Page:The Portrait of a Lady (1882).djvu/202

194 194 THE PORTRAIT OF A LADY " Oh, hang Henrietta ! " said Ralph, coarsely. " If yon ask me, I am delighted at it." " Is that why your father did it for your amusement 1 " "I differ with Miss Stackpole," Ralph said, more gravely. " I think it's very good for you to have means." Isabel looked at him a moment with serious eyes. " I wonder whether you know what is good for me or whether you care." " If I know, depend upon it I care. Shall I tell you what it is? Not to torment yourself." " Not to torment you, I suppose you mean." " You can't do that ; I am proof. Take things more easily. Don't ask yourself so much whether this or that is good for you. Don't question your conscience so much it will get out of tune, like a strummed piano. Keep it for great occasions. Don't try so much to form your character it's like trying to pull open a rosebud. Live as you like best, and your character will form itself. Most things are good for you ; the exceptions are very rare, and a comfortable income is not one of them." Ralph paused, smiling ; Isabel had listened quickly. " You have too much conscience," Ralph added. "It's out of all reason, the number of things you think wrong. Spread your wings; rise above the ground. It's never wrong to do that." She had listened eagerly, as I say ; and it was her nature to understand quickly. " I wonder if you appreciate what you say. If you do, you take a great responsibility." " You frighten me a little, but I think I am right," said Ralph, continuing to smile. " All the same, what you say is very true," Isabel went on. "You could say nothing more true. I am absorbed in myself I look at life too much as a doctor's prescription. Why, indeed, should we perpetually be thinking whether things are good for us, as if we were patients lying in a hospital 1 Why should I be so afraid of not doing right 1 As if it mattered to the world whether I do right or wrong ! " " You are a capital person to advise," said Ralph ; " you take the wind out of my sails ! " She looked at him as if she had not heard him though she was following out the train of reflection which he himself had kindled. " I try to care more about the world than about my- self but I always come back to myself. It's because I am afraid." She stopped; her voice had trembled a little. "Yes, I am afraid ; I can't tell you. A large fortune means freedom, and I am afraid of that. It's such a fine thing, and one should