Czytaj książkę: «The Bramleighs of Bishop's Folly», strona 13

“Deference to me? What do you mean? what can you mean?”

“I mean, my Lord, that all the flattery of being the object of your Lordship’s choice could not obliterate my sense of a disparity, just as great between us in years as in condition. I was nineteen my last birthday, Lord Culduff;” and she said this with a pouting air of offended dignity.

“A peeress of nineteen would be a great success at a drawing-room,” said he, with a tone of pompous deliberation.

“Pray, my Lord, let us quit a theme we cannot agree upon. With all your Lordship’s delicacy, you have not been able to conceal the vast sacrifices it has cost you to make me your present proposal I have no such tact. I have not even the shadow of it; and I could never hope to hide what it would cost me to become grande dame.”

“A proposal of marriage; an actual proposal,” muttered Bramleigh, as he arose to move away. “I heard it with my own ears; and heard her refuse it, besides.”

An hour later, when he mounted the steps of the chief entrance, he met Marion, who came towards him with an open letter. “This is from poor Lord Culduff,” said she; “he has been stopping these last three days at the L’Estranges’, and what between boredom and bad cookery, he could n’t hold out any longer. He begs he may be permitted to come back here; he says, ‘Put me below the salt, if you like, – anywhere, only let it be beneath your roof, and within the circle of your fascinating society.’ Shall I say Come, papa?”

“I suppose we must,” muttered Bramleigh, sulkily, and passed on to his room.

CHAPTER XXI. GEORGE AND JULIA

It was after a hard day with the hounds that George L’Estrange reached the cottage to a late dinner. The hunting had not been good. They had found three times, but each time lost their fox after a short burst, and though the morning broke favorably, with a low cloudy sky and all the signs of a good scenting day, towards the afternoon a brisk northeaster had sprung up, making the air sharp and piercing, and rendering the dogs wild and uncertain. In fact, it was one of those days which occasionally irritate men more than actual “blanks;” there was a constant promise of something, always ending in disappointment. The horses, too, were fretful and impatient, as horses are wont to be with frequent checks, and when excited by a cold and cutting wind.

Even Nora, perfection that she was of temper and training, had not behaved well. She had taken her fences hotly and impatiently, and actually chested a stiff bank, which cost herself and her rider a heavy fall, and a disgrace that the curate felt more acutely than the injury.

“You don’t mean to say you fell, George?” said Julia, with a look of positive incredulity.

“Nora did, which comes pretty much to the same thing. We were coming out of Gore’s Wood, and I was leading. There’s a high bank with a drop into Longworth’s lawn. It’s a place I have taken scores of times. One can’t fly it; you must ‘top,’ and Nora can do that sort of thing to perfection; and as I came on I had to swerve a little to avoid some of the dogs that were climbing up the bank. Perhaps it was that irritated her, but she rushed madly on, and came full chest against the gripe, and – I don’t remember much more till I found myself actually drenched with vinegar that old Catty Lalor was pouring over me, when I got up again, addled and confused enough; but I’m all right now. Do you know, Ju,” said he, after a pause, “I was more annoyed by a chance remark I heard as I was lying on the grass than by the whole misadventure?”

“What was it, George?”

“It was old Curtis was riding by, and he cried out, ‘Who’s down?’ and some one said, ‘L’Estrange.’ ‘By Jove,’ said he, ‘I don’t think that fellow was ever on his knees before;’ and this because I was a parson.”

“How unfeeling; but how like him!”

“Wasn’t it? After all, it comes of doing what is not exactly right. I suppose it’s not enough that I see nothing wrong in a day with the hounds. I ought to think how others regard it; whether it shocks them, or exposes my cloth to sarcasm or censure. Is it not dinner-hour?”

“Of course it is, George. It’s past eight.”

“And where’s our illustrious guest; has he not appeared?”

“Lord Culduff has gone. There came a note to him from Castello in the afternoon, and about five o’clock the phaeton appeared at the door – only with the servants – and his Lordship took a most affectionate leave of me, charging me with the very sweetest messages for you, and assurances of eternal memory of the blissful hours he had passed here.”

“Perhaps it’s not the right thing to say, but I own to you I ‘m glad he ‘s gone.”

“But why, George; was he not amusing?”

