Page:The Confessions of a Well-Meaning Woman.djvu/171

 a good deal of soft brown hair, too, and pretty hands. Quiet, simply dressed; a perfect specimen of “the old country clergyman’s pretty little daughter.” And that, I have no doubt, was the effect she wanted to achieve with Will, the appeal of innocence and youth to a palate grown weary of more sophisticated charms; I wonder more men are not caught in that way. . . Will, I am thankful to say, pulled back before the trap could close on him; I was really astounded that the father had the effrontery to come all the way from Morecambe on what was nothing less or more than a blackmailing expedition. Futile, if nothing else; Will is not one of those men who find it necessary to buy popularity by giving presents to all and sundry; and I am sure he is too prudent to write a girl foolish letters. . . “Arthur, do stop walking about,” I said, “and tell me what has happened.” Too often, only too often, when Will has been in trouble of any kind, I have been excluded on the pretext that this was not a woman’s province. His own mother!

“What has happened?,” he shouted. “Why, we have brought into this world as choice a young blackguard as any one is ever likely to meet. Phenton told me so to my face; and I had to agree with him. He said he wished