Part 7 (1/2)

But Mr. Lusignan interfered promptly. ”Rosa, no noise. I will not have you snapping at your best friend and mine. If you are excited, you had better retire to your own room and compose yourself. I hate a clamor.”

Rosa made a wry face at this rebuke, and then began to cry quietly.

Every tear was like a drop of blood from Christopher's heart. ”Pray don't scold her, sir,” said he, ready to snivel himself. ”She meant nothing unkind: it is only her pretty sprightly way; and she did not really imagine a love so reverent as mine”--

”Don't YOU interfere between my father and me,” said this reasonable young lady, now in an ungovernable state of feminine irritability.

”No, Rosa,” said Christopher, humbly. ”Mr. Lusignan,” said he, ”I hope you will tell her that, from the very first, I was unwilling to enter on this subject with HER. Neither she nor I can forget my double character.

I have not said half as much to her as I ought, being her physician; and yet you see I have said more than she can bear from me, who, she knows, love her and revere her. Then, once for all, do pray let me put this delicate matter into your hands: it is a case for parental authority.”

”Unfatherly tyranny, that means,” said Rosa. ”What business have gentlemen interfering in such things? It is unheard of. I will not submit to it, even from papa.”

”Well, you need not scream at me,” said Mr. Lusignan; and he shrugged his shoulders to Staines. ”She is impracticable, you see. If I do my duty, there will be a disturbance.”

Now this roused the bile of Dr. Staines. ”What, sir!” said he, ”you could separate her and me by your authority, here in this very room; and yet, when her life is at stake, you abdicate! You could part her from a man who loved her with every drop of his heart,--and she said she loved him, or, at all events, preferred him to others,--and you cannot part her from a miserable corset, although you see in her poor wasted face that it is carrying her to the churchyard. In that case, sir, there is but one thing for you to do,--withdraw your opposition and let me marry her. As her lover I am powerless; but invest me with a husband's authority, and you will soon see the roses return to her cheek, and her elastic figure expanding, and her eye beaming with health and the happiness that comes of perfect health.”

Mr. Lusignan made an answer neither of his hearers expected. He said, ”I have a great mind to take you at your word. I am too old and fond of quiet to drive a Simpleton in single harness.”

This contemptuous speech, and, above all, the word Simpleton, which had been applied to her pretty freely by young ladies at school, and always galled her terribly, inflicted so intolerable a wound on Rosa's vanity, that she was ready to burst: on that, of course, her stays contributed their mite of physical uneasiness. Thus irritated mind and body, she burned to strike in return; and as she could not slap her father in the presence of another, she gave it Christopher back-handed.

”You can turn me out of doors,” said she, ”if you are tired of your daughter, but I am not such a SIMPLETON as to marry a tyrant. No; he has shown the cloven foot in time. A husband's AUTHORITY, indeed!” Then she turned her hand, and gave it him direct. ”You told me a different story when you were paying your court to me; then you were to be my servant,--all hypocritical sweetness. You had better go and marry a Circa.s.sian slave. They don't wear stays, and they do wear trousers; so she will be unfeminine enough, even for you. No English lady would let her husband dictate to her about such a thing. I can have as many husbands as I like, without falling into the clutches of a tyrant. You are a rude, indelicate--And so please understand it is all over between you and me.”

Both her auditors stood aghast, for she uttered this conclusion with a dignity of which the opening gave no promise, and the occasion, weighed in masculine balances, was not worthy.

”You do not mean that. You cannot mean it,” said Dr. Staines, aghast.

”I do mean it,” said she, firmly; ”and, if you are a gentleman, you will not compel me to say it twice--three times, I mean.”

At this dagger-stroke Christopher turned very pale, but he maintained his dignity. ”I am a gentleman,” said he, quietly, ”and a very unfortunate one. Good-by, sir; thank you kindly. Good-by, Rosa; G.o.d bless you! Oh, pray take a thought! Remember, your life and death are in your own hand now. I am powerless.”

And he left the house in sorrow, and just, but not pettish, indignation.

When he was gone, father and daughter looked at each other, and there was the silence that succeeds a storm.

Rosa, feeling the most uneasy, was the first to express her satisfaction. ”There, HE is gone, and I am glad of it. Now you and I shall never quarrel again. I was quite right. Such impertinence! Such indelicacy! A fine prospect for me if I had married such a man! However, he is gone, and so there's an end of it. The idea! telling a young lady, before her father, she is tight-laced! If you had not been there I could have forgiven him. But I am not; it is a story. Now,” suddenly exalting her voice, ”I know you believe him.”

”I say nothing,” whispered papa, hoping to still her by example. This ruse did not succeed.

”But you look volumes,” cried she: ”and I can't bear it. I won't bear it. If you don't believe ME, ask my MAID.” And with this felicitous speech, she rang the bell.

”You'll break the wire if you don't mind,” suggested her father, piteously.

”All the better! Why should not wires be broken as well as my heart? Oh, here she is! Now, Harriet, come here.”

”Yes, miss.”

”And tell the truth. AM I tight-laced?”

Harriet looked in her face a moment to see what was required of her, and then said, ”That you are not, miss. I never dressed a young lady as wore 'em easier than you do.”