There was nothing at all to keep us from the necessity of talking to each other, for he immediately gave up looking at the portraits, and the room was in fatal good order, and all the books put away. After the first awkward pause, he said something about the pictures: “they were family portraits, no doubt.”
“No,” said I, “that is, they are not Southcotes; they are portraits of grandmamma’s family, I suppose; but we always count our family on the other side.”
Then we came to another dead pause, and Mr. Edgar advanced to the window where I sat.
“How fresh and green your garden looks,” he said, after the fashion of people who must say something, “what a good effect the grass has – are there really blossoms on the trees? how early everything is this year!”
“We are well sheltered,” said I, in the same tone. “Our trees are always in blossom before our neighbors’.”
“And that is old Corpus,” he said, glancing out at the little gleaming windows of the College, “all this youth and life out of doors, contrasts strangely enough, I am sure, with the musty existence within.”
“The books may be musty, but I don’t think the existence is,” said I, rashly; “everybody ought to be happy that has something to do.”
“Yes. I always envy a hard student who has an object,” said Mr. Edgar, rather eagerly seizing upon this possibility of conversation – “he is a happy fellow who has a profession to study for, otherwise it is vanity and vexation of spirit.”
Now I had a strong instinct of contradiction in me – a piece of assertion always provoked me to resistance.
“I do not know how that can be,” said I. “I suppose Mr. Osborne only lives for his books, and his spirit shows very little vexation or vanity, and papa does nothing else but study, and cannot have any object in it – I fancy a good thing ought to be good for its own sake.”
“Mr. Osborne is a very busy man – he has a great many pursuits,” said my new friend, “he is not a fair example. We have an enthusiasm for books when we are young, and suck inspiration from them, and then we come back to them that they may deaden our own feelings and recollections after we have had a life of our own – when we are old.”
“You are not old, to be aware of that,” cried I, though I secretly thought that, at least, in my father’s case this might be true.
“I have lived a very solitary life,” he said, “which is almost as good as grey hairs.”
After that we paused again, very conscious of our silence, but finding conversation a very difficult matter. I was more at my ease than I had expected. I observed him, but not with the same intense observation. A person I knew by name, and spoke to in my father’s house, was a less mysteriously interesting person than the stranger who had attracted my notice so much, when all were strangers. At last, Mr. Edgar began to talk again – it was only to ask me if I had seen the great author who was at the party when he met me first – he did not say “had the pleasure to meet.”
“I saw him, but I did not speak to him – nor even hear him speak,” said I.
Another pause – what were we to say? “Do you like his books?” said the young man.
“I do not care for any books but novels,” said I bluntly. I am afraid I was not above a wish to shock and horrify him.
Mr. Edgar laughed a little, and his color rose. I am sure I did what I could to give him an unfavorable impression of me, in this our first interview. He said —
“You are very honest, Miss Southcote.”
I cannot tell how it was either that he presumed so far, or that I suspected it – but I certainly did think he had a great mind to say Hester, instead of Miss Southcote, and only checked himself by an effort. It was very strange – I felt haughty immediately, but I scarcely felt displeased; but I am sure there was a consciousness in the deep color that rose upon his face, and in my tone as I answered him.
“I am only telling the truth,” said I. “I cannot help it – when it is only thinking about a thing, I would rather think myself. A story is a different matter; I am very sorry for my dulness, but I think there are no really pleasant books except those which tell a story.”
“Even that limit reaches to something more than novels,” said Mr. Edgar; “there is history, and biography besides.”
“Yes – but then I only care for them for the mere story’s sake,” said I, “and not because they are true or good, or for any better reason. I suppose a man’s life is often more like a novel than like anything else – only, perhaps, not so well arranged. The misfortunes do not come in so conveniently, and neither do the pleasures. I think reading a novel is almost next best to having something to do.”
“I am afraid some of us think it a superior good, now and then,” said my companion.
And so our talk came to an abrupt conclusion again. It was my turn to make a new beginning, and I could not. I did not like to ask him any questions about himself – which was his college, or if he was a Cambridgeshire man, or any of the things I wished to know; and, as I glanced up at his thoughtful face, I once more fell a-pondering what he could be thinking of. I do not recollect that I had ever had much curiosity about other people’s thoughts before. My father always had a book before him, which he read, or made a pretence of reading, and my father’s meditations were sacred to me. I guessed at them with reverence, but it would have been sacrilege to inquire into them. As my established right, I claimed to know what Alice was thinking of, and did not need to wonder; but here, with the full charm of a mystery which I could not inquire into, came back upon me my first curiosity about this stranger. Either his face did express what was in his mind, or I was not acquainted with its language. What was he thinking of? – what did he generally think of? I wondered over his thoughts so much that I had no leisure to think of himself who was standing beside me, though still I was strongly aware of every movement he made.
Just then I heard my father and Mr. Osborne ascending the stairs. I was half sorry, and yet altogether glad that they were coming; and I was a little curious how my father would receive my new acquaintance. My father received him with stately politeness, distant but not ungracious, and as Mr. Osborne and he took their usual places, they began their ordinary conversation. When Mr. Edgar joined in it, I discovered from what they said that he was a student of Corpus, a close neighbor, and it amused me a little to watch the three gentlemen as they talked; of course, my father and Mr. Osborne were in the daily habit of talking, without any greater reference to me than if I had been a very little girl with a doll and a pinafore. I was not intellectual. I did not care for their discussions about books – and I expected no share in their conversation, nor wished it. I was quite pleased to sit by, with the ring of their voices in my ear, doing my needlework. I always worked at something, during these times; and thinking my own thoughts. But Mr. Edgar, who was unused to this, and perhaps did not think me quite so little a girl as my father and his friend did, was puzzled and disconcerted, as I saw, by my exclusion from the stream of talk. I had a certain pleasure in showing him how much a matter of course this was. I had never known a young man of rank and age before, but I had a perverse delight in making myself appear something different to what I was. I turned half aside to the window, and hemmed as only demure little girls can hem, when grave talk is going on over their heads. But I saw very well how uncertainly he was regarding me – how puzzled he was that I should be left out of the conversation, and how he wanted to be polite and amiable, and draw me in.
“How is the garden, Hester?” said Mr. Osborne at last, rising and coming towards me with a subject adapted to the capacity of the little girl, “what! blossom already on that little apple tree – what a sturdy little fellow it is! Now, Southcote, be honest – how many colds has Hester taken this winter in consequence of your trap for wet feet – that grass crotchet of yours?”
“Hester