True to a Type Volume I Part 11

"If she is willing, I do not see why he should not."

"Joseph Naylor! Is that the interest you take in poor Caleb's fatherless daughter? And you call yourself her guardian!"

"Well? What would you have me do?"

"Remove us at once. Then she is not compromised by any exhibition of intimacy there may have been this evening. I have been thinking of Nahant. It is an extravagant place, I know; but we can stop and have a couple of days' shopping in Boston on the way. Will you arrange for our starting by the forenoon train?"

"To-morrow morning! Do you forget that your rooms here are engaged for a fortnight?--could not have got them for a shorter time--and there are still eleven days to run?"

"I know. We must pay for the fortnight, of course. Another obligation to add to the many we owe your favourite."

"But you will find Nahant dull, I fear. It is not a place many Canadians go to, and you have no New England friends. Will it not be lonesome for you and the girls to look on at the gaieties, without even a man to stand beside you in the crowd?"

His sister-in-law turned and looked at him questioningly. Joseph, as she knew, was not aggressively self-a.s.serting, but this was self-effacement beyond any modesty she could have believed.

"You will do very nicely, Joseph," she said, encouragingly. "You are presentable anywhere, and--well--almost distinguished-looking, let me tell you; and you give our party far more weight than if you were younger. And then you are so clever about making friends with the nicest people within reach. We shall do capitally."

Joseph opened his eyes and smiled, to hear his sister-in-law sum him up to his face so patronisingly. "You are too appreciative of my small merits, Susan. Pray spare me. But I had no idea of joining in your escapade. Clam Beach is perfectly good enough for me. I shall not dream of leaving it before my fortnight is up; and quite likely, if I continue to like it, I shall stay on for three or four weeks longer."

"Do you mean that you will let us roam away over the United States--your poor dead brother's helpless widow and orphans--without a protector? I could not have believed it, Joseph. But--ah! I can see it all!--designing girl--this evening----"

Mrs Naylor grew disjointed and confused, and finally stuck fast in the middle of a sentence which she could not properly be said to have begun; having merely betrayed, in her irritation, a wish "to carry the war into Africa"--or at least, since Joseph was so unsympathetic in her concerns, to discuss his own in a similar spirit. But there came the look into his face of a man who will not be trifled with, and who chooses to introduce the subject himself, when his affairs are to be mentioned; and between surprise, and having nothing exactly to say--though in another mood there would have been an opening for banter and insinuation--the thread of her ideas gave way, and she stopped short.

Joseph's brow cleared as quickly as it had darkened, so soon as Susan had checked herself; but he said nothing, and after waiting in silence for a minute and a half, he turned on his heel, saying--

"That is all you have to tell me, I suppose? Good night."

"Stop, Joseph! You have told me nothing. What am I to do? Do you really mean that you will not come with us?"

"That is what I mean."

"You propose to keep us here against our will, and to hand that poor misguided child Margaret over to such a fate? I would not have believed it of you, Joseph."

"I have no power to keep you here against your will, Susan, any more than you have the right to drag me away against mine. If I can do anything short of that to pleasure you, name it. My cheque-book is freely at your service, if you insist on going to Nahant, where you will find your expenses ten times as heavy as here."

"I don't want your cheque-book. Poor Caleb took care we should be provided for. And very fortunate it is, too,"--which was an ungracious and uncalled-for observation; but all things, as Joseph thought, are pardonable in an angry woman.

"And what am I to do," she continued, "with this young man? He will drive me distracted. I know he will."

"Accept what you cannot prevent, Susan; and save yourself the worry of struggling against the inevitable. Let them have their way. Do it soon, and make a favour of it; and you will be in a position to stipulate for long delay. When Walter is a year or two older, he will have had enough of the wilds, and be willing to settle down in a civilised neighbourhood."

"But Margaret ought to do so much better. I cannot resign myself to the idea of her sinking into a farmer's wife. I have a right to expect position for her--the best the Province can afford. Why should she not live in Toronto and lead society?"--which, perhaps, you may deem a small ambition, my British reader; yet it is precisely what all mankind are born to feel. Ambition is the same everywhere, but its object varies with the lat.i.tude and longitude. There are actually people as eager to be first in Timbuctoo and Bokhara, as any one you may know to be of the best in London.

