You blame me, dear Helena, for not having paid proper attention to the questions put to me in your last letter. I have only been waiting to make up my mind, before I replied.
First question: Do I think it advisable that you should write to my father? No, my dear; I beg you will defer writing, until you hear from me again.
Second question: Considering that he is still a stranger to you, is there any harm in your asking me what sort of man my father is? No harm, my sweet one; but, as you will presently see, I am afraid you have addressed yourself to the wrong person.
My father is kind, in his own odd way—and learned, and rich—a more high-minded and honorable man (as I have every reason to believe) doesn’t live. But if you ask me which he prefers, his books or his son, I hope I do him no injustice when I answer, his books. His reading and his writing are obstacles between us which I have never been able to overcome. This is the more to be regretted because he is charming, on the few occasions when I find him disengaged. If you wish I knew more about my father, we are in complete agreement as usual—I wish, too.
But there is a dear friend of yours and mine, who is just the person we want to help us. Need I say that I allude to Mrs. Staveley?
I called on her yesterday, not long after she had paid a visit to my father. Luck had favored her. She arrived just at the time when hunger had obliged him to shut up his books, and ring for something to eat. Mrs. Staveley secured a favorable reception with her customary tact and delicacy. He had a fowl for his dinner. She knows his weakness of old; she volunteered to carve it for him.
If I can only repeat what this clever woman told me of their talk, you will have a portrait of Mr. Dunboyne the elder—not perhaps a highly-finished picture, but, as I hope and believe, a good likeness.
Mrs. Staveley began by complaining to him of the conduct of his son. I had promised to write to her, and I had never kept my word. She had reasons for being especially interested in my plans and prospects, just then; knowing me to be attached (please take notice that I am quoting her own language) to a charming friend of hers, whom I had first met at her house. To aggravate the disappointment that I had inflicted, the young lady had neglected her, too. No letters, no information. Perhaps my father would kindly enlighten her? Was the affair going on? or was it broken off?
My father held out his plate and asked for the other wing of the fowl. “It isn’t a bad one for London,” he said; “won’t you have some yourself?”
“I don’t seem to have interested you,” Mrs. Staveley remarked.