John Caldigate | Page 9

not leave his country
without a word either to Julia or to aunt Polly. But the idea of Julia was
doubly distasteful to him since that lovely vision of young female
simplicity had shone upon him from the corner of Mrs. Bolton's
drawing-room. Romping with the Babington girls was all very well; but
if he could only feel the tips of that girl's fingers come within the grasp
of his hand! Then he thought that it would lend a fine romance to his
life if he could resolve to come back, when he should be laden with
gold, and make Hester Bolton his wife. It should be his romance, and
he swore that he would cling to it.
He turned back, and came down to dinner five minutes after the time.
At ten minutes before dinner-time Mr. Bolton heard that he was gone
out and was offended,--thinking it quite possible that he would not
return at all. What might not be expected from a young man who could
so easily abandon his inheritance! But he was there, only five minutes
after the time, and the dinner was eaten almost in silence. In the
evening there was tea, and the coldest shivering attempt at conversation
for half an hour, during which he could still at moments catch the
glance of Hester's eyes, and see the moving curve of her lips. Then
there was a reading of the Bible, and prayer, and before ten he was in
his bed-room.
On the next morning as he took his departure, Mr. Bolton said a word
intended to be gracious. 'I hope you may succeed in your enterprise, Mr.
Caldigate.'
'Why should I not as well as another?' said John, cheerily.
'If you are steady, sober, industrious, self-denying and honest, you
probably will,' replied the banker.
'To promise all that would be to promise too much,' said John. 'But I
mean to make an effort.'
Then at that moment he made one effort which was successful. For an
instant he held Hester's fingers within his hand.

Chapter III
Daniel Caldigate

That piece of business was done. It was one of the disagreeable things
which he had had to do before he could get away to the gold-diggings,
and it was done. Now he had to say farewell to his father, and that
would be a harder task. As the moment was coming in which he must
bid adieu to his father, perhaps for ever, and bid adieu to the old place
which, though he despised it, he still loved, his heart was heavy within
him. He felt sure that his father had no special regard for him;--in
which he was, of course, altogether wrong, and the old man was
equally wrong in supposing that his son was unnaturally deficient in
filial affection. But they had never known each other, and were so
different that neither had understood the other. The son, however, was
ready to confess to himself that the chief fault had been with himself. It
was natural, he thought, that a father's regard should be deadened by
such conduct as his had been, and natural that an old man should not
believe in the quick repentance and improvement of a young one.
He hired a gig and drove himself over from Cambridge to Folking. As
he got near to the place, and passed along the dikes, and looked to the
right and left down the droves, and trotted at last over the Folking
bridge across the Middle Wash, the country did not seem to him to be
so unattractive as of yore; and when he recognised the faces of the
neighbours, when one of the tenants spoke to him kindly, and the girls
dropped a curtsey as he passed, certain soft regrets began to crop up in
his mind. After all, there is a comfort in the feeling of property--not
simply its money comfort, but in the stability and reputation of a
recognised home. Six months ago there had seemed to him to be
something ridiculous in the idea of a permanent connection between the
names of Caldigate and Folking. It was absurd that, with so wild and
beautiful a world around him, he should be called upon to live in a
washy fen because his father and grandfather had been unfortunate
enough to do so. And then, at that time, all sympathy with bricks and
mortar, any affection for special trees or well-known home-haunts, was
absurd in his eyes. And as his father had been harsh to him, and did not
like him, would it not be better that they should be far apart? It was
thus that he had reasoned. But now all that was changed. An unwonted
tenderness had come upon his spirit. The very sallows by the brook
seemed