Adela Cathcart, Volume 3 by George MacDonald (ready player one ebook txt) 📖

you do. But just let me shift round a bit, and see what you will do then.-Are you in love with Miss Cathcart?"

"Yes."

"Upon my word, I shouldn't have thought it. Here have we been all positively conspiring to do her good, and you have been paying ten times the attention to the dogs and horses that you have paid to her."

"By Jove! it's quite true. But I couldn't somehow."

"Then she hasn't encouraged you?"

"By Jupiter! you are frank enough now.-No, damn it-not a bit.-But she used to like me, and she would again, if you would let her alone."

"Now, Mr. Percy, I'll tell you what.-I don't believe you are a bit in love with her."

"She's devilish pretty."

"Well?"

"And I declare I think she got prettier and prettier every day till this cursed ague took her.-Your fault too, my mother says."

"We'll leave your mother out of the question now, if you please. Do you know what made her look prettier and prettier-for you are quite right about that?"

"No. I suppose you were giving her arsenic."

"No. I was giving her the true elixir vitae , unknown even to the Rosicrucians."

Percy stared.

"I will explain myself. Her friend, Mr. Smith-"

"Old fogie!"

"Old bachelor-yes.-Mr. Smith and I agreed that she was dying of ennui; and so we got up this story-club, and got my brother and the rest to bear a hand in it. It did her all the good the most sanguine of us could have hoped for."

"I thought it horrid slow."

"I am surprised at that, for you were generally asleep."

"I was forced, in self-defence. I couldn't smoke."

"It gave her something to think about."

"So it seems."

"Now, Mr. Percy, how could you think you had the smallest chance with her, when here was the first one and then another turning each the flash of his own mental prism upon her weary eyes, and healing them with light; while you would not take the smallest trouble to gratify her, or even to show yourself to anything like advantage?-My dear fellow, what a fool you are!"

"Mr. Armstrong!"

"Come, come-you began with frankness, and I've only gone on with it. You are a good-hearted fellow, and ought to be made something of."

"At all events, you make something of yourself, to talk of your own productions as the elixir vitae ."

"You forget that I am in disgrace as well as yourself on that score; for I have not read a word of my own since the club began."

"Then how the devil should I be worse off than you?"

"I didn't say you were. I only said you did your best to place yourself at a disadvantage. I at least took a part in the affair, although a very humble one. But depend upon it, a girl like Miss Cathcart thinks more of mental gifts, than of any outward advantages which a man may possess; and in the company of those who think , a fellow's good looks don't go for much. She could not help measuring you by those other men-and women too. But you may console yourself with the reflection that there are plenty of girls, and pretty ones too, of a very different way of judging; and for my part you are welcome to the pick of them."

"You mean to say that I sha'n't have Addie?"

"Not in the least. But, come now-do you think yourself worthy of a girl like that?"

"No. Do you?"

"No. But I should not feel such a hypocrite if she thought me worthy, as to give her up on that ground."

"Then what do you mean?"

"To win her, if I can."

"Whew!"

"But if you are a gentleman, you will let me say so myself, and not betray my secret."

"Damned if I do! Good luck to you! There's my hand. I believe you're a good fellow after all. I wish I had seen you ride to hounds. They tell me it's a sight."

"Thank you heartily. But what are you going to do?"

"Go back to the sweet-flowing Thames, and the dreams of the desk."

"Well-be a man as well as a gentleman. Don't be a fool."

"Hang it all! I believe it was her money, after all, I was in love with. Good-bye!"

But the poor fellow looked grave enough as he went away. And I trust that, before long, he, too, began to reap some of the good corn that grows on the wintry fields of disappointment.-I have my eye upon him; but it is little an old fogie like me can do with a fellow like Percy.


CHAPTER VI

THE CRUEL PAINTER.


Now to return to the Story-Club.

On the night appointed, we met. And to the delight of all the rest of us, Harry arrived with a look that satisfied us that he was to be no defaulter this time. The look was one of almost nervous uneasiness. Of course this sprung from anxiety to please Adela-at least, so I interpreted it. She occupied her old place on the couch; we all arranged ourselves nearly as before; and the fire was burning very bright. Before he began, however, Harry, turning to our host, said:

"May I arrange the scene as I please, for the right effect of my story?"

"Certainly," answered the colonel.

Harry rose, and extinguished the lamp.

"But, my dear sir," said the colonel, "how can you read now?"

"Perfectly, by the firelight," answered Harry.

He then went to the windows, and drawing aside the curtains, drew up the blinds.

