Love Me Little, Love Me Long Part 13

"Aha!" thought Eve, exulting, "we have driven him away."

Judge her mortification when Lucy, after shutting the piano, joined her uncle and Mr. Talboys. Eve whispered David: "Gone to smooth him down: the high and mighty gentleman wasn't made enough of."

"Every one in their turn," said David, calmly; "that is manners. Look!

it is the old gentleman she is being kind to. She could not be unkind to anyone, however."

Eve put her lips to David's ear: "She will be unkind to you if you are ever mad enough to let her see what I see," said she, in a cutting whisper.

"What do you see? More than there is to see, I'll wager," said David, looking down.

"Ah! that is the way with young men, the moment they take a fancy; their sister is nothing to them, their best friend loses their confidence."

"Don't ye say that, Eve--now don't say that!"

"No, no, David, never mind me. I am cross. And if you saw a sore heart in store for anyone you had a regard for, wouldn't you be cross? Young men are so stupid, they can't read a girl no more than Hebrew. If she is civil and affable to them, oh, they are the man directly, when, instead of that, if it was so, she would more likely be shy and half afraid to come near them. David, you are in a fool's paradise. In company, and even in flirtation, all sorts meet and part again; but it isn't so with marriage. There 'it is beasts of a kind that in one are joined, and birds of a feather that came together.' Like to like, David. She is a fine lady and she will marry a fine gentleman, and nothing else, with a large income. If she knew what has been in your head this month past, she would open her eyes and ask if the man was mad."

"She has a right to look down on me, I know," murmured David, humbly; "but" (his eye glowing with sudden rapture) "she doesn't--she doesn't."

"Look down on you! You are better company than she is, or anyone she can get in this-out-of-the-way place; it is her interest to be civil to you. I am too hard upon her. She is a lady--a perfect lady--and that is why she is above giving herself airs. No, David, she is not the one to treat us with disrespect, if we don't forget ourselves. But if ever you let her see that you are in love with her, you will get an affront that will make your cheek burn and my heart smart--so I tell you."

"Hush! I never told you I was in love with her."

"Never told me? Never told me? Who asked you to tell me? I have eyes, if you have none."

"Eve," said David imploringly, "I don't hear of any lover that she has. Do you?"

"No," said Eve carelessly. "But who knows? She pa.s.ses half the year a hundred miles from this, and there are young men everywhere. If she was a milkmaid, they'd turn to look at her with such a face and figure as that, much more a young lady with every grace and every charm. She has more than one after her that we never see, take my word."

Eve had no sooner said this than she regretted it, for David's face quivered, and he sighed like one trying to recover his breath after a terrible blow.

What made this and the succeeding conversation the more trying and peculiar was, that the presence of other persons in the room, though at a considerable distance, compelled both brother and sister, though anything but calm, to speak _sotto voce._ But in the history of mankind more strange and incongruous matter has been dealt with in an undertone, and with artificial and forced calmness.

"My poor David!" said Eve sorrowfully; "you who used to be so proud, so high-spirited, be a man! Don't throw away such a treasure as your affection. For my sake, dear David, your sister's sake, who does love you so very, very dearly!"

"And I love you, Eve. Thank you. It was hard lines. Ah! But it is wholesome, no doubt, like most bitters. Yes. Thank you, Eve. I do admire her v-very much," and his voice faltered a little. "But I am a man for all that, and I'll stand to my own words. I'll never be any woman's slave."

"That is right, David."

"I will not give hot for cold, nor my heart for a smile or two. I can't help admiring her, and I do hope she will be--happy--ah!--whoever she fancies. But, if I am never to command her, I won't carry a willow at my mast-head, and drift away from reason and manhood, and my duty to you, and mother, and myself."

"Ah! David, if you could see how n.o.ble you look now. Is it a promise, David? for I know you will keep your word if once you pa.s.s it."

"There is my hand on it, Eve."

The brother and sister grasped hands, and when David was about to withdraw his, Eve's soft but vigorous little hand closed tighter and kept it firmer, and so they sat in silence.

"Eve."

"My dear!"

"Now don't you be cross."

"No, dear. Eve is sad, not cross; what is it?

"Well, Eve--dear Eve."

"Don't be afraid to speak your mind to me--why should you?"

"Well, then, Eve, now, if she had not some little kindness for me, would she be so pleased with these thundering yarns I keep spinning her, as old as Adam, and as stale as bilge-water? You that are so keen, how comes it you don't notice her eyes at these times? I feel them shine on me like a couple of suns. They would make a statue pay the yarn out. Who ever fancied my chat as she does?"

"David," said Eve, quietly, "I have thought of all this; but I am convinced now there is nothing in it. You see, David, mother and I are used to your yarns, and so we take them as a matter of course; but the real fact is, they are very interesting and very enticing, and you tell them like a book. You came all fresh to this lady, and, as she is very quick, she had the wit to see the merit of your descriptions directly. I can see it myself _now._ All young women like to be amused, David, and, above all, _excited;_ and your stories are very exciting; that is the charm; that is what makes her eyes fire; but if that puppy there, or that book-shelf yonder, could tell her your stories, she would look at either the puppy or the book-stand with just the same eyes she looks on you with, my poor David."

"Don't say so, Eve. Let me think there is some little feeling for me inside those sweet eyes, that look so kind on me--"

"And on me, and on everybody. It is her manner. I tell you she is so to all the world. She isn't the first I've met. Trust me to read a woman, David; what can you know?"

"I know nothing; but they tell me you can fathom one another better than any man ever could," said David, sorrowfully.

"'David, just now you were telling as interesting a story as ever was.

You had just got to the thrilling part."

"Oh, had I? What was I saying?"

"I can't tell you to the very word; I am not your sweetheart any more than she is; but one of the sailors was in danger of his life, and so on. You never told me the story before; I was not worth it. Well, just then does not that affected puppy choose his time to come meandering in?"

"Puppy! I call him a fine gentleman."

"Well, there isn't so much odds. In he comes; your story is broken off directly. Does she care? No, she has got one of her own set; he is not a very bright one; he is next door to a fool. No matter; before he came, to judge by her crocodile eyes, she was hot after your story; the moment he did come, she didn't care a pin for you _nor_ your story. I gave her more than one opening to bring it on again; not she.

I tell you, you are nothing but a _pa.s.s_ time;* you suit her turn so long as none of her own set are to be had. If she would leave you for such a jackanapes as that, what would she do for a real gentleman?

such a man as she is a woman, for instance, and as if there weren't plenty such in her own set--oh, you goose!"

* I write this word as the lady thought proper to p.r.o.nounce it.

David interrupted her. "I have been a vain fool, and it is lucky no one has seen it but you," and he hid his face in his hands a moment; then, suddenly remembering where he was, and that this was an att.i.tude to attract attention, he tried to laugh--a piteous effort; then he ground his teeth and said: "Let us go home. All I want now is to get out of the house. It would have been better for me if I had never set foot in it."

"Hush! be calm, David, for Heaven's sake. I am only waiting to catch her eye, and then we'll bid them good-evening."

"Very well, I'll wait"; and David fixed his eyes sadly and doggedly on the ground. "I won't look at her if I can help it," said he, resolutely, but very sadly, and turned his head away.

"Now, David," whispered Eve.

David rose mechanically and moved with his sister toward the other group. Miss Fountain turned at their approach. Somewhat to David's surprise, Eve retreated as quickly as she had advanced.

"We are to stay."

"What for?"

"She made me a signal."