Part 53 (2/2)
”Because poor Mrs. Wilson will be glad.”
Mrs. Bazalgette was piqued at this unexpected answer. ”You seem quite captivated with this Mrs. Wilson; it was for her sake you took Lucy to task. Apropos, you need not have scolded her, for she did not know the woman was in the house.”
”What do you mean?”
”I mean Lucy was not in the room when Mrs. Wilson was announced. I was, but I did not tell her; the all-important circ.u.mstance had escaped my memory. Where are you running to now?”
”Where? why, to ask her pardon, to be sure.”
Mrs. B. [Brute!]
David ran down the stairs to look for Lucy, but he found somebody else instead--his sister Eve, whom the servant had that moment admitted into the hall. It was ”Oh, Eve!” and ”Oh, David!” directly, and an affectionate embrace.
”You got my letter, David?”
”No.”
”Well, then you will before long. I wrote to tell you to look out for me; I had better have brought the letter in my pocket. I didn't know I was coming till just an hour before I started. Mother insisted on my going to see the last of you. Cousin Mary had invited me to ----, so I shall see you off, Davy dear, after all. I thought I'd just pop in and let you know I was in the neighborhood. Mary and her husband are outside the gate in their four-wheel. I would not let them drive in, because I want to hear your story, and they would have bothered us.”
”Eve, dear, I have no good news for you. Your words have come true. I have been perplexed, up and down, hot and cold, till I feel sometimes like going mad. Eve, I cannot fathom her. She is deeper than the ocean, and more changeable. What am I saying? the sea and the wind; they are to be read; they have their signs and their warnings; but she--”
”There! there! that is the old song. I tell you it is only a girl--a creature as shallow as a puddle, and as easy to fathom, as you call it, only men are so stupid, especially boys. Now just you tell me all she has said, all she has done, and all she has looked, and I will turn her inside out like a glove in a minute.”
Cheered by this audacious pledge, David pumped upon Eve all that has trickled on my readers, and some minor details besides, and repeated Lucy's every word, sweet or bitter, and recalled her lightest action--_Meminerunt omnia amantes_--and every now and then he looked sadly into Eve's keen little face for his doom.
She heard him in silence until the last fatal incident, Lucy's severity on the lawn. Then she put in a question. ”Were those her exact words?”
”Do I ever forget a syllable she says to me?”
”Don't be angry. I forgot what a ninny she has made of you. Well, David, it is all as plain as my hand. The girl likes you--that is all.”
”The girl likes me? What do you mean? How can you say that? What sign of liking is there?”
”There are two. She avoids you, and she has been rude to you.”
”And those are signs of liking, are they?” said David, bitterly.
”Why, of course they are, stupid. Tell me, now, does she shun this Captain Keely?”
”Kenealy. No.”
”Does she shun Mr. Harvey?”
”Hardie. No.”
”Does she shun Mr. Talboys?”
”Oh Eve, you break my heart--no! no! She shuns no one but poor David.”
<script>