“Yes, I suppose he was; but he was so supremely arrogant, so impressed with his own grandness, and our littleness, so persistently eager to show us that we were enjoying an honor in his presence, that nothing in our lives could entitle us to, that I found my patience pushed very hard to endure it.”

“I liked him. I liked his vanity and conceit; and I wouldn’t for anything he had been less pretentious.”

“I have none of your humoristic temperament, Julia, and I never could derive amusement from the eccentricities or peculiarities of others.”

“And there’s no fun like it, George. Once that you come to look on life as a great drama, and all the men and women as players, it’s the best comedy ever one sat at.”

“I ‘m glad he ‘s gone for another reason, too. I suppose it’s shabby to say it, but it ‘s true, all the same. He was a very costly guest, and I was n’t disposed, like Charles the Bold or that other famous fellow, to sell a province to entertain an emperor.”

“Had we a province to sell, George?” said she, laughing.

“No, but I had a horse, and unfortunately Nora must go to the hammer now.”

“Surely not for this week’s extravagance?” cried she, anxiously.

“Not exactly for this, but for everything. You know old Curtis’s saying, – ‘It’s always the last glass of wine makes a man tipsy.’ But here comes the dinner, and let us turn to something pleasanter.”

It was so jolly to be alone again, all restraint removed, all terror of culinary mishaps withdrawn, and all the consciousness of little domestic shortcomings obliterated, that L’Estrange’s spirit rose at every moment, and at last he burst out, “I declare to you, Julia, if that man had n’t gone, I ‘d have died out of pure inanition. To see him day after day trying to conform to our humble fare, turning over his meat on his plate, and trying to divide with his fork the cutlet that he would n’t condescend to cut, and barely able to suppress the shudder our little light wine gave him; to witness all this, and to feel that I mustn’t seem to know, while I was fully aware of it, was a downright misery. I ‘d like to know what brought him here.”

“I fancy he could n’t tell you himself. He paid an interminable visit, and we asked him to stop and dine with us. A wet night detained him, and when his servant came over with his dressing-bag or portmanteau, you said, or I said – I forget which – that he ought not to leave us without a peep at our coast scenery.”

“I remember all that; but what I meant was, that his coming here from Castello was no accident. He never left a French cook and Château Lafitte for cold mutton and sour sherry without some reason for it.”

“You forget, George, he was on his way to Lisconnor when he came here. He was going to visit the mines.”

“By the by, that reminds me of a letter I got this evening. I put it in my pocket without reading. Is n’t that Vickars’ hand?”

“Yes; it is his reply, perhaps, to my letter. He is too correct and too prudent to write to myself, and sends the answer to you.”

“As our distinguished guest is not here to be shocked, Julia, let us hear what Vickars says.”

“‘My dear Mr. L’Estrange, I have before me a letter from your sister, expressing a wish that I should consent to the withdrawal of the sum of two thousand pounds, now vested in consols under my trusteeship, and employ these moneys in a certain enterprise which she designates as the coal-mines of Lisconnor. Before acceding to the grave responsibility which this change of investment would impose upon me, even supposing that the Master’ – who is the Master, George?”

“Go on; read further,” said he, curtly.

“‘ – that the Master would concur with such a procedure, I am desirous of hearing what you yourself know of the speculation in question. Have you seen and conversed with the engineers who have made the surveys? Have you heard from competent and unconcerned parties – ?’ Oh, George, it ‘s so like the way he talks. I can’t read on.”

L’Estrange took the letter from her and glanced rapidly over the lines; and then turning to the last page read aloud: “‘How will the recommendation of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners affect you touching the union of Portshandon with Kilmullock? Do they simply extinguish you, or have you a claim for compensation?’”

“What does he mean, George?” cried she, as she gazed at the pale face and agitated expression of her brother as he laid down the letter before her.

“It is just extinguishment; that’s the word for it,” muttered he. “When they unite the parishes, they suppress me.”

“Oh, George, don’t say that; it has not surely come to this?”

“There ‘s no help for it,” said he, putting away his glass, and leaning his head on his hand. “I was often told they ‘d do something like this; and when Grimsby was here to examine the books and make notes, – you remember it was a wet Sunday, and nobody came but the clerk’s mother, – he said, as we left the church, ‘The congregation is orderly and attentive, but not numerous. ‘”

“I told you, George, I detested that man. I said at the time he was no friend to you.”

