Georgie

“ Georgie flushed.
"Poor chap, you can't expect him to be sorry he's missed," said he, "he's only human after all. And we shall never have a centre three-quarter in the town to touch him. I told him about the Gladiators, and you should have seen his eyes blaze. He said he'd give everything he'd got to come over for the afternoon, and help us to give them beans." ”

“ I might have guessed. What more can a girl want than she finds in Georgie. Curse everything!"
"Come in," cried Georgie happily. "I'm getting my bat ready for the match to-morrow, and the weather's a dream. I'm nearly off my head with joy. It's a ripping world."
"I'm glad you find it so," said I shortly. "I don't agree with you, and I should like to have a few words with you when you've finished with that beastly bat."
He looked up with a good-tempered surprise.
"Hallo!" he said, "something's put you out. What's wrong, old chap?" ”

“ Georgie said, "calling itself a theatre, and on the wall there was a bill—a flaming thing all scarlet and black; caught the eye like anything, don't you know. But it wasn't only the bill that caught mine. There was some one reading it."
"Ah!" said I.
"What was she like?" Drusilla asked gently.
Georgie flushed.
"She was crying. I could see the tears rolling down her poor little face, and her eyes were red, as if she'd been crying all night. It makes me feel furious to see a woman cry. ”

“ One time it would be, 'Georgie! It's me! Ah, Georgie!' Or, 'Georgie, are you in? Will you speak to Irwin?' Then a long pause, and at the end of, say, ten minutes, a most strange, unearthly sigh, or a cough—a perfectly intentional, forced cough, other times nothing but, 'Ah, Georgie!' On one night there was a dreadful fog. He called me so plain, I got up and said, 'Oh, really! that man must be here; he must be lodging somewhere near, as sure as life; if he is not outside I must be going mad in my mind or imagination.' I went and stood outside the hall door steps in the thick black fog. ”

“ Georgie had a little mustache and an income, just enough income to support the little mustache, and he sang inoffensively, and was always winning tennis cups—almost—and he always said, at least once at every party, "The basis of savoir faire is knowing how to be rude to the right people." Fire-enamored and gliding into a perfumed haze of exquisite drowsiness, Claire saw Georgie as heroic and wise. But the firelight got into her eyes, and her lids wouldn't stay open, and in her ears was a soft humming as of a million bees in a distant meadow golden-spangled—and Gene was helping her upstairs ”

“ Once on the other side I fear no one. I know your room; its windows look out on the river; watch for the boat, and when it is fairly across, do what to you seems best! only screen me, as I will screen you, now and forever.”
“You swear it,” Georgie asked, and he replied, “Yes, I swear by the love I bear Janet, and the little ones, and the hope I have of seeing them again, never to breathe a word to any living being, that I ever heard of you save as the belle and heiress.” ”

“ Don't call him Taffy. Taffy was a thief, you know."
"People never grow up to fit their names," Georgie said gloomily. "Look at me. There's nothing solid and British and conventional about me, you know. I'm not narrow, or conservative, or obstinate. George is a very John Bull kind of name."
I thought of a possible Georgie, twenty years ahead, and smiled to myself.
But Drusilla looked gravely from the stern young face to the little boy, and back again, and I was amazed to find tears in her absurd eyes. ”

“ Georgie, with all her dearness, was almost too prosperous to understand. Judy radiated an inner joy that Ishmael had not attained and that Georgie had never felt the need of. That joy had not been won until her feet had trod stranger ways than her friends at Cloom ever imagined. Often she was seized by a pang of conscience that they should admire her as a creature above everything honest and courageous ... for there was more to know of her now than her relation with Killigrew. ”

“ Lots of people eat them, and periwinkles too. You shall taste them yourself.'
'Oh, Georgie, do throw them into the sea! They are horrid!' she exclaimed, shuddering. 'I don't like this bay, or the dark cruel rocks, or the waiting for Thomas, with the tide coming in to drown us if he is late! And now those dirty shells—alive and horrid—which you want to eat!'
Georgie laughed with such shouts of merriment that Alan told him to shut up; he would have the boat over if he kicked about in that manner. ”

