第121章

The Docimers were now in London, where it was their custom to live during six months of the year,; but Houston had not been at their house since he had parted from them in the Tyrol. He had spent but little of his time in London since the autumn, and, when there, had not been anxious to see people who had, at any rate, treated him somewhat roughly. But now it would be necessary that he should answer Imogene's letter. What should be the nature of such answer he certainly had not as yet decided;nor could he have decided before those very convincing assurances of Sir Thomas Pringle. That matter was at any rate over, and now the "Adriatic might wed another," -- if the Adriatic thought well to do so. The matter, however, was one which required a good deal of consideration. He gave to it ten minutes of intense thought, during which he consumed a cup of coffee and a cigarette;and then, throwing away the burnt end of the paper, he hurried into the morning-room, and wrote to the lady as follows:

DEAR IMOGENE, You will not have to press to your bosom as my wife the second daughter of Sir Thomas Tringle, Bart. The high honour of that alliance has at last been refused by him in very plain language.

Had she become Mrs Frank Houston, I do not doubt but you would have done your duty to your own cousin. That lot, however, has not been written for me in the Book of Fates. The father is persistent in looking upon me as an idle profligate adventurer; and though he has been kind enough to hint more than once that it might be possible for me to achieve the young lady, he has succeeded in convincing me that I never should achieve anything beyond the barren possession of her beauty. A wife and family on my present very moderate income would be burdensome; and, therefore, with infinite regrets, I have bade adieu to Miss Tringle.

I have not hitherto been to see either you or your brother or Mrs Docimer because I have been altogether unaware whether you or your brother or Mrs Docimer would be glad to see me. As you say yourself, there was a storm on the Tyrolese hillside -- in which there was more than one wind blowing at the same time.

I do not find fault with anybody -- perhaps a storm was needed to clear the air. But I hate storms. I do not pretend to be a very grand fellow, but I do endeavour not to be disagreeable.

Your brother, if you remember, was a little hard. But, in truth, I say this only to account for my apparent incivility.

And, perhaps, with another object -- to gain a little time before I plunge into the stern necessity of answering all that you say in your very comprehensive letter of five lines. The first four lines I have answered. There will be no such Mrs Frank Houston as that suggested. And then, as to the last line. Of course, you will see me again, and that very speedily. So it would seem that the whole letter is answered.

But yet it is not answered. There is so much in it that whole sheets would not answer it. A quire of notepaper stuffed full would hardly contain all that I might find to say in answer to it -- on one side and the other. Nay, I might fill as many reams of folio as are required for a three-volume novel. And then Imight call it by one of two names, The Doubts of Frank Houston, or The Constancy of Imogene Docimer -- as I should at last bring my story to one ending or the other. But the novel would contain that fault which is so prevalent in the novels of the present day. The hero would be a very namby-pamby sort of a fellow, whereas the heroine would be too perfect for human nature.

"The hero would be always repeating to himself a certain line out of a Latin poet, which, of all lines, is the most heart-breaking:

The better course I see and know -- The worser one is where Igo.

But then in novels the most indifferent hero comes out right at last. Some god comes out of a theatrical cloud and leaves the poor devil ten thousand a year and a title. He isn't much of a hero when he does go right under such inducements, but he suffices for the plot, and everything is rose-coloured. I would be virtuous at a much cheaper rate -- if only a young man with his family might have enough to eat and drink. What is your idea of the lowest income at which a prudent -- say not idiotically-quixotic hero -- might safely venture to become heroic?

Now I have written to you a long letter, and think that I have indicated to you the true state of my feelings. Whatever may turn up I do not think I shall go fortune-hunting again. If half a million in female hands were to throw itself at my head, there is no saying whether I might not yield. But I do not think that I shall again make inquiry as to the amount of booty supposed to be within the walls of a city, and then sit down to besiege the city with regular lines of approach. It is a disgusting piece of work. I do not say but what I can lie, and did lie foully on the last siege operation; but I do not like it. And then to be told that one is unmanly by the father, and a coward by the young lady, as occurred to me in this affair, is disheartening.

They were both right, though I repudiated their assertions. This might be borne as a prelude to success; but, as part of a failure, it is disgusting. At the present moment I am considering what economy might effect as to a future bachelor life, and am meditating to begin with a couple of mutton chops and half a pint of sherry for my dinner today. I know I shall break down and have a woodcock and some champagne.

I will come to you about three on Sunday. If you can manage that your brother should go out and make his calls, and your sister attend divine service in the afternoon, it would be a comfort.

Yours always, F. HOUSTON