"Well, I don't know," I said. "She has always said so, and we have
always done as she said. I have always found it was the best thing for
me," I added.
Eloise pretended indignation. "Well, now, let me tell you, Jack, this
is my funeral as well as yours, and for once this isn't the right idea!"
"Oh," said I, "maybe you've grown big enough since I saw you to defy
Aunt Lucretia. Well, _I_ haven't; and dear, dear Little Sister," I went
on, taking her slim hand in mine with more warmth than she seemed to
like, "I have learned to hold my own among men, but Aunt Lucretia is a
very different thing! I am not going to defy her, or go contrary to her
wishes--I've tried it and know better! And you?"
"Of course I am," she said, moving a little away from me; "the idea!
Why, Jack, it is absurd! Jack--" and instantly she stopped. Her voice
dropped with a sad little wilt, and she laid her head upon my shoulder.
I knew that she was brave and never cried, or else I would have believed
she was in tears.
"Dear Little Sister," I said consolingly, "why, what is it? What has
happened since I left? This has been Aunt Lucretia's dream all her life,
and mine too," I said, tenderly kissing her cheek.
Eloise sighed; then after a while she answered. "Of course, Jack, she
has said that always, ever since we were children, and being children,
why we couldn't say anything, for our very home and living depended on
it. But Jack, I see it all now. I'm ashamed of it--though I couldn't
help it--this--this awful buy-and-sell way, this bartering me because I
am poor and an orphan, this closing the chance of the great dream of my
life for me--that one dream which every woman loves more than life,
Jack. It's--why, I've treated you so badly. I wonder that you care for
me at all. But--oh, Jack, I had such ideas of love, and now to be mated
off like her cattle!"
"I know it," I said, "only you were never as mean as you say. Young as
we were I felt it, too, and that is why I didn't blame you. But it
never made any difference with me, Eloise--I have loved you always, and
I'm as proud of you now as anyone can be."
"Oh, you dear boy," said she. She laid her head upon my shoulder, then
reached up and kissed me on the cheek. She was silent and I was never
so happy, with her head lying there, and the perfume of her hair in my
face.
At last she laughed. "Jack, you neglected me shamefully while you were
away, studying."
"I wrote you a love letter every week!" I exclaimed.
"But people in love write to each other every day," she said. "You
don't really love me, Jack!"
"Eloise, I couldn't write every day, but I thought of you the last thing
every night before I went to sleep, and I slept with your picture under
my pillow, and I used to play that we were married, and that my dressing
gown in the chair was you."
"O, Jack," and she clasped my hand in hers, "you dear boy! And I must
say I never dreamed you'd be so big and handsome!"
I seized her hands, holding them in mine: "And let me tell you, Eloise,
you almost took my breath when I saw you for the first time this
morning!"
There was a long silence before Eloise spoke. "Jack, what are we going
to do about--about--Aunt Lucretia?"
"Why, I tell you there is nothing to do but to do as she
says--marry--you know how she has planned this all her life. It would
break her heart; and mine," I added softly.
"Listen now," said Eloise earnestly. "Jack, that is nonsense. I don't
love you that way nor you me. I don't care what she says. Love is made
from higher, nobler motives, and true marriages should be made in heaven
as they say. I," she went on with a sigh, "Jack, I have given up; I was
not made for love like that--as you want to love me. I am too selfish,
I care too much for the fine world around me, for my own self, for
pleasure. I love to will, to conquer, Jack. I don't want to love, to
give myself up to any man and his whims unless--"
"Unless what?" I asked eagerly.
"Well, two things," she said. "First; unless I loved him--oh, if I only
could! How I would love him! And if not that--well, for--for--it would
have to be compensation of another kind, such as great wealth, and all
that, to have a great name like that of the Countess of Carfax."
"The Countess of Carfax?" I asked.
She was looking at me very earnestly. I felt her eyes on my face.
Something unpleasant began to dawn upon me.
"Jack, I cannot deceive you. I do not, I cannot love anyone that
way--that one sweet way. It is not in me. I might have loved you that
way, Jack, it is the truth, but Aunt Lucretia has thwarted the chance
you had with me, with her blooded stock idea of it. That is why I've
treated you so all my life; it was not I, it was Love resenting this
profanity of itself."