“ Drusilla looked at the fire. "Georgie, don't think me very hateful, but isn't it just possible that these people may be taking you in?"
"No," said Georgie, shortly; "it isn't. I know a nice girl when I see one." ”

“ She loves the life. You must give it up, Georgie. She wouldn't for worlds. And perhaps it isn't such a pity as you think." Drusilla glanced quickly at the depressed Dolly. "You see she does sing well, doesn't she, and there wouldn't be anything else so very likely to suit—well, to suit her peculiar style, would there, to look at it in a really sensible and practical light?"
"I suppose not," Georgie said reluctantly. ”

“ I wondered at Georgie's methods of persuasion.
"I'm sorry," said I grimly, "and it may seem heartless; but we can't adopt your protégé, Georgie. We shall find it as much as we can manage to provide for Matthew Arnold's future, I am afraid. And it will take all the earnings of my piffling pen to keep the Little Mansion over our three heads in modest comfort. And as you say, I am not a sportsman, therefore not qualified to develop his young promise in football. You had better leave him to the Welsh parish. And seriously, my dear boy, do think of the risk. ”

“ His whole face changes when he speaks of her. Fact is, Georgie, if the man didn’t come rooting about on our very own frontier, I couldn’t help having a sneaking liking for him. His belief in his own greatness is perfectly sincere, and he cherishes no animosity against us for opposing his plans. He told me that he hoped political differences would make no break in our friendly intercourse—Hang it! this thing’s giving way. Why in the world don’t you have stronger tables?”
“Sit here,” said Georgia, pointing to the wicker sofa. “Well, Dick?” ”

“ Not that Georgie Warrender was a mere rustic beauty, as her taper hands and tiny feet showed. It takes a good foot to look well in a walking shoe, and even in the trying walking shoe Georgie's foot was unmistakably a good one. Her clear blue eyes were honest and sympathetic; Georgie Warrender looked every one straight in the face, she had evidently nothing to conceal, nothing to be ashamed or afraid of. ”

“ The child's black hair was ruffled, his cheeks rose pink from his sudden awakening, and his beautiful eyes wide open, bewildered. The girls in their pretty bright gowns crowded around us, and their brothers watched with surprised, amused faces over their shoulders. Georgie faced his mother in pale silence, and I waited. Little Diana peeped from behind Drusilla with a pleased, excited face. It was the Goddess Girl who broke the silence. If I remember right, it generally was.
"Say!" she cried. "Isn't he just too cute for anything? Whose little piccaninny's this, Georgie? Do tell." ”

“ And Georgie would make a charming wife, and, if her husband proved a tyrant, would still go down upon her knees and adore him, and thank Heaven for her prince’s affection, and his perfections, to the end of her innocent days. As for herself, it was no business of hers, when she had done her duty toward her friend. The best thing she could do, would be to leave them alone, and she left them alone, and gave them every opportunity to be lover-like, if they had chosen. ”

“ They were yet in sight, Mr. Gabriel sitting and seeming to adjure Faith, whose skirts he held; but she stood, and her arms were outstretched, and, pale as a foam-wreath her face, and piercing as a night-wind her voice, I heard her cry, “O Georgie! Georgie!” It was too late for her to cry or to wring her hands now. She should have thought of that before. But Mr. Gabriel rose and drew her down, and hid her face in his arms and bent over it; and so they fled up the basin and round the long line of sand, and out into the gloom and the curdling mists.
I bound up Dan’s head. ”

“ You had better cross the border into Ethiopia, Mab. We are just as artificial here as at home.”
“Georgie! as if I wanted to make a savage of myself, like the youth in ‘Locksley Hall’! Surely life can be simple and primitive without being squalid?”
“You haven’t asked my advice, and I don’t know whether you want it, but it’s dreadfully commonplace. Get married.”
“You mean that I should know then what reality is? What an indictment to bring against Dick! What in the world does he do to you, Georgie?”
Georgia smiled superior. “You don’t expect me to begin to defend Dick to you?” ”

“ Georgie gazed at the open windows, with hunted eyes.
"It must be delightful," Anne pursued, "to be engaged to a girl like Diana. A girl who always defers so charmingly to the opinion of the world at large. She is so sweetly conventional, isn't she?" ”