“If he felt it his duty – ”

“Duty, indeed! I never heard of a cruelty yet that had n’t the plea of a duty. I ‘m sure Captain Craufurd comes to church, and Mrs. Bayley comes, and as to the great house, there ‘s a family there of not less than thirty persons.”

“When Grimsby was here Castello was not occupied.”

“Well, it is occupied now; and if Colonel Bramleigh be a person of the influence he assumes to be, and if he cares – as I take it he must care – not to live like a heathen, he ‘ll prevent this cruel wrong. I ‘m not sure that Nelly has much weight; but she would do anything in the world for us, and I think Augustus, too, would befriend us.”

“What can they all do? It’s a question for the Commissioners.”

“So it may; but I take it the Commissioners are human beings.”

He turned again to the letter which lay open on the table, and read aloud, “‘They want a chaplain, I see, at Albano, near Rome. Do you know any one who could assist you to the appointment? – always providing that you would like it.’ I should think I would like it.”

“You were thinking of the glorious riding over the Campagna, George, that you told me about long ago?”

“I hope not,” said he, blushing deeply, and looked overwhelmed with confusion.

“Well, I was, George. Albano reminded me at once of those long moonlight canters you told me about, with the grand old city in the distance. I almost fancy I have seen it all. Let us bethink us of the great people we know, and who would aid us in the matter.”

“The list begins and ends with the Lord Culduff, I suspect.”

“Not at all. It is the Bramleighs can be of use here. Lady Augusta lives at Rome; she must be, I’m sure, a person of influence there, and be well known too, and know all the English of station. It’s a downright piece of good fortune for us she should be there. There, now, be of good heart, and don’t look wretched. We ‘ll drive over to Castello to-morrow.”

“They ‘ve been very cool towards us of late.”

“As much our fault as theirs, George; some, certainly, was my own.”

“Oh, Vickars has heard of her. He says here, ‘Is the Lady Augusta Bramleigh, who has a villa at Albano, any relative of your neighbor Colonel Bramleigh? She is very eccentric, – some say mad; but she does what she likes with every one. Try and procure a letter to her.’”

“It’s all as well as settled, George. We ‘ll be cantering over that swelling prairie before the spring ends,” said she. Quietly rising and going over to the piano, she began one of those little popular Italian ballads which they call “Stornelli,” – those light effusions of national life which blend up love and flowers and sunshine together so pleasantly, and seem to emblematize the people who sing them.

“Thither, oh, thither, George! as the girl sings in Goethe’s ballad. Won’t it be delightful?”

“First let us see if it be possible.”

And then they began one of those discussions of ways and means which, however, as we grow old in life, are tinged with all the hard and stern characters of sordid self-interest, are in our younger days blended so thoroughly with hope and trustfulness that they are amongst the most attractive of all the themes we can turn to. There were so many things to be done, and so little to do them with, that it was marvellous to hear of the cunning and ingenious devices by which poverty was to be cheated out of its meanness, and actually imagine itself picturesque. George was not a very imaginative creature; but it was strange to see to what flights he rose as the sportive fancy of the high-spirited girl carried him away to the region of the speculative and the hopeful.

“It’s just as well, after all, perhaps,” said he, after some moments of thought, “that we had not invested your money in the mine.”

“Of course, George, we shall want it to buy vines and orange-trees. Oh, I shall grow mad with impatience if I talk of this much longer! Do you know,” said she, in a more collected and serious tone, “I have just built a little villa on the lake-side of Albano? And I’m doubting whether I ‘ll have my ‘pergolato’ of vines next to the water, or facing the mountain. I incline to the mountain.”

“We mustn’t dream of building,” said he, gravely.

“We must dream of everything, George. It is in dreamland I am going to live. Why is this gift of fancy bestowed upon us if not to conjure up allies that will help us to fight the stern evils of life? Without imagination, hope is a poor, weary, plodding foot-traveller, painfully lagging behind us. Give him but speculation, and he soars aloft on wings and rises towards heaven.”

“Do be reasonable, Julia, and let us decide what steps we shall take.”

“Let me just finish my boat-house; I ‘m putting an aviary on the top of it. Well, don’t look so pitifully; I am not going mad. Now, then, for the practical. We are to go over to Castello to-morrow, early, I suppose?”

“Yes; I should say in the morning, before Colonel Bramleigh goes into his study. After that he dislikes being disturbed. I mean to speak to him myself. You must address yourself to Marion.”

