The Prisoners of Hartling

by J. D. Beresford

"I should at least like to know why you have taken such a dislike to me," he said. "But you might not feel inclined to tell me that in any case."

"Oh! dislike," she responded, almost contemptuously. "That's much too strong a word."

He had a sense of hopeless frustration. All her half-unwilling responses appeared now to have been nothing more than a condescension to his ineptitude. And he was all too horribly conscious of the fact that he deserved nothing better than her contemptuous opinion of him. He was just an average young man of twenty-eight. He had done nothing that thousands of other young men had not done as well or better. The only boast he could have made would have been that of ambition, a boast that was no longer possible for him after his recent admission that he meant to stay on at Hartling and liked being there. He knew intuitively what her reply would be, if he told her that he meant to study, to prepare himself for the work of a specialist. Indeed, he himself saw that project, now, as little more than a fatuous piece of self-deception. Practice was what he wanted: book-work would be no good without that. And in five years he would be soft and over-fed; his nerve would be gone.

He looked down and began to trace the pattern of the carpet with his toe. "Yes, I'm not worth hating," he muttered.

She turned away with a gesture of impatience. "Well, shall you be ready in ten minutes?" she threw at him over her shoulder.

"But if you would so much sooner I didn't come ..." he conceded humbly.

"I'll meet you in the hall," she said, as she went out.

He hesitated again while he was putting on his shoes. If she merely despised him, as she obviously did, what was the use of trying to win her confidence? Nothing he could say or do would alter her opinion of him. He had nothing to say. There was nothing he could do. The most he could hope for would be to defend his position by argument. He had little doubt that her contempt for him was based on the fact that he had consented to stay on at Hartling; and it might be well that she had not, as yet, a proper understanding of his reasons. She might not have heard of his verbal compact with the family made the previous day? Was it worth while attempting his own defence?

He was still weighing that question when she joined him in the hall. He continued to weigh it as they walked together in silence down the length of the garden.