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

it; but now he was driven to do so on finding it to be the source of trouble and pain. I think it is open to us to doubt whether, even yet, Bernard Dale was in love with his cousin; whether he was not rather in love with his own desire. But against himself he found a verdict that he was in love, and was angry with himself and with all the world.

“Ah, Bell,” he said, coming close up to her, “I wish you could understand how I love you.” And, as he spoke, his cousin unconsciously recognized more of affection in his tone, and less of that spirit of bargaining which had seemed to pervade all his former pleas, than she had ever found before.

“And do I not love you? Have I not offered to be to you in all respects as a sister?”

“That is nothing. Such an offer to me now is simply laughing at me. Bell, I tell you what⁠—I will not give you up. The fact is, you do not know me yet⁠—not know me as you must know any man before you choose him for your husband. You and Lily are not alike in this. You are cautious, doubtful of yourself, and perhaps, also, somewhat doubtful of others. My heart is set upon this, and I shall still try to succeed.”

“Ah, Bernard, do not say that! Believe me, when I tell you that it can never be.”

“No; I will not believe you. I will not allow myself to be made utterly wretched. I tell you fairly that I will not believe you. I may surely hope if I choose to hope. No, Bell, I will never give you up⁠—unless, indeed, I should see you become another man’s wife.”

As he said this, they all turned in through the squire’s gate, and rode up to the yard in which it was their habit to dismount from their horses.

XIV John Eames Takes a Walk

John Eames watched the party of cavaliers as they rode away from his mother’s door, and then started upon a solitary walk, as soon as the noise of the horses’ hoofs had passed away out of the street. He was by no means happy in his mind as he did so. Indeed, he was overwhelmed with care and trouble, and as he went along very gloomy thoughts passed through his mind. Had he not better go to Australia, or Vancouver’s Island, or⁠—? I will not name the places which the poor fellow suggested to himself as possible terminations of the long journeys which he might not improbably be called upon to take. That very day, just before the Dales had come in, he had received a second letter from his darling Amelia, written very closely upon the heels of the first. Why had he not answered her? Was he ill? Was he untrue? No; she would not believe that, and therefore fell back upon the probability of his illness. If it was so, she would rush down to see him. Nothing on earth should keep her from the bedside of her betrothed. If she did not get an answer from her beloved John by return of post, she would be down with him at Guestwick by the express train. Here was a position for such a young man as John Eames! And of Amelia Roper we may say that she was a young woman who would not give up her game, as long as the least chance remained of her winning it. “I must go somewhere,” John said to himself, as he put on his slouched hat and wandered forth through the back streets of Guestwick. What would his mother say when she heard of Amelia Roper? What would she say when she saw her?

He walked away towards the Manor, so that he might roam about the Guestwick woods in solitude. There was a path with a stile, leading off from the high road, about half a mile beyond the lodges through which the Dales had ridden up to the house, and by this path John Eames turned in, and went away till he had left the Manor house behind him, and was in the centre of the Guestwick woods. He knew the whole ground well, having roamed there ever since he was first allowed to go forth upon his walks alone. He had thought of Lily Dale by the hour together, as he had lost himself among the oak-trees; but in those former days he had thought of her with some pleasure. Now he could only think of her as of one gone from him forever; and then he had also to think of her whom he had taken to himself in Lily’s place.

Young men, very young men⁠—men so young that it may be almost a question whether or no they have as yet reached their manhood⁠—are more inclined to be earnest and thoughtful when alone than they ever are when with others, even though those others be their elders. I fancy that, as we grow old ourselves, we are apt to forget that it was so with us; and, forgetting it, we do not believe that it is so with our children. We constantly talk of the thoughtlessness of youth. I do not know whether we might not more appropriately speak of its thoughtfulness. It is, however, no doubt, true that thought will not at once produce wisdom. It may almost be a question whether such wisdom as many of us have in our mature years has not come from the dying out of the power of temptation, rather than as the results of thought and resolution. Men, full fledged and at their work, are, for the most part, too busy for much thought; but lads, on whom the work of the world has not yet fallen with all its pressure⁠—they have time for thinking.

And thus John Eames was thoughtful. They who knew him best accounted him