“The forlorn hope always falls to my share,” said she, poutingly.

“Why, you were the best friends in the world till a few days back!”

“You men can understand nothing of these things. You neither know the nice conditions nor the delicate reserves of young lady friendships; nor have you the slightest conception of how boundless we can be in admiration of each other in the imagined consciousness of something very superior in ourselves, and which makes all our love a very generous impulse. There is so much coarseness in male friendships, that you understand none of these subtle distinctions.”

“I was going to say, thank Heaven we don’t.”

“You are grateful for very little, George. I assure you there is a great charm in these fine affinities, and remember, you men are not necessarily always rivals. Your roads in life are so numerous and so varied, that you need not jostle. We women have but one path, and one goal at the end of it; and there is no small generosity in the kindliness we extend to each other.”

They talked away late into the night of the future. Once or twice the thought flashed across Julia whether she ought not to tell of what had passed between Lord Culduff and herself. She was not quite sure but that George ought to hear it; but then a sense of delicacy restrained her – a delicacy that extended to that old man who had made her the offer of his hand, and who would not for worlds have it known that his offer had been rejected. “No,” thought she, “his secret shall be respected. As he deemed me worthy to be his wife, he shall know that so far as regards respect for his feelings he had not over-estimated me.”

It was all essential, however, that her brother should not think of enlisting Lord Culduff in his cause, or asking his Lordship’s aid or influence in any way; and when L’Estrange carelessly said, “Could not our distinguished friend and guest be of use here?” she hastened to reply, “Do not think of that, George. These men are so victimized by appeals of this sort that they either flatly refuse their assistance, or give some flippant promise of an aid they never think of according. It would actually fret me if I thought we were to owe anything to such intervention. In fact,” said she, laughingly, “it’s quite an honor to be his acquaintance. It would be something very like a humiliation to have him for a friend. And now good-night. You won’t believe it, perhaps; but it wants but a few minutes to two o’clock.”

“People, I believe, never go to bed in Italy,” said he, yawning; “or only in the day-time. So that we are in training already, Julia.”

“How I hope the match may come off,” said she, as she gave him her hand at parting. “I ‘ll go and dream over it.”

CHAPTER XXII. IN THE LIBRARY AT CASTELLO

When L’Estrange and his sister arrived at Castello, on the morning after the scene of our last chapter, it was to discover that the family had gone off early to visit the mine of Lisconnor, where they were to dine, and not return till late in the evening.

Colonel Bramleigh alone remained behind. A number of important letters which had come by that morning’s post detained him; but he had pledged himself to follow the party, and join them at dinner, if he could finish his correspondence in time.

George and Julia turned away from the door, and were slowly retracing their road homeward, when a servant came running after them to say that Colonel Bramleigh begged Mr. L’Estrange would come back for a moment; that he had something of consequence to say to him.

“I’ll stroll about the shrubberies, George, till you join me,” said Julia. “Who knows it may not be a farewell look I may be taking of these dear old scenes.”

George nodded, half mournfully, and followed the servant towards the library.

In his ordinary and every-day look, no man ever seemed a more perfect representative of worldly success and prosperity than Colonel Bramleigh. He was personally what would be called handsome, had a high bold forehead, and large gray eyes, well set and shaded by strong full eyebrows, so regular in outline and so correctly defined as to give a half-suspicion that art had been called to the assistance of nature. He was ruddy and fresh-looking, with an erect carriage, and that air of general confidence that seemed to declare he knew himself to be a favorite of fortune, and gloried in the distinction.

“I can do scores of things others must not venture upon,” was a common saying of his. “I can trust to my luck,” was almost a maxim with him. And in reality, if the boast was somewhat vainglorious, it was not without foundation; a marvellous, almost unerring, success attended him through life. Enterprises that were menaced with ruin and bankruptcy would rally from the hour that he joined them, and schemes of fortune that men deemed half desperate would, under his guidance, grow into safe and profitable speculations. Others might equal him in intelligence, in skill, in ready resource and sudden expedient; but he had not one to rival him in luck. It is strange enough that the hard business mind, the men of realism par excellence, can recognize such a thing as fortune; but so it is, there are none so prone to believe in this quality as the people of finance. The spirit of the gambler is, in fact, the spirit of commercial enterprise, and the “odds” are as carefully calculated in the counting-house as in the betting-ring. Seen as he came into the breakfast room of a morning, with the fresh flush of exercise on his cheek, or as he appeared in the drawing-room, before dinner, with that air of ease and enjoyment that marked all his courtesy, one would have said, “There is one certainly with whom the world goes well.” There were caustic, invidious people, who hinted that Bramleigh deserved but little credit for that happy equanimity and that buoyant spirit which sustained him. They said, “He has never had a reverse; wait till he be tried.” And the world had waited and waited, and to all seeming the eventful hour had not come; for there he was, a little balder, perhaps, a stray gray hair in his whiskers, and somewhat portlier in his presence, but, on the whole, pretty much what men had known him to be for fifteen or twenty years back.

