Man and Wife, Wilkie Collins [classic literature list .txt] 📗

Sir Patrick’s interest in the first quadrille became almost painful to see. “Do tell me, my dear, when is the dancing going to begin?”

“The sooner the better,” interposed Lady Lundie; “before Blanche picks another quarrel with me on the subject of Miss Silvester.”

Blanche looked at her uncle. “Begin! begin! Don’t lose time!” cried the ardent Sir Patrick, pointing toward the house with his cane. “Certainly, uncle! Any thing that you wish!” With that parting shot at her step-mother, Blanche withdrew. Arnold, who had thus far waited in silence at the foot of the steps, looked appealingly at Sir Patrick. The train which was to take him to his newly inherited property would start in less than an hour; and he had not presented himself to Blanche’s guardian in the character of Blanche’s suitor yet! Sir Patrick’s indifference to all domestic claims on him—claims of persons who loved, and claims of persons who hated, it didn’t matter which—remained perfectly unassailable. There he stood, poised on his cane, humming an old Scotch air. And there was Lady Lundie, resolute not to leave him till he had seen the governess with her eyes and judged the governess with her mind. She returned to the charge—in spite of Sir Patrick, humming at the top of the steps, and of Arnold, waiting at the bottom. (Her enemies said, “No wonder poor Sir Thomas died in a few months after his marriage!” And, oh dear me, our enemies are sometimes right!)

“I must once more remind you, Sir Patrick, that I have serious reason to doubt whether Miss Silvester is a fit companion for Blanche. My governess has something on her mind. She has fits of crying in private. She is up and walking about her room when she ought to be asleep. She posts her own letters—_and,_ she has lately been excessively insolent to Me. There is something wrong. I must take some steps in the matter—and it is only proper that I should do so with your sanction, as head of the family.”

“Consider me as abdicating my position, Lady Lundie, in your favor.”

“Sir Patrick, I beg you to observe that I am speaking seriously, and that I expect a serious reply.”

“My good lady, ask me for any thing else and it is at your service. I have not made a serious reply since I gave up practice at the Scottish Bar. At my age,” added Sir Patrick, cunningly drifting into generalities, “nothing is serious—except Indigestion. I say, with the philosopher, ‘Life is a comedy to those who think, and tragedy to those who feel.’ ” He took his sister-in-law’s hand, and kissed it. “Dear Lady Lundie, why feel?”

Lady Lundie, who had never “felt” in her life, appeared perversely determined to feel, on this occasion. She was offended—and she showed it plainly.

“When you are next called on, Sir Patrick, to judge of Miss Silvester’s conduct,” she said, “unless I am entirely mistaken, you will find yourself compelled to consider it as something beyond a joke.” With those words, she walked out of the summer-house—and so forwarded Arnold’s interests by leaving Blanche’s guardian alone at last.

It was an excellent opportunity. The guests were safe in the house—there was no interruption to be feared, Arnold showed himself. Sir Patrick (perfectly undisturbed by Lady Lundie’s parting speech) sat down in the summer-house, without noticing his young friend, and asked himself a question founded on profound observation of the female sex. “Were there ever two women yet with a quarrel between them,” thought the old gentleman, “who didn’t want to drag a man into it? Let them drag me in, if they can!”

Arnold advanced a step, and modestly announced himself. “I hope I am not in the way, Sir Patrick?”

“In the way? of course not! Bless my soul, how serious the boy looks! Are you going to appeal to me as the head of the family next?”

It was exactly what Arnold was about to do. But it was plain that if he admitted it just then Sir Patrick (for some unintelligible reason) would decline to listen to him. He answered cautiously, “I asked leave to consult you in private, Sir; and you kindly said you would give me the opportunity before I left W indygates?”

“Ay! ay! to be sure. I remember. We were both engaged in the serious business of croquet at the time—and it was doubtful which of us did that business most clumsily. Well, here is the opportunity; and here am I, with all my worldly experience, at your service. I have only one caution to give you. Don’t appeal to me as ‘the head of the family.’ My resignation is in Lady Lundie’s hands.”

He was, as usual, half in jest, half in earnest. The wry twist of humor showed itself at the corners of his lips. Arnold was at a loss how to approach Sir Patrick on the subject of his niece without reminding him of his domestic responsibilities on the one hand, and without setting himself up as a target for the shafts of Sir Patrick’s wit on the other. In this difficulty, he committed a mistake at the outset. He hesitated.

“Don’t hurry yourself,” said Sir Patrick. “Collect your ideas. I can wait! I can wait!”

Arnold collected his ideas—and committed a second mistake. He determined on feeling his way cautiously at first. Under the circumstances (and with such a man as he had now to deal with), it was perhaps the rashest resolution at which he could possibly have arrived—it was the mouse attempting to outmanoeuvre the cat

“You have been very kind, Sir, in offering me the benefit of your experience,” he began. “I want a word of advice.”

“Suppose you take it sitting?” suggested Sir Patrick. “Get a chair.” His sharp eyes followed Arnold with an expression of malicious enjoyment. “Wants my advice?” he thought. “The young humbug wants nothing of the sort—he wants my niece.”

