Felix had lately become conscious of a luxurious preference for the society--if possible unshared with others--of Gertrude Wentworth; but he had relegated this young lady, for the moment, to the coldly brilliant category of unattainable possessions. She was not the first woman for whom he had entertained an unpractical admiration.
He had been in love with duchesses and countesses, and he had made, once or twice, a perilously near approach to cynicism in declaring that the disinterestedness of women had been overrated.
On the whole, he had tempered audacity with modesty; and it is but fair to him now to say explicitly that he would have been incapable of taking advantage of his present large allowance of familiarity to make love to the younger of his handsome cousins.
Felix had grown up among traditions in the light of which such a proceeding looked like a grievous breach of hospitality.
I have said that he was always happy, and it may be counted among the present sources of his happiness that he had as regards this matter of his relations with Gertrude a deliciously good conscience.
His own deportment seemed to him suffused with the beauty of virtue--a form of beauty that he admired with the same vivacity with which he admired all other forms.
"I think that if you marry," said Mr. Wentworth presently, "it will conduce to your happiness."
"Sicurissimo!" Felix exclaimed; and then, arresting his brush, he looked at his uncle with a smile. "There is something I feel tempted to say to you.
May I risk it?"
Mr. Wentworth drew himself up a little. "I am very safe;
I don't repeat things." But he hoped Felix would not risk too much.
Felix was laughing at his answer.
"It 's odd to hear you telling me how to be happy. I don't think you know yourself, dear uncle. Now, does that sound brutal?"
The old man was silent a moment, and then, with a dry dignity that suddenly touched his nephew: "We may sometimes point out a road we are unable to follow."
"Ah, don't tell me you have had any sorrows," Felix rejoined.
"I did n't suppose it, and I did n't mean to allude to them.
I simply meant that you all don't amuse yourselves."
"Amuse ourselves? We are not children."
"Precisely not! You have reached the proper age.
I was saying that the other day to Gertrude," Felix added.
"I hope it was not indiscreet."
"If it was," said Mr. Wentworth, with a keener irony than Felix would have thought him capable of, "it was but your way of amusing yourself.
I am afraid you have never had a trouble."
"Oh, yes, I have!" Felix declared, with some spirit; "before I knew better.
But you don't catch me at it again."
Mr. Wentworth maintained for a while a silence more expressive than a deep-drawn sigh. "You have no children," he said at last.
"Don't tell me," Felix exclaimed, "that your charming young people are a source of grief to you!"
"I don't speak of Charlotte." And then, after a pause, Mr. Wentworth continued, "I don't speak of Gertrude.
But I feel considerable anxiety about Clifford.
I will tell you another time."
The next time he gave Felix a sitting his nephew reminded him that he had taken him into his confidence. "How is Clifford to-day?" Felix asked.
"He has always seemed to me a young man of remarkable discretion.
Indeed, he is only too discreet; he seems on his guard against me--as if he thought me rather light company. The other day he told his sister--
Gertrude repeated it to me--that I was always laughing at him. If I laugh it is simply from the impulse to try and inspire him with confidence.
That is the only way I have."
"Clifford's situation is no laughing matter," said Mr. Wentworth.
"It is very peculiar, as I suppose you have guessed."
"Ah, you mean his love affair with his cousin?"
Mr. Wentworth stared, blushing a little. "I mean his absence from college.
He has been suspended. We have decided not to speak of it unless we are asked."
"Suspended?" Felix repeated.
"He has been requested by the Harvard authorities to absent himself for six months. Meanwhile he is studying with Mr. Brand.
We think Mr. Brand will help him; at least we hope so."
"What befell him at college?" Felix asked. "He was too fond of pleasure?
Mr. Brand certainly will not teach him any of those secrets!"
"He was too fond of something of which he should not have been fond.
I suppose it is considered a pleasure."
Felix gave his light laugh. "My dear uncle, is there any doubt about its being a pleasure? C'est de son age, as they say in France."
"I should have said rather it was a vice of later life--of disappointed old age."
Felix glanced at his uncle, with his lifted eyebrows, and then, "Of what are you speaking?" he demanded, smiling.
"Of the situation in which Clifford was found."
"Ah, he was found--he was caught?"
"Necessarily, he was caught. He could n't walk; he staggered."
"Oh," said Felix, "he drinks! I rather suspected that, from something I observed the first day I came here.
I quite agree with you that it is a low taste. It 's not a vice for a gentleman. He ought to give it up."
"We hope for a good deal from Mr. Brand's influence,"
Mr. Wentworth went on. "He has talked to him from the first.
And he never touches anything himself."
"I will talk to him--I will talk to him!" Felix declared, gayly.
"What will you say to him?" asked his uncle, with some apprehension.
Felix for some moments answered nothing. "Do you mean to marry him to his cousin?" he asked at last.
"Marry him?" echoed Mr. Wentworth. "I should n't think his cousin would want to marry him."
"You have no understanding, then, with Mrs. Acton?"
Mr. Wentworth stared, almost blankly. "I have never discussed such subjects with her."
"I should think it might be time," said Felix. "Lizzie Acton is admirably pretty, and if Clifford is dangerous...."
"They are not engaged," said Mr. Wentworth. "I have no reason to suppose they are engaged."
"Par exemple!" cried Felix. "A clandestine engagement?
Trust me, Clifford, as I say, is a charming boy.
He is incapable of that. Lizzie Acton, then, would not be jealous of another woman."
