Young Earnest: The Romance of a Bad Start in LifeCannan, Gilbert
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Young Earnest: The Romance of a Bad Start in Life
Cannan, Gilbert
English fiction -- 20th century
"If there's one thing I hate," said Ann, "it's being dished. I suppose
I always knew it couldn't last. It was too wonderful. You don't know
how kind he was in his ways, never wanting anything you didn't want
yourself. And that was awful, too, because it made you afraid to want
anything. It seemed to shame you. He was always shaming me, and I did
feel awful sometimes. But it was lovely when we went for rides on tops
of buses."
This appreciation of René's qualities as a housemate seemed to bore
old Martin, for he took up a newspaper and began making notes and
calculations from the betting columns.
"Hullo!" he said. "This must be some connection of his. 'Miss Janet
Fourmy of Elgin, N.B.' 'Miss Fourmy,' it says, 'was a distinguished
German and Italian scholar, a Goethe translator, a contributor to the
Scottish Encyclo--' what you may call it. 'In her youth she was
familiar with the famous Edinburgh circle which gathered round _Maga_
and did much valuable philological work, and was for a time governess
to the late Archbishop of Canterbury who never ceased to express his
admiration for her intellect and gifts. She had many friendships with
the interesting figures of her day, and it is believed that she has
left some record of them.'"
"He told me about her," said Ann. "He used to go and stay with her,
and she used to read an Italian book called Dante, with the pages
upside down. She was very old, but good to him, and she thought Lord
John Russell was in love with her."
"Lord who?"
"I don't know who he was, but that's the name. Renny says it was her
weakness. She lived all alone, and it's very dreary in the winter in
Scotland. She had met a lot of lords in her time, and she liked to
remember more than she'd met. And she'd never married, and Renny says
she thought it sounded well to account for it by saying that Lord John
Russell was in love with her. It wasn't always him----"
"Well! the things women do think of. I shall say I remained a widower
because of Madame Tussaud."
"She was fond of Renny," said Ann, and that seemed on her lips the
noblest possible epitaph for old Janet. She added:
"Perhaps that's where he's gone."
"I shouldn't think so. It costs a pile o' money to go to Elgin, N.B.
It's a good deal north o' Bedford, which is the farthest I ever went
with the 'orses. That was in eighteen-eighty-four."
He settled down for a story. Fortunately for Ann, he was allowed to
get no further than clearing his throat, when he was cut short by the
entry of Casey.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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