away, as it were, from under one's feet: one's friends, one's connexions drop off, and indeed reconcile one to the same passage ”

“ Trevor, and Senator Phillips says he is heartbroken by her tragic death.”
“That is no excuse for neglecting the living. Mr. Trevor owes much to his daughter’s affection.” Peggy did not see the quickly suppressed sneer that distorted Clark’s handsome features. “Miss Trevor acts as if she had something preying on her mind, don’t you think so?” ”

“ Trevor, anxiously. "I desire that he is not allowed to come near me. I cannot, I will not see him!"
"No fear of that, Sir," answered the son coldly; "he is not very likely to trouble you with his presence."
"Well, well, that's all right; let him rave as much as he likes out of my sight. And now give me a drop of brandy, Marryott, and stir up the fire gently, only just gently. It's very cold."
And the victim of conscience cowered and shivered over the scanty flame thus excited.
"Eugene, stay!" ”

“ I had not openly assumed the form which the vanity of man has dignified with divine above a fortnight, before my grandfather, Trevor, died. He had been what is usually called a good father; had lived in reputation, and had brought up a large and expensive family. ”

“ Something bumped softly against the door; the woman glanced suspiciously from Trevor to the closet. Trevor looked carelessly out the window and began to whistle. A low whine issued from the prison. Trevor heard it, but apparently the “goody” didn’t; he whistled louder. The whining increased. Trevor began to sing.
Then began a most appalling series of bumps, growls, knocks, whines, jars, gnawings, and similar disturbing [110] noises from the closet. With loudly thumping heart Trevor sang on, rapidly, loudly, unceasingly. The woman turned and viewed him in astonishment not unmixed with alarm. ”

“ Trevor started a raging refusal, and then his mind was gripped as by a great hand, shaken and turned and changed. And his fury flowed away into blankness.
"But of course," he thought. "There are many boulders, and I can topple them into the chasm so easily...." ”

“ From Vivian Dangerfield to Roy Montaine,
“Dear Sir, and Friend”—in letters bold and plain,
Written on cream-white paper, so it ran:
“It is the will and pleasure of Miss Trevor,
And therefore doubly so a wish of mine,
That you shall honour me next New Year Eve,
My wedding hour, by standing as best man.
Miss Trevor has six bridesmaids I believe.
Being myself a novice in the art—
If I should fail in acting well my part,
I’ll need protection ’gainst the regiment
Of outraged ladies. ”