The Duke's Children. Anthony Trollope

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ He had never been much given to the pleasures of the table; but this habit of simplicity had grown on him of late, till the Duchess used to tell him that his wants were so few that it was a pity he was not a hermit, vowed to poverty.

      Very shortly a message was brought to Lady Mary, saying that her father wished to see her. She went at once, and found him seated on a sofa, which stood close along the bookshelves on one side of the room. The table had already been cleared, and he was alone. He not only was alone, but had not even a pamphlet or newspaper in his hand.

      Then she knew that Tregear must have told the story. As this occurred to her, her legs almost gave way under her. "Come and sit down, Mary," he said, pointing to the seat on the sofa beside himself.

      She sat down and took one of his hands within her own. Then, as he did not begin at once, she asked a question. "Will Silverbridge stand for the county, papa?"

      "No, my dear."

      "But for the town?"

      "Yes, my dear."

      "And he won't be a Liberal?"

      "I am afraid not. It is a cause of great unhappiness to me; but I do not know that I should be justified in any absolute opposition. A man is entitled to his own opinion, even though he be a very young man."

      "I am so sorry that it should be so, papa, because it vexes you."

      "I have many things to vex me;—things to break my heart."

      "Poor mamma!" she exclaimed.

      "Yes; that above all others. But life and death are in God's hands, and even though we may complain we can alter nothing. But whatever our sorrows are while we are here, we must do our duty."

      "I suppose he may be a good Member of Parliament, though he has turned Conservative."

      "I am not thinking about your brother. I am thinking about you." The poor girl gave a little start on the sofa. "Do you know—Mr. Tregear?" he added.

      "Yes, papa; of course I know him. You used to see him in Italy."

      "I believe I did; I understand that he was there as a friend of Silverbridge."

      "His most intimate friend, papa."

      "I dare say. He came to me, in London yesterday, and told me—! Oh Mary, can it be true?"

      "Yes, papa," she said, covered up to her forehead with blushes, and with her eyes turned down. In the ordinary affairs of life she was a girl of great courage, who was not given to be shaken from her constancy by the pressure of any present difficulty; but now the terror inspired by her father's voice almost overpowered her.

      "Do you mean to tell me that you have engaged yourself to that young man without my approval?"

      "Of course you were to have been asked, papa."

      "Is that in accordance with your idea of what should be the conduct of a young lady in your position?"

      "Nobody meant to conceal anything from you, papa."

      "It has been so far concealed. And yet this young man has the self-confidence to come to me and to demand your hand as though it were a matter of course that I should accede to so trivial a request. It is, as a matter of course, quite impossible. You understand that; do you not?" When she did not answer him at once, he repeated the question. "I ask you whether you do not feel that it is altogether impossible?"

      "No, papa," she said, in the lowest possible whisper, but still in such a whisper that he could hear the word, and with so much clearness that he could judge from her voice of the obstinacy of her mind.

      "Then, Mary, it becomes my duty to tell you that it is quite impossible. I will not have it thought of. There must be an end of it."

      "Why, papa?"

      "Why! I am astonished that you should ask me why."

      "I should not have allowed him, papa, to go to you unless I had—unless I had loved him."

      "Then you must conquer your love. It is disgraceful and must be conquered."

      "Disgraceful!"

      "Yes. I am sorry to use such a word to my own child, but it is so. If you will promise to be guided by me in this matter, if you will undertake not to see him any more, I will—if not forget it—at any rate pardon it, and be silent. I will excuse it because you were young, and were thrown imprudently in his way. There has, I believe, been someone at work in the matter with whom I ought to be more angry than with you. Say that you will obey me, and there is nothing within a father's power that I will not do for you, to make your life happy." It was thus that he strove not to be stern. His heart, indeed, was tender enough, but there was nothing tender in the tone of his voice or in the glance of his eye. Though he was very positive in what he said, yet he was shy and shamefaced even with his own daughter. He, too, had blushed when he told her that she must conquer her love.

      That she should be told that she had disgraced herself was terrible to her. That her father should speak of her marriage with this man as an event that was impossible made her very unhappy. That he should talk of pardoning her, as for some great fault, was in itself a misery. But she had not on that account the least idea of giving up her lover. Young as she was, she had her own peculiar theory on that matter, her own code of conduct and honour, from which she did not mean to be driven. Of course she had not expected that her father would yield at the first word. He, no doubt, would wish that she should make a more exalted marriage. She had known that she would have to encounter opposition, though she had not expected to be told that she had disgraced herself. As she sat there she resolved that under no pretence would she give up her lover;—but she was so far abashed that she could not find words to express herself. He, too, had been silent for a few moments before he again asked her for her promise.

      "Will you tell me, Mary, that you will not see him again?"

      "I don't think that I can say that, papa."

      "Why not?"

      "Oh papa, how can I, when of all the people in the world I love him the best?"

      It is not without a pang that any one can be told that she who is of all the dearest has some other one who to her is the dearest. Such pain fathers and mothers have to bear; and though, I think, the arrow is never so blunted but that it leaves something of a wound behind, there is in most cases, if not a perfect salve, still an ample consolation. The mother knows that it is good that her child should love some man better than all the world beside, and that she should be taken away to become a wife and a mother. And the father, when that delight of his eyes ceases to assure him that he is her nearest and dearest, though he abandon the treasure of that nearestness and dearestness with a soft melancholy, still knows that it is as it should be. Of course that other "him" is the person she loves the best in the world. Were it not so how evil a thing it would be that she should marry him! Were it not so with reference to some "him", how void would her life be! But now, to the poor Duke the wound had no salve, no consolation. When he was told that this young Tregear was the owner of his girl's sweet love, was the treasure of her heart, he shrank as though arrows with sharp points were pricking him all over. "I will not hear of such love," he said.

      "What am I to say, papa?"

      "Say СКАЧАТЬ