Henry James: Complete Stories 1864-1874 by Henry James Read Free Book Online Page B

Mildred. I don't see why you should take so for granted that I would accept him.
You will never meet a man who has so few disagreeable qualities. He is probably not very well off. I don't know what is the pay of a captain in the navy
It's a relief to find there is something you don't know, Kate Theory broke in.
But when I am gone, her sister went on, calmly, when I am gone there will be plenty for both of you.
The younger girl, at this, was silent for a moment; then she exclaimed, Mildred, you may be out of health, but I don't see why you should be dreadful!
You know that since we have been leading this life we have seen no one we liked better, said Milly. When she spoke of the life they were leadingthere was always a soft resignation of regret and contempt in the allusionshe meant the southern winters, the foreign climates, the vain experiments, the lonely waitings, the wasted hours, the interminable rains, the bad food, the pottering, humbugging doctors, the damp pensions, the chance encounters, the fitful apparitions of fellow-travellers.
Why shouldn't you speak for yourself alone? I am glad you like him, Mildred.
If you don't like him, why do you give him orangeade?
At this inquiry Kate began to laugh, and her sister continued
Of course you are glad I like him, my dear. If I didn't like him, and you did, it wouldn't be satisfactory at all. I can imagine nothing more miserable; I shouldn't die in any sort of comfort.
Kate Theory usually checked this sort of allusionshe was always too latewith a kiss; but on this occasion she added that it was a long time since Mildred had tormented her so much as she had done to-day. You will make me hate him, she added.
Well, that proves you don't already, Milly rejoined; and it happened that almost at this moment they saw, in the golden afternoon, Captain Benyon's boat approaching the

 

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steps at the end of the garden. He came that day, and he came two days later, and he came yet once again after an interval equally brief, before Percival Theory arrived with Mrs. Theory from Rome. He seemed anxious to crowd into these few days, as he would have said, a good deal of intercourse with the two remarkably nice girlsor nice women, he hardly knew which to call themwhom in the course of a long, idle, rather tedious detention at Naples, he had discovered in the lovely suburb of Posilippo. It was the American consul who had put him into relation with them. The sisters had had to sign in the consul's presence some law-papers, transmitted to them by the man of business who looked after their little property in America, and the kindly functionary, taking advantage of the pretext (Captain Benyon happened to come into the consulate as he was starting, indulgently, to wait upon the ladies) to bring together two parties who, as he said, ought to appreciate each other, proposed to his fellow-officer in the service of the United States that he should go with him as witness of the little ceremony. He might, of course, take his clerk, but the Captain would do much better; and he represented to Benyon that the Miss Theorys (singular name, wasn't it?) suffered, he was sure, from a lack of society; also that one of them was very sick, that they were real pleasant and extraordinarily refined, and that the sight of a compatriot literally draped, as it were, in the national banner would cheer them up more than most anything, and give them a sense of protection. They had talked to the consul about Benyon's ship, which they could see from their windows, in the distance, at its anchorage. They were the only American ladies then at Naplesthe only residents, at leastand the Captain wouldn't be doing the polite thing unless he went to pay them his respects. Benyon felt afresh how little it was in his line to call upon strange women; he was not in the habit of hunting up female acquaintance, or of looking out for the particular emotions which the sex only can inspire. He had his reasons for this abstention, and