The Seamy Side, Chapters XXXIII-XXXVI [pp. 321-339]

THE SEAMY SIDE. 329
" He did not tell you why? " Stephen inter rupted.
"No."
"Since he did not, I shall not," he said, with
the air of a man who had been doing good by
stealth. "Sufficient that it is so. I am going to
travel, and to forget in travel, if possible, all the
annoyances I have had in this business. I hard ly blame you, Alison. It would be absurd to
blame you, altogether, for the attitude you as sumed. When I became quite certain that my
brother had never married, I resolved to befriend
you. I made two distinct offers to you, which
you refused with scorn and contumely. You re member that-I do not, I say, reproach you; that
is all over. Now that I learn the truth, I recog nize the fact that my brother desired that you
should never find it out, and that he wished you
to inherit his property. Therefore, I retire."
This was very grand, and Alison was greatly
affected.
"But it is all yours," she said.
"It is all mine, until I have signed a deed of
transfer-to you," he replied, waving his hand as
one who confers a kingdom.
She could not reply.
"I will tell you more," her father went on.
"I believe the reason why my brother kept this
thing a secret was, that I married the girl with
whom he was in love. He spoke to her sister,
Miss Nethersole, about her: I, meantime, spoke
to the young lady herself. As Miss Nethersole
refused to listen to the match proposed by the
elder brother, on some religious ground, I believe, the younger brother thought it was no use
for him to try that way. So he persuaded the
girl into a secret marriage, and the day after they
were married they eloped.
" Well "-he went on, carefully folding up the
"Journal of a Deserted Wife," and putting it into
his breast-pocket, to prevent the chance of her
seeing it-" we were not suited to each other.
Put it, if you please, that I was too young to be
married-that I have never been what is called a
marrying man: we were unhappy together. I
said that it would be well to part for a time: I
left her-it was by her own wish and choice-at
the seaside: you were born: she told me nothing
about it: she fell ill: she wrote to my brother
when she became worse: she died: he told me
of the death, but not of the birth: I forgot all
about my marriage: it was just exactly as if I
had never been married at all."
This was a rendering of the history which
had, somehow, a false ring about it; it was too
smooth and specious. But Alison tried to believe it.
"Mind," he said, "I do not attach any blame
to my wife; I should be unwilling for you to think
that she was to blame. Let all the blame, if there
is any, fall on me. Some, perhaps, on my broth er, but not much. No doubt, poor Anthony acted
for the best, and persuaded himself that the wisest
thing for you was to bring you up in ignorance of
your parentage; later on, he became fond of you,
and grew more unwilling still to part with you.
So he invented the fiction of your being his daugh ter. It was clever of him, but it has led us all
into strange paths. Things would have been
different with me, and with you, too, if we had
known all along what we were to each other."
" And now," asked Alison, "can there never
be anything between us but formal friendship?"
" Never," said Stephen, shaking his head and
putting his hands into his pockets, as if he was
afraid that his daughter might offer to fondle
them. "Never. Do not let us pretend to try.
Why, we could not begin all at once to bill and
coo to each other. I could never endure, for in stance, such endearments as you used to lavish
on your supposed father."
" No," said Alison, sadly, "that would be impossible. But kindness of thought-"
"Rubbish, Alison! You will marry some
day, I suppose -"
" I am going to marry Gilbert Yorke."
"Ah!" He started. Gilbert Yorke was the
young man who had been present at the family
council. "Ah! you will marry him! That
makes it doubly impossible for us ever to be
friends. You are going to marry a man-well,
never mind. No more sentiment, Alison. You
have got a father, and I have got a daughter. It
is a relationship which begins to-day. Let it end
to-day."
It was harsh, but Alison, somehow, felt a little
relieved. She would have liked a few words of
sympathy, of hope, of kindness. She could not
contemplate without a shudder the simple operation of kissing her "uncle," Stephen the Black.
And she was humiliated to find that one whom
she had always regarded as the Awful Example
was actually her father.
"By the way," he went on pleasantly, "I
think I have got one or two things here which
you might like to have." He opened a desk and
began to rummage among the papers. "I know
that Anthony sent the things to me when Dora
died. I put them away, and I haven't looked at
them since. Ah! here they are."
He handed to Alison a small packet containing a portrait of a sweet-faced girl, with light
hair and blue eyes, very different from her own;
and another containing one or two books of devotion: this was all that remained of Dora Hamblin.
"Now go, Alison," said Stephen. "You may
cry over them at home if you like. Good-by.
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329