The Changeling. Walter Besant

cousin slowly drank a glass of champagne. "Yes?" he asked, without much affectation of interest.

      "I thought that if the Archbishop were living, he would like to found a college – not for priests, nor for old villagers, but for girls; not to teach anything, but to give them a place where they can go and stay. In this college we do not teach anything. There are no lectures. We need not do any work unless we please. Every girl does exactly what she pleases: some study, some paint – not after your school, I fear; some practise music; in fact, they do just what they please. I believe that at least a dozen are writing novels, two or three are writing verse, one or two are working for examinations. In the evening we amuse ourselves."

      "You give them all this?"

      "Certainly. They come here whenever they please, and they can stay here for three months, or more if there is necessity. In three words, my cousin, I maintain an establishment of forty guests, and I fear I shall have to increase the number."

      "And what's the good of it?"

      "When the Archbishop built his school, he argued, first, that education is good even for the swineherd; next, that with education follow manners; and, thirdly, that it was good for himself to give. So, you see, it is good for the girls to get the rest and quiet; living thus all together in a college raises their standard of thought and manners; and, thirdly, it is good for me, as it was the Archbishop, to give."

      "I do not feel myself any call to give anybody anything."

      "Meantime, I keep before myself the great function of woman. She is, I say, the eternal priestess. She compels men into ways of gentleness and courtesy; she inspires great thoughts. By way of love she leads to the upper heights. But you do not feel these things."

      "I do not, I confess."

      "If the girls must work, I want them ever to keep before themselves the task laid upon them. They have hitherto civilized man from the home; they must now civilize him from the workshop. That, my cousin, is the meaning of this college."

      "You've got some rather pretty girls in the place," said Humphrey.

      "Oh, pretty! What has that to do with it?"

      The music ceased. There was a general lull. The guests all leaned back in their chairs. The president knocked with her ivory hammer, and they all returned to the lady's bower.

      In the drawing-room Humphrey left the president to the people who pressed in upon her, and wandered round the room, looking, apparently, for some one. Presently he discovered, surrounded by a company of men, the girl who was called Molly. She, too, was dressed in white, and wore a cherry-coloured ribbon round her neck; a dainty damsel she looked, conspicuous for this lovely quality of daintiness among them all. At sight of her the young man coloured, and his eye brightened; then his face clouded. However, he made his way to her. She stepped out of the circle and gave him her hand.

      "It is a week and more," he whispered, "since I have seen you. Why not say at once that you don't care about it any longer?"

      "You are welcome to the college, Sir Humphrey," she replied aloud. "Confess that it is a pretty sight. The president was talking to you about it all dinner-time. I hope that you are interested."

      "I think it is all tomfoolery," he replied ungraciously; "and a waste of good money too."

      "Hilarie wants money to make happiness. You do not look in the best of tempers, Humphrey."

      "I am not. I couldn't get enough to drink, and I have had to listen to a lot of stuff about women and priestesses."

      "Good stuff should not be thrown away, should it? Like good pearls."

      "I want to talk to you – away from this rabble. Where can we go?"

      "I will take you over the college." She led the way into the library, a retired place, where she sat down. "Do you ask how I am getting on?"

      "No, I don't." He remained standing. "You'll never go on the stage with my consent."

      "We shall see." By her quick dancing eye, by her mobile lips, by the brightness of her quaint, attractive face, which looked as if it could be drawn into shapes like an india-rubber face, she belied his prophecy. "Besides, Hilarie wants me to become a tragic actress. Please remember, once more, Humphrey, that what Hilarie wishes I must do. I owe everything to Hilarie – everything."

      "You drive me mad with your perverseness, Molly."

      "I am going to please myself. Please understand that, even if I were engaged to you, I would keep my independence. If you don't like that, take back your offer. Take it back at once." She held out both her hands, as if she was carrying it about.

      "You know I can't. Molly, I love you too much, though you are a little devil."

      "Then let me alone. If one is born in a theatre, one belongs to a theatre. I would rather be born in a theatre than in a West End square. Humphrey, you make me sorry that I ever listened to you."

      "Well, go and listen to that fiddler fellow who calls you Molly. Curse his impudence!"

      "Oh, if you had been only born differently! You belong to the people who are all alike. You sit in the stalls in a row, as if you were made after the same pattern; you expect the same jokes; you take the same too much champagne; you are like the pebbles of the seashore, all rounded alike."

      "Well, what would you have?"

      "The actors and show folk – my folk – are all different. As for kind hearts, how can you know, with your tables spread every day, and your champagne running like water? There's no charity where there's no poverty."

      "I don't pretend to any charity."

      "It is a dreadful thing to be born rich. You might have been so different if you had had nothing."

      "Then you wouldn't have listened to me."

      "Thank you. Listening doesn't mean consenting."

      "You cannot withdraw. You are promised to me."

      "Only on conditions. You want me to be engaged secretly. Well, I won't. You want me to marry you secretly. Well, I won't."

      "You are engaged to me."

      "I am not. And I don't think now that I ever shall be. It flattered me at first, having a man in your position following around. I should like to be 'my lady.' But I can't see any happiness in it. You belong to a different world, not to my world."

      "I will lift you into my world."

      "It looks more like tumbling down than getting lifted up. There is still time, however, to back out. If you dare to maintain that I ever said 'Yes,' I'll say 'No' on the spot. There!"

      This sweet and loving conversation explains itself. Every one will understand it. The girl lived in a boarding-house, where she took lessons from an old actress in preparation for the stage. From time to time she went to stay with her friend – her benefactress – who had found her, after her father's death, penniless. At her country house she met, as we have seen, her old friend Dick, and the other cousin. The second meeting, outside the boarding-house, which the latter called, and she believed to be, accidental, led to other meetings. They were attended by the customary results; that is, by an ardent declaration of love. The girl was flattered by the attentions of a young man of position and apparent wealth. She listened to the tale. She found, presently, that her lover was not in every respect what a girl expects in a lover. His ideas of love were not hers. He turned out to be jealous, but that might prove the depth and sincerity of his love; suspicious, which argued a want of trust in her; ashamed to introduce her to his own people; anxious to be engaged first and married next, in secrecy; avowedly selfish, worshipping false gods in the matter of art and science; and, worst of all, ill-tempered, and boorish in his ill temper. Lastly, she was, at this stage, rapidly making the discovery that not even for a title and a carriage and a West End square ought she to marry a man she was unable to respect.

      "We will now go back to the lady's bower," she said. "This talk, Humphrey, will have to last a long while."

      CHAPTER VI.

      THE OLD LOVER

      "My dear Dick!" Molly ran into the dining-room of her dingy