"Yes," he cried, as he hid from himself the motive power that was
energising his life. "Yes, I will now be a man. I will show you--the
world--that one can be a great student and thinker, and at the same time
a man of that world--a gentleman of this present day. The man who
calculates the distance of one of the glorious orbs I have made my
study, rarely is as others are in manners and discourse--educated in the
ordinary pursuits of life--without making himself ridiculous if he
mounts a horse--absurd if he has to stand in competition with his peers.
Yes, you are right, Lucy, I have been a dreaming recluse; now the
dreams shall be put away, and I will awaken into this new life."
Lucy clapped her hands, and, flinging her arms round her brother kissed
him affectionately, and then drew her face back to gaze in his.
"Why, Moray," she cried proudly, "there isn't such a man for miles as
you would be, if you did as others do."
He laughed as he kissed her, and then gently put her away.
"There," he said, "go now. I have something here--a calculation I must
finish."
"And now you are going back to your figures again?" she cried pettishly.
"Yes, for a time," he replied; "but I will not forget my promise."
"You will not?" she cried.
"I give you my word," he said, and kissing him affectionately once
again, Lucy left the observatory.
"He has forbidden me to speak," she said to herself, with a glow of
triumph in her eyes, "but it will come about all the same. He loves
Glynne with all his heart, and the love of such a man as he is cannot
change. Glynne is beginning, too; and when she quite finds it out, she
will never go and swear faith to that miserable Rolph. I am going to
wait and let things arrange themselves, as I'm sure they will."
The object of her thoughts was not going on with the astronomical
calculation, but pacing the observatory to and fro, with his brow knit,
and a feverish energy burning in his brain.
Volume 2, Chapter XI.
THE DOCTOR BRINGS ALLEYNE DOWN.
About an hour later Oldroyd called; and, as the bell jangled at the gate
and Eliza went slowly down, Lucy's face turned crimson, and she ran to
the window and listened, to hear the enquiry,--"Is your mistress in?"
That was enough. The whole scene of that particular morning walk came
back with a repetition of the agony of mind. She saw Rolph in his
ludicrous undress, striding along the sandy road; she heard again his
maundering civilities, and she saw, too, the figure of Oldroyd seated
upon the miller's pony, passing them, and afterwards blocking the way.
It was he, now, seated upon the same pony; and, without waiting to hear
Eliza's answer, Lucy fled to her bedroom and locked herself in, to begin
sobbing and crying in the most ridiculous manner.
"No, sir," said Eliza, with a bob; "she've gone to town shopping, but
Miss Lucy's in the drawing-room."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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