Volume Ii Part 6 (2/2)

I stammered out a very eager, but a very blundering attempt at denial, while she resumed,--

”Pray do not make matters worse, which apologies in such cases always do. Grandpapa told me that ill health had made you a recluse and avoid society. This, and the mystery of your own close seclusion, were quite enough to make me desirous to see you.”

”How flattered I should have been had I suspected so much interest could attach to me! but, really, I dreaded to inflict upon a very old friend what I found to be so tiresome, namely, my own company.”

”I always heard that you were fastidious about going into society; but surely a visit to an old friend, in a foreign country too, might have escaped being cla.s.sified in this category?”

”I own my fault, which, like most faults, has brought its own penalty.”

”If this be meant to express your deep affliction at not coming to us, I accept the speech in all its most complimentary sense.”

I bowed in acquiescence, and she went on:--

”You must forgive me if I talk to you with a freedom that our actual acquaintances.h.i.+p does not warrant, for, while _you_ never heard of me before, _I_ have been listening to stories and narratives about _you_, I cannot say how long.”

”Indeed! I scarcely suspected Sir Gordon had more than remembered me.”

”I did not say that Grandpapa was my informant,” said she, laughing.

”Lady Catherine Douglas--the Collingwoods--the Grevilles--and then that delightful person, Madame de Favancourt,--all spoke of you.... For which of my catalogue was that blush intended, Mr. Templeton?”

”I was only yielding to a very natural sentiment--call it shame, pride, or pleasure--that so many fair friends should have deemed me worthy a place in their memory. Is Mary Greville married?”

”Yes; about a month since she accepted the hand she had, it is said, some half-dozen times rejected.”

”Sir Blake Morony?”

”The same: an intolerable bore, to my thinking; and, indeed, I believe to poor Mary's, too. But, then, 'the' man did not offer. Some say, he was bashful; some, that he dreaded what he need not have dreaded--a refusal; and so, Mary went but to the Cape when her father became Governor there; and, like all governors' daughters, took a husband from the staff.”

”She was very pretty, but----”

”Say on; we were never more than mere acquaintances.”

”I was going to add, a most inveterate flirt.”

”How I do detest to hear that brought as an accusation against a girl, from the very kind of person that invariably induces the error!--Young men like Mr. Templeton, who, entering life with the prestige of ability and public success, very naturally flatter the vanity of any girl by their attentions, and lead to a more buoyant character of mind and a greater desire to please, which are at once set down as coquetry. For my own part, I greatly prefer old men's society to young one's, from the very fact that one is permitted to indulge all the caprices of thought or fancy without incurring the offensive imputation of a design on his heart.”

”I should not always give a verdict of acquittal even in such cases.”

”Very likely not. There are old men whose manner and bearing are infinitely more attractive than the self-satisfied, self-relying composure of our modern young ones. Any thing, however, even boyish awkwardness, is preferable to your middle-aged gentleman, who, with a slight bald spot on his head, and a very permanent flush on his cheek, adds the stately pomp of his forty autumns to a levity that has no touch of younger days.”

”Heaven help us! what are we to do from thirty to fifty-five or sixty?”

”Marry, and live in the country. I mean, do not be young men about town.

_Apropos_ to nothing--are we not, this instant, in the very scene of Manzoni's novel, 'I Promessi Sposi?'”

”Yes; the whole of our journey to-day lies through it, from Lecco to Como; or rather, more to the northward again--what they call here, the 'Brianza.'”

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