The old man shook his head. “I don’t pretend to have contributed anything to the amusement of my contemporaries.”
“My dear father, you’re too modest!”
“That’s a kind of joke, sir,” said Lord Warburton.
“You young men have too many jokes. When there are no jokes you’ve nothing left.”
“Fortunately there are always more jokes,” the ugly young man remarked.
“I don’t believe it—I believe things are getting more serious. You young men will find that out.”
“The increasing seriousness of things, then that’s the great opportunity of jokes.”
“They’ll have to be grim jokes,” said the old man. “I’m convinced there will be great changes, and not all for the better.”
“I quite agree with you, sir,” Lord Warburton declared. “I’m very sure there will be great changes, and that all sorts of queer things will happen. That’s why I find so much difficulty in applying your advice; you know you told me the other day that I ought to ‘take hold’ of something. One hesitates to take hold of a thing that may the next moment be knocked sky-high.”
“You ought to take hold of a pretty woman,” said his companion. “He’s trying hard to fall in love,” he added, by way of explanation, to his father.
“The pretty women themselves may be sent flying!” Lord Warburton exclaimed.
“No, no, they’ll be firm,” the old man rejoined; “they’ll not be affected by the social and political changes I just referred to.”
“You mean they won’t be abolished? Very well, then, I’ll lay hands on one as soon as possible and tie her round my neck as a life-preserver.”
“The ladies will save us,” said the old man; “that is the best of them will—for I make a difference between them. Make up to a good one and marry her, and your life will become much more interesting.”
A momentary silence marked perhaps on the part of his auditors a sense of the magnanimity of this speech, for it was a secret neither for his son nor for his visitor that his own experiment in matrimony had not been a happy one. As he said, however, he made a difference; and these words may have been intended as a confession of personal error; though of course it was not in place for either of his companions to remark that apparently the lady of his choice had not been one of the best.
“If I marry an interesting woman I shall be interested: is that what you say?” Lord Warburton asked. “I’m not at all keen about marrying—your son misrepresented me; but there’s no knowing what an interesting woman might do with me.”
“I should like to see your idea of an interesting woman,” said his friend.
“My dear fellow, you can’t see ideas—especially such highly ethereal ones as mine. If I could only see it myself—that would be a great step in advance.”
“Well, you may fall in love with whomsoever you please; but you mustn’t fall in love with my niece,” said the old man.
His son broke into a laugh. “He’ll think you mean that as a provocation! My dear father, you’ve lived with the English for thirty years, and you’ve picked up a good many of the things they say. But you’ve never learned the things they don’t say!”
“I say what I please,” the old man returned with all his serenity.
“I haven’t the honour of knowing your niece,” Lord Warburton said. “I think it’s the first time I’ve heard of her.”
“She’s a niece of my wife’s; Mrs. Touchett brings her to England.”
Then young Mr. Touchett explained. “My mother, you know, has been spending the winter in America, and we’re expecting her back. She writes that she has discovered a niece and that she has invited her to come out with her.”
“I see,—very kind of her,” said Lord Warburton. Is the young lady interesting?”
“We hardly know more about her than you; my mother has not gone into details. She chiefly communicates with us by means of telegrams, and her telegrams are rather inscrutable. They say women don’t know how to write them, but my mother has thoroughly mastered the art of condensation. ‘Tired America, hot weather awful, return England with niece, first steamer decent cabin.’ That’s the sort of message we get from her—that was the last that came. But there had been another before, which I think contained the first mention of the niece. ‘Changed hotel, very bad, impudent clerk, address here. Taken sister’s girl, died last year, go to Europe, two sisters, quite independent.’ Over that my father and I have scarcely stopped puzzling; it seems to admit of so many interpretations.”
“There’s one thing very clear in it,” said the old man; “she has given the hotel-clerk a dressing.”
“I’m not sure even of that, since he has driven her from the field. We thought at first that the sister mentioned might be the sister of the clerk; but the subsequent mention of a niece seems to prove that the allusion is to one of my aunts. Then there was a question as to whose the two other sisters were; they are probably two of my late aunt’s daughters. But who’s ‘quite independent,’ and in what sense is the term used?—that point’s not yet settled. Does the expression apply more particularly to the young lady my mother has adopted, or does it characterise her sisters equally?—and is it used in a moral or in a financial sense? Does it mean that they’ve been left well off, or that they wish to be under no obligations? or does it simply mean that they’re fond of their own way?”
“Whatever else it means, it’s pretty sure to mean that,” Mr. Touchett remarked.
“You’ll see for yourself,” said Lord Warburton. “When does Mrs. Touchett arrive?”
“We’re quite in the dark; as soon as she can find a decent cabin. She may be waiting for it yet; on the other hand she may already have disembarked in England.”
“In that case she would probably have telegraphed to you.”
“She never telegraphs when you would expect it—only when you don’t,” said the old man. “She likes to drop on me suddenly; she thinks she’ll find me doing something wrong. She has never done so yet, but she’s not discouraged.”
“It’s her share in the family trait, the independence she speaks of.” Her son’s appreciation of the matter was more favourable. “Whatever the high spirit of those young ladies may be, her own is a match for it. She likes to do everything for herself and has no belief in any one’s power to help her. She thinks me of no more use than a postage-stamp without gum, and she would never forgive me if I should presume to go to Liverpool to meet her.”
“Will you at least let me know when your cousin arrives?” Lord Warburton asked.
“Only on the condition I’ve mentioned—that you don’t fall in love with her!” Mr. Touchett replied.
“That strikes me as hard, don’t you think me good enough?”
“I think you too good—because I shouldn’t like her to marry you. She hasn’t come here to look for a husband, I hope; so many young ladies are doing that, as if there were no good ones at home. Then she’s probably engaged; American girls are usually engaged, I believe. Moreover I’m not sure, after all, that you’d be a remarkable husband.”
“Very likely she’s engaged; I’ve known a good many American girls, and they always were; but I could never see that it made any difference, upon my word! As for my being a good husband,” Mr. Touchett’s visitor pursued, “I’m not sure of that either. One can but try!”
“Try as much as you please, but don’t try on my niece,” smiled the old man, whose opposition