Not being a Scotchman, I am incapable of going into the metaphysics of this thing. However, I may point out that there was some difference between the love I had felt for Conny and the love that I now felt for Theresa. To begin with, I deny that I ever did love Conny. Oh yes, you may turn back to other chapters and point me out several most condemnatory phrases; but don’t judge people by phrases. There is only one alphabet, but there are a hundred passions; and admiration will express itself in the language of love, precisely as if it were the most perfect and enduring devotion.
I had loved Conny for her face and figure. Voilà tout. She had not one intellectual charm, that I can remember, to fascinate me. Reading her character in the light thrown upon it by her elopement, I found, let me tell you, a very great deal that was decidedly objectionable. This was enough to confirm my indifference.
Now it was quite otherwise with Theresa. I won’t pretend that I didn’t immensely admire her handsome face, and fine eyes, and noble figure, and that they were not the first cause of my loving her. But during my stay at Thistlewood, I had discovered many qualities in her which, had I not been influenced in a great measure by Conny, would have settled the question there and then, and dismissed me to Updown as much in love as ever man was. It was enough that Conny should turn out a regular little trickster, who had trifled with my feelings merely to fool me at last, to send my thoughts trooping to Theresa. Here was a foil upon which her fine qualities of head and heart could not fail to glisten brightly. Long before had the memory of her eccentric reception of me been transmuted by the alchemy of admiration into a pungent and a piquant reminiscence; so that could not deform my opinion of her. Here, then, my love was based upon altogether different ground from that on which I had built my first and unsubstantial passion. There were physical graces to charm me; there were mental characteristics to fascinate me. A love was now inspired that was every day to gain greater strength; and thus I could start on my new amatory career with a conviction that, whether I should win Theresa’s love or not, my devotion would never be met with a heartless betrayal.
I never left the bank to return to Grove End with more pleasure than I did on that day. Uncle Dick had returned to Thistlewood by the mid-day train, and I found Theresa thoroughly domiciled, sitting at the open drawing-room window with some work in her hand. A bright look lighted up her face when she saw me.
“When will Conny be here?” she asked.
“Very shortly, I expect. How have you been amusing yourself?”
“Aunt and I went for a drive this afternoon,” she answered, laying down her work, and joining me on the lawn. “Hasn’t uncle Tom returned with you?”
“He remained behind with the phaeton to drive the turtle doves over,” said I. “The truth is, he wants Updown to see him and them together. We all stand in awe of gossip.”
“Aunt is much more reasonable than she was last evening,” exclaimed Theresa. “The talking-to Papa gave her has done her no harm. She is, I think, slowly beginning to see that her husband’s view is the soundest, and that Conny might have done a very great deal worse, though she might also have done a very great deal better. Mothers are nearly always the last to come round in these matters. I wonder why?”