The Landlord at Lion's Head — CompleteHowells, William Dean
General
The Landlord at Lion's Head — Complete
Howells, William Dean
Artists -- Fiction; Massachusetts -- Fiction
“No, that was it. She was what her mother wished her to be. I've often
wondered how much she was interested in the marriage she made.”
Cynthia let a rustic silence ensue, and Westover shrank again from the
inquisition he longed to make.
It was not Genevieve Vostrand's marriage which really concerned him, but
Cynthia's engagement, and it was her mind that he would have liked to
look into. It might well be supposed that she regarded it in a perfect
matter-of-fact way, and with no ambition beyond it. She was a country
girl, acquainted from childhood with facts of life which town-bred girls
would not have known without a blunting of the sensibilities, and why
should she be different from other country girls? She might be as
good and as fine as he saw her, and yet be insensible to the spiritual
toughness of Jeff, because of her love for him. Her very goodness might
make his badness unimaginable to her, and if her refinement were from
the conscience merely, and not from the tastes and experiences, too,
there was not so much to dread for her in her marriage with such a man.
Still, he would have liked, if he could, to tell her what he had told
her father of Durgin's behavior with Lynde, and let her bring the test
of her self-devotion to the case with a clear understanding. He had
sometimes been afraid that Whitwell might not be able to keep it
to himself; but now he wished that the philosopher had not been so
discreet. He had all this so absorbingly in mind that he started
presently with the fear that she had said something and he had not
answered, but when he asked her he found that she had not spoken. They
were standing at an open window looking out upon Lion's Head, when he
said: “I don't know how I shall show my gratitude to Mrs. Durgin and you
for thinking of having me up here. I've done a picture of Lion's Head
that might be ever so much worse; but I shouldn't have dreamed of
getting at it if it hadn't been for you, though I've so often dreamed
of doing it. Now I shall go home richer in every sort of way-thanks to
you.”
She answered, simply: “You needn't thank anybody; but it was Jeff who
thought of it; we were ready enough to ask you.”
“That was very good of him,” said Westover, whom her words confirmed in
a suspicion he had had all along. But what did it matter that Jeff had
suggested their asking him, and then attributed the notion to them? It
was not so malign for him to use that means of ingratiating himself with
Westover, and of making him forget his behavior with Lynde, and it was
not unnatural. It was very characteristic; at the worst it merely proved
that Jeff was more ashamed of what he had done than he would allow, and
that was to his credit.
He heard Cynthia asking: “Mr. Westover, have you ever been at Class Day?
He wants us to come.”
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.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account