The Child Wife. Майн Рид
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the steamer coming from beyond the distant Point Judith, and heading in a north-easterly direction.
It was a fine sight, this huge black monster beating its way through the blue water, and leaving a white seething track behind it.
Cornelia sprang out into the balcony to get a better view of it.
“I wonder what boat it is?” she said. “One of the great ocean steamers, I suppose—a Cunarder!”
“I think not, Neel. I wish it was one, and I aboard of it. Thank Heaven! I shall be, before many weeks.”
“What! tired of Newport already? We’ll find no pleasanter place in Europe. I’m sure we shan’t.”
“We’ll find pleasanter people, at all events.”
“Why, what have you got against them?”
“What have they got against us? I don’t mean the natives here. They’re well enough, in their way. I speak of their summer visitors, like ourselves. You ask what they’ve got against us. A strange question!”
“I haven’t noticed anything.”
“But I have. Because our fathers were retail storekeepers, these J.’s and L.’s and B.’s affect to look down upon us! You know they do.”
Miss Inskip could not deny that something of this had been observed by her. But she was one of those contented spirits who set but little store upon aristocratic acquaintances, and are therefore insensible to its slights.
With the proud Julia it was different. If not absolutely slighting, the “society” encountered in this fashionable watering-place had in some way spited her—that section of it described as the J.’s and the L.’s and the B.’s.
“And for what reason?” she continued, with increasing indignation. “If our fathers were retail storekeepers, their grandfathers were the same. Where’s the difference, I should like to know?”
Miss Inskip could see none, and said so.
But this did not tranquillise the chafed spirit of her cousin, and perceiving it, she tried to soothe her on another tack.
“Well, Julia, if the Miss J.’s, and Miss L.’s, and Miss B.’s, look down on us, their brothers don’t. On you, I’m sure they don’t.”
“Bother their brothers! A fig for their condescension. Do you take me for a stupid, Neel? A million dollars left by my father’s will, and which must come to me at mother’s death, will account for it. Besides, unless the quicksilver in my looking-glass tells a terrible lie, I’m not such a fright.”
She might well talk thus. Than Julia Girdwood, anything less like a fright never stood in front of a mirror. Full-grown, and of perfect form, this storekeeper’s daughter had all the grand air of a duchess. The face was perfect as the figure. You could not look upon it without thoughts of love; though strangely, and somewhat unpleasantly, commingled with an idea of danger. It was an aspect that suggested Cleopatra, Lucrezia Borgia, or the beautiful murderess of Darnley.
In her air there was no awkwardness—not the slightest sign of humble origin, or the gaucherie that usually springs from it. Something of this might have been detected in the country cousin, Cornelia. But Julia Girdwood had been stepping too long on the flags of the Fifth Avenue, to be externally distinguished from the proudest damsels of that aristocratic street. Her mother’s house was in it.
“It is true, Julia,” assented her cousin; “you are both rich and beautiful. I wish I could say the same.”
“Come, little flatterer! if not the first, you are certainly the last; though neither counts for much here.”
“Why did we come here?”
“I had nothing to do with it. Mamma is answerable for that. For my part I prefer Saratoga, where there’s less pretensions about pedigree, and where a shopkeeper’s daughter is as good as his granddaughter. I wanted to go there this season. Mother objected. Nothing would satisfy her but Newport, Newport, Newport! And here we are. Thank Heaven! it won’t be for long.”
“Well, since we are here, let us at least enjoy what everybody comes for—the bathing.”
“Pretends to come for, you mean! Dipping their skins in salt water, the Miss J.’s, and L.’s, and B.’s—much has that to do with their presence at Newport! A good thing for them if it had! It might improve their complexions a little. Heaven knows they need it; and Heaven be thanked I don’t.”
“But you’ll bathe to-day?”
“I shan’t!”
“Consider, cousin! It’s such a delightful sensation.”
“I hate it!”
“You’re jesting, Julia?”
“Well, I don’t mean that I dislike bathing—only in that crowd.”
“But there’s no exclusiveness on the beach.”
“I don’t care. I won’t go among them any more—on the beach, or elsewhere. If I could only bathe out yonder, in the deep blue water, or amid those white breakers we see! Ah! that would be a delightful sensation! I wonder if there’s any place where we could take a dip by ourselves?”
“There is; I know the very spot I discovered it the other day, when I was out with Keziah gathering shells. It’s down under the cliffs. There’s a sweet little cave, a perfect grotto, with a deepish pool in front, and smooth sandy bottom, white as silver. The cliff quite overhangs it. I’m sure no one could see us from above; especially if we go when the people are bathing. Then everybody would be at the beach, and we’d have the cliff shore to ourselves. For that matter, we can undress in the cave, without the chance of a creature seeing us. Keziah could keep watch outside. Say you’ll go, Julia?”
“Well, I don’t mind. But what about mamma? She’s such a terrible stickler for the proprieties. She may object.”
“We needn’t let her know anything about it. She don’t intend bathing to-day; she’s just told me so. We two can start in the usual style, as if going to the beach. Once outside, we can go our own way. I know of a path across the fields that’ll take us almost direct to the place. You’ll go?”
“Oh, I’m agreed.”
“It’s time for us to set out, then. You hear that tramping along the corridor? It’s the bathers about to start. Let us call Keziah, and be off.”
As Julia made no objection, her sprightly cousin tripped out into the corridor; and, stopping before the door of an adjoining apartment, called “Keziah!”
The room was Mrs Girdwood’s; Keziah, her servant—a sable-skinned damsel, who played lady’s maid for all three.
“What is it, child?” asked a voice evidently not Keziah’s.
“We’re going to bathe, aunt,” said the young lady, half-opening the door, and looking in. “We want Keziah to get ready the dresses.”
“Yes, yes,” rejoined the same voice, which was that of Mrs Girdwood herself. “You hear, Keziah? And hark ye, girls!” she added, addressing herself to the two young ladies, now both standing in the doorway, “see that you take a swimming lesson. Remember we are going over the great seas, where there’s many a chance of getting drowned.”
“Oh, ma! you make one shiver.”
“Well, well, I hope swimming may never be needed by you. For all that, there’s no harm in being able to keep your head above water, and that in more senses than one. Be quick, girl, with the dresses! The people are all gone; you’ll be late. Now, then, off with you!”
Keziah soon made her appearance in the corridor, carrying a bundle.
A stout, healthy-looking negress—her