“And what did he say to that?”
“How am I to tell you what he said? He talked nonsense about my beauty, as all the men do. If a woman were humpbacked, and had only one eye, they wouldn’t be ashamed to tell her she was a Venus.”
“But, aunt, you are a handsome woman, you know.”
“Laws, my dear, as if I didn’t understand all about it; as if I didn’t know what makes a woman run after? It isn’t beauty—and it isn’t money altogether. I’ve seen women who had plenty of both, and not a man would come nigh them. They didn’t dare. There are some of them, a man would as soon think of putting his arm round a poplar tree, they are so hard and so stiff. You know you’re a little that way yourself, Kate, and I’ve always told you it won’t do.”
“I’m afraid I’m too old to mend, aunt.”
“Not at all, if you’ll only set your wits to work and try. You’ve plenty of money now, and you’re good-looking enough, too, when you take the trouble to get yourself up. But, as I said before, it isn’t that that’s wanted. There’s a standoff about some women—what the men call a ‘nollimy tangere,’ that a man must be quite a furious Orlando to attempt to get the better of it. They look as though matrimony itself were improper, and as if they believed that little babies were found about in the hedges and ditches. They talk of women being forward! There are some of them a deal too backward, according to my way of thinking.”
“Yours is a comfortable doctrine, aunt.”
“That’s just what I want it to be. I want things to be comfortable. Why shouldn’t things be nice about one when one’s got the means? Nobody can say it’s a pleasant thing to live alone. I always thought that man in the song hit it off properly. You remember what he says? ‘The poker and tongs to each other belongs.’ So they do, and that should be the way with men and women.”
“But the poker and tongs have but a bad life of it sometimes.”
“Not so often as the people say, my dear. Men and women ain’t like lumps of sugar. They don’t melt because the water is sometimes warm. Now, if I do take Bellfield—and I really think I shall; but if I do he’ll give me a deal of trouble. I know he will. He’ll always be wanting my money, and, of course, he’ll get more than he ought. I’m not a Solomon, nor yet a Queen of Sheba, no more than anybody else. And he’ll smoke too many cigars, and perhaps drink more brandy-and-water than he ought. And he’ll be making eyes, too, at some of the girls who’ll be fools enough to let him.”
“Dear me, aunt, if I thought all that ill of him, I’m sure I wouldn’t marry him;—especially as you say you don’t love him.”
“As for love, my dear, that’s gone—clear gone!” Whereupon Mrs. Greenow put up her handkerchief to her eyes. “Some women can love twice, but I am not one of them. I wish I could—I wish I could!” These last words were spoken in a tone of solemn regret, which, however, she contrived to change as quickly as she had adopted it. “But my dear, marriage is a comfortable thing. And then, though the Captain may be a little free, I don’t doubt but what I shall get the upper hand with him at last. I shan’t stop his cigars and brandy-and-water you know. Why shouldn’t a man smoke and have a glass, if he don’t make a beast of himself? I like to see a man enjoy himself. And then,” she added, speaking tenderly of her absent lover, “I do think he’s fond of me—I do, indeed.”
“So is Mr. Cheesacre for the matter of that.”
“Poor Cheesy! I believe he was, though he did talk so much about money. I always like to believe the best I can of them. But then there was no poetry about Cheesy. I don’t care about saying it now, as you’ve quite made up your mind not to have him.”
“Quite, aunt.”
“Your grandfather’s will does make a difference, you know. But, as I was saying, I do like a little romance about them—just a sniff, as I call it, of the rocks and valleys. One knows that it doesn’t mean much; but it’s like artificial flowers—it gives a little colour, and takes off the dowdiness. Of course, bread-and-cheese is the real thing. The rocks and valleys are no good at all, if you haven’t got that. But enough is as good as a feast. Thanks to dear Greenow,”—here the handkerchief was again used—“Thanks to dear Greenow, I shall never want. Of course I shan’t let any of the money go into his hands—the Captain’s, I mean. I know a trick worth two of that, my dear. But, lord love you! I’ve enough for him and me. What’s the good of a woman’s wanting to keep it all to herself?”
“And you think you’ll really take him, aunt, and pay his washerwoman’s bills for him? You remember what you told me when I first saw him?”
“Oh, yes; I remember. And if he can’t pay his own washerwoman, isn’t that so much more of a reason that I should do it for him? Well; yes; I think I will take him. That is, if he lets me take him just as I choose. Beggars mustn’t be choosers, my dear.”
In this way the aunt and niece became very confidential, and Mrs. Greenow whispered into Kate’s ears her belief that Captain Bellfield might possibly make his way across the country to Westmoreland. “There would be no harm in offering him a bed, would there?” Mrs. Greenow asked. “You see the inn at Shap is a long way off for morning calls.” Kate could not take upon herself to say that there
