My worthy uncle, true to himself, played a very different part from
these gentlemen. He hung back, forbore all words on the subject of
my debut, and of the promising auspices under which my career was
begun, and actually placed certain matters of legal business into
the hands of another lawyer. Of this, he himself gave me the first
information in very nearly this language:-"I have just had to sue Yardle & Fellows, and a few others, Edward,
and I thought of employing you, but you are young, and there may
be some legal difficulties in the way:--but when you get older, and
arrive at some experience, we will see what can be done for you."
"You are perfectly right, sir," was my only answer, but the smile
upon my lips said everything. I saw, then, that HE COULD NOT
SMILE. He was now exchanging the feeling of scorn which he formerly
entertained for one of a darker quality. Hate was the necessary
feeling which followed the conviction of his having done me wilful
injustice--not to speak of the duties left undone, which were
equally his shame.
There were several things to mortify him in my progress. His sagacity
as a man of the world stood rebuked--his conduct as a gentleman--his
blood as a relation, who had not striven for the welfare and good
report of his kin, and who had suffered unworthy prejudices, the
result of equal avarice and arrogance, to operate against him.
There is nothing which a base spirit remembers with so much malignant
tenacity as your success in his despite. Even in the small matter
just referred to, the appropriation of his law business, the
observant fates gave me my revenge. By a singular coincidence of
events, the very firm against which he had brought action the day
before were clients of Mr. Edgerton. That gentleman was taken
with a serious illness at the approach of the next court, and the
business of their defence devolved upon his son and myself; and
finally, when it was disposed of, which did not happen till near
the close of that year, it so happened that I argued the case; and
was successful.
Mr Clifford was baffled, and you may judge the feeling with which
he now regarded me. He had long since ceased to jest with me and
at my expense. He was now very respectful, and I could see that
his dislike grew daily in strict degree with his deference. But the
deportment of Mr. Clifford--springing as it did from that devil,
which each man is supposed to carry at times in his bosom, and of
whose presence in mine at seasons I was far from unaware--gave me
less annoyance than that of another of his household. Julia, too,
had put on an aspect which, if not that of coldness, was at least,
that of a very marked reserve. I ascribed this to the influence of
her parents--perhaps, to her own sense of what was due to their
obvious desires--to her own feeling of indifference--to any and
every cause but the right one.