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

want to do her any harm, but yet I’d like to fight that man⁠—if I only knew how to manage it.”

And then he bethought himself that if they could both be slaughtered in such an encounter it would be the only fitting termination to the present state of things. In that way, too, there would be an escape from Amelia, and, at the present moment, he saw none other.

When he entered the room he shook hands with all the party from Allington, but, as he told his sister afterwards, his flesh crept when he touched Crosbie. Crosbie, as he contemplated the Eames family sitting stiff and ill at ease in their own drawing-room chairs, made up his mind that it would be well that his wife should see as little of John Eames as might be when she came to London;⁠—not that he was in any way jealous of her lover. He had learned everything from Lily⁠—all, at least, that Lily knew⁠—and regarded the matter rather as a good joke. “Don’t see him too often,” he had said to her, “for fear he should make an ass of himself.” Lily had told him everything⁠—all that she could tell; but yet he did not in the least comprehend that Lily had, in truth, a warm affection for the young man whom he despised.

“Thank you, no,” said Crosbie. “I never do take wine in the middle of the day.”

“But a bit of cake?” And Mrs. Eames by her look implored him to do her so much honour. She implored Captain Dale, also, but they were both inexorable. I do not know that the two girls were at all more inclined to eat and drink than the two men; but they understood that Mrs. Eames would be brokenhearted if no one partook of her delicacies. The little sacrifices of society are all made by women, as are also the great sacrifices of life. A man who is good for anything is always ready for his duty, and so is a good woman always ready for a sacrifice.

“We really must go now,” said Bell, “because of the horses.” And under this excuse they got away.

“You will come over before you go back to London, John?” said Lily, as he came out with the intention of helping her mount, from which purpose, however, he was forced to recede by the iron will of Mr. Crosbie.

“Yes, I’ll come over again⁠—before I go. Goodbye.”

“Goodbye, John,” said Bell. “Goodbye, Eames,” said Captain Dale. Crosbie, as he seated himself in the saddle, made the very slightest sign of recognition, to which his rival would not condescend to pay any attention. “I’ll manage to have a fight with him in some way,” said Eames to himself as he walked back through the passage of his mother’s house. And Crosbie, as he settled his feet in the stirrups, felt that he disliked the young man more and more. It would be monstrous to suppose that there could be aught of jealousy in the feeling; and yet he did dislike him very strongly, and felt almost angry with Lily for asking him to come again to Allington. “I must put an end to all that,” he said to himself as he rode silently out of town.

“You must not snub my friends, sir,” said Lily, smiling as she spoke, but yet with something of earnestness in her voice. They were out of the town by this time, and Crosbie had hardly uttered a word since they had left Mrs. Eames’s door. They were now on the high road, and Bell and Bernard Dale were somewhat in advance of them.

“I never snub anybody,” said Crosbie, petulantly; “that is, unless they have absolutely deserved snubbing.”

“And have I deserved it? Because I seem to have got it,” said Lily.

“Nonsense, Lily. I never snubbed you yet, and I don’t think it likely that I shall begin. But you ought not to accuse me of not being civil to your friends. In the first place I am as civil to them as my nature will allow me to be. And, in the second place⁠—”

“Well; in the second place⁠—?”

“I am not quite sure that you are very wise to encourage that young man’s⁠—friendship just at present.”

“That means, I suppose, that I am very wrong to do so?”

“No, dearest, it does not mean that. If I meant so I would tell you so honestly. I mean just what I say. There can, I suppose, be no doubt that he has filled himself with some kind of romantic attachment for you⁠—a foolish kind of love which I don’t suppose he ever expected to gratify, but the idea of which lends a sort of grace to his life. When he meets some young woman fit to be his wife he will forget all about it, but till then he will go about fancying himself a despairing lover. And then such a young man as John Eames is very apt to talk of his fancies.”

“I don’t believe for a moment that he would mention my name to anyone.”

“But, Lily, perhaps I may know more of young men than you do.”

“Yes, of course you do.”

“And I can assure you that they are generally too well inclined to make free with the names of girls whom they think that they like. You must not be surprised if I am unwilling that any man should make free with your name.”

After this Lily was silent for a minute or two. She felt that an injustice was being done to her and she was not inclined to put up with it, but she could not quite see where the injustice lay. A great deal was owing from her to Crosbie. In very much she was bound to yield to him, and she was anxious to do on his behalf even more than her duty. But yet she had a strong conviction that it would not be well that she should give way to him in everything. She wished to think as he