“Hard upon Arthur! I did not suppose so; he can fight his own battles,” said Lucy, raising her head with a look which was almost haughty. “But you are unkind to us. You are my cousin, our nearest relation, Bertie. You should not go about telling disagreeable stories. And then you are a—”
“Go on,” he said; “recall me to my duties. I am a clergyman—was not that what you were about to say? and I ought not to be a gossip, going from house to house. I will not attempt to defend myself, Lucy. If that is my character, it is better I should say nothing; and certainly, if you think so, I cannot undertake to undeceive you. It is you who are unkind to me.”
“I don’t think so. I did not mean to say so much as that,” said Lucy, abashed. “But oh, Bertie, why should you treat us so? Are not we, is not Arthur, your own flesh and blood.”
“I am but too ready to acknowledge it, too glad to think of it,” he said with a sudden smile.
And as Lucy had no difficulty in looking at him, no shyness about meeting his eyes, she could not help seeing the eagerness in them, and softening of unmistakeable sentiment. Altogether, apart from the fact that she would be very well off and an excellent match, he liked her as sincerely as was in him. Love, perhaps, is too strong a word; but he liked her, well enough to have wanted to marry her if she had only possessed a competence and nothing more, if she had not been in any exceptional position as the only obedient and dutiful child of the house. Whether his sentiment was of a robust enough kind to have made him seek Lucy had she been poor, is a different question; but it might even have been strong enough for this, perhaps, for all anyone could say.
She was softened too. Lucy was not one of those farouche young women who resent being loved. She was sorry that any such mistaken feeling should be in his mind, if it was in his mind; but all the same she was rather softened than hardened by the look of eager conciliatoriness and desire to please her, which was in his face.
“Aunt Anthony might have told us herself. She need not have let other people know,” she said, shifting her ground, and in a gentler tone.
But here he had a very good answer provided.
“My mother is not here,” he said, quite gently, without a tinge of reproach. “She cannot either explain or defend herself.”
What could Lucy say? She blushed crimson, deeply moved by the sting of this retort courteous.