“Well, this is good, so far—now for the rest of you, all. You meet my impatience too coldly.”
“Yes, you were always an impatient fellow. Why, I suppose you need hardly be told that I have been admitted to the bar.”
“That I can very well imagine—you must have found your sea-training of great service on the examination.”
“Ah! my dear Wallingford—what a simpleton I was! But one is so apt to take up strange conceits in boyhood, that he is compelled to look back at them in wonder, in after life. But, which way are you walking?”—slipping an arm in mine—“if up, I'll take a short turn with you. There's scarce a soul in town, at this season; but you'll see prodigiously fine girls in Broadway, at this hour, notwithstanding—those that belong to the other sets, you know; those that belong to families that can't get into the country among the leaves. Yes, as I was saying, one scarce knows himself, after twenty. Now, I can hardly recall a taste, or an inclination, that I cherished in my teens, that has not flown to the winds. Nothing is permanent in boyhood—we grow in our persons, and our minds, sentiments, affections, views, hopes, wishes, and ambition; all take new directions.”
“This is not very flattering, Rupert, to one whose acquaintance with you may be said to be altogether boyish.”
“Oh! of course I don't mean that. Habit keeps all right in such matters; and I dare say I shall always be as much attached to you, as I was in childhood. Still, we are on diverging lines, now, and cannot for ever remain boys.”
“You have told me nothing of the rest,” I said, half choked, in my eagerness to hear of the girls, and yet unaccountably afraid to ask. I believe I dreaded to hear that Lucy was married. “How, and where is Grace?”
“Oh! Grace!—yes, I forgot her, to my shame, as you would naturally wish to inquire. Why, my dear Captain, to be as frank as one ought with so old an acquaintance, your sister is not in a good way, I'm much afraid; though I've not seen her in an age. She was down among us in the autumn, but left town for the holidays, for them she insisted on keeping at Clawbonny, where she said the family had always kept them, and away she went. Since then, she has not returned, but I fear she is far from well. You know what a fragile creature Grace ever has been—so American!—Ah! Wallingford! our females have no constitutions—charming as angels, delicate as fairies, and all that; but not to be compared to the English women in constitutions.”
I felt a torrent of fire rushing through my blood, and it was with difficulty I refrained from hurling the heartless scoundrel who leaned on my arm, into the ditch. A moment of reflection, however, warned me of the precipice on which I stood. He was Mr. Hardinge's son, Lucy's brother; and I had no proofs that he had ever induced Grace to think he loved her. It was so easy for those who had been educated as we four had been, to be deceived on such a point, that I felt it unsafe to do anything precipitately. Friendship, habit, as Rupert expressed it, might so easily be mistaken for the fruits of passion, that one might well be deceived. Then it was all-important to Grace's self-respect, to her feelings, in some measure to her character, to be careful, that I suppressed my wrath, though it nearly choked me.
“I am sorry to hear this,” I answered, after a long pause, the deep regret I felt at having such an account of my sister's health contributing to make my manner seem natural; “very, very sorry to hear it. Grace is one that requires the tenderest care and watching; and I have been making passage after passage in pursuit of money, when I am afraid I should have been at Clawbonny, discharging the duties of a brother. I can never forgive myself!”