Betacular

Betacular Download +128K - V5.4.1 The two young men burst out simultaneously with the speech in tones of sheer astonishment, and stared at Etwald as at some strangle animal. That this elderly man--Etwald was midway between thirty and forty, but that looked elderly to these boys of twenty-five--should dare to love Isabella Dallas, was a thing unheard of. She so young, so beautiful, so full of divine youth and diviner womanhood; he so sombre, pale and worn with intellectual vigils; with a mysterious past, a doubtful present and a problematic future.,Patricia broke in on her dismal forebodings with a rippling, silvery laugh.,"Why not?" said Etwald, coolly. "Mrs. Dallas had no reason to steal the devil-stick, yet--","Oh, you mean that Obi rubbish, my dearest," said Maurice, slipping his arm round the slender waist of the girl. "It is on that very account that I wish to tell your mother of our engagement, for I must rescue you from the influence of that dark Jezebel. She is dangerous.","Yes. He loves Isabella much more than you do, and he asked permission--which you didn't--to pay his addresses to her. I consented, and so," Mrs. Dallas raised her voice, "he shall marry her."，"If she's going to be a writer, she'll drop her dignified pose soon enough," predicted Elinor easily. "She'll be too much interested in other people and things to remember herself too vividly."，Self-contained as ever, Etwald looked up at the wall near him, and seemed to be considering a decoration of savage arms, which looked barbaric and wild, between two oil-paintings. When Jen came back with the cigars, his gaze followed that of his guest, and he made a remark about the weapons.，"I don't know if you'll consider them so; but Mrs. Dallas and her daughter go back to their estates in Barbadoes within the month.""No, no, Billy; the judge is just looking over the hedge at our flowers! Don't you want to give him a rose?" I hurried to say, as the smile died out of Judge Wade's face and he looked at Billy intently.

They parted, at the end of the sumptuous supper in the transformed ante-chamber, with a thousand plans for the coming season and a strong sense of enrichment in the friendship of these sincere and attractive neighbors.,"Well, no, major, I can't say that he was. In fact," added Etwald, with the air of a man making a simple statement, "I hated him!",What I am, is just a poor foolish woman, who has a lot more heart than she can manage with the amount of brains she got with it at birth. I'm not any star in a rose-coloured sky, and I don't want to inspire anybody; it's too heavy an undertaking. I want to be a healthy, happy woman and a wife to a man who can inspire himself and manage me. I want to marry a thin man, and when I get to be thirty I want my husband to want me to be as large as Aunt Bettie, but not let me. An inspiration couldn't be fat, and I'm always in danger from hot cakes and chicken gravy.,"I didn't dream those uproarious creatures could be so serious. I wonder where they got that song," she said to herself as she slipped unnoticed out into the twilight of the corridor.,Elinor smiled a wistful little puckered smile. "Perhaps I am rather lop-sided in my feelings," she confessed. "I always feel so dreadfully sorry for the wrong-doers, and the less they care the sorrier I am.","I have warned you, Alymer," he said, sternly. "Your marriage, after or before it, means life in death. Take care! Ladies," he added, with a bow, "I take my departure.",Judith explained that although she had been so eager for a visit to the celebrated night life, she had tired of the loneliness of work hours, and had run off home, leaving Elinor still expecting her criticism.,"Voodoo! Voodoo!" she cried, hoarsely.,After their laughter at her dramatic disappearance had died down, they sat quietly in the twilight watching the lamps flicker into life across the park, each one busy with her own thoughts.,"But here, as you may guess, I found an unexpected obstacle. The young lady was in love with Mr. Alymer, and would have nothing to do with an elderly bachelor like myself. I determined to remove that obstacle; not by death, but by gentler means which would do away with all risk, and place Miss Dallas in my power. Need I say that I allude to the devil-stick?,Miss Jinny had a queer look, Patricia thought, as she turned hurriedly away with a murmured excuse about the tea table.,"'Dear Elinor'—begins well, doesn't it, Judy? I couldn't have done much better myself—'Tom Hughes and I are coming to town next Saturday, and we are going to blow ourselves, for his birthday.' Not very enlightening as to Tom Hughes—never heard of him before; but that's neither here nor there, of course.".