“My dear, it is quite unimportant who she is—unless you think she is one of your brother’s friends. Considering who his associates are, one could never be astonished at any arrival. It may be a lady lecturer, perhaps, on Female Suffrage and Universal Equality.”
“Oh, papa! because he knows one man like that! But I have something to tell you—something that makes mamma and me a little uneasy. A gentleman came on Monday—oh, not a common person at all, a gentleman, and very nice. We could not tell what to do, but at last, after many consultations, we made up our minds to invite him to stay.”
“My dear Alice!” cried Sir William, “what do you and your mother mean? Is my house to be made into an hotel? What is the meaning of it? Am I to understand that you have taken in another nameless person, another disreputable acquaintance of Paul’s? Good heavens! is your mother mad? But I will not put up with it. My house shall not be made a refuge for adventurers, a den of——”
“For that matter,” said Alice growing pale, “I suppose it is mamma’s house too.”
There are opinions that get into the air and spread in sentiment when most opposed to principle. Nobody could have been more horrified than Lady Markham at any claim for her of woman’s rights; but when her little daughter, generously bred, found herself suddenly confronted by this undoubted claim of proprietorship, a chord was struck within her which had perhaps only learned to vibrate of recent days. She looked her father in the face with sudden defiance. She had not intended it—on the contrary, the object of her mission, the chief thing in her thoughts, had been to conciliate him in respect to this visitor, and soften his probable displeasure. But a girl’s mind is a delicate machine, and there is nothing that so easily changes its balance by a sudden touch. A whole claim of rights, a whole code of natural justice, blazed up in her blue eyes. She forgot To-to in her sudden indignation, looking with all the severity of logical youth in her father’s face.
Sir William was altogether taken aback. He returned her look with a kind of consternation.
“You little——” But then he stopped. A man sometimes remembers (though not always) that when he is speaking to his children of their mother it is necessary to do so with respect. Unquestionably it was expedient that a girl should have full faith in her mother. Besides (it gleamed upon Sir William) Alice was not a child. She was a reasonable little creature, able, after all, more or less, to form an opinion for herself. Perhaps he was more disposed to grant this privilege to the girl who was not likely to make any extravagant use of it, than to the boy; or perhaps his ill success in respect to the boy had taught him a lesson. Anyhow he paused. “Of course,” he said, “it is also, as you say, your mamma’s house. A friend of hers, I need not tell you, would be as welcome to me as a friend of my own. Do I ever attempt to settle without her who is to be asked? but with your sense, Alice, you must be aware there is a difference. I must interfere to prevent your excellent mother, who is only too good and kind, from being imposed upon by those disreputable acquaintances of Paul.”
“I beg your pardon, papa,” said Alice, who had been waiting breathless for the end of his address to make her eager apologies. “But,” she added, not unwilling to bring him down summarily from his elevation, “the gentleman I have been speaking of declares that he is your friend, and not Paul’s.”
“My friend! Then I daresay it is quite simple,” said Sir William, relapsing into his previous state of perfect repose and calm. “My friends are your mother’s friends too.”
“Ah, but this is different. (Papa, I am certain that woman is following us.) This is quite different. It is an old friend, whom none of us ever heard of. If we had known even his name we should not have been afraid. But do not be frightened, he is very nice. We all like him. He says he knew you in the West Indies, and the thing that alarmed us was that none of us, not even mamma, ever knew you had been there at all.”