Hills of the Shatemuc Part 70

"But Governor, really I am tired of this life -- it isn't what I am fit for; -- and why not escape from it, if I can, by some agreeable road that will do n.o.body any harm?"

"With all my heart," said Winthrop. "I'll help you."

"Well? --"

"Well --"

"You think this is not such a one?"

"The first step in it being a stumble."

"To whom would it bring harm, Governor?"

"The head must lower when the foot stumbles," said Winthrop.

"That is one harm."

"But you are begging the question!" said Rufus a little impatiently.

"And you have granted it."

"I haven't!" said Rufus. "I don't see it. I don't see the stumbling or the lowering. I should not feel myself lowered by marrying a fine woman, and I hope she would not feel her own self-respect injured by marrying me."

"You will not stand so high upon her money-bags as upon your own feet."

"Why not have the advantage of both?"

"You cannot. People always sit down upon money-bags. The only exception is in the case of money-bags they have filled themselves."

Rufus looked at Winthrop's book for three minutes in silence.

"Well, why not then take at once the ease, for which the alternative is a long striving?"

"If you can. But the long striving is not the whole of the alternative; with that you lose the fruits of the striving -- all that makes ease worth having."

"But I should not relinquish them," said Rufus. "I shall not sit down upon my money-bags."

"They are not _your_ money-bags."

"They will be -- if I prove successful."

"And how will you prove successful?"

"Why!" -- said Rufus, -- "what a question! --"

"I wish you would answer it nevertheless -- not to me, but to yourself."

Whether Rufus did or not, the answer never came out. He paced the floor again; several times made ready to speak, and then checked himself.

"So you are entirely against me, --" he said at length.

"I am not against you, Will; -- I am _for_ you."

"You don't approve of my plan."

"No --I do not."

"I wish you would say why."

"I hardly need," said Winthrop with a smile. "You have said it all to yourself."

"Notwithstanding which a.s.sumption, I should like to hear you say it."

"For the greater ease of attack and defence?"

"If you please. For anything."

"What do you want me to do, Will?" said Winthrop looking up.

"To tell me why I should not marry Miss Haye or Miss Cadwallader."

"You not knowing, yourself."

"Yes -- I don't," said Rufus.

Winthrop turned over a few leaves of his book and then spoke.

"You are stronger, not to lean on somebody else's strength.

You are more independent, not to lean at all. You are honester, not to gain anything under false pretences. And you are better to be yourself, Will Landholm, than the husband of any heiress the sun s.h.i.+nes upon, at such terms."

"What terms?"

"False pretences."

"What false pretences?"

"Asking the hand, when you only want the key that is in it.

Professing to give yourself, when in truth your purpose is to give nothing that is not bought and paid for."

Rufus looked very grave and somewhat disturbed.

"That's a very hard characterizing of the matter, Governor,"

said he. "I don't think I deserve it."

"I hope you don't," said his brother.

Rufus began again to measure the little apartment with his long steps.

"But this kind of thing is done every day, Winthrop."