Isa entered her brother’s almost unfurnished apartment. One dull candle threw faint light on bare walls, and a table and chairs that would have looked shabby in a farm-house. On one of the latter (there were but three) was seated Gaspar Gritton. He was a man still in the prime of life, but the sallow complexion and stoop consequent on protracted ill health, made him look several years older than he in reality was. Gaspar had been rather handsome in youth, and still his features, though contracted, were good; but his eye was dull, and the whole expression of his face unpleasing: it was marked by dissatisfaction and peevishness, and more so than usual as Isa entered his study.
“I wish that you would tell those fellows not to startle one by such thundering raps,” said the invalid brother.
“I am sorry that the knock disturbed you; its loudness was certainly disproportioned to the occasion,” replied Isa, good-humouredly, as she seated herself by her brother; “I will tell John to announce my return in a more modest manner next time.”
“I don’t know why you should come in a carriage at all. You might have walked home with Lottie and Mrs. Bolder after the meeting was over; the night is perfectly fine. I expected you before half-past eight, and now it is almost eleven.” Gaspar took a pinch of snuff to soothe his aggrieved feelings, this being the sole luxury in which he habitually indulged; his doing so happened unfortunately to be particularly disagreeable to Isa.
“My uncle kindly wished me to stay the evening with himself and Edith, and to pass every day on which lectures are given with them at the Castle,” said Isa.
“Gadding—always gadding; girls are never satisfied at home,” observed Gaspar with a sneer.
Isa felt irritated and inclined to make a retort, but she suppressed the words on her tongue, and replied as cheerfully as she could,—
“You cannot wonder at my liking to meet with some of my nearest relations; and were I to see absolutely nothing beyond our Wildwaste domain, I might grow as antiquated and whimsical as Robinson Crusoe himself. But I fear that you have passed but a dull evening without Isa to sing or read to you, Gaspar.”
The ungracious brother made no reply; he only applied again to his little brown box.
“Sir Digby asked me if you would not join his circle,” continued Isa; “but I told him that you did not yet venture to expose yourself to the night air. Was I right? You will, of course, call upon him some morning; you will find him a pleasant acquaintance.”