The Fruit of the Tree. Edith Wharton

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СКАЧАТЬ the least necessary for any of us either to stay on now or to return. Truscomb could come to Long Island when he recovers, and answer any questions we may have to put; but if Bessy has sent for the child, we must of course put off going for today—at least I must," he added sighing, "and, though I know it's out of the question to exact such a sacrifice from you, I have a faint hope that our delightful friend here, with the altruistic spirit of her sex——"

      "Oh, I shall enjoy it—my maid is unpacking," Mrs. Ansell gaily affirmed; and Mr. Tredegar, shrugging his shoulders, said curtly: "In that case I will ring for the time-table."

      When he had withdrawn to consult it in the seclusion of the library, and Mrs. Ansell, affecting a sudden desire for a second cup of tea, had reseated herself to await the replenishment of the kettle, Mr. Langhope exchanged his own chair for a place at her side.

      "Now what on earth does this mean?" he asked, lighting a cigarette in response to her slight nod of consent.

      Mrs. Ansell's gaze lost itself in the depths of the empty tea-pot.

      "A number of things—or any one of them," she said at length, extending her arm toward the tea-caddy.

      "For instance—?" he rejoined, following appreciatively the movements of her long slim hands.

      She raised her head and met his eyes. "For instance: it may mean—don't resent the suggestion—that you and Mr. Tredegar were not quite well-advised in persuading her not to see Mr. Amherst yesterday evening."

      Mr. Langhope uttered an exclamation of surprise.

      "But, my dear Maria—in the name of reason … why, after the doctor's visit—after his coming here last night, at Truscomb's request, to put the actual facts before her—should she have gone over the whole business again with this interfering young fellow? How, in fact, could she have done so," he added, after vainly waiting for her reply, "without putting a sort of slight on Truscomb, who is, after all, the only person entitled to speak with authority?"

      Mrs. Ansell received his outburst in silence, and the butler, reappearing with the kettle and fresh toast, gave her the chance to prolong her pause for a full minute. When the door had closed on him, she said: "Judged by reason, your arguments are unanswerable; but when it comes to a question of feeling——"

      "Feeling? What kind of feeling? You don't mean to suggest anything so preposterous as that Bessy——?"

      She made a gesture of smiling protest. "I confess it is to be regretted that his mother is a lady, and that he looks—you must have noticed it?—so amazingly like the portraits of the young Schiller. But I only meant that Bessy forms all her opinions emotionally; and that she must have been very strongly affected by the scene Mr. Tredegar described to us."

      "Ah," Mr. Langhope interjected, replying first to her parenthesis, "how a woman of your good sense stumbled on that idea of hunting up the mother—!" but Mrs. Ansell answered, with a slight grimace: "My dear Henry, if you could see the house they live in you'd think I had been providentially guided there!" and, reverting to the main issue, he went on fretfully: "But why, after hearing the true version of the facts, should Bessy still be influenced by that sensational scene? Even if it was not, as Tredegar suspects, cooked up expressly to take her in, she must see that the hospital doctor is, after all, as likely as any one to know how the accident really happened, and how seriously the fellow is hurt."

      "There's the point. Why should Bessy believe Dr. Disbrow rather than Mr. Amherst?"

      "For the best of reasons—because Disbrow has nothing to gain by distorting the facts, whereas this young Amherst, as Tredegar pointed out, has the very obvious desire to give Truscomb a bad name and shove himself into his place."

      Mrs. Ansell contemplatively turned the rings upon her fingers. "From what I saw of Amherst I'm inclined to think that, if that is his object, he is too clever to have shown his hand so soon. But if you are right, was there not all the more reason for letting Bessy see him and find out as soon as possible what he was aiming at?"

      "If one could have trusted her to find out—but you credit my poor child with more penetration than I've ever seen in her."

      "Perhaps you've looked for it at the wrong time—and about the wrong things. Bessy has the penetration of the heart."

      "The heart! You make mine jump when you use such expressions."

      "Oh, I use this one in a general sense. But I want to help you to keep it from acquiring a more restricted significance."

      "Restricted—to the young man himself?"

      Mrs. Ansell's expressive hands seemed to commit the question to fate. "All I ask you to consider for the present is that Bessy is quite unoccupied and excessively bored."

      "Bored? Why, she has everything on earth she can want!"

      "The ideal state for producing boredom—the only atmosphere in which it really thrives. And besides—to be humanly inconsistent—there's just one thing she hasn't got."

      "Well?" Mr. Langhope groaned, fortifying himself with a second cigarette.

      "An occupation for that rudimentary little organ, the mention of which makes you jump."

      "There you go again! Good heavens, Maria, do you want to encourage her to fall in love?"

      "Not with a man, just at present, but with a hobby, an interest, by all means. If she doesn't, the man will take the place of the interest—there's a vacuum to be filled, and human nature abhors a vacuum."

      Mr. Langhope shrugged his shoulders. "I don't follow you. She adored her husband."

      His friend's fine smile was like a magnifying glass silently applied to the gross stupidity of his remark. "Oh, I don't say it was a great passion—but they got on perfectly," he corrected himself.

      "So perfectly that you must expect her to want a little storm and stress for a change. The mere fact that you and Mr. Tredegar objected to her seeing Mr. Amherst last night has roused the spirit of opposition in her. A year ago she hadn't any spirit of opposition."

      "There was nothing for her to oppose—poor Dick made her life so preposterously easy."

      "My ingenuous friend! Do you still think that's any reason? The fact is, Bessy wasn't awake, she wasn't even born, then. … She is now, and you know the infant's first conscious joy is to smash things."

      "It will be rather an expensive joy if the mills are the first thing she smashes."

      "Oh I imagine the mills are pretty substantial. I should, I own," Mrs. Ansell smiled, "not object to seeing her try her teeth on them."

      "Which, in terms of practical conduct, means——?"

      "That I advise you not to disapprove of her staying on, or of her investigating the young man's charges. You must remember that another peculiarity of the infant mind is to tire soonest of the toy that no one tries to take away from it."

      "Que diable! But suppose Truscomb turns rusty at this very unusual form of procedure? Perhaps you don't quite know how completely he represents the prosperity of the mills."

      "All the more reason," Mrs. Ansell persisted, rising at the sound of Mr. Tredegar's approach. СКАЧАТЬ