"O I like him?I _like_ him pretty well; he"s rather jolly on the whole; but?that"s another thing from being married, you know. I like very well to have him round,?bringing me flowers and doing everything I bid him; I _have_ made rather a slave of him, that"s a fact; it"s awfully ridiculous! He doesn"t dare say his soul"s his own, if I say it"s mine, and I snub him in every other thing. But then?
it"s another thing to go and marry him. Maybe he wouldn"t like me to snub him, if I was his wife. Mamma don"t dare do it to papa, I know; unless she does it on the sly."
Hazel drew back rather coldly.
"I think it is extremely probable he would not like it," she said. "He is not much of a man, to stand it now."
"Not?" cried Josephine. "Why what is the good of a man if you can"t snub him? And if a man pretends to like you, of course he"ll stand anything you give him. O I like the bridle figure in the German?
that suits me;?when I"m the driver; but the Germans are all over for this season. Aren"t you awfully sorry?"
"No. And a girl ought to be ashamed to talk as you do, Josephine!"
"Now hush! _You_ shan"t snub me. I came to you for comfort. Why ought I to be ashamed to talk so? Don"t _you_ like to have your own way?"
"My own way does not trend in that direction," said Miss Kennedy.
"And I should scorn to have it over such a weak thing as a man who would let a girl fool him to his face."
"Men like such fooling. I know they do. I can do just what I like with them. But then if I was married,?I don"t suppose I could fool so many at once. Why, Hazel, if you don"t have your own way with men who let you, who _will_ you have it with? Not the men who won"t let you;?such a bluebeard of a man as your guardian, for instance. O do tell me! don"t you sometimes get tired of living?"
"We are talking about your affairs this morning," said Hazel. "I should get tired of living, very soon, I think, at your rate."
"I am," said Josephine. And she looked so. "Sometimes I am ready to wish I had never been born. What"s the good of living, anyhow, Hazel, when the fun"s over?"
"Fun?" Hazel repeated,?how was she to tell this girl what seemed to her just now the good of living?
"Yes. You know all the summer there have been the garden parties and the riding parties, and the Germans, and the four-in-hand parties, and all sorts of delightful things; and now they"re all over; and it makes me so blue! To be sure, by and by, there will be the season in town; but that won"t be much till after the holidays, anyhow; and I feel horridly. And now comes Charteris bothering me. What would you do, Hazel?"
"What would I do?" Hazel repeated again, with a curious feeling that there was but one man in the world, and so of course what _could_ anybody do! A little shy of the subject too, and feeling her cheeks grow warm in the discussion. "Do you like him very much, Josephine?"
"Very much?"?deliberately. "No. I don"t think I like him very much. But papa says that will come fast enough when I am married. He says,?you know Charteris is awfully rich,?he says, papa says, this marriage will give me such a "position." Mamma don"t conceive that one of her daughters can want position. But then, papa is a little lower down than mamma, you know. Well, I should have "position," and everything else I want?carriages and jewels, you know; diamonds; don"t you like diamonds? I could have all I want. If I only could have them without the man!"
"You could live with him all your life, you think? by the help of the diamonds?"
"Papa says so. And mamma says so. I don"t get any feeling at home. Annabella is wholly engaged in getting up parties to go to Dane Rollo"s readings in Morton Hollow; that"s all she thinks about. Isn"t he too ridiculous?"
"I asked about Mr. Charteris," said Wych Hazel, knitting her brows a little. "And it is you who must live with him?not your father and mother. Could you do it, Josephine? with him alone?"
"One must live with somebody, I suppose," said Josephine, idly pulling threads of wool from a foot mat near her.
"Well could you live without him?" said her questioner, taking a short cut to her point of view.
"Charteris? He ain"t the jolliest man I know."
"Answer!" said Hazel, knitting her brows again.
"Live without Charteris? I should say I could. From my present point of view. Easy! But it comes back to that awful bore, Hazel; a girl has got to be married. I wish I was a man."
"Then I would," said Wych Hazel quietly.
"What?"
"Live without Mr. Charteris. And as you cannot be a man, suppose you talk like a woman."
"What do you mean?" said Phinney, looking doubtfully at her. "I haven"t come here to be snubbed, I know. Aren"t you sorry for me?"
"No,?not when you talk so. A girl has not "got to be married."
And if you marry some one you can live without, you deserve what you will get."
"What will I get?" said Josephine.
"John Charteris?without the bouquets and the fooling."
"I don"t know but he"s very good," said Josephine meditatively. "And Hazel, a girl can"t live without getting married. What should I do, for instance?"
"Wait till the right person comes," said Hazel. "And if he never comes, be thankful that you escaped the wrong one."
"But suppose the right person, as you call him, is poor?" said the young lady with a peculiar subdued inflexion of voice.
"O, is that it!" said Wych Hazel. "Then if he thinks you can make him rich. I would keep up the delusion."
"But I _can"t_, Hazel. Papa hasn"t much to give any of us. He has just enough to get along with comfortably."
"There are other things in the world besides money, I suppose?"
said Hazel. "And I know there could be no starvation wages for me, like diamonds from a hand I did not love."
"I like diamonds though," said Josephine. "And it"s dreadful to be poor. _You_ don"t know anything about it, Hazel. You"re of no consequence, you have no power, n.o.body cares about you, even you"ve got to ask leave to speak; and then n.o.body listens to you! I mean, after you are too old to flirt. I don"t want to be poor. And Mr. Charteris would put me beyond all that. He has plenty. And they say I would love him well enough by and by. It"s such a bore!"
And the young lady leaned her head upon her hand with a really disconsolate face.
"I thought you just said somebody does care about you?"
"Did I? I don"t recollect."
"You said "the right person" was poor. Which would seem to imply that he is in existence."
"Well, he might just as well not," said Josephine in the same tone.
"They would never hear of my marrying _him_. It"s all very nice to drive four-in-hand with somebody, and dance the German with him; and have good times at pic-nics and such things; but when it came to settling down in a little bit of a house, without a room in it big enough for a German; and ingrain carpets on the floors?I couldn"t, Hazel!" said the girl with a shudder. "And there it is, you see."
Wych Hazel looked at her?and then she laughed.
"There is nothing much more fearful than "the right person" on ingrain carpets," she said mockingly. "Except, perhaps, the wrong one on Turkey."
"Turkey carpets are jolly under your feet," said Josephine. "And after all, I wonder if it matters so much about the man? At least, when you can"t have the right one. Well, you don"t help me much.
Annabella wanted to know if you wouldn"t join a party to hear Dane Rollo read, Sat.u.r.day night? She is crazy about those readings. _I_ believe she"s touched about him. Will you go?"
"No. Josephine, it matters _everything_ about the man," said Hazel earnestly. "What sort of a life do you expect, if you begin with a false oath?"
"A false oath?"
"Yes. Think what you have to promise."