George made no remark upon this communication, and left a card for Major Carteret on the following day. An invitation to dinner followed, and on his mentioning the circumstance to Meredith, George was surprised and offended by his manner. He laughed unpleasantly, and said something about the futility of George's expecting to be received on the same footing as he had been in the country, which made him decidedly angry.
"I don't understand you, Meredith," he said. "You brought me to the Deane, I owe the acquaintance entirely to you, and now you talk as if you resented it."
"Nonsense, old fellow," returned Robert with good humour, which cost him an effort; "I only discourage your going to the Baldwins, because I do not want to hear you talked of as an unsuccessful competitor for the heiress's money-bags, and because I know, if you have any leaning in that direction, it will be quite useless. The young ladies fly at higher game than you or I."
A deep flush overspread George Ritherdon's face as he replied:
"I beg you will not include me, in your own mind, in the category of fortune-hunters; as for what other people think or say, you need not trouble yourself."
"As you please. I only warn you that Gertrude Baldwin is an interested coquette, determined to make the most of her money,--to buy rank with it, at all events, but by no means averse to numbering her thousands of victims in the mean time."
"You speak harshly of this girl, Meredith, and cruelly."
"I speak candidly, because I am speaking to _you_. You don't suppose I would put another fellow on his guard. I might have got bit myself, you know, if I had not understood her in time. However, we had better not talk about it. Forewarned, forearmed, they say, though I can't say I ever knew any good come of warning any one."
Thereupon Meredith pretended to be very busy with his papers, and the subject dropped. But it left a very unpleasant impression on George's mind. "An interested coquette!" No more revolting description could be given of any woman within the category of those whom an honest man could ever think of marrying. Had George Ritherdon thought of marrying Gertrude? No. Did he love her? He knew in his heart he did; but he did not question for a moment his power of keeping the fact hidden from the object of his love, and every other person. He would have regarded the declaration of his feelings to an inexperienced girl, who had had no opportunity of choice, of seeing the world, of forming her judgment of character, to whom the language of love was utterly unknown, on the eve of her entrance upon a scene on which she ought to enter perfectly untrammelled, as in the highest degree dishonourable. He would have held this opinion concerning any woman whose wealth should have made her position so exceptionally difficult as that of Gertrude; but in her particular instance he had an additional motive for his strict self-conquest and reticence, which, if it ever could be explained, must remain concealed for the present.
George Ritherdon had no coxcombry or conceit about him, and he had not made up his mind by any means that Gertrude loved him, or was likely to be brought to love him in the future, should he find that the ordeal to which she was about to be exposed had left her still fancy-free, and his own circumstances be such as to enable him to believe he might try for the great prize of her heart and hand without dishonour. He did not deceive himself as to the obstacles and the rivals he might have to encounter; he gave all the fascinations of the new sphere in which Gertrude was about to shine their full credit and importance, and he contented himself with this conclusion: