Part 63 (1/2)
”Well, one might think so, from that doleful phiz of yours. What's troubling you now, my worthy parent?”
”Ach! Shoodith! Don't dishtress me by your speeches. I hash something of importance to shay to you, before I go to shleep.”
”Say it quick, then: for I want to go to sleep myself. What is it, pray?”
”Well, Shoodith, dear, it ish this: you mushn't trifle any more with thish young fellow.”
”What young fellow do you mean, my good man?”
”Vochan, of coursh--Mashter Vochan.”
”Ho! ho! you've changed your tune. What's this about?”
”I hash reason, Shoodith; I hash reason.”
”Who said I was trifling with him? Not I, father! Anything but that, I can a.s.sure you.”
”That ish not what I mean, Shoodith.”
”Well, then, what do you mean, old gentleman? Come now! make yourself intelligible!”
”I mean thish, Shoodith: you mushn't let things go any further with the young fellow--that ish, shoost now--till I knowsh something more about him. I thought he wash going to be lich--you know I thought that, mine daughter--but I hash found out, thish very night, that--perhaps--he may never be worth a s.h.i.+ngle s.h.i.+lling; and therefore, Shoodith, you couldn't think of marrying him--and mushn't think of it till we knowsh more about him!”
”Father!” replied the Jewess, at once throwing aside her habitual badinage, and a.s.suming a serious tone, ”it is too late! Did I not tell you that the tarantula might get caught in its own trap? The proverb has proved true; _I_ am that unhappy spider!”
”You don't say so, Shoodith?” inquired the father, with a look of alarm.
”O do! Yonder sleeps the fly,”--and the speaker pointed along the gallery in the direction of the hammock--”secure from any harm I can ever do him. And were he as poor as he appears to be--as humble as the lowest slave on your estate--he is rich enough for me. Ah! it will be _his_ fault, not _mine_, if he do not become my husband!”
The proud, determined tone in which the Jewess spoke, was only modified as she uttered the last words. The conjunctive form of the closing speech, with a certain duplexity of expression upon her countenance showed that she was not yet sure of the heart of Herbert Vaughan.
Notwithstanding his attentions at the ball--notwithstanding much that had since occurred, there appeared to be a doubt--a trace of distrust that still lingered.
”Never, Shoodith!” cried the father, in a tone of determined authority.
”You mushn't think of it! You shall never marry a pauper--never!”
”Pauper him as much as you like, father; he won't care for that, any more than I do.”
”I shall disinherit you, Shoodith!” said the Jew, giving way to a feeling of spiteful resentment.
”As you like about that, too. Disinherit me at your pleasure. But remember, old man, it was you who began this game--you who set me to playing it; and if you are in danger of losing your stake--whatever it may be--I tell you you're in danger of losing _me_--that is, if he--”
The hypothetic thought--whatever it was--that at this crisis crossed the mind of the Jewess, was evidently one that caused her pain: as could be seen by the dark shadow that came mantling over her beautiful brow.
Whether or not she would have finished the speech is uncertain. She was not permitted to proceed. The angry father interrupted her:--
”I won't argue with you now, Shoodith. Go to your bed, girl! go to shleep! Thish I promish you--and, s'help me, I keepsh my promis.h.!.+--if thish pauper ish to be a pauper, he never marries you with my conshent; and without my conshent he never touches a s.h.i.+lling of my monish. You understand that, Shoodith?”
And without waiting to hear the reply--which was quite as defiant as his own declaration--the Jew hurried out of his daughter's chamber, and shuffled off along the verandah.