“I do like him so much,” said Mary, boldly.
“So do I, my dear. He is a gentleman, and clever, and, upon the whole, he bears a great injury well. I like him. But I don’t think people ought to fall in love when there is a strong reason against it.”
“Certainly not, if they can help it.”
“Pshaw! That’s missish nonsense, Mary, and you know it. If a girl were to tell me she fell in love because she couldn’t help it, I should tell her that she wasn’t worth any man’s love.”
“But what’s your reason, Aunt Sarah?”
“Because it wouldn’t suit Mr. Gilmore.”
“I am not bound to suit Mr. Gilmore.”
“I don’t know about that. And then, too, it would not suit Walter himself. How could he marry a wife when he has just been robbed of all his fortune?”
“But I have not the slightest idea of falling in love with him. In spite of what I said, I do hope that I can help it. And then I feel to him just as though he were my brother. I’ve got almost to know what it would be to have a brother.”
In this Miss Lowther was probably wrong. She had now known her cousin for just a month. A month is quite long enough to realise the pleasure of a new lover, but it may be doubted whether the intimacy of a brother does not take a very much longer period for its creation.
“I think if I were you,” said Miss Marrable, after a pause, “that I would tell him about Mr. Gilmore.”
“Would you, Aunt Sarah?”
“I think I would. If he were really your brother you would tell him.”
It was probably the case, that when Miss Marrable gave this advice, her opinion of Mr. Gilmore’s success was greater than the circumstances warranted. Though there had been much said between the aunt and her niece about Mr. Gilmore and his offers, Mary had never been able quite to explain her own thoughts and feelings. She herself did not believe that she could be brought to accept him, and was now stronger in that opinion than ever. But were she to say so in language that would convince her aunt, her aunt would no doubt ask her, why then had she left the man in doubt? Though she knew that at every moment in which she had been called upon to act, she had struggled to do right, yet there hung over her a half-conviction that she had been weak, and almost selfish. Her dearest friends wrote to her and spoke to her as though she would certainly take Mr. Gilmore at last. Janet Fenwick wrote of it in her letters as of a thing almost fixed; and Aunt Sarah certainly lived as though she expected it. And yet Mary was very nearly sure that it could not be so. Would it not be better that she should write to Mr. Gilmore at once, and not wait till the expiration of the weary six months which he had specified as the time at the end of which he might renew his proposals? Had Aunt Sarah known all this—had she been aware how very near Mary was to the writing of such a letter—she would not probably have suggested that her niece should tell her cousin anything about Mr. Gilmore. She did think that the telling of the tale would make Cousin Walter understand that he should not allow himself to become an interloper; but the tale, if told as Mary would tell it, might have a very different effect.
Nevertheless Mary thought that she would tell it. It would be so nice to consult a brother! It would be so pleasant to discuss the matter with someone that would sympathise with her—with someone who would not wish to drive her into Mr. Gilmore’s arms simply because Mr. Gilmore was an excellent gentleman, with a snug property! Even from Janet Fenwick, whom she loved dearly, she had never succeeded in getting the sort of sympathy that she wanted. Janet was the best friend in the world—was actuated in this matter simply by a desire to do a good turn to two people whom she loved. But there was no sympathy between her and Mary in the matter.
“Marry him,” said Janet, “and you will adore him afterwards.”
“I want to adore him first,” said Mary.
So she resolved that she would tell Walter Marrable what was her position. They were again down on the banks of the Lurwell, sitting together on a slope which had been made to support some hundred yards of a canal, where the river itself rippled down a slightly rapid fall. They were seated between the canal and the river, with their feet towards the latter, and Walter Marrable was just lighting a cigar. It was very easy to bring the conversation round to the affairs of Bullhampton, as Sam was still in prison, and Janet’s letters were full of the mystery which shrouded the murder of Mr. Trumbull.
“By the by,” said she, “I have something to tell you about Mr. Gilmore.”
“Tell away,” said he, as he turned the cigar round in his mouth, to complete the lighting of the edges in the wind.
“Ah, but I shan’t, unless you will interest yourself. What I am going to tell you ought to interest you.”
“He has made you a proposal of marriage?”
“Yes.”
“I knew it.”
“How could you know it? Nobody has told you.”
“I felt sure of it from the way in which you speak of him. But I thought also that you had refused him. Perhaps I was wrong there?”
“No.”
“You have refused him?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t see that there is very much of a story to be told, Mary.”
“Don’t be so unkind, Walter. There is a story, and one that troubles me. If it were not so I should not have proposed to tell you. I thought that you would give me advice, and tell me what I ought to do.”
“But if you have refused him, you have done so—no doubt
