"By Jove, Ingram," he said, with a singular light of enthusiasm on his handsome face, "what a beautiful voice that girl has! I have never heard anything so soft and musical in all my life; and then when she smiles what perfect teeth she has! And then, you know, there is an appearance, a style, a grace about her figure—But, I say, do you seriously mean to tell me you are not in love with her?"
"Of course I am not," said the other impatiently, as he was busily engaged with his portmanteau.
"Then let me give you a word of information," said the younger man, with an air of profound shrewdness: "she is in love with you."
Ingram rose with some little touch of vexation on his face: "Look here, Lavender: I am going to talk to you seriously. I wish you wouldn't fancy that every one is in that condition of simmering love-making you delight in. You never were in love, I believe—I doubt whether you ever will be—but you are always fancying yourself in love, and writing very pretty verses about it, and painting very pretty heads. I like the verses and the paintings well enough, however they are come by; but don't mislead yourself into believing that you know anything whatever of a real and serious passion by having engaged in all sorts of imaginative and semi-poetical dreams. It is a much more serious thing than that, mind you, when it comes to a man. And, for Heaven's sake, don't attribute any of that sort of sentimental make-believe to either Sheila Mackenzie or myself. We are not romantic folks. We have no imaginative gifts whatever, but we are very glad, you know, to be attentive and grateful to those who have. The fact is, I don't think it quite fair—"
"Let us suppose I am lectured enough" said the other, somewhat stiffly. "I suppose I am as good a judge of the character of a woman as most other men, although I am no great student, and have no hard and dried rules of philosophy at my fingers' ends. Perhaps, however, one may learn more by mixing with other people and going out into the world than by sitting in a room with a dozen of books, and persuading one's self that men and women are to be studied in that fashion."
"Go away, you stupid boy, and unpack your portmanteau, and don't quarrel with me," said Ingram, putting out on the table some things he had brought for Sheila; "and if you are friendly with Sheila and treat her like a human being, instead of trying to put a lot of romance and sentiment about her, she will teach you more than you could learn in a hundred drawing-rooms in a thousand years."
CHAPTER III.
THERE WAS A KING IN THULE.
He never took that advice. He had already transformed Sheila into a heroine during the half hour of their stroll from the beach and around the house. Not that he fell in love with her at first sight, or anything even approaching to that. He merely made her the central figure of a little speculative romance, as he had made many another woman before. Of course, in these little fanciful dramas, written along the sky-line, as it were, of his life, he invariably pictured himself as the fitting companion of the fair creature he saw there. Who but himself could understand the sentiment of her eyes, and teach her little love-ways, and express unbounded admiration of her? More than one practical young woman, indeed, in certain circles of London society, had been informed by her friends that Mr. Lavender was dreadfully in love with her; and had been much surprised, after this confirmation of her suspicions, that he sought no means of bringing the affair to a reasonable and sensible issue. He did not even amuse himself by flirting with her, as men would willingly do who could not be charged with any serious purpose whatever. His devotion was more mysterious and remote. A rumor would get about that Mr. Lavender had finished another of those charming heads in pastel, which, at a distance, reminded one of Greuze, and that Lady So-and-so, who had bought it forthwith, had declared that it was the image of this young lady who was partly puzzled and partly vexed by the incomprehensible conduct of her reputed admirer. It was the fashion, in these social circles, to buy those heads of Lavender when he chose to paint them. He had achieved a great reputation by them. The good people liked to have a genius in their own set whom they had discovered, and who was only to be appreciated by persons of exceptional taste and penetration. Lavender, the uninitiated were assured, was a most cultivated and brilliant young man. He had composed some charming songs. He had written, from time to time, some quite delightful little poems, over which fair eyes had grown full and liquid. Who had not heard of the face that he painted for a certain young lady whom every one expected him to marry?
The young man escaped a great deal of the ordinary consequences of this petting, but not all. He was at bottom really true-hearted, frank and generous—generous even to an extreme—but he had acquired a habit of producing striking impressions which dogged and perverted his every action and speech. He disliked losing a few shilling at billiards, but he did not mind losing a few pounds: the latter was good for a story. Had he possessed any money to invest in shares, he would have been irritated by small rises or small falls; but he would have been vain of a big rise, and he would have regarded a big fall with equanimity, as placing him in a dramatic light. The exaggerations produced by this habit of his fostered strange delusions in the minds of people who did not know him very well: and sometimes the practical results, in the way of expected charities or what not, amazed him. He could not understand why people should have made such mistakes, and resented them as an injustice.