The Small House at Allington, Anthony Trollope [best ebook reader for chromebook .txt] 📗

that that’s hard? I think it confounded hard. Of course I must put off my marriage.”

“Why do you not speak to my uncle?”

“I shall do so. To tell the truth, I think it would have come better from him; but that is a matter of opinion. I shall tell him very plainly what I think about it; and if he is angry, why, I suppose I must leave his house; that will be all.”

“Look here, Crosbie; do not begin your conversation with the purpose of angering him. He is not a bad-hearted man, but is very obstinate.”

“I can be quite as obstinate as he is.” And, then, without further parley, they went in among the turnips, and each swore against his luck as he missed his birds. There are certain phases of mind in which a man can neither ride nor shoot, nor play a stroke at billiards, nor remember a card at whist⁠—and to such a phase of mind had come both Crosbie and Dale after their conversation over the gate.

They were not above fifteen minutes late at the trysting-place, but nevertheless, punctual though they had been, the girls were there before them. Of course the first inquiries were made about the game, and of course the gentlemen declared that the birds were scarcer than they had ever been before, that the dogs were wilder, and their luck more excruciatingly bad⁠—to all which apologies very little attention was paid. Lily and Bell had not come there to inquire after partridges, and would have forgiven the sportsmen even though no single bird had been killed. But they could not forgive the want of good spirits which was apparent.

“I declare I don’t know what’s the matter with you,” Lily said to her lover.

“We have been over fifteen miles of ground, and⁠—”

“I never knew anything so lackadaisical as you gentlemen from London. Been over fifteen miles of ground! Why, uncle Christopher would think nothing of that.”

“Uncle Christopher is made of sterner stuff than we are,” said Crosbie. “They used to be born so sixty or seventy years ago.” And then they walked on through Gruddock’s fields, and the home paddocks, back to the Great House, where they found the squire standing in the front of the porch.

The walk had not been so pleasant as they had all intended that it should be when they made their arrangements for it. Crosbie had endeavoured to recover his happy state of mind, but had been unsuccessful; and Lily, fancying that her lover was not all that he should be, had become reserved and silent. Bernard and Bell had not shared this discomfiture, but then Bernard and Bell were, as a rule, much more given to silence than the other two.

“Uncle,” said Lily, “these men have shot nothing, and you cannot conceive how unhappy they are in consequence. It’s all the fault of the naughty partridges.”

“There are plenty of partridges if they knew how to get them,” said the squire.

“The dogs are uncommonly wild,” said Crosbie.

“They are not wild with me,” said the squire; “nor yet with Dingles.” Dingles was the squire’s gamekeeper. “The fact is, you young men, nowadays, expect to have dogs trained to do all the work for you. It’s too much labour for you to walk up to your game. You’ll be late for dinner, girls, if you don’t look sharp.”

“We’re not coming up this evening, sir,” said Bell.

“And why not?”

“We’re going to stay with mamma.”

“And why will not your mother come with you? I’ll be whipped if I can understand it. One would have thought that under the present circumstances she would have been glad to see you all as much together as possible.”

“We’re together quite enough,” said Lily. “And as for mamma, I suppose she thinks⁠—” And then she stopped herself, catching the glance of Bell’s imploring eye. She was going to make some indignant excuse for her mother⁠—some excuse which would be calculated to make her uncle angry. It was her practice to say such sharp words to him, and consequently he did not regard her as warmly as her more silent and more prudent sister. At the present moment he turned quickly round and went into the house; and then, with a very few words of farewell, the two young men followed him. The girls went back over the little bridge by themselves, feeling that the afternoon had not gone off altogether well.

“You shouldn’t provoke him, Lily,” said Bell.

“And he shouldn’t say those things about mamma. It seems to me that you don’t mind what he says.”

“Oh, Lily.”

“No more you do. He makes me so angry that I cannot hold my tongue. He thinks that because all the place is his, he is to say just what he likes. Why should mamma go up there to please his humours?”

“You may be sure that mamma will do what she thinks best. She is stronger-minded than uncle Christopher, and does not want anyone to help her. But, Lily, you shouldn’t speak as though I were careless about mamma. You didn’t mean that, I know.”

“Of course I didn’t.” Then the two girls joined their mother in their own little domain; but we will return to the men at the Great House.

Crosbie, when he went up to dress for dinner, fell into one of those melancholy fits of which I have spoken. Was he absolutely about to destroy all the good that he had done for himself throughout the past years of his hitherto successful life? or rather, as he at last put the question to himself more strongly⁠—was it not the case that he had already destroyed all that success? His marriage with Lily, whether it was to be for good or bad, was now a settled thing, and was not regarded as a matter admitting of any doubt. To do the man justice, I must declare that in all these moments of misery he still did the best he could to think of Lily herself as of a great treasure