Hilda Wade, a Woman with Tenacity of Purpose. Allen Grant
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here again?”
“Yes, Lady Tepping. He called to see Daphne.”
My aunt turned to me with an aggrieved tone. It is a peculiarity of my aunt’s—I have met it elsewhere—that if she is angry with Jones, and Jones is not present, she assumes a tone of injured asperity on his account towards Brown or Smith, or any other innocent person whom she happens to be addressing. “Now, this is really too bad, Hubert,” she burst out, as if I were the culprit. “Disgraceful! Abominable! I’m sure I can’t make out what the young fellow means by it. Here he comes dangling after Daphne every day and all day long—and never once says whether he means anything by it or not. In MY young days, such conduct as that would not have been considered respectable.”
I nodded and beamed benignly.
“Well, why don’t you answer me?” my aunt went on, warming up. “DO you mean to tell me you think his behaviour respectful to a nice girl in Daphne’s position?”
“My dear aunt,” I answered, “you confound the persons. I am not Mr. Holsworthy. I decline responsibility for him. I meet him here, in YOUR house, for the first time this morning.”
“Then that shows how often you come to see your relations, Hubert!” my aunt burst out, obliquely. “The man’s been here, to my certain knowledge, every day this six weeks.”
“Really, Aunt Fanny,” I said; “you must recollect that a professional man—”
“Oh, yes. THAT’S the way! Lay it all down to your profession, do, Hubert! Though I KNOW you were at the Thorntons’ on Saturday—saw it in the papers—the Morning Post—‘among the guests were Sir Edward and Lady Burnes, Professor Sebastian, Dr. Hubert Cumberledge,’ and so forth, and so forth. YOU think you can conceal these things; but you can’t. I get to know them!”
“Conceal them! My dearest aunt! Why, I danced twice with Daphne.”
“Daphne! Yes, Daphne. They all run after Daphne,” my aunt exclaimed, altering the venue once more. “But there’s no respect for age left. I expect to be neglected. However, that’s neither here nor there. The point is this: you’re the one man now living in the family. You ought to behave like a brother to Daphne. Why don’t you board this Holsworthy person and ask him his intentions?”
“Goodness gracious!” I cried; “most excellent of aunts, that epoch has gone past. The late lamented Queen Anne is now dead. It’s no use asking the young man of to-day to explain his intentions. He will refer you to the works of the Scandinavian dramatists.”
My aunt was speechless. She could only gurgle out the words: “Well, I can safely say that of all the monstrous behaviour—” then language failed her and she relapsed into silence.
However, when Daphne and young Holsworthy returned, I had as much talk with him as I could, and when he left the house I left also.
“Which way are you walking?” I asked, as we turned out into the street.
“Towards my rooms in the Temple.”
“Oh! I’m going back to St. Nathaniel’s,” I continued. “If you’ll allow me, I’ll walk part way with you.”
“How very kind of you!”
We strode side by side a little distance in silence. Then a thought seemed to strike the lugubrious young man. “What a charming girl your cousin is!” he exclaimed, abruptly.
“You seem to think so,” I answered, smiling.
He flushed a little; the lantern jaw grew longer. “I admire her, of course,” he answered. “Who doesn’t? She is so extraordinarily handsome.”
“Well, not exactly handsome,” I replied, with more critical and kinsman-like deliberation. “Pretty, if you will; and decidedly pleasing and attractive in manner.”
He looked me up and down, as if he found me a person singularly deficient in taste and appreciation. “Ah, but then, you are her cousin,” he said at last, with a compassionate tone. “That makes a difference.”
“I quite see all Daphne’s strong points,” I answered, still smiling, for I could perceive he was very far gone. “She is good-looking, and she is clever.”
“Clever!” he echoed. “Profound! She has a most unusual intellect. She stands alone.”
“Like her mother’s silk dresses,” I murmured, half under my breath.
He took no notice of my flippant remark, but went on with his rhapsody. “Such depth; such penetration! And then, how sympathetic! Why, even to a mere casual acquaintance like myself, she is so kind, so discerning!”
“ARE you such a casual acquaintance?” I inquired, with a smile. (It might have shocked Aunt Fanny to hear me; but THAT is the way we ask a young man his intentions nowadays.)
He stopped short and hesitated. “Oh, quite casual,” he replied, almost stammering. “Most casual, I assure you.... I have never ventured to do myself the honour of supposing that… that Miss Tepping could possibly care for me.”
“There is such a thing as being TOO modest and unassuming,” I answered. “It sometimes leads to unintentional cruelty.”
“No, do you think so?” he cried, his face falling all at once. “I should blame myself bitterly if that were so. Dr. Cumberledge, you are her cousin. DO you gather that I have acted in such a way as to—to lead Miss Tepping to suppose I felt any affection for her?”
I laughed in his face. “My dear boy,” I answered, laying one hand on his shoulder, “may I say the plain truth? A blind bat could see you are madly in love with her.”
His mouth twitched. “That’s very serious!” he answered, gravely; “very serious.”
“It is,” I responded, with my best paternal manner, gazing blankly in front of me.
He stopped short again. “Look here,” he said, facing me. “Are you busy? No? Then come back with me to my rooms; and—I’ll make a clean breast of it.”
“By all means,” I assented. “When one is young—and foolish—I have often noticed, as a medical man, that a drachm of clean breast is a magnificent prescription.”
He walked back by my side, talking all the way of Daphne’s many adorable qualities. He exhausted the dictionary for laudatory adjectives. By the time I reached his door it was not HIS fault if I had not learned that the angelic hierarchy were not in the running with my pretty cousin for graces and virtues. I felt that Faith, Hope, and Charity ought to resign at once in favour of Miss Daphne Tepping, promoted.
He took me into his comfortably furnished rooms—the luxurious rooms of a rich young bachelor, with taste as well as money—and offered me a partaga. Now, I have long observed, in the course of my practice, that a choice cigar assists a man in taking a philosophic outlook on the question under discussion; so I accepted the partaga. He sat down opposite me and pointed to a photograph in the centre of his mantlepiece. “I am engaged to that lady,” he put in, shortly.
“So I anticipated,” I answered, lighting up.
He started and looked surprised. “Why, what made you guess it?” he inquired.
I smiled the calm smile of superior age—I was some eight years or so his senior. “My dear fellow,” I murmured, “what else could prevent you from proposing to Daphne—when you are so undeniably in love with her?”
“A great deal,” he answered. “For example, the sense of my own utter unworthiness.”
“One’s own unworthiness,” I replied, “though doubtless real—p’f, p’f—is a barrier that most of us can readily get over when our admiration for a particular lady waxes strong enough. So THIS is the prior attachment!” I took the portrait down and scanned it.
“Unfortunately, yes. What do you think of her?”
I scrutinised the features. “Seems a nice enough little thing,” I answered. It was an innocent face, I admit; very frank