Upon none did the well-to-do, blooming, and prosperous rich man produce a more powerful impression than on the young curate, who, young, vigorous, handsome as he was, could yet never sufficiently emerge from the res angusto domi to feel the ease and confidence that come of affluence.

What a shock was it then to L’Estrange, as he entered the library, to see the man whom he had ever beheld as the type of till that was happy and healthful and prosperous, haggard and careworn, his hand tremulous, and his manner abrupt and uncertain, with a certain furtive dread at moments, followed by outbursts of passionate defiance, as though he were addressing himself to others besides him who was then before him.

Though on terms of cordial intimacy with the curate, and always accustomed to call him by his name, he received him as he entered the room with a cold and formal politeness, apologized for having taken the liberty to send after and recall him, and ceremoniously requested him to be seated.

“We were sorry you and Miss L’Estrange could not join the picnic to-day,” said Bramleigh; “though, to be sure, it is scarcely the season yet for such diversions.”

L’Estrange felt the awkwardness of saying that they had not been invited, and muttered something not very intelligible about the uncertainty of the weather.

“I meant to have gone over myself,” said Bramleigh, hurriedly; “but all these,” – and he swept his hand, as he spoke, through a mass of letters on the table, – “all these have come since morning, and I am not half through them yet. What ‘s that the moralist says about calling no man happy till he dies? I often think one cannot speculate upon a pleasant day till after the post-hour.”

“I know very little of either the pains or pleasures of the letter-bag. I have almost no correspondence.”

“How I envy you!” cried he, fervently.

“I don’t imagine that mine is a lot many would be found to envy,” said L’Estrange, with a gentle smile.

“The old story, of course. ‘Qui fit, Maecenas, ut Nemo’ – I forget my Horace – ‘ut Nemo; how does it go?”

“Yes, sir. But I never said I was discontented with my lot in my life. I only remarked that I did n’t think that others would envy it.”

“I have it, – I have it,” continued Bramleigh, following out his own train of thought, – “I have it. ‘Ut Nemo, quam sibi sortem sit coutentus.’ It’s a matter of thirty odd years since I saw that passage, L’Estrange, and I can’t imagine what could have brought it so forcibly before me to-day.”

“Certainly it could not have been any application to yourself,” said the curate, politely.

“How do you mean, sir?” cried Bramleigh, almost fiercely. “How do you mean?”

“I mean, sir, that few men have less cause for discontent with fortune.”

“How can you– how can any man, presume to say that of another!” said Bramleigh, in a loud and defiant tone, as he arose and paced the room. “Who can tell what passes in his neighbor’s house, still less in his heart or his head? What do I know, as I listen to your discourse on a Sunday, of the terrible conflict of doubts that have beset you during the week – heresies that have swarmed around you like the vipers and hideous reptiles that gathered around St. Anthony, and that, banished in one shape, came back in another? How do I know what compromises you may have made with your conscience before you come to utter to me your eternal truths; and how you may have said, ‘If he can believe all this, so much the better for him’ – eh?”

He turned fiercely round, as if to demand an answer; and the curate modestly said, “I hope it is not so that men preach the gospel.”

“And yet many must preach in that fashion,” said Bramleigh, with a deep but subdued earnestness. “I take it that no man’s convictions are without a flaw somewhere, and it is not by parading that flaw he will make converts.”

L’Estrange did not feel disposed to follow him into this thesis, and sat silent and motionless.

“I suppose,” muttered Bramleigh, as he folded his arms and walked the room with slow steps, “it’s all expediency, – all! We do the best we can, and hope it may be enough. You are a good man, L’Estrange – ”

“Far from it, sir. I feel, and feel very bitterly, too, my own unworthiness,” said the curate, with an intense sincerity of voice.

