Part 3 (1/2)
”Yes, dear,” said Kate. ”Did Ruth tell you?”
”When did that aimless infant ever tell anything?”
”Then how did you know it?”
”If I waited for knowledge till that sweet-tempered parrot chose to tell me,” Aunt Jane went on, ”I should be even more foolish than I am.”
”Then how did you know?”
”Of course I heard the boat hauled down, and of course I knew that none but lovers would go out just before a thunder-storm. Then you and Harry came in, and I knew it was the others.”
”Aunt Jane,” said Kate, ”you divine everything: what a brain you have!”
”Brain! it is nothing but a collection of shreds, like a little girl's work-basket,--a sc.r.a.p of blue silk and a bit of white muslin.”
”Now she is fis.h.i.+ng for compliments,” said Kate, ”and she shall have one. She was very sweet and good to Philip last night.”
”I know it,” said Aunt Jane, with a groan. ”I waked in the night and thought about it. I was awake a great deal last night. I have heard c.o.c.ks crowing all my life, but I never knew what that creature could accomplish before. So I lay and thought how good and forgiving I was; it was quite distressing.”
”Remorse?” said Kate.
”Yes, indeed. I hate to be a saint all the time. There ought to be vacations. Instead of suffering from a bad conscience, I suffer from a good one.”
”It was no merit of yours, aunt,” put in Harry. ”Who was ever more agreeable and lovable than Malbone last night?”
”Lovable!” burst out Aunt Jane, who never could be managed or manipulated by anybody but Kate, and who often rebelled against Harry's blunt a.s.sertions. ”Of course he is lovable, and that is why I dislike him. His father was so before him. That is the worst of it. I never in my life saw any harm done by a villain; I wish I could. All the mischief in this world is done by lovable people. Thank Heaven, n.o.body ever dared to call me lovable!”
”I should like to see any one dare call you anything else,--you dear, old, soft-hearted darling!” interposed Kate.
”But, aunt,” persisted Harry, ”if you only knew what the ma.s.s of young men are--”
”Don't I?” interrupted the impetuous lady. ”What is there that is not known to any woman who has common sense, and eyes enough to look out of a window?”
”If you only knew,” Harry went on, ”how superior Phil Malbone is, in his whole tone, to any fellow of my acquaintance.”
”Lord help the rest!” she answered. ”Philip has a sort of refinement instead of principles, and a heart instead of a conscience,--just heart enough to keep himself happy and everybody else miserable.”
”Do you mean to say,” asked the obstinate Hal, ”that there is no difference between refinement and coa.r.s.eness?”
”Yes, there is,” she said.
”Well, which is best?”
”Coa.r.s.eness is safer by a great deal,” said Aunt Jane, ”in the hands of a man like Philip. What harm can that swearing coachman do, I should like to know, in the street yonder? To be sure it is very unpleasant, and I wonder they let people swear so, except, perhaps, in waste places outside the town; but that is his way of expressing himself, and he only frightens people, after all.”
”Which Philip does not,” said Hal.
”Exactly. That is the danger. He frightens n.o.body, not even himself, when he ought to wear a label round his neck marked 'Dangerous,' such as they have at other places where it is slippery and brittle. When he is here, I keep saying to myself, 'Too smooth, too smooth!'”
”Aunt Jane,” said Harry, gravely, ”I know Malbone very well, and I never knew any man whom it was more unjust to call a hypocrite.”