“Is that any reason we shouldn’t now?”
“But Miss Linton will be displeased, if not very angry. Besides, as you know, there may be danger on the river.”
For a short while Gwen is silent, as if pondering on what the other has said. Not on the suggested danger. She is far from being daunted by that. But Miss Linton is her aunt—as already hinted, her legal guardian till of age—head of the house, and still holding authority, though exercising it in the mildest manner. And just on this account it would not be right to outrage it, nor is Miss Wynn the one to do so. Instead, she prefers a little subterfuge, which is in her mind as she makes rejoinder—
“I suppose we must take him along; though it’s very vexatious, and for various reasons.”
“What are they? May I know them?”
“You’re welcome. For one, I can pull a boat just as well as he, if not better. And for another, we can’t have a word of conversation without his hearing it—which isn’t at all nice, besides being inconvenient. As I’ve reason to know, the old curmudgeon is an incorrigible gossip, and tattles all over the parish, I only wish we’d some one else. What a pity I haven’t a brother, to go with us! But not to-day.”
The reserving clause, despite its earnestness, is not spoken aloud. In the aquatic excursion intended, she wants no companion of the male kind—above all, no brother. Nor will she take Joseph; though she signifies her consent to it, by desiring the companion to summon him.
As the latter starts off for the stable-yard, where the ferryman is usually to be found, Gwen says, in soliloquy—
“I’ll take old Joe as far as the boat stairs; but not a yard beyond. I know what will stay him there—steady as a pointer with a partridge six feet from its nose. By the way, have I got my purse with me?”
She plunges her hand into one of her pea-jacket pockets; and, there feeling the thing sought for, is satisfied.