Читать книгу Not Like Other Girls - Rosa Nouchette Carey - Страница 10

Table of Contents

The library at Longmead was a very pleasant room, and it was the custom of the family to retire thither on occasions when guests were not forthcoming, and Mr. Mayne could indulge in his favorite nap without fear of interruption.

A certain simplicity, not to say homeliness, of manners prevailed in the house. It was understood among them that the dining-room was far too gorgeous for anything but occasions of ceremony. Mrs. Mayne, indeed, had had the good taste to cover the satin couches with pretty, fresh-looking cretonne, and had had arranged hanging cupboards of old china until it had been transformed into a charming apartment, notwithstanding which the library was declared to be the family-room, where the usual masculine assortment of litter could be regarded with indulgent eyes, and where papers and pamphlets lay in delightful confusion.

Longmead was not a pretentious house—it was a moderate-sized residence, adapted to a gentleman of moderate means; but in summer no place could be more charming. The broad gravel walk before the house had a background of roses; hundreds of roses climbed up the railings or twined themselves about the steps: a tiny miniature lake, garnished with water-lilies, lay in the centre of the lawn; a group of old elm-trees was beside it; behind the house lay another lawn, and beyond were meadows where a few sheep were quietly grazing. Mr. Mayne, who found time hang a little heavily on his hands, prided himself a good deal on his poultry-yard and kitchen-garden. A great deal of his spare time was spent among his favorite Bantams and Dorkings, and in superintending his opinionated old gardener—on summer mornings he would be out among the dews in his old coat and planter’s hat, weeding among the gooseberry-bushes.

“It is the early bird that finds the worm,” he would say, when Dick sauntered into the breakfast-room later on; for, in common with the youth of his generation, he had a wholesome horror of early rising, which he averred was one of the barbarous usages of the dark ages in which his elders had been bred.

“I never took any interest in worms, sir,” returned Dick, helping himself to a tempting rasher that had just been brought in hot for the pampered youth. “By the bye, have you seen Darwin’s work on ‘The Formation of Vegetable Mould’? he declares that worms have played a more important part in the 23 history of the world than most people would at first suppose: they were our earliest ploughmen.”

“Oh, ah! indeed, very interesting!” observed his father, dryly; “but all the same, I beg to observe, no one succeeded in life who was not an early riser.”

“A sweeping assertion, and one I might be tempted to argue, if it were not for taking up your valuable time,” retorted Dick, lazily, but with a twinkle in his eye. “I know my constitution better than to trust myself out before the world is properly aired and dried. I am thinking it is less a case of worms than of rheumatism some early birds will be catching;” to which Mr. Mayne merely returned an ungracious “Pshaw!” and marched off, leaving his son to enjoy his breakfast in peace.

When Dick entered the library on the evening in question, Mr. Mayne’s querulous observation as to the noisiness of his entrance convinced him at once that his father was in a very bad humor indeed, and that on this account it behooved him to be exceedingly cool.

So he kissed his mother, who looked at him a little anxiously, and then sat down and turned out her work-basket, as he had done Nan’s two or three hours ago.

“You are late after all, Dick,” she said, with a little reproach in her voice. It was hardly a safe observation, to judge by her husband’s cloudy countenance; but the poor thing sometimes felt her evenings a trifle dull when Dick was away. Mr. Mayne would take up his paper, but his eyes soon closed over it; that habit of seeking for the early worm rather disposed him to somnolent evenings, during which his wife knitted and felt herself nodding off out of sheer ennui and dulness. These were not the hours she had planned during those years of waiting; she had told herself that Richard would read to her or talk to her as she sat over her work, that they would have so much to say to each other; but now, as she regarded his sleeping countenance evening after evening, it may be doubted whether matrimony was quite what she expected, since its bliss was so temperate and so strongly infused with drowsiness.

Dick looked up innocently. “Am I late, mother?”

“Oh, of course not,” returned his father, with a sneer; “it is not quite time to ring for Nicholson to bring our candles. Bessie, I think I should like some hot water to-night; I feel a little chilly.” And Bessie rang the bell obediently, and without any surprise in her manner. Mr. Mayne often woke up chilly from his long nap.

“Are you going to have a ‘drap of the cratur’?” asked his son, with alacrity. “Well, I don’t mind joining you, and that’s the truth, for we have been dawdling about, and I am a trifle chilly myself.”

“You know I object to spirits for young men,” returned Mr. Mayne, severely: nevertheless he pushed the whiskey to Dick 24 as soon as he had mixed his own glass, and his son followed his example.

“I am quite of your opinion, father,” he observed, as he regarded the handsome cut-glass decanter somewhat critically; “but there are exceptions to every rule, and when one is chilly––”

“I wish you would make an exception and stay away from the cottage sometimes,” returned Mr. Mayne, with ill-suppressed impatience. “It was all very well when you were all young things together, but it is high time matters should be different.”

Dick executed a low whistle of surprise and dismay. He had no idea his father’s irritability had arisen from any definite cause. What a fool he had been to be so late! it might lead to some unpleasant discussion. Well, after all, if his father chose to be so disagreeable it was not his fault; and he was no longer a boy, to be chidden, or made to do this or that against his own will.

