Tinman. Gallon Tom

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СКАЧАТЬ "Do you hear what I say?"

      "Yes, I hear," I responded. "When is it to be?"

      "In about a fortnight's time. It's a whim of old Patton's to get the girl settled, and to know that she is safe. You'll be asked to go. You'll get a formal invitation, but I was to tell you from the old man that you were expected. Only a quiet wedding, of course."

      Once again he started that ceaseless rambling round the studio; once again he stopped. "You don't say anything about it," he exclaimed querulously. "I thought you were sweet in that quarter?"

      I looked at him quietly; after a moment he dropped his eyes, and turned away. "You told me once," I reminded him, "that you intended to marry Miss Patton yourself."

      "That was a business scheme that came to nothing; I was forestalled. You were forestalled, too," he added. "I have not thought any more about it; it was only a whim."

      There was silence between us for a minute or two; then I remembered something else, and spoke again. "You said it would mean red ruin to you if you did not marry her."

      "Did I?" He looked at me as though he did not see me, and as though he were thinking of something else. "I don't remember it; at any rate, I didn't mean it in the sense you mean." He hesitated again, and then went on more passionately, with a rising inflection in his voice that startled me, as it had startled me once before with this extraordinary man. "On that day you met her in the woods, when she came to you, singing and with smiles, and walked and talked with you – oh, my God! – I had spoken to her in the same place – before you came at all."

      The passion that consumed him was frightful; the recollection of what he had gone through, and what he had suppressed, shook and tore him like a storm. He clenched and unclenched his hands, and moistened his lips, and strove to speak; fought down that rising devil in him, and got himself calm again.

      "She – she laughed at me." He beat the air before him, and swallowed hard, and stamped his foot, in a rage at himself that he could not control himself more easily. "I did not make – make love to her; I am not a boy. I told her that I wanted her, that I wanted to marry her. And then she – she laughed."

      I could imagine the scene; and yet I think, if she had known all the deadly things that were to spring out of her light laughter in the wood that day – the lives that were to be shattered, and the souls brought into the dust – she might not have done it. She was but a child, and she did not know the man she had to deal with; he had meant to humble her, and she had humbled him too much.

      He turned away, choking; although I despised the man, and although I remembered my own sorrow, I yet sorrowed for him. When he went on again he had got himself into some condition of calmness.

      "Then I saw you in the woods, and I wondered that she should meet you as she did, because I knew you had not met before. It was your cursed youth," he broke out, his violence showing again for a moment – "you could speak to her with a voice that was not mine, and that I did not understand. That's all there is to say; I shall never speak of it again."

      I did not know what to say, and so I thought it best to say nothing. Once more he made the circuit of the room, and once more he came back to me. Although I was silent, simply from lack of words, I knew instinctively that he felt himself to be a meaner thing than I was, because of his weakness and his rage, and that he hated me for that knowledge.

      "I don't like the thought that you are not friends with Hockley," he said, as he came back to me, and laid his hand on my shoulder. "After all, this girl is going out of our lives, and will be nothing to us in the future. That bone of contention is gone, and I want you to meet Hockley. He's got a loose tongue, and he's not over nice in his manners; but he's not a bad sort. Say you'll meet him."

      "I'd rather not," I said, with a remembrance of what the man must have said concerning Barbara and myself.

      "You will be doing me a service, if you meet him, and treat him fairly," said Fanshawe, impressively. "Come, my dear boy," he pleaded, "I really want you to help me in a difficult matter. Swallow your pride, and meet the man."

      "How shall I be helping you in that?" I asked.

      "In a certain way – to a slight extent, that is – I am in his power," said my guardian. "Over a matter of speculation," he added hurriedly, "a little money I've lost."

      I remembered that demand for money made by Hockley, and his threat when it was refused; I felt that I couldn't very well refuse to help the man who was the only real friend I had in the world. After a moment of hesitation, I grudgingly said that I would meet him, if Jervis Fanshawe wished.

      "That's right; that's good of you, Charlie," he exclaimed, with more fervour than I should have expected of him. "We'll have a little dinner together, and you shall see what a good fellow he is, when you really come to know him. And we'll keep off difficult topics," he added reassuringly.

      On the evening appointed for the dinner I got to Fanshawe's rooms before Hockley had arrived; and I found my guardian in a strange humour, even for him. He made clumsy attempts to be facetious, and to throw off that rather grave reserved manner he usually wore; clapped me on the shoulder, and generally behaved like the really youngish man he was in years. Before Hockley came in he referred for a moment to that matter we had discussed in my studio; but he only touched upon it lightly.

      "You mustn't think anything, Charlie, of what I said the other night about – about a certain subject," he said, standing in front of me, and nervously fingering the lapel of my coat. "I mean about – about Barbara Patton. I was never really in earnest, and you and I have something else to think about in the world beside girls, haven't we?"

      I laughed a little foolishly, but made no direct reply. He went on with the subject eagerly.

      "I've come to the conclusion that I've been taking life too seriously, Charlie; I've been too grave and careful. I'll blossom out a bit; we'll both blossom out." He laughed in an unnatural fashion, and clapped me on the shoulder again.

      "By the way," I said, as a sudden thought occurred to me, "I've been wanting to talk to you a little about my affairs – money matters, you know. I'm getting hard up, and I don't quite know how I stand in regard to such things. My income ought to be a substantial one, but I want to know exactly how much it is."

      He always had an irritating way of speaking to any one over his shoulder, with his back to them and his head half turned; he adopted that method now. "Why should you trouble about your income?" he asked, a little sourly. "Don't you trust me? – don't you think you're safe in my hands?"

      "Of course I trust you," I replied, a little indignantly. "But I want to know how much I can spend, that's all."

      "Spend as little as possible," he said. "As a matter of fact, I've tied up your money in various ways, so that it may be safe; there's not much of it that can be handled at the moment. You shall have what you want – of course, within reason; but you must be careful – for your own sake."

      I had no suspicion of him then; no doubt of him entered my mind. I knew nothing of business matters, and up to that time had always been supplied with the small sums necessary for my individual expenses, while all bills had, I believed, been sent to him. Nothing more was said about the matter then, because the entrance of Hockley drove everything else from my mind.

      My guardian certainly seemed anxious to do all in his power to bring Hockley and me to a better understanding. He insisted on our shaking hands to begin with; and we performed that ceremony briefly and distrustfully. He hovered about us, and talked about our individual tastes, and wondered openly why we did not meet, or go about together.

      "Two СКАЧАТЬ