The Man Between [8]
"You suppose this Mr. Mostyn may become Squire of Rawdon Manor?"
"He may, Ruth, but it is not certain. There is a large mortgage on the Manor."
"Oh!"
Both girls made the ejaculation at the same moment, and in both voices there was the same curious tone of speculation. It was a cry after truth apprehended, but not realized. Mr. Rawdon remained silent; he was debating with himself the advisability of further confidence, but he came quickly to the conclusion that enough had been told for the present. Turning to Ethel, he said: "I suppose girls have a code of honor about their secrets. Is Dora Denning's `extraordinary news' shut up in it?"
"Oh, no, father. She is going to be married. That is all."
"That is enough. Who is the man?"
"Reverend Mr. Stanhope."
"Nonsense!"
"Positively."
"I never heard anything more ridiculous. That saintly young priest! Why, Dora will be tired to death of him in a month. And he? Poor fellow!"
"Why poor fellow? He is very much in love with her."
"It is hard to understand. St. Jerome's love `pale with midnight prayer' would be more believable than the butterfly Dora. Goodness, gracious! The idea of that man being in love! It pulls him down a bit. I thought he never looked at a woman."
"Do you know him, father?"
"As many people know him--by good report. I know that he is a clergyman who believes what he preaches. I know a Wall Street broker who left St. Jude's church because Mr. Stanhope's sermons on Sunday put such a fine edge on his conscience that Mondays were dangerous days for him to do business on. And whatever Wall Street financiers think of the Bible personally, they do like a man who sticks to his colors, and who holds intact the truth committed to him. Stanhope does this emphatically; and he is so well trusted that if he wanted to build a new church he could get all the money necessary, from Wall Street men in an hour. And he is going to marry! Going to marry Dora Denning! It is `extraordinary news,' indeed!"
Ethel was a little offended at such unusual surprise. "I think you don't quite understand Dora," she said. "It will be Mr. Stanhope's fault if she is not led in the right way; for if he only loves and pets her enough he may do all he wishes with her. I know, I have both coaxed and ordered her for four years--sometimes one way is best, and sometimes the other."
"How is a man to tell which way to take? What do her parents think of the marriage?"
"They are pleased with it."
"Pleased with it! Then I have nothing more to say, except that I hope they will not appeal to me on any question of divorce that may arise from such an unlikely marriage."
"They are only lovers yet, Edward," said Ruth. "It is not fair, or kind, to even think of divorce."
"My dear Ruth, the fashionable girl of today accepts marriage with the provision of divorce."
"Dora is hardly one of that set."
"I hope she may keep out of it, but marriage will give her many opportunities. Well, I am sorry for the young priest. He isn't fit to manage a woman like Dora Denning. I am afraid he will get the worst of it."
"I think you are very unkind, father. Dora is my friend, and I know her. She is a girl of intense feelings and very affectionate. And she has dissolved all her life and mind in Mr. Stanhope's life and mind, just as a lump of sugar is dissolved in water."
Ruth laughed. "Can you not find a more poetic simile, Ethel?"
"It will do. This is an age of matter; a material symbol is the proper thing."
"I am glad to hear she has dissolved her mind in Stanhope's," said Judge Rawdon. "Dora's intellect in itself is childish. What did the man see in her that he should desire her?"
"Father, you never can tell how much brains men like with their beauty. Very little will do generally. And Dora has beauty --great beauty; no one can deny that. I think Dora is giving up a great deal. To her, at least, marriage is a state of passing from perfect freedom into the comparative condition of a slave, giving up her own way constantly for some one else's way."
"Well,