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Authors: Anthony Trollope
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your chief study. I believe, my dear, I’ll ask you to let Jane get me a cab. I shan’t have a bit toomuch time to dress for the concert’
Alice simply rang the bell, and said no further word on the subject which they had been discussing. When Lady Macleod got up to go away, Alice kissed her, as was customary with them, and the old lady as she went uttered her customary valediction. ‘God bless you, my dear. Good-bye! I’ll come tomorrow if I can’ There was therefore no quarrel between them. Butboth of them felt that words had been spoken which must probably lead to some diminution of their past intimacy.
When Lady Mac-leod had gone Alice sat alone for an hour thinking of what had passed between them, – thinking rather of those two men, the worthy man and the wild man, whose names had been mentioned in dose connection with herself. John Grey was a worthy man, a man worthy at all points,as far as she knew him. She told herself it was so. And she told herself, also, that her cousin George was wild, — very wild. And yet her thoughts were, I fear, on the whole more kindly towards her cousin than towards her lover. She had declared to her aunt that John Grey would be incapable of such suspicion as would be shown by any objection on his part to the arrangements made for the tour.She had said so, and had so believed; and yet she continued to brood over the position which her affairs would take, if he did make the objection which Lady Macleod anticipated. She told herself over and overagain, that under such circumstances she would not give way an inch. ‘He is free to go’ she said to herself. ‘If he does not trust me he is quite free to go.’ It may almost be said that shecame at last to anticipate from her lover that very answer to her own letter which she had declared him to be incapable of making.
CHAPTER 3
John Grey, the worthy man
M R G REY’S answer to Alice Vavasor’s letter, which was duly sent by return of post and duly received on the morning after Lady Macleod’s visit may perhaps be taken as giving a sample of his worthiness. It was dated from Nethercoats, a small country-house in Cambridgeshire which belonged to him, at which he already spent much of his time, and at which he intendedto live altogether after his marriage.
‘Nethercoats, June, 186‘
D EAREST A LICE,
‘I am glad you have settled your affairs, – foreign affairs, I mean, – so much to your mind. As to your home affairs they are not, to my thinking, quite so satisfactorily arranged. But as I am a party interested in the latter my opinion may perhaps have an undue bias. Touching the tour, I quite agree with you thatyou and Kate would have been uncomfortable alone. It’s a very fine theory, that of women being able to get along without men as well as with them; but’ like other fine theories, it will be found very troublesome by those who first put it in practice. Gloved hands, petticoats, feminine softness, and the general homage paid to beauty, all stand in the way of success. These things may perhaps someday be got rid of, and possibly with advantage; but while young ladies are still encumbered with them a male companion will always be found to be a comfort. I don’t quite know whether your cousin George is the best possible knight you might have chosen. I should consider myself to be infinitely preferable, had my going been upon the cards. Were you in danger of meeting Paynim foes, he, no doubt, wouldkill them off much quicker than I could do, and would be much more serviceable in liberating you from the dungeons of oppressors, or even from stray tigers in theSwiss forests. But I doubt his being punctual with the luggage. He will want you or Kate to keep the accounts, if any are kept. He will be slow in getting you glasses of water at the railway stations, and will always keep you waitingat breakfast. I hold that a man with two ladies on a tour should be an absolute slave to them, or they will not fully enjoy themselves.
Alice simply rang the bell, and said no further word on the subject which they had been discussing. When Lady Macleod got up to go away, Alice kissed her, as was customary with them, and the old lady as she went uttered her customary valediction. ‘God bless you, my dear. Good-bye! I’ll come tomorrow if I can’ There was therefore no quarrel between them. Butboth of them felt that words had been spoken which must probably lead to some diminution of their past intimacy.
When Lady Mac-leod had gone Alice sat alone for an hour thinking of what had passed between them, – thinking rather of those two men, the worthy man and the wild man, whose names had been mentioned in dose connection with herself. John Grey was a worthy man, a man worthy at all points,as far as she knew him. She told herself it was so. And she told herself, also, that her cousin George was wild, — very wild. And yet her thoughts were, I fear, on the whole more kindly towards her cousin than towards her lover. She had declared to her aunt that John Grey would be incapable of such suspicion as would be shown by any objection on his part to the arrangements made for the tour.She had said so, and had so believed; and yet she continued to brood over the position which her affairs would take, if he did make the objection which Lady Macleod anticipated. She told herself over and overagain, that under such circumstances she would not give way an inch. ‘He is free to go’ she said to herself. ‘If he does not trust me he is quite free to go.’ It may almost be said that shecame at last to anticipate from her lover that very answer to her own letter which she had declared him to be incapable of making.
CHAPTER 3
John Grey, the worthy man
M R G REY’S answer to Alice Vavasor’s letter, which was duly sent by return of post and duly received on the morning after Lady Macleod’s visit may perhaps be taken as giving a sample of his worthiness. It was dated from Nethercoats, a small country-house in Cambridgeshire which belonged to him, at which he already spent much of his time, and at which he intendedto live altogether after his marriage.
‘Nethercoats, June, 186‘
D EAREST A LICE,
‘I am glad you have settled your affairs, – foreign affairs, I mean, – so much to your mind. As to your home affairs they are not, to my thinking, quite so satisfactorily arranged. But as I am a party interested in the latter my opinion may perhaps have an undue bias. Touching the tour, I quite agree with you thatyou and Kate would have been uncomfortable alone. It’s a very fine theory, that of women being able to get along without men as well as with them; but’ like other fine theories, it will be found very troublesome by those who first put it in practice. Gloved hands, petticoats, feminine softness, and the general homage paid to beauty, all stand in the way of success. These things may perhaps someday be got rid of, and possibly with advantage; but while young ladies are still encumbered with them a male companion will always be found to be a comfort. I don’t quite know whether your cousin George is the best possible knight you might have chosen. I should consider myself to be infinitely preferable, had my going been upon the cards. Were you in danger of meeting Paynim foes, he, no doubt, wouldkill them off much quicker than I could do, and would be much more serviceable in liberating you from the dungeons of oppressors, or even from stray tigers in theSwiss forests. But I doubt his being punctual with the luggage. He will want you or Kate to keep the accounts, if any are kept. He will be slow in getting you glasses of water at the railway stations, and will always keep you waitingat breakfast. I hold that a man with two ladies on a tour should be an absolute slave to them, or they will not fully enjoy themselves.
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