'I don't know.'
'Perhaps Helena knows?'
'Not she!'
Mrs. took the next question out of her husband's mouth: 'Come, come, my dear! you must know how old you are.'
'Yes; I do know that. I'm eighteen.'
'And how old is Helena?'
'Helena's eighteen.'
Mrs. turned round to Mr.: 'Do you hear that?'
Mr. said: 'I shall write to her father, and ask what it means.'
I said: 'Papa will only tell you what he told us—years ago.'
'What did your father say?'
'He said he had added our two ages together, and he meant to divide the product between us. It's so long since, I don't remember what the product was then. But I'll tell you what the product is now. Our two ages come to thirty-six. Half thirty-six is eighteen. I get one half, and Helena gets the other. When we ask what it means, and when friends ask what it means, papa has got the same answer for everybody, 'I have my reasons.' That's all he says—and that's all I say.'
I had no intention of making Mr. angry, but he did get angry. He left off speaking to me by my Christian name; he called me by my surname. He said: 'Let me tell you, Miss Gracedieu, it is not becoming in a young lady to mystify her elders.'
I had heard that it was respectful in a young lady to call an old gentleman, Sir, and to say, If you please. I took care to be respectful now. 'If you please, sir, write to papa. You will find that I have spoken the truth.'
A woman opened the door, and said to Mrs. Staveley: 'Dinner, ma'am.' That stopped this nasty exhibition of our tempers. We had a very good dinner.
.......
The next day I wrote to Helena, asking her what she had really said to the Staveleys about her age and mine, and telling her what I had said. I found it too great a trial of my patience to wait till she could see what I had written about the dispute in my journal. The days, since then, have passed, and I have been too lazy and stupid to keep my diary.
To-day it is different. My head is like a dark room with the light let into it. I remember things; I think I can go on again.
We have religious exercises in this house, morning and evening, just as we do at home. (Not to be compared with papa's religious exercises.) Two days ago his answer came to Mr. Staveley's letter. He did just what I had expected—said I had spoken truly, and disappointed the family by asking to be excused if he refrained from entering into explanations. Mr. said: 'Very odd;' and Mrs. agreed with him. Young Miss is not quite as friendly now as she was at first. And young Master was impudent enough to ask me if 'I had got religion.' To conclude the list of my worries, I received an angry answer from Helena. 'Nobody but a simpleton,' she wrote, 'would have contradicted me as you did. Who but you could have failed to see that papa's strange objection to let it be known which of us is the elder makes us ridiculous before other people? My presence of mind prevented that. You ought to have been grateful, and held your tongue.' Perhaps Helena is right—but I don't feel it so.
On Sunday we went to chapel twice. We also had a sermon read at home, and a cold dinner. In the evening, a hot dispute on religion between Mr. Staveley and his son. I don't blame them. After being pious all day long on Sunday, I have myself felt my piety give way toward evening.
There is something pleasant in prospect for to-morrow. All London is going just now to the exhibition of pictures. We are going with all London.
.......
I don't know what is the matter with me tonight. I have positively been to bed, without going to sleep! After tossing and twisting and trying all sorts of positions, I am so angry with myself that I have got up again. Rather than do nothing, I have opened my ink-bottle, and I mean to go on with my journal. Now I think of it, it seems likely that the exhibition of works of art may have upset me.
I found a dreadfully large number of pictures, matched by a dreadfully large number of people to look at them. It is not possible for me to write about what I saw: there was too much of it. Besides, the show disappointed me. I would rather write about a disagreement (oh, dear, another dispute!) I had with Mrs. Staveley. The cause of it was a famous artist; not himself, but his works. He exhibited four pictures—what they call figure subjects. Mrs. Staveley had a pencil. At every one of the great man's four pictures, she made a big mark of admiration on her catalogue. At the fourth one, she spoke to me: 'Perfectly beautiful, Eunice, isn't it?'
I said I didn't know. She said: 'You strange girl, what do you mean by that?'
It would have been rude not to have given the best answer I could find. I said: 'I never saw the flesh of any person's face like the flesh in the faces which that man paints. He reminds me of wax-work. Why does he paint the same waxy flesh in all four of his pictures? I don't see the same colored flesh in all the faces about us.' Mrs. Staveley held up her hand, by way of stopping me. She said: 'Don't speak so loud, Eunice; you are only exposing your own ignorance.'
A voice behind us joined in. The voice said: 'Excuse me, Mrs. Staveley, if I expose
I felt grateful to the person who took my part, just when I was at a loss what to say for myself, and I looked round. The person was a young gentleman.
He wore a beautiful blue frock-coat, buttoned up. I like a frock-coat to be buttoned up. He had light-colored trousers and gray gloves and a pretty cane. I like light-colored trousers and gray gloves and a pretty cane. What color his eyes were is more than I can say; I only know they made me hot when they looked at me. Not that I mind being made hot; it is surely better than being made cold. He and Mrs. Staveley shook hands.
