Part 39 (1/2)
”It's most frightfully good of you....”
”Rubbish, rubbish.” Lord Evelyn testily waved his words aside. ”'Tisn't for your sake. It's for mine. I want your company.... My good boy, haven't you ever guessed, all these years, that I rather like your company? That was why I was so angry when you and your precious brother made a fool of me long ago. It hurt, because I liked you, Peter Margerison. That was why I couldn't forgive you. Demme! I don't think I've forgiven you yet, nor ever shall. That is why I came and insulted you so badly one day as you remember. That's why I've such a soft place for Lucy, who's got your laugh and your voice and your tricks of talk, and looks at me with your white face. That's why I wasn't going to let her and you make young fools of yourselves together. That, I suppose, is why I know all the time what you're feeling; why I knew you were in h.e.l.l all last summer; why I saw you, though I'm such a blinde bat now, last night, when neither Denis nor Lucy did. And that's why I want you and your boy to come and keep me company now, till the end.”
Peter put out his hand and took Lord Evelyn's.
”I don't know what I can say to thank you. I do appreciate it, you know, more than anything that's ever happened to me before. I can't think how you can be so awfully nice to me....”
”Enough, enough,” said Lord Evelyn. ”Will you or won't you? Yes or no?”
Peter at that gave his answer quickly.
”No. I can't, you know.”
Lord Evelyn turned on him sharply.
”You _won't_? The devil take it!”
”It's like this,” said Peter, disturbed and apologetic, ”we don't want to lead what's called respectable lives, Thomas and I. We don't want to be well-off--to live with well-off people. We--we can't, d'you see. It's not the way we're made. We don't belong. We're meant just to drift about the bottom, like this, and pick up a living anyhow.”
”The boy's a fool,” remarked Lord Evelyn, throwing back his head and staring at the roof.
Peter, who hated to wound, went on, ”If we could share the life of any rich person, it would be you.”
”Good Lord, I'm not rich. Wish I were. Rich!”
”Oh, but you are, you know. You're what _we_ mean by rich.... And it's not only that. There's Denis and Lucy too. We've parted ways, and I do think it's best we shouldn't meet much. What's the good of beginning again to want things one can't have? I might, you know; and it would hurt. I don't now. I've given it all up. I don't want money; I don't want Denis's affection ... or Lucy ... or any of the things I have wanted, and that I've lost. I'm happy without them; without anything but what one finds to play with here as one goes along. One finds good things, you know--friends, and suns.h.i.+ne, and beauty, and enough minestra to go on with, and sheltered places on the sh.o.r.e to boil one's kettle in. I'm happy. Wouldn't it be madness to leave it and go out and begin having and wanting things again?”
Lord Evelyn had been listening with a curious expression of comprehension struggling with impatience.
”And the boy?” he said. ”D'you suppose there'll never come a time when you want for the boy more than you can give him here, in these dirty little towns you like so much?”
”Oh,” said Peter, ”how can one look ahead? Depend on it, if Thomas is one of the people who are born to have things, he will have them. And if he's not, he won't, whatever I try to get for him. He's only one and a half now; so at least there's time before we need think of that. He's happy at present with what he's got.”
”And is it your purpose, then, to spend all your life--anyhow, many years--in these parts, selling needlework?”