It was full high moon, and the light so clear that, notwithstanding the brightness of the fire, each window seemed to lie in ghostly shimmer on the floor. Not a breath of wind was abroad. The whole country being covered with snow, the air was filled with a snowy light. On one side rose the high roof of another part of the house, on which the snow was lying thick and smooth, undisturbed save by the footprints, visible in the moon, of a large black cat, which had now paused in the middle of it, and was looking round suspiciously towards the source of the light which had surprised him in his midnight walk.

"Now," said Harry, returning to his seat, and putting on an air of confidence to conceal the lack of it, "let any one who has nerves retire at once, both for his own sake and that of the company! This is just such a night as I wanted to read my story in-snow-stillness-moonlight outside, and nothing but firelight inside. Mind, Ralph, you keep up the fire, for the room will be more ready to get cold now the coverings are off the windows.-You will say at once if you feel it cold, Miss Cathcart?"

Adela promised; and Harry, who had his manuscript gummed together in a continuous roll, so that he might not have to turn over any leaves, began at once:

"THE CRUEL PAINTER.

"Among the young men assembled at the University of Prague, in the year 159-, was one called Karl von Wolkenlicht. A somewhat careless student, he yet held a fair position in the estimation of both professors and men, because he could hardly look at a proposition without understanding it. Where such proposition, however, had to do with anything relating to the deeper insights of the nature, he was quite content that, for him, it should remain a proposition; which, however, he laid up in one of his mental cabinets, and was ready to reproduce at a moment's notice. This mental agility was more than matched by the corresponding corporeal excellence, and both aided in producing results in which his remarkable strength was equally apparent. In all games depending upon the combination of muscle and skill, he had scarce rivalry enough to keep him in practice. His strength, however, was embodied in such a softness of muscular outline, such a rare Greek-like style of beauty, and associated with such a gentleness of manner and behaviour, that, partly from the truth of the resemblance, partly from the absurdity of the contrast, he was known throughout the university by the diminutive of the feminine form of his name, and was always called Lottchen.

"'I say, Lottchen,' said one of his fellow-students, called Richter, across the table in a wine-cellar they were in the habit of frequenting, 'do you know, Heinrich Höllenrachen here says that he saw this morning, with mortal eyes, whom do you think?-Lilith.'

"'Adam's first wife?' asked Lottchen, with an attempt at carelessness, while his face flushed like a maiden's.

"'None of your chaff!'said Richter. 'Your face is honester than your tongue, and confesses what you cannot deny, that you would give your chance of salvation-a small one to be sure, but all you've got-for one peep at Lilith. Wouldn't you now, Lottchen?'

"'Go to the devil!' was all Lottchen's answer to his tormentor; but he turned to Heinrich, to whom the students had given the surname above mentioned, because of the enormous width of his jaws, and said with eagerness and envy, disguising them as well as he could, under the appearance of curiosity:

"'You don't mean it, Heinrich? You've been taking the beggar in! Confess now.'

"'Not I. I saw her with my two eyes.'

"'Notwithstanding the different planes of their orbits,' suggested Richter.

"'Yes, notwithstanding the fact that I can get a parallax to any of the fixed stars in a moment, with only the breadth of my nose for the base,' answered Heinrich, responding at once to the fun, and careless of the personal defect insinuated. 'She was near enough for even me to see her perfectly.'

"'When? Where? How?' asked Lottchen.

"'Two hours ago. In the churchyard of St. Stephen's. By a lucky chance. Any more little questions, my child?' answered Höllenrachen.

"'What could have taken her there, who is seen nowhere?' said Richter.

"She was seated on a grave. After she left, I went to the place; but it was a new-made grave. There was no stone up. I asked the sexton about her. He said he supposed she was the daughter of the woman buried there last Thursday week. I knew it was Lilith.'

"'Her mother dead!' said Lottchen, musingly. Then he thought with himself-'She will be going there again, then!' But he took care that this ghost-thought should wander unembodied. 'But how did you know her, Heinrich? You never saw her before.'

"'How do you come to be over head and ears in love with her, Lottchen, and you haven't seen her at all?' interposed Richter.

"'Will you or will you not go to the devil?' rejoined Lottchen, with a comic crescendo; to which the other replied with a laugh.

"'No one could miss knowing her,' said Heinrich.

"'Is she so very like, then?'

"'It is always herself, her very self.'

"A fresh flask of wine, turning out to be not up to the mark, brought the current of conversation against itself; not much to the dissatisfaction of Lottchen, who had already resolved to be in the churchyard of St. Stephen's at sun-down the following day, in the hope that he too might be favoured with a vision of Lilith.

"This resolution he carried out. Seated in a porch of the church, not knowing in what direction to look for the apparition he hoped to see,