Nobody Part 113

"There isn't a girl among them all to compare with you, as far as looks go."

"I am afraid that will not help the matter," said Lois, smiling; but then she added with earnest and almost anxious eagerness,

"Madge, dear, don't think about it! Happiness is not there; and what G.o.d gives us is best. Best for you and best for me. Don't you wish for riches!--or for anything we haven't got. What we have to do, is to live so as to show forth Christ and his truth before men."

"Very few do that," said Madge shortly.

"Let us be some of the few."

"I'd like to do it in high places, then," said Madge. "O, you needn't talk, Lois! It's a great deal nicer to have a leopard skin under your feet than a rag-carpet."

Lois could not help smiling, though something like tears was gathering.

"And I'd rather have Mr. Dillwyn take care of me than uncle Tim Hotchkiss."

The laughter and the tears came both more unmistakeably. Lois felt a little hysterical. She finished dressing hurriedly, and heard as little as possible of Madge's further communications.

It was a few hours later, that same morning, that Philip Dillwyn strolled into his sister's breakfast-room. It was a room at the back of the house, the end of a suite; and from it the eye roved through half-drawn _portieres_ and between rows of pillars, along a vista of the parquetted floors Madge had described to her sister; catching here the glitter of gold from a picture frame, and there a gleam of white from a marble figure, through the half light which reigned there. In the breakfast-room it was bright day; and Mrs. Burrage was finishing her chocolate and playing with bits of dry toast, when her brother came in. Philip had hardly exchanged greetings and taken his seat, when his attention was claimed by Mrs. Burrage's young son and heir, who forthwith thrust himself between his uncle's knees, a bat in one hand, a worsted ball in the other.

"Uncle Phil, mamma says her name usen't to be Burrage--it was your name?"

"That is correct."

"If it was your name once, why isn't it your name now?"

"Because she changed it and became Burrage."

"What made her be Burrage?"

"That is a deep question in mental philosophy, which I am unable to answer, Chauncey."

"She says, it's because she married papa."

"Does not your mother generally speak truth?"

Young Philip Chauncey seemed to consider this question; and finally waiving it, went on pulling at a b.u.t.ton of his uncle's coat in the energy of his inquiries.

"Uncle Phil, you haven't got a wife?"

"No."

"Why haven't you?"

"An old cookery book says, 'First catch your hare.'"

"Must you catch your wife?"

"I suppose so."

"How do you catch her?"

But the answer to this most serious inquiry was met by such a burst of laughter on the part of both the older persons in the room, that Phil had to wait; nothing daunted, however, returned to the charge.

"Uncle Phil, if you had a wife, what would her name be?"

"If ever I have one, Chauncey, her name will be--"

But here the speaker had very nearly, in his abstraction, brought out a name that would, to say the least, have astonished his sister. He caught himself up just in time, and laughed.

"If ever I have one, her name will be mine."

"I did not know, last night, but you had chosen the lady to whom you intended to do so much honour," his sister observed coolly, looking at him across her chocolate cup.

"Or who I hoped would do me so much honour. What did you think of my supposed choice?" he asked with equal coolness.

"What could I think, except that you were like all other men--distraught for a pretty face."

"One might do worse," observed Philip, in the same tone, while that of his sister grew warmer.

"Some men,--but not you, Philip?"

"What distinguishes me from the ma.s.s?"

"You are too old to be made a fool of."

"Old enough to be wise, certainly."

"And you are too fastidious to be satisfied with anything short of perfection; and then you fill too high a position in the world to marry a girl who is n.o.body."

"So?"--said Philip, using, which it always vexed his sister to have him do, the half questioning, half admiring, wholly unattackable German expression. "Then the person alluded to seemed to you something short of perfection?"

"She is handsome," returned his sister; "she has a very handsome face; anybody can see that; but that does not make her your equal."

"Humph!--You suppose I can find that rare bird, my equal, do you?"

"Not there."

"What's the matter with her?"

"She is simply n.o.body."

"Seems to say a good deal," responded Philip. "I do not know just _what_ it says."

"You know as well as I do! And she is unformed; unused to all the ways of the world; a mere novice in society."

"Part of that is soon mended," said Philip easily. "I heard your uncle, or Burrage's uncle, old Colonel Chauncey, last night declaring that there is not a girl in the city that has such manners as one of the Miss Lothrops; manners of 'mingled grace and dignity,' he said."

"That was the other one."