“I think you so far good that you are not worldly. You would not do a mean thing, an ignoble, a dishonest thing; you would n’t take what was not your own, nor defraud another of what was his, – would you?”

“Perhaps not; I hope not.”

“And yet that is saying a great deal. I may have my doubts whether that penknife be mine or not. Some one may come to-morrow or next day to claim it as his, and describe it, Heaven knows how rightly or wrongly. No matter, he ‘ll say he owns it. Would you, sir, – I ask you now simply as a Christian man, I am not speaking to a casuist or a lawyer, – would you, sir, at once, just as a measure of peace to your own conscience, say, ‘Let him take,’ rather than burden your heart with a discussion for which you had no temper nor taste? That’s the question I ‘d like to ask you. Can you answer it? I see you cannot,” cried he, rapidly. “I see at once how you want to go off into a thousand subtleties, and instead of resolving my one doubt, surround me with a legion of others.”

“If I know anything about myself I ‘m not much of a casuist; I haven’t the brains for it,” said L’Estrange, with a sad smile.

“Ay, there it is. That ‘s the humility of Satan’s own making; that’s the humility that exclaims, ‘I’m only honest. I ‘m no genius. Heaven has not made me great or gifted. I ‘m simply a poor creature, right-minded and pure-hearted.’ As if there was anything, – as if there could be anything so exalted as this same purity.”

“But I never said that; I never presumed to say so,” said the other, modestly.

“And if you rail against riches, and tell me that wealth is a snare and a pitfall, what do you mean by telling me that my reverse of fortune is a chastisement? Why, sir, by your own theory it ought to be a blessing, – a positive blessing; so that if I were turned out of this princely house to-morrow, branded as a pretender and an impostor, I should go forth better, – not only better, but happier. Ay, that’s the point; happier than I ever was as the lord of these broad acres!” As he spoke he tore his cravat from his throat, as though it were strangling him by its pressure, and now walked the room, carrying the neckcloth in his hand, while the veins in his throat stood out full and swollen like a tangled cordage.

L’Estrange was so much frightened by the wild voice and wilder gesture of the man, that he could not utter a word in reply.

Bramleigh now came over, and leaning his hand on the other’s shoulder, in a tone of kind and gentle meaning, said, —

“It is not your fault, my dear friend, that you are illogical and unreasonable. You are obliged to defend a thesis you do not understand, by arguments you cannot measure. The armory of the Church has not a weapon that has not figured in the Middle Ages; and what are you to do with halberds and cross-bows in a time of rifles and revolvers! If a man, like myself, burdened with a heavy weight on his heart, had gone to his confessor in olden times, he would probably have heard, if not words of comfort, something to enlighten, to instruct, and to guide him. Now what can you give me? tell me that? I want to hear by what subtleties the Church can reconcile me not to do what I ought to do, and yet not quarrel with my own conscience. Can you help me to that?”

L’Estrange shook his head in dissent.

“I suppose it is out of some such troubles as mine that men come to change their religion.” He paused; and then bursting into a laugh, said, “You hear that the other bank deals more liberally, – asks a smaller commission, and gives you a handsomer interest, – and you accordingly transfer your account. I believe that’s the whole of it.”

“I will not say you have stated the case fairly,” said. L’Estrange; but so faintly as to show that he was far from eager to continue the discussion, and he arose to take his leave.

“You are going already? and I have not spoken to you one word about, – what was it? Can you remember what it was? Something that related personally to yourself.”

“Perhaps I can guess, sir. It was the mine at Liscon-nor, probably? You were kind enough the other day to arrange my securing some shares in the undertaking. Since that, however, I have heard a piece of news which may affect my whole future career. There has been some report made by the Commissioner about the parish.”

“That’s it, that ‘s it. They ‘re going to send you off, L’Estrange. They ‘re going to draft you to a cathedral, and make a prebendary of you. You are to be on the staff of an archbishop, – a sort of Christian unattached. Do you like the prospect?”

“Not at all, sir. To begin, I am a very poor man, and could ill bear the cost of life this might entail.”

“Your sister would probably be pleased with the change; a gayer place, more life, more movement.”

“I suspect my sister reconciles herself to dulness even better than myself.”