“Not worth betting on, is it?” was the languid reply. “I have done what I could for the boy—kept him out of numberless snares and pitfalls. I’m a trifle tired of it now. If he is such a fool as to plunge in headlong—why, he must.”
In spite of this admirable indifference, the speaker was, in fact, watching the game keenly, and so far it was progressing entirely to his own satisfaction. Did his female accomplice—in obedience to her better instincts, or to a natural tendency to revolt against dictation—show any signs of slackness, there he was, ruthless, unswerving, at hand to remind her of the consequences of failure. She must succeed or fail. In the latter alternative no palliation that she had done her best would be admitted, and this she knew. No such excuse—indeed, no excuse—would avail to save her and hers from the consequences of such failure, and the result would be dire. She was in this man’s power—bound hand and foot. She might as well expect mercy from a famished tiger as one shade of ruth from him did the task which he had set her to fulfil fail by a hair’s breadth. And she judged correctly.
Not by accident was Fordham strolling there that afternoon. The strongest of all passions—in a strong nature—the vindictive, vengeful hate of years thoroughly awakened in him, he watched the puppets dancing to his wires. His accomplice must be kept alive to the fact that his eye was ever upon her, that she dare not do, or leave undone, anything, however trivial, that might risk the game. And now his companion’s remarks only went to confirm his previously formed decision. It was time the curtain should be rung down upon the first act of the three-act drama—time that the second should begin.
“The most susceptible youngster that ever lived! I believe you’re right, Wentworth,” he pursued, in reply to one of the aforesaid remarks. “And the worst of it is he takes them all so seriously—throws himself into the net headlong. Then, when he finds himself caught—tied tight so that no amount of kicking and swearing will get him out—he’ll raise a great outcry and think himself very hardly used. They all do it. And I’m always warning him. I warned him against this very girl who’s trying all she knows to hook him now.”
“The deuce you did. I should be curious to know in what terms,” said Wentworth.
“In what terms? I preached to him; I spake parables unto him; I propounded the choicest and most incisive metaphors. No use—all thrown away. ‘A woman, my dear chap,’ I said—‘an attractive woman, that is—is like a new and entertaining book, delightful—for a time. But when you have got from cover to cover you don’t begin the book again and go through it a second time, and then a third, and so on. Even the few books that will bear going through twice, and then only after a decent interval, will not keep you in literary pabulum all your life. So it is with a woman. However attractive, however entertaining she may be, she is bound to pall sooner or later—some few later, but the vast majority, like the general run of books—sooner. So that in chaining yourself to one woman all your life, as you seem bent upon doing, you are showing about as much judgment as you would be in condemning yourself to read one book all your life. Less, indeed, for, if the book bores you, you can chuck it out of the window; but if the woman bores you, or leads you the life of a pariah dog, you can’t chuck her out of the window, because if you do you’ll likely be hanged, and she certainly will see you so before she’ll walk out of the door, once in it. Philip, my son, be warned.’”
“And how did he take that undoubtedly sound counsel?” said Wentworth, with a laugh.
“Oh, abused me, of course—swore I was a brute and a savage—in fact, he rather thought I must be the devil himself. That’s always the way. Show a man the precipice he’s going to walk over, and ten to one he turns round and damns you for not minding your own business. And as a general rule he’s right. Talking of precipices, Wentworth, did you hear that man’s idea at table d’hôte when we were talking of the difficult state the Dent Blanche was in this year?”
“No. It must have been after I went out.”
“Why, he suggested, in the most matter-of-fact way, fixing a hawser from the top of it to the glacier below. Gaudy idea, wasn’t it, doing the Dent Blanche by means of a hawser? And, just as we had done guffawing over the notion, he added that the only drawback to the scheme was that somebody would be sure to creep up and steal it. Whereupon that sheep-faced parson on the other side of the table cut in with a very aggrieved and much hurt amendment to the effect that he was sure the mountain people were much too honest. We all roared in such wise as to draw the attention of the whole room upon us, including an overheard remark from one of the tract-dispensing old cats that some people were never happy unless they were making a noise—even upon a Sunday.”