Under St Paul's: A Romance. Dowling Richard
I daresay you'd like him better.' 'I should not.' 'Well then, you're giving that young man a very good chance of breaking his heart, anyway.' 'O'Connor, what do you mean?' 'Oh, it's all very fine for you to let on you don't know. You have been all over London with him, and the blind would see he worships the ground under your feet. You never carried on like this before.' 'O'Connor, I cannot allow you to say such things. You have no right to say such things. I have a great respect for Mr Osborne, and I have taken a great fancy to his lovely sister. He is a very wise man-' 'And a very good-looking young man too. Now you have taken a serious notion, and are going about so much with Mr Osborne, I shouldn't be a bit surprised if you went off to church with him to St Paul's next Sunday. There, you may go down now. That's the bell. You are a regular fright, but you're the best I can make of you.'
CHAPTER X.
AN IDLE DAY
All at the breakfast-table remarked Miss Gordon's pallor. Osborne was shocked by it. Mrs Barclay exclaimed, 'What is the matter with you, Miss Gordon? You look as if you had had no sleep.' 'I have had no sleep,' she said gravely, as she sat down. 'No sleep! What was the matter? Are you not well?' 'I am quite well, thank you. I did not feel sleepy. I couldn't sleep. That is all.' 'Bless my soul!' cried Nevill. 'Miss Gordon, what an extraordinary thing to find a great traveller like you cannot sleep! I can scarcely believe it. I thought travellers were commanders-in-chief of sleep. I have never yet been beaten by sleep. I've slept in every conceivable place, and in every conceivable circumstances you could think of. Attitude is nothing to me. You hear of people composing themselves to sleep. I never do anything of the kind. I think I should like to sleep, and before I have taken the unnecessary precaution of closing my eyes, I've got a nightmare. I have slept in the tops of a ship. I have slept soaking in six inches of brine in a salt-mine. I have slept on the prairie, and in the tender of a railway engine. I have slept in a museum with one of the Pharaohs. I've had a good eight hours on the demonstration-table of a dissecting-room with an intact subject. I've slept in wigwams, and I've slept in the nobbiest beds they make up in 'Frisco. I've slept in the stokehole of a steamboat, and up to my neck in the crevasse of a glacier. I can doze while I'm diving under water, or while I am riding a steeplechase. Bless my soul, to think a great traveller like you could not sleep!' She looked him full in the face as she said, – 'I am not travelling now. Perhaps that may account for my sleeplessness.' 'Not travelling! Well, if you split hairs you may say you are not at the moment travelling. You are not at the moment in motion. But you are to all intents and purposes travelling.' 'But suppose I do not at this moment consider myself a traveller. Suppose, although I have gone about a good deal in the past, I have formed no resolution of continuing to move about, would you, Mr Nevill, still consider me entitled to all the privileges of a traveller to sleep?' 'The case does not apply. You have not given up the road. Have you?' 'That is an indirect answer.' Then for one brief instant she glanced at Osborne, and looked back at Nevill again. 'Ah, who can tell what any of us shall not do some day?' 'What do you intend to do to-day, Miss Gordon?' asked Mrs Barclay from the head of the table. 'I intend staying indoors to-day. I have a lot of tidying and putting away to do, and I want to make a list of a few things I require.' Osborne looked across the table reproachfully at her. She did not raise her eyes to his. What a change had taken place in this girl during the past twelve hours! When he said good-night to her after the concert her eyes were full of soft fire, her cheek glowed, her voice was like a caress. Now her eyes were weary, her colour gone, her voice full of suffering. What could have happened to his darling-his idol? She was perfect still, but something had been lost. How was this? Perfection meant the possession of all the constituent parts. Here was perfection still, and yet something was missing. Then he put the matter poetically to himself. 