A Little Rebel, Margaret Wolfe Hungerford [best novels to read for beginners txt] 📗

is she?"

The professor waves this question aside.

"Keep to the point," says he.

"Well, _she_ is the point, isn't she? And look here, Curzon, why aren't you of our world? It is your own fault surely; when one sees your sister, your brother, and--and _this,"_ with a slight glance round the dull little apartment, "one cannot help wondering why you----"

"Let that go by," says the professor. "I have explained it before. I deliberately chose my own way in life, and I want nothing more than I have. You think, then, that last night Miss Wynter gave you--encouragement?"

"Oh! hardly that. And yet--she certainly seemed to like--that is not to _dislike_ my being with her; and once--well,"--confusedly--"that was nothing."

"It must have been something."

"No, really; and I shouldn't have mentioned it either--not for a moment."

The professor's face changes. The apathy that has lain upon it for the past five minutes now gives way to a touch of fierce despair. He turns aside, as if to hide the tell-tale features, and going to the window, gazes sightlessly on the hot, sunny street below.

What was it--_what?_ Shall he never have the courage to find out? And is this to be the end of it all? In a flash the coming of the girl is present before him, and now, here is her going. Had he--had she--what _was_ it he meant? No wonder if her girlish fancy had fixed itself on this tall, handsome, young man, with his kindly, merry ways and honest meaning. Ah! that was what she meant perhaps when last night she had told him "she would not be a worry to him _long!"_ Yes, she had meant that; that she was going to marry Hardinge!

But to _know_ what Hardinge means! A torturing vision of a little lovely figure, gowned all in white--of a little lovely face uplifted--of another face down bent! No! a thousand times, no! Hardinge would not speak of that--it would be too sacred; and yet this awful doubt----

"Look here. I'll tell you," says Hardinge's voice at this moment. "After all, you are her guardian--her father almost--though I know you scarcely relish your position; and you ought to know about it, and perhaps you can give me your opinion, too, as to whether there was anything in it, you know. The fact is, I,"--rather shamefacedly--"asked her for a flower out of her bouquet, and she gave it. That was all, and," hurriedly, "I don't really believe she meant anything _by_ giving it, only," with a nervous laugh, "I keep hoping she _did!"_

A long, long sigh comes through the professor's lips straight from his heart. Only a flower she gave him! Well----

"What do _you_ think?" asks Hardinge after a long pause.

"It is a matter on which I could not think."

"But there is this," says Hardinge. "You will forward my cause rather than your brother's, will you not? This is an extraordinary demand to make I know--but--I also know _you."_

"I would rather see her dead than married to my brother," says the professor, slowly, distinctly.

"And----?" questions Hardinge.

The professor hesitates a moment, and then:

"What do you want me to do?" asks he.

"Do? 'Say a good word for me' to her; that is the old way of putting it, isn't it? and it expresses all I mean. She reveres you, even if----"

"If what?"

"She revolts from your power over her. She is high-spirited, you know," says Hardinge. "That is one of her charms, in my opinion. What I want you to do, Curzon, is to--to see her at once--not to-day, she is going to an afternoon at Lady Swanley's--but to-morrow, and to--you know,"--nervously--"to make a formal proposal to her."

The professor throws back his head and laughs aloud. Such a strange laugh.

"I am to propose to her--I?" says he.

"For me, of course. It is very usual," says Hardinge. "And you are her guardian, you know, and----"

"Why not propose to her yourself?" says the professor, turning violently upon him. "Why give me this terrible task? Are you a coward, that you shrink from learning your fate except at the hands of another--another who----"

"To tell you the truth, that is it," interrupts Hardinge, simply. "I don't wonder at your indignation, but the fact is, I love her so much, that I fear to put it to the touch myself. You _will_ help me, won't you? You see, you stand in the place of her father, Curzon. If you were her father, I should be saying to you just what I am saying now."

"True," says the professor. His head is lowered. "There, go," says he, "I must think this over."

"But I may depend upon you"--anxiously--"you will do what you can for me?"

"I shall do what I can for _her."_


CHAPTER XIV.



"Now, by two-headed Janus,
Nature hath framed strange fellows in her time."



Hardinge is hardly gone, before another--a far heavier--step sounds in the passage outside the professor's door. It is followed by a knock, almost insolent in its loudness and sharpness.

"What a hole you do live in," says Sir Hastings, stepping into the room, and picking his way through the books and furniture as if afraid of being tainted by them. "Bless me! what strange beings you scientists are. Rags and bones your surroundings, instead of good flesh and blood. Well, Thaddeus--hardly expected to see _me_ here, eh?"

"You want me?" says the professor. "Don't sit down there--those notes are loose; sit here."

"Faith, you've guessed it, my dear fellow, I _do_ want you, and most confoundedly badly this time. Your ward, now, Miss Wynter! Deuced pretty little girl, isn't she, and good form too? Wonderfully bred--considering."

"I don't suppose you have come here to talk about Miss Wynter's good manners."

"By Jove! I have though. You see, Thaddeus, I've about come to the length of my tether, and--er--I'm thinking of turning over a new leaf--reforming, you know--settling down--going in for dulness--domesticity, and all the other deuced lot of it."

"It is an excellent resolution, that might have been arrived at years ago with greater merit," says the professor.

"A preacher and a scientist in one! Dear sir, you go beyond the possible," says Sir Hastings, with a shrug. "But to business. See here, Thaddeus. I have told you a little of my plans, now hear the rest. I intend to marry--an heiress, _bien entendu_--and it seems to me that your ward, Miss Wynter, will suit me well enough."

"And Miss Wynter, will you suit _her_ well enough?"

"A deuced sight too well, I should say. Why, the girl is of no family to signify, whereas the Curzons---- It will a better match for her than in her wildest dreams she could have hoped for."

"Perhaps, in her wildest dreams, she hoped for a good man, and one who could honestly love her."

"Pouf! You are hardly up to date, my dear fellow. Girls, now-a-days, are wise enough to know they can't have everything, and she will get a good deal. Title, position---- I say, Thaddeus, what I want of you is, to--er--to help me in this matter--to--crack me up a bit, eh?--to--_you_ know."

The professor is silent, more through disgust than want of anything to say. Staring at the man before him, he knows he is loathsome to him--loathsome, and his own brother! This man, who with some of the best blood of England in his veins, is so far, far below the standard that marks the gentleman. Surely vice is degrading in more ways than one. To the professor, Sir Hastings, with his handsome, dissipated face, stands out, tawdry, hideous, vulgar--why, every word he says is tinged with coarseness and yet, what a pretty boy he used to be, with his soft, sunny hair and laughing eyes----

"You will help me, eh?" persists Sir Hastings, with his little dry chronic cough, that seems to shake his whole frame.

"Impossible," says the professor, simply, coldly.

_"No?_ Why?"

The professor looks at him (a penetrating glance), but says nothing.

"Oh! damn it all!" says his brother, his brow darkening. "You had _better,_ you know, if you want the old name kept above water much longer."

"You mean----?" says the professor, turning a grave face to his.

"Nothing but what is honorable. I tell you I mean to turn over a new leaf. 'Pon my word, I mean _that._ I'm sick of all this old racket, it's killing me. And my title is as good a one as she can find anywhere, and if I'm dipped--rather--her money would pull me straight again, and----"

He pauses, struck by something in the Professor's face.

"You mean----?" says the latter again, even more slowly. His eyes are beginning to light.

"Exactly what I have said," sullenly. "You have heard me."

"Yes, I _have_ heard you," cries the professor, flinging aside all restraints and giving way to sudden violent passion--the more violent, coming from one so usually calm and indifferent. "You have come here to-day to try and get possession, not only of the fortune of a young and innocent girl, but of her body and _soul_ as well! And it is me, _me_ whom you ask to be a party to this shameful transaction. Her dead father left her to my care, and am I to sell her to you, that her money may redeem our name from the slough into which _you_ have flung it? Is innocence to be sacrificed that vice may ride abroad again? Look here," says the professor, his face deadly white, "you have come to the wrong man. I shall warn Miss Wynter against marriage with _you,_ as long as there is breath left in my body."

Sir Hastings has risen too; _his_ face is dark red; the crimson flood has reached his forehead and dyed it almost black. Now, at this terrible moment, the likeness between the two brothers, so different in spirit, can be seen; the flashing eyes, the scornful lips, the deadly hatred. It is a shocking likeness, yet not to be denied.

"What do _you_ mean, damn you?" says Sir Hastings; he sways a little, as if his passion is overpowering him, and clutches feebly at the edge of the table.__

"Exactly what _I_ have said," retorts the professor, fiercely.

"You refuse then to go with me in this matter?"

_"Finally._ Even if I would, I could not. I--have other views for her."

"Indeed! Perhaps those other views include yourself. Are you thinking of reserving the prize for your own special benefit? A penniless guardian--a rich ward; as a situation, it is perfect; full of possibilities."

"Take care," says the professor, advancing a step or two.

"Tut! Do you think I can't see through your game?" says Sir Hastings, in his most offensive way, which is nasty indeed. "You hope to keep me unmarried. You tell yourself, I can't live much longer, at the pace I'm going. I know the old jargon--I have it by heart--given a year at the most the title and the heiress will both be yours! I can read you--I--" He breaks off to laugh sardonically, and the cough catching him, shakes him horribly. "But, no, by heaven!" cries he. "I'll destroy your hopes yet. I'll disappoint you. I'll marry. I'm a young man yet--yet--with life--_long_ life before me--life----"

A terrible change comes over his face, he reels backwards, only saving himself by a blind clinging to a book-case on his right.

The professor