Page:The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17.djvu/334

326 dashes on, in his own open, frank way, about his drive, and the state of the ice in the river, and some shipments he had made from New York to Porto Rico,—on capital terms, too.

"And did you see much of Reuben?" asks Mrs. Elderkin.

"Not much," and Phil (glancing that way) sees that Adèle is studying her crimsons; "but he tells me he is doing splendidly in some business venture to the Mediterranean with Brindlock; he could hardly talk of anything else. It's odd to find him so wrapped up in money-making."

"I hope he'll not be wrapped up in anything worse," said Mrs. Elderkin, with a sigh.

"Nonsense, mother!" burst in the old Squire; "Reuben'll come out all right yet."

"He says he means to know all sides of the world, now," says Phil, with a little laugh.

"He's not so bad as he pretends to be, Phil," answered the Squire. "I knew the Major's hot ways; so did you, Grace (turning to the wife). It's a boy's talk. There's good blood in him."

And the two girls,—yonder, the other side of the hearth,—Adèle and Rose, have given over their little earnest comparison of views about the colors, and sit stitching, and stitching, and thinking—and thinking—

had at no time given over his thought of Adèle, and of the possibility of some day winning her for himself, though he had been somewhat staggered by the interview already described with Reuben. It is doubtful, even, if the quiet permission which this latter had granted (or, with an affectation of arrogance, had seemed to grant) had not itself made him pause. There are some things which a man never wants any permission to do; and one of those is—to love a woman. All the permissions—whether of competent authority or of incompetent—only retard him. It is an affair in which he must find his own permit, by his own power; and without it there can be no joy in conquest.

So when Phil recalled Reuben's expression on that memorable afternoon in his chamber,—"You may marry her, Phil,"—it operated powerfully to dispossess him of all intention and all earnestness of pursuit. The little doubt and mystery which Reuben had thrown, in the same interview, upon the family relations of Adèle, did not weigh a straw in the comparison. But for months that "may" had angered him and made him distant. He had plunged into his business pursuits with a new zeal, and easily put away all present thought of matrimony, by virtue of that simple "may" of Reuben's.

But now when, on coming back, he found her in his own home,—so tenderly cared for by mother and by sister,—so coy and reticent in his presence, the old fever burned again. It was not now a simple watching of her figure upon the street that told upon him; but her constant presence;—the rustle of her dress up and down the stairs; her fresh, fair face every day at table; the tapping of her light feet along the hall; the little musical bursts of laughter (not Rose's,—oh, no!) that came from time to time floating through the open door of his chamber. All this Rose saw and watched with the highest glee,—finding her own little, quiet means of promoting such accidents,—and rejoicing (as sisters will, where the enslaver is a friend) in the captivity of poor Phil. For an honest lover, propinquity is always dangerous,—most of all, the propinquity in one's own home. The sister's caresses of the charmer, the mother's kind looks, the father's playful banter, and the whisk of a silken dress (with a new music in it) along the balusters you have passed night and morning for years, have a terrible executive power.

In short, Adèle had not been a month with the Elderkins before Phil was tied there by bonds he had never known the force of before.