Rachel Percival never thought much of him. She said he was weak, and weakness in a man is something Rachel never excuses. She says it is trespassing on one of the special privileges of our sex. Thus she disposed of Charlie Hardy.
“Look at his chin,” said Rachel; “could a man be strong with a chin like that?”
“But he is so kind-hearted and easy to get along with,” I urged.
“Very likely. He hasn’t strength of mind to quarrel. He is unwilling, like most easy-going men, to inflict that kind of pain. But he could be as cruel as the grave in other ways. Look at him. He always is in hot water about something, and never does as people expect him to do.”
“But he doesn’t do wrong on purpose, and he makes charming excuses and apologies.”
“He ought to; he has had enough practice,” answered Rachel, with her beautiful smile. “He has what I call a conscience for surface things. He regards life from the wrong point of view, and, as to his always intending to do right—you know the place said to be paved with good intentions. No, no, Ruth. Charlie Hardy is a dangerous man, because he is weak. Through such men as he comes very bitter sorrow in this world.”
That conversation, Tabby, took place, if not before you were created, at least in your early infancy—the time when your own weight threw you down if you tried to walk, and when ears and tail were the least of your make-up.
All these years Charlie has never married, but was always with the girls. He dropped with perfect composure from our set to Sallie Cox’s—was her slave for two years, though Sallie declares that she never was engaged to him. “What’s the use of being engaged to a man that you can keep on hand without?” quoth Sallie. But Charlie bore no malice. “I didn’t stand the ghost of a show with a girl like Sallie, when she had such men as Winston Percival and those literary chaps around her. It was great sport to watch her with those men. You know what a little chatterbox she is. By Jove! when that fellow Percival began to talk, Sallie never had a word to say for herself. It must have been awfully hard for her, but she certainly let him do all the talking, and just sat and listened, looking as sweet as a peach. Oh! I never had any chance with Sallie.”
Nevertheless, he was usher at her wedding, then dropped peacefully to the next younger set, and now is going with girls of Pet Winterbotham’s age.
I thoroughly like the boy, but I can’t imagine myself falling in love with him. If I were married to another man—an indiscreet thing for an Old Maid to say, Tabby, but I only use it for illustration—I should not mind Charlie Hardy’s dropping in for Sunday dinner every week, if he wanted to. He never bothers. He never is in the way. He is as deft at buttoning a glove as he is amiable at playing cards. You always think of Charlie Hardy first if you are making up a theatre party. He serves equally well as groomsman or pall-bearer—although I do not speak from experience in either instance. He never is cross or sulky. He makes the best of everything, and I think men say that he is “an all-round good fellow.”