“ Georgie went on gravely, "and to the country too, perhaps. I've never heard of an international coming out of the workhouse. Have you?"
"The workhouse?" Drusilla glanced with troubled eyes at poor Taffy, now fast asleep and no longer fierce.
"Yes," Georgie said slowly. "Skilly would weaken a chap's kick, don't you think? His mother's dead. So is his father; fell off his boat drunk. This chap's been living with an aunt ever since." ”

“ I wish the roof had fallen in, and smashed him up. Talk about something else; and look here, don’t let me catch you going there again, or we shall quarrel. I won’t have any one I know going sneaking after that humbug.’
‘All right, Georgie dear,’ replied the damsel, smiling maliciously. ‘Then it’s true, I suppose, that he’s going to marry your cousin? I saw her sitting right under him, and thought her awfully pretty.’
‘You let her alone,’ grumbled George, ‘and mind your own affairs.’
‘Why don’t you marry her yourself, Géorgie?’ persisted his tormentor. ”

“ Georgie was fully conscious of her privileges. No woman can twice in her life dress in white satin and orange blossoms, and if she mars the effect by the regulation tears, it is quite certain that there must be a screw loose somewhere. There was a great deal of tittering, smiling, and blushing; but the squire glanced at the clock, Lucy handed the bridal bouquet to her cousin, then the squire gave his daughter his arm, and, preceded by the bridesmaids, the little procession entered the carriages, and five minutes' drive brought them to the church. ”

“ Georgie's face grew crimson.
"On the contrary," said he, "she's absolutely wrapped up in me. And I've not changed my mind. I love her every bit as much as I did when I proposed to her."
"Be a man," said I softly, "and get it over. Break it off."
"Thank you," said he loftily, "I prefer to behave like a gentleman and keep it on."
"With both of them?" I suggested mildly.
He collapsed.
"Oh, Lord! You might help a chap, Martin, instead of jeering. I can't give Violet up. I can't."
"Then tell the truth to Drusilla instead. Explain about the rose-colored dance, and the rest of it." ”

“ CHAPTER XII. THE VILLA LAMBERT.
Twenty-four hours at a Genevese hotel were got through by Georgie and her cousin without difficulty.
"I do think," said Lucy, "that Reginald might have brought us here himself. I confess that a tête-à-tête of two women is dull; when they are almost sisters, as a rule it's duller still; though the dulness is frequently enlivened by a pitched battle. Georgie, why are you not of a pugnacious disposition? My fingers literally itch to box some one's ears; as for Hephzibah, I've no patience with her." ”

“ Phillida collapsed suddenly on to a chair, and I could see her lips tremble. I tried to slip out of the room, but Georgie stopped me with a quick gesture of appeal.
"I guess I'd better make tracks," said the poor Goddess Girl with limp despair.
"Yes," said Georgie grimly, "and thank you very much for your—kind charity."
She rose without a word and left the room. I followed her meekly, and at the hall door she turned her charming face to me, with pleading eyes;—eyes as full of tears as Anne's had been, and oh, so much more beautiful.
"Say," she whispered with a sob, "you're his friend. ”

“ I said quickly, "and, Georgie—of course it seems a pity, but it is a terrible necessity, you see. Thousands of them have to be turned over to the parish every year. This little man must take his chance with the others, I am afraid."
Georgie flushed indignantly and moved restlessly. Taffy grunted in his sleep and buried his grimy face farther into the gorgeous waistcoat.
"Look at him," Georgie said. "When I saw him kicking his absurd apology for a ball and giving the other chap such a thundering good licking, I seemed to see 'International' written big all over him." ”

“ Laying one arm round her, with his other hand he draws her head down on his breast.
"At least, before we go, you will kiss me once," he says, entreatingly. All the gayety—the gladness—has gone from his voice; only the deep and lasting love remains. He says this, too, hesitatingly, as though half afraid to demand so great a boon.
"Yes; I think I should like to kiss you," says Georgie, kindly; and then she raises herself from his embrace, and, standing on tiptoe, places both hands upon his shoulders, and with the utmost calmness lays her lips on his. ”