I listened doubtfully: it did not occur to me that his words had any foundation in fact; yet, all the same, the newly-suggested idea burdened me. "I think you are mistaken," said I gently. "Nothing of that kind could ever possibly happen."
"Not for years—not until I am dead," returned Mr. Raymond peevishly. "It was nothing—nothing at all. All that occurred I will tell you, since I was foolish enough to speak of it in the first instance. James said he wanted Helen to be much with you. 'You know how those childish intimacies end,' I replied to him—'in deep attachment and desire for marriage.'—'I ask nothing better for Helen,' James exclaimed. 'She will grow up like other girls, and love, and finally become a wife; and if she became Floyd's wife I should have no fears for her.'" Mr. Raymond's eyes met mine. "You will never tell Mr. Floyd I spoke of this to you," he said under his breath. "I am not quite myself this morning, or I should not have suggested a thought of it to you."
I was very sure that I should never mention it, for I found the idea of my marrying Helen so painfully irksome that it went with me all the day, casting a shadow across our intercourse. I told myself over and over that the idea was absurd—that such a thing could never, never come to pass. She was so mere a child. I studied her face with its baby contours, where nothing showed the dawn of womanhood yet except the great melancholy eyes; I took her hand in mine, where it lay like a snowflake on my brown palm; and I laughed aloud at the grotesqueness of the fancy that I should ever put a ring on that childish finger.
"Why do you laugh?" she asked me wonderingly.
"To think," I rejoined, "how funny it is to remember one day you will be grown up and have rings upon your fingers."
"Is that funny?" she asked. "Of course, if I live I shall grow up and be a woman. My mamma was married when she was only seventeen, and in seven years I shall be seventeen." I dropped her hand as if it had stung me. "I have all mamma's rings," she went on: "I have a drawerful of trinkets that mamma used to wear. When Georgy Lenox comes I shall give her a locket and a chain that are so very, very pretty they will be just right for her. Tell me more about her, Floyd."
It was easy enough for me to grow eloquent in talking of Georgina, and Helen was as anxious to hear as I to tell. The little girl had had few friends of her own sex and age: every summer had brought the New York and Boston Raymonds to The Headlands, and when the neighboring watering-place was in its season numerous flounced and gloved little misses had been introduced to the shy, quaint child, who felt strange and dreary among them all. In fact, the little heiress's position, so unique in every respect, had isolated her from the joys of commonplace childhood, and she found more companionship in her dumb pets, in the sumptuous silence of the blossoming gardens, in the voices of the shore, than among girls of her own age with their chatter about their teachers or governesses, their dancing-steps and their games. Nevertheless, she was both ardent and affectionate, and ready to love all the world; and no sooner had Georgy appeared than she lavished upon her all the passion of girlish fondness for her own sex which had hitherto lain dormant within her. Georgy had always been used to adulation and to lead others by her capricious will and her radiant smile, and within a day after her coming had established almost a dangerous supremacy over the child. It was at once fascinating and disappointing to be under the same roof with Georgy: every[page 208] morning when I awoke it seemed a miracle of happiness that I had but to dress and go out of my room to have a chance of meeting her, of perpetually recurring smiles and conversation such as I had never enjoyed before at Belfield. But the reality never bore out the promise of my vague but delicious reveries. Mr. Raymond at once took an active, almost virulent, dislike to his young guest, and pointed out her faults to me with clear and concise words, each one of which pierced me like a rapier; and the certainty of his condemnation gave me a keen, and at times almost inspired, vision for her weaknesses.
Nothing could exceed her rapture at being in the beautiful house which she had so long wished to see, and which she loudly asserted a thousand times surpassed all her expectations. And she fitted admirably into her costly surroundings: the sheen of her golden hair made the dark velvet cushionings and hangings a more beautiful background than before; she gave expression to the stately, silent rooms; and what had at first been almost, despite its luxury, a desert to me, became a fairy land. Little Helen was so burdened with possessions that it was a pleasure for her to give them away. Still, I wished that Georgy had not been so willing to accept all that the lavish generosity of the child prompted her to offer. But Georgy was no Spartan: she wanted everything that could minister to her comfort. She was a natural gourmand, hungry for sweets and fruits all day long: she coveted ornaments, and found Helen's drawer of trinkets almost too small for her; she liked velvets and furs, silks and plushes, and wore the child's clothes until Mr. Raymond sent his housekeeper to Boston to purchase her a complete outfit of her own. But all these faults I could have pardoned in Georgy, and ascribed them to her faulty education and false influences at home, had she been grateful to little Helen.
"She hates Helen for being luckier than herself," Mr. Raymond affirmed: "she would do her a mischief if she could."
I could not believe that, yet I could see that she loved to torture the child, whose acute sensibilities made her suffer from the slightest coldness or suspicion.