A Chicago Princess

“I think that is a very capital and convincing illustration, Mr. Tremorne,” confessed the lady generously.

Now, look you, how vain a creature is man. That remark sent a glow of satisfaction through my being such as I had not experienced since a speech of my youth was applauded by my fellow-students at the Union in Oxford. Nevertheless, I proceeded stubbornly with my lecture, which I had not yet finished.

“Now, madam, I am going to give you the opportunity to charge me with inconsistency. I strenuously object to the application of the term ‘servant’ as applied to yourself or to me. I am not a servant.”

“But, Mr. Tremorne, you admitted it a while ago, and furthermore said that your distinguished cousin would also have confessed as much if in your place.”

“I know I said so; but that was before the veneer fell away.”

“Then what becomes of the candour of which you boasted? Has it gone with the veneer?”

“They are keeping each other company on the ocean some miles behind us. I have thrown them overboard.”

Miss Stretton laughed with rather more of heartiness than she had yet exhibited.

“Well, I declare,” she cried; “this is a transformation scene, all in the moonlight!”

“No, I am not Mr. Hemster’s servant. Mr. Hemster desires to use my knowledge of the Eastern languages and my experience in Oriental diplomacy. For this he has engaged to pay, but I am no more his servant than Sir Edward Clark is a menial to the client who pays him for the knowledge he possesses; and, if you will permit me the English brag, which you utilized a little while since, I say I am a gentleman and therefore the equal of Mr. Silas K. Hemster, or any one else.”

“You mean superior, and not equal.”

“Madam, with all due respect, I mean nothing of the sort.”

“Nevertheless, that is what is in your mind and in your manner. By the way, is your lecture completed?”

“Yes, entirely so. It is your innings now. You have the floor, or the deck rather.”

“Then I should like to say that Silas K. Hemster, as you call him, is one of the truest gentlemen that ever lived.”

“Isn’t that his name?”

“You were perfectly accurate in naming him, but you were certainly supercilious in the tone in which you named him.”

“Oh, I say!”

“No, you don’t; it is my say, if you please.”

“Certainly, certainly; but at first you try to make me out a conceited ass, and now you endeavour to show that I am an irredeemable cad. I have the utmost respect for Mr. Hemster.”

“Have you? Well, I am very glad to hear it, and I wish to give you a firmer basis for that opinion than you have been able to form from your own observation. Mr. Hemster may not be learned in books, but he is learned in human nature. He is the best of men, kind, considerate, and always just. He was a lifelong friend of my father, now, alas, no more in life. They were schoolboys together. It was inevitable that Mr. Hemster should become very wealthy, and equally inevitable that my father should remain poor. My father was a dreamy scholar, and I think you will admit that he was a gentleman, for he was a clergyman of the Episcopal Church. He was not of the money-making order of men, and, if he had been, his profession would have precluded him from becoming what Mr. Hemster is. Although Mr. Hemster grew very rich, it never in the least interfered with his friendship for my father nor with his generosity to my father’s child. If I cared to accept that generosity it would be unstinted. As it is, he pays me much more than I am worth. He is simple and honest, patient and kind. Patient and kind,” she repeated, with a little tremor of the voice that for a moment checked her utterance, – “a true gentleman, if ever there was one.”

“My dear Miss Stretton,” I said, “what you say of him is greatly to the credit of both yourself and Mr. Hemster; but it distresses me that you should intimate that I have failed to appreciate him. He has picked me up, as I might say, from the gutters of Nagasaki without even a line of recommendation or so much as a note of introduction.”

“That is what I said to you; he is a judge of men rather than of literature and the arts; and it is entirely to your credit that he has taken you without credentials. You may be sure, were it otherwise, I should not have spent so much time with you as I have done this evening. But his quick choice should have given you a better insight into his character than that which you possess?”

“There you go again, Miss Stretton. What have I said or done which leads you to suppose I do not regard Mr. Hemster with the utmost respect?”

“It is something exceedingly difficult to define. It cannot be set down as lucidly as your exposition of etiquette. It was your air, rather than your manner at luncheon time. It was a very distant and exalted air, which said as plainly as words that you sat down with a company inferior to yourself.”

Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.

Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».

Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию на ЛитРес.

Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.