Magnificent Ambersons, The - Booth Tarkington [80]
Except for the incidental teariness of her voice, her tone was casual, as though she mentioned a subject previously discussed and understood; for Fanny had no doubt that George had only pretended to be mystified because, in his pride, he would not in words admit that he knew what he knew.
"What did you say?" he asked incredulously.
"Of course I understood what you were doing," Fanny went on, drying her handkerchief again. "It puzzled other people when you began to be rude to Eugene, because they couldn't see how you could treat him as you did when you were so interested in Lucy. But I remembered how you came to me, that other time when there was so much talk about Isabel; and I knew you'd give Lucy up in a minute, if it came to a question of your mother's reputation, because you said then that--"
"Look here," George interrupted in a shaking voice. "Look here, I'd like--" He stopped, unable to go on, his agitation was so great. His chest heaved as from hard running, and his complexion, pallid at first, had become mottled; fiery splotches appearing at his temples and cheeks. "What do you mean by telling me--telling me there's talk about--about--" He gulped, and began again: "What do you mean by using such words as 'reputation'? What do you mean, speaking of a 'question' of my--my mother's reputation?"
Fanny looked up at him woefully over the handkerchief which she now applied to her reddened nose. "God knows I'm sorry for you, George," she murmured. "I wanted to say so, but it's only old Fanny, so whatever she says--even when it's sympathy--pick on her for it! Hammer her!" She sobbed. "Hammer her! It's only poor old lonely Fanny!"
"You look here!" George said harshly. "When I spoke to my Uncle George after that rotten thing I heard Aunt Amelia say about my mother, he said if there was any gossip it was about you! He said people might be laughing about the way you ran after Morgan, but that was all."
Fanny lifted her hands, clenched them, and struck them upon her knees. "Yes; it's always Fanny!" she sobbed. "Ridiculous old Fanny--always, always!"
"You listen!" George said. "After I'd talked to Uncle George I saw you; and you said I had a mean little mind for thinking there might be truth in what Aunt Amelia said about people talking. You denied it. And that wasn't the only time; you'd attacked me before then, because I intimated that Morgan might be coming here too often. You made me believe that mother let him come entirely on your account, and now you say--"
"I think he did," Fanny interrupted desolately. "I think he did come as much to see me as anything--for a while it looked like it. Anyhow, he liked to dance with me. He danced with me as much as he danced with her, and he acted as if he came on my account at least as much as he did on hers. He did act a good deal that way--and if Wilbur hadn't died--"
"You told me there wasn't any talk."
"I didn't think there was much, then," Fanny protested. "I didn't know how much there was."
"What!"
"People don't come and tell such things to a person's family, you know. You don't suppose anybody was going to say to George Amberson that his sister was getting herself talked about, do you? Or that they were going to say much to me?"
"You told me," said George, fiercely, "that mother never saw him except when she was chaperoning you."
"They weren't much alone together, then," Fanny returned. "Hardly ever, before Wilbur died. But you don't suppose that stops people from talking, do you? Your father never went anywhere, and people saw Eugene with her everywhere she went--and though I was with them people just thought"--she choked--"they just thought I didn't count! 'Only old Fanny Minafer,' I suppose they'd say! Besides, everybody knew that he'd been engaged to her--"
"What's that?" George cried.
"Everybody knows it. Don't you remember your grandfather speaking of it at the Sunday dinner one night?"
"He didn't say they were engaged or--"
"Well, they were! Everybody knows it; and she broke it off on account of that serenade when Eugene didn't