‘Oh, Jack!’ cried Mrs. Egerton horrified, clasping her hands in deprecation. ‘I never said that. I never thought it. It is only that you are not in the same sphere.’
‘Would you say so if I were at the head of my firm?’ said John, ‘if I were making thousands a year; if I had works going on all over the world? I shall be if you will give me time. Would you say then that I was not of the same sphere?’
‘Yes,’ said Elly, quick as lightning, taking the words with fine scorn out of her aunt’s mouth; ‘for, of course, it would not be likely then that you would come to a poor little village to ask for a country girl like me.’
Percy had been standing all this time with his back to the belligerents, looking fixedly out of the window. His back was as uncertain and embarrassed a back as ever man had. It gave his aunt no support at all. There was something in the aspect of his shoulders shrugged up to his ears, and his elbows sunk with the plunging of his hands into his pockets, that took all courage out of her. Percy, who had been so much more strenuous on this question than Aunt Mary herself, who had undertaken to speak to John! And now, here he stood, taking no notice, gazing out of the window! When it came to this point, however, he turned round, not looking at anyone, his eyebrows pulled down over his eyes.
‘I say,’ he remarked, slowly, ‘what is the good of all this now? It’s gone too far to be stopped like this. You should have made an end of it long ago. I warned you when he came first. You had no call to have him here. It was folly to begin with, and it’s nonsense now. You wouldn’t let him marry Elly if he could, and he couldn’t if you did let him. What’s the good of going on? It’s all true that both of you say. If he was rich enough you’d have him like a shot. But you can’t have him now, and he knows it, and so do we all. Why, even my father would make a stand. It’s a pity they’ve had this talk, but it can’t be helped now. The best thing for him to do is to go right away.’
‘Away!’ cried Elly and John in a breath, making a simultaneous step towards each other. Percy was the little one of the family. He was much shorter than John, and even than Elly, whose female garments and hair upon the top of her head gave her the advantage. He came drifting between them, still with his hands in his pockets.
‘I like good family and that sort of thing,’ said Percy, ‘but I never said it required that to make a gentleman. Handsome is as handsome does. There are things a fellow can do, and things he can’t do,’ said this young man.
‘I know what he means, Elly,’ said John, ‘and I believe he’s right, though I never thought Percy would stand my friend. I’ll go, Mrs. Egerton: he’s right. I’ll not even hold Elly to what she has said—(though I know the sky will fall before she’ll desert me,’ he exclaimed, in an aside). ‘But I’ll not say another word. I’ll go.’
The ladies looked at him with a little gasp of surprise, Elly standing with her lips apart as if she had begun to speak and stopped herself, Mrs. Egerton drawing a sudden long breath. She was astonished by the sudden quick turn this youthful argument had taken. Percy, her champion, her inspirer even, had seemed to take the other side, and yet had routed the enemy. It was altogether amazing and incomprehensible, almost disappointing: for Mrs. Egerton had felt that John would take a great deal of arguing with, and she had some belief in her own powers. The scene was a curious one. Percy, standing between the two with his hands in his pockets and his head down, looked more as if some wind had blown him there than as if he had been taking an active part in such a controversy. Mr. Cattley, still sitting passive near Mrs. Egerton’s table, had now lifted his head and was looking on, while John, all firm and strong in his new resolution, had become the centre of the group.
‘I thought I might have had a week more,’ said John, with a touch of pathos which went to the hearts of both the ladies, ‘after all these years! But I won’t, Elly. I won’t waste another moment. What do I want with holidays when there’s you at the end? Mrs. Egerton, good-bye. You’ve been awfully kind to me. And I know you’re right. I’m not a match for her. I’ll never be good enough—but I’ll be rich enough one day, please God.’