On the road he asked me what had made me hurry away, the night before.
“My aunt’s screams,” I answered. “My nerves disappear when a woman cries. I hope she is well this morning.”
“Moody, terribly moody. I very much fear that she will never be able to get over her prejudice against Curling.”
“They’ll have a kind of home of their own,” said I, “and I suppose before long you’ll furnish a house for them.”
“Oh, that I must do as soon as possible, if only for the sake of appearances. It would never do for people to say ‘Hargrave’s daughter is in lodgings. Depend upon it, Hargrave is not the substantial man we have thought him or he would never allow his child to live so meanly.’ A hint of this kind started by the first malicious person it occurred to, would run through the town, and ultimately, perhaps, injure the bank; for people naturally would object to trust their money to a man who, if he is too poor to assist his daughter, must be obviously living beyond his means by residing in such a house as mine.”
I quite appreciated this reasoning, which nevertheless had, I was persuaded, nothing whatever to do with his real motives. The fact was, he felt he had no business to forgive Conny too readily and make her as comfortable as if she had married with his full consent. But as, in spite of his conscience, he had forgiven her, and as he had determined, in defiance of his sense of justice, that she should be comfortable, there was nothing for him to do but to mask his fine instincts with worldly considerations, and pretend to find the inspiration of his kindness in the fear of gossip.
On reaching the bank, he was detained for some time in consultation with a client. When released, he told me he was now going to call on the rector to see about getting Conny married properly; and away he trudged, under a broiling sun, agitated, and energetic, and looking worried to death.
Ah, Eugenio, these are some of the little troubles people have to put up with who take wives and raise families. No doubt, if we had our way, we should marry our daughters to dukes, and our sons to maids of honour. But our children, most of us find, have their own original theories upon the subject of matrimony; and, as they are our masters and mistresses, what are we to do but to submit? follow them humbly, hat in hand? blubber our congratulations over the marriages contrived by themselves, and illustrate, by our meek faces, how sensible we are that we were put upon this earth for no other purpose than to make handsome settlements, welcome the poor and needy into our family circles, order wedding-breakfasts and bridesmaids’ lockets, fiddlers and waiters, champagne and carriages, that the events we deprecate may be celebrated with all proper magnificence? and, finally, half beggar ourselves to furnish those houses which we are never afterwards to enter without being made to feel that, “papa and mamma do interfere so?”
My poor uncle returned to the bank a little before four o’clock, covered with dust and perspiration.
“Never,” he gasped, sinking into a chair, “never whilst I live may I be called upon to do such a day’s work again.”