A Modern Instance. William Dean Howells
to see the new moon over his left shoulder.”
“I beg his pardon, then,” returned Bartley. “I ought to have said religions: the Squire has no religions.” The young fellow had a rich, caressing voice, and a securely winning manner which comes from the habit of easily pleasing; in this charming tone, and with this delightful insinuation, he often said things that hurt; but with such a humorous glance from his softly shaded eyes that people felt in some sort flattered at being taken into the joke, even while they winced under it. The girl seemed to wince, as if, in spite of her familiarity with the fact, it wounded her to have her father's scepticism recognized just then. She said nothing, and he added, “I remember we used to think that a redheaded boy was worse-tempered on account of his hair. But I don't believe the sorrel-tops, as we called them, were any more fiery than the rest of us.”
Marcia did not answer at once, and then she said, with the vagueness of one not greatly interested by the subject, “You've got a sorrel-top in your office that's fiery enough, if she's anything like what she used to be when she went to school.”
“Hannah Morrison?”
“Yes.”
“Oh, she isn't so bad. She's pretty lively, but she's very eager to learn the business, and I guess we shall get along. I think she wants to please me.”
“Does she! But she must be going on seventeen now.”
“I dare say,” answered the young man, carelessly, but with perfect intelligence. “She's good-looking in her way, too.”
“Oh! Then you admire red hair?”
He perceived the anxiety that the girl's pride could not keep out of her tone, but he answered indifferently, “I'm a little too near that color myself. I hear that red hair's coming into fashion, but I guess it's natural I should prefer black.”
She leaned back in her chair, and crushed the velvet collar of his coat under her neck in lifting her head to stare at the high-hung mezzotints and family photographs on the walls, while a flattered smile parted her lips, and there was a little thrill of joy in her voice. “I presume we must be a good deal behind the age in everything at Equity.”
“Well, you know my opinion of Equity,” returned the young man. “If I didn't have you here to free my mind to once in a while, I don't know what I should do.”
She was so proud to be in the secret of his discontent with the narrow world of Equity that she tempted him to disparage it further by pretending to identify herself with it. “I don't see why you abuse Equity to me. I Ve never been anywhere else, except those two winters at school. You'd better look out: I might expose you,” she threatened, fondly.
“I'm not afraid. Those two winters make a great difference. You saw girls from other places,—from Augusta, and Bangor, and Bath.”
“Well, I couldn't see how they were so very different from Equity girls.”
“I dare say they couldn't, either, if they judged from you.”
She leaned forward again, and begged for more flattery from him with her happy eyes. “Why, what does make me so different from all the rest? I should really like to know.”
“Oh, you don't expect me to tell you to your face!”
“Yes, to my face! I don't believe it's anything complimentary.”
“No, it's nothing that you deserve any credit for.”
“Pshaw!” cried the girl. “I know you're only talking to make fun of me. How do I know but you make fun of me to other girls, just as you do of them to me? Everybody says you're sarcastic.”
“Have I ever been sarcastic with you?”
“You know I wouldn't stand it.”
He made no reply, but she admired the ease with which he now turned from her, and took one book after another from the table at his elbow, saying some words of ridicule about each. It gave her a still deeper sense of his intellectual command when he finally discriminated, and began to read out a poem with studied elocutionary effects. He read in a low tone, but at last some responsive noises came from the room overhead; he closed the book, and threw himself into an attitude of deprecation, with his eyes cast up to the ceiling.
“Chicago,” he said, laying the book on the table and taking his knee between his hands, while he dazzled her by speaking from the abstraction of one who has carried on a train of thought quite different from that on which he seemed to be intent,—“Chicago is the place for me. I don't think I can stand Equity much longer. You know that chum of mine I told you about; he's written to me to come out there and go into the law with him at once.”
“Why don't you go?” the girl forced herself to ask.
“Oh, I'm not ready yet. Should you write to me if I went to Chicago?”
“I don't think you'd find my letters very interesting. You wouldn't want any news from Equity.”
“Your letters wouldn't be interesting if you gave me the Equity news; but they would if you left it out. Then you'd have to write about yourself.”
“Oh, I don't think that would interest anybody.”
“Well, I feel almost like going out to Chicago to see.”
“But I haven't promised to write yet,” said the girl, laughing for joy in his humor.
“I shall have to stay in Equity till you do, then. Better promise at once.”
“Wouldn't that be too much like marrying a man to get rid of him?”
“I don't think that's always such a bad plan—for the man.” He waited for her to speak; but she had gone the length of her tether in this direction. “Byron says,—
'Man's love is of man's life a thing apart,—
'Tis woman's whole existence.'
Do you believe that?” He dwelt upon her with his tree look, in the happy embarrassment with which she let her head droop.
“I don't know,” she murmured. “I don't know anything about a man's life.”
“It was the woman's I was asking about.”
“I don't think I'm competent to answer.”
“Well, I'll tell you, then. I think Byron was mistaken. My experience is, that, when a man is in love, there's nothing else of him. That's the reason I've kept out of it altogether of late years. My advice is, don't fall in love: it takes too much time.” They both laughed at this. “But about corresponding, now; you haven't said whether you would write to me, or not. Will you?”
“Can't you wait and see?” she asked, slanting a look at him, which she could not keep from being fond.
“No, no. Unless you wrote to me I couldn't go to Chicago.”
“Perhaps I ought to promise, then, at once.”
“You mean that you wish me to go.”
“You said that you were going. You oughtn't to let anything stand in the way of your doing the best you can for yourself.”
“But you would miss me a little, wouldn't you? You would try to miss me, now and then?”
“Oh, you are here pretty often. I don't think I should have much difficulty in missing you.”
“Thanks, thanks! I can go with a light heart, now. Good by.” He made a pretence of rising.
“What! Are you going at once?”
“Yes, this very night,—or to-morrow. Or no, I can't go to-morrow. There's something I was going to do to-morrow.”
“Perhaps go to church.”
“Oh,