The Magnificent Ambersons - Booth Tarkington (top novels of all time TXT) 📗

George’s face was pale no longer, but pink with fury. “Yes, I did.”

“All of it?” she asked gently, as she rose.

“Certainly!”

She did not look at him, but kept her eyes downcast upon the letter in her hands, tremulously rearranging the sheets in order as she spoke⁠—and though she smiled, her smile was as tremulous as her hands. Nervousness and an irresistible timidity possessed her. “I⁠—I wanted to say, George,” she faltered. “I felt that if⁠—if some day it should happen⁠—I mean, if you came to feel differently about it, and Eugene and I⁠—that is if we found that it seemed the most sensible thing to do⁠—I was afraid you might think it would be a little queer about⁠—Lucy, I mean if⁠—if she were your stepsister. Of course, she’d not be even legally related to you, and if you⁠—if you cared for her⁠—”

Thus far she got stumblingly with what she wanted to say, while George watched her with a gaze that grew harder and hotter; but here he cut her off. “I have already given up all idea of Lucy,” he said. “Naturally, I couldn’t have treated her father as I deliberately did treat him⁠—I could hardly have done that and expected his daughter ever to speak to me again.”

Isabel gave a quick cry of compassion, but he allowed her no opportunity to speak. “You needn’t think I’m making any particular sacrifice,” he said sharply, “though I would, quickly enough, if I thought it necessary in a matter of honour like this. I was interested in her, and I could even say I did care for her; but she proved pretty satisfactorily that she cared little enough about me! She went away right in the midst of a⁠—of a difference of opinion we were having; she didn’t even let me know she was going, and never wrote a line to me, and then came back telling everybody she’d had ‘a perfectly gorgeous time’! That’s quite enough for me. I’m not precisely the sort to arrange for that kind of thing to be done to me more than once! The truth is, we’re not congenial and we’d found that much out, at least, before she left. We should never have been happy; she was ‘superior’ all the time, and critical of me⁠—not very pleasant, that! I was disappointed in her, and I might as well say it. I don’t think she has the very deepest nature in the world, and⁠—”

But Isabel put her hand timidly on his arm. “Georgie, dear, this is only a quarrel: all young people have them before they get adjusted, and you mustn’t let⁠—”

“If you please!” he said emphatically, moving back from her. “This isn’t that kind. It’s all over, and I don’t care to speak of it again. It’s settled. Don’t you understand?”

“But, dear⁠—”

“No. I want to talk to you about this letter of her father’s.”

“Yes, dear, that’s why⁠—”

“It’s simply the most offensive piece of writing that I’ve ever held in my hands!”

She stepped back from him, startled. “But, dear, I thought⁠—”

“I can’t understand your even showing me such a thing!” he cried. “How did you happen to bring it to me?”

“Your uncle thought I’d better. He thought it was the simplest thing to do, and he said that he’d suggested it to Eugene, and Eugene had agreed. They thought⁠—”

“Yes!” George said bitterly. “I should like to hear what they thought!”

“They thought it would be the most straightforward thing.”

George drew a long breath. “Well, what do you think, mother?”

“I thought it would be the simplest and most straightforward thing; I thought they were right.”

“Very well! We’ll agree it was simple and straightforward. Now, what do you think of that letter itself?”

She hesitated, looking away. “I⁠—of course I don’t agree with him in the way he speaks of you, dear⁠—except about the angel! I don’t agree with some of the things he implies. You’ve always been unselfish⁠—nobody knows that better than your mother. When Fanny was left with nothing, you were so quick and generous to give up what really should have come to you, and⁠—”

“And yet,” George broke in, “you see what he implies about me. Don’t you think, really, that this was a pretty insulting letter for that man to be asking you to hand your son?”

“Oh, no!” she cried. “You can see how fair he means to be, and he didn’t ask for me to give it to you. It was brother George who⁠—”

“Never mind that, now! You say he tries to be fair, and yet do you suppose it ever occurs to him that I’m doing my simple duty? That I’m doing what my father would do if he were alive? That I’m doing what my father would ask me to do if he could speak from his grave out yonder? Do you suppose it ever occurs to that man for one minute that I’m protecting my mother?” George raised his voice, advancing upon the helpless lady fiercely; and she could only bend her head before him. “He talks about my ‘Will’⁠—how it must be beaten down; yes, and he asks my mother to do that little thing to please him! What for? Why does he want me ‘beaten’ by my mother? Because I’m trying to protect her name! He’s got my mother’s name bandied up and down the streets of this town till I can’t step in those streets without wondering what every soul I meet is thinking of me and of my family, and now he wants you to marry him so that every gossip in town will say ‘There! What did I tell you? I guess that proves it’s true!’ You can’t get away from it; that’s exactly what they’d say, and this man pretends he cares for you, and yet asks you to marry him and give them the right to say it. He says he and you don’t care what they say, but I know better! He may not care⁠—probably he’s that kind⁠—but you do. There never was