Love stories; Nobility -- Great Britain -- Fiction; Switzerland -- Fiction
“You must be what father calls a wicked Radical,” said Godfrey
staring at her, “one of those people who want to disestablish the
Church.”
“I daresay,” she replied, nodding her head. “That is if you
mean making clergymen work like other people, instead of spying and
gossiping and playing games as they do about here.”
Godfrey did not pursue the argument, but remarked immorally:
“It’s a pity you don’t come to our class, for then I could do
your history papers and you could do my sums.”
She started, but all she said was:
“This would be a good place to learn history. Now I must be going.
Don’t forget to give the note. I shall have to say that I waited a
long while before I found anyone. Goodbye, Godfrey.”
“Goodbye, Isobel,” he answered, but she was gone.
“I hope he did dream that it was his mother who kissed him,” Isobel
reflected to herself, for now the full enormity of her performance came
home to her. Young as she was, a mere child with no knowledge of the
great animating forces of life and of the mysteries behind them, she
wondered why she had done this thing; what it was that forced her to do
it. For she knew well that something had forced her, something outside
of herself, as she understood herself. It was as though another entity
that was in her and yet not herself had taken possession of her and
made her act as uninfluenced, she never would have acted. Thus she
pondered in her calm fashion, then, being able to make nothing of the
business, shrugged her shoulders and let it go by. After all it
mattered nothing since Godfrey had dreamed that the ghost of his mother
had visited him and would not suspect her of being that ghost, and she
was certain that never would she do such a thing again. The trouble was
that she had done it once and that the deed signified some change in
her which her childish mind could not understand.
On reaching the Hall, or rather shortly afterwards, she saw her father
who was waiting for the carriage in which to go to the station to meet
some particularly important week-end guest. He asked if she had brought
any answer to his note to Mr. Knight, and she told him that she had
left it in the schoolroom, as she called the refectory, because he was
out.
“I hope he will get it,” grumbled Mr. Blake. “One of my
friends who is coming down to-night thinks he understands architecture
and I want the parson to show him over the Abbey House. Indeed that’s
why he has come, for you see he is an American who thinks a lot of such
old things.”
“Well, it is beautiful, isn’t it, Father?” she said.
“Even I felt that it would be easy to learn in that big old room with
a roof like that of a church.”
An idea struck him.
“Would you like to go to school there, Isobel?”
“I think so, Father, as I must go to school somewhere and I hate those
horrible governesses.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account