Mr. Mayne was sufficiently shrewd to see that his son was somewhat taken aback by this sudden onslaught, and he was not slow to press his advantage. He had wanted to give Dick a bit of his mind for some time, and after all there is no time like the present.

“Yes, it was all very well when you were a lot of children together,” he continued. “Of course, it is hard on you, Dick, having no brothers and sisters to keep you company; your mother and I were always sorry about that for your sake.”

“Oh, don’t mention it,” interrupted Dick: “on the whole, I am best pleased as it is.”

“But it would have been better for you,” returned his father, sharply: “we should not have had all this fooling and humbug if you had had sisters of your own.”

“Fooling and humbug!” repeated Dick, hotly; “I confess, sir, I don’t quite understand to what you are referring.” He was growing very angry, but his mother flung herself between the combatants.

“Don’t, my boy, don’t; you must not answer your father in that way. Richard, what makes you so hard on him to-night? It must be the gout, Dick: we had better send for Dr. Weatherby in the morning,” continued the anxious woman, with tears in her eyes, “for your dear father would never be so cross to you as this unless he were going to be ill.”

“Stuff and nonsense, Bessie! Dr. Weatherby indeed!” but his voice was less wrathful. “What is it but fooling, I should like to know, for Dick to be daundering his time away with a parcel of girls as he does with these Challoners!”

“I suppose you were never a young man yourself, sir.”

“Oh, yes, I was, my boy,” and the corners of Mr. Mayne’s mouth relaxed in spite of his efforts to keep serious. “I fell in love with your mother, and stuck to her for seven or eight 25 years; but I did not make believe that I was brother to a lot of pretty girls, and waste all my time dancing attendance on them and running about on their errands.”

“You ought to have taken a lesson out of my book,” returned his son, readily.

“No, I ought to have done no such thing, sir!” shouted back Mr. Mayne, waxing irate again. It could not be denied that Dick could be excessively provoking when he liked. “Don’t I tell you it is time this sort of thing was stopped? Why, people will begin to talk, and say you are making up to one of them, it is not right, Dick; it is not, indeed,” with an attempted pathos.

“I don’t care that for what people say,” returned the young fellow, snapping his fingers. “Is it not a pity you are saying all this to me just when I am going away and am not likely to see any of them for the next six months? You are very hard on me to-night, father; and I can’t think what it is all about.”

Mr. Mayne was silent a moment, revolving his son’s pathetic speech. It was true he had been cross, and had said more than he had meant to say. He had not wished to hinder Dick’s innocent enjoyments; but if he were unknowingly picking flowers at the edge of a precipice, was it not his duty as a father to warn him?

“I think I have been a little hard, my lad,” he said, candidly, “but there, you and your mother know my bark is worse than my bite. I only wanted to warn you; that’s all, Dick.”

“Warn me!—against what, sir?” asked the young man, quickly.

“Against falling in love, really, with one of the Challoner girls!” returned Mr. Mayne, trying to evade the fire of Dick’s eyes, and blustering a little in consequence. “Why, they have not a penny, one of them, and, if report be true, Mrs. Challoner’s money is very shakily invested. Paine told me so the other day. He said he should never wonder if a sudden crash came any minute.”

“Is this true, Richard?”

“Paine declares it is; and think of Dick saddling himself with the support of a whole family!”

“It strikes me you are taking things very much for granted,” returned his son, trying to speak coolly, but flushing like a girl over his words. “I think you might wait, father, until I proposed bringing you home a daughter-in-law.”

“I am only warning you, Dick, that the Challoner connection would be distasteful to me,” replied Mr. Mayne, feeling that he had gone a little too far. “If you had brothers and sisters it would not matter half so much; but it would be too hard if my only son were to cross my wishes.”

“Should you disinherit me, father?” observed Dick, cheerfully. He had recovered his coolness and pluck, and began to feel more equal to the occasion.

“We should see about that, but I hardly think it would be 26 for your advantage to oppose me too much,” returned his father with an ominous pucker of his eyebrows, which warned Dick, that it was hardly safe to chaff the old boy too much to-night.

“I think I will go to bed, Richard,” put in poor Mrs. Mayne. She had wisely forborne to mix in the discussion, fearing that it would bring upon her the vials of her husband’s wrath. Mr. Mayne was as choleric as a Welshman, and had a reserve force of sharp cynical sayings that were somewhat hard to bear. He was disposed to turn upon her on such occasions, and to accuse her of spoiling Dick and taking his part against his father; between the two Richards she sometimes had a very bad time indeed.

Dick lighted his mother’s candle, and bade her good-night; but all the same she knew she had not seen the last of him. A few minutes afterwards there was a hasty tap at the bedroom door, and Dick thrust in his head.

“Come in, my dear; I have been expecting you,” she said, with a pleased smile. He always came to her when he was ruffled or put out, and brought her all his grievances; surely this was the very meaning and essence of her motherhood—this healing and comfort that lay in her power of sympathy.

When he was a little fellow, had she not extracted many a thorn and bound up many a cut finger? and now he was a man, would she be less helpful to him when he wanted a different kind of comfort?