'Yesterday I saw this perfect landscape by sunlight. I am now looking at it by moonlight. It remains perfect under either light. Which do I prefer it by? I cannot say. I am more familiar with the fuller light. Which is the lovelier I cannot tell. What does she mean by saying she will stay indoors all day? She promised me I should see her and be with her all the month. She is not going to break her word, and rob my life for a whole day of all it now has in the world? I cannot, I will not endure that. What should I do all day long without her? I could rest neither in nor out of doors. Can she not get her maid to do this wretched drudgery for her? I envy any person or place that takes away from me any particle of her time. How is it to be with us? How is it to be with me? If I cannot bear the loss of her now for a few hours, how could I endure to lose her altogether? No, no, no; I cannot, I must not lose her altogether. Nothing shall take her from me. She must be mine, mine, mine! O glorious hope, bold certainty, essential bliss!' Nevill burst in with 'Now, can anything be more provoking than the position in which you have placed us, Miss Gordon? Here is Miss Osborne, the very embodiment of amiability, who has declared she will enter into no scheme until you are consulted; here is Mr Osborne, the very embodiment of amiability, has declared he will enter into no scheme until you are consulted; and here am I, the very embodiment of amiability, who have declared I will wait until you come down, and abide by your decision. And when you do come down, your decision is to convert your room into a kind of nunnery, and hide yourself behind its blinds. For sordid selfishness, I never heard of a meaner programme.' She smiled faintly. 'What am I to do? I have had no sleep. You all tell me I am looking like a ghost. I do not feel lively. I should be a drag on any party. What better can I do than be stupid all to myself?' 'But if you resolve to be stupid all to yourself, you interfere with our arrangements, and impose stupidity upon us. What do you say, Miss Osborne?' 'I really don't know,' said Miss Osborne softly, across the table. Here the conversation paused for awhile. Miss Osborne wished most heartily this talkative man would not address her. Eating in public was new and unpleasant to her. She felt very uncomfortable even when let alone. But when this flippant, empty-headed man drew attention to her, she wished the ground would open and swallow her up. She liked Miss Gordon very much, but she was growing to dislike this sallow-faced, plain-looking, profane man. Although she was homely-minded and quiet, she was not stupid or unobservant, and already she had perceived her brother George was more attentive to Miss Gordon, and more interested in her presence and movements, than she had ever seen him in the presence or movements of any other woman. When undisturbed her mind was sensible and prudent. In the present case she saw no cause for alarm or uneasiness with respect to George. He was quite old enough to marry. He had sufficient means. His family were independent of him. Her mother, she, and her sister were moderately provided for. If the girl were suited to him, and he liked her, and there was no reasonable objection to the girl, why should he not marry her? She had not only taken no objection to Miss Gordon, but had conceived a strong predisposition in her favour. They had had a little chat together the day before, in which Marie had briefly and simply related the chief events of her life, and confessed that, notwithstanding the life of change and excitement she had led, she was fascinated by nothing so much as the uneventful peaceful routine of English country life. Whatever qualities this girl may have lacked, she had such a straightforward spirit in her eyes, and such a straightforward manner in her speech, no one could dream of calling in question the absolute and literal truth of what she said. Her mistakes hitherto had been on the side of excessive candour. She had, as she told Osborne, adopted that form of manner to protect herself. But with Kate she had no need of it. She, the lonely wandering girl, with a deep-buried passionate worship for all noble and great things, had talked freely and simply to the fair-faced simple-minded Kate Osborne. Long roaming through the world had taught Marie many useful things. Among these were a quick discernment of those she should like and those she should not. When first she saw George Osborne she was prepossessed in his favour. He was different from any other man she had met. Indian adventurers and Australian colonists are different classes. But both are active, each is in the midst of struggles and ambitions. What a contrast to these pushing discontented men the calm George Osborne presented! She had been all her life out of quiet England. She had been in the hurry of new lands or the swagger of military rule. Here she was now in the busiest, the most bustling city in the world; and here in this house, at that table, she met an English gentleman of the pastoral type. He was as subdued as night at sea, and as free from self-assertion as dreams. He was chivalric and simple, with a reverential clinging to the faith and traditions which make history beautiful. He had not approached her with confidence or bold admiring glances. He had not put out his best side. He had drawn near her in a timid, bashful, whole-hearted way. He had forgotten himself and thought only of her. She saw through him at a glance, for she examined him closely before she had felt anything