"As Blount's wife," answered Joseph, "she will be all right socially; and between what she has from her father, and what she may look for from her uncle, she does not need to consider whether her husband is a rich man or not."

"I intended her to be in the middle of everything. For what else did I take so much trouble with her education?"

"She does not seem to mind about that herself."

"And there were chances for her here, if Blount would have stayed away. There is that clever Mr Wilkie, and young Walter Petty, both evidently well inclined to her."

"I think Margaret's preference shows good taste and good sense. Blount is a gentleman, and his people have a property in Wales. If you want connection, he is the best of the three."

"He is a younger son. His prospects don't amount to much, or he would have stayed at home; while Mr Wilkie----"

"A worthy person. A rising man, if you like----"

"Mrs Petty would give her eyes to get him for Ann."

"Very likely. But he is not to compare with Blount; though I do not blame him for that. There is a kind of person which must be born and bred, though it is not the kind which makes its way in the world the best. For myself, I sympathise with Margaret's taste."

"I declare, I think that young fellow has turned your head! But he _shan't_ be your nephew, for all his scheming, if I can prevent it....

If you will not take us to Nahant, I suppose we must stay here. We would have to invent so many excuses if we went straight back home; though it would be serving Margaret just right if we did. But she shall stay at my side and under my eye while we remain here; Mr Blount shall gain nothing by it. The worry and botheration will injure me, I know, and may even have the worst consequences; but it will be your fault, Joseph Naylor, and some day, when it is too late, you will regret it. I would not have believed that it was in you to be so unkind."

"Good night," said Joseph, getting away at last; and before many minutes more, he too was one of the army of sleepers.

CHAPTER XIII.

MAIDA SPRINGER.

The succeeding week was a time of depression, waiting, watching, and general tantalisation for Margaret Naylor and Walter Blount.

Margaret's mother was more cross and more watchful than Argus or duenna had ever been before. The only consolation--as Joseph, pitying the lad's despair, found with some remorse that he had let fall--was, that such preternatural vigilance could not last; or if it did, that Margaret would be goaded to desperation and rebel.

Interchange of glances even was denied the hapless lovers. Mrs Naylor intercepted, so to speak, an [oe]illade in its flight across the breakfast-room on the first morning of the siege, and sternly insisted that her daughter should change places forthwith to the other side of the table, and turn her back to the enemy.

To save appearances, while acting jailer on the girl, Mrs Naylor made a martyr of herself, and moved about under a load of superabundant clothing--wrapping herself in shawls and wearing a wisp of knitting upon her head on days when her brother-in-law was wishing himself a wild Indian, that he might dress in a coat of paint. Mrs Naylor was "poorly,"--she felt premonitions of ague, a threatening of neuralgia, and, of course, severe "headache"; at least so the ladies agreed, on comparing notes, after making tender inquiries--each anxious to make sure there was nothing infectious, so as to steal away quietly before the general panic and stampede which would ensue if there were.

"Just a case of general all-overishness, my dears," said Mrs Carraway, "arising from change to this bracing air, after the sickly heats of Upper Canada. I had a touch of it myself, on coming first. There is so much salt and ozone down here."

"I should say it was a case of hypochondria," observed Mrs Chickenpip, who, being serious and robust in her views, was given to cultivate truth at the expense of charity. "I am sure we do wrong in encouraging her to make-believe, by showing so much sympathy. If you had seen, as I did, the breakfast she made this morning, you would think less of her ailments."

"That's not always a sign," said Mrs Wilkie. "Look at _me_ now. I eat hearty. I'm always best at meal-times; but an hour after, I'm just fairly done, and my heart thumpin' like a smiddie hammer."

"Not at all to be wondered at," Mrs Chickenpip retorted, below her breath. "If people will over-eat, they must expect to be uncomfortable,"--a remark which pa.s.sed unheard.

"How do you feel to-day, Mrs Wilkie?" was more audible. It was Rose Hillyard who spoke.

"Ah, my dear, it's you? I'm glad to see you. I'm only so-so, between the heat and the palpitations; but I think the h.o.m.oeopathy is doing me good. I think the lady we are speakin' about should try some of it."

"Have you been taking any more powders?" asked Rose, smiling at the recollection of the cloud of "poother" she had seen issue from the old lady's mouth.

"Just wan each day. I haven't forgot how kind you were to me the first day. I have been better ever since."

"You blew that one all away, I think."