Arnold sat down under Sir Patrick’s eye, with a well-founded suspicion that he was destined to suffer, before he got up again, under Sir Patrick’s tongue.

“I am only a young man,” he went on, moving uneasily in his chair, “and I am beginning a new life—”

“Any thing wrong with the chair?” asked Sir Patrick. “Begin your new life comfortably, and get another.”

“There’s nothing wrong with the chair, Sir. Would you—”

“Would I keep the chair, in that case? Certainly.”

“I mean, would you advise me—”

“My good fellow, I’m waiting to advise you. (I’m sure there’s something wrong with that chair. Why be obstinate about it? Why not get another?)”

“Please don’t notice the chair, Sir Patrick—you put me out. I want—in short—perhaps it’s a curious question—”

“I can’t say till I have heard it,” remarked Sir Patrick. “However, we will admit it, for form’s sake, if you like. Say it’s a curious question. Or let us express it more strongly, if that will help you. Say it’s the most extraordinary question that ever was put, since the beginning of the world, from one human being to another.”

“It’s this!” Arnold burst out, desperately. “I want to be married!”

“That isn’t a question,” objected Sir Patrick. “It’s an assertion. You say, I want to be married. And I say, Just so! And there’s an end of it.”

Arnold’s head began to whirl. “Would you advise me to get married, Sir?” he said, piteously. “That’s what I meant.”

“Oh! That’s the object of the present interview, is it? Would I advise you to marry, eh?”

(Having caught the mouse by this time, the cat lifted his paw and let the luckless little creature breathe again. Sir Patrick’s manner suddenly freed itself from any slight signs of impatience which it might have hitherto shown, and became as pleasantly easy and confidential as a manner could be. He touched the knob of his cane, and helped himself, with infinite zest and enjoyment, to a pinch of snuff.)

“Would I advise you to marry?” repeated Sir Patrick. “Two courses are open to us, Mr. Arnold, in treating that question. We may put it briefly, or we may put it at great length. I am for putting it briefly. What do you say?”

“What you say, Sir Patrick.”

“Very good. May I begin by making an inquiry relating to your past life?”

“Certainly!”

“Very good again. When you were in the merchant service, did you ever have any experience in buying provisions ashore?”

Arnold stared. If any relation existed between that question and the subject in hand it was an impenetrable relation to him. He answered, in unconcealed bewilderment, “Plenty of experience, Sir.”

“I’m coming to the point,” pursued Sir Patrick. “Don’t be astonished. I’m coming to the point. What did you think of your moist sugar when you bought it at the grocer’s?”

“Think?” repeated Arnold. “Why, I thought it was moist sugar, to be sure!”

“Marry, by all means!” cried Sir Patrick. “You are one of the few men who can try that experiment with a fair chance of success.”

The suddenness of the answer fairly took away Arnold’s breath. There was something perfectly electric in the brevity of his venerable friend. He stared harder than ever.

“Don’t you understand me?” asked Sir Patrick.

“I don’t understand what the moist sugar has got to do with it, Sir.”

“You don’t see that?”

“Not a bit!”

“Then I’ll show you,” said Sir Patrick, crossing his legs, and setting in comfortably for a good talk “You go to the tea-shop, and get your moist sugar. You take it on the understanding that it is moist sugar. But it isn’t any thing of the sort. It’s a compound of adulterations made up to look like sugar. You shut your eyes to that awkward fact, and swallow your adulterated mess in various articles of food; and you and your sugar get on together in that way as well as you can. Do you follow me, so far?”

Yes. Arnold (quite in the dark) followed, so far.

“Very good,” pursued Sir Patrick. “You go to the marriage-shop, and get a wife. You take her on the understanding—let us say—that she has lovely yellow hair, that she has an exquisite complexion, that her figure is the perfection of plumpness, and that she is just tall enough to carry the plumpness off. You bring her home, and you discover that it’s the old story of the sugar over again. Your wife is an adulterated article. Her lovely yellow hair is—dye. Her exquisite skin is—pearl powder. Her plumpness is—padding. And three inches of her height are—in the boot-maker’s heels. Shut your eyes, and swallow your adulterated wife as you swallow your adulterated sugar—and, I tell you again, you are one of the few men who can try the marriage experiment with a fair chance of success.”

With that he uncrossed his legs again, and looked hard at Arnold. Arnold read the lesson, at last, in the right way. He gave up the hopeless attempt to circumvent Sir Patrick, and—come what might of it—dashed at a direct allusion to Sir Patrick’s niece.

“That may be all very true, Sir, of some young ladies,” he said. “There is one I know of, who is nearly related to you, and who doesn’t deserve what you have said of the rest of them.”

This was coming to the point. Sir Patrick showed his approval of Arnold’s frankness by coming to the point himself, as readily as his own whimsical humor would let him.

“Is this female phenomenon my niece?” he inquired.

“Yes, Sir Patrick.”

“May I ask how