“The woman’s an idiot,” thought Morris; but he was obliged to say something different. It was not, however, materially more civil. “Was it in order to tell me this that you requested I would meet you here?”
Mrs. Penniman had been conscious of a certain vagueness in her errand, and of not being able to offer him any very tangible reward for his long walk. “I thought perhaps you would like to see one who is so near to Catherine,” she observed, with considerable majesty. “And also,” she added, “that you would value an opportunity of sending her something.”
Morris extended his empty hands with a melancholy smile. “I am greatly obliged to you, but I have nothing to send.”
“Haven’t you a word?” asked his companion, with her suggestive smile coming back.
Morris frowned again. “Tell her to hold fast,” he said rather curtly.
“That is a good word—a noble word. It will make her happy for many days. She is very touching, very brave,” Mrs. Penniman went on, arranging her mantle and preparing to depart. While she was so engaged she had an inspiration. She found the phrase that she could boldly offer as a vindication of the step she had taken. “If you marry Catherine at all risks,” she said, “you will give my brother a proof of your being what he pretends to doubt.”
“What he pretends to doubt?”
“Don’t you know what that is?” Mrs. Penniman asked almost playfully.
“It does not concern me to know,” said Morris grandly.
“Of course it makes you angry.”
“I despise it,” Morris declared.
“Ah, you know what it is, then?” said Mrs. Penniman, shaking her finger at him. “He pretends that you like—you like the money.”
Morris hesitated a moment; and then, as if he spoke advisedly—“I do like the money!”
“Ah, but not—but not as he means it. You don’t like it more than Catherine?”
He leaned his elbows on the table and buried his head in his hands. “You torture me!” he murmured. And, indeed, this was almost the effect of the poor lady’s too importunate interest in his situation.
But she insisted on making her point. “If you marry her in spite of him, he will take for granted that you expect nothing of him, and are prepared to do without it. And so he will see that you are disinterested.”
Morris raised his head a little, following this argument, “And what shall I gain by that?”
“Why, that he will see that he has been wrong in thinking that you wished to get his money.”
“And seeing that I wish he would go to the deuce with it, he will leave it to a hospital. Is that what you mean?” asked Morris.
“No, I don’t mean that; though that would be very grand!” Mrs. Penniman quickly added. “I mean that having done you such an injustice, he will think it his duty, at the end, to make some amends.”
Morris shook his head, though it must be confessed he was a little struck with this idea. “Do you think he is so sentimental?”
“He is not sentimental,” said Mrs. Penniman; “but, to be perfectly fair to him, I think he has, in his own narrow way, a certain sense of duty.”
There passed through Morris Townsend’s mind a rapid wonder as to what he might, even under a remote contingency, be indebted to from the action of this principle in Dr. Sloper’s breast, and the inquiry exhausted itself in his sense of the ludicrous. “Your brother has no duties to me,” he said presently, “and I none to him.”
“Ah, but he has duties to Catherine.”
“Yes, but you see that on that principle Catherine has duties to him as well.”
Mrs. Penniman got up, with a melancholy sigh, as if she thought him very unimaginative. “She has always performed them faithfully; and now, do you think she has no duties to you?” Mrs. Penniman always, even in conversation, italicised her personal pronouns.
“It would sound harsh to say so! I am so grateful for her love,” Morris added.
“I will tell her you said that! And now, remember that if you need me, I am there.” And Mrs. Penniman, who could think of nothing more to say, nodded vaguely in the direction of Washington Square.
Morris looked some moments at the sanded floor of the shop; he seemed to be disposed to linger a moment. At last, looking up with a certain abruptness, “It is your belief that if she marries me he will cut her off?” he asked.
Mrs. Penniman stared a little, and smiled. “Why, I have explained to you what I think would happen—that in the end it would be the best thing to do.”
“You mean that, whatever she does, in the long run she will get the money?”
“It doesn’t depend upon her, but upon you. Venture to appear as disinterested as you are!” said Mrs. Penniman ingeniously. Morris dropped his eyes on the sanded floor again, pondering this; and she pursued. “Mr. Penniman and I had nothing, and we were very happy. Catherine, moreover, has her mother’s fortune, which, at the time my sister-in-law married, was considered a very handsome one.”
“Oh, don’t speak of that!” said Morris; and, indeed, it was quite superfluous, for he had contemplated the fact in all its lights.
“Austin married a wife with money—why shouldn’t you?”
“Ah! but your brother was a doctor,” Morris objected.
“Well, all young men can’t be doctors!”
“I should think it an extremely loathsome profession,” said Morris, with an air of intellectual independence. Then in a moment, he went on rather inconsequently, “Do you suppose there is a will already made in Catherine’s favour?”
“I suppose so—even doctors must die; and perhaps a little in mine,” Mrs. Penniman frankly added.
“And you believe he would certainly change it—as regards Catherine?”
“Yes; and then change it back again.”
“Ah, but one can’t depend on that!” said Morris.
“Do you want to depend on it?” Mrs. Penniman asked.
Morris blushed a little. “Well, I am certainly afraid of being the cause of an
