Part 60 (2/2)

Somebody suspects him, and brings a creature shut up in a covered dish to ask him to tell what it was--and it happens to be a robin; so when he cries out, ”Oh, poor Robin!” thinking himself done for, out hops the bird, and the enemy is sold.'

'Yes; and then he counts his dinners every day, and the thieves who have come to look on think he is counting them, and throw themselves on his mercy.'

'It has capabilities,' said Edgar.

'But the moral!' said Wilmet.

'What! Not the lesson against dealing with conjurors? demanded Edgar.

'I'll undertake to arm your pupils against spirit-rapping for ever.'

'In that point of view--' said Wilmet doubtfully.

'In that point of view,' said Felix, laughing, 'it has my vote.'

'I don't like deception to succeed,' said Wilmet; 'but at least there's none of the worst sort of nonsense.'

Lance leapt up and performed a pas seul, insisting that Bill Harewood must come and be a robber; and Edgar and Cherry instantly had their heads together as playwrights and managers.

'Never mind, Wilmet,' said Felix at their bedroom doors that night.

'Remember, Father never was a man for all work and no play.'

'I don't mind play, but I don't know what this may lead to;' then, as Felix laughed merrily at the repet.i.tion, she followed him into his room, saying, 'I mean, I have no trust in Edgar's discretion, or Lance's either, and all sorts of things may be put into the children's heads.'

'You can't keep children's heads a blank,' said Felix, 'and Edgar's good taste ought to be trusted in his own home, for his own sisters.

Even you might stretch a few points to keep him happy and occupied with Cherry. Besides, I believe we do live a duller life than can be really good for any one. It can't be right to shut up all these young things all their holidays without any pleasure.'

'I thought,' said Wilmet, her eyes growing moist, 'it was pleasure enough to be all at home together.'

'So it is, to staid old fogies like you and me,' said Felix, kissing her; 'but the young ones want a lark now and then, and I confess I should be immensely disappointed if this fun didn't come off. No, no, W. W., I can't have you an old cat; you are much too young and pretty.'

The levity of this conclusion shocked Wilmet beyond remonstrance. Was Felix falling from his height of superiority, or was her strictness wearisome?

Meantime, Geraldine's brain was ringing with doggrel rhymes, and whirling with stage contrivances, in the delight of doing something with Edgar, whether versifying or drawing; and as Felix said, to keep him happy at home for Christmas was no small gain, even though it brought a painful realisation that their feast was not his feast.

Geraldine suffered in silence, for a word from her was always put down by some tender jest, avowing as much inferiority in goodness as superiority in intellect. As to Clement, Edgar's sport was to startle him with jokes, dilemmas, and irreverences, and then to decline discussion on the ground that he never argued with _sisters_, and that Clement would understand when he went to Cambridge. Otherwise, the subject was avoided at home, but Edgar consorted a good deal with Mr. Ryder, calling him the only person in the town, except Cherry, who knew the use of a tongue, and one day, when Felix was a.s.sisting his old master in a search through old newspapers in the reading- room, Mr. Ryder said, 'By-the-by, your brother Edgar has a good deal more of the talk of the day than you can be prepared for.'

'I am afraid so, sir,' said Felix; 'but he does not put it forth much at home.'

'So I hoped. It would have startled your father a good deal; but I believe myself acting in the spirit of his wishes in letting him talk out his crudities.'

'Thank you, sir,' said Felix, not quite knowing how to take this.

'It is a phase to be pa.s.sed through,' said Mr. Ryder. 'Indeed, a good deal of it is fas.h.i.+on and vanity.'

'Mr. Audley thinks so,' replied Felix. 'He said he thought poor Edgar did not think enough to have real doubt, but that he considered other people's a dispensation from attending to the subject at all.'

'Exactly,' said Mr. Ryder, 'except so far as repeating what he has caught up seems to him knowing, and according to the spirit of the time, fit to dazzle us down here. Whatever may deepen him will probably change all that--I do not say into what you or your father would wish; but what is jargon now will pa.s.s away into something more real, for better or--'

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