“Oh, is that all, papa? are you sure that is all? Not—what they were speaking of last night?—not—oh, forgive me!—I did not understand; only the loss of your money—no more that that, papa?”
A painful contraction, almost a grimace, went over his face. The rage which he had partially assumed before was now real, but he did not show it. He clenched his fist at her, but kept it in his pocket, and put on a smile which looked something between a grin and a snarl. “Most people would think it was quite enough—and more than enough. Now you know my secret. I did not want—to make you unhappy,” he said.
“Oh, unhappy! it is the contrary; if you knew how happy you have made me!” said Helen, with the first real smile that had visited them for days in her wet eyes. “You have taken off the weight here—oh, it is all gone, and I can breathe. You have lost your money, poor papa! I am so sorry, and yet I can’t help being glad. After all, what does it matter? We have enough, and we are together. Oh, if you knew the things that have been going through my wicked, wretched heart! Papa, will you forgive me?” the girl cried, growing pale and clasping her hands. “Oh, I ought to ask your pardon on my knees!”
“We will dispense with that formula,” said her father, with a chilly smile which froze her fervour; “perhaps this will teach you to refrain from hasty judgment. There can scarcely be a case, let me entreat you to believe, in which I shall not be the best judge of us two.”
“Yes, papa,” she said submissively: then added with a timid look, “but would it not have been better to have stayed and met it in the face, whatever it was? To be unfortunate is not any harm. What could ruin do to us, but to make us poor? Papa——”
A sharp laugh from him cut her short; he could have struck her as he struck Janey when she found out his disguise, but he did not dare to treat the elder sister so, and she was more easily managed in the other way. “It seems to me,” he said, “that you are doing precisely what you have just promised not to do. We have agreed that I am the best judge, and the judge I mean to be, in my own concerns. Therefore go to bed, and recollect that to-morrow you are Miss Harford—and know nothing about that other name.”
She shrank a little away, looking at him with piteous eyes. “Yes, papa,” she said; “but——” and stood looking with a beseeching, tender entreaty. She clasped her hands, but she did not say anything, though every moving line of her face, the glimmer of moisture in her eyes, the quiver in her lips, all spoke. In his impatience he stamped his foot on the floor.
“By Jove! you will drive me mad,” he cried, “with your fancies and your hesitations. Do what I tell you—hold your tongue, if you are so scrupulous about an innocent social pretence. What does it matter to those French clowns what name I call myself by? Will they be any the wiser? And I hold that a man has as much right to his mother’s name as his father’s. It is the same thing. There, Helen, I forgive your nonsense, because you are tired out, poor child! Go to bed.”
“Yes, papa,” she said, but still she did not budge. All this time the voices and noises were going on below, sounds of disputation, quick fire of talk, more vivacious and louder in tone than anything English; outside and in, there were sounds of conversation going on. All this babel of sound continued while these two quiet English persons had their explanation, which meant so much; the rest meant nothing. When Helen thought of it after, she always remembered the discussion in the salle à manger, and the clatter of words which Jeannette on the top storey flung down to her mistress below-stairs.
But as for herself she had said her say. Her father bade her good night in a peremptory tone, dismissing her beyond appeal. But he was very kind, and kissed her, though she was conscious of a thrill and tremor about him when he did so, which she could not understand to be suppressed rage. But as it was, Helen retired with a weight gone from her heart, as she said—yet not such a complete relief as she had felt at the first moment. Only ruin, only poverty! these were nothing. But then—people were sorry for men who had lost all their money, nobody was cruel to them, or thought it their fault; it was nothing to be ashamed of; the best people in the world (she reflected) have been poor; therefore why, why had he fled from home? Why had he not faced the worst? Better even, Helen thought, to have endured a little vexation, to have given up everything, than to have become fugitives, and worn disguises, and feared a friendly face, and changed their name. The weight came back as these strange details recurred to her mind. That false beard! would any deprivation, any scorn of cruel creditors, any misfortune have been so bad, so debasing, so shameful as that? And why should Charley Ashton’s honest face have so appalled him? Ah! Charley Ashton could meet the gaze of all the world and never flinch; he would not disguise himself, nor hide himself, whatever might be the danger. Helen tried to represent to herself that she was not the judge, as he had said—that her father must know best; but there is nothing so difficult to believe as this, especially when reason seems all on our side.