Rachel was actually indifferent to the entire question of the marriage.
Having made the astonishing discovery, Julia renounced her worldliness for the time. Had the circumstances been other than just what they were, had the stranger been as eager for the marriage as Simon himself, Julia assuredly would have employed every means to frustrate their plans, and would have taken a malicious pleasure in her own manoeuvring because of rooted antipathy to Simon. As matters stood, however, she resolved to do the ignorant and unambitious young thing a service in spite of herself. Instead of a few days, Julia begged to keep the invalid indefinitely, and it was owing to her entreaties, rather than to Simon's arguments, that Rachel finally consented to remain a fortnight.
Then Julia applied herself, with the utmost discretion, to furthering the romance. She attempted to prick the girl to interest by discreetly praising Simon. He was very much looked up to by members of the Jewellers' Association of which he was the president; as a business man, as a member of society at large, he was irreproachable: and she made these statements without a curl of the lip. Rachel listened in silence. Then Julia employed other tactics. She waxed spiteful in her remarks about her cousin; she even laughed at his peculiarities. An oyster was not more secretive, and save for his trick of running his fingers through his hair in moments of agitation or excitement, one would never dream that he knew an emotion. At that, the other raised resentful eyes. She saw nothing ridiculous about Mr. Hart; on the contrary, his manner was unusually dignified. In justice to him she avowed the fact, then would say no more.
As yet Rachel was too weak to consider her situation. Grief had excluded every other emotion; even memory of Emil had flagged. Ill at ease and oppressed by the luxury around her, she strove to conceal every sign of her desperate sorrow and it was only at night that she relaxed command over herself. Then, convulsed with sobs, she lay in the darkness and, stretching out her hands, whispered, "Grandfather, are you there?" Her despair was the deeper because of the fantastic conceit that old David's simple soul was kept away by the richness of her surroundings. Had she remained in the poor rooms of the tenement, his spirit could have found her readily, descending out of that patch of pure sky visible through the dormer windows, even as the souls of saints and angels descend out of the blue in old pictures.
These woful imaginings, incident to physical weakness, for a time oppressed her; but later, as her strength came, she turned from them. She began to look at life with apprehensive eyes, though she still said little.
Simon felt that she was reading him and agonized under her gaze. Vainly he tried to speak the word that honour, pity, decency demanded. Could he have beheld her existing without masculine companionship, he would have released her, but the possibility of an unknown rival in the shrouded future, a rival whose love she would return, sealed his lips. Out of her presence the tension of the situation was relieved. When no longer confronted by her helpless and mutely accusing youth, it was a simple matter for him to convince himself that the step he had contemplated was unnecessary. Girls as young as she were material easily moulded; if she did not love him now, she would later. Meanwhile the situation was ambiguous, and for that reason, if for no other, an early marriage was advisable.
Despite these arguments, he began to show the effect of mental torture. The man was passing through fire. At last even Julia was moved by his look. As Rachel was the cause of the unnatural, strained situation, she proposed that something be done to rouse her spirits.
"Give her a taste of pleasure," Julia advised, "She's a little frozen ghost now, but I've yet to see the girl whose gloom won't yield to amusement and excitement."
With an eagerness almost pathetic, Simon agreed to this proposal. But just what could they do?
The answer came promptly: "Dress her properly and carry her off to some gay resort for the early spring. I will take her in charge, if you say so?"