Magnificent Ambersons, The - Booth Tarkington [86]
George drew a long breath, then advanced and stood close before his uncle. "Didn't you understand me when I told you that people are saying my mother means to marry this man?"
"Yes, I understood you."
"You say that my going over there has made matters worse," George went on. "How about it if such a--such an unspeakable marriage did take place? Do you think that would make people believe they'd been wrong in saying--you know what they say."
"No," said Amberson deliberately; "I don't believe it would. There'd be more badness in the bad mouths and more silliness in the silly mouths, I dare say. But it wouldn't hurt Isabel and Eugene, if they never heard of it; and if they did hear of it, then they could take their choice between placating gossip or living for their own happiness. If they have decided to marry--"
George almost staggered. "Good God!" he gasped. "You speak of it calmly!"
Amberson looked up at him inquiringly. "Why shouldn't they marry if they want to?" he asked. "It's their own affair."
"Why shouldn't they?" George echoed. "Why shouldn't they?"
"Yes. Why shouldn't they? I don't see anything precisely monstrous about two people getting married when they're both free and care about each other. What's the matter with their marrying?"
"It would be monstrous!" George shouted. "Monstrous even if this horrible thing hadn't happened, but now in the face of this--oh, that you can sit there and even speak of it! Your own sister! O God! Oh--" He became incoherent, swinging away from Amberson and making for the door, wildly gesturing.
"For heaven's sake, don't be so theatrical!" said his uncle, and then, seeing that George was leaving the room: "Come back here. You mustn't speak to your mother of this!"
"Don't 'tend to," George said indistinctly; and he plunged out into the big dimly lit hall. He passed his grandfather's room on the way to the stairs; and the Major was visible within, his white head brightly illumined by a lamp, as he bent low over a ledger upon his roll-top desk. He did not look up, and his grandson strode by the door, not really conscious of the old figure stooping at its tremulous work with long additions and subtractions that refused to balance as they used to. George went home and got a hat and overcoat without seeing either his mother or Fanny. Then he left word that he would be out for dinner, and hurried away from the house.
He walked the dark streets of Amberson Addition for an hour, then went downtown and got coffee at a restaurant. After that he walked through the lighted parts of the town until ten o'clock, when he turned north and came back to the purlieus of the Addition. He strode through the length and breadth of it again, his hat pulled down over his forehead, his overcoat collar turned up behind. He walked fiercely, though his feet ached, but by and by he turned homeward, and, when he reached the Major's, went in and sat upon the steps of the huge stone veranda in front--an obscure figure in that lonely and repellent place. All lights were out at the Major's, and finally, after twelve, he saw his mother's window darken at home.
He waited half an hour longer, then crossed the front yards of the new houses and let himself noiselessly in the front door. The light in the hall had been left burning, and another in his own room, as he discovered when he got there. He locked the door quickly and without noise, but his fingers were still upon the key when there was a quick footfall in the hall outside.
"Georgie, dear?"
He went to the other end of the room before replying.
"Yes?"
"I'd been wondering where you were, dear."
"Had you?"
There was a pause; then she said timidly: "Wherever it was, I hope you had a pleasant evening."
After a silence, "Thank you," he said, without expression.
Another silence followed before she spoke again.
"You wouldn't care to be kissed good-night, I suppose?" And with a little flurry of placative laughter, she added: "At your age, of course!"
"I'm going