“It would be interesting to ascertain his opinion of you,” returned Margaret. “If he puts no higher estimate on your conduct on this occasion than I do, perhaps it is as well for us to remain in ignorance of it.”
“And do you suppose I care one penny for his opinion? If you do, you are much mistaken. I was obliged to give my address when he asked for it, but I hope he’ll not trouble himself to call. I have no desire to improve his acquaintance.”
“And yet you might find it not only pleasant but profitable,” said Margaret. “There are many things that you might, with great benefit, learn from him.”
“Upon my word, Margaret, this is a little too much,” exclaimed Somers. “You have abandoned and repudiated your own people in a very short while, when you can talk of my learning from a conceited Yankee fop like that.”
“It isn’t the first time I’ve advised you to take lessons from the Yankees,” said Margaret; “and as to Mr. Gaston’s being conceited, I really think he’s less so than you are, Charley, though he knows much more. As to his being a Yankee—well, yes, he is a Yankee, as we should say, and he’s a very capable and accomplished one. And as to the third point, of his being a dandy, you know very well he is simply a remarkably well-dressed man, whose appearance in your heart you admire, in spite of your tall talking. But what’s the use of all this? It isn’t dress, nor nationality, nor deportment even, that makes the man. Superficially, you two are very unlike, but I think the discrepancy as to your real natures is by no means so great. You are a pair of true and honorable gentlemen at heart—at least, I believe Mr. Gaston to be such, and I know you are, Charley.”
She spoke in a tone of great gentleness for she knew that, before this interview ended, she must say words which would bruise his poor heart cruelly, and it was a kind and honest heart, which had long cherished for her a true and steadfast devotion By degrees she led him on to a quieter mood, and spoke to him gravely and earnestly of their future lives—his and hers—which, as she gently tried to show him, must needs lie apart. He had heard her utter these sad words before, but there was a difference—an absolute resolve in looks and tones that compelled him to realize that this time they were final. And yet she had never been so gentle and so kind.
“I think too highly of you, Charley,” she said, when their interview was drawing to a close, “to believe that you will let this feeling for me ruin your life. There is so much a man may do! The very thought of it is tantalizing to a woman sometimes. Oh, Charley, be in earnest. It is all you lack. Do something—no matter what, so it is work, and do it faithfully and well. I think that, in itself, would make you almost happy. But don’t think about happiness. Indeed, I think that does not signify so very much. Think only of filling your place in the world and doing your duty to God and man, and happiness will come of itself.”
When she sent him from her at last, the hope which had until now lived in his bosom was quite, quite dead, never to revive again; and yet, with the relinquishment of that hope, a new life seemed to spring up within him, which made him resolve, before he left her presence, that he would win her approval though he could never win her love. He knew he could not feel that he had ever possessed her entire approbation, and it was well worth striving for—better, he said to himself, as many another good man has said, in those first moments of sad renunciation, than another woman’s love.
That evening Charley Somers formed a sudden resolution. He would not go back to the South and the old stagnating life, which had already made its sad impress upon his mind and character. He would set out at once to South America, to join some resolute fellows who were friends of his, who had gone to seek their fortunes, and had often urged him to come to them. He did not see Margaret again, but wrote her a manly note of farewell, over which she shed tears enough to have recalled him from the ends of the earth, if, by ill-luck, he could have seen them.
It happened that Louis Gaston, chancing to meet her on her way to her room with this letter, which she had just been reading, open in her hand, saw her tearful eyes and pale, distressed face; he further noted traces of weeping that would have escaped a superficial observer, when she appeared at dinner an hour later. He could not help associating these signs with Mr. Somers, and when he took occasion to mention the latter’s name, in speaking to Mrs. Gaston after dinner, he was scarcely surprised when she informed him that she had heard, through Margaret, that Mr. Somers had already left for South America, to be gone indefinitely.