Читать книгу Fenton's Quest - M. E. Braddon - Страница 10

"The story does you credit, sir; and I honour you for your goodness," said Gilbert Fenton.

"Goodness, pshaw!" cried the Captain, impetuously; "it has been a mere matter of self-indulgence on my part. The child made herself necessary to me from the very first. I was a solitary man, a confirmed bachelor, with every prospect of becoming a hard, selfish old fogey. Marian Nowell has been the sunshine of my life!"

"You never made any farther discoveries about Mr. Nowell?"

"Never. I have sometimes thought, that I ought to have made some stronger efforts to place myself in communication with him. I have thought this, especially when brooding upon the uncertainties of my darling's future. From the little Mrs. Nowell told me about her marriage, I had reason to believe her husband's father must have been a rich man. He might have softened towards his grandchild, in spite of his disapproval of the marriage. I sometimes think I ought to have sought out the grandfather. But, you see, it would have been uncommonly difficult to set about this, in my complete ignorance as to who or what he was."

"Very difficult. And if you had found him, the chances are that he would have set his face against the child. Marian Nowell will have no need to supplicate for protection from an indifferent father or a hard-hearted grandfather, if she will be my wife.

"Heaven grant that she may love you as you deserve to be loved by her!" Captain Sedgewick answered heartily.

He thought it would be the best thing that could happen to his darling to become this young man's wife, and he had a notion that a simple, inexperienced girl could scarcely help responding to the hopes of such a lover. To his mind Gilbert Fenton seemed eminently adapted to win a woman's heart. He forgot the fatality that belongs to these things, and that a man may have every good gift, and yet just miss the magic power to touch one woman's heart.