"Oh, I have no time. Here is a sovereign. Please give me two candles directly, candlesticks and all."
The woman"s manner changed directly.
"You shall have them this moment, miss, and my own candlesticks, which they are plated."
She brought them, and advised her only to light one. "They don"t carry well, miss," said she. "They are wax--or summat."
"Then they are summat," said Miss Gale, after a single glance at their composition.
"I"ll make you a nice hot supper, miss, in half an hour," said the woman, maternally, as if she were going to _give_ it her.
"No, thank you. Bring me a two-penny loaf, and a scuttle of coals."
"La, miss, no more than that--out of a sov"?"
"Yes--THE CHANGE."
Having shown Mrs. Grip her father was a Yankee, she darted upstairs, with her candles. Zoe came to meet her, and literally dazzled her.
Rhoda stared at her with amazement and growing rapture. "Oh, you beauty!"
she cried, and drank her in from head to foot.
"Well," said she, drawing a long breath, "Nature, you have turned out a _com-_plete article this time, I reckon." Then, as Severne laughed merrily at this, she turned her candle and her eyes full on him very briskly. She looked at him for a moment, with a gratified eye at his comeliness; then she started. "Oh!" she cried.
He received the inspection merrily, till she uttered that e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n, then he started a little, and stared at her.
"We have met before," said she, almost tenderly.
"Have we?" said he, putting on a mystified air.
She fixed him, and looked him through and through.
"You--don"t--remember--me?" asked she. Then, after giving him plenty of time to answer, "Well, then, I must be mistaken;" and her words seemed to freeze themselves and her as they fell.
She turned her back on him, and said to Zoe, with a good deal of sweetness and weight, "I have lived to see goodness and beauty united. I will never despair of human nature."
This was too pointblank for Zoe; she blushed crimson, and said archly, "I think it is time for me to run. Oh, but I forgot; here is my card. We are all at that hotel. If I am so very attractive, you will come and see me--we leave town very soon--will you?"
"I will," said Rhoda.
"And since you took me for an old acquaintance, I hope you will treat me as one," said Severne, with consummate grace and a.s.surance.
"I will, _sir,"_ said she, icily, and with a marvelous curl of the lip that did not escape him.
She lighted them down the stairs, gazed after Zoe, and ignored Severne altogether.
CHAPTER XV.
GOING home in the carriage, Zoe was silent, but Severne talked nineteen to the dozen. Had his object been to hinder his companion"s mind from dwelling too long on one thing, he could not have rattled the dice of small talk more industriously. His words would fill pages; his topics were, that Miss Gale was an extraordinary woman, but too masculine for his taste, and had made her own troubles setting up doctress, when her true line was governess--for boys. He was also glib and satirical upon that favorite b.u.t.t, a friend.
"Who but a _soi-disant_ woman-hater would pick up a strange virago and send his sister to her with twenty pounds? I"ll tell you what it is, Miss Vizard--"
Here Miss Vizard, who had sat dead silent under a flow of words, which is merely indicated above, laid her hand on his arm to stop the flux for a moment, and said, quietly, _"Do_ you know her? tell me."
"Know her! How should I?"
"I thought you might have met her--abroad."
"Well, it is possible, of course, but very unlikely. If I did, I never spoke to her, or I should have remembered her. _Don"t you think so?"_
"She seemed very positive; and I think she is an accurate person. She seemed quite surprised and mortified when you said "No.""
"Well, you know, of course it is a mortifying thing when a lady claims a gentleman"s acquaintance, and the gentleman doesn"t admit it. But what could I do? I couldn"t tell a lie about it--could I?"
"Of course not."
"I was off my guard, and rudish; but you were not. What tact! what delicacy! what high breeding and angelic benevolence! And so clever, too!"
"Oh, fie! you listened!"
"You left the door ajar, and I could not bear to lose a word that dropped from those lips so near me. Yes, I listened, and got such a lesson as only a n.o.ble, gentle lady could give. I shall never forget your womanly art, and the way you contrived to make the benefaction sound nothing. "We are all of us at low water in turns, and for a time, especially me, Zoe Vizard; so here"s a trifling loan." A loan! you"ll never see a shilling of it again! No matter. What do angels want of money?"
"Oh, pray," said Zoe, "you make me blush!"
"Then I wish there was more light to see it--yes, an angel. Do you think I can"t see you have done all this for a lady you do not really approve?
Fancy--a she doctor!"
"My dear friend," said Zoe, with a little juvenile pomposity, "one ought not to judge one"s intellectual superiors hastily, and this lady is ours"--then, gliding back to herself, "and it is my nature to approve what those I love approve--when it is not downright wrong, you know."
"Oh, of course it is not wrong; but is it wise?"
Zoe did not answer: the question puzzled her.
"Come," said he, "I"ll be frank, and speak out in time. I don"t think you know your brother Harrington. He is very inflammable."
"Inflammable! What! Harrington? Well, yes; for I"ve seen smoke issue from his mouth--ha! ha!"
"Ha! ha! I"ll pa.s.s that off for mine, some day when you are not by. But, seriously, your brother is the very man to make a fool of himself with a certain kind of woman. He despises the whole s.e.x--in theory, and he is very hard upon ordinary women, and does not appreciate their good qualities. But, when he meets a remarkable woman, he catches fire like tow. He fell in love with Mademoiselle Klosking."
"Oh, not in love!"
"I beg your pardon. Now, this is between you and me--he was in love with her, madly in love. He was only saved by our coming away. If those two had met and made acquaintance, he would have been at her mercy. I don"t say any harm would have come of it; but I do say that would have depended on the woman, and not on the man."
Zoe looked very serious, and said nothing. But her long silence showed him his words had told.
"And now," said he, after a judicious pause, "here is another remarkable woman; the last in the world I should fancy, or Vizard either, perhaps, if he met her in society. But the whole thing occurs in the way to catch him. He finds a lady fainting with hunger; he feeds her; and that softens his heart to her. Then she tells him the old story--victim of the world"s injustice--and he is deeply interested in her. She can see that; she is as keen as a razor. If those two meet a few more times, he will be at her mercy; and then won"t she throw physic to the dogs, and jump at a husband six feet high, and twelve thousand acres! I don"t study women with a microscope, as our woman-hater does, but I notice a few things about them; and one is, that their eccentricities all give way at the first offer of marriage. I believe they are only adopted in desperation, to get married. What beautiful woman is ever eccentric? catch her! she can get a husband without. That doctress will prescribe Harrington a wedding-ring; and, if he swallows it, it will be her last prescription. She will send out for the family doctor after that, like other wives."