The man she hated : $b or, Won by strategy — John Stuart Mill — John Shaqi
The man she hated : $b or, Won by strategy
John Stuart Mill · en
“You have forgotten your preserver’s name, you ungrateful child!”
Fair’s pale and tear-wet face suddenly grew rosy red, and she said
quickly:
“Oh, no, for I never knew his name. He did not tell me, and, of course,
I did not like to ask him.”
Mrs. Fielding cried out in dismay:
“You did not find out his name, nor where he lives?”
“No, mamma,” despondently.
“But, of course, you told him your name?” pursued the mother.
“Of course I did not. As he did not show interest enough in me to ask
it,” Fair retorted hotly, for she resented bitterly, in secret, her
preserver’s proud indifference as shown in the fact that he did not
even care to know the name of her he had saved from a horrible death.
Mrs. Fielding was perplexed and disappointed beyond expression.
“Why, I really do not know what to think,” she exclaimed. “He must
be the strangest young man that ever was born, not to take any more
interest than that in such a lovely girl, and one whose life he had
saved at the peril of his own. And I really hoped something would come
of it. It was so much like novels I had read that I hoped it would end
like a novel; but I fear it will always remain a mystery.”
To Fair Fielding, as well as to her mother, the events of that day
seemed most romantic; but she did not, like the ambitious woman,
cherish any fancy that anything would “come of it.” The kindly
carelessness of her preserver’s manner had been too decided to foster
anything like a hope that he had taken any interest in her beyond the
humane one of saving her life.
Her young heart, fascinated by his heroism and his manly beauty,
had gone out to him in a rush of tenderness. Pity, too, had helped
to strengthen the flowery chain, for she felt that he had suffered
severely from the hurt received in her behalf. It was according to the
dictates of her woman’s nature to yearn over and to compassionate him
for the pain he had endured without a sign, except the marble pallor of
his handsome face.
But, alas! by his proud reserve and lack of curiosity over the girl
he had rescued, the young man had excited, together with gratitude
and tenderness, a bitter pique that swelled the young heart almost to
bursting. She tossed and turned restlessly all night on the pillow by
her mother’s side, thinking of the dark-blue eyes that had looked at
her so gravely, and wondering if her confession that she was only a
working girl had indeed been the cause of his coldness. More than once
she sighed to herself, with earnestness:
“Oh, if only I were his equal in birth and wealth, and he was my
lover, I should have nothing left to ask for on earth!”
She was so troubled and restless all night that her mother became very
anxious over her wound, and in the morning forbade her going to work.
Fair did not insist upon it, for she felt weak and nervous, and dreaded
meeting the girls who had rallied her so much yesterday.