Henry James - Henry James - The Complete Novels (The Greatest Novelists of All Time – Book 10)

"Come!" she cried. "This is interesting."

"I wish her to accept me freely, as she would accept any other man. For that purpose I must cease to be, in all personal matters, her guardian."

"She must herself forget her wardship, if there is to be any sentimentalizing between you,—all but forget it, at least. Let me speak frankly," she went on. Whereupon Roger frowned a bit, for he had known her frankness to be somewhat incisive. "It is all very well that you should be in love with her. You are not the first. Don't be frightened; your chance is fair. The needful point is that she should be just the least bit in love with you."

He shook his head with melancholy modesty. "I don't expect that. She loves me a little, I hope; but I say nothing to her imagination. Circumstances are fatally against it. If she falls in love, it will be with a man as unlike me as possible. Nevertheless, I do hope she may, without pain, learn to think of me as a husband. I hope," he cried, with appealing eyes, "that she may see a certain rough propriety in it. After all, who can make her such a husband as I? I am neither handsome, nor clever, nor accomplished, nor celebrated. She might choose from a dozen men who are. Pretty lovers doubtless they would make; but, my friend, it 's the husband , the husband, that is the test!" And he beat his clenched hand on his knee. "Do they know her, have they watched her, as I have done? What are their months to my years, their vows to my acts? Mrs. Keith!"—and he grasped her hand as if to call her to witness,—"I undertake to make her happy. I know what you can say,—that a woman's happiness is worth nothing unless imagination lends a hand. Well, even as a lover, perhaps I am not a hopeless case! And then, I confess, other things being equal, I would rather Nora should not marry a poor man."

Mrs. Keith spoke, on this hint. "You are a rich one, then?"

Roger folded up his pocket-handkerchief and patted it out on his knee, with pregnant hesitation. "Yes, I am rich,—I may call it so. I am rich!" he repeated with unction. "I can say it at last." He paused a moment, and then, with unstudied irony,—"I was not altogether a pauper when you refused me. Since then, for the last six years, I have been saving and sparing and counting. My purpose has sharpened my wits, and fortune, too, has favored me. I have speculated a little, I have handled stock and turned this and that about, and now I can offer my wife a very pretty fortune. It has been going on very quietly; people don't know it; but Nora, if she cares to, shall show them!" Mrs. Keith colored and mused; she was lost in a tardy afterthought.

"It seems odd to be talking to you this way," Roger went on, exhilarated by this summing-up of his career. "Do you remember that letter of mine from P—?"

"I did not tear it up in a rage," she answered. "I came across it the other day."

"It was rather odd, my writing it, you know," Roger confessed. "But in my sudden desire to register a vow, I needed a friend. I turned to you as my best friend." Mrs. Keith acknowledged the honor with a toss of her head. Had she made a mistake of old? She very soon decided that Nora should not repeat it. Her hand-shake, as she left her friend, was generous; it seemed to assure him that he might count upon her.

When, soon after, he made his appearance in her drawing-room, she gave him many a hint as to how to play his cards. But he irritated her by his slowness; he was too circumspect by half. It was only in the evening that he took a hand in the game. During the day he left Nora to her own affairs, and was in general neither more nor less attentive than if he had been a merely susceptible stranger. To spectators his present relation with the young girl was somewhat puzzling; though Mrs. Keith, by no ambiguous giving out, as Hamlet says, had diffused a sympathetic expectancy. Roger wondered again and again whether Nora had guessed his meaning. He observed in her at times, as he fancied, a sort of nervous levity which seemed born of a need to conjure away the phantom of sentiment. And of this hostile need, of course, he hereupon strove to trace the lineage. He talked with her little, as yet, and never interfered in her talk with others; but he watched her devotedly from corners, and caught her words through the hum of voices. Sometimes she looked at him as if she were on the point of telling him something. What had she to tell him? In trying to guess, Roger made up his mind that she was in love. Search as he could, however, he was unable to find her lover. It was no one there present; they were all alike wasting their shot; the enemy had stolen a march and was hidden in the very heart of the citadel. He appealed distractedly to Mrs. Keith. "Lovesick,—lovesick is the word," he groaned. "I have read of it all my days in the poets, but here it is in the flesh. The poor girl plays her part well; she's wound up tight; but the spring will snap and the watch run down. D—n the man! I would rather he carried her off than sit and see this." He saw that his friend had bad news. "Tell me everything," he said; "don't spare me."

"You have noticed it at last," she answered. "I was afraid you would. Well! he 's not far to seek. Think it over; can't you guess? My dear Mr. Lawrence, you are celestially simple. Your cousin Hubert is not."

"Hubert!" Roger echoed, staring. A spasm passed over his face; his eyes flashed. At last he hung his head. "Dear, dear," he said; "have I done it all for Hubert?"

"Not if I can help it!" cried Mrs. Keith, sharply. "She may not marry you; but, at the worst, she shall not marry him!"

Roger laid his hand on her arm; first heavily, then gently. "Dear friend, she must be happy, at any cost. If she loves Hubert, she must marry him. I will settle an income!"

Mrs. Keith gave his knuckles a great rap with her fan. "You will settle a fiddlestick! You will keep your money and you will marry Miss Nora. Leave it to me! If you have no regard for your rights, at least I have."

"Rights? what rights have I? I might have let her alone. I need n't have settled down on her in this deadly fashion. But Hubert 's a happy man! Does he know it? You must write to him. I can't!"

Mrs. Keith burst into a ringing laugh. "Know it? You are amazing! Had n't I better telegraph?"

Roger stared and frowned. "Does he suspect it, then?"

Mrs. Keith rolled up her eyes. "Come," she said, "we must begin at the beginning. When you speak of your cousin, you open up a gulf. There is not much in it, it 's true; but it 's a gulf. Your cousin is a humbug,—neither more nor less. Allow me; I know what I say. He knew, of course, of your plans for Nora?" Roger nodded. "Of course he did! He took his chance, therefore, while you were well out of the way. He lost no time, and if Nora is in love with him, he can tell you why. He knew that he could not marry her, that he should not, that he would not. But he made love to her, to pass the time. Happily, it passed soon. I had of course to be cautious; but as soon as I saw how things were going, I spoke, and spoke to the point. Though he 's a humbug, he is not a fool; that was all he needed. He made his excuses, such as they were! I shall know in future what to think of him."

Roger shook his head mournfully. "I am afraid it 's not to be so easily settled. As you say, Hubert 's a gulf. I never sounded it. The fact remains that they love each other. It 's hard, but it 's fatal."

Mrs. Keith lost patience. "Don't try the heroic; you will break down," she cried. "You are the best of men, but after all you are human. To begin with, Hubert does n't love her. He loves no one but himself. Nora must find her happiness where women as good have found it before this, in a sound, sensible marriage. She cannot marry Hubert; he is engaged to another person. Yes, I have the facts; a young girl in New York with whom he has been off and on for a couple of years, but who holds him to his bargain. I wish her joy of it! He is not to be pitied; she is not Nora, but she is extremely fond of him, and she is to have money. So good-by to Hubert. As for you, cut the knot! She 's a bit sentimental just now; but one sentiment, at that age, is as good as another. And, my dear man, the girl has a conscience, it 's to be hoped; give her a chance to show it. A word to the wise!"