The Wings of the Dove - Henry James (classic literature books TXT) 📗

what a man⁠—and such a man!⁠—might make of a woman. She could see how the Condrip pair pressed their brother’s widow on the subject of Aunt Maud⁠—who wasn’t, after all, their aunt; made her, over their interminable cups, chatter and even swagger about Lancaster Gate, made her more vulgar than it had seemed written that any Croy could possibly become on such a subject. They laid it down, they rubbed it in, that Lancaster Gate was to be kept in sight, and that she, Kate, was to keep it; so that, curiously, or at all events sadly, our young woman was sure of being, in her own person, more permitted to them as an object of comment than they would in turn ever be permitted to herself. The beauty of which, too, was that Marian didn’t love them. But they were Condrips⁠—they had grown near the rose; they were almost like Bertie and Maudie, like Kitty and Guy. They talked of the dead to her, which Kate never did; it being a relation in which Kate could but mutely listen. She couldn’t indeed too often say to herself that if that was what marriage did to you⁠—! It may easily be guessed, therefore, that the ironic light of such reserves fell straight across the field of Marian’s warning. “I don’t quite see,” she answered, “where, in particular, it strikes you that my danger lies. I’m not conscious, I assure you, of the least ‘disposition’ to throw myself anywhere. I feel as if, for the present, I have been quite sufficiently thrown.”

“You don’t feel”⁠—Marian brought it all out⁠—“as if you would like to marry Merton Densher?”

Kate took a moment to meet this inquiry. “Is it your idea that if I should feel so I would be bound to give you notice, so that you might step in and head me off? Is that your idea?” the girl asked. Then, as her sister also had a pause, “I don’t know what makes you talk of Mr. Densher,” she observed.

“I talk of him just because you don’t. That you never do, in spite of what I know⁠—that’s what makes me think of him. Or rather perhaps it’s what makes me think of you. If you don’t know by this time what I hope for you, what I dream of⁠—my attachment being what it is⁠—it’s no use my attempting to tell you.” But Marian had in fact warmed to her work, and Kate was sure she had discussed Mr. Densher with the Miss Condrips. “If I name that person I suppose it’s because I’m so afraid of him. If you want really to know, he fills me with terror. If you want really to know, in fact, I dislike him as much as I dread him.”

“And yet don’t think it dangerous to abuse him to me?”

“Yes,” Mrs. Condrip confessed, “I do think it dangerous; but how can I speak of him otherwise? I dare say, I admit, that I shouldn’t speak of him at all. Only I do want you for once, as I said just now, to know.”

“To know what, my dear?”

“That I should regard it,” Marian promptly returned, “as far and away the worst thing that has happened to us yet.”

“Do you mean because he hasn’t money?”

“Yes, for one thing. And because I don’t believe in him.”

Kate was civil, but perfunctory. “What do you mean by not believing in him?”

“Well, being sure he’ll never get it. And you must have it. You shall have it.”

“To give it to you?”

Marian met her with a readiness that was practically pert. “To have it, first. Not, at any rate, to go on not having it. Then we should see.”

“We should indeed!” said Kate Croy. It was talk of a kind she loathed, but if Marian chose to be vulgar what was one to do? It made her think of the Miss Condrips with renewed aversion. “I like the way you arrange things⁠—I like what you take for granted. If it’s so easy for us to marry men who want us to scatter gold, I wonder we any of us do anything else. I don’t see so many of them about, nor what interest I might ever have for them. You live, my dear,” she presently added, “in a world of vain thoughts.”

“Not so much as you, Kate; for I see what I see, and you can’t turn it off that way.” The elder sister paused long enough for the younger’s face to show, in spite of superiority, an apprehension. “I’m not talking of any man but Aunt Maud’s man, nor of any money, even, if you like, but Aunt Maud’s money. I’m not talking of anything but your doing what she wants. You’re wrong if you speak of anything that I want of you; I want nothing but what she does. That’s good enough for me!”⁠—and Marian’s tone struck her companion as dreadful. “If I don’t believe in Merton Densher, I do at least in Mrs. Lowder.”

“Your ideas are the more striking,” Kate returned, “that they’re the same as papa’s. I had them from him, you may be interested to know⁠—and with all the brilliancy you may imagine⁠—yesterday.”

Marian clearly was interested to know. “He has been to see you?”

“No, I went to him.”

“Really?” Marian wondered. “For what purpose?”

“To tell him I’m ready to go to him.”

Marian stared. “To leave Aunt Maud⁠—?”

“For my father, yes.”

She had fairly flushed, poor Mrs. Condrip, with horror. “You’re ready⁠—?”

“So I told him. I couldn’t tell him less.”

“And, pray, could you tell him more?” Marian gasped in her distress. “What in the world is he to us? You bring out such a thing as that this way?”

They faced each other⁠—the tears were in Marian’s eyes. Kate watched them there a moment and then said: “I had thought it well over⁠—over and over. But you needn’t feel injured. I’m not going. He won’t have me.”

Her companion still panted⁠—it took time to subside. “Well, I wouldn’t have you⁠—wouldn’t receive you at all, I can assure you⁠—if he had