Frank Houston as he read this threw himself back on the sofa and gave way to a soft sigh. He knew he was doing his duty --just as another man does who goes forth from his pleasant home to earn his bread and win his fortune in some dry, comfortless climate, far from the delights to which he has been always accustomed.
He must do his duty. He could not live always adding a hundred or two of debt to the burden already round his neck. He must do his duty. As he thought of this he praised himself mightily.
How beautiful was his far-away cousin, Imogene Docimer, as she would twist her head round so as to show the turn of her neck!
How delightful it would be to talk love to Imogene! As to marrying Imogene, who hadn't quite so many hundreds as himself, that he knew to be impossible. As for marriage, he wasn't quite sure that he wanted to marry anyone. Marriage, to his thinking, was "a sort of grind" at the best. A man would have to get up and go to bed with some regularity. His wife might want him to come down in a frock coat to breakfast. His wife would certainly object to his drawing the back heads of other young women. Then he thought of the provocation he had received to draw Gertrude's back head.
Gertrude hadn't got any turn of a neck to speak of. Gertrude was a stout, healthy girl; and, having L#120,000, was entitled to such a husband as himself. If he waited longer he might be driven to worse before he found the money which was so essentially necessary. He was grateful to Gertrude for not being worse, and was determined to treat her well. But as for love, romance, poetry, art -- all that must for the future be out of the question. Of course, there would now be no difficulty with Sir Thomas, and therefore he must at once make up his mind. He decided that morning, with many soft regrets, that he would go to Glenbogie, and let those dreams of wanderings in the mountains of the Tyrol pass away from him. "Dear, dearest Imogene!" He could have loved Imogene dearly had fates been more propitious. Then he got up and shook himself, made his resolution like a man, ate a large allowance of curried salmon for his breakfast -- and then wrote the following letter. "Duty first!" he said to himself as he sat down to the table like a hero.
Letter No. 1
DEAR LADY TRINGLE, So many thanks! Nothing could suit my book so well as a few days at Glenbogie just at the end of August. I will be there, like a book, on the 20th. Of course I understand all that you say.
Fathers can't be expected to yield all at once, especially when suitors haven't got very much of their own. I shouldn't have dared to ask hadn't I known myself to be a most moderate man.
Of course I shall ask again. If you will help me, no doubt Ishall succeed. I really do think that I am the man to make Gertrude happy.
Yours, dear Lady Tringle, ever so much, F. HOUSTONLetter No. 2
MY OWN ONE, Your governor is a brick. Of course, Glenbogie will be better than the Tyrol, as you are to be there. Not but what the Tyrol is a very jolly place, and we'll go and see it together some day. Ask Tom to let me know whether one can wear heavy boots in the Glenbogie mountains. They are much the best for the heather;but I have shot generally in Yorkshire, and there they are too hot. What number does he shoot with generally? I fancy the birds are wilder with you than with us.
As for riding, I don't dare to sit upon a horse this weather.
Nobody but a woman can stand it. Indeed, now I think of it, Isold my horse last week to pay the fellow I buy paints from.
I've got the saddle and bridle, and if I stick them up upon a rail, under the trees, it would be better than any horse while the thermometer is near 80. All the ladies could come round and talk to one so nicely.
I hate lunch, because it makes me red in the face, and nobody will give me my breakfast before eleven at the earliest. But I'll come in about three as often as you like to have me. I think I perhaps shall run over to the Tyrol after Glenbogie. A man must go somewhere when he has been turned out in that fashion.
There are so many babies at Buncombe Hall! -- Buncombe Hall is the family seat of the Houstons -- and I don't like to see my own fate typified before the time.
Can I do anything for you except riding or eating lunch -- which are simply feminine exercises?
Always your own, FRANK
Letter No. 3
DEAR COUSIN IM, How pleasant it is that a little strain of thin blood should make the use of that pretty name allowable! What a stupid world it is when the people who like each other best cannot get together because of proprieties, and marriages, and such balderdash as we call love. I do not in the least want to be in love with you -- but I do want to sit near you, and listen to you, and look at you, and to know that the whole air around is impregnated by the mysterious odour of your presence. When one is thoroughly satisfied with a woman there comes a scent as of sweet flowers, which does not reach the senses of those whose feelings are not so awakened.
And now for my news! I suppose that G. T. will in a tremendously short period become Mistress F. H. "A long day, my Lord." But, if you are to be hung, better be hung at once. Pere Tringle has not consented -- has done just the reverse -- has turned me out of his house, morally. That is, out of his London house. He asked of my "house and my home", as they did of Allan-a-Dale. Queen Gate and Glenbogie stand fair on the hill."My home", quoth bold Houston, "shows gallanter still.'Tis the gerret up three pair -- "Then he told me roughly to get me gone; but "had laughed on the lass with my bonny black eye." So the next day I got an invite to Glenbogie, and at the appropriate time in August, She'll go to the mountains to hear a love tale,And the youth -- it will be told by is to be your poor unfortunate coz, Frank Houston.
Who's going to whimper? Haven't I known all along what was to come? It has not been my lot in life to see a flower and pick it because I love it. But a good head of cabbage when you're hungry is wholesome food. --Your loving cousin, but not loving as he oughtn't to love, FRANK HOUSTON"I shall still make a dash for the Tyrol when this episode at Glenbogie is over."