“Come in, my son,” she said, beckoning him to the low chair beside her, into which Dick threw himself with a petulant yawn.

“Mother, what made the pater so hard on me to-night? he cut up as rough as though I had committed some crime.”

“I don’t think he is quite himself to-night,” returned Mrs. Mayne, in her soft, motherly voice. “I fancy he misses you, Dick, and is half jealous of the Challoners for monopolizing you. You are all we have, that’s where it is,” she finished, stroking the sandy head with her plump hand; but Dick jerked away from her with a little impatience.

“I think it rather hard that a fellow is to be bullied for doing nothing at all,” replied Dick, with a touch of sullenness. “When the pater is in this humor it is no use saying anything to him; but you may as well tell him, mother, that I mean to choose my wife for myself.”

“Oh, my dear, I dare not tell him anything of the kind,” returned Mrs. Mayne, in an alarmed voice; and then, as she glanced at her son, her terror merged into amusement. There was something so absurdly boyish in Dick’s appearance, such a ludicrous contrast between the manliness of his speech and his smooth cheek; the little fringe of hirsute ornament, of which Dick was so proud, was hardly visible in the dim light; his youthful figure, more clumsy than graceful, had an unfledged air about it, nevertheless, the boldness of his words took away her breath. 27

“Every man has a right to his own choice in such a matter,” continued Dick, loftily. “You may as well tell him, mother, that I intend to select my own wife.”

“My dear, I dare not for worlds––” she began; and then she stopped, and laid her hand on his shoulder. “Why do you say this to me? there is plenty of time,” she went on hastily; “that is what your father says, and I think he is right. You are too young for this sort of thing yet. You must see the world; you must look about you; you must have plenty of choice,” continued the anxious mother. “I shall be hard to please, Dick, for I shall think no one good enough for my boy; that is the worst of having only one, and he the best son that ever lived,” finished Mrs. Mayne, with maternal pride in her voice.

Dick took this effusion very coolly. He was quite used to all this sort of worship; he did not think badly of himself; he was not particularly humble-minded or given to troublesome introspection; on the whole, he thought himself a good fellow, and was not at all surprised that people appreciated him.

“There are such a lot of cads in the world, one is always glad to fall in with a different sort,” he would say to himself. He was quite of his mother’s opinion, that an honest, God-fearing young fellow, who spoke the truth and shamed the devil, who had no special vices but a dislike for early rising, who had tolerable brains, and more than his share of muscle, who was in the Oxford eleven, and who had earned his blue ribbon—that such a one might be considered to set an example to his generation.

When his mother told him she would be hard to please, Dick looked a little wicked, and thought of Nan; but the name was not mentioned between them. Nevertheless, Mrs. Mayne felt with unerring maternal instinct that, in spite of his youth, Dick’s choice was made, and sighed to herself at the thought of the evil days that were to come.

Poor woman, she was to have little peace that night! Hardly had Dick finished his grumble and sauntered away, before her husband’s step was heard in his dressing-room.

“Bessie,” he called out to her, “why do you allow that boy to keep you up so late at night? Do you know that it is eleven, and you are still fully dressed?”

“Is it so late, Richard?”

“Yes, of course,” he snapped; “but that is the care you take of your health; and the way you cosset and spoil that boy is dreadful.”

“I don’t think Dick is easily spoiled,” plucking up a little spirit to answer him.

“That shows how little you understand boys,” returned her husband. Evidently the whiskey, though it was the best Glenlivat, had failed to mollify him. It might be dangerous to go too far with Dick, for he had a way of turning around and defending himself that somewhat embarrassed Mr. Mayne, but 28 with his wife there would be no such danger. He would dominate her by his sharp speeches, and reduce her to abject submission in a moment, for Bessie was the meekest of wives. “Take care how you side with him,” he continued, in a threatening voice. “He thinks that I am not serious in what I said just now, and is for carrying it off with a high hand; but I tell you, and you had better tell him, that I was never more in earnest in my life. I won’t have one of those Challoner girls for a daughter-in-law!”

“Oh, Richard! and Nan is such a sweet girl!” returned his wife, with tears in her eyes. She was awfully jealous of Nan, at times she almost dreaded her; but for her boy’s sake she would have taken her now to her heart and defied even her formidable husband. “She is such a pretty creature, too; no one can help loving her.”

“Pshaw!” returned her husband; “pretty creature indeed! that is just your soft-hearted nonsense. Phillis is ten times prettier, and has heaps more sense. Why couldn’t Dick have taken a fancy to her?”

“Because I am afraid he cares for the other one,” returned Mrs. Mayne, sadly. She had no wish to deceive her husband and she knew that the golden apple had rolled to Nan’s feet.

“Stuff and rubbish!” he responded, wrathfully. “What is a boy of his age to know about such things? Tell him from me to put this nonsense out of his head for the next year or two; there is plenty of time to look out for a wife after that. But I won’t have him making up his mind until he has left Oxford.” And Mrs. Mayne, knowing that her husband had spoken his last word, thankfully withdrew, feeling that in her heart she secretly agreed with him.