Villette by Charlotte Brontë Read Free Book Online Page B

papa and Mrs. Bretton: I must hand his tea.’
    She took her own seat, and beckoned with her hand to her father.
    ‘Be near me, as if we were at home, papa.’
    And again, as she intercepted his cup in passing, and would stir the sugar and put in the cream herself, ‘I always did it for you at home, papa: nobody could do it as well, not even your own self.’
    Throughout the meal she continued her attentions: rather absurd they were. The sugar-tongs were too wide for one of her hands, and she had to use both in wielding them; the weight of the silver cream-ewer, the bread and butter plates, the very cup and saucer tasked her insufficient strength and dexterity; but she would lift this, hand that, and luckily contrived through it all to break nothing. Candidly speaking, I thought her a little busy-body; but her father, blind like other parents, seemed perfectly content to let her wait on him, and even wonderfully soothed by her offices.
    ‘She is my comfort!’ he could not help saying to Mrs. Bretton. That lady had her own ‘comfort’ and nonpareil on a much larger scale, and for the moment, absent: so she sympathized with his foible.
    This second ‘comfort’ came on the stage in the course of the evening. I knew this day had been fixed for his return, and was aware that Mrs. Bretton had been expecting him through all its hours. We were seated round the fire, after tea, when Graham joined our circle: I should rather say, broke it up—for, of course, his arrival made a bustle; and then, as Mr. Graham was fasting, there was refreshment to be provided. He and Mr. Home met as old acquaintance; of the little girl he took no notice for a time.
    His meal over, and numerous questions from his mother answered, he turned from the table to the hearth. Opposite where he had placed himself was seated Mr. Home, and at his elbow, the child. When I say child I use an inappropriate and undescriptive term—a term suggesting any picture rather than that of the demure little person in a mourning frock and white chemisette, that might just have fitted a good-sized doll—perched now on a high chair beside a stand, whereon was her toy work-box of white varnished wood, and holding in her hands a shred of a handkerchief, which she was professing to hem, and at which she bored perseveringly with a needle, that in her fingers seemed almost a skewer, pricking herself ever and anon, marking the cambric with a track of minute red dots; occasionally starting when the perverse weapon—swerving from her control—inflicted a deeper stab than usual; but still silent, diligent, absorbed, womanly.
    Graham was at that time a handsome, faithless-looking youth of sixteen. I say faithless-looking, not because he was really of a very perfidious disposition, but because the epithet strikes me as proper to describe the fair, Celtic (not Saxon) character of his good looks; his waved light auburn hair, his supple symmetry, his smile frequent, and destitute neither of fascination nor of subtlety, (in no bad sense). A spoiled, whimsical boy he was in those days.
    ‘Mother,’ he said, after eyeing the little figure before him in silence for some time, and when the temporary absence of Mr. Home from the room relieved him from the half-laughing bashfulness, which was all he knew of timidity—‘Mother, I see a young lady in the present society to whom I have not been introduced.’
    ‘Mr. Home’s little girl, I suppose you mean,’ said his mother.
    ‘Indeed, ma’am,‘ replied her son, ‘I consider your expression of the least ceremonious: Miss Home I should certainly have said, in venturing to speak of the gentlewoman to whom I allude’.
    ‘Now, Graham, I will not have that child teazed. Don’t flatter yourself that I shall suffer you to make her your butt.’
    ‘Miss Home,’ pursued Graham, undeterred by his mother’s remonstrance, ‘might I have the honour to introduce myself, since no one else seems willing to render you and me that service?