“Thro’ light and shadow thou dost range,
Sudden glances sweet and strange,
Delicious spites and darling angers,
And airy forms of flitting change.”
I had not yet had an opportunity of being introduced to Min’s mother.
’Pon my word, you exclaim, this looks very serious!
I beg to differ from you. We had been brought together legitimately enough, down at the church-decoration-gathering in the school-room: we had been regularly introduced by no less a clerical authority than little Miss Pimpernell, the vicar’s sister: we had then and there associated under the safest chaperonage—good heavens! would not Miss Spight’s jealous green eyes, that were certain to pick out the tiniest blot in her fellow man or woman, and Lady Dasher’s stately, albeit melancholy presence, satisfy you? Thus, the “convenances,” that horrid Anglo-French pseudonym, of the still more horrible bugbear “society,” had no cause to consider themselves neglected and find an excuse for taking umbrage. From this point, our acquaintanceship naturally and gradually ripened. We got intimate: it was our fate, I suppose—what more or less would you have expected?
Besides, although, mind you, I do not consider myself in any way bound to allay your curiosity and satisfy your compunctious scruples, you should remember that all of us young parishioners of Saint Canon’s—Horner, Baby Blake, Lizzie Dangler and the rest—had known each other almost from the distant days of childhood; and, consequently, were in the habit of tutoyer-ing one another, using our respective “given” names in familiar conversation. The habit may be a bad one, it is true, but you cannot prevent it sometimes. There is no practice so capable of imitation as that of calling one another by the Christian name. It is just like that of the monkeys all cleaning their teeth along the banks of the Amazon with pieces of stick, because they saw Professor Agassiz setting them an example one fine morning, when engaged on his toilet in company with a tooth-brush. You can’t help yourself: you must bow to the custom and follow suit.
In this instance, there was Miss Pimpernell, always addressing her as “Min,” and me as “Frank.” The Dasher girls and others soon learnt to do the same. What more likely than that we ourselves should fall into a similar friendly system? It was only reasonable; and a result which even a less alert person than yourself would have looked for. At all events, neither of us meant any harm by it; and I am willing to “take my affidavit” to that effect any day you please to name, in any Court of Justice you may appoint.
Notwithstanding the intimate footing that now existed between Min and myself, the fact of my non-acquaintance with her mother, annoyed me extremely. You need not flatter yourself, however. It was not in the least on account of any conscientious qualms, like yours.
I wished to know her personally from a totally different motive; and yet, in spite of all attempts and stratagems on my part, I never could get a chance of meeting her when I was in the company of some kind friend to act as go-between and soothe the exigencies of introduction; although, when alone I would encounter her frequently. This was very vexing—especially so after a while; and I’ll tell you how it was.
As the days flew by, and the new year, born in a moment, grew with giant strides in that hasty growth common to all new years—they have a habit of shooting ahead the first few months of their existence, as if they desired to “force the pace,” and make all the “running” they can—my facilities for intercourse with Min became “small by degrees and beautifully less.” There you have the cause of my annoyance at once.
I could see her at the window, certainly. I also frequently passed her mother and herself in the street, or on The Terrace, or along the Prebend’s Walk, when I was taking an airing abroad with dog Catch at my heels; yet, I don’t know how it was, but I invariably chanced to be on the opposite side of the street, or road, or terrace, whenever I thus passed them. I never failed to receive the timid little bow and smile from Min, with a rosy heightening of her complexion the while—to which I had now got so accustomed that, should I have been debarred from their receipt, I would have considered myself very hardly used and felt a morbid inclination to go mad and drown myself. But, Min’s bow was hardly sufficient to introduce me to her mother, even if people could be introduced from opposite sides of roads. Thus it was that I remained a stranger to Mrs Clyde, and did not have a chance of meeting her daughter and talking to her, as I might have done if I could but have visited her at home.