William Dean Howells: 27 Novels in One Volume (Illustrated). William Dean Howells
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set at me," Halleck wrote, "and if I had not fooled away so much time already on law and on leather, I should like to fool away a little more on such a cause as this." He did not mention the matter again in his letters; but the first night after his return, when they all sat together in the comfort of having him at home again, he asked his father, "What should you think of my going to South America?"
The old man started up from the pleasant after-supper drowse into which he was suffering himself to fall, content with Halleck's presence, and willing to leave the talk to the women folk. "I don't know what you mean, Ben?"
"I suppose it's my having the matter so much in mind that makes me feel as if we had talked it over. I mentioned it in one of my letters."
"Yes," returned his father; "but I presumed you were joking."
Halleck frowned impatiently; he would not meet the gaze of his mother and sisters, but he addressed himself again to his father. "I don't know that I was in earnest." His mother dropped her eyes to her mending, with a faint sigh of relief. "But I can't say," he added, "that I was joking, exactly. The man himself was very serious about it." He stopped, apparently to govern an irritable impulse, and then he went on to set the project of his Spanish-American acquaintance before them, explaining it in detail.
At the end, "That's good," said his father, "but why need you have gone, Ben?"
The question seemed to vex Halleck; he did not answer at once. His mother could not bear to see him crossed, and she came to his help against herself and his father, since it was only supposing the case. "I presume," she said, "that we could have looked at it as a missionary work."
"It isn't a missionary work, mother," answered Halleck, severely, "in any sense that you mean. I should go down there to teach, and I should be paid for it. And I want to say at once that they have no yellow-fever nor earthquakes, and that they have not had a revolution for six years. The country's perfectly safe every way, and so wholesome that it will be a good thing for me. But I shouldn't expect to convert anybody."
"Of course not, Ben," said his mother, soothingly.
"I hope you wouldn't object to it if it were a missionary work," said one of the elder sisters.
"No, Anna," returned Ben.
"I merely wanted to know," said Anna.
"Then I hope you're satisfied, Anna," Olive cut in. "Ben won't refuse to convert the Uruguayans if they apply in a proper spirit."
"I think Anna had a right to ask," said Miss Louisa, the eldest.
"Oh, undoubtedly, Miss Halleck," said Olive. "I like to see Ben reproved for misbehavior to his mother, myself."
Her father laughed at Olive's prompt defence. "Well, it's a cause that we've all got to respect; but I don't see why you should go, Ben, as I said before. It would do very well for some young fellow who had no settled prospects, but you've got your duties here. I presume you looked at it in that light. As you said in your letter, you've fooled away so much time on leather and law—"
"I shall never amount to anything in the law!" Ben broke out. His mother looked at him in anxiety; his father kept a steady smile on his face; Olive sat alert for any chance that offered to put down her elder sisters, who drew in their breath, and grew silently a little primmer. "I'm not well—"
"Oh, I know you're not, dear," interrupted his mother, glad of another chance to abet him.
"I'm not strong enough to go on with the line of work I've marked out, and I feel that I'm throwing away the feeble powers I have."
His father answered with less surprise than Halleck had evidently expected, for he had thrown out his words with a sort of defiance; probably the old man had watched him closely enough to surmise that it might come to this with him at last. At any rate, he was able to say, without seeming to assent too readily, "Well, well, give up the law, then, and come back into leather, as you call it. Or take up something else. We don't wish to make anything a burden to you; but take up some useful work at home. There are plenty of things to be done."
"Not for me," said Halleck, gloomily.
"Oh, yes, there are," said the old man.
"I see you are not willing to have me go," said Halleck, rising in uncontrollable irritation. "But I wish you wouldn't all take this tone with me!"
"We haven't taken any tone with you, Ben," said his mother, with pleading tenderness.
"I think Anna has decidedly taken a tone," said Olive.
Anna did not retort, but "What tone?" demanded Louisa, in her behalf.
"Hush, children," said their mother.
"Well, well," suggested his father to Ben. "Think it over, think it over. There's no hurry."
"I've thought it over; there is hurry," retorted Halleck. "If I go, I must go at once."
His mother arrested her thread, half drawn through the seam, letting her hand drop, while she glanced at him.
"It isn't so much a question of your giving up the law, Ben, as of your giving up your family and going so far away from us all," said his father. "That's what I shouldn't like."
"I don't like that, either. But I can't help it." He added, "Of course, mother, I shall not go without your full and free consent. You and father must settle it between you." He fetched a quick, worried sigh as he put his hand on the door.
"Ben isn't himself at all," said Mrs. Halleck, with tears in her eyes, after he had left the room.
"No," said her husband. "He's restless. He'll get over this idea in a few days." He urged this hope against his wife's despair, and argued himself into low spirits.
"I don't believe but what it would be the best thing for his health, may be," said Mrs. Halleck, at the end.
"I've always had my doubts whether he would ever come to anything in the law," said the father.
The elder sisters discussed Halleck's project apart between themselves, as their wont was with any family interest, and they bent over a map of South America, so as to hide what they were doing from their mother.
Olive had left the room by another door, and she intercepted Halleck before he reached his own.
"What is the matter, Ben?" she whispered.
"Nothing," he answered, coldly. But he added, "Come in, Olive."
She followed him, and hovered near after he turned up the gas.
"I can't stand it here, I must go," he said, turning a dull, weary look upon her.
"Who was at the Elm House that you knew this last time?" she asked, quickly.
"Laura Dixmore isn't driving me away, if you mean that," replied Halleck.
"I couldn't believe it was she! I should have despised you if it was. But I shall hate her, whoever it was."
Halleck sat down before his table, and his sister sank upon the corner of a chair near it, and looked wistfully at him. "I know there is some one!"
"If you think I've been fool enough to offer myself to any one, Olive, you're very much mistaken."
"Oh, it needn't have come to that," said Olive, with indignant pity.
"My life's a failure here," cried Halleck, moving his head uneasily from side to side. "I feel somehow as if I could go out there and pick up the time I've lost. Great Heaven!" he cried, "if I were only running away from some innocent young girl's rejection, what a happy man I should be!"
"It's some horrid married thing, then, that's been flirting with you!"
He gave a forlorn laugh. "I'd almost confess it to please you, Olive. But I'd prefer to get out of the matter without lying, if I could. Why need you suppose any reason but the sufficient one I've given?—Don't afflict me! don't imagine things about