September Something
My Dear Sis: This is to ask a great favour of you, and you must be a pet and grant it. There's nothing I won't do for you in return, if you will.
I have just been having a most satisfactory chat with Sir L. It began in reference to Dick. Somehow or other that ingenious darling had forced Ellaline Lethbridge to ask Sir Lionel for his (Dick's) hand! I say "forced," because she is not in the least in love with him, indeed, (strange as it may seem to you) detests the ground he walks on; yet she does things that he tells her to do—things she hates like poison. This last coup of Dick's convinces me of what I've often suspected: he knows something about her past which she is deadly afraid he will tell Sir Lionel. It may be connected with that visit to Venice, when the Tyndals saw her; anyhow, whatever the secret may be, it is serious. She is obliged to bribe Dick; but she dislikes him too intensely to marry him ever—even if the way to do so were made easy; so, I reiterate, have no fear on that score.
Sir Lionel fancies himself in love with the girl, but he will get over it, even if he isn't on the way to do so already, pushed roughly onto the right road by her confessed preference for Dick. For the moment, however, I can see he is rather hard hit, though he would be mad if he dreamed I or anyone could read his august feelings. He thinks his hesitation to permit an engagement arises from conscientious scruples, but really it's because he can't bear to have any other man (or boy) making love to his girl. That's the brutal truth; and he's haggling and putting off the evil day as long as he can. He wanted to ask me what my feeling was in the matter; whether you would be pleased, and so on. Ellaline might not be rich, he explained, but she would have enough for her own wants as a married woman. He thought her husband, when she had one, ought to wish to do the rest; and though Dick considered his own prospects good, a partnership in a detective agency hardly seemed ideal.
I told him I couldn't quite answer for you, as you had always hoped your one boy might fall in love with a rich girl; but that I was sure Dick adored Ellaline. I asked if I should write to you, when Dick did; and he said, half reluctantly, perhaps I had better. Poor wretch, he was afraid I might succeed in persuading you!
I was pathetic on the subject of Dick, and our comradeship, which must be broken by the dear boy's marriage, and as Sir L. was suffering himself, he was in just the right mood to sympathize with me. I snivelled a little; and at last, emboldened by success, I allowed him to gather that there was someone I'd cared for a long, long time—someone who didn't care for me. At that he was so nice, that I liked him better than I ever thought I could; and since then I feel I really can't and shan't lose him.
No sooner had he given my hand a warm yet disappointing "kind friend" squeeze, at parting, than I routed out Dick in his own room. I promised him that I would induce you to write a nice letter about the proposed engagement to Sir Lionel if he in his turn would persuade Ellaline to put in a good word for me with Sir L., to tell him that she believed I cared for him a good deal, and was unhappy.
When I said "persuade" to Dick, I meant use his unknown power to command; for if the girl would say that to her guardian, her words would be the one stone capable of killing two birds. It would prove to him that of which I don't think he is perfectly sure at present: her love for Dick, or, at worst, her complete indifference to himself; and it would pop into his head the idea I want to put there, though I have done all it's safe to do openly toward inserting it.
I saw when I softly hinted at a hopeless affection which had spoiled years of my life, that he didn't think of himself. Somehow, he must be made to think; and now is the right time, for his heart is sore, and needs balm. He would be so sorry for me that, in the state he is in, he couldn't be hard. He would argue that, as he was bound to be unhappy anyway, he might as well try to make others happy. I feel that everything would happen exactly as I want it to happen if Ellaline Lethbridge could be depended upon to say the right thing.
Of course, there lies the danger: that she won't. But Dick boasts that she'll have to do as he tells her. It's worth risking; but he won't give the word unless he thinks that